In search of the lost logo

It’s not often that I get my name mentioned in the same sentence as two of my design heroes, so thanks to Paul Mellon for posting an update to his search for the (as-yet-unknown) designer of theNeighbourhood Watch logo.

The design neighbourhood really stepped up to support our quest to locate the original designer of the NW roundel. Design journalists such as Lynda Relph-Knight and some of the UK’s pre-eminent designers from the 80’s and 90’s era, such as Mike Dempsey, Studio Dempsey and Michael Johnson, Johnson Banks joined in the search as did ex-employees of the COI in-house design studio, such as Fanny Sigler, Mike Wheeler and Rob Levison who actually put us onto our strongest lead.

Whilst the identity of the original designer remains elusive, Paul goes on to cite Creative Barcode as a method of identifying the originator of creative works that goes beyond simple copyright watermarks.

In the same way that map makers use ‘paper villages’ to identify when their work has been plagiarised, Creative Barcode is a way for creators, entrepreneurs, innovators and brand owners to use Intellectual Property (IP) tags to protect their ideas, concepts and designs.

Part of the value inherent in the value of a brand is its original instance, its history and and subsequent design journey.

By ensuring a design history is maintained, Creative Barcode records, authenticates, time-stamps and IP tags iterations of a design and its creative expression.





The designer should therefore always be identifiable and credited in the Creative Barcode time-line.

So whilst it has become easier for creatives to promote their work by putting their portfolios online, being able to timestamp work and identify yourself as the creator is increasingly important in an industry where ideas are the main currency and it is easier than ever to ‘borrow’ other designers work for creative inspiration.

The joy of timesheets

Timesheets. We all hate them. We’ve all got to do them.

Why can’t we just get on with being creative?

But we need to remember that design is a business, and like any other business, to be able to stay in business, we need to remain solvent.

Unlike manufacturing where you can measure the number of units produced, and then price them accordingly to cover your costs, as a professional service we creatives can only charge for our time.

Only if we know the value of our time can we know whether we’re working efficiently, and only if we know how efficiently we work, can we know how much time to allocate to a project.

Allocating time to a project, and thus knowing when we’re under budget and when we’re over budget is the difference between profit and loss.

And measuring time also provides structure to our day, telling us when we’re over-servicing a demanding client (so maybe we should talk about additional fees), and when we can afford to go the extra mile (maybe to help build a relationship with a new client).

Measuring time also informs our professional development by telling us when we’re taking a bit too long to do something, maybe something that requires new software, or more training, or could be passed to a junior, or should be outsourced to a specialist?

So for example, my local garage charges me £25/hour to service my car. I could do it at home, but I haven’t got the right kit, it means getting a bit oily, two trips to a parts supplier and most of Saturday afternoon spent lying in gravel.

Assuming the average design freelance rate of £36/hr, clearly it’s more cost effective to outsource the work to a specialist. However, if I do the work myself (for my own satisfaction), at least I’m doing it in the knowledge that I’m making a small loss (but maybe acquiring new kit and developing a new skill in the process).

It’s an informed cost/benefit business decision that is only made possible thanks to timesheets.

Love ‘em.

UBS - asking the right questions

UBS is a global firm providing financial services to private, corporate and institutional clients.

Their new brand strategy aims to adopt a more thought-provoking and personal approach to clients with a clear tone of voice that cuts through the clutter of a busy financial marketplace.

The rebranding is a full redesign that includes all elements apart from the logo, using both sight and sound with the introduction of an audio tone developed in conjunction with Leicester University.

The first expression of the new brand is a new campaign that demonstrates the power of a simple proposition - the first step to making the right choices is focusing on the right questions.

Client insight and research into what motivates clients across countries and across all client groups identified that some questions stay pretty much the same.

Thus questions form the foundation of the creative concept.

The narrative structure poses questions from different life stages - family, our values, the impact we have on other people - and suggests that asking the right questions can make things a little clearer.

The brand film of simple black text on a while background shows hypothetical questions asked by clients, whilst press adverts, using images shot by Annie Leibovitz in a muted colour palette, present personal stories as case studies.

The questions and case studies form a powerful story arc that engages the viewer by allowing them to project their own answers into the narrative.

And of course there’s a great emotional hook at the end.

A simple concept, based on solid research, well structured, gracefully executed.

Structured thinking is a competitive advantage

The process of design calls for a combination of investigation, strategic thinking, design excellence and project management skills.

But regardless of the nature of your client and the complexity of their project, the process should remain the same.

By breaking a project down into distinct phases, each with defined beginning and endpoints, you create logical breaks for review and decision making.

Reinventing the process each time in order to cut costs can create substantial risks to the project, and negate any long-term benefits.

Larger firms may follow a controlled and documented process, such as PRINCE2, whilst smaller agencies may have a simple five-stage plan, but in either case having a structured process appropriate to the task provides competitive advantage by:

• assuring that a proven method is being used to achieve business results;
• sharing the understanding of the time/cost/quality required;
• creating trust and confidence in the project team;
• positioning project management as smart, efficient and cost-effective;
• building credibility for the proposed creative solutions; and
• setting and managing expectations for the process.

However it is expressed, the design process can be seen as just a more complex version of the simple ‘story hill’ that is taught in primary school.

You need a beginning, a middle and an end, and within that you need to ask what needs to happen (and in what order) and how are things resolved?

But because the process is just the process, you still need a creative spark, intuition or leap of faith to bring it to life.

Having a structure in place lessens the background ‘noise’ and creates the space in which creative thinking can thrive.

Google Mobile App UX Principles

I do like a good UX framework, and Google’sMobile App UX Principles document uses practical examples to demonstrate how to improve the user experience of apps. The effectiveness of user optimisation strategies are illustrated using metrics such as app performance and user conversion on both Android and iOS platforms.

Adopt, Use, Transact, Return

In designing an app, you need to work hard to meet the expectations of users who are becoming accustomed to high quality apps that deliver usable, robust, and sometimes delightful user experiences.

Investing time and effort in creating, testing and optimising services can have a significant effect on how ‘sticky’ your app becomes.

The basics that need to addressed include optimising conversion, and avoiding interrupting users, or forcing them to think about things that should be simple. Google expresses this as a four-stage ‘Adopt, Use, Transact, Return’ framework.

Adopt, Use, Transact, Return

Adopt - Remove roadblocks to usage  
Remove all roadblocks to usage - and adoption - of your mobile app. Get users into the content / substance as quickly as possible, so that they can use, assess and experience its value to them.

First impressions count, and a splash screen gives you a short but vital window to engage a user in your proposition. But, never make users wait.

Tips / help or an onboarding sequence should only be employed if really necessary - so as not to interrupt users - but when used appropriately at key decision points, tips/help can guide the user in their initial experience and adoption.

Use - Make conversion decisions simple  
Enable people to use your app in the way that suits their needs. A clear structure combined with an excellent search facility using a range of methods, from keyword to product scanning and image search, will help users find what they want quickly and easily, satisfy their needs and drive conversion.

Transact - Provide the ultimate in convenience
Help users progress through each checkout stage with minimal effort, and with sufficient reassurance, to convert without hesitation.

Return - Self service, engagement and delight
Be useful, to engage and delight, in order to retain customers or encourage member loyalty. Because, mobile apps are the most appropriate touchpoint for repeat interactions and frequent transactions, customers and members already loyal to a brand, and mobile first use cases (that couldn’t exist without unique smartphone services leveraging rich and contextual data; etc.), are more likely to return if an app provides an engaging experience.

What not to do

Do not mimic UI elements from other Platforms 
Design for each native mobile platform – Android and iOS - because each has unique capabilities and visual languages

Do not use underlined links 
Avoid using text with underlined links, which are part of the web / browser / page model, and not part of the app / screen model. Apps use buttons, not links.

Do not take users to the browser
Keep users in-app at all times, to maintain their spatial geography and to optimise conversion.

Do not ask users to rate your app too soon after downloading it
Avoid interrupting users by asking them to rate your app if they’ve only recently downloaded it or only used it a few times. Instead, wait until they prove to be repeat users and they’ll be more likely to rate your app favourably and provide more informed feedback

Mobile-friendly

My portfolio website at www.robertlevison.co.uk passes Google's mobile-friendly website test. Yay!

"Mobile friendliness" will affect how prominently websites appear in Google search results pages from 21 April 2015.

A page is eligible for the “mobile-friendly” label if it meets the following criteria as detected by Googlebot:

• Avoids software that is not common on mobile devices, like Flash
• Uses text that is readable without zooming
• Sizes content to the screen so users don't have to scroll horizontally or zoom
• Places links far enough apart so that the correct one can be easily tapped

Google provides a Mobile Friendly Test developer tool so you can see if your website is mobile-friendly.

Are Annoyingly Literal Headlines Set In Title Case Optimised For SEO?

You can find them across the web, headlines written for search engines rather than readers.

Online magazines like DesignTaxi and news aggregator sites such as BuzzFeed and Huffinton Post use strangely formulaic headlines, typically including a keyword, a proper noun, a verb, and an adjective whilst avoiding simple connectives. It’s English, but not as we know it. In SEO terms the language is optimised to add ‘value’ to each headline.

But in writing for robots, you just get robotic headlines.

It’s hard to imagine classic newspaper headlines such as the Sun’s 1992 headline ‘GOTCHA’ having the same impact as ‘Royal Navy Stealth Submarine Sinks Argentinian Cruiser in South Atlantic’.

Probably the best (worst?) example is the Daily Mail Online, where the inclusion of multiple keywords in the headline means the headlines have become almost as long as the stories themselves. It's clickbait in its purest form. The logical conclusion of this process is that the headline becomes the story, just a shrieking top-line opinion seeking an instinctive knee-jerk reaction from the comment trolls.

Surely we can write better than this.

The point of SEO is to provide sufficient context for search engines to rank the story as high as possible in the search results, relative to the value of the content.

Whilst search engine algorithms are constantly being tweaked, it’s generally accepted that an editor can improve the page ranking of a story by crafting the relationship between the headline, page title and meta description.

As well as describing the story, the title needs to include a proper name and a likely keyword that the reader might be using in their search (towards the front of the headline if possible). The page title can expand on the headline, for instance using a full name when the headline just uses a shorter, well-known, shorthand (eg. Diana / Diana, Princess of Wales), whilst the meta description can include more detail for the ‘snippet’ displayed underneath the link in the search results. All three elements should aim to match the words that users are likely to use in their search, and these search-optimised keywords should also be included in the opening paragraph of the story.

Thinking more widely about the utility of the headline, fitting it within 156 characters to read fully in the search results makes it easier to circulate on social networks, and including a personal pronoun in the headline also improves the chances of readers sharing your story.

(There are of course other factors in SEO, such as unique links to the story and referring links from the story, but these are not necessarily part of the headline construction).

In 2009, usability expert Jakob Nielsen introduced the concept of writing short, snappy SEO friendly headlines that “…must be absolutely clear when taken out of context” and cited the BBC's website as a best practice example of headline-writing “…offering remarkable headline usability."

Nielsen claimed that BBC headlines have the following characteristics:

• Short, typically 5 words or less
• Information-rich
• Include keywords
• Understandable, even out of context 
• Predictable/match for reader expectations

On the other hand, headlines from viral sites are usually the complete opposite:

• Long, sometimes to the point of being rambling and incoherent
• Emotion-rich
• Few or no keywords
• Typically non-contextual
• Use shock or emotional language

And whilst there is value in using searchable terms, the results can be lost in translation.

The late advertising and copywriting genius, David Ogilvy, said that "On average, five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy.”

The point of a headline is to draw the reader into a story that they might not otherwise have read. The skill of the web subeditor is in knowing their audience so well that they can add their editorial tone of voice to the headline, whilst still capturing the imagination of the reader.

And if you can turn your headline into a pun, then so much the better.

The Scottish Sun’s ‘Super Caley go ballistic Celtic are atrocious’ is held up as one of the all time classic newspaper headlines.

And, although no one knew it at the time, it’s SEO friendly.