Can Graphic Design Save Your Life?

And so to the Wellcome Collection, and their exploration of the relationship between graphic design and health Can Graphic Design Save Your Life?.

The exhibition highlights the widespread and yet subliminal nature of graphic design in constructing and communicating healthcare messages; words and images, signs and symbols, colour, scale and format, all carefully structured to communicate, and in doing so shaping our environment, society and personal health.

Creating a health message that an individual is willing to self-identify with, and consequently inspire action or change their behavior, requires a range of design interventions. Surprisingly, sometimes a small structural change can create the greatest impact.

For example, ‘nudge’ theory suggests that presenting people with a mandated choice or opt-out question makes it significantly more likely that they would choose to carry an organ Donor card.

The exhibition is divided into zones; persuasion, education, hospitalisation, medication, contagion and provocation.

Each of which explain one aspect of design in health, from national public awareness campaigns such as those for AIDS (TBWA) and the Samaritans (BBDO), to design research such as the NPSA’s findings on improving pharmaceutical packaging design and patient safety (RCA’s Helen Hamlyn Centre for Design).

I enjoyed seeing Dr. John Snow’s historic map of cholera deaths around the Broad street pump, and Florence Nightingale’s ‘rose’ charts to illustrate deaths from disease in the Crimea, classics of information design.

On a larger scale, the sympathetic A&E information and wayfinding system for the NHS (Pearson Lloyd) and the now ubiquitous emergency service ‘battenburg’ patterns (PSDB) are reminders of how effective design ideas quickly spread and become an accepted part of the environment.

Whether taking the correct tablet, deciding to donate an organ or to practice safe sex, graphic design influences our health and wellbeing. Can Graphic Design Save Your Life? considers just how vital graphic design can be.

Get some structure in your life

Time to clean up my desktop.

There are only four rules:

1. Action it
2. File it
3. Delegate it
4. Bin it.

That's all.

You wanted more?

Sorry.

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.

Investing in design

Design Council research has shown that for every £1 that businesses invest in design, they gain on average over £4 net operating profit, over £20 net turnover and over £5 net exports.

And there is increasingly widespread awareness in industry that when the remit for design is widened beyond the traditional focus on products or graphics to provide benefits such as improved strategic thinking, morale and productivity, then design can add significant value to organisations.

A new report, Leading Business by Design, suggests that rather than being a method solely for creating desirable objects, design can be fundamental to businesses in helping them innovate and define strategy.

The report was commissioned from Warwick Business School by the Design Council, and came up with three main findings;

1. Design is customer-centred – Benefit is greatest when design is intimately related to solving customers’ problems.
2. Design is most powerful when culturally embedded – It works best when it has strong support from senior management in the commissioning organisation, and is integrated into product / service development from beginning to end.
3. Design can add value to any organisation – Design can benefit small, medium or large manufacturing and service-based organisations by driving innovation and opening up uncontested market spaces, differentiating products and services to attract customers, and improving recognition by strengthening branding to embody a company’s values.

Using case studies, the report provides practical examples of how these three design themes have benefited a range of organisations, and provides clear evidence that structured design thinking offers a set of widely applicable principles that can be of huge benefit to all businesses.

Essentially, it suggests that rather than being a method solely for creating desirable objects, design can be fundamental to businesses in helping them innovate and to define strategy.

New structures for corporate reporting

In 2010 the UK government ran a consultation to find out what improvements could be made to non-financial reporting, and in 2011 the Department of Business Innovation and Skills (BIS) published Future of narrative reporting where a new structure for annual reports was proposed.

Draft regulations were published in October 2012 and the changes became law on 30 September 2013.

The new format replaces the ‘business review’ with a ‘strategic report’ and UK quoted companies now have to report on:

• their strategy
• their business model
• the number of women employed at different levels in the organisation

The main areas for change are:

• The structure and content of the Strategic Report changes (and no longer forms part of the Director’s Report)
• Changes to Directors’ Report, including Greenhouse Gas (GHG) reporting
• Revised UK Corporate Governance Code disclosures
• Changes to Going Concern statement
• Revised Auditor’s Report
• New remuneration disclosures and voting

The idea behind the changes is to;

• improve the value of information contained within annual reports for investors and UK compliance authorities;
• to make it easier to make comparisons between companies; and
• to increase transparency.

Current best practice in annual report writing is to produce an integrated structure that brings together strategy, the business model, market analysis, governance, management remuneration, risk factors and key performance indicators (KPIs) in an overarching narrative.

But this method of dividing responsibility for the creation and supply of content will become more difficult, as the various elements of the document now need to knit together closer than ever before.

So whilst the new reporting framework from BIS splits the report into four parts (the Strategic Report, The Directors’ Report, the Remuneration Report and the Financial Statements and Notes), in practice, the new reporting structure might look something like this;

Strategy report

• Highlights section
• Mission statement
• At a glance
• Chairman’s statement
• CEO’s statement
• KPI’s
• Risks
• Market landscape
• Sustainability statement

Director’s report

• Governance section
• Renumeration report
• Any other statutory content
• Accounts section

The regulations came into force in October 2013. This means that companies with reporting years ending after October are now expected to prepare their Annual Report in line with the new regulations.

The consequence of this is going to be more intensive work in the run up to publishing your Annual Report; gathering and verifying the content, identifying any gaps and managing your reporting team  in a more active and integrated manner. It may mean a minor tweak to your workflow, or a complete overhaul of your reporting structure, but if you haven’t got your plans in place, maybe now is a good time to get started.

Imaginary customers

Designing a successful user experience requires a clear understanding of your audience –their wants, needs, likes, dislikes and likely behaviours. Put together, this information forms a user profile.

If your project has sufficient time and budget, a range of focus groups composed of people who fit the user profile (and there may be more than one) can be used to inform your initial designs and then test each stage of design development. Insights from focus group testing can be used to refine the design and make sure that it resonates with your target audience.

However, if time and budget are unavailable, even a little audience research goes a long way. One of the simplest and cost-effective ways of gaining insight into your audience is to use an imaginary user profile, or persona, created from desk research, project knowledge and a little common sense.

The level of detail that is required will vary depending on the nature of your project, but creating a relevant persona means that you and your team always have a touchpoint to refer to when designing. This helps make sure that design decisions remain in line with the needs and expectations of your audience.

The idea is to be able to imagine how a particular user will interact with your design. So if your audience has been identified as a young people not in employment, education or training (NEETs), your persona will outline their likely personality attributes, esteem, sense of belonging, security, and physical needs (based on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs).

• Identify the main audience types by talking to your client and researching their customer base at the start of the project.
• Create a shortlist of attributes including demographics (age, education, gender, location, profession) and psychology (attitude, interests, lifestyle, personality).
• Encourage empathy by giving each persona a name (and a stock photo also helps to bring it to life).
• Share the user profiles with your client and project team.

This fictional user profile represents your audience, and depending on the type of project, you may need three, four or five personas that reflect the range of your audience.

You can now imagine how your personas would interact with a piece of information and use the insight gained to help refine your design and make sure it meets the needs of your audience.

Behavioural science

Behavioural science and behavioural economics show us that, very often, we do not behave in ways we would expect to if we were perfectly ‘rational’ human beings. Many of us still have not insulated our lofts, despite the fact that doing so will reduce our energy bills; we very rarely switch our bank accounts, despite the fact that we may benefit from higher saving rates elsewhere; and we may not yet have committed to becoming an organ donor, despite the fact that the majority of us would be willing to do so if asked.

Many of today’s issues have a strong behavioural component. From tackling anti-social behaviour, to education and health – our behaviours as citizens, parents and neighbours significantly affect the quality of our lives and that of others.

We can influence people’s behaviour in a number of different ways. Tough laws can be made, with fines for those who fail to comply with new legislation, or bans can be introduced that prevent people from eating certain types of food or engaging in particular types of activities.

This is where advertising and design can make a difference. We can give citizens more or better information. We can prompt people to make choices that are in line with their underlying motivations. And we can help to encourage social norms around healthier behaviours in ways that avoid inadvertently communicating that the ‘problem behaviour’ – rioting or driving whilst using a mobile phone or dropping litter – is relatively widespread.

And, if we know anything from behavioural science, it is that behaviour is strongly influenced by what we think others are up to.

Governments, businesses and charities are using the behavioural change MINDSPACE framework to support advertising and design decision-making that impacts upon the behaviour of citizens.

M I N D S P A C E
Messenger  – We are heavily influenced by who communicates information
Incentives -– Our responses to incentives are shaped by predictable mental shortcuts such as strongly avoiding losses
Norms – We are strongly influenced by what others do
Defaults – We ‘go with the flow’ of pre-set options
Salience – Our attention is drawn to what is novel and seems relevant to us
Priming – Our acts are often influenced by subconscious cues
Affect – Our emotional associations can powerfully shape our actions
Commitment – We seek to be consistent with our public promises, and reciprocate acts
Ego – We act in ways that make us feel better about ourselves

For example, exercise is strongly affected by our tendency to discount future
gains, such as being fit and feeling good, relative to short-term pains. Turn this
problem around, such as by introducing an immediate pleasure through the fun of
the Stockholm Metro piano stairs (affect and salience). Making the stairs
eye-catching and fun to climb also had a motivating effect, in that once more people started taking the stairs, others tended to follow.

Or by changing the social norm around exercise with the London city bike hire scheme Seeing more people cycle creates a new social norm and visual prompt, encouraging more people to want to cycle.

In most cases, success will not come from a single design intervention. Instead it will come from a combined approach between many partners – local communities, professionals, businesses and citizens themselves.

A key objective is to try out a range of behavioural approaches – to experiment at local level – to find the most effective ways communicating and of ‘nudging’ citizens lifestyles in ways that make it easy for them to adopt 'good' behaviours.

Character archetypes and patterning

Thanks to Dr Janis Wilson from Archetypology for a fascinating presentation at Wednesday’s Language Consultancy Association event, The Archetypology of Brands.

Archetypes are derived from neuroscience, psychology and classical studies. Essentially they are groups of certain personality traits and behaviours that can be recognised, categorised and expressed as a persona.

These personality traits and behaviours are laid down in the subconscious brain as ‘loose patterns’. The power of these loose patterns is that the brain is programmed to respond to stimuli that are a close fit. If your message is a close fit to the pattern, it triggers a response that requires fulfillment. If your brand offers this fulfillment, then the loose pattern is reinforced in a feedback loop that is now conditioned by your brand message.

In simple terms, you can use a structure of 12 classic archetypal characters – Innocent, Regular guy, Caregiver, Explorer, Hero, Outlaw, Lover, Creator, Ruler, Sage, Jester and Magician - to describe both your customers and your brand. In theory, if you know what your brand character is, and whom you want to talk to, adopting the correct tone of voice for a conversation between the two archetypes triggers this patterning and helps you to deliver your message. The key is to use the appropriate language between brand and audience archetypes to trigger the loose patterning in the subconscious.

Where it gets interesting is the knowledge that people move through all 12 archetypes at different life stages (although they will have a preferred archetype that they return to), whilst successful brands tend to stick with the same archetypal character.

Then it gets more complicated.

Each archetype has a number of sub-archetypes, and within these are a number of different, sometimes opposing behaviours.

So character archetypes can have a dark side. When a brand expression loses its way it tends to exhibit these opposing behaviours. This could explain why successful brands, for example, British Airways, BP, Coca-Cola, Gap, sometimes get it so wrong. The message no longer resonates as it disrupts the expected pattern. Returning to their archetypal character normally sees the brand refreshed and revitalised as the fit with the audience archetype loose pattern is restored.

As brand strategists, brand managers and copywriters, you can leverage these patterns to connect with and influence your customers.

Creative clusters and innovation

Putting creativity on the map

NESTA research report 2010

NESTA is the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts - an independent body with a mission to make the UK more innovative. NESTA invests in early-stage companies, informs policy, and delivers practical programmes that inspire others to solve the big challenges of the future.

Their report into Creative Clusters, published in November 2010 makes interesting reading for both businesses looking to foster creativity within their organisations, as well as policy makers and planners looking at creativity locally and nationally.

The creative industries are a force for innovation at the national, regional and organisational level. At 6.2 per cent of the economy, and growing at twice the rate of other sectors, the economic importance of the creative industries to the UK are proportionately the largest of any in the world. Nurturing high-technology clusters can also be seen as a way of rebalancing the economy away from the construction and financial services sectors.

The UKs creative industries are more innovative than many other high-innovation sectors, providing a disproportionate number of the innovative businesses in most parts of the country. Analysis of the innovation performance of Britain’s creative industries confirms that they punch well above their weight in terms of innovation across almost all regions in the UK.

NESTA took the concept of creative clusters as a starting point to examine the role that creative industries play in local and regional innovation systems.

Industrial clustering benefits businesses by giving them access to skilled staff and shared services, and the opportunity to capture valuable knowledge spillovers.

Creative firms tend to locate close to each other even more than
most other sectors. Advertising and Software firms often cluster near each other; the same is true of Music, Film, Publishing and Radio and TV businesses.

Creative hotspots
London is at the heart of the creative industries in Britain, dominating in almost all creative sectors, and particularly in the most intrinsically creative layers of the value chain for each sector.

The nine other creative hotspots across Britain are Bath, Brighton, Bristol, Cambridge, Guildford, Edinburgh, Manchester, Oxford and Wycombe-Slough.

Different cities across Britain have different profiles of creative specialisation: cities across the South present more diversity in their range of creative services, whereas Northern and Midlands cities (Manchester excepted) have similar creative profiles.

However, the mere existence of a creative agglomeration is not enough for the benefits from clustering to emerge. The other crucial ingredient is connectivity between firms within a cluster, with collaborators, business partners and sources of innovation elsewhere (both in the UK and overseas), and finally, with firms in other sectors that can act as clients, and as a source of new and unexpected ideas and knowledge. These three layers of connectivity are underpinned by a dense web of informal interactions and networking.

NESTA’s report identified a range of proactive steps that can be taken to help boost creativity internally, locally and nationally;

Look for latent clusters rather than try to build new ones from scratch
Identify whether there are any latent clusters ‘hidden’ in your locality that would benefit from networking and awareness-raising to develop a dense web of internal and external links.

Think about which sectors work well together
There are important synergies between some creative sectors, but not others. Avoid potentially wasteful ‘one-size-fits-all’ strategies for creative clusters that don’t pay sufficient attention to the distinctive needs of different sectors.

Adopt better targeted, and more realistic strategies that focus on ‘building up and connecting’ those sectors that are already present – and are complementary with each other.

Technological innovation is increasing the potential impacts from the creative industries…
The creative industries do not have a monopoly on creativity, but neither do manufacturing and engineering have a monopoly on technological innovation.

Universities should do more to promote innovation in increasingly tech-intensive creative industries
Technology intensive creative industries, for example, have something to gain from tapping into the public research base in their local universities.

In the context of the creative industries, universities tend to be seen mainly as a source of skilled labour. This contrasts with the technology and science-based sectors, where universities are a crucial source of knowledge for innovation, as well as high-growth spinoffs. It is important to ensure that the local creative industries engage more actively with universities to harness research outputs that might enhance their productivity and innovative performance.

Nurture talent, and give it reasons to stay
The presence of a specialised and knowledge-intensive pool of labour is a key factor in business.

Help remove barriers to collaboration
Even if they are aware of each other, local creative businesses may be keen to protect their valuable ideas or client portfolios and be wary of collaborating for fear of disclosing sensitive information.

Capture creative value locally
The generation of original intellectual property (IP) is at the core of what many creative businesses do. Where they retain ownership over their IP, they have more incentives to innovate to exploit it, generating additional revenues that can be reinvested in growth, and building commercial and collaborative relationships with other local firms.

Build bridges as well as towers
Although investments in iconic public buildings can produce undoubted cultural and economic benefits, building links between potentially collaborative businesses and sectors may produce longer lasting impacts.

East London Tech City as the beginning of a new approach for creative cluster development?
The Prime Minister’s announcement (in November 2010) of the East London Tech City set of initiatives, aimed at building up the vibrant high-tech and digital media cluster in Old Street and Shoreditch is a step in the right direction. Rather than trying to create a new cluster from scratch, East London Tech City aims to take an organic, already competitive cluster to the next level, by providing it with the right infrastructure (both physical and digital), and developing its connections with global companies.

Messaging

According to the New York Times, the average person is subjected to over 5,000 advertising messages a day. The more messages we perceive, the greater the background noise.

The more you shout, the more noise is created. Everybody wants to be heard. Everybody shouts. To rise above the noise, you need to shout louder.

Or do you?

What your clients need is a message that cuts through the noise, even if you only whisper.

Formulating and structuring your message is therefore critical to making sure you are heard.

Needs
Establishing the needs of your target group – and therefore the types of messages that are likely to resonate with them – is a key component of your message.

Maslow expressed his triangular hierarchy of needs in 1954. Basic physical needs form the base of the pyramid. Once these are satisfied, people’s desires move up to the next level, safety needs, and then social, esteem and self-actualisation at the apex. We move up and down through these levels depending on our lifestage and circumstances.

To be successful, messages, goods and services need to be aligned with the needs of your target audience at their appropriate lifestage.

For instance, expensive makeup is neither a physiological, safety nor social need. Loreal plays on esteem needs of the professional woman with disposable income ‘because you’re worth it’.

Arguments
Rather than shouting louder, it is better to convince a person with a series of statements establishing your proposition.

That’s right, you came here for an argument.

The first stage in an argument is to delimit the terms of reference. What is in and what is out. Provide too much unnecessary information and your audience gets bored.

Then there has to be a structure to the message to make it worth listening to; a narrative with a beginning, middle and end; a dialogue; a setup and a payoff.

The actual message itself can consist of a primary argument (eating 5 portions of fruit and vegetables a day is healthy) and secondary arguments (fruit and vegetables are cheap and easy to prepare) that help convince the receiver by supporting the main argument.

The optimum message is based on the primary argument, but where there are several supporting arguments, the strongest one is normally used first with the second strongest left until last and the weakest ones in between.

Both primary and secondary arguments may appeal to logic (health benefits) or emotion (better skin tone) to get their point across. However, whilst the receiver can be convinced by rational arguments, logic is no more important than emotion in decision-making.

This is because the receiver firstly identifies with and adopts a position on your message. Based on the position takes, the receiver then filters all the arguments and counter-arguments. If the pros outweigh the cons, then a subconscious decision is made and the receiver rejects the opposition position. In essence, the receivers convince themselves of the course of action to take.

Generally arguments are one-sided, as the receiver can be relied upon to provide the subvocalised opposition. However, two-sided arguments, where the sender expresses the disadvantages as well as the advantages of their position, can suggest honesty and integrity.

Finally, it is important that your audience feels involved and proactive in the messaging process. Your story leads the way, but by allowing the receiver space to work out your message for themselves, they are more likely to come to the desired conclusion.

Aligning your message with the needs of your audience and developing a clear argument gives you the cut-through that you need and the best chance of being heard.

Have you got a strategy?

Strategy is one of those terms that designers love to hate. More often than not because the person hearing it doesn’t understand what it means (and ‘strategy’ only scores 10 points in buzzword bingo).

Whereas tactics are concerned with actively doing something, strategy is all about your plan for actively doing something. The key words here are ‘your plan’.

Launching straight into a piece of design without knowing why you are doing it, or what you are trying to communicate or to whom you are communicating, is, quite frankly, a waste of everybody’s time and effort.

Having a strategy is not a ticklist exercise, but a methodology for getting to where you want to be.

It can take many different forms from a simple who, what, why, where, when and how, through to a more formal PRINCE2 documented process.

The scale and depth depends on the nature of a project – a flyer will not need the same attention to detail as a campaign.

The important thing is to make your strategy work for you so that you have a solid base on which your communication is built. Each element of the framework can then be tested to make sure your design decision-making is evidence-based and sound.

You can then argue that you may not like the solution, but you can’t argue with the solution.

Plan to succeed
Start with a blank sheet of paper, and on it define a structure within which you can construct your design. By creating a pattern of decisions and actions in the present, you can guarantee success in the future.

So before you even think about words and pictures, you need to work your way through your strategy and see how it will influence the design;

• Have you a mission statement (do you know why you are doing this)?
• Do you know what your aims and objectives are (where are you now, where do you want to be and how are you going to get there)?
• What are the characteristics of the brand you are working with?
• What are the communications criteria (segmentation, positioning)?
• Do you have a communication plan (audience, medium, message, schedule, budget)?
• Do you know what the communication channels are?
• What does success look like (and how will you measure it)?

And then there are all those paper tools you can use to help inform your strategy (all with their little acronyms);

• SMART – Specific. Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Timebound
• SWOT – Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats
• AIDA – Attention, Interest, Desire, Action
• PPPP - Product, Price, Place, Promotion

Do you need to use them all? The answer (of course) is that it all depends on the nature of the project, but a partly informed strategy is better than no strategy at all. And as they say in the army, ‘Perfect Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance.’