When Tropicana launched its new package design, it was met with consumer resistance and consequently, there was a 20 percent drop in sales. The Arnell Group, responsible for the redesign, attempted to create a fresher more modern look but inadvertently created a generic looking package that couldn’t stack up in grocery stores compared to its original predecessor.
PepsiCo did a remarkable 360 when they retracted the new Tropicana design and reverted back to the original packaging that we all grew to know and love. The original packaging by Sterling Brands just worked.
PepsiCo also stirred up a flurry of online chatter when they unveiled Pepsi’s new logo/redesign. Debates still continue on whether this was a $1 million step toward a brighter future or a $1 million mistake:
The 50th anniversary edition of Communication Arts has an article about the personal ties and attachments we as consumers develop to our brands. Researchers call this unaided awareness in that these brands automatically elicit an emotional response and thus we recognize these brands instinctively. Even in a recession, as seen with such brands as Tropicana or even Walmart, brands have marketing power.
“… every client, partner, or stranger is someone to learn from. … listen before assuming. … seek to understand the historical, geographical, social, cultural, and economic context and precedent before beginning the design process.” This quote from industrial designer and writer Emily Pilloton came to mind when I attended an AIGA event last Thursday.
Last Thursday, James Biber an architect with Pentagram, spoke about his work on designing the Harley Davidson Museum. Before tackling the design, extensive research was done to understand the “cultural anthropology” of Harley. Beauty, performance, functionality and style: these words describe the heritage of Harley as well as the resulting museum.
The museum is a beautiful display of history and stories from exhibitions of bikes lined up in a row telling the story of the company’s first 50 years, to the construction and anatomy of the bikes themselves.
There’s even a bike gallery where you can mount a Harley and enjoy a video about the American open road and the camaraderie of riding.
The museum provides visitors an engaging, interactive experience that takes them into the heart and soul of Harley Davidson as a company. Inside and out, the spirit of Harley Davidson is omnipresent and felt in every aspect of the design.
Another example of industrial design that embodies this phenomenon of cultural anthropology is the new Facebook building designed by Studio O+A.
Prior to their new office building, O+A interviewed Facebook employees (scattered over 10 different locations) to gain an understanding of what makes the company tick. Facebook wanted its new headquarters to reflect its values: freedom of expression, individuality and creativity. The end result was a youthful, dynamic work environment with open spaces for meetings and gatherings balanced by its unique partitions.
The trendy cafe serves meals around the clock. Their signature “crane table” is a work surface suspended from a hoist to form a table that swings in any direction.
Studio O+A understood who they were designing for.
Understanding your audience is an integral part of successful design … and business, in general. Just as Starbucks converted an everyday feedback mechanism into an idea generator on their My Starbucks Idea site we should continue to look to our audience for valuable information in finding design and business solutions.
From Web sites to print media and even logos, we see how visual communication can simplify complex ideas, processes and information, making them easier to understand.
Consider my colleague Ashley’s post. Something as complex and as abstract as Web 2.0 can easily be explained using cut-outs and hand drawn graphics.
Design must be objective with clearly defined goals. But most importantly, it must address client and consumer needs.
“Understanding Graphics and Visual Communication” by Ryan Hembree explains the difference between fine art and graphic design. Fine art is a self-driven form of expression with a self-serving purpose where as graphic design, although it uses the same tools, has a client and/or audience/worldly serving purpose.
It’s important to keep in mind the big picture and communication goals at hand when approaching design projects, don’t take it too personal or you’ll just be making art.
When I saw this caricature by Dale Stephanos in the 50th Anniversary edition of Communication Arts magazine, I realized how powerful images can be, and how much they can communicate with out using any words at all.
As marketers, sometimes we do just the opposite when communicating with our audiences: how much can we say on any single piece of media to make sure that we get all our points across? The irony is that this actually has an adverse affect: consumers filter this as “visual noise.” Think about how many billboards, car wraps or ads you remember seeing on your drive to work this morning versus how many there actually were.
Image selection is crucial in design and in communicating with your targeted audience. To demonstrate this further, take a look at these two ads:
At a glance, which ad do you think is more memorable?
Consider image selection when working with communication tools. Be it online communications or print media, think about whether you should:
go that extra step and hire a photographer
purchase stock photography
commission an artist or produce something original
Photoshop it to give an image that extra polish
Having the right image can mean the difference between being remembered, and being forgotten.
So think about what you’re really trying to say, and before you say it all with words, think about how you can make it more memorable with imagery.
Neenah Paper created an iPhone App called Think Ink that allows users to create custom color palettes from photos taken. Users can also explore the psychology and meaning behind color, and even coordinate colors with papers and order paper samples.
Weber took their recipes beyond the cookbook when they released their mobile Grilling Companion App. Users can access recipes, a grilling timer, shopping lists, sauces, marinades and more.
These marketing approaches take products and services beyond traditional marketing. They integrate them into the consumers’ lifestyle placing information at their finger tips.
In an ever-changing tech world it’s important to consider how people are getting information. Watch as these shifts occur, and tailor your delivery accordingly. Consider non-traditional approaches and find new ways to reach your audience.
Fans and viewers everywhere began twittering away about Kanye West’s disorderly conduct at the MTV Video Music Awards.
We saw a visual representation of this as his profile picture bubble grew to enormous proportions on the VMA Twitter Tracker:
This dynamic tracker created by social media measurement company Radian6 and design firm Stamen, is a real – time visual display of users’ twittering activity on Twitter. In creating this tracker, they were able to translate complex statistical information into something visually pleasing and tangible that people can easily relate to. This is a powerful example of what happens when design and technology come together in an innovative and engaging way.
Another example of this is Flickr’s new clock … It’s a visual representation of recently uploaded videos arranged chronologically to give a broad look at what’s being posted in the Flickr community.
In these two examples, we see the critical role design plays in how we receive and interpret information especially on the Web and on social media platforms.
By finding new and creative approaches to design and visual communication we can inform, as well as engage and connect with our audiences.
So when great design and technology combine, we see form and function at its best.
eBizMBA.com highlights the top 10 best Flash Web sites of 2009. When you have a moment, check it out. You’ll see some really neat sites! But, there’s more to a good Web site than being really, really, really good looking.
The layout and presentation of information is key. In general, information should be organized and presented, taking into account the users’ intuitive processes and actions. In short, it is important to understand how and what users will access, and navigate on your site.
At Curley & Pynn, we ask four questions to help understand what drives a target audience:
Who do you want to reach?
What do they know about you?
What do you want them to know?
What do you want them to do?
The answers to these questions can also help shape how you present the information on your Web site.
For example, the home page is the point of entry where you must grab and keep users’ attention and further pull them into your Web site. You don’t want to overload users with too much information, links and clutter. Instead create “zones” or sections that group and highlight key items that you want to call to your audiences’ attention like news feeds, blog updates or maybe a new product or service, and then allow them the option to click to learn more.
Apple does a good job of this by highlighting key items on their home page such as product announcements and headlines, breaking them into zones and then allowing the user the choice to navigate to desired areas of the site to access additional information.
We see the same thing with the Dell home page:
This idea of grouping and gradually revealing information is best defined by the term Progressive Disclosure. Progressive Disclosure is the separating of information into multiple layers and only presenting layers that are necessary or relevant.
By only presenting the necessary and relevant information first, you provide users with a quick snapshot of what they need to know and put them in the driver’s seat.
When it comes to Web site design, good looks will only get you so far. Information presentation is what helps connect your audience to your message.
Designs that are preferred are not always the designs that help us achieve optimal performance results.
Take a look at your keyboard for example. Most likely this keyboard has a QWERTY layout which was originally developed by Christopher Sholes in 1874 to assist with the fluidity and movement of the mechanical parts. Almost all keyboards follow this layout to this day. Christopher Sholes set the standard and as a result, people have been trained to type on this keyboard format for years.
Unbeknownst to many, there is another layout called the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard (DSK) that was specifically designed to maximize typing speed and efficiency.
It was developed in 1936 by August Dvorak, an educational psychologist and professor of education at the University of Washington and his brother-in-law William Dealey. This keyboard layout increased typing efficiency by 30 percent and assisted in some of the world records set for speed typing. But despite the clear performance advantage of the Dvorak keyboard, the QWERTY keyboard is still the most widely used and preferred keyboard today.
When approaching design, it is important to acknowledge the difference between performance and preference, and select a design that will achieve the most optimal outcome. Test designs to see if they are achieving desired performance objectives. Seeing a design in context and observing audiences’ interactions will, often times reveal truths about a design’s performance that would otherwise remain overshadowed by preferences.
Be sensitive to preferential cues, but at the same time take a realistic look at performance outcomes because in the world of design, the preference IS performance.
We talk every day about new ways to incorporate social media into client strategies. So much is online … blogs, Twitter, Facebook, it’s easy to forget communication does exist off the Web … until yesterday.
Buried in the clutter of my mail was this piece:
Woof! Orlando
No, your eyes aren’t failing you. That’s a handwritten postcard.
I’ve never given much thought to bringing my dog to a chichi salon, but somehow I feel this meticulous handwriting-mixed-with-red-crayon shouldn’t be in vain.
When one of the world’s leading video game developers operates in your own backyard you have to tap into it as a resource. That’s why we organized a Leadership Orlando visit to Electronic Arts Tiburon’s Maitland studio to provide local leaders an opportunity to learn more about this creative company that’s on top of the competitive digital media industry.
As part of the business group’s Regional Entrepreneurship Day, more than 50 professionals from around Central Florida took a tour of the studio and heard from EA Tiburon executives including Phil Holt, Daryl Holt, Dale Jackson and Roy Harvey about how EA functions.
In order to produce some of the biggest games in the industry, like Madden NFL, NCAA Football, Tiger Woods PGA Tour and others, Tiburon recruits highly skilled employees to work in a competitive team centric environment with a strategy to “Win at Everything We Do!”
Executive Producer Dale Jackson compared the company’s hiring philosophy to that of the Navy Seals, “only the best and the brightest,” he said. “We drop them off in the deep end and they have to swim to safety; they use their problem-solving and passion for games to make an unbeatable product this way.”
During the tour, the LO students saw those highly skilled EA team members hard at work. Concept artwork and brainstorming notes covered the walls showing project developments, but it was clear the intensity of the work is balanced by opportunities for fun. Seen below, great minds need an outlet, and what better way to let loose then playing in a ball pit within a conference room?
The mixture of high performing creative minds, casual attire, dynamic leaders and free-thinking atmosphere make EA Tiburon a perfect place to learn about building a team and operating a successful company.
Posted by Curley & Pynn - The Strategic Firm 
Posted by Curley & Pynn - The Strategic Firm 
Posted by Curley & Pynn - The Strategic Firm 
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