Examples

Karen Fewell - "Avery Office Assistant"

InDzine in Marlow, Buckinghamshire is a design agency producing design for print, multimedia and the Internet. One of their clients, Avery Dennison, who produce stationery products, had the idea of producing a website specifically for their needs. The brief received by InDzine was to come up with a website outline for secretaries, but after research it was felt that the project needed to be altered slightly. It was decided that instead a bi-monthly email newsletter would be produced with content tailored specifically to secretaries so they would receive information about Avery products, information that would help them in their jobs and information for their personal lives. The aim was to be fun and to offer something to the secretaries themselves when they opened the Avery products they had ordered. The idea behind this campaign was to encourage secretaries to use the Internet and therefore the Avery website.

Working to a brief

	Audio Schedule for Project Proposal by InDzine

We're giving them articles about health and fitness and beauty, so to get to that idea, once it was felt internally that it wasn't going to be suitable to do a website, our client actually came over here and we had a brainstorming session about how we could alter it from a website to something else, which is when we came up with the email idea. But we knew that we needed to build the database for the secretaries, because there wasn't really enough to make it viable at the moment on Avery's database and we know that secretaries don't actually use the web as far as Avery are concerned, so we needed to get them onto the web, perhaps using off line methods. So we discussed ways we could do this and we actually opted for magazine advertising in a specific Office Secretary magazine, and what's called the TU from Avery scheme.

The TU from Avery scheme is a scheme that's actually placed in 100 sheet packs of Avery laser labels and it's just a two sided A4 leaflet but it's a scheme that gives something as a gift to the person who's opening these packs of labels and we know that the people who predominantly open 100 sheet laser packs are secretaries or the gate keepers within the company.

So our brief we then formalised into a proposal of exactly what we were going to do, when we were going to place them, what we were going to offer as a free gift and we put that all together in a formal thing with our timescales, content requirements, costs and then went back to the client. We discussed it further to see what did and didn't fit with their budget, what they thought to the idea.

Understanding the audience or user

	Audio Questionnaire used to gather data from audience

It's about the market and promotions. It came out in that promotion that the thing they're most likely to respond to is a free gift or a try before you buy sample, so hence the reason we went along this route. It showed us what websites people were going to for work, for home, what their roles included in the job, so it stretches as far as buying their bosses wife a present at Christmas or their birthday, so we need to cover things like that in the newsletter as well.

These are the two ads and what we did was to get them to actually go and register their information so that we could have their email address to contact them. But we needed some incentive, so we offered a thousand sample packs and these packs aren't just Avery products, there's a selection of things in there suitable for a secretary, so you've got hand cream, pens, coffee, shampoo and conditioner, couple of Avery products, a brochure all about the Avery range, so they're getting a full pack they receive through the post.

It looks impressive, so they go onto the website to request this and they also get entered into a free prize draw so there's a great incentive. This went out last Monday and we've had a fantastic response to it, so we know that it's worked and we know that it's a good way of targeting secretaries for the future. This is currently going into boxes at the moment and I don't know if it will actually reach any of the re-sellers to know what the response rate is yet, but it's a scheme that's constantly running so people do expect to get something free now when they open their box of labels.

Research techniques and methodologies

	Audio Single Page Advert

It is a good way of showing how people don't necessarily go to the web, but you can entice them by making it not just work based I suppose, by making it more interesting for their whole lifestyle and that's why we're going to carry out further research 'cause this is an ongoing project, we're sending out newsletters on a bi-monthly basis, so we're going to this Crème event so we can understanding the audience better, find other companies who are wanting to do joint promotions who might want to do something in the health and fitness section or at the Crème event there's a fashion show, we can see what sort of fashions that they're showing there and talk to people, the people who produce the Office Secretary magazine are going to be there, so again, talking to them, getting a real understanding of the market so we know we've been successful in this, but just to keep them there and keep the interest there.

It showed us what websites people were going to for work, for home, what their roles included in the job, so it stretches as far as buying their bosses wife a present at Christmas or their birthday, so we need to cover things like that in the newsletter as well.

We used several versions of this Office Secretary magazine for the copy writers and the designers and we wanted to go along the advert route, so it's very important that the copy and the design fitted with the rest of the magazine, and although we weren't actually allowed to use the same font, you'll notice that there's a line across the top which is what's been used on pages where Office Secretary have actually produced the editorial, the way the images are placed is very similar, they often use this faded back image, it can be seen in other ads. The positioning of these product pictures was very similar, and then we had to bring in some Avery branding, so the red band across the bottom is Avery branding along with the logo, and we've got the call to action so we know that the secretaries. We know that the secretaries might not necessarily want to go to the web straight away and a telephone number is really important because they can request it and give their details that way.

Other research that we did, I certainly went and looked at how other people are targeting secretaries. We looked at schemes such as hotels offering points to secretaries for booking in for their bosses, so that they are actually getting some reward back and I think that's really important with the secretaries, that they're actually getting something for themselves by doing their work. It certainly works when I've been ordering off this stationery, because I'm getting some vouchers back, whatever makes me choose that supplier rather than another one.

Design methods and practical development

	Audio Range of Publicity Materials

This all came out of a brainstorming session actually with the client, following our initial brainstorm into the website when we decided to change it. We sat down and had a couple of hours of throwing ideas around. We knew from research that in the past they'd responded to magazine advertising, but we had to choose which magazine, because there wasn't a huge budget.

What they actually get was all part of the idea that they were actually getting something that looked great, they weren't just getting a couple of labels, they were getting an indexing system, plus filing labels, plus all these things that are just for them rather than for their work and we know that secretaries like free gifts, you just have to look through this magazine to see how many companies are doing it, and when we talked to the sales guy that was offering us a space and trying to negotiate a price, he said they're going to love it, that's just what our audience like.

Creation and construction

	Audio Wireframe mock-up of webpage

Gave to designer and copy writer saying this is how I think it should go - use the bottom as the call to action and the Avery, we use the top area for general advert and we use these two areas, it's gone from that stage to that.

Presenting and gathering feedback

	Audio First Edition of Newsletter

This is what we've mocked up as the design for the first newsletter and we've got to go with a set format so they can actually update it themselves for future broadcasts. We've thought about the future and how it's going to be cheaper for them so we've got the image that we've used throughout all the advertising of the lady at a computer, at the top, we've carried through the red and the yellow and the scrawly font, so what will actually happen is they'll come to us and say this is the content which is going in, they'll put together the copy for a lot of the sections themselves, but we're responsible for the 'how to' and the 'ten ways...' so ten ways to combat stress, we'll be putting the copy together to go with our copy writer. I think we're doing how to create the perfect business card for the 'how to' section and again we're putting the copy together for that.

The other sections where it's something about an Avery product they'll put together themselves and they'll be able to go into our email system that we've built for them a few months ago and say right in this section put in this copy, and they'll just be able to go and type it all in themselves. They'll probably ask us to produce some of the images for them, so we'll save off the images, put them into the system and they can assign them to the relevant section of the newsletter, so what we've got is a style product, which I think we're going to feature on the business cards and give away free samples.

We've got a secondary Avery product which is going to be a special indexing product that they've recently brought out. There'll be a competition and we'll use the competition as a way of gathering market research about the market so finding out more about secretaries and what motivates them and how they relate to particular products, this is a market research tool as well. We're giving away a free sample business card in the style product section so there's something for them to actually do and carry through, we're doing ten ways to combat stress but we thought about future ones such as ten ways to impress your boss, maybe at Christmas ten ways to cope with your boss's hangover and ways that you can treat them or ten ways to impress your boss with Christmas present ideas for his wife, so we're trying to make them a bit more interesting.

We've got health and fitness and fashion, both of which we're going to external companies for and we're just in the process at the moment of doing that to get ready for the May broadcast that's going out mid May. We've got a list of people that we're going to contact so we'll be contacting people who want the publicity, perhaps have got an objective based mission such as charities and wanting to get messages across to this sort of target, some people might be able to try and get a free day at a health spa trial so they can try and get membership, so we've got ideas but we're talking to companies at the moment to try and work out what we can schedule in for the broadcasts for this year and then we'll re-assess it at the end of the year and see what we can do next year and how much budget can be assigned to this and whether we can grow it any more. That's where the market research and the competition sections are really helpful, and it ties in with other projects we've done in the past, which is this email system that we've built for them, it means that they can do these broadcasts themselves, they're not having to pay for email broadcasts for a large database which is what they've built up themselves over time.