Lecture Notes

• It’s really about who are your customers? Who is your audience?
• What are they trying to do? Why are they trying to do what they’re trying to do?
• What problems do they have? What do the first 100 of your customers look like?
• Where are they?
• Why are they doing what they are doing?

Think about the first 100 customers and their personas. Location, age and Psycological patterns.

• Is there a key buying persona?
• Is there a key action persona?
• Are they different people?
• Are the decision makers in your purchasing, different to the people that are actually using your product?

Think about the assumptions you are making and how likely you think these are to be correct or not. A good way to check these assumptions is to ask qualititive and quantitive questions. I wonder if there is a way to do this before going to market?

Dan talks about using survey tools to gain this valuable insight into customer behaviours. The two he suggests are Typeform and Surveymonkey. More from both can be seen below.

 

Competitors

I looked for ages to find someone who creates children’s quotes in a designed way. No luck. I then expanded my search to look for typographical prints for children and found etsy:

https://www.etsy.com/uk/market/kids_typography

I had heard of them before. They are a global marketplace in which ‘nique and creative goods’ can be purchased. The items on the shop are a bit unrealised and easily produced. They don’t carve out specific niches like I intend to do and they also take a cut from any profit you make through them. It may be another source of income for me but not the primary route I would hope for my customers to take.

 

Another company who makes, in my opinion, more finished and quality pieces of work is Desino. Check them out here:

https://desenio.co.uk/en/childrens-poster-coolest-kid

At Desenio, we are passionate about interiors and specifically Scandinavian design. Our business idea is simple: stylilsh wall art should be affordable to everyone. Since the business was founded in 2010, we have grown exponentially. We boast an online presence in 33 countries and are steadily breaking into new markets. At Desenio, you will find Scandinavia’s widest range of posters along with frames, hangers, picture ledges and clips. We frequently add new items to our range, in order to keep abreast of the latest interior and Scandinavian designs. We have something to suit every room and style of interior.

Again, Desenio brings together a number of creatives which results in a mixed aesthetic. By focussing on a certain style and story I hope to stand out from the market.

Anthony Burrill

Anthony Burrill has developed his niche overtime and people buy into his letterpress aesthetic. It goes back to doing what you love and not giving into to other tempting art forms.

His shop looks like this: https://anthonyburrill.com/

Simple, understated and showcasing the work. Perfect.

Unfortunately, Similarweb did not have a marketing report for AnthonyBurrill.com 🤷‍♂️

SWOT Analysis

SWOT stands for: Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, Threat. A SWOT analysis guides you to identify your organization’s strengths and weaknesses (S-W), as well as broader opportunities and threats (O-T). Developing a fuller awareness of the situation helps with both strategic planning and decision-making.

SWOT Analysis (Links to an external site.) 

Social Media as a Marketing Tool

80% of people use Instagram to make a buying decision. That cant be ignored!

The clever use of a visual medium like this combined with appropriate hashtags will mean the audience and reach of my products will be a lot further.

I believe Instagram slightly edges it over Facebook as people tend to use Instagram for visual things – just like my product.

Building an Audience

The audience is key because that audience becomes your customer base. I had an idea to start this artefact as a Facebook group in which discussions about children and their funny sayings were encouraged. This would build up an audience in which surveys and products could be tested before going to market. I still think this is a valid proposal and one that I will include in the overarching plan.

This infographic seemed to highlight all the areas I felt important to include:

Workshop Challenge

How can you ensure a business / creative idea is targeted and researched to maximise potential?

• Select one of your ideas from the previous week and develop a clear business outline of your intended audience outlets for distribution or purchase.
• You may need to evolve aspects of the proposition, and ensure there is a clear objective for the next stages of development.
• Your output will include product development, research insights and production challenges; all of which will come together in the final week of this module.
• Upload the artefact and evidence of any development undertaken (this might also include brand names and approach to the product’s story), and include a one page report outlining research, insights and development challenges.

Kidisms

Following on from last weeks exploratory ideas and my subsequent research I have decided that I would love to create a business around ‘kidisms’ – the funny things children say as they are growing up. Some are mispronunciations, and some are from some other place. Everyone seems to have a story. Wouldn’t it be great to remember these as a piece of art for your home, office or as a gift?

The Graphic Designer in me wants these pieces to be beautifully crafted and designed prints that have a tactile nature to them. In reality, this may prove too costly both in time and materials.

This leads me to propose two goals and pathways to a potentially viable business. In the first suggestion, I plan on taking the minimum viable product to the masses. Low cost means low risk. It also establishes whether or not there is a strong enough market for my product and gives me a source to survey. Valuable consumers and customers who may give me a better understanding of realising my ultimate goal – suggestion number 2.

Having worked in acrylic fabricators and a print room, I stumbled across an idea that may or may not be worth pursuing. Acrylic sheeting is a relatively cheap material that can be cut and moulded to shape. What if acrylic could be used to create a new set of letterpress characters to be used in the same way as old? New typefaces can be created and whole sets reproduced at a fraction of the cost.

This, of course, needs a lot more research and is a frivolous endeavour if the outcome is nothing more than an interesting artefact. Anthony Burrill’s, ‘Work hard and be nice to people’, always made me think about authorship and how much credit he could take for the work. He overheard the saying, got someone else to print it and sold the result – making millions in the process. There is obviously money in taking comments from another and presenting them in an aesthetically pleasing way.

So, yes, I would love to create a printing press with acrylic letterforms. But this may have to wait….for now.

Onto the business plan then, and how I can maximise its potential for minimal risk and cost.

The Details

Kidisms 1.0

Elevator Pitch

Immortalising children’s words in a typographically designed piece of work, Kidism takes the funny, strange and wonderful things our little ones say and transforms them into a piece you would be proud to hang on the wall. So why not, ‘do us a flavour’ and collaborate with us to create beautiful memories.

The First 100

Who are the people that Kidisms will look to target? Well, anyone with a child in the first instance – parents, grandparents, families, teachers, childcare providers. Children often say interesting things which are lost to the sands of time. Even I can’t remember everything my eldest said as an infant, that makes me sad. If you have a child, I bet you remember them saying amusing things but can’t recollect the exact words?

By offering a service in which anyone can remember the thought-provoking words muttered by little’uns on their pathway of discovery, Kidsms fills a void that is probably unthought about.

Why would people use this service? For all the reasons above. But also, as a physical product – as a gift, memento, home décor or office reminder.

Assumptions

• People find things kids say memorable
• Other kids say interesting things
• People want typographical prints
• Customers are happy to pay for something which is yet to be created

SWOT

Strengths	Weaknesses
PersonalisedUniqueHigh Quality DesignsQualified DesignerDownloadable / replicable	Unknown in market Small audience No return custom or up-sale opportunities
Opportunities	Threats
Reward scheme if quote and design allowed to be re-soldExpand to other products – cards, mugs, fridge magnetsPassive income	Other services offer personalised prints designer aspect may stop people taking quotes to these sites

MVP

Having researched several ways to start a business – Kickstarter, Etsy, Not on the Highstreet etc I believe this product sits best on Facebook / Instagram. By that, I mean it is the best place to start with minimal risk. I will invite my network and ask them to invite theirs. Free prints will be offered on this basis to increase reach and engagement. This will also increase brand awareness and provide vital insights into customer behaviour. Prints will be provided as a digital download at this stage.

The Future

This is a big part of the plan and it allows the company to build and expand. As stated in my blog I would love to create acrylic characters to be used in letterpress. However, there are substantial holes in my current knowledge of the market and the customer’s expectations and consumer choices. By starting with the above I can start to engage with my customers and address some of the assumptions I have made – Will people pay more for letterpress design work? Do they care about the processes involved? Do the old methods work with new technology?

Ideas Wall

References

Processes

SWOT Analysis (Links to an external site.) 

Competitive Landscape (Links to an external site.)

Competition Comparision (Links to an external site.)

Tools

Hotjar (Links to an external site.) – Tracks customers on a website

Google Analytics (Links to an external site.) – Tracks audience behaviour and data on websites

Later.com (Links to an external site.) – Social Media Tracking and Analytics

https://www.typeform.com/ – Survey Site

www.surveymonkey.co.uk – Survey Site

Walker-Ford, M., 2021. 5 Steps to Discover & Reach Your Target Online Audience [Infographic]. [online] Red Website Design Blog. Available at: <https://blog.red-website-design.co.uk/2018/09/19/reach-online-audience-infographic/> [Accessed 19 August 2021].

Smartdraw.com. n.d. SWOT Analysis – SWOT Analysis Examples and How to Do a SWOT Analysis. [online] Available at: <https://www.smartdraw.com/swot-analysis/> [Accessed 19 August 2021].

Young, A., (2011). Brand Media Strategy – Planning in the Digital Era (Links to an external site.), New York: Palgrave MacMillan.