We were put into groups and told to come up with 100 problems a new student at LCAD is faced with. We wrote around 60, and then had choose the ten we felt affected us the most.
After writing them down, and choosing a further three to concentrate on from another groups questions, and a couple of passes around, as a group we were given one of the questions the create a solution for:
How to Survive Freshers Flu
- Who needs to know?
- What/Why do they need to know?
- Are you trying to EXPLAIN, INFORM, INSTRUCT or EDUCATE the audience?
- What will the audience respond to, where will they look?
- How will they need to interact with it?
- How will you know it is working?
- What is the tone of voice?
Who?
- Students/freshers
- Parents
- Tutors
- Public transport workers (taxi/bus), doctors
What?
- Symptoms
- Precautions
- Preventions
- How it's caused
- Treatments
Why?
- Health risks
- Mass Epidemic
How?
- Posters
- Leaflets
- Billboards
- Websites
- Social networking
- Apps
- TV/Radio adverts
- Freshers clinic
Tone of voice?
- Formal and Ironic
- Cheesy and non-serious
We decided to stick to telling students/freshers as it was the simplest and best one to do. With this in mind we had to create solutions which were contemporary, and something they would actually look at and not just give a glance and throw away.
With that in mind we decided on three solutions:
- Leaflet
- Social networking page (Twitter)
- Freshers Flu Survival Kit
Our tone of voice is formal and ironic, so with this, we decided that the best way to educate students on it was to design ourselves as an independent firm, that was in association with the NHS. So with that, we had to keep with the corporate feel of the NHS, but keep it interesting and eye catching for students.
The leaflet is our main source of information, and the main aspect of the project. On one side we decided on a prescription form, noting down all the symptoms, along with the prescription - which is everything you would get in the survival kit.
The other side was full of information on Freshers Flu and our survival box, with a tear off form at the bottom which the student would fill in and hand in to get the survival kit.
The Twitter page is a question page from students to our doctor @drfredresher, so they could ask about symptoms/how they were feeling, and would be able to see if they had the flu and needed a kit. It is a place where students can ask as many questions as they wanted and they would be answered for them, much like the twitter feeds of the NHS and other health corporation.
The survival kit is our main solution, as it is full of everything which should help a student when they have freshers flu. After discussion we decided on eight items, which combined together would be the most effective/beneficial.
- Bottle of water
- Cuppa Soup
- Lemsip max
- Teabags
- Sugar supplement
- Tissues
- Nicotine patch
- 'Hair of the dog'
As we were putting ourselves in association with the NHS, branding is an important aspect of the project. We needed to keep it corporate looking, but something contemporary that would appeal to students at the same time.
Branding & General Look
Looking at the NHS website, we found the blue and the orange was the general colour scheme, and one we felt would work well in this project. The typeface is easy and simple to read, not just being there to look nice.
This blue and orange is something we wanted to keep running throughout the solutions for the project. The front of the leaflet is where the students get most of their information, so this is the main place where we will be using the branding, to try get across the organisation in one sheet.
For the typeface of the whole project, we needed something easy to read and to the point, like the NHS website, so we went for the closest font to the NHS website, deciding on Century Gothic as it was exactly that, and had a contemporary feel to it.
Top of the leaflet:
A logo was a minor part of the project, but just as important as the major elements. We wanted to sum up our company within a picture, which is quite a tricky thing to do.
Looking at the logo's for different organisations/health services, we decided upon the Caduceus - which is the widely used symbol for hospital/medicine (Dating back to Greek Mythology), the snakes wrapped around the staff.
The stencil-like image was exactly what we thought would be best for our logo, involving the two elements we chose - a beer bottle and stethoscope. (The beer bottle being the staff, and the stethoscope as the snakes).
The four stages above show how we got to the final logo. I designed and drew out a base to work from for the logo, which we then imported into Photoshop, along with a vector of a beer bottle.
The main issue was the 'FHS' text, as we couldn't find a decent place to have it on the bottle, finally settling for the left hand side, though I still feel it looks a little out of place, however as it is only going to be a small feature of the leaflet, it perhaps doesn't matter as much as it would if it was on a larger scale.
After looking up prescription forms (above), we took the base of one and created a form bespoke to our symptoms/prescriptions. As we're in association with the NHS we thought it'd be best to keep everything formal and professional looking when it came to the medical side of things, which is why we kept with the classic prescription form instead of creating our own.
The only thing we did change is putting the symptoms in the top, left hand corner, instead of a 'pharmacy stamp' - we felt the symptoms would be more beneficial as it was an information leaflet, and not an actual prescription form.
We had a typewriter typeface, so it looked authentic and like the information had just been added to the card, keeping with the whole real, formal look of the project. It is created as a sample, and a completed form which related to all freshers who would be looking at the form, so it was full of general information, along with symptoms, prescription and the details of our 'clinic'.
Overall it worked well, and has an authentic look about it. We kept with real prescription forms while inputting the data, keeping in with the putting the weight/dosage, and prescription of how to take and when.
This is where our branding was the most important thing we had to carry out well. We had to keep it contemporary, easy to read, and interesting to look at/read. As we're aimed at students, we had the task of making it so they wouldn't just pick it up and throw it away without reading it. The whole thing kept with the blue and orange colour scheme, and overall it worked very well as a informative leaflet.
At the bottom with the cut off form, we put websites/companies Freshers Flu is directly related to - Drink Aware, NHS and Talk to Frank. We put those there so the students are aware there are other websites which help with related issues and that we are associated with them.
The cut off form also informs them of where to collect the survival kit. This was something that we discussed throughout the project; where to pick it up or where it is available. There were a few options that we considered:
- Freshers fair
- Student Union
- Local Doctors
- Pharmacies
- Hospitals
We decided to keep things simple, we would keep it within the universities, and potentially set up a stall in freshers fair, where we would hand out leaflets, and students could pick up a kit straight away from our stall.
The second solution was that they were able to also pick the kit up from the student union, where they would be kept once the fair was over. This keeps it easy access for the students, so they don't have to go far to collect it, as a lot would not go down to their local doctors/pharmacy for it, especially if they were suffering from the flu.
Throughout the project we decided to stick with the informing the students and helping them deal with it. We didn't go down the prevention route, as they are students, and whatever we said/did, a lot of them would still end up getting it as they would ignore everything we said. We informed them how it is caused, and what the symptoms are, before giving them a solution to help deal or 'survive' it.
Keeping with the NHS, prescription and formal theme, we designed stickers to go on each of the items within the survival kit. They are based off original NHS prescription labels so they match the prescription form. Depending on the item, we wrote exactly how many and when they needed to be taken. We kept them simple, with an easy to read format, and all the important information in bold.
An example of the sticker on a kit item:
Survival Kit
