Design Strategy and Touchpoint Experience

Project Overview

Client

Draw is a Minnesota-based non-profit organization that brings people together to color, share stories, and build connection through its “Coloring Day” events.

Challenge

Develop a design strategy and propose a system of touchpoints that will increase visibility and awareness of Draw to its partners and users.

Approach

Understand client goals and problem space from Stakeholder Interview
Competitive Audit and Secondary Research of social entrepreneurship models
Develop a Guiding Strategy Statement and Multi-touchpoint Strategy Map
Create lo- and hi-fidelity storyboard and prototypes of “Draw Kit” touchpoint

Outcomes

A multi-touchpoint strategy map and “Draw Kit” prototypes intended to increase Draw’s visibility, increase accessibility and participation of drawing/coloring during Covid-19

Design Team

Ruth Abend, Gabrielle Bajuscik, Maria George, and Sarah Monson

My Role

Secondary Research on Social Entrepreneurship, Guiding Strategy Statement, Storyboarding, Prototyping “Draw Kit” Touchpoint, Video Presentation, Slide Deck

Tools

Methods

Zoom
InVision Freehand
Miro
Canva
Pen and Paper
Sketch
Keynote

Stakeholder Interview
Competitive Audit
Secondary Research
Kanban Workflow
Multi-touchpoint Strategy Map
Wireframing
Prototyping

Methods and Deliverables

Whales_know,don't know.jpg — Understanding Client Goals

My team and I met with the client to understand the history and vision for Draw, the user experience (pre- and during Covid), their partnerships, current challenges, and goals for the future. In preparation for our stakeholder interview, we noted what we know, don’t know, and want to know.
We learned that Draw has had tremendous success with bringing people together to color and in supporting local non-profits by co-hosting coloring day events at local coffee shops and breweries through sponsorships. However, like many other organizations, Draw was significantly impacted by the pandemic with restrictions on in-person gatherings. In partnership with a Prime full stack cohort, they developed creative solutions to continue hosting coloring day events in socially-distanced settings. However, the closure of many local establishments during the winter months deferred these events for the unforeseeable future.
How can Draw continue to foster connection and storytelling through coloring/drawing during the pandemic, particularly in remote settings?
While the client hopes to return to in-person coloring events post-Covid, we learned that the short- and long-term goals for the client include:
Sharpen and more clearly communicate its mission
Increase the awareness of Draw to its partners and users
Increase involvement in the activity of coloring/drawing for therapeutic and community-building benefits and find ways to make participants’ illustrations have a lasting impact
Expand participants beyond young and middle-aged adults to include under-resourced communities

Deep Dive research_whiteboard.jpg — Understanding the Space

To better understand the existing space and to propose an effective design strategy and multi-touchpoint system, my team and I conducted extensive secondary research of the problem space in the following key areas:
Social entrepreneurship
Non-profit fund-raising
Social media marketing and non-profits
Public art and community engagement
Art and mental health
I conducted a competitive audit of three other organizations/businesses and investigated primarily how they communicate their mission and value to their users and partners. I also looked at strategies for increasing visibility and adapting their touchpoints for remote and socially distanced settings while staying true to their respective missions. I learned that a variety of key partnerships, attention from the press (including celebrity, and investing heavily in social media marketing have been the most successful in increasing visibility and awareness for these mission-driven establishments. I also noted that 2/3 provide explicit statements indicating how they appropriate money from their fund-raising initiatives (e.g., donating 50% of net profit), and they explicitly display the organizations and amounts donated on their websites.

draw secondary research synthesis.jpg — Organizational Trends

My team and I synthesized our collective findings and grouped them into buckets.
In addition to my findings from a competitive audit, we learned:
Non-profits and mission-driven businesses utilize social media to connect with users and expand audience engagement
Non-profits include explicit “Donate” button, call out boxes for upcoming events, transparency of total donation amounts on their websites
Community-made public art events are effective for building relationships within communities, sharing stories, and investing in a shared cause
Similar organizations have transitioned similar public and community art events to digital spaces
These helped us formulate a design strategy statement for the client and later inform an expanded system of touchpoints that support the client’s mission and goals.

Guiding Strategy Statement

Working from our secondary research and in conjunction with our client’s goals, my team and I collaborated on writing a guiding strategy statement:

All user experience touchpoints for Draw will help community members and partner organizations to feel connected, heard, and invested in Draw’s mission and impact so that they are able to share valued community stories and express values along with having a greater sense of impact of the work and their involvement. We will do this by focusing on the lasting impact of the art and the stories the art tells to build awareness and profitability. As a result, we hope to see an increase in engagement with the website, an increase in partners contacting Draw and partnerships formed, and higher donation rates at fundraising events.

Multi-touchpoint Strategy Map

Using our guiding strategy statement, findings from our secondary research, and the client’s goals, my team and I developed a touchpoint strategy map. This map features a user scenario which takes the user through a journey of multiple touchpoints or ways a user would interact with Draw in experientially meaningful ways. We focused on the following touchpoints: social media (highlighting past and upcoming events, connect users to website), Draw’s website (highlighting donation page, upcoming events, partnerships, virtual gallery, and mission statement), a digital gallery, and Draw kits.
My responsibility was to build out the “Draw Kit” touchpoint.

View map

Wireframing

To imagine what a Draw Kit might look like, I sketched out a storyboard and two wireframes for how to request and donate a kit from Draw’s website.

Description

A Draw kit is a package containing drawing prompts & other supplies as needed
Intent is to increase accessibility by expanding “Coloring Day” events for remote and socially distanced settings
Kits can be customizable by theme and content
Can be mailed or prompts can be emailed.
Can be requested individually, for private groups, or for public/community events
Kits can also be donated.

Action/User Goals

Get involved and invest in Draw’s mission in remote & socially distanced settings
Connect with others through drawing and storytelling
Feel like their drawings have a larger impact after the event has ended.
Support Draw’s mission by donating kits for community art/storytelling activities

Value to Draw

Enact Draw’s mission by making drawing/coloring more accessible during Covid
Connecting people through art and storytelling
Make drawings more impactful

Rationale

Based on my secondary research of similarly-structured non-profits (e.g., Love Your Melon), I noted that successful organizations have found creative ways to continue to advance their missions during the pandemic (i.e., in remote settings). Love Your Melon, for example, has created opportunities for people to request LYM products to be delivered to people in need without in-person contact. In collaboration with Prime Digital Academy in 2020, Draw found a way to deliver coloring "kits" to tables at in-person events which solves the problem of how to continue "Coloring Day" events while practicing social distancing. I expand this iteration of the Draw kit to solve a slightly different problem: How can Draw continue to carry out its mission of building connections through drawing and storytelling and find a lasting impact with people's artwork in remote and socially distanced settings? That is, how can Draw increase participation and make it accessible if Covid-19 limits and/or prevents people from gathering in-person? This Draw kit concept solves that problem. I learned from our interview with the client that the cost of supplying draw kits is relatively low; however, postage can be high. The "Donate a Kit" option offers a solution to decrease or cover costs for groups with limited funds. In addition to subsidizing cost, the option to donate allows people to build community through Draw and contribute to making drawings more impactful. Private parties requesting Draw kits (e.g., for corporate team building events) can elect to cover those costs themselves.