Lifes's A Pitch - Funding - Lottery Funds

We have started to piece together our presentation but there are still a few questions about Fundings. We are wanting to get the free rent for the first year at Duke Studios, but we will still need funding for setting up the printers and web design etc. We can get loans and grants but the lottery also funds people in communities. It is more for developing skills and health etc. But if we pitch that we would support small local business in the community then we could receive a grant from £300-£10,000. 

Life's A Pitch - My Final Script

Hello slide

Finished Script...

"Hello, We are platform"


Who we are slide:

Finished Script...

'I'm Alice, this is Tyler, Rebecca, Naomi and Georgie and together we are creating an online business called Platform.
We are all illustrators coming from different backgrounds, each of us having different and unique styles, which is what inspired us to build a business for creatives inclusive to any style and background'


Promotion Slide:

Finished Script...

'As we are an online based business, we aim to promote ourselves mainly on social media, keeping up with the many social networking sites. We will also distribute business cards and leaflets to locations such as art cafes, student unions, art and craft shops. Networking will also be important to us, so that we have a presence in the art and business community, outside of our online existence.'

Bye Slide:

Finished Script...

'Thats all from us, thank you for listening. Does anyone have any questions?'


Although i have written scripts for each part and will revise them to remember the key parts, i will probably say it in my own words on the day to make it feel more natural and less wooden.

Life's A Pitch - Scripts

I have started to write the scripts for my slides for the presentation. I have left out writing the scripts for the "hi" and "Bye" slides as I would like to discuss it with the group as the script doesn't sound natural when saying hello and I'm unsure whether I am just saying hello or i am introducing our company as well.

The other two slides I have to write for, i have wrote a draft, which needs improving and i think we can discuss it when we meet today.

For the Character Slide:

'I'm Alice, this is Tyler, Rebecca, Naomi and Georgie and together we are creating an online business called Platform.
We are all illustrators coming from different backgrounds, each of us having different and unique styles, which is what inspired us to build a business for creatives.....'

- I found this a challenge to write as the slide is just the characters of ourselves, so i didn't know whether i should introduce everyone, or we should all say our own names. This is something i will bring up with the group when we meet. Im also not very good at writing, which you can tell as i have left dots where i know something should be added.

For the Promotion slide:

'As we are an online based business, we aim to promote ourselves mainly on social media, keeping up with the many social networking sites. We will also hand out business cards and leaflets to art cafes, student unions and *Levels of Education. 
My job as the liaison will be travelling to different networking functions around the country to meet and *socialise with other businesses and creatives.'

- *here I've decided i would like to chat to the group about this bit, as on the slide and my notes we have mentioned promoting to art classes, but i have thought that that could range to loads of levels  of education, also we could promote in public places, like libraries, art galleries etc. I could have written this in but i think maybe a discussion about it just to see what the others think.

The 'Bye' slide:

'Thats all from us, thank you for listening. Does anyone have any questions?'

Male Make-Up

Responsive - Collaboration

Today we had a twilight lecture, in this session we viewed slides of everyones work from Illustration, Graphic Design and Animation. After the slide show, we entered the cafe to gather around tables which had assigned briefs. We had to choose which brief we would like to collaborate on and then meet students from other courses to make a group between 2 and 4. 

I gathered around the table with the 'Design Bridge Brief - Break New Ground In Beauty Branding'. I ended up in a group with an other illustrator 'Sol Hilmarsdottir' and a Graphic Designer 'Vedika Kapoor'.

We got to know each other a bit and then left with planning what we should do before meeting up together again.

What to do for next time:

- Research Men's Make-Up and the branding etc.

Life's A Pitch - Group Meeting

Our group all met together today, we spoke about the individual things we all had to do. We have decided on a logo for our company and have gone through flow charts etc. 

We made a mock up presentation, with notes of what we need to include etc. and gave each other slides which we will be speaking about in the assessment. This part was quite tricky as one of our group members finds it difficult speaking, but was not here so we found it hard to assign slides as we didn't know what would be easy for her to say.

In the end, we just gave what we thought would be easy for her, in the hopes that when she writes her own script for her slides, she will be able to write it in her own words and practice so she will be more confident in speaking. In the situation that she does find it hard, we will all be able to step in and help her along. 

My slides assigned to me are:

- Saying Hello and introducing everyone to our company.

- Who we are

- Promoting

- Good Bye and asking if there are any questions

I now have to write a script for each of these slides and then on friday we will meet up and discuss it.

Life's A Pitch - Animated Venn Diagram no. 2

Presentation After Effects2 from Alice Franklin on Vimeo.

I have changed the Diagram using the feedback i got from the group. I think its a lot better, straight to the point and simple.

Life's A Pitch - Future Prospects

I have done some research into were we could take our business in the future. I have looked at buying our own printer and equipment, as cutting out the middle man should make us more profit, this would also help us to not have prints left over that haven't been sold as we can print to order. In the future we could also look at selling more products, but i have done some research in to this already.

Life's A Pitch - Research for Location

For my research on Locations, i have looked into Duke Studios in Leeds. They provide really creative spaces for people in the creative industries, which are really different. They also have a lot of perks if you rent a studio space from them. 

Naomi and Georgie have also looked into winning your 1st years rent for free from them, which would mean you would have a year to earn money before having to pay bills.

Life's A Pitch - Venn Diagram

Presentation1 from Alice Franklin on Vimeo.

I have posted a link to this video on our group chat for some feedback.

The main thing i wanted feedback on was the company name i added too it, as i didn't know if it actually needed it as is only 2 slides after we introduce our company name. Tyler mentioned that maybe just putting 'us' on it would be better, which i agree as it just needs to show that we are in the middle.

Life's A Pitch - Animated Venn Diagram

I have had a go at making a animated Venn Diagram, i wanted to make this so our presentation wasn't just static images and words. It was pretty simple to create, once i learnt the tools but i would like to get some feedback from my group as i think there could be some slight changes too it.

Life's A Pitch - Presentation Preparation

In this session we looked at some previous presentations from past years. We spoke about what we thought was good about them and what wasn't. 

Things that were good:

- Having a photo on the presentation. This helps people remember you after your presentation, they could be seeing a lot of different people and if they have to look back at your slides, this could help them remember you.

- Making it fun. Depending on what your business is about, tone of voice etc. its good to stand out and not be boring.

- Short and snappy. This will keep the viewers entertained and not get bored.

Things that were bad:

- Too much writing. If there is too much writing on the slides, the viewers will be focused on reading and not on you. Try and keep writing to a minimal and use your speech to inform people.

- Spelling. There were a few type errors in the presentation, which is bad if there is only one sentence on the screen as that slide will probably be shown for a while whilst your talking. Use spell check!

- Being Boring. The presentations were really informative and well designed, but didn't show any personality, especially from creative students.

After, we discussed in our groups about planning our presentation. We have finally decided on a name.... Platform. I really like the name and when we posted it on to Facebook to ask other people, they also chose this. They also chose "Springboard", which we have decided to use as our name for the online forum on our website.

We wrote down what we want to say/show in each slide.

We wanted to consider:

- We want to make it feel like a community/friendly

- Maybe hand moving elements to the presentation, so it isn't just on screen and fills up the time.

- Characters. Instead of a photo, we thought we would each draw ourselves.

- Duke Street. We were told that Dike Street Studios lets you have free rent for the first year, so we will look into this and include it in our presentation.

- Funding. Lottery Community money.

- Promoting

- Advertising the website

- Funding- core business. Not For Profit - community project (safety if it goes bust) No share holders.

This is our plan for our slides and who is doing what:

1. Our Name - All

2. Characters-us - All

3. What we do - Me

4. Manifesto - ALL

5. Target Market - All

6. Visuals of Website - Georgie

7. Submitting work - Tyler

8. Purchasing - Tyler

9. Visuals of Packaging - Rebecca

10. Promotion - TBC

11. Roles - ALL

12. Location - Me

13. Costing - Naomi

14. Future - Me and Naomi

15. Exit Strategy - Naomi

16. Contact 

17. Bye, thanks.

I am going to create  a little animated diagram in After Effects for the "What we do slide". I thought this would be something a bit different and not be boring as we will be talking for a long time. I have just done an animated sting in another module so feel quite confident to do it, although the rest of the group mentioned that i should use the masking tool, which i haven't used before so i am going to try and figure it out.

Life's A Pitch - Naming Our Business

At the end of this session, after we did our group SWOT analysis we decided that it was about time that we finally came up with a name for our business. We gathered all the names that we had came up with and shared on the Facebook group chat and whittled down to just a few. 

All of our ideas

The Illustrator Room The Art Neighbourhood Illustration village illustration circle Memento Blue Fish

Printy Parrot

Platform

Art Platform

Lift Off

Print Platform

Launch pad

Springboard

Print Base

Arty People

Print Lab

Print Partners

Print Pig

Print Pug

Printable

Print-a-bull

Propel-a-Print

Propeller Print

Principle

IllustrationBoard

Printville

DrawVille

The Art Folk

IllustrationFolk

ThePrintBoard

Printsy

Boardsy

TheSketchBoard

Printy Polly

PrintSize

IllustrationMonthly

PiggyPrints

TheArtPrinters

TheArtPrints

Illustratesy - You Illustustrate, we recreate

PrintAlly

Printpal

Printchums

The Print Pad.

PrintFolk

Printerest,

Print village Print quest Arteasy

Print Fair

The Big Draw

Elevate

Raffle

Line Up

Jumble

The selected names

Blue Fish
Platform, 
Print Platform, 
Launch pad, 
Springboard, 
ThePrintBoard, 
The Print Pad
Jumble

To get some more primary research for our business proposal, I decided it would be  good idea for us to put the last few names that we had all selected, on the level 5 illustration page on Facebook and see what other people think is the best name.

Life's A Pitch - SWOT analysis

At the end of our session, we were asked to make an individual SWOT analysis of our business proposal and then get together to generate a collaborative SWOT analysis.

My Analysis

Strengths

- Gives people an opportunity to sell their and advertise their work

- Anyone can enter into it

- It's free for people to enter

- Fair to both buyer and seller

Weaknesses

- Other websites are a little similar

- How to tackle ordering prints, do we buy in bulk or to order?

Opportunities

- could earn to buy own printer, this would make profit higher each month and no waste of too many prints

Threats

- Have too many prints

I didn't spend a lot of time on my individual analysis as we started talking about choosing a name for our business, we have spoke about this over Facebook i.e. posting name ideas, but we have not yet chose one yet, so its quite hard to get on with branding etc.

Because we spent time talking about the business name i found it very helpful that we then made a group SWAT analysis, as we could chat about all the points and came up with more points through discussion.

Group SWOT analysis

Strengths

- Art community is huge

- It's free to enter

- The winners don't have to produce the prints themselves

- Supports unknown creatives and puts everyone on a level playing field

- Respects artists and customers through fair pricing

- Temporary advertising, almost like an agency

- Online based - doesn't require a large space, reduces rent costs

- No house style - only 2D media that can be digitally reproduced

- Always refreshing and the themes allow consistency through varying styles

-Similar websites are successful

Weaknesses

- A lot of the profit relies on the sale of products

- Slim margins

- Short run printing/ print to order is high cost

- If we print long runs we might have leftovers

- Using a printer company gives us extra costs

- Do people want a middle man

- Limited to 12 winners - we don't know how many entries we are going to get

- A month is a long time - people may get bored

- Only having a website will take a lot of promotion to get noticed

- Upkeep of website - cost of coding? web design?

Opportunities

- Buy our own printer when we have enough profit to be stable (we would need a bigger space)

- Forums, blogs, social media presence - newsletter

- Opportunity to get ourselves noticed as well

- Advertising in physical locations

- Build relationships with printers etc.

- Top sales category on the website?

- Calendar - Many qualms 

- Expanding products

Threats

- What if nothing sells

- Leftover prints means lost money

- Other competing websites - illustration friday

- Not enough people entering

- There is no good work

- copyright and ownership

Life's A Pitch - Marketing

What is Marketing?

Understanding what consumers want and how to deliver it.

Social and managerial process which individuals and groups obtain what they want and need through creating, offering and exchanging products of value with others

- identify needs through market research
- target market
- product management
- develop appropriate pricing strategy
- identify distribution networks
- value added - improve customer experience through value added benefits

What can be marketed?

- goods
- services
- events
- experiences
- personalities
- places
- organisations
- properties
- information
- ideas and concepts

marketing is a creative process - each marketer has their own approach but there are some universally agreed and fundamental principles to be considered when strategising for a successful campaign

4 P's of Marketing

- Product
- Price
- Place
- Promotion

Product- is a tangible good or intangible service

Price - Price paid for product or service

Promotion - encompasses all methods of communication used to inform all parties about the product

Place - refers to the arena or context in or through which the consumer can access the product

= target market

Benefits

- allows you to sell
- allows you to analyse your product/service
- sell underlying philosophy/message
- helps differentiate from other market competitors
- identify audience
- inform new and existing customers on new product/service and where to access it

How?

- Market research
- Primary research
- Secondary research

factual - Quantitative research
opinions - Qualitative

SWOT

- strengths
- weaknesses
- opportunities
- threats

Twilight Lecture - Briefing

Studio Brief 2 - Collaborative Practice

Working in groups of between 2&4 you will focus on he role of the creative team and collaborative approaches to solving creative problems.

Deadline 17th March
Module deadline 14th April

consider:

- Why should i collaborate? - two heads are better than one, how will you use them effectively?
- Who will i work with?
- What brief will we choose?
- What do I need to submit?
- How wil i be assessed?

Deliverables:

- For assessment, submission work should be presented on 5xA2 boards (digital PDF format)summarising the research, development and resolution of the brief. Please note that these boards will be different (and in addition) to any deliverables specified and produced for the D&AD/YCN submission.

- Development files and blog entries

- Screenshot of your submission to your chosen competition.

YCN - Free   D&AD - submission charge
(enter in to a contract of partnership, share costs of materials, submission charges etc.)

Evidence of Submission:

- Studio Practice Blog
- Products, Proposals & Presentation Boards
- Project Report
- Written Summative Evaluation (750)

For the next session:

- Read studio brief 2
- Sign up/subscribe/Join YCN & D&AD
- Explore the content of their websites
- Read the terms and conditions