FMBE CREATIVE TAKES OVER NTU FMB INSTA

On Thursday evening FMBe Creative had the opportunity of taking over the NTU FMB Instagram account to share the brand development work that we’ve been working on over the past month or two.

Since learning about the practice and effectiveness of reflection, I am going to consciously write this blog with a reflective mindset, starting with ‘describing’ what happened, touching upon my ‘feelings’, as well as ‘evaluating’ and ‘analysing’.

My team, FMBe Creative, were allocated the time slot 8:30-9pm. Overall, I thought it was a very successful experience. We were one of the last teams to takeover the Instagram page, and we were all a but apprehensive and worried that we may be repeating similar content to previous groups. However, it turned out that the content we posted was unique in the sense that no one else did. After discussing on our WhatsApp group chat, we decided we would upload individual videos. We decided that in these videos we would reflect on the module, by discussing what the highlights and lowlights of the module/project have been for each of us. This was my idea and I am glad I suggested this and thought it was a great idea because it allowed us to use our reflective skills that we have been learning throughout this week, as well as giving future second year FMB students great insights into the module that they will likely be taking part in, in the future.

This was my individual reflective video in two parts that was shown on the NTU FMB stories:

Upon evaluation, it was a great experience and I am grateful that we got this opportunity. The run up to our takeover slot was slightly stressful as we didn’t confirm our ideas with plenty of time. It was also disappointing because only five out of nine of our team members took part by providing a reflective film. This was a shame because I think it would have been great for every team member to take part, since it was a group task. Nonetheless, it was a successful experience for the five of us that did take part. It has benefitted me and given me skills that I can take forward into future projects and aspects of life.

If I were to take part in this again or something similar in the future, I would make a conscious effort to better plan our content and structure our time slot. To do this, I would schedule a live teams meeting over something like MS Teams or meet in person well in advance of the time slot to throughly plan and be clear on what we want to do.

REFLECTIVE PRACTICE: THE GIBB’S TOOL

Throughout this module, I have learned to understand the importance of reflection. Parminder provided an insightful lecture of reflective practice. This blog is dedicated to this.

I have decided to use the Gibb’s reflective tool to reflect on my A3 Brand Boards presentation that occurred two days ago. My previous blog discussed the feedback of my presentation, but I am wanting to put my reflective skills further into practice.

Step 1: Description

What had happened?

Over the past few weeks I had been working on my A3 Brand Boards. On Tuesday 18th at 2:30pm I presented them to two of my tutors.

Step 2: Feelings

What were you thinking and feeling?

I am a very self-critical individual. I often get this thing known as imposter syndrome, when I doubt my work and never acknowledge the good in what I have done. Although I was feeling this way about my boards and my presentation, I was also feeling well prepared and was looking forward to the feedback that I would receive from my tutors that I could work on before my final submission the next day.

Step 3: Evaluation

What was good and bad about the experience?

The positives that came from the boards and the presentation was that I presented will and got everything I wanted to get across in the 3 minutes that I had. I was also told that the visuals and the impact of my boards were good.

The negatives that came from the boards is that my consumer profiles were not visually represented as much as they could be, and my communications board didn’t strongly reflect the core of my brand and where it wants to go.

Step 4: Analysis

What sense can you make of the experience?

I appreciate and understand all of the feedback that I was given, both good and bad. I agree and am proud of the positives that were outlined about my boards, and I also understand the constructive criticism that I was given and am happy to work on them to make my work better.

Step 5: Conclusion

What do you need to improve on?

I need to take forward the constructive criticism and work on improving my boards before my summative deadline. The key things that I need to improve on are:

1. The tone of voice in the storytelling of the brand

2. Making my consumer profiles more visual if possible

3. Visualising the ‘partnering with a charity’ aspect of the comms plan rather than just discussing it

4. Making clearer where consumers can find the Fortitude brand on social media platforms

Step 6: Action plan

How will you improve?

For the purpose of adopting this tool properly, this action plan will be in the future tense, even though I have already acted upon what needs to improve so that I could meet my summative deadline which was yesterday.

1. I am going to edit the first pink text box on my first board to include more impactful and striking words/phrases that better reflect my brand’s story and overall tone of voice.

2. I am going to edit my second board consumer profiles by adding something visual that allows the viewer to better understand the consumer. For example a small image per consumer group or a simple line drawing that reflects the consumer.

3. I am going to incorporate the logos of the charities that Fortitude would like to partner with. This is a key part of the comms plan and it is important that I visualise it.

4. I am going to feature a line of text that communicates the ‘@’ handle that Fortitude would use across all of their social media platforms to make it easy for the consumer to find the brand.

BRAND BOARD PRESENTATIONS

Another week, another presentation! Over the past few weeks I have been working very hard on the development of my 3 A3 Brand Boards. Today I presented to two of my tutors as well as a small group of other FMB students.

Once again, I put myself forward to present first. I truly am proud of how far I have come with my confidence and presentation skills. Ever since I was younger I haven’t been very confident speaking in front of people or putting myself forward for things, but since studying FMB at university, particularly second year, has instilled confidence in me and it is definitely something that I will take away from my university experience and take with me into my future career.

The presentation went really well. I had no technical issues, I was perfectly on time (3 minutes) and I confidently got my ideas and points across that I had wished to. My peers gave me some great feedback as well as my tutors. Once I have written this blog, I am going to go away and make some final tweaks based on the feedback for the summative Brand Board submission tomorrow.

Good points included:

• Strong visuals, design and colour scheme, great eye for detail, visuals striking and impactful boards.

• Strong logo, particularly the ‘O’ represented by the abstract wave icon.

• Relatively clear consumer groups explained well - good understanding of who the brand is aiming at.

• Lots of nice queues within the work including the statement down the side, the 3 T’s and part of the brand name highlighted in the brand personality.

• With board two, good opening with a question; ‘Are you one of us?’

• Great inclusion of QR code which stimulates interaction, and leads to the Instagram page with is currently great and visually striking.

• Good idea to partner with charities and nice addition that the consumers will be involved with the direction of the brand and tapping into their values that reflect Fortitude’s brand values.

Things to work on:

• The storytelling and brand story/meaning could be better worked on in terms of tone of voice (could embody who the brand is a little bit more to add a little more character).

• Could work on the visual representation of the consumer groups and distinguish the consumer groups based on the brand archetypes used through their characters, who they are, how they speak/behave etc.

• Expand/work on the Instagram page a bit more by maybe adding some more copy to explain the brand and plant the seed in the consumers mind about what the brand is about.

• Could work on the key message of the brand through communications and social media - what’s really important, what lies at the core etc.

• Must be clear to consumers how they can find Fortitude on the social media platforms highlighted - they need to know where to find you.

• Be more clear about the actions Fortitude is going to do to stop the issue of plastic in the oceans (was spoken about a little bit in the comms at the end, but more details needed).

• Feature visually the idea of partnering with charities - this is something that doesn’t want to be missed as it makes Fortitude unique.