My Design Process

Design thinking & human-centered design inspired process.The event had a major theme of focusing on what the community needs at thistime, the design process should reflect this.

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The Problem:

The annual fundraising event for 300 people which needs to raise $150,000, and a re-adjustment to host in a post-Covid community event. A desire to combat past frustration this annual event has caused, and do things differently to honor all stakeholders, build community excitement, gather people together for a fun night of philanthropy.  

#1 – Event Brand

#2 – Communication & Marketing

#3 – DigitalProduct Solutions

Empathize:

Analysis of event and positioning goals for this event, based on interviews, past experiences, and what we’ve learned about the history of event marketing at NWCS.

Here's what I learned:

• NWCS Community needs connection – everyone feels a lack of community and a feeling of togetherness. Want for “fun”.
• Too much reliance on staff and volunteers in the past – people are burnt out!
• Too big an ask for community – Drive-by coin drives, constant pestering for donation items and relentless ticket sales.
• A need for event to be easy to attend, low stakes for the attendee
• People like to know ahead of time what they’re getting into, what’s going to be expected? Lots of attendees with different socioeconomic backgrounds.  People wanted to understand things like: Food, Items for Sale (want to know if their favorite past items will be back again), Community, and were asking questions like, "What’s required of me?"

Research, what did stakeholders say?

Administrators – We need revenue! But also want to bolster this community’s economy

Teachers – We are exhausted! Auctions usually require so much of us we are glad when it’s behind us for the year.

Attendees– What’s the value proposition? Why should I go? I don’t want to just give NWCS more money. I liked the online auctions better – could choose when to engage and when they were done.

Event Team – Hard to get registrants, a logistical nightmare trying to coordinate donor and attendee information and make everyone happy. Community needs a lot of handholding. Difficult to “sell” sponsorships, just another “ask” for the same people.Paper everything gets chaotic.

Define:

What can we conclude are the needs of all the stakeholders?

Simple – All the information needs to be clear, easy to find and digest. No hunting for information.

Community – Show, don’t tell. This is an amazing community! We want you to be a part of it, and you should want to engage in it!

Fundraising – The “why” statement needs to be front and center.

Planning Efficiency – Online forms are a must! Will require some change management but will ultimately make data collection so much more effective.

Ideate:

I went through lots of wireframes to fully explore what solution would be best - a site that nested all the information in submenus? A simple landing page? At the ship date, we didn't actually have all the event information nailed down yet, but there was demand for tickets to be available to purchase. This is obviously not the desired situation, but it was the situation our event planner found herself in, so I needed to find a solution, and quick!