Social Media Design Sprint: Reflection

For this assignment, we were asked to choose an organization or company to design, read the article “7 Social Media Design Ideas for PR Pros” by Brian Conlin, complete Canva tutorials and design four different social media pieces on Canva for our client. I chose the organization Upendo Kids International, an international child advocacy nonprofit that specializes in providing an education for Kenyan children who lack the means to attend school, as well as a fully-run children’s home for neglected, abused or orphaned children to live with their needs provided.

I was excited for this assignment because it gave me the freedom to choose an organization from which I have personal experience and knowledge. I have my own set of numerous photographs from my time in Kenya working at this organization, as well as videos and quotes from the children at the children’s home.

What I actually did I reacted rather disappointed towards, because I realized there was no consistent “feel” or personality that existed through the pieces, except for the fact that they all had pictures of the children in them. All child advocacy organizations have pictures of children, so I need to find a way to distinguish mine from the others, highlight something I know from personal experience with the organization that makes it something I feel is worthy of investment. I realized through my brainstorming that being able to meet your sponsor child in person, as well as visit the home and community in general were very important aspects of the organization. I also could tell you the names and stories of all of the children and how Upendo Kids had changed the course of these children’s lives. I could describe these children’s personalities and what they want to be when they grow up. I think I need to really grasp how to combine both emotion and factuality in my social media posts, because while the children may drive a positive reaction from my audience, if they believe this was merely a photograph snapped by the organization of a random child then they don’t trust the work of the organization. I need to make it clear that the organization is trustworthy through the inclusion of facts about the children, quotes by the children and create a clear message about what specifically the organization does. I also need to create a consistent feel throughout the pieces, so that if someone could connect all the pieces together as part of the organization and be able to recognize the brand anywhere. If they appear to be all different from each other, audiences won’t connect them back to the same organization. I need to find consistency in my colors, fonts, shapes and objects.

As for working with Canva, this was a bit of a struggle for me. I found that though the website was simple and entertaining, it was very hard to try and pin-point consistency through my pieces because there were so many options I could include in my pieces. There were also a lack of blending and mixing of the elements in the design together, which kind of gave the pieces an elementary feel. My design process and thinking changed when I used Canva because the website is so different from InDesign and Photoshop. I tried to make cartoony objects flow through photographic backgrounds, and that remains a bit difficult for me. I do like Canva and think it is an excellent website for design pieces. I want to devote more practice to design through Canva so that I can really find my creative personality through it.

These are my initial pieces through Canva, though I am continuing to edit them.