Graphic Clinic

Category: Work

  • Original Designers Workbook app: update

    Original Designers Workbook app: update

    As of the time of writing, our attempt to digitise the Workbook into an iOS was suppose to launch before Xmas 2021. However, bugs and time constraints meant it was not to be. We are hopeful we can launch early in 2022.

    Watch this space!

  • What we mean by ‘strategy’

    Strategy is a much lauded work in consultancy, as such it means many things to many people. So here’s our take on what is strategy and the consultancy we offer when it comes to the use of this word.

    Strategy, to us, is about devising a plan to help our clients take their product to market. But sometimes it goes even higher than that, it’s a pre-product decision. Our most effective consultancy (on strategy) comes when the product hasn’t been designed yet, let alone the marketing strategy to sell that product.

    Let us elaborate.

    Our most successful client relationship to date is with a financial services company who came to us with an outline of their business. They knew the sector to which they were going into and they had enlisted a group of stakeholders and investors who liked their idea.

    The first job was to work out with this group (of 15+ individuals across 9 businesses) a consensus for what this company was going to ‘be’. Not the obvious ‘be’ of being a financial services provider, but the ‘be’ of culture. What type of business were they going to create. Our work here was about extracting from those individuals what each of them thought in an open forum with their peers, analysing and seeking agreement across all stakeholders to ensure that everyone was on the same page.

    Now we knew what kind of a business we were creating the strategy for we could move on to analysing values, developing personality traits; putting in place the brand strategy. What this essential first-step did was give a central reference point for all future business decisions. It afforded them a clear grounding and a clear direction for growth and has helped them define their proposition ever since.

    In short, an effective strategy.

  • Summer Photobox campaign

    Summer Photobox campaign

    We recently completed a successful TFL campaign for the lovely Photobox, getting their summer message – to treasure the photo’s you take on holiday – out across the London Underground. The simple creative execution puts their core product (prints) at the heart of the ad.

    photobox-summer-2015

  • Judging a book by its cover

    Note: This blog article was written for our client Nucleus Financials “Illuminate” campaign. It is due to be published in the autumn of 2015.

    Picture the scene: you’ve got a day jammed full of meetings with new and existing clients alike. Your paraplanner and administrator have already left your a stack of post-it notes on your desk asking you for various decisions, and your 10 o’clock (a possible new client) is late. That’s okay because you can deal with those questions and contact your Platforms CRM to release a new fund for another client. But they’re still late.

    30 minutes after their appointment time a mid-20s, unshaven man, with several piercings and a tattoo poking out of the top of his v-neck t-shirt arrives at the office to meet you. Already disappointed at their lack of punctuality you begin your usual preamble about your adviser firm when his phone goes off. Quite unexpectedly he takes the call, meanwhile you seethe. You’re already thinking this person is going to be a very bad client; lots of work and probably a small income to invest. You’ll no doubt hand him off to a junior member of staff to handle once you get through this meeting.

    We all love to think that we’re intelligent enough not to take people at face value. Not to make assumptions before they’ve opened their mouth, nor to assume the way they dress, or that week-old five o’clock shadow, defines who they are. But subconsciously we do, and then spend the rest of the time fighting those opinions.

    It could turn out our gentleman above is a professional footballer with a £200,000 a week salary or heir to a family fortune.

    But when it comes to the image of a business you really cannot get away with such a lack of care and attention. For as we judge individuals by their ‘cover’, so too do we judge companies. And when we judge them we are much less forgiving. How many times have you searched online for a product or service, selected the first link and arrived on a website that looked like it was created in Word? Or one with a confusing page layout and unclear descriptions? Your reaction? Close the page and try the second link in your search.

    Cover: judged.

    The value of spending due care and attention on your businesses look is, alas, an unquantifiable one. For no two logos should be alike. What works for one business will not work for another, and so on. But the UK Design Council estimates through its research that businesses who invest in design get a 15% return on their investment and that 50% of businesses make their investment back within a year.

    When every customer is judging your book by it’s cover, can you afford to cut corners? It could very well be the difference between growth and stagnation.

  • Seasonal mailings for PhotoBox

    We’re delighted to announce that we will be designing and producing some seasonal direct mail pieces for the excellent London-based PhotoBox to celebrate their amazing products that bring your photos to life; from their most basic digital prints to some brilliant canvas art prints and iPhone, iPad and Galaxy covers.

    They’re timed to go out in the post to coincide with PhotoBox’s first ever TV advert in mid-November (in the UK) and we’ll be following that up with a Radio Times promotion too (that we’re also designing).

    We can’t wait to let you see the work and will pop it on the site ASAP.

  • My Life through Colin and other stories

    My Life through Colin and other stories

    02-Colin-and-other-stories-WEBWe’re delighted to reveal our second book jacket design for Kenneth Paul Stephen’s second book, My Life through Colin, part of his Forgotten Scotland Mini-reads.

    This book is part of, what we understand to be, a trilogy of books that explores the unseen Scotland of real people.

    You can buy a copy from Amazon here for 80p.

  • Anna’s story for Nucleus

    Anna’s story for Nucleus

    Our wonderful client Nucleus tasked us with producing a series of animations to support the launch of their new pricing structure.

    Using our illustrated characters we created 3 unique and informative animations that demonstrate to financial advisers how clear and simple their new pricing would be when set in a real-world story.

    http://youtu.be/vPlsfyoctGs?list=UUcoMisXTZzkZ2vna55b4wtw

  • Book covers

    Book covers

    Sheep-and-other-stories-WEBDoing a book cover design must be easy. Dead easy-peasy lemon squeazy. After all, if it was hard only professional designers would do it. As such isn’t it great that designing your own book cover is a task open to all.

    Or is it?

    We were recently asked to produce an eye catching book cover for Kenneth P Stephens collection of short stories set in the undiscovered parts of Scotland. So what else could we do than start researching book cover design in the post-print world.

    We were amazed, astounded and apoplexy that so many authors are choosing to cut corners on their cover designs. All that hard work, slogging away at their laptops producing wonderfully crafted word smithery and then they wrap it up in something that they bash out in MS Paint in the final evening before the deadline.

    We couldn’t let Kenny suffer that fate so we snuggled down with a decent malt, fired up the iPad, devoured his prose and set to work the following day. The result is above.

    We’re looking forward to the arrival of his second collection of short stories and will serve up the creative solution here when it’s published.

  • Searching for a business development director

    Graphic Clinic is now nearly 9 and in that time we’ve produced some great work for some great clients. Now is the time to grow and as such we have a great opportunity for the right person.

    You will be a motivated self-sufficient and experienced business development director with a minimum 5 years experience in the creative industries, preferably in the brand and/or digital sector, with a proven track record. You will be responsible for finding new leads, securing new business, generating presentation documents (in partnership with the Creative Director), delivering presentations and driving the company forward across the various channels in which Graphic Clinic operates.

    Salary commensurate with experience, with share options and bonuses based on performance for the right individual.

    Initally a part-time position it will grow into a full-time position over time and in line with growth.

    Please send your CV, salary expectations, a wish-list of your top ten ideal clients and a brief paragraph on why you think you should get the job to Brian.

    NOTE: This position has been filled.