Mokokoma Mokhonoana || Graphic designer » Personal

How great use of psychology in design tripled my intended donation

Mokokoma Mokhonoana — Sun, 31 May 2009 14:30:43 +0000

First things first, apologies for the “could-have-been-better” quality of the photographs in this post. My camera decided to “call it a life”, so until I replace it my PDA will play the role of a photographer’s main tool-of-trade.

I always try my level best to dedicate most part (if all is impossible) of my Fridays’ “working hours” to self-improvement, so I went to Exclusive Books on Friday morning, and I sort of ended up using a huge chunk of money reserved for my groceries on books.

Worry not, I’ll survive — starvation is temporary, but knowledge isn’t.

Back to the real reason for writing this post.

One of the books that I bought is Made to stick by brothers, Chip and Dan Heath. I only read about ten pages thus far but I’m already confident this will be one of the purchases I’ll forever be thankful I made.

After paying for the books, I went to the graphic design books shelve. While browsing through design books that caught my eye, this young lady, 16 years of age I assume, walked towards me. I then took a step backwards just so there’s enough space for her to pass, but she didn’t.

She stopped in front of me and then waved at me with a smile. While I, at the back of my mind, was wondering “Er, what the hell did I do to get such a warm smile from a stranger?”

Before I could think of any possible answers she handed me a card, the blue card in the picture above.

It turned out she was deaf. The card she gave me read:

“Smile! Try and speak to the deaf people by sign language”

The card then had Alphabetical deaf sign language with an illustration of how to say “thank you” in sign language.

Now enter, the moment that I applaud.

Again, at the back of my mind, I was trying to recall if I had any coins in my pocket which was unlikely because I hate coins. I think their value fails to justify their weight, but I did.

Just before I was about to literally dig deep into my pockets, my eyes got stuck on the part below:

I think this card posses some excellent employment of usability, authority, and psychology. There’s a lot to learn from this, and the lesson can be applied almost anywhere. Ideas, business, website design, user-interface design, graphic design, user experience, to name just a few.

Honestly, I was thinking of giving the young lady around R3.00, which is what the coins I had totaled.

But the bottom part of the card suggested the amount of my donation, it sort of (without using ‘force’) gave me a minimum to donate, well at least what the organization would appreciate. Add to that, the sympathy that “naturally” accompanied the situation.

After those two seconds, reaching for the few coins I had was “out of the question” — I ended “coughing up” R10.00.

What myth is common in the areas I’ve listed as areas which this lesson could be applied?

More options equals a happier consumer or user.

You have to let consumers decide on everything, as to what they want or need.

The first myth, actually causes more confusion than action. While, the second also causes a bit of confusion.

I would love to quote Steve Jobs to touch on the two fallacies:

“It’s really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them.”
— Steve Jobs

“You can’t just ask customers what they want and then try to give that to them. By the time you get it built, they’ll want something new.”
— Steve Jobs

The purpose of this post was not for me to rant and rave over money that I donated, it was to illustrate a real-life situation where clever usage of psychology and sometimes taking authority can make a design or product sell better.

If you play your cards right consumers might actually spend way more than you actually hoped for.

Related Writings:

18 inspirational quotes for fellow freelancers

Mokokoma Mokhonoana — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 09:07:49 +0000

We all know how challenging being self-employed can be, there is a time where you experience a period of very few to no billable projects. This often leads to most people questioning their decision to work for themselves and some even consider calling it quits, I’ve collected quotes that will help you keep your focus on the ‘price’ and fight one more round when things gets a bit tough!

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As you make your way through life, let this ever be your goal, keep your eye upon the doughnut and not upon the hole.

Unknown author

~•~

The greater the difficulty the more glory in surmounting it. Skillful pilots gain their reputation from storms and tempests.

Epictetus

~•~

I do not think there is any other quality so essential to success of any kind as the quality of perseverance. It overcomes almost everything, even nature.

John D. Rockefeller

~•~

There is no elevator to success. You have to take the stairs.

Unknown author

~•~

Be not afraid of growing slowly, be afraid only of standing still.

Chinese proverb

~•~

Effort only fully releases its reward after a person refuses to quit.

Napoleon Hill

~•~

Never, never, never, never give up.

Winston Churchill

~•~

History has demonstrated that the most notable winners usually encountered heartbreaking obstacles before they triumphed. They won because they refused to become discouraged by their defeats.

B. C. Forbes

~•~

Smooth seas do not make skillful sailors.

African Proverb

~•~

Your biggest break can come from never quitting. Being at the right place at the right time can only happen when you keep moving toward the next opportunity.

Arthur Pine

~•~

Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.

Thomas A. Edison

~•~

Perseverance is the hard work you do after you get tired of doing the hard work you already did.

Newt Gingrich

~•~

A hero is one who knows how to hang on one minute longer.

Norwegian proverb

~•~

There are no shortcuts to any place worth going.

Unknown author

~•~

Once you learn to quit, it becomes a habit.

Vincent Lombardi

~•~

Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.

Thomas Edison

~•~

When you get in a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hold on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.

Harriet Beecher Stowe

~•~

Quitting is only a short cut to losing.

Unknown author

~•~

Credit: photograph

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Letters are not just pretty faces, at times they can be such characters.

Mokokoma Mokhonoana — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 22:47:46 +0000

A while back, about 8 months or so I published a post on Forum of Black Journalists which was part of my personal project, words theater. After contemplating on the direction and future of the project, I decided to have a website solely dedicated to the project. I’m glad to announce that the website just went through the phase of existence, the launch.

This obviously means that the project will no longer be part of this website like it used to be.

From now on the project can be viewed at wordstheater.com, please refer to the about page on the website for a background and more information on the project.

Like all web environments, wordstheater will need time to be grown. This launch is just the birth, a lot of work will still go into growing the project.

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Interview by Neo Dhlamini

Mokokoma Mokhonoana — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 12:31:42 +0000

I was recently approached by Neo Dhlamini, a graphic design student at Inscape Design College to be interviewed as part of his college assignment. Students were required to choose a professional South African graphic designer of their choice and ask them a few questions. And the interview went as follows:

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1. What process do you follow when you have a new project like creating a new corporate identity?

• I first meet (or communicate) with the client to give them an opportunity to present their company, background, products or services, competitors, the current and preferred image that their clients has about their company etc.

• I then research the client’s industry and see how their competitors present their brands. This helps in knowing the client more and it avoids me designing an identity that looks similar to my client’s competitors, which will be unprofessional as the aim is to differentiate client’s brand A from Brand B, C, D, E an so forth.

• I then decide on the style of an identity I will go with, after that I start brainstorming: sketching and playing around with ideas, at the end of this phase I choose the idea or solution that answers the client’s brief the best.

• The next step is simply to transform the logo I chose in to a digital format: i.e redraw the logo in a vector based design application, I prefer Adobe illustrator.

• After converting into a digital format, I then apply the logo to a business card and letterhead to give the client an idea of how the logo will look when applied to stationery.

• I then take my proposed design solution, and present it to the client. This includes taking the client through my creative rationale behind the design I would be proposing.

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2. How do you know whether your work is good, how do you set standards for yourself and how do you know that you have met the client’s requirements and expectations?

The first thing I always remind myself is that it’s not about me, I compare myself to a doctor, you only do what is required and best to ensure that you meet the patient’s brief, to heal them. As a doctor you might have years of experience in doing brain surgery successfully but if your patient’s challenge only requires painkillers to solve, then offer exactly that. Don’t operate simply because you can.

I don’t really set standards, I simply answer brief then my job is done. I only present ideas that answers the brief and I always make the clients expectations or requirements part of my brainstorming so I don’t go over or below my limitations [design brief].

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3. What do you consider to be great design – examples of good design?

Any design that is more of a communicating tool and less of a decoration. Looks are also important as they help in attracting attention, but the message of the design is the most important. But one can only know the real brilliance of a design after they’ve went through the brief that led to the design, because you get to learn the constraints and limitations that the designer faced.

Favourite designs: Apple logo, Woolworths‘ packaging for their products. And my recent would be logos for Black On Black and Zonkizizwe Investments.

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4. Identity leaves footprints in all spheres of life. Do you think that your identity becomes part of the projects you work on, in what aspects of the projects is it evident?

To some extend yes, but I think it’s more of “projects that I work on become part of my identity, more than me being part of their identity”. Offering clients excellent designs is the best form of effective advertising a designer can ever dream of, as it leads to more referrals at no cost to the designer. All the designer has to do, is do what they are hired to do – offer excellent design solutions.

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5. “and I’m not a racist, I’m just a visual poet at work ” what do you mean by that and do you think it is essential for a graphic designer to be aware of what is happening in their surroundings?

I knew that most people would perceive that design as me showing support to what happened at the Forum of Black Journalists meeting, which was definitely not my intention.

I think it’s a must for designers to be aware of their surroundings as it will help their work to be relevant, plus as a designer you get to learn about the different parts of the world, their culture and history which definitely affects your designs: For example white is a colour of angels, peace and brides to western people but a colour for funerals to Eastern people.

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6. How would you describe the characteristics of a good designer?

A communicator not a decorator. It’s about nothing but the client’s design challenge not the different photoshop effects you know!

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7. How do you conceptualize?

I play around different ideas by sketching them on my visual diary, [there's no such thing as a stupid idea, there's just ideas that answers the brief and ideas that doesn't so whatever comes to mind I pen it down on paper]. I then choose ideas that fit the brief best.

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8. Do you take design as career path or as something that is part of you?

It’s definitely something that’s part of me; luckily I’m able to make a living out of it.

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9. Who are your favourite designers and how much have they influenced you?

It has to be Paul Rand and Ji Lee, 2 of the designers I think are/were excellent as a visual communicators. With their work aesthetics always follows communication NOT the other way around. Ji Lee has a project named “word as an image” which influenced me in establishing Words Theater.

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10. What do think of the South African design industry in comparison with places like U.S.A.?

I think design or visual communication is a universal language. Take a look at the 2 icons (man and woman) used on toilets for example; it communicates the same message wether you in Nigeria, America, India or Hong Kong. Though, restriction because of geography, culture and religion sometimes apply depending on the location of targeted audience.

Related Writings:

Skout, for the love of designers

Mokokoma Mokhonoana — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:34:54 +0000

After long hours of labour, litres of caffeine and almost all my bandwidth I just jumped the first hurdle, the launch of Skout™.

Skout™ is a bookmark sharing platform with design resources for designers by designers.

Everybody is free to submit their sites to share with everybody.

Skout™ aims at becoming a one stop resources shop with links of great resources on just one page, all listed for free.

Skout™’s mandate is to list quality design resources from all over the world, and I aim at promoting quality resources from designers in Africa wherever applicable.

Listings are not limited to African design resources websites only but part of this project would be only be a success, as more and more sites from Africa get listed and promoted as Skout™ grows.

I was able to gather just over 250 sites over the past 9 months and I hope the number will grow as we all share our list of design resources.

You can share your sites by emailing the urls to: share[at]skout.co.za

Related Writings:

How I kicked whites out of the Forum of Black Journalists without saying a word!

Mokokoma Mokhonoana — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 13:37:21 +0000

…And I’m not racist. I’m just a visual poet at work!

There is currently a huge debate in the country on whether South Africans should condone how Forum of Black Journalists “kicked-out” their white colleagues at the forum’s function attended by The President of the ANC two weeks or so back.

I played with letters of the name Forum of Black Journalists on my personal project words theater, where I try to use nothing but the letters or words themselves to convey their meaning and intended effect.

I removed all white(s) from the name Forum of Black Journalists – letters: O, B, A. The end result is the Forum of Black Journalists with no white(s).

The only white (colour) serves as negative space, and I used it to represent whites (in the industry) surrounding the forum but with the white(s) not being part of the Black Journalists Forum.

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The above is just me playing around with the 23 letters and one of our country’s current racial debate. I however don’t aim at condoning any exclusion of particular group based on their skin colour.

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!ke e: Ixarra IIke

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Related Writings:

Letters are not just pretty faces, at times they can be such characters.