I will walk around and speak to students and assist.
Make sure to upload it tothis link on MyKangan before the class is over. Upload complete and incomplete works. You can always add to it and re-upload your work.
Listening to your customers is an integral aspect of customer service. Image: Federico Viola
To be able to provide good customer service you need to know what the needs of your customers are.
This ability to understand is central to customer service and shows how customer service should commence with and ear rather than a mouth. Listen to your customers!So, let us have a look at customers.
Customers
Industries vary in customers and customer interaction. Some industries can be quite casual and friendly while other industries may have a more professional or even reserved level of contact. Your local hairdresser or many cafes are relaxed in the way they interact with clients.
Below is a list of customer groups. Try to relate these groups to multimedia design. So, brainstorm what these clients may be for a multimedia designer. I will post the brainstorm from class.
Clients
‘Purchasers of services’
Suppliers of goods and services
Contractors providing goods and services
Members of the general public who make contact with the organisation, such as prospective purchasers of services
Potential funding bodies
Co‑workers, peers and fellow frontline managers
Board members
Supervisors
Customer Needs
Let us look at customer needs. Customer needs can be looked at in a context. They may be related to:
Accuracy of information
Advice or general information
Complaints
Fairness/politeness
Further information
Making an appointment
Prices/value
Purchasing organisation’s products and services
Returning organisation’s products and services
Specific information.
Write down a context this may happen in, a location or point of contact (online, in a shop in person).
Please create examples of customer needs attached to each. Example: Complaints – A customer wants to be listened to , wants to reach a certain outcome and a customer would like an apology or explanation.
If you look at the diagram above you can see that customer needs can be classified further into value needs, psychological needs and performance needs.
Once you understand the customer needs of your target audience you will be able to respond to these.
Analysing Your Customers
What options do you have as a business owner or service provider to learn about the needs of your target audience? Below are some suggestions on how to receive the information:
customer feedback form
customer satisfaction surveys
quality assurance data
conducting interviews
making recommendations
obtaining management decisions
questioning and asking directly
seeking feedback to confirm understanding
summarising and paraphrasing.
A multimedia business can, as part of their quality control, make a feedback question or survey a recommended procedure for their staff. ‘Before a project is complete you need to ask the client for specific feedback.’
See my comment at the bottom of every post as another example.
Customer Service Standards
A business needs to plan to meet customer requirements. When you have a contract with a client most aspect of customer needs will be specifically stated (eg: ‘design a website that allows sales and promotion of sport equipment… due date:…).
The delivery of products and services needs to be aligned with the business plan of an organisation. You need to clarify what standard of product and service quality you want to reach.
The larger the organisation the harder it is to inform everyone of the customer service standards. A good way to set customer service standards and to make sure everyone in the organisation is well aware of it is to make it part of the culture of the business.
It helps to discuss the customer service standards at every meeting. Posters are another great way to ensure that staff know about them. See example below:
Customer service standards that work – source: WinningCareers.com.au
Assignment
Complete the questions in the attached assignment sheet and create a basic Customer Service Standard list or poster for a café in the CBD or a multimedia business that specialises in Web Design and Instructional Videos, and online resources.
Include 10 points in the poster that that business should focus on. Make it all up!
Let us continue with were we finished off last week: businesses or brands that we associate with excellent or even good customer service and those that we accociate with bad custumer service.
Let us list both groups by everyone in class on the white board.
Found at Inc.com
Customer Service varies from brand to brand and business to business. It can be classified by attitude of a business and its employees as well as their behaviours. The behaviour really consists of what an employee does as well as what they do not do.
Finally, we can look at customer service from the customer’s point of view, the experience and how the customer feels.
We will write down our emotions and associations that we have with the brands. Use the attached document to document the class discussion:
This class will be delivered in 4 hour schedules every Tuesday morning. The content will be posted on MyKangan. Tasks, discussions and research will be conducted inside the 4 hour slot and at home.
You are expected to work towards goals independently and to be able to operate as part of a team. In a work place you will sometimes be lucky to work with people that you easily get along with, but unfortunately you might often have to work with people that you might not easily get along with. A professional looks beyond this and finds ways to function in a professional environment with a range of personalities.
MyKangan
MyKangan is Kangan’s content delivery platform for all classes. You will find all the content on MyKangan and as stated before: you will submit your assessments here. To access MyKangan please open Kangan’s student portal and click on MyKangan. Next find the class by unit title. This can be a bit hard to see, so make sure to know the unit titles.
I will run you through this in person.
This is also where you will submit your assessments. You will find hyperlinks with names such as Submit Assessment 1 here.
You can send messages to your teacher and you can leave comments as well. I am always open to suggestions, so please feel free to forward ideas about content or software that you would like to cover.
Introduction to Units of Competency
This class will focus on these Units of Competency:
Please click on the link to view the Unit of Competency Text. Read through the elements and performance criteria to understand what you need to do to pass this class. The elements and performance criteria basically state all the points that yu need to prove to know.
In-class Task
Answer the 4 questions below and upload to MyKangan. Either complete electronically (eg MS Word) or on paper in form of a mindmap.
Write your definition for customer service, good customer service and bad customer service.
What does customer service mean to you?
How can a business ensure good customer service (as a standard)?
Give examples for brands, business or industries/trades with good customer service and for businesses with bad customer service.
Feedback
Please leave your feedback in form of a comment. Your feedback and suggestions will help me to make this blog more user friendly. Thanks!
Below is an example of the Multimedia Production Cycle:
Multimedia Production Cycle – This image is under the Creative Common Agreement, you can use it but will need to reference this site: www.classoffederico.wordpress.com
Inspirations for Tables of Content
Below are some ideas for a table of content. You can always go for a traditional table of content or do something more exciting.
Make sure that the information is easy to find. A good design is one that is easy to understand. This should not stop you from making it fun though.
Colourful Table of Content – Ribbons in Primary Colours – found at: LifeBlue.comText and Shapes – This design lends itself to an interactive use – found at: Klafferty.comText-based Table of Content – Very Graphic and Black and White- found at: Smashing Magazine (click image for inspiring article on table of content design)Text and Shapes – This design lends itself to an interactive use – found at: Smashing Magazine (click image for inspiring article on table of content design)Table of Content from an old Textbook – This design lends itself to an interactive use, the bird silhouettes could get highlighted when touched – found at: Smashing Magazine (click image for inspiring article on table of content design)Fruity Design – This is great for a menu, very appetizing thumbnails – found at: WeddingPhotography.com.phColours, Numbers and Boxes – very happy and alive, personally I do not like the distortion of the word content – found at: FlickrTypographic with Colours and Photos – The use of large numbers is effective and the low opacity of the boxes works, personally, I find it looks a bit dated- found at: JuxtaPost.com
Feedback
Please leave your feedback in form of a comment. Your feedback and suggestions will help me to make this blog more user friendly. Thanks!
A Clean and Beautiful Layout for a Portfolio by Graphic Designer Derek Chan. Source: Computer Arts Projects- Issue 153, 2011, Design for the Web
Work on Assessment 1
You will work on Assessment 1 in class for the first 2 hours. You should be close to completion and hopefully be able to complete Assessment 1 by the end of class.
Use it to help you create an experience planner for the event PDF that you are creating. This will give you the ability to focus on fixing negative experiences and planning for a positive experience with a product or service.
Inspirations for Layouts
Inspirations for layouts can be found at various places:
Creative Hotlist this site has a large selection of solid design ideas. You will find many design concepts that are inspiring to look at and are complete as a work.
Born Book is a beautiful and inspiring interactive PDF document.
Issuu is a site that allows you to publish your work and you can find a large number of publications there.
Lonny is the website of the Lonny Magazine, a online home decor magazine that highlights inspiring interiors, innovative designers, and the latest things to buy for interiors. Their online interactive magazines are good examples of interactive PDFs and layouts.
Assessment 1 is a planning assessment. Your focus will be on creating an interactive PDF for an event of your choice. Assessment 2 will then focus on the creation of the interactive PDF. We will go through the steps of creating the interactive PDF in the next 2 weeks.
Assessment 1 requires of you to plan an interactive PDF for an event of your choice. Assessment 1 will not require for you to create this interactive PDF, you will just plan for it.
Just to clarify, the idea with this experience planner is to have a more detailed look at the actual experience of a customer or user. This will give you the ability to focus on fixing negative experiences and planning for a positive experience with a product or service.
Discuss Assessment 1
Assessment 1 requires of you to plan an interactive PDF for an event of your choice. Assessment 1 will not require for you to create this interactive PDF, you will just plan for it.
Interactive PDFs and apps are good ways to promote events. We will focus on the creation of an interactive PDF in this class. Events can be promoted with style in this format. It allows for the promotion of the event and sponsors. Links to websites, addresses, phone numbers, embedded videos, there are a lot of options to include hypermedia elements in a PDF.
Film Festivals (MIFF, French Film Festival, German Film Festival, Italian Film Festival, …)
Food Festivals (Melbourne Food and Wine Festival, Festivale, Tasting Australia, Great Barrier Feast, …)
Music Festivals (Stereosonic, Summadayze, Big Day Out, Soundwave, …)
Sport Events (Skateboard Event, Football World Cup 2014 in Brazil, Olympics, Melbourne Cup, …)
Health Events
Holiday Resorts (for tourists)
Fashion Week
Cultural Festival (Phil Fest)
Ideas for the Style, Look and Feel
To set yourself apart from the rest it is important to create work that is visually inspiring and in a style that appeals to the right target audience, but that is also within the spirit of time or contemporary. Be careful not to create the same old and to do something that you were inspired to by a software tutorial. The result would be most likely boring.
Look at contemporary design ideas and influences. Start your search in my links: Links to Inspire You (at the right side of this blog) include links to sites such as:
Other ways to find inspirational designs and contemporary graphics
Look for the works of contemporary graphic artists and designers:
Jamie McKelvie
Jamie has a comic artist and illustrator. His works are interesting plays on figure/ground relationship (or positive and negative space).
If you look at the illustration below, her body is very abstract and basically just made up of a number of diagonal lines. Her shoulder and upper body are shown in shape, but towards the lower end of the shirt the lines are just left unfinished. I find this an interesting treatment and the illustration appeals.
The star in the top right is a cutout of the the diagonal lines, which are already very dynamic. The title has been highly stylised. The texture has an aged, scratched finish and the arrangement of the type is very interesting, it looks like display type used in a shop front.
Illustration: Jamie McKelvie – Suburban Glamour Comic Series
Illustration: Jamie McKelvie – Art Brut Record – Found at McKelvie’s Flickr account (click image)
Children’s Book Illustrations
There are many different styles of children’s book illustrations. One thing they all have in common is their target audience: children. That is what makes them so unique and often you can sense a desire in the illustrator to add a lot of story telling qualities and depth to the characters.
The interesting thing about children’s books as a source of inspiration is that you can search by designer or era.
You might be surprised that iconic graphic designer Saul Bass illustrated a children’s book. ‘Henri’s Walk to Paris’ was published in 1962 and if you look at the pages you will recognise the style of Bass. I strongly believe that children should be exposed to good graphic design ideas. I don’t mean the theory, but the children’s book should be inspiring. Below are some pages from ‘Henri’s Walk to Paris’.
From ‘Henri’s Walk to Paris’ 1962 – children’s book by Saul Bass Found at: Brainpickings.org
From ‘Henri’s Walk to Paris’ 1962 – children’s book by Saul Bass Found at: Brainpickings.org
The Street Art of Jef Aerosol
A Beautiful Piece by Aerosol found on his Facebook
Look at GUI Design Trends:
There is a clear move towards touch interfaces, due to tablets and other mobile trends. This can be seen in the Windows 8 Metro interface and latest trends in the Xbox 360 interface.
Artform that became extremely popular in the early 20th Century. Particularly popular in German Expressionism and Dadaism. Click the images for links to the original images or sites:
Photomontage: Amir Ebrahim Photography
Massive Attack – The Essential Mix
Homework for Assessment 1
Please complete the tasks below for next class:
Pick an Event
Find 10+ images for a style/feel that you like for the interactive PDF
Write down events + locations for the event (relevant to your event)
eg: Skateboard Week
events
shops
cafes
parks
map
Feedback
Please leave your feedback in form of a comment. Your feedback and suggestions will help me to make this blog more user friendly. Thanks!
Sorry, I will not be able to run this class in front of you. I did get very sick late last week and it is still holding on. As a result today’s class will be a pure online class.
Designing a Holistic Customer Experience
Completing last week’s Experience Planner
Design the experience for a product of your choice
Feedback
I WILL POST THIS AT 7:30AM AND POST UPDATES THROUGH THE DAY WITH MORE DETAILED EXPLANATIONS
Designing a Holistic Customer Experience
Let us recapture some of last class:
When we plan for a multimedia production (or any type of production really) we should plan with the customer or user experience in mind. This means that we actually design the playground for the customer experience.
Design the Experience for a Product of Your Choice
Now, try to apply the Experience Planner to a new product.
The new product can be a website: so, imagine a new website. Write down a few facts: name and purpose (be descriptive for the purpose), service/product (what will the user get from it), other aspects.
Apply the experience planner to this website! Give it a fair shot and complete all points! Take your time to do this and do not rush it like a task that is annoying, but savor it like a task that anticipates the pleasures that your future users will have.
Use the same template.
Feedback
Please leave your feedback in form of a comment. Your feedback and suggestions will help me to make this blog more user friendly. Thanks!
Steel Curves, Image: courtesy of flickr.com, photographer: Margeois.
Your Lipstick Needs You, an entertaining take by Digital Media Artist Samantha Cain. Courtesy of: Samantha Cain, http://www.behance.net/samanthacain
The swirls in the image are made up of numerous lines. Courtesy of: www.openprocessing.org
From ‘Henri’s Walk to Paris’ 1962 – children’s book by Saul Bass Found at: Brainpickings.org
Photo by omdur on morgueFile
Based on a photo by delboysafa from morgueFile.com
Swiss travel poster from 1934 by Herbert Matter – Source: http://swisstype.wordpress.com/work/
Swiss International Style – Joseph Müller-Brockmann – Beethoven – found at www.designhistory.com
The concept was used on the German side as well with this ‘Auch du sollst beitreten zur Reichswehr’ [You too should join the German Army], design by Julius Engelhard, Image: courtesy of mental_floss
Using the Reflect tool (o) to reflect the i downwards as if it has collapsed in front.
Image source: Data Center Knowledge
Based on photo by hotblack from morgueFile.com
The grass layer has been turned into a clipping mask with the shape of the rabbit below.
Outlined text changed in size and colours dropped into the individual letters with Eyedropper tool using LMB + Alt
Work by Justin Anderson
Peace- Swiss International Style Reference – by Maryam Chananeh
Based on image by hotblack on morgueFile.com – F.Viola
Free Transform and Ctrl – I am loving it!!!
The gentle curve of the river and the light green tones of the grass give this image a calming feel. The montains and the clouds have a less calming effect. Image: courtesy of Icon Photography School – http://www.photographyicon.com/line/
Britons, Lord Kitchener Wants You! Propaganda poster design from WWI by Alfred Leere. Image: courtesy of WorldWarEra.com
Photo by Seemann on morgueFile.com
Screenshot from What’s Your Story by Joyce Hostyn
Text-based Table of Content – Very Graphic and Black and White- found at: Smashing Magazine (click image for inspiring article on table of content design)
Some of us have there most enjoyable moments in nature at the beach, Photo by rivediamoci on morgueFiles
Found at Inc.com
Photo by mconnors on morgueFile
From ‘Henri’s Walk to Paris’ 1962 – children’s book by Saul Bass Found at: Brainpickings.org
Grassy Rabbits
Photo by mcconnors on morgueFile
Photo by dharder on morgueFiles.com
Custom Shapes and Custom Shape Icon
Work by Egon Schiele, found at Mom.org
This is a template for a business website found at TemplateMonster. It is interesting in the sense that it breaks up the main image as part of the navigation. The sound it comes with is annoying.
“Step into my office” Source: The Age, click image for link
A Beautiful Piece by Aerosol found on his Facebook
Michael Pointing in GTA V – Courtesy of Rockstar
What Time is it Now? by King_Bobbles
Illustration: Jamie McKelvie – Suburban Glamour Comic Series
Geese in Ameland, Photo by Frans Schouwenburg
Illustration by Tavis Coburn found on DzineBlog.com
Photomontage: Amir Ebrahim Photography
Colourful Table of Content – Ribbons in Primary Colours – found at: LifeBlue.com
Typographic with Colours and Photos – The use of large numbers is effective and the low opacity of the boxes works, personally, I find it looks a bit dated- found at: JuxtaPost.com
Light Streaks – Courtesy of: PhotoshopEssentials
Vista Lighting Effect – Courtesy of: Tutorial9
Screenshot – 82 Everyone is a Marketer by Seth Godin from What’s Your Story by Joyce Hostyn
Image from morgueFile by lemai13
Contemporary design in style of Construcitvism by Teo Brito found at LauraGreen92 – click image for more information and link to her blog
Table of Content from Textbook – This design lends itself to an interactive use – found at: Smashing Magazine (click image for inspiring article on table of content design)
Study – Lines and Grace Kelly – by Federico Viola photo: courtesy of GettingCheeky.com and curved lines wallpaper: courtesy of FreeFever.com
Setting the grid up.
Good Morning! Photo: wallyir, from: morgueFile.com
Photo by matthewbridges on morgueFile.com
Poppies – Vector art Federico Viola based on photo by hotblack from morgueFile
Layers in Photoshop are like a Collage of images stuck on top of each other…
Photo Montage by SGlider12 on Webdesign.org – Click image for great Gimp tutorial
ruthworkx -http://ruthworkx.files.wordpress.com
The underlined text and insertion point at end of the word indicates that you are still in the type mode.
Milk Poster – Swiss International Style Reference – by Annabel Stephen Salip
Photo by ariadna on morgueFile
The Face by drfranken found on ChromoArt.de
Uncle Sam Wants You, WWI Propaganda Poster for US Army recruits, Design by James Montgomery Flagg, 1916, image found at: Live Auctioneers
Jenga, photo courtesy of: Design-Crit.com
Concept for Gallery Screnshot
Examples of Output and Display for web-content. Image: live.surveyshack.com
Multimedia Production Cycle – This image is under the Creative Common Agreement, you can use it but will need to reference this site: www.classoffederico.wordpress.com
The Glossy Reflection is transparent on top and gets whiter towards the bottom.
Photo by hotblack on morgueFile.com
He loves OHS! – Photo by Karpati Gabor on morgueFile
I Want You – Emily Strange, The lovable Emily Strange came to life in 1991, designed by Nathan Carrico for Santa Cruz Skateboards. She is referred to as a counterculture icon. I would just call her a sceptic. Image found at: Kollectable Kaos
Courtesy of The Art of Mass Effect Universe’, 2012
Illustration by Gary Neill found on Dzineblog.com – http://garyneill.com/ http://garyneill.tumblr.com/
Constructivism Reference – by Lylah Livingston
Source: morgueFile, Photo by matei
Illustration by Kate Miller, found on DzineBlog.com
Colours, Numbers and Boxes – very happy and alive, personally I do not like the distortion of the word content – found at: Flickr
Study – Lines and Grace Kelly – by Federico Viola photo: courtesy of GettingCheeky.com and curved lines wallpaper: courtesy of FreeFever.com
Example of applied changes
Illustration by Jessie Ford, found on DzineBlog.com
Based on photo by dhester from morgueFile.com
Couple found at http://frenchbydesign.blogspot.com.au
Pink Ribbon Day – Swiss International Style Reference – by Hwan Rochanabuddhi
Photo by DTL on morgueFiles
Illustrator unknown – found at: Ephemera – World of Rare Books
Illustration: Jamie McKelvie – Art Brut Record
Text and Shapes – This design lends itself to an interactive use – found at: Klafferty.com
Text and Shapes – This design lends itself to an interactive use – found at: Smashing Magazine (click image for inspiring article on table of content design)
![The concept was used on the German side as well with this 'Auch du sollst beitreten zur Reichswehr' [You too should join the German Army], design by Julius Engelhard, Image: courtesy of mental_floss](https://classoffederico.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/world-war-propaganda_auch-du-sollst-beitreten.jpg?w=225&h=287 "world war propaganda_Auch du sollst beitreten")
