Visual identity

Laying strong foundations – The logo, brand guidelines,
photography style and website.

The logo

The first focus in my role within SSAFA was to tweak the existing logo so it would be clearer for people to understand what SSAFA does. The abbreviation of SSAFA needed to remain and so did the main logo type. A tricky assignment that was solved by removing the existing strap line and replacing it with a new descriptor ‘the Armed Forces charity’. This statement clearly describes what type of organisation SSAFA are and the cohort of people they support. The ‘Armed Forces’ is bolded to further emphasis this point and a colour bar represents the three Armed Forces – Navy blue: The Royal Navy, Red: The British Army, Blue: Royal Air Force.

Brand guidelines

A new set of visual guidelines were created to give in-house staff, agencies and freelancers a design platform to adhere to. These guidelines ensure all of SSAFA’s creative work remains consistent, authoritative and confident. A new headline style was developed with a key-line around the copy with a line directing towards the logo in the bottom – the idea behind this device was that no matter what situation you find yourself in you can turn to SSAFA for help.

A new secondary colour palette was developed to allow greater flexibility for design and creative with different colour representing different services and functions SSAFA provides.

Photography

SSAFA is a people charity, so photography has played a huge part in the way I have developed the brand identity. People are used as much as possible in the images. They bring warmth and emotion to the brand.

To make sure all the communications are varied and interesting, I chose five possible image styles to choose from; Editorial, still life, portraits, fundraising and epic.

The website

I worked closely with the internal digital team and an external agency to develop the new website for SSAFA. Advising on design and brand decisions as well image selection throughout the site. The final result has seen bounce rates decrease significantly against the old site and improved the overall user journey allowing visitors to find what they need quicker and easier. 

ssafa.org.uk

Raising awareness

Increasing SSAFA’s profile with engaging content. 

Forcesline campaign

Forcesline, is a free and confidential telephone helpline and email service that provides support for serving (regulars and reserves), ex-Forces and their families. It is a vital service which continually needs raise awareness within military publications and across all of SSAFA’s digital platforms.

Above shows examples of a printed press advert created during the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic, a digital motion ad, and a carousel advert for Facebook. The concept gently asks a common question to the viewer about subjects based upon the main issues raised by people who contact Forcesline; debt, addiction, and family separation. The aim of the ad campaign was to encourage people that are struggling to pick up the phone or email Forcesline and get the help they require. This has been achieved perfectly with the considerate copy lines and use of bold main headlines which pop against the contrasting greyscale photography.

Volunteer recruitment campaign

With ever increasing demand for support from veterans within local communities SSAFA needs to be able to keep up with this demand by recruiting more volunteers to deliver services to veterans in need,

A targeted marketing campaign was needed to persuade people with extra time on their hands to help SSAFA deliver support on ground within their local area. The campaign idea was to show current volunteers doing great work and highlight how they use their time to make a difference.

I used a graphical reference of a clock to anchor the idea around with copy lines moving around it for the paid Facebook advertising (Top left). Adverts were also placed in local publications. The overall launch of the campaign was via SSAFA Instagram account with a grid takeover (top right).

Armed Forces Week

Each year the Armed Forces is celebrated throughout the country providing a great opportunity for SSAFA to communicate to a wider audience on a national stage. For the last two years I have been asked to great the creative direction for the campaigns. This involved designing large 48 posters to social media event graphics and everything in between. I used this as an opportunity to show flexibility within the visual identity guidelines to push the boundaries with the direction without taking the ideas too far ‘off brand’.