Where we left off

What are we doing?

• Helping women get a career in IT/STEM
• Showing women the value of such a career
• Promoting IT/STEM through events, scholarships, etc.

What currently exists?

• Core team of volunteers
• Organization website
• Ambition to build a strong brand message

What am I here for?

• Define a clear brand message
• Create a brand identity to speak to that message
• Give an example of that brand in application

Well then. Let's get started, shall we?

Exploring your idea

You suggested using...

• An owl ('wise' character)
• with pink glasses
• Incorporated into the logo

Ta-da!

But seriously...

• WiSE acronym is not the focus, what it stands for is
• If using a character, it must visually tie in to IT/STEM
• We should avoid associations with imagery that de-values or negatively depicts women as objects

What Women Want

9 brands women love

Finding similarities

• Wordmark conveys power, demands attention by being so simply, elegantly designed

• Thin sans-serif typefaces

• Icon, if any, appears centered above wordmark

Why do this research?

• Find brands that women identify with
• Use design elements to capture attention
• Create overlap between WiSE and pop-culture

What's in a logo?

3 main types

• Great for businesses with short names

• Great for businesses with long names or visual names

• Best examples require strong sense of design and balance to become timeless

What's best for WiSE?

• Definitely a wordmark, given our short name
• Perhaps a combination if the right icon can be used
• Any visual cue must refer to IT/STEM and the idea of advancement for women in technology, software, engineering fields

Challenge accepted.

Exploring symbols

Common IT/STEM symbols

*

/

<>

+

()

#

@

Asterisk/star - wildcard in programming

slash (forward) - system filepath indicator

brackets - commonly used in web languages

plus - general mathematical symbol

parentheses - programming/math symbol

octothorpe/hash/pound - ID, hashtag

at - twitter handle, email addresses

*   /   <>   +   ()   #   @

Narrowing our options

[Press down to proceed]

*

• Asterisk, star, splat
• Symbol used in nearly all STEM/IT fields
• Used as a wildcard character or to denote pointers, repetition or multiplication in computer science

/

• Slash, forward-slash
• Symbol used in nearly all STEM/IT fields
• Used as a path operator in networking, many use cases in programming, mathematics and computer science

Both are great. Can we use them both?

* + / =

By golly, that's it!

What's 'it'?

• We used relevant universally-recognized symbols to re-create an important part of the WiSE acronym
• It is unique enough to be instantly recognized
• But subtle enough to not detract from the overall name

Ready to see the new logo?

Why it works

• Clearly states our organization's name in a professional visual form
• Written in thin, sans-serif, similar to popular female brands
• i is a slash, denoting classification of women into a specific IT/STEM group
• Star is perfectly centered over the wordmark, creating inherent balance
• Overall logo conveys a smart, powerful, confident female presence

We're just getting started!

A bold splash of color

Color and women

https://blog.kissmetrics.com/gender-and-color/

Some interesting statistics

Summary

• Women like purple, blue, green
• Women hate orange, brown
• Women devalue orange, yellow

Drum roll please...

In summary

The logo is a true mark to symbolize both groups:

• Strong, powerful woman currently working towards a fulfilling career in IT/STEM and passionate about encouraging others to follow her
• Young women looking for female mentors to help guide them to a successful career path, hopefully in the challenging but rewarding field of information technology, science or engineering

Where are we now?

• We have a logo
• We need somewhere to put it and build awareness
• We would like a fun character to be part of our logo that creates an emotional connection with women
• We need to create a campaign with a central theme and compelling visual that ties to our new logo and ultimately embodies our organization's message 

Meet Star

Star on clothes

Here star is stitched into a WiSE shirt as a powerful and proud mark of a woman's IT/STEM career.

Star on totes

Star on earbuds

Star on USB

Star on phone cases

Star in app

Here, star is featured on yet-to-exist but totally viable WiSE app.

Note how the purple background makes Star really pop.

The ad campaign

Brief

Build awareness of our mission to help advance women in IT, science and engineering with a city-wide poster campaign featuring a bold visual message that is easily relatable to our audience and encourages action to learn more about how to get started.

Message

Giving girls more power to speak up in IT

The artwork

Explanation

Each poster features common mobile technology symbols. However, instead of containing the traditional number of 'bars' or 'notches' to indicate power, those elements appear to go on ad infinitum, thereby amplifying the message of giving girls 'more power' to speak up in IT.

Color gradation is used to symbolize that the more powerful you get, the closer you come to being 'WiSE' and having your voice heard.

Lock-up with IT-ology

Why it is successful

• Letterforms from both logos are similar in weight
• The uniqueness of WiSE logo adds to (and in no way conflicts with) that of IT-ology logo
• Colors contrast each other well and create a strong visual relationship

Something to leave behind at events

Remember...

I'd like your feedback

• Does this brand identity properly reflect the message and core values of WiSE and those involved?
• Given what you just saw, are you confident these brand elements will provide a strong foundation from which to launch a bold educational platform for WiSE?
• Are there any specific items or graphical elements you have strong business-related objectives towards?

Thank you

One last thing...