The New Jersey YMCA State Alliance was looking to revamp their annual Culture of Health Conference. Having worked with them for several years on various design and marketing needs, they reached out to me to create a brand new brand identity and all of their marketing design needs for their Culture of Health Conference for 2024, in its 11th year.
- Julia Wieczorek - New Jersey YMCA State Alliance (Hamilton, New Jersey)
The team at New Jersey YMCA State Alliance had great ideas coming into our initial meeting for their Culture of Health Conference revamp. For their 11th year, they were holding their conference in Long Branch, New Jersey, right on the Jersey Shore. They wanted to work in several elements, such as the blues and greens from the current Y USA branding to help keep with a nautical feel, sea/ocean vibes (potentially using seafoam green colors), the state of New Jersey, and some sort of compass or navigational icons or elements to tie in their theme "Navigating Systems for Deepening Community Impact."
Taking all of those elements they wanted, I got to work figuring out a way to encompass (pun intended) all of what they were looking for in a logo and make it the new face of their Culture of Health Conference. I worked on various ways to turn the state of New Jersey into a compass along with using the blue/green Y USA color scheme. The result were these two logo options, both of which keep with the nautical/ocean vibes while tying in New Jersey and navigation.
After sending them the initial two concepts (above), they immediately replied, telling me I nailed their vision in their logo. They chose to go with the first concept with minor edits. We moved the tagline below the conference name for better visibility, and adjusted the arrow inside of the compass to point to Long Branch, New Jersey, where they were having their conference. They also wanted to keep with the blue and green color schemed but requested some gold be used throughout the branding as well. I also worked on a more "compact" version of the logo to work in tight spaces or in space where the longer, more horizontal logo wouldn't work or would reduce legibility.
With the logo squared away, it was time to produce a wide variety of materials for their conference, from their sponsorship prospectus, to social media postings, to signage.
For their conference, the first introduction of the conference is often to prospective sponsors to help get the conference going. We completely revamped their Sponsorship Prospectus and I fleshed out more of the design elements for the new 11th Annual Culture of Health Conference brand. I found photos of true Jersey Shore spots to feature throughout the branding, along with pulling out the compass element from the logo and placing it throughout various parts of the branding as its own standalone item. To drive (another pun intended) the point home, I masked photos of the Jersey Shore with a vector outline of the Jersey Shore as a visual element for photos throughout the branding.
The Sponsorship Prospectus introduced the brand for the new conference branding and set the stage for all of their marketing design work they would need. You can see the entire Sponsorship Prospectus here.
While the Sponsorship Prospectus was sent out to prospective sponsors and introducing the conference and its new branding to them, I got to work creating a series of graphics for various needs using the new brand identity to introduce the branding and conference to potential attendees with graphics needed for announcements, save the dates, and registrations.
In the image you can see the various ways in which the new conference branding was used to create social media graphics, email banners and signatures, and digital invites.
Another bulk of branding work came with announcing the speakers and their sessions as a way to encourage sponsorships and registrations for the conference. The branding followed the same aesthetics as other designs including using the Jersey Shore coastline with imagery of the Jersey Shore, touches of gold, and integrating other elements such as speaker photos and sponsor logos.
We used the speaker announcement graphics for email newsletters and social media, while the speaker graphics were used for social media to promote the individual keynote speakers, speakers, moderators, and panelists.
With the day of the conference quickly approaching, I designed a series of signage and other printed materials that they would need at their conference.
Everything from their registration signage, agenda signage and banner, sponsorship signage and banner, podium signage, session signage, outdoor signage, even their name badges all needed to be designed to provide a cohesive look throughout the conference.
This is a sampling of the signage that was produced for their conference, often printed posters on foamcore or vinyl banners.
To wrap up the conference branding project, I worked on their on-screen presentation graphics that they would use on a large screen on stage to guide the conference and be a visual point-of-reference to keep the agenda moving along.
This is a collection of various screens that were designed for their presentation, all of which continue with the extensive branding that this conference had.
Overall, their conference was a success, not only due to their exquisite planning of every detail, but with a solid conference brand identity, logo, and marketing collateral that helped them introduce, promote, and execute another successful conference!
