Emily Zink - Helping Link

Helping Link is a nonprofit organization located in Seattle's International District that supports the Vietnamese-American community by providing classes in language, technology, and citizenship.

Project Overview

The Brief:

To promote the Helping Link brand through the creation of digital and physical marketing pieces.

What I Did:

As one of three graphic designers on the project, I:

• Worked independently on marketing projects (posters, displays, digital banners) and iterated with one-on-one feedback from Helping Link's director.
• Worked closely alongside my fellow designers to divide up work, provide feedback, and complete large tasks together (event materials, newsletters, website updates).
• Worked with my other fellow volunteers to bring events to life – event planning, fundraising, class preparation.

Key Tools and Deliverables:

• Used Adobe Photoshop to create website mockups, banners, and displays.
• Used Adobe Illustrator to craft a new logo and branding guide for the 25th Anniversary Celebration.
• Used Adobe InDesign to design quarterly newsletters.
• Used Adobe After Effects to create animated ads.
• Used HTML/CSS/Javascript to update/maintain Helping Link's website.

Results and Business Impact:

• Increased volunteer, student, and sponsor participation.
• Streamlined graphic design processes and documentation.

Helping Link Branding Package

Part 1 - Website

My first task after joining Helping Link was to redesign the website. I spent a lot of time initially immersing myself in everything our volunteers/students did day to day and learning about Vietnamese culture. I wanted to make sure that whatever I created would accurately represent the mission and feel of Helping Link. I then started laying out the new design, making sure to highlight key features that were hard to find on our current site based on student/sponsor feedback, such as how to donate, where to read our quarterly newsletter, and how to find Helping Link. The design went through a few iterations based on feedback from the web team and Helping Link's director. We spent a lot of time refining the color palette (as shown above), which I would then go on to use in other marketing pieces in the future.

During the website redesign, I also helped my fellow web team members with updates to the current site, which included creating new graphics and also maintaining the code base.

Part 2 - Trifold

Helping Link attends many in-person events where each business is given a small booth space that usually contains just a few empty tables. It was our job as volunteers to transform that space into an eye-catching glimpse into our world, and as a result gain some new students and volunteers.

One day while in the Helping Link office, I found a huge 3ft x 5ft empty velcro trifold and asked the director about it. We both agreed it was the perfect canvas to design a new advertising spread to add to our booth decorations.

I set to work designing the new layout. It being Helping Link's 25th anniversary, I went for a theme of "25s", which would emphasize our fundraising target of $25,000 for that year. I also planned out how to easily print and assemble the design, ultimately dividing each block of content into separate pieces that could be printed on 11x17in sheets of paper. After printing was complete, I laminated each piece and attached velcro to the back. Lastly came the fun part, sticking all the pieces to the trifold. Seeing my mockup come to life on the giant trifold was a great feeling, and the director was also very pleased with the result. We then showcased our new trifold in our booth at the Tet in Seattle event, where many prospective volunteers and students stopped to read and admire it.

25th Anniversary Celebration Branding Package

Each year, Helping Link holds a gala and invites the whole Helping Link family to attend (sponsors, donors, students, volunteers). It's the most significant event for gaining new members and donations. The year I volunteered there happened to be very important: Helping Link's 25th anniversary. Naturally, the director wanted it to be their biggest celebration yet, so the graphic design team and I quickly set to work on coming up with a fresh brand for the event.

Part 1 - Logo

Round 1

Round 2

Round 3

We started with the logo and color palette first. Our celebration's theme was "Woven Together," so we each set about drafting logo designs based on that theme separately, then individually presented our designs to the greater event team. Votes were cast and the top two designs were chosen.

Next we explored different color and font options and presented our designs to the team once again. My design was ultimately chosen since the team liked how the colors wove together like a bracelet and visually represented the theme. It also reminded them of the banana leaf wrappings of a traditional Vietnamese banh tet (sticky rice cake).

The final round of iteration was between two color palettes and three different ways to treat the logo with them (gradient blended, gradient separated, and flat). The brighter palette of oranges and blues ultimately won out, as well as the subtle gradient treatment.

I created the above branding spec sheet to give the other designers an easy document to pull the font styles, colors, and vectorized logo from. We certainly needed it for all of the advertising plans ahead.

Part 2 - Advertising

Letterhead Banner

Webside Ad

Website Banner

Newsletter Announcement - Outside

Newsletter Announcement - Inside

Now that we had a logo and a branding guide, we were ready to work with the marketing team to get the word out about our big event, and most importantly sell tickets! We ran numerous ad campaigns across several platforms, including Facebook, email/mail invitations, Eventbrite, flyers, our newsletter, our website, local newspapers, and animated web ads. Above is just a sampling of the advertisements that I designed. The diamond motif in the backgrounds of the ads was another idea I had to represent our "woven together" theme.

Part 3 - Event Materials

Name Tag

Donation Paddle

Tote Bag Gift

Table Tent

Welcome Banner

Once the advertisements were up and running, it was time for us to shift gears and start designing the physical items needed for the day of the event. This included name tags, donation paddles, program booklets, certificates, gifts (custom mugs and tote bags), a welcome banner, and table tents with the dinner menu. Our growing brand style made this huge undertaking much more efficient for our team. This part was definitely the most challenging for me: I had no idea how to fold a table tent or how big text on a giant welcome banner or tiny name tags needed to be. Through patience and iteration, we were able to pull everything off, and keep the brand style consistent throughout each piece.

Part 4 - The Big Day

Finally the big day came, but there was still more to do of course. All of the volunteers gathered together at the venue with our tools in hand and a goal to transform it into a dream celebration. We delicately hung woven decorations to create a photo booth, arranged our hand-crafted print materials on the tables, set up banners and activities, and organized all of the name tags and awards.

The rest of the event became a blur as attendees started pouring in, but i'll never forget how much fun it was and how many smiles I saw that night. It's one thing to see your design on a computer screen, but to see them become a part of something great is another thing entirely.

Project Reflections

Volunteering at Helping Link was the most challenging yet humbling experience of my life. There was always a lot to do and too few resources to do it, but the passion each volunteer had for bettering their community (and themselves) was truly inspiring.

What I Am Most Proud of:
• Working with a team of volunteers that was positive, self-motivated, and caring.
• Trying new design challenges and learning from them.
• Mentoring my fellow designers in graphic design principles (and learning from them in the process).
• Helping in ways completely unrelated to design.

What I Would Do Differently Next Time:
• Plan, plan, plan – flesh out a deliverable schedule early and thoroughly.
• Divide up the design tasks more evenly among my fellow volunteers – play to their strengths.
• Set aside more time for design review, and bring in more perspectives (students, donors, etc.) for varied feedback.