Agency: Strategic Holdings
Location: Mérida, Yucatán, México
Duration: 8 months
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My Role: Art Direction - Experience Design - Editorial Design - Content Creation.
Tasks: User Research (Primary and Secondary), Visual Design, Information Architecture, Brand Development, Photography, Content Edition, Printing Supervision, Marketing Campaign.
Goals Achieved:
• This Guide eased the groundwork of the Expat community relocated to the Yucatan Peninsula. Providing a reliable source to find useful services and products for their new day-to-day life.
• We set a platform of communication between 2 communities. Facilitating their interaction to share insights into their cultures.
• The local community experienced economic growth after learning about new types of customers.
“Our goal is to establish a bridge between the Yucatan business community and the communities of the rest of the country. But mainly with foreigners who visit us every year, of which several have found a new home in the Peninsula.”
- Strategic Holdings Director
Strategic Holdings is a Yucatecan agency focused on the needs of the Expat community living in Merida, Yucatan, Mexico. Most of these foreigners relocate from the US, Canada, and some European countries.
I led this project as the Art Director and Experience Designer. I worked with the agency’s Director (as the stakeholder), a marketing lead, and a sales lead (as my team).
The agency’s director proposed to create a FREE Catalog containing a resource listing with the information needed in the expats’ day-to-day life. This Guide must cover relevant topics like Daily Life, Immigration, Real Estate, Community, Culture, and Healthcare.
The funding to produce this printed guide came from local businesses. These local businesses wanted to reach the foreign community. Not only to offer their services/products but to create a deeper connection between cultures. Through their paid advertising bundles, we should cover the printing costs, promotion, distribution, salaries, and a profit for the agency. Therefore, our main constraints to consider were: costs and time.
This brings me to the time frame. The initial idea was to have 2 editions per year (one every 6 months). A run of 10,000 copies per year. Having that in mind, we needed to schedule: user research (primary/secondary), brand design, information architecture, marketing campaign, ad sales, editorial design, content creation, printing process, promotion, and distribution.
Plus, our goal for the next 2 years, was getting to the top 5 of the English-language resource guides (considered by the Expat community living in Yucatan).
Understanding the Expat Community
| Our Users |
The Marketing Lead conducted a focus group with five members of the Expat community. While they were having the discussion, I was observing their reactions and took notes. I easily empathize with them, as I was not a native of Yucatan either.
This state in Mexico had small amounts of Mexicans from north or central Mexico. Most of its population is 100% Yucatecan. Even further, a big percentage has deep Mayan roots. They still speak Maya in daily activities. This beautiful Mayan lineage creates a magical ambiance in Yucatan. But in some aspects, this closeness with their roots makes them suspicious about outsiders, and hard for integrating them into their ancient culture.
Considering all these factors, the insights of the focus group, and the data gathered from a Government survey to the Expat community, we created three Personas.
We prioritized one of these personas as it represented our bigger audience, and created an Empathy Map.
After analyzing all this, we concluded the Expat community main needs are:
• Have an enjoyable, affordable, and safe relocation to their new home.
• Find a way to socially integrate with the new community.
• Maximize their time while learning from the new culture.
• Learn to communicate within their new environment.
• Have an economical gain, by maximizing their savings/salary.
The Expatriate community living in Yucatan, finds it complicated their relocation process and their integration into the local community, because of multiple cultural barriers.
How might we engage our users while guiding them?
As the Art Director and Experience Designer, I needed to decide how to engage our users through their senses (mostly visually), while guiding them through the content in the catalog.
My first considerations to start designing were:
| Brand Design |
• The logo design needs to reflect the local culture. It needs to inspire the foreign community, but at the same time make proud the local community.
• The color palette should be vibrant and joyful. We are living in a tropical paradise.
• I need to create elements that can be constant in marketing collaterals, sales tools, the guide, and promotion materials for print and digital media.
• Define a tone of voice aligned to our brand values. We’ll use this when choosing article writers.
| Experience Design |
• The concept of the Guide is closer to a high-quality travel magazine or a coffee table book. But keeping in mind the budget provided.
• Printing materials and endings are important to create a unique experience while reading.
• Cover Design is a big topic to decide. It should be aligned with the concept of a travel magazine or coffee table book. Go get cool pictures to choose from.
• Accessibility shouldn’t be overlooked while defining font style and size, paragraph length, text amount, and the physical weight of the Guide. We need to care for our Expats Baby Boomers.
| Content Development |
• Information hierarchy has special importance.
• The content sequence should present surprises but at the same time a logic of what the readers will find after turning a few pages.
• Define the sections/topics of the Guide aligned with the user's needs.
• The Guide must have a geographical bookmark, a topic bookmark, an article for each topic, ads related to each section, emergency contacts listing, advertisers listing, and some extra info about local activities (could be written or design infographic).
• Choose the writing collaborators wisely. Think of the user needs, topics to develop, the voice tone of the project, and the level of engagement we expect.
| Advertisers Selection |
• Review the topic selection. Collaborate with the sales team to generate a quick list of possible advertisers to include. Consider the three locations we are including in the Guide (Merida, Izamal, and Beaches).
• Sales projections, plus business goals, plus production costs, will help me decide the number of total pages in the Guide. Communicate constantly with the Sales lead.
• Develop a scheme in collaboration with the sales team, of how are you retrieving from the advertisers, the design elements/information to create their ads design/copy.
Printing and Delivery
| Looking Over the Printing Process |
After I did several printing proofs (assisted by the Printing House’s Manager), reviewed by the Director and the Marketing lead. I took the high-fidelity prototype and tested it with 2 of the 5 expats that participated in the focus group.
Their feedback provided some refining details. I collected the final files and prepared them for offset printing.
The Printing House processed our catalog in a month and a half. Printing 5,000 copies for our first semester.
| Helping the Sales and Marketing Team with the Distribution |
We picked our copies from the Printing House. With a list of distribution spots (previously collected), the Sales lead divided us into groups. Each group delivered from 50 to 100 copies to each of the assigned spots.
Final Thoughts
• Advertising sales have a huge impact on the schedule and the layout of the Guide. We should plan better to have our advertisers’ goals covered early.
• I need to design a sales tool to present the impact/benefits for our advertisers, after this 1st Edition.
• I need to include more content for pet owners.
• I have to research for a better platform to present the digital version of the Guide.
• I learned from the people in charge at the distribution spots, that I needed to provide an acrylic display to highlight our catalog in their businesses. For large spaces, placing our Guide as a coffee table book, was not so convenient for quick finding purposes.
| Reflections for the Future |
• Should we consider doing The Guide to Living in Yucatan a digital product?
