Central YMCA – Brand Development & Campaign Communications
Overview
Central YMCA is one of the UK’s leading charities, dedicated to improving the health and wellbeing of people and communities through education, fitness and social impact programmes. As Design Executive, I work across a wide range of brand, marketing and recruitment initiatives, helping to evolve the organisation’s visual communications while ensuring consistency across multiple departments and audiences.
Concept
Working within a complex organisation with diverse audiences, the challenge was to create engaging, accessible and consistent communications that reflected Central YMCA’s mission while modernising aspects of its brand presence. This included supporting brand evolution projects, improving learner and member engagement, and ensuring campaigns connected with audiences across digital and print channels.
Execution
My role spans a broad range of creative outputs, including:
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Brand development and repositioning projects
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Collaboration with external agencies and stakeholders
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Campaign concept development
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Digital marketing campaigns
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Social media content and short-form video
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Interactive prospectuses and recruitment materials
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Print collateral and promotional assets
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Brand guideline implementation and management
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Internal communications and presentation design
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Multi-channel campaign rollouts
Outcome
Through collaborative work with internal teams and external agencies, I have helped strengthen brand consistency across the organisation, improve audience engagement through digital campaigns and support learner recruitment objectives. The projects have contributed to a more cohesive brand experience while helping communicate Central YMCA’s impact, services and opportunities to a wide range of audiences.
Central YMCA Annual Report
Brief:
Create Central YMCA's Annual Report for trustees and stakeholders.
Solution:
Took sole ownership of the report's design and production, collaborating with internal and external stakeholders to create a clear, engaging and on-brand publication.
Result:
Published as the organisation's official Annual Report, created to communicate the charity's impact and performance to trustees and key stakeholders. Take a look at the file here.
Education Prospectus
I was tasked with redesigning Central YMCA's Education Prospectus, evolving the existing visual identity through a refreshed gradient palette, improved layouts and playful design elements to create a more engaging publication for prospective learners. View the full prospectus here.
YMCAfit B2B Brochure
A B2B prospectus designed to showcase the full scope of YMCAfit’s course offerings. This was a web content design project you can view it here.
YMCA fit Photoshoots
Planned, executed, and captured photoshoots and video content for YMCA campaigns and events keeping the imagery raw, natural, and minimally edited to reflect authenticity.
More than a qualification.
A career for life.
YMCA fit Brand Refresh
Working alongside an external agency, the goal is to reposition YMCAfit’s brand identity and introduce a more modern approach to its marketing and communications. I play a key role in this process, collaborating with Cornerstone and the wider marketing team to help shape the new tone of voice and visual direction for the brand.
As part of the early stages of the project, I created a mood board to present to internal stakeholders, helping guide discussions around the potential creative directions YMCAfit could take. The mood board helped visualise the transition of the brand and gather feedback on which direction resonated most with Cornerstone. We are still in the process of repositioning the brand. View the Visual Mood board here.
Our Brand
Vision
To become the UK’s most trusted fitness education provider, building careers, healthier communities and transforming lives both in the sector, and through the sector via robust, diligent and industry leading training.
Strapline
More than a qualification.
A career for life.
Tone of voice
Our personality is what makes us stand out within the marketplace, differentiates us from our competitors and lets us express our brand values, mission and raison d’etre. Language may change slightly from one campaign to another to cater to the audience, channel and wider macro climate and influences, but in essence, our tone of voice should follow these guidelines:
Friendly and supportive – we want the audience to feel heard and understood while still being confident in their decision.
Trustworthy – we want the audience to trust us; share our knowledge we have within the industry, and help them feel we know what we’re talking about. We’re highly experienced.
Transparent – we don’t sugar-coat, we’re straightforward but also approachable. We’re easy to understand while instilling confidence in our products.
Passionate – we really care about what we do and how we deliver. We’re enthusiastic for student success and career development
Values
Honest and transparent - We’re open and clear with our learners. It’s a commitment and we’re open about the costs, expectations from them and the challenges. We don’t sugar-coat; we prepare them.
Quality – we’ve been providing high-quality courses for over 40 years, and we aim to still do that within our teaching. We ensure qualifications are credible, respected and career-building
Trust – we’re trusted by organisations such as the NHS and Police, and we aim to uphold those relationships through high-quality courses
Supportive - We provide ongoing support, even after the courses have finished. Our tutors and team are here to guide learners ever step of their journey
Relationship - We think long-term, developing lasting partnerships with learners, employers and the wider community.
Passion – we care about what we do, we’re passionate about changing lives through fitness, health and wellbeing education
FIT Prospectus
Aimed to provide those who are seeking to become personal Instructors indepth knowledge into each Personal Training course YMCA FIT has to offer using Turtl for Web Content we was able to produce this online accesible and easy to use prospectus
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Event Activations
Large and small collateral print + interactive experiences for event activations.
Short form + Long form video content
Created short-form video content for promotional campaigns aimed at increasing learner engagement, expanding reach across digital platforms and driving course sign-ups. Collaborated with an external agency to develop audience-focused messaging and creative concepts, providing prospective learners with fresh insights into the value, outcomes and opportunities offered by YMCAfit courses.
Brief:
Create a suite of short- and long-form video assets to support PPC campaigns promoting YMCAfit courses and increase learner sign-ups.
Solution:
Working alongside Cornerstone, I designed video assets while they developed the campaign copy and messaging. Together, we created engaging content tailored to prospective learners that aligned with YMCAfit's trusted reputation and brand identity.
Result:
The final assets were used across PPC and digital marketing campaigns to increase awareness, drive course enquiries and encourage learner registrations across YMCAfit's education programmes.
