Caroline Ledger, Parkinson's UK Digital Communications on a Shoestring Conference, 13 October 2010. www.charitycomms.org.uk/events

2. Today
• Introductions
• A bit of background
• Tools and resources
• Questions and discussion

4. • Every hour, someone is told they have
Parkinson’s. Because we’re here, no one has to
face Parkinson’s alone.
• As the UK’s Parkinson’s support and research charity we’re
leading the work to find a cure, and to improve life for everyone
affected by Parkinson’s.
• We have 34,000 members, 330 local groups run by volunteers,
and 300 staff - 200 of which are based at home.
• We are dependent on voluntary donations. 50% of our income
is from legacies.
• In April 2010 we became Parkinson’s UK.

6. Lot’s of people don’t understand Parkinson’s
properly.
1 in 7 people incorrectly think only older
people get Parkinson’s, and that people under
40 cannot get the disease.
Lots of people haven’t heard of us or know that we
can help.
The Parkinson’s Disease Society only has 1%
public awareness and only 5% of people say
they have seen our old logo.

7. We don’t reach everybody that we should.
There are 120,000 people living with
Parkinson’s in the UK, and yet we only have
30,000 members.
We must increase our income by raising more than
£27million by the end of 2014. That’s an 11%
increase per year, and means inspiring lots
more people to support us.

9. Phase 1 – Research
(March to May)
We carried out research to find out how much we needed to
change. This included interviews and focus groups with all our
audiences.
• We didn’t have a clear vision and found out that
everyone explained the society in a different way.
• People didn’t like our name. Some people didn’t like the word
“disease” because it sounded off-putting or contagious. Others
felt the word “society” was old fashioned or sounded exclusive.
• Some people criticised the culture of the charity for being
divided, slow and “a bit dusty”. Like a plodding hippo rather than a
fast-paced fox.

10. Phase 2 – Brand Development
(May – July)
• Next we defined our vision, mission and values, and
developed options for a new name and strapline.
• These were tested with all our audiences (reference groups)
before being agreed by the Board.

11. Phase 3 – Creative development
(July – October)
• We started by doing an audit of the current identity and style
of language (tone of voice).
• We designed three options for the brand (logos, colours,
typography and photography) and tested them with the same
reference groups from stage two.
• We then chose one route on the basis of the feedback –
developed it further – and got approval from our Board.

13. How did we engage and involve
people?
• Not the “B” word!
• We used open and honest communications through all
available channels from the outset, and at every stage.
• This included presentations at the beginning about what a
brand was and why we were re-branding.

15. We produced
• Videos
• Online
• Word templates
• Other templates
• Artwork
• Brand guidelines
• Photo library

16. We involved our staff and supporters in the project all the way
through, including at our AGM in September
Embedded Video clip

17. We made a follow up video following the creative development to
explain our new visual identity.
Embedded Video clip

18. Online

21. Photo library

24. Get in touch
Caroline Ledger
cledger@parkinsons.org.uk
020 7963 9331