On 13th August 2022 Saturday, the first ever “nostu 2022″ — MES College of Engineering Kuttippuram: Alumni Reunion was conducted at Crowne Plaza Kochi. 200+ alumni with family attended the event.
Event participation depends on many factors and one of the important factors is marketing using posters. Everyone loves a funny poster that drives the message home and triggers the desired action from the viewers. Let’s look at all the ‘nostu 2022′ posters designed by me.
Around thirty posters were created with different variations within a span of a month. But all of them fall under the following six categories.
- Teaser Posters — to create a curiosity among people
- Sponsorship Posters — to be distributed among the alumni to attract funding for the program
- “I’m going…” Posters — to apply ‘peer pressure’ on people and to act as a trigger for event registrations
- Event Announcement Posters — to educate people on how to register, how much money to register…
- Social Media Profile Pictures — to be used in Whatsapp groups and social media as profile images
- Countdown Posters — to create a sense of urgency among the people by highlighting a count down; thus acting as a trigger for last minute event registrations
1. Teaser Posters
Who can forget the mini-drafter from the engineering college days? This poster is along the lines of “something is cooking.” The logo for ‘nostu’ was already in place when the initial version of this poster was published. The Kochi Alumni Chapter logo was later added to this poster within a couple of days.
Movies like ’96 (2018) conveyed that Alumni reunions can be risky! A CASIO scientific calculator was also made an entry in the above poster to represent the ‘calculated’ risk of attending the event with your spouse! 🙂
This poster is based on the inside joke of swindling pocket money from parents on the pretext of repairing the broken legs of “Clark’s Table!”
The campus films in Malayalam language, ‘Pranayavarnangal’ (1998) and ‘Niram’ (1999) had a lot of colors on their title designs. The more recent Tamil film ’96 (2018) had an intricate iconography on its title. All these inspired the design of nostu logo.
2. Sponsorship Posters
The target audience for these sponsorship posters were alumni of our college who own and run successful enterprises. Even before fixing the venue and the date of the event, the sponsorship poster conveyed the idea that this is going to be an event to be attended by hundreds of people.
Inspired from the phrase “Sing like no one is listening.”
Inspired from the phrase “blow your own trumpet.”
The response from the alumni entrepreneurs was overwhelming. This was the first poster that featured all the sponsor logos.
3. “I’m Going…” Posters
There were three variations of the masthead on these “I’m going…” posters.
- “I’m going to nostu. Are you coming?”
- “I’m attending nostu. Will you be there?”
- “Let’s meet at nostu. You will come, right?”
The body copy was identical on all the three variations. This poster series was so popular, people started creating their own posters and publish in social media!
4. Event Announcement Posters
Even before the venue was not fixed, a “Save the date” poster proved to be the best attention-grabber to announce the date just like a marriage date announcements.
Since WhatsApp rolled out UPI payment feature, posters shared there with a UPI QR code made the mobile app to automatically scan and read the VPA leading to a frozen/crashed WhatsApp.
People started asking whether the cute faces on the posters are alumni! We had to disappoint them by disclosing that the images are downloaded from royalty-free stock image websites like FreePik.com.
Just two days before the event, the discounted registrations were sold out. This poster was hastily designed at the middle of the night with an image implying a ‘victory sign’ as well as ‘two days to go.’
5. Social Media Profile Pictures
Initially there was a bigger plan to make the quote “The mists of nostalgia color memory!” a ubiquitous slogan for the nostu event. Since the posters didn’t have much real estate to accommodate this lengthy slogan, it appeared only in a few places like the website banner.
This is the current version that is used in the ‘www.nostu.in’ website and social media.
6. Count Down Posters
A colorful numbers’ template was downloaded from FreePik.com and this was the first count down poster announcing ‘five days to go.’
Another face that was popular among the Alumni!
A WhatsApp discussion somehow landed on the movie ‘Zindagi Na Milegi Dobarah’ (2011) and it became the basis for this poster that also featured food (Pizza!).
The image implies a ‘victory sign’ for sold out registrations as well as a ‘two days to go’ message.
A one year old infant ‘attacking’ a birthday cake with ‘one’ written on it was the exact state of mind of the nostu organizers then!
‘Thumbs Up!’ (Fingers crossed?)
The relief after the conclusion of nostu on the 13th of August!
Conclusion
Well designed posters that drive the message home, played a very big role in bringing people out to the event. The posters conveyed a premium-like standard, ‘once-in-a-life-time-event’ vibes and the FOMO (fear of missing out) together made nostu a marketing success!
Free image resources used in this post
- Group of asian friends eating pizza during party at pizzeria: FreePik
- Architecture background design: FreePik
- World health day Instagram posts template: FreePik
- Crumpled posters composition mockup: FreePik
- Flat design of portfolio social media post template: FreePik
- Musician isolated on dark studio in neon light: FreePik
- Bald man playing trumpet: FreePik
- Woman doing close up photoshoot in studio: FreePik
- Attractive enthusiastic Armenian young woman curly hair pointing: FreePik
- Shot of unrecognizable man demonstrates victroy sign: FreePik
- Abstract style number of days left template: FreePik
- Smiling happy Indian student with backpack pointing his finger on wall: FreePik
- Victory hand gesture: FreePik
- Baby boy celebrating her first birthday with gourmet cake: FreePik
- Young stylish indian student show emotion and gesture class: FreePik
- Thankful young man keeping hands on chest: FreePik
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