IMG Social Media and Design Workshop: Insider Insights
Written By: Joana Kim
Interviewees: Kristy Leung and Grace Wu
The IMG Social Media and Design Workshop is an annual event that offers an exciting opportunity for participants to learn more about the digital space. This year, the workshop was hosted by Grace Wu, Jaskiran Kallah, and Kristy Leung, who are all also Insider’s very own executive members! From last year’s Social Media and Design Workshop, I distinctly remember having learned valuable insights about design basics and brand building as an attendee. And with the announcement of this year’s event, I was looking forward to learning new, versatile skills that are widely applicable for everyone, especially for those interested in the world of digital media.
If you weren’t able to attend the workshop, or did but wanted to learn more, we got you covered! Including post-workshop interview excerpts, this article will provide further insight into the topics discussed during the workshop. The broad range of topics covered during the workshop were divided into three sections: Discover the Behind the Scenes At Insider, Learn How to Build a Brand & Partnerships, and Learn Business Design Essentials.
Discover the Behind the Scenes at Insider
The first was Discover The Behind The Scenes At Insider, led by Jaskiran Kallah, 3rd year BBA student and Insider’s very own VP of Marketing. Jaskiran guided us through the process behind Insider’s content scheduling process on both Instagram and Facebook and introduced versatile scheduling and marketing tools, including Later and Facebook Business Manager. During the segment, the audience was also taken through some past content of the Insider, such as our digital magazines. Whether you’re working as a content creator for yourself, an organization, or club - you definitely want to be well-acquainted with how to schedule posts, an integral part in the content creation process, and Jaskiran shared just the needed insights that anyone can use from a valuable, insider perspective. For any of you who have missed the event but are interested in discovering more about our past works and campaigns launched on IMG social media platforms by the Insider Marketing Team, definitely check out the IMG website here!
Insider Digital Magazine: 2021 Back to School Edition
Learn How to Build a Brand & Partnerships
Next, in the Learn How to Build A Brand & Partnerships segment of the workshop, we were able to hear from Insider’s Information Technology Director, Kristy Leung! As a content creator and food blogger, she is one of the co-founders of @aka.foodiedreams (check out the Instagram account for some amazing food content based in Toronto!) As a social media content creator and a full-time student, the audience was able to hear personal insights on turning your passion on social media into a more professional page, and a look into the daily tasks of a food blogger, including information on getting monetized on social media. For those of you who were not able to attend the segment, don’t worry! We interviewed Kristy post-workshop to catch up and talk a bit about the event:
Looking at your food blog (@aka.foodiedreams) on Instagram, I see that it has over 4K followers on Instagram all the while treating users with quality content of delicious-looking food all over Toronto! Can you tell us about how you first started with your food blog? Did it start as a casual hobby, or did you have sort of a vision in mind in terms of growth and engagement?
Kristy: The food blog started casually for fun in May 2019! I’ve always had a passion for photography and loved visiting new food places and restaurants around the city. I wanted to share these experiences with others so more people can know about these unique restaurants and dishes and go check it out too! Gradually, as the page grew a larger audience and following, brands started to reach out to collaborate in exchange for gifted products. As a result, I grew more into a content creator/nano-influencer! Some of the brands that I’ve worked with include Chatime, Real Fruit Bubble Tea, and Thai Express!
What are some basic responsibilities you have as a social media content creator in your day-to-day life?
Responsibilities would include creating engaging content, connecting with businesses and brands regarding collaborations and partnerships, and analyzing post insights! There is actually a lot of work and dedication that goes behind the creation of each and every post. The process usually includes brainstorming, executing ideas & taking the photos, photo editing, matching the photo colours with my feed, writing the caption, publishing the content, and lastly, but most importantly, analyzing insights to measure the post’s performance.
A breakdown of the content creation process from Kristy’s presentation!
In your experience, what are three things that matter most to a social media content creator?
I would say three key things are:
Creating unique content - by putting your own spin on your content, you’re able to differentiate yourself from other content creators and stand out from the crowd!
Tracking post insights and engagements - it allows you to find out what type of content your audience is most likely to engage with and what they’re interested in.
Engaging with other accounts - organic reach is getting harder and harder to achieve, so connect and engage with other accounts in your niche to be discovered by people who have the same interests and passions as you.
How has managing your food blog/creating content on social media helped you in your professional life? What type of skills has it honed that you can utilize for future projects or positions?
Through collaborating with various businesses, brands, and marketing agencies, it has taught me a lot about the behind the scenes of how social media influencer campaigns work. Managing @aka.foodiedreams has also allowed me to develop a critical eye and attention to detail through editing photos, which is a transferable skill that can be utilized in any future job or project.
Learn Business Design Essentials
Our last segment was hosted by Grace Wu, last year’s Insider co-president, and our current senior advisor! Grace wowed us during her Learn Business Design Essentials segment where she shared helpful tips and essentials about graphic design, as well as led us through a design tutorial on the graphics editor tool, Figma, showcasing the techniques that could be utilized to draw some Funky Frogs! Having experience in communications and design at RBC, Grace was able to share about her journey and insights in graphic design while encouraging fellow business students to learn how to use graphic design in our everyday lives, whether it be with school, work, or personal projects! After the workshop, we caught up with Grace to chat about graphic design, her experience in leading a workshop tutorial for the first time, and of course - FIGMA! Check it out:
When did you first get into graphic design? Have you always been interested in the field?
Grace: I first got into graphic design in high school as I was the publicity director for my athletic council, where I made posters for sporting events and health initiatives. I was always interested in art and being creative, and before graphic design, I liked doing more traditional art! I’m not the best at drawing and doing art traditionally, so graphic design was a way for me to be creative and apply art principles so that I could put down the ideas in my head onto an actual piece of work.
What is your top advice for beginners, or even those who might not see a specific need to hone graphic design skills in their field of study or work?
One thing for certain is that design or graphic design is not just limited to the very creative or the very flashy things that you might see, like advertisements or billboards. Design finds its way in a lot of what you do. Even a cover page or a powerpoint deck involves design. Anything where you are visually presenting something is design! For example, even if your resume just consists of words, the way you lay it out involves design. In particular, for any business student, just because you might not see yourself in marketing or in a more creative field, don’t discount yourself from how design can help you!
Word on the street has it that your FIGMA tutorial in teaching workshop attendants how to draw Funky Frogs (as seen in the picture) was a hit! How was the experience of organizing a demo like that for the first time?
I wanted to do something simple that was also able to show people a lot of the useful features at once as an introduction to the platform, FIGMA. To start off, I chose FIGMA because it’s a free tool that anyone can use, and it challenges you to try and create something on your own; it’s just a fun way for people to get started on a platform that gives you more freedom. Personally, organizing this tutorial was an interesting process because as someone who is familiar with using FIGMA, I had to put myself in a different perspective so that I could translate what I do into actual instructions for people who have never tried it before. Knowing how easy it is to get stuck on tutorials, I would have loved to be able to help people one-on-one. I also prefer going back and replaying certain parts of tutorials as needed, so although I wasn’t able to necessarily implement that for this workshop, hopefully in the future there will be an opportunity to do so! Adding on to that, the tutorial reminded me of how, at its core, graphic design really comes down to all those basic elements and principles, so that was a refresher for me in putting this tutorial together!
Note: The recording of Grace’s FIGMA tutorial was sent to participants who were able to attend the workshop so that you can also go back and watch the live tutorial again if you wanted to refresh your knowledge or familiarize yourselves with a technique that you were stuck on!
Funky Frogs from Grace’s FIGMA tutorial!
What is a takeaway you hope participants would receive from this segment?
I hope that most participants took away something from the myth-busting section, where I shared some common myths about graphic design - mainly pertaining to what may be hindering people from starting graphic design themselves. I hope that it was a good takeaway to realize that those reasons that might be stopping you aren’t as intimidating as they may initially seem.
Lastly, do you have any advice or practical tips in using graphic design?
In terms of practical tips, when making visual presentations like a PPT, to make it cleaner make sure things are aligned. Also, sometimes less is more, so don’t be afraid of negative space. Ultimately, what is most important is that the message you want to convey is clear and gets across to the audience! This might mean limiting the amount of design elements used, or changing the aesthetic to reflect your message better; the intended message should be kept at the center of your decisions.
And for general advice, I hope that whoever wants to get started with graphic design would go for it, and not be afraid to make mistakes. Once you get started, continue practicing because no one can get good at anything unless they practice! Don’t be scared to try out the ideas in your head and don’t get discouraged when it doesn’t turn out the way you wanted the first time around, or even the tenth time around. The beauty of graphic design is that you can always edit it again and again. And last thing - save your original design files!
Well, there you have it! From our multi-talented panelists, we hope that you were able to learn brand new information and insights regarding posting social media content, practical steps of social media content creation, and why you should start your journey in graphic design! To stay updated with the Insider, make sure to follow us on our socials @TheInsiderMedia (Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn) where we share about our latest initiatives and updates, and click here to check out and listen to the Insider’s exclusive podcast, The Inside Scoop! We would love to connect with you and hope to see you at a future Insider event!