VIRGINIA FUNDERS NETWORK

Designing VFN's conference booklet highlighted diverse support and strategic initiatives.

Challenge

In May 2023, the Virginia Funders Network (VFN) – a statewide membership association composed of over 120 philanthropic organizations working to improve the quality of life in the commonwealth – hosted its 2nd annual Stronger Together Conference for one of the largest gatherings of Virginia’s philanthropic community. Growing in scale with the number of attendees, the organization wanted to ensure the two-day event focused on empowering the social impact sector while also unveiling the organization’s new strategic framework. 

As the primary communications firm for VFN, the client tasked Shannon Strategies with designing the conference program. Conference programs serve as a blueprint for the event. The accompanying program booklet is a go-to resource for attendees to map out their day, learn about speakers, take notes, and have an artifact for future reference.

Our Approach

The goal was to design a booklet that highlighted the diversity of philanthropic support and introduced VFN’s new strategic framework to more than 220 funders and nonprofit leaders.

To meet the client’s needs we maximized time by organizing the distribution of design hours, creating a shared workflow outline, and streamlining the number of rounds of drafts and deadlines for each. In particular, we nailed down the aesthetic of the booklet by designing two mockups for the cover and an internal spread. 

Four key elements were incorporated to elevate the design of the conference booklet: 

  • A summary of key points of the strategic framework and QR code to read the full report;

  • Use of the VFN logo across the agenda spread to emphasize event branding;

  • Secondary brand colors for icon key to differentiate hierarchical content and align with the framework; and  

  • Display of event sponsor logos for each plenary session to demonstrate the diversity of philanthropic support across issue areas.

Result

We started the project in late February and completed the overall design in four weeks.

The client loved the program and said it was “perfect for their needs and beautifully designed.” The interim executive director stated “Dejah, your design work was fabulous! Thank you!”

VFN noted an uptick in site traffic to the strategic framework web page. The design format we created in 2023 is being used for the 2024 conference.