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The Janus Institute is an organization with a mission to help economic development professionals and the communities they serve to move forward through unique peer learning and educational opportunities in a casual atmosphere, including the Janus Forum. The Institute is based on the belief that economic development is an “applied discipline” with much to be learned from the experiences of communities and practitioners alike.
Over the years, the organization’s leadership realized the need to better connect ideas and best practices to the community at large, not just industry professionals and Janus Forum attendees. Many people want to be a part of making their communities better places to live but often don’t know where to look for information and ideas. That inspired the idea to create a place where community leaders, concerned citizens, elected officials, and others could come for on-going information related to community and economic development generated from thought leaders in the industry.
The Janus Institute’s leadership team partnered with us to bring this idea to life. Meetings were held to discuss and develop audience profiles and establish tone standards for content while we concurrently worked through the needs the final outcome would need to fulfill. The primary goal of the project was to create a website with a blog where content could be shared but also needed to include a forum where visitors could post questions to discuss, ask for advice, and more. Time was also dedicated to looking at websites the Janus Institute’s team liked and didn’t like so website architecture and design ideas could begin to be formed.
This project also included creating a name for the brand and website. We lead the Janus Institute through a brainstorming session to develop crisp naming options that would resonate with the audience. The name Prosperous Places was selected as a reflection of the goal to equip people with the knowledge to drive positive changes to help their communities grow.
Once the naming, branding, and website architecture and design were determined, we completed the development of the site as well as content insertion and testing. Prosperous Places launched in late February 2019 as an online resource for community and economic development. Upon announcing the website to its Janus Forum alumni, the Janus Institute reported responses indicating Prosperous Places was a much-needed resource, with one alumnus noting it was exactly what they hoped the Janus Institute would one day produce.
Moving forward, we have continued to provide ongoing support to the Janus Institute team for Prosperous Places with the creation of graphics for blog and social media content, and content and email marketing strategy and support.
Adding the tree silhouette to the logo was a great way to pay homage to Prosperous Place’s roots – The Janus Institute
An eye-catching color scheme and imagery style was developed to help images stand out.
Text elements are incorporated into imagery to help emphasize specific topics regarding community and economic development.
Photographs are chosen to support content topics as well as help readers visualize analogies.
A unique overlay of text helps readers begin to visualize the SWOT analysis of their own communities.
