Visual media can have a significant impact on how effectively a message is communicated. Appropriate and strategic visuals can inspire the audience, lend clarity to a message, and, in general, say things that words alone cannot.
Throughout this course, you decided on a message to communicate, determined the most effective platform or medium for that message, and selected the most appropriate visuals to support the message. For the Final Project, you will use a minimum of three different types of appropriate media to deliver your intended message. Note that if you did not create the visual, you must include a reference for the visual(s) contained in the project.
For this project, use the concepts you’ve learned in this course to effectively apply visuals to a business-related message. Below, you will find just a few examples of how visuals can be utilized to communicate a message in the business setting. Feel free to use any of the examples listed below, or if you choose to select examples not included on the list, be sure to request instructor approval prior to completing the Final Project.
| Examples of Business Communication | How Each Example Might Look for Your Assignment |
| Presentation on department achievements | PowerPoint slides with visuals such as video clips, images, and charts and associated speech in the Speaker’s Notes section at the bottom.. |
| Print advertisement for your own business | Word document or PDF version of an advertisement, complete with appropriate image(s), embedded (or links to) video clips, composition, typography, and company logo and website. |
| Training materials on your job responsibilities | Word document or PDF version of job instructions using typography, composition, and relevant images and video to promote clarity. |
| Company website | Word document, PowerPoint, or PDF mock-up that illustrates what you would want your website to look like. Complete with appropriate images, effective composition and color usage, company logo, video clips, and shapes representing where the buttons would be. |
Your Final Project must contain aspects of each element discussed in the course as it applies to your example communication piece. It must use appropriate typefaces, deliver a clear message, and have clear brand identity. It must also use an appropriate composition of graphics, photos, video, or other visual media. In addition to the text, your paper must contain a minimum of five scholarly sources, two of which must be from the Ashford University Library.
In your five- to seven-page paper (not including the title and reference pages or the three visual media examples), be sure to address the following:
- Discuss the rationale behind choosing each of the three media elements and support your discussion with concepts from the course material.
- Explain why the media elements contained in your Final Project deliver the message you intended to communicate.
- Describe the intent of the message.
- Apply a minimum of five concepts from the course material to support your choice of media elements. For example you may use concepts such as visual literacy, perception, visual marketing, storytelling, design, branding, social media, communication theories, or any of the other concepts presented during the course. Be sure to discuss the relationship of the concepts to the media elements that you have chosen.
Writing the Final Paper
The Paper:
- Must be five to seven double-spaced pages in length (not including the title and reference pages or the three visual media examples) and formatted according to APA style as outlined in the approved APA style guide. Title page, reference page, and any exhibits or appendices are not counted in the paper length.
- Must include a cover page that includes:
- Title of paper
- Student’s name
- Course name and number
- Instructor’s name
- Date submitted
- Must include a title page and an abstract.
- Must include an introductory paragraph with a succinct thesis statement.
- Must address the topic of the paper with critical thought.
- Must conclude with a restatement of the thesis and a conclusion paragraph.
- Must use a minimum of five scholarly in addition to the text, two of which must be from the Ashford University Library.
- Must use APA style to document all sources.
- Must include a reference page that includes the scholarly sources that you relied upon in constructing your paper per APA guidelines.
- Must be written in the third person.
