In December, we eagerly tested Facebook’s latest innovation for our personal profiles: Timeline. Initially just for our personal profiles, it seemed like a few crafty page pirates found a way to adapt their business pages to Timeline before the social media giant actually gave them this option in February.

On March 30, Facebook went ahead and made it mandatory for brands to use Timeline. By the next day, every business, community, government, brand, public figure and entertainment page had been switched over by the folks at Facebook – whether they were ready or not. If you haven’t spent a few minutes over the past couple of days familiarizing yourself with the new lay-of-the land, now’s the time to update your page.

Timeline personalizes your brand pages to allow your company’s creative side to shine through – so it’s important to showcase your best work up front. If your likes, shares and comments have gone down due to the switch – don’t panic. It’s a time to rework your social media marketing strategy.

Tips to Make Your Brand, Community, Government or Public Figure Page Pop

Timeline is more image-driven than the old Facebook page template – which is saying something. Make sure you have high-res, well-framed images for your cover photo. Our client, Mirror Lake Inn Resort and Spa does a great job of creating a feel for the resort while keeping their fans informed and engaged.

1. Be ready for your fans when they get to your page. There’s nothing worse than landing on a page and seeing old or skewed imagery and even older posts. Update your content – make sure it’s fresh – whether images, video, intriguing posts, surveys or announcements.

   Ex: L.L. Bean does a great job at this. Rather than focusing on their clothing or gear – they have chosen a cover image that truly captures the spirit of their brand. Tabs are front and center, offering sweepstakes information, gear giveaways and a tab titled “Million Moment Mission” that engages their audience to get involved in supporting kids programs at National Parks simply by clicking “Like,” leaving a comment, wall post or checking in. L.L. Bean is engaged and ready for their fans. The imagery is enough to keep anyone clicking.

2. Test. Don’t be afraid of trial and error. If you’ve missed Facebook’s grace period for curating your content on Timeline, don’t let any more time lag. Encourage engagement with posts, rich content, images and video. Craft a creative identity.

3. Get out there. Timeline is not the place to be a wallflower. Check out other brand’s pages, do some market research, see what is getting noticed and what is ignored. Talk to your audience. Most importantly, listen. And post.

For more tips on how to use Facebook, check out Facebook Marketing Solutions’ thread for Page administrators.

What do you think of our Timeline business pages? Check them out at Facebook.com/Inphorm and Facebook.com/Adworkshop.

I recently read that in 2014 mobile internet usage will overtake desktop internet usage. This is happening because basically it’s easier to grab your smartphone than find a computer. Face it – don’t you panic a little bit when you’re out and about and discover you don’t have your phone with you?

Apple once coined the phrase “there’s an app for that” which for me translates into “you don’t have to get up to go to your big desktop computer– just look it up on your mobile device.” You want to know the lyrics to a song? There’s an app for that. What’s the weather like in Ireland today? There’s an app for that. You want to play a video game on your phone? There’s an app for that. And, if you don’t want to pay for all those apps you can get the ‘lite’ versions –which means they have ads. And that gives advertisers a whole new way to reach their target audience.

Mobile marketing is nothing new – QR, or Quick Response codes have been around for a couple of years. Those black and white squares appear on everything from menus to the sides of cars to billboards. But when you scan them (yes, there’s an app for that too) where are you taken? In many cases you’re taken to a website that doesn’t look very nice on your mobile device – and, if it’s an iPhone and your site has Flash components, it won’t work very well either. The same goes with those ads you see at the top or bottom of your games, weather apps, and even Google search results. Although most of us know that we need to advertise on mobile devices, we also have to think about the result of that click or scan—and what viewers are experiencing.

Currently, many businesses are opting for new sites that use adaptive website design—meaning the site works across numerous devices and adjust sits layout to fit various screen sizes including desktops, mobile phones and tablets. However, that doesn’t help the businesses that have a website designed only for desktops, and don’t have the budget to do an overhaul to make their website work on all devices – especially if it was only done in the last year or so. Here is where the mobile landing page works well.

Mobile landing pages are a cost-effective way to give your mobile audience a good user experience without the cost of a full-blown mobile website. Mobile landing pages can serve many purposes such as providing information only (a menu or upcoming event), or they can include a call to action such as asking you to fill out a form to sign up for promotional emails or clicking on a phone number to call for more information.

Your company’s video can also be embedded or showcased in a mobile landing page with a message or call-to-action. Watch our Gift of Nature video—which was created in a responsive design so it works on all devices from desktop to mobile phones—but try it on your phone to see what I mean.

The next time you are thinking about mobile advertising and your website is not designed for mobile sites, consider having a mobile landing page created to give your users the best experience and keep them as customers.

On Monday I arrived at DrupalCon Denver, the first of the biannual conferences for the Drupal community, held at the Colorado Convention Center in Denver. Since then, the same message has resounded throughout. Drupal is not just an open source content management platform, it is a community of developers, coders and users.

The conference kicked off with a keynote address by Drupal founder Dries Buytaert. During his speech, Buytaert showed a video montage that showcased large organizations, such as NBC Universal, that chose Drupal for their website—and explained each company’s reasons for doing so. In every example, the motivation had to do with the strength, maturity and vibrancy of the Drupal community.

During the sessions that followed, the praise exchanged between attendees and presenters served to highlight the respect and appreciation that exists among community members. Raucous applause greeted maintainers of the Zen theme and Views modules; and one questioner at the end of the Panels module session simply said, “Thanks.”

The last session I attended on Tuesday focused on building and maintaining a strong team. The day’s final presenter summed up our community well. To paraphrase, he pointed out that for each site, service or product built on Drupal that we deploy—either as individuals or as a web development company— we are representing the work of every person here and around the world who is involved in this project.

Drupal & Adworkshop

Adworkshop began using Drupal in early 2010 and to date we have deployed dozens of websites. Most recently, we launched a new website for the Whiteface Region. Developed with a responsive design; the site works across numerous devices and adjusts its layout to fit various screen sizes including desktops, mobile phones and tablets.

During the last two years, we have used Drupal for a variety of projects ranging from basic brochure style websites, blogs and e-commerce solutions to more dynamic websites.

Drupal has proven to be an excellent Content Management System (CMS) and a solid application framework. And like the other developers, coders and users around the world, we understand—and appreciate—that the core features of the platform are constantly strengthened by the efforts of Drupal’s dedicated global community.

More than a philosophy but an in-depth process defined by new generation websites that are fast becoming the model for efficient web deliverables. Adaptive and Responsive sites have pushed the clear focus onto the content of the website. UCD places the user (as opposed to the ‘thing’ - or website) at the center aligned with the content; it is a process that focuses on cognitive factors (such as perception, memory, learning, problem-solving, etc.) as they come into play during peoples’ interactions with things (our adaptive and responsive website).

The preliminary goal of any website project is to answer questions about users, tasks and goals with general interaction, then use these findings to drive appropriate development and design.

Usual questions that need to be answered to achieve any goal:

• Who are the users of this ‘thing’?
• What are the users’ tasks and goals?
• What are the users’ experience levels with this thing, and things like it?
• What functions do the users need from this thing?
• What information might the users need, and in what form do they need it?
• How do users think this ‘thing’ should work?
• How can the design of this ‘thing’ facilitate users’ cognitive processes?

At Adworkshop, there are certain global usability principles that are instituted, or guidelines as they apply to web development.

Many of theseguidelines can be summarized as follows:

Visibility

Help users predict the effect(s) of their actions. Important elements (such as those that aid navigation) should be highly visible. Users should be able to tell at a glance what they can and cannot do. Let the “thing” be transparent and understood.

“Tuned-Out”

Well conceived websites should reduce a user’s memory load. The “KISS” method is paramount. Screen elements should be meaningful and consistent across the site so users can recognize, instead of remember, what elements mean from one page to another. Any new items, functions or design features should relate to ones the user already knows.

Gratification

When a user performs an action, they should receive immediate feedback. For example, when the user clicks a button, something on the screen should change so the user knows the system has registered their action.

Accessibility

80% of all users need to find information quickly and easily:

• Offer users a few ways to find information (such as navigational elements, search functions, site map, etc). However, don’t offer too many options at once as this confuses many users.
• ‘Chunk’ information into small, digestible pieces and organize them into some type of schema or hierarchy that is meaningful to the user.
• Enable skimming; provide clues that allow users to find their ‘nugget’ of information’ by scanning rather than reading.
• Most users don’t really read web pages. Users looking for their ‘nugget’ of information are more like hunters than someone out for a leisurely stroll.

Orientation/Navigation

Web users often report feeling lost.

There are several ways to help users orient themselves:

• Links should be descriptive enough so that users can easily predict what they will find when they click a particular link (make buttons look like buttons).
• The user should be able to visualize the site’s structure.
• There should be no ‘dead-end’ pages from which users can’t, or don’t know how, to exit.
• Every page should have clearly visible elements telling users what page they are on, where they are in relation to other pages, and how to get to other pages. (Users enter sites from many places; they don’t always enter a site via the home page.)

Errors

An error is an incorrect action by the user such as clicking the wrong link. It is important to minimize user errors and provide users with mechanisms that allow them to recover quickly from errors, such as being able to navigate back to their intended page on the website.

Satisfaction

The site should be pleasant to use and look at. Users’ perception of ‘pleasantness’ influences their:

• Perception of ease-of-use
• Motivation for learning how to use the site
• Confidence in the reliability of the site’s information
• Legibility: website font should be easy to read

Visual Design

Don’t go overboard. Unique is not better. Speaking to how your brand should be represented is key.

• Using grids/wireframes for preliminary page layout gives a clear picture for information flow.
• Strive to create pages that are interesting, yet simple and uncluttered.
• The use of graphics should:
  • illustrate/inform (not decorate).
  • increase the user’s satisfaction/motivation.
  • aid navigation.
  • use graphics that are small (in file size) so they download quickly.
• Make the most important elements the most visually prominent.
• Use color conservatively. Color can engage users, both emotionally and cognitively, but misapplication of color creates negative outcomes. Designing in grey removes emotion, and gives a clear picture of a layout.
• Group like elements together.
• Use the ‘white space’ to visually organize the page. Make important elements stand out, and give the users’ eyes some resting space.

How to Develop User-Centered Websites

1. Know your users
   Ask questions! How much experience do the users have with: Computers? The Web? What do the users need and expect from this website? The more you can gleam about your users, the better chance the site has to convert and achieve business goals.
2. Analyze the users’ tasks and goals
   Observe and interact with testing users (preferably at their workspace):
   
   • What are the tasks users need to perform; how do they currently perform these tasks? What is the workflow?
   • Why do the users currently perform their tasks the way they do?
   • What are the users’ information needs?
   • How do users discover and correct errors?
   • What are the users’ ultimate goals?
3. Don’t force a design
   The ability to prototype design while developing with responsive and adaptive models can lead to exploration of different designs and approaches and get user feedback before making final direction, development, and design decisions.
4. Test, test and test for usability—repeatedly!
   Usability testing is an iterative process; it is important to conduct usability testing throughout the development cycle.

Conclusion:

User centered design can improve the usability and usefulness of any design and website development model. Adaptive and responsive models will continue to gain in popularity as users’ become device inter-dependant and expect engagement that are not only interesting but informative.

*** Usefulness: relates to relevance; do the functions, information, etc., match what the user actually needs?
*** Usability: relates to ease-of-use—a simple concept, but not always easy or intuitive to implement.

With each update, the Google search algorithm becomes a little more sophisticated—and as of last month, a little more personal. Google has announced that it will be incorporating even more personal data into its search results based on a user’s previous actions, search queries and online behavior. As a marketer this is intriguing; as a consumer, it’s somewhat eye-opening.

In “To Know Me is to Target Me” in the February 2012 edition of Direct Marketing News, the author discusses how our devices have become smart about who we are. And our personal information, search and purchase behaviors give rise to brand, product and website recommendations. Increasingly, the Internet will know what we like, what we’re looking for and ideas on how to find it—possibly better than our closest friends.

However, data mining to provide personalized recommendations is nothing new. For years, companies like Amazon have used our purchase history and on-site inquiries to suggest other products we might like. More recently, brands like Nike, M&Ms and Coca-Cola have invited consumers to personalize their products.

The difference now is the rapid convergence of organic search marketing with social media. Google is sharing more of the information it has about us in an effort to predict what we are looking for and display better results. Everything a person does with Google Products including the search engine, Google+, Andriod phones, gmail, and Youtube, will be tracked and the information integrated, archived, and tied back directly to them. The implications for both marketers and consumers are huge.

With increased access to our personal preferences, whether explicitly shared on sites like Pinterest or implicitly collected by Google,marketers now have an even greater opportunity to use this data to personalize information. Marketing strategies will become more individualized and customer-centric. And in every part of the marketing mix, as well as with the product itself, companies can connect more consumers with their brand, make it more relevant and deliver more benefits.

It’s a brave new world—and a great time for businesses to target consumers, deliver just what they want, when they want it, and build loyalty. Now if only I could look at my closet and an algorithm would take over and send me back an outfit based on what I need…

With the growing number of social media platforms popping up it is not surprising that businesses are scratching their heads and are frazzled by the daunting task of engaging and utilizing these platforms for their business.

Just recently Pinterest has made it the top of the social media ladder— it’s already one of the top 10 social networking sites in the country and according to Comscore,it was the third-fastest-growing site in January. Earlier this month, Facebook, with its 845 million users worldwide, filed for its IPO with an estimated valuation of $100 billion. And every day, new online communities, networks, and media platforms enter the arena, all competing for market share and your precious time and attention.

Not surprisingly, with the emergence of so many new channels, there is an ongoing conversation about social media fatigue. There are a lot of options out there and a lot of factors to consider. Which networks do I join? Which will benefit my business the most? How often should I post? Should I be concerned about my number of followers and fans? Is SEO a consideration?

In a social media jungle, business owners need to have a social media strategy to navigate the complex and crowded terrain. Social media is about having an ongoing conversation with your customers, not a few sporadic posts about your business on every existing network. You have to put in the time and effort to cultivate your existing customers and attract new ones.

So rather than try to do it all—and stumble, narrow your focus. Ask yourself: What are my business goals? What am I hoping to achieve? How can I reach my audience and accomplish these goals?

Outline your objectives and create a plan. Figure out who your audience is, which platforms they engage in and what kind of content appeals to them. From there, you should be able to determine which social media platforms best align with your goals. Focus on one or two and establish your brand or business on those channels.

Next, start focusing on your message rather than the platform used to distribute it. Social media should be natural, not contrived. Find your voice, post often, and provide something useful to your audience. As your social presence grows, remember to analyze your analytic data and determine which social media platforms are driving more traffic. Adjust your strategy, evaluate your goals and keep moving forward to meet them.

Contact us today to learn more about our social media marketing services.

Building a brand takes thought and planning. The process involves many aspects, some of which include brand reputation, brand trust and brand promise. Your identity as a brand hinges upon solidifying these concepts into one cohesive initiative—and then consistently communicating that unified message at every touch point.

One begins by clarifying your unique selling proposition—meaning, who you are and what you stand for. One way of doing this is by asking the question, “We are the only ones who …?” to establish what is unique about your company or product. These points should not be intangible entities like “best service” or “friendly representatives.” These attributes must be compelling and unique to your organization. It is critical to keep focus on these key points in this step and throughout the process.

The development of a thoughtful brand is not for the faint of heart. It takes courage to stand out and sometimes be controversial. Bringing attention to a brand often brings accolades as well as criticisms and we must be prepared to address both. The brand owner must not only be willing to speak to their customers but also to listen to them. This is why customer engagement with social media is becoming so important to leading companies today.

A thoughtful brand must exhibit character. This is not necessarily in the literal sense, although in some cases an animated character can be used to exemplify the qualities that the brand stands for. An example would be the Geico Gecko. He is friendly, easy going, practical—and British, which of course, makes him smart, polite and affable.

Next, the brand identity must establish credibility. One way to do this is by asking, “who you are not.” Your defining identity must be believable. It is a promise of what you are attempting to represent. And this identity should remain consistent across all platforms. From your print advertising such as newspaper ads to a storefront, your customer should recognize your brand wherever they encounter it.

Lastly, having a thoughtful brand requires commitment. Conveying your brand is the responsibility of everyone in your organization. Once you have established year brand, it must be nurtured like a new born baby. It takes time for a brand to grow and mature and during this process expect to see some changes. Remember, you will most likely get tired of your brand well before your customers do. If you are patient and you persevere, hopefully, over time, you will see your brand become a well known entity that your customers will welcome and grow to rely upon for years to come.

Earlier this week, we posted part I of “Responsive, Adaptive, Fluid…” an exploration into “what is responsive web design?” Now in part II, we’re diving a little deeper into how to actually achieve responsive websites and why they’re so important in today’s marketplace.

How We Achieve Responsive Websites

While current versions of Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and even Internet Explorer allow us to use media queries to achieve responsive websites, the ever-popular Internet Explorer versions 6-8 do not support this feature (and many others). Thankfully, there are several solutions for making this work in Internet Explorer 6, 7 and 8. We have been using Scott Jehl’s respond.js to make our sites responsive in these older versions of IE. Simply reference this very lightweight (3kb) script after your CSS has been included, and then “crack open Internet Explorer and pump fists in delight.” While this will make the older IE’s parse and interpret your media queries, it will not make them listen to the cool new HTML5/CSS3 things you are trying to do. Another widely used JavaScript library, Modernizr, allows for a more consistent experience within these new HTML5/CSS3 websites in older browsers. This way, we can take full advantage of what HTML5 and CSS3 can do without sacrificing control over the experience in our older friends.

For years, web designers have been practicing the concept graceful degradation: giving users with the latest browsers an exciting and full experience while still maintaining a simple and accessible experience for those with older browsers. This still leaves much to be desired in the older browsers. Progressive enhancement states that we must now work in the opposite direction: delivering the most basic experience first and then building upon it for users with better bandwidth and browsers, enhancing the experience as the rendering capability of the device and user’s connection allows. After all, the content of our sites is what drives users to visit them in the first place: everything else is just decoration.

Looking Ahead

It’s a very exciting time to be in the field of web and interaction design. An ever-increasing number of tablets, smartphones, and laptops have forced us to abandon the old practice of simply creating separate desktop and mobile versions of a site. Instead, one universally accessible and flexible version of a website must be served up to any device that requests it. Many people think these practices will be carried over into television interfaces, which currently leave something to be desired on smaller screens as an increasing amount of users try to access their televised entertainment on their tablets. While tablet computing may be a trend, designing responsively for different screen sizes is not and is the best practice going forward. After all, who knows what the next great mobile device may be or what size it will be. By beginning to implement these practices now, we can create websites that are ready for whatever may be coming down the pike.

For some hands-on experience with a few terrific responsive websites, check out the below links (and don’t be afraid to resize your browser to see how they react!)

http://bostonglobe.com/

http://thinkvitamin.com/

http://css-tricks.com/ 

Recently, Adworkshop’s Senior Digital/UX/Interactive Designer Geoff Sanford and I had the opportunity to attend An Event Apart in Washington, D.C. At the conference we heard several leading experts in the field of web design discuss the exciting features of the new HTML5 and CSS3 specifications. We also attended an inspired lecture on responsive web design given by Ethan Marcotte, whose book “Responsive Web Design” we had been reading for a few weeks leading up to the event. Hearing Ethan speak passionately about creating websites for the ever-increasing number of devices that are popping up made us realize just how vastly the landscape had changed in the past year.

What Happened? 

To understand responsive web design we must look at how the web has changed in recent years. Just a few years ago, designers only concerned themselves with the constraints of the desktop computer. With the smartphone explosion, designers had to start thinking about how their sites were displayed on small screens. This led to a dramatic increase in mobile versions of websites, which offered simple layouts appropriate for mobile smartphone browsing screens. With the success of the iPad and increase in touchscreen tablet use in the past two years, the number of screen sizes designers need to consider again increased. Several imitations of the iPad with varying screen sizes were created based on Google’s Android mobile operating system. Faced with the dilemma of creating versions of sites specifically tailored to fit all of these new devices, designers and programmers came to the conclusion that we need to make our websites responsive and embrace HTML5 mobile web development.

Now What? 

Responsive web practices offer us the opportunity to create one website, one experience, and alter it depending on whatever device may request it. Rather than building a website for desktop use (typically constrained within a 960 pixel fixed width that is centered on the page), we must now build our sites from the smallest device up: enhancing the presentation of content, images and amount of graphics onscreen as the width of the device increases. This requires a more flexible and liquid approach to layout, allowing our content to adapt and size itself depending on how much horizontal space is available on the canvas. Combined with scalable images and fluid layouts based on percentages and em’s, we can render content appropriately across any number of screen sizes. A device’s screen is, after all, our canvas, and we would be remiss not to offer up a satisfying and usable experience no matter what size it may be.

Responsive web practices are more achievable now than ever before as more and more browsers adapt the new HTML5 and CSS3 specifications. These allow us to finally incorporate media queries into our stylesheets. HTML4 and CSS2 allowed us to include separate stylesheets for different media types, for example websites often include a separate print stylesheet that is run to strip down content to its most basic elements for clean printing. HTML5 and CSS3 media queries take this one step further, allowing us to inquire about specific media features of the device that is requesting our content, such as height and width. This is immensely powerful, because we can now include styles specifically designed to adjust the layout and graphics based on the width of the device without changing the content itself. Combined with simple and clean HTML5 coding practices, we can offer up a consistent experience across any device. Instead of giving a gated experience and hiding certain content and features from mobile users, we simply present them in a manner more appropriate for their browsing device.

To learn more about how to achieve responsive web design, stay tuned for Part II- coming soon!

As 2011 comes to a close and marketing plans are finalized for 2012, there is a lot to consider for the future. However, while drafting your marketing plan, don’t forget about an important print creative piece that is simple and effective –and often overlooked: direct mail marketing.

Seriously, direct mail is still relevant, and important to the overall success of your campaign. In fact, a recent study by Epsilon Targeting states the following:

• Customers surveyed in the U.S. and Canada Selected ‘Mail’ as their preferred method of receiving information for almost every category listed, from health care information to household products,insurance and financial services. (The only category where direct mail didn’t rank #1? Travel. Customers were split on preferred information source – 29% liked the Internet, while 28% wanted direct mail.)
• Customers trust direct mail messages more than information received via e-mail or online.
• Customers feel valued when they receive a piece of mail.

Now, sending a postcard to a database of 100,000 names can be costly, so segment strategically. Remember, customers want to feel valued with that piece of mail, and receiving a plain white envelope to “Valued Customer” because that’s all you could afford won’t do the trick. Personalized Pieces with variable fields. Learn to engage the senses by incorporating taste, smell or sound to your piece. There are small things you can do to increase your yield and, consequently, ROI.

Of course, there are many other things to consider: target markets (women prefer direct mail over men), call-to-action and urgency of the message, just to name a few. And again,a strategic, integrated approach to marketing and communications is the key. But the notion that direct mail is no longer as valued or as important is far from the truth.

Contact us today and find out how we can help you reach your goals for 2012.