Good read
Peeking Into Netflix Queues
There is an interesting article in the New York Times today that uses Google Maps based data visualizations to show neighborhood by neighborhood Netflix rental patterns in 12 major U.S. cities. For the selected city you can roll around the map to see the most rented movie by zip code or sort them by most rented, alphabetical or meta score and then use the slider to go through the 50 movies listed. In looking at New York you see interesting trends on some movies like Mad Men that is almost exclusively concentrated in Manhattan, Obsessed that was concentrated in Brooklyn and New Jersey and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button was seen by everyone everywhere.
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10 Realizations For Productivity & Making Ideas Happen
Behance.com is far and away my favorite online creative community for the quality of their content and their members. They recently published an article to their online magazine called “10 Realizations For Productivity & Making Ideas Happen” that explores the concept that there are too many ideas in the world and not enough action. It then goes through ten tips they put together from interviewing hundreds of the most productive individuals and teams in the world. It’s worth the read no matter what your experience.
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2007 ONE Show Annuals
One of the problems with changing jobs and states is that you lose track off all the little things like magazine subscriptions and professional memberships. Over a year later I am finally caught up and my newly renewed ONE club membership brought the latest ONE show awards annuals to my office door. I have made no secret that the quality of the work chosen for these publications doesn’t get to me very excited. I think this problem is compounded for interactive annuals since the very mediums let’s us see work from anywhere in the world almost immediately after it is launched. I say all of this not to simply torture the same topic again but rather explain my state of mind as I unboxed this new set of annuals today.
When you first see the annuals what is going on doesn’t sink in immediately. In the case of the Interactive Annual the cover reads “I AM ________ THIS BOOK. PG: ________”. It isn’t until you open the cover of the book and see there are several pages of stickers inside. The first one simple has “IN” and “NOT IN” which can be placed in the first blank on the cover. There are then two pages of numbers which can be placed in the second blank on the cover.
There is also two sheets if small multi-colored stickers you can use to tag edges of key pages through the annual. They have a variety of saying like “Seen it”, “Done it” and my favorite “Had it, C.D. killed it”.
This isn’t an original idea since I watch my wife read Domino and Lucky magazines every month which both come with their versions of these stickers. That being said, I haven’t seen an annual do something like this before and it moved the experience of going through the books to be engaging, fun and personalized. It even made going through an interactive annual – well – interactive. So kudos to ONE club for doing something fun, creative and NOT SAFE!
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My Kid Could Paint That
I follow the fine art community but I am not a huge devotee. This world was once again trust into the spotlight last year with the emergence of 4-year-old Marla Olmstead who rocketed from total obscurity into international renown. Some called her a prodigy and an equal of compared to Kandinsky and Pollock with her paintings sold for over $300,000. Others called a complete fraud since her parents would never let her paint one of her paints with a witness who could verify that she was the one producing the work. All of this is now the subject of a new documentary called ‘My Kid Could Paint That’ which looks to final put the debate to rest.
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Flash e-mail adoption
For years I have had clients asking about putting Flash in their e-mails and I saw an article today on CampaignMonitor.com with some results that back-up what I have been telling them – no one can see it. It will be interesting to see if this trend continues in the future but it is definitly here to stay.
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BACK TO BASICS – Practice safe design. Always use a concept.
The single largest problem that continues to hinder interactive design from really coming into it’s own is the fact that designers allow their work to be led more by technology or production techniques and not creative thinking that creates a user experience or concept that will resonate with the consumer.
As a creative director I have had tons of interactive portfolios come across my screen over the years and I see the same problem over and over again. Designers who think that technology is an idea. Unfortunately most of this work has been produced in Macromedia Flash and that technology has taken a huge amount of criticism over the years. I personally believe that pointing to Flash as the reason for ineffective user experiences and online advertising makes about as much sense as blaming paper for creating junk mail or the telephone for creating the solicitors who call during dinner. The fault should fall to the designers who have not taken the time to use a creative strategy as the basis of their work.
A good on-line creative strategy should define the values and brand attributes that need to be communicated to the consumer in a distinctive and compelling way that takes advantage of the medium. I use answers to the following list of questions as a starting point when I meet with a new client or start on a new project.
What are we advertising and why?
When you meet with your client about a new project, get a thorough understanding of the focus of the communications efforts such as: the brand, a specific product or service, a promotion or new news. Make sure you understand their reasons for wanting to be on-line. Often the rationale clients provide are expressed as marketing objectives not as communications objectives. Communications change the way people think and influence their behaviors. That is the difference between a marketing objective and a communications objective. What is it they are trying to achieve? Increase market share? Drive awareness? Increases frequency or penetration? Increase sales? Focus on uncovering the single most important obstacle the communications must overcome.
What is the brands communication past?
Get a clear understanding of where the brand has come from and where it is now is critical to determining where the brand needs to go. Look at the brands past advertising to gain a solid understanding of the it’s positioning, personality and focus. Research if the target of the brand’s activities have shifted and why. What are the reasons for this change?
What do we need to do?
It is a simple as it sounds. What are the deliverables that need to be created to fulfill the clients marketing and communications needs?
Who are we talking to? (Demographics)
What are the physical characteristics of your clients market? Your client should be able to provide you with some statistics that provide a snapshot of the consumer you will target with the creative work. Common demographics include: age, gender, religion, income level, education, and family composition.
Who are we talking to? (Psychographics)
What are the mental characteristics of your clients market? Your client should again be able to provide you with some information that provides a snapshot of the consumer’s mindset regarding: their personal values, their beliefs, their habits and their activities. Psychographics are often more powerful influences upon how a consumer views your clients category, brand or product as attributes often affect behavior, and attitudes typically cross age groups. Take time to know your consumer so your creative will be more impactful.
What is the personality and tone?
A brand’s personality should be a reflection it’s behavior, character, and manner. This personality should drive the style and tone of all our communications in writing, photos/illustrations, typography and style.
What is the selling idea?
The selling idea is a way of saying the most persuasive thing you can say to get consumers to alter their behavior towards a client’s category, brand or product. The selling idea should be the starting point for the development any compelling, original, and successful creative ideas. The selling idea can be about: ways of using the product, disadvantages of not using the product, satisfying needs (physical, social, psychological, new ways), product heritage / where or how it was made or generic benefit you want to own.
What do we want the consumer to do?
With any advertising you want to be able to evoke and emotion or action. What is the emotion you want them have? How should they feel about the brand? What do you want them to do?
This list is just a starting point. To create a great strategy you have to be able to distill and refine the answers to get at the insights and core brand attributes. The more accurate and concise you are able to become the better your ideas will be. I also recommend if possible to share your answers and thinking with a team of your peers or co-workers because the more people thinking about a project, the more new ideas can be generated.
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Back to basics
As web designers we work in very technology centric industry that likes to question how everything is done and the only constant is change. Our ever evolving technology forces us to find better and newer ways of doing everything. But as designers how can we separate the constantly changing technology from the un-changing need to have great ideas and created great designs?
I was lucky enough to grow up in an extremely creative family and my father was the executive creatice director at an ad agency in Pittsburgh. When most kids where earning their allowance from chores and paper routes, I was starting my advertising career. This was back in the dark ages before computers when you had to do paste-up keys, cut rubylith and set rub-down type all by hand. I am going to assume 90%+ have no idea what I just said I think that is a problem. For me, when it comes to my creative process and concepting I think that the old ways are the best ways. We seems to have lost our way and gotten too wrapped up in the shiny new technology we have to play with. We have forgotten that any advertising or design needs to start with a strategy and an idea. This never needed to be re-inevnted and we have become more concenred with production techniques and browser plug-ins than great ideas that create brands and shape culture.
All of that being said, I have decided to start writing a series of articles to help us all go back to basics. To look at what goes into a great ad, great typography, strategy and more. I also want to spend some time looking at the one thing no one ever seems to teach you – the tools and techniques that will help you have a great idea.
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Flash Embedding Cage Match
I have to hand it to the guys at A List Apart because it is the only site that has been able to remain as one my my favorite sites for years. They have another fantastic article this month from Bobby van der Sluis called ‘Flash Embedding Cage Match’. The article takes an in-depth look at the complexities and subtleties of embedding Flash content and examines the most popular embedding methods to see how good they really are. I would recommend it as a must read for any beginner to sub-guru level Flash developers out there. In addition to the article van der Sluis has also create a Flash embed test suite that is a sprawling documentation of all the different operating systems, browsers and embed methods.
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Truth in creative critics
Though not as funny as the “Truth in advertising” short film from a few years ago this is still very funny and you can easily put client and co-workers faces to each one of these personalities.
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TASCHEN Advertising Now! Online
I have written the praise of TASCHEN books before and I received the latest book from them today and they continue to impress. Advertising Now! Online is the most complete and best collection of best-in-class online advertising I have seen. All 448 pages are well laid out with large photos and the work is organized by subject. Each chapter also has an article from one of the agencies in the book about their biggest campaigns and what went in to creating them.
The best thing is that the book also contains a DVD which shows all of the work in motion which brings it to life and shows it the way it should be seen. Before this I have always enjoyed the books from ONE show every year but this is a much more international and complete collection and something should is a great desk reference for online advertising designers.
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