Ohio Website Design, Open for Business
April 2, 2008
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This is the second of 4 new commercials for marketing website design in Ohio that Marcy Design has created. This commercial portrays different types of signs that say: ‘Open”. The theme of the spot states that your website is open 24/7 and that it should be ready for business at all times. Good variety of signs are used. I’ve seen some of these actual signs on store-fronts myself.
Ohio Website Design, Get More Out Of Your Website
March 28, 2008
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Marcy Design has created 4 new commercials for marketing website design in Ohio. The first commercial visually shows people using the web through the use of typography. The word ‘Click’ appears on the screen numerous times to represent the ability to attract the target audience to your website. Good use of the tag-line at the end of the commercial: ‘Get more out of your website by visiting ours.’
Ohio Website Design, Government Style
March 5, 2008
Website design is important for government websites as well. The Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission has created a new website to promote their services. Flash animation was used to enhance the website. For a website this large, it is well organized and easy to navigate.
17 Reams of Copy Paper Equals 1 Tree
February 1, 2008
How do you market your company? Most businesses use brochures, sales sheets, reports and a wide variety of printed materials. The paper that these items are printed on comes from trees. Fortunately, trees are a renewable source and more paper is being recycled every year. But how can you help the environment, conserve paper and stay in business all at the same time? The first step is to find out how much paper your company uses with its printed materials. A website called Conservatree has put together information with statistics related to printing and paper usage. Below is a brief summary you can use to calculate paper usage.
- 1 ream of copy paper (500 sheets) uses 6% of a tree
- Nearly 17 reams of copy paper uses 1 tree
- A 16-page brochure (5,000 copies) uses almost 5 trees
The next step is to create a dynamic new website and warehouse all of your marketing materials online. Sales sheets could become PDF files that you can link from your website or send to clients via email. Reports can come alive through Flash animation. Annual reports can be customized for each viewer with a database application. Think about the new generation of prospects coming into the market. With cell phones, laptops, and wireless connection, they are online gurus. So moving your marketing online isn’t just saving the planet, it’s good for your business. Create a new website and save a tree or two.
Honda Commercial, 606 Takes Equals 6 Million Dollars
January 24, 2008
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Honda has created a Rube Goldberg style two-minute commercial for the new Honda Accord. The commercial is ground-breaking because it was shot in real-time, in one take. Supposedly, it took several weeks to produce and 606 takes to get the one perfect take, all at a cost of 6 million dollars. Everything shown in the commercial is from two real automobiles that were disassembled and not from 3D graphic animation. This spot is currently being shown on British television and, through viral marketing, making its way through email boxes in the US.
Apple Commercials Continue to be Funny
January 23, 2008
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Apple continues to create TV commercials that are funny and extend the brand. A recent Apple commercial, ‘Quote’, is another in a series of ads featuring the characters ‘Mac’ and ‘PC’. The spot promotes Leopard (their new operating system) and the reaction by ‘PC’.
Add Video to Your Website to Engage Your Audience
January 22, 2008
In the context of marketing and advertising, words use only one of our senses, our eyes. A voice over also uses only one of our senses, our ears. It is only video that engages both our eyes and ears. And the way to capture the attention of your target audience is to engage more than one of their senses. It’s the reason that companies such as Anheuser-Busch will spend 2.6 million dollars for one 30 second spot on the Super Bowl this year. It works.
Your business can use this marketing advantage by adding video to your website. Think about creating a 30 second commercial about your business and put it on your Home page. If you have a product, demonstrate the benefits and features in a short video spot. If you have a service and it can’t be described in a brief video, break the narrative into segments like chapters in a book. Create a simple navigation that make it easy for the user to view your videos.
Because the video should be professionally produced, hire a marketing firm to identify your brand identity, write a tight script and produce your business video. There are many methods to encode and upload the final video to your website. You can also use the free services of YouTube to upload and host your business video and link back to your website. The fact is that you don’t have to spend 2.6 million dollars to create a great video for your website. Get started and get your target audience excited.
A New Website Design Can Improve Your Business
January 21, 2008
A new website design allows you to re-introduce your company. Think of a company like Apple and how they are constantly seen as innovators of their market. One method for giving your business a boost in sales is to review your existing website.
- Does your website reach your target audience effectively?
- Have you reviewed your competition’s websites?
- Does your website reflect your brand identity?
- Is your website search engine ‘friendly’?
- Does your website design look professional?
- Have you budgeted for a new website this year?
Sales does not happen in a vacuum. If you’ve done your homework by creating an effective brand, then the next step is to build solid marketing support to reach prospects, warm them up to your product or service, and make the sale. The more qualified prospects you can get into the pipeline, the better the opportunity to improve your business. And the Internet is the most exciting playing field to plant your flag. Online, the world is your oyster.
That’s not to say that you can put up an average website. Your website needs to be the best. When prospects visit, you want them to stay, review and be excited about your product or service. The goal should be to get them to call or send for more information. On low-priced items, get them to place an order online. On higher ticket items, a salesperson usually needs to make the close. In either case a new website design can dramatically re-energize your business’ sales.
Ohio Website Design, Part IV
January 7, 2008
Website design is important in promoting events. The Ohio Auto Dealers Association has created a new website to promote the Greater Toledo Auto Show this month. Flash animation was used to enhance the website. The opening is fantastic.
Should You Hire a Website Design Company?
December 27, 2007
There are three ways to design and build your company website: Build it yourself, use an online service or hire a professional website development company. The first choice, building the website yourself, is easy and inexpensive. If you have the know-how, you can put a basic website up for in a short amount of time. Keep in mind that you need to think about the target audience, your competition and brand identity. There are other articles on this website blog that go into more detail about the web design process. There are also unlimited books and resources available on the Internet to help you build a website. The downside is the time it takes to build your website. If you own your own business, then you might have more pressing needs such as keeping the business running by focusing on sales.
The next method for building a company website is to utilize available online resources. Simply Google ‘website design’ and you will see hundreds of companies that offer pre-build websites for your company. I would recommend using this method if you are opening a new business. This give you the time to work out different versions of the content that defines your website. There is a free service at ionWeb.com that offers a one-page, non-nonsense approach to get you started. When using this method, you won’t have a lot of choices, but it helps to get your website off of the ground without the fuss.
The third choice is to hire a professional website development company. If you don’t have the time or experience to use the other methods, then hire someone to help. When you find the right company, you get a more objective opinion about your company’s website. There are even businesses that offer marketing and search engine services that go beyond just the design and production. Obviously it will cost money to hire someone who knows what they are doing, but if you budget for marketing, including website design, your company stands a better chance of succeeding.
Before you start the project yourself give this some thought. When we remodeled our kitchen a few years ago, I reviewed the process and thought I could save money and do the work myself. However I don’t remodel kitchens for a living so I also assumed that I could only work weekends and weeknights and found it would take me a minimum of 6 months to complete the remodeling project. Along with the mess it also meant that we would be without a kitchen for that period of time. Long story short, we hired a kitchen remodeling expert; it was completed in a tmely fashion and we were serving meals to our family in our beautiful new kitchen no time.
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