info snack

A friend saw this poster in his neighbourhood recently. His...

Thu, 17 May 2012 12:04:00 -0700

A friend saw this poster in his neighbourhood recently. His words when he posted it on Facebook were “Caught my eye and made me laugh” (a successful headline can’t do too much more than that). A couple more people reposted it, including me here and I will certainly get a quote if we move again (especially as I really am small and weak) - job done for whoever wrote that headline and all for the price of a piece of plain paper.

As adman David Ogilvy said, “The best ideas come as jokes. Make your thinking as funny as possible.” I’m pretty sure that idea started as a joke.

1907 Vancouver tram-cam I think this takes you around...

Wed, 01 Jun 2011 09:27:41 -0700

1907 Vancouver tram-cam

I think this takes you around Granville-Hastings-Carrall-Cordova-Cambie-Robson. Still driving on the left in those days and there are noticeably more hats and fewer Starbucks outlets.

El Clasico: Round three Round three of the El Clasico marathon...

Wed, 27 Apr 2011 09:20:00 -0700

El Clasico: Round three

Round three of the El Clasico marathon today. Let’s hope for more artistry from Messi and co. Animation (of November’s amazing Barcelona performance) by Richard Swarbrick of Gareth Bale vs Inter Milan fame.

Inside Vancouver - a tourism blog done well

Mon, 04 Apr 2011 10:34:00 -0700

Inside Vancouver - a tourism blog done well:

It amazes me that not every city or country’s Tourism Board has a blog. There’s a limitless amount of content that can be produced and no shortage of writers, photographers, videographers and other content creators who would jump at the chance to get their work featured.

An example of a tourism blog done very well is Inside Vancouver from Tourism Vancouver. The content is really well organized, with clear categories (instead of the vague “Things to Do” you often see on travel-related blogs, or worse, content organized by month as in many blogs), and it does a brilliant job of showcasing the people, sights and things to do within the city. A quick search on Google for a couple of topics sees the blog rank pretty highly, so the SEO element works well. And of course every post is easily distributed through Twitter and Facebook.

Useful stuff #7 - Things

Fri, 01 Apr 2011 13:57:00 -0700

Useful stuff #7 - Things:

It’s a bit embarrassing to count how many task management type apps or online to-do list tools I have tried over the years, but Things (Mac) is the only one I’ve stuck with as an alternative to a pen and paper for planning and organizing my own projects. And it has an iPhone version that syncs nicely.

I did stick with one other to-do list service, though (in addition to Today). TeuxDeux is a nice one if you float between different locations/computers. Also has a good iPhone version.

Fancy gadgets more viral than gorillas? This video from Corning...

Fri, 25 Mar 2011 12:15:00 -0700

Fancy gadgets more viral than gorillas?

This video from Corning Glass has had over 10m views and counting on YouTube - compared to just 90,000 or so for their one featuring a gorilla.

It’s a nice way of telling a story about a pretty mundane product, not to mention looking very plausible. Man in gorilla suit - not so much. Should have had him play the drums.

Got a desk for rent in Vancouver?

Fri, 25 Mar 2011 09:11:00 -0700

This has been my longest stretch working from the home office/local coffee shop (four months now) and I’ve decided I need workmates again, or at least other people working around me.

I’m looking for a co-working or shared office space in Vancouver for at least one day a week - ideally with a small design/marketing/digital or other creative business, a small start-up, or a social enterprise or charity - basically somewhere where I could also make myself useful if ever needed. I can provide copywriting, content, proofreading and other services in part-return or for similar reasonable rates (as well as just helping out as an extra pair of eyes).

I’m office-trained, have worked in a shared, rented or hot-desking space before and am happy to contribute Timbits, do the coffee run, come for post-work beers, discuss the Canucks, etc, etc.

Or, somewhere like The Melting Pot or Centre of Social Innovation would be perfect.

"Content informs design; design without content is decoration."

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 17:36:00 -0700

“Content informs design; design without content is decoration.”

- Jeffrey Zeldman

One job title. Three toques. I gave myself the longish job title...

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 17:09:00 -0700

One job title. Three toques.

I gave myself the longish job title of copywriter / web editor / web content strategist partly because that’s a benefit of being self-employed, partly to keep up-to-date with recent developments in the area of web content, and partly because choosing one risked pigeonholing myself (which also sounds painful).

This post is intended to clarify the differences between the three slightly different but interlinking roles of copywriter, web editor and content strategist (in the context of what I do direct for client companies or through agencies).

Copywriter

A copywriter is, to quote the title of this excellent book, an idea writer, as well as a marketing storyteller. The aim of a copywriter is to deliver your messages and communicate your stories in as compelling and engaging a way as possible. There are different types of copywriter, but generally I do the following:

Web copy
Print copy
Copy themes
Platform copy
Marketing storytelling
Copy for any sort of marketing campaign
Taglines and headlines
Newsletters
Articles
Scripts, eg corporate videos
Customer value statements

Web editor

Web editors make cluttered, unclear and inaccessible websites better. A web editor can step in when you have existing content from, for example, a brochure or other source, but it’s not readable, accessible or engaging enough to work well on the web. Or you have existing web copy and it’s just not very good.

The aim of a web editor is to help ensure that visitors to your website very quickly understand the hows, whys, whats and whos of your business, as well as making sure the content is up-to-date and written in a consistent style (often, web content is produced by a number of different people). As web editor, I can:

Edit and organize content for the web
Ensure consistency
Write a style guide
Provide training in web writing for future client content updates
Add keywords for search engine optimization purposes
Write meta data

Web content strategist

Web content strategists take an overall, holistic view of your website and other content to make sure it’s all working well together. The aim of a web content strategist, like any kind of strategist, is to ensure there is a plan in place for all or specific elements of your content. A relatively new role, it’s quite similar to a web editor role, including:

Content planning and organization
Content reviews
Content audits
Content inventories
Content repurposing
Content marketing
Editorial schedules, eg blog calendars

Depending on what your project involves, I can wear one or a combination of these hats (without actually wearing them of course; I don’t own any of the hats above) on your project. Please get in touch for more info.

Useful stuff #6 - Today

Mon, 21 Mar 2011 15:35:00 -0700

Useful stuff #6 - Today:

My favourite to-do and calendar app, Today sits in the menu bar and integrates with iCal - very useful.

Gareth Bale vs Inter Milan Breathtaking. (Bale’s...

Mon, 14 Mar 2011 17:34:00 -0700

Gareth Bale vs Inter Milan

Breathtaking. (Bale’s performance and the animation.)

Surely won’t be long before we’ll see this animator used in a Nike or Adidas ad.

Travel Marketing Case Study: Tourists + camera + curious...

Wed, 09 Mar 2011 06:58:00 -0800

Travel Marketing Case Study: Tourists + camera + curious squirrel + Internet + creative thinking + Twitter + someone funny = @Banff_Squirrel

When I signed up to Twitter I didn’t expect a squirrel wearing glasses and a hockey helmet to generate the most entertaining tweets in my feed.

But that’s what’s happened. Credit to Banff and Lake Louise Tourism for recognizing an opportunity and making the most of it.

Update: Squirrel wins Best Online Campaign at the Canadian E-tourism Awards.

Great website - A New Warrior | Greenpeace. For the first time...

Mon, 07 Mar 2011 16:42:00 -0800

Great website - A New Warrior | Greenpeace.

For the first time in ages there’s a Flash intro I actually wanted to watch and listen to, and that had a purpose other than to look flashy. The soundtrack then stays with you while you’re on the site, making browsing feel like a cinematic experience.

The content is great in bringing a famous ship to life, and the whole website works superbly as one big call to action, as well as tackling the problem of how to show people exactly how their donation can help.

There’s the clear overview copy on the home page, making it obvious what the site is for; the sense of urgency generated by the construction percentage widget and the crossing out of items already bought; the very prominent viral Facebook and Twitter buttons; the interactive navigation; the brilliant design and imagery that lets you see the ship built donation by donation; and the donor incentive of being able to help build and become part of the new Rainbow Warrior.

Not perfect I suppose as Flash won’t work for everyone, but superb nonetheless.

"What no wife of a writer can ever understand is that a writer is working when he’s staring out..."

Wed, 02 Mar 2011 11:07:00 -0800

“What no wife of a writer can ever understand is that a writer is working when he’s staring out of the window.
– Burton Rascoe”

- I suggest everyone who works in any sort of job involving creative thought bookmarks this quote for the next time your other half/boss gives you some stick for staring out the window.

Not that that just happened to me or anything…

Useful stuff #5 - QuickCursor and Safari Reader

Wed, 02 Mar 2011 08:55:00 -0800

Useful stuff #5 - QuickCursor and Safari Reader:

When doing a content audit or inventory it’s often necessary to copy and paste a very large number of web pages from a client’s existing site to organize them into one document that’s easy to comment on and edit.

QuickCursor is a small app that lets you select any text in a browser and quickly edit it in your selected text editor - in my case WriteRoom - before dumping it into something like Word to format it.

For pages that have a lot of graphics or frames, I also use the Safari Reader tool in Safari to bring up a clean page of text first. Safari Reader also does a great job of stripping out the text from PDFs, which can be a formatting nightmare.

Instapaper does a similar job of providing a page of clean text, but in more steps. The Readability Add-on for Firefox also works well, but not on PDFs.

Are you sitting comfortably? I’m working with social media...

Tue, 22 Feb 2011 19:15:43 -0800

Are you sitting comfortably?

I’m working with social media agency Soya Marketing (who take a great story-based approach to social media strategy) on a project just now and was introduced at a meeting as “Web Storyteller”.

Maybe I should grow a beard and start smoking a pipe?

All the talk of stories in marketing these days has also brought back childhood memories of Jackanory.

It’s amazing to think that Jackanory just consisted of a person sitting in a chair reading a book out loud.

That’s the power of a good story though.

“As little as possible, as much as necessary.”

Fri, 18 Feb 2011 09:28:00 -0800

The amount of content you can stick on a website is not limited by paper size or printing costs, which is why people tend to write far too much online.

When asked how much is needed for a particular page or section, I generally reply with something like, “As much as you need to get your message or information across effectively.”

However, this is a much better way of saying it:

“As little as possible, as much as necessary.”
- Brain Traffic Blog

Or points (ii) and (iii) from George Orwell’s ‘Politics and the English Language’ essay also put it nicely:

(ii) Never us a long word where a short one will do.

(iii) If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.

Just scroll it. Seeing more and more imaginative scrolling...

Thu, 10 Feb 2011 13:07:00 -0800

Just scroll it.

Seeing more and more imaginative scrolling navigations (eg Ben the Bodyguard).

Nike Better World website.

Web content strategy. Got one?

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 09:43:00 -0800

“Content isn’t king anymore - it’s more like the emperor. Content is the start, middle and end of your online marketing story and is critical to virtually everything you do.”

- The Noob Guide to Online Marketing (SEOmoz.org)

The phrase ‘Content is king’ has been bandied around for a while as the Web has developed. Despite that, content creation - the words portion at least - would too often be left until the last minute in web projects - even very large web projects.

The content that time forgot

I often found myself being called in after a website’s launch to edit old content that had simply been shoehorned into the new website design. Like an explorer discovering lost tribes in the Amazon jungle, I would find myself stumbling over old content that time forgot.

The best reason I can think of for this is that the visual and interactive capabilities of the Web as a medium pushed written content down the list of priorities.

It also used to be thought that people don’t read online, when in fact of course they do - just differently. And people really didn’t give much thought to who would own or update the content on a regular basis. Or how it could be repurposed to help with their marketing efforts.

In other words, they didn’t have a content plan or strategy.

“Content informs design; design without content is decoration.”
- Jeffrey Zeldman

Times they are a’changin’

Things are changing though. A characteristic of today’s effective websites is clear, well-written, easy-to-navigate and helpful copy and content - see Evernote, Mint, 37Signals, Spotify, Apple and ZenDesk as just a few good examples.

If it doesn’t interfere with the flow of information and fits with the brand, there’s room for some humour and clever lines, but the overall aim is to convey important messages (benefits, features, brand story, calls to action… ) in a clear and engaging way.

As well as the actual words, people are now more aware of the role content plays in the overall user experience on a website, including navigation. I used to do just writing and editing, but these days I find myself getting asked to contribute much earlier in website projects - through design agencies or by the client - so I can conduct an audit and provide an input into navigation labels, IA, content repurposing for marketing, etc.

Keyword research and the placement of keywords in visible page text - while still keeping the copy readable – and within the meta data is also more important than ever.

This seems to be how the role of ‘Web Content Strategist’ (sometimes aka ‘Web Editor’ or ‘Web Content Officer’) has emerged to become a more integral part of web projects rather than an after-thought.

Got a website. Now what?

Like ‘content strategy’, it’s hard to escape the phrase ‘content marketing’ these days. Pretty much any respectable list of digital marketing predictions for 2011 included ‘content’. Here’s one example from E-consultancy.

As well as being integral to website development, content is now a recognized cornerstone of a good online marketing strategy.

That strategy might require content to be produced, repurposed and distributed via email, a blog, keyword-optimized articles, whitepapers, Twitter, YouTube, etc to engage with an audience, drive traffic, retain customers, and generally contribute to the overall marketing effort.

So, do you need a web content strategy?

While a content strategy is essential for larger websites with a lot of regularly updated content, the benefits also apply to smaller businesses and websites - just on a smaller scale.

Whether you are a business, a designer or a small agency designing and building a new website or updating an existing site, ask yourself these questions:

Who produces the content and when?
Who plans it?
Who owns particular sections or subject areas?
Who approves it?
Who updates and reviews it?
Who writes the meta data?
Who makes sure other content is keyword-optimized?
Who does the audit and inventory of the existing copy?
Who writes the style guide?
Who trains the client in web writing for ongoing updates?
Who writes the behind-the-scenes yet essential user content, such as error pages, email notifications and other user copy?
Who produces the blog or email newsletter editorial calendar?

If you are based in Vancouver and don’t know the answers to these questions, a chat with a web content strategist in Vancouver could be a good starting point.

Useful stuff #4 - Pomodoro Technique

Mon, 07 Feb 2011 09:00:00 -0800

Useful stuff #4 - Pomodoro Technique:

Out of all of the ways I’ve tried to keep organized while working on multiple projects over the years the Pomodoro Technique is probably the best for shutting out distractions like a video of a gorilla walking like a man or a dramatic squirrel.

Designed by Italian procrastinator Fransesco Cirillo, the PT uses a timer that looks like a tomato to help you focus on specific tasks and get more stuff done. Strange as that might sound, it works!

All you need is a pencil, a note pad and a timer (Pomodoro is Italian for tomato and a tomato-shaped timer was all Fransesco had to hand when he invented his technique). You list your tasks at the start of the day, prioritize them and then work on them in 25-minute chunks, with a 5-minute break between chunks.

It works best when you have loads of little tasks to work through, although I’ve also found it useful for working through a longer content project that can be broken into sections.

Of course, this being 2011 there is an iPhone app. I got the Mac app, which does the job until I find somewhere that sells tomato timers.