We’ve always been slightly suspicious of formal public relations efforts. It works for lots of companies but in a social networking world public relations has a harder job remaining credible and authentic. We’ve been working on our own ideas and learning from our friends at Grasshopper to build a simple sales-orientated buzz process.

Although still in a state of refinement here is the process and some specific tasks associated with each step. Keep in mind this specific checklist is in context of creating buzz for Fresh Tilled Soil so the relevant audience targets would be exchanged for each appropriate client should we go that route:

Buzz Process Checklist:

1. Read through the list of design blogs that are looking for contributions and add each one to a spreadsheet (use Google docs if you can so we can all have access to it and make edits if necessary) Read more

Recently renamed the Search and Social Marketing department, our SEO team had more to celebrate this past weekend than just the Superbowl.  Everyone at Fresh Tilled Soil was delighted upon learning Friday that our long time process engineering and design build firm client, SPEC, closed a new deal worth $15,000,000. High spirits around our Waltham office increased further when SPEC informed us that the initial lead landed on their doorstep as a result of our organic search engine optimization services. The term which lead their new client to SPEC’s website was “boston process engineering” and after looking at the following screenshot you’ll see why the introduction was no accident.

In addition to the top organic listing seen just below the Google Maps image, Fresh Tilled Soil’s Search and Social Marketing department also spent time getting Spec’s website to the top of the local search listings. The ensuing dual-coverage on Google’s SERP (search engine results page) made Spec’s corporate website impossible to miss, and a very profitable new business relationship has been the exciting eventuality.

Selling goods and services online is a multi-step process, with each facet dependant on the others all the way down the line. To dust off a tired marketing analogy, there’s no point in leading a horse to water if it isn’t going to take a big gulp once it gets there. It’s as true today as the moment a hundred years ago when it was likely coined – and is frequently repeated within our Waltham walls in one form or another. Everyone at our company is thrilled about Spec’s recent accomplishment, and it’s a perfect example of the way in which we strive to “partner” with our clients. To never abandon, but rather work with them from start to finish. Beginning with the earliest discovery phases and carrying right on through to a website’s final conversion analysis. We did this with Spec – and now it’s your company’s turn.

You may be a pro at your job and an expert on your industry, but how much do you know about web site design? For all the busy marketers and business owners out there, here is a quick guide to help you get the most out of your web site project.

• You are the expert on your company, so it is essential that you provide as much feedback as possible at every stage of the project. If anything is unclear or too abstract, just say something! Your web design team will be happy to help you understand. Read more

I just read this great article by Paul Boag. As a designer or specialist in any field it’s easy to blame a break down of communication or project failure on the client.

From Paul’s article and our own experience I have listed the things designers can do to reduce friction and ensure the web design project goes smoothly:

1. Asking the client for the budget needs to be explained in the context of what dollars can buy. Using comparisons and familiar analogs helps the client figure out why we need those numbers and what the value of those dollars will be. We often say “when shopping for a house you look at comparative homes. Let’s look at some comparison web sites to see what your money will buy”. Read more

(Another reason to love Campaign Monitor)

This morning we discovered just how powerful and flexible the Campaign Monitor Template system is for enabling clients to craft and send their own Newsletter or Email Campaigns through the system. Using their proprietary Template Tags, you can customize virtually any section of an Email Campaign template you want while making higher level elements such as the overall structure, branding and footer elements locked through the system.

Here’s an example of a template that’s fully editable by a client in our system:

Everything you see from beneath the logo to the Salutation is editable, including the hyperlinked image in the right column.

Here are a few helpful tips on how we created it:

The Main Newsletter Title:

The main title is simply a Heading 1 Tag with the following inside of it:

<$title link=’true’ default=’Enter Title Here’>

Repeating Content Blocks:

In Campaign Monitor, content blocks consist of a Repeater element with other elements nested within such as headings, images and paragraphs. In this case, we have a Heading 2 tag, a Paragraph beneath it. In other templates, we’ve included the ability to float an image to the right of the paragraph. In this case, we’ve inserted a “Clearing” div above each repeated block so that every content block you add clears the right-aligned image and starts underneath it.

Here’s some sample code:

<repeater>
<h2><$title link=’true’ default=’Enter Body Content Title’$></h2>
<$description default=’Enter Body Content’$>
</repeater>

The coolest thing about these proprietary tags is that the tags that say ‘Enter Body Content Title’ or ‘Enter Body Content’ can be changed to anything you want so the more you extend the template for clients to work with, the more you can guide them by customizing the headings they see when inputting their content.

Single Images:

The most basic form of allowing a client to upload an image is simply to use this tag:

<img src=”<$imagesrc link=’true’$>”>

Now, in the event you wanted to lock the width, apply a border, align it or margin it, you can add on parameters to the image tag like so:

<img src=”<$imagesrc link=’true’$>” width=”200″ align=”right” border=”0″ style=”margin:10px;”>

Once you start playing with these tags inside of Campaign Monitor, it becomes clear that you have access to a great deal of flexibility for custom templates.

View a full list of Campaign Monitor Template Tags.

Last Friday we had two great meetings that have confirmed that Agile development practices and product prototyping are going to be web entrepreneur’s most valuable tools in the coming years. The release early, release often methodologies of Agile and Scrum combined with the velocity that you can create work with prototypes is totally disrupting new product development cycles. What we heard in these meetings was pleasantly surprising.

The first meeting we had on Friday was with Jo Tango, founder of Kepha Partners, and self-proclaimed “business builder”. Jo and his team manage a $100 million fund which is aimed at very early stage ventures across several markets. What was surprising for us to hear from Jo is that he’s looking for entrepreneurs that are spending more time working on a prototype than they are on their presentation decks. “We’ve invested in teams that have a 2-page PowerPoint and an awesome demo”, Jo told us. We too have heard too often from VC’s and investors that an entrepreneur’s deck and pitch can make or break their chances of getting funded. Jo disagrees with that approach and focuses on what startup founders have already created, whether it’s perfect or not. His team is looking for iterative traction from a demo or beta release not a fancy PowerPoint.

The meeting that followed was a short but fruitful conference call with Medtronic CIO, Mike Hedges, and his application development team. We’re currently designing an app for Medtronic that will be disruptive to their primary market of pacemaker sales and support. We’re using our hybrid of Agile and prototyping to get this big project done in digestible bite-size pieces. As we talked about using this approach for several upcoming projects, Mike reminded us, “no need to talk about Agile and prototypes. You’re preaching to the converted”. Old habits are hard to break. Until recently we felt as if preaching about Agile and prototyping was falling on deaf ears.

The alternative to this approach is what most tech teams are used to: a long series of meeting to decide what to do, impossibly trying to predict obstacles, writing bible-length tech specs, working with frustrating offshore resources, endless QA cycles and launch delays. Traditionally large companies, like Medtronic, have relied on other larger companies, like IBM and Sapient, to deliver end-to-end technology solutions. Now it seems those companies move too slow for them. Application development teams are looking for small, nimble partners that can iterate and update prototypes on an almost daily schedule.

In the real world, the landscape and markets are always changing. By the time you have completed the first round of development, you’re already behind the changes the market is absorbing. That leaves you with obsolete features and dissatisfied end users. In Agile development, you build small pieces, test them and let the feedback guide you to the next small piece. By ensuring units are kept small Agile development can help mitigate many of the issues that case large unmanageable applications to emerge.

So if you are an entrepreneur and you’re trying to launch a web project what should you be thinking about?

• Team work: Every project we do has two or more UI experts working on the same designs so we can double check our own work. Never have one person doing the thinking in a vacuum. A designer sitting in a corner trying to figure out the complex user iterations for each story is a disaster waiting to happen. Small nimble teams with open spaces work better than overly funded all-star teams. You’ll be surprised by what Agile and prototyping can accomplish. Our team recently prototyped an entire 50-plus page application in 2.5 days.
• Keeping everything small: By keeping the design and development teams small and by breaking big problems into small problems we eat the elephant much quicker. Trying to solve big problems by having big meetings with lots of senior level people only slows things down. In one recent case we were able to double the pace of delivery by reducing the client team to four people from the initial ten. Informal and small teams make the process much more flexible and agile (with a small ‘a’). Changes can be made quickly without breaking related elements or upsetting the course of action.
• Tracking and accountability: We use Basecamp as a management tool. I’m not a big fan of complex project management tools. Basecamp is super simple and doesn’t encourage you to add unnecessary complexity. If you can’t break down the project into small stories and tasks there is no system on the planet that will help you track your daily work. Basecamp to-do’s allow us to immediately assign responsibility for each task and to follow up each morning during our Universal Backlog reports. Constant feedback on where we are on the overall task lists make it  easier to make higher level decisions maintain focus on the product vision or mission.

Our new office is a beautiful space. The space is located in the recently renovated Watch Factory in Waltham, MA. The building is located on a bend in the Charles River which affords us an amazing uninterrupted view from almost every window.

We selected this space for several reasons but mostly for it’s open plan layout. Our designers, developers and marketing specialists all work collaboratively eliminating the need for individual offices or cubes. This might seem either obvious to some and foreign to others so let me explain how physical space influences our somewhat virtual work.

Almost every project we do requires team work. Designers often work closely with other designers and digital strategists to determine the best UI and aesthetics. Physical barriers like walls and dividers reduce the opportunities for teams to ask questions and talk about ideas and obstacles. We believe that projects are successful when small decisions get made every day instead of waiting for a weekly meeting to deal with accumulated big decisions. We go so far as to ask that no one takes ‘ownership’ of a desk but rather chooses to sit where it makes the most sense on that day. Desk and chair arrangements change daily and follow no set floor plan. This gives teams the flexibility to work together one day and split up to collaborate with other people the next day.

Justin Bingham is one of those guys that never disappoints with his insight into development. In a series of posts on his new blog he clearly outlines the advantages and pitfalls of hybrid development practices. What I really like about the detailed descriptions he offers is that he combines both the technical and the psychological aspects of managing and delivering a successful project. It’s easy to follow a step by step methodology. On the other hand being empathetic to client and team needs while still being alert to bullshit gives you serious advantage over just following process alone. This except hits at the core of Justin’s point…

Respect your Bullsh*t Meter. Some people will say just about anything to get your money.  You can ask all the right questions, and still get fleeced if you don’t listen carefully to the answers.  Look for any elements of inconsistency.  If someone tells you that they adhere to agile development practices, ask them later on in the conversation how long they usually spend putting together their technical specification document before they start coding.  This is a lot like being at a party and having someone tell you how much they love the movie that you were just talking about, and then later dropping an obvious reference and watching it sail over their head.  Steer clear of these people, and steer clear of these firms.  They’ll say anything to get you to like them.  Don’t be afraid to tune your meter if you’re having trouble identifying them.

Who's Behind the Curtain?

I’ve always known that something wasn’t quite right with corporate websites, and after seeing things like Dustin Curtis’ mockery of American Airlines, I couldn’t help but explore the topic furthur. Why is it so hard for a large corporations to create successful strategies online? Bureaucracy.

Designers need to sell ideas to middle managers, middle managers in turn sell those ideas to upper management. If upper management doesn’t scoff it then and there, it may make it to that illusive decision maker. I’ve found that communication can quickly stray from it’s original message in any chain of conversion. It’s hard to tell if your intended message makes it all the way through. As designers we need to realize that it is our job to shake things and force influence upon decision makers from time to time. If we aren’t loud we’ll never be heard. Why is this so hard to do in a corporate web design environment? As Andy Rutledge beautifully puts it, “It’s usually about trying to keep the dumbest people in the room (or in the company) from shooting themselves in the foot.”

The reason this sort of thing is allowed to happen is because the corporate model for projects does not work for a design project. Design can only succeed when all of the relevant business needs and expectations: for the brand, end-users, marketing, conversion, as well as decision-maker concerns are communicated to the designers. And it helps to know just who the ultimate decision makers are. But this so seldom happens in the corporate world, as decision makers are hidden behind layers of administration and process, so designers often end up working without the information necessary to satisfy them.