Archive for December 2010

Fri 31
Dec
2010

Slogan is and has always been employed by marketers to make people aware of the motto, importance or benefits of using the services or products of a particular organization. Slogan has to be powerful, persuasive and visually expressive so that people like it and speak enthusiastically about it. By using an interesting slogan, you can give boost to your company’s brand image. So, you need to be a bit cagey while choosing a slogan for your business. It is basically a double edged sword and if you fail to use it properly, a rude reality check will be waiting for you at the end.

Tips For Great Slogan
From print media to online advertisement, catchphrases are everywhere. But the truth is that not all of them are good enough to remember. Some of them even are awfully long and boring to the death. You need to do something significantly different; otherwise, you will find it really hard to generate a positive vibe. Your slogan should contain an “X” factor that will help you catapult your company into fame. Here are certain tips that you can try out:

  • Be original
  • Make it memorable
  • Keep it easy to read and remember
  • Stay consistent with your brand name
  • Generate a positive feeling

Now, you would definitely like to see some real world examples and here they go:

Volkswagen: – “Think small” – This you can least expect from a company of such strength and size. It creates a dramatic contrast that is hard to ignore.

Blogger: – “Push Button Publishing” – Blogger.com could not have got anything better than this. Its slogan is short, simple and easy to understand. The message is quite clear – Blogger.com stands for publishing.

Mac Pro: – “Beauty Outside. Beast Inside” – Who says beauty and brain cannot go together? Mac Pro busts the myths, as it offers beastly performance without making any comprise with its beautiful appearance.

Google: “Don’t be Evil” – It is an informal corporate motto of Google. What Google tries to convey through this message is that you can make it large in the virtual world without cheating.

Canon: – “See What We mean” – This is a classic example of an ideal slogan that inspires and encourages beholders time and again.

Reebok: – “I am What I am” – Reebok reaches out to its targeted audience with this simple yet highly engaging slogan.

Thu 30
Dec
2010

Best Social Bookmarking Plugins For WordPress

Poisted by : WebGuru     Under : Wordpress     1 Comment

People like to share and that is why Social bookmarking sites are here. Sharing interesting, funny or exciting info is cool. So, if you would like to make your WordPress blog look cool and fresh, here we have got something that you should not miss out at any cost. We have compiled a list of some highly popular social bookmarking plugins for WordPress that you can easily integrate with your blog. By integrating any of these social bookmarking plugins, you can easily spread your message. Your posts can get instant popularity as your visitors will share your posts with their friends by clicking on the bookmarking icons.

Drag to Share eXtended: – It is a powerful social bookmarking plugin that allows your visitors to share your blog post on different social bookmarking sites. It is easy to use and simple to integrate.

Socialgrid: – It is another simple widget that lets you organize your links in different profiles. Currently, it is offering support for these following services: Twitter, Technorati, StumbleUpon, Posterous, Friendfeed, Flickr and many more.

GetSocial: – This is an extremely lightweight widget. It floats onto your blog which means it will remain visible even when your visitors scroll down the page of your blog. This social bookmarking plugin comes loaded with Google Buzz button, Stumbleupon Submit button, Facebook Share button, Retweet button and Tweetmeme. However, you can easily add or remove any social media sharing button.

Light Social: – This is a lightweight social bookmarking plugin that adds a set of social bookmarking icons at the bottom of each post. It is extremely easy to configure and you can effortlessly enable or disable links of social bookmark. This widget uses latest and sophisticated simplistic html code, which means it is not going to have any detrimental impact on your website’s loading speed.

Share and Follow: – If you do not have enough time in hand, you can try out this social bookmarking plugin. It is designed for those average users and developers who want to save time.

SexyBookmarks: – The name may sound a bit edgy but this is one of those powerful social bookmarking plugins that can help your visitors submit your articles in different social bookmarking sites.

Sociable: – It comes with a zillion of social bookmarking sites. You can choose from 99 social bookmaking sites, which are amazing. This widget automatically adds links to your favorite bookmarking sites.

Tue 28
Dec
2010

Display Typography Inspiration and Best Examples

Poisted by : WebGuru     Under : Web Design     3 Comments

Picture is more powerful and expressive than thousand words put together. It can display emotion and can connect you precisely to your targeted audience through a powerful visual medium. Display typography is basically a rare combination of pure art and advertisement concept. Here pictures are made up of words, sometimes thousands of words and the outcome is undoubtedly impressive. The main objective of display typography is to establish a firm relationship between words and images to make an indelible mark on the minds of the people.

Display typography has recently emerged as a powerful advertisement tool, as it can help attract the attention of the viewers instantly. However, you need to make sure that the finished product is interesting and engaging, otherwise you will find it really hard to get connected to your targeted visitors.

Here in this article, we are going to feature some typographic portraits that can blow your mind:

Amnesty International Ad: – Brilliant concept and it is powerful enough to unsettle you. This typography depicts the horror of losing a leg in land mine blast. It urges the viewers to raise their voice and fight for a complete ban on land mines.

Cola Cola: – This typography does not come with a visual gimmick. It is quite straightforward and the purpose is to arrest the attention of the viewers.

Typographic World Map: – What’s interesting about this typography is that the shape of each of each country is represented by its name. It looks like newspaper cutout and the bold use of text is hard to ignore.

Australia Post Ad: – This is one of the most inspiring examples of display typography. It expresses the idea that word makes the best platform to get your message conveyed to someone very special.

Cover Girl: – Use of bright colors and fancy fonts has helped typography stands out from the rest.

Tribute to the Dalai Lama: – This was mainly done as a study project. It is a serious attempt to represent Dalai Lama by incorporating some of his speeches as far as possible.

Website header is arguably the most vital part of a website, as it is the section that receives maximum attention of the visitors. As is obvious, it has to look good and impressive. But if you have ever been into this creative field, you know it very well how difficult it is to make a website header stand out. Sometimes, you just run out of ideas and sometimes, you will struggle frantically to get some inspirations. Here in this article, we are going to feature some unique and trendy website headers that will hopefully spark ideas for your next website design project:

Giancarlo-Fajardo.com: – This website features a large header that goes perfectly with its overall theme. It looks exciting and has enough ingredients in it to make you feel inspired.

Pixel Cool: – This is another example of colorful website header design. Every pixel of this header looks great and the designer has done a thundering good job by placing bright colors against a dark background cleverly and astutely.

Howhost.com: – It is the brilliant blending of bright and dark colors that adds flavor to this website. It is interesting to note that here prominence is not given on the logo, rather it is the header that steals the show.

Sietedefebrero.com: – This is an example of clean and simple website header. It looks great with simple and sober color combination.

Hugsformonsters.com: – This header looks stunning and the designer has tried something different. It is large but at the same time, it looks nice and pleasing to the eye. Its artistic appeal is something that few of us can ignore.

Latest Header Design Trends

Big is Better: – Small header has already become passé as designers are finding it comfortable to work with large header, as it gives them the opportunity to experiment.

Different: – Designers are trying to break new ground to churn out something interesting. They are fusing different techniques, color combinations etc and the results are satisfying so far.

Fonts: – Designers are using fancy fonts to seize the attention of the viewers. Headers are coming with extra large and wacky fonts to deliver message of an organization precisely to its targeted audience.

Fri 24
Dec
2010

Small is beautiful. Is not it? But the problem is that it takes some efforts to make it large. The same rule is applicable to small business website design. Be it small or large, every business needs to have a unique online presence. Offline presence of your business can be small, but you can easily expand your online presence without incurring huge setup cost. First, you need to make sure that your website looks professional and impressive. It is totally futile to spearhead an online marketing campaign if your website looks ordinary. It will be a complete waste of money and effort. Here in this article, we are going to share some common small business web design tips that can help you edge past your competitors:

Dictate Who You Are: – This is the most vital thing that you should not give a miss. As your business does not have an impressive offline presence, you should tell straight who you are. Describe your business objectives, missions, services etc in clear words. It will help you to transmit your message to your targeted audience easily.

Unique Logo: – Logo of your organization should be placed at the top left corner of your website to grab maximum attention of the viewers. Moreover, you need to make sure that the logo is capable of reflecting the brand image of your organization. It has to be unique and it should be powerful enough to get your message across.

Make Your Website Searchable: – Your home page should contain a search option because online visitors do not have the patience to browse through all your pages. You can integrate breadcrumb in your website to make it easier for the surfers to find information.

Do Not Make It Look Weird: – Do not make your website an eyesore. Avoid the use of bright color combination, complex navigation, fancy fonts etc if you wish to expand your business. Just keep it simple.

Maintain A Balance: – Do not cram your website with unnecessary images. Try to use punch lines rather than rubbing on a particular point over and over again. You should juxtapose images and text carefully.

Make It Light: – If your website takes painfully long time to get loaded, you are definitely losing a significant number of visitors. Moreover, your website might fall from the favor of search engines. Now, if you wish to make your website visible, you need to keep it as clean as possible. Create external files for JavaScript and CSS, as it will help you to reduce the loading time of your website.

Thu 23
Dec
2010

The difference is slowly fading away, as the two worlds – SEO and Web Design are gradually getting merged, and thereby setting a new trend. No doubt, it is terrific news for SEO professionals, but at the same time, it is giving website designers sleepless nights, as they will have to work their fingers to the bone to make a website both search engine friendly and user friendly. Here we are going to share some popular tactics that you can employ to increase online visibility of your website without making any kind of compromise on the graphical front:

Sparing Use of Call To action: – There is no point in making your visitors confused with an overwhelming number of Call-to-Action buttons or texts. This is ridiculous and it does not serve any useful purpose. You can check out some famous websites such as reuters.com or nytimes.com as reference. They use it at the end of articles and the result is satisfying.

This is a good tactic for increasing the number of page views, and if the Lady Luck favors you, conversion rate can shot up significantly.

Design that Connects: – As a designer, your sole objective is to strike a perfect note with the viewers. Do not try to sing a different tune, as visitors may not find your design interesting. If you can somehow manage to get connected to your targeted visitors, chances are that they may link back to you or spread your message. In short, give your visitors reason to spend some quality time on your website.

Creative and Search Engine Friendly: – Probably you have experienced this thing hundreds of time while browsing net. Sometimes, you just chanced on a website that looks truly impressive but with almost zero search engine visibility. However, thankfully, these websites are fast becoming things of past as a new breed of websites has born, and they are all equally impressive and search engine friendly.

User Badges: – If you wish to encourage visitor interaction in your website, you can let your visitors use badge or you can dole out some points. It will definitely inspire them to spread your message far and wide. By encouraging participation, you can give your brand presence a boost.

The Animated HTML Multiheader: – Use of multiheader is fast becoming a rage in the website design industry. It helps you to feature different things in the home page and it is compelling too. Just make sure that all the headers are visible to search engine. Why should you use multi-headers? Well, the reasons are obvious. It comes with two-fold benefits. Firstly, you need not have to concentrate on other internal pages for communicating your message to your targeted audience. Secondly, if people start linking to you, your home will get the maximum number of linkback.

Use of Infographics: – This is another trend that is smeared in controversy. Some people lauded it and some lambasted it. The good thing about Infographics is that, it can make your website look truly different. It might help you to get some natural links but you cannot deny the fact that it is not an ideal practice from search engine’s point of view.

Designing a travel website may take some doing, as you will have to present something interesting in an engaging way otherwise, people would not care a fig to explore that website. Moreover, you need to make sure that the details are easily accessible, images are of good quality and the website looks professional, otherwise you might find it really hard to hit the bull’s eye. The outcome should look refreshing, impressive and should have an enticing appearance, if you wish to woo your targeted audience. Since people surf travel websites for gathering information about culture, climate, facilities, reservation, restaurants, memorable places, special events etc of a particular place, you need to present them all in a compact form. Here we have included some of the best travel website design samples that will help you come to term with the latest trends in this sphere:

Atlantis.com: – It is a complete package, as this website comes loaded with almost everything that a traveler needs before setting off. Atlantis looks highly impressive with large images and its top horizontal menu is quite easy to locate. Located on the left panel is a section for special offers. Visitors can easily find interesting information such as “Where to stay”, “Where to Eat”, “Things to do” etc.

Trump.com: – It is a flash-based travel website and here the focus is primarily on grabbing the attention of the viewers. Navigation is simple but it has a touch of innovation. At the bottom of the page, you can locate clickable images of some popular cities.

Liveafrica.com: – Liveafrica presents the charm and beauty of Africa without cramming up the site with loads of images or graphics. Sparing use of images and proper placement of text has helped this website to stand tall in the crowd.

Australia.com: – This website is a true showstopper. It steals the show with its brilliant color combination. Its navigation system may appear a bit out of the box but a novice user is not likely to face any trouble while browsing this website.

Emirates.com/English: – It is one of the most popular websites among travelers. You can book flight, manage booking, check out latest offers and can do other things without facing a single hassle. Its interface is utterly simple.

Visitsnowymountains.com.au: – This is another refreshing and colorful example of travel website design. It comes with a lively background. Navigation is simple and there is a riot of colors that gives it a distinct appeal.

Tue 21
Dec
2010

Tips To Manage Criticism Gracefully

Poisted by : WebGuru     Under : Web Design, Website Design     No Comments

Creative person as you are, you know how hard it is to take constructive criticism in your stride. However, criticism is not rare in the creative field, more particularly in the field of website design and development. Sometimes, it is your boss and sometimes it is another finicky or hard-to-please client, who literally drives you to brink of insanity. Now losing your temper is not a solution. You need to face the truth that you have to accept criticism, no matter how vile it may appear, as long as you are into a creative field. Frustration is bound to surge if you fail to take criticism gracefully. Now, there is not shortcut way to get you out of this messy situation. Here we are going to share some commons tips that might help you to keep your tantrums under control no matter what:

Define The Purpose of the Criticism
First, try to find out whether the criticism is constructive or not. Constructive criticism does help a person to pinpoint his shortcoming and thus helps him polish his skills. So, you should not shy away from constructive criticism. However, if the criticism is not constructive, you should better ignore it

Analyze It
If the criticism is constructive, think about it carefully to determine which suggestions you can adopt and which you cannot. Take your time before you bump on a conclusion.

Define the Corrective Action
Once the purpose of the criticism is determined, you need to act decisively on it. Try to correct your stance and hone your skills whenever required so that you would not have to face it all over again.

Learn from the Critique
When you have done with the suggestions, you should try to think what you have learnt during the corrective session.

Here are some other tips that you can give a try

  • Do not forget the fact that people who criticize you, believe in your ability to overcome them otherwise, they would not have wasted their valuable time.
  • Do not deny your faults flatly because it will never do good to you.
  • If you critic is wrong, do not attack him hammer and tongs. Try to make him see your reasons.
  • Do not feel offended.

No body likes to be criticized. But as it is quite common in the creative field, you need to learn how to live with it. We hope that with these tips, you will be able to transform the negative vibes into something positive that will eventually help you to reach the peak of your career.

Fri 17
Dec
2010

Since your website represents the brand image of your organization in the virtual world, you need to make it look as perfect as possible. You should not cram it with technical jargon, unwanted graphics, styles etc, as they can have detrimental impacts on user experience. Now, if you are serious about enhancing users experience and looking for a way to boost your website’s performance, you should not give these tips a miss:

Use Google Libraries API: – If your website is using JavaScript framework, it will run the risk of consuming a fair bit of bandwidth, which could have negative impacts on your website’s online reputation and visibility. Now, if you do not wish to shell out extra money for this purpose, you should give Google Libraries API a try. It is fast, free and extremely simple.

Use HTTP Compression: – Server side Compression is arguably one of the most effective ways to boost a website’s performance. Whenever a client requests for a webpage, the page is compressed before it is sent back to the client. The browser then unzips the compressed information before rendering the website. Compression can help you a lot to make your website load faster, but you need not have to compress everything. You can specify the files that you want to compress by adding some codes in the htaccess file. Here are some extra tips:

  • Clean Code: – Try to weed out junk codes from your website’s source file, as it will help you to boost the visibility of your website. Here are some cool tips to assist you in this complicated job:
  • Eliminate unnecessary Div tags: If you feel that some of the div tags are unnecessary, just remove them.
  • Create External Files for Javascript and CSS: – Try to create separate files for Javascript and CSS codes, as it will make your code easy to read. Moreover, it will help you locate and eliminate problems later on.
  • Use CSS Shorthand: It is a handy option to save bandwidth. However, you need to get the hang on of it first before being able to give it a try.

Image optimization: – By reducing the sizes of the images, you can beef up your website’s online visibility to some extent. If you are a regular Photoshop user, you should always choose “Save For Web” option while saving images. However, you need to make sure that you are not making any kind of compromise on the quality.

CSS Sprite: – Total number of image requests can be reduced significantly by using CSS Sprites. You can combine two or more background images into one for this purpose. Alternatively, you can use the CSS background-image and background-position properties to display images in your website.

Wed 15
Dec
2010

Despite the onslaught of Internet and social media, print advertisement has managed to survive unscathed. What is even more amazing is that it has emerged stronger than ever. The main objective of running an advertising campaign is to deliver its message to its targeted audience tactfully and subtlety. It should not be too complex but at the same time, you should not make it look ordinary otherwise, you will never be able to reap its benefits. However, this is not an easy feat to achieve by any means. You need to have a creative bend of mind otherwise; you will find it really hard to translate your thoughts into something creative.

Here in this article, we have included some example of cool and highly creative print advertisements that can blow your mind. Let’s start a visual journey:

Tide Advertisements

Tide Advertisements

This is a brilliantly provocative advertisement that is powerful enough to convey the message of the company to its targeted visitors. The tagline of the company “Because stains love your clothes” goes perfectly with the theme of the advertisement campaign.

Sky TV Advertisements

Sky TV

This is another interesting example of print advertisement campaign. This advertisement shows that only Sky TV can make two belligerent parties participate into a friendly match. The idea is definitely wacky but it has the spark.

Juicy Fruit Advertisements

Juicy Fruit

The idea behind this advertisement campaign is unique and definitely impressive. Though the advertisement may appear a bit scary, it is tinged with a touch of humor that makes it different from the rest of the others.

Komatsu Wheel Loader Ads

Komatsu

Just cast your glance and you will realize almost instantaneously that it has been photoshoped. Though the idea is absurd, it is simple enough to seize the attention of even casual viewers.

FPA Australia Ad

FPA Australia

The message of this advertisement campaign is crystal clear. It asks people to stop smoking by stubbing it out.

Arihant Superstructures Advertisements

Arihant Superstructures

This is a supercool advertisement campaign. The message is quite obvious and the presence of a Penguin in living-room has given it a distinct edge.