Curious Chipotle Bag

Chipotle Bag

When picking up the requested Burrito Bowl for my husband last night, I was shocked to find a familiar excerpt printed on the Chipotle bag. (Click image for larger view).

The wording won’t make any sense to most of the world, but for someone in the marketing industry, I use this phrase almost daily! The ‘Lorem ipsum…” phrase (otherwise knows as Greek text) is commonly used as placeholder text on marketing materials in the design process. The idea being, if the designer doesn’t have approved content for the piece yet (brochure, website…), to use this Greek text as filler content. That way, the client doesn’t focus on the made-up/unapproved content (as they inevitably do) instead of the design that they are supposed to provide feedback for. This method is very standard within the design industry.

So knowing this information, it begs the question – did Chipotle send an unfinished bag to print?! Either they forgot to change out the filler text on the one side of the bag, or they certainly have an interesting new marketing strategy!

Do you have a Blog yet? Some ideas for incorporating a blog

My favorite piece of social media would have to be the blog. It is so versatile, so search-engine-friendly, so easy to use and so delightfully free! If you don’t have a blog yet…you should definitely consider starting one. Why? I’m so glad you asked…

• Number one reason (from my standpoint as a website designer) – search engines love blogs. Blogs generally do very well with search engines. Because of the constant fresh content (assuming you actually create posts for your blog regularly) and because of the popular platforms (wordpress, blogger…), blog content can definitely boost your search engine ranking. Sure – you still need to follow guidelines to make your content search engine friendly, but if done appropriately, blogs can yield great results!
• Almost as important is the fact that blogs are so versatile. You don’t have to be a published author or journalist to have a blog – break all the rules. Use a blog as a portfolio of your work, use it for your latest news, use it for upcoming events, press releases, white papers, a diary, random thoughts… or all of the above! Use it AS your website! You can create as many pages as you want, plus you’ll have a content management system built right in – so you won’t have to pay someone else for updates. As with any ‘free’ service, there are of course pros and cons and limitations with using a blog as your website, but it’s worth looking into. KDesign can customize your blog to give it the look you want as a website, with all the functionality of a blog. Or we can very easily integrate your posts into your existing website, so that fresh content appears there too!
• As mentioned above, blogs can be customized. Again – there are limitations and pros/cons, but with some minor upgrades and an unlimited selection of plugins, your blog can do virtually anything you can dream up and have a completely customized look to go with it. Chances are, you’ll need to enlist the help of a designer/css guru to do this. Contact KDesign for a quote!
• Blogs are easy to use. All it takes is  some poking around on your own and you’ll likely figure out how to create posts, categories and pages without any training. As mentioned above, blogs are being used more and more as content management systems for websites. This gives the client full control over the content on the website – new posts, updates to static pages, new plugins and widgets. Of course, this can be a double-edged sword! There’s no wordpress hotline to call, so if you are an ambitious do-it-yourself type of client, and go changing settings that aren’t meant to be changed, you could mess up the whole site very quickly and it might take a professional a long time to figure out what you did and how to fix it! But with appropriate training and access to the professional support of your website designer, you will love updating your own blog.
• Blogs are free! What’s the catch, right? Well, there’s a lot of them There are certain paid upgrades likely required to get your blog to do what you want and look how you want – but the good news is they are cheap. $15/year for css editing (for a designer to customize the look). $12/year for your chosen domain to point to your blog (instead of myblog.wordpress.com). AND of course the costs of enlisting a website designer to customize the code and integrate fancy plugins when necessary. The upfront costs will be worth it in the long run as the ongoing costs will go down since you are doing the site updates.

So what are you waiting for?! Unless your business is in a perfectly static state and no changes ever occur (anyone? anyone?) then a blog would likely fit in well with your online marketing strategy.

Feature Project: ATAX Website Redesign

America First Tax Exempt Investors felt the need to freshen the look of their website. They felt their old site was boring, had blah colors and needed more “oomph” while still clearly providing the important information required by users. The challenge was that their content is, well, boring. The information necessary to provide users is a lot of links required by the industry, K1 information, press release links, distribution numbers… not very sexy stuff! It was important for the focus to remain on this content and ease-of-use. This was accomplished by dividing the important information into two groups (investors and real estate developers) and calling out the major links on the homepage for each group. A slideshow of attractive properties owned by the ATAX fund was also incorporated to create visual interest. The colors were brightened up as well (to match a recent piece created by the company in an effort to create a cohesive brand). The last fun feature added is the ticker across the top – ever so appropriate for a publicly traded company on NASDAQ! The ticker updates every few seconds so the user is always up-to-date with the latest price of their stock. Enjoy your newly redesigned website, ATAX! Check out the live website here.

To Flash or Not to Flash

Flash can be cool. Flash can also be horribly annoying. For the impatient user (like me), to sit and wait for a Flash intro to slowly load is the quickest way to get me to leave a website. However, when Flash is used for subtle “touches” that make sense for the website, or for animations directly relevant to the content, the effect can really enhance the user experience. I have put together the following suggested guidelines to follow when attempting to answer the question, “To Flash or Not to Flash”…

• Lose the intro. No one will watch it but you. If you just can’t let go of your super cool flash intro video, then have it be a teaser link from the homepage – an option for the user to click on as opposed to a required sit-and-wait for loading and viewing.
• Does animation really make sense for your website? If you just want an animation for the sake of having an animation on your website (like a cartoon boy ringing a bell every time you visit the homepage or a waving US flag because the website is semi-related to military) then the answer is NO. In both instances (actual client requests) the animation is not relevant to the content and not adding anything to the site. If your company has a complex business process or cycle that is best understood visually, then an animation is certainly relevant and appropriate. Google advertisements are another completely appropriate and recommended place for Flash use.
• If javascript, jquery or ajax can handle it… let it. These tools are becoming more robust and powerful every day and can handle a lot of the simple animation that Flash was originally used for (slideshows, galleries…) PLUS – most of these applications can be viewed on mobile devices whereas Flash can NOT.
• Keep in mind that Flash animations take a lot of time and it’s becoming a more difficult talent to find… which means they are not cheap!
• In the past, Flash-based websites have had trouble with placement on search engines. While there are ways around this now, I would still never recommend an entire website to be done in Flash. Plus – not everyone has a Flash plugin, which means those users won’t be able to see anything on your site if the whole thing is in flash.
• If you have decided that Flash is in your future, try not to use photographs or raster graphics – stick to vector artwork to avoid low-quality images.

To be honest, I hate Flash. Probably because I’m not all that great at it, but also for the reasons above. When it comes down to answering the question, “To Flash or Not to Flash,” just remember the purpose of your website. If the Flash element is not directly relevant to that purpose, then don’t waste the time or money on it!