Insight Studios Blog

Big Change :: Joining with RKD Web Studios

2009-09-11T14:31:00-05:00

Things have been brewing this summer at Insight Studios, no doubt about it… As one of our valued clients and friends, we want you to know about how things are changing to serve you even better.

The biggest news: WE’VE TEAMED UP with another web studio, also in Guelph, Ontario: RKD Web Studios. Whoa! What does it mean? How does it change things? Don’t worry, we’ll answer all your questions.

What’s going on?

We’ve teamed up with people that are better than us. Therefore, we just got better.

Whoa! What will happen to the Insight Studios I know?

Well, it’s gonna have nicer offices, a bigger team of skilled people to help you, and the same commitment to integrity and excellence. Future work will be done under the banner of RKD Web Studios, but existing services being provided by Insight will stay the same.

What do you mean by “bigger and better team”?

This is the best part - most of you were familiar with calling in and talking with Jason to answer all your questions. Now, you can still call in and talk to Jason, but you might also talk with a whole bunch of other great people:

Jane (our other Project Manager) might look after your content, organize project details, or otherwise keep you on track if Jason’s not!

Rudy (our President and Account Manager) might help you plan your next project or web strategy.

Dawn (our SEO specialist) could walk you through the ins and outs of search engine marketing.

Kelly (our Creative Director) might come up with an awesome usability concept for your site, or talk your ear off about mobile strategies.

Thom (our Development Director) probably won’t talk too much. When he does, it’ll be a genius plan for anything database or programming.

For any design or development projects, you also might hear from Cindy, Gianni, or Eric, or perhaps even our Update Guru, Stacy!

But I like Jason. Can I still deal with him?

Absolutely. Jason’s not going anywhere. He will continue to coordinate existing Insight projects alongside RKD projects, as one of the Project Managers in the RKD Office (new contact info below). But, the other advantage is that you can deal with other people (in case you didn’t like dealing with Jason!)…

Will prices change?

For the most part, no. We won’t be changing anybody’s contracts or pricing agreements. Existing contracts will continue as they were, but, with a bigger and better team, we can do even more now.

Do you guys offer more services now?

Yes! We are now a full-featured web studio for anything and everything web… Strategy, Mobile, Usability, SEO, Design, Development, Web Applications, Hosting, E-Commerce, Maintenance, everything!

To contact anyone at RKD: 519-767-3267

To contact Jason at RKD: 519-341-4680

To email Jason at RKD: jason@rkd.ca

Rock star marketers

2009-05-09T20:28:00-05:00

There are so many messages telling us to “try really hard!” “Success follows hard work!” Maybe. Success takes hard work. But not everyone who works hard succeeds. The important thing is to be working at the right thing.

Edward Simmons says, ””The difference between failure and success is doing a thing nearly right and doing a thing exactly right.”

It’s like rock stars and opening acts. The opening act gets a restless, disinterested crowd, but the rock star has the crowd chanting and applauding before they even come on stage. Seth Godin writes a great little insight on it on his blog about opening acts and rock stars:

Most marketers are opening acts. The ad or blog post or tweet is a desperate attempt at attention, at keeping people from switching it off or booing. The posture of the marketer who is an opening act is unstable and a little sad.

Some marketers are rock stars.

How’d that happen?

I’d argue that the two keys to becoming a rock star marketer are:

1) Settle for a tiny audience that views you as a star, not an opening act. Then grow that audience.
2) Be really good.

Who are you going to AMAZE, how are you going be really good?

Hello, You Look Like an Axe Murderer

2009-02-28T19:48:00-05:00

So you have this website. Your co-worker’s 16-year-old made it for you as an assignment for high school, and sure, it’s not the most visually appealing website, but it’s functional, right? It sure was creative of him to title the page with flashing, jumping words, even if the words themselves were “Serenity Landscaping, Inc.”. However, it puzzles you that you finally got this website up and running 5 months ago, and you have still not heard from even a single potential client. You’re starting to think the whole “web presence” idea is highly overrated…

Hmm. Let’s just hang on before we jump to any conclusions here! A website is so much more than a place to put your contact information. I’d like to invite you learn with me why some websites bring in the bucks while others stagnate in cyberspace… Buckle up!

Hmm. Let’s just hang on before we jump to any conclusions here! A website is so much more than a place to put your contact information. I’d like to invite you learn with me why some websites bring in the bucks while others stagnate in cyberspace… Buckle up!

As a graphic designer, I must live with the constant agony of being faced with near-grotesque websites and posters and advertisements as I go through each day. I know, I know, you’re not shedding any tears for me right now. But I’m actually not complaining; I say this because it scares me that these people expect business to increase because of these ads/websites/etc. Good luck with that, folks! It doesn’t matter how nice a person you are or how good your product is; if your marketing image looks like a four-year-old put it together on Windows Paint, you aren’t going to get much business. To your target market, you are not who you say you are; you’re who you show you are.

People live by stereotypes. We judge by appearance constantly. Maybe you’ve noticed: employers don’t want to hire the guy who looks like an axe-murderer. He may not BE an an axe-murderer. He might be a very kind and loving person. He might have amazing people-skills. He might be brilliant, the top of his class. But it would take more than one minute to find that out.

In the website world, you don’t have more than one minute. Studies show that you have mere seconds before the viewer decides what they think of you. In those few seconds, what do you want to say?

Your website should, in a way, function as a photograph of you. Do you place a high value on relationships? Your website should show that. Do you truly believe that honesty is the best policy? It should be in your website. Are you excellent at keeping costs down and delivery time short? Get it in the design. There’s so much about you that makes your business uniquely desirable! Believe me, a picture really is worth a thousand words.

If your website LOOKS a certain way, those who view it will assume your business IS that way. If your website has tacky graphics, fuzzy photos, and broken links all over the place, people won’t expect much of you. If it looks like it’s straight out of the early 90s, people will wonder where you’ve been all these years.

One of my greatest passions as a designer is to say visually what is deepest in my client’s heart for their business. That excites me! This is why Insight Studios never creates the same website twice. This is why we are so dedicated to communication with our clients. We want to see you succeed like you dream of succeeding! And we know that an effective website is such a powerful tool by which that can be accomplished. You deserve to be represented honestly on the web.

If you have an “axe-murderer” website, how much longer are you going to put up with it? It’s not exactly putting your best foot forward. Because you’re NOT an axe-murderer…

...I hope.

I Don’t Want You to Be Our Customer

2009-02-23T22:39:00-05:00

Just how much do you actually care what’s in my iTunes library? Probably not at all, unless you were unnervingly overconcerned about only working with those who can enjoy the musical experimentation of MuteMath’s latest EP. I guess it could happen.

How much does that matter to you, though? Read on.

I just happen to buy music for my library; I don’t hop on the Internet and download my music for free. True, it’s not “illegal” here in Canada. But I just don’t see how I’m helping the artist win by me listening to them for free. I want them to keep producing great music, so I will support them by paying for what I listen to.

It works the same way for our vendors here at Insight… We pay top dollars to use top software, because we want our vendors to keep making great software. That means they are making a profit from us. We want that!

In fact, we want everyone who we do business with to make a profit. If they do better - if YOU do better - than we do too! It truly is a win-win world out there.

How do you feel about us making a profit from your business? Are you in favour? I hope so! I just can’t understand how we could give you value when we know we won’t be able to pay our salaries, keep the heat on, or stay in business.

The way I see it, corporate success is directly tied to personal decisions. Personal decisions become business decisions. And the flip-side is true too - you can tell the person I am by the business decisions I make.

So next time you think about how we don’t pirate our software, just think about what kind of people we must be.

Next time you think about how I buy the music I listen to in my iTunes library, think about what kind of person I must be to support those I believe in.

Maybe it’s the kind of person you would want building your website.

Or maybe not. And if not, then certainly you’re not the kind of person we would want to build a website for.

What’s up with Content?!?

2009-01-30T18:21:01-05:00

Hey there—well, here’s my first attempt at blogging for Insight… I can’t tell you how great it is being part of such a fun and hardworking team!

Being the “Queen of Content”, I’ve chosen CONTENT as my first blog topic. Ironically, I must recommend that you read every word in this blog, so that you can find out why you, or your customers, won’t read very many words on any website. But wait, you can do something about that!

Hey there—well, here’s my first attempt at blogging for Insight… I can’t tell you how great it is being part of such a fun and hardworking team!

From what I can tell, there are at least twelve billion web pages out there. Twelve billion voices talking, but mostly saying nothing. If even just 1% of those pages used concise and effective web writing, the world would be a better place.

“Letting Go of the Words” is a great book written by Janice (Ginny) Redish, and it has a lot to say about the principals of web writing. On the web, we usually want to grab information and use it quickly. We go to the web to get answers to questions or to complete tasks to gather information, reading only what we need. We are all too busy to read much on the web.

I hope the following tips help you to understand how and why I write content the way I do—for your websites. I also hope this helps when trying to decide what information and how much information should go on your website.

Enjoy !! and see you next time… when I may tackle the subject of ‘meta tags’ !!!

Scanning for the Facts

Even though you’ve worked really hard develop a good web page, most people won’t read everything on it.

They scan: They look for headlines, summaries and captions.

After they find what they want they may read it, or they may consider their scan to be adequate, or they may quit – finding it too overwhelming to spend any more time reading.

Short Concise Sentences

Since most people don’t read everything on the page, it’s important to make sure they can find what they need. If your page/document is long, with long drawn out paragraphs, they either won’t easily find what they want, or they’ll give up and you’ve lost your opportunity to share your ideas and information.

Write short sentences. Write short paragraphs. Typically one to three sentences is about all you’ll want to include in each online paragraph.

Simply Put

Most of us prefer simple language. We want information that is easy to understand.

I have quickly learned to befriend my grammar tool bar. If it says your sentences are passive, learn what that means and how to correct it. If the writing is at the 12th grade level and you’re writing for the general public, learn how to make your writing more understandable.

Many web writing books tell you to write information at a sixth grade level. While web content may not need to be at that level, we should try for about the 8th grade, which is often the reading level newspapers aim for. It will most likely be understandable by the widest audience.

Some Friendly Conversation

People interact with their computer and the content on web pages. Most have come to expect the writing on web pages to be more personal than what they read in print.

One way to do this is to insert “we” or “our” where you normally would say “the company” or “the department”. I also try to use the word “you” whenever possible.

For example, instead of: The Security Department safety program helps Kitchener citizens learn how to keep their homes secure. I would write more like this: Our safety program helps you learn how to keep your home secure.

Top 5 Ways to Create Community Around Your Site

2009-01-16T18:26:00-05:00

As we move into a new year, we should all be looking closely how our websites have been performing over the last year. Looking at statistics and figures about our site traffic should give us a good picture of what has worked in the past and what we can focus on in the future. Additionally, refreshing and reimagining your website is a great way to boost your customer base as well as your sales.

But what if we want to increase site traffic and develop more solid leads and customers from our sites? We need to create a solid group of website users that can spread the word about us. I’ve listed a couple of ways to create a user base from your website after the break.

But what if we want to increase site traffic and develop more solid leads and customers from our sites? We need to create a solid group of website users that can spread the word about us. I've listed a couple of ways to create a user base from your website:

Create a blog. It sounds like old news, but a blog will help you connect with your users and customers. Providing a blog with relevant and useful information is key to establishing and maintaining an ongoing user base for your site - as long as you put time and effort into keeping it updated. Commenting is a must! Your users must have a way to interact with you as well as each other.
Sell things right on your site. Apart from making money from your items, a store allows people to recommend and review your products right online. By having an online store, you can support your big fans, as well as create new ones.
Develop a forum. This is a bigger time commitment, and it's only helpful if you have a decent amount of users on your site. If you can create a forum that becomes the de facto place for your products (or even your industry), you've got customers and fans for a long time to come.
Establish an ecosystem. Providing a place where your users can exchange information, tangible or intangible items, or ideas will be a big draw for new users, especially if you can kickstart it with a large amount of quality items.
Release something of value for free. A surefire way of widening your website's influence, releasing free items will attract subscribers and users quickly. The harder part will be how you can convert those users into paying customers.

Optimizing Your Site for the Christmas Holidays

2008-12-03T15:58:01-05:00

With the Christmas season almost in full swing, perhaps this is already a bit late to be posting an article like this, but take a look either way. There are so many ways to make sure your website is optimized for the holidays… It’s the season of sales, so make sure you share in them through your website.

Jessica Hupp writes a great article about it here, called Holiday Cash: 50+ Ways to Optimize Your Website for Christmas Conversions. It’s a must-read… Here’s the summary of it, though. (I’ve highlighted the parts I thought were extra great!)

Usability

1. Make it easy for buyers to find what they want
2. Be sure everything works
3. Be clear with errors
4. Use descriptive headings
5. Follow conventions
6. Clearly identify the next step
7. Use readable text

Landing Page

8. Answer your customer’s question
9. Create different landing pages

Checkout

10. Make checkout easy for new customers
11. Second Bite
12. Make sure cart editing is easy
13. Offer a progress indicator
14. Keep payment options simple
15. Offer total costs early

Copy

16. Avoid excessive adjectives
17. Use trigger words
18. Use question-based headlines
19. Make your copy “scannable”

Design

20. Provide lots of photos
21. Use text more than images
22. Differentiate between significant and insignificant attributes
23. Avoid “click here”
24. Place important items in the upper left corner of your pages
25. Don’t overload browsers
26. Avoid banners
27. Check for dead links
28. Highlight just one thing
29. Embrace white space
30. Differentiate your site from others

Cross-selling

31. Recommend products other customers like
32. Don’t end the cross sell at the transaction
33. Offer best-sellers

Trust

34. Make your return policy easily available
35. Offer assurance
36. Prove there are real people behind your site
37. Join trust groups and display their logos
38. Use testimonials
39. Back up statements with evidence
40. Make yourself available
41. Send out automated emails when contacted
42. Offer alternate ordering methods
43. Make it look like you have customers

Closing the Deal

44. Create a sense of urgency
45. Offer customer reviews
46. Give an incentive

Tracking Tools

44. Google Analytics
45. StatCounter
46. pMetrics
47. Crazy Egg
48. Site Meter
49. Mint
50. AWStats
51. Opentracker

The Overflowing Garbage Bin

2008-07-03T19:49:00-05:00

There’s something nostalgic about reviewing old website designs that never made the light of day - it makes you realize the value of positive feedback. Sometimes, as a designer, I can get so focused on one style that I become blind to creative impulses.

Here’s a bunch of website designs that got thrown out unceremoniously. Which ones do you think had potential, and what feedback would you have suggested?

Another Day, Another Site

2008-06-18T14:58:01-05:00

Yep, we’ve relaunched our site again… call it designer cramp, but I just wasn’t a fan of the last one after awhile! We think this one will help showcase our work and answer potential questions much easier. Let us know if we’ve missed anything (squash those bugs!).

We’ll see where this one will land in the CSS galleries.

Setting Up Your Email in Outlook

2008-04-21T14:47:00-05:00

Want the step-by-step on how to get your email set up in Microsoft Outlook? Follow our easy tutorial here…

This tutorial will take you through the steps to set up Microsoft Outlook for your e-mail account. This tutorial focuses on setting up Microsoft Outlook 2003, but these settings are similar in other versions of Microsoft Outlook. You can set up previous versions of Microsoft Outlook by using the settings in this tutorial.

Step 1: In Microsoft Outlook, select Tools > E-mail Accounts from the top menu.
Step 2: On the E-mail Accounts wizard window, select "Add a new e-mail account" and click Next.
Step 3: For your server type, select "POP3" and click Next.
Step 4: On the Internet E-mail Settings (POP3) window, enter your information as follows:

Your Name
Enter your first and last name.

E-mail Address
Enter your e-mail address.

User Name
Enter your full e-mail address (ie, john@yoursite.com).

Password
Enter the password you set up for your e-mail account.

Incoming mail server (POP3)
Enter mail.yoursite.com for your incoming mail server (replace yoursite.com with your domain and extension).

Outgoing mail server (SMTP)
Enter mail.yoursite.com for your outgoing mail server (replace yoursite.com with your domain and extension).
Step 5: Click More Settings. On the Internet E-mail Settings window, select the "Outgoing Server" tab.
Step 6: Select "My outgoing server (SMTP) requires authentication."
Step 7: Select "Log on using" and enter your user name (your email address) and password.

NOTE: Some Internet Service Providers (ISPs) block outgoing mail unless it is sent through their servers. If you find yourself unable to send outgoing mail, you may need to change your Outgoing Mail Server to their server (ie., smtp.broadband.rogers.com) and change your "Log on using" username and password to your respective username and password with ISP. This is usually your-email-address@theirdomain.com and your webmail password.
Step 8: Select the "Advanced" tab and confirm that the "Outgoing server (SMTP)" port is set to 25 or 26.
Step 9: If you want to be able to still access your email from the web or from another computer at another time, check the "Leave a copy of messages on the server" and configure how long you want it left there. We recommend no longer than 30 days, otherwise your mailbox might get too full.
Step 10: Click Next.
Step 11: Click Finish. You're Done!