This morning, our principal Jeff came to work with a surprise. No, it was not a puppy; it was even better. A family member recently sent him some impeccably preserved, vintage Valentine postcards that date back to 1917. They were sent to his grandmother, Florentine Perrault, when she was 11 years old, growing up in Manhattan. The one above, dating back to the suffrage movement, shows how personalized for the times that the cards were. Today, our typical card only reads of affection or adoration, nothing political, and with no illustrations of actual people. Instead we have pink, red, and a few images of sunset silhouettes or animals. It’s interesting to see how the holiday has transformed. We scanned and posted the rest of the postcards on our Pinterest page if you’re interested in the others. Happy Valentine’s Day from Hero.
A lot of people that we talk to about inbound marketing are concerned with the actual body content of their online content creation strategy. We often hear, “I don’t want to write that much everyday,” or, “how will I keep creating content without sounding redundant?”. I think it’s often forgotten, in this world of online marketing, that blog content can include media– from photos, to infographics, to video clips– as long as it stays relevant to your services and your client needs.
The 8th annual Art Director’s Club of Denver Paper Fashion Show is coming and is definitely a spectacular show check out as a part of our local community. The show consists of an extensive runway collection by local and national fashion designer teams– each who is willing to take on the challenge of working in the paper medium and come up with a creative and wildly innovative style for garment design. Talk about mixed media. Our questions for those involved are how much paper is used in one design and what the sustainability factor is overall. Regardless, definitely a cool concept of 21st century design that makes you wonder how long it will be before productions like this become digital or paperless. That might sound crazy, but look at where technology is already taking us. Find out more on the ADCD website. It’s an awesome cause.
Since it’s launch, we haven’t seen a whole lot of widespread growth in networks on Google+. We’re all asking, “What’s happening over there, Google?” . . .but, maybe they’re asking the same thing about where all the people are. Perhaps everyone is still highly consumed with Facebook as their primary social network. Maybe, if you’re like me, no one in your suggested circle is engaging with the platform so if I were to post anything I fear I’d be talking to myself. Regardless, your involvement on Google+ will not only get your name out there in search engines, but you’ll grow a foundation with others within circles of interest similar to your own and it can eventually lead to finding new clients. Creating a Google+ page (like a Facebook fan page) in addition to your personal profile page is a great way to further plant your inbound marketing strategy online. We’ve created a list of why you need a presence on Google+ and how you can become a top influencer. Check it out below. Read the rest of this entry »
“News, information, and entertainment will never go back to “the way it was,” and this change will have a powerful impact on all aspects of inbound and outbound marketing. In 2012, marketing is publishing, so let’s learn how to be a great publisher in an industry under constant disruption.” -Kipp Bodnar
The publishing industry has forever changed with individuals being able to self-publish online. Best-selling author or not, you can call yourself a published author by creating your own website and creating content for the masses. From the author’s side, there are no guarantees that you’ll be read by thousands of viewers each day; and, from the reader’s side of it, there are no guarantees that each of these self-published authors will constantly produce quality and authoritative content. However, the future of online content looks bright, as people are relying heavily on marketing themselves online through the inbound strategy of content creation. Read the rest of this entry »
Your website is not a one and done deal. It requires constant improvement. A weekly, if not daily, review of your website metrics will be the way you identify areas that need work. Of course, knowing which metrics are valuable and which are just distractions is important. Where is your focus on your metrics? Do you have an eye on every angle? Read the rest of this entry »
Last week, San Jose graffiti artist David Choe graced Denver with his presence for the annual street art convention of the Terminal Kings. In his time in here, he gave us several public murals that you can find in the art district, specifically off of 13th and Champa.
What brings me to talk about Choe, besides my grandiose excitement that Denver’s art culture is rapidly growing in a tasteful fashion, is the hype surrounding the rumors and anticipation of Facebook’s stock going public and Choe’s relationship with Facebook that will soon bring him to residency in America’s top 1%. Read the rest of this entry »
Not to geek out with techie stuff, but this is really awesome.
Yesterday at the studio, a couple of us found ourselves distracted in a conversation about Mashable’s recent blog post on 3D printing– something that actually ties into one of our clients and their work at Render Plus Systems. This conversation eventually led to open mouths watching videos of 3D printers in action in anticipation for the year 2030.
The Pirate Bay recently opened a new category on their site– called “Physibles”– which consists of files that can be downloaded and materialized through 3D printing. Last week, TPB finally spoke about their mission on their blog, stating, “Today most data is born digitally. It’s not about the transition from analog to digital anymore. We don’t talk about how to rip anything without losing quality since we make perfect 1 to 1 digital copies of things. Music, movies, books, all come from the digital sphere. But we’re physical people and we need objects to touch sometimes as well! We believe that the next step in copying will be made from digital form into physical form. It will be physical objects.” How cool is this? Read the rest of this entry »
The key to improving the performance of your website, over time, is to constantly improve the effectiveness of your conversion paths. A conversion path is the sum of steps a person takes to respond to an offer on your site while becoming a lead for your business. In a website redesign, it’s important to look at your current conversion path and see where it needs improvement. The offer might be an eBook and the visitor might enter the conversion path from a blog post or email, as you may after leaving this site. Making ongoing improvements to each element in the path means higher landing page conversion rates and an ever-increasing number of leads. Read the rest of this entry »
After 5 years with Hero, our powerhouse illustrator, designer, and code-wizard Shaw Nielsen is hitting the road to pursue freelance projects. We wish him the absolute best of luck in all of his endeavors, knowing very well he’ll come nothing short of just that, the best. We know he’ll be doing nothing but the snazziest of things in his future work and can’t wait to see where the projects unfold. Though we’re sad for him to leave us, we can’t be more excited for Shaw, who has acquired a mighty client base that reaches to the UK and all the way down-under, to Aussieland.
This is Hero's place to share insights, ideas and best practices in web design, branding and inbound marketing. We hope these posts will be a catalyst for your success.
“News, information, and entertainment will never go back to “the way it was,” and this change will have a powerful impact on all aspects of inbound and outbound marketing. In 2012, marketing is publishing, so let’s learn how to be a great publisher in an industry under constant disruption.” -
