NEWS ITEMS 
Build a Killer Website
1/30/2012
I’m continually surprised by how many people call my design company with very firm ideas about what they want on their business website and yet, they haven’t thought through some of the most basic questions first. For this reason, our first question is always “Why do you need a site?,” not “What do you want on it?”
At bottom your website is a marketing tool. For many businesses, it’s the only source of business. If done right, it can be a major part of yours.
Here’s my quick-hit list of the top dos and don’ts before you get started.
By IIya Pozin as seen in Inc.
Can Google+ Help Your Business?
1/18/2012
Michael Dell, the famed entrepreneur who started Dell Computer, posted a message on the web. He asked what everyone thought about a new Android app that lets customers make purchases quickly and easily. The service he used? It’s called Google+. The fledgling social network has garnered a lot of press. There are millions of active users and several high-profile business owners are generating buzz. Small businesses have a prime opportunity right now to connect with customers, promote your brand, and even find venture capital funding on the service.
By John Brandon as seen in Inc.
U R What U Tweet
1/18/2012
If you take a look at the top 10 Twitter users you'll see a list of famous men and women, from Justin Bieber to Selena Gomez, who have used the popular platform to further expand their personal brands. Perhaps more interesting, however, is how everyday people are investing more time and energy into social networking for professional purposes.
By Amber Mac as seen in Fast Company
Four Apps: A Closer Look
1/19/2012
In this post I want to discuss four apps worth examining that all try to get users to look at objects and use the tablet platform to extend that experience. And then maybe, there’ll be questions about apps creating virtual analogues of a physical experience.
The apps in question are:
1.The University of Virginia Art Museum's "UVaM" app,
2. MoMA's "Abstract Expressionism NY,"
3.The American Folk Art Museum's "Infinite Variety: Three Centuries of Red and White Quilts",
4.and a non-museum example, Pyrolia SA's "Road, Inc."
They run the gamut from pilot project to high-end, big budget custom developed project. What links them is that they all try to use the tablet platform to get you to do engage in a fundamental museum experience: looking closely at objects. And to a surprising extent, they all managed to get me to do it.
By Ed Rodly as seen in Thinking About Exhibits Blog
A Gumball For New Followers
1/19/2012
Whenever someone follows brand communications agency Uniform's Twitter account, a toy train inside a cuckoo clock shoves a gumball out the door onto a circuitous track. When the gumball comes to rest, it’s available for studio members to consume. After that’s all done, their Twitter account automatically @replies the new follower with a link to a video of the thing in action.
By Tim Maly as seen in Fast Company Design
Tumblr Is Headed For The Creative Community, Should Arts Organizations Follow?
1/18/2012
A vast repository of pop culture memes and internet humor, the blogging service Tumblr has grown significantly since its launch in 2007. With over 12 million blogs and with the recent raising of $30 million in funding, some see Tumblr's future as taking on blogging services like WordPress and Blogger.
The site's hallmarks are its streamlined posting dashboard and reblogging feature. Add on likes and short replies, and this gives the site a familiar feel to social networks like Flickr, Facebook, and Twitter.
By Thomas Hughes as seen in Technology in the Arts
11 Tips for Marketing Your Brand on LinkedIn
1/18/2012
With more than 135 million users, 59 percent of which are located outside of the United States, and with 75 of the Fortune 100 companies using the network for marketing and recruiting purposes, LinkedIn has become a critical platform for building, connecting with, and growing your personal and professional networks.
As the leading business social network, LinkedIn offers the chance to connect with professionals all around the world and from all industry backgrounds. But how do you convert networks into customers and ‘likes’ into sales?
By Ekaterina Walter as seen in The Next Web
What Were They Thinking?
1/5/2012
New product developers and marketers tend to be slaves to trends. And Pepsi was no different in the early '90s when it jumped on the clear trend. It was consumers' perception that clear meant healthy. It worked for one of their competitors with the introduction of Clearly Canadian, and it was working in other categories like personal care and laundry detergent, so why not for them?
Pepsi introduced Crystal Pepsi, a caffeine-free clear cola in 1992. Although initial sales were good, it quickly fizzled and was discontinued in 1993.
By Sandie Glass as seen in Fast Company
As New Composers Flourish, Where Will They Be Heard?
1/5/2012
We critics have long argued vehemently that if major musical institutions hope to be regarded as vital, modern institutions, they must keep their listeners (and performers) in touch with the ideas, trendy or otherwise, that excite the composers of their time. But truth be told, we are a little bipolar on that subject. Though we criticize the big organizations for fostering a museum culture, we actually value the museums they have become.
By Allan Kozinn as seen in The New York Times
Search and Social Media Marketing Predictions for 2012
1/5/2012
The year 2012 is finally here. 2011 was a breakout year for Web marketing developments, and as the geography of the field has rapidly evolved, those who have taken greatest advantage of these new innovations have reaped the most rewards.
2011 brought us Google+, Siri on the Apple iPhone, the Internet cloud, the Panda updates, and widespread changes across every major search engine and social platform. With all of these new technologies at our fingertips, the only thing that remains uncertain is what changes and challenges the New Year will bring. With that in mind, here’s our forecast for search engine and social media marketing in 2012.
By Alex Wall as seen in Business2Community
10 Brand-Building Steps
1/4/2012
So you've made the resolution that in 2012 you are finally going to "get into" social media and use it to build a brand for you or your business. But you're not a geek and you’re not with a big corporation that already has a social media team or a fairly savvy marketing department. For you, time is of the essence. You don't have all day to give to this endeavor, which is why you haven't done it already. So here's what to do in 10 easy steps.
By Francine Hardaway as seen in Fast Company
Millennials Are Playing With You
1/4/2012
At MTV, we have long suspected that understanding the relationship between Millennials and game play is one of the keys to understanding the generation as a whole. Our 2011 study, "Let's Play Brand," attempts to understand some of the implications of this "meta-game-mentality" for brand builders and marketers. The study has given us startling reaffirmation of our intuition that a "game-like metaphor" applies to almost every aspect of Millennial life. Half of Millennials said "People my age see real life as a video game" and almost 6 out of 10 said "#winning is the slogan of my generation" (certainly #epic_fail seems to have become their anti-slogan!)
By Nick Shore as seen in Harvard Business Review
Old White People Love Broadway
1/5/2012
"One of the benefits of the Annual Broadway League meeting held every December is that you get to pick up your glossy copy of the Broadway Audience Demographic Study," writes Broadway producer and blogger Ken Davenport. If you say so! But his post does provide some fun statistics about the demographic of the average Broadway fan who marches through the miserable crowds just west of Times Square to make it to the theater in time to get a sippy-cup full of white wine before the curtain rises. The results of the study will probably not blow your mind.
By Tyler Coates as seen in Black Book Magazine
How to Become A Social Media Influencer
12/13/2011
I’ve put together 10 points below drawing on experiences from around the web. These are 10 steps to get into social media and to see a route toward influence, the basics. Is it necessary to have this knowledge? I think so. There is valid scepticism about the numbers game. Nonethless I think young people, and some of us older ones, will enhance our career prospects by contributing to the web through creating and curating valuable content.
1. Planning
Playing a role in social media through blogs, Google +, Facebook and similar channels takes time out of your day. Efficient bloggers can create effective posts in twenty minutes. I can’t. It takes me an hour, at least. So you need time.
By Haydn Shaughnessy as seen in Forbes
Museum as Node: What to Love About the Walker Art Center's New Website
12/13/2011
The Walker Art Center launched a new website last week that should be a model for other institutions of all kinds. The site repositions the Walker, in the words of Artlog, "at the center of the global conversation about contemporary art," by incorporating ideas, words, and art from far outside the museum's walls.
Museums have options. One, they can stay off the web, hoarding their treasures offline and doing what they've always done. Two, they can dabble on the web and try to use it as a marketing platform to maximize the value of their physical spaces. Three, they can take advantage of the Internet's reach and figure out a way to become valuable within the new paradigm. We've seen a lot of options one and two, but the Walker is a definitive step down the third way.
Image: Walker Art Center
By Alexis Madrigal as seen in The Atlantic
