Two Drink Minimum

An HTML e-mail promoting an e-mail service has a missing image

Interestingly enough, this was an e-mail sent from an email service provider I was evaluating. I don’t think it reflects negatively on their product (since the software is certainly GIGO), but the little twist of irony made me chuckle. I’ll bet the creator isn’t chuckling, though.

I can forgive the missing image - I think that’s an issue with the overly-aggressive spam filtering at the location where I’m reading this e-mail - but it’s a great reminder in and of itself that there’s a risk in images being blocked. At least they used a proper ALT tag.

That last line, though - either they should have spent a little more time proofing and not just relied on spell-check, or they’ve got me in the wrong customer segment and have sent me a personalized e-mail using incorrect data. 

Additionally, please learn the difference between your and you’re.

Both very simple mistakes. Both mistakes could have been easily caught. Both mistakes erode the message they’re trying to convey.

It’s a mantra worth repetition. Test. Test. Test. (That includes reading - really reading - what you’re sending as a test.)

It’s amazing how music can influence the emotion and tone of a visual.

Check out this link (dooku.net). It’s very simply a looped clip of the character Count Dooku riding a speeder bike in Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones. When you click the empty rectangle underneath the clip, the music changes. It’s amazing how your impression of the clip changes with each different background. Is he being chased, is he doing the chasing, or is he just out for a joyride? Is he angry, sad, or silly? Continue reading »

…be sure to read this article, and be sure to click the link to see a day of Google traffic on a worldwide map.

Did you notice? It never goes dark. Never. Someone, somewhere, is always searching for something.

Are you going to be behind the link that they find?

“Immersive” and “Experiential” are great concepts, especially for marketers. When used appropriately (and honestly!), these help transform targets from being passive consumers to participatory evangelists.

20th Century Fox has done a fantastic job of this in marketing their summer release of The Simpsons Movie. Continue reading »

Friend and fellow Seth disciple Gil Rogers got himself quoted and then commented on. I’m happy to have had a small part in the latter.

Gil Rogers, An Audience With The Pope.

Me too.

There are so many interesting and effective ways to present data. I keep a file of interesting PowerPoint ideas - actual presentations, or screen shots of them. And then I found a site that has been really helpful to me:

A Periodic Table of Visualization Methods

Not that this site is particularly about PowerPoint, because it’s not. (See below for one specifically on PowerPoint.) What it does very well is present a gallery of different ways to present data - categorized by what you want to present (data, concepts, strategies, etc.) and how you want to present it (process, structure, level of detail, convergence / divergence, etc.). When I’ve got to make a presentation, I think about the purpose and what I’m trying to accomplish - and then use this site to see what methods would be best.

Of course, once I have the correct method(s) in place, I still need to make it attractive, engaging, and comprehensible. This next site deals mostly with PowerPoint specifically, and I think it’s great:

Presentation Zen

Check it out.  And do your part to end the reign of bad PowerPoints.