If you're heading to ad:tech this year and you're trying to work out which sessions to go to, our resident crowd favourite, Jason, will be on the 'Creative – Strategy – Data: What Should Drive Your Digital Marketing Most?' panel on March 16. Also.... we've been offered a 20% discount on conference passes to extend to our friends. Just type in ATSPC when you're signing up to redeem the discount. Hope to see you there! Sarah

‘Managing the Recovery’, by Kath Walters in BRW (Jan 14 – Feb 3) features quotes from Jim taken from ‘business@100Mbps – A View of the Firm of the Future’. The focus of the article is on crucial lessons that Walters believes should have been learned by businesses as a result of the economic downturn. Jim’s quotes support her ascertain that attitudes to customer service must improve in order for businesses to prosper in the upturn. Read the full article here: BRW_EmergingCompanies BRW_EmergingCompanies2

Greg discussed the essence of a good business website with Sydney Morning Herald journalist Julia Talevski in today's NEXT column. The article covered the current do's and don'ts of good website design and maintenance as many organisations  move their primary marketing and business initiatives online. Some of the do's included: > keeping text on the home page to a minimum > avoid the overuse of stock photos > use images that load quickly > research your customers before website build or redesign > use web analytics to review your site > promote Social Media channels from your homepage The don'ts to be aware of: > don't load your home page full of text thinking it will improve SEO > don't leave your site static > don't use colours on colours for text making it difficult to read The full article can be viewed here: Build on your reputation, Sydney Morning Herald, 22 September, 2009

Normal 0 false false false EN-AU X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 Greg’s recent interview with Phil Dobbie from BNET.com has gone live today. The interview discusses the necessary steps in a  Website Prelaunch Checklist. The interview gives a clear message around due diligence and a valuable set of to do’s for the audience.

In the interview Greg reviews the following:

• The importance of first impressions to website users
• Aligning your website to different customer groups
• The importance of a research phase
• The changing face of digital and the NBN: Greg mentions the business@100Mbps report
• His ideal usability checklist

The podcast can be heard here:

http://blogs.bnetau.com.au/aussierules/2009/08/05/the-website-prelaunch-checklist-btalk-australia/

Richard Gonclaves from SkyNews' IT program, interviewed Jim to gain his insights on the impact of the impending national broadband network.

Jason's recent presentation at the Public Sector Marketing conference (29/06/09) rated an average of 9.5/10 from delegates. See his presentation here on Public Sector Digital Marketing: now and in the Future.

Our Director of Digital Marketing, Jason Davey will be imparting his insights on 'Latest Twitter Tips', when he joins the founder and publisher of Smartcompany, Amanda Gome for a webinar on August 4,  at 2.00pm. To join this webinar and/or to forward along details,  click on the following link to register. Smartcompany webinar: Latest Twitter Tips

    1. DEXTER VIRAL – TEN Oh no, not another loony running around with a blade! But hang on a minute, like all good detectives re-visiting the crime scene, on closer inspection this is a viral piece for the new series of Dexter. The intro to the US news report is believable – with the taped-off police areas and CCTV footage of the killer leaving the scene adds to the authenticity. I do like the idea and like all good virals has that viral effect in that you can personalise the piece and send it on giving the impression that your mate could be next - lovely idea. After all that was revealed at the end, I thought the art direction needed more of an edge and the line “You’ve just been given the Dexter treatment” was not as sharp as Dexter’s blade. A good effort overall.  2. THE HAPPENING Quick cuts, camera zooms with deep gravelly voice-overs from the director of the Sixth Sense – it was bound to grab my attention, so when I went online to find out what was happening I was still none the wiser. Maybe that was the whole point? To create enough intrigue that you’ll want to see the film. There was ‘The Happening experiment’ which was basically a flash mob of people all falling to the ground at the same time. I love the thought, but have seen this idea done before in New York’s Times Square where everyone ‘froze’ 3. VICELAND TIME CRISIS GAME A shoot-em-up game with lots of blood and a high body count – now we’re talking. As a non-Vice reader, I didn’t really understand the ‘don’ts and dos’ and as I entered the site I was taken straight to the shooting range. It would have been nice to chose your weapon of choice as my personal favourite is the AK-47. Still, pulling my hard gangsta bro face I started shooting. It didn’t feel like I was using an AK- 47, it felt more like a water pistol. More action and sound effects would have helped the experience of a virtual shoot-em-up world all blokes love.

4. BIG BROTHER A virtual Big Brother house that has lovely art direction. I loved the Flash animation (apart from a glitch when I rolled over the music stereo in the bedroom) and thought it was well executed. The prize on offer is an ‘ultimate’ trip for two to the Gold Coast, including limo transfers and a tour of the BB house and other things. I guess this is very appealing for the audience but for me – who doesn’t watch BB with all the naval gazing that goes on with a bunch of wannabe stars – this site didn’t entice me enough to interact, so earning points and cracking codes wasn’t compelling enough (not even for a trip to the Gold Coast) and I reckon this audience haven’t the attention span to navigate around the site.

5. THE WORLD GAME I thought the site design and interface was a bit stale, but I did like the fact that they had videos, blogs and stats on the ‘beautiful game’. To be honest if you’re a football nut this site will be a favourite. For me, it was the videos from the English Premier League, and coming from the East End of London I was looking for the ‘ammers, what the hell? No West Ham and as they say around Upton Park ‘bloody liberty’. I still feel they could have ‘real’ fans from Australia talking and reviewing games. The site could have also used Vodcasts and not just on the blogs, and polls from the fans would have added a bit more to the site. 6. BRATZ FASHION DESIGNER Out of all the sites I reviewed, this site for me worked the best. I know it works well as my three girls are on this site all the time so I know from first-hand experience that this is a great site. It has everything that all good online experiences should have – relevant rich content, personalisation with the ‘Fashion Studio to The Gallery’ where you can upload your favourite design and vote for the best. This site really understands who its talking to, it doesn’t try to be too clever but still manages to be very rich and immersive. This gets top marks from me.