Vector Magic – vectorising images
I would love to say that I am great with Photoshop, but unfortunately I’m not. It’s embarrassing to admit that the image editor I use most is Paint, the free software accompanying Microsoft’s operating system. I do a lot of presentations and screen grab many sites from the web. All are the perfect resolution for the presentation, but not so good for printing. Introducing Vector Magic, a site attached to Stanford Uni. It is particularly useful for logos and photos.
There are four steps involved with making your image vectorised:
- Upload the image
- Configure the image
- Vectorise the image
- Review and download.
It takes about 5mins to make the images look great and a high quality for printing. The file inputs are: JPG, GIF, PNG, BMP, TIFF, while the file outputs are: EPS, SVG, PNG. Very useful site.
—————————————————
Summary:
Simple service, quick to use, useful for people not familiar with Photoshop. A very functional site with a simple interface.
Rating (out of 10):
Design: 5
Functionality: 8
Service: 8
Originality: 8
OVERALL: 8
Who should use it:
People who aren’t really good with photoshop or any other image editing software. This site does all the work for you.
Hassle Me – online reminders
Most people would use their email client to remind them of things they need to do on a regular basis, but Hassle Me has developed a service that can remind you of a range of things just by being sent an email. It is a UK based service, but is available to everyone.
There are only three fields that you need to complete:
1. Frequency of the hassle (email)
2. Email address that the hassle is sent to
3. Description of the hassle (reminder) you need.
Being the start of the year, most people’s hassles are focused on exercise and going to the gym.
Summary:
Simple service, quick to use, useful for people not familiar with calendars, not a pretty design, but very functional.
Rating (out of 10):
Design: 4
Functionality: 8
Service: 7
Originality: 5
OVERALL: 6
Who should use it:
Those people not using Outlook or who are not familiar with it. People who are using a web-based email.
Stumble upon – time waster
I don’t need an excuse to waste time online or another way to discover new sites, but Stumble Upon is the perfect way to waste even more time in front of the computer. After going through an easy registration process, you select the genres that are of interest (see image 2 for my selection), download the app and a Stumble Upon tool box sits at the top of your page giving you the remote to viewing 1,000’s of sites. When the sites appear you have the choice to decide if you give them thumbs up or thumbs down. This helps to build up a list of your favourite websites (see image 3 for my favourites).
Currently, there are over 4,100,000 people using this application to discover new websites that they normally wouldn’t reach.
One of the drawbacks is that this only works in Firefox and Internet Explorer. It is definitely worth switching over to spend time playing.
—————————————————
Summary:
The best downtime tool ever. Can also be good if you have writers block. Shows you a lot of sites that you wouldn’t normally come across.
Rating (out of 10):
Design: 8
Functionality: 9
Service: 9
Originality: 8
OVERALL: 8.5
Who should use it:
Anyone who is sick of watching the TV and being dictated to regarding the shows they watch, when. Creative’s looking for inspiration.
Actionable web analytics – ZAAZ
Previously working as part of the Y&R Brands network, and in particular Wunderman, it gave me exposure to a lot of great companies that were acquired – all with a focus on digital, direct and data. One of the best companies within the group was ZAAZ.
While on holiday (in rainy Thailand), I did myself a favour and read their book ‘Actionable Web Analytics’. It is written by the CEO and Chief Analytics and Optimisation Officer. A good book for all those who think they get analytics or need to get it for their jobs.
There were several themes that rang true for me:
- Data smog: How can agencies cut through the data smog for their clients? Clients are getting so many reports from so many different partners – what is important? what do they need to improve? how can they improve it? how can this information be moulded into bit size chunks and usable?
- Monetising online: How can you monetise websites? Without having a thorough understanding about how websites are performing and all of the details, this is extremely difficult to determine. However, measures can be taken to ensure this is overcome (particularly those that allow to test, test and test).
- Results: Why understanding the results are critical? Too many people don’t understand the results. They look at them, but don’t know what they mean.
- The difference between web analytics and web reporting – yes there is a difference. One focusing on analysing the results, while the other just highlights the findings. The hard thing with this is getting clients to understand the importance of the difference and acting on the results.
- Consumer journeys: How do you define the conversation path? This needs to be done both online and offline. How are you attracting people, getting them to engage with the brand/company, then moving them through to transaction and into a retention cycle? So important to map this out prior to starting any campaign.
The book also made me consider the following process upgrades within an interactive agency to ensure the following are happening (and not just been given lip service):
- Google analytics included on all sites (it’s free why shouldn’t you?)
- Exit survey’s are a must (understanding what is missing from the site and what other content is needed, is best from users rather than second guessing)
- Test strategies are a must and need to be developed at the start of a campaign (things to be tested cover offers, messaging and media).
A couple of my favourite quotes from the book:
‘Your website is a series of customer processes. They’re trying to discover, learn, compare, configure, price, locate, purchase, join, discuss, etc.’
‘For every action, there is an opportunity for an intelligent reaction.’
‘Keywords and banner ads are highly targeted doorways to specific destinations on websites.’
ZAAZ’s focus is on performance-driven design. Most agencies are trying to achieve this, but they get lost in the big ideas. I think we should all be striving for performance-driven engagement and bring all of the consumer learnings together and understand what engages them or continues bringing them back.
In summary, the book looks at the website from the users view (who comes to your site? what are they trying to accomplish?) and the marketer’s view (how can we make the website better? what do we need to look at and what is important?). It is a great sales book for ZAAZ, but they honestly are a brilliant company.
If you have some downtime and are interested in know what things to look at, I recommend reading the book.
Blu – Blue Freeway’s Client intranet
So many clients are expecting their agencies to know more and more about their industry. However, most agencies are really bad at promoting just how much research and knowledge they have of client’s industries and businesses. Blue Freeway have created their own intranet Blu, which combines this industry information as well as their project workflow system and methodology (obviously, these features only work when you are a client of Blue Freeway, so I don’t have access). Tag line being ‘your marketing universe’. Personally, I am not sure if it is my marketing universe and wouldn’t be for the clients either – there is not enough intel or thought leadership.
Anyone is able to register and then log in to the site. Information available includes: research and articles, conference events, in the news and profiles of their clients.
Very interesting that they are allowing non-clients to register, but I guess it helps build up their brand and exposure to new people/potential clients.
I would be interested to see how the campaign area (see image 3) works in practice. Every agency says they are using something similar, but unfortunately not many can deliver. With so many agencies under the Blue Freeway umbrella with different ownership structures, I am not too sure how this could work – but happy to be proved wrong.
Summary:
Clean design. A lot of irrelevant information (conferences in Asia, when I am based in Australia, sections that you can’t get into if you aren’t a Blue Freeway client).
Rating (out of 10):
Design: 6
Functionality: 6
Service: 8
Originality: 6
OVERALL: 6
Who should use it:
Competitors to Blue Freeway, as it helps to understand the offering and methodology they follow. Clients of Blue Freeway, as they are able to track progress of campaigns………….
Book Mooch – online book exchange
Book Mooch’s tag line is ‘Give books away. Get books you want.’ and in four easy steps the site helps you to do that. If you can’t find the book you want through the community of Book Moocher’s then there is the option to use Amazon to find the book as well.
The search features are great: topics, location, language and members. Some of the sites functionality has been borrowed from the Amazon thinking: wish list and Amazon reviews.
The site is simple to use and one that is pushing the recycling barrier without focusing on the environmental message everyone else is.
As at 19 December 2007, there were just under 420,000 books listed for giving. The site has an area with their vital stats focusing on the giving, books mooched, members and growth.
Summary:
Good idea (cuts out the second hand book store man though), helps encourage recycling and reuse.
Rating (out of 10):
Design: 7
Functionality: 6
Service: 7
Originality: 8
OVERALL: 7
Who should use it:
Book worms and people with lots of books sitting around the house collecting dust (yes, that is me).
Pimp My Safari – giving it a Firefox Facelift
With most advanced Internet users trialling Firefox, Safari doesn’t seem so sexy (well not to an old IE user). To try and regain some lost ground there is a site that allows you to Pimp my Safari.
It recommends three must haves:
Saft
Pith Helmet
SafariStand
Saft has features like draggable tabs, full-screen browsing, searchable bookmarks and history, URL shortcuts, kiosk mode and more. Pith Helmet is basically an ad blocker: flash, pop-ups and Shockwave.
The site is a very clean design and provides the links to all of the options where you can pimp your Safari browser. Attached to the site is a blog detailing any changes to the options, links to the plugins and bookmarklets.
Summary:
Nice aggregator of Safari applications and content. Clean design and easy to use.
Rating (out of 10):
Design: 7
Functionality: 6
Service: 7
Originality: 7
OVERALL: 7
Who should use it:
People who are using Safari and what it to do a little more.
