Posted On May 8th, 2009 Author Kyle Racki
Filed Under Headspace News, 5
When Headspace started, it was just me.
I never dreamed that in such a short time, it would grow into the team that it has become. In March, we hired as our first employee, Ricky Ferris. Ricky and I go back a long time, both working in and out of various agencies. I was very excited to have Ricky come on board full-time with Kevin and me.
As a web development ninja, Ricky brings a comprehensive understanding of design and usability to his brilliant knack for front-end development. From coding clean, semantic mark-up and CSS, to Actionscript/Flash development, Ricky is the guy who makes it all happen under the hood, and improves how things look and work. Ultimately, his job is to solve problems, and that’s what he has been doing for Headspace since his arrival in March. I don’t know how I got things done without him.
Among the many other changes to Headspace, we now have a studio! At the beginning of May, we moved into our new spot in 57 Portland Street in Dartmouth. We look forward to getting our space in good working order (in between client projects which just don’t seem to slow down), and we’re preparing to organize an open house that we will invite our clients and colleagues to. Stay tuned for more.
Just a quick thanks to all of our great clients who have made this recent growth possible. Thanks! And now we’ll get back to finishing your website.
Posted On April 2nd, 2009 Author Kyle Racki
Filed Under External Articles, Business, Development, 3
View the original post here: 10 criteria for selecting a CMS
I like all of Paul’s choices for the post, including:
Multi site support
We’ve had a few instances come up where our clients have multiple websites all running off the same server. In these case, having a CMS that let’s you edit content across multiple sites from the same admin login is invaluable.
Roles and permissions
Whenever I set up a website for clients to edit themselves, there’s always some work involved in making it a pleasant experience for them. With different levels of permission, I make sure that while my Super Admin account has all of the bells and whistles that I need for development, the client’s account is significantly simplifed to make it easy for them, and also avoid the chances of them accidentally deleting everything!
User interaction
Modern sites almost always require some sort of user interaction, whether it’s filling out a contact form or adding a comment to a blog. How easy does the CMS make it to gather, store and view the data?
Managing assets
In many cases, clients need to upload images, PDF, and video files through their site. How easy is it for them to store and use the content?
These are all great points Paul made, but I have two more of my own I’d like to make:
Markup generated
Something I hate about many CMS’s is the HTML they generate. It’s frustrating to design and develop a standards based site with clean, semantic markup, only to have a content management system to spit out nested div tags with unintelligible class names like “node-21”. This sometimes can mean that your design is dictated, not by user testing or skilled designers, but the back-end code that makes the content editable.
Wake up CMS developers! The CMS should just control what flows out of the database, not what the users sees and interacts with. This is one of the reasons we love Wordpress and ExpressionEngine. Utilizing their powerful loop, it generates data and let’s you wrap it in any sort of markup you want.
Open Source vs Proprietary
This is a controversial topic, but the bottom line is this: Open source CMS’s are free to download and use, built by a community of developers. The downside is that if the CMS doesn’t have a large following, there is no one to support it, and also you don’t have a tech support phone number to call if you need help.
On the other hand, proprietary CMS’s are developed and owned by a commercial company. Some like this option because they can speak directly to the company for support and to feel taken care of. However in many cases, there is the risk of the company going under, in which case, you have to rebuild your site if you want upgrades. Also, I find that proprietary systems are more limiting than open source, simply from the fact that open source projects are built by a large community, and companies are limited to their staff.
What about you, do you have any other factors to consider when choosing a CMS?
Posted On March 30th, 2009 Author Kyle Racki
Filed Under Headspace News, 5
Two articles have been written about Headspace and our work for the Municipality of the District of Lunenburg. We’ve been engaged in an ongoing brand strategy, identity re-design and naming project, managing to convince an entire committee to buy into it. We’re very pleased with how it went, and how surprisingly open the committee has been to our work, thanks in part to the diligence of our client lead, Dave Waters.
The following are excerpts from the articles written in the South Shore News:
Municipality of Lunenburg adopts tourism strategy
“The Municipality of Lunenburg has been branded with a birdhouse.
That, along with the moniker Lunenburg Region, will form the logo to pair with future tourism initiatives such as a website and magazine ads.
“The birdhouse says rural and comfortable and over time, will become a recognizable aspect of the region,” said Kyle Racki of Headspace - a company specializing in strategic branding, print and web design - during a recent committee of the whole presentation.
Jennifer Faulkner of Headspace said a common example of branding is why many people choose Coke over Pepsi.
“I’m a Coke drinker and we all swear there is a taste difference, but really, the difference is slight, it’s really about branding … it’s all about the feeling you have when you interact with that brand.”
In terms of tourism, that’s an emotional promise made to visitors.
“It’s about finding a compelling message that you want to communicate to people, then interpreting that in many ways. Your brand is how people should feel about the area with every interaction - whether they’re on the phone, reading brochures, speaking to an operator or looking at signage - everything.”
She said a brand will also help define the municipality from its competition.
Marketing firm recommends municipality alter name
COUNTY - What’s in a name?
For marketing purposes, apparently quite a bit.
“Sometimes you have to say ‘your baby is ugly,’” said Jennifer Faulkner of Headspace - a company specializing in strategic branding, print and web design - during a recent committee presentation to the Municipality of the District of Lunenburg (MODL).
“Your name is lengthy, it’s confusing and it’s really not sexy, to be honest. That’s where ‘your baby is ugly,’” she laughed. “It’s really a political term.”
Therefore, the MODL plans to bill itself as the Lunenburg Region in future tourism initiatives.
“You need something you can market and recognize,” said community economic development officer Dave Waters.
“When I met with tourism agencies and groups in the area, the biggest difficulty I ran into was people don’t recognize that the Municipality of the District of Lunenburg is not part of the Town of Lunenburg.
“One of the things we wanted to do was find a name that was simple, not complex and something that would represent the area as a whole, and not a specific part.”
He said Lunenburg Region does that while differentiating itself from the town, but not too much.
“Although we’re trying to say we’re not the Town of Lunenburg, it would be suicide for us to ignore the town, because they’re the draw. We’re not a tourism destination, we’re a diversion. Having the name Lunenburg in there ties in to what we want to do.”
Councillor Martin Bell said the name also allows a more open invitation for partnerships with other municipal units that want to market the area.
“That was a real selling feature for me. We weren’t just raising our own flag, we were raising a flag for the region and capitalizing on a name that is recognized internationally.”
The Lunenburg Region moniker is expected to be used in context with marketing initiatives such as advertisements and brochures.
“It’s just a vessel to help carry the message,” said Ms Faulkner.
That message is expected to be delivered primarily to people in the Halifax area and beyond.
“This will not replace our municipal name or logo,” said Mr. Waters.
“This is strictly for tourism purposes only.”
“That doesn’t mean you have to compete with other people, it just helps to define you so people actually think about you. We know people are thinking about Lunenburg and Mahone Bay. How do you get them to think about you at the same time?”
Part of that strategy will involve marketing a natural, rural experience.
“That’s what people want,” said Ms Faulkner.
“They’re not looking for the Disney World experience. That has its place, but people want to have a real experience and interact with the community.”
She said among the region’s many selling points are diversity of heritage, unspoiled nature, unique communities with their own identities and local cultures.
“This is a big tourism trend now. People aren’t just going places to see something,” said Ms Faulkner.
“They want to experience local culture, and you certainly have that here - even local language - the terms and phrases you use or the charming accents some people have … it’s something unique and interesting people from away will remember and tell stories about when they go back home.”
Four attributes will be the keys for this marketing initiative - genuine, fresh, charismatic and eclectic.
“What happens with this brand is you take these four attributes and use them as pillars. You use them to communicate your message. As long as you’re true to these four attributes in how you do your logo, your ads and all your other materials, you’ll always be on brand.”
We’re excited to showcase the brand and two websites within the next month or so. Stay tuned.
