Many designers and developers may disagree that the Web 2.0 craze is over, but I think it is reasonable to say it is winding down. By “winding down” I do not mean that Facebook, Twitter and other massively popular sites are going to vanish, but I do not foresee a lot more revolutionary sites emerging that are not classified under the next step (Semantic Web or Web 3.0). As a developer I feel that there will always be a piece of 2.0 in all of our future sites for quite a while, but there are a few items that will have a major impact until newer technologies make these obsolete (after the jump). I would love to hear your opinions as well so please leave some comments.

(more…)

Communicating your ideas effectively through a digital medium is essential to maintaining a productive and successful business. However, conveying your ideas isn’t so easy when emails can be misinterpreted, or even worse, if they are unreadable due to poor structure and grammar. Here are a few tips you can use to make sure that you are understood correctly the first time you type it.

The Subject Has a Purpose
If you were about to submit a report to your manager, boss, or a business investor, would you ever label the cover page “Read Me” or “Question”? If you said “yes” then I think email communication should be the least of your worries. The subject line of an email is one of the most important parts of an email, as it determines when, and if the recipient is going to read it. Subjects should be clear, to the point, and as much of a summary of the containing email as possible. Don’t abuse the purpose however, and keep it short to a few words. If the subject line is more than 10-15 words I would consider cutting it down. Also, mind your manners when sending an email to your recipients and do not type in ALL CAPS. It is rude, appears as if you are yelling, and overall is ineffective in communicating your message. If the email is urgent either mark it so in your email program (most client-side programs have integrated this feature regardless of what program you are using) or else place “Urgent:” before your subject. Just be sure that your message is indeed urgent, or else nobody will treat your emails with priority anymore.

Grade School Grammar
Nothing is worse than an email without proper use of grammar and punctuation. Read over your emails and think of what your 4th grade English teacher would have said about your email if it were written on wide rules loose leaf paper (you know, the yellow kind with 2″ lines that tears every time you try to erase something). Use the shift key, punctuate properly, and make sure that you have a subject and predicate. Decrypting the hieroglyphics of a sentence is sometimes more time consuming than reading the email in its entirety. Not only is this frustrating to your recipient, but it requires them to reply to your email for further clarifications. It can also lead to misinterpretation which sometimes is a minor issue, but if you are estimating a large project then misinterpreted scope can cost you a substantial amount of money.

Attachments
Unfortunately not everyone is using high speed internet connections yet. Sending an email with a 3 MB attachment is not so bad on a cable or DSL connection, but those of us that are still using dial-up connections are going to have to wait a good 10-15 minutes for the email to finally download. Even worse, some email programs will not allow you to read other emails or continue using the program until all of your email has downloaded. Talk about frustrating! If you have a large email there are a few alternatives. If you are able to zip the file using a zip program (or Windows’ built in zip functionality) it may be all the difference you need. There are also a lot of great sites that allow you to upload your files and send them to another person for download. I wouldn’t recommend sending your financial documents and other sensitive information, but simple presentations, graphics, multimedia clips, and other reports are perfect for this purpose. Here are a few upload sites that you may want to look into:

DropSend
DropBoks
OneDump
SendThisFile
MegaUpload

Stay On Topic
In relation to the first topic concerning the subject having a purpose, remember that throwing in additional information towards the end of an email is a sure way to be forgotten. Rather than adding “p.s. our meeting is at 3 p.m. tomorrow, right?” to the end of a lengthy email about an entirely different topic, send out another shorter email so that it has its own subject, and is separated from the bulk of the current message. It is very easy to forget the final line of an email if there is a lot of other subject matter that the recipient is focusing on.

Listening can do wonders for friendships, conflict resolution, managing your employees and even marriages. You can’t begin to solve a problem if you aren’t sure what the problem is. The only way to find out what the problem is…is by listening. So how does this apply to the Web and graphic design business?

Day in and day out, I come across one point that is stressed repeatedly as the most important step for being a good leader: listening!

Your Client Knows What They Want
So how does this apply to the Web and graphic design business? Simple…listening to your client is the number one rule for success as a service provider. When a client requests that I draft up a design for a Web site or logo, he or she usually has a general idea of what they are looking for. It is my job to extract their thoughts  and transform them into a physical presence in traditional or digital media.

However, as a designer, you cannot achieve this without having your client describe the thought they have in their mind. A good majority of my clients have come to me because they were looking for a designer to replace a firm that couldn’t give them what they wanted. The firm didn’t listen to the client. They created what they thought the client wanted…all the while ignoring the description the client was trying to convey. The client would say they wanted a red square, and the firm would give them a blue circle because they thought it looked better. You get the picture….

Guide and Educate
The point is, our role is to guide the client . . . to take their thoughts and mold them into something they can see. Feel free to make suggestions along the way, but don’t think you know what the client wants better than he/she does. Listen to the client, give them what they want, and you will build a strong relationship that will bring you promotion via word of mouth…and ultimately more business!