Indigo Thoughts

A web and graphic design portfolio: A lead generator

2009-07-02T09:17:00.005-05:00

I met with a potential client earlier this week, looking to create a logo and web site look and feel. A start up company, they have a great idea and a hefty business plan - a sure sign to mean that they really mean business.

It never ceases to amaze me the number of start up companies I meet who have no business plan just a vague idea. They want to start developing a brand image with no idea of who they are targeting, their competition, price structure and any of those other elements a good business plan will detail.

The start up company I met this week had found us via Google and had spent a considerable time going through our extensive portfolio. We had impressed them enough that they called and scheduled an appointment. A great example of our web and graphic design portfolio working as a lead generator!

A brand color palette. Eye of a St Louis web designer

2009-06-22T09:25:00.003-05:00

A few weeks ago these beautiful irises were in full bloom in my St Louis garden. Notice anything about the colors in this photograph? They are essentially the palette of colors we use in our brand.

I love using nature as an inspiration during web and graphic design projects and as this image shows a simple photograph is sometimes all you need to build a great color palette from which to work.

St Louis web designer tip of the day

Need a website ASAP?

2009-06-09T09:41:00.004-05:00

We need a website ASAP. This is a surprisingly common request and was exactly what Software Assistants asked of us.

Their site was launched today, less than two weeks after we began the project. The fast turn around did not mean we cut corners, we followed our tried and tested design and development process, and set an aggressive timeline for each phase. With fast client feedback and collaboration we were able to deliver exactly what they wanted. Here is the end result.

St Louis web designer tip of the day: Give your blog a boost

2009-06-04T11:04:00.004-05:00

Blogs are a great way to promote your services, improve your search engine ranking and provide a great way to interact with your readers.

Here are some quick tips to give your blog a boost and grow your readership

Write it regualry - at least twice a week.
Comment on other blogs- in the comments box there is often an opportunity to include your own website or blog URL.
Title your blog posts with keywords you are targeting.
Submit your blog to a blog directory such as blogcatalog
Give your readers different options to subscribe to your content. e.g. sign up through a reader - try Goggle Reader or sign up to receive via email.
Start a Twitter account and use it to promote new blog posts.
Use a free pinging service such as Pingoat

St Louis web designers tip of the day!

Brochure Design for St Louis Financial Advisor.

2009-05-27T11:59:00.002-05:00

We recently completed this brochure design for St Louis financial advisor, LegaGroup.

Adobe Illustrator Layers Palette has disappeared

2009-05-20T15:51:00.002-05:00

I have been working on a new logo today for Warson Capital Partners, my tool of choice for logo design is Adobe Illustrator.

Every once in a while I encounter an annoying problem with Illustrator - the layers palette just disappears and nothing I do within the program itself will bring it back.

Here are the steps I take to fix the problem

Close Adobe Illustrator
Locate Aiprefs - this is the file where all the runtime preferences are stored. This is a hidden file so run a search on your system disc.
Delete Aiprefs. This is completely safe as Illustrator will generate a new file when it is next started.
Re-open Adobe Illustrator. The menu palette will now be accessible once again.

Eye of the St Louis Web Designer

2009-05-13T17:30:00.002-05:00

I love the fact my job as a web and graphic designer allows me to indulge my creativity but sometimes it is fun to apply those creative skills to something completely different.

I brought my painting talents to this backdrop for Wildwood Dance and Arts.

It was completed this afternoon and will feature in a dance production of Peter Pan this Saturday, May 16th at Chesterfield YMCA. There are two shows at 2.30pm and 7pm. Tickets are available on the door.

Are you all blogged out? St Louis Web Designer's tip of the day

2009-05-11T15:12:00.002-05:00

If you are blogging for business, pleasure or both there will be days /weeks, when you come up empty in creating that next killer blog post. Welcome to Bloggers Block .

Here are some of the tips I use to keep those creative juices flowing.

Keep a running list of blog post ideas and add to it frequently - skim over your list and pick something that appeals to you.
Think about recent interactions with clients. What types of questions have they asked. Can they be worked into a blog post?
Got a new client, launched a new project or service? Blow your own trumpet and blog about it.
Flick though a magazine or newsletter relevant to your business, industry or organization. An image or article may be all the inspiration needed.
Member of any social networking sites, Twitter, Facebook LinkedIn? Check what's happening with your friends/followers.
Get away from your computer. Sitting in front of a blank"New Post" screen desperately thinking of something to share is not conducive to ideas. Go for a walk, have a cup of coffee, crank up your favorite music on your ipod.
Find inspiration from the natural world...everything from systems, processes, life cycles, shapes color, texture
Lastly don't sweat! While posting to a blog regularly is important missing the odd day or even week is not the end of the world.

Website for St Louis wedding Officiant Ruth Hasser

2009-05-05T10:51:00.004-05:00

The internet is an invaluable tool when planning a wedding and if you are in the wedding business, having a website which engages the "bride to be" is vital.

Ruth Hasser, a St Louis wedding officiant and celebrant, understood this and we began working with her in the design of her website in early March.

A picture speaks a thousand words and we incorporated a photograph or Ruth in action and built the site around a natural color palette of greens, browns and cream and topped it with an intuitive navigational tool.

Internet marketing was also a priority for the site and it has been optimized for the search engines and also includes a custom designed blog.

The site www.ruthellenhasser.com went live yesterday

Website first impressions: New site for Breeze Law Firm

2009-04-28T12:38:00.004-05:00

You have one chance to make that all important first impression, are you achieving that with your web site?

The updated site we've created for Breeze Law Firm delivers a great first impression with a rich look/feel, easy to navigate interface and direct copy allowing visitors a thorough overview of the practices areas.

Visit the site a www.breezelaw.com

Custom 404 error pages.

2009-04-23T09:00:00.000-05:00

Does your web site have custom error pages? If a visitor types in the address of a page that has been moved or no longer exists are they greeted with this?

Does this screen engage your users? No and you are missing an opportunity to direct your users to the information they are looking for.

Take this "error" opportunity to present your visitors with custom 404 error pages, ours has full site navigation and a site map.

Are you getting the most of the visual elements of your brand ?

2009-04-21T16:03:00.007-05:00

The visual elements of your brand are typically classified as

Your Logo

Typography – font face, sizes

Color Palette – primary and secondary colors

Imagery- photographs, illustration and their styles

Personality

Here are the visual elements of the Indigo Image brand and examples of how we use them to create a consistent image.

Ideally your brand elements should be present on all forms of communication, your web site, business cards, letterhead, envelopes, email signature even on your social network profiles like LinkedIn and Twitter.
Don't miss an opportunity to make your brand work for you.

New Online Catalog for St Louis Woman's Exchange

2009-04-17T15:43:00.003-05:00

Looking for unique kids clothes or gifts? Check out the new online catalog of the St Louis Woman's Exchange web site launched this afternoon.

We configured the catalog so it could be easily populated by the client, they have made a great start and there is already a good selection of kids clothes.

Web Design Updates for Indigo Image

2009-04-15T11:21:00.004-05:00

Back in February I mentioned our web site was undergoing a freshen up. Client work always comes first so it has taken until the middle of April to roll out the changes. But today is the day!

While the overall design has not dramatically changed we have focused on usability issues. Our home page now features our RSS feed and a dynamic portfolio navigator. The entire portfolio section has been reworked and all logo and graphic design pieces are presented as a slide show format for easy viewing.

The portfolio has been split into the following sections

Web Design - with 3 galleries of web site, email templates, landing page, banner ads etc
Logo Design
Graphic Design -with 3 galleries of business cards, letterheads, flyers, trifolds, menus etc
Complete Branding - with six galleries of branding projects

We have also taken the opportunity to update our blog template and create a custom background for the STLwebdesign Twitter page

Web Site Testimonial from St Louis Associates in OBGYN

2009-04-13T09:16:00.003-05:00

Hearing this kind of feedback makes it all worth while!

Working with Zoe at Indigo Image was an extremely positive experience. Her prompt communication and professionalism truly made our web page development a breeze. Not only was the development process easy for us, her creativity continues to bring our practice's best face forward. We are extremely grateful for all of her hard work and unique creative touch! Thank you!

Jessica Kliethermes
Associates in OB/GYN, Inc.

www.snowdenmd.com

Twitter experiment

2009-04-03T15:58:00.002-05:00

Are you using Twitter yet?

I have had a Twitter account for quite some time now but only really started using it recently. Twittering is like micro blogging; you have 140 characters to have your say. It is quick, easy and free.

As with any social networking tool there is a time commitment, albeit relatively small for Twitter, so I have set myself a number of goals to see if it is really worth the effort.

To follow me on Twitter click here

Looking for a basketball camp in St Louis? View our latest web site

2009-04-01T09:28:00.003-05:00

Launched this week is an updated web site for the Larry Hughes Basketball summer camp. Time was of the essence in getting this site online as flyers advertising the camp were being distributed and visitors were being directed to a very outdated site with incorrect information. We completed this new site in less than a week.

More user friendly and with clear call to actions was the focus or our re-design. Here is what our client had to say "The site looks fantastic!!"

Web site in progress for wedding officiant

2009-03-25T20:50:00.002-05:00

I am currently working on a new web web site for a St Louis wedding officiant.

At the start of any project, as part of the discovery process, I asked my clients to send me a few URL's of web sites they like and ones they don't. From the sites they send, I can get a really good idea of the looks that appeal to them and vice versa.

My client on this project did a great job picking out sites. I did a search on wedding officiants and about 90% of the sites out there are awful - bad design, impossible navigation, no call to action, unpolished and generally just yucky.

I can gaurentee that the site created for my client will NOT be in that 90%.

New web site for St Louis' Hotshots sports Bar and Grill

2009-03-24T14:58:00.002-05:00

Launched today is a new web site for Hotshots Sports Bar and Grill

http://www.hotshotsnet.com/index.html

With a warm appealing design, akin to walking into one of the nine locations in the St Louis area, the site features a free coupon sign up and calendar of events. A Hotshots shop will be added shortly.

This is not a web project

2009-03-16T21:15:00.003-05:00

I recently turned my design skills to something other than web sites. It was an interesting project, the creative brief was to construct a crocodile costume for 4 dancers. The costume will be used in the production of Peter Pan by Wildwood Dance and Arts.

Here is the head (made of sculpture wire and papier mache) which will be held by the lead dancer, the three other dancers will be draped in fabric and the 4th dancer has a tail.
It was a lot of fun to make!

St Louis Jazz Cafe: opening soon

2009-03-13T09:55:00.004-05:00

Opening March 21st is the much anticipated St Louis Jazz Café

I worked with Cafe owner Arnold Charleston in April last year in design of their logo. I love the way they have incorporated it into their web site.

Check it out at http://www.stlouisjazzcafe.com/

Updates to our web site

2009-03-05T15:58:00.003-06:00

We have been swamped with work this week, a big SEO project, client web maintenance, and juggling 5 design projects, so the updates to our web site I announced last week are not going to happen...just yet. They are however well underway. If I can roll them out before the end of March I will be happy.

It is good to be busy, especially in this economic climate!

The quality of your web coding and SEO

2009-03-03T16:06:00.002-06:00

Today I have been working on a site I recently took over.

The site has a clean well functioning design with no usability flaws. However it has not been doing well in the search engines for the keywords and phrases the client is targeting, so they have asked me to do some SEO work .

Delving into the code “behind” the site I have come across a number of problems that have not been helping the situation. The code is bloated beyond belief with font tags, span tags and nested tables. It appears that the original creator of the site had a “thing” about using tables…even simple lists were put into a table.

I have stripped away the superfluous code and used css to control the look and feel of the content. The code is cleaner and shorter ( from around 240 lines to 70 lines) and the web site looks exactly the same to the user.

Tomorrow I will work on adding elements that will enrich the keyword density of the pages.

The time commitment of blogging: St Louis web designers tip of the day

2009-03-02T15:25:00.004-06:00

Blogging can be a great tool to add to your marketing mix. It can improve the visibility of your online presence and allow easy interaction with your clients and site visitors.

For small business owners serious about getting their sites to perform well in the search engines (internet marketing, SEO) I generally suggest adding a blog if … and this is a “big if”, they can devote the time to write it. A new blog will require at least two to three post a week for the first few months to get it rolling and at least one per week after that.

There is no way you can cheat either. I subscribed a year or so back to a blog which, until the weekend, appeared to be dead. However over the last few days posts have been rolling into my reader from this blog, all post dated. To readers new to the blog it looks like the blog has been updated on a regular basis …but the search engines will know better.

Coming up with regular fresh content can be a challenge, but you most definitely “reap what you sow”

The St Louis web designer Tip of the day

New web site for Saint Louis Associates in OBGYN

2009-02-26T13:53:00.003-06:00

Launched this afternoon is a brand new web site for Saint Louis Associates in OBGYN.

Presented with a clean and fresh look/feel, the site information is organized in well structured categories, from "Practice Areas" to "Woman's Health by Life Stage". The user is able quickly to hone in on their information of interest.

Home Page

Woman's Health by Life Stage

Visit the site at www.snowdenmd.com