Eden Web - Design & Marketing Blog » Design as a business asset

‘Best of Irish’ Design Exhibition

peter — Tue, 07 Nov 2006 10:03:52 +0000

The Enterprise Ireland ‘Best of Irish’ Design exhibition is finishing up today in Glasnevin.

Enterprise Ireland’s Design Aware Briefing will provide essential information on the effective use of design to add value to business.Â The breakfast briefing consists of a number of presentations including advice on seleting and briefing a design consultancy, the advice, training and funding supports available from EI in the area of design and a company will also share their story of how they used design to enhance their product, brand and corporate identity.Â After the briefing attendees will have the opportunity to view the ‘Best of Irish’ Design Exhibition which will showcase award-winning designs by Irish designers across a range of design disciplines.Â The exhibition will appeal to all business sectors.

Yahoo climbs 1%

peter — Mon, 21 Aug 2006 13:47:59 +0000

Recent article on from Maccentral.com. I wonder if the Yahoo climb has anything to do with their recent homepage redesign

Googleâ€™s Web sites continued to be the U.S.â€™s most-used search source in July, but lost 1 percent market share to Yahoo, comScore Networks said Sunday.

Google accounted for 43.7 percent of all U.S. searches, but declined in total use for the first time after 11 consecutive months of increases, comScore said. Yahooâ€™s sites increased to 28.8 percent, up 0.3 percent over June of this year, but still down by 1.7 percent compared to the same month last year. Microsoft and MSN sites stayed unchanged at 12.8 percent.

Yahoo and Google continued to dominate the browser-based toolbar search market, with over 95 percent of all toolbar searches between them, comScore said.

All searches totalled 6.3 billion for July, down two percent from June and reflecting seasonal change, comScore said.

New design portfolio

peter — Thu, 10 Aug 2006 08:51:18 +0000

While we’re in the process of redesigning our site and bringing it up to date with our new Design and Marketing services, we’ve added some recent design work to our temp holding page.

Visit www.edenweb.ie and click on the Portfolio link on the top right of the page. Believe it or not, in the last 5/6 years we’ve never had our own design work on our site.

Anyway, please take a look and I’d love to hear your feedback.

How to live happily with a great designer

peter — Sun, 23 Jul 2006 16:29:01 +0000

Why do some organizations look great… and get great results from their design efforts and ads… while others languish in mediocrity? I think it has little to do with who they hire and a lot to do with how they work with their agencies and designers.

Here are the things your design team wishes you would know:

If you want average (mediocre) work, ask for it. Be really clear up front that you want something beyond reproach, that’s in the middle of the road, that will cause no controversy and will echo your competition. It’ll save everyone a lot of time.

Seth Godin hits the spot with his post – How to live happily with a great designer

North by NorthWest

peter — Thu, 23 Mar 2006 20:20:15 +0000

UK design organisation, D&AD are launching D&AD Northwest.
The organisation which aims to champion excellence in creativity globally will kick off the expansion with a lecture from President, Johnson Banks and culminate in a series of year-round events, workshops and exhibitions all aimed at a vibrant creative base in the NorthWest of England.

Speaking of Creativity and England, I’ll be in the Northest myself this weekend but the most creative thing I intend to do is rest and get plenty of fresh air.

The many roles of a corporate web site

peter — Sun, 26 Feb 2006 19:28:08 +0000

Have started working with an exciting new(ish) hi-tech company who are seeking level 2 funding and need their homepage and web site redesigned for a VC round which will take place in the US over the coming weeks.

Overhauling a companies web site for a Venture Capital audience is a common occurrence for hi-tech companies as they move from

Stealth-mode (owner invested/managed)
to
Level 1 funding (employing first staff members, improving marketing collateral, establishing credibility etc)
to
Level 2 (ramping up product(s) offering, hiring key management, marketing to customers)

What isn’t so predictable during the lifecyle of a company web site is the scope of audience a site may need to cater for outside the usual sales/marketing customer net.

I’ve recently started design work for one of Ireland’s largest landscape architectural firms whose sole target audience are potential employees.
A long term customer of EdenWeb in the UK had some great feedback on their web site from their Board at the end of the year. The Boards approval is vital.
An Irish client secured Level 2 funding from their VCs last year. The VCs said the strength of the client’s web site was was a major factor in determining the level of funding provided.
A US hi-tech company who rolled out a large marketing campaign for their Partners received a lot of praise for the professionalism of the landing page I designed and their email newsletter too.

I’ll be developing this post over the coming weeks so keep any eye on the blog for more updates.