Search Engine Optimisation » User Experience

Logo Redesigns – Do they always work?

Andy Kinsey — Sun, 02 Oct 2011 16:48:51 +0000

Over the past few years there have been many logo redesigns, from twitter to hotmail to microsoft office. But have they all been a success? or have they flopped and gone pretty much unnoticed?

Below are some examples of logo redesigns, which do you think have mad the service and company appear improved or better in some way? leave a comment and let us know.

So which were the best, which failed, which impress and which don’t? You tell me?

Also if you have a logo redesign to share, tweet @andykinsey

Your Website is Dead – Encourage Comments

Andy Kinsey — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 09:29:46 +0000

One of my more common conversations with Website and Blog owners, regardless of industry or niche, is how to encourage readers to engage and leave comments on blogs.

It is a common problem that not many blog posts have lots of comments. It is even more common to find if there are comments they are spam! So how to combat the spam whilst encouraging REAL comments?

Here are my top 10 tips to getting blog comments

Concise and Clear
Most bloggers miss the notion that actually people generally skim read a blog post. Unless you are say in the chemical industry talking about some formula that you have to go into great detail about. Keep you points clear and concise – don’t beat around the bush (too much).
ASK!
It’s quite simple, if you are aiming to get comments (and it’s not every bloggers aim!) then don’t make them find a reason. Simply ask a question or for their views.
Make it Easy
So many blogs require 7 or 8 fields, or even pre-registration to comment. This whilst meaning people maybe subscribed to your blog means they can’t engage. It is plain dumb to put road blocks in the way. Remember to keep it simple – maybe like us try Disqus, users can sign in as a guest, using facebook, google or twitter – there is no registration on this site!
Formatting
allowing users some way of formatting can really help encourage comments. But it can also have the converse effect of allowing more spam into your system – I found that out the hard way!
Allow Links
Allowing links into your comments may seem like an open door to spam – and if you don’t have spam control in place it can be. But get it right and others in your niche or outside your niche with an interest are almost 4 times as likely to leave a comment (i will one day find the report i read that in).
Recognise Hurdles
Linked to some of the above will be a requirement to prevent spam. Akismet is great at doing this automatically, but there are other systems such as ReCaptcha that do a “human check” – this means not letting bots post. But checks like this can cause problems – take Googles Captcha it is often so hard to read I get told to go away 7 or 8 times! do you really want to use that hurdle or will Akismet do the job?
Join in the Conversation
If you notice one or two comments on a blog, actively join in and encourage people to talk. Be aware you can stagnate the conversation but it is likely they will have wrote something you can reply to and add further depth to your post. do it.
It’s not only your site
One thing you notice as a website content owner and controller is other sites will use your content. Don’t worry as long as they link back, don’t pass it off as their own its fine – but remember if you do kick up a fuss that they could be gaining comments for you on that site or say on facebook – these are valuable too, don’t make them disappear.
Getting More Replies
One thing I’ve played with is the idea of “let me know of future response” on individual blogs. It’s a great idea that if one person comments they may want to know if there is a reply, so let them sign up for email alerts. It also means they will likely come back to comment in reply again. But beware if you are open to spam your readers may get annoyed at hundreds of reply emails with spam in them!
Outside the box
It’s all very well looking outside the box, on the top rung of a ladder, thinking it looks nice out there, but never doing anything about it. But take those steps into the outside world, make comments on other blogs, do guest posts, use social media – be known as a person, a blog and a brand … market and they shall come. otherwise you are just another store for people to walk on by!

I think I’ve covered most things in this post, but if you’ve got any further ideas on how to increase user interaction and commenting rates – let us know, leave a comment.

How to Promote Your Design Portfolio

Andy Kinsey — Sat, 17 Sep 2011 09:32:16 +0000

Regardless of your niche in design, from jewellery to painting to graphic design to website design your portfolio online is one of the most important aspects of your business. Getting it right is one thing, getting is seen is quite another. As with all websites without promotion and marketing it is a store front people will walk past.

When you first start out online as an “artist” it can be quite daunting thinking about how to be seen through the crowd of other artists, in the same niche. But alas success is within reach, in 3 steps, you can ensure your portfolio is seen, admired and drives business.

Design, Develop & Deploy

Step 1 – Design a Killer Portfolio

As an artist you will naturally want to create the best portfolio around. Not just in your little niche but the best overall. This was certainly one of my aims when I redesigned my Website and Graphic Design portfolio earlier this year. So what are the minimum requirements for a “killer portfolio” website?

Examples Your Work (with case studies if applicable)
Your Skills (tell them what you can do, plain and simple)
Your Personality (don’t make the mistake of being bland, show your passion)
Your Style (the design itself should reflect your work and style)

Notice I say examples of your work. As a designer I’ve working with far to many companies to name or show my work. Show only your best work, things you are proud of – writing a case study should be simple – if its a painting explain what it shows and means to you, if its a website explain what work went into it etc. Creating a portfolio isn’t expensive or hard work – if money is an issue use a system like behance or deviantart they are free though not quite as professional, if you want higher quality use a professional web designer (like me)

Step 2 – Develop your arena

This section I will keep short and sweet, a subsequent post will list some ideas of places to do this. Basically this is about blatant self promotion. You have a high quality professional website, it’s time to back it up – join other artist based websites like deviant or folksy or coroflot show off your work on there but make sure each image you upload has your web address in a comment (and watermark the work). This is the development of your brand so again show only your best work, if you’ve other work you can show this too here but don’t show the same 50 pieces of work on 50 websites, show your best plus maybe a few other pieces of random work.

Note though that although these sites may offer you a chance to create a portfolio, such as behance, you dont want to do this – you simply want to show some of your work and point them to your real portfolio. This is why you should join lots of them, you dont have to do them all at this stage, but over a few months or a year maybe.

Step 3 – Deploy in a big way!

Now comes the bit that is likely the hard work for you – more so than creating the perfect portfolio website, promoting that website. But you’ve done a fair bit already by joining the creative communities online (like deviant) but now you need to engage with them, offer to write guest blog posts, comment on blogs about your niche, engage with users on social media (create a facebook page use twitter).

If you are wanting to gain work via your portfolio (not everyone does) then you could link to your LinkedIn profile, join other communities such as forums, read up about internet marketing (you already are by reading this blog), put it on your great business card – but most of all have fun doing it. Don’t be a stickler for detail just go out have fun and tell people they should take a look at your work.

Remember though – you never “complete” your portfolio polish it and polish it, add to it, take from it update it love it be it. your portfolio is your existence - never let it go.

–

If you know of any amazing portfolios let me know, in the next few weeks I’ll be publishing my top 10 inspirational portfolios from across the creative niches. If you have a great portfolio or know of one let me know! Leave a comment!

In Short: Feedback, Reflection and Second Guessing

Andy Kinsey — Sun, 11 Sep 2011 10:00:01 +0000

When writing content something we are all guilty of is “second guessing“, if you don’t understand what I mean think about this – When you blog about something you think people will want to read, you are second guessing the wants of your audience. Second guessing can be good and bad, it depends how well you know your audience.

Some great examples of having fun with second guesses come on April Fools day, one of the best this year was by outdoor sports company CheapTents who have an audience of outdoor enthusiasts – so what did they write for a blog post on April fools? Take a look for yourself, its here, pretty well matched and thought out.

Second Guessing happens when you are pushed to write a post, pushed for time or pushed because you don’t know what to write. Which ever it is, think twice and Reflect!

Reflection is a lovely word. It can mean what you see in the mirror or how you see that thing. Reflection in these sense I mean is more akin to the later, and the spiritual sense of finding ones self. When writing content reflection for most is just skim reading it again or proof reading, but that isn’t what you should be doing. You should be taking a look at your posts, its tone, its topic and then look at other blogs in your niche … are you really doing your blog justice with this post, is the question. Take a deeper look and see what you can add or detract from the post … quantity isn’t everything.

So reflect on your current writing, and then reflect with Feedback on your older works.

Feedback is a vital tool to any website designer, copy writter, blogger, journalist, web editor or otherwise (the list could go on and on). Listening to your users means you don’t always have to second guess what they want, you reflect on your content with the help of your users – this is how you can continue to improve your website, your blog, your forum posting, commenting, tweeting and generally being webby.

Go on – Second Guess, Reflect, and Listen.

Boost your e-commerce conversion rate – 10 Tips to success

Andy Kinsey — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 11:13:42 +0000

As a website owner or internet marketer, you’ll probably know the profitability of a website and what it sells is based on conversion rates. Increasing this by just 1% in some cases can mean millions extra income, for others a 50% increase will mean a larger profitability such that the company can survive – obviously this is at the top of the agenda as the UK faces a double-dip recession. But why increase conversion rates and not work on advertising or improving rankings? The answer is conversion rates hit the bottom line, increasing traffic through PPC or advertising can cost a lot, where as small improvements to websites to increase conversions costs little and increases profitability off the bat!

So here are my 10 Top Tips to e-commerce conversion success

Guarantees
Offering a meaningful guarantee, which is easy to understand will help form a trusting relation ship with users. If it is a physical product the user will expect the same rights and guarantees they would receive from the high street. But remember don’t include 25 exclusions means that actually no one could ever figure out how to use it, let alone actually make use of it. Keep It Simple Stupid!
“Trusted” Logos
Whether you are selling clothes or cd’s one of the most important things to do is to inspire trust. It sound’s odd but it’s easy to do and really effective. Take for example SafeBuy or the ISIS scheme or verified by visa, such schemes all have logos that are easy to get hold off when you sign up. If you are rated well buy these guys you’ll inspire trust. But go further, add a review box to your website from an independant source, show that your customers trust you (take a peek at the cheap tents, trustpilot, review box below their sidebar).
Vouchers and Coupons
Offering regular voucher codes to buyers is a sure way to get them to come back looking for more, as well as showing you are a company that cares about it’s customers back pockets. If you are going to put these offers into the public domain, such as 10% off using this code, maybe you could get them to sign up to a mailing list to get the code … it sounds cheeky but this way you can send them even more savings and your latest news – it’s a win win situation.
Promotions
I know of very few people that ever want to, or are even happy to, pay full price for an item. Most markets are saturated with special offers, and whilst you can’t always beat the offer you should at least give some kind of offer – even if its say 10% off your next purchase or something along these lines. One fact often over looked is that promoting things in public will drive people to your site / landing page, but more often than not they will buy something else from the same range instead of the promoted product.
Perks of Membership
Creating a newsletter is a fantastic way of getting into the homes and offices of possible customers. In essence they sign up to receive your special offers and latest news, then maybe once or twice a month you send them a newsletter containing just that, and an exclusive gift sometimes … maybe they get a free pump with every 2 bike tires purchased.
Something else overlooked about membership lists is that people usually sign up because they are interested in buying from you, but maybe not right now. So giving them something such as a 10% off code to sign up is a great idea and may help get that sale a little quicker.
Payment Options
Different types of sites call for different types of payment method. You should try to keep everything neat and tidy and not offer too many methods. Maybe by default you use PayPal but also offer an ability to pay by another gateway … why this way around? well PayPal is a “trusted” system, people know how to use it and almost everyone will have heard of it. In addition to this maybe you could offer to take order over the phone, because some people are sceptical of security on the web. Or for more elderly based website offer payment on delivery, this is what Wiltshire Farm Foods do.
Personality
Adding a touch of personality, that human touch, to a website can be hugely effective in increasing conversions. Everyone knows most website use manufacturers descriptions – they are all the same – but why not add a little humanity to it by maybe saying “this waterproof jacket is perfect for keeping you warm and dry this winter” it’s not much hard work and it’s enough to beat your competitors in most cases.
Clear Terms
There is nothing like a page full of jargonised crap text to make me cringe and decide not to read it. Think about it, with any software you install you “agree” to the terms and conditions but have you ever read them? No, at least not until it’s too late! So why make your customers go through the same thing, keep everything simple and categorised, there is no need for 15 pages of terms … ever!
Present Benefits, Not Features
Most websites will sell based on features of a product. But again it’s a little boring and none engaging, so again add some personality and say something like “this waterproof jacket has a gore-tex outershell designed to keep you warm and protect you from the rain” – it tells you the feature but also about the benefit and how it can help the customer. Engaging the customers mind is often the key to conversion.
Plenty of Photos
Imagery is an often over looked part of the web, each website has its own image and theme … thats great. But so does each product and it’s you job to bring that image out and to show the world. So for example with a waterproof jacket you may show a full view, zip view, vent views and views of other features of interest. The better the image the more engaging and the more likely someone will click “add to cart”.

25+ Awesome Business Card Designs

Andy Kinsey — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 17:10:43 +0000

Thanks to everyone who sent in pictures of business cards, most of which aren’t their own! Below are just a few of those sent in, lots featured elsewhere on the net and gathered with kind permission, but this also means the quality and sizes differ – sorry about that.

If you want to submit a business card to be featured here tweet it to @andykinsey

In the interests of fairness and honesty I’ve not posted my own designs here, but you can view my business card designs here.

If you would like to be included in this list of business cards, or you know of a card that should be here – tweet @andykinsey

10 Essential Tips for Online Retailers

Andy Kinsey — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 13:13:13 +0000

If you are an online retailer you no doubt will be aware of the value of marketing your website in the correct way to drive sales and loyalty. However there are several simple ideas that are overlooked when it comes to marketing your business in the minds of your user.

Focus on Customer Service
By providing a world class customer service you can stand out from your competitors. You can give the ultimate in customer service by understand their needs, wants, desires and of course by always always being friendly.
Be Customer Focused
It isn’t enough to give the best customer service, you have to have a team which eats, sleeps and breathes an ethos of putting the customer first. The team should never be about profit or time keeping (though someone should be responsible for this) they should always be driven by the customers – after all without customers you have no business.
In Retail, the key is Detail
Oh, so corny. But you will probably remember it for that reason. What I am trying to say is dot your i’s and cross your t’s. Make sure product details and specifications are correct and upto date, the same with your images and any feeds you have. Detail will enhance your websites rankings naturally (it’s great content), put you above your competitors (better descriptions than them) and ultimately increase revenue (GOAL!!!).
Establish your Brand and your company Values
Sounds a little odd to mention values, but it really isn’t. Most companies have a natural ethos, some have a mission statement, others just float on by with values in their heads – either way they all have a set way of working and idea of what they want to achieve, these are their values. In E-commerce your first value should be “the customer comes first” then maybe “quality of products” is second etc … make a list of your 10 key values. By clearly defining them you are defining your business and how it operates, this can make you stand out from the crowd.
Put Quality in everything you do
Make sure everything that you do, your team does and you supply is the best it possibly can be. Do testing on everything your team does and you supply. You and your company should always strive to provide the best service everyday and each & every time your team interacts with a person (your website counts as part of your team).
Get the best from your team
You should now begin to understand that you need to get the best out of everything, and this could mean lots more training of staff to ensure they give their best. But what else can you do to ensure they always give their best? One of the best ways to incentivise a team is to reward them with a bonus for reaching a target or a commission on each sale. But be careful this kind of thing can lead to pressure sales tactics and this is a big “no no!”.
Do Not Procrastinate!
Sitting on your hands humming and ahh-ing gives your competitors an advantage because you are not moving forward, you become a spectator sat on the fence. So get down before you give your backside some splinters, make a decision and go with it – if it doesn’t work try another way. What ever you do, the world is moving fast, so don’t stop moving!
It isn’t quantum physics
Selling things has been happening since the dawn of man, well it started with bartering as we see it today. Anyway to be blunt, people buy an item from you, you are selling it at cost+margin make sure you do the maths and you are making a profit. There is nothing like a business loosing money to bring team spirit down with a bump.
Get and Use, Facts and Information.
Basically this means analyse any data about your site you can get your hands on, and your competitors if you can. Use the information to define and refine the shopping experience for the user. By analysing the information you can diagnose potential problems and fix them before it becomes a problem. You can also see “hotspots” and replicate them to make the most of your site’s real estate.
Enjoy Yourself!
The journey that is SEO is one that means you have to work hard, but you should also play hard. Take yourself and your team out whenever you can, there is nothing like a few drinks down the local (pub) to get colleagues nattering and increase team spirit and it will help your team to bond and grow together. It also means you will end up with a team that is well rounded and loves their boss, because they respect their staff and treat them well.

Still wanting more tips for increasing your online revenue?
click here to see 40 great ways to improve your online sales.

We also recently posted 10 great ways to boost your online sales.

Designing an Awesome Business Card

Andy Kinsey — Mon, 22 Aug 2011 13:44:46 +0000

Ever wondered what makes the perfect business card? What makes people go “wow”? and more importantly what will make people remember your business card? The answer is the design. Business Card Design is something of a mix, its both an ultimate / endless creative but it’s also likened to a mysterious mythical creature – the perfect business card and the loch ness monster brother and sister?

Designing a business card is about more than putting a little text on a small piece of card that fits in a wallet. It is about making you and your business stand out from the crowd, making you stick in someones memory and being the first person they recall when they want a job doing. There are four key aspects to the perfect business card design; being top of the pile, standing out, enhancement and implementation. These may sound quite confusing and it may take you some time to get your head around the almost endless possibilities for business card design – but when you do, it will be worth it.

A Simple Business Card

Being Top of the Pile

Think back to the last networking meeting, conference or trade show you went too – I am sure you gave out lots and lots of business cards right? Good. When you passed them over what was the reaction of the majority of people? Did they compliment the design, did they shove it in their pocket, did they show your business card to someone else or maybe well erm they ripped it up? Regardless of what they did it will explain how good or bad your card is. Great stuff if the compliment the design and ask for another one or two, pitting it in their pocket is ok, showing it around is good stuff – ripping it up well I hope for that rudeness you walked away!

Top of the Pile in business card design means that you will be literal top of the pile when it comes to them saying “hello” following an event, stay in their collection of cards (or better still their wallet) and it also means you will never be forgotten.

To be top of the pile though you need to have an amazing card, to do this you need all of the below ideas and then some awesome content!

Standing Out from the crown

To give you an idea of what stands out with business cards, I want you to try something for me. Take a selection of anywhere between 20 and 50 business cards, lay them out on a table and then go and grab a coffee. When you come back the idea is you won’t remember most of the cards, now look over the cards briefly spend no more than 30 seconds in total and pick out maybe 5 to 10 cards that stand out to you. Hide the rest of the cards. With those cards think about them for a minute each, why does that card stand out and does it in some way relate to their business? or is it just a gimmick? maybe it’s actually their brand?

Some things that may stand out to you are:

Colour
Colour is a fantastic tool in any designers arsenal, the colour of a business card doesn’t have to respect guidelines (oops did I really say that?). What I mean is there is no reason why your business card can’t be bright red or bright yellow. It’s attention grabbing and even when at the back of someones wallet will stand out from other business cards and well debit cards.
Use of Imagery
An eye catching graphic (maybe in the logo) made to stand out, or a great photo of a person means that a brand or that person will be instantly recognised next time you see them. Add to this there are VERY few business cards with the picture of a person on them and it adds to a business card which stand out from the crowd. An example of this is Councillor Kevin Peel’s business card (check my design site to see this).
Horizontal vs Vertical vs Other!
I could spend a whole post talking about these virtues in design, but suffice to say business cards which stand out maybe be vertical (not many are) others may be an awesome trifold design!
Simplicity in design
It speaks for itself, but above you can see an example of a business card for Councillor Jake Morrison, the business card is very simple but for this reason alone stands out from others.

Now you’ve done this exercise you may have some more ideas of what should be on your own business cards, but now lets take a look at how you can go even further with your business card design.

Ways to Enhance Your Business Card

Now you’ve seen other business cards, hopefully, in a new light you will want to go further with your own business card design. Why not think about the following ideas, some will be more expensive than others, some more effective than others, and some will just (well) be out of your idea of “good” and ignored! I don’t blame you but here are some suggestions.

Funny Shape Business Cards (a bite out of a card?)
Something On or In your business card (seeds for a flower business?)
Chocolate Business Cards (mmm expensive and may melt)
Trading (or playing cards)
Information Business Cards (hair dressers with prices on reverse)
Pop-up Business Cards (offer a unique perspective on your business)
Credibility Additions (logos of accreditation)
Rubber Stamps (instead or as well as business cards)
Unique Material (use felt or metal business cards)
Multiple Language Business Cards (why reserve yourself to just english?)

Implementation of Business Card Design

Some cards I designed

Someone once told me “great ideas are a penny a dozen, but great implementation is priceless” and it is very much true. In a world with some many people out networking continually, yes your card has to stand out, give that something extra but it also has to be implemented amazingly well to make that special difference.

There are many companies out there that will print your card amazingly well, there are also just as many not to trust. If you are working with a designer who has come up with a unique shape or a card that requires die cutting – then always go with the suggestion of the designer when it comes to printing (because not many places will do these jobs complete justice). If your card is a normal rectangular shape my advice is to try somewhere like Moo.com or UK FastPrint or VistaPrint.

Once your business card is complete, send me a picture so I can post it and show it off for you!
Simply email it to me – contact*at*andykinsey.co.uk
You can also do the above if you already have a pretty awesome business card.

–

We recently also posted 25 amazing business card designs – take a look at them and send us yours today.

How to Choose the Perfect Brand Name

Andy Kinsey — Sun, 21 Aug 2011 12:42:40 +0000

The name of your company can decide it’s future, if it’s a shop it can mean people will walk past or walk in, if your an online business it can instill trust or fear into a user – whatever your brand name it is the most important of any business and choosing the perfect brand name isn’t and easy task!

Choosing a Great Brand Name

Whether you are a new business choosing a brand name for the first time, or you are a business embarking on a brand realignment, you need to think carefully about what a brand name is and what difference it can make to the fortunes of your business. Choosing a brand name can be the most nerve racking part of any branding process, its a name that can make or break a company, it can decide if someone will walk through a shop door or walk past and more than this it’s name that unless your a super huge company you are going to be stuck with for some years to come. So choosing the right brand name is vital!

Finding a name to suit your business, a task that even us marketers can struggle with. There are a few major routes we start with and then diverge from as ideas are formed. But basically they fall into one of a few categories, and those are:

Abbreviation Names
These are brand names which are made of using the first letter of each word in a longer name, as is obviously suggested. It’s useful for companies with big long names or international companies who’s names maybe unpronounceable in other countries. Can you think of any brand names which are acronyms? What about…

IKEA – Ingvar Kamprad Elmtaryd Agunnaryd
UPS – United Parcel Service
AMD – Advance Micro Devices
AOL – America OnLine

And lest we forget that the abbreviations often sound much nicer, are more memorable and erm sexier even?

Descriptive Brand Names
These are bran names which are created as a description of what a company does, generally a useful way to advertise a company via it’s name. They are so common that they are easy to overlook, think of the literature that comes through your door for take-aways … last week we had “Spice hut”, “Indian cuisine” & “No 1. Wok” – all descriptive in their own way and you can probably guess the type of food they do even when drunk (which for the most part is the idea with these leaflets!). Thinking about better well known brand names there is “Pizza Hut”, “FootLocker” & FarmFoods”.
Combined or Conjunctive Brand Names

Acronym or Combined?

The last two brand names above (footlocker and farmfoods) are perfect examples of combined names. These are brand names which as you may have already guessed are two words placed as one, usually the two words will have separate meanings, giving you brand name a dual aspect – which can be quite nice, think farmfoods (farm = fresh, food = what you want). Other examples of combined brand names are Microsoft, Coca-Cola and FedEx.

Object (Non Associated) Brand Names
When you think of a brand name, its probably going to fall into one of the above categories, very few will fall into the Non Associated group, and that’s because they can be fairly hard to market. On the other hand they can be used to make your brand stand out from the crowd and more memorable. Some great examples in this category are: Apple (computers or fruit) , Orange (mobiles or fruit) and Fuji (camera company or mountain?).

Founders Name Brand Names
Some of these can be very very popular, many will fit into other categories above. You will probably know a good number of these without needing to think too hard, although if you’ve never thought about the names (as is their desire) then you may not realise that the company is named after a person. As an independent graphic designer and website designer, I know all too well the hassles of “getting your name out”, so for a bigger company this will be a huge undertaking and unless starting as a single person it may not be worth he effort. Some great examples of this kind of brand name are “Andy Kinsey Designs” (end plug), Adidas, Disney and Ernst & Young.

and Finally…. Out of the Box Brand Names

Out of the Box!

Now this may conjure up some idea you have of a name being “off the shelf” like a piece of software or something… one size fits all. But these are pretty much the opposite, these are names which you’d probably never think of as being business names, many are made up and most (if you read books about brand names) are apparently though of in a dream. However you come up with an out the box name, you should think of you business being in a biscuit tin, each step you take in preparing your business takes it up a ladder in the tin … to get out of the tin you need a really awesome name … but there are so many names out there – so why not make one up… think outside of your little tin world and jump out of the box. You never know you may end up a big success like: Google, Yahoo! or Bing.

Do you / have you used any of the above techniques in creating your memorable brand name? or did you have a different method of choosing your perfect brand name? either way let us know how you did it, and what your brand name is below!

Redesign – it doesn’t have to be everything!

Andy Kinsey — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 10:37:46 +0000

Nearly 2 years ago now National Rail redesigned their website, something that got them to the top of my list of best redesigns for 2009. Since then the team behind the National Rail website has been working to take steps forward, from slight tweaks in style to new functions being added to their systems.

Once examples of this incremental update / redesign is the latest update to the “journey planner”. The update includes adding the ability to search for local stations via your own postcode, quite handy for many who may have 2 or 3 stations near by, such as those commuters in Manchester City Centre! They’ve added the ability to view slower trains, where it is cheaper – this is handy for those who aren’t in a rush and are happy to spend an extra little time for the saving of maybe £50 at times! They’ve also continues to listen to customers and added prices to the journey page – something long overdue. Add to this the website still looks amazing two years on, and will do for another few years at least and National Rails becomes a gleaming example of why most websites do not need a total redesign every two or three years!

National Rail - Leading by Example

These updates, as you may have guessed or seen, are just one of a series of incremental updates National Rail have made since the redesign. Each making the service better and more useful, National Rail is now the hub for information – user’s don’t spend hours looking around for info on trains – and importantly can now track where there train is and whether it is on time.

Incremental Design

Incremental or Iterative Design, is a process which most companies will never have heard of. It’s the process, as the name suggests, of continual improvement to a solution. Most companies looking at their own product lines, will throw away a solution in favour of starting again – the aim to build bigger and better. But this is wasteful and more costly.

It is the same when thinking about websites. And this is why I’ve used National Rail as a great example of how to do things properly. Incremental Design is about making the most of what is, then improving it continually. Whilst you may think “this means a larger cost over x years” … well it doesn’t have too! The redesign of a website from scratch can cost many thousands (say 10k), incremental improvements (maybe) every few months may cost X (say 1k) but that X every 6 months to improve your service and be better than your competition makes more sense over say 3 years (at 6K) than a huge outlay of a full redesign. It also means you don’t need to budget for a huge outlay and can help improve your business cash-flow.

In addition to the above, incremental design is important for customers. If you are seen to stagnate and not improve or update (the same with updating blog content) customer may go elsewhere and your brand can be undermined.

the Catch 22

Unfortunately, not all websites can be improved by this process of incremental design though. Some websites are just so old and worn, or use antiquated code and this means the more economic and effective route would be to simply redesign the whole site. Any good web designer worth their salt would explain if this was the case, and if not would explain maybe one or two “on going” strategies to take forward with the company and website over say 2 years. – just something worth baring in mind.

_{Many thanks to the Chief Execs Blog of National Rail for use of the above image.}