Analyzing Analytics? No... I'm not going to get that deep, this is just an overview of what is important for the Interactive Producer to be familiar with, besides, quite a bit of writing would be involved to Analyze Analytics... Let's begin with a simple definition:
Web analytics is the measurement, collection, analysis and reporting of internet data for purposes of understanding and optimizing web usage.
This can mean so so many things but we are going to stick to the basics and some of the tools/tactics one can use to get very interesting results from such usage. There are two forms: on-site and off-site analyzation these are defined pretty much as they sound, today we will lean more to on-site analytics. But to quickly define off- site: In a nutshell its the measurement of the websites visibility away from the site out on the internet i.e. blogs, possible traffic that "may" come etc. On-site? Once the user hits your website even in the situation as a referral from another website every move they make can be tracked and thus analyzed against every other "unique" user to get some great quantifiable data that can optimize your site to be the best it can be for your target audience or evolve along with your audience.
Although it is very important to track your goals and keep an eye on analytics as a whole, goals previously planned I might add, I normally like to look at 30 day intervals unless I have a marketing campaign I'm tracking or another reason that may involve an outside push of traffic to the site over a period of time. I think the important thing to express here is you are not just going to log in run some reports and hand them in to someone especially the client. This process can go smoothly, or it can be a 5 day long journey down some rabbit holes you will have to ponder deep into the night in continuing to analyze in your own psyche to even make sense as to why something is happening.
Marketing Campaigns are certainly a necessity in our world today, and they need to be tracked to be able to calculate ROI, or simply to see if they were worth a damn. Ad Units (IAB, check it out... learn about online advertising and GET IAB CERTIFIED) are a different story and can have a whole separate platform to track the individual ad unit itself form the publisher but one can still see referrals from the site to which the ad was placed etc... Some key indicators to keep a look out for when analyzing the campaign is what is working and what is not. Example: are you users visiting a photo montage below the fold much more than they are the information that is above the fold? Is it UGC?, hmmm wonder why THIS is happening...LOL, well, one may want to consider moving this option above the fold so users can get to what they are interested in users absolutely love "real" user generated content. You will find users love to make their own choices on the internet. I always try to keep this in mind..." A User is a "lone" individual in front of a single computer, its very easy to get caught up in the masses of users and think that way, don't do it... think about that "lone user" and what you are doing for them, you overall analytics will show you and you'll be surprised that folks are just about like cattle. In IA, having the foreknowledge to try to predict a users movement to keep them "funneled" towards a "goal" on you site is the key. Analytics help you to see if this is working, see what the users are "trending" to, and allow you to make small changes to appease the audience or to get them to go back to the "funnel" to ROI you were planing on. Kinda like herding cattle. I don't know what I'm talking about its just a stupid analogy?
Goal Funnelization? The process of forecasting a trend to lead a user to a goal i.e. a sale, or to sign up for a sweepstakes, gathering data etc. Along this user interaction path there will be key milestones, as each one is reached via the hopefully thousands of visitors more data can be derived especially if they are "bouncing" i.e. exiting... at a certain milestone not completing to the goal. This is great example of why to do analytics, this can be analyzed and corrected quite quickly as to not lose precious time and money.
I wont lean on anyone tool to use (Google) but the smart person always, or at least the sites I've worked on has two methods of tracking. Seeing as Google Analytics is free??? I like to use the two methods, "log files" and "page code insertion", whatever you do, it will be rare to have two sources of analytics software usage and get the same results. So, in having two sources you get a comparison of the data and there are advantages from the different methods. Google has a plethora of other webtools that integrate all into a nice little package and it's too simple and useful not to integrate into your site, besides... its FREE. A couple of other are Urchin (Google owned), Webtrends and Omniture as well as others, but they all work along the same principles and can be quite scalable, I like em all! But with Google at 85% of the search market? Hmmm they are doing something right, we better make sure we in the least, seeing as its FREE, utilize some of their FREE tools.
In closing lets talk quickly about some external sources of data gathering that has become quite important... pay close attention especially if you are a publisher or even trying to get your brand on a substantial site. It is so very important to follow IAB standards, it is also very important to get "Quantified"! Quantcast... in today's market it is very cut throat to put it lightly, a potential advertiser looking to buy ad space on the HP above the fold of your website needs data aside from you provide to make a business decision on his investment. If you're "Quantified" via Quantcast the advertiser can check your numbers without even speaking with you, and if your proposal numbers are correct it would seem you are off to a good start into a negotiation. Get Quatified. You can also get this same service via Alexa. These services basically offer valid data from your site via a piece of code you inserted and can grab analytics on uniques, geographical and demo graphical data... very important as a publisher to provide to a prospective advertiser.
Well... I could go on for pages on this topic, but it is well-defined in other areas quite well here. Please, as an Interactive Producer Analytics are an important piece of knowledge in your arsenal and don't be surprised if this entire process of proving the numbers does not land on your shoulders to analyze and then even present to the client. Don't worry its fun, build the site right, and the numbers will be like opening presents at Christmas time! ( ;
Just my two cents...
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Monday, March 8, 2010
Chance Spann Interactive Producer Suggestion: " KNOW Social Networking!"
As usual let us define as "you" the people of the internet would define " Social Media" by visiting Wiki...
"Social media is media designed to be disseminated through social interaction, created using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques. Social media uses Internet and web-based technologies to transform broadcast media monologues (one to many) into social media dialogues (many to many). It supports the democratization of knowledge and information, transforming people from content consumers into content producers."
For any brand or even for myself, its imperative today and even more in the future to completely engage you or your brand into the social media networking angle to get in the loop of what is "fresh" and to draw especially a younger audience. Folks lets face it, what used to sell does not work as well as it used to, the numbers are proving it and some don't even have any numbers... they guess???. But... Neilson has integrated itself in our world with research to prove that users (unique) are spending on the internet one angle is an immense ( 7 hours a month! click here) amount of time on simple networking sites like Facebook. Not simple in the degree of structure and code, but in idea of how to converse and stay engaged with people thus with your brand.
Now that we live in a world that a user can reach a plethora of information within a few seconds, it is worth the time to set up as many social media sites as possible, set blogs, tweet, get your information/Brand out there! As I've said before social media is a HUGE add-on to the future of SEO tactics and can easily overwhelm the standardized dinosaur tactics of the past, but please still do them.
Want to learn more to benefit your knowledge in your workplace and how you approach projects, get caught up on the research. The Neilson links above will blow your mind on research, they have an interactive/digital angle called @plan, you can learn allot from the research they provide that is free. Another great resource is comScore, you can gain great research on the internet from multiple angles here as well. Research is a good start at a social media strategy, remember, there are dangers, you must be careful and do things such as moderate etc... some blogs and forums scenarios, NOT CENSOR... moderate. There are many social platforms that I suggest you check out, add your content/brand, skin it and add your content, daily... even hourly if you can, connect with the users as much as possible:
Facebook, Twitter, Blogger, Wordpress, MySpace, Linkdin, Migente, BlackPlanet ... just to name a few or you can go here and look till your heart is content and see the site user base = Social Sites
Engage your brand in front of all these social networking eyeballs, utilize the social platforms to your advantage to advertise and to converse with like-minded and interesting people of the "world" for a just a little time a day, no print cost, no network fee's, hmmm sounds like we are on to something, actually we have been for a while. ( ;
Just my two cents...
"Social media is media designed to be disseminated through social interaction, created using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques. Social media uses Internet and web-based technologies to transform broadcast media monologues (one to many) into social media dialogues (many to many). It supports the democratization of knowledge and information, transforming people from content consumers into content producers."
For any brand or even for myself, its imperative today and even more in the future to completely engage you or your brand into the social media networking angle to get in the loop of what is "fresh" and to draw especially a younger audience. Folks lets face it, what used to sell does not work as well as it used to, the numbers are proving it and some don't even have any numbers... they guess???. But... Neilson has integrated itself in our world with research to prove that users (unique) are spending on the internet one angle is an immense ( 7 hours a month! click here) amount of time on simple networking sites like Facebook. Not simple in the degree of structure and code, but in idea of how to converse and stay engaged with people thus with your brand.
Now that we live in a world that a user can reach a plethora of information within a few seconds, it is worth the time to set up as many social media sites as possible, set blogs, tweet, get your information/Brand out there! As I've said before social media is a HUGE add-on to the future of SEO tactics and can easily overwhelm the standardized dinosaur tactics of the past, but please still do them.
Want to learn more to benefit your knowledge in your workplace and how you approach projects, get caught up on the research. The Neilson links above will blow your mind on research, they have an interactive/digital angle called @plan, you can learn allot from the research they provide that is free. Another great resource is comScore, you can gain great research on the internet from multiple angles here as well. Research is a good start at a social media strategy, remember, there are dangers, you must be careful and do things such as moderate etc... some blogs and forums scenarios, NOT CENSOR... moderate. There are many social platforms that I suggest you check out, add your content/brand, skin it and add your content, daily... even hourly if you can, connect with the users as much as possible:
Facebook, Twitter, Blogger, Wordpress, MySpace, Linkdin, Migente, BlackPlanet ... just to name a few or you can go here and look till your heart is content and see the site user base = Social Sites
Engage your brand in front of all these social networking eyeballs, utilize the social platforms to your advantage to advertise and to converse with like-minded and interesting people of the "world" for a just a little time a day, no print cost, no network fee's, hmmm sounds like we are on to something, actually we have been for a while. ( ;
Just my two cents...
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Chance Spann Interactive Producer Suggestion: “Rewinding to Producer Revolution”
I wanted to rewind for a moment. In a blog or two ago I mentioned the Topic " Producer : Evolution/Revolution". I went in to the evolution part of the producer angle but really did not give my "opinion" (based on award-winning experiential facts over a decade) on the current revolution. I noticed lately due to being in the job market (hint hint), potential employers, talking to recruiters, reading blogs, social networking, basically interactively branding the name Chance Spann, a few old methods, few weird methods and some just flat-out methods or logic towards a Producer function description or expectation that are just the wrong perspective to take.
It's a natural feeling for me to go into immediately to what an Interactive Producer is not, but I'm going to go against my first thought and speak towards what one needs to expect from an Interactive Producer in 2010 inside the agency world as there is no true Int. Producer on the client side unless they have multiple websites/campaigns and in this case they need experts with versatility to which they are not acquiring thus you get a stale site (s)... taking a breath.... Another client side term I hear of Director of Project Management? On the client side? This cant exist, can it? Weird. The kind of interactive initiatives Int. Producers are involved in require many professionals that form an "interactive team" strictly pro's at the interactive space. This is very important. I've been a Director of over 30 interactive professionals at a national agency on fortune 500 clients over roles from project/ production managers to IA/QA/Creative/Copy/Video/.NET/PHP/HTML/Flash design/developers, but even in the role of Director I was only a glorified Sr. Producer. I still took on medial task at times, and always had my own sites I personally was working on within the agency or doing the IA or doing Analytics or...whatever it takes. Lets get to the point, an Interactive Producer, better be well-rounded and well compensated, as they are a key position in the team of the project, especially being joined at the hip with the lead creative, which is a vital relationship. If you are hiring someone who wants less than 80K then he/she is a Jr., with not enough experience and possibly needs to get more before you hire them. I don't even think one should even be allowed to be an Int. Exec, or Sr. Producer until they are PMI certified have a couple of years of project management under their belt, some creative time as a true (video or online) creative and have worked on the client side with an agency. This equates to experience and most importantly understanding. You get what you pay for, please don't find this out the hard way, it's just not worth it.
Ive heard those compare interactive producers to Broadcast producers. Not the same. One example... An interactive Producer may have to work closely with a Broadcast Producer to gain some video content BUT... once delivered in broadcast quality they then have to jump through 5 more hoops to get it up on the internet. This is not true in the reverse. Actually does not happen in the reverse. Or can it... (Grin)
Ive been a broadcast producer/video editor/ motion graphics artist for many years in my career and it was a joy and its great to have that knowledge now as the video on the internet is only going to EXPLODE ever more! Just another feather under my hat, one you should seriously look to get into as an Int. Producer, especially encoding. i.e. Squeeze, or look into Itunes encoding techniques they are amazing, have the ability to move around Final Cut, and a cherry on top would be After Effects etc...
Learn also to project manage the project manager.... carefully... don't cross boundaries! Realize these guys and gals, God Bless them, may have blinders on to focus completely on the time and money... and please do, but you need that knowledge as well to avoid pitfalls. The producer should be more well rounded and have much more experience from a birds eye view than the PM. One thing you can't always and should not even really expect is a relationship to any degree besides time and money between a PM and a GCD or CD. What more do they have to talk about? In my experience at different agencies, PM's have either been asked to do too much and know what they are doing but to the projects demise due to medial task that are pulling them away from the focus of the time line and the budget, or... they do not have the experience to do anything other than be a PM that focuses on the time and money and that is perfect for me as a Producer, I work with them as a part of team and my experience fills the gaps to which they are lacking.
As a Int. Producer you are surrounded by many moving parts that funnel to a common goal i.e. a website. You must know something or a good part of every one of these roles, its your responsibility, and trust me if something goes wrong the finger points at you. I'm going to end this with a Quote I've read in another blog. The gentleman's name is "Chris Higgins" ... " It’s interesting that even though the title Interactive Producer has been around for a while, most managers would have a fairly limited understanding of the full breadth of tasks that can fall under this domain." Hear Hear!!!
Just my two cents...
It's a natural feeling for me to go into immediately to what an Interactive Producer is not, but I'm going to go against my first thought and speak towards what one needs to expect from an Interactive Producer in 2010 inside the agency world as there is no true Int. Producer on the client side unless they have multiple websites/campaigns and in this case they need experts with versatility to which they are not acquiring thus you get a stale site (s)... taking a breath.... Another client side term I hear of Director of Project Management? On the client side? This cant exist, can it? Weird. The kind of interactive initiatives Int. Producers are involved in require many professionals that form an "interactive team" strictly pro's at the interactive space. This is very important. I've been a Director of over 30 interactive professionals at a national agency on fortune 500 clients over roles from project/ production managers to IA/QA/Creative/Copy/Video/.NET/PHP/HTML/Flash design/developers, but even in the role of Director I was only a glorified Sr. Producer. I still took on medial task at times, and always had my own sites I personally was working on within the agency or doing the IA or doing Analytics or...whatever it takes. Lets get to the point, an Interactive Producer, better be well-rounded and well compensated, as they are a key position in the team of the project, especially being joined at the hip with the lead creative, which is a vital relationship. If you are hiring someone who wants less than 80K then he/she is a Jr., with not enough experience and possibly needs to get more before you hire them. I don't even think one should even be allowed to be an Int. Exec, or Sr. Producer until they are PMI certified have a couple of years of project management under their belt, some creative time as a true (video or online) creative and have worked on the client side with an agency. This equates to experience and most importantly understanding. You get what you pay for, please don't find this out the hard way, it's just not worth it.
Ive heard those compare interactive producers to Broadcast producers. Not the same. One example... An interactive Producer may have to work closely with a Broadcast Producer to gain some video content BUT... once delivered in broadcast quality they then have to jump through 5 more hoops to get it up on the internet. This is not true in the reverse. Actually does not happen in the reverse. Or can it... (Grin)
Ive been a broadcast producer/video editor/ motion graphics artist for many years in my career and it was a joy and its great to have that knowledge now as the video on the internet is only going to EXPLODE ever more! Just another feather under my hat, one you should seriously look to get into as an Int. Producer, especially encoding. i.e. Squeeze, or look into Itunes encoding techniques they are amazing, have the ability to move around Final Cut, and a cherry on top would be After Effects etc...
Learn also to project manage the project manager.... carefully... don't cross boundaries! Realize these guys and gals, God Bless them, may have blinders on to focus completely on the time and money... and please do, but you need that knowledge as well to avoid pitfalls. The producer should be more well rounded and have much more experience from a birds eye view than the PM. One thing you can't always and should not even really expect is a relationship to any degree besides time and money between a PM and a GCD or CD. What more do they have to talk about? In my experience at different agencies, PM's have either been asked to do too much and know what they are doing but to the projects demise due to medial task that are pulling them away from the focus of the time line and the budget, or... they do not have the experience to do anything other than be a PM that focuses on the time and money and that is perfect for me as a Producer, I work with them as a part of team and my experience fills the gaps to which they are lacking.
As a Int. Producer you are surrounded by many moving parts that funnel to a common goal i.e. a website. You must know something or a good part of every one of these roles, its your responsibility, and trust me if something goes wrong the finger points at you. I'm going to end this with a Quote I've read in another blog. The gentleman's name is "Chris Higgins" ... " It’s interesting that even though the title Interactive Producer has been around for a while, most managers would have a fairly limited understanding of the full breadth of tasks that can fall under this domain." Hear Hear!!!
Just my two cents...
Monday, March 1, 2010
Chance Spann Interactive Producer Suggestion: "Getting to know SEM"
In my last blog I grazed the surface of SEO and the importance of implementing SEO tactics into your overall web development strategy, you can review that article here: Suggestion 2/26/10 “The Acronyms 2”. Today lets just touch another acronym that can be helpful in the world of search engines called SEM (Search Engine Marketing). And let's go to the mecca of UGC... Wikipedia and to the world's definition and go from there: Wiki defines it as:
"Search engine marketing, or SEM, is a form of Internet marketing that seeks to promote websites by increasing their visibility in search engine result pages (SERPs) through the use of paid placement, contextual advertising, and paid inclusion. "
Let's just say for a good read in this article we will keep it light as once you pay the placement its pretty much done for you especially with Google, I'll just take you through the process so you can have a one stop shop for the understanding and quick implementation strategy of SEM. Lets get started. So once again lets use Google as an example, they have a program called AdWords. Three simple steps can get you started with a simple SEM program with Google AdWords.
1. Create the ads: ( Google has a nice little tool for this). You then choose keywords/tags = words or phrases that associate to your ads initiative, ultimately to be ranked by, then come up in a search under those terms or phases by users who are searching.
2. Place the Ads: This is very easy as Google has set a step by step process and its easily done. Once users search on Google and type in one of the words or phrases you associated to your ad, your ad may appear next to the search results. ( according to how many have clicked in the past, money you spent etc...) This allows for your ad to be shown to users who are interested in the topics your ads initiative is advertising in hope to get a "click" or 1000's ( ;. It's a good program as they use a PPC methodology, Ohhh an acronym I have yet to mention, "Pay Per Click" we will be getting into this in a later article, but basically you only pay a certain amount if a user clicks your ad. This can also work in reverse as in this case Google is a "Publisher", now Google is HUGE, they almost have to use this method, smaller sites with 1mm or under can utilize a CPM (Cost Per 1000 clicks) methodology and be much more profitable, add a contract to end of the ad at a certain time or at a certain amount of money usage etc... like I said I will get into this another day.
Google has lots of extras to help you to get placement in their rankings and to analyze them. These are very important as well, and might not be found in lesser markets. A couple you should research are " contextual targeting technology" this can automatically match your ads to pages in the Google content network that are most relevant to your ads initiative via the keywords or phrases you use. Also there is a very useful tool to most importantly measure and optimize your results: you can pay close attention daily to multiple ad placements performance on a site-by-site basis to see impressions, clicks, cost, conversion data, and use this data to identify well-performing sites to target more aggressively and low-value placements that require content optimization or need to end due to lack of performance.
Yahoo Yahoo! Search Marketing and MSN Microsoft adCenter also have programs for paid ad placement that pretty much work under the same protocol and criteria as mentioned above, but with less eyeballs, and frankly less tools to combine all of the useful methods you will need to maintain your site. But to will want to get into them up to your "EYEBALLS" as well as some user only use these engines and you want their visits. A good read would be "What are Google Webmaster Tools". One may learn allot by typing this into a search engine browser.
Just my two cents.
http://www.linkedin.com/in/chancespann
"Search engine marketing, or SEM, is a form of Internet marketing that seeks to promote websites by increasing their visibility in search engine result pages (SERPs) through the use of paid placement, contextual advertising, and paid inclusion. "
Let's just say for a good read in this article we will keep it light as once you pay the placement its pretty much done for you especially with Google, I'll just take you through the process so you can have a one stop shop for the understanding and quick implementation strategy of SEM. Lets get started. So once again lets use Google as an example, they have a program called AdWords. Three simple steps can get you started with a simple SEM program with Google AdWords.
1. Create the ads: ( Google has a nice little tool for this). You then choose keywords/tags = words or phrases that associate to your ads initiative, ultimately to be ranked by, then come up in a search under those terms or phases by users who are searching.
2. Place the Ads: This is very easy as Google has set a step by step process and its easily done. Once users search on Google and type in one of the words or phrases you associated to your ad, your ad may appear next to the search results. ( according to how many have clicked in the past, money you spent etc...) This allows for your ad to be shown to users who are interested in the topics your ads initiative is advertising in hope to get a "click" or 1000's ( ;. It's a good program as they use a PPC methodology, Ohhh an acronym I have yet to mention, "Pay Per Click" we will be getting into this in a later article, but basically you only pay a certain amount if a user clicks your ad. This can also work in reverse as in this case Google is a "Publisher", now Google is HUGE, they almost have to use this method, smaller sites with 1mm or under can utilize a CPM (Cost Per 1000 clicks) methodology and be much more profitable, add a contract to end of the ad at a certain time or at a certain amount of money usage etc... like I said I will get into this another day.
Google has lots of extras to help you to get placement in their rankings and to analyze them. These are very important as well, and might not be found in lesser markets. A couple you should research are " contextual targeting technology" this can automatically match your ads to pages in the Google content network that are most relevant to your ads initiative via the keywords or phrases you use. Also there is a very useful tool to most importantly measure and optimize your results: you can pay close attention daily to multiple ad placements performance on a site-by-site basis to see impressions, clicks, cost, conversion data, and use this data to identify well-performing sites to target more aggressively and low-value placements that require content optimization or need to end due to lack of performance.
Yahoo Yahoo! Search Marketing and MSN Microsoft adCenter also have programs for paid ad placement that pretty much work under the same protocol and criteria as mentioned above, but with less eyeballs, and frankly less tools to combine all of the useful methods you will need to maintain your site. But to will want to get into them up to your "EYEBALLS" as well as some user only use these engines and you want their visits. A good read would be "What are Google Webmaster Tools". One may learn allot by typing this into a search engine browser.
Just my two cents.
http://www.linkedin.com/in/chancespann
Friday, February 26, 2010
Chance Spann Interactive Producer Suggestion 2/26/10 “The Acronyms 2”
The acronyms just seem to fly out of the air in the interactive world but its important to learn their meaning, least you be the only visitor to your site? Two important acronyms in this discussion are SEO and SEM. Quick story, after being in the biz a while I have had different supervisors over me usually in the VP status and truth be told... I've mentioned SEO in my early conversations with only to asked what it meant WHAT?... WOW! So Int. Producer... be sure you can define it and make sure you can assist your team in all the angles of integration. My good friend and UGC mecca Wikipedia defines it as:
"Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the volume or quality of traffic to a web site from search engines via "natural" or un-paid ("organic" or "algorithmic") search results as opposed to search engine marketing (SEM) which deals with paid inclusion. Typically, the earlier (or higher) a site appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine. "
There are currently industry standards of SEO, these include making the website "search engine friendly" via a few things: optimization of the content and the HTML, the relevance of the descriptions and keywords, including also a sitemap.xml and a robots.txt, site submission etc... these are all common and need to be done as a part of the last stages of development but... they are old news friends. If you want to get ranked these days according to the methodologies that the search engines are using, let just say seeing as Google holds the larger share of the market amongst them all, you need to do a few more things.
Without getting into "deep" detail, after you have done the common industry standard SEO moves, you must flood the "social networking world" with your information i.e. a link back to your site. Let me give you an example and we will use me, Chance Spann, I'm a brand? I'm trying to sell myself on the internet Right?, I'm doing it right now (Grin). I created a base site, I actually use www.linkedin.com/in/chancespann or www.naymz.com as a base site to lead users back to learn more about me, my expertise awards etc. These sites will be the sites I want ranked the highest and will contain the full information I want the user to engage in. Then I use all the other social networks to lead users back like: Digg, Facebook, Twitter, Blogger etc. insert "tag clouds" and I get it into every one of them I can. My links get Dugg and Tweeted and clicked and passed around by users and it's just wonderful. The bots from the search engines are hitting my link from every source and then ranked and the whole process begins and as content gets updated daily by such methods as what you are reading now it keeps ranking and keeps me at the top of the search rankings. It takes a while for an "indirect" vs "direct" search terms to rank me on the first page of a search or higher, but at this point I'm doing quite well.
Here are some example search terms to look for me in Google, Yahoo Bing etc this is how is would work in any situation even with a big brand but that brand will probably rank highest simply due to the fact of the user base and competition:
Direct search terms: Chance Spann, Chance Spann Interactive Producer
You notice the page just fills with information on me. Hmmm so what Eh?
This is where the all the SEO work begins to show...
Indirect search terms (Google):
1. Interactive Producer Dallas Texas = ( Im ranking 2nd with this one under a job posting... this is good)
2.Addy awards dallas American airlines = ( with this just random search term the SEO kicks in, and along side a huge brand name like American Airlines and Addy ( Addy Awards) I rank an incredible 9th on the first page in a Google search. This is great!)
Same terms in Bing:
1. Interactive Producer Dallas Texas = ranking 3rd under paid search. Great!
2. Addy awards dallas American airlines = 3rd page in ) : needs work, actually needs clicks ( ;
Same terms in Yahoo!:
1. Interactive Producer Dallas Texas = 2nd page 6 down due to this blog I'm writing now. Getting better but I want on the first page!!! But remember its yahoo and remember I was on the first page on Google the master of the internet. LOL?
2. Addy awards dallas American airlines = not even worth mentioning. LOL hit and miss
All in all my work over the past couple of weeks I feel good about my tactics, just simply due to the Google ranks. Im going to leave with this thought, standard SEO practices are needed and please do them, but we now have the UGC model and Social Networking angles these are imperative and you must incorporate them into your "Organic" SEO strategy. SEM... more to come.
Just my two cents...
"Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the volume or quality of traffic to a web site from search engines via "natural" or un-paid ("organic" or "algorithmic") search results as opposed to search engine marketing (SEM) which deals with paid inclusion. Typically, the earlier (or higher) a site appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine. "
There are currently industry standards of SEO, these include making the website "search engine friendly" via a few things: optimization of the content and the HTML, the relevance of the descriptions and keywords, including also a sitemap.xml and a robots.txt, site submission etc... these are all common and need to be done as a part of the last stages of development but... they are old news friends. If you want to get ranked these days according to the methodologies that the search engines are using, let just say seeing as Google holds the larger share of the market amongst them all, you need to do a few more things.
Without getting into "deep" detail, after you have done the common industry standard SEO moves, you must flood the "social networking world" with your information i.e. a link back to your site. Let me give you an example and we will use me, Chance Spann, I'm a brand? I'm trying to sell myself on the internet Right?, I'm doing it right now (Grin). I created a base site, I actually use www.linkedin.com/in/chancespann or www.naymz.com as a base site to lead users back to learn more about me, my expertise awards etc. These sites will be the sites I want ranked the highest and will contain the full information I want the user to engage in. Then I use all the other social networks to lead users back like: Digg, Facebook, Twitter, Blogger etc. insert "tag clouds" and I get it into every one of them I can. My links get Dugg and Tweeted and clicked and passed around by users and it's just wonderful. The bots from the search engines are hitting my link from every source and then ranked and the whole process begins and as content gets updated daily by such methods as what you are reading now it keeps ranking and keeps me at the top of the search rankings. It takes a while for an "indirect" vs "direct" search terms to rank me on the first page of a search or higher, but at this point I'm doing quite well.
Here are some example search terms to look for me in Google, Yahoo Bing etc this is how is would work in any situation even with a big brand but that brand will probably rank highest simply due to the fact of the user base and competition:
Direct search terms: Chance Spann, Chance Spann Interactive Producer
You notice the page just fills with information on me. Hmmm so what Eh?
This is where the all the SEO work begins to show...
Indirect search terms (Google):
1. Interactive Producer Dallas Texas = ( Im ranking 2nd with this one under a job posting... this is good)
2.Addy awards dallas American airlines = ( with this just random search term the SEO kicks in, and along side a huge brand name like American Airlines and Addy ( Addy Awards) I rank an incredible 9th on the first page in a Google search. This is great!)
Same terms in Bing:
1. Interactive Producer Dallas Texas = ranking 3rd under paid search. Great!
2. Addy awards dallas American airlines = 3rd page in ) : needs work, actually needs clicks ( ;
Same terms in Yahoo!:
1. Interactive Producer Dallas Texas = 2nd page 6 down due to this blog I'm writing now. Getting better but I want on the first page!!! But remember its yahoo and remember I was on the first page on Google the master of the internet. LOL?
2. Addy awards dallas American airlines = not even worth mentioning. LOL hit and miss
All in all my work over the past couple of weeks I feel good about my tactics, just simply due to the Google ranks. Im going to leave with this thought, standard SEO practices are needed and please do them, but we now have the UGC model and Social Networking angles these are imperative and you must incorporate them into your "Organic" SEO strategy. SEM... more to come.
Just my two cents...
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Chance Spann Interactive Producer Suggestion 2/24/10 "The Acronyms"
The acronyms? What are you talking about Chance? Well, lets see... UGC, UCC, CGM, SEO, SEM and it can goes on and on. Why so many acronyms and what could it all MEAN!!! Unless you are a HUGE brand that generates its own traffic and even still it could mean whether you get the traffic or optimal traffic to your site you need these. So you spent 6 months to a year on the site on a development server, you have ton of video and decided to go with a CDN ( another acronym...LOL) and now you think you will just launch?... and "IF YOU BUILD IT THEY WILL COME!". No, that unfortunately that is not how it works. Some of the coolest most creative and expensive sites I've produced and launched without the full support through the "acronyms", traffic was low even after "Site of The Day" awards on FWA and Communication Arts, the traffic went up and just right back down. You must utilize UGC methods and more to help to have constant flow of traffic, especially in a e comm situation.
Lets start slowly with this and begin with UGC... buzz acronym of the moment and its sidekicks, CGM and UCC...Its hard not to laugh because there are just so many its ridiculous. Ive seen so many weird looks on faces when I so quickly bust out with the "acronyms"... But they are important... So what do they stand for? Lets go to the mecca of UGC and see what they mean... Wikipedia. "User-generated content (UGC), also known as consumer-generated media (CGM) or user-created content (UCC), refers to various kinds of media content, publicly available, that are produced by end-users." Now you can go read the history and such out there later if you like, what does this have to do with my site? UGC is or can be integration with social networking like Blogs, Reviews i.e. Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Blogspot, Wordpress etc... allowing content from those portals via API's, feeds, RSS, XML or the like and serve back to your site creating... User Generated Content. Another way to do this is integrate forum software into your site, (FYI this can be dangerous and can backfire, get knowledgable of this UGC thing... least you end having to turn it off, don't learn this the hard way!) UGC and forums can improve rankings and it's just fun for your users, it will take off quickly if set up and pushed correctly.
Another is to have users upload content like photos or video to your site (Dangerous as well must me monitored!!!). I mentioned CDN earlier, Content Delivery Network, you can stream your video or whole flash site if you want off of 1000's of servers each in the geographical location of the call of the content lets say video from a local server rather than a single server on site to which will possibly overload i.e. crash if too many request are requested. Let me put this into perspective, how many employee's will you have to hire to keep the users of the internet happy with content? What you are doing is reversing the method and letting the user make themselves happy on your site by allowing thm to engage with your brand. You use their content. Good example of how this works? In forums... realize every single topic is ranked by a search engine and then according to certain keywords the post and how many read that topic/post that are associated they are then ranked by the search engines behind that, ultimately leading users back to your forum and to your site. It's wonderful!
With the technical genius to which Google and some of the search engines are heading towards in ranking content, in search or the paid search options they offer UGC methods are a must due to the fact users love to converse with one another. The search engines utilizing new methods allows users to have more influence on websites and ad units more than ever. You must understand and be knowledgable on how to integrate your campaigns and sites into the Search Engines methods. Brands that have been ignoring their users or members have a slow leak... so to speak. You need to get into the mind of your users, allowing them to push UGC onto your site will allow this but you must engage and pay close attention to analytics. Think about what they might be saying about your brand or more importantly your "Clients" brand. Then decide how you want to engage, eventually someone will have to answer, be sure you engage in time to give an answer that allows for knowledge to be spread and not have to try to curve negativity towards the brand in any way. The Search Engines...they are changing... offering more tools and options, evolving as to how we work with the internet. Producer... you must engage, and have the knowledge to evolve as well so you can bring it to the table when needed and support those who surround you and to support the UGC = User= Content methodology this is your content bread and butter.
Just my two cents...
Lets start slowly with this and begin with UGC... buzz acronym of the moment and its sidekicks, CGM and UCC...Its hard not to laugh because there are just so many its ridiculous. Ive seen so many weird looks on faces when I so quickly bust out with the "acronyms"... But they are important... So what do they stand for? Lets go to the mecca of UGC and see what they mean... Wikipedia. "User-generated content (UGC), also known as consumer-generated media (CGM) or user-created content (UCC), refers to various kinds of media content, publicly available, that are produced by end-users." Now you can go read the history and such out there later if you like, what does this have to do with my site? UGC is or can be integration with social networking like Blogs, Reviews i.e. Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Blogspot, Wordpress etc... allowing content from those portals via API's, feeds, RSS, XML or the like and serve back to your site creating... User Generated Content. Another way to do this is integrate forum software into your site, (FYI this can be dangerous and can backfire, get knowledgable of this UGC thing... least you end having to turn it off, don't learn this the hard way!) UGC and forums can improve rankings and it's just fun for your users, it will take off quickly if set up and pushed correctly.
Another is to have users upload content like photos or video to your site (Dangerous as well must me monitored!!!). I mentioned CDN earlier, Content Delivery Network, you can stream your video or whole flash site if you want off of 1000's of servers each in the geographical location of the call of the content lets say video from a local server rather than a single server on site to which will possibly overload i.e. crash if too many request are requested. Let me put this into perspective, how many employee's will you have to hire to keep the users of the internet happy with content? What you are doing is reversing the method and letting the user make themselves happy on your site by allowing thm to engage with your brand. You use their content. Good example of how this works? In forums... realize every single topic is ranked by a search engine and then according to certain keywords the post and how many read that topic/post that are associated they are then ranked by the search engines behind that, ultimately leading users back to your forum and to your site. It's wonderful!
With the technical genius to which Google and some of the search engines are heading towards in ranking content, in search or the paid search options they offer UGC methods are a must due to the fact users love to converse with one another. The search engines utilizing new methods allows users to have more influence on websites and ad units more than ever. You must understand and be knowledgable on how to integrate your campaigns and sites into the Search Engines methods. Brands that have been ignoring their users or members have a slow leak... so to speak. You need to get into the mind of your users, allowing them to push UGC onto your site will allow this but you must engage and pay close attention to analytics. Think about what they might be saying about your brand or more importantly your "Clients" brand. Then decide how you want to engage, eventually someone will have to answer, be sure you engage in time to give an answer that allows for knowledge to be spread and not have to try to curve negativity towards the brand in any way. The Search Engines...they are changing... offering more tools and options, evolving as to how we work with the internet. Producer... you must engage, and have the knowledge to evolve as well so you can bring it to the table when needed and support those who surround you and to support the UGC = User= Content methodology this is your content bread and butter.
Just my two cents...
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Interactive Producer Suggestion 2/23/10: "Process..."Do or Die"
Over the years I have been in situations to where a process was in place and worked, well kinda sorta, places that had no process and scared me to death and places that I developed process but in general as the business of interactive is constantly evolving the process to which one works in the business will need to evolve as well. But there can be a basic guideline process that for the larger more profitable and resource allocating projects and through careful planning be designed special just for that initiative. This process will scale up or down and be defined as the project is scoped initially, lets jump right in... remember you are clay we mold ourselves to our clients and their needs following our proficiency and expertise, as does the process so this is just a guideline you may have seen many be inspired to create your own...
First item of business is looking at these in "Phases":
Discovery/Ideation Phase
So we have met initially with the client responded to the RFP etc ... but we feel we will need a bit of time to get a tight grip on the project and our approach. We do a "Discovery Phase", this allows time to get our bearings, gather the best resources for the project and begin to create an idea and vision of what we can deliver to the client. This would include for example: the receiving of materials from the client to review and study, creating a client facing Business Requirements Document (BRD), conducting a competitive analysis, do user profiling, create client facing Technical Requirements Document (TRD), plan of communications i.e. who are the point resources between the client and you? and a preliminary Project Schedule ( this needs as detailed as one can get at this point as this is when the client receives, locks into their mindset and will more than likely hold you to it. Besides, the client is paying for this "Discovery" phase, if I were the client I would want the timeline close to reality so I could get a line on my internal parallels that may be inline with this project. So with timeline and milestones within the timeline, be accurate in working with your Project Manager and the rest of the team to be on target with this large detail.
There is also a part of this Phase I would like to separate and that is "Strategy". Due to the differences of every project, for example a website about a staffing agency vs. a major airline, although the interactive principles are the same the strategy in which we engage the user/users will certainly be different. Competitive analysis of other major sites etc will shine some light on what is being done and not being done to give the team a good start. Strategy would include more or less the following: Identify the Goals and Objectives, define user needs of the site (there may be multiple User Interaction Paths), Research the Market, Benchmark Competitive Sites and lastly separate this part of the document on the Strategy and how it will impact the goals and objectives and this must be a client facing and be sure the client completely understands the proposed strategy.
Planning Phase ( Ideas are evaluated and turned into projects)
Strategy will continue in the "Planning Phase" at times, as the team will come upon new revelations as they all begin to come together and work as one on the project. This Phase will also include other task such as, making sure we have the correct team assigned, this gives us one more chance if anything changes in Discovery to switch around some resources who may have more experience. time etc. Now that we have the Business and Technical Requirements signed by the client and we all understand one another we can move into specific details. These may include specifications for design as well begin to spec out some ideas, development approaches that may have evolved, enterprise ideation, legal, analytics approach, and a branding approach/possibly an integrated ad campaign. Kickoff meeting with the final assigned team internally and then present back the consensus to the client and sign off to move forward.
Design Phase ( Information, Interaction, Visual Design) ( Project Requirements guide the conceptual and technical development)
Now that we are off to a good start and are beginning as a team to really understand the clients goals and objectives, we can move to the "Information'. What is a good way to organize the information? Is there an existing site? Does it need to just go away or can it be salvaged? Analyze existing site structure if applicable. Begin from scratch if the site is yet to exist. Begin to define the user profiles and then move into "Interaction". We begin by asking "How will the user (s) interact with the site? (User Experience, UX) We begin to define from the user profile the user interaction paths throughout the site and then quickly into site architecture options i.e. Information Architecture (IA). This phase begins to the define the architecture of the information and how the user will experience this information according to the choices they make. We now... very gently present these IA ideas to the client and get sign off.
Visual Design
How will the site look? Creative begins to define the visual designs based on the architecture documentation and the UX as we have previously defined and gained "CLIENT SIGN OFF"... Danger areas here include, not gaining full client understanding but a sign off. Be absolutely certain your client understands where the site headed. I've worked with some clients who are very visual, they smile and sign off on the architecture but then begin to step backwards as they see it with creative. This can cost time and money. DANGER WILL ROBINSON! There is a trick here I have learned and actually put to the test. One will have to use this rarely and by this point in the project you will know the client well enough to use this, and really you are only offering the client more of what they want. Sometimes if the site is really complicated this should be required, a simple design one layout may be enough with some revisions. The idea is to have three creative designers approach the HP design and one secondary page layout from their personal perspective. You will be so surprised at the differences in the creative approaches! There are a couple of variations to this approach, are you having budgetary probs with the client? Is the client just creatively very picky? This approach can help to solve both of these problems. If the problem is the client is having slim budget, present the three options strategically to focus on the middle option that includes the specifics needed in moderation for the client and then at a budget that the agency can actually make some kind of profit from or create a site that could be award-winning. Secondly if the issues are picky creative responses the three options gives the client more to look at, more options, they are more likely to begin to narrow down to a singular focus and keep the creative process moving with less revisions. Try it... I have actually run test on these theories and they actually work out better for both ends. So we've presented the paper prototypes and we finally have a creative vision with client sign off... YES! There are some meetings and details before this but we are moving along... One thing I would like to certainly mention are "Focus Groups", there will be scenarios that Focus Groups are absolutely needed and must be integrated in so not to surprise the client with a hidden cost.
Implementation Phase ( Build, Test, Maintain) ( The Site is built and modified based on testing and analytical feedback)
It is time to begin to create a working website in the "Build" stage. We move to technical production front end and back-end development. Tie the front end visual interface to the backend, go through internal reviews/revisions and launch an "Alpha" site on a development server ( we will not be getting into servers in this discussion as it can get lengthy). This is where Quality Assurance (QA) technicians come in and "Test" test test! Now we can determine... Where are the problems? We determine through, proofreading the copy top to bottom/every page, testing on various platforms and browsers, complete QA, a client review once stable, gain feedback make revisions and move to "Beta" testing.
Maintain (How Can We make the Site Better?)
We will certainly hear from the users if it was a "re-design" and can incorporate valid revisions from this angle as they will catch the smallest of detail so be sure to provide an area suggesting they provide their feedback. Also, begin to analyze the server logs over the next month or so, look at your analytics applications, Google, Webtrends, Omniture, whatever you have gone with, I suggest have two installed to so you have something to compare to Google is free and has so many other options to integrate you gotta use it as at least one angle (period). You also have the online versions that if you integrate the code can give you data as well: Quantcast.com and Alexa.com, if you are planning on serving Ad Units/Banners this is a must as well as becoming IAB certified. From all this data begin to prioritize the revisions and quantify the rational of the users via the interaction with the site and how you would change the site to get the results you are looking for to gain ROI or funnels to a goal. The process above never ends, it continues and continues, one will always need to maintain and upgrade the site with content and remain fresh.
There are a million details that are between the lines you have just read, but this is a good start and a good "umbrella" process and has worked for me on projects ranging from 30K to over 1 million. Remember process is imperative, it will evolve and need to be tweaked from project to project, but a process like I've described above will keep you on track which equates to agency profitability and more importantly a happy client.
Just my two cents...
First item of business is looking at these in "Phases":
Discovery/Ideation Phase
So we have met initially with the client responded to the RFP etc ... but we feel we will need a bit of time to get a tight grip on the project and our approach. We do a "Discovery Phase", this allows time to get our bearings, gather the best resources for the project and begin to create an idea and vision of what we can deliver to the client. This would include for example: the receiving of materials from the client to review and study, creating a client facing Business Requirements Document (BRD), conducting a competitive analysis, do user profiling, create client facing Technical Requirements Document (TRD), plan of communications i.e. who are the point resources between the client and you? and a preliminary Project Schedule ( this needs as detailed as one can get at this point as this is when the client receives, locks into their mindset and will more than likely hold you to it. Besides, the client is paying for this "Discovery" phase, if I were the client I would want the timeline close to reality so I could get a line on my internal parallels that may be inline with this project. So with timeline and milestones within the timeline, be accurate in working with your Project Manager and the rest of the team to be on target with this large detail.
There is also a part of this Phase I would like to separate and that is "Strategy". Due to the differences of every project, for example a website about a staffing agency vs. a major airline, although the interactive principles are the same the strategy in which we engage the user/users will certainly be different. Competitive analysis of other major sites etc will shine some light on what is being done and not being done to give the team a good start. Strategy would include more or less the following: Identify the Goals and Objectives, define user needs of the site (there may be multiple User Interaction Paths), Research the Market, Benchmark Competitive Sites and lastly separate this part of the document on the Strategy and how it will impact the goals and objectives and this must be a client facing and be sure the client completely understands the proposed strategy.
Planning Phase ( Ideas are evaluated and turned into projects)
Strategy will continue in the "Planning Phase" at times, as the team will come upon new revelations as they all begin to come together and work as one on the project. This Phase will also include other task such as, making sure we have the correct team assigned, this gives us one more chance if anything changes in Discovery to switch around some resources who may have more experience. time etc. Now that we have the Business and Technical Requirements signed by the client and we all understand one another we can move into specific details. These may include specifications for design as well begin to spec out some ideas, development approaches that may have evolved, enterprise ideation, legal, analytics approach, and a branding approach/possibly an integrated ad campaign. Kickoff meeting with the final assigned team internally and then present back the consensus to the client and sign off to move forward.
Design Phase ( Information, Interaction, Visual Design) ( Project Requirements guide the conceptual and technical development)
Now that we are off to a good start and are beginning as a team to really understand the clients goals and objectives, we can move to the "Information'. What is a good way to organize the information? Is there an existing site? Does it need to just go away or can it be salvaged? Analyze existing site structure if applicable. Begin from scratch if the site is yet to exist. Begin to define the user profiles and then move into "Interaction". We begin by asking "How will the user (s) interact with the site? (User Experience, UX) We begin to define from the user profile the user interaction paths throughout the site and then quickly into site architecture options i.e. Information Architecture (IA). This phase begins to the define the architecture of the information and how the user will experience this information according to the choices they make. We now... very gently present these IA ideas to the client and get sign off.
Visual Design
How will the site look? Creative begins to define the visual designs based on the architecture documentation and the UX as we have previously defined and gained "CLIENT SIGN OFF"... Danger areas here include, not gaining full client understanding but a sign off. Be absolutely certain your client understands where the site headed. I've worked with some clients who are very visual, they smile and sign off on the architecture but then begin to step backwards as they see it with creative. This can cost time and money. DANGER WILL ROBINSON! There is a trick here I have learned and actually put to the test. One will have to use this rarely and by this point in the project you will know the client well enough to use this, and really you are only offering the client more of what they want. Sometimes if the site is really complicated this should be required, a simple design one layout may be enough with some revisions. The idea is to have three creative designers approach the HP design and one secondary page layout from their personal perspective. You will be so surprised at the differences in the creative approaches! There are a couple of variations to this approach, are you having budgetary probs with the client? Is the client just creatively very picky? This approach can help to solve both of these problems. If the problem is the client is having slim budget, present the three options strategically to focus on the middle option that includes the specifics needed in moderation for the client and then at a budget that the agency can actually make some kind of profit from or create a site that could be award-winning. Secondly if the issues are picky creative responses the three options gives the client more to look at, more options, they are more likely to begin to narrow down to a singular focus and keep the creative process moving with less revisions. Try it... I have actually run test on these theories and they actually work out better for both ends. So we've presented the paper prototypes and we finally have a creative vision with client sign off... YES! There are some meetings and details before this but we are moving along... One thing I would like to certainly mention are "Focus Groups", there will be scenarios that Focus Groups are absolutely needed and must be integrated in so not to surprise the client with a hidden cost.
Implementation Phase ( Build, Test, Maintain) ( The Site is built and modified based on testing and analytical feedback)
It is time to begin to create a working website in the "Build" stage. We move to technical production front end and back-end development. Tie the front end visual interface to the backend, go through internal reviews/revisions and launch an "Alpha" site on a development server ( we will not be getting into servers in this discussion as it can get lengthy). This is where Quality Assurance (QA) technicians come in and "Test" test test! Now we can determine... Where are the problems? We determine through, proofreading the copy top to bottom/every page, testing on various platforms and browsers, complete QA, a client review once stable, gain feedback make revisions and move to "Beta" testing.
Maintain (How Can We make the Site Better?)
We will certainly hear from the users if it was a "re-design" and can incorporate valid revisions from this angle as they will catch the smallest of detail so be sure to provide an area suggesting they provide their feedback. Also, begin to analyze the server logs over the next month or so, look at your analytics applications, Google, Webtrends, Omniture, whatever you have gone with, I suggest have two installed to so you have something to compare to Google is free and has so many other options to integrate you gotta use it as at least one angle (period). You also have the online versions that if you integrate the code can give you data as well: Quantcast.com and Alexa.com, if you are planning on serving Ad Units/Banners this is a must as well as becoming IAB certified. From all this data begin to prioritize the revisions and quantify the rational of the users via the interaction with the site and how you would change the site to get the results you are looking for to gain ROI or funnels to a goal. The process above never ends, it continues and continues, one will always need to maintain and upgrade the site with content and remain fresh.
There are a million details that are between the lines you have just read, but this is a good start and a good "umbrella" process and has worked for me on projects ranging from 30K to over 1 million. Remember process is imperative, it will evolve and need to be tweaked from project to project, but a process like I've described above will keep you on track which equates to agency profitability and more importantly a happy client.
Just my two cents...
Monday, February 22, 2010
Interactive Producer Suggestion 2/22/10... "Your Resources"
In the world of the Interactive Producer one is only as good as the "Resources" one is surrounded by. Carve that in stone! By resources I mean the other experts that make of the team of professionals that are engaged in the project you are producing. These could be a variety of internal functions such as Account Service/Executive, Flash designers and Developers, Front and Back end Developers, Production Managers, Project Managers, Writers, proofreader's, Translators, Media (Ad Units), Video experts, Creatives etc... This group is very diverse in nature, think about it, you have many personalities with different capabilities coming together to form a singular function with a common goal. As a Producer one must utilize these Resources to the advantage of the project as diligently and efficiently as possible, how you do this is grounded according to a process or protocol in place. I recently had the pleasure of working in a digital environment who had a Traffic Manager but not in the traditional sense of the title, not media traffic, this person was in charge of allocation of time of the creative and production resources ( people). They were able to keep track of this by utilizing an online application and gathering of project needs on a weekly basis or as needed by a Producer. We knew exactly who was available who was becoming overloaded and we were able to make better decisions on resources and bring a greater sense of efficiency to the process in general and most importantly ... Forecast resource needs. This is very important as Time = $$$ = Happy Boss = Job/Raise... ( ; This is a good example of at least one process that helps the Producer utilize their resources efficiently and productively to get the best usage so the resources do not get over looked and especially overworked to the degree the project is jeopardized. Each resource including yourself as a resource has their own niche, their own function that brings something special to the team, as Producer you must watch this closely, not to become that defined resource yourself but you better be able to take on that role or find another resource to fill it quickly if needed. Know your resources, respect your resources, surround yourself with knowledge and professionalism in your resources and as a Producer you are on a path to a successful project and a very rewarding career.
Just my two cents...
2/23... Suggested Process Milestones
Just my two cents...
2/23... Suggested Process Milestones
Friday, February 19, 2010
Interactive Producer Suggestion 2/19/10 “The Int. Producer Evolution/Revolution”
No Neandertal talk or tea party business in this one, I’m wanting to slightly touch upon the issue of the integration of the three mediums: print, broadcast, and digital/interactive. Print and broadcast advertising, “More power to you!” But it seems with the economy and the state of things, its just flat out cheaper to get the message across online even if the masses are not actually buying now…brand recognition and “eyeballs” are worth their weight in gold. And online we can track that down to the eyeball to prove ROI. So what are you talking about Chance? I’m talking about you Interactive Producer and integration and knowledge of the print and the broadcast angles into your medium the world-wide web (LOL I feel weird when I call it that?). Print not as difficult for us on the digital end as,… well, its already in a digital state, we don’t hav to go through the respective processes they go through and the vendors and the color matching, reprints etc etc etc… Print is a tough and respectable advertising angle. But, in our world once the layout is designed, approved, its digital… we can easily have it in front of eyeballs quickly. So the point… learn to deal with another angle… your print professionals they are not going anywhere and can teach much my friends. Secondly and to me a bit more sentimental due to the fact I was a video editor, encoding professional and motion graphics designer for almost a decade, is the integration of video in to the digital realm. Me personally, I have a large enough monitor and have watched full feature films online in HD. There is much involved in this process. I mean to get high-end broadcast quality video online in so many forms i.e. from a video integration into a flash ad with tight specs, to a feature-length film in HD all from the actual shooting from a camera. It’s important that as a Producer one begins to open your mind to the possibilities, actually if you have not yet… you are years behind. I actually started in the biz encoding video for the web back in the day when there was only one encoding technology “Cinepak” there were other methods but with the pipe at that time being small the video size had to be really small to even get it to play was a chore. Anyway… the point is…Evolve as a Interactive Producer. Move your skill set to be a better Interactive Producer by having an understanding of the integration of other mediums like said video. Video alone has to go through to many steps according to complexity and quality to even get to the point to where you can press play online. An Int. Producer needs to have a familiarity with the steps and respect the “Broadcast” Producer…they are your friend. The future as a fact, contains High quality video online, more than one can ever imagine. By now you have worked with some in some form or fashion, because you can do so many cool things with video online especially in flash. There is also video that is rendered from 3D modeling. Ummmm… very popular guys. Ultimately ends up an encoded video product of some sort but before that is a heck of a lot of work. Have to give a shout out to a few folks cause I want to show some examples of this 3D integration in to Award winning sites I’ve produced they are the real champions. www.bell429.com my friends and colleagues at TM Advertising: Andy Mahr Creative Director, Boone Jarshky 3D animator and AS3 flash, Joe Burud secondary Flash. Also a masterpiece especially the “upgrade” section is www.theflagshipexperince.com from the genius of Eric Feitel Creative Director, Boone Jarshky 3D as well as some outside vendors at SLC McCann. These are wonderful examples of what can be done in the digital world online with other mediums. Now a days there are no limits online, if its digital we can figure a way to incorporate it into an idea or design, as a Producer one must have the basic knowledge to accommodate, be a force that helps to push the envelope… keep that edge and know how to support the technology.
Just my two cents.
Just my two cents.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Interactive Producer Suggestion 2/18/10... "Engage"
Engage... Hmmm... yes pretty much what your thinking, the work is not a male or female, but you are engaged to it. LOL. You need to have a high sense of integrity, drive and passion to hold up the project and the team at times, the team will only be as strong as its weakest link. Unfortunately that could be angles not normally thought of...i.e... the client, just due to a lack of understanding of what the heck you are even doing to which it is your job to help to manage, it could even be higher leadership such as a VP. These stakeholders are part of the team as well. A producer must "Engage" themselves into this monotony at times to be sure the understanding is there that the "why's" are answered and understood by those that can make decisions that ultimately end up on your shoulders if there is a misunderstanding. I know, I know... there are just some outside of the Interactive world that just don't want to get us or want to follow the SDLC to build websites or have IT run the back end instead of actual web developers, not having the actual interactive professionals be taking the lead on the project. (Yes there is an actual difference in lets say .NET for software development and .NET for web development) There are a plethora of areas where as a Producer you will have to "engage" to be sure that you and the team are following the process but just simply to protect your expertise and the expertise of your fellow interactive professionals protect their good name and their good work. Example, traditional creatives at times lack experience on interactive projects, they can learn, or if they know PS or Illustrator and can design in these and have the conceptual skills to think in a more 3D environment rather than flat art, we will get somewhere but most utilize software such as Indesign that just can not be translated particularly to Flash. Dont get me wrong, I LOVE to see it when traditional creatives begin to see the value of the digital space and begin to incorporate their skillset for interactive, I think that is a great expansion for a creative. But this is an area again where the producer must "engage" to be sure we as a team have the skill set to accommodate the Business Requirements we have promised the client and the integrity we have set forth for ourselves and our team. You are the protector at times, and unfortunately you take on a burden and a responsibility and can get hammered... Never let this bring you down, always follow process and be team oriented and stay engaged with these principles, in the end you can hold your head high and know that you did the best job possible. There will always be those that will just never see the light... even as you warn them of the pitfalls or the dark alleys, but that is why you are the professional, that is why you must stay engaged with the team... Be as one... and Be successful... Be Engaged.
Just my two cents.
Just my two cents.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Interactive Producer Suggestion 2/17/10 Staying on the topic of “Team Collaboration”
Collaboration… what is it? Creative vision can be a singular art? Each of us are individualistic in our thoughts and who we are, it’s just how we are made? If you wiki “collaboration” it begins with “is a recursive process where two or more people or organizations work together in an intersection of common goals”. Id say a fair assessment of the definition, but I begin to laugh as I write due to the fact that the definition seems to not take into account all the individualistic angles that will come into play as people begin to try and “\kə-ˈla-bə-ˌrāt\”. Whats my point you ask? Producer! (period). This is a large part of your job. A producer is a part of a team of an initiative/project that has many stakeholders with angles with many different agendas and perspectives, luckily I have over a decade of experience to drive me to solve issues towards a common goal. The key word here is common goal and this is what the producer needs to focus on throughout the project to keep the momentum going, you (Producer) must wear every hat in the process if needed, even cry with the “very frustrated” at times to keep the peace, all with the goal of maintaining that momentum to keep the project on track so the PM will stay in a pleasant mood. ( ; I have a saying or lets say I don’t say it as much as I think it… I like to approach any situation as a Producer as “clay”, then mold myself to the situation to be sure to be a team player looking for a solution from the problems perspective, sometimes I cant find that perfect mold being clay, so we re-convene as a “TEAM” from Jr. PM to Group Creative Director, everyone… and we work together as a team we…”\kə-ˈla-bə-ˌrāt\”. Producer… you are the “oil” that keeps the many cogs turning in the very intricate mechanism that will create awarding work, or in the least a happy paying client that will pay again and again (smil’n at cha), Producer you are also the “glue” that holds this very diverse team of geniuse together to bring the project to the projected creative vision, development criteria, time line and budget.
Just my two cents.
Interactive Producer suggestion 2/16/10… Creative conceptualization and developer collaboration…
I have noticed the past few digital worlds Ive taken a glance at that often the creative and development teams often lack in collaboration and often not enough conversation. I often smile as I hear frustration come from developers or creatives either front end HTML/.NET etc. and especially Flash about the lack of knowledge or input they were asked of before handed creative layouts or the creative frustrated that the vision did not come across as intended. Producer problem… Producer Suggestion… almost every developers goal is not to give a rats patootie about the creative, they only want to make it work to the best of their ability from a development perspective to the creatives vision to the restraints of the application to which they master . So… that being said, there is a GREAT possibility of creating efficiency and not falling down a pitfall of misunderstanding of how the creative translates into Flash for example by simply inviting the Flash Dev./Designer to a meeting. Sit for 20 minutes and have the Flash Designer/Developer take a look at the “conceptual ideas” before moving into valuable and costly creative time, this ensures that idea will translate over the way the creative envisions and will help to keep the project to time line and to budget. Outside vendors… see if they will “spec” an idea, most likely in my experience they will, this helps to keep cost down in the long run if the project goes amuck and it gives the client something to LOOK at and they will feel as if progress is being made.
Just my two cents.
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