A few months ago, we featured Local Habit as an example for promoting a new business with a blog before a final site was completed… A full restaurant and 650+ Facebook fans has confirmed our beliefs.
Monthly Archives: August 2011
Readying Sites for Social Search
Is your website +1-able? We’ve been updating sites with Google’s ‘+1′ Sharing Button, which allows people to recommend content to their social networks.
Ninthlink Hits the Sand for a Weekend Beach Clean Up
In coordination with The Surfrider Foundation and San Diego Coastkeeper, we headed to Pacific Beach and collected more than a pound of trash including bits of plastic, cigarette butts and used band-aids!
How Legos Teach Web Development
Jeromy found this post on Eight Ways Legos Teach Web Development, and it is pretty rad. I grew up with Legos, from Robin Hood and his merry men, through Star Wars. Maybe thats what drew me in to the world of web development too? If you can dream it, you can build it. Check out the rest of reasons, via Cory Etzkorn.
The 50 Best Websites of 2011 (According to TIME)
Last week, TIME Magazine released their picks for the Best Websites of 2011. In making the selections, 5 sites were chosen for each of the following categories: Music & Video, Family & Kids, Sports, News & Info, Financial & Productivity, Shopping & Travel, Health & Fitness, Social Media, Games and last but not least, Education. Google + is an obvious addition to this year’s list in the Social Media category; the fast growing music sharing/discovery service turntable.fm also made the list. If you have a couple extra minutes and want to do something you can feel good about, head on over to Freerice.com, which presents you with multiple choice answers to some relatively easy questions and donates rice to the U.N. World Food Program for each correct answer. Freerice is responsible for the donation of hundreds of millions of grains of rice each month.
Ninthlink Gets Another Office Mascot?
We all love our official Ninthlink mascot, Arnold (and wish him a speed recover from the grips of The Cone). But once in a while, it is handy when the office is doggy-free. Like when Matt goes to pick his backpack up, and finds a lizard, just chillin. Lucky for us, David came to the rescue. After the lizard relieved itself in his hands, and posed for another picture, it was released into the outdoor jungle that is our back patio area, and Mission Hills / Hillcrest outside of that. READ MORE
Real Nice Ad for Puma
National Forest – Puma “The Games We Play” Montage from National Forest on Vimeo.
I just got an email from the guys over at National Forest and they helped design and create the set design for this Puma ad. All I can say is that this whole project looks like a lot of fun (albeit seemingly quite laborious). Check out the creative process over at the National Forest website.
Meet Marshall: Ninthlink’s Student Guest for the Day
Today we had the pleasure of welcoming a new face to the office as Marshall, an incoming sophomore at the Dehesa Charter School and future/aspiring web developer, designer, and master of all things online was given a behind the scenes look at exactly what it is we do all day. READ MORE
Ninthlink + Petunia Pickle Bottom Lookbook
“Born out of a desire to bring style and sophistication to the world of modern parenting, Petunia Pickle Bottom was founded in 2000 by a trio of people who pay homage to the chic mommy who makes a statement without saying a word.” When they wanted to replace the static images on their homepage with a javascript-powered “Lookbook” to showcase their new Fall 2011 collection, they came to Ninthlink. I must give credit to Tom Doyle for the starting point of creating a slick Prototype + Scriptaculous image gallery. And then, Aimee and I put it in to action. READ MORE
The Age of Transparency
In online marketing, the old adage used-to-be that if you built it, marketed it and optimized it, they would come. A top ranking in Google could be achieved through search engine optimization techniques and you’d have all the traffic you wanted to your site. Over the years, however, people got tired of going to websites that were “over-optimized” and didn’t answer their needs. Google and the other engines started updating their rankings less on algorithm manipulations and based positioning on relevancy and solid user experiences. While all this was going on with the search engines, the explosion in Social media occurred. Suddenly, your brand reputation became the focal point for smart and savvy consumers. A top position in Google, for example, meant a whole lot less… if you had several bad reviews in Yelp. Google and the other engines also started docking businesses that were not living up to their promises. This change in online marketing has been happening now for the past few years behind the scenes but has been a welcomed change for good brands. So now, in late 2011, it is extremely difficult to rank if your site and your company does not deliver.
We are now in an era of complete transparency. If you don’t believe it, try searching for your “brand name” and use the word “reviews” at the end of your search query. Chances are there is either a review site out there with real customers posting a review about your site and/or your competitor has built a landing page that compares your brand with theirs. Reputation matters a whole lot these days. Ask anyone who has been on “rip off report” and has tried to manage back to better rankings.
The goal, moving forward, for any online business is to be consistent in thought, in message, and in fulfillment. From your advertising to your customer service department, stand for who and what you are and be that brand. Those brands that heed the call will undoubtedly receive a wealth of praise and new business opportunities from word of mouth marketing through Social media channels and higher rankings on the engines. The age of transparency is a win-win for both customers and for the best brands out on the web. We, at Ninthlink, love what we are seeing and look forward to seeing how this plays out in the coming years.
