Twitter in Action, Fanboy Tweets, Entrepreneur Re-Tweets

I just had a powerful experience with Twitter that has cemented it in my mind as a powerful marketing tool.

In preparation for a meeting on a site UI this morning, I revisited An Introduction to Using Patterns in Web Design on 37signal’s site. It’s a fantastic overview of Christopher Alexander’s approach to design based on “chunks” or patterns.

After I read the article, I tweeted about it. I was sure that any number of my followers might have an interest in it. If not for their personal use, then for a reference if and when they work with me.

Here’s the tweet:

Doodlehaus tweet about Designing with Patterns by Ryan Singer

Here’s where it gets interesting. Minutes later, Jason Fried, owner of 37Signals tweets about the same article. He noticed someone was revisiting some older content produced by his company and saw it as an opportunity to promote 37Signals’ expertise on the issue.Check it out:

Jason Fried of 37Signals tweets about Pattern Design

From a random shout into the Twitter void to nearly instant recognition from the owner of one of the Web’s most innovative companies. Now that’s cool.

There are other halo effects from this exchange. Ryan Singer gets props for his article. 37Signals gets more exposure as a leader in clean, usable interface design. Christopher Alexander sells some more books. Hey, I write this post that references all these things.

All because of one little tweet.

Everyone's a designer now

Whether you like it or not, you’re a graphic designer. In Why aren’t you (really) good at graphic design?, Seth Godin reminds us that this is a new truth in business. Every day people people in all walks of life throw bad clip art into their PowerPoint slides. They write memos using only 14 pt comic sans. Their email signatures contain an image of their favorite Disney character.

Please stop.

If you read Seth’s post, he provides a link to some great resources to learn the very basic graphic design skills that will keep you from embarrassing yourself and your company. Learn to design, it is now a basic business skill.

Somewhat related: ever notice that most people who say “I’m a visual person” can’t draw a lick. I think this is code for “I can’t articulate what I want, but I’ll know it when I see it. However, I will not pay for the dozens of revisions I’ll ask you to do.” I think that’s a topic for another time.

Drop-Down Menus: Examples and Best Practices (Smashing Magazine)

I’m mostly posting this for myself. The more content people have, the faster they ask for dropdown menus. Here’s a list of best practices and examples for using dropdown menus from the good people at Smashing Magazine. Dropdown menus add complexity and potential confusion for users. These tips can help you make the call or draw the line.

Open for Questions Tag Cloud

Rebranding != Changing Your Name or Slogan

There must be something in the water. The great state of Wisconsin has a new tourism slogan “Live Like You Mean It” and the SciFi Channel is changing it’s name to SyFy.

I can imagine these meetings: “We need new energy! We need a new brochure…no…a new SLOGAN!…a new NAME!!” Imagine broad sweeping arm gestures accompanying that sentence as if the speaker were expanding her arms to embrace the entire expanse of her new empire.

Both these moves are classic branding mistakes. A slogan is not a brand, it should sum up what’s already there. Otherwise don’t bother. The best take on this was in the book “Cutting Edge Advertising” where the authors advised, if it’s not as good as “Just Do It”, don’t. Especially don’t if the slogan’s been beaten like a rented mule.

In regards to Sci Fi’s name change, Bonnie Hammer, former president of Sci Fi is quoted in the New York Times, “We couldn’t own Sci Fi; it’s a genre. But we can own Syfy.”

Let me ask everyone who watches Sci Fi, do you care if the channel can own it’s name? I sure as hell don’t. What does that have to do with the quality of your programming? When I thought of T.V. and science fiction, I thought of Sci Fi. Now I’ll cringe every time I linger there.

What’s even more surprising about the Sci Fi name change is that their audience is one of the most cynical and dismissive of this kind of chicanery. These are the people who will point out plot holes in comic book story lines from decades ago and you’re going to try to jam brand-speak down their throats? Why don’t you see if the folks over at D.C. Comics can get Batman into therapy and get a cheerier disposition. Because, you know, women from 18-35 think he’s too negative.

It’s all ridiculous. It’s like giving yourself a nickname and insisting everyone else use it. People either think you’re nuts or arrogant. The internet exposes these flimsy excuses for real branding as weak and inauthentic. Just stop. Please.

What took me so long?

Just added the ShareThis button to all news and events on www.bus.wisc.edu. Now site visitors, faculty, staff…whoever…can crow about their accomplishments and upcoming events on any number of social networking tools.

In the spirit of “it’s not a problem until it’s a problem,” I’ll now get to work on how to measure the results of this tweak.

Wish me luck.

WordPress for the iPhone

I find that writing with my thumbs is tedious. Do people really use this for extended periods of time?

The autocomplete seems to help quite a bit, but even still I think people are going to need some sort of thumb therapy in about 10 years.

Web site design overview

Web Design From Scratch offers a great high level view of designing a site. Here’s the skinny:

1. Know what you’re doing
2. Know what the site needs to do
3. Know what the site’s visitors want
4. Get a good picture of the personality and style of the web site
5. Sketch out highly successful scenarios
6. Organise views into a site map
7. Sketch the essential features & look
8. Map your visitors’ attention
9. Arrange the visual elements to work together

I encourage everyone to re-read this article before every project (myself included).

Designing using information patterns

It’s no secret that I’m a big fan of 37signals‘ approach to application and Web design. There’s something about their approach that is exceptionally clear and easy to use.

Not too long ago, I found a blog post on their site that reveals the secret: patterns.

I encourage you to give the article a read and refer to it the next time you need to bring clarity to a collection of seemingly disparate information.

Four Sites Deconstructed

Jakob Nielsen analyzes four sites for usability in his April 14 column Four Bad Designs.

“Bad content, bad links, bad navigation, bad category pages… which is worst for business? In these examples, bad content takes the prize for costing the company the most money.”

Ouch.

Let me know what you think. Nielsen is a polarizing figure for Web designers, so I hope we can have some good discussion.