Brand Spotlight: The Quarterly

Welcome to our first Brand Spotlight feature! Today we're super excited to be talking to Sanj Sahota of the Quarterly! Sanj is on a mission to promote ethic work practices within the creative community and already runs the Creative Book. Now the Quarterly is here as a submission based publication that has a central theme for each issue. Over to Sanj to tell us all about it!

"Think of it as a social enterprise publication, a kind of fair trade for creativity: high standards based on an ethical revenue share that tries to do the right thing.

It’s a publication with a focus in the field of photography, featuring the work of a wide range of talent from around the world and a variety of different backgrounds, from fashion, to photojournalism, travel to landscape and portraiture and so on.

It’s a submission-based journal that aims to release 4 issues a year, where each issue has a theme and creatives are tasked with sharing their ideas for submission. Those who have their ideas accepted for publication are then supported to bring their concepts to life, in whatever way we can.

The Quarterly is about challenging, provoking thought, embracing the awesome, championing talent and above all bringing value back to creatives and their work, in our own bold way. It’s not a new idea but we kinda think it’s daring, will likely ruffle a few feathers, and put some noses out of joint—especially when creative talent is often exploited and their real value goes unrecognised and underappreciated. It’s time for a creative journal with guts and integrity."

Sounds exciting right? We really love what the Quarterly is about, it's so inspiring to see a fellow creative doing their own thing and really promoting and nurturing talent. We asked Sanj to tell us more about the process of bringing the Quarterly into being…

Hi Sanj! What inspired you to launch the Quarterly?//

The inspiration for the Quarterly comes from all the incredibly talented creatives out there, working day in and day out to perfect their craft. I wanted to create a publication that gives readers exclusive content, created specifically for the publication, that engages and inspires and doesn't offer false promises or pretend to be something more than it actually is. 

Over the last few years since starting The Creative Book. I've encountered various working practices within the "publishing" industry that i feel are rather exploitive. Ones that provides empty promises and illusions of massive mount exposure and false hope. I realise that not everyone in the industry does these things and i'm reluctant to tar everyone with the same brush, but more often than not, things are made out to be bigger than they actually are. I just wanted to create a publication that was honest, open and tries to do the right thing. Which is pretty much what inspired the ethical, social enterprise aspect of The Quarterly. We don't have investors and we don't do advertising and so every issue is self-funded by myself with my own personal savings. 

The idea of being able to split the profits amongst the contributors felt like the right thing to do, as it's their work, created exclusively for The Quarterly that is makes the project what it is. I'd love to pay everyone for their time, but the publication isn't in a position to do so, but i'd love to be able to grow it into a position where the rewards are more obvious.

We wanted to create a photographic journal, one where each issue is focused around a theme and creatives interested in taking part are given the task to create a proposal for a piece of work that they would like to produce for the issue at hand. Once shortlisted, we work with those creatives to help pull teams together and bring that proposal to life. Taking an active role in helping creatives to make things happen is also an important part of what The Quarterly is about.

How have you found your self publishing journey?//

The Self-publishing journey is not one for the faint of heart, but it's immensely satisfying especially when you finally have the end product in your hands after months of hard work from everyone. You're always learning, always picking up new bits of information, some much more welcome than others. We started out doing things on a tiny scale, just so we can understand all the things that need to be done.. It's much easier to handle things, when things go wrong and you don't have a clue as you can learn from your mistakes. It's quite a complicated industry in someways, there's so much to consider, so much that needs to be done, a lot of balls that need juggling. Doing it with such a small team is a challenge and scary one at that. I really wished It was simple case of, get the content, put it together and sell it… but it's not like that at all. The promotion, the PR the distribution, raising awareness of it, the marketing and all that stuff are things that start making things so much much complicated and challenging. But i think we're having fun doing it at the moment.. We'll see how long that last for though!

We're big fans of how you run the Quarterly, how have your ethical methods of sourcing and developing content been received by your contributors?//

We think it's gone down well. It was fun seeing the reactions from the contributors, when they finally had a physical copy in their hands. I think for a lot of them and us included it felt great to have something tangible in their hands. Obviously we've not managed to make it a profit making project yet, due to the massive costs involved in setting something like this up from scratch, but we hope to reward people with something soon enough. A fair few of the contributors of the first issue, were quite eager to jump back in the ring and get involved in the second issue as well. Which i'm guessing is a good sign, especially as they also been more active in the production of it this time round. 

There was a level of scepticism by various creatives we approached when we first started this project up, about what we we're striving towards and trying to achieve. But this time round, it was an easier dream to sell. I guess that stems off of the fact that we actually managed to do what we said we'd do and create an actual independent physical publication.

Finally, how do we submit to the Quarterly?//

To submit, we ask people to share proposals and mood boards that are relevant to the theme of issue in question. We don't want to see finished products or work that has already been published before, mind you as that's not the way we work. Anyone interested in getting involved should keep an eye on http://www.thequarterly.co.uk/submissions/ for the announcement of the next theme. As to what that's going to be? i've got no idea as of this moment..

Thanks to Sanj for taking the time to talk to us, (and for sending us the very beautiful first issue of the Quarterly!) We can't wait to see what's to come from this exciting publication!

Svea & James xo

Images courtesy of The Quarterly

Pinterest and Portfolios

As a designer, it's getting harder and harder to create a portfolio that will have any sort of impact on potential employers. The rise of Pinterest in recent years means that original ideas are becoming less commonplace and once vibrant portfolios are in danger of being taken over by shot upon shot of identities laid out in grid formation.

I like a portfolio to be neat, tidy and well presented, I really do. But does this mean that now we're all expected to present our work in this specific way? A general search for graphic design on Pinterest will throw up reams of images of designers' work that is difficult to distinguish from one another. The work could be (and usually is) awesome, but we tend to glaze over it because we're sure we've seen that image before. It's sad to see really great work get lost amongst the masses. 

I feel that now more than ever, there is becoming a standard as to how work is presented in portfolios. All of the print should be laid out a right angle to each other, any digital work comped onto a Matchbook/iPad. We are looking at many varieties of the same photo. Graduates in particular seem to be jumping on the bandwagon with this trend.

Just once, I'd love to see someone really think about how they compose their portfolio imagery. I mentioned in a previous post that when applying for a job portfolios should have a sense of neatness about them - especially in the corporate environment - but does this mean that we as designers need to sacrifice all of our creativity? Now that great looking portfolios are so accessible online, It's becoming increasingly important to separate ourselves from the masses and up our game. I almost feel that maybe it's time to go back to the tangible, rough and ready work. Get the sketchbooks and the prints out, bring it all with you so employers can have a feel of the boss paper you've printed on and get a sense of how your pieces work together. It's time to re-evaluate how we do things and start thinking outside of the grid.

So please, please can we get over the right angles already?

Svea xo

Do you have Klout?

After a bank holiday break, we return refreshed and ready to give you your daily dose of the world of the web and design.

For this Tuesday, I'm going to introduce you into the world of Klout. For everyone that doesn't know what Klout is, it is a secret algorithm to measure online influence. This monitors everything you do on social media, the web and tracks you ability to influence people within your peer group.

Klout breaks down people's online “influence” by topic, which should theoretically help you find interesting people to follow on topics you like. Most social networks do this, too, but Klout uses something called +K points. If someone thinks you’re expert on a certain subject, they can visit your user page and award you +K points, which is supposed to further increase your "influence." But like your overall score, it doesn’t have a lot of relevance outside of the Klout echo chamber.

Why is this important I hear you ask? Well some people don't, some people do. Klout gives a score to your social status online. With a trackable number, you can measure one person in relation to others in their field, you can measure improvement over time, you can use it to set standards that people can aspire to.

My Klout score comes in at 41 which isn't too bad as the average is around 50, only Justin Bieber has managed the elusive 100 score and Barack Obama picked up 99 so these people of influence have the potential to help raise your score if you want to engage with them (Obama probably over Bieber any day).

I suggest you setup yourself up on Klout, it's interesting to see where you stand in your field of influence. After that, you need to start building relationships with people. Start and join in conversations. Interact with people one-on-one and provide useful information. Ask and answer questions. Follower and interact with the thought leaders in your field. The more engaging your content is the more likely people are to share it, which shows Klout you really are an influencer. Raising your Klout score isn’t an overnight process. It takes time to build meaningful relationships and fill your social media account with kick-ass content. With time, patience and know-how, you’ll slowly see your influence and following grow. And this time around, you’ll be the most popular kid on the playground.

'Til the next time
James x

Adobe DPS How To: Part Three

Happy mid-week all! Time for another screen recording, (I hope the last one was ok!). Today I'm going to quickly show you how to upload your articles into the cloud and how to preview them on a device. Sound ok?

Let's get going!!!

See you next week!

Svea xo

p.s.

Like last week, if you have any questions about the video, or want to know more, drop me a comment and I'll be happy to help!

Get to know In-Page Analytics

Welcome back!

Hope you've had a productive week, last time we spoke I chatted about setting up and using Google analytics. Hopefully, you have that up and running on your site now, so I'm going to talk your through one of the features that will help you get a bit more understanding about your site

In Page analytics enables you to see how people are moving around your websites. This is vital in putting together an online strategy as it gives you a very orange and annotated view of what people are clicking on your website, so shows you what people are and aren't engaging with.

This is not only vital in assessing future online strategy, but it also gives you an overview of your current strategy and how it’s working. Are your ‘Call to Actions’ being used, are people dropping off your site on certain pages and what is your ROI? In Page Analytics can be drilled down to 4 key metrics – Clicks, Percentages, Visitors, and viewing filter. It works in the same way as the rest of Google Analytics – you set your date range, you can compare your date ranges and see how your site is comparing to either the previous month, or previous period last year.

It looks a little like this...

This tool, like everything has its pros and cons, the ability to see where people click on the page and follow navigation paths through your site. Although this data has always been available in analytics, it took a lot of digging around and a fair bit of patience.

But, as great as In-Page Analytics can be, it’s not all roses, where it displays a percentage to represent the proportion of visitors to a page who clicked a certain link, it does so by the target url, rather than the actual link. So for example, if your logo links to your homepage and you also have a home button, it will show the same percentage across both of them rather than telling you whether people clicked the logo or the home button most. Whilst not a major issue, this does cut into the tool's usefulness.

So what does In-Page show you?

Well, you can see what are your most and least popular links and understand why people are clicking and how you can fix them, for example:

Links that are receiving a lot of clicks but aren't visible

Make the link more visible:

• If you make the link more visible it is likely it will get even more clicks
• Your users are actively searching out that link, so making it easier to find makes their life easier

Improve the content of the page for that link:

• Why was the link not visible in the first place?
• If the page it links to is not a priority as it doesn't make money or provides poor content then give that page a make-over.
• Make it useful and if possible monetise it.

Links that are visible but aren't getting clicked

Improve the call to action:

• Take a look at your popular links - what makes them successful?
• There has to be a call to action to encourage users to click.

Hide the link:

• What you see as a really important piece of content doesn't do anything for users
• If that content is vital and you need it to be seen, consider how you could direct users to pages differently - links from the pages they're clinking on?

For anyone wanting to see how In-Page works this is the perfect start to get going. If you know any tips to share just drop them in the comments below. I'll be finally getting round to hooking up the Raspberry Pi this week. I have still been looking after Milo so my attention has been elsewhere, so normal service will resume.

'Til the next time
James x

DPS How To: Part Two

Hi guys! Welcome to the DPS Tutorial Part Two!

I've decided to try something a little different today, someone has unwisely given me a microphone to use so I am coming to you via the magic of screen recording! I hope you can deal with my accent/fast talking! If you need me to clarify anything then just drop me a comment and I'll be more than happy to answer your questions!

I've decided to swap up the order of these how to's. I was originally going to give you a quick overview of how to build a publication and preview it on an iPad, but instead we'll be building a single page with some interactivity from scratch. I'll show you how to thread all of the separate pages together into one document next week. Sound good?

Just before we start, you should know that Adobe have some of their own language that they use in relation to DPS that doesn't quite tally up with what we'd call things on paper. These could cause some confusion so I'll quickly explain them here.

Article: This is the name used for every individual page. Even if you swipe across to continue the story, the singular page is still called an article. (it's best to get out of the habit of saying 'story' altogether to avoid confusion.

Drop: This is the name used for articles where the reader will scroll downwards either continuously or with the snap to page function

Smooth Scroll: This is when the  reader scrolls downwards to continue reading without moving to a separate page.

Snap to Page: This is when the reader scrolls downwards, but the pages appear separate, the movement is more rigid and doesn't allow for design to continue across more than one page.

This is a really basic intro, as I said, any questions I'll be happy to answer, so just drop me a comment!

Ok let's begin!

I hope you enjoyed my little video! See you next week for Part Three!

Svea xo

Getting more insight with Google Analytics

Happy Monday,

I'm back to kick start your week with more insight into the world of the web. It's been a busy week, I have the task of looking after a Jack Russell called Milo (Yes, like the dog in the mask) as you may know or not know they're a very demanding dog so the keeping him entertained is taking up the best part of my time at the moment. This is him, with the big ears....

But lucky, I managed to break away from my canine friend for a moment to bring you how you can get more insight into your website, by using a free tool called Google Analytics.

I use this tool frequently and it gives you the perfect look at how your customers use your site and the journey they take. Have you ever wondered which keywords resonate with visitors? Need insight on what design elements might be turning people away? Here's how you can start answering the website questions that have been keeping you awake at night.

First thing you need to do is add is set up your Google Analytics account, you'll need to implement the code on your website. Set up a profile for the site you'd like to track and the step-by-step process will generate a unique script that you can add.

If you're using a content management system or blogging platform like WordPress, Blogger or Tumblr, you only need to add the code once to your template or theme. The theme will propagate the code in every post and page you create. If your site is custom-built, you'll either need to implement the code on each page manually, or speak to your web developer about how the site generates content.

Copy the JavaScript code from Analytics and paste it just above the tag in your page or template. Adding this code will not affect the look of your site. After you connect your site to Google Analytics, hit "View Report" on the initial screen. This will bring you to the main dashboard.

In the left column, you'll see the various types of data Google Analytics provides, some examples are:

Visitors: This shows many things about the people coming to your site, including where they're located geographically, what language they speak, how often they visit your site and what computers and browsers they use to get there.
Traffic Sources: Here you'll find how people got to your site. You can track which sites link to your page or keywords people search to find you.
Content: This tab gives you insight into specific pages on your site. It can help answer questions about how people enter and exit your pages, as well as which ones are most popular.
Goals: If you're aiming for established objectives, reports in the Goals tab will be helpful to you. Here you'll find data about desired actions from users, including downloads, registrations and purchases.
Ecommerce: You'll only need this tab if you're selling items on your site as it houses all merchandise, transaction and revenue activity information.

Setting Up the Dashboard 
On the main dashboard, you'll see a summary of your site's data. You can customize the dashboard to show whichever reports you decide you want to see upfront. Just click on the type of report you want to see from the left column and hit "Add to Dashboard." You can then position reports on the dashboard by dragging and dropping, or deleting ones you don't want. You can delve deeper into a data set by clicking "View Report" underneath the report graphic on your dashboard. This brings you to the full report on that topic. 

Adjusting the Time Range 
Be sure to adjust the date range in the upper right-hand corner before analyzing information from your reports. It defaults to a month-long range, ending the day prior to the day you're viewing the report.

Click on the date range box and a calendar will pop up. You can adjust it to track information quarterly, weekly, daily, or whatever time-frame works best for you. If you want to compare date ranges, hit "Comparison" underneath the "Date Range" field. This will bring up a second calendar for you to adjust based on what time periods you want to consider, such as weekend to weekend or the first Tuesday of the month vs. the last Tuesday of the month.

Data Tables and Visualizations Google Analytics 
Many of the reports in Google Analytics, such as pageviews and conversion rates, contain linear graphs that present data for the topic and date range you've selected. When mousing over the dots on the line, you'll see measurements for that day, week or hour. You can change the metric you want to visualize by clicking the tab above the graph on the left. Here you'll also have the option to compare two metrics against each other. When you're not comparing date ranges, you can compare against the site average. This is particularly helpful if you've laid out goals, as you can compare site activity to conversion goals. When comparing, a second line (gray) will appear for the variable over the graph with the original metric line (blue), making it easy to see how you're stacking up. Beneath the graph, you'll see more data laid out with summaries and scorecards prominently displaying important overall metrics, such as pages per visit and time on site.

That's my little insight into Google Analytics you can tailor it to whatever report you like to see about your site. Next week I'll show you how to track content and also the customer journey with the extensive features this free tool offers. I think it's a pretty handy tool to see what content resonates with your customers and also how to make it easier for people to find you, but I'll explain more of that next week.

I hope you enjoyed Svea's DPS training because Part 2 will be heading your way come Wednesday so look out for it.

I'm off now to get pestered by a pooch.

'Til the next time x

Adobe DPS How To: Part One

Welcome to my first ever tutorial! I'm sure if we're all patient with each other we'll all learn some stuff and have some fun!

So, without further ado, welcome to Part One of my beginners guide to Adobe DPS!

First things first, what is Adobe DPS?

DPS stands for Digital Publishing Suite. You know all those sweet digital magazines sitting in Apple Newsstand? Most of those were made using this little baby. It's actually a plugin that comes with the new version of inDesign. Great news for primarily paper designers like me that aren't used to coding and the like. If you can already use inDesign then you're home and dry with this program, aside from the odd piece of HTML wizardry there's no need to move out of inDesign at all. 

Today I'll be talking through the very basics such as setting up the correct document size and a quick look at the new tools. We'll move on to building publications and functionality in another post. 

So here we go, if you're a designer you'll likely be familiar with the classic inDesign set up. To pull in the new palettes that hold the DPS controls, you'll need to hit up Workspace, and select 'Digital Publishing'. This will bring up all the shiny new tools we'll be using to build your publication. 

You'll notice a lot of new things have popped up such as Media, Liquid Layout, Folio Overlays etc. This is where all the magic happens. Theses are the things that mean we don't really have to leave inDesign. Pretty much any functionality you can think of happens here, but more about those later.

Next you'll want to set up your document. Adobe have thoughtfully set up all of the device sizes for us as presets, we just have to select the one we want. The only thing to bare in mind is that every time you want to switch devices, it will include a total redesign. 

To set your document up, follow what you'd normally do (File > New > Document) then where it says intent, select Digital Publishing. This will load the presets. Then just select the device you're after and your ready to go!

One last thing for today. I've you're designing for a pad, obviously you'll know that it can either be viewed in Portrait or Landscape. You'll have to redesign every page to suit the second layout but once it's done it's worth it!
To set up the second layout, select pages from the palette and then click the icon in the top right corner. From there select 'Create Alternate Layout'. You'll need to name the new layout (inDesign does this automatically but you can name them anything you like. Now you've done this, you can choose which pages have an alternate layouts - just in case you want to only have the rotation on certain spreads. I'll show you how to make the alternate layout work in the next post.

So there you have it, you've set up your first digital publication using Adobe DPS!

I hope you've found this first look into DPS helpful, next week we'll cover how to set up a publication and preview it on a device, and how to make the liquid layouts work. Then we'll move on to building and functionality. Sound good?

Talk to you soon!

Svea xo 

The way to go, is on the go.

We're back from our week off. It's been a great week off relaxing and putting our feet up. We visited the amazing Harry Potter Studio Tour, it is a must for any Potter fan. I was blown away by pretty much everything so get yourselves down there.

Now that we're back it's down to business and it's of the mobile variety. I'm going to talk about the importance of having a more mobile friend site.

In 2012, the world’s mobile internet traffic was twelve times the amount of all combined internet traffic in 2000. This is a stat that you can’t afford to ignore, mainly because mobile internet users behave differently from desktop users. If you want to succeed online, then a mobile-friendly web presence is essential. While it’s relatively easy to navigate a website using a mouse and a computer monitor, it’s not always so straightforward with a small-screened mobile device. Anyone who has used a touchscreen mobile device has accidentally touched or typed something they didn’t mean to.

A mobile website should be easily navigable with large navigation buttons and a simple layout. You need to use every bit of precious screen space in the smartest way possible. Mobile devices have become powerful tools for quickly accessing and retrieving data. Mobile users have an “always on” mentality, meaning that they expect access to data at any given time. This changes the way advertisers operate, and also brings about the need for to have a rich online experience. For one thing, a fast-loading, easily navigable mobile website is a must. It’s also a good idea to give mobile viewers the ability to access the full desktop site if they prefer.

Take the time to find out what percentage of your visitors access your website via mobile device, and what platform they use (Apple or Android). Also, creating mobile-optimized email is just as important as a mobile-optimized website, especially if you send regular email communications to your subscribers. Use a simplified header that is 50-100 pixels in height. Enlarge your text and buttons. Choose bold images with a single focus. Link to mobile-friendly sites. Streamline your layout (a single column layout works best).

With so many mobile users spending time on sites like Twitter and Facebook, social media presents a significant opportunity for sites wanting to expand their online reach. It’s also worth noting that consumers are becoming increasingly comfortable with making online purchases through their mobile devices. This has significant implications for mobile advertising, and also underscores the necessity of making purchase information readily available.

Although desktop internet access is still going strong, people increasingly prefer to access the internet on the go. Professional demands, long commutes, multiple social activities, and other factors that keep people away from home make mobile internet access a necessity for many people.

So it seems the future of web design will be in your hands..literally.

'Til the next time

James x

The Journey From Platform 9 3/4...

So as we mentioned in the last post, we've been away on a little trip.
We've only been to Hogwarts!! Well, not exactly, we went to the Warner Brothers Studio Tour. It was perfect!!

This place needs little introduction, I'm just going to leave you with these pretty epic photos...enjoy!

I cannot tell you how amazing this place is, perfect for Harry Potter geeks like me, if you get the chance to go then please do it, it is quite possibly the most magical place in the world!

We'll be back on Monday with James' post!

Svea xo