Kaleidoscopic, Inc - Thinking Aloud

Darlington County Tourism

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 01:16:00 -0500

We've been busy designing and developing a new website for Darlington County Tourism.

Two days ago we performed a soft launch so that Darlington County Tourism could start using their new site as we wrap up development on a few additional site features.

The site has a new look and many cool features such as a 3 panel slide show and a text slider all powered by PageCraftCMS. A powerful internal search engine, a video console, in-depth geo mapping for business locations, a news / blog that powers other areas of the site such as "What's New in Darlington County & Stories about Local Characters. In addition there's also keywords tags that power the search engine and we'll be launching their photo gallery soon too.

Palmetto Grill and Bakery

Wed, 15 Feb 2012 23:30:00 -0500

We wrapped up the design and development of a small business website for Palmetto Grill & Bakery.

Palmetto Grill & Bakery needed a way to share their restaurant menu online, post specials for breakfast, lunch and dinner and an easy way for people to locate and contact them. I'm a frequent customer of Palmetto Grill & Bakery, enjoy the atmosphere and food. Having visited so often in the short period of time they've been open - I had a good idea of what I wanted to design for them when they asked me too. The theme of palm trees and tiki gods was an easy choice to go with, because of the decór that can bee seen throughout the restaurant.

Working on a limited budget, I worked up a design concept and presented it to them to review and we were off and rolling in no time developing the HTML and CSS styles. First on our plate was to develop some CSS to deliver the menu items in a way that was easy for the reader to understand and easy for Palmetto Grill to edit using PageCraftCMS. Once we had the menus developed we focused on developing the site's design and code for the remaining site pages. We also developed a news / blog for the site that is used to power the SPECIALS section of the site, making it easy for Palmetto Grill to build more content for their site, easy for readers to get to the information they're looking for and easy for Palmetto Grill to share using social netowrks.

Palmetto Grill & Bakery is located in Mint Hill, NC. Drop by the food is great and the prices are exceptional for the food quality.

Kaleidoscopic won the Ripley Website Award

Thu, 18 Aug 2011 22:57:00 -0400

Whoo Ho! Our website just won the "Ripley Website Award" at www.websitelaunchpad.com

I noticed the email come in and sat at my computer staring at it for a few seconds, wondering if there was good news or bad news. I finally opened the email and here's a little of what was in the message body:

Hi Michael Habenicht,
You are receiving this email because the website http://www.kaleidoscopicinc.com has just won the Ripley Award on Website Launchpad. The Ripley Award is only awarded to websites with visual design excellence. Well done!

Website Launchpad defines the Ripley Award as:
The Ripley Website Award is awarded for visual and creative excellence and is the second highest award to be won on Website Launchpad. To win one means your website must look very impressive!

I'm quite excited about winning this website design award.

Michael

Creative Design - It's what we do

Fri, 05 Aug 2011 18:10:00 -0400

Kaleidoscopic specializes in graphic design, illustrations, website design and web development.

If you're ready for creative graphic design to capture the eye of your audience, so they read your message and learn about your business, you've come to the right place. We design page layout for printed materials, such as brochures, booklets, advertising, product packaging, business marketing materials, trade shows, newsletters, point of sales, vehicle wraps, and practically anything else that can be printed.

We're also very creative illustrators, specializing in vector-based digital illustrations for logos, product renderings, character illustrations, mascots, website art elements, product branding and picture books... you name it, we can illustrate it.

In addition to graphic design and illustrations, we also design great looking websites, that not only look good - but function great and work hard for your business. When you choose Kaleidoscopic for your website design and web development needs - you can rest assured knowing your site will be search engine optimized and built to web standards to ensure there are no road blocks that would otherwise obstruct your website from being indexed by search engines. We have the web development skills, the experience and the right tools to create the web-based solutions your business needs.

Are you ready for creative and thoughtful design, excellent customer service and solutions that produce results? Let us know.

Creative Blast of Imagination

Fri, 05 Aug 2011 00:13:00 -0400

I was asked what made me decide to get into graphic design.

My reply was:

I love art and all things creative... whether it's a sketch, a painting, vector art, photography or literature. I'm also a color junkie and will stop for every beautiful sunset, rainbow, changing of the leaves, or a little blue tailed lizard hanging out on my front porch. I really dig figuring out how things work and how to make them better. I have a deep thirst to learn and better myself and my skills. With that said, I couldn't think of a job I'm better suited for, nor love more... everyday is a creative blast of imagination, color, adventure and wonder.

Leisure Travel Website Design

Tue, 26 Apr 2011 20:12:00 -0400

We're working on a new website design concept for a leisure travel website.

Our task is:

To design a travel agency website that is visually interesting.
A website that is search engine optimized so search engines can navigate past the site code and get to the good stuff... the message.
Develop a great message that site visitors will find interesting and enticing.
Develop the site to target specific markets and build awareness of the travel agency services offered.
A site our client can manage on their own, create new content, change out and post new photos, etc.
List travel vacation destinations, travel specials, etc.
List testimonials and photos sent in by clients of the travel agency.
Design and develop a new company logo.
Refresh the existing company brand.
And a few other things as well.

I met with our client last week and presented a rough sketch of the initial design concept to review and he seemed quite excited about what he saw. Very encouraging and I too am excited about working on this site, because I'll have the opportunity to do more graphic illustrations. I really dig illustrating art and a travel agency website is the perfect opportunity to get very creative on the design, but better yet the subject matter will be very interesting visually. This is going to be a fun website project to work on and I look forward to showing our client the finished illustrations we'll be rendering for his website.

Business Marketing, Without a Budget

Wed, 13 Apr 2011 15:38:00 -0400

Need to target your audience, but have a limited or no budget at all for marketing? Here's a tip on marketing that will only cost you a little time, and pay-out of a little of your product.

Hint: Social networks.

Sure, we've all heard about social networks and if you own a business, you probably already have a Twitter account, Facebook page and possibly set up your business location on Foursquare. You may be thinking, "this is nothing new". But have you been able to get you're Facebook Fans or Foursquare patrons to do your marketing for you?

Here's an example of how you can offer a little of your product as a reward and get your Fans and Patrons to market your business to their friends.

Example:

John owns an ice cream shop called the "Four Corner Creamery". John would like to make more people aware about his ice cream business, but has no budget for marketing. So John creates a Facebook account and a Facebook Page for his business the "Four Corner Creamery". John then creates a few signs asking his patrons to follow the "Four Corner Creamery" on Facebook. With every ice cream scoop purchased John makes his patrons aware of the Facebook Page he has created. As his Facebook Fans grows, John creates another sign that says, "Join us on Facebook and post a photo of your ice cream scoop with the "Four Corner Creamery" sign in the photo. The first person to post 20 photos of ice cream scoops wins a Quart of ice cream of their choosing."

John has now given his patrons an incentive to visit more often and they will help market his business by posting countless photos of ice cream scoops with his business sign in the pictures. His patrons who are on Facebook have friends and they will wonder... "why is Jane, posting so many ice cream scoop photos to their Facebook account". Jane's friend may ask why and learn about the chance to win a quart of ice cream. Jane's friend will probably want to visit the "Four Corner Creamery" to taste the ice cream first hand and to learn why Jane seems so ice cream crazy. Thereby Jane has helped market the "Four Corner Creamery" to all her friends and they too may begin snapping photos of their ice cream scoops for a chance to win a quart of ice cream as well.

Every few months John offers a chance to win a quart of ice cream. John's "Four Corner Creamery" Facebook Page now has many fans, so he makes announcements directly to his Facebook Page about a chance to win a quart of ice cream and tells on-site patrons as well. His "Four Corner Creamery" Facebook Page continues to grow in fans, more and more people learn about the "Four Corner Creamery" and when people see all those ice cream photos posted on all those personal Facebook pages... they're going to have to drop by and taste the ice cream at "Four Corner Creamery".

Visit again soon, for a tip on using Foursquare to market your business.

SEO - Search Engine Optimization

Mon, 28 Mar 2011 15:35:00 -0400

Search engine marketing SEM should only be considered after search engine optimization SEO.

Many search engine marketing (SEM) firms employ methods to drive customers to your website, through keyword stuffing, link building, content farms, web directory postings, etc. Many SEM firms do not improve on your website content, they simply try to build awareness of your brand, products, services to drive people to your website so they can measure the traffic they have driven to your website to validate the fees they charge.

SEM can help build awareness to your brand, products and services... However, driving people to your website only to leave them unimpressed with your message is a sure-fire way to drive them away as quickly as they arrived. Without quality content, a clear message on your website that speaks to your targeted audience, that keeps the site visitor engaged and interested in the products and services you offer, it's very likely they will leave and seldom or never return. This leaves you stuck in a cycle of continuously paying out to SEM firms to drive people to your website.

SEM doesn't naturally draw people to your website, it pushes people to your website. Therefore, SEM is not an effective long term solution and ultimately is a waste of money if you can not keep your website visitors engaged and drive sales.

Content is KING ... developing a clear and informative message about the services your business provides, why someone should choose your business over your competition and how they'll benefit, will perform much better than dropping $400.00 - $700.00 per month to a search engine marketing company who is driving visitors to a website that has nothing worth reading. In addition, without quality content and message, you're setting yourself up for an expensive SEM failure.

In addition Google recently changed their search algorithm (Feb 2011) and the old methods of SEM do not work as they did just a month ago. With the recent Google search algorithm changes - content is King.

Our Approach - search engine optimization SEO

Quality content - developing a clear and informative message about the products and services your business provides, why someone should choose your business over your competition, how they'll benefit.. tailored to target your markets.
Website code optimization - Optimizing and streamlining the code used on your website to remove road blocks that Google, Yahoo, Bing may have difficulty navigating past. Thereby, Google, Yahoo, Bing can easily navigate through your website's code and reach the good stuff... your website message, spend more time indexing your website's informative message about the products and services your business provides that will show up in search engines.
Rich content development - Keyword and Keyphrases written into your informative website message, tailored to target your markets. Thereby, naturally drawing in and attracting those who are really interesting in the products and services you offer through organic search engine results and building true - measurable site traffic.

Once your website has undergone quality search engine optimization SEO, a SEM strategy can actually be effective to build awareness of your brand, products and services. Once you site has undergone SEO, and if you are still interested in SEM, please contact us to discuss and develop a tailored SEM strategy and we'll also discuss cost effective tips on building brand, service and product awareness that you can achieve on your own.