OnYourMark, LLC Blog

In Fond Memory of
Lloyd R. Klein

October 1932 - February 2008

“He will live on in the hearts of everyone that loved him and will never be forgotten.”

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Klein, Lloyd R. Age 75, of Black River Falls, formerly of New Berlin. Found peace on Friday, February 29, 2008. Devoted father of Keith (Cindy) Klein, Karen (Tom) Onasch, Debbie Klein and Kim (Dave) Nyenhuis. Loving grandfather of Aaron, Erika, Chad, Justin, Ryan, Nathan, Kathryn, Megan, Danielle, Jordyn and Hayley. He is also survived by a great many friends. He was preceded in death by Shirley, his wife of 34 years, and his sister, Esther Klein. Lloyd was a decorated Korean War veteran and a member of the New Berlin’s VFW Post. He was self-employed for over 50 years as a construction contractor and retired from New Berlin School District. He had a vision for his work and the craftsmanship to execute that vision. Visitation will be held on Wednesday, March 5, from 5-7 PM, AT CHURCH AND CHAPEL, 15250 W. NATIONAL AVE., NEW BERLIN. Services will begin at 7 PM. The family invites friends to CHURCH AND CHAPEL IN NEW BERLIN at 10 AM on Thursday, March 6, for procession to Highland Memorial Park Cemetery for Graveside Services with Military Honors. A special thank you to the staff of Pro Health Hospice Care and AngelsGrace Hospice. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions to the New Berlin Veterans Memorial or AngelsGrace Hospice. Dad, you are loved by many and will be missed by all. CHURCH AND CHAPEL 15250 W. National Ave (262) 827-0659 Obit - Condolences - Directions View Memorial slide show at: www.churchandchapel.comView and sign online guestbook

Your website’s ICRA tag has been updated as your value-added service for February 2008. The Internet Content Rating Association (ICRA) allows webmasters to create a tag identifying how much adult or profane content appears on a website. Rating categories include profanity, nudity, violence, sexual material, profanity and substance abuse. Over the years, ICRA has expanded the definitions of these items in its rating system. New categories for user-generated content have been added, covering forums and chat rooms.

Almost all of our clients sites had zeros in their ICRA tags, which means there is no questionable material on the sites. We expected this as we created the new tags… OnYourMark, LLC will not host sites with offensive content.

Some sites received slightly different ICRA tags because they had forums or other features where users can submit content. This doesn’t mean the sites have offensive content. If outside contributors can submit content, there may be a chance that offensive content appears on the website. Our own theBubbler.com allows members to submit content, but we strictly monitor the site to ensure content being posted is family friendly.

Why does a website need a tag even if it has no offensive content? Parents and businesses often use software to monitor Internet use. The software may use ICRA tags as part of its content filtering system. If no ICRA tag is found, the software may block the site simply because it can’t determine what kind of content the site features. An ICRA tag tells the software your site is safe for everyone.

We have renewed all client banner ad campaigns on theBubbler.com for 2008 as your value-added service for December 2007. Your site’s 468 x 60 animated banner will show at the top of the page in one category. Your 125 x 125 animated banner will appear a minimum of 50,000 times, in random rotation, throughout theBubbler.

An “impression” is a view. When a page comes up and a set of eyeballs sees it, that’s an impression. We are proud to have the highest ranked Wisconsin web guide and directory for traffic as our vehicle to show off your ads.

This month we are enhancing all client website listings in theBubbler.com’s Wisconsin Directory to include your address and keywords. Adding keywords improve your chances of being found by searchers on theBubbler. When a searcher views your website’s listing, a map will show your location.

Enhanced listings on theBubbler.com are included as part of the hour per month of maintenance provided with your website hosting and email service.

This month’s Pro is Christian Kocinski, Video Developer at OnYourMark, LLC. Christian offers advice for planning your corporate video.

When you decide to do a corporate video, you need to think about what you want your video to represent. Your company of course, but besides that… what about your company are you interested in showing? Do you have a particular product worth mentioning, or is it a service that you provide? In either case, what is your main focus of your video?

When you start to develop ideas, the best place to start is your website and current marketing materials. Your video should help enhance your website and existing fulfillment materials. Your video can have a similar look and feel as your website and literature, making them go hand in hand. Look at the most important information presented on your website and print pieces; this information should be referenced in your video.

Once you have gotten your ideas put together, start organizing your thoughts. Create an outline of what you want to show and the order it should be shown in. Starting on paper, brainstorming and creating a flow of ideas will help to solidify your plan before a camera crew is hired or tape starts rolling. We’ll work from these thoughts to develop your script and shot list. This way everything will fall into place throughout the entire process.

The first few minutes of your video are the most important. These moments of the video will determine whether the customer will move on or keep watching. It’s important to grab viewers right away. Once you have them hooked you can start to show them specifics, go into greater detail and show examples of why they should select you or your product. Starting with an overview of your company gives viewers or prospective customers a chance to learn a little bit more about you.

Breaking down your video into sections is a great way to create a flow. Ease one section into another to keep the viewer’s attention level up. If your video spends too much time on one section, or one specific thing, the viewer may start to lose interest. Breaking your video up into smaller sections will help eliminate this.

Once you have your outline, decide how long you would like to spend on each section of your video. Keep in mind your ultimate time goal. If you only want to make a five-minute video, decide what items are worth keeping and what items can be cut. What items do you want to spend more time on, and what items do you want to spend less?

From there you can begin to write the voice over. We’ll help! The outline and voice over script are a starting point for deciding what shots will be taken. Devote time to carefully planning the voice over, or narration, and to reviewing our recommendations. We use a stop watch to determine if you are over or under your time goal. The more you do in pre-planning, the more time and money will be saved in the end.

Overall, always keep your goals in mind. What do you want your video to say about you? With that and early planning, you can have a successful corporate video.

See Videocracy.com.

What would you like to ask the pro? Email your questions to askthepro@OnYourMark.com!

This month’s Pro is Kate Hodgkinson, Marketing Assistant Intern at OnYourMark, LLC. Kate offers tips for incorporating blogging into your marketing.

Our blog at Videocracy highlights industry trends, new video services at OnYourMark and personal anecdotes from our videographer.

The term BLOG is derived from “web log” which is viewed by many as an online journal. These days, it is usually more time efficient to type one’s thoughts rather than taking the time to write them down. Log in, type, post: that’s all it takes.

Did you ever stop to consider the benefit of blogging as a marketing tool? The ease of logging in, typing and posting could be applied to your business’ marketing plan to return great results. Did you know there are people today who get paid JUST to blog?

Using a blog as a marketing resource has the potential to set off a chain of important events. By using a blog that is rich in keywords, it can be found through search engines. When reading your blog, potential customers should not feel pressured to buy.

Your blog should be somewhat informal, as if they were reading a post from a friend. Make viewers comfortable with your company by helping them feel like they’re reading something that wasn’t copied and pasted from a company brochure. Your blog MUST have great content. You want them to read all of it rather than skim through it quickly, don’t you? Intrigue them - give them enough information to make them curious enough to click on that link to your website. At this point, whether they buy or do not buy, your marketing has proved successful in getting potential customers to your website.

Tip from Keith Klein, Author of WebForging: Great selling means making it easy for buyers to buy from you.

Recent blog posts are featured on the Register Success homepage, adding current content to the site.

With your blog increasing traffic to your website, there is now the potential to increase sales. Make sure your website is updated and doing its job! They’ve clicked on your website link for more information, so be sure the information they’re looking for is available and as easily accessible as the blog was.

Writing one good blog isn’t enough. A key factor to blogging is constantly updating. In order to build credibility you need to appear committed. Do you have a new product you’re excited about? Do you have upcoming events? Blog it! Make your blog one that people will come back to and read. Establish yourself in the blogging community. If readers post comments or responses to your blog, answer them and let them know they’ve been heard. This gives you bonus points in the customer service spectrum.

Not only can your blog drive web traffic to your site and establish your company name, but a good blog opens the doors for “viral marketing” as well. First, you gain the benefit of free (or inexpensive) marketing through your blog, and then you gain the benefit of completely free marketing through blog readers! Friends or colleagues are discussing something related to your company, someone has read and been impressed by your blog, and they speak up. A customer, or potential customer, has just expanded your audience at no cost to you.

So after all this talk about how successful blogging as a marketing tool can be, you wonder “How do I write a good blog?”

• Write your blogs in your own distinct voice - Sound like a human, not a machine.
• Make them interesting - Why buy the cow if you can get the milk for free? Don’t give away every detail of your company in your blog. If they have all the information right there in front of them, why would they want to explore your website? When all else fails, K.I.S.S. (Keep It Simple Sweetheart)
• Update it constantly - Respond to comments from readers, keep them up to date with new occurrences, check in to reiterate your message.
• Make sure they’re rich in keywords - Identify your target market and think of terms they would search for. This will ensure you’re getting the right people to your blog.

For more info, be sure to check out OnYourMark, LLC’s blogging resources!

The Beginner’s Guide to Corporate Blogging

(General Resource for New Bloggers)

www.corporateblogging.info/basics/corporatebloggingprimer.pdf

WebLoggers.org

(Online Community for New and Experienced Bloggers)

www.webloggers.org

Blog Tutorials

www.onyourmark.com/view.php?id=190

What would you like to ask the pro? Email your questions to askthepro@OnYourMark.com!

This month’s Pro is Ellen Rohr, Operations Manager at OnYourMark, LLC. Ellen offers resources for obtaining digital images without infringing on copyrights.

Photos and images are essential to a website. They add interest, excitement and brand awareness. Here is some important terminology to know about photos:

Copyrighted photos are exclusive to their owners and cannot be used without the owner’s permission. Most photos found on the web will have a copyright. The World Intellectual Property Organization has extensive information on photography and legal issues.

Many of us turn to Google’s Image Search or Flickr to find photos. While these sites can retrieve photos on any topic, the photos are usually copyrighted. Google Images photos are pulled from websites across the Internet or posted by users. They belong to the photographers, users, webmasters, site owners or companies that own and operate the websites. Google even posts a warning on its results pages: Image may be scaled down and subject to copyright.

Flickr’s Community Guidelines specifically address use of copyrighted images:

Don’t upload anything that isn’t yours.
This includes other people’s photographs and/or stuff that you’ve collected from around the Internet. Accounts that consist primarily of such collections may be terminated at any time.

RULE OF THUMB: If you didn’t personally take the photograph, chances are you may have to ask permission before use.

If you do find an image on the web and want to use it, check the website’s copyright policies. If nothing is posted, that does not mean there is no copyright on it. The absence of a notice in works published on or after March 1, 1989, does not necessarily indicate that the work is in the public domain. Use the site’s contact form or an email to contact the owner. Often photographers are happy to share photos… as long as you ask and receive permission. Even if you use the photo and cite the source, you are risking copyright infringement if you have not received permission to use it.

Public Domain images are uncopyrighted, uncopyrightable or have a copyright that has expired. Stock.XCHNG and PDphoto.org are popular sources of free images. Photographers post their work to these sites and allow others to use the photos. While the image use is free, some photographers will ask to be notified or credited if their image is used in a public work. More free photo sources can be found at myBackgrounds.com or in theBubbler forums under Tons of Free Stock Photo Images.

Royalty Free photos can be purchased for web or print use. The purchaser can use the photos as often as allowed according to the source’s license terms. Some licenses allow up to a set number of uses, while others allow unlimited use of the photo.

iStockphoto, Getty Images and Photos.com offer royalty free images for sale. Prices and subscriptions vary widely. iStockphoto charges more for high-resolution images; a better investment because they can be used in print and on the web. Photos.com is a subscription service. Users can download up to 250 photos per day and subscribe for as little as $99.95 for one month.

A royalty-free image from PDphoto.org

Royalty free and public domain photos do not guarantee exclusive use. If you purchase an image for your website from iStockphoto, your competitor can also purchase that image and use it. The only way to guarantee exclusivity is to have custom photography done by a professional photographer.

The bottom line is simple… read disclaimers, terms of use, licensing agreements and copyright policies before using any photo you find online!

Links Mentioned in this Article:

• wipo.int/sme/en/documents/ip_photography.htm
• images.google.com
• flickr.com
• flickr.com/guidelines.gne
• sxc.hu
• pdphoto.org
• mybackgrounds.com
• thebubbler.com/modules.php?name=Forums
• istockphoto.com
• creative.gettyimages.com
• photos.com
• videocracy.com/photoservices.php

What would you like to ask the pro? Email your questions to askthepro@OnYourMark.com!

This month’s Pro is Mike Weinand, Web Application Developer at OnYourMark, LLC. Mike explains what Web 2.0 is all about.

Web 2.0 (pronounced “web two-point-oh” or “web two-dot-oh”) is a concept that means different things to different people. To designers, it means new, more modern graphics for websites. For developers, it means focusing on interactivity. For users, Web 2.0 means participation.

Web 2.0 is the transformation from browsing the web to participation in the web. New technologies allow web content to be decided by its users. Instead of proprietary sources providing news, content or search results, Web 2.0 is driven by user submitted stories. Blogging and RSS feeds allow users to send and receive content faster than ever. Consider the differences between these Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 sites:

Site Type	Web 1.0	Web 2.0
Information	Encyclopaedia Britannica - Information is updated by a few in the know	Wikipedia - Anyone can add and update content
Search	Google Search - Results are determined by a proprietary ranking system	del.icio.us - Results are based on sites users have “tagged” as relevant to the searched topic
News	CNN.com - Content is created by CNN journalists	Digg.com - Top ranked stories are voted on by Digg users
Advertising	DoubleClick - Offers advertising for web publishers to place on their sites; requires extensive campaign maintenance and is geared towards large websites	Google AdSense - Self-serves ads based on a page’s content, can be used on any size of website

Web 2.0 sites implement new technologies such as AJAX to make the user experience more enjoyable. One example of this is Google Spreadsheet, which allows multiple users to edit the same document at the same time. Cascading style sheets (CSS) allow web designers to use colors and images more effectively on the web.

Web 2.0 affects online advertising and internet marketing. Instead of paying per impression when advertising online, it is now possible to pay per action. Advertising avenues such as pay-per-call are being tested. Marketing websites via blogs, forums and other social networking methods bring word-of-mouth advertising to the web.

Is your website Web 2.0 functional, or making strides to get there? There are many things you can do to bring your site into the Web 2.0 world:

• Redesign: Does your site look outdated, or does it not match your current literature and print media? It may be time for a face lift.
• Content Updates: Use your website’s blog to post company news, press releases, MSDS, industry articles and more. A big part of Web 2.0 is keeping your site current.
• Video: If a picture is worth a thousand words, what is a video worth? Show your products in action and provide tutorials with online video.
• Social Networking: “Tag” your site with tools like Digg and del.icio.us. Offer social networking on your website via forums or user-updateable photo galleries.

The web is no longer a one way street, and we are always happy to help you take your website to the next level.

Links Mentioned in this Article:

• britannica.com
• wikipedia.org
• google.com
• del.icio.us
• cnn.com
• digg.com
• doubleclick.com
• google.com/adsense
• en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajax_(programming)
• docs.google.com/
• facebook.com
• en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pay-per-call

What would you like to ask the pro? Email your questions to askthepro@OnYourMark.com!

This month’s Pro is Kristen Day, Web Developer at OnYourMark, LLC. Kristen offers tips to make website content and image additions faster and more cost-effective.

Recently I attended a luncheon for the Health Care Public Relations & Marketing Society on effective print advertising. A segment of the session was devoted to the best ways to submit content and images to your graphic designer. While many in the audience were surprised to learn that Microsoft Word often hinders quick print production, I couldn’t help but smile. Many of the do’s and don’ts in the print world also apply to websites.

Website Content

At OnYourMark, LLC, we ask for website content in a digital format. Why? When we receive a digital document (Word documents, text files, PDFs), we can easily extract the text and format it for the web. When we receive a hard copy, we have to add additional time to type the content, proof for typos and then format it. We would much rather spend our time and your money making fantastic websites, not typing!

If you have existing printed literature, first seek the original electronic files. If you can’t get those, have a staff member type the content before submitting it. We can accept many formats, but plain text or rich text files (mycontent.txt, mycontent.rtf) are the easiest to work with. Microsoft Word documents (mycontent.doc) have many default text formatting features that often mangle text when it is extracted from the Word document. While we have both Macs and Windows machines in our shop, a shop with Macs only will not even be able to open a Word file. Plain text, rich text and PDFs are friendly to both Macs and Windows workstations.

PDFs usually work well for submitting content, but we are not always able to extract text from a PDF file. If a PDF was saved as one large image, the text in the file will be flattened and behave just as a photo would. If the PDF was saved to preserve the content as text, we can easily remove it. For extensive PDF documents, such as technical manuals, it may be best to put them online as a PDF instead of a traditional HTML webpage. When the PDF document changes, uploading the latest version is faster than updating HTML pages by hand.

If you do not have digital content available, or the time to type it, please submit your content anyway! One of the biggest hold-ups on websites going live is the webmaster waiting for content. We will work with you to get the content web-ready.

Website Images

Whenever possible, digital versions of logos and photos are best. If you only have prints of your logo or photos, we can scan them but quality may be affected. When a page is scanned, we have to take the resulting scan and crop it to grab the logo or photos we need. In the case of a logo or an image that shows a background behind it, tedious hand-editing in Photoshop is often needed to remove the background. One of my favorite areas of graphic design is photo or logo restoration, but it is definitely time consuming!

If you do not have a digital version of your logo or have an outdated version that was done years ago in MS Paint, it is worth investing in logo recreation. A version of your logo done as a vector graphic can be reused in print, on the web, as vehicle graphics and more. Vector graphics are made up of points that define lines and curves, allowing them to be resized without losing proportion or detail. Having a vector graphic available for all of your vendors also aides in the consistent use of your logo and branding.

For digital images, we can work with high resolution and low resolution photos, though higher resolution images are preferred. Having descriptive file names on your images is also handy. Digital cameras usually name photos with numbers (000_012.jpg, 000_013.jpg). Renaming the files with descriptive text helps you (and us) know what the photos are about (blue_widget_628a.jpg). We have a tutorial online to help you with creating filenames (onyourmark.com/tutorials). If you have a handful of small photos, emailing them to us will be fine. For a large catalog of digital photos, mailing a CD is best. It is also best to submit the individual photo files, not to insert them in a Word document and submit that!

Making a high resolution image smaller preserves detail.	Making a low resolution image larger distorts the image.

What would you like to ask the pro? Email your questions to askthepro@OnYourMark.com!

This month’s Pro is Ryan Klein, Systems Administrator at OnYourMark, LLC. Ryan offers ways to research new technology online.

Learning about technology online can be a tricky task. This is not for the lack of information on the Internet by any means, but the lack of direction on where to look. Over the years I have stumbled upon some pretty in-depth sites to learn about the latest and greatest in technology. They range from a general overview of a technology or product to a detailed writing and background with future outlook.

Product and Software Reviews
If you are interested in learning about a new product or software, the manufacturer’s or developer’s website is the place to start. To highlight these points, here are two examples. If I was looking for information about the upcoming Apple iPhone, I would first look at Apple’s website (www.apple.com/iphone). If I was looking for information on Microsoft Office, I would look at Microsoft’s website (office.microsoft.com). Manufacturer’s and developer’s websites will most often carry the technical specifications of the product along with all of the positive reviews.

For very good, (usually) unbiased opinions, CNET (www.cnet.com) provides technology reviews on manufactured or developed products. CNET’s staff of very intelligent writers that break down the ins and outs of a product in language that is comfortable for everyone (not just the geeks in the crowd). A very helpful tool on CNET’s website is the rating system they use. Not only does the writer have a rating, but the community chimes in and rates the product or software according to their real world experiences.

ZDNet (www.zdnet.com) is a bit more on the technical side, giving the ins and outs of an item but also a history of the product and its technical features. I go to ZDNet when I am looking for the latest news in the larger networking and technology fields.

Ars Technica (www.arstechnica.com) gives some very long and almost painfully detailed reviews, coverage, pros and cons, suggestions and much more. It is based around a news site but does do reviews on current ‘hot items’ that have been much talked about. I strongly suggest going to Ars Technica if you are looking to not only learn about technology but to learn about the current state of technology, the tech community and its effect on the world.

Technical Documentation and Tutorials
Of course, the most commonly used form of obtaining information online today is via search engines. Lets look at a practice example of using Google (www.google.com) to learn about the Ruby programming language. When putting in search terms, you want to be somewhat specific. I searched with “ruby programming language” instead of “ruby” to avoid getting information on gemstones.

Now I browse through what Google returned to me. The first result is from the official Ruby home page (www.ruby-lang.org), the second is from Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_programming_language) detailing the history of Ruby, the creator, versions and just about everything else I want to know about Ruby. The third result is a beginners tutorial on how to start programming Ruby.

Search engines may direct you to documentation websites or forums related to your search. Documentation websites like the Linux Documentation Project (www.tldp.org) contain extensive how-to guides and frequently asked question (FAQ) pages. Forums such as our own WebLoggers (www.webloggers.org) are topical discussion boards that allow users to post questions, answers and other messages related to a topic.

If you are looking to learn about technology, a search engine combined with good results is going to be the single most effective way to learn about any subject. Technology can be a wonderful new science but extremely overwhelming at times. But, if you take your time to do some research, you can learn a lot about a lot of technologies in a very short amount of time. If you have any resources you wish to suggest to me, please feel free to email me at ryan@OnYourMark.com.

Links Mentioned in this Article:

• www.apple.com/iphone
• office.microsoft.com
• www.cnet.com
• www.zdnet.com
• www.arstechnica.com
• www.ruby-lang.org
• en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_programming_language
• www.google.com
• www.tldp.org
• www.webloggers.org

What would you like to ask the pro? Email your questions to askthepro@OnYourMark.com!