Tuesday, 31 May 2011

Rezept-Destillate

05_02_11_a.jpg

An incredible packaging design for Swiss fruit spirits, based on the principle of "reduction to the pure essential":


'Rezept-Destillate is an assortment of different pure fruit spirits from a local Swiss producer. The packaging design reflects the process of distillation, during which the fruits are reduced to theirs flavor essences. This approach leads to a unique brand concept incorporating the context of pharmaceuticals at the beginning of the last century.


The labels refer to the periodic table and imply the products‚ elementary purity. Though simple technical solutions had to be found for its production, the design now evokes an impression of high class and exclusiveness."

The Dieline's Latest Top 10 Package Designs - TheDieline.com - Package Design Blog

1. PureProject Shoes

Sir Kensington's Ketchup Miniature Jars

05_02_11_sir1.jpg

You may remember Sir Kensington's Gourmet Scooping Ketchup from the last we featured it:


'We're excited to say that we've released the next version of these, which are 1.5oz miniature jars evoking the same aesthetic as the larger ones. Our intention was to create a compelling option for premium hotels, restaurants, and caterers to offer their customers in single-serve sizes. Though this exists in jams, jellies, and mustards, we simply didn't think it existed with ketchup.'

ALLOTINABOX


ilovedust created the packaging for this kit of implements and information on growing one's own food:


'ALLOTINABOX provides people of all ages and abilities with the knowledge and basics for growing their own food at home. We provide untreated, certified and organic seeds alongside other augmented products packaged within a beautiful GYO box delivered directly through the post.


Alongside the product proposition, customers are able to join and enjoy our online social community at www.allotinabox.com launching soon) where we encourage people of all abilities and capabilities to learn to sow, grow and network with other like minded growers.'

Adnams Southwold Bitter

05_03_11_adnams.jpg


CookChick Design has re-designed Adnams no.1 real ale brand. The re-design covers pump clips and take home packaging along with other launch & POS items.

Instant Comfort Pocket Boxes


Designed by Kim Welling, an illustrator from Netherlands.


Saké Jun Daiti


Linea Packaging, France was challenge by Diageo in Brazil to create a Sake packaging for their local brazilian market.


"The slender, blue tinted glass bottle and highly embossed black texts printed on a cream coloured textured label, firmly place Jun Daiti in the premium Saké category. The hand drawn visual of a Japanese samurai and the original Kanji calligraphy reinforce the authenticity of the product. "

Omine


Check out Stockholm Design Lab's contemporary take on Sake Packaging. The abstracted graphic of the grain/ grains on the bottles indicates the quality of the sake. In this case, less truly is more.


"Takeshi Akiyama is a exclusive sake manufacturer based in southern Japan. For generations, his family has produced sake in three qualities; Junmai, Junmai Ginjo, Junmai Daiginjo. The quality of the sake is determined buy the percentage of the original rice grain that is used in the brewing process. The lesser the better. And that is also the core idea of our design. The label on the bottle of the best quality sake, Daiginjo, only shows one single grain. The Unique White bottle has à traditional cap and screenprinted text. In addition to the bottles, we have created the corporate identity."

Current Lets its Bold Flag Fly

Current Logo, Before and After

Launched in 2005 by former Vice President Al Gore (before An Inconvenient Truth fame) and entrepreneur Joel Hyatt, Current TV was originally a pretty drastic model of programming, featuring user-generated 'pods' reflecting a broad range of topics and opinions that lasted anywhere from 3 to 10 minutes. You could tune in at any time of day and just jump right in into whatever was going on and not have to worry about following typically scheduled programming. This was the same year YouTube launched and before it went as big as it is now, so the concept was fairly ahead of the curve. Current gathered some initial attention but then it just kind of disappeared as the novelty wore off and despite hiring former MTV Networks' President Mark Rosenthal, toying with the idea of going public, and transitioning into 30- and 60-minute programming Current felt anything but. Enter Keith Olbermann, the love-him-or-hate-him, ex-ESPN anchor turned political commentator. In February Current announced that Olbermann would be taking his show, Countdown With Keith Olbermann, from MSNBC to their cable channel starting June 20. Reminiscent of when Howard Stern announced he would be leaving the broader air waves for SiriusXM, Olbermann's move to Current gave it instant relevance. Last week, Current quietly introduced a new look, launched the website for Olbermann's show, Countdown, and over the Summer will be implementing the new look. The identity has been designed by Wolff Olins with motion assistance by Ghava, the on-air look is by loyalkaspar, and web design by Code and Theory.

Logo animation, brought to life by Ghava. Click here to view.

Current


The previous identity was designed by Meta Design and Peter Saville and, at the time, the idea of a pixelated logo was somewhat forgivable despite the internet-sized cliché it represented. Six years later and the idea is inexcusable. Looking dated is an understatement. Current needed an extreme statement to indicate a completely new direction and almost erase its previous history to establish a new reputation. A flag, signaling they have arrived and that they stand for a specific kind of journalism, is exactly what they needed. And it looks awesome. Conceived as a moving logo first and static logo second, the execution is dynamic, bold, and innovative without feeling like it's trying hard to be cool and relevant. The black and white approach also gives it a sharp edge in contrast to all the colorful identities found on TV. The identity applications and on-air look are still limited but everything shows plenty of promise. So far, one of my favorite logos of the year.


Current


Current


Current


Current


Current


Current


On-air look by loyalkaspar, above.  

Vanguard promo, click here to view.

YouTube - Lynx Excite Angel Ambush London Victoria


Friday, 27 May 2011

Sarah AdamsCarnewas I



Sarah Adams


Carnewas I

Friday, 20 May 2011

Symmetry

Wednesday, 18 May 2011

Making Future Magic: Media Surfaces

the journey 1024x640 Making Future Magic: Media surfaces

Two video sketches made as part of a collaboration with BERG on the subject of Dentsu London’s philosophy.

These two films look at media surfaces and the different ways emerging for smart brands and companies to use them. In each film we imagine playful, polite examples for our clients and other companies.

Incidental Media looks at the plethora of surfaces in and around us at home, on the street, and in retail environments. The Journey focuses on the surfaces during and around train travel.

Père Lachaise

Funerary decorative detail from Père Lachaise cemetery, Paris.

Funerary decorative detail from a plot just away from the Avenue Transversal #2 in Père Lachaise cemetery, Paris.

Peter Booth

'frame book' by seok ho hwang + jung geun ahn + sang hyuck lee - 'FUJITSU design award 2011'


'frame book' allows users to multitask by enlarging various window layers on their PC according to application through touch pad gesture recognizing sensors which are on the sides of the frames.

How the Internet is Revolutionizing Education

albert-einstein2

As connection speeds increase and the ubiquity of the Internet pervades, digital content reigns. And in this era, free education has never been so accessible. The Web gives lifelong learners the tools to become autodidacts, eschewing exorbitant tuition and joining the ranks of other self-taught great thinkers in history such as Albert Einstein, Alexander Graham Bell, Paul Allen and Ernest Hemingway.


“Learning is not a product of schooling but the lifelong attempt to acquire it.” -Albert Einstein


10 years ago in April 2001, Charles M. Vest, the MIT President at the time, announced that the university would make its materials for all its courses freely available on the Internet. This initiative, found at OpenCourseWare, has enabled other teachers and lifelong learners around the world to listen and read what is being taught at MIT. 5 years later, in April 2006, UC Berkeley announced its plan to put complete academic courses on Apple’s iTunes U, beginning what is now one of the biggest collections of recorded classroom lectures in the world. One year later, in October 2007, the school launched UC Berkeley on YouTube. According to Benjamin Hubbard the Manager of Webcast at UC Berkeley, the school has had well over 120 million downloads since first sharing videos online, which they began doing in 2001.


He says, “I think there’s a wide array of reasons why faculty should be engaged in recording and publishing lectures online. The first is wanting students to have access to materials. The second is for cultivating a really great affinity for a public university that’s providing research and community service. The third is closely aligned with this opportunity to provide educational resources all over the world to those from all walks of life, despite what disadvantages they have faced. It’s so important that we recognize as a public institution that this is something people value greatly and has great value for us too.”


Both Yale and Stanford have followed suit, and even Harvard has jumped on board in the last two years. Open Yale features free and open access to a selection of introductory courses taught by distinguished teachers and scholars, supported by funding from the William and Flora Hewlitt Foundation. Outside of the U.S., some of the most selective universities in India have created a vast body of online content in order to reach more of the country’s exploding student population. At Stanford, you can freely “attend” The Stanford Mini Med School featuring 3 year long series of courses by more than thirty distinguished faculty, scientists and physicians.


The world’s encyclopedia is as weightless, free and instantly accessible as Wikipedia, which is quickly gaining legitimacy in the education sphere. Using the Internet, you can learn a new language or delve into the depths of metaphysics with just a click of a mouse. The Web has unlocked the keys to a worldwide virtual school, potentially leveling the playing field for students around the world.


Open Culture


Should knowledge should be open to all to both use and contribute to? Yes, and it’s this intuitive philosophy that forms the base of The Open Education Movement, which has been gaining momentum since 2006, the same year Dr. Dan Colman, launched Open Culture, the greatest free cultural and educational media website I’ve ever come across. Almost 5 years old, Open Culture is the largest database of free cultural and educational media in existence. Open Culture is edited by Colman who received his PhD from Stanford in 1997. After graduating from Stanford he worked at About.com in the early days, then later worked for the Stanford, Oxford, Yale Consortium. He now runs Stanford’s continuing education program and works on Open Culture in his spare time.


“I’m trying to bring the best good ideas to the rest of the world. There currently exists too much of a gap between the university world and the general public.” -Dr. Dan Colman


The site has two dimensions: First, it acts as a portal, collecting external links so users are able to access materials directly from the distributor, whether the media be on a site, YouTube or iTunes. Second, it includes blog-style content with 2-3 posts a day of handpicked media bites like “The Existential Star Wars: Sartre Meets Darth Vader.” Open Culture features over 350 courses in its collection: links to epic TED Talks, over 380 high quality streams of classic movies and tens of thousands of hours of audio book material. In fact, 50% of Open Culture’s collection is audio content.


In the future, Colman would like to implement a social feature so that users can rate certain classes and share those ratings. Most importantly, he wants to add what he calls “the critical element” to Open Culture and the Open Education Movement. How can users get feedback as if they were in a classroom? How can they receive due credit? And perhaps, how can we measure learning in this new way?


Khan Academy


With just a computer and a pen-tablet-mouse, one can educate the world! Even better, the content never goes old. My (or your) great-great-great grandchildren could learn from the very same videos! -Sal Khan, Founder of Khan Academy


Khan Academy is an online collection featuring over 2,100 educational videos ranging in intensity from 1+1=2 to college level calculus and physics. Khan Academy includes an important recording feature; every time you work on a problem or watch a video, the site remembers what you’ve learned and where you’re spending your time. It keeps all of this data private but exposes powerful statistics to each user. Coaches or tutors can also log into Khan Academy through Google or Facebook and track their students progress. Khan Academy’s knowledge map shows all of its exercise concepts.


Watch more about The Khan Academy here.



Academic Earth


Academic Earth is working its way up to being the Hulu of academic videos and courses. However, they don’t cover audio, which is a shame because a lot of courses are only taped and released in audio since it’s easier on the budget. Academic Earth features the videos on their site, as opposed to pushing you directly to iTunes if it’s available. How about watching an entire semester’s worth of lectures on Science, Magic and Religion from an esteemed UCLA professor? Check it out here.


P2PU


John Britton, now a developer evangelist at Twilio, spent his first year at RPI studying nuclear engineering, then switched to computer science. He quickly realized he didn’t like school, but not wanting to drop out, he had to game the system. He spent the next year in Spain learning the local language and customs. Upon returning, he set up an internship for himself at a company he launched, “faking the school out” as he says. Finally, when beckoned back to the books, he spent another year abroad in China; 3 months in Beijing and 9 months in Hong Kong. At the end of it all, with one semester left, he dropped out. He now has $60,000 in loans.


“I don’t like school. It’s why I’m working on starting my own.”

-John Britton, Entrepreneur and Unicycler


Britton now works with the founders of P2PU, “a grassroots open education project that organizes learning outside of institutional walls and gives learners recognition for their achievements.” P2PU’s Founders include Philipp Schmidt, Delia Browne, Stian Haklev, Neeru Paharia and Joel Thierstein.


“It’s kind of like couchsurfing but for learning,” says Britton. P2PU started in 2008 and launched its first 6 peer-based, free courses on 09/09/09. The courses had 15-20 people enrolled for 6 weeks. Each subsequent cycle, the number of courses nearly doubled. The most recent, 4th cycle had 60 courses with 20 people in each course. P2PU had to turn down nearly 70,000 additional people who applied.


Learn more about P2Pu here:




In the past year, they teamed up with Mozilla to create the P2PU School of Webcraft, a new way to teach and learn web developer skills. Classes are globally accessible, 100% free, and powered by learners, mentors and contributors. Their goal is to provide a free pathway to skills and certification to help people build careers on open web technology.


Skillshare


We were the first to write about Skillshare when the NYC startup launched in early April 2011. Simply put, Skillshare is a community marketplace that enables users to learn anything from anyone. Teachers can host classes anywhere, literally; classes are happening everywhere from NYC to Boston to San Francisco right now.


At the end of Sir Ken Robinson’s “Bring on the Learning Revolution” TED Talk, he encouraged everyone in the room “who represent extraordinary resources in business, in multimedia, and the Internet to combine technology with the extraordinary talent of teachers to revolutionize education. Not for ourselves but for the future of our kids.” I mean… who doesn’t want to make the world better for the kids? After watching this TED Talk it planted the seed and inspiration to really revolutionize education.


Last year, I played in the 2010 World Series of Poker (yes, completely random) for charity. I donated 100% of my poker winnings and got coached by some of the top professional poker players in the world. When I got back to NYC, my friends asked me to teach a class on what I learned, which is when everything clicked. And thus, Skillshare was born.

-Michael Karnjanaprakorn, Founder of Skillshare


So how does Mike K envision the future of education? He says, “Technology has the opportunity to completely disrupt education by democratizing learning. There’s something fundamentally wrong when a college degree can cost upwards of $100,000 when all of the information can be learned for free on Khan Academy. We need to go back to the true goal of education: learning new skills.” So what are you waiting for? Learn the basics of Ruby on Rails for $50 from the Chief Product Officer of DesignerPages.com or how to make chocolate for $40 from a holistic health and nutrition coach.


“Human communities depend upon a diversity of talent not a singular conception of ability.” -Sir Ken Robinson in his 2010 TED Talk


Scitable


Want to learn about genetics? Cell biology? Ecology? Scitable is a free science social network with a peer-reviewed on library built on top of it. The network, which launched in 2009, is a product of the Nature Publishing Group, one of the largest, most prestigious science publishers in the world. It’s dedicated to encouraging students to take part in science education and science in general, which is a huge problem today. In fact, science high school education has a depressing 40% attrition rate in undergraduate science students. The site, which has just over 1 million users, recently launched The Green Science and Science In Africa sections, as well as a mobile site.


Skype’s Role


As our Midwest Editor Alex Wilhem wrote earlier this year, without a doubt, technology has changed education in the classroom. And Skype’s global platform and massive user adoption makes it one of the most influential technologies in changing the reach of education.


Ever heard of “The Granny Cloud“? A professor of education technology at UK’s Newcastle University named Sugata Mitra, whose work inspired the film “Slumdog Millionaire,” decided he could use Skype to improve literacy and education around the globe by getting 200 story telling Grannies to read to children in India over Skype.


Jacqueline Botterill leads Skype’s CSR (corporate/social responsibility) initiatives for Skype in Europe. Skype in the Classroom, which launched March 30th, 2010, is one of the company’s first forays into the education sphere. ”We created Skype in the Classroom to help like-minded teachers collaborate on projects and share resources. Skype can connect children globally for shared learning experiences and is low-cost and simple to use,” she says. Since it’s launch over 12,000 teachers have signed up for Skype in the Classroom.


Betsey Sawyer, a middle school teacher in rural Groton, Massachusetts integrated Skype into her classroom to regularly connect students with an Afghan youth peace volunteer group. As part of her “Bookmakers and Dreamers club,” students ask questions about Afghanistan to their virtual pen pals, while sharing their own experiences in return. Already, the program of 10-17 year-olds has grown to 125 members.


Teach the World Online is using Skype to give young students in Haiti and Cambodia access to English teachers. The News Literacy Program is also using Skype so journalists can give guest lectures to students all over the world on how to sort fact from fiction in the digital age. At the moment, Skype is speaking with a number of different organizations that are trying to level the playing field of access to education.


Hungry for more? One of our favorite fellow tech reporters, Audrey Watters put together a list of 10 more open educational resources and OCW resources that you should know about including Smarthistory, a free and open multimedia website and OpenStudy, a social learning network.


But can the Internet really replace higher education?


As a journalist, I essentially creates my own courses and earn a living asking smart people provocative questions all day long. At this time, I’ve never been happier or more satisfied that I didn’t pay $150,000 to go to graduate school. However, I would hope that my gynecologist or dentist didn’t feel the same way.


There’s a lot of debate right now about whether or not paying for a degree is worth it, a particular problem facing entrepreneurs. TNW’s U.S. editor Brad McCarty recently wrote a piece titled, “Stay in or drop out? The entrepreneur’s education fiasco.” [Read it here.]


Entrepreneur Peter Thiel has recently sparked a big debate lately focused on: you don’t need to go to college, smart people should go out in the world and do.


Education is a bubble in a classic sense. To call something a bubble, it must be overpriced and there must be an intense belief in it. Housing was a classic bubble, as were tech stocks in the ’90s, because they were both very overvalued, but there was an incredibly widespread belief that almost could not be questioned — you had to own a house in 2005, and you had to be in an equity-market index fund in 1999. Probably the only candidate left for a bubble — at least in the developed world (maybe emerging markets are a bubble) — is education.


It’s basically extremely overpriced. People are not getting their money’s worth, objectively, when you do the math. And at the same time it is something that is incredibly intensively believed; there’s this sort of psycho-social component to people taking on these enormous debts when they go to college simply because that’s what everybody’s doing. It is, to my mind, in some ways worse than the housing bubble.


There are a few things that make it worse. One is that when people make a mistake in taking on an education loan, they’re legally much more difficult to get out of than housing loans. With housing, typically they’re non-recourse — you can just walk out of the house. With education, they’re recourse, and they typically survive bankruptcy. If you borrowed money and went to a college where the education didn’t create any value, that is potentially a really big mistake.


-Peter Thiel


Likewise, innovators such as John Britton, Sir Ken Robinson and Mike K of Skillshare, see the future of education as something of a necessary revolution, thriving on the powers of the Internet.


Education is going to move away from antiquated accreditation systems and towards a focus on real-world skills. Our vision is to unlock this knowledge and allow people to share their skills with those who want to learn them. Let’s be honest – by the time a college has a class on how to build an iPhone app or use social media to market your business, it’ll be completely outdated because the world is moving so fast.


-Mike K, Founder of Skillshare


But what do the academics have to say about this?


“I think courses on the Internet are a great way to continue learning and to acquire new information and new knowledge, but they only partially address furthering education. An education is more than just passively listening to lectures.”


-Dr. Dan Colman, Editor of Open Culture


Replace? Oh no. The Internet is an amazing tool. But it’s also a tool that’s built on the capabilities of the people who are using it. The Internet alone won’t be able to replace higher education. I’m looking to enhance the experience of the user whether they are sitting in their dorm room or half way around the world…I wouldn’t say hitting play and pause for an hour can replace the experience of being in the classroom and interacting with a faculty member but perhaps for a larger class size that’s less true…


We need a better integration between the videos we’re capturing in the classroom and the experience learners have when interacting in a social context. Online, you don’t get that same sort of feedback. What are the ways we can take the data about these videos and analyze that and understand if students are having trouble understanding something?


-Benjamin Hubbard, ETS, Manager of Webcast at UC Berkeley


So where does that leave us? To pay or not to pay for a quality education? Much of it depends on the job you want, but then again it always has. If you want to be a fireman, you don’t need to go to graduate school. But if you want to be an orthodontist, please don’t just watch YouTubes and practice pulling out cavities on your dog.


It’s clear that the world is moving faster than it ever has before. As we learn more about ourselves and more about the world around us through massive amounts of data collection and data transfer at ever increasing speeds, surely the foundations of learning must change too.


After all, it’s clear our current education system is broken, from the bottom up. If we’re going to continue to evolve as a species and as a culture, we’re long overdue for an education revolution.


The dogmas of the quiet past, are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise — with the occasion.


-Abraham Lincoln, December 1, 1862

Caroline UnderwoodPostcard



Caroline Underwood


Postcard

Typography & Graphic Work by Andaur Studios

unnamed ro53w0rgtg Typography & Graphic Work by Andaur Studios

Some absolutely stunning typography and graphic work. I really appreciate work like this. A lot of people may think it looks easy but it’s always the little things which really make it work, like the colours, the font, font size, letter spacing, shadows and more.


unnamed 1wpyx5zp3 Typography & Graphic Work by Andaur Studios


Go here for more — Typography & Graphic Work by Andaur Studios

Barbara and Antony













Love black and magenta wedding invitations? I do! These alluring pieces are by Antony Wilcock. [via FPO]|DBK

Tis the Season









These gorgeous gift wrap papers caught my eye this morning on Felt & Wire. Designed by Loop, an eco-conscious stationery and textile brand based in Philadelphia, this paper hits all the right notes—simple, modern, organic, and hand-drawn. What a great way to jump-start all that wrapping this season. |DBK

Will Travel with Serif

Whoa. This tote is a beauty. Enjoy the long weekend

(those of you who are stateside). [via swissmiss] |DBK

The 7 Social Media Marketing Essentials for Brands

Social-Media-Marketing2
Social media is changing in front of our eyes. It’s still a very new discipline but companies and brands are embracing it across the board in a number of ways. It can be easy to become distracted by all the new technologies and some people don’t know where to start or how to make a difference with their social media marketing.

With that in mind we wanted to create a list of seven key areas that we think all businesses and brands should be spending their time on. Yes the headings are broad and there are a hundred things you could be trying within each section but if you improved your company’s performance across these 7 areas you would start to see real tangible results. It can be easy to get caught up in all the hype and move from one platform to another trying to follow the trends but have a little focus, hone in on these clear goals and you will be in a far better place…

Internal Communications


The tools are available to help improve how you talk to each other within your company. Companies that communicate well internally will more often than not have far better results. I’m always amazed at the lack of communication internally but with a new range of tools available to us all there really isn’t any excuse any longer. Try out Yammer, Convofy, SocialCast, Campfire, Facebook groups or instant messaging tools like Skype or Google chat to get the best out of your company. The smart companies are adding a social layer to their entire business and putting as big a focus on internal communications as external comms. Make sure that your company has excellent social media guidelines to allow staff to talk about where they work and the benefits of working there. The days of control where upper management decided what was projected in to public domain about your company are long gone and every single one of your staff now have a voice thanks to social media.

Branded Content


It’s not enough trying to create engaging updates or throw up the odd picture on social media channels. If you are really serious about engaging with a community you’ll need to start thinking about branded content and how to seed it within the communities that you have access to. This could be anything from videos and websites to blogs or podcasts and the most important thing about branded content is creating something that the consumer has genuine interest in. We all know how to filter ads out these days and the savvy consumer is looking for new ways to engage with brands. Content should be at the very center of everything you do and spending time and money developing branded content is a route most brands and businesses should be going down. If you want to see the masters of branded content have a look at this video or others from Red Bull. Now you won’t have their budgets for creating content but it’s an important part of social media now and one your company should be trying to engage with.



Stunning Customer Service


There is no reason why you should’t be talking to your customers in this day and age. The tools are there from Twitter and Facebook to Linkedin or forums and the smart brands are talking to their customers and solving problems to build positive word of mouth. The businesses doing this well are actually being proactive via social media channels and finding the problems and putting out the fires before they go any further. The upside of creating advocates through stunning social media customer service is that they all have the power to tell 100s of friends about their positive experiences. Being proactive and engaging with your customers on 3rd party channels rather than waiting for them to come to you is the key.

Ignore Facebook At Your Peril


Websites come and go. Look at Myspace and Bebo as classic examples. Many think Facebook will have a similar fall from grace one day and that we will move on to the next big thing but to think like that would be foolish. You need to think of Facebook not as a website but as a platform which will become as important as the internet or Google itself. Facebook is starting to force it’s way on to websites, it’s being built in to the core of mobile phones and soon you’ll be buying stuff through there and it will influence search results. Facebook is not going away any time soon and while you should always have a broad approach and not have all your eggs in one basket I’d advise people to spend a decent percentage of their time and money marketing via Facebook. It’s only going to get bigger and more important.



Transparency


It’s getting harder and harder to spin a story about your company that is not accurate or glosses over the truth. Brands and businesses have to be more transparent than they ever have in the past and consumers and the man in the the street has as much say in a brand as people working within the company. It’s a seismic shift away from the days when control was key and the message could be tailored to suit the goals of the company. There have been countless social media disasters and many of them arise from companies trying to bend the truth or cover something up. Social media is bringing a whole new level of transparency to business and for the consumer that can only be a good thing.

Adapting To Technology And Being Nimble


Trends change in social media circles quicker than you could imagine. While it is important not to jump from trend to trend without achieving anything it’s also important to be nimble and have your marketing strategy evolve over time. In the past placing an advert in a newspaper was always pretty much the same process but marketing on Facebook can change from week to week as the platform evolves. Twitter doesn’t even have an effective ad platform yet but chances are you could be using it next year. You need to look at new platforms like the tablet computer which although less than 2 years old is creating a seismic shift in our online habits. These new technologies and platforms seem to come out of nowhere and they can change entire industries within a year so be nimble and evolve your strategy because consumers might not always be in the same place.

Mobile Mobile Mobile


If you don’t have some sort of mobile strategy for your business or brand then you better start moving fast. Consumers are moving away from newspapers and magazines and embracing smart phones and tablets. Have a look around at other people on the next bus or train you are on and you’ll see people peering in to their mobiles. People are finding deals on the go and they are researching products on their mobiles. We’re only at the very start of this journey and as tools like location aware advertising and local deals take hold over the next year it’s clear that you would be a fool if you hadn’t at least started to put some thought in to the area of mobile.

The Right Medicine







I have no idea what I would use these for, but I want them all. Three Potato Four is selling these antique medicine bottles in sets of three, chock-full of 1900s typography and design. Hmmm... they would make great vases, wouldn't they? |DBK