Written By: Patrick on March 10th, 2010
Too many social media marketing and website design companies don’t follow their own advice. That’s not cool! We’ve been pretty good about embracing the same things we suggest to our clients- web standards website design, getting involved in social media, and creating web video that properly positions your brand in the marketplace, to name but a few common themes. But even we fell down on something, until recently: our website didn’t fully work on an iPhone.
Well, to be fair, our website is so well-coded and well-designed that 99% of the website displayed perfectly on an iPhone or iPad. But, 99% isn’t enough for a company that’s pushing its clients to embrace the new web and mobile space. The problem was, our video on our homepage is Flash-based. This is great if you’re on a desktop PC or Mac, and it’s even OK on a number of mobile devices. But Flash doesn’t work on the iPhone and it doesn’t work on the iPad. While devices like this are only a small percentage of your website’s visitors, it’s good to support everyone you can.
So, we created a new website called m.patrickortman.com. You can visit it, even if you’re not on an iPhone, to see how it works. You’ll notice it looks and performs almost exactly like our “main” website. That’s cause we’re supercool, and it’s because we want to give those who have embraced rich media devices like the iPhone a web experience that’s equal to what they’d get if they were tethered to a clunky “oldschool” computer. From now on, if you visit www.patrickortman.com and you’re on an iPhone or iPad, you’ll automagically get the new mobile website.
And you know what the Kool Aid man would say about that: “Ohhh YEAH!”.
Awesome array of Kool-Aid Photo
Written By: Patrick on March 4th, 2010
Attention 99.5% of all businesses on planet earth- everything’s changed again! If you haven’t noticed, and adjusted how you do business accordingly, you’re probably on your way to becoming irrelevant. If you want to succeed online today, your business must take a holistic approach towards your digital marketing.
What’s a holistic digital marketing plan? It’s what Aristotle was talking about when he was prattling on about how “the whole is more than the sum of its parts”. Here’s a few common ingredients to a well thought out holistic digital marketing program:
What’s Your Story?
There’s a reason we promote PatrickOrtman, Inc. as a collective of digital storytellers. We’re not just design freaks or tech-heads, we’re a bunch of people who thrive on helping our clients tell their stories in a digital age. That’s important, because people have been educating and entertaining each other with stories since caveman days. Storytelling is how we relate to each other, it’s how we relate to the world. It’s truly amazing and somewhat frightening to me that most companies spend huge amounts of money on traditional and digital marketing without taking the time to figure out their stories. What makes your company unique? Why do you stand out from the competition?
Once you have your company’s story sussed out, it’s time to (more…)
Written By: Patrick on February 24th, 2010
Typography is important. Blame it on sIFR- the original scalable Inman Flash Replacement for text on websites. It was a little clunky, it was often hard to implement, but it looked freakin’ cool. Web designers everywhere began implementing text replacement in the headers of their websites, and suddenly the web looked a lot better. Plus, it degraded pretty well if your browser didn’t support Flash. First, do no harm, right?
These days there are other text replacement alternatives that are a bit easier to use, like Cufon and Typekit. We use them both, depending on the client and their audience. These technologies let designers take typography on the web to the next level, and they help bridge the “design gap” between Flash-based and web standards based website designs. And that’s a very good thing, seeing as Flash-based websites kind of suck from a usability and maintenance standpoint.
If you’re a designer, you need to know about typography on the web. Go beyond Arial and Verdana, get creative, and watch your websites blossom!
Gap photo by The Lab
