I must admit I had my team queued up to tackle this as a project. We had wireframes, etc. Then it hit me where is the value added? I couldn’t answer my own question so we shelved the project. For those of you who don’t know what I mean here are a few examples of […]
Starting a client project right
We have been honing our skills at taking on clients over the last year so I wanted to share a few documents that help us get off to the right foot. New client marketing survey ( send this before first meeting to get their ideas) Project service agreement ( this doc is kind of overkill […]
Charging for web services in higher ed – rev gen
Lots of people ask what its like to run a pay to play or revenue generating shop. I tell them it is a double-edged sword. We do charge here, we charge per project. We will work with pretty much anyone on campus assuming they have the budget. We have to charge because we have so […]
On branding
I have worked with many groups recently that have problems comprehending what a brand is. Here is a simple attempt to help As I tell others I don’t expect people to need to understand the ins and outs of branding. Same as I don’t expect someone to know how to make sausage. I just expect them to consume it. […]
Dealing with social media trolls
Maybe it is because the holidays brings out the best in us all, but I have seen a lot of people talking about how do deal with negative people AKA trolls on social media. I would suggest taking the approach that many universities have which is to make a social media response guide. The first […]
Mobile sites, apps and responsive – oh my
I have seen a lot of people struggling with mobile apps, sites and responsive recently. A lot of people get caught up on the shiny object of an app but in most cases an app is not the solution. My thoughts are app, if done at all should be done last for a few reasons […]
FIU Calendar now open sourced
Since I know people are always looking for calendars I thought I would mention that we just open sourced ours today Here is a live example http://calendar.fiu.edu/ Here is the github repo https://github.com/fiuwebteam/Calendar We would love to be able to collaborate with other institutions to make this a stronger tool. For those of you here […]
Change agent manifesto: how to build web culture on campus
We have made great strides in the web community here on campus. I decided to write a proposal to speak at the HighEdWeb conference on the topic so I have been reflecting on how the community has grown and how we can continue to grow the FIU web community. Proposal Here is the proposal I […]
Dont forget your website is still there – Post site launch checklist
Your site launch has come and past and our course you used our site launch checklist. But now you need to be sure to keep on top of your site so it doesn’t become dated and unfunctional. So that that ends we created a post site launch checklist. Our list includes but is not limited to: View […]
Inbound linking strategy to get to the top listing on google fast
Approximately 1 week ago we launched a site for our client the FIU President’s Council. This was a brand new site starting from scratch, not an existing site. We had great on-page SEO, meaning we have page titles, meta tags, headers etc. But for a site that is undiscovered or not yet relevant, even the best […]