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• Considering the ROI of social media

  Friday, July 16, 2010

  Increasingly, the buzz is that every company--regardless of its industry focus--is a media company*. That reflects what we are hearing from clients as well. In working with a City of Portland agency whose focus is urban development, a company executive described the agency as a media-producing organization. That's a change from the recent past where this agency was largely concerned with financing City development projects. But given the changing business landscape, to achieve and maintain relevancy, organizations understand that they must be content-producing or else fade away.

  In recent years, social media has been positioned as The Answer for any number of business challenges. Want to enhance your company's brand? Social Media. Want to drive more interest? Social Media. Interested in customer loyalty? Social Media. Why is this? Partly, it's because everybody is engaging in social media, so it stands to reason that online tactics must adapt to these trends somehow and participate in this sort of discussion or get lost in the crowd. Partly, it's because of data. Some data show increased site traffic following social media programs, or certainly an increase in brand awareness can be resonably assumed from a well-executed social media program. On the other hand, social media effectiveness can also be considered to be anecdotal. If end users are tweeting about your company or product, it stands to reason that this buzz will contribute to more leads...and more leads to more business. But is that the case?

  A study recently done by LeadForce1* indicates that website traffic referred from a tweet is more likely to be concerned with content (like blogs) versus product information, or the completion of a contact form (see figure below from LeadForce1).

  

   

  So when it comes to social media, one must consider the source to determine what end users actually will do when they visit your site. In some instances, it seems that a well-crafted tweet will result in increased interest in your content. In other cases, a social media source like LinkedIn may result directly in a lead.

  Does this mean that social media that don't result directly in leads are ineffective, or don't contribute to your ROI? Not at all. But it is worth noting that some effective social media will only result in increased engagement in your content. That's not a bad thing, especially if your objectives are to enhance your brand value and to be perceived as a thought leader in your space.

  What's the takeway here? The social media landscape is still very new and emerging and ROI can be murky, depending on how you measure it. It is important to understand your business goals before embarking on a social media initiative and keep ROI in mind. Better yet, understand the results that you seek before you start so that you have a more concrete way to measure once your program is underway.

   

  * References:

  • Mashable: Is Social Media Failing to Produce Leads
  • LeadForce1: How Effective is Social Media for B2B Lead Generation?

  Posted by: OakTree Digital

  Category:

• What's wrong with this picture?

  Friday, June 25, 2010

   Google Local result showing a coffeehouse in results for "Web Site Design near Portland, OR."  I haven't looked to closely for reasons yet, but (a) the cofeehouse's page not only says nothing about any of the searched keywords; and (b) the page is actually created using images rather than html text, so it just plain doesn't contain text at all.  Glitch?

   

   

   

  - Lawrence W. Gallick

  Posted by: OakTree Digital

  Category:

• Getting Real About SEO

  Friday, June 11, 2010

  It is certainly tempting to try to box up SEO as another project with a beginning, middle, and an end.  However, the important stuff never ends.  As you can see in this report by SEOmoz on search engine ranking factors, external links (links to your site from other places) remain the gold standard for improving organic search engine rankings on your site.  

   The first three factors all relate to backlinks:

  1.  Keyword Focused Anchor Text from External Links
  2. External Link Popularity (quantity/quality of external links
  3. Diversity of Link Sources (links from many unique root domains)

  What this means is that any successfully "SEO'd" site not only must be optimized for SEO and your target keyphrases, but must also (a) conduct an ongoing campaign to build inbound links from other sources; and (b) be consistently creating new content that third parties would want to proactively link TO.

   

  Lawrence W. Gallick

  Posted by: OakTree Digital

  Category:

• Some love for DC P2P defendants

  Thursday, June 10, 2010

  Turns out maybe you can't just name a large pool of defendants who don't have any formal relationship vis a vis the sued transaction.  Score one for the Constitution and due process.  It can't be good to sue 4500 unrelated defendants...except from the plaintiff's perspective.  This is the latest information on this issue in D.C., where US Copyright Group has been taking on P2P defendants.  Amicus briefs by the ECLU and EFF may have influenced the judge's decision here, it seems.

  The situation came about when a group of lawyers convinced plaintiffs to sue various defendants, while also setting up a website where named defendants can settle via an online transaction of a couple of grand.  Something just doesn't seem right about that; it seems to really be just a moneymaking scheme for a group of lawyers.  But what do I know?

  What does this mean for the rest of us?  This is good.  This means you can't be ganged up on by companies that are well aware that they are arbitrarily singling out defendants in a pool that is extremely large.  Plus, P2P is here to stay, and illegal use does not permit any of the interests (lawyers and production companies) represented here to herd defendants together in order to make a lawsuit much easier for themselves while diminishing the unique character of any given defendant's alleged misuse. At least that's how I'm seeing this one.

  Lawrence W. Gallick

  Posted by: OakTree Digital

  Category:

• Your short attention span

  Friday, June 04, 2010

  Studies suggest that the average website visitor will spend somewhere around 4 seconds evaluating your website to determine relevance. You read that right: 4 seconds. So this means that given the very likely scenario that a user doesn't see what they want in 4 seconds, they will leave. In the language of website analytics, this quick departure due to lack of perceived relevance is called a "bounce." Using tools like Google Analytics, we can measure the percentage of bounces. A site like ours, with a domain like ours (oaktree.com), attracts a whole lot of folks looking for...what would you guess? Oak trees! As a result, we have a higher than normal bounce rate.

  For everybody else, there are a few simple lessons to make the most of the 4 seconds that a user will spend on your site before deciding to bounce:

  • Keep it simple: your home page is no place to wax poetic. Ensure that your page is clean, scannable and offers a limited number of choices
  • Ensure that links and menu labels correspond to language that your target end users actually use when searching. This sounds like a head-scratcher, but you can invest a little time with Google researching search terms that describe your products or services. Better, hire someone with expertise in SEO (search engine optimization) who can use analytics software to identify a list of terms that fit your content best.
  • Prioritize your messaging so that a user is able to easily find key content. "Key content" means content that you consider key, as well as your end user. Hopefully, these are the same.
  • Avoid clutter: question the addition of "eye candy," or graphical content that doesn't add value, that doesn't help you achieve your business goals. Every element on your page must meet specific objectives.

  4 seconds is little more than the blink of an eye. So the fact that you are still reading this post suggests some success--that this content was relevant to you. But the norm is drastic: we have precious little attention, and patience for content that doesn't add immediate value. Take the time to design yours so that your site will capture the attention you expect and translate your website in a valuable tool for your organization.

  Posted by: OakTree Digital

  Category:

• Who is this website for anyway?

  Tuesday, June 01, 2010

  With few exceptions, most all of our clients have a pretty solid notion of audience segmentation insofar as who is purchasing their products or services. In fact, it's not unusual for some of these clients to produce impressive documentation detailing demographics, drilling into quite a lot of detail around audiences. Even so, when it comes to the design of websites, it is very common that website navigation, or information architecture (IA), ignores what we know about the end user. Instead, the website often mirrors the organization itself, from departments to products, with navigational labels that reflect the culture and language of the organization. For many reasons, this sort of organization has had appeal for many years...because it may be logical, accurate and convenient. But increasingly, the leadership at companies expect tangible results from websites--whether these results are about increased revenue, engagement or brand loyalty. It begs the question: what is it that we want the end users of our websites to do anyway?

  
  

  Who is this website for anyway?

  It seems like an obvious place to start, but in addition to understanding the objectives of a website, how about defining who the website is for, and after that, what we want these users to do. A user-centered website design methodology is one that seeks to accommodate the needs and desires of the primary audiences of the website. This methodology can be empowering for the team that practices it, because so much of the emotions and politics of defining navigation are put aside, while content is organized and developed to serve the interests of the user. As a part of this process, user profiles are often developed, which establish "stories" for primary audience members, including likes, dislikes, and a limited set of tasks that he or she wishes to complete on your site. User profiles like these are invaluable during the design process, when subjective feedback starts to pile up. You counter, "Yes, but what would Lisa think of that decision?" The user profile takes on a life of its own and serves as a guide for making good decisions that will yield the right sort of results.

  
  

  If you are embarking on a website redesign project, we're hoping that this post strikes an intuitive chord. Spend time upfront defining your project objectives, identifying the users of your website, and learn what they want to accomplish once on your website. Make it easy for them to find what they need, and let them get on with their lives. In doing so, there is a good chance that you'll achieve your business objectives as well.

  
  

  
  

  Posted by: OakTree Digital

  Category:

• How much is too much information?

  Friday, May 21, 2010

  I think we all know a few people within our social networks that like to share a bit more than we would care to know about, and often times they are repeat offenders.   A  few smart entrepreneurs have found a way to launch companies from this addictive need for people to share their every move.  First, we knew that you got a new chicken on your fictional Farmville farm and now we know you treated yourself to a Caramel Frappuccino in real life afterwards.  Thanks to sites like blippy people can share their every purchase to the world and this has venture capitalists very interested.  blippy is getting around 125,000 hits a month and has closed an initial investment round of $11million.  Investors are betting that big consumer brands will be very interested and willing to buy this type of information.

  Check out the New York Times for the full article.

  Posted by: OakTree Digital

  Category:

• OakTree's AFB/LPB ready for Oregon Primary

  Saturday, May 01, 2010

  In support of the State of Oregon's ongoing commitment to making it easier for voters to cast their ballots, OakTree Digital's Alternate Format and Large Format Ballots will be used for the upcoming May 18th Primary Election.

  The Help America Vote Act (HAVA) of 2002 included provisions to ensure that voters with disabilities are provided the opportunity to vote privately and independently and have equal access to the process.

  OakTree's Alternate Format Ballot is an HTML ballot that works alongside Oregon’s vote by mail process to enable individuals with disabilities, including non-visual accessibility and visually impaired to vote in much the same manner as all Oregon Voters: independently and privately from home, on an assistive computer in the election offices or another place of the voters’ choosing.

  OakTree Digital’s AFB application converts election data from HP’s Oregon Centralized Voter Registration (OCVR) system into a W3C compliant HTML coded ballot. The ballot works with several assistive devices as well as Ai Squared's ZoomText product. The AFB was first used for the 2008 May Oregon Primary..

  The Large Print Ballot follows the same data path but produces 11" x 17" or 8.5" x 14" with specialized 18 point typeface ballots in PDF format. These are mailed to voters who have requested large print format to assist them in voting independently. The ballots are folded and submitted in the secrecy envelops like any other ballot.

  OakTree Digital is marketing the AFB/LPB products to other states looking to meet the spirit of the HAVA requirements. More details see OakTree Digital AFB Product Brief.

  Posted by: OakTree Digital

  Category:

• After a mock funeral, will IE6 die already?

  Thursday, March 04, 2010

  What did Internet Explorer 6 do to deserve a mock funeral attended by over 100 smirking developers, adorned symbolically in black? Put bluntly, it didn't die when it should have. Morbid? Sure. But IE6, which was released in 2001, still commands nearly 10% of the browser market (as of February 2010), even though Microsoft released version 7 in 2006, and version 8 this time last year. For website developers, IE6 had been a thorn in the side for years, but in recent years, that thorn wound has abscessed as workarounds to ensure compatibility have grown more complex, and costly. Yet, with usage numbers in the neighborhood of 10%, it has been hard to justify neglecting IE6.

  Finally, however, the browser tide appears to be turning. Google announced on January 29th that it would stop supporting IE6 in its applications starting March 1. Others have, and will, follow. With this announcement, the cheers from the message boards were nearly audible as all the little guys showed enthusiastic support for what should have been done long ago.

  Unfortunately, bidding IE6 a permanent farewell won't be so simple, especially during a recession. In so many corporate and large organization environments, IE6 is in lockstep with the operating system, and without a dire need, IT departments are loathe to upgrade its users unless it must. Therefore, Google and other leaders in the web community will need to responsibly persuade its constituents to upgrade to modern browsers to ensure consistent experiences across the web. Until that time, some web developers will continue to support this bitter relationship with IE6, while others, like those attending the mock funeral today, will be relieved to say goodbye to this geriatric relative that lived far too long.

  Posted by: OakTree Digital

  Category:

• The death of subtlety

  Monday, January 04, 2010

  T-mobile commercial - they show a priest and he says "what - you don't think we [meaning priests] text?  We text."  Then a couple of people later, there's a young designer who lifts up a mannequin's arm and leg and says "I don't want it to cost one of these and one of these [pause]  An arm and a leg."

  
  

  In both cases, the writing isn't exactly award-worthy, but what really hammer me over the head are the explanations.  The writer obviously isn't sure if the audience will be able to make the small leap between the statement and its explanation.  In the first case, there is almost a fear of not answering a question which is transparently rhetorical (or the absolute lack of faith by the writer in his/her audience) - obviously, within the world of the commercial, the only answer is that yes, priests do text.  In the second case, there is an equally evident fear that the audience cannot jump between the images of an arm and a leg and the expression they stand for.  This is not a case of the writer thinking that perhaps the audience won't know the expression, for the ultimate explanation still functions within its paradigm.  Rather, the writer is manifesting a distrust for the viewer's grasp of basic analogical and semiotic modes of communication.

  
  

  The only other argument you could make is that those explanations enhance the commercial from a creative or marketing perspective.  It isn't even worth seriously addressing.  They don't - and as implied above, it is an absolute failure of the use of expressions and rhetorical devices to have to constantly explain them.  They exist to communicate through a shared basin of knowledge, to shorten the path to meaning and in doing so add an extra dimension of meaning in the process.

  
  

  Sad.

  
  

  Author: Lawrence W. Gallick

  Posted by: OakTree Digital

  Category:

• WhiteHouse.gov Moves to Drupal

  Wednesday, November 18, 2009

  I had written a blog post a little more than a year ago called President 2.0, concerning Candidate Obama's superior internet strategy, which translated into some advantage at the voting booth. As a candidate, Obama made extensive use of social media, including Twitter, RSS, wiki pages and Facebook, and with tools and methods like these, his campaign team was able to be more nimble, communicate more effectively, and ensure that voters were more intimate with issues.

   

  More recently, the Administration has made another significant technological stride forward, moving its website platform to the Drupal CMS. This move is significant, even symbolic, as it represents an administration that is making a demonstrable effort to govern in a more transparent way, allowing the public to participate and collaborate in the government in a way that hasn't been possible until now. Further, because Drupal is modular, scalable and supported by an immense community of global developers, the new www.WhiteHouse.gov site can be updated quickly and efficiently to meet changing public needs. This also translates into a more robust system that costs much less to maintain. In many ways, the website platform itself is consistent with the promise of the Administration and its particular view of how government should behave.

  The following video clip is from the November 2009 DC Drupal Meetup, and includes leaders from the White House New Media team. Check it out.

  
  

  White House New Media Team on Using Drupal from Development Seed on Vimeo.

  Posted by: David Martin

  Category:

• The real-time web reconsidered

  Friday, October 23, 2009

  My coworker recently posted about the real-time web, some of its great potential, and some of the challenges in integrating it into business websites.  I have to say though, to me some of the promise of that buzzword threatens to exclude some of the things that make social media sites so different than their predecessors. 

   

  Here's what I mean: one of the things I like most about Facebook, for example, is its ability to construct impromptu sidebar conversations.  In one sense, this is nothing new, as it is really just forum functionality - I make a post, someone comments on it (and possibly signs up for notification), someone else makes a post, perhaps the author chimes in again, etc.  It is a little node of conversation that gets placed into a conceptual room on the server.

   This is different with Facebook due to the timeliness of the communication, but more importantly due to improvisational threading.  Rather than rely on someone proactively posting a "thread," they use a basic element of social interaction - a general post to everyone you know, and as people comment on it, two things happen.  (1) A collaboration of your "friends" and the poster's "friends" is created ad hoc.  This can create interesting synergies, yet the conversation remains fairly civil as these people have some relation to you, albeit once removed (2) The original post slowly becomes buried as the overall churn of posting in the main "feed" continues.  Thus like the forum, a seperate conversational space is created.  I would argue that being "real-time" has little to do with the appeal of this functionality.  The alure is instead a utilization of classic principles of user interface.  Build the app for the people don't try to get the people to mold to the app...

   

   

   

  Posted by: Lawrence W. Gallick

  Category:

• HTML tips for handling super/subscript

  Thursday, September 17, 2009

  For developers, superscript and subscript formatting in HTML can be annoying, to say the least. In the spirit of saving readers of this post some headaches, I wanted to share some advice on handling superscript and subscript.

   

  There are many issues with formatting in HTML 4.0 that result in an unattractive reading within paragraphs. Most of these issues are a result of the character set that the browser uses as default, or a defined character set in the document head (Ex. UTF-8). However, the issue that subscript and superscript cause is a product of vertical alignment specified within the browser's default. That is to say, a paragraph will look truncated because the superscript or subscript is beyond the line height of the inherited height of the font. For example, in the image below, you will see how the paragraph is truncated:

   

  The answer to fixing this problem is with CSS. There are two ways to handle this in CSS, depending on your needs. One way is to simply increase the line-height of the paragraph tag so that everything has proportionately greater spacing.

  Example: using PX for measurements for simple math (you could do the equivalent with EM as well):

   

  

   

  This approach is usually not ideal because it makes the paragraph much longer. The strong point of this solution is that it allows the subscript and superscript to really pop out. This works well for math or scientific documentation where you want it to be obvious.

   

  For a more practical approach, we can use position:relative to resolve this by setting the superscript and subscript properties to relative and adding top or bottom positioning. (Note the following example is based off of 12px font size.)

   

  

   

   ...resulting in this:

   

   

  Posted by: Brian Wald

  Category:

• Why care about the Real-Time Web?

  Monday, September 14, 2009

  Of all the 2009 web trends, the so-called "Real-Time Web" has probably had the most obvious impact on our collective lives. Prior to this year, it's likely that you knew someone in your network using Twitter or Facebook. This year, it's probable that you are personally using a social media service like Twitter or Facebook, and you have family members who are as well. While Twitter and Facebook are certainly not the only examples of Real-Time Web, their popularity and usage have exploded recently and have become ubiquitous in our popular culture.

   

  For interactive agencies, we are still at a point of transition where we recognize the clear effects of the RTW in daily/personal lives, yet for our client work, these effects have not yet fully infiltrated the strategies with which we approach projects. Certainly, clients are starting to inquire about integrating social media, RSS, blogs, etc., but the notion of "real-time" still remains somewhat foreign to most marketers who tend to struggle perfecting copy that might not change for months on their corporate websites. Undoubtedly, some of the more sophisticated organizations get it: what's the incentive for an end user to return to a website when the content is stale? There is a simple answer: NONE. No matter how much spit and polish on your website copy, most users may browse it once, but rarely will again...until it changes...until it becomes relevant and timely.

   

  Many organizations still see little difference between the printed brochure and the web, but increasingly, at this point of transition, such thinking will yield only disappointing results. Normal users of the web these days are consuming information like a whale consumes plankton and have little patience for stale, irrelevant content.

   

  So maybe you aren't employed by an uber sophisticated firm that has its own Chief Social Media Officer and a team of specialists. What can you do? Here are a few thoughts:

  • Have a longterm content strategy: often, the strategy for content is to produce it to support a launch. Have a plan for the days and weeks and months following launch. Have a publishing schedule. Have resources assigned, and be able to forecast these internal costs to management.
  • Put your web on a CMS: If your website isn't integrated with a Content Management System (CMS), this might be Priority One. Run, don't walk. Without a sophisticated platform that allows for easy publishing of content without programming capabilities, your content strategy will be handicapped from the outset.
  • Research the competition: take the time to survey how your competitors and peers are using their websites and note best practices. Look for trends, and adopt those that make sense.
  • Integrate 3rd party tools strategically: consider integrating a social media service as it makes sense and complements your strategy. Twitter is a powerful platform for microblogging and some users will appreciate short bursts of relevant information versus lengthy sermons. But remember that technology is always an ends to a means, so have a plan.
  • Let go of perfection: don't let perfect be enemy to the good. Your website visitors will appreciate fresh, dynamic content, even if it's not worthy of a Pulitzer Prize. Avoid analysis paralysis when it comes to content and publish, publish publish!

  For more information on the Real-Time Web, read "The Top 5 Web Trends of 2009: The Real-Time Web."
  

  Posted by: David Martin

  Category:

• OakTree CMS build in Sitefinity showcase

  Wednesday, July 01, 2009

  Telerik is featuring the website built by OakTree Digital for Mercedes-Benz of El Dorado on the Sitefinity CMS home page.  Scroll down to 'featured work' to see a screenshot.  Sitefinity is a ASP .NET based content management system (CMS).  View the Merceded-Benz of El Dorado website.
  

  Posted by: Lawrence W. Gallick

  Category:

• Content - are we getting it?

  Friday, March 13, 2009

  One of the notorious holdups in web development projects has historically been when clients are responsible for their own content. Its something we try to avoid, as we do offer copywriting services, but nonetheless, when it comes to content, clients are typically pretty possessive.  They are the subject matter experts, therefore they should write the copy....right?  However, they quickly realize what we warn them about starting with the kickoff meeting - it ain't so easy.  There are multiple issues:

  • Many internal stakeholders and subject matter experts = many opinions
  • Once you realize you've bitten off more than you can chew and delegate some of the work, you are left in the just-as-difficult position of managing many different content authors
  • These content authors actually have other jobs which inevitably are a higher priority than copywriting for the web, making deadlines next to impossible to meet
  • Once the content all comes back, you realize that it has inconsistent voicing and tone, not to mention format
  • Once the content all comes back, you realize that it needs to be linked together in key places, since this is the internet and not a series of unrelated articles
  • Inevitably you don't realize the need for some crucial pieces of content until late in the game.  People notoriously miss section landing pages, although these are crucial to a site's success

  The above issues occur despite our best intentions as an agency - we provide content matrices, content development templates, consultation on best practices for writing on the web, and many other services.  But content development still inevitably extends the project timeline in projects like these.

  As our static web site development (static = collection of flat html pages) dwindled and was replaced by ubiquitous and affordable content management systems, we were encouraged.  The clients who want to develop their own content are empowered to do so, and we can create the final infrastructure of the website without waiting for final copy from the clients.  However, things are not always as simple as they seem.

  • For some companies, it is hard to shake out of the standard editorial and review workflow process they are used to – in fact, for companies such as this, often times the editorial process is the only thing that will enable them to see the forest for the trees as it were and truly feel ok with the overall structure of the web site in development.
  • Other companies are decidedly not technical – even though most everyone reading this is used to web interfaces, many companies function in older paradigms, and the interfaces in some of the content management systems (CMS) can be a bit tricky – this is especially true of some of the open source based systems.  This trickiness tends to get better over time (for example Drupal 6 is much easier to use than Drupal 5), but is an unfortunate but understandable side effect of open source development where many different programmers are able to contribute to a product.

  So we’ve found ourselves, especially on the side of the OakTree house that used to do a lot of HTML development, transitioning over to much more technical implementations on the one side, and a lot of training on the other side – training both on the use of CMS systems and on good web focused content development workflows and processes.  It’s definitely a change for the positive and helps our clients get a head start towards the final goal, which is the creation of a site which is a living document – with content that is constantly added, modified, and removed to suit the needs of the user community.

  Posted by: Lawrence W. Gallick

  Category:

• Are we still compatible, Internet Explorer 6?

  Thursday, March 05, 2009

  Microsoft's Internet Explorer version 6 was released in August, 2001, yet there are still more people using it today than Firefox 3.0. As of February 2009, IE6 still holds greater than 18% of the total web browser market share.

   

  As for me, I am a part of that 18% constituency, not because I love IE6, but because I figure someone in our office should represent this dysfunctional (and sizable) view of the websites that we ourselves design. For the same reason, I also choose to browse the web using Firefox 2.0, versus the current 3.0 version. It's true that Firefox 2.0, released in October 2006, only commands a mere ~ 4% of browser market share, but that's still greater than Chrome, Safari and Opera, which each are less than 4% (but growing while Firefox 2 usage contracts). Choosing to personify that "LCD" (lowest common denominator) that we website designers speak of doesn't make me popular around the office, I admit. I tend to be the wet rag, the buzz-kill in the design process when some sweet, new design fails for me in either IE6 of FX2. And it's due to these compatibility issues that most website development processes begin to churn. Without retrofitting a tight CSS layout to accommodate outdated browsers, life would be much easier. Website development would cost less and take less time. There would be peace and harmony in the world.

   

  On March 19th, Microsoft publicly releases its 8th version of Internet Explorer, and this time, we are told, IE8 will be the most standards-compliant browser of all. If history is any lesson here, we'll believe it when we see it. While release candidate 1 is available this month, it will be several months more before what we can consider a "stable" version will be available for download. But a bigger question is this: will the launch of IE8 finally compel all of the large corporations still running IE6 to finally take the plunge and upgrade??

   

  Website and web application developers have begun to force the issue, drawing a line in the sand and stating a timeline after which IE6 support will cease. In fact, we now see that none other than the Norweigians have taken a leadership role in this issue, starting a movement to force IE6 abandonment. As a company, we at OakTree Digital have discussed this topic as well, and in the coming months, we too will no longer include IE6 and Firefox 2 in our default list of browsers we ensure compatibility for. When that time comes, I, too, will upgrade...but not a moment before.

   

  In the scheme of things, the Internet (and the web browsers that allow us all to experience it) is still relatively new. We should hope and expect that in the near future, any competing web browsers will follow the same set of standards so that development doesn't require one part science and one part magic. That day is surely coming, and not a moment too soon.
  
  

   

   

   

   

  
  

  Posted by: David Martin

  Category:

• Recession? Online Giving is Great in Portland.

  Friday, January 02, 2009

  Now that 2009 is just underway, substantial doubts linger about the ongoing impacts of the U.S. recession, and what it will mean for businesses and nonprofits. Common sense dictates that shrinking assets in the world of affluence will eventually affect large and small businesses alike, as well as the nonprofit sector. But if all the recent gloom and doom has you down, we suggest you consider the Willamette Week’s 2008 Give!Guide as a glimmer of hope in an otherwise stormy outlook.
  
  The Give!Guide, the brainchild of Richard Meeker, Publisher of Willamette Week, has steadily grown in attention and dollars donated since its inception in 2004—and 2008 was no exception. The Give!Guide aggregates some of the most innovative and worthy nonprofits in the Portland area, particularly those with leadership and influence in the under 35-year old demographic. This year, the Give!Guide included 55 such nonprofits—across categories like Arts, Social Action and the Environment.
  
  Since 2006, OakTree Digital has joined Willamette Week and its other partner, Momentum Market Intelligence, to design and develop the online Give!Guide. OakTree’s contribution has resulted in a sleek and sophisticated charitable online giving engine that’s attractive, informative and easy to use. Since 2006, the Give!Guide has experienced the sort of annual growth that would make Wall Street salivate. Consider the last three years:
  

  • 2006 Give!Guide raised $228,000
  • 2007 Give!Guide raised $518,000
  • 2008 Give!Guide raised over $826,000

  This year, despite the worst recessionary period since the Great Depression and this being an election year, the 2008 Give!Guide raised more than +60% in donations compared to 2007. It’s a remarkable achievement for the Give!Guide partners, but it speaks volumes about the Portland community—and, we hope, the national community as a whole. Read Willamette Week's January 21 article reflecting on this year's Give!Guide successes.
  
  As we ring in the New Year, here’s to the 2008 Give!Guide, to all the good that it has done and will do. And here’s looking ahead to the 2009 Give!Guide; with the success of these last three years, what a year 2009 should be!

  Posted by: David Martin

  Category:

• "IM" is a verb

  Friday, December 19, 2008

  I searched ["im" is a verb] in Google and didn't get anything substantial in terms of results, but I think it is time we all face it that "i.m." has become a verb.  It is actually a very commonly used word in techno-babble.

   

  Also, and I am not a lawyer so I don't know how this works but, I would also like to declare my intention to patent an eyetracking device that will sense when I look at an IM window and auto-magically make the window stop blinking.  I just have to actually invent it first.

  
  

  Posted by: Lawrence W. Gallick

  Category:

• Recession? Been there, done that!

  Friday, November 14, 2008

  Being in business almost sixteen years gives one a perspective that hopefully can be used to guide us and our clients into the unknown ahead.

  I vividly remember the “tech recession” of 2001-2003 and how it affected our clients. So, assuming you are not in banking or real estate, what did we learn that may help us all get through to 2010?

  Back then, once a business had built their brochure site it was left to just exist on the “internet super-highway.” MARCOM folks cut or lost their budgets because they couldn’t quantitatively justify additional expenditures on the web.

  Planning for a recession is totally different today. Internet usage has not only exploded, it has become indispensable. Customer’s expectations for the kinds of instant information, “touch points” and ease of use are embedded in everyone’s buying process.

  Now is when you need to keep your internet presence active and responsive. Demonstrate how your products save time and money. Give prospects examples of successes they can model. Help them in their buying decisions.

  What OakTree Digital learned back then was to sharply focus our services to what our clients’ needed to keep their businesses thriving. And, we're still doing it.

  Look for my “Seven Ways to Recession Proof Your Business On-Line”, coming soon.

  Posted by: John Schmitt

  Category:

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