Feeling defeated by the day, Google AdWords

It was just one of those days today. The type of day where you just want to wipe it away and forget that it happened. Due to a whole world of changes at the office (diversification, new directions, etc.) I've been tasked with a whole pile of online tasks that, if I was asked seven years ago back when I was still a print graphic designer, I would have said that you were crazy to expect this out of me. Of course after I failed the 109 question Google AdWords for Search certification test today, I felt like my co-workers, again, were crazy to expect this out of me. A passing grade is 85% and I achieved a not-terrible 81% but it wasn't enough in the eyes of Google to achieve certification.

It's been that kind of week/month/year for me. I've been tasked with a whole host of new ventures which rest on my hopefully capable shoulders. On top of achieving Google AdWords certification, I also need to complete a framework for handling what can only be described as a whole shit-ton of data via an XML workflow and wrangling it into a hundred or-so page InDesign layout. That task is due in a couple weeks and I still haven't figured out a simple and understandable way for non-techies to input the data. Add to that having to design a rather involved (for me) companion website for that XML/InDesign project and I'm starting to feel the pressure.

Not to mention learning a rather intense and complex website monitoring/evaluation software package for my employer's S.E.O. venture and I've got simply that much more to get done.

I feel, somedays, like the future of my employer rests at least partially on my shoulders. I am confident that I can handle these tasks and more but the timeframe has me concerned. Thankfully my team has a meeting tomorrow to plan the launch dates of a whole host of service offerings so I can at bring up my concerns and mention my woeful shortcomings in front of those who, up until now, thought I was totally capable and were in awe of what I've been able to accomplish in a short time.

Hey, at least I have the musical stylings of Childish Gambino and his awesome and totally filthy rap lyrics to get me pumped up on my way in to the office each morning.

The worst logo ever

I did it. I took the How Low Can You Logo challenge and  incorporated elements of design which, over the course of the past 13 years, I have come to despise. Brush Script font -- in all caps to boot. Some Comic Sans in the mix to up the level of sucktitude. Bad clip art, CHECK! A pointless but moderately phallic arrow to up the ante. And last, but not least, a rainbow gradient accentuated by an excessively bold and bright (and painfully contrasty) stroke on a giant capital letter. It's the perfect logo for the customer who wants it all and has no idea what a good image is. I think I have a winner here.

Don't trust an online advertising "expert"

A short conversation today quickly turned to discussing a supposed online sales guru with the last name of Blinder and how anyone with a couple years of experience in the graphic design industry knows what really works. Keep the animation to a minimum (don't make it annoying but use it when needed), don't be too fucking wordy and the most important point I brought up is that in the world of online users you have about a second to grab a reader's eyes and get them to pay attention to their ad. Don't use the same thought process that goes in to designing a typical newspaper or magazine advertisement because those are typically wordy and coming from a guy who reads fast, the shorter tidbits - no matter where I am reading them - get my attention first.

But back to Mr. Blinder. He and his team of "sales professionals" do produce results. They do so because they are overbearing, confrontational, aggressive and obnoxious (or so I've heard). They produce a shitload of revenue for their clients -- I've witnessed the results -- but they do so at a cost. That cost is the simple fact that your customers will forever associate online ads with the presentation they witnessed from the Blinder sales team. The Blinder team seems to make a habit out of over-promising results which sadly aren't achievable.

They promise that people will click the ads they are selling and drive traffic to customer's websites. Well, for that to happen the customer has to want whatever is being advertised pretty damn bad because plenty of websites out there are so bad that they shouldn't exist or so hopelessly outdated that the owner of them should bury their head in shame. This isn't a rip on local businesses because these very businesses keep a roof over my head and keep my co-workers gainfully employed but would you let your storefront display of Christmas items stay in your front window until May? I didn't think so.

For that matter, don't let your online ad fall in to that same outdated time warp. Update your ad and contrary to the advice of Mr. Blinder don't just change the background color. Simply changing the background color is fucking lazy. If I saw a designer doing this I'd be appalled for two reasons. The color should be thought out to a certain extent. Choosing a color, in my experience, is part of the overall design of a piece no matter how small or insignificant it is and changing the background -- the most dominant element -- can destroy a campaign and any business advertising should realize that a consistent look is what builds brand recognition. Change the color, disturb the brand recognition. It's pretty simple. Just look at what happened this week when Gap stores unveiled a new logo. That one move disrupted forty-plus years of history Gap had built. Don't tear down for the sake of tearing down, instead remodel, overhaul, refresh. The second reason is that this business' sales person isn't doing their job and is taking the easy way out. And if you have only one ad in your online arsenal, try harder. Multiple messages will allow website users to see something fresh. While sitting through TV commercials, I'd rather see two messages from the same advertiser than just one. Don't treat your online marketing any differently.

Mr. Blinder's greatest blunder is due to the fact that his ideas are displayed via Powerpoint. Sure, it's a decent enough program for conveying information but the way in which he does so is so ineffective that I'd rather sift through an endless stream of spreadsheets. The bulleted items are so vague that they could mean nearly anything if left open to interpretation. These vague points, after being given to sales persons, are then disemminated to potential customers. Cut through the bullshit and get real with customers. They want results but they also don't want to spend anything to achieve them because most businesses -- on a local level at least -- are so overtaxed financially that they aren't going to commit to a year's worth of advertising at any cost. I think most people would find it refreshing to NOT be sold a string of vague promises and numbers which mean nothing to them. A paragraph story in your ad -- no matter what its size is -- won't get read so keep it to ten words or less. I'll agree, though, with a point I read earlier this week about many advertisers having no fucking clue what CPM means and why they should care what it means so speak their language. To bring advertisers in to the fold of your website, be honest with them. They aren't going to get 10% of website users clicking on their ads. I've achieved that level once in a decade of experience with online advertising and that had more to do with the position and format of the ad than anything else. They wouldn't expect shoppers to bring their entire newspaper ad in to their store so why should click-thrus matter if your ad doesn't particularly lend to being clicked?

Expanding on that point, offer customers something they actually want. Click Here for a 50% off coupon is a good start. That will break the bank, you say? Have you heard of a disclaimer? Cap the savings amount at ten or twenty dollars and limit it to one coupon per user. Even grocery coupon sites like coupons.com have print limits so don't say that it can't be done because it can. And to bring it full circle, if your website sucks, don't expect people to come back to it. You get but one chance to make that first-time visitor a repeat visitor. If your inventory is stagnant or doesn't change frequently, add something to your website that CAN be freshened frequently and promote that to the front page of your site. Maybe a blog about something relevant to your business. Trust me, your employees are the best source of ideas so ask them, hell, have them handle that aspect of your online presence because sometimes letting go of what you think is the only way to do things is the best thing to do.

The Oprah Winfrey Network logo keeps getting worse

Oprah Winfrey's cable television network has been in the works for two or three years and has missed its launch date twice but that doesn't stop the channel helmed by the reigning queen of daytime talk from approving logos which keep getting worse with each revision. It almost makes me wonder just how bad the channel will be when/if it launches. But rather than speculate, let's look at these logos.

From a pre-launch logo that seemed to be all-things Oprah including her almost instantly recongizable "O" and a classy feel with a pleasing green tone to an almost instantly outdated sans serif/rounded font in something resembling Vag Rounded in descending orange tones to the latest design abortion seen below...

At first glance many may say that this screamingly bright logo perfectly nails Oprah's larger than life personality but upon closer inspection it's borderline trash. It's a poorly conceived logo attempting to stand out and be three-dimensional. The color bands lack consistent width across the three letters. The seemingly chopped out color band's inconsistency is particularly obvious on the letter "O" -- just look at the inner-most band's upper right corner. Why is there only a thin sliver of yellow there? If it's done that way to give the illusion of dimension, it's done so poorly because that corner's poorly crafted arc is driving me fucking nuts to look at. It sickens me that someone got paid to design this and that's not me being bitter because I didn't get a crack at designing it -- I wouldn't want to even begin dealing with the endless tweaks, revisions, suggestions and demans involved with creating even something as visually appalling as this piss-poor and maybe final version of the Oprah Winfrey Network logo.

Come on Oprah, you can do better.

What does a three-minute break yield?

I'm taking a brief break from my recent deluge of design work. To give you some detail on the deluge I have eight two-sided poster-type projects to complete in the next two weeks, I'm waiting on revisions for the quarterly magazine which I am the Art Director and designer for, I have 140-plus pages for two annual publications to complete, a website which needs ads created for mock-up purposes so it's saleable, I am in the process of teaching myself Drupal (Google it) and I'm hungry for some freelance projects whether they be general graphic design work, logo design or photography. Because I never have enough to do, I also am in the 4-6 month long process of contributing to the redesign of eight moderately-viewed websites.

Those reasons are why I'm treating myself to a break.

It's all part of my daily life which also includes MinnPics. Curious? Check it out and prepare to be amazed.

The lost art of basic spelling

The English language must be dying. In the past decade I have seen so many instances of poor spelling and improper usage of words that it makes me angry. I'm angry because people in all lines of work get away with their blissful ignorance of how to spell, punctuate or otherwise use the written word.

A fine example was from late last year when a local, mom and pop-type convenience store a few blocks from my office opened in what had been a vacant location. For over two weeks they proudly displayed a vinyl lettered banner draped across a portion of their building proclaiming their "Grand Openning".

Yes, this hung for two weeks and there are at least two "professionals" at fault for this one. Obviously, the store's owner(s) contacted a sign shop to purchase this banner and the sign shop created the banner. Somewhere along the line, an ignoramus, assuming that opening would logically have two Ns in it made the sign as such. It's also obvious being that the convenience store hung the sign that they didn't think this was an error either. So now the tally of third grade flunky spellers totals at least two.

To begin with, in my line of work I wouldn't have made a spelling error like that but let's say that I had by way of a keystroke error - I would have corrected it upon reading my work or one of my department's proofreaders would have instantly redmarked it and I would have made the change before anyone beyond the two of us had seen it. If something on this scale would have slipped through the cracks (and it has happened a couple of times) the customer would have likely noticed it and we, as a company, would eat the cost of making the correction and replacing the product.

But apparently today, in the error of cut-rate everything, people have no knowledge of basic elementary spelling. Errors like the example I've used tell me that the divide between smart and uneducated, rich and poor, attentive and slovenly - is widening at an alarming pace. We might be closer than we ever imagined to careening down that slippery slope portrayed in the barely-noticed movie "Idiocracy".

So with this example I urge you to take a couple seconds and examine everything you do which will be seen by anyone outside of your household. Critique your own spelling and educate yourself if the schools failed you. It's never too late to learn how to spell.

It's also never too late to become a fan of the fine photography showcased at MinnPics. All photos, all Minnesota, all the time.

Project Runway sends the Minnesotan home

I won't say that I've watched the entire season of "Project Runway" on Lifetime because I haven't. I have, however, watched the final fifteen minutes or so of each episode because it always amazes me who gets "aufed" by Heidi Klum and her band of fashionistas.

Chris Straub, or Shakopee as I call him (because he's from Shakopee, MN - represent!) did amazingly well early in the competition. He actually won the first competition and I was excited to see that someone from Minnesota - especially the suburbs - was recognized for their creative skills. Then, as the series went on, Straub seemed to be strung along. His work wasn't terrible but the judges consistently billed it as such but kept him in the competition. It seemed almost mean for Heidi Klum and her band of fashion divas to keep Shakopee's Chris Straub on the show as they kept berating his designs. He was a near-permanent fixture in the show's bottom two or three designers.

I hoped that Straub was being strung along for a good reason. Hopefully they realized that he had immense potential. I rarely saw huge negatives in Straub's designs but maybe I'm just a homer who hates seeing the home team lose.

Then last night, on the final episode before "Project Runway's" big Bryant Park Fashion Week finale, Chris Straub was eliminated. The judges sent two designers packing leaving three young women to duke it out in New York City on next week's episode. So for many months now Shakopee's home town deisgner has been working away in the basement of his townhome - which us graphic designers in my office have determined the general location of - creating new fashion trends on his own. The difference is that he now has a significant amount of national television exposure to help his career. Something tells me that he'll be alright.

If you are fond of Minnesotans and all things Minnesota, check out MinnPics to tour Minnesota via photographs.

New logos that annoy me

I've designed plenty of logos that I flat out will not claim as my work. I've been practically sickened by the amount of changes some customers want and angered by how poorly thought out the changes they demanded were. On the other hand, I've done work that was just crap from the get go.

I have to wonder which bucket this newest pair of abominations from PepsiCo falls in to.

Since its launch, Sierra Mist has been straight up shit. For some reason, Pepsi thought they needed a clear, citrusy soda. Well, at least they got the clear part down but the citrus side of things is strangely missing. The first time I had a drink of Sierra Mist, soon after its debut, I thought someone had slipped me a glass of carbonated toilet water. In fact, carbonated toilet water would have been an improvement. This shit lacks any citrusy undertones, overtones, dulcet tones or dial tones.

Then came their new logo.

Apparently Sierra Mist causes blurred vision. A logo is supposed to convey an image of the brand but the only image of the Sierra Mist brand I see is that you'd only drink it if you couldn't see straight. Fail.

Next up is the flagship brand from PepsiCo, Pepsi.

They have this annoying habit of totally reinventing their branding every three years and each time they do so, it looks totally trendy and in tune with the times but the old logos look terribly dated. They each fail to stand the test of time. Not to mention that their brand of cola tastes overly molasses-y and downright sludgy. The newest logo will last about three years before being reinvented, for the princely price of a few million bucks, and traded for a new uber-trendy logo. The Pepsi brand seems almost afraid of becoming iconic and would rather be trendy for a few months every few years. That's what happens when you're playing second fiddle in the cola wars.

The last logo is Butterfinger.

I don't pay lot of attention to the logos of candy bars because I'm out of the candy bar demographic. I don't have the luxury of slipping a few dozen candy bars into mom's grocery cart while waiting in the checkout line at Hy-Vee. Hell, there aren't even any Hy-Vee stores around here. However, I did drop a whopping forty cents on a Butterfinger this past weekend and became flustered when I got back to the car and opened my crispety, crunchety treat.

That fucking candy bar had not one but two logos on it. See...

Why does Nestle, who seems to own about half of the food world, feel the need to plaster their corporate logo on everything they produce? I don't care if Bin Laden Confectionary Company makes Butterfingers. If something tastes good, I'll eat it. A corporate logo on the wrapper won't sway me. In fact, it's been known to make me consider an alternative. And before you think that Nestle is alone in this, Kraft seems to be an even greater offender in this arena. The plaster their logo on every damned thing in grocery stores. It's not a carefully integrated logo, it's exactly the opposite. It's blatantly front and center and it doesn't need to be. Nestle and Kraft, I'm watching you.

If you're looking for something happy and calming, not to mention artistic, check out MinnPics. It's brimming with the greatest photos taken in Minnesota of Minnesota.