Chapter Two
How we really use the Web
Our goal for a viral marketing campaign is to get people to read our page and be excessively interested in it. For that, we have to do several things, including increasing usability. If our page is dense and cluttered, no one is going to care how cool the pens are that we are talking about. We need to highlight important parts and consider the fact that when people read online pages, they only scan them. This web presence should be targeted at every person, meaning the majority of people who are rushed and click-happy when browsing the web.
Chapter 8
"The Farmer and the Cowman Should Be Friends"
This is one chapter that really targets what we are doing - a team project. We all are very creative people, or we would not have made it this far in the class. At some point, we are going to have very different ideas about how we want to design our site or promote our service, and we may want to punch each other in the face or at the very least not come to a conclusion many people are happy about. Hopefully, by following the advice of this chapter, we will be able to avoid the question of personal preferences and focus on what the reader needs in context with a particular page or media site. After all, our viral marketing is supposed to target the public and meet their needs, not ours. (This is not a problem right now, I just hope we don't pass through our group's honeymoon phase)
Chapter 9
Usability testing on 10 cents a day
This chapter talks about how to figure out what works. Of course, we can't have a successful viral marketing campaign without knowing what gets our audience's attention, but we don't have money to conduct large-scale research. What we will need is a larger army. So maybe we use our friends as a focus group or a live audience for our video recording, get them on board, and have other people starting to promote our videos. We will most likely need to test several versions of things to ensure our video goes viral. Though this chapter is more about usability mistakes, I can take from it tactics that help test effectiveness on an audience.
Monday, October 29, 2012
Wednesday, October 24, 2012
Unit 4 Web-Presence Tools: Storify
I used the web application Storify to play with ways of constructing a useful web presence for our group pen story. Storify integrates social media tools to allow the user to generate one large story to share on many sites at once. I'm not too sold on this tool, but I think it will be useful if we need to do a quick blast.
Some other sites I have used in the past may work a bit better, even though they are typically used for marketing and PR purposes. PitchEngine is the most amazing tool I have yet to find on the web. You can basically create an entire media kit using this online tool and blast it through to social media as well. I would like to try to incorporate this tool in this unit production even though it isn't listed under our class's unit production tools.
Hootsuite is another social media tool that is used to connect all your social media sites onto one central "desktop" area. You can then generate stories for all of the sites in one place. This is similar to Storify, but I'm not sure that you create a heading or add tools in the same way.
Each of these tools are useful in different ways, but I think I like PitchEngine the most when it comes to generating a professional image for Ink, Inc. We plan on fabricating elaborate stories about pens and their importance, and we need a professional website to do so. With PitchEngine, we can essentially create our entire brand and get the word out about who we are and what we stand for. We can add our "company's" boiler plate and integrate our message with all of our corresponding social media tools. This will help expand our web presence both out on the Internet and on the WVU server.
Some other sites I have used in the past may work a bit better, even though they are typically used for marketing and PR purposes. PitchEngine is the most amazing tool I have yet to find on the web. You can basically create an entire media kit using this online tool and blast it through to social media as well. I would like to try to incorporate this tool in this unit production even though it isn't listed under our class's unit production tools.
Hootsuite is another social media tool that is used to connect all your social media sites onto one central "desktop" area. You can then generate stories for all of the sites in one place. This is similar to Storify, but I'm not sure that you create a heading or add tools in the same way.
Each of these tools are useful in different ways, but I think I like PitchEngine the most when it comes to generating a professional image for Ink, Inc. We plan on fabricating elaborate stories about pens and their importance, and we need a professional website to do so. With PitchEngine, we can essentially create our entire brand and get the word out about who we are and what we stand for. We can add our "company's" boiler plate and integrate our message with all of our corresponding social media tools. This will help expand our web presence both out on the Internet and on the WVU server.
Thursday, October 18, 2012
The World Wide Web of Pens
After perusing the Internet for only about 5-10 minutes, it has become apparent to me that pen theft is a very serious issue, beyond the personal damage I have suffered. These online sources provide evidence to the fact AND ways we can rally together to prevent pens from being stolen in the future.
First of all, this website clearly exemplifies the value of pens to millions of people. These people go to shows to see the best fountain pens, watch talk shows about pens and read this website's blogs about PENS! That is some significant pen information!
Look at ALL THESE PAGES (below) of people who are 1) lost and confused after having lost a pen and 2) frustrated with all of the people who just keep stealing their pens! This is just disgusting that so many have posted and ranted about this problem.
Stop Stealing My Pens
To my @$$hold Co-workers: STOP STEALING MY FREAKING PENS!
Check out #5 on this page (scroll down)
Guest Speaker: Dwight Speaks!
Stop stealing my pens. Thanks :)
How do I get people to stop stealing the pens in my office?
Please stop stealing my pens
Stop. Stealing. My. Pens.
Fortunately, some people have thought of things that we can do about this major issue. First off, we can gain awareness through social media on the Facebook and Twitter pages. Also, you can buy cool prank items to make people want to NEVER steal your pens again!
Lastly, make sure your kids don't grow up to be pen stealers. Early Intervention!
Wednesday, October 17, 2012
Friday, October 5, 2012
How to Write Dialogue that Works
The readings for this week seemed like common sense to me. If you pay attention to the way dialogue works in books and on television it's really easy to emulate the style and create good dialogue.
However, I'm kind of a special case because I have always enjoyed fiction writing and was "taught" (who knows where I learned it - either from the Young Writers Workshop at Pitt or just from loving fiction so much) from an early age. I've always wanted to create my own work of fiction, but unfortunately that hasn't happened yet.
One thing that really stood out in both of these readings was the point to pay attention to the different ways people talk. I have already been playing with my Xtranormal video and didn't really think about the type of language both of my characters were using.
This could be for two reasons: 1) I am writing the dialogue and putting my own words and inflection into their mouths, or 2) I envision personalities and the dialogue works in relation to that personality without having to specifically think about it.
I have one character who is modeled after Milton from Office Space, and the other is supposed to be Bill Lumbergh, the boss. I wanted my Bill to be calm yet somehow overbearing, only because my "Melvin" is shy and submissive. I used motions and facial expressions to convey those personalities.
Also, Melvin speaks with a stutter when being confronted by his boss. There is not much dialogue between the two of them.
When Melvin speaks to the camera, he is talking about his pen. He doesn't exactly become less mousy, but he does complete his sentences and express his emotions more openly than he was able to when he was speaking to Bill. Still, I think I followed the do's and don'ts of writing acceptably at this point in my project, anyway.
However, I'm kind of a special case because I have always enjoyed fiction writing and was "taught" (who knows where I learned it - either from the Young Writers Workshop at Pitt or just from loving fiction so much) from an early age. I've always wanted to create my own work of fiction, but unfortunately that hasn't happened yet.
One thing that really stood out in both of these readings was the point to pay attention to the different ways people talk. I have already been playing with my Xtranormal video and didn't really think about the type of language both of my characters were using.
This could be for two reasons: 1) I am writing the dialogue and putting my own words and inflection into their mouths, or 2) I envision personalities and the dialogue works in relation to that personality without having to specifically think about it.
I have one character who is modeled after Milton from Office Space, and the other is supposed to be Bill Lumbergh, the boss. I wanted my Bill to be calm yet somehow overbearing, only because my "Melvin" is shy and submissive. I used motions and facial expressions to convey those personalities.
Also, Melvin speaks with a stutter when being confronted by his boss. There is not much dialogue between the two of them.
When Melvin speaks to the camera, he is talking about his pen. He doesn't exactly become less mousy, but he does complete his sentences and express his emotions more openly than he was able to when he was speaking to Bill. Still, I think I followed the do's and don'ts of writing acceptably at this point in my project, anyway.
Thursday, October 4, 2012
Pen Show
Just wanted to point out that there are people out there who are crazier about pens than I am.
Tilbrook Pen Show: a brief overview
Tilbrook Pen Show: a brief overview
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