Design for Designers

Irit-Designs is an artist who creates unique hand-made glass art and jewelery. She needed to quickly have a website set up in preparation for an art show.

YELLmedia helped Irit first by designing an appropriate artistic logo. Since the premise of her art is glass, we used sea glass images as buttons for her different gallery pages and inter-wined an art deco motif. The colors we chosen for the logo and background designs were neutral allowing the more colorful and engaging part of her site (the art pieces) to be the focal point. For her home page image we took a photo of some of her collection pieces and applied some effects to make it an abstract image - as most of her pieces have an abstract quality to them. Next we helped Irit prepare her pieces for display on the website by making sure all images and scans have similar backgrounds, clarity, reduced glare (due to glassy surface), and similarly sized. We found that the best quality images actually came from scanning the pieces directly on the scanning bed. Future additions to the site will include e-commerce options.

YELLmedia, Inc. assisted in domain creation and purchase, web hosting, web administration, logo design, web design, image scans, and copy.

Wrigley's "5"

Wrigley launched a new "sensory"experience gum appropriately called "5" to indulge your 5 senses. Their PR company contacted YELLmedia to help create a highly customized power point presentation for their Chief Marketing Officer that would would incorporate multiple media clips with little to no text. It needed to reflect "5"s brand messaging and not Wrigleys.


YELLmedia, Inc. designed a custom power point template and laid out and organized the slides according to an outline of the presentation provided by the PR company. Media clips were inserted varying from movie clips to commercial spots, and then all organized and burned to CDs for the presentation.

NEW LACP AWARD UPDATE!!!!!!

The LACP (League of Communication Professionals) 2006 International Spotlight Awards for print, television, and web awarded the Silver medal to Mather LifeWays 2006 Year in Review - "All's Well Who Age Well." It was also listed in the TOP 100 communication materials received for the contest.


YELLmedia, Inc. assisted in conceptualizing this project and bringing it from concept to finished product with design and layout, hand-drawn and hand-painted illustrations, scans, mock-ups, and finally digital print-ready and electronic web formats.

I like it a Latte

Emmi is a European dairy company that is entering the US market launching their tasty line of ready to go coffee beverages. Their local Chicago PR company needed help with a product fact sheet for printed and electronic press kits and a charity fact sheet for an Arts event Emmi sponsored to help kick start their launch.

Using their existing look, YELLmedia created both these sheets maintaining a consistent branding look and message. Digg Communications provided the copy.

YELLmedia, Inc. provided design and layout along with press ready and electronic files for ease of use.

Brain and Braun - FirmWise

FirmWise provides hosting and development solution software specifically for law firms. The software helps small to medium law firms maintain and update their own website on their own.

FirmWise was a new out of the box product with only an existing logo. They needed a letter size Brochure to help sell their product and they needed a look. YELLmedia, created their first brochure and used the logo for inspiration. Copy was provided by FirmWise.

YELLmedia, Inc. provided design and layout, as well as pre-flighting the files for printing.

YELLmedia Introduces "Celebrate" Micro-Site

YELLmedia, Inc. has extended its services to provide personal as well as business needs. The services included in this new extension are custom-designed, personalized, handmade invitations , announcements, stationary, and accessories to help you get heard! Stand out from the crowd with unique party items to fit your events theme, colors, mood, and story. Make your event as memorable as possible, by not leaving out any details. Customization allows you to really express yourself and your event and takes the blah out of ordinary cookie-cutter invitations.

In order to launch this new enhancement YELLmedia has created a micro-site befitting celebrations with samples of previous work. No two people are the same, so trust that no two events will be the same. Visit www.YELLmedia.com/celebrate.

A Makeover from a Makeunder

SpaSurgicaKenosha.com wanted to revamp their look and name (previously UltraSmartLipo) to be more professional. Their former site had 4 pages which included their welcome page. They felt that is was too cartoony, and doesn't draw the type of clients they would like to be getting. They came to YELLmedia, Inc. with a simple black and white logo and asked for a complete redesign.

Before & After (pictured right). The new site looks a lot more professional and sophisticated with tasteful pictures on all the pages. The website also navigates a lot better in a easy and cohesive manner. There are separate sections for before and after shots, testimonials, technology, etc. Plus there is an email database to collect visitors information for future email blasts and an easy to use contact form on the "us" page. I think they will be very successful with their new site.

YELLmedia, Inc. provided website design, database set-up, web forms, stock photography, web hosting, emails, domain forwarding, and web administration.

An Amazing Facelift - Before and After

This company needed a makeover for their website. They've been in business since 1939 and their website looked about the same age - complete with a white box around the company logo. They make all kind of rain gutter products and sells tools to distributors. But their website didn't quite match their materials or say a whole lot about what is so fantastic about their company. They also had parts of their site that had completely different looks - a great inconsistency, as well as a lot of products that opened to different views, but the views were no longer in a branded page. So that's what we fixed.


Our first goal was to match the collateral materials so they wouldn't have to go reprint or redesign. The next thing we needed to do was explain who the company is by adding some Flash to the site (quite literally). We added a flash movie to add movement to the page. Underneath the movie is a little more explanation as to why you should choose them over anyone else. We added a weather feed at the bottom of the page - so you can always check the weather at the corporate headquarters. It seemed relevant since their products have a lot to do with the weather and a nice added feature.

We continued the look and the branding onto the interior pages. Simply clicking on a type of product brings you to that products page. There you have the option to click on 3D views where you can move your mouse around and see the product from different angles, see an elevation drawing of the product, or just see the image larger.

YELLmedia, Inc. provided web redesign, graphic design, and stock photos rights management for this project.

Every"BODY"s Different

Unique Body Solutions (UBS) is a new company associated with Laser Concepts Chicago and Hair Free Chicago. They provide affordable solutions to your body concerns from laser hair removal and acne scars to skin tightening and cellulite reduction. They offer a la carte solutions packaged to solve your individual needs and of course...it's all very discrete. No one needs to know you've had anything done!

YELLmedia assisted UBS with logos, taglines, web design, and web hosting/administration, database collection. The logo concept picked up on soothing med spa colors of green and blue with the cleanliness of white. The reflection was used to mimic water for cleanliness and beauty reflected in/out and on surfaces. The tag ties into the title "Unique Body Solutions. Because EveryBODY's different." "body"="BODY", "unique"="different".


In the process of developing the UBS logo, we also developed a second logo that ties into the new brand identity. This is for their private label skin care - Unique Skin Solutions. The sun represents renewal, refreshing, and a tag line "Where Beauty Awakens."


The website's focus was to show all the great media and press coverage received by the high quality technology that UBS uses and to inform the visitor of all the great solutions they can provide for your unique body concerns. I was certainly sold after designing the site. A "Before and After" page highlights just some or their solutions and a "Technology" page focuses on the different laser machines used with downloadable PDF's and links to the manufacturers. Visit the "Media" page to see a few clips from various TV coverage or once again link to the manufacturers websites for even more coverage! The best kept secret in Chicago is no longer a secret!

YELLmedia provided copy, design, branding, web hosting, web admin, and database to collect visitors emails.

Draw a Card...Any Card!

A La Card Chicago is a terrific new company. They promote authentic Chicago restaurants through their special discount card decks. They also have a charitable arm that donates proceeds to a local food charity. These cards make great corporate gifts and your companies logo can go on it, or they can be sold as fundraisers, or just given as gifts. If you like to dine out and try new restaurants, this is definitely worth your while. I don't want to give away the whole enchilada, so you will just have to wait for further website development. Please contact A La Card Chicago if you are interested in participating as a restaurant, purchasing card decks, or have any questions at info@alacardchicago.com tell them YELLmedia sent you.

YELLmedia first assisted A La Card Chicago with their brand identity. This particular logo concept was chosen to convey a sense of adventure for the different types of restaurants you can try out. The colors are modern, and reflect the earthy and natural food trend as well as the charitable part of their organization. The style adapted is slick and modern to attract higher end and trendier eateries. YELLmedia went on to help with business cards, letterhead, and the actual card deck designs/card boxes.

For the tag, we wanted something quick, catchy, and yet descriptive. What could fit the "bill' better than "draw. dine. save." Because that's what you do. Draw a card, eat at that restaurant, and save on your bill. Fait Accompli!

YELLmedia also set up A La Card Chicago's interim website and email addresses. Stay tuned for their next developments. They are totally going to be on OPRAH!!!!

YELLmedia provided/developed brand identity, design layout, copyrighting, tag line, web design, and web administration.

Case Study: A Manual That Instructs

CellKeeper[TM] is a fantastic new company that provides digital device (iPods, cameras, cell phones, Blackberry/Palm Pilots, mp3 players, etc.) carrying accessories. The CellKeepers are versatile caddies that have room for your IDs, credit cards, money, key hooks, and digital device - for those on the move and in case you don't want to drag your purse or briefcase out with you on your next walk. They are convenient if you switch bags all the time and they are also fashionable. Worth, the company's founder, says he came up with the idea when he went to walk his dog and had no where to put his keys.

The problem (or plus) is that the product is so versatile. The current "How To Wear" guide which folds to the size of a credit card and comes packaged inside the wallet portion of the product wasn't very clear, and if anything was more confusing. Focus groups were thrown off by it's complexity and vague descriptions.

We redesigned the manual with the user in mind, by taking very clear photos (instead of illustrations) of the products parts and labeling them up front. Then we added section headers for the different wearing styles and clearly detailed the steps while referencing to the product parts photographed. We maintained a consistency with their brand style, but used more of the company's orange color to appeal to a wider audience - all the while maintaining the same size final product.

YELLmedia provided layout design, copy, photos, and photo retouching.

Bloom Keeps Growing!

Bloom Yoga Studio is a real unique place - a yoga, massage, and childbirth resource that provides a variety of classes from beginning yoga to advanced, and from prenatal to mom and baby. They also offer special workshop classes on an on going basis. I just checked out their website and there is even a belly dance class! I got to go sign up for that!

The concept behind Bloom Yoga Studio is that they wanted to create a safe environment for anyone to come do yoga...not just Hollywood actresses and the like. Its a positive place for everyday people where no one gets judged. Since outsourcing their website in 2005, they had been creating much of their advertising by themselves. They finally decided they had enough.

Our first project was an ad which needed to be friendly and down to earth, not unapproachable like some high-brow yoga studios with attitude. That meant an inviting headline "let's yoga!" that defies the English language and an approachable model who doesn't alienate anyone by being too thin or too scantly clad. The copy followed along this reasoning - fun, upbeat, and inviting with a strong call to action at the end - a limited engagement free yoga class. We maintained their brand identity by using the same colorful bars used on their website and logo and introduced their main focuses (yoga | massage | childbirth resources) in a graphic arc treatment.

From there we went on to polishing their monthly e-newsletter (which was managed by an e-newsletter vendor) maintaining the the colors and bars from their website. Water bottle labels, which are needed by thirsty yoga-ers, were created to help promote the brand in a fun way, coming up with the water's tag line "you need water to bloom." Once again retaining the brand in a modern and clean way. As the companies owners Kerry and Zach look to expand we will keep adding on new items piece by piece - building their brand, brick by brick.

YELLmedia provided copywriting, concepting, design, layout, and HTML web programming.

SEO(T) - Search Engine Optimization Tips

To be found or not to be found? That is the question.

Today people spend serious dough on what is called SEO or Search Engine Optimization. What's that you ask? Its improves the likelihood that people will a) find your website and b) when they find your website that they were actually looking for it. As with anything it can be a science and a full time job on. There are now companies that exist for that sole benefit. But if you understand it, you don't have to break the bank over it.

Here are some tips/tricks specific to Google[TM] but applicable to other search engines on improving your page rankings:

1) LINKS: It's important that other websites link to yours and that those sites are quality and reputable i.e. not just anyone and nothing underhanded. It is even healthier and better to have reciprocal links. So if your clients don't compete with your services i.e. you sell janitorial supplies and your link partner is a maid service, it would be a great idea to trade links support each other. Start a linking campaign.

2) TITLE TAGS: Make sure that the title (seen at the very top of the browser and programmed in the "head" of the source code) is pertinent to your site and to what is on that page.

3) KEYWORD DENSITY: This refers to the content on your page and specifically the keywords. If you are selling puppies and you mention them once on your page and then have a whole bunch of pictures, you page isn't very dense. If you mention puppies 50 times on that same page, that's density you can cut through with a knife!

4) KEYWORD LINKS: Links to your website should say more than "click here." For example if you sell puppies, a link with the text "Purebred Maltese Puppies" pointing at your site will cause your site to be listed earlier if a visitor searches for "Maltese puppies" than if the link simply said "click here".

5) ALTERNATE TAGS ON IMAGES: Since images are sometimes names "38756.jpg" or any strange variety of letters and numbers on your website, a search engine isn't going to figure out that that's a picture of Brad Pitt, unless you changed it's name to "BradPitt.jpg." So the solution is to place ALT tags on images. In Brad's case it might be tags such as . You get the picture.

6) META TAGS: The Meta Keywords tag used to be an important way to get your page listed under specific keywords under the search engines. Nowadays major search engines like Google and Alta Vista ignore this tag, and the keywords tag no longer has the significance it used to have in the early days of the web. You probably remember when you use to do a search for a "car" and 10 adult sites would pop-up. They put "car" in their meta tag, and this is probably when Meta tags don't have the same weight they use to.

Though the benefits conferred by using the various meta tags on your page is not substantial, they are nonetheless useful in controlling how the search engines index and list your page. Since tags like the description and robots tag require very little effort to add to your page, it is probably a good idea to add at least these tags to your pages. So you can slug them in and sleep easy at night.

7) MANUAL SEARCH ENGINE SUBMISSIONS: Go to each of the major search engines and make sure your URL is listed with them. Make sure you have a list of keywords handy, as they will ask you for this. This is time consuming, but a FREE service. This should be done yearly.

8) PAID ADVERTISEMENTS/PAY-PER-CLICK: All the tips above relate to what they call a "natural" search. But the best way to guarantee that your website ranking is to define your prescribed criteria and then BUY it. There is no such thing as a free lunch. How it works is that you select the keywords you want to be found under. Those keywords have a different cost depending on popularity i.e. "dog" might cost $1 a click while "runt" will only cost $.05 a click.

You only pay for what was clicked. So if you budgeted $10 for "dog" after 10 users click through the ad to your website your ad won't come up on top of the search anymore. You can outbid the highest purchaser of that word i.e. $1.10 to guarantee your name comes up first every time till you have exhausted your budget. You can do this with as many relevant words as you please. Your search engine vendor will be able to provide you with access to reports on how your rankings, number of click throughs, and budgets. From there you can constantly play with your key words and budgets till you find a winning combination.

Hopefully this helped explain and demystify the SEO monster. Please let me know if you have any questions or would like to add some SEO magic to your website. Just YELL!

yael@YELLmedia.com.

No Average Annual Report

All's Well Who Age Well was the last project I worked on as I transitioned from Marketing Art Manager of Mather LifeWays to Creative Director of YELLmedia. The project specifically was the Mather LifeWays 2006 Year in Review. As with any Annual Report type piece, the purpose was to convey to shareholders, board members, and customers who the company is while instilling confidence in the future of the company, and highlighting certain benchmarks.

At the same time we started brainstorming the project Mather LifeWays had introduced the idea of storytelling or storywelling into its company culture. Working with their in-house copywriter we developed the concept for the annual report by taking the idea of "storytelling" quite literally. The Year in Review as a story that the audience would be more likely to read (maybe even more than once), hold on to, and show to their kids. It would reflect a book from title page and dedications to the foreword and afterword, and separate Mather LifeWays from the others in their industry. It would also convey the companies ideas and feelings about aging and better define the company. Often people are confused at who Mather LifeWays is because of their many great offerings: Research/Education, Senior Living Residences, and Community Outreach.

Our story revolved around a character we invented called Alli, an average, female, older adult who wonders if she is "aging well." As Alli goes on her quest to find "Ways to Age Well" (the companies tag line), she embarks on a virtual tour of Mather LifeWays. The reader learns all about Mather LifeWays as Alli does. As she visits a location, that locations benchmarks are highlighted along the margins of that page.

At the end of Alli's journey the story is left open ended with a call to action for the reader to submit how he/she thinks Alli's story continues. It calls for the readers to take a more active role and symbolically shows that there is more to the journey/adventure of aging than you might think. To download the review click here.

YELLmedia helped with developing the concept, storyboarding, hand drawn paintings & illustrations, layout, and print production.

Case Study: Migun Means Beautiful Health - Reconstructed

It's official. Welcome to the first YELLmedia blog, a.k.a YELLog. Let's hear it! Can I get a YELL? Booyah!

I thought starting a blog would be a great way for future clients to get a glimpse into the thought processes and capabilities of YELLmedia and at the same time give a little more exposure to my clients. Today, every link counts in bringing your hits and search engine rankings up. Also, I solidly support all the projects that I work on. I think it's good moral, work ethics and it helps keep me be excited about the projects that I am working on.

Migun
Migun South Africa came to YELLmedia without anything - no collateral, no website, no business cards, zippo. Migun is a Korean company that creates thermal massage beds that actually improve your health. The beds are sold world wide. I've tested one out and it feels nothing like those wimpy massage chairs at novelty stores. Helga move over!

Migun Headquarters has no brand standards that they issue to franchisees. That means that every Migun website in America looks completely different. This particular entrepreneur had full rights to the South African market for Migun and wanted to be sure any subcontracted stores looked exactly the same . He understands the value of a consistent brand.

We developed their distinct branding and feel which all subsequent stores/locations will need to replicate. Migun HQ had two different logo looks with blue and green. We really connected with the green color because of its association with nature and health. Since Migun South Africa is a start-up work was done on an ongoing basis and rolled out little by little. After corporate identity, we developed the website which is constantly evolving.

From there we started with gym ads, flyers, the Grand Opening E-vite for their first Demo Centre, and Web-coupons. They are currently growing, have teamed up with a highly respected Chiropractic professional, and have a couple large deals on the horizon.

YELLmedia provided the following skills for this job: brand identity, marketing strategy, copywrighting, web design, print collateral materials, photo selection/purchase/rights management, e-vites, and press release.