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There are certain technical charts, diagrams and other visual media that probably bring back horrible memories of High School aptitude testing and harsh criticism of performance. Fortunately, the present generation of web designers, graphic artists and creative writers have found a way to turn those passing points of trauma into massive business exposure and renowned Web content.

Skills like SEO and link mastery are useful, but they tend to irritate readers more than peak interest in a service or product. The key to your business site or creative contributions becoming viral is dependent on a very creative media approach.

It is imperative that in order to become a ranking site, and not just one that has clever SEO juice to weasel its way into everyone’s browser, you must successfully integrate useful written content with eye-catching, universally attractive visual content.

Just a few months ago, my solution for eye-popping content consisted of  blogs, video and social media. I am a web designer by trade, thus aware they existed but consciously refrained from jumping into the world of online infographics. It was a bit of an self-induced intervention since I was technically an infographics “virgin.” My business, Biz Name Wiz, has greatly benefited since.

Infographics are a visual aid which accompanies your master content, or illustrates any type of trend in business, economics and “virtually” any other subject. The more relevant the infographic is to your content, the more people will be inclined to adopt what it illustrates and share it with their demographic. It can be simple maps and charts, or complex how-to diagrams that are unique on the Web.

Biz Name Wiz is a company that provides business naming help to start-ups and those wanting fresh profiles. The brain center of our team decided infographics are the correct type of evolution with which we could really grow.

After a bit of looking around, I discovered that Infographic creation services average $5000 per project! Having a tiny budget, I was stuck with accomplishing the impossible. I somehow needed to create a professional-looking infographic without breaking the bank. Oh yes, it can be done. Here is my “secret” recipe for success, and how my ingredients only cost me $279.

Infographic Success Recipe
 

• 1 Highly interesting and creative bit of content with useful subject. The subject must be attractive, or site popularity will not rise.
• 1 Tireless Researcher. This is the major “prep step.” (Cost ~$50)
• 1 Fast Writer (Cost ~$100, save on this expense using your own honed writing skills)
• 1 Experienced Artist with Photoshop mastery (Cost ~$100)
• 1 Month Pro Subscription to Piktochart (Cost ~$29)

Total: ~$279 Now let’s get cooking!

Research

This is the crux of your infographic success recipe. I found an incredibly talented research expert by posting a job at oDesk.com. My ad contained the following:

“Looking for a web research expert who can help us find a “buzz worthy” subject for an infographic. Must be incredibly fluent in written and spoken English. Must proficiently navigate Google Trends, Google Keywords and Google Spreadsheets.  You are required to have high English test scores, be proactive to your inquiries via Skype chat and email. Must have logged over 100 hours on oDesk. No rookies.”

I then asked the researcher to come up with 10 ideas using Google Trends to discover subject matter that is hot and trend-related to our business. Also, to use Google Keyword Tool to narrow down the subject to keywords with substantial search traffic.

After doing all of this we decided on the subject of “funny business names.” Admittedly, I always go for low-hanging fruit. This means a low-competition keyword with several thousand global monthly searches. We asked our new researcher to find 100 funny business names. She delivered it in stellar fashion and it only took $50 of her services.

Writing

Use your in-house team to dive into the content pool. If your writing resources suck, then take advantage of a brokered copy writing site like Textbroker.com. The downside is you cannot communicate directly with the creative team, the site moderates it incredibly well. Generous compensation for expert writers who provide type of service is about $.067 per word plus a small brokerage fee. (1500 words = $100 )

Design

Piktochart will get mad at me for saying this but “Picktochart an AMAZING online WYSIWYG tool to help quickly create high quality infographics. However, it’s not worth paying the recurring monthly fee for, and the design interface is limiting to the point of frustration for any professional designer!”

That being said, use it for one month to kick start your style in the right direction, and for its large library of style elements. I started our project in Piktograph essentially as a visual prototyping tool. We gave the username and password to the designer hired through eLance.com to recreate the prototype offline in Photoshop. Obviously, the powerhouse Photoshop software allows any designer a higher level of creativity and direct communication. Design Cost: $129 (10 hours @ $10/hr + $29 for Picktochart)

Timeline Estimate

Technical work on the project should only take about two weeks. Our project took about a month because I had to find a way to fit development into my regular work and home-based diaper changing duty. Budgeting time and balancing the cooperation between the team was really the most difficult and rewarding element.

Summary

It’s possible to produce high-quality content for a little dough.

It’s a little like producing a great movie, but with a tiny budget. Think about James Cameron’s Avatar. It would have been a monumental achievement even without a huge studio because everyone involved gave it their utmost.

The process of integrating infographics to your site should adhere to this formula. Everyone must give it their best and produce absolutely concrete, inarguably high quality work. It sounds harsh but, spend the time. If then, team members are not up to par, pay them, wish them well and replace them.

So, the final infographic outcome? We’re stoked!

Not only has the introduction of the infographic showcased our creative writing skills to the world it has also increased our website traffic, brand awareness and overall “buzz!”

I think the team at Biz Name Wiz succeeded. Please judge for yourself!

LINK: http://www.biznamewiz.net/blog/business-naming-images/52-Funny-Business-Names-Infographic.jpg

A client recently needed some help on setting up video tutorials on her website. I realized that this info is probably of value to just about everybody, so here it is. Disclaimer: these are my opinions as to what constitutes an effective tutorial and this is by no means authoritative.

• Initial capture:
  1. Script out the mouse clicks and screens that you want to hit in order (sometimes I do this in PowerPoint)
  2. Capture that workflow in a video with Camtasia or Captivate (possibly run the PowerPoint in another window for visual queues OR just print it out)
  3. Edit LIBERALLY to get tutorial down to final runtime
  4. Play video and record VERY rough voice over to get the basic structure down
  5. Replay voiceover and transcribe into a script, editing for brevity
  6. Read your script while the final video is playing and capture audio
  7. In Captivate or Camtasia, marry the audio with the video
• Stay away from the post-it style popups that are so popular in Captivate … people are way too impatient to read in a video, so these are not effective (example: subtitled films don’t do well)
• Instead, to highlight content or actions, perform a ZOOM in the video editing software
• When doing the VO, keep a consistent distance from the mic. I’d say 12 – 14 inches if you have a standalone mic. If it’s clip on or headset, then ignore this.
• I like audible clicks and typing sound effects in tutorials.  In Camtasia, this is one click box.
• Make sure the volume is fairly loud, but not blaring on the final version … people always have their speakers wayyy too low
• If this is an intro-style of video, it should be really fast, like 30 – 45 seconds (you are telling your audience that your service or product is as easy as 1-2-3 … so REALLY make it as easy as 1-2-3)
• Unless you have an insanely complex form (and if you do, you might consider redeveloping it), when demoing a form being filled out, show the beginning of filling out a form, then do a blur transition to “fast-forward” to the completed form.  If you must, fast-forward blur to the challenging parts of the form and in your voiceover, give users clear, concise direction.  Or, like I said, redevelop.
• Break non-intro tutorials into 1 minute to 1:30 chunks
• Use an SEO-friendly player like Longtail

That’s a messy, incomplete set of guidelines to making an effective tutorial.

It’s no longer cool to have a brown box on your Twitter profile.

Way back in March just HAVING a Twitter account said “savvy”.  Now the marketing  mavens  are branding the holy lights out of all things “Tweet” and Twitter’s gone main stream.

Here’s some examples of what I’m talking about:

Executives, and the publications that target them, are talking non-stop about how Twitter should be leveraged in the enterprise – as in  this video of CIO’s from Home Depot, Baxter, and Yahoo, and this  CIO Magazine article “Twitter’s Potential for Business Users“, and in newly coined vernacular like  “Real Time Monitoring” used by Lenny Mendonca in this Think Big video.

For a great example of how one brand is leveraging Twitter to extend its brand reach, increase goodwill, and improve customer service, check out Whole Foods. (Thanks Denise, @denisess for tweeting this).

How to leverage Twitter for your enterprise is a fundamental strategy question that should be carefully studied by your organization’s executive team.

The take away message is this: Ignoring Twitter is a way to get noticed – only not the way you want.

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P.S.  Your mid to large size organization may qualify for a free 60 minute executive workshop customized to your brand.  Contact topLingo

We’re not talking about the Carl’s Jr. chili burger mess on that guys face. We’re talking about how your visitors are going to find what they’re looking for on your web site.

Google offers a very low cost – $100 a year – custom edition search engine called the “Business Edition“. (50,000 page sites cost more).

The coolest thing is that you can fit Google Search Business Edition seamlessly into your site – sans the “Powered by Google” logo – and with no results page ads. To completely customize the look and feel around your core branding instead of theirs, Google offers an XML API.

So the topLingo tip for today is: Google Custom Search Business Edition with the XML API is the way to go if your site needs a commercial grade search that won’t detract from your core branding.

Now you got it. Now you’re good.

Now you can schedule Google Analytics to automatically email site statistics. Schedule reports to be generated and sent at the interval that works best for your situation: daily, weekly, monthly or quarterly. Reports can be generated in PDF or other formats, and sent to one or multiple email addresses.

Most web builders are familiar with Google Analytics. It’s something every web site should run and that every web builder should make their clients aware of. Not just because it’s FREE, but because the reporting and dashboard functionality is just plain awesome. Google could easily charge thousands of dollars for this functionality and get paid for it because the ROI is there, so why would you NOT use it?

Learn more here: Google’s three minute video tour.

Need a solid video host?

Brightcove, an internet TV platform, not only hosts your vids but also helps you promote it via:

1. Community: Leverage viral video sharing.

2. Distribution: Attract affiliates and list content with video search engines.

3. Advertising: Generate revenue from advertising.

Check out their 2 minute demo: http://www.brightcove.com/products/index.cfm

When it launched we blogged a review of Google Audio Ads, the marketing service that allows you to manage your radio advertising campaigns online.

Now intending to get people excited, Google is offering a $2000 future ad credit if you spend $1000 in advertising.

Nice two for one deal! Enjoy it while it lasts!

Actual Google Promotion

Man I love Google! Not only are they buying up some very cool companies handsomely rewarding the owners, they’re hooking up the users as well by “Googlizing” the products.

For those of you using Feedburner, a new Google purchase, two critical features and reasons to pay monthly for the service are now free. MyBrand which allows you to remove the Feedburner URL and use your own, and TotalStats which gives you more analytics are now FREE! Here’s how to enable:

http://blog.wired.com/monkeybites/2007/07/feedburner-give.html

Recently beta launched Google Audio Ads allows you to create radio advertising campaigns by producing high quality radio ads and allowing you to set your own budget and decide when and where your ads air.  And for a little as $400 … I can hear that!

Google Audio Ads

According to Google “Website Optimizer, Google’s free multivariate testing application, helps online marketers increase visitor conversion rates and overall visitor satisfaction by continually testing different combinations of site content (text and images).”  

So, after I looked up what the word multivariate meant I then checked out the demo.

    This free new tool comes with a Google AdWords account and lets you rotate and track ROI on webpage variations.  The example they present is scenario with three different homepages that only differ by a unique headline, photo and paragraph of copy.  These pages are then auto rotated and tracked by Google whose analytics reveal which message is the most effective.  Try it out.  

Google Website Optimizer

On March 23 we announced the launch of an online mortgage marketing toolkit portal for Silver Hill Financial and three days later were featured on DSNews.com.   

Proof that press releases can get really you press!

http://dsnews.com/broadcasts_archive.cfm?streamid=285

Recently a friend of mine ramped up to invest in a new website application.  However, it wasn’t really a new project rather one with dozens of major competitors.  

His development budget was realistic, his drive was impressive, his operation plan was on par for success and his marketing dollars seemed enough.  $40k sounded like it would do the job.

Then he did something very smart.

He dug deep into his competition and discovered that their marketing budgets ranged from $500k to $1mil a year.  So, in order for him to realistically compete in the same space $40k was only a drop in the bucket.  $40k would get him going but he’d struggle massively to launch.

 Lesson learned … Digest (info) before you invest (cha-ching$$).

Want a better alternative to taking a marketing class at your local college? Then pay attention marketing guru Seth Godin.  Here’s a 48 minute online video of him speaking to the people at Google about why they rock and what marketing means in web 2.0.   

Seth recaps his permission marketing, purple cow, idea virus and all marketers are liars concepts with remarks like “Tiffany’s doesn’t sell necklaces.  They sell blue boxes with the Tiffany’s logo on it.  They charge you $1000’s of dollars for the box and then give the necklace away free inside!”

“All Marketers are Liars” – Seth Godin speaks at Google

Need more info about e-marketing?  I attended this informative webinar from Salesforce.com which did a good job outlining e-marketing concepts tips and tricks.   

Click here to watch it online.