The NWA Selects Charlotte Web Design Company as New Website Design & Internet Marketing Partner

Charlotte, NC.  ”The National Wrestling Alliance (NWA Professional Wrestling) has selected The Idea People as our new web design and Internet marketing agency of record,” announced NWA Executive Director Robert K. Trobich from his Charlotte, NC headquarters.  ”The NWA is the oldest professional wrestling association in the world and we need a professional, highly-experienced, passionate web organization to work with us in redesigning and relaunching our prominent International brand.”

Many people across the Carolinas will remember NWA Wrestling from the 1960′s through 1980′s under the Charlotte wrestling promotion of Jim Crockett Promotions, headquartered in Charlotte.  The famous wrestlers who worked for the NWA and Jim Crockett Promotions included Ric Flair, Jim Cornette, Harley Race, Dory Funk Jr., the Iron Sheik, Nikita Koloff, Tully Blanchard, Ole Anderson, Sting, Lex Luger, and the list goes on.  The NWA was wildly popular across the southeast USA prior to Ted Turner purchasing large territories and creating the WCW in Atlanta.

“The Idea People have sports marketing and creative experience working with ECHL teams, the Arena Football League, the NBA II expansion, and the NASCAR Truck Series,” said Jay Joyce of The Idea People.  ”The NWA really responded to what we had done with the various teams and leagues we have branded and worked with over the past 15 years.  We are no stranger to professional sports branding and marketing.”

The immediate project at hand is the redesign of the existing NWA website.  Because the NWA has a global appeal and fan base, The Idea People will be developing micro-sites in different languages inside the main NWA website.  ”We will also be creating interactive message boards and a heavy social media opportunity within the NWA website and brand, ” said Joyce.  ”One of the goals that the NWA has is to use their web presence to bring their fans closer to the wrestlers and individual NWA promotions across the globe.”

If your business would like to learn more about the professional web design and Internet marketing services offered by The Idea People, please contact Jay Joyce at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.

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Web Design in Charlotte Features 2012 Trends on Custom Content & Increased User Experiences

Web design in Charlotte, NC is quickly evolving for businesses of all types and sizes.  Website users are expecting a certain level of creativity, page design, “surprises” and chunks of highly-relevant, fresh content.  They are hungry for everything that is prescribed by Google.

So what does Google have to do with your business web design here in Charlotte?  Well, just about everything if you want to differentiate from competitors and attract active, savvy web users (i.e., customers).  Google is still the king of search engines, Internet technologies, emerging user trends, social sharing and social collaboration.  Your best bet is to ensure that your web design is Google-relevant and Google-friendly by search standards and design.

The Idea People in Charlotte have designed and developed websites for hundreds of businesses on thousands of web and Internet projects since 1994.  We have the basic web design techniques and tactics down very well.  But where we really excel is in the adoption of emerging and early-stage web design trends and Internet technologies.  Our web design clients expect us to know where the web is going and how to accelerate their growth to capture those trends and technologies in 2012.

What Makes for Great Web Design in 2012?

1.  Web design for a stronger user experience. The Panda releases from Google in 2011 have put all web designers and SEO’s on alert that Google is now evaluating web user experience from a human perspective.   So your web design should be well-organized, easy-to-navigate, “feel trustworthy and reliable,” and be presented as a source of “expertise” and “knowledge.” Human traits are now important in web design and user experience.  Web design in 2012 should capture attention in under 3 seconds so the user feels like this is a good place to be.

2.  Mobile and smart phone web design. Your web presence on mobile and smart phones should be specifically designed for the mobile experience. Tighter navigation, limited graphics, links to view the full HTML site, and easy contact forms with directions to your location. Acceptable mobile web design elements include video, maps and simple contact forms with a phone number that is easy to click to dial.

3.  Video inside your web design. A rich media experience is at the top of the list for well-designed websites. Video elevates and enhances a superb user experience. But the video production needs to be targeted, appropriate and highly-relevant to the topic of each page. Video grew by leaps in 2011 as more and more consumers used video as a resource on their iPads, smart phones, laptops and desktops. Video captures emotion and can touch more senses than any other medium.  Powerful desktop editing and graphics suites enable video editors with The Idea People to create movie-like scenes, music and graphics.

4.  Writing & developing custom content. Writing and developing custom content is part of your web design and is extremely important for creating longer user experiences and stronger search engine rankings. Custom content is highly-relative to the keywords and information that users are searching for. The Idea People creates and markets custom content in-house, just like this news article. All of the content in this post is focused on the web design trends for 2012. The content is highly-relative and targeted to the user (you!).

5.  Web design extending to Social Media. The creative web design that you create for your main HTML website should be extended to your social media pages. Facebook, Twitter, Blogger, WordPress, and YouTube should each have the creative design elements from your main website. Social media continues to grow with acceptance on all levels of audiences. And social media is blending closer with your Internet marketing tactics as the search engines begin to integrate social media into search results.  The very definition of “web” is the sharing of content between websites and users.  So is the definition of “social media”.  The lines between social media and the web will continue to blur as they seamlessly share back and forth.

To learn more about Charlotte web design trends for your business, please contact Jay Joyce at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.  The Idea People are professional web design and Internet marketing specialists who can collaborate with your business and help you win on the Internet.

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Charlotte Brand Design & Branding Company The Idea People

The Idea People in Charlotte believe that every business should have an established, researched, identifiable, and creatively-appropriate business brand.  Ideally, your customers and top prospects “picture” your business brand when somebody mentions your product or service line.  That’s strong brand recognition.

Your business brand also helps convey intangible (subliminal) qualities that can quickly become important and very tangible in the minds of customers and key prospects.  We build-in these unique qualities when we develop your business brand attributes and business logo.

What are some intangible brand building qualities?

• »Trusted – Helps the individual feel that “this is a good place to do business…I trust this brand”
• »Qualified- Helps the individual feel like “this company is qualified to help me with my product or service needs.”
• »Experienced – Helps the individual feel that “this company has in-depth and varied levels of experience that will benefit me.”
• »Longevity – Helps the individual feel a sense of “association and closeness to your brand because you’ve been in business a longer time span.”

But your business brand extends beyond physical appearance as a logo or building signage (that is still important, however!).

What are some external branding points that I should consider?

• »Phone Etiquette – How is your business perceived when you answer the phone? What about voice mail?
• »Customer Reviews – The web shows the good, the bad and the ugly. How are your customer reviews?
• »Customer Testimonials – Are your best customers inside your website and marketing campaigns “singing your praises”?
• 
• »Email Signature – Is there a consistent email design and content plan in place, or does everybody use whatever email signature they invent?
• »Marketing & Sales Collateral – Are your brochures, magazine ads, newsletters, and sales flyers consistent with appearance and message?
• »Website & Social Media – Are they consistent in design, messaging, images, audience and optimization?
• »Customer Service Program – Is it clearly defined and easy for the customer to access? Or is your customer service program “whoever answers the phone”?

These are all touch-points that represent your company, image and message.  Are your touch-points accurate?  Or do your touch-points veer off course with respect to your brand intentions?  The Idea People includes all of this in our discovery, research and strategy for building and strengthening your market brand.

The Idea People can help your company create new business brands or strengthen existing business brands.  Either way, we look at your entire business image and philosophy.  That is the core essence of your brand.  Colors, fonts and icons should come WAY down the road after you have established an appropriate business brand strategy and program!

If you would like to talk about your business brand and how to strengthen your business brand, please call Jay Joyce with The Idea People at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.  We look forward to helping you create a new business brand or strengthen your existing business brand!

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Web Design & Website Marketing Technology Trends in Charlotte NC for 2015.

Web design and website marketing trends in Charlotte have evolved dramatically over 2011.  Our web design and website marketing clients here at The Idea People have seen first-hand how a move toward creating custom content, improving website user experiences, and cultivating social media marketing opportunities can help generate new customers and prospects.

But where is web design, website marketing and mobile marketing going in the future in Charlotte?  How will the web evolve with respect to the technologies that we use today?

The Idea People have developed a forward-thinking marketing and technology program for the web that we call Push to 2015™.  Push to 2015™ is what we identify and forecast as trends we have either witnessed or developed within The Idea People.

“You can’t just ask customers what they want and then try to give that to them. By the time you get it built, they’ll want something new.”

- Steve Jobs

We authored a special article called “Where the Web is Going” and you can download it here. This article contains our forecasts from the Idea People on where we believe the web is moving over the next few years toward 2015.

“Web design in Charlotte with our clients has evolved in 2011 to be more focused on creating positive user experiences and delivering targeted, fresh content,” said Jay Joyce of The Idea People.  ”It takes technology and Internet savvy to create momentum and opportunities for businesses to grow in today’s competitive marketplace, and this is where we do our best work.”

Our forecast for web design and website marketing includes some surprising statements that will be startling for some and exciting for others.  Download our report “Where the Web is Going” and decide for yourself!

If your company would like to talk about a strategy for your business, please call Jay Joyce at The Idea People at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.  We have the experience of 18 years in business as a forward-thinking, collaborative, creative, and technology-oriented company that has helped hundreds of businesses adapt and excel!

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Charlotte Pay-per-click PPC and Google AdWords Remarketing Web Campaigns Grow

Internet marketing and web design for Charlotte businesses is evolving every month, thanks to the mega forces of Google and Google AdWords.  The new online advertising and marketing tools that have been developed this year can really help your website marketing and SEO effort scoop in targeted customers.

The Idea People in Charlotte help our clients maintain forward momentum by understanding and implementing these new marketing technologies.

Have you heard of Remarketing from Google AdWords?  This is a unique and fabulous service that you really should review and implement with your AdWords PPC campaigns.

PPC Remarketing Campaigns with Google AdWords

So what is remarketing and why should it be important to you?  Remarketing allows you to reach people who previously visited your website, and match the right people with the right message. You can show users these messages as they browse sites across the Google Display Network. The Ads that you see on this blog post are Remarketing Ads in our campaign here at The Idea People.

Let’s say you are a business who sells Widgets and Zenons. You can show Widget ads to those people who visited the Zenon section, and you can cross-sell, up-sell, and promote other relevant products: Widget service agreements and Zenon add-ons, for example.  It’s an awesome program!  We use it at The Idea People to target web design and website application development traffic.

Here’s how it works: You add a piece of code (remarketing tag) to pages of your site that correspond to certain categories you want to promote. For example, adding a tag for “Web Design” on all of the pages where you market Web Design services will let you later show relevant Web Design ads to everyone who visits those pages.

Remarketing is a tool that can drive ROI for all types of advertisers, regardless of the focus of your campaigns (brand-oriented, performance-driven, etc.) or your ad formats.

Search advertisers (pay-per-click ads) can use remarketing to create an integrated campaign strategy. After driving traffic to your site with search ads, you can then remarket to those users who reach your site by showing them tailored ads on sites throughout the Google Display Network.

When you combine your keyword campaigns with remarketing, you might see higher conversions for your campaigns overall. For example, if you have keywords that you don’t use because you haven’t seen conversions in the past, you can use these keywords to drive traffic to your site, and then remarket to the user to drive the conversion!

If you would like to learn more about Google AdWords, PPC (pay-per-click) Campaigns, keyword advertising, SEO and Remarketing, please call Jay Joyce at The Idea People at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.  We look forward to helping your business maximize website traffic and build new prospects!

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Your Web Design & Blog Design in Charlotte Should Be the Same Design

Business blogging around the country, especially here in Charlotte, is at an all-time high.  People like to read blog posts, even more so when the blog posts are highly-relative to topics that affect the target audience.

This is a primary reason why The Idea People embeds WordPress blogs directly into our client web designs.

Why Blog Designs Should Mirror Your Web Design

Writing and developing custom content is one of the hottest professional services offered by full-service web companies like The Idea People.  The search engines are engaged with searching the Internet and categorizing your content inside their search engines.  The most relevant content gets served at a higher ranking when searched on by a user.  Makes sense, right?

Now, more than ever before, creative design for your blog is critical.  Especially when it is embedded directly into your website design!  Embedding your blog inside your website design gives you three very distinct benefits for users and search engines:

1. Keeps brand consistency page-by-page through your blog and main website
2. All content “lives” inside your domain name – keeps visitors inside your website
3. Fresh content updated weekly keeps your domain name “highly relevant” to users and engines

As the mission of your business web design and your blog design evolves, it will become more critical to have consistent creative branding and graphics shared equally between the two.

Seamless User Experience.

Users, visitors and subscribers to your blog and website should easily and seamlessly flow back and forth between blog posts and main website navigation.  The Idea People believes in providing a natural flow through your website for maximum user performance with zero tolerance for user experience interruptions.

So, the story goes that The Idea People believes in bridging the creative treatment and user experience for your web design and your business blog design.  To find out more about our unique web and blog design services, contact our managing partner, Jay Joyce, at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.  You’ll then understand more about where the web is going™.

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Charlotte Content Marketing & Content Development Company Surges in Rankings!

Content marketing and custom content development (like this particular blog post) are what The Idea People have done since 1994.  We have always believed that creating and broadcasting custom content is what customers and prospects are always interested in.

As users of the web have matured over the past few years, and the search engines have evolved to urgently want to deliver highly-relative search results, developing and marketing content is rushing to the top of how businesses are marketing their business and reaching uniquely-qualified customers.

The Idea People uses content development and content marketing for our Charlotte clients as an active, highly-relevant and engaging method to target and attract new customers for our clients.  As the costs of PPC and new customer acquisition continues to climb higher and higher, we see most of our clients turning to us to develop custom content for them on a weekly basis.

We research and write all custom content right here
at The Idea People!

Search engines love the fresh and highly-relevant content!  They index new content so quickly and efficiently.  Now, there are plenty of rules to follow to ensure that the content is appropriately targeted to the keyword search terms and keyword phrases.  Of course, all of the content development and content marketing that we perform on behalf of The Idea People clients always exceeds search engine expectations…and our client’s customers love the fresh content!

If you would like to learn more about custom content development and custom content marketing, call Jay Joyce at The Idea People at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.  Our custom content programs will help you increase your organic search engine rankings, increase new prospect interest, and increase your website engagements.

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Your Charlotte Web Design Easily Transforms Your Facebook Business Page Design!

Facebook business pages are surging in popularity as social media continues to grab millions and millions of people’s (customer’s) attention and valuable time.  Facebook levels the playing field for businesses of every size, industry and location.  When you’re on Facebook, you’re in their environment insulated from Google and external search engine rankings.  It’s all about you and your fans (customers)!

So where does Charlotte web design figure into your Facebook business page?  Well, the creative web design options have never been larger or more open to customize Facebook business pages with features and design elements found on your main business website.

We’ll use The Idea People’s Facebook page as our example to show you what type of creative web design and features are available to use.  The first image pictured below is The Idea People’s main Facebook page.  We can incorporate custom graphics and “headers” to give our Facebook page a similar creative look and appeal as our main website page.

In the next photo below, we incorporated a Portfolio section on our Facebook page that easily showcases pieces of our client work for users to stay inside Facebook and explore more about our company’s unique web design and marketing capabilities.

In the photo below, we decided to create a Video section that houses some of our client video project work as well as some key videos promoting The Idea People and our capabilities.  Again, our goal is to keep people inside Facebook as they interact with our company brand and capabilities.

The next two photos below show how we brought in our Blog and Twitter feeds from our main website.  This keeps our Facebook fans engaged with our Facebook business page so they can explore every aspect about The Idea People while they stay inside the Facebook domain.  Now, at any time, they can visit our main website by simply clicking on our external website links.

Facebook business pages should be blending elements from your main website page into the design.  The Idea People forecasts that you soon will have several key “websites” that share content and elements to serve audiences and customers who desire to “stay inside” a social media’s environment.

To find out more about Charlotte web design and Facebook business page design, please contact Jay Joyce with The Idea People at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.  We can build custom Facebook business pages, WordPress Blogs, and every other type of mini website!

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Charlotte Web Design Company Earns Top 10 Web Design Listing from Charlotte Business Journal

The Idea People have been selected as a Top 10 Charlotte Web Design Company for 2011/2012 by the annual Book of Lists from the Charlotte Business Journal.  This is the third year in a row that The Idea People have been selected to appear in the annual list as a Top Charlotte Web Design Company.

“We are proud of the accomplishments that we have made this year as a Charlotte web design company,” said Jay Joyce of The Idea People.  “We all work hard every day to ensure that our web design clients receive the best overall creative impact coupled with the cutting-edge optimization and seo techniques.”

The Idea People began in 1994 and have been under the same ownership of Jay Joyce and Bill McCown from the beginning.  “In 1994, there were not many marketing companies that offered strategy, creativity and web design under one roof,” says Joyce.  “We were real trailblazers of sorts offering an approach that was similar to full-service advertising agencies, except with a technology spin toward the Internet.”

“As we Push toward 2015 and beyond, we see an incredible opportunity for our clients to prepare themselves with emerging Internet and technology marketing trends,” added Joyce. “Video and mobile phones will rise as the ‘go to’ customer connection points, and E-business will take on more of a presence as our clients streamline and automate business processes.”

If your company would like to learn more about our Charlotte web design company and website development services, please contact Jay Joyce at The Idea People at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.

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The Idea People Launches New Charlotte Web Design & E-commerce Website

The Idea People is excited to announce that we have launched another new Charlotte website for an Internet-based company called Parrot Moon.  Parrot Moon will be heavily focused on social media for new customer acquisition and branding through Facebook and Twitter with a PPC campaign using Facebook, Google AdWords and Bing that launches in mid-October.

“2011 has been an amazing and exciting year as we have witnessed five different entrepreneurs launch five completely different Internet-based businesses,” said Jay Joyce of The Idea People.  ”The economy has opened the door for successful business people to develop and launch service and product-based websites in large surges this year.”

Parrot Moon is offering a unique, free online date and important event reminder service that easily imports your Facebook friends and email contacts, birthdays and other important event dates  into Parrot Moon’s web-based date reminder software.  ”We developed the web-based reminder software to keep you informed via email or simple text messages of upcoming important dates,” added Joyce.  ”And each user can adjust how often they need the reminder service to remind them!”

Parrot Moon also features a large variety of free E-cards that anybody can easily customize and send to a friend or contact.  No account is needed.  Free E-card categories include birthdays, anniversaries, thank you’s, holidays, care and concern, weddings, congratulations, encouragement and more.

“The E-commerce experience in Parrot Moon is their enormous selection of unique gifts, jewelry for men and women, watches for men and women, chocolate truffles and other items that are popular everyday gift ideas,” said Joyce.  ”Parrot Moon is the only e-tailer in the United States that is offering these beautiful, stylish Swiss-movement men’s watches from Claro, for example.”

For more information about Parrot Moon and how The Idea People can help your business with web design, custom web applications, or Internet marketing, call Jay Joyce at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.

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Website Design & SEO for Charlotte Business Websites is Changing from Google Panda

SEO’s and Internet marketing pros have been sweating bullets this year because of Panda.  Why would a Panda cause an SEO to sweat?  Because this particular Panda is from Google, and this Panda is changing the way websites are being ranked.

The Idea People in Charlotte provides our clients with a turnkey web design, web development and Internet marketing SEO program.  We do it all.  And we have since 1994.  But enough about us!  The one thing that we have held consistent through all of the SEO fads and evolution is that the user experience and general “feelings” that humans get from your business website is vastly important.  We design websites for humans, then search engines and spiders.

OK.  What is Panda?  Panda is the last name of an engineer employed by Google named Navneet Panda.  He has led some very interesting work on machine learning algorithms at Google.  Navneet really developed some larger curves that advanced machine learning algorithms to a much higher level this past March.  See, “Panda” was released this past March by Google.

Panda did some interesting and revolutionary things with how websites are ranked.  Some websiteswent up, and others went down.  Some websites saw dramatic drops in overall traffic…just out of the blue.  People panicked. SEO’s panicked.  Some SEO’s lost sleep at night thinking of ways to work around this new Panda update.  But it won’t work and it won’t happen.  Panda is here and it is changing the search.

What Does Google Panda Do to Your Website?

For the first time, Google is including input from their human “quality raters” to mix into the search results algorithms to help the machines learn.  The quality raters were asked questions about “trusting a website with giving them a credit card,” “how was the design of the website,” “how would you rate the quality of this website,” and “how is the user experience on this website.”

So, with this input from the quality raters, Google separated websites into ones that the group wanted to see rated higher and ones that the group wanted to see rated lower.  The machines are now learning this way.  No more “tricks” or “bad tactics” to get websites to rank higher.  This Panda update now gives us cleaner and purer search results based on exactly the data we want to see.  Cool, huh?

Writing and presenting good content is still important, obviously.  And good website design is now more important.  And presenting all of this in a website that is highly-relevant, feels good, has a high degree of trust, and is easy to use now rises toward the top over meta tags and stuffing web pages full of keywords.  Panda should shake out the SEO riff-raff in Charlotte and just leave the professional web strategists, designers and developers. *shock*

This post is just scratching the surface on what Panda and Google will do to revolutionize SEO and website design.  We at The Idea People like it.  We like creating websites that have high user experiences, creative designs, and are packed with trustworthy content.

We build websites for humans!

If you would like to learn more about Panda, really good website design, and Internet marketing with proper content development, call Jay Joyce at The Idea People at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.  In our eyes, Panda is a good thing.  We’ve waited 17 years for “him” to get here!

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Charlotte Custom Content Writing, Content Development & Content Marketing will Grow Your Business

We at The Idea People have long believed that creating custom content and content marketing are the real keys to making your website a thriving, active, search-engine-dominating machine.  You can only optimize your website so much with keywords and SEO “tricks”.

So What is Content Marketing & Content Development?

Content marketing and custom content development is the custom creation of targeted, fresh, up-to-date content that is placed on your website and submitted to the stream of fresh content for the search engines to absorb.  Remember, the goal of Google and the other search engines is to deliver you the FRESHEST, most HIGHLY-RELEVANT content based on your keyword search.

Keyword phrases do play an important role in custom content marketing…but the keywords are placed INSIDE your custom content!  The search engines are moving so quickly toward only wanting the freshest and most-relevant content delivery.  They are hungry for new content.

New content means new opportunity on the search engines…or maybe we should say that new content means “fresher” opportunity on the search engines.

Think about this.  When you are searching for a pet sitting service in Charlotte, you want to see the latest and greatest results.  How many times have you searched in the past only to see results that included business listings that were closed or had disconnected phone numbers?  It happens often.  Or you’ll pull up dog food, dog collars, kitty litter and other search results that have nothing to do with Pet Sitting.  Those days will be closing quickly.

Creating custom content and content marketing,
like we do here at The Idea People,
is a rare service offered by website design companies.

To learn more about creating custom content and content marketing for your company, please contact Jay Joyce at The Idea People at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.  We look forward to working with your company and developing a proactive, focused, highly-relevant custom content marketing program!

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Charlotte Web Design Heroes or Charlotte Website Design Zeroes? Is Your Web Design Partner a Winner?

Everybody is a web designer.  Your boss’ kid designed his cub scout pack’s website.  Your neighbor designed the HOA website.  Heck, you even started a WordPress blog about collecting and trading antiques!  Everybody is designing websites all over the web!  There are even “web design” companies that claim they are professional designers and marketing “experts”.

You’re right.  Everybody can design a website or a web page.  Facebook, Twitter, Google, Yahoo…they have all made it “point and click” to build a website.  Albeit these websites are simple and fast to build, they lack so much in so many areas.

Web Design Zeroes

Building it on a simple and primitive scale is easy.  Point and click.  Upload an odd-sized photo.  Stretch that photo over there.  Add non-complementing colors.  Create an awkward-sized text block.  Use different-sized fonts to create havoc.  Import text from Word documents and watch the craziness of bad grammar and terrible spellings occur.  Add a new page and overwrite your “About Us” page.  Wonder where it went.  Then send the link to your cub scout troop.  Email the link to the homeowners in your neighborhood.  Blast that link out to your customers.  Ouch.  Import some whiz-bang Search Engine Optimization gimmick that you paid $1.99 on eBay.  Ouch.  Now that you have built it…where are the visitors?  Where are the customers?  Look at your one and only post from February 2010.  Ouch.  The zeroes take your money and give you less than expected.  The zeroes don’t respond to your needs.  The zeroes rest on their laurels.  The zeroes are on to the next account.  The zeroes don’t know about growing your brand.  The zeroes don’t care.

Web Design Heroes

A professional web design company is like an attorney, accountant or architect.  We have special education, training and many years of experience.  We are business owners.  We are marketers.  We are creative designers.  We are technology-oriented.  We understand search engine algorithms and ranking theories.  We write and develop custom content for your website so you “sound” professional to customers.  We create engagement opportunities on your website like video, mp3 files, contact forms, white papers, and calls-to-action.

We target and address your best prospects directly.  We deliver options to your customers.  We tie together marketing themes and branding initiatives.  We plan, direct and shoot professional video and photography for your website.  We anchor your website with a strategic social media and Internet marketing plan.  We track results and make adjustments.  We keep you informed.  We offer new ideas and direction.  We anticipate and forecast technology and marketing trends.  We adjust your marketing messages as your company products and services evolve.  We look after your best interest.  We grow along side you.  We return phone calls and emails quickly (we really do).  We represent your image, brand and reputation in the most professional and proud manner.  We think with you.  We rely on each other.   We create a strong and profitable professional partnership.  We always deliver more than you expect.  We increase your new customer prospects.  We thank you.

To learn more about the professional web design and Internet marketing services offered at The Idea People, call Jay Joyce at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.  We have been one of the web design heroes since 1994.

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Charlotte Graphic Design & Advertising Agency The Idea People Launch Ad Campaign for Client

The Idea People has been the advertising, print design, trade show, video production and website design partner with Rutland Plastic Technologies since 2007.  We design and coordinate many different types of creative design projects each month through the year.

Rutland Plastic Technologies is a the global screen printing ink manufacturer for thousands of screen printing companies and brands across the globe.  For more than 50 years, this Pineville, NC-based company has developed, marketed and manufactured millions of pints, quarts, gallons and drums of world-class inks.  Several years ago, Rutland merged with one of their largest competitors, Union Ink Company, based in New Jersey.  Together, the two companies literally dominate the world of professional screen printing ink production!

Rutland is launching a new ink targeted for high-performance 100% p0lyester fabrics and other high-performance poly-blended fabrics called Endurance.  Their new Endurance Ink is formulated with determination for great stretch and recovery in the fabric, in addition to good shelf stability.  You can see the national Ad design for Endurance here on this page.

If your company would like to learn more about how The Idea People can create action-oriented print and graphic design campaigns, please call Jay Joyce at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.  We look forward to bringing your unique products and services to life through creative graphic design and print advertising.

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Charlotte Marketing Summer Dog Days Tips!

The dog days of summer seemed like they started back in June of this year, heat and weather wise.  To date, Charlotte has had something like 47 days of temperatures above 90 degrees.  That’s hot!  And I think it affects people’s absorption and openness to marketing messages…during the dog days of Charlotte summer marketing.

So what can help bring business owners and marketing decision makers out of the dog days (besides a brisk 75 degree, humidity-free day!)?  How about some different approaches to marketing?  How about some different messages?  That might help stir some attention to your consistent marketing drip.  Our approach here is to “go personal” with your marketing and think away from email bombardments.

Dog Day Marketing Buster #1 – Write & Send a Real Letter

Try writing and sending a real letter.  How often do you receive an actual letter?  With an actual .44-cents postage stamp.  Put some humor in it about “how hot it is.”  Focus the letter just on one (1) unique aspect of your product or service.  Focus on how that aspect can help the prospect solve a challenge or problem.  Keep it short and simple.  It’s something new.  Oh, and don’t forget to stick your business card in there.

Dog Day Marketing Buster #2 – Hand Write & Mail a Post Card

What?  Hand writing?  A Post card?  Sure, why not!  How often do you receive a post card from somebody marketing to you?  Not often at all.  Post cards are inexpensive to purchase and mail.  Purchase some post cards about Charlotte…we have many landmarks and prominent city scenes that have been made into post cards.  Then write a short, personal message on the back.  “Hope you’re keeping cool during this summer’s heat wave!  Can I show you the new benefit of our widget service that can change your life?”  Short, sweet, and personal.  Something new.

Dog Day Marketing Buster #3 – Stage a Free “Coffee & Iced Tea Meet-Up”

Create a free “learning event” on a Friday morning at a convenient coffee house.  The Meet-Up is a group of only 5 prospects that you invite to do some close-knit networking and talk about your new product or service.  (Of course, one of the 5 people is an actual customer of yours!)  Make it real informal.  Use hand-written invitations that outline your purpose with the Meet-Up.  Keep it simple.  Make it only 45 minutes.   You’re going to have free coffee, iced tea, or whatever.  Again, the attempt is personal and something different from the consistent marketing drip.

Just a couple of ideas for you to think about doing something new during our dog days of Charlotte summer marketing.  Let me know which of these ideas works!

If you would like to learn more about growing your customer base and improving your company’s business image through web design, Internet marketing and creative graphic design, please call Jay Joyce at The Idea People at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.

 

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Charlotte Web Design & Internet Marketing Client Lands Big Deal from Google Keyword Search!

Congratulations to one of The Idea People’s web design and Internet marketing clients, Get The Lead Out®, for being selected by the Hilton national hotel chain to be involved with their national disaster response program!  (By the way, they were found by a Google search!)

Get The Lead Out® is a nationwide lead paint, asbestos, mold and radon gas testing and removal company based here in Charlotte.  They have performed thousands of tests and inspections on all types of buildings and houses since they began in 1993.

Hilton selected Get The Lead Out® to participate in the Hilton Disaster Response Program for their depth of services and experience pertaining to detecting and removing potentially hazardous materials that might surface following some type of disaster.

“Buildings that were constructed prior to the mid-1970′s could have used lead-based paint or asbestos in some part of the building process,” said Get The Lead Out® Principal Scientist Pete Hubicki.  “If there is damage to parts of a building from a tornado or other natural disaster, or maybe a fire, some of these materials could be released or exposed if they existed.”

Get The Lead Out®’s emergency response duties would include identifying possible material threats, isolating these hazards, and safely removing them.

“We are very proud of the work that Get The Lead Out® does not only here in Charlotte but across the eastern seaboard,” said Jay Joyce of The Idea People.  “They are very experienced with identifying these man-made hazards and safely removing them so no harm will come to people.”

If you would like to learn about the web design and Internet marketing services that The Idea People offers, please contact Jay Joyce at 704-398-4437 or email jay@theideapeople.com.  We look forward to working with your business and helping you stand out from your competitors.

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