Today’s the Day! Elon Interactive Media Exhibition
It’s finally here! Today we finally present our capstone projects that we have been working on for the ENTIRE semester! It has been a pleasure to work with Ella Sven, as I have said many times before. It has also been great using Shopify! The interface is so simple and I am excited to show my client how she can use it herself along with the mobile app. We will be making the site live soon, then adding in the shopping part later as we get more and more of the products of up!
I will be showcasing the site I created using Shopify along with my social media strategies and her Ella Sven’s social media accounts.
If you want to know more about Ella Sven, visit her Facebook page at www.facebook/ellasven
If you want to know more about Elon University (which I’ll be graduating from tomorrow with my Master’s in Interactive Media!) Check out their Facebook page at www.facebook.com/eloninteractivemedia
The end is near…
I can’t believe I am less than 6 days away from graduating with a Master’s degree in Interactive Media! It has been quite the ride and a fast one at that. Today I will be presenting my final presentation of the work I have done for Ella Sven. It has been wonderful work with Ella and though the capstone project will be over soon, I will not be done working with the Ella Sven brand as I will be managing the website and assisting with social media until, well, I’m not sure when I’ll stop! There are lots of amazing plans for the summer, including a launch party of the official Ella Sven shopping site, the Ella Unwound Blog, trips to New York City, perfume making, t-shirt pressing and more photo & video shoots! I’m excited to actually be near my client, as I have been working remotely with her for the past 7 months!
(Photos by Rob Woodcox Photography)
If you haven’t followed Ella Sven on Facebook yet, please check it out, she has some amazing stuff!
Finally got the @ELLAunwound items printed! (Taken with instagram)
Some more #infographics for ya!
As part of a class assignment, I was fortunate enough to work with a group who designed some neat infographics after the rest of our class gathered the information we discussed in a whitepaper. We researched how Pinterest would be received in India and China and how the users of those countries could benefit from the burgeoning social network.
Below are the infographics I designed along with Steph Olsen, Emily Kamischke and Liz Shroyer to go along with our data, take a look!
Ella Sven: SEO and finishing touches
Today was a day that I was going over the analytics of Ella Sven’s website. It was a pleasant surprise to see that organic traffic was up! Before, our second highest source of traffic was, gratefully, from Twin Stripe, an amazing online magazine started by a couple of my iMedia comrades, Katie Williamsen and Alison Harshbarger. For the week of April 25 through March 2, it has been great to see that organic traffic is second, while most of our traffic comes from Facebook! I have been lucky enough to have, in addition to creating Ella Sven’s website, be running her social media campaigns and practices. We are up to 254 likes, which has been rewarding to see the growth over these last few months, way up from the 100 or so Ella Sven had before.
I have been looking up some keywords to enhance the SEO of Ella Sven’s site over the last couple of days. It is difficult to find when I run into high search terms like “fashion,” “dresses”, “jewelry” and such. There is a lot of competition out there, so we are focusing on creating content that is unique from the rest and also having a great product that people will love to own. See a photo of one of the product pages below!
I have also been busy at work finishing up the Ella Sven shopping site! The official shopping portion should be completed by mid-July, but I will be unveiling a sneak-peak for my capstone exhibition at Elon University. If you have the chance you should check it out! My own personal hashtag for the evening will be #ellasven. The IMX, which I helped create our theme and advertising pieces as seen below, will be on Wed. May 16 at Elon University on the second floor of the Powell building.
Graduation is so close! I can taste it!
Ella Sven: Shopifying
Hey all!
I have been just a busy little beaver these past few weeks, chipping away at my work for my client, Ella Sven, as well as juggling all of my other projects (15 page paper, an app, a series of infographics and more). We are in the process of using Shopify, which I know I am totally going to love! I had the opportunity to briefly speak with So Worth Loving about their experience with Shopify for my Ella Sven research, here is what they had to say about it…
“We absolutely love Shopfiy. Being able to use the many different apps that they have available is great for expansion and growing.
We are able to create receipts, make refunds, and update it SO easily! It breaks down the order sales and their phone app is really great to use. I would definitely refer anybody who is a small start up to use it. We purchased our theme and then tweaked it just a bit and didn’t run into many problems. They do have a great selection of themes which is awesome. “
Being able to hear from an actual user was great for me as well as my client. I realize that doing your research is super important when trying to find out what is the best for your client, but also for yourself. I have been able to use my stellar research skills to look at every possibility for the Ella Sven e-commerce effort and we are now in full action. I am excited to get this site completed for her. Check out her Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, or Tumblr pages to get some more info! (You can also follow her on Instagram @ellaswenson)
Being the creative entrepreneur that my client Ella Swenson is, she has decided to collaborate with another creative to also sell perfume! She seems to have her hand in everything right now, and it’s amazing to see the progress that I have experienced with Ella over the past two years.
Let’s make things more Pinteresting…
As you can tell, I happen to LOVE social media! When one of my great friends invited me to Pinterest back in July, it was one of the greater social media moments of my life. Ok, that may be a bit dramatic, but I cannot deny my affinity for the thing!
It surprised me that it took so long for the social media outlet to take off. When the Pinterest buzz started spreading (stemming from Mashable and beyond) it got out of control. I was getting tens of followers per day, in comparison to about 1 per week (if that) before.
I am happy that Pinterest has taken off, but even happier that business have realized the potential marketing they can do with it!
I have decided to take the marketing of my own brand up a notch with Pinterest. Though I do love my “Puppy love” and “Things I want to make” boards, I know I would not be doing a service to myself if I did not put up a “Portfolio” board. I just completed my own portfolio site (though I’m still working out the kinks) and what better way to supplement my work than by pinning my work to Pinterest! I know that others will see it and hopefully repin it or become interested!
How to make your own PinFolio:
1. If you have your own portfolio website, I would start there by selecting the pics you want to pin and just going at them one by one. You will want to think of the descriptions of each pin so that people can quickly and easily see what your design/photo/etc. is. I also have been posting the URL to my website at the end of each caption like so:
2. If you do not have your own portfolio site, I would suggest uploading your own pins of your work. Pinterest is the perfect platform to showcase your work without having your own website! However, if you want to be a serious designer, I do suggest having your own site ;)
3. Pinterest does not have to be specifically for those who create visual works. That’s the beauty of Pinterest. My friend Sam her journalistic ventures. I am planning to add to my writing pieces to my own PinFolio soon!
4. Now that you have established your own PinFolio (if not, get started here), then you need to organize your boards. Pinterest has established a simple way to display your work elegantly. You want to arrange your boards in the order of highest priority to lowest. Here is a look at my top four that I want other to see first:
To rearrange your boards and click on “Edit Boards.”
Hold down and drag your boards around to the order of your liking :)
5. Having boards on Pinterest is like having your own voice within your other social media accounts. You want to stay consistent across the board (get it? Haha, I like stupid puns). If you want others to view you as a designer, have a board dedicated to it. This same idea can be applied to other areas of your interests as well. I plan on creating a social media board and also an infographics board! I happen to love typography, so I already have a board for that :) When thinking of names for your boards, also try to be creative. You want people to actually want to see those boards, not just glance over them and move on.
*Another note. Pinterest now shows you all of the measurements of your pins right on your profile! It’s an easy and quick way to see how many followers you have, and those you are following, pins, repins, where you are pinning to and all sorts of other activity.
What are you waiting for? Get started on that PinFolio!
Ok, that’s my bit of humming nerd advice for now, keep checking back for more!
Like a good student, progress is there
I happened to just see a State Farm commercial and thought of that catchy headline, you like it?
Ok, so I have been a busy bee finishing up my business cards, finalizing my schedule and beginning my portfolio mockup. I spent the entire weekend in the computer labs of iMedia.
I had been working on my business cards for a while now. I did my research and tried to find inspiration from every which way. I conjured up some different designs, check them out in the post below…
Though I liked the look of these, I decided, “these are little boring.” A thought popped into my head after browsing through visual.ly, an infographic dedicated website, that I should make my business card into an infographic of some basic things about me that I feel that employers might want to know about me :) It’s going to be a folded up business card! I’m hoping it’s going to make me stand out just a little bit. I used Illustrator to create the business cards.
I also wanted to take a different approach to my portfolio site. I have been researching and scouring the internet for various examples of parallax scrolling sites. I love the single page look with the cool way of scrolling and moving objects on the page. I’m excited to get it completed so I can begin applying for jobs.
If you have any questions, please let me know! Check out the pics in the next post of my sketches for my business cards and my portfolio mockups.
Screen shot of my work-in-progress portfolio!
