Wagg

The new Wagg site has gone live...

www.waggfoods.co.uk

Wagg was designed & built by Michael Wood. The technical work on the project was conducted by Joe Bragg and the project was managed by Anna Mawhinney.

Facebook is now officially classed as work

No more switching browser tabs when someone walk past 'cos you're writing on the wall of someone you think you once knew at school. With the opening up of the Facebook Platform, allowing anyone to develop custom applications for the Facebook site, this is now officially classed as development work, maybe...

http://developers.facebook.com/

This release seems to have led to an upsurge in custom apps being released for Facebook (eg. Poke Pro etc...) - some useful, most cr@p. But seriously, this really could be chance for clients to tap into the huge opportunities available within the social networking and branding arena.

Go-Go-Gadgets

Love it or hate it, we’re bound to all be using the new version of Windows (Vista) on our PCs within a few years.

One new feature of Windows Vista is the introduction of ‘Gadgets’ (Mac users may already know them as Widgets). These are mini-applications that live on the Windows desktop.

So why is this important? Because it enables brands to have a presence right on a user’s computer desktop.

If an organisation provides a useful Gadget to the user, such as displaying the latest news, offers, live video and commentary, or product information; the user will choose to install that Gadget. The user sees the Gadget on their desktop every time they switch on their PC, and forms an association between the useful information provided by that tool and the organisation’s brand.

The number of methods by which we can access information from the web is increasing all the time, and this is another one of those methods. An organisation can display summarised content from their website directly to the user’s desktop. The user does not have to open a web browser to see this content, but at the same time is more likely to visit the main website, so the Gadget acts to drive traffic.

The opportunities for marketing with Gadgets are huge. Microsoft claims that “In the first month of Windows Vista’s general availability, sales exceeded 20 million licenses”.

Here in Team Digital we are always looking for new ways to use technology creatively for the promotion of client brands.

Midland Mainlines Always Getting More

Midland Mainline's loyalty scheme - Always More - went live and has bedded in offering integration between the customer's offline experience and the website. The Always More layer sits seamlessly with the rest of the site and works effortlessly with broader promotions Midland Mainline offer.

Credits: Always More was built and coded by Joe Bragg using ASP.NET via EpiServer. The project was overseen by Anna Mawhinney.

The impressive version of the obligatory out of the window image

Every office blog has the digital camera from the window shot and this one is no different but the photo in question - taken by Digital's Heinz Schmidt - is impressive and has been picked up by the BBC.

Sometimes we go to the village, sometimes the village comes to us

Every website has a twin, sometimes two, which are still born at the point in the process where a client looks over the two or three designs put forward and gives the thumbs up to one leaving the other two standing at the sides like a Morrissey fan at a disco.

In 2001 I went through this with breakdown recovery people Green Flag. They took a design and made a fist of it but as always another idea was put out to pasture. That idea was simple enough - Super Tiny pixel art - but it was a little too esoteric for what they wanted then.

And so other pixel art moved on and my idea never really matched another client until now. This project - details to follow of course - sees the pixel design go to the client along with a rather impressive pseudo-newspaper design. The client decides tomorrow and while I love my children equally I'm rooting for the pixel art.

Five years long enough in the wilderness for anyone.

Going Shopping With Northern Rail

Christmas comes early in advertising - what is aimed for December is conceptualised in August - and so with earphones on playing the likes of Simply Having A Wonderful Christmas Time and Step Into Christmas the Northern Rail Shopper website snuck live as Direct Mail post drops started to hit door mats and posters went up in railway stations around the region.

www.northernrail.org/shopper

The site itself augments the offline work with freshly written city guides and other goodies. It offers free pamper treatment for rail users to de-stress during the festive period.

Credits: The website was designed from an original poster campaign by Michael Wood and he also coded the site in XHMTL/CSS - a technical aside, the site has no active server elements and is pure HTML - and the project was overseen by Ross Hewitt and Anna Mawhinney.

Meadowhall.co.uk Xmas reskin goes live

One very happy client and one very pretty website. www.meadowhall.co.uk

Credits: Chris Ball redesigned the elements of the website based on the original templates and coded the CSS implementation. Ross Hewitt oversaw the project.

Vodkat.co.uk goes live!

Many forms of Vodkats have been aired recently. To add to this the website has been lauched. Go on, fill your boots ...err with vodkat. www.vodkat.co.uk

Credits: Joe Bragg developed the back end code for the Vodkats website and Michael Wood designed it from an original poster campaign and coded the XHTML/CSS interface. Ross Hewitt oversaw the project.