Loud Dog Links

July 13, 2010

• Why you should not hire me to design your website:
  The most common argument I get from clients that want web design is “But I just need you to do the .psd file designs, I have a developer friend that will put them together for me.” This is fine. If I wasn’t so completely picky and insane this would be great, but to me I see it like this: If you designed a tattoo for yourself, spent months thinking about it and drawing it, would you take it to your cousin’s friend that bought a tattoo gun on ebay because he calls himself a tattoo artist now?
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, design, webdesign

July 8, 2010

• Why Facebook the Site Will Die » Adotas
  Interesting perspective on the long term future of Facebook: Facebook will eventually morph into a set of services which will be plugged into other websites, into browsers and into the operating system. Facebook will become nothing more than a series of API’s (application programming interface’s).
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, webStrategy

April 27, 2010

• Dropbox Startup Lessons Learned (Slideshare)
  Awesome slideshow from Dropbox founder Drew Houston
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, webapps
• Five reasons iPhone vs Android isn't Mac vs Windows (O'Reilly Radar)
  It's human nature to look to the past to predict the future. That's why it's unsurprising to see knee-jerk conclusion that Apple iPhone vs Google Android will mirror the PC wars. Here's five reasons why this time, it's different.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business

April 16, 2010

• Organic Startup Ideas (Paul Graham)
  At this point, when someone comes to us with something that users like but that we could envision forum trolls dismissing as a toy, it makes us especially likely to invest.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, design

April 8, 2010

• Show Me the Money (for Art Direction) (Subtraction.com)
  Khoi Vinh, Design Director for the NYT website, identifies what it means to "save publishing" and smoothly dismantles the notion that the iPad will do it. In summary: "Every article in every magazine looked different, looked gorgeous, because publishers could afford to make it so. That's over."
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, design

April 5, 2010

• Case Studies in Freemium: Pandora, Dropbox, Evernote, Automattic and MailChimp
  Don’t spend money on marketing, do offer flexibility and data exporting to eliminate buyers’ regret, make sure to capitalize on and value goodwill, and only charge for things that are hard to do. That’s what some startups say is the key to success in the freemium business. But the biggest reason the five presenters this morning at the Freemium Summit in San Francisco — Pandora, Dropbox, Evernote, Automattic (see disclosure at the bottom) and MailChimp — are doing well is because they have great products that people want.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: bestPractices, business

March 24, 2010

• 5 ways startups can slay giants (VentureBeat)
  Dave Kellogg, CEO of Mark Logic (one of our clients), writes lucidly about being the best and want it takes.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business

February 4, 2010

• How CEOs think (Persistent Sys CEO Blog)
  Focus on top-line growth, partnering to solve complete business problems, and maintaining high levels of involvement in a few priority areas.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business
• Selecting a CMS: How to Build a Short List (CMS Wire)
  Some interesting and straightforward guidelines to select a CMS. Not a list of CMSs, but just an outline of a good selection process.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, cms

January 4, 2010

• ReadWriteWeb's Top 5 Web Trends of 2009 (ReadWriteWeb)
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, technology

December 21, 2009

• A Social Media Strategy Checklist (ClickZ)
  Before you spend money on building a social media presence, take a step back and craft a strategy. If you don't spend money with a strategy, you're throwing it away.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, marketing, socialMedia

December 20, 2009

• Itâ��s All About Selling for Survival
  "Selling” conjures up negative images of used-car salesmen peddling clunkers. But the ability to persuade people to believe in you is a necessity. That’s because sales is not just about selling things for money. Selling is about life.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business
• The End Of Hand Crafted Content (TechCrunch)
  My advice to readers is just this – get ready for it, because you’ll be reading McDonalds five times a day in the near future. My advice to content creators is more subtle. Figure out an even more disruptive way to win, or die.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, content, copywriting, seo

December 10, 2009

• The reason social media is so difficult for most organizations (Seth's Blog)
  It's a process, not an event.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, marketing, socialMedia

December 8, 2009

• Letting Go of John Hancock (A List Apart)
  Interesting article on paperless signatures and contracts.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business

December 4, 2009

• Google DNS makes the web faster (kottke.org)
  Google introduces a public DNS server to make the web faster. Why invest in making the web faster? Their research showed that speed was critical: half a second delay caused a 20% drop in traffic.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, usability, webStrategy

November 25, 2009

• HBS Cases: Customer Feedback Not on elBulli's Menu (HBS Working Knowledge)
  For Chef Ferran Adrià particular business owner, creativity and innovation trump any traditional decisions about pricing and operations.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, marketing

November 5, 2009

• A List Apart: Articles: Can You Say That in English? Explaining UX Research to Clients
  A cheat sheet that describes different UX techniques using plain, client-friendly language that focuses on the business value of each exercise.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, usability

October 6, 2009

• 9 Ways to Take Your Site from One to One Million Users (Carsonified)
  On-the-cheap viral traffic building tips.
  by: Josh Orum | tags: business, pr, promotion, webapps