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Archive for the ‘Communication’ Category

Keren gets interviewed

Friday, August 20th, 2010

It’s always a good idea to mention it to the world if you get a mention in the press – could be online, could be offline.

Offline – The Guardian Digital Business Supplement

Recently I was interviewed by Digital Business supplement of the Guardian for an article by Peter Bartram (from New Venture Publishing) about building personalised features into websites.

Here is an excerpt of the interview!

Interview

Online – One Xtra Pixel

I was also recently interviewed by Krishna Solanki (a website designer in Cambridge) for the On Xtra Pixel blog about Women in Website Design

Have a read of this interview here

Interview

All comments are of course very welcome!

Golden Rules of Blogging

Tuesday, July 27th, 2010

Thinking of starting starting a blog? Maybe you already have a blog but aren’t 100% sure of those little dos and don’ts that somehow you’re just EXPECTED to know! Well, help is on the way! We like to think we’ve had a bit of experience with blogging, so we have come up with 3 Golden Rules to think about when taking a step into the wonderful world of blogging! (more…)

The trials and tribulations of PSP

Wednesday, July 7th, 2010

A word

Public Speaking.
A term that can strike fear into the hearts of most people, myself included. One person who does not seem to share this view is Keren. She believes that Public Speaking is an essential skill and excels at it. Unlike the rest of us. Ask us to meet with a client, chat to each other, argue over who gets the coldest coke or biggest ice cream, no problem, but place us in front of a room full of people and we turn to gibbering wrecks (some of us more than others.. *note to self!)

(more…)

Quick ways to update your website

Monday, July 5th, 2010

So, you have a website, but you feel it needs a bit of freshening up? A bit of an update? But you don’t want to spend shed loads of money giving it a complete overhaul right now?

Make it Pop

We here at Top left Design have complied a short list of a few tips and pointers that might help you put that little “pop” back into your website! It might be that you just need something really simple,  like updating a few images, changing a link or a new logo! It’s all in the details! (more…)

Our Say Our Way – I say let’s get this party started!

Tuesday, June 8th, 2010

Of the many exciting projects we’ve got on at the moment, one in particular has tickled my fancy. One that involves canoes, kids, rubber chickens and parachuting eggs. Confused? Let me help you out.

This project is for a new website, called Our Say Our Way, and is to be an online link to the world within the Youth for Youth project.

A bit of insight into Youth for Youth:

Youth for Youth was started about a year ago with the aim of empowering young people. It’s a one of kind approach to bringing together young people from all over the UK with similar interests and ideas, as well as forming a support base for those that need one. It is an inspired project that can only provide growth and positivity for all those involved and affected by it. (more…)

Types of blog posts that make blogging easy

Monday, May 17th, 2010

People have different opinions of the types of posts which are most useful, interesting or tweetable. I personally really like “list posts” (eg top tens, best of, collections), as they are easy to process and pass on. They do seem to also get more traffic. Some of our clients ask for our advice with coming up with ideas for what to blog about, which prompted me to put together a list of the types of posts which I believe will make coming up with blogging ideas easier. I have also included examples for each type!

We recommend people blog regularly and consistantly, but vary your posts. Choose from the below – and feel free to add your comments/suggestions!

Types of Blog Posts

Best-of lists

This is where you have taken the time and collected together a good selection of examples within a certain topic – which you believe are interesting/useful/cool enough to be labelled “top” or “best”!

(more…)

Communicate by Community – embracing new ways of being connected!!

Wednesday, March 17th, 2010

A selection of social media communities and other fascinating Web 2.0 examples – people seem more and more inclined to let the world know what they are up to!

(with thanks to Betti Moser for her help on this post!)

Foursquare

foursquare.com
You can make lists of your favourite things to do and share them with friends. Foursquare will keep track of the things you’ve done, help you create To-Do lists and even suggest new experiences to seek out…. As you check in around the city, you’ll start finding tips that other users have left behind. After checking-in at a restaurant, you may unlock a tip suggesting the best thing on the menu. Checking-in at a bar will often offer advice on what your next stop should be. Every tip you create is discoverable by other users just by checking-in.

A bit like a mixture of Twitter updates, GPS search to locate people you know and ‘Dungeons & Dragons’.

Plancast

plancast.com
A service for sharing your upcoming plans with friends – a social calendar of sorts. Just submit the things you’re thinking about doing in the future, and your friends will be able to hear about them – and maybe join you, too!

TechCrunch calls it “a ‘Foursquare for the future’. The main idea is that while many people use Foursquare and similar location-based services like Gowalla and Loopt to share where they are, Plancast is about sharing where they will be.”

It looks very similar to a Twitter timeline, but the focus is on what you’re planning today, tomorrow, next week, next month etc. This is how it works in action: plancast.com/mark

Blippy

blippy.com
“Blippy allows you to automatically share your credit card transactions as you make them. This includes the place you made the purchase, the amount, and in some cases, the item. This is all placed in a social stream where other Blippy users can comment on and ‘like’ the various items.”

This is still very new. It looks similar to a Twitter stream, but the updates are automatic via a link from your credit card to Blippy. (Hmmmm…)

Last fm

www.last.fm
“a music service powered entirely by its community of listeners.”

Completely interactive music-based community. Plugs into all other social media platforms. Listeners automatically stream the tracks they’re listening to onto Last.fm, thereby creating their online profile.

Spotify

www.spotify.com/en
“peer-to-peer music streaming service that allows instant listening to specific tracks or albums, with virtually no buffering delay.”

A monthly subscription gives access to millions of songs to download. Spotify also has profiles on Twitter and Facebook.

Listverse

listverse.com
“a website dedicated to lists of trivia from a variety of categories – the most popular of which are lists of misconceptions and human oddities.” Full of curious stories, all presented as a “Top 10 most…” list.

Hunch

hunch.com
This is a pretty cool site. It uses artificial intelligence concepts to help people with everyday (and not so everyday) decisions! Try it out and let us know what you find!

Petrol Prices.com

www.petrolprices.com
“Find the lowest UK petrol price in your area! 9,537 petrol stations and 8,000 daily updates.”

Just enter your post code and find the cheapest petrol station near you. Compares prices in real time. Also available as iPhone app.

Gabby’s blog post – Social Media Gurus, Ninjas, Jedi’s or Consultants – a “reblog”

Tuesday, March 9th, 2010

I have to post this as I want to draw atttention to the blog article written by my cousin Gabriella Sholk – it is hilariously funny but you have to make sure you read it in ALL seriousness anyway as it’s great advice!

Check out the post here:

Keren speaks

Monday, February 15th, 2010

It’s going to be a busy time for Keren, as she prepares to do numerous talks “all over the country” (well – mostly London!) to certain niche audiences. We thought it might be interesting to share a few details of this.

Wednesday 24 February 2010A Business Innovation
“Grow your Business” talk on Social Media with Abbie Tanner.

Tuesday 23 February 2010 – With New Venture Publishing, Perfect Online PR Masterclass with New Venture Publishing, alongside Jo Lynn from Splash PR

Saturday the 27th of February – Along with Tamsin Fox Davis from Enthuse Marketing, a talk on Social Media on to a group of professional Wedding Planners.

Friday 14th May 2010 – Keren is going to be doing a talk to a group of translators in York for the Institute of Translators and Interpreters.

If you would like more information about any of these events, please get in touch!

Only the English Could Have Invented This Language

Sunday, January 24th, 2010

This was sent by email so we thought we would share! (author unknown)

Make your memory hook memorable

We’ll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes,
But the plural of ox becomes oxen, not oxes.
One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese,
Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.
You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice,
Yet the plural of house is houses, not hice.

If the plural of man is always called men,
Then shouldn’t the plural of pan be called pen?
If I speak of my foot and show you my feet,
And I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?
If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth,
Why shouldn’t the plural of booth be called beeth?

Then one may be that, and three would be those,
Yet hat in the plural would never be hose,
And the plural of cat is cats, not cose.
We speak of a brother and also of brethren,
But though we say mother, we never say methren.
Then the masculine pronouns are he, his and him,
But imagine the feminine: she, shis and shim!

Let’s face it – English is a crazy language.
There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger;
neither apple nor pine in pineapple.
English muffins weren’t invented in England ..
We take English for granted, but if we explore its paradoxes,
we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square,
and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

And why is it that writers write but fingers don’t fing,
grocers don’t groce and hammers don’t ham?
Doesn’t it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend.
If you have a bunch of odds and ends
and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?

If teachers taught, why didn’t preachers praught?
If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?
Sometimes I think all the folks who grew up speaking English
should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane.

In what other language do people recite at a play and play at a recital?
We ship by truck but send cargo by ship.
We have noses that run and feet that smell.
We park in a driveway and drive in a parkway.
And how can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same,
while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?

You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language
in which your house can burn up as it burns
down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out,
and in which an alarm goes off by going on.

And, in closing, if Father is Pop, how come Mother’s not Mop?