Slide Design for Developers So I gave this talk called How GitHub Uses GitHub to Build GitHub. Someone submitted my slides to Hacker News, where it stayed at #1 for most of the day. This was pretty strange to me at first. My slides are not designed for people who didn't see the talk in person. They're designed to support my words, not some online audience. Working on your slide design pays off for the audience in front of you and for the audience online reading your slides later. Colors Color is the very first thing people will notice. Head to a color site like Colour Lovers and find a palette you like. Size Make your text huge. Most of my text in my entire deck is at least 90pt. For the curious, I use Yanone Kaffeesatz as the typeface for both my slide deck and the headings on my blog. One of my favorite tweets from my New Orleans talk said "Great slide design- I was way in the back and could read every single word!" Words as Shapes I took one design class in college. Slides give you the same opportunity. Repetition
Media Relations 102 for Your Startup: Finding Media Leads This is a follow up to my first post, Media Relations 101 for Your Startup. Knowing how to write up an awesome email pitch and how to smooth talk a journalist or reporter means nothing if you do not know how to get in contact with people in media. Getting in contact with reporters isn't your only problem though. Which reporters are you going to target? It's not sensible to pitch a story about your new Software as a Service startup to someone who writes about hardware. Danny Wong is the co-founder of Blank Label, an e-commerce startup that produces custom dress shirts. The story is only half the battle - maybe even less than half. Here are several simple ways you can find the appropriate people to contact in different media outlets: Listen On Twitter Follow some influential writers, reporters and bloggers. Use Help A Reporter Out (HARO) Turn Your Google Alerts On What keywords are related to your company? Search for Columnists Go Local Local media outlets thrive on anything that is local.
Garr Reynolds/Design Basics Graphic Design Fundamentals Alexander White in his book , The Elements of Graphic Design , outlines seven important and fundamental design components. Whether you're writing the company newsletter, designing your personal website, or putting together your slides for a sales presentation, understanding these basic points on graphic design will help set you apart. If you can master these fundamental concepts, your graphical treatments — from PowerPoint slides to Microsoft Word documents to company brochures — will greatly improve. And even if you will never be the one actually making (designing) the documents, you will be able to better judge what is good visual communication and what is not. Unity Unity may be the single most important concept. However, it is important to break up the unity once in a while (or on parts of a page). Gestalt When you say the overall design "works" you are describing the design's Gestalt. Empty space is beautiful, yes.
FlowingData | Data Visualization, Infographics, and Statistics Advanced Media Relations For Startups: How to Be Newsworthy Media relations starts with understanding the basics and finding the right leads. Next, you want to craft a powerful enough message that will make the media want to cover you. You're not newsworthy if only you think the story idea is awesome. Guest author Danny Wong is the Media and Marketing Guru of Blank Label, an e-commerce startup specializing in co-created custom dress shirts. Here are some things to consider when building a strong message to communicate: How is this story different? Media Relations For StartupsMedia Relations 101 Don't be an exact copycat to stories that have already been published. What would be compelling is you saying that you are using XYZ new materials for your hardware and how you have reduced your carbon footprint by 75%. Is your content easy to digest? This might sound overly simplistic, but use bullets if you can. Does it make sense? Can anyone other than you understand it? Split up long paragraphs for a quicker read. Does it really sound compelling?
A Non-Designer's Guide to Creating Awesome Diagrams for Slides Yeah. I do loads of slide decks each year for several companies and there are two types of decks I do a lot. One is the presentation. One is the infodeck, which is really intended more as a document for distribution than as a presentation. The trouble is when I run into people who I can't convince there should be a difference. A coworker refers to them as textbombs, or in particularly egregious cases, text WMDs. Anybody help me? They are loose terms, so I'm sure they're called other things as well. An infodeck is a slide deck that is not meant to be presented to an audience.
Why megatrends matter Megatrends are the great forces in societal development that will very likely affect the future in all areas the next 10-15 years. Many companies and organizations use megatrends in their strategic work. Below, you can gain an overview over the 10 most important megatrends as we head toward 2020. Megatrends are great forces in societal development that will affect all areas - state, market and civil society - for many years to come. In megatrends such as, for example, prosperity and aging, lies a great deal of the knowledge we have about the future. We know that wealth will probably continue to increase by about 2% a year in the western world. In other words, megatrends are our knowledge about the probable future. Even though megatrends say something about what we know about the future, it is not certain how society, companies or any of us will react to these forces. Futures researchers always work with three types of futures: the predictable, the possible, and the preferred. #1 Ageing
Tips for Getting (Follow-Up) Press Coverage for Your Startup When it's time to launch your startup, you probably know to have the press release ready to go out to the various publications you hope will give you coverage. But after you launch, how (and when and where) do you go about securing follow-up coverage? The obvious answer is to simply continue the PR push. Keep trying. Although you might feel as though you are filling reporters' inboxes with email (and yes, yes you are), we are always looking for stories. Offer Your Expertise But even when - or even if - you have no major updates to tout, it's still good to stay on reporters' radars. Blogging helps in other ways as well. Stories you pitch to reporters needn't necessarily be about new features. Build Relationships It helps, of course, to build relationships with reporters. If you have any other advice for startups looking for ongoing media coverage, please let us know in the comments. Image credits: State Library of New South Wales
The Publicity FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions About Getting Media Coverage This FAQ addresses the following questions: 1. Media publicity - you mean free advertising? 2. 3. 4. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. No. 2. If you know how to answer a key question - Why would our readers/listeners/viewers be interested in learning about you now? 3. The angle is the aspect of your product, service or event that makes your business qualify as news and hence worthy of publicity. What's new about your business? One way to understand angles is to examine the coverage in a newspaper, magazine or radio or TV broadcast, asking yourself precisely what about the businesses that were featured appear to have earned them attention. 4. If you have a controversial product or need a constant stream of publicity instead of a jump start or occasional boost, you may be better off hiring a PR firm to handle publicity. Back to Top 1. A press release is a brief document in a specific format that sets forth for media gatekeepers the newsworthy angle on your business.
Experiential Marketing to 18-34 Year Olds Experience's CEO and founder explains how to successfully reach the elusive 18-34 year old demographic. The latest buzz in the industry is experiential marketing. While many define it as tapping the senses through a variety of marketing tactics, we realize it is more. A true connection with consumers will create a positive, interactive experience with your brand, product or service. Join me as we step off the internet screen, come off the page and make consumers interact with these experiences. From interactive to experientialYoung adults demand that information be presented in contextual, educational and entertaining formats, rather than in straight sales pitches. Phase 1 (Interactive) Online-- create an interactive campaign college students will frequently visit and send their friends to. Phase 2 (Engaging) Phase 3 (Experiential) Don't miss the boatThe statistics are compelling: 17 million college students make high-impact purchasing decisions. So you face a now-or-never opportunity.