Recently in the web design industry, the use of “real world” textures and materials has become a major trend. As the average user’s internet connection continues to gets faster, it becomes more and more feasible for designers to incorporate a greater amount of imagery into their work. For this reason, we’re seeing a lot more textural imagery - for example: woods, metals, concrete, and fabrics, being used as backgrounds and for other primary imagery.

When used with care and attention to detail, these types of natural textures can add a lot of depth and character to the visuals of a site. Unfortunately, in many cases, these textures are incorporated without considering how the rest of the design would be affected. In these cases the textures can feel forced or tacked on, as if they were added as an after thought, simply to appeal to the trend.

At this point, we’d like to present a few examples of textural and material imagery done right for your inspiration, as well as a downloadable care package full of free textures to add to your bag of tricks.

Kyle Haskins

In this portfolio site, we see a pleasant, subtle use of wood texture to create a dark and smokey ambiance.

Agami Creative

Agami employs a gorgeous, watercolor-esque background. You can tell a lot of work went into this design, both in thinking through the concept, and in the pristine execution.

Bern Unlimited

This design uses torn cardboard to create a unique effect, even allowing the navigation to follow the shape of the torn edge. The content area, unfortunately, does not follow as creative an approach, resulting in feelings of unbalance and incompleteness in many areas.

Translating the creativity that we put into the homepage, headers, and footers, to the rest of a site’s content is a challenge that designers should bear in mind, especially when the design will be implemented through a CMS, ecommerce system, or other template based web application.

Design Commission

This very clean and modern layout, with a neutral gray concrete background, offers an interesting contrast in style between the grunge elements and the crisp, minimal content area.

Design*Sponge

This design really plays off of the fabric and scrap-booking concepts with a creative use of textures and real world objects. It can be a bit overwhelming in certain areas, but overall it’s an inspiring example of how these very natural textures and worldly objects can be used to create a coherent impression.

Now for the free stuff…

And now, MetaSpring is pleased to offer our first designer’s care package - a set of various textures, hand-picked from an obliging, local abandoned lumber mill.

If you like what you see, please subscribe to our blog or check back soon, as we plan on offering up many more of these packages. Enjoy!

SEO: It takes more than pretty graphs

As a consulting firm in the SEO market, we frequently find that extracting detailed information from potential clients can be quite a challenge. In general, these prospective clients tend to be predominately concerned with getting the most bang for their buck and often end up conveying their needs in an over-simplified manner. In some cases, they’re not even sure what their needs are - just that they have them!

For these clients, we’ve prepared a quick survey to help focus the campaign planning process on achieving the actual goals of a company instead of just increasing site traffic.

What is the overall objective of the campaign?

Are you looking to gain more website sales, find additional leads, or perhaps increase brand awareness? A successful SEO campaign needs more than just a general increase in site traffic to improve conversions and revenue. Therefore, it’s important to define your objectives and continually refocus them as the campaign progresses.

A well-formulated campaign can lead to increased profits, better customers and higher conversions, while an unfocused campaign can often lead to a false sense of success. This can happen, for example, when site traffic increases through the use of very general keywords. These generic keywords might attract a high number and broad range of visitors, but only a handful of those people are actually in the company’s target demographic.

Similarly, if someone finds your site with the term “furniture,” they’re more likely to be “window shopping” than somebody who found your site with the term, “amish solid wood furniture”. So, while a general increase in traffic can be the desired objective in some cases, most clients require a more specific business goal to justify the cost of a continued SEO campaign.

Who is your target audience?

Do you need to target tech savvy 20 year olds or 60+ baby boomers? Understanding your target market is crucial to being an effective internet marketer.  If you want to attract the younger generation, social media websites such as Digg, Youtube and Facebook might be targeted. If baby boomers are the focus, then organizational sites and niche forums might be more ideal.

What action do you want visitors to take?

Should visitors come to your site to purchase a product, download a document, or fill out your contact form? Each goal may require a slightly different approach and should be looked at accordingly. Additionally, encouraging users to engage in the desired action generally requires a combined effort of onsite and offsite optimization.

Fortunately, there are a number ways to track and monitor these conversion goals. These tools can help to give you a real sense of how visitors are following, or diverging, from the directed path laid out for them.  A free and simple way to accomplish this conversion tracking is by setting up a funnel with Google Analytics.

Have you considered adding a blog to your site?

Why would I want to add a blog? Who really cares about what type of grass our golf course uses? Many companies have difficulty comprehending the vast utility of a blog, and more so, what it is that they should be blogging about. For SEO, blogs add the potential to increase direct traffic to your website and encourage inbound linking to your articles.

In terms of content, the possibilities are endless - you can blog about your industry, help explain a common misconception your customers have, or talk about a new product in development. While there are plenty of great resources available to help you dream up your viral masterpieces, here are a few good ones to start with:

101 Great Posting Ideas that Will Make Your Blog Sizzle

50 Blog Post Ideas for Business Blogging

Ultimately, good content is king and the more quality content that you can produce, the more inbound links you’re likely to acquire.

Who are your main competitors?

Understanding who your online competitors are can help us to assess their strengths online. If your competitors are successful, it’s possible to learn from what they’re doing right. If they are not, then you’ve got the opportunity to gain a competitive advantage by doing better.

Do you currently use any traffic analytics software?

Analytical software can be very helpful in analyzing and monitoring the progress of your campaign.  Not only can you see what keywords people are using to find your site, but you can also see what your most popular pages are, and how long people tend to stay on your site.

If you do not already have some analytical software installed you might want to consider Google Analytics. This software is free and very easy to setup on your website. It gives you access to a colorful and informative set of tools that you can use to understand the value and progress of your SEO campaign.

Your mileage may vary…

These are just a few of the key questions that you should consider asking your clients before beginning any extensive SEO campaign. Of course, every client will have their own special needs and will require your skills as an SEO consultant, and good listener, to determine the appropriate way to expand on these foundational questions.

How do you determine the scope of your SEO campaigns? Or if you are the client, what questions do you have when looking for an SEO consultant to work with?

Download our SEO Client Questionnaire PDF

Here for free download is the PDF version of our SEO Client Questionnaire. Feel free to adapt these concepts to your own needs and let us know how it worked out or what we missed!

Three years after Twitter’s inception in 2006, the great marketers of the Twittersphere continue to surprise me on an almost daily basis by finding new and exciting ways of getting their name out.

At the same time, there are still far more marketers out there that just aren’t sure how to use Twitter to their advantage and end up giving up when they don’t see a return. For these individuals, I’d like to present a few simple DOs and DON’Ts for a successful Twitter marketer.

Let’s start with the DON’Ts since this is where most people seem to get into trouble…

DON’T spam followers with constant links back to your website

Self-promotion is okay every now and then, but every link that you tweet should NOT go back to your website - that generally makes you what we on the internet like to call a “spammer”. I’d suggest a healthy balance of the following:

1. Links to your website(s) - Post a new blog article and want to know what people think? Link it up! But also be sure to try to express an interest in your followers thoughts on the topic - the more you’re followers feel like their opinion matters to you, the more interested they’ll be in what you have to offer them.
2. Links to other websites - Find something interesting on the net? Share it - along with your thoughts. If you’ve got valuable content to share, you’re followers will start looking to you for exciting news and information.
3. Retweets of links posted by the people you follow - You want your followers to know that what they have to say is valuable too, and more importantly, that you’re paying attention to it. If someone posts something interesting, spread the love. Your followers will appreciate the attention.

Bonus: DON’T tweet ONLY a link without any context. This is a HUGE Twitter foul. Simply put, it wastes your followers time and probably makes them a bit hesitant about clicking - who knows what they could be getting into, and more importantly - do they even care in the first place?

DON’T follow everyone and anyone that you can find

Let’s repeat: spamming is bad. The value of Twitter is in the relationships that you can maintain, not the sheer number of them. It’s safe to say though, as a business, you should follow anyone that follows you - EXCEPT for the spammers. It may also be a good idea to go out looking for other people to follow; consumers in your target market or colleagues in your industry are good places to start.

One great resource for finding new people is WeFollow, a user-powered, tag-based Twitter user directory. WeFollow allows you to tag your Twitter account with three tags that represent you - say ‘blogger’, ‘tech’, and ‘web’, so that other users with similar interests can easily find you.

Bonus: DON’T just follow someone. Try to make it a point to say hello or thank them for following you if they initiated the connection.

DON’T post vast amounts of irrelevant content

Simply put, don’t tweet every little thing that you do. Because most people just don’t care what you had for lunch - unless what you had is somehow of importance to them. Take the following two tweets for example:

mmm I love me a good sammich

I just had a fabulous artichoke & turkey panini at the new Sandwich Shoppe on Adam St. in Saskatchewan - I highly recommend it!

The first example provides, generally, no value to anyone. That’s right, no one cares that you like sandwiches because almost everyone likes sandwiches. If you post these kinds of tweets frequently, you’re likely to lose followers fast. Even if you do have something interesting to offer every now and then, most people won’t want to deal with the extra clutter in their Twitter feeds. So ultimately, posting tweets without value may be far easier, but they can also be far more damaging.

The second example, however, offers your followers something of value - a specific recommendation. Now, anyone in, around, or visiting Saskatchewan might consider checking out the new Sandwich Shoppe because you had such a great experience that you felt it was worth sharing - that’s an extremely powerful marketing tool.

And now, on to the DOs…

DO interact with as many people as possible

Even though tweets are publicly broadcast out to the world, the nature of Twitter content, in general, tends to be relatively personal. This live and personal nature of the content, in tandem with the immediate dispersion of it, gives people a sense of proximity to the poster that has not been previously available on such a large scale.

On top of the one-way sharing aspect, Twitter also allows for two-way communication, primarily via replies and direct messages. This is one of the most interesting aspects of Twitter, in that it branches the gaps between people who never would have converged on their own. CEOs have the ability to talk directly to consumers, celebrities can talk directly to fans, and regular Joe’s with similar interests can find each other all over the world.

Regular and personable interaction with your followers will help to keep them interested in your content, as well as give them a personal and, likely, a positive connection to your brand.

DO get your followers involved

Have a new product coming out or an invite only beta application to test? Get your followers involved! Post images and insider details of the development process and ask your followers for their thoughts, criticisms, or ideas. If you’ve got a beta site, invite your followers to check it out and provide their feedback.

Getting your followers involved in something important to you gives them a sense of control and significance since it’s their feedback that could determine how you move forward. This is a great way to forge new relationships and start new conversations. Plus, if you’ve got a product that’s in high demand, it’s likely to pull in droves of new followers anxious to get involved and keep up to date with developments.

DO give something away to your followers

Another way to get your followers involved, or to simply gain more followers, is by giving something away. Everybody likes a good perk and if following you gets them access to something they can’t get anywhere else, it’s likely they’ll give it a try.

Here are a few examples of companies who’ve successfully utilized this model:

• @macheist asked followers to retweet a promotional post in return for a free software license, regularly costing $50.
• @AdagioTeas posts $10 gift certificate codes, redeemable by the first person only. This likely drives a ton of traffic to their website, and I’d be willing to bet that a lot of these people spend a good amount of time on the site - waiting for the next code to use.
• @trent_reznor, in promotion of Nine Inch Nail’s 2009 summer tour, offered up free tickets and backstage passes to the Xth person to visit a URL he posted to Twitter.
• @jasoncalcanis said he’d give away a free MacBook Air to one of his followers after reaching the #1 followed twitterer spot. He never made it to #1, but he certainly gained tens of thousands of new followers.
• @markhoppus of Blink-182 offered up free music downloads to anyone that retweeted a promotion post.

But that’s just the beginning…

Ultimately, Twitter is about relationships and relationships depend on both parties to survive. If you blast your best friend with innocuous, impersonal marketing pitches, it’s probable that they won’t remain your best friend very long. The same applies to your Twitter followers - be a friend, or at least a person, not a robotic salesman.

The above suggestions are just the tip of the vast and complex Twitter etiquette iceberg. For more marketing ideas and rules of conduct, check out some of the following posts:

• 17 Ways You Can Use Twitter: A Guide for Beginners, Marketers and Business Owners
• Twitter Marketing: Why You Don’t Need to Mass Follow Users
• The Golden Rule of Twitter Marketing
• The Ultimate Guide for Everything Twitter

Have you seen any awesome or horrible Twitter marketing implementations? Share them in the comments!

Here at MetaSpring, we’re avid fans of the TextMate text editor because it makes developing web apps a breeze through the use of its hotkeys, snippets, and bundles.

TextMate comes with a plethora of basic language bundles - all of which come with their own set of custom hotkeys and snippets designed specifically for that language. These hotkeys and snippets can be customized for your preferences or you can even make your own.

At MetaSpring, we work predominately with Ruby and would like to share a few of the TextMate helpers that have made us all much more efficient developers. The following hotkeys and snippets can be found in the Ruby bundle, unless otherwise noted.

Helpful Hotkey Commands

Convenient Snippets

Other Useful TextMate Bundles

With bundles for almost every programming and scripting language, the above examples are only a small sampling of the magic that TextMate is capable of. For more Ruby-relevant functionality, you might check out some of the following add-on bundles:

• Merb & Datamapper Bundles
• Rails 2.0 Bundle
• Rspec Bundle
• Cucumber Bundle

A designer’s greatest challenge isn’t necessarily in coming up with a good design, but in coming up with a good design that is different. When the client is expecting multiple design mock ups finding the balance between a design that is innovative and unique while also maintaining a high level of usability can feel like an uphill struggle. You really like how your first design came together and the temptation can be to borrow from and lean on those same strengths in your second mock.  This quickly turns the uphill struggle into a long fall down a slippery slope, and the next thing you know your two designs bear an uncanny similarity that is impossible to miss.  Ever find yourself in this situation?

Know your client

Try to get a solid grasp of your clients branding strategy and message (whether the client is able to give it to you or not) before you get too far into the design process.  Some clients invest more in defining their brand than others, but some research on your part of their market and competition can help you to grasp what they’re all about and what their expectations will be.  Once you’ve done your research, you can begin planning out your design strategy: for example, design one could focus on one aspect of their branding, while design two will focus on another, etc.  While planning out your strategy, ask yourself the following questions: can any part of their message be communicated through imagery?  Are there important pieces of information that need to be highlighted in the design?  Has the client made any specific design requests or suggested any similar websites that they’d like to draw inspiration from?

Start fresh

When working on multiple mocks for the same client, start with a new file each time.  Beginning a design by deconstructing a previous mock may seem like a good idea, but you’ll likely be leaning on the crutches of your previous design, which doesn’t usually allow for a unique vision.  You should always try to start fresh without any preconceptions.  Sure, you may want to reuse a couple of the original design elements (text from the primary navigation, for example) but make it a point to start with a fresh canvas whenever possible.

Get inspired

Sites like Smashing Magazine and Pattern Tap can be a valuable asset during the design process since they’re are constantly compiling galleries of the latest design trends and showcasing unique and creative designs.  The highly innovative nature of the designs means that most of the sites they showcase generally tend to be blogs and designer portfolios, but just because the site your working on is for a lawn mowing service doesn’t mean that they aren’t relevant!  Observe how they manipulate the ’standard’ layout idea and how that manipulation affects the site’s usability, how they use color and typography, how they arrange the page elements in the spacial plane, etc.  Bringing in an idea from an unrelated site and adapting it to fit within the needs of a completely different project can, if nothing else, give you a fresh insight that could lead to a break through in the design.

Take a break!

When you get to the point that you feel like you’re in a rut, your shoulders are starting to hunch, and you get that twitch in your eye, and it’s already long past time for a coffee (or tea!) break,  roll your head back and stare at the ceiling, touch your toes, take a quick walk outside, or do whatever it takes to get the blood flowing again.  This is one of the most common pieces of advice you can find on getting past a creative block, and for good reason!

Try a different tool

Some designers swear by their pen and paper rough drafts. For others, the idea of starting anywhere other than Photoshop is completely out of the question.  However, if you find yourself staring at the same Photoshop document for an extended period of time with the same vacant expression on your face, it might be time to change mediums.  Concordantly, if your sheet of paper just isn’t doing it for you, try hopping into Photoshop or Illustrator.  The change of setting and tools can free you from thinking within the confines of your usual tool set and give you fresh ideas on a new approach to the design.

What do you do when you find yourself in a rut?