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NBD News
July 14, 2008

Welcome to my Newsletter!

Dear Client,
This is the frst edition of NBD News - the e-newsletter from Nora Brown Design. You are receiving this because of the work I did for you on your website. However, if you don't wish to receive future editions, please feel free to use the unsubscribe link provided on the left and at the bottom of the page.

Some of the items I hope to feature in each issue are:

  • A "Showcase" featuring a past or present client and the work I've completed for her or him
  • "News and Notes", including news from me and the world of web design
  • "What's Next": ideas for using new techniques, technologies, and services to further develop your website or promote your company
  • A short "Explainer" article about something related to the web, web design, or design in general

If you've got an idea for an Explainer article, or any other content you'd like to see here, I'd love to hear from you!

So, without further ado...

Showcase: Peace of Mind Organizing

I thought it would be appropriate, in my first edition, to feature one of my first clients that wasn't a family member or friend. Janine Adams was referred to me by her friend (and my aunt), Sally Brown. At first, she contacted me about revamping the website for her pet-writing career. However, after a change in vocation to Professional Organizer, Janine needed a logo, business card, and website for her new business, Peace of Mind Organizing. The final logo, shown here, emerged after several variations and iterations.

The logo then set the look for Janine's website and blog, business card, stationery, notepads, postcards, mailing labels, t-shirts, and tire-cover. I didn't design these all at once, but as the need arose. Most recently, Janine had me revamp her original pet-writing homepage, to clearly direct users to her Peace of Mind Organizing site, her blog, or her past life as a pet-writer.

The work I completed for Janine and Peace of Mind Organizing has really helped my business grow; several of my subsequent clients have been either professional organizers or freelance writers.

News and Notes: My Blog!

This will only be news to those of you who don't already know about my blog at www.norabrowndesign.com/blog. I started it last fall, and the focus of the whole thing is to provide tutorials, tips, and general information for my clients on websites, blogging, e-newsletters, etc. I found I was putting together instructions over and over for each client that were largely the same, so I thought why not collect them all in one place, for anyone to refer to, and save clients some dough at the same time?

So far, I have a whole list of instructional screencasts and quite a few articles. I'm still working how to organzing it, and what I should focus on, so if you have ideas or requests, drop me a line.

Explainer: CMS

A CMS (which stands for Content Mangement System) is a piece of software that can be used to create dynamic websites - that is, websites on which the content changes frequently (such as a blog or news site). But, perhaps more importantly for the type of websites I usually create, a CMS provides an interface my clients can use to edit their content (even "static" content such as About Me information) without knowing any html or having any technical knowledge. Basically, this is achieved through the use of templates into which content (text and images) is inserted.

My current CMS of choice is Textpattern, which many of you will be familiar with by now, and it is the engine that runs nearly all of the sites I've built in the past couple of years. Other examples are Wordpress, Joomla, Drupal, and Expression Engine.

What's Next: Moooo...

Moo Cards, that is. MOO.com is a UK-based printing service that offers a unique feature: being able to print a variety of images in a single order of mini-cards or business cards, without a drastic increase in price. Although there many dirt-cheap online printers, such as the good-quality Overnight Prints , of course the entire pack of business cards you order from them will all be identical. But with MOO, you can have as many as 50 different images on the front. So you could feature 50 different products, photos, bits of trivia, quotes or colors. You could use their mini-cards for branded hang-tags or gift tags, discount cards or gift certificates. Divide a design into several pieces to make a puzzle of sorts, or print sequential images for a flipbook...possibilities abound. They also print stickers and other types of cards.

If you have an idea for using MOO printing, to promote your business or just for fun, let me know!

Till Next Time

Well, I hope you enjoyed Volume 1, Number 1 of NBD News. I plan to send it monthly or every other month, depending on the response. Again, I'd love to hear from you about content you'd like to see featured here or on my blog, so email me at nabrown78@gmail.com, or call me up at 312.624.8249.

Till next time,
Nora