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For me, one of the interesting things about design has always been how changing seemingly small items can have amazingly large results.

And I'm not talking about a 24% rise in sales because someone decided to make the logo bigger.

More about huge cost savings (and environmental savings) when there's a Designer clever enough to rethink a product's packaging.

Over at the GreenerComputing blog, Claudia Girrbach visited with several members of Cisco's supply chain team, who are working on an environmentally sound packaging program. In the pilot program alone, which only focuses on a few of their high volume products, promises to yield $24 million in annual savings.

She goes on to say, "...by focusing on packaging material content, volume and transport container efficiency, the company will save on materials and transportation costs as well."

When you're talking numbers like that, you can pretty much guarantee that your senior management might listen up, even if you're "just" a Designer working down in Creative.

In the article, Claudia outlines her three best practices for a product's packaging diet: Eliminate, Right Size, and Sustain.

Cisco was kind enough to provide a PDF outlining their process.

It makes me proud to own a Cisco phone, I tell you!


(Photo by Steve Keys)

  

We're excited to sponsor FITC Toronto again this year on April 24-27: 
http://www.fitc.ca/events/about/?event=102 

And we're thrilled that FITC has generously offered a 15% DISCOUNT to Aquent Talent to attend. 

If you'd like more information, please contact Julie Robinson for the code: 
jhrobinson@aquent.com 
http://aquent.us/go/julierobinson 

Thanks, FITC! 
Hope to see you there :) 
Susie 

The name of the game is speed.

With the insanely rapid pace of information on social media, keeping your brand intact by responding to consumer issues ASAP, or even before they happen, is absolutely essential.

According to John Thomson, CEO of Saepio, "Whether it means pulling ads featuring a controversy-laden spokesperson, changing messaging that is offensive to certain cultures or not leading with a product that isn't performing at its best -- you need to react quickly and just as important, consistently."

Otherwise you might just catch the tiger by the tail. (Sorry!)

The full article is over at MediaPost's site.


(Photo by Keith Allison)

Your resume is the key that can open the door to new opportunities and a bright future. A poorly written resume however is a sure-fire way of keeping that door firmly shut.

One question I've been asked repeatedly over the years is, "what's the most important thing to have on your resume?" My answer is simple: a Great Overarching Statement!

Like any piece of effective communication, you need to hook your reader immediately. Call it what you will - Professional Profile, Overview, Career Summary - the GOS is your positioning statement. It's a short, sharp statement that says who you are and what you've done. It can also be used to show the reader where you are heading, particularly if your aim is to transition into a different field.

Career objectives are fine if you are a graduate, however, caution is advised for anyone else. A career objective is all about what you want. In reality, the potential employer doesn't care what you want - they want to know what you can do for them. Show them!

As potential employers and recruiters see so many resumes, you may only have a few seconds to capture their attention. The top half of the first page of your resume is the most important. Use this space wisely. If you don't engage them immediately, it won't matter what you say on page two or three as they won't get that far.

When writing your resume you should remember CCR (an no, I'm not talking about the 60/70s rock band). You must keep your information Clear, Concise and Relevant.

Be clear about who you are and why you deserve to be considered for a role above your competition. What is your value proposition? Why should you be interviewed and subsequently hired?

Clarity is essential around dates, job titles and employer names. If you've worked for organizations that aren't household names, it can be beneficial to have a brief description of who they are and a link to their website. This is particularly useful if you have worked overseas or interstate. Also include with your qualification, the name of the institution(s) you studied at and the year you graduated.

Be concise - don't waste time and space by waffling. Write with precision. As most resumes are sent electronically these days, you can extend the depth of your resume through embedded links to your LinkedIn or Google profile, online portfolio or other dedicated web pages.

Make sure that what you include in your resume is relevant. If you've been an account manager for years, you don't need to list the duties of that part time burger-flipping job you had whilst you were at school.

There are a variety of styles to choose from when putting your resume together so do a bit of research and see what works for you. Your employment history does not necessarily have to be in chronological order. If you have taken a career break and spent a year rescuing elephants in Thailand or pouring Guinness in an Irish pub, don't put that up front. Break your employment history into 'professional experience' and 'other adventures' (or wording to that effect).

Remember to focus on your achievements. It is benefits that sell products, not features. That same principle applies to you. Sure, you were responsible for doing something, but how well did you do it? Let the reader know.

Resumes do not need to be boring. Make yours come to life by injecting your personality and your personal brand. If you are a designer, don't present a Word document nicely typed in a 10 point Times New Roman font. Include design elements! If you are a copywriter, then your words really should woo your reader.

In today's world we are constantly bombarded by marketing and advertising messages. Your resume is your marketing message so don't let it become part of the clutter - make sure it stands out. After all, it's there to sell the most important thing in the world - YOU!

(As published in Campaign Brief Magazine - March 2010)

I just saw Jared Spool speak again last week at the IxDA event onsite at Yahoo!, and he's honestly one of the most engaging speakers I've seen! He's uber knowledgeable about all things UX and has a fabulous way of sharing his insight through awesome presentations - and stories that make you think. Here's a special offer for the Web App Masters Tour in San Diego - GOOD THROUGH TUESDAY 3/9 ONLY!! Share a new experience with another person at considerable savings. When you register for the Web App Masters Tour in San Diego, you can bring another person at 50% off. This offer is only for the Tour in San Diego and it expires on Tuesday, March 9. To get this discount, just place the name of the second person in the promo code area when you register. When the second person registers, we'll apply the 50% discount to their registration. Learn all about the Tour at http://bit.ly/6sMosG. ENJOY! And thanks, Jared for another great presentation :)

Say you are interviewing to be part of a multinational team. Or that your company needs to hire agencies across multiple countries. You know these conversations will be in English but you want to learn to say something in the other language, to make a favorable impression and stand out from the crowd. Which words or phrases should you learn?

Pick a handful of NON-OBVIOUS words to learn first.

1. Don't pick words you need to know, pick ones that are nice to know. This is counter-intuative, but the reason is that these words will give you more bang for your buck. If you can toss out a more unusual word people will be more surprised and more impressed, plus may think that, since you know that less common word, you must have done a lot of studying to get that far. Like Ford Prefect's trick with the towel in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

2. Pick words that are easy to remember and easy to pronounce. You want to be able to comfortably use the word at the right time. You don't want to spend the entire meeting being distracted by trying to remember otsukaresama deshita.

3. Have a native speaker demonstrate how to pronounce the word, and under what circumstance to use it. This can make or break the usage.

BTW, these are the best words to learn first in Japanese:

so desune [SO des neh] - "I agree". Guaranteed to impress every time.
chōtto [choht-toh] - Literally means "a little" but used as a soft way to say "no"
dōmo [DOH-moh] - Can be used casually for hello, thanks and excuse me.

This of course isn't a substitute for learning more, just a way to get started.

Steve is based out of Aquent's Tokyo office. You can follow him on Twitter.

(Image from fallerd1)

Since the 1990's SunChips have been Frito-Lay's healthy option for their snack line.

For years, however, the brand never really seemed to take off. In fact, sales seemed to stall over time.

Then a few years back, their brand team discovered that many of the people who buy brands like SunChips also happen to be environmentally minded. In an interview with BrandWeek, Frito-Lay VP of Marketing Gannon Jones said:

"We started to see that there was an intersection of people who were concerned with their health and with the planet's health. Out of that was born the hypothesis that we could begin to connect SunChips more prominently with the environment so [the brand would become] a small step for me and the planet."

The brand seemed to take the message to heart and remake themselves - and not just greenwash their image.

* They started producing some of their chips in a Modesto, California manufacturing plant that is completely solar powered. (It's one of their eight of their manufacturing facilities.)
* They buy green energy credits to offset the electricity to produce their snacks.
* They partnered with National Geographic to launch a "Green Effect" contest, which encouraged people to submit environmentally-friendly local projects. They would fund the winners' ideas for up to $20K each.

And, if you managed to miss their barrage of ads during the Olympics, they've just developed the compostable chip bag to be release in America on (of course) Earth Day. Yes, in a mere 14 weeks, that pesky SunChips bag in the vacant lot across the street will be dust. Or plant materials, more likely. (They've retained both Ketchum and OMD to get the word out for their compostable bag).

So, how's all this greening of their brand working out for them?

According to Frito-Lay, sales grew 17.6 percent to $201.8 million in 2008 and has tripled its household penetration in the past four years.

I don't know about you, but those sound like pretty sustainable numbers to me.
 

(Photo by cogdogblog)

Nielsen's 2010 Internet & Technology Report was released in Australia yesterday and, surprise surprise, it finds we are spending ever more time online.

 

The study found internet usage has risen by nearly 10 per cent over the past twelve months; users are now typically spending 17.6 hours online every week.

 

This is a whopping 28.5 per cent increase on 2007 usage levels and a 9 per cent increase on 2008 levels. Again, unsurprisingly, 16 to 29 year olds are the heaviest users, spending an average 22 hours online every week, while 30 to 49 year olds are averaging around 18.2 hours.

 

Those over 50 - whom you might think are too busy either tinkering with their ham-radios or scrawling angry letters-to-the-editor on their Smith Corona typewriters to spend time 'internetting' - are spending a weekly average of 15.5 hours online, almost as much time as they spend watching Eastenders and Antiques Roadshow on television.

 

Males are spending more time online than females and users based in major cities  are spending more time online than their counterparts in regional areas. The study  - which gathered 2371 responses from internet users and non-users through both online surveys and telephone hook-ups - found too that in major centres, the internet is now equal with television as the preferred outlet through which to source news and information.

 

What is interesting about the report is that it finds that, rather than concentrating on just one form of media (ie. television, radio, internet) at a time, people of all ages are increasingly multi-tasking with various media at the same time.

It's a bit like a McDonalds ad currently airing here in Australia. In keeping with the conglomerate's successful 'Love...' campaign, a smartly-dressed Gen-Y clown happily reads the paper, listens to his I-Pod and surfs the web, somehow still managing to wolf down an artery-clogging bacon, sausage and egg McMuffin in the process. 'Love multitasking (and heart disease, it would appear)' the ad declares; yumbo.

Anyway, I digress. The Nielsen study found 49 per cent of internet users multitask the internet and television at the same time, while 39 per cent do the same with internet and the radio. It's common now for live television shows (like the ABC's 'Q&A' current affairs program, for example) to encourage viewers to actively engage with guests via Twitter. Other shows, meanwhile, direct viewers to websites where additional content is available to download for a limited time.

The release of the I-Phone, Blackberry and other smart phone devices means we all now have the ability to go online - and stay online - just about anywhere. The daily commute to work on the bus or train once saw people awkwardly negotiate their broadsheet newspapers with the throng of other passengers doing the same. That has now given way (what's a broadsheet anyway? I hear you ask) to a sea of white earphones connected to internet-capable phones, I-Pods and other similar devices, at which most of us stare blankly.

It's interesting though - and reassuring - to note older generations are increasingly embracing new technology, as evidenced in the Nielson report. The days of shopping for 45s and LPs may be over, but baby boomers appear to have little trouble downloading their favourite music.

Apple I-Tunes celebrated its 10 billionth song being downloaded last week. Notably, the buyer was NOT some youngster hunting down the latest appalling, mass-produced and marketed dross by the likes of Ke$ha. Oh no, it was 71-year old country music fan Louie Sulcer from Woodstock Georgia, who bought Johnny Cash's 'Guess Things Happen That Way', and won $10,000 worth of free music on I-Tunes for his effort.

I don't know what I'd download with all that I-Tunes cash but, in a rather feeble attempt to end this blog rant cleverly, I'd include both Bob Dylan's 'The Times They Are a-Changin' (because they have) or Handsome Boy Modelling School's 'The World's Gone Mad' (which it has also). Aaah-Ha! Now, time for a cup of tea.....

 

Yo Noid!  That's the first thing I remember about Domino's.  That and crappy pizza that could only be digested during a late night binge after a night of beer with friends.  So what was I thinking when I ordered 4 pizzas for my son's birthday party this weekend?  I was starting to ask myself the same thing until....

HOLY CRAP!  Their new site is really cool.  Not only does it tell me what stage of the pizza making process my delicious pie was in but also the name of my pizza chef.   Not only that, when I arrived, my "chef" William greeted me as I walked in the door with a "You must be Lucas".  I know I'm very important with many leather-bound books and my apartment smells of rich mahogany, but this was unbelievable!  The guy in blue knew my name! 

Something you should know: For Lucas Mitchell the customer, it's more about service than a great product.  To me, knowing my name and treating me like a person is something I will always pay a premium for with less regard as to the overall features of the product.  All things being the same, I'll gladly pay extra for the service.  Why won't I ever change to Progressive Insurance?  Because Progressive doesn't have Mark, my agent.  Mark sat down with my wife and I when we were 22 years old and has been our agent ever since.  He comes to our house, provides advice without selling us on things, and has seen our family grow.  This is how business should be done, and I think Domino's finally gets this too.

When Domino's came out with their new commercial advertising their new recipe, I wasn't really impressed, but I took notice.  It drove me to their site, and after trying the Domino's site and the overall experience ending in the enjoyment, yes enjoyment, of their pizza they've gained a new customer.  The pizza has been upgraded from an F to a C+/B- in taste and an A- in value, respectively.  For any companies trying to gain market share in a down economy, try copying Domino's model of using the tools available to make someone's experience unique, not just your product.  Remember, people will pay a premium for product, but they will also remain a customer with great service.