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"Building a skyscraper? Forget about steel and concrete, says architect Michael Green, and build it out of ... wood. As he details in this intriguing talk, it's not only possible to build safe wooden structures up to 30 stories tall (and, he hopes, higher), it's necessary."
Vancouver’s Michael Green Architecture, a firm specializing in timber buildings, has been acquired by Silicon Valley startup Katerra.
Timber is trending. Earlier this year, Azure wrote about the proliferation of plyscrapers around the world: thanks to the possibilities of cross-laminated timber, which is fire-resistant and as strong as concrete, wood construction is being considered for 70-storey buildings in Japan, 80-storey residential projects in London and mid-rise college campuses in Toronto. And one of the most prominent champions of timber construction is Vancouver-based Michael Green, whose firm has been pushing wood buildings – and indeed wood cities – since 2012.
Green, who authored The Case for Tall Wood Buildings and won a 2017 AZ Award for Environmental Leadership for his T3 Minneapolis office building, promotes timber as an environmentally friendly alternative to concrete. Earlier this week, Michael Green Architecture (MGA) was acquired by Katerra, a Silicon Valley construction startup that received $865 million from Japanese venture capital giant Softbank Vision Fund. Reportedy valued at over $3 billion, Katerra is run by former Tesla interim CEO Michael Marks; it lists itself as a tech company, though it aims to disrupt the construction industry.
Green says that, after the acquisition, he will remain the president and CEO of his firm – it will be called Michael Green Architecture, a Katerra company. In an email, Green says that its parent company will help “advance our agenda on design, quality, sustainability and affordability.” MGA and its two dozen employees will remain in Vancouver.
Katerra, Architectural Record notes, wants to vertically integrate all aspects of construction, from design to subcontracting. Founded three years ago, it, like Green, focuses on affordability through efficiency: Katerra has created market-rate multi-family housing and student and senior housing, with projects focused on mass-timber construction. The acquisition of MGA, it seems, is a step towards making its architecture division more environmentally friendly – and could provide Green with wider resources, both human and financial, to achieve his wood-built ambitions.
The terms of MGA’s acquisition by Katerra were not disclosed.
Green said the acquisition allows him to make a bigger impact on the North American market – though his reach already extends beyond his Gastown office. MGA’s recent projects include the OSU College of Forestry building at Oregon State University, a proposal for the world’s tallest timber tower in Paris, and Riverfront Square, a 2,000-unit residential project in New Jersey.
Though the acquisition is a victory for Green, it’s also a promising step for the future of timber construction. Silicon Valley’s embrace – and investment – in architecture, green design and wood construction could have a lasting impact on the built environment. For a glimpse of what the future may have in store, watch Green’s influential TEDxTalk above.
Source: AZURE / Written By: Mark Teo
Last year was all about taking risks in graphic design. But most of the graphic design trends we predicted last year have become mainstream. Like incorporating a whole new world of colour, and breathing life into print with a rainbow of metallic huges. Click HERE to download the metallic ink design guide.
What are the BIGGEST graphic design trends of 2019 that you should be following?
That’s what this design guide will tell you. For an in-depth guide to the biggest graphic design trends in 2019, check out the full article and infographic HERE.
The blog post contains a ton of examples for each trend, as well as templates that you can use to stay on top of the trends. In the video above, we introduce you to the 8 graphic design trends that we predict are going to take over in 2019. We’ve included examples from some of the biggest brands in tech right now, including Apple, Spotify, MailChimp, Facebook and more.
If you want your branding to be ahead of the curve, try incorporating some of these graphic design trends into your proposals, marketing materials, packaging and internal communications.
Source: Venngage / Written By: Ryan McCready
The strategic use of psychology in direct mail can drive amazing results. Did you know that our brain is doing most of its work outside of our consciousness? If we are able to create a good direct mail psychology strategy that enables us to tap into subconscious decisions, we can generate a greater response from prospects and customers.
How Can This Work?
1. Emotional Triggers
Both men and women need emotional engagement for direct mail to work. This requires the use of both good emotional copy and imagery. Segmentation can really help you target the right people with the right emotional copy and images.
2. Overload
When there is too much clutter of messages, either copy or images, the brain cannot process it. Make sure that you leave white space and use concise copy so that the brain can easily process your message.
3. Interesting
The brain likes puzzles and humor. Keep them simple for easy understanding. They are effective, with increased engagement.
4. Women and Empathy
If your audience is women, you need to tap into empathy. Women engage with images depicting faces and direct eye contact. Women also respond to group/community activity images and, of course, babies, too. Some women will pay attention to messages that make life easier, celebrate her or allow her to do multiple things.
A complicated mail message will most likely be ignored by the brain. There are ways to simplify your copy and images to capture attention.
How to Capture Attention
Novelty — This is the No. 1 way to capture attention. Our brains are trained to look for something new and cool. A novel message or layout can really help you stand out in the mail box.
Eye Contact — Humans are social beings. Images of people or animals making eye contact with your prospects or customers grab attention and draw them into the mail piece.
When you are able to integrate a multiple sensory experience into your mail piece, you create a richer and deeper engagement with your audience.
How to use the senses:
As you can see, the brain is powerful and is very good at ignoring messages. Taking the time to consider all of these psychological factors can really help you drive your response rates up. As always, focusing your messaging with targeted segments to really reach the right people with the right message will increase the success of your mail campaigns. Are you ready to get started?
Source: Target Marketing / Written By: Summer Gould
“Without trust, your relationship does not exist; all you have is a series of transactions,” says Rosa Sheng, architect and senior associate at Bohlin Cywinski Jackson.
Trust is the foundation of any relationship between architect and client, and cultivating trust has huge benefits: repeat clients, patience when challenges arise, and referrals to new clients. But a weak or eroded sense of trust can harm your reputation, cost you future business, and even drive clients toward litigation.
Due to the complex nature of architecture projects, a number of factors can make or break an architect-client relationship. Here are seven tips from architectural experts to help you build and maintain trust.
1. Have an Effective Online Presence.
The first way to build a client’s trust—before you ever meet in person—is with your online presence. An unsubstantial or outdated online presence can be a red flag for prospective clients, so keep your website and professional profiles (including LinkedIn) updated with information about your firm and projects. “How is the client supposed to build trust if they look you up and can’t find anything about you?” Sheng asks.
2. Communicate Well Consistently.
Good communication is the cornerstone of building trust. “We get lost in the design process, and then we forget to communicate what’s happening and how it’s happening in an effective way and on a regular basis,” Sheng says. A regular check-in can bring potential problems to the surface early in the process and show the client you’re fully engaged.
Communicating your design intent to clients in a language your clients can understand is also essential to building trust. Make sure you don’t use “archispeak”—words such as “parti” and “trombe wall.” Architects often assume that clients can read drawings well and share the same technical vocabulary, which is usually not the case.
3. Show Your Vision With BIM.
Using 3D-modeling software like BIM, you can convey design and site-planning concepts via virtual walk-throughs and visualizations, leaving little room for clients to misinterpret your designs. This process also allows you to anticipate conflicts that may come up in construction with more accuracy so you can solve problems and reduce change orders.
“With BIM, you can go in with a wider array of tools and answer questions that would never have come up if you were just looking at 2D plans,” says Philip Noland, design visualization artist and owner of Noland Design Studio. “It brings about new exploration. The questions aren’t glazed over—they’re really looked at.”
For architect Lionel Scharly from Scharly Designer Studio, using BIM visualizations instills trust because clients can see the whole picture. “The more the client has details of the project, the better they understand, the more you accumulate their trust,” he says. “They are the ones paying, but they often don’t have a background in architecture, yet they want to be ‘in the project.”
4. Don’t Overpromise.
One of the most fundamental ways to build trust is to deliver what you’ve committed to doing. “The fear of saying no is rampant in our industry,” Sheng says. It’s especially hard to say no when it’s a down market and architects are starved for work. But in the long run, when you’ve said yes to something you can’t deliver just to get a job, your client will stop trusting you.
To avoid biting off more than you can chew, talk your clients through their project goals to confirm what they want can be done. “If it passes the three-question challenge, then it might be okay,” Sheng says. “Ask about the desired goal in three different ways—with a focus on design, budget, and schedule—to make sure they thought through their idea.”
5. Do Your Homework.
Designing a building entails a lot of moving parts. It’s important that you do your homework on factors such as applicable codes, the properties of materials you want to use, and what things cost. Clients rely on architects to be the experts in many arenas, and by doing your homework, you will convey the correct information and make fewer mistakes. “You definitely have to know what you’re talking about, so when you tell the client something, always double-check that it is accurate,” Sheng says.
6. Be Honest in Setting Expectations.
If you discover a problem, it may be tempting to cave to your client to curry favor. For example, if you learn the project will cost more than the client can afford, it’s important to deliver the message without wavering—even if the client pushes back. “There’s an expectation for an architect to push the boundaries, be innovative, and stretch the dollar, but the architect still needs to be financially responsible,” Sheng says. “Show conviction and maintain integrity in your professional expertise. Trust is built on consistency.”
Clients may also have unrealistic demands to squeeze the budget and schedule, and it’s your job to be honest about what’s feasible. “Sometimes the truth is hard to swallow, and in some cases, we lose out,” Sheng says. “But in the long term, the client realizes that you were right, and the truth prevails.”
Being up front about cost and viability can also prevent you from absorbing costs outside your initial scope, which can negatively impact your profit margin on the project.
7. Offer New and Creative Solutions.
When trust is lost due to a mistake or failed promise, it may take a long time to re-establish it. The best way to regain trust is to acknowledge where you went wrong, apologize, and offer solutions.
A contract BIM manager in the Facilities Management Group at Carolinas HealthCare System, Meghan Ruffo regularly collaborates with architects. For her, defaulting to problem solving within a linear 2D process—design, then engineer, then build—can erode confidence. “The willingness to think about how to solve the problem is important, rather than relying on the traditional approach or what an architect has always done in specific scenarios in the past,” she says.
For Sheng, creative problem solving is particularly important when the stakes are high: “Because construction is such a costly endeavor, costing hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars, it is a huge responsibility for architects to be the steward of that kind of money in the form of a building.”
Source: Redshift by Autodesk / Written By: Taz Khatri
Think beyond “educating the client” to build transformational relationships.
“If only we could educate the client about the true value of architecture,” goes the wistful narrative, “then they would have greater appreciation for architects and what they do.” It is clear to many members of the profession that this painfully slow enlightenment process needs to be accelerated. What if architects used an evidence-based approach to design a better way to transform their client’s thinking? What if these initiatives made use of research on experiential learning? What if more clients engaged in interactive experiences that generate exceptional value?
The shift to transformational experiences
Transformational client-architect experiences are based upon mutually beneficial exchanges of knowledge and aha’s that occur before, during, and after the project. In contrast to fee-driven transactions, these two-way engagements bring out the best in both entities. They are built on empathy and the trusting relationships that develop when the architect and client think through possibilities and constraints together.
“I love my clients,” says Gregory Henriquez, Architect AIBC, FRAIC, managing partner of Henriquez Partners Architects and a leader among a new generation of ethical, activist architects. “We decline one or two project requests a week because we choose our clients. Rather than being reactive, we decided to take control of our careers and surround ourselves with people who have a reciprocal relationship with us. Clients are attracted by our commitment to doing something meaningful and exceptional together. We provide them with a positive experience.”
“Like a lot of architects, I used to be fearful of showing clients my work in progress,” Henriquez continues, “then I experimented with sharing the design as it evolved and discovered to my surprise, the more I did that, the more excited they got about the emerging ideas.”
More architects are taking the initiative to shape project opportunities and the selection process. They are using fresh thinking, meaningful interaction and empathy for clients to be the proverbial firm that has the inside track.
What is empathy-driven marketing?
Empathy is the ability to put yourself “in someone else’s shoes” to understand how they see things. For architects this involves being attuned to a client’s concerns, hopes and fears—both spoken and unspoken. When framing communication and marketing strategies for your firm, an empathy-driven approach can more clearly distinguish you from the many firms that vaguely claim they listen and collaborate. Empathy also means caring enough to interview clients long before they create their selection criteria and being in a position to influence those criteria.
Use empathy to triumph over apathy
When I conduct interviews with clients to understand why they choose one top design firm over another, they tend to talk about the working relationship. For example, they cite “someone who cares about my obsessions as a client, not just their obsessions,” and they praise the architect who “has our best interests at heart,” or the firm that “shows they really care about us.”
Overwhelming research on how people make major buying decisions indicates that emotions rule their choices. Typically, the purchaser’s conscious and unconscious feelings are then justified with logic (such as assigning point scores in the case of public work proposal evaluations).
In other words, an excellent way to build greater appreciation for what architects do is to communicate that you recognize the demands, risks, pressures and primal fears of being a client. Often when spending large sums of money, clients must justify their decisions to others, some are under hostile public scrutiny, and some may even fear losing their job if project planning mistakes are made. Also, clients are frequently asked to quickly digest concepts that may have taken a design team days or weeks to evolve back in the studio. So you can set yourself apart by integrating clients into your design and planning deliberations so that they can proceed with confidence.
Every project begins with a conversation
From my experience, thought leaders in the profession begin the design process with the premise that we must seek first to understand,” says John Stephenson, OAA, MRAIC, partner, FORM Architecture Engineering and current president of the Ontario Association of Architects. “This involves not just passive listening; it requires insightful questions that are ‘designed’ to achieve an exceptional level of understanding before leaping to a hypothesis. It poses design ideas not as solutions, which presume that the architect has all the answers, but as a series of ‘what if’ questions that challenge both designer and client. This quality of interaction brings real craft and greater perceived value to the design that emerges.
Where are you on the empathy spectrum?
A doctor can be dedicated to the medical profession while not appearing to care that much about patients. Likewise, on one extreme of the marketing spectrum we find architects who describe themselves as passionate about architecture without explaining how their passion translates into benefits for a client. Marketing profiles that neglect to mention the client’s role may unintentionally convey a message that clients will be viewed primarily as a means to expand portfolios, win awards and fulfill a need for self-expression.
On the other side of the empathy spectrum we find architects who see a common cause with clients, serving their own agenda as well as client needs, fears, hopes and priorities. These architects build trust and enthusiasm with clients through interactions that demonstrate they truly care.
From the client’s perspective, how can I tell where you fall on this empathy spectrum? Many architect profiles are written in a way that appeals to other architects, rather than speaking to the client as reader. If your clients would truly say you “care about us” this is a crucial differentiator that should be conveyed through all your written and verbal communication.
Caring does not mean compromise
If you practice principle-centred negotiation you know that in order to get what you want, you must first discover what the other person wants. Finding common ground—or agreeing on a common cause—does not need to involve compromise. So when we talk about a client-centric, empathy-driven marketing strategy for architectural services, it does not mean that design quality will be diminished. But it does require asking astute questions that reveal where your interests intersect with your client’s.
Bryan Croeni, AIA, director, B+H Advance Strategy immerses his clients in a rigorous participatory design experience that sparks animated dialogue about what’s truly important and meaningful to stakeholders. This empathy-driven approach has multiple benefits that serve to differentiate the firm. “In addition to enriching the value of our interaction with clients,” Bryan says, “our process saves time by surfacing challenges and opportunities early on in the project. In a rapidly changing, complex planning and design environment, our clients can’t afford to settle for easy conclusions and untested assumptions. Status quo mindsets are destined to yield status quo outcomes, which is risky in an environment of accelerating change.”
In my consulting work I encounter architects who have collaborative process talents that they take for granted. These capabilities, rooted in empathy and appreciation for the high stakes decisions that clients must face, often get masked by standard marketing claims. An empathy-driven approach to marketing can reveal fresh opportunities and strengthen client relationships. To do this, you need to paint a picture of what it feels like to collaborate with your team and the benefits of your unique way of working. How do you develop a deeper understanding of what each client wants their project to achieve?
Rather than rely on well-worn phrases that clients see as norms for the profession—such as years of experience and vague, me-too statements about excellence and innovation—what if you conveyed the quality of client experience and the benefits of that interaction? If empathy is about understanding how clients see things, how do you gain that understanding rather than proceed on the basis of assumptions?
Communicating a higher quality of interaction could encompass:
Describe your consultative approach
In recent years, doctors have added “patient interview skills” to their classroom curriculum. They realize that traditional, paternalistic ways of dispensing their wisdom must be replaced with a consultative approach. Design clients often don’t know what questions they should be asking, in the same sense that you may not know all the questions you should be asking your doctor. Also, clients frequently don’t fully understand their needs until the design process begins to unfold.
How effective are your client interview skills? Architects who establish an outstanding reputation for empathy are more than good listeners. They certainly are not order-takers, because they don’t accept what clients say at face value. They do not say “we will build your vision.” Instead, similar to a good doctor, they know that better questions lead to better answers.
Your ability to respond to what matters most
Enormous amounts of time can be wasted when we jump ahead without asking “what matters?” to clients. Are we making the right assumptions? Are we ruling out the right possibilities?
“We make our thinking process highly visible by involving clients in hands-on working sessions, rather than relying on presentations that require us to convince decision makers, says Tania Bortolotto, OAA, FRAIC, president, Bortolotto. “Our transparent approach allows us to spotlight how we explore project possibilities and creative problem solving. It also helps clients digest complex issues so they feel more confident as we move forward.”
Are you hiding your most valuable client collaboration skills behind a wall of “me-too” claims? Not every architect is interested in delving into these emotional aspects of the business. Yet an empathy-driven strategy will make the value of what you do more obvious to clients, and free you from the commodity services trap.
Source: Canadian Architect / Written By: Sharon Vanderkaay
It’s an age-old debate: direct mail versus email marketing.
Supporters of digital media will say why drain your marketing budget on direct mail campaigns that nobody reads when you can contact your customers using the channels they prefer — television, social media, and mobile?
However, the latest data makes a strong case for printed direct mail. Sure, social media and mobile marketing are on the rise. But that doesn’t mean that customers aren’t responding to direct mail or that this channel is losing its effectiveness. That’s just plain false.
The reality is, direct mail remains a critical part of the mix. So the next time someone tries to tell you direct mail is dead, remember:
1. Direct mail doesn’t require opt-in
Unlike email and text messaging, you don’t have to get a recipient’s permission to send them direct mail. This means, even if a customer doesn’t subscribe or unsubscribes from your email list, you can still get in touch with them. (Which is why it’s always a good idea to get physical addresses from those on your email lists!)
2. Direct mail never stays in a spam filter
"Yes, your message may be picked by someone else," notes Roger Buck, former director of marketing and product development at The Flesh Company. "But the chances are small - and direct mail never has a virus."
3. Direct mail stays effective longer than you think
Direct mail is a bit like a note on the refrigerator door. "We sometimes hear from customers that our mail stays on their desk for weeks," says Andre Palko, president of Technifold USA. "They may not immediately take action, but our brand lingers until they are ready to contact us. An e-mail does not last as well - and is far less striking. "
4. It’s still effective when the target recipient has moved on
“If you send an email to someone who’s no longer at a particular company, it bounces. If you send a postcard, the new person in that job sees it — and you’ve just introduced yourself as a vendor,” says Palko.
5. With direct mail you do not have to fight to get attention
E-mail is effective, but also overwhelming. In 2014, The Radicati Group concluded that the average business customer sends or receives 121 emails per day. In 2018 there are probably 141 in all likelihood.
Larry Bradley, owner of Proforma Sunbelt Graphics, writes: "The overwhelming deluge of e-mail in the office is a solid hurdle for e-mail marketers. It is difficult to distinguish the mess from the real mails, so that a large part of business e-mails is not read at all. By contrast, companies receive much less marketing by mail than ten years ago - a unique advantage for direct mail."
6. Certain offers just won’t get traction by email
There’s a reason businesses are more likely to get lending offers in the mail than they are by email. B2B decision-makers trust direct mail more than email, especially for high value products and services. Mailers can also include a wide variety of trust-building content not possible (or reasonable) to include in email. Yes, you can provide links. But with direct mail, you get that content in front of them in a tangible way right out of the gate.
7. Direct mail can reach high-level decision-makers
There are only so many things you can do to make email look more important. But beyond writing a compelling subject line, most of them look hokey. Direct mail offers options like kits, dimensional mail, and unique packaging options that, by their nature, get past the gatekeepers. (Palko has used everything from metallic envelopes, lunch bags, packing list pouches and prescription bottles to mail letters. “They are not only fun, but they get opened!” he says.) While these mailings may have higher price tags, they can also get near 100% open rates. When you’re trying to reach the C-Suite, that’s worth a lot..
8. Direct mail drives social media and online marketing
Many people believe you don’t need direct mail when you have social media and mobile marketing. What they’re overlooking is how social media and mobile marketing relationships get captured in the first place. Very often, it’s through print. Saying that you only need social and mobile is akin to saying that when you buy a house you only need the upper stories and not the foundation. Without print, getting social and mobile engagements is much more difficult.
Don’t let digital marketers get away with stealing your customers based on false contrasts. Open the discussion about the benefits of direct mail versus email—and when to use each. Be proactive and let direct mail showcase what you can do.
Source: Xerox / Written By: Heidi Tolliver-Walker
1. Interior designers do the same thing as interior architects?
A lot of people are confused by the many different job titles there are in the design industry. However, a very common mistake is to think that interior designers and interior architects do the same job. The reality is that these professions can involve many different things which are more often than not, very far apart. Generally speaking, interior design has more to do with the art of the building, while interior architecture is more concerned with the science behind it.
2. Interior design is all about décor
Interior design involves much more than just a good knowledge of décor. As we’ve mentioned in our previous article on the topic, the practice of interior architecture requires designers to consider pretty much everything to do with the building of an interior space that will affect human habitation, including materials, finishes, electrical requirements, plumbing, lighting, ventilation, ergonomics, and intelligent use of space. Interior designers with training in interior architecture will usually be present at, and have an important say during all stages of the construction process, from the initial plans right through to the finishing touches.
3. Hiring an interior designer is very costly
Depending on the scale of the project, the budget and the time frame you have in mind for finishing it, the price of hiring a professional interior designer can vary dramatically. In most cases, interior designers charge very reasonable fees and the value you get for your money will be worth paying for. If you’re not sure how much your interior design project would cost, you can simply enquire and decide if you are ready to pay for it.
4. Interior designers only work with very expensive materials
As every other professional, interior designers can work with both expensive and cheap materials and products. More importantly, they will work within the limits of the budget and requirements you give them as their client. You have to remember that the price of materials is not always crucial to getting the end result you desire. If you’re working with an experienced interior designer, they should be able to recommend you the best quality products at the most reasonable price there is.
5. You don’t need to have AN education to become an interior designer
There are many people out there that claim that they are interior designers, without having any formal education. However, as explained in some of the other points above, interior design is a very challenging and exciting profession that includes a variety of tasks and requires a great deal of skills and knowledge. The only way you can ensure that you have all these on board when applying for a job, even at an intern level, will be to obtain a formal qualification from a recognised organisation. A career in interior architecture and design can be difficult to get started and an accredited course in the subject will give you a head start by providing you the knowledge, skills, and qualifications you need to succeed.
6. Interior designers make all the decisions for you
Don’t expect that all decisions on an interior design project would be made by the designer you have hired. He or she will have a lot of recommendations on the way ideas can be implemented, but the final decisions will lie with you.
7. Interior designers can’t work with existing structures, materials and objects – they always want to throw everything old away
The truth is that interior designers always work towards achieving the goals in an interior design plan. If this plan involves the stripping of a building to its bare bones they would definitely need to throw everything old away. This is not always necessary and you can keep as much of your old stuff in your new house or space as you want.
8. “I don’t need an interior designer – I can do it on my own”
As we outlined earlier in the article, interior design is a very complex job. You can try and do some of its components on your own, but unless you have the training and understanding of interior design concepts, we think you shouldn’t start any project, small or big without a professional eye. There are so many examples of terrible design decisions that show that it is not worth risking your dream project, if you can leave it to the professionals. At the end of the day, you wouldn’t operate on somebody if you’re weren’t a doctor, right?
9. Interior designers always want to be trendy
Interior designers always strive to be aware of the new trends in their profession. However, they wouldn’t force you to do something on your project if you don’t like it or you think it doesn’t suit your needs. Trends are interesting to follow, but they are not something every interior designer tries to implement in their work.
10. Interior designers don’t need a plan for their projects
Interior designers can’t work without a plan for their project. They need to think about every single detail and plan in appropriate time for it. A good plan means that as a customer you will get an idea on the cost involved as well as the deadline for completion of each stage. Planning is a crucial part of the job of the interior designer.
11. Interior design doesn’t require a lot of time
Interior design projects can take a lot of time and this usually happens because the whole process requires the attention, skills and knowledge of the many other specialists who work with the interior designer. The designer needs to be able to speak everyone else’s language – from the plumber to the conservation officer, to be able to make the project plan work. This doesn’t mean that all interior design projects take years to complete – a complex, but very well organised job on a residential property, for example, can take around five months from start to finish.
12. Interior designers don’t need to work towards a budget
A good plan always comes with a clear idea of the budget the client has for it. There’s no such thing as “open budget” – interior designers should know what is affordable and what is not, because this can help them make some very important decisions. Give your interior designer a budget to work with and leave the magic touch to them!
Source: Id! Blog Written By: The IDI Team
So, what is interior architecture? There has been a debate raging for some time around the terms architecture, interior architecture, interior design, and interior decoration. The discussion centres on the blurring of the lines that define the role and responsibilities of each profession: where does the interior design of a space end and architecture begin, and vice versa?
So, what is interior architecture?
There have been a number of factors over the last few decades that have increased the ambiguity of these titles, including the improvement of interior design education. This has in turn increased the scope of the profession and led many interior designers to becoming more involved with architectural and technical aspects of interior design, and less with the decorative, soft furnishings side.
As a result, many interior design degree courses have been renamed as interior architecture degrees to more accurately reflect what they cover. Courses like this have also shot up in popularity, producing a growing number of architecturally savvy designers, and in turn making it more difficult to differentiate between architecture and interior design.
So what is interior architecture, and perhaps just as importantly, how does it differ from architecture, interior design and interior decoration?
Click HERE to find our more about the differing roles and responsibilities of all of these professions.
Source: Id! Blog Written By: The IDI Team
Marketing is an ever evolving combination of art and science, and today marketing's role is growing in importance. The challenges of producing tangible growth and ROI are two trends that will continue to grow as the business climate becomes more competitive, and the opportunities more fragmented.
Market fragmentation is creating a new frontier in terms of techniques, strategies and reach. As niches become more focused, the concept of a “market-of-one” is becoming the new reality. We have to create a “unique” experience for each prospect to drive them to convert, build trust, and finally act.
Focusing On Customer Experience
These trends deserve your attention as you address the complexities and challenges of marketing in the coming year.
1. The Growing Role of B2B Marketing
This year will see marketing expand beyond its traditional role. Businesses are facing new and unique challenges today, like the shortage of talent, commoditization and increasing competition to name just a few. These are enterprise-wide challenges that will require cross-departmental collaboration to solve, and marketing is in the perfect position to take the lead.
Watch for greater alignment between marketing and HR, sales, and operations. Everything from addressing employer branding strategies to recruit talent, to business development will be calling on marketing to increase value and visibility.
2. Balancing The “Customer Experience”
Probably the biggest trend to watch in the coming year will be the task of focusing on customer experience while still driving growth. Marketers have been focusing on “customer-centric” methods, basing their approach on the lifetime value of a prospect.
This year, the focus will be on adding “customer-focused” techniques of providing relevant experiences across all touch points, to deliver what customers most value. Balancing these two approaches can deliver a more personalized approach that will generate higher revenue, while building stronger brand loyalty.
3. Executive Branding: Thought Leadership
In the past few years the focus of branding (thanks to the Internet, mobile, and social media) has shifted to the individual – both in terms of the customer, as well as the “voice” of the business.
As a result traditional branding and marketing efforts aren't enough. Especially when it comes to B2B marketing. Today, executive branding, or developing thought leadership is growing. Buyers want to know the “why” behind the business and put a face to the operation to build trust. In order to really stand out, executive branding will be the fastest growing trend in B2B marketing in the coming years.
4. Formats, Channels and Mix
As marketing refocuses on thought leadership, the need will arise to refine content and marketing mix as well. As more channels and delivery platforms become available, marketing teams will need to better leverage a broader mix of marketing choices and formats.
For example, video both pre-recorded and live is becoming much more prominent as is live streaming of events. Diversification of content delivery formats includes podcasts, interactive assessments (as in the managed print field) and mobile friendly content. Marketing firms will also see a shift from Twitter and LinkedIn to more non-traditional B2B formats like Facebook and Instagram. Along with this shift will come the reliance on paid opportunities to boost distribution away from organic-only approaches.
5. Artificial Intelligence/ Machine Learning
DRIP Marketing has grown in the past few years, and the "automation" trend will continue as the integration of artificial and machine learning in B2B marketing grows in importance.
According to Forrester Research, “AI will provide business users with access to information and insights before they're available.” By using cognitive interfaces, complex systems and advanced analytics combined with machine learning technology, business decisions in e-commerce, marketing, product management and other areas will be able to happen almost in real time.
6. Experiential Marketing
Imagine being able to give your customers and prospects the opportunity to experience your brand in “real life” or the virtual world. This trend will grow in the coming years, especially in the B2B space. As virtual reality begins to take a greater hold, it will be possible to immerse prospects or customers from anywhere in the world.
A great example in the B2C space is the growing use of virtual reality in luxury home sales. Prospects are able to take an "immersive" tour of properties that have not yet been built. When it comes to B2B, educate yourself about the latest experiential strategies and techniques and how you can integrate them into your marketing strategy so users can “touch," “taste” or “feel” your brand. Internally, experiential marketing is a great opportunity to engage, educate and energize employees.
These are 6 trends to be aware of in the coming year. As marketing continues to become more personalized, the techniques, strategies and channels will continue to evolve. Staying ahead of the trends and technologies that are changing our business will be the key to success moving forward!
Source: Adobe Hubspot Blueleadz Written By: Rob Steffen
Companies are spending thousands of dollars on marketing and advertising in an effort to bring more awareness to their brand or to their message. Many collect or buy data about their target audience which they should be able to turn into tactics to drive responses, but 80% still report that their traffic generation tactics are only slightly or somewhat effective. (brighttalk 2015)
Targeting Your Customers Interests
Getting the audience to see their message is one challenge, but getting them to act on it is an even greater one. Some companies are asking for feedback or promoting the sale of products but rarely do they speak directly of their clients specific wants and or needs.
We believe that you can use your audience data along with your marketing message to create a powerfully unique message for each recipient. By specifically targeting your customers interests and by delivering it through a printed marketing piece, you can increase your response rate roughly 35% and increase brand retention by as much as 70%.
If more people paid attention to your marketing and remember your brand, how much more revenue could you generate?
If this is an interesting topic for you, lets talk. We may be able to assist with your next marketing campaign.
Click HERE to Contact Us »
In a survey conducted by ResearchNow for Adobe, 76 percent of marketers believe marketing has changed more in the last two years than in the previous 50....
Convenience Is the New Currency
Time and money have always been directly correlated, and for the last several years, consumers have been short on both. Even though we’ve made quite a comeback from the dark days of the economic collapse in late 2008, the Great Recession is still fresh on everyone’s mind.
As a reaction to the substandard economy that wrapped up the first decade of the new millennium, buyers have become obsessed with finding unsurpassed value, with competitive sellers bending over backward to come up with new ways to draw in potential customers. Bottom-line pricing, impeccable service, and personalized experiences have all become crucial to staying competitive in the post-recession marketplace, but another customer demand has risen through the ranks, forcing companies to rethink the way they market their products and services.
That demand can be summed up in a single word: CONVENIENCE
Click HERE to Read the Full Article »
Source: Adobe Digital Marketing
We've compiled 101 Data Protection Tips to help you protect your passwords, financial information, and identity online...
Protecting Your Data in 2017
Keeping your passwords, financial, and other personal information safe and protected from outside intruders has long been a priority of businesses, but it's increasingly critical for consumers and individuals to heed data protection advice and use sound practices to keep your sensitive personal information safe and secure.
There's an abundance of information out there for consumers, families, and individuals on protecting passwords, adequately protecting desktop computers, laptops, and mobile devices from hackers, malware, and other threats, and best practices for using the Internet safely. But there's so much information that it's easy to get confused, particularly if you're not tech-savvy.
We've compiled a list of 101 simple, straightforward best practices and tips for keeping your family's personal information private and protecting your devices from threats.
Click HERE to View Dominion Blue's Document Management Services
Click HERE to View the entire list of 101 Data Protection Tips
Table of Contents
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Securing Your Devices and Networks
Data Protection Tips for Mobile Devices
Protecting Your Identity
Protecting Your Credit
Protecting Your Data on Social Networking
Protecting Your Data Online
Data Protection Following a Data Breach
Source: Digital Gardian | digitalgardian.com
You're wasting money if you don't have a system in place for digitally storing the millions of pages of documents and files your business produces. Here's the lowdown on digital archiving...
Discover M-Disc the 1000 Year Archive
Businesses in Canada and the United States make more than 1 billion photocopies every day and spend more than $25 billion a year to file, store and retrieve their paper documents. In many cases, records and information systems often represent as much as 50 percent of the total cost of doing business.
With the technologies that are available today, however, it doesn't make good business sense to spend large amounts of capital to store and maintain hard copy information. As with all aspects of a company's business, using technologies that will increase productivity and reduce costs is vital to your profitability and success.
Because of the cost-savings available, many companies are changing their attitudes toward data storage and are looking at innovative ways to handle the flow of data. Today, there are several inventive and cost-effective technologies available that can streamline the processing and storing of hard-copy data, which, in turn, will save you money--money that you can use to improve systems and invest in the future of your business. Let's take a look at one of these new systems.
Defining the Solution
Digital archiving, also known as scan-to-file, is one of the best methods around for processing and storing documents. Simply put, digital archiving is the process of converting paper information to a digital representation of the original document. These highly cost-effective conversions allow information to be stored and accessed easily, enabling companies to save time, storage space, money and resources, and increase their productivity and security.
Over time, digitally storing information will reduce the costs of document storage. It will reduce employee workload associated with filing, retrieving and re-filing paper documents. Additionally, it provides easy access to search, retrieve, read, print and e-mail imaged files.
Digital archiving also allows for expedient file transmission over the internet or an internal network. And it creates a flexible, electronic database of corporate documents, such as financial statements, required regulatory documentation, client and patient files, tax and legal documents--all of which can be password-protected to restrict printing and content extraction.
And there's more good news: The process is simple. Information is scanned and stored on one of a number of forms of media, most often on CD-ROMs (M-Disc is the most secure), but also on hard disks or other file formats. You then store the digital data in a secure location, either onsite or away from your business. The digitally stored information can easily be retrieved by simply loading a CD-ROM or disk onto any computer. The document appears just as it did in its original hard copy form and can be saved to the computer, e-mailed or printed.
Digital archiving enables companies to put unlimited amounts of information onto CDs. Imagine taking 35,000 pages of paper and converting it to three CDs.
If you think digital archiving may be right for your company, here are a few questions to ask your visual communications partner:
How is information scanned? Who does it and how long does it take?
Information can either be hand-scanned or fed into a scanner based on the type of data being scanned. Scanning should be done by a team of professionally trained and certified digital specialists, who know how to scan and archive your important documents. Scanning times will vary based on the amount of information being converted. For example, 1,200 pages can take up to four hours to complete.
Is the information secure while it's being scanned for digital archiving?
Most likely it is, but you need to ensure that the vendor has a dedicated and secure digital archiving imaging area designed with your sensitive documents in mind. Additionally, you need to verify that the information won't be shared with any outside source, and your vendor should return all documents upon completion. In some cases, you and the vendor may determine that the scanning should be done at your location.
Where is the information stored? Will the CDs be given to me to store or will I need to have the vendor to store them in a secure location?
Typically, your vendor should store the information on CDs that will be returned to you for storage.
What format will the digitized documents be in?
At a minimum, documents should be converted to PDF because that's the widely accepted format for digitized information. Additionally, PDF formatting is approved and in use by a host of local, state and federal agencies. However, based on your needs, files can also be created in Word and other industry-specific software.
Click HERE to Learn More About Small and Large Format Scanning
Source: Entrepreneur | entrepreneur.com
There are lots of reasons to use direct mail, and you may have heard many of them. So here are three statistics on the value of direct mail marketing that you may not have heard...
Go Direct for Best Results
1. Direct mail has higher value in persuasion.
According to a recent study by Canada Post and True Impact Marketing,[1] direct mail generates a motivation score that is 20% higher than digital media. The study found this score to be even higher when direct mail creative uses print enhancements (for example, special coatings, dimensionality, and print-to-mobile technologies).
2. Direct mail is easier to understand.
A wide variety of studies confirm that information provided in print is easier for people to understand and process than information provided in digital form. In the case of the True Impact study, direct mail was found to require 21% less cognitive effort. That means your message is absorbed more quickly and effectively.
3. Direct mail results in higher brand recall.
Not only is information in direct mail easier to process, but it is more likely to be retained. True Impact found that brand recall was 70% higher among participants who were exposed to direct mail ads rather than to digital ones.
Need more reasons to love direct mail? Just ask! Click Here » to learn more.
[1] “A Bias for Action” (Canada Post and True Impact Marketing, July 2015)
