We recently sent our summer newsletter which covers topics like how to brew the perfect cup of iced coffee, a quick look at a couple recent success stories, an article about how businesses can select the best design partner, and an announcement about a couple additions to our growing team.

Hopefully you received a copy of the newsletter in your inbox, but don’t panic if you missed it, you can still view it online. Please sign up to be added for the next blast due in a few months (we try to keep them to a minimum).

Happy summer!

There’s something happily surreal about sipping on your morning coffee and reading the newspaper when you stumbled across a story about a client’s success story. Very nice indeed.

A few years ago we designed the logo, brand identity system and website for a proposed state of the art sports training, medicine and therapy complex in Burnaby called The MultiSport Centre of Excellence. After years of delays, the construction has finally begun with a ground-breaking ceremony.

Congratulations to all involved in the project!

For the past three and a half months I have been an intern at Industrial Brand, and what a journey it has been. I have learnt a lot about the business of design and every step in between from how to write an RFP response to preparing production ready files to organizing a 16TB server chock-a-block full of archives and files up to 14 years old! The whole design process: beginning to end. Come on, what more could you ask for out of an internship, really! It’s awesome!

For all of you who know the team at Industrial Brand personally, I think we can all safely say they say a lot of random things. During my internship I have published a series of quotes on my blog that the members at Industrial Brand have said at the office. Half of the team did not know they have been secretly recorded for this purpose… SURPRISE! Some of the quotes have been censored out (for good reason) and some have been forgotten through time. I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I enjoyed listening to these five unforgettable people.

Here are a couple examples:

For the rest, check out my Tumblr page: nikolej.tumblr.com/tagged/Fun_Quotes

What I have learnt at Industrial Brand is invaluable, and definitely unforgettable. I have been able to see and contribute to multiple projects, some from the beginning of the design discovery process, and some projects as they are coming to an end and being sent to press. One thing I know now from interning at Industrial Brand, as funny as it may sound, is that there is so much I do not know. School can only teach you so much, and until you are in a working environment and get a real grasp at what you are doing, it’s only then that you get to use those skills they taught you at school and apply them.

There are many things I shall miss at Industrial Brand. I shall miss: Charlie running into furniture when we moved things around the office, the morning banters, the ‘tining’ sound of iPhones going off, the random jokes and off topic conversations that never end, and the random one liners that keep me laughing. Most importantly I shall miss the people at Industrial Brand. This office is made up of five very uniquely different team members who all bring a new perspective and individuality to the team.  How they bring together each members’ individual styles into the projects, while listening and guiding one another through the design process I will never know. All I know is that I will miss it.

I will now pack my backpack with books and a K4 sandwich and go back to school, finishing my 4^th year of BA Graphic Design for Marketing Degree Program at Kwantlen. Thank you Industrial Brand for everything. Your knowledge and wisdom is invaluable. During this summer I have viewed the team as my Yoda, my Jedi Master of communication design.

Good luck. Farwell… and I am just a text message away in case something is lost on the server.

Thank you!  Nikole Japuncic

‘Stationery!’

After a lengthy search resulting in dozens of portfolio reviews and interviews, Industrial Brand is proud to announce the newest member of its growing communication design team.

Joanna Ambrosio was born in Mexico City and raised in Guadalajara and graduated with honours from the ITESO before finishing her Masters of Design in Vancouver at Emily Carr University of Art + Design, where she was chosen as class valedictorian. As Industrial Brand’s newest Communication Designer, Joanna brings over six years of international experience working as a Communication Designer in Canada, Indonesia and Mexico.

Joanna’s passion as a designer is exploring the different possibilities that hybrid design brings to a stream of creative discipline, and how this diversity can be used as a tool to expand the relationship between space, culture and creativity.

A co-founder of the creative collective Gámomo Creative Lab, where she served as Head Designer overseeing the publishing of Mátika Magazine for the past six years, Joanna’ strong background in identity and print design is complimented by her abilities in strategy development, design research, web interface design, and environmental installations.

Joanna loves working with people from around the world and different perspectives on collaborative projects, and is committed to a life-long learning experience both in and outside the job. Like most Mexicans, she’s crazy about good food, so she’ll fit in easily at Industrial Brand.

Welcome Joanna! We’re looking forward to seeing your work and your contributions to this blog!

“We need a Facebook page and a Twitter account, right?” ask many of our clients these days. Much like clients who want news sections or blogs as part of their websites, our answer is always “It really depends.”

If social media channels are where a majority of your audience is spending their time, then yes, you should probably consider making it part of your marketing and communications plan. But if you don’t formulate a strategy and stick to it, you could make a mess and even undermine your brand in the minds of that same audience.

Many of our clients have jumped into the “Twittersphere“, convinced there is benefit in engaging an audience using this new form of communication through micro-blogging. However, some take on this activity without the aid of a formal strategy to guide them and as a result get caught up in tweeting often instead of tweeting well, risking turning off the new audience they’ve attracted.

One of our clients recently engaged the services of two PR & communications professionals and challenged them to build their brand presence online using Twitter. They came out of the gate strong, using some clever posts to get the attention of dozens, then hundreds, of followers. But as they got more comfortable with this new voice, and others in the group joined in the publishing of tweets, they began to post too frequently (and at the wrong times) and the content of their posts were increasingly less relevant to their business and its audience.

Our advice? Focus. It was time to re-examine the strategic plan outlining why they were using social media in the first place. A social media plan is terribly important if you want a tool like Twitter to work for you.

One of the fundamental issues behind a decision to engage in social media with business has to be the goals and objectives. As with any marketing initiative, it is imperative to consider who your target audience is, how they are using social media and most importantly the core message you want to share with your audience. Lastly, some thought toward how success in this new realm will be measured is highly recommended to avoid endlessly investing time with no notion of what positive impact the effort is having

Our client stated that they were expanding their tweets beyond their niche focus to integrate others’ posts (retweets) and local events to establish community relations. This might be a smart strategy if used wisely, but could undermine the whole effort if it resulted in a drift away from the core message and numerous tweets which ultimately serve to annoy their audience.

As much as social media can be a fabulous way to create large ‘social’ networks, when used in the service of business, it works best when focused on expressing or reinforcing that ONE THING that a business does best.

For example, a restaurant may choose to use Twitter to foster a genuine relationship with an online community–especially if there is something unique about the restaurant that people may not know about from existing channels. This audience might be grateful to read posts about location openings, new dishes, special offers, contents, events, even customer polls, but that same audience might not appreciate being inundated by frequent, irrelevant or even confusing tweets.

Many social media experts will argue that using Twitter is about creating a conversation, which we agree with, and having a human tone and friendly interactions can be a good way to engage a community in a dialogue, but one should remember that this is still a business/consumer relationship. A corporate Twitter account isn’t probably the best place for chit chat with strangers, clogging others’ Twitter stream.

It’s a good idea to remember that you’re not buddies, and keep casual conversations to a minimum—just enough ton invite or welcome new members to your tribe. If tweets are meaningless gibberish without clicking on “In Reply To…”, or merely retweets of some local Twitterstar with little relevance to your core message, then you are risking annoying your audience and might suffer the dreaded “unfollow”.

Our experience has shown that personalized, original content wins over repurposed content every time, so when tempted to reply, quote or retweet anything, our advice is to pause to recall your strategy, asking yourself “Is this the right tone or relate to our core message?” or “Will our audience understand or even care about this?”

Another risk when tweeting for business is too frequent of posts, which is a common reason for users to unfollow an account. If you have a lot to say, stop to ask yourself “Have I tweeted too much today?” or “Should I schedule this for later?” knowing that there are spikes in Twitter activity in late morning with the peak actually between 3–4pm. Avoid posting a flurry of tweets in a row if you can help it.

Using the restaurant example, perhaps tweets about offers or specials could be scheduled for late afternoon or early evening, resulting in the highest revenue return as people consider where to dine that night.

One company who we think does a tremendous job of using social media to build their business is Rouxbe.com, a Vancouver-based online cooking school and recipe website. They know exactly who their audience is and what they are interested in, and they never stray from their core message.

They tweet original and relevant content just frequently enough to stay top of mind and at strategic times during the day. They also use a variety of online media tools such as Netvibes to track mentions of key words and phrases that appear in the Twittersphere so they can respond to them strategically. They’re cunning in fact.

When someone posts a tweet that says something like “I wish I new how to cook”, they engage them by following them, followed up with a short greeting along with appropriate links to pages on their online cooking school. If someone posts something specific, like “I’d love to learn how to make pad thai,” they respond with a direct link to that recipe with video instructions.

“We hope to do more on the social media side, and for me it’s all about providing a service to others—even if this just means reading, comment or contributing to others.” says Rouxbe founder Joe Girad. “What we try NOT to focus on is “pitching” Rouxbe too often.” This strategy is results in a quick, inoffensive and effective way of engaging people, and their social media efforts have not only helped create a large community, but more importantly a highly focused one that actually spends money on the  company’s website!

Going back to the restaurant example, perhaps the chef decides to do create a special dish? This is a terrific example of what to feature on their Twitter channel! Heck, they could even link to info on the qualities and characteristics of the ingredients and done well, this will compel people to engage in conversation, others to come to the restaurant to try it out.

Of course a restaurant doesn’t want to sound desperate, but some have even started using Twitter to offer special discounts to users and post information on waiting time for tables. Useful and relevant to that audience, making them feel like they have a genuine relationship with the business—like they are part of their tribe.

There are a couple key things to keep in mind when using Twitter. Twitter is just a tool—in fact, it’s a very easy thing to learn how to use—but it takes training and practice to become an effective Twitter user. Also, there is a huge difference between people AT a company and the way they tweet versus the way the company itself tweets to its audience. Forget that and things can backfire quickly.

To summarize, using Twitter can be a powerful business tool used to attract a broader audience when used cleverly as part of a social media strategy, but it can also be a risky proposition if not done well.  When focused and on message, Twitter can help build a business and increase the value of its brand, but used haphazardly and in an unfocused manner, a business runs the risk of annoying and even alienating consumers, causing potentially irreparable damage to the relationship. The key to success is a well-considered strategy resulting in a set of rules understood by all participating in social media outreach.

Now consider all the other social media tools you can use, such as Blogs (yours and others), Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, Vimeo, Flickr, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, Digg, Technorati, Tumblr, Foursquare, Gowalla…the list goes on. The  reality is that unless you employ a dedicated, full-time  marketing person to create and maintain a comprehensive program, you’ll not likely want (or need) to engage in all of these channels—but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t go secure accounts in all of them before someone else does!

There’s a new book that’s been published by maomao publications called Blogs, Mad about Design, featuring profiles and screenshots from more than 250 blogs about design-related topics—including this blog. Sort of a compendium of sorts. But is it really?

The irony about producing anything about the web in print is that as soon as you’ve published it, it’s out of date. Case in point? We re-branded the company and re-launched the blog before the book ever made it to print. Hence, the Industrial Brand double page spread showcases our old design, back when it was called We’re Not Wired Right. And there are numerous other blogs and websites that have since changed or even been shut down since this material for this book was assembled.

And so it goes with books about Web—as soon as something has hit, it’s almost too late to publish anything that will have any lasting use more that a short period of time.

One great thing about what we do as brand and interactive designers is the variety of clients and projects we get to work on, each very different needs, goals, and audiences. One day it’s a brand and collateral aimed at investors or a website for a Japanese bistro, the next it’s a complicated website for a large engineering firm. Enter Chatwin Engineering.

With over 25 years as a leading engineering and planning firm in BC, Chatwin hired Industrial Brand to completely revamp its online presence to more accurately reflect who they are as a company. Their old website had become dated, cluttered, and ineffective. The outdated technology was cumbersome and the content wan’t easily updatable. It was time for a fresh start.

After engaging our discovery process, which looks past assumptions and digs deeper into the real situation and goals, we determined that they required a site they could easily manage themselves for use not only as a marketing tool, but for recruitment and communications too. So we developed a project plan that included the creation of a CMS-driven site (in this case Drupal) with an aesthetic emphasis on simplicity, intuitive information access, and messaging that better told the story of the Chatwin brand to their unique audience.

Considering their audiences’ needs and what it is that a multi-disciplinary engineering and planning firm does, it was also important to use the site to emphasize their work. We created a modern, clean portfolio system separated by their three main areas of expertise—civil, building, and environmental—with a gallery of rotating images and case studies of their highlighted projects.

Engineers do love to produce lots of words and data, so by our launch date, the site was populated with copious amounts of information and contiues to grow. Thankfully our well-considered information architecture and site structure, which included a powerful serach tool, multi-functional footer and intuitive navigation system, a user can access any of the content with two mouse clicks.

Our entire team deserves congratulations, Steve Mynett in particular, who worked very hard with our developers on this project to see it through to a successful launch. Now that it’s complete, the Chatwin Engineering website appears simple to me, betraying all the work that went into it’s design. I think most websites that use smart interaction design thinking to organize and present complicated concepts and content fall into this category. Engineers can be a picky bunch, but in this case were terrific to collaborate with and work for, and they are thrilled with the new online presence and interactive tools we created for them.

Check out the new Chatwin Engineering website and tell us what you think!

After an absence in last year’s competition, Industrial Brand teamed with Best Buy Canada Ltd. for Canstruction 09. After months of designing, planning and visiting to grocery stores, the design was finally executed over the two day build on April 25th and 26th. Based on this year’s theme: “From Caveman to Spaceman: Throughout History”, we decided to build a honeybee because of it’s importance to man and role in food chain. Integral to the world’s food production through pollination, honeybees have made their way into the news due to their recent decline in population. With this in mind we concluded that the honeybee best represented the event’s theme while communicating the message of hunger as a global problem.

After deciding on the bee, we drew up concepts for the structure keeping in major aspects of the figure right down to details such as the direction of the antennae. Working closely with David, our team architect, we developed a CAD rendering that would assist is in visualizing the bee both in preparation and during the weekend competition. Throughout the research and development process, the Best Buy and Industrial Brand employees scoured local grocery stores for in search of the perfect can for the bee’s various parts. What sounded like a simple process evolved into a detailed study in packaging and in the process we all have become experts on canned food.

On day one of the build, started work early to prepare the templates and collect the various sundries. Five hours, 30+ cardboard templates and 500 construction paper circles later, our team made their way down to the event the begin the build. The team arrived at 2:30 to the new Vancouver Convention Centre, where everyone was briefed on the details of the build and rules of the Canstruction. A collective sense of urgency soon over came all the participants as the build commenced at 3pm. We broke up into teams, working on different parts of the bee and the flower. It was an exciting time worked to build a solid foundation while all the teams work just as methodically, layering cans on to create their structures. At then end of day one the bee’s body and petals were complete. For the most part we were on time however the wings, and petals were proving to more time intensive than we expected.

Despite the aches and early start time, day two saw members from Industrial Brand and Best Buy cooperate like we had known each other for years to complete the build with 30 minutes to spare. With three crews working like clockwork, dedicated to completing the wings and leaves, a team of four worked on the body continuing their mastery of no-name tuna and bamboo shoots. By the end of the day everyone was exhausted and physically drained but buoyed by the feeling of accomplishment and a job well done. The bee was done, built out of tuna, bamboo shoots and coffee, using a combined total of 9,500 containers of food.

In a matter of 24 hours, 28 separate teams transformed palettes of canned food into spaceships, roller coasters and lovable cartoon characters. Part of the magic of this weekend was observing the combined efforts of the participants who were all creating these amazing in the name of battling hunger in the community. It was a big moment walking into the new Convention Center at the end of the competition and walking around the exhibition floor marveling at all the creativity and work put into each entry.

Canstruction runs from April 26 to May 3 at the new Convention Centre. Admission is by donation and proceeds go to support the Vancouver Food Bank. Hope to ‘bee’ seeing you there. Stay tuned to the Industrial Brand for the Canstruction 09 micro-site casestudy and build time lapse by our friend Todd Smith.

We would like to recognize the work that Janice Podmore, the Canstruction organizing committee and the Vancouver Food Bank for putting on this great event. A special thanks to Shafiq, Mike and the team from Best Buy Canada Ltd. for their gusto, elbow grease and unwavering support. Thanks to David, our team architect, who committed his evenings to working with us to develop a solid CAD model from which to work from. If not for his late hours working working with CAD, this would have been a very difficult build. Thanks also to Steph, Todd and Janeen who came early and stayed late to lend their support throughout the weekend. And finally thanks to the team at Industrial Brand who helped make my first Canstruction, a memorable and rewarding experience.

Photos from the build can be see in this Flickr group. Check out a time lapse of the build on YouTube here.

Tourism BC, perhaps best known for creating the memorable brand campaign Super, Natural British Columbia, recently concluded its search for creative partners and Industrial Brand was honoured to be selected among the preferred suppliers of marketing and design services over the next few years.

Tourism BC has created initiatives such as the HelloBC.com official tourism site as part of its mandate to promote development and growth in the tourism industry, increasing revenues, employment, and economic benefits throughout BC. And with the 2010 Olympics fast approaching, we’re excited at the chance to work on some of the initiatives that will promote the province we’re all so proud to live in.