Journal

Attitude Redesign the Hallam Internet website

Attitude Design — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 09:38:30 +0000

Once again Attitude Design have worked with Hallam Internet to redesign the Hallam website, www.hallaminternet.com. Hallam are a fantastic team of search engine optimisation experts offering an unparalleled SEO service under the leadership of the renowned internet marketing speaker Susan Hallam. Through the websites various stages, the Attitude team have consistently developed the design and structure to keep it fresh and professional, making it easier to navigate and more powerful to the user. This marks a new development of the Hallam brand identity by presenting the quality services of Hallam Internet in a powerful and modern website.

Old Design

Compare with the old design below, the new design flows smoothly and notice how the subtle use of shadows and forms set the framework, bringing a clean cut finish without losing structure or looking too rigid. The Hallam purple is set off by the use of the pale grey that breaks up the page. The navigation is simplified and careful typography maximises the contrast and clarity of the key messages. Adopting more modern elements make the pages easier on the eye and result in a lighter, more spacious and well structured website.

Call To Action

Throughout the pages are Call To Action sections, which are fully customizable, allowing the attention of site visitors to be guided towards new or important content whilst also aiding the continuity of the design.

Home Page Ticker

The home page now features a fully customisable ticker, which displays key messages to help direct visitors to useful pages. Using large crisp images and snappy messages, attention is kept and important shortcuts transfer visitors to the pages they need most.

Authors

Each Hallam Internet author has a profile page complete with a customisable contact form that can be modified to fit each team member. The website is also integrated with Google+, allowing articles to be matched to their authors on a Google search. The website is also fully linked to social media and it is easy to follow individual team members, keep up to date and share pages. This allows clients to view the latest activity of Hallam on the social sites they visit daily.

Optimised for iphone/ipad using the 1140 grid system

The website is built using the 1140px grid system, making it work fluidly accross different screens, adapting itself for ipad and iphone so that all content can be viewed wherever you are, quickly and clearly! We feel it is important to make the website fully accessible as the number of ipad/iphone visitors rise.

Videos

An informative video interview with Director Susan Hallam adds personality to the message, whilst testimonials from clients also bring a personal touch to the website, in addition to confirming that the company is trustworthy. Videos are engaging and are great for efficiently communicating more information in less time it takes to read. Everyone loves videos! View them here »

WordPress

Finally, the Hallam website content is managed using WordPress. WordPress is easy to use and the entire website is customisable, allowing Hallam to update the site regularly and efficiently to focus on relevant news and services, so that the website works like a flexible tool, growing and changing to match the company and its communication needs.

Work with Attitude

If you need your website redesigning and want some Attitude – why not contact us. As we hope you’ll agree, the project above shows we offer the perfect union between form and function so be sure to drop us a line if you need a website design (rhyme not intended but it does have a nice ring to it!)…

10 Free Fonts We Use and Love 2

Attitude Design — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 16:12:19 +0000

Recommended Free Fonts

Once again here at Attitude we would like to share with you 1o of our favourite fonts that we have used recently, and they are all free to download and use! Follow the links to give the brilliant creators exposure they deserve! Get creative and download them all!

Museo

Download Here

Created by: exljbris

Weston

Download Here

Created by: Pavel Pavlov

ChunkFive Roman

Download Here

Created by: The League of Moveable Type

Quicksand

Download Here

Created by: Andrew Paglinawan

BorisBlackBloxx

Download Here

Created by: Manfred Klein

Code

Download Here

Created by: Font Fabric

Sansation

Download Here

Created by: Bernd Montag

Miama

Download Here

Created by: Fuex

London Between

Download Here

Created by: Francois Bruel

Lane

Download Here

Created by: GemFonts Graham Meade

So there you have it! 10 amazing fonts for you to enjoy, thanks to the hard work of the credited typographers! Have fun!

2012. New Year. New You.

Attitude Design — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 16:15:41 +0000

Happy New Year!

2012 has arrived and Attitude are here for you as always, providing fresh new design for all your needs. Do you see a new you in the new year? Here at Attitude we thrive on creating imaginative design solutions tailored to fit the needs of your business. Have a look at our portfolio or download our ‘Real Results’ showcase to find out what we can do for you.

App Design

As Smart Phones take the world by storm, apps are being downloaded like “hot-cakes”. An informative, easy to use app is a powerful tool to generate exposure and income for your business. Whatever you want your app to do, we can design and create it for you. It will be app-solutley amazing (sorry couldn’t help ourselves there!).

Print Design

The printed word is not dead! The tactile and enduring qualities of a printed product surpasses digital visuals and is a more personal media to communicate. Come to Attitude for your print design - whatever your needs, we will produce graphic design that will inspire and help you attract more business. Well designed printed matter can inform your customers about you, and position your business in a positive light to help you increase sales.

Web Design

Never underestimate the importance of the perfectly designed website. With visitors usually making a judgment within the first few seconds of seeing your site, it is imperative that it has high visual impact and strategic layout to create an effective online presence for your business. Maybe your website is growing tired and holding you back or perhaps you are a new company looking to create impact. Whatever you need, Attitude will work with you to create fresh, strategic design to suit you.

Retainers

Our retainer packages are an ideal way for us to offer continual support. We passionately believe in building long term relationships with our clients, offering them good quality design on an ongoing basis. If you are regularly in need of quality design, why not stay with us for continual support from a company you can rely on. It is easier, cheaper and Attitude can grow to really understand your needs and development to provide a consistent high quality service.

Happy Holidays

Attitude Design — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 11:33:01 +0000

Wow – another year has gone by! We couldn’t let it go without saying a huge thank you to all our clients for their business this year – it’s been great to work (and be working) with you.

Closing times

We’re shutting up shop on – Friday 23rd of December. Don’t worry though, we’ll be back open for business bright eyed and bushy tailed on Tuesday 3rd January 2012 to help with all your design requirements.

A quick look back at 2011

2011 has been another invigorating year for us! We’ve increased our office space and taken on three new members of the Attitude team. We redesigned our website and updated our brand identity. We’ve been involved in some really exciting projects both across print and web. Our clients can now be found globally all over the world. We worked on e-commerce and CMS website projects that were larger than ever before, we launched a couple of iPhone apps, as well as working on integrated marketing strategies across social media, email marketing, photography, video, mobile, web and print. Some of these projects were featured in online magazines such as PixelArts and published by publishers like Liaoning Publishing and Bright Books. A few of our blog posts were also published by respected design blogs like Smashing Magazine and Tripwire Magazine – so a busy year indeed! We’re exhausted!

Roll on 2012

A new year a new you! If you do have any projects that you’d like to book in for the new year, please feel free to contact us for a chat – although hurry up as we are already looking extremely busy in January!

FREE Illustrator Blend Tool Tutorial

Attitude Design — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 17:06:49 +0000

Welcome to this free Blend Tool tutorial for Adobe Illustrator.

The blend tool is a fantastic tool which is incredibly simple to use but with endless creative possibilities! In a nutshell, the blend tool allows you to blend any shape into another, creating 3D effects and patterns. This tutorial will show you the basic functions of the Blend Tool (W) for you to take away and get creative!

Step One

We have started with a new document and made a locked (cmd + 2) grey background box. Using the Pen Tool (P) we draw two wavy, overlapping lines and give each a different colour. If you like, you can give them different stroke weights and styles and bring your preferred line to the front (shift + cmd + ]).

Step Two

Making sure the two lines are unselected, select the Blend Tool (W) from the tools panel. Then click on the first line and then the second. They will then blend and look something like this:

Step Three

Now you can change the blend by going to Object » Blend » Blend Options…

Here you can select either Specified Steps which allows you to enter the number of times the shape is repeated in the blend of Specified Distance which allows you to enter the desired space between each repetition. In this example we have specified 20 repetitions to create this pattern. Notice how the two colours have blended smoothly. You can now use your Selection Tool (A) to select anchor points and edit the form of the two primary lines.

Other Techniques

Ribbon Effect

The above blend is between two different shapes, but you can blend two of the same shapes to create a ribbon-like effect. Below we used the Pen Tool (P) to create a line, and then duplicated it (shift + alt + drag) then repeated (cmd + D). This allows us to select three colours to blend together. We then can use the Selection Tool (A) to select grouped anchor points to change the ribbon shaped blend.

Curved Blend

Using the Selection Tool (A) and the Pen Tool (P) (Add/Delete/Convert Anchor Tool), you can bend the form of the blend direction. Below we made a blend of a square and a star. We then could use the above tools to ‘bend the blend’:

Align to Path or Page

Finally, when blending shapes, you can choose whether to align to path or align to page. This can be selected in Blend Options:

So there you have it, the basics of the Blend Tool covered! Play around and see what 3D effects you can make. How about blending outlined text to create jazzy, retro typography or adding an outer glow effect to create dazzling neon light designs.

Attitude Design produce Actons Videos

Attitude Design — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 11:40:13 +0000

Lights, Camera, Action!

We’re pleased to announce that we have recently filmed, edited and produced 6 videos for the Actons Solicitors Personally Injury Department. The videos fit in with a larger pay per click and brand strategy and users will be encouraged to view the videos after coming to the Actons site via a Google adword advert campaign.

The power of video

Videos like these are a perfect example of how powerful video on the web is. The videos are directly targeted at the audience and are personal. Real solicitors are featured in them speaking clearly and enthusiastically about a specific service which will help the user with their problem. This is far better than a user facing a wall of text.

Less is more

“The design of these videos is all about simplicity”, Attitude
Design’s Creative Directer Matt Davies says. “There is no clutter, no distraction – just the simplicity of a solicitor explaining a quality service as if you were meeting them face to face. They feel spacious and professional and have been designed to not only educate but give authority to our client. The great thing about the web now is that we can now stream these videos to our audiences. Whereas historically they would have to read about these services online they can now have a real person explain them to them – this is the future of the web…”

Get your video today!

Let us know if you need any videos producing to fit in with any campaigns you might be planning. The Attitude Team would love to help…

Childrens Claims Actons Solicitors

Beauty Salon and Spa Injuries Actons Solicitors

Supermarket Shop Accidents Actons Solicitors

Slips Trips and Falls in a Public Place Actons Solicitors

No Win No Fee Actons Solicitors

Hair Disasters Actons Solicitors

Dog Bites and Attacks Actons Solicitors

5 Ways to Convert Your Site Visitors

Attitude Design — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 14:41:45 +0000

Appearing high in search engines like Google is becoming increasingly important for businesses as the online market grows. However, getting thousands of unique visitors a month is just half the story. Once the visitors are on your site, you need to ‘convert’ them – whether this means purchasing a product, contacting you for a quote, or signing up to receive your newsletter.

It’s important to have a clear goal of what you would like a visitor to do once they reach your site. It’s no good getting thousands of visitors if none of them stay on your site very long. Here we look at 4 simple ways that will help achieve your aims.

1. Calls to action

It’s amazing how many sites lack such a simple thing as this. A call to action is basically any text/information which explains to the visitor what we want them to do. They’ve read about your company – now what? “Call us now”, “click here for a free quote” or “buy our special offer” are all examples of calls to action. The more you have on your site and the more prominently they are positined, the more chance you have of a converstion.

See an example below of a website we have designed – note how clear and obvious the calls to actions are within the design.

2. Trust points

Selling from a website has a disadvantage from, say, a high street shop, in that your potential customer’s can’t see any ‘real’ people, they can’t touch the product they want to purchase and it may therefore be harder for them to make a judgment as to whether your company is trustworthy. Your website therefore has to have an abundance of ‘trust points’. These are visual factors that help to reinforce your business as honest, successful and professional.

Trust points can be a variety of things – we will look at 2 examples here:

Testimonials

Ask previous customers/clients to provide a comment that you can place onto your website. This provides feedback from ‘real people’ and, providing it is positive (!), helps to establish your company as one with high standards.

Accreditation Logos

Has your company been awarded with an industry relevant award or do you comply with certain industry standards? If so, why not place proof of this onto your website. Again, it will help to reinforce the message to users that your company can be trusted.

An example of trust points on a website:

3. Hard facts

Most people can see through fancy sales jargon – but what a lot of customers look for is some cold, hard facts. Why not carry out a bit of research – find out if your services increased a client’s sales by xx percent, or whether your product has been sold in xx countries. Facts like these can really help make more sales as people can place a real value on your services/products. These facts need to be displayed in a prominent place on your website. See below for an example of where we have done this for one of our clients.

4. Messaging

One of the most frustrating things to a site visitor is that after trawling through reams of text on your website, they’re still not really sure what your company does. Messaging is key – you only have a few seconds to comunicate with the visitor what your company does.

You should have a clear idea of who your target audiences are and the priority you would like to give to each target audience. The design of the site and the messaging should then be implemented accordingly.

See an example of one of our sites below – it is immediately clear what this company does.

5. Video

Videos can bring a personal touch to your website and can communicate more information clearly in less time than it takes to read. Users are easily be put off by a lot of cold text, most people prefer to hear and see information in an expressive way than to read information on a page. A video brings the message to them in an exciting and more memorable way.

See an example of one of our sites below – a selection of video interviews attracts attention and bridges the gap between the you and the user, making the user feel welcome and the website more trustworthy.

In conclusion, it’s not sufficient to have a great design – the design has to have purpose and thought behind it. We hope this article has been useful. Do you think your website needs some marketing TLC? Contact us here for a free quote.

Another 50 Inspirational Logo Designs

Attitude Design — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 09:46:16 +0000

We’re always looking for inspiration at Attitude Design and thought another selection of x50 great logos would whet your creative appetite! The ones we’ve chosen below show a variety of design techniques and strategies – including negative space and great typography. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: We are not attempting to take any credit for the above work – we have had nothing to do with any of them. If you have any questions regarding this please contact us.

Time Machine / Film Posters from the 1930′s

Attitude Design — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 14:51:37 +0000

Once again the Attitude Time Machine has strolled down memory lane to discover gems from the past. Here we have explored the spectacularly illustrated film posters produced during the classic years of the 1930‘s. Beginning with the after effects of the wall street crash (1929) and ending in Word War II (1939), the 1930’s was the decade that introduced us to colour films for the first time and contributed greatly to the Golden era of film making.

We hope the sparkling drama, glamour and impact of these posters inspire you all as much as it has the Attitude team.

Disclaimer: We are not attempting to take any credit for the above work – we have had nothing to do with any of the designs shown. If you have any questions regarding this please contact us.

Free download – Attitude performs

Attitude Design — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 12:37:11 +0000

We don’t normally blow our own trumpet but today we are going to. Toot toot.

We’re really proud to announce a new PDF download of star client performances. These are not theatrical exaggerations but real results that we have had with our wonderful clients. Presented in a creative and engaging way we hope they excite and engage.

Download now »

Read online »

View online with issuu

What now?

Perform with Attitude – get in touch today!

Appsolutely Amazing!

Attitude Design — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 14:13:36 +0000

The Attitude Design team are excited to announce the recent launch of another iPhone App we have designed and developed.

We were approached by Debtology a debt advice company who wanted to release a unique App. The purpose of the App was to provide people in debt with a convenient source of advice and assistance.

Users sign up for an account on the App and then work through a series of personal and financial questions. The information provided is then processed by the App to provide a set of suggested routes forward and a list of appropriate organisations who can help further. Users can “save” information they have inputted – meaning that they don’t have to complete all the questions in one go and can come back to the App at a time convenient for them. The App gives users a personal, professional debt advice service which is both private and accessible.

The nature of the App means that there are lots of questions, information and figures for a user to look at and we were therefore keen to ensure that the user interface was as simple and user friendly as possible. Having already designed the Debtology brand identity and website, we kept the App design consistent with the existing brand and built further upon it. We introduced a series of icons to illustrate different areas of the App and also created a smaller version of the brand identity to serve as the App logo. Some of our designs for the App can be seen below:

The development aspect of the App was quite complex and involved creating a system which took certain information provided by the user to produce certain outcomes.

The App is now available for download on Apple. For more information about the App see debtology.org.uk

Would your company benefit from an App? Contact us today for a quotation and see how we can develop your business further…

Hicks Clicks – The Secret of top E-Commerce websites

Attitude Design — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 13:52:09 +0000

Recognise this? It’s Hick’s Law, which describes the time it takes for a person to make a decision as a result of the possible choices he or she has. This idea is well worth reading up on especially if you have an e-commerce website.

What’s that got to do with e-commerce sites? Everything! The more choices you offer a user the more difficult it becomes for them to make a decision. Here are some top tips to use Hick’s law in your e-commerce website design:

Two Click rule

The more clicks a potential customer has to make before they start buying from your site, the more choices they have, the less likely they are to buy. So keep it simple and easy. No more than 2 clicks before they can start buying
Home Page offer. Get them shopping on the first page of your site to maximise purchases. Maybe feature a special offer or today’s favourite product or this month’s new product range.

Navigation.

Keep it simple and where possible use a good drop down navigation which allows customers to browse categories of products and get to where they need to be quickly.

Search box

If a customer knows what they want they don’t want to trail through loads of options. Make sure your search box is clearly labelled and easy to notice. Also ensure it works well pulling up relevant results.

Looking for inspiration? Here’s some really good e-commerce sites to get inspiration from:

So make sure you are making things as simple as possible for your users and ensure they get to the product they need by following our simple tips…

Logo a go-go

Attitude Design — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 14:48:21 +0000

Here’s an acronym to help you remember the important features of a logo. How well does yours do?

LOGIC. A logo must have reasoning and purpose to work. The font, the image, the letters, the colours, the impact must all have rationale. A logo without logic is a sign without meaning, an empty symbol that shouts amateur and unprofessional.

ORIGINALITY. A logo must enable your business to stand out and be noticed against the competitors in your market. It must be unique to you, personalised and individual. It must work in all its environs, from the handed out business card through to the website, your visible presence in the global market.

GREATNESS. A logo must be strong, definite, have impact and tap into the viewers’ subconscious so that it is memorable and easy to recall. Just one look tells us who and what you are. It’s your identity, persona out in the big, wide world.

OUTLOOK. A logo or brand identity is what defines you. Strong colours, shapes and design reflect power and professionalism. Clear and simple design suggests a business that is well organised with straightforward procedures. Modern design suggests a company that is up to date and contemporary.

To see some great logos, visit our logo portfolio

Attitude Design Showcased

Attitude Design — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 10:51:29 +0000

A quick post to blow the Attitude Design trumpet. It’s always nice to have our work recognised and we’re pleased to say that our new site design has been making ripples in the graphic design community for it’s uniqueness and style. Toot toot!

The new design has been featured by some of the leading design showcases and we are sure more will follow (watch this space). Below are the ones we know about (If we’ve missed any feel free to add a link in the comments below!):
&nbsp
&nbsp

WeLoveWP

CSS Mania

Folio Focus

Design Snack

CSS Yorkshire

Screenalicious

UPDATE – Attitude Design’s website becomes site of the day on eyesonpixel.com!

We were happily surprised to be featured on the prestigious eyesonpixel.com site as the “site of the day” for 12 September 2011

Seven top tips to improve your website navigation

Attitude Design — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 13:30:27 +0000

Hello fellow internet traveler. In years gone by, in the real world, travellers used to use maps, compasses and even the stars in order to navigate from one place to the other. Today, in cyberspace, we use menu-bars.

If you are about to set up a new website, or if you currently own one, you’ll want people to easily be able to browse around the valuable content you have spent hours creating. Below the Attitude Design team, have put their heads together to give you our top seven tips for creating an easy to use navigation menu to help your users get from A to B. Enjoy!

1. Keep it consistent

One of the most important things is not to move your navigation menu bar around. Imagine you are a ships captain being guided to your location using the northern star. Then upon reaching that destination that star moves position in the sky making it impossible for you to easily find your way back. Take that offline example into the online world and you’ll see our point!

Keep a simple “universal” navigation consistently available to the user at all times. Usually the best navigations have very simple grand parent pages in them. These form the top level universal navigation. When a user goes into, or rolls over, these grand parent items then parent pages and child pages will be shown – but the top navigation will always be the same and appear in the same place.

2. Use text links not images

Icons are a very good accompaniment to any navigation system as they help to further explain to the user what each area of the site does. Note we said accompaniment – NOT icons on their own. Why do we say this? Because icons are representative symbols and what might represent one thing to one person might not mean the same thing to another person. Often icons do not work well on their own – they need accompanying text. So if you must use images make them sit alongside your menu links and ensure they are not the menu links themselves.

3. Keep your page menu titles short

Nobody wants to read a long navigational name. Ensure each navigation item only uses one or two words to describe what is within it otherwise users will not bother glancing through them all.

4. Ensure titles are easy to understand

There is nothing worse than standing at a cross roads not knowing quite what road you need to go down and looking at a sign post which does not label what is at the end of each road. You wouldn’t go down each road to find out what’s down there. Likewise with website navigation why would you expect a user to go to a poorly labelled link?

People don’t have time to find out what your amazingly branded “techscope”, “bytes” or “snazz” links do. So – keep it simple – the most common top tier navigational items are: Home, Products, Services, About and Contact. Each item is very descriptive and is one word. Easy Peasy.

5. Only have up to 8 items

When you present too many options to a user they find it hard to make a decision. This is called “Hicks law” (see this wikipedia article for more information). Therefore when it comes to site navigation it’s important to give the user few (but clear) options to get them to make a decision as to what information they want. This helps them filter down to what they want rather than pushing everything at them. This normally allows sites to run the navigation bar horizontally under the header which is far better – as this follows the natural way people read.

6. List items by order of importance

You might not get this one right first time around because without testing it, it is sometimes difficult to know which pages of the site will be most important to users before they do what we want them to do. For example, if we want them to purchase a service, they might want to see examples of that service before they will buy. Therefore they will need to see “case studies” as a priority. But what if our users need to understand what each service is and does before they can understand the case studies? If they do, then a “services” section might be more of a priority to hook people in before we show them the case studies.

By asking yourself the following questions you can help to sort through your navigational items and order them in a user friendly way. If you mark each item out of 10 (10 being “ABSOLUTELY” and 1 being “NOPE”) then the highest scoring items should be placed at the front.

Does the user need to see this item in order to fulfil our site’s objectives?
Will this page help the user to make a decision?
Does this section of the site give our website credibility?
Does this page educate the user to specifically understand what is on offer?

7. Always place ‘Home’ at the front and ‘Contact’ at the end

For most websites it is very important to have a prominent “contact” item in the menu. For most businesses getting interested users to contact them is the number 1 objective of their website. Only when a brand is well known and a site is getting too many contacts to manage would the “contact us” page be dropped in favour of filtering users through to a “support / customer services” area of the website. It is usual practice to put the contact us page at the end of a navigational list and so if a user expects it to be sat there at the end – why remove it?

A link to the home page should also be prominent because this marks the beginning of a normal user journey and helps the user to feel “safe” – that they can always get back to the home page of the site. Home page links are usually placed at the start of menu lists or alternatively the site’s logo will normally link to the home page.

Because both of these things are done by the majority of sites, users have become used to navigating in this way. If people are used to something then it is easy for them and on the internet making things easy for a user is always beneficial!

Conclusion

So – we hope the above tips might help you to make your website a place where sightseers find it easy to get from A to B. Feel free to leave a comment below!

If you need a hand with your next website design why not drop us a line.