This year, for the first time, smartphones and tablet shipments exceed those of desktop and notebook shipments (source: Top 10 Mobile Internet Trends)

Today’s customers are free and untethered from traditional media which creates both a challenge and opportunity for marketers. Old consumer behaviors are being modified and new behaviors are developing as a result.

Searching is no longer just for the desktop. Mobile search is growing and experts say that by year end, 30% of a brand’s web traffic will be from mobile sources.

Research also shows consumers are much more apt to act via their mobile device than their desktop. This is obvious with studying the actions consumers make after searching on a mobile device. The numbers are compelling, (see chart below) 52% called the business and 52% made a visit!.

According to Google mobile searches for travel-related terms increased 12 times and searches for specific hotel terms increased 30 times from 2009 to 2010.

A smartphone or mobile device enables customers to communicate directly more easily. Sharing of information or opinions are now in real-time. The opportunity is how to become part of those conversations and how to add value to them.

Anderson Finn believes all roads lead to mobile marketing and the time to get on board is now. In the upcoming months we will share how to add value and engage consumers using mobile as a new marketing channel for business.

Contact us now to find out how you can capitalize on this trend today!

Gearing up for a pilgrimage to the Northeast here is a playlist (of sorts) by State.

FL – Rick Ross, Flo-Rida, Molly Hatchet, and Lynyrd Skynyrd

GA – Outkast, REM, B52′s

SC – The Marshal Trucker Band, Chubby Checker and James Brown

NC – Squirrel Nut Zippers, Corrosion of Conformity & Southern Culture On The Skids, and Superchunk

VA – Patsy Cline, Robert Cray, Pharrell, D’Angelo, GWAR and all things Dave Grohl

DC – Lounge & Hardcore! Thievery Corporation, Fort Knox Five, Fugazi & Minor Threat

MD – Billie Holiday & Tupac

PA – Brotherly Soul! Hall & Oats mashups, The Roots, Pink, Santigold and G. Love

NJ – Just Weird! The Fugees, Misfits, David Cassidy, George Clinton, and Steely Dan

NY – Helmet, Notorious B.I.G., Talking Heads, Mephiskapheles, LCD Soundsystem, Living Colour, and Vampire Weekend

CT – WWE and ESPN compilations

MA – Pixies, Boston mash-ups, The Cars, Aerosmith and Bim Scala Bim

ME – Bluegrass and progressive folk

International roaming is still not cheap. The $25 dollars a month include small print with lots of add-on costs for data over 20mb. Everyone sends big emails theses days so International roaming is not an option. So my strategy is to use WiFi through my hotel for email and internet. I could answer emails, tweet and call the office via Skype without incurring cellular charges.

To block out all cellular activity you need to change a few settings on your device. Here is a great tutorial with 8 easy steps from Barbara Weibel’s blog “Hole In The Donut Cultural Travel“.

Since my team and I use Dropbox and Evernote, I put some project files in Dropbox and all paper work (tickets, itineraries & reservations) in Evernote to sync with my phone.

I also found some great iPhone apps for the trip I wanted to share below:

- Mobile Ticketing & train schedules

- Language Guides – Learn Italian

I guess there are some benefits to being a digital nomad. CIAO!

P.S. I will post pictures to Flickr, don’t worry!

6 things to consider when developing a logo

1. Visibilty/Distinctiveness- will it stand out from competitors and provide quick and memorable identification for your company while at the same time revealing something of the nature of your business?
2. Simplicity/Universal Appeal- Is the concept easily understood to many audiences at a glance?
3. Retention- A sense of surprise and discovery allows a viewer to connect to and remember a logo.
4. Color-Ask yourself these questions to get started thinking about color. Is there a color that culturally represents what it is you do? What colors are your competitors using? Do you want to blend in or stand out to potential clients? How do you want to be perceived; serious, playful, compassionate, hip etc.? Color has context in our society and it has more meaning than it is often given credit for. Choose your logo’s color keeping that in mind.
   (note: Blue is the most globally & culturally inoffensive color and as a result is the most commonly used color in logos. Because of this, blue does not help differentiate one brand from another but is rarely disliked.)
5. Applications- Will it work where it needs to, online, in print, on TV etc.?
6. Attributes- Is your business cutting edge, modern, or conservative?
   Any adjective that you use to describe your core business should apply directly to the look of your logo as well.

We all know everyone has a mobile device. This trusted companion does more than make calls. But who ever though you could buy stuff on your device.

USKA was up in NYC so we sent him over to the mCommerce Summit at the National Museum of the American Indian. The Mobile Commerce Daily organized the event. The “Summit” was comprised of individual presentations/case studies and panel discussions with a few notable brand marketers.

The audience was a good mix of agencies, brand managers and miscellaneous companies. The results that Carrabba’s Italian Grill is seeing from their mobile initiatives is very compelling. It was great to learn about new platforms like Knotice, 5th Finger, and SiteMinis as well as what the big brands are doing in the space like Target and HSN.

Ask yourself some of these questions to help with the process…

Does your name represent you and what you do?
The first thing you want to have is a business name that lets people know what you do.  Something in the name should give them an idea of what type of service or product you offer, (think “Facebook” and “Shopify”). Ironically, some of the most successful new business launched recently ignore this advice completely and invent new words that eventually come to “mean” what they do, think “Google” and “Bing”. Which brings us to the next point.

Is it Memorable? There are so many business names and advertisements that flash in front of people these days. You need to make sure the name you choose is going to stick in a potential customer’s head at a glance. Is your name, short, catchy, unique, unusual? Keeping your name to one or two syllables is helpful as well.

Is it Available? Before you lock into a name you need to make sure it is not already in use. You should check with the Trademark Electronic Search System (TESS), to see if the name is obtainable. Then check the availability of the URL as well at someplace like GoDaddy.com.

Is it Easy to Spell? Words are being spelled in all sorts of clever ways these days – replacing Cs with Ks and Using Fs instead of PHs, etc.  But you have to remember that people today tend to search business names online and are going to use what they think is a traditional spelling.  Enough said!

Can You Expand? While you may now have a small business that is focused on one product or service, you never know what you will become down the road. Make sure your name does not limit you to doing just one thing, unless that is your intention.

When choosing a name there are many factors to consider.  Choose something that you love and that your customer’s will understand and remember. Choose something that you will be able to work with and that will allow you to grow for years to come.  Inspiration can come from many places, our name is a combination of our two sons names and it certainly meet’s all of the above criteria.

By taking the time to choose the right name, you increase your business’ chance of success a hundredfold!

Yes it is March but we are mad busy with projects and then we are off to the SxSW Conference. My apologies for my lack of blog entries.

We like our clients to be really happy and we know from personal experience how little our stationary actually gets used.  So, we smile and say of course, no problem, but, and here is the kicker,  there are a few limitations that you need to be aware of…

Bleeds don’t work:

You can import artwork with bleeds and it does preview in Word’s page layout view and it will work when exported to a PDF.  But and it’s a big but, very few clients (or recipients) will be able to print it! Typical office letter-size printers will force a white non-printable area around all four sides, and that border will be slightly different for every printer out there.

Typefaces Often Have to Change:

If your client wants to send files that can be opened in word, your client and the person he is sending to would have to have the same fonts that you used in the letterhead artwork. So any text that is part of the letterhead artwork should be converted to outlines or rasterized to simplify things. Then when building the template, the body of the letter should be a standard issue PC font so as not to make things even messier. The outcome is that the template will not look as good as the commercially printed letterhead, but you knew that right?

Colors are RGB, period!

Word converts any colors in the graphics you import to RGB, period. CMYK and Pantone are not supported!. If your clients are sticklers about the color used in their logo, make sure they understand this. I like to convert my colors into RGB myself before hand so as to get the best result possible.

If you can live with these limitations, then by all means proceed!

Each designer was hand picked from several hundred prospects based on the following criteria:
• Operationally transparent
• Manage their business relationships with the highest integrity
• More accessible than designers who are physical neighbors
• Offer good service
A special thanks to the peeps @: Sparkah for the publicity!

What a way to round out the end-of-the-year with a little PR for Anderson Finn Design. That’s right we made the cut for “The 100 Top Designers Around The World, All of Whom Are Your Neighbors:” list.

Each designer was hand picked from several hundred prospects based on the following criteria:
• Operationally transparent
• Manage their business relationships with the highest integrity
• More accessible than designers who are physical neighbors
• Offer good service

A special thanks to the peeps @: Sparkah for the publicity!