Getting Started: Electronic Presence

Not everyone is up to speed on their electronic presence. In fact, relatively only a few people or companies are.

So what do you do if you have not yet established your electronic presence (website, social media, electronic collateral)?

I would suggest that you get started by establishing some goals. Many people have social media, websites, and etc., just because everyone else does and they feel its part of some unwritten “rule.” However, without a specific aim and some measurable goals, its all for not.

If you want to have a website, what do you want your users to gain from it?

If you want to use social media, what will its success look like?

What other questions would you add?


2010 Election Web Design

Recently, Mackrill Media had the opportunity to provide a website for Jim Nash’s campaign for Mayor of the Minneapolis suburb of Waconia. A number of different items attributed to our design concept.

1. Jim has invested a number of years in this community through multiple forms of service and involvement ranging from local business to city council. This needed to be displayed in text, picture, and overall theme.

2. Our client is an avid outdoorsman who enjoys taking part in local recreation around the Waconia area who is situated next to a wonderful Minnesota lake.

3. Jim’s family is involved in local events through their school, church, and community so we wanted to reflect that connection to the core of what Waconia is all about.

4. We want to make the presentation clear, informative, unpretentious, and fitting to the local area. Our goal was that through your user experience you will gain a firmer knowledge of who Jim is, what his vision is, and how you can better support his campaign.

In reviewing other sites that have been used for political and specifically mayoral campaigns, many were confusing, cookie cutter, distracting, and/or out of touch with the actual community. We sought to buck that trend with Jim’s site.

Our end product was an outdoors-esque site that features a good number of photos with information that will give you a good understanding of what Jim Nash is all about and how he can make a difference for the community. With a Fall election, we sought to incorporate color schemes that fit with an autumn look as well as the local season of blue to identify with local water bodies. We were also able to integrate Jim’s campaign calendar, Paypal donation funcationality, and his Facebook page to provide a clear springboard for his campaign’s full electronic presence.

Please feel free to stop by and check out the live site at http://www.jimnash2010.com