Case Studies
Case Studies | Marketing or Advertising ‘Design’ | More Than Art?
SEO Client Website Gets 41% More Unique Visitors Per Year!
Our work for this home inspection client included getting them found in nearby cities instead of just their home city. That’s a pretty good trick since Google doesn’t like to rank local companies outside their home city. A picture may be worth a thousand words, but the numbers could be worth thousands of dollars!
Before SEO Work:
After SEO Work
Solar Power Engineer Providing Electricity to Africa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
A young lady almost died in an African hospital due to lack of electricity and no gasoline for the generator. She devoted her life to bringing electricity to her people as a result.
A logo was designed, a website was created, press releases are written, linkedin, facebook, and twitter accounts were created and content pushed to all channels regularly to increase likes, follows, and reach for the message of services offered and accomplishments achieved.
Previous branding was not conducive to the message of services provided but the new logo does the job!
A WordPress website was created, a theme was heavily customized, graphics were sourced or created, social media likes and sharing was implemented.
This client is also working on green and renewable energy, focusing on battery management for longer more reliable and efficient service to store collected solar energy and release it on demand to power automobiles or satellites.
The site can be seen at www.SminPowerGroup.com.
Digital Photography School Website With Community & Freemium Subscription Model
A world traveled professional photographer had people asking him to teach them digital photography so he developed video lessons and led classes. But he wanted to scale and provide the classes online in a subscription model. A previous developer had created the site using a custom built WordPress theme, Educational Class Delivery Plugins, and a WooCommerce ecommerce engine. The previous developer had edited the core code of WordPress and the plugins to make the site work. In three years, no sales ever took place. Another developer was hired to improve the site, but security patches and updates from WordPress and plugins broke the site. When I was brought in, I advised rebuilding the site using a current and well maintained theme with current versions of best in class plugins.
The site content existed but had to be imported into the new theme. The site was built with a WordPress Theme, a Custom Coded Child Theme, An Educational Class Delivery Plugin, a WooCommerce Plugin, and several social media plugins. Then a child theme was created to allow custom CSS and code edits that would not break the build. HTML and Javascript code was edited as needed and the site was launched. Students began to buy subscriptions, but volume was lower than the client desired. I proposed adding a free social media community to allow people to join, upload photos, rate and comment on each other’s work, and otherwise engage the site and explore the paid classes. Functionality was added so that site visitors could join using existing social media accounts instead of fill out membership forms. Social media likes and sharing buttons were implemented to allow one click distribution to site users social media profiles. More subscriptions resulted. This site can be seen at www.shdlearning.com.
Art Gallery Website For Lead Generation & Sales
A photographer and print artist wanted to sell work online and attract commissions. A website was designed with a WordPress Theme. A custom frame shop with the artists work shown printed on various media and in various sizes, mounts or frames was implemented. The art can also be ordered on phone cases, pillows, and more.
Content Strategy, Image Design, API’s from external Art Sales Sites were implemented, custom code restructured the API output, and SEO work was done. Lead generation was successful as demonstrated when a site visitor from Connecticut needed to locate a service provider in Toledo to commission a photo and print.
The subject of the project was a family heirloom watercolor painting of great value. The goal was to reproduce it faithfully so that more than one family member could enjoy a work owned by a father who had died. This site can be seen at www.eGiclee.com.
Product Design Update & Value Engineering For Health and Beauty Manufacturer
A very old product developed a new life as the result of a change in society and industry. A company with a very dated product wanted to update the product design to make it more current, and eliminate some steps in the assembly process during the manufacturing. A product that had three pieces which required assembly, costing about 15 seconds of labor time was turned into a single piece product. The 15 second savings may not sound like much but the company was selling 2 million units per year. That’s 30,000,000 seconds, 500,000 minutes, or 8,333 hours of assembly time. The savings per year to the company, at $8 per hour came to $66,666 dollars.
The material used in the past had been an inexpensive polypropylene plastic which worked well, but has a matte surface that looks like ‘old fashioned cheap plastic’. The material suffered abrasion easily. These abrasions acquired in use allowed surface dirt to accumulate. This plastic also became brittle with age. As a result, the product could become dirty and break over time. The new material chosen during re-design was polycarbonate. This is an expensive material but easily handled in injection molding processes that the company was used to using. It is shiny and glossy and very current or modern in appearance. It resists abrasion, withstands any cleaning chemicals, retaining a clean look for a long time during heavy use. It is also unbreakable. By changing the material, the product went from looking old fashioned and having a bad reputation for product life to a product that appeared to be very modern and gained an excellent reputation for durability.
A new logo and packaging were created to support the effort.
Marketing Company Website Focusing On SEO and Website Design Services
My own marketing consultation company has several websites offering marketing consultation, website design, and SEO. But the message about my design service and experience needed an update. This present site was created with a WordPress them and a little custom HTML, CSS, and javascript code in less than 8 hours, hopefully demonstrating design skills in context of an overall ability as a Senior Designer to design and launch attractive and functional websites quickly. Additional work will be done in the future to perform SEO work, provide helpful file names, labels, titles, and descriptions for each project as well as ADA compliance.
Auto Dealership Website Design For Lead Generation & Sales
A Honda dealer felt that the website provided by Honda Corp for dealerships was not producing enough leads and sales. I met with the client weekly for one hour per week, formulated a plan, photographed the dealership and staff, developed an SEO strategy and implemented it, then designed and launched the website. Leads started coming in so fast, on the first day of launch, that the dealership thought I was paying friends to inquire about cars. But then they sold two of the most expensive high end Honda sport convertibles made, on the first day of the site launch, to a person inquiring from the new website! The internet sales guy at the dealership later provided a testimonial, ” Thanks Lonn. I Sold A Lot Of Cars From That Website & Made A Lot of Money!”
A New Machine Shop Wanted A Website That Would Be Found on Google For Market Launch and Lead Generation
Two machinists started a machine shop and needed to get a website that could be found on google.
A Video was made and posted to YouTube and then the home page to help with SEO.
Photography and video editing services were provided. Animated images were created showing product progression from raw block of steel to a printing jig / die to hold plastic bottles for imprinting.
SEO work was successful, ranking the new website for multiple important keywords.
Leads were generated and sales resulted.The new shop was now working for a global plastic container manufacturer.
Real Estate Website For List Building, Lead Generation & Sales
A real estate sales team had several websites but lead generation was not happening.
I provided SEO work, added conversational and casual copy to humanize and warm up the image of the team, added calls to action, created new logos and image / positioning artwork.
Lead generation increased 400% and led to sales growth.
Website For Health and Beauty Products Distributor
A startup health and beauty products company with a limited marketing budget contacted me for a marketing consult for his business expansion from a local retail operation to a nationwide wholesale operation.
After careful consideration of all his alternatives, he decided to launch an Ecommerce website. I installed and configured MIVA Merchant, and did the SEO work, copy, content, image optimization, online catalog, and configured the payment process so funds went to his commercial bank account. Within one year he became one of the most successful U.S. distributors for the single most successful U.S. manufacturer in his industry, selling over $1,000,000 per year.
Closing Notes: If the maxim in design is that form follows function, then ‘design’ is much more than ‘art’.
“Before one can design something, one must understand the function of the thing being designed. An image never stands alone. A product needs a shape, a material, a color, a texture, and so much more. A package not only holds the product, and provides for safe economic shipment but may also provide for retail display, and interact with the customer in the unboxing experience. For all of these reasons, the case studies on this page do not reference art for art’s sake, and reach far beyond the idea that creating an image or page layout is an act unto itself.” Lonn Dugan, BIGMARK Digital Marketing.
