Summary analysis of the uses of business blogging within the Irish graphic design sector

Today I am releasing this summary report of the quantitative aspect of my research.

This research analyses the uses of business blogging by graphic design companies and graphic designers in Ireland and evaluates that usage against current best practice. 

Existing Irish graphic design blogs are surveyed, details of their activities and characteristics are collected. The data collected on each blog is categorised. The category data for graphic design companies and individual graphic designers is compared to identify any differences in emphasis and approach between them. The category information is analysed. 

In conclusion the current state of the Irish graphic design business blogosphere is evaluated. Recommendations on policies and strategies for business blogging and micro-blogging are given. An increased focus on listening and engaging with stakeholders through blogging and social media is recommended.

Please feel free to share this report and pass it along to anyone you think may be interested. 

Download the report here.

ICAD member graphic design companies: blogging or not?

I reviewed the websites of all members of The Institute of Creative Advertising & Design listed under ‘Graphic Design, Identity Design and Packaging Design’ in the Member’s Directory on the ICAD website (accessed on 20 June 2009) and investigated which have a link to a company blog from their primary company website. IDI membership is individual, so I have aggregated this list by company name.This research does not preclude their being such a company blog, but where one is not visibly linked on the company website, then an inference can be made as to how such a blog is positioned within the company’s mix of corporate communications.

This list does not capture any company design blogs which are not linked from the company’s primary website, or any personal blogs maintained by company directors or employees. Some companies are members of all three Irish design organisations and therefore appear on the three lists.

Methodology
The list was processed in the following manner. All IDI members who did not supply a valid URL were first removed from the list. Then all repeated URLs were then removed. Any URLs checked which were not graphic design companies were also removed.

Members with business blogs
Of forty-eight relevant ICAD member companies these three have a link to their corporate blog on their company web sites.
The Brand Union An Our Blogs link from the international home page leads to the Dublin office blog.
Threesixty The News section is a blog, with an RSS feed, but with no comments enabled.
Whitenoise Studios A link to the blog on the home page.

You can read more analysis of these blogs in the Blog List section. If you are a relevant ICAD graphic design member company with a blog that is not on this list, please let me know and I will include you.

Members without business blogs
These forty-seven member companies had no link to a corporate blog on their company web sites.
01 Arrival [www.arrival.ie]
02 Atelier David Smith [www.atelier.ie]
03 Baseline [www.baseline.ie]
04 Begley Hutton [www.begleyhutton.com
05 Bennis Design [www.bennisdesign.ie]
06 Brandcentral [www.brandcentral.dk]
07 Carival Advertising & Design [www.carival.ie]
08 Catalysto [www.catalysto.com
09 Conor & David [www.coranddavid.com
10 Creative Inc. [www.creativeinc.ie]
11 Dcoy Design Ltd [www.dcoy.ie]
12 Design Factory [www.designfactory.ie]
13 Designers Ink [www.designers-ink.ie]
14 Designworks [www.designworks.ie]
15 Detail Design Studio [www.detail.ie]
16 Dynamite [www.dynamite.ie]
17 Dynamo [www.dynamo.ie]
18 Finn Creative (Australia) [www.finncreative.com.au]
19 First Impression [www.firstimpression.ie]
20 Form [www.form.ie]
21 Fresh Design [www.fresh.ie]
22 Fuse Graphic Design [www.fuse.ie]
23 GHQ [www.ghqdesign.com]
24 Huguenot [www.huguenot-xmi.com]
25 IDEA [www.idea.ie]
26 Kunnert & Tierney [www.kunnertandtierney.com]
27 Language [www.language.ie]
28 Paragon Design & Advertising [www.paragondesign.ie]
29 Persona Design [www.personadesign.ie]
30 PH7 Design Ltd [www.ph7.ie]
31 Raven Design [www.ravendesign.ie]
32 Red & Grey Design [www.redandgreydesign.ie]
33 Red Dog [www.reddog.ie]
34 Rodney Miller Associates [www.rodneymillerassoc.com]
35 Sans Studio [www.sansstudio.com
36 Scale [www.scale.ie]
37 Slater Dublin [www.slaterdesign.com
38 Source Design Consultants [www.sourcedesign.ie]
39 Studio Richards [www.studiorichards.com
40 The Design Suite [www.designsuite.ie]
41 Totem Visual Communications [www.totem.ie]
42 We Make Design [www.wemakedesign.com]
43 White Chalk [www.whitechalk.ie]
44 Zest Design [www.zestdesign.ie]
45 Zinc Design Consultants [www.zinc.ie]

IDI member graphic design companies: blogging or not?

I reviewed the websites of all members of Institute of Designers in Ireland listed under ‘Visual Communications’ on the IDI website (accessed on 03 June 2009) and investigated which have a link to a company blog from their primary company website. IDI membership is individual, so I have aggregated this list by company name. This research does not preclude their being such a company blog, but where one is not visibly linked on the company website, then an inference can be made as to how such a blog is positioned within the company’s mix of corporate communications.

This list does not capture any company design blogs which are not linked from the company’s primary website, or any personal blogs maintained by company directors or employees.

Some companies are members of all three Irish design organisations and therefore appear on the three lists.

Methodology
The list was processed in the following manner. All IDI members who did not supply a valid URL were first removed from the list. Then all repeated URLs were then removed. Any URLs checked which were not graphic design companies were also removed. The original list was sorted by member's surnames. This list was resorted alphabetically by company name and all duplicates were removed.

Members with business blogs
Of 71 IDI members, these nine member companies (and individual designers) had a link to their corporate blog on their company web sites.
Chuffey Media Link to blog in the About Us section. (However it only has three entries, the last being 07 November 2008.)
Design Inch Link to blog on the home page.
Design Tactics Link to design reference blog on the home page.
Con Kennedy Link to blog on thehome page.
Neville Design Group Link to blog on thehome page.
Penhouse Design Fresh Air Blog link on the home page.
The Brand Union An Our Blogs link from the international home page leads to the Dublin office blog.
Whitenoise Visual Communications Link to blog on the home page.
These Were Fields The News link on the home page leads to the blog.
You can read more analysis of these blogs in the Blog List section. If you are a relevant ICAD member company with a blog that not on this list, please let me know and I will include you.

Members without business blogs
These sixty-two member companies had no link to a corporate blog on their company web sites.
01 AK Graphics [www.akgraphics.ie]
02 Atelier [www.atelier.ie]
03 Baseline [www.baseline.ie]
04 Begley Hutton Design [www.begleyhutton.com]
05 Bite Design [www.bitedesign.com] A blog is listed on homepage, but link returns an error.
06 Brandcentral [www.brandcentral.ie]
07 Boyd Freeman Design [www.boydfreeman.ie]
08 Boyle Design Group [www.boyledesigngroup.com]
09 Carton LeVert [www.cartonlevert.ie]
10 Creative Inc [www.creativeinc.ie]
11 Cronin, Conor [www.conorcronin.com]
12 Cronin Designs [www.cronindesigns.ie]
13Dara Creative [www.daracreative.ie]
14 Darling [www.hellodarling.ie]
15 Dcoy Design [www.dcoy.ie]
16 Design Factory [www.designfactory.ie]
17 Design HQ [www.designhq.ie]
18 Design In Mind [www.designinmind.ie]
19 Design Image [www.designimage.ie]
20 Designworks [www.designworks.ie]
21 Dynamite [www.dynamite.ie]
22 Eamon Sinnott and Partners [www.sinnott-design.com]
23 Fire Design [www.fire.ie]
24 First Impression [www.firstimpression.ie]
25 Form [www.form.ie]
26 Frank [www.frankbelfast.com]
27 Fresh Design [www.fresh.ie]
28 GHQ Design [www.ghqdesign.com]
29 Hamill Bosket [www.hamillbosket.com]
30 Huguenot [www.huguenot.ie]
31 InputOut [www.inputout.com
32 Joseph group [www.joseph-group.com]
33 Kilkenny Design Consultancy [www.kilkennydesign.eu]
34 Language [www.language.ie]
35 Loman Cusack Design [www.lomancusack.com]
36 Márla.ie [www.marla.ie]
37 Martin, Geraldine [www.geraldinemartin.com]
38 Mitchell Kane Associates [www.mitchellkane.com]
39 Mxbrandcom [www.mxbrandcom.co.uk]
40 New Moon Graphics [www.newmoongraphics.com]
41 Neworld Associates [www.neworld.ie]
42 Nolka Design [www.nolka.com]
43 Origin [www.origin.ie]
44 Persona Design [www.personadesign.ie]
45 Positive Design Consultants [www.positivedesign.co.uk]
46 Principle [www.principle.ie]
47 Propeller Design Consultants [www.propeller.ie]
48 Rain Design Partners [www.raindesign.com]
49 Red Dog [www.reddog.ie]
50 Rodney Miller Associates [www.rodneymillerassoc.com]
51 Roomthree Design [www.roomthree.com]
52 Sharp Design [www.sharpdesign.ie]
53 Southern Advertising [www.southernad.ie]
54 The Little Red Hen [www.littleredhen.ie]
55 Threesixty Marketing [www.threesixty.ie]
56 Trigger Communications [www.trigger.ie]
57 Totem Visual Communications [www.totem.ie]
58 Twisel River Studios [www.tandemdesign.co.uk]
59 Vermillion Design [www.vermilliondesign.com]
60 White or Cream Visual Communications [www.whiteorcream.ie]
61 Yap Brand Consultancy [www.yapbrandconsultancy.com]
62 Zinc [www.zinc.ie]

Notes from Viral Marketing presentation

Yes, I did forget to turn on my moblie phone's camera flash.

Jonah Perertti of Buzzfeed.com gave a very interesting presentation on viral marketing last night 17 April 2009 at the Science Gallery, as part of the Infectious festival and exhibition. Viral marketing is tangential to the subject of this research, but I noted some points that may be of interest.

Some aspects of his talk aligned with the observations of Shirkey regarding the societal forces that limit or promote the effects of Internet technology.
• In the case of viral marketing it is the social imperative that drives the passing-on of the viral content.
• The architecture of the underlying system influences how viral memes spread. He drew an analogy with a forest fire: it's not so much about the particular match as about the dry brushwood and the trees. ‘The network structure is more important than the influencers.’

There are a number of nontrivial problems with viral marketing that need to be mitigated against.
1 It is unpredictable and hard to control.
2 What tends to spread is inconsequential: free, simple, fun and instant.
Ergo most messages are not viral. Furthermore, the slightest drag makes something non-viral. To grow at exponential rate 100 people will need to tell 200, who then go on to tell 400 and so on. If the spread rate is only one-to-one or less, then it will die out.

He spoke about his categorisation of the Bored At Work Network. This seemed to posit some kind of viral elite who are too busy, too hip and too creative to ever have any time to be bored, as opposed to millions of numb accountants and claims-adjusters waiting to click on the next photo of a kitten on a skateboard, or whatever.

In terms of viral marketing for things other than novelty, fun, trivia, he spoke about ‘big seed media’. This seemed to have an old-school Interruption Marketing basis, as it is starting point was leveraging an installed base of email addresses. His example was Tide emailing a million people to shift 40k of product samples.
More interesting was his overview of the real-time audience data informing the editorial decisions on the Huffington Post home page. Articles are promoted or demoted based on their audience figures. This reinforces Shirkey's analysis of the new paradigm of 'publish first and filter second'. It's the same Darwinian methodology that kills off unpopular television shows, but whereas that process takes months this happens in hours.

Finally, in strategising how best to propagate your particular message it's best to think like a Mormon rather than a Jew. That metaphor is about focussing as much on the mechanism of how your message is to spread and not just on the content of your message. This is probably his most insightful point. Looking to the Irish graphic design blogosphere the greatest failing seems to be that most effort is expended on the content and little on ensuring both that the content is read and that it facilitates being read. Building in hooks for propagation whether by social imperatives or other means is part of the key to success.

DBI graphic design companies: blogging or not?

I thought it would be interesting to look at all of the graphic design companies listed as members of Design Business Ireland website (accessed on 05 April 2009) and see whether any have a company blog linked to from their primary company website. This does not preclude their being such a blog, but where none is visible on the company website an inference can be made as to how the blog is positioned within the company’s mix of corporate communications. Of the 46 DBI members on the list, six had corporate blogs and forty had none.

These six member companies had a link to their corporate blog on their company web sites.

BFK  Most of the company web site is a news blog of projects, with multiple an RSS feeds, but no comments or social networking features.

Creative Media  A 'News Blog' link from the home page.

Penhouse  A 'Fresh Air Blog' link from the home page, with comments and an RSS feed, but no social networking features.

The Brand Union  An 'Our Blogs' link from the international home page leads to the Dublin office blog, with comments and an RSS feed, but no social networking features.

Rain Communications  A 'blog' link from the home page, with comments, social networking features and an RSS feed.

20-20 Vision  The news section of their website is in a blog, with comments, social networking features and an RSS feed.

These forty member companies had no link to a corporate blog on their company web sites.

Affinity, AKGraphics, Baseline, Big Fish Design, Blink Design, Catalysto, Creative Inc, Dara Creative, Dcoy Design, Design Associates, Designbank, Design Factory, Designers Ink, Designinmind, Designworks, Drawinginc, Eamon Sinnott & Partners, Form, Frank, Fuse Graphic Design, GSDC, HamillBosket, Huguenot, IDEA, Konnect Media, Martello Media, Mesh Design Consultants, Neworld Associates, Pica Design, Positive Design Consultants, Principle, Profiles Design & Marketing, Proviz Design & Visualisation, Rain Design Partners, Raven Design, Roomthree Design, Red Dog, Source Design Consultants, Totem Visual Communications, Zebedee Marketing & Design.

This list does not capture any company design blogs which are not linked from the company's primary website, or any personal blogs maintained by company directors or employees.

Small pieces, loosely connected

After a very quick scan through the blogs submitted after yesterday’s email request it strikes me that there are no A-list or Go-To blogs in the Irish Graphic Design sector. Only a few blogs were mentioned more than once by respondents (in what was admittedly a very small and unscientific sample).

Where are the Seth Godins, the Hugh Macleods and John Grubers of this sector? Given the small size of the Irish graphic design sector and the smaller subset one would expect to actively blog within that, perhaps small, ultra-niche atomized, personalized audiences are all that one can expect. Shirkey’s power law analysis of blogging would suggest that one or two of these blogs should have gained a broader audience and expanded beyond their initial audience.

Actions: examine the sample blogs.
— Is their content very personalized, only of interest to friends and acquaintances?
— Is their content primarily of interest only to the author (diary blog, design reference for self)?
— Is their material published on an ad-hoc basis, with long intermissions?
— Does the blog promote the designer or their business?

Initial call for Irish design blogs

I sent this email out to certain contacts of mine to gather some initial blog addresses.

I am researching the uses of blogs by Irish design companies and by Irish designers.

What I need to do at this stage is pull together a quick list of blogs by Irish designers and if possible Irish design companies. So if you can send me on links to any that you know of, your contribution will be most appreciated.

This is very preliminary work, so go as broad and wide as you can — I will filter later. It's more important that I get a comprehensive sample to start off with.

I'll just be looking through them — at this stage this is not a call for people to interview or anything as involved as that.

The term 'blog' is wilfully elusive: so if you are not sure if something is bloggy enough or not, just go ahead and add it in anyway.

I'm also interested in designer's personal blogs. Whether they are freelancers using their blog as part of marketing (Like Benny here) or designers doing their own thing quite separate from whatever design studio they work in. (Like Con here.)

Also the blogs don't have to be writing-orientated. Link-blogs or design reference blogs full of deadly cool stuff are just as valid. (Like this kind of thing.)

I'm also looking for any Irish design companies or designers micro-blogging on Twitter (like this). In my research I will eventually need to focus on applied use of this for some defined aim: most likely marketing. But as this stage just seeing whether many in design industry are availing of this channel at all shall be productive.

I will aggregate all of the results onto a web page as some kind of shared resource listing. I will circulate that once I get it lashed together.

Also, do feel free to forward this email on to anyone you know who may be able to point me towards some relevant blogs. (That way I can tick the box beside Research Aim of “Leveraging the sophisticated network effects of online social networks to gather information”.)

Thanks in advance.
Aiden

Irish design blogs listing

As part of my research I am going to gather a representative sample of Irish design company and designer's blogs. For now this list is unfiltered. It will eventually be categorised as personal blogs, group blogs, corporate blogs, etc depending on whatever taxonomy I decide to impose.

Update: I have decided to move the lists into a seperate dedicated section of this site and they now can be found under Blog Lists in the top navigation.

‘Twitter’ trending over ‘Blog’ on Wikipedia

I have been looking at Jeffrery Veen’s useful new site Wikirank and did a comparison of how ‘Twitter’ is trending over ‘Blog’ in searches on Wikipedia.

This interactive graph allows you to examine the data yourself, just run your cursor over it.

Twitter and Blog on Wikirank

This second graph I have generated also adds comparisons to searches for both ‘Facebook’ and ‘LinkedIn’ during the same timeframes.

Twitter, Blog, Facebook, and LinkedIn on Wikirank