PixelMEDIA Inc.

In 2010, Vermont-based PKC was in the final stages of realigning its business offering from a consumer-focused product to a business-to-business OEM solution. That required a radical change in the company’s value proposition, message architecture, and website, with a focus on the business benefits of incorporating the PKC medical informatics technology into healthcare information systems, including clinical decision support, online medical records, and patient portals. PKC asked PixelMEDIA to develop a new approach the company’s messaging and website. Read More…

In 2011, Massachusetts-based Empirix Technologies was in the middle of a transformation. The company was moving away from a product-focused business model and embracing a solution-based approach that leveraged the company’s network testing and quality assurance products and technologies. A redesigned Empirix website was seen as a critical tool for explaining the company’s solution architecture and communicating its new identity. Empirix asked PixelMEDIA to help define and shape the new user experience.

Success Factors

Empirix had a solid internal working group in place to drive the messaging and content of the new website, including the re-alignment of its extensive product offerings with its new solutions framework. In addition, Empirix was developing a new logo and brand identity elements that would be incorporated into the new website. PixelMEDIA identified 3 key elements needed for a successful outcome:

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Prior to the launch of the Mass Save website in 2010, customers had to visit multiple websites to learn about energy- and money-saving opportunities. The programs were sponsored by nine gas and electric utilities and energy services companies serving the state, with goals and guidelines set by the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources (DOER). Because the design and navigation of each site was different, customers had to learn multiple ways to find information and application forms for energy-saving incentives.

Success Factors

The sponsors and DOER asked PixelMEDIA to consolidate the 6 separate websites into single Mass Save website and to create a unique brand identity. The new brand would serve as a recognizable focal point for a wide range of online and traditional marketing activities, and having a single brand would reduce the cost and complexity of maintaining multiple marks and identity systems. PixelMEDIA identified 3 key elements needed for a successful outcome: Read More…

PixelMEDIA is a finalist in the Consumer Goods category for Boston Beer Company’s new Samuel Adams website for the 15th Annual MITX Interactive Awards. Held annually by the Massachusetts Innovation & Technology Exchange, the MITX Awards recognize excellence in the creation of web innovations designed, produced or developed in New England.

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If you’re UNH, you find an anchor donor. If your name is Peter T. Paul, you offer to put up $25 million as a challenge – to the entire state of New Hampshire, far-flung alumnae and friends – to come up with the other half. Then you call PixelMEDIA to promote the goal: an advanced new facility devoted to advanced ideas in business and economics education that will become a national model for new ways to teach and learn.

The new building will enable new approaches to education centered around contextual problem-solving. For example, break-out rooms provide the space to allow large classes to divide into smaller discussion groups, then reform to share ideas and solutions. The building’s integration of advanced technology will further enable teaching and learning in the age of video, computer networking and the Internet. Read More…

Riding the Boston subway recently, I noticed several people crowded around one of the doors in the center of the car despite a clearly worded warning: DO NOT STAND IN FRONT OF DOORS. They stayed at the door during several stops, but did not get off. People getting on and off had to squeeze by them. The train wasn’t especially crowded; there was plenty of space away from the doors. So why were these people huddled in the one spot they were not supposed to be?

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If you have participated in taking a website in a new design direction, you may have noticed the difficulty in separating the form from the function. Here at PixelMEDIA, we employ a useful deliverable know as a mood board. In its simplest form, a mood board combines numerous elements into a collage that establishes an overall tone and creative direction. In many cases, we use it when a brand “refresh” is needed or if there is a lack of defined brand guidelines for the web channel. If you are currently working on a complete rebrand, you may consider this method as way to explore and establish typography, a color palette, or a style of a photography or illustration.

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The goal of any good web firm should be to provide clients with the best possible online face to the world.  Notice, however, that I use the term “best possible”.  The reality is that we as developers, designers, information architects, content strategists, account managers and project managers, are often limited by the budget, particularly in this difficult economy.  While a $100,000 website redesign might be off the table during tough times, “small victories” in key places can happen as part of the regular support and maintenance of your website, and often have a big impact.

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Last Thursday I had the pleasure of attending the Ad Club’s Edge Conference. Positioned as “It’s where you go to get inspired,” the conference focused on topics ranging from the effects of technology on the creative process to the extremes agencies go through to retain a large client.

The presenters included an impressive list of industry heavyweights like Baba Shetty, Chief Media Officer at Hill Holiday, Suzie Reider, Director of Ad Sales and Marketing for YouTube, and Lance Jensen, Creative Director for Modernista! All had engaging presentations but the most profound (at least to me) was Brian Collins, Chief Creative Officer and Chairman of COLLINS. His discussion touched on a few, well articulated points, but the most interesting to me was the effect of society and its direct influence on art and creative endeavors. Read More…

I’ve been working with a client who came to PixelMEDIA looking for an Information Architect to turn an existing desktop application into a browser-based user experience. They invited us to support their in-house programmers and a third-party visual design company. At the initial project kickoff meeting, it became apparent that the three parties at the table had wildly differing ideas on how the application worked and what the vision for the next version of the product should be.

But it also turned out, that the majority of the client stakeholders were puzzled as to what PixelMEDIA was providing. They didn’t understand what Information Architecture was, and hadn’t even thought about the overall user experience for the product. Yet, they had requested an IA. How odd. Read More…