Internet Insights by LevelTen Interactive

Is Your Site Design 2012 Compliant?

gretchenv — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 19:11:00 +0000

I recently heard someone on TV say, “I’m a woman of the tens .…” Ha, I had never thought about it but I guess what else would you call this decade?

I am starting off my third year of the tens with a bang, as the new web designer for Level Ten Interactive. As I settle in with my brand new colleagues in this brand new year, I’ve been reflecting on my goals for my client work at Level Ten. I’ve decided one of my top priorities is to make our clients’ sites look “of the tens.” But what does it mean to be “of the tens?”

Web Words Explained: Open Source Software

tabathap — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 17:00:00 +0000

I’ll let you in on a secret. Like many of you, I’m new to Drupal. Despite having a strong background in content management, Drupal is unexplored territory. I remember what it was like in the beginning as I learned to develop new sites. We all remember a point when we were baffled by basic applications like posting blogs, and terms like “CMS”, or “open source” seemed foreign.

Socialize your Drupal site in 5 Easy Steps

Tom — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 13:10:07 +0000

A modern day web presence is not just your website. To be successful you have to expand your digital footprint to include social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and YouTube. You need to enable your site visitors to Tweet, Like, +1 and share your content on the likes of StumbleUpon and Reddit.

To create a rich connected user experience, you need to do more than just link to social media. You need to integrate familiar social engagement directly into your website.

Release of Drupal 7 Content Analysis & Optimizer modules

Tom — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 20:38:06 +0000

During 2011 the list of requests to port the Drupal SEO Tools suite had grown quite long. After a few months of brushing up on the new D7 changes, I finally got a chance to sit down and do some programming over the holidays. So for all of you who have been encouraging the D7 ports, I give you the Drupal 7 release of Content Analysis and Content Optimizer.

If you are not familiar with what these modules do, let's review.

Drupal Mega Menus Made Simple

Mark Carver — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 19:15:50 +0000

Have you ever made a Drupal site where the design called for implementing one or more mega-menus? Have you spent countless hours downloading module after module and hacking your theme's template file to get the code to insert at just the right place?

LevelTen Interactive introduces: Menu Views

How to Write a Headline for Your Blog That Will Knock People Out With Its Sheer Amazingness

Sumeeta Kumar — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 16:37:41 +0000

Your headline is the equivalent of your physical appearance in the web world. It’s the short skirt that captures that cute guy’s eye. It’s that sexy hairstyle and ivy league degree that makes that gal look twice. Because people are surfing the web at rapid intervals, and everyone has developed acute ADHD as a result, it is imperative to grab your audience’s attention in 2 seconds or less, and to rope them into giving your blog or article a read. The Huffington Post is great at this. Celeb rags are great at this.

The Decline of Greeting Cards

Brent — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 15:18:04 +0000

The decline of personalized greeting cards has left my refrigerator bare this year. Usually wrapped with family pictures, season greetings and magnets, it now stands naked; shivering in the cold winter nights that have approached. What about the cards of years past? Will they not have an opportunity to welcome new comers to their shoebox home? It seems Gmail and Facebook have become their new resting place. This hardly seems fair.

How to Create Great Content for the Web

Sumeeta Kumar — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 16:23:14 +0000

Content is king. In our modern day, people are bombarded with blogs, videos, articles and photos every single time they turn their computer on. Essentially, people are being shouted at all day long, and so their natural inclination is to tune marketers out. You must EARN their attention. The thing that will allow your company to stand out among the clutter is the quality of content that you churn out. Create remarkable content to connect online with your buyers, and it will bring you back both tangible and intangible rewards.

Responsible Responsive Drupal Themes

Mark Carver — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 15:06:21 +0000

After being introduced to the concept of responsive web theming, I took to it like a duck in water. I was pleased with the well documented contributed Drupal base theme, Omega based on the 960.gs grid. This amazing framework provides a plethora amount of configurable options, scalability and an overall sense of structure. I will not be covering any technical space-talk or how to configure Omega in this blog. If you would like to learn more about Omega, please visit the following site for more information: http://omega.developmentgeeks.com.

Nobody Wants a Website

Randall Knutson — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 15:36:25 +0000

Why do you want a website? Because everyone else has one? That's a really terrible reason. Websites are really tools to accomplish a goal. Too many companies set out to build a website without fully thinking this through.

Let me give you an example.

Widget herding made simple - Introducing the Widgets module

Tom — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 15:31:52 +0000

Have you ever needed to put Service links or ShareThis into block? How about AddToAny in a node link? Want to have different share buttons per content type? Want a simple way to add the latest widgets from Twitter, Facebook or Google to your site. Want to enable admins to customize widgets without having to dig into the API docs? It's time to start wrangling in all those widgets.

Checkup: Drupal coming to the Healthcare & Medical Industry

Chris — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 20:27:49 +0000

Healthcare, love it or hate it, it's not going away and in fact the healthcare industry is booming and continues to grow. Almost daily we hear about some revolutionary break through in medicine that will help us to lead longer healthier lives. The web has made sharing knowledge and information easier and easier and the emergence of smart phones allows anyone to access years of historical data at their fingertips.

Tutr.tv: Top Videos of the Week

Sumeeta Kumar — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 15:57:46 +0000

Apps: Drupal Simplified
by: Dallas Drupal User Group

How to Motivate Your Employees

Sumeeta Kumar — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 16:48:11 +0000

As a company, it is imperative to have the very best team you possibly can. A strong team is one that stands by its leader, advocates for its company brand on and off the clock, and that genuinely wants the best for its company. The disputes between American Airlines' executives and its employees, and the company’s subsequent bankruptcy,

What are social media widgets? Oooh, give me.

Tom — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 15:25:22 +0000

The web has gone crazy for social media widgets. What's not to love? Magic little boxes that connect our sites to the social power of the web in convenient little code snippets. They are all the rage with the hip, in-the-know online pundits.

5 Basic Principles For Creating a Strong Brand

Brent — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 15:15:37 +0000

LevelTen’s team recently had a brand discussion over lunch regarding our website. Questions like - does out website positively promote our brand? What is our message? Do we communicate to potential customers in a way that is easily understandable? I can’t say I was very surprised when the overwhelming consensus was that it needed significant improvement.

Unleashing the Power of Drupal on Your Theme

Mark Carver — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 15:30:13 +0000

People love changing things around. Wouldn't it be nice if people could easily swap out images on their home page or even change the background of the theme. Granted, I usually advise against the latter scenario as many people think they know what looks good, but don't realize that their camping escapade isn't always enjoyable by all. However, it can be done! What I think is more important is that it can be done intuitively.

Apps: Making Drupal Distributions Work

Tom — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 15:58:12 +0000

It is amazing in three short years how much more powerful and easy to use Drupal distributions have come. Three years ago I spent the holidays converting our base Drupal installation into a distribution. Friday, we launched the fourth generation of the OpenEnterprise distribution, built in Drupal 7 leveraging Apps. Distros have come a long way baby!

Social Media 201

Sumeeta Kumar — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 15:23:35 +0000

Social media is defined as “a new way of marketing where a company has a two-way conversation about itself.”

Here are some interesting statistics to consider when implementing this crucial business mechanism:

Only 14% of people actually believe what you say about yourself (advertising and marketing messages) therefore instead of focusing on company motives, commercials should serve as mini-movies that entertain people so they will associate that feeling with your brand. Here's a great example.

Learning Drupal - Part 2

David Hahn — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 15:29:38 +0000

In Part 1 of Learning Drupal we looked at learning considerations, seeing what Drupal can do and being inspired, diving in, local user groups and DrupalCamps. In Part 1.5 I shamelessly plugged a Drupal themer / developer position we had open (what better way to learn Drupal??).

Tutr.tv: Top Drupal Videos of the Week

Sumeeta Kumar — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 15:37:35 +0000

Introduction to Views and Panels
by: Atlanta Drupal Users Group

People don’t plan to fail, they fail to plan. No wait, they do plan to fail.

Tom — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 18:23:06 +0000

What is the purpose of website planning?

That's not meant to be a rhetorical question. Think about it. Write down your answers.

This is a question I ask at a lot of conferences. Most audiences I present to are developers. The typical answers are:

So we know what the client wants
To document requirements
To assess risk
To estimate the project budget

LevelTen Sponsors Drupal on the Bayou & Hosts Drupal Training in New Orleans

Sumeeta Kumar — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 15:16:41 +0000

LevelTen is a proud organizing co-sponsor, along with Neospire, of the first ever Drupal on the Bayou! The Drupal summit will take place at the award-winning Harrah's hotel which is walking distance from the French Quarter and the keynote speaker will be Drupal rockstar "Webchick" a.k.a. Angie Byron.

Tutr.tv: Top Drupal Videos of the Week

Sumeeta Kumar — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 15:26:08 +0000

Learning Drupal
by: Atlanta Drupal Users Group

Learning Drupal - Part 1.5 - A New Hope

David Hahn — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 15:39:58 +0000

In Part 1 of my Learning Drupal blog series, I introduced some first steps to learning and understanding Drupal. In Parts 2 & 3 I plan to dig into training classes, official Drupal documentation and user forums, site recipes, blogs and blog aggregators, books, podcasts, videos, slide decks, distributions, Twitter, IRC, and more. But I thought I'd sneak in a Part 1.5 and show you a really great way to get paid to learn Drupal.

Don't Do it with Drupal

Randall Knutson — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 14:02:02 +0000

I'm sure most of you who are reading this are in love with Drupal and so am I. But I'm about to share with you one of the hard learned lessons about Drupal. That is, sometimes not doing it in Drupal is a better idea.

Exploring Typography Rules

Kayla Wren — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 14:27:15 +0000

I always feel a little intimidated when discussing typography with people who really KNOW typography. Don't get me wrong, I know my way around old-school web-safe fonts and I have an innate aversion to Comic Sans, but when in the presence of a designer or typographer, I'll inevitably make an observation that causes them roll their eyes and sigh with the same disdain English teachers do when you end a sentence with a preposition. I know good typography when I see it, I just don't know all the rules.

Tutr.tv: Top Drupal Videos of the Week

Sumeeta Kumar — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 14:09:24 +0000

Rapid Drupal Development using the Features Module
by: Atlanta Drupal Users Group

Commons Intranet: Open-Source for Internal Collaboration

Brent — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 13:41:54 +0000

Social communities have been hyped beyond belief over the past ten years, but it seems like most of the discussions have been focused on external facing web communities like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Today, businesses seem to be focusing more of their internal initiatives on leveraging these same social models to create more robust and useful intranets/extranets for internal collaboration. This article discusses how Drupal has arisen as an ideal platform for social business as recognized by Gartner’s Magic Quadrant.

Tutr.tv: Top Drupal Videos of the Week

Mon, 24 Oct 2011 14:36:56 +0000

Considering Drupal and OSS
by: Atlanta Drupal Users Group

Social Media 101

Sumeeta Kumar — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 15:55:24 +0000

So at this point, we all know social media has the potential to make or break a business. Still, sometimes it can be quite overwhelming and non-sensical, especially to a newbie. The plethora of choices can consume hours from your life and result in decision fatigue.

Booktrack: Is this the future of reading?

Sumeeta Kumar — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 15:17:14 +0000

A new app for iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch called Booktrack was recently launched. It is an “enhanced eBook company that matches written text with music, sound effects, and ambient sound to create an immersive reading experience.” In other words, it plays music while you read your ebook. This differs from wearing an iPod while reading a book in that the music is synchronized to the passage you are on, and the company claims that the book can sense your pace of reading. Sort of like a literary soundtrack, or a movie with words instead of pictures, depending on your take.

Learning Drupal - Part 1

David Hahn — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 18:24:21 +0000

I try to always start any blog post with a pretentious-sounding quote, so let's go with:

"The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step"

Lao-tzu, The Way of Lao-tzu
The Way of Taoism
600 BCE

A 2600 year old quote- now that's pompous! But also semi-relevant. Drupal isn't easy to learn, but it is learnable- one step at a time.

The Learning Cliff

Tutr.tv: Top Drupal Videos of the Week

Tue, 11 Oct 2011 14:40:03 +0000

Apps for Drupal Distributions: A start to finish guide.
by: Phase2 Technology

RIP Steve Jobs – Thanks for the career.

Tom — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 14:37:45 +0000

A friend texted me last night with three short words. "Steve Jobs died"

Suddenly I saw my life play itself back, paralleled to a track of products his company built. I never thought about it before, at least not at this level, but Steve Jobs is one of the greatest influencers in my life.

Tutr.tv: Top Drupal Videos of the Week

Mon, 03 Oct 2011 15:38:49 +0000

Creating and Theming a Node Photo Gallery with Drupal 7 and Colorbox
by: Danny Englander

6 Best Practices for Web Design

Sumeeta Kumar — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 13:38:48 +0000

Your website is one of your company's most powerful marketing vehicles, so make sure you are maximizing its returns by observing some best practices:

1) The simpler, the better - In today's day and age, a lot of website home pages are littered with too much information. People get bombarded the second the page loads, and they have no clue where to look first. Make the experience as simple and friendly for people as possible by utilizing clean, white space, having a clear and easy-to-navigate architecture, and minimizing text wherever possible.

4 Great New Websites Worth a Look

Sumeeta Kumar — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 15:28:26 +0000

Here are some great websites worth checking out if you haven't already:

1) Turntable.fm -
“Spotify is great, but Turntable.fm is amazing.” - The New York Times

A Little Humor in the Workplace Will Do You Good

Sumeeta Kumar — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 13:01:31 +0000

There is a British comedy series called “The IT Crowd” that almost perfectly depicts my life at LevelTen. If ever there was a real-life office filled with Roy, Moss and Douglas-like characters, this is it. A sampling of our potential daily dialogue might include:

Roy: [singing] We don't need no education.
Moss: Yes you do. You've just used a double negative.
_____________________

Jen: How can you two live like this?
Moss: [typing] How can you two...
Roy: Don't Google the question, Moss!

Tutr.tv: Top Drupal Videos of the Week

Sumeeta Kumar — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 14:32:37 +0000

The Path to a Mobile Drupal: Techniques, Tools and Failure
by: John Albin Wilkins

How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Block

Randall Knutson — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 13:44:09 +0000

I hated the block system. There I said it. Many of you probably felt the same way. I've used everything I can think of to get around the block system and have built sites every different way imaginable. Recently though, I've had a revelation. The block system, while not perfect, actually is pretty good.

Drupal Crisis Point: Marketing Ice to Eskimos

Tom — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 15:43:08 +0000

A week or so back, Mediacurrent wrote a thought provoking blog post about how Drupal is at a crisis point and losing the CMS marketing battle. The article expounds upon Dries' DrupalCon London State of Drupal keynote, calling on the community to better market Drupal. While I wholeheartedly agree with the points in the post, I think there is a bigger picture opportunity for marketing that is being missed.

A Clear Vision for Muddy Waters

Brent — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 13:26:15 +0000

Creating a vision is an imperative first step in designing and marketing a website because it helps align individuals and helps teams create strategies, plans and budgets. While the word vision connotates something grand or mystical, the direction that guides transformation can be simple. Without vision, strategy becomes useless and budgeting dissolves into a mindless exercise of throwing darts at a board.
John Kotter, author of “Leading Change” suggests that effective visions seem to have at least six key characteristics. Those characteristics include:

Answering How Can I Get a Results Oriented Website on a Tight Budget

Tom — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 14:13:53 +0000

So there I was. Standing in front of a room of 150 or so small business owners stumped by a single question. Probably the most astute question a small business owner could ask about the web.

"How can I get a results oriented website on a tight budget?"

I had just spent the last two hours doing something I preach to others not to do: identifying a problem without giving a solution. Worse than that, I was stumped to think of one.

Tutr.tv: Top Drupal Videos of the Week

Sumeeta Kumar — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 16:28:57 +0000

Responsive Content: Re-architecting the Basic Page, Render API, etc
by: John Albin Wilkins

Problem:

LevelTen Drupal Training in Houston, Dallas & New Orleans

Thu, 15 Sep 2011 16:20:41 +0000

LevelTen is packing up a camper van with a propane stove, some castile soap, and a whole lot of Drupal knowledge to share! We will be touring the South, offering training workshops in Houston and New Orleans, and topping it all off with a full week of training back home in Dallas where we will spend the entire week showing you how to build and theme your own Drupal website.

Whether you’re a Drupal newbie, a dabbler or an experienced developer, we’ve got a workshop that’s right for you. Come get hands-on, interactive training from our Drupal experts.

Why Incorporating Mobile Into Your Organization is Necessary

Sumeeta Kumar — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 14:37:41 +0000

A recent report published by venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers claims that mobile internet is the future of business, and I wholeheartedly agree. There are several reasons why incorporating a mobile component into your business not only makes good sense, but is necessary.

Basic Drupal and SugarCRM Integration pt. 2

David Hahn — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 14:54:20 +0000

In Part 1 of Basic Drupal and SugarCRM Integration we looked at how to connect your Drupal Contact webform to a campaign in SugarCRM. In Part 2 we'll go over how to add a new custom field to your webform and link it to Sugar.

Tutr.tv: Top Drupal Videos of the Week

Sumeeta Kumar — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 15:45:24 +0000

So What's this "Drew-paul" Thing You Do? (Explaining Drupal to Others)
by: David Needham

Even Microsoft wants IE6 to Die

Kayla Wren — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 15:35:05 +0000

Web designers and developers have been complaining about IE6 for years. In addition to numerous security problems, privacy issues, and bugs, it lacks support for modern web-standards - and it's an absolute nightmare to work with. I've seen it bring otherwise healthy and stable developers to their knees (yes, I'm talking about you Tom Nelson and I feel your pain.)