#its my personal vibe check metric | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

chacusha · 2 years ago

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Dreamwidth pitch

Sometimes I wish more people would talk to me on Dreamwidth but then I don't really talk about Dreamwidth and why it's good or how it works, so maybe it would be good for me to do that??

So I guess some of the basic selling points about Dreamwidth:

Signing up is free and quick. (Also, I believe you can have any number of accounts associated with the same email address.) It has a similar vibe to Tumblr -- a geeky/fannish space.

It is a journaling website based on LiveJournal. By this I mean that it's almost like having a diary where you can choose to make some parts of that diary public or semi-public (at which point it becomes a blog). Counter to the direction of a lot of social media sites which increasingly focus on metrics, engagement (in a numeric form of views/likes/notes/retweets/etc.), and wide availability and easy (or automatic) sharing of content so as to maximize those metrics, Dreamwidth goes in the opposite direction with a focus on privacy. Each post you make has three possible privacy settings: public (viewable by anyone visiting the site), friends (viewable only to people who you have intentionally granted access to your friends-only posts -- you can also freely define custom friend groups to select subsets of friends, although I don't usually use this level of compartmentalization), and private (viewable only by you). It's very easy to check which privacy setting you've used for a post and to change them after the fact. Because posts on Dreamwidth cannot be shared or reblogged, when you revoke access to your post, it is immediate and total because you control the only copy of the post. Usual internet exceptions apply: People may screenshot your post; the internet archive may manually or automatically take a snapshot of older content; or a person might still have "friends" access and then leak the details of a post outside of "friendslock", which would make semi-private material accessible to the public again even though you've tried to lock it down. But for the most part, you much less run into the issue where something you wrote when you were 16 is still public knowledge and can't be scrubbed from the internet. And because privacy settings are such a big feature of the site, there are strong social norms against violating someone's privacy by sharing details they've posted semi-privately outside of that space. I really like this aspect of Dreamwidth because being able to write up my thoughts on very personal things I'm thinking about or going through and have some close internet friends who I trust share their thoughts in response has been so helpful to me throughout my life. There are a lot of mental health benefits to keeping a diary and even more so when you can get semi-anonymous advice from people you know and trust on the internet. I cannot tell you how invaluable it has been to panic or vent about some situation I'm encountering for the first time and have an older and wiser friend give me some advice on how to approach it. I've really grown as a person through first LiveJournal and now Dreamwidth as its replacement because of the semi-anonymous (pseudonymous) AND semi-private way you interact with the site and other users, and I don't know any other social media website that can do this, except I suppose through DMs, but that always feels like having a side conversation whereas doing it on a journaling site makes it the main conversation, where it's easier to organize/search/sort through.

Dreamwidth was forked from LiveJournal many years ago by a small group of people who are very thoughtful and intentional about site design and purpose. You can see in the way DW and LJ have diverged since what the value is in having site runners who have a philosophy about approaching websites that's more than just "make money/break even." Dreamwidth is very "shoestring budget" in its feel -- it has fewer features, development is slow and (I'm guessing) largely done by the site founders or volunteers, and bugs are slow to fix. But on the flipside, the site is simple and loads quickly, the default look of the site is very clean and easy to read, and in addition, the site allows you to fully customize the default style in which content is displayed to you, something that other social media sites will never do (aside from a "dark mode", I suppose) because being able to establish and fully control the site look is key for a company's/website's branding. However, Dreamwidth goes another direction, because accessibility and accessibility features have been a value of the site owners from the founding, and they take that seriously. Dreamwidth is also very intentional about its content policy and takes pains to maximize free expression while still maintaining a safe environment conducive for dialogue and debate for its users. Finally, there are no advertisements on the site anywhere at all. Zero. How does the site support itself, then, you ask? It's based on a paid subscription model where a core of passionate users are willing to pay some money each year so that the site is able to support the amount of users/traffic it gets. This funding model means that the site remains the product being sold rather than the users (and their data/eyeballs). This is a good alignment to have because you want the site to be incentivized to be useful and valuable to users rather than to harvest as much as it can from its users so as to be useful and valuable to advertisers. Dreamwidth takes security seriously and keeps its users informed about potential security breaches (e.g. one where LJ's passwords were compromised, which led to DW accounts using the same password being similarly compromised). A comparison of what Dreamwidth and LiveJournal are like now is illustrative -- I find LiveJournal almost unusable because of the ads, loading times, and just general janky interface; LJ has also been subject to multiple purges and controversial content policy changes over the years. Being on Dreamwidth is almost calming and relaxing by contrast, even though it is clearly missing some obvious and sometimes very useful features like post-/comment-liking, video uploading, post scheduling, etc.

How tagging works on Dreamwidth: This is probably the biggest difference in how Tumblr/AO3 and Dreamwidth work. On Tumblr and AO3, tags are universal across the whole site. When you tag a post with something, then it will appear in global searches for anyone browsing that tag. Heck, on Tumblr, it might pop up unsolicited on someone's dash if they follow that tag. Tags are the main way people find and are recommended content from people they're not already following. On Dreamwidth, though, tags only apply to your blog. There is no universal tag search. I mean, you can search Dreamwidth for content you're interested in; you can also search users based on what tags they've listed in their "Interests." In my experience, though, this tends to not really turn up much useful stuff; you'll likely get a lot of weird/niche content probably not meant to be viewed by a wider audience, as well as users and communities who haven't updated their journal in, like, five years. Not very useful. (In general, content production and content discovery are extremely anemic on DW, a downside I discuss more fully below.) However, what this means is that tags are 100% geared toward the function of helping you organize your own blog. You have full control over your tagging scheme. Much more than any social media website I can think of (Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and Instagram for sure), Dreamwidth facilitates having a complete record of every post you've written and helps you easily find specific content again even if you wrote it years in the past. This is why I say the site is very good for journaling. It's easy to double-check things like: "In order for people to understand this part, they need to read that post where I talked about that grocery store incident. Where is that post?" "How long have I been having this issue at work? Oh wow, my first post on this was eight months ago." "Where are all the posts I've made with my TV show reviews?" (Tip: The default setting on Dreamwidth is to display only a selection of the most frequently used tags in alphabetical order on your main journal page; I would recommend overriding this immediately to set it to show all tags because your tags are going to be a SUPER useful navigation tool for sorting through your own posts.)

Features that support having actual conversations with your friends rather than shouting one-sidedly into the void and maybe getting a supportive like in response IDK: Fully-threaded comments (and also, no "like" button). *old lady voice* Kids these days don't appreciate the value of a fully-functional comment threading system! Okay, so Dreamwidth allows you to start new comments in response to a post and reply freely to other comments, creating a kind of hierarchical tree structure. All the discussion associated with a post is viewable on a single page, and this means you can have a pretty detailed back-and-forth with the author of a post without coming off as hostile or without awkwardly spamming your followers with one half of the conversation, which is how conversations work on Tumblr. The comment character limit is 16k characters (~2500 words) so you can reply fully to a post rather than needing to condense the essence of your reply into a brief comment. You can talk not only to your friends but also to your friends' friends who are contributing to the discussion too. Separation of public and private spaces: I won't go into this too much but Dreamwidth has "personal blogs" (private spaces) and "communities" (public spaces moderated by the leader of the community) that work very differently (have completely different mechanics underlying them). Unlike Tumblr and Twitter, this means there is a clear separation between public and private spaces, behavior norms in each, and who you're accountable to when interacting in each space, which does a lot to ease social interactions and make them less fraught and contentious. And unlike sites like Reddit, you actually GET a private space without having to interact entirely in communities/special interest forums. These sets of features means that you can have a very deep, easy-to-follow conversation in a semi-public forum on a wide variety of topics while keeping the conversation all in one place and allowing interested people to follow the conversation. It's just a set of features that prioritizes responding to content with high-quality conversation rather than the mere sharing of content without comment.

If you're interested in joining Dreamwidth, here is a word of warning and then advice:

The warning is that, unlike Tumblr, it is very hard to make friends on DW. On Tumblr, you can make friends by browsing tags and journals of people who post things relevant to your interests or who interact on the posts YOU'RE making and sharing; you can follow someone whose content you enjoy and want to continue seeing and maybe they follow you back and start interacting with your posts! Cool. Easy. DW makes this process problematic in many ways: (1) as mentioned earlier, content discovery is difficult, (2) in some cases, most or all of people's content may be friendslocked which means you cannot preview it before you decide to approach someone suggesting to be friends, (3) assuming you do find a stranger whose (public) content is interesting, you can "subscribe" to them (the equivalent of following on Tumblr; their content now regularly shows up on your dash ("friends page")) and/or "friend" them (this will give them access to YOUR friendslocked posts); the person you subscribe to or friend will get a notification of this action, but this doesn't actually mean you are or will be "friends." You see, in order to be friends, someone needs to subscribe and friend you back. For the first thing, that means being interested in your content (usually not an issue; even if you don't have any content, people are willing to take a chance on you and subscribe back). But the second thing is more important -- by friending you back, that will grant access to all the friendslocked entries. Just because some stranger on the internet is interested in what you post and is like "Friends?" and give you access to their friendslocked entries doesn't mean you actually trust that person enough to give them full access to your years and years of friendslocked writing, you know what I mean? So making a random friend request might just result in being completely ignored. Instead, you often need to give someone the context for why you are interested in being friends, introduce yourself, and ask for their permission to friend before hitting that button.

Okay, so what this means is that it is very hard to find potential friends on DW and trying to friend people can be way more work than creating a new account and clicking some buttons on people's profiles. So how do people make friends on DW?! In order to get around this, people have come up with several things:

Friending memes: These are activities that happen every so often where someone gives people a form to fill out (where you talk about various interests and type of things you post about on your blog, potential dealbreakers in your content, etc.) and people browse through other people's comments and when they find someone who looks interesting, they can reply and be like "Hey! You seem like an interesting person. I also post about camping and photography. Want to be friends?" It's like, uh, speed dating but for online friends? This is much better than a cold approach as described above. In particular, every January on Dreamwidth, a group of people runs an activity called the Snowflake Challenge, where they have various fannish activities and challenges and you can choose to participate in whichever ones you like. A lot of them act as kind of icebreaker questions, and you can strike up conversations with other people by browsing things they've posted, and at some point in the activity, there's always a friending meme. Usually reccing active communities and helpful resources on DW is also part of the Snowflake Challenge (which is SUPER useful because being on DW can be like walking through a graveyard sometimes), so it's great for people who are new.

Stickied friending posts at the top of journals. These posts will often explain what kind of journal the person keeps, what content they post, how much of their journal is friendslocked, requirements for friending, etc. Comment there to introduce yourself, explain why you are interested in friending this person, ask to be friended back, etc.

Participate in public-space "communities" first and use that to find friends. Okay, okay, a bit difficult because there are a lot of communities on DW that are *tumbleweed blowing in the wind* -- dead. Abandoned. So quiet and unresponsive that it's almost worse than being fully dead because there are people there who will sometimes give you a bite but it's just not enough to feel worth the time and now you're all embarrassed for yourselves and each other. Here are some recs of active communities: dw_community_promo (for finding (newly) active communities, not necessarily fannish in nature); fandom_on_dw (any kind of fannish activities/communities); fandomcalendar (fannish events); thefridayfive (a currently active community that posts a collection of five questions each Friday; great for icebreakers and you can browse other people's answers); addme_fandom (if a friending meme were a community instead; this comm also has a lot of resources for new joiners of DW in its sticky post). Active but maybe a bit drama-llama-y (you may or may not enjoy these): fandomsecrets (an EXTREMELY long-running community run by maybe the most tireless/superhuman mod I know of; you can anonymously submit images containing a fandom-related secret you have, and they get posted in random order over the following week and people discuss in the comments -- it's a great multifandom space, especially if you want to vent about some fandom drama you're going through or an unpopular opinion you have, but can be intimidating to interact there non-anonymously due to the nature/contentiousness of the secrets/discussions sometimes; also, sometimes people are mean :(); fail_fandomanon (a fandom gossip comm, essentially, but also a good multifandom discussion place; very difficult to find friends, though, due to the anonymous posting requirement but it's very active and gives you plenty of reading material if you largely like to use social media to read interesting stuff you didn't know about before. Also, its "Ask meme" threads and its personal posts are great for getting anonymous help and advice -- like you know those newspaper advice columns or r/AITA or r/relationships? That kind of thing. You can be very detailed about an issue you're having in your personal life and people will give you advice. Even more so than fandomsecrets, "lightly bitchy and petty" is kind of the vibe of this place, and anonymous trolling is commonplace (one rule of the comm is "don't be THAT much of an asshole" which kind of gives you an idea of what baseline level of politeness we're talking about here). It's got a complicated set of norms that have developed over time (see, for example, the elaborate comment titles and the sheer number of acronyms flying around), which can make the learning curve for delurking pretty steep.

Weirdly, the type of communities in which I have made the longest-lasting LJ/DW friends have been "landcomms," a special kind of competitive fannish activity community. I think they were based on the House Cup of Harry Potter. At least, it's easiest to explain it that way: there are multiple "games"/"rounds" (each lasting 3 months, say) where all the participants are sorted into teams, and they earn points for their team by participating in various challenges and activities set up by the mods. I no longer have time to really be active in any of these but WOW they really help you make friends who you know pretty deeply because you're interacting and strategizing with your fellow teammates, and over time you get to know the regulars quite well. These communities often lock all their content and activities to members only, which means that it's a good sandbox to experiment with fannish creation because the audience is fairly small and a priori quite supportive. You can experiment and put your work out there in a way that isn't like "now everyone on the internet has access to this and can judge it." Anyway, I'm too old to participate in these, but apparently lands_of_magic is an active multifandom landcomm and might be worth checking out.

Some other random features of Dreamwidth that I like, and also the major weaknesses of Dreamwidth as a site:

Strength: You get multiple icons/userpics. It's kind of weird to me that social media sites have done away with the ability for users to have multiple userpics (I suppose it does make it easier to identify who is saying what!), but in any case, this is a weirdly unique feature that LJ/DW have -- you can upload multiple 100x100 little images and choose which one to accompany each post and comment you make (or just use your default icon). Icons on DW, to me, are like custom emoji on Discord. They are ways to be expressive through images without the need for words, they can be quite personal, you get some slots for free, but because a lot of people get REALLY into them, users are literally willing to pay money for more slots that they can use. Anyway, you get 15 icon slots by default, and there are a lot of users and communities dedicated to making icons that people can use. It's fun!

Strength: Dreamwidth has a very powerful and simple HTML editor. Weakness: I have never used Dreamwidth's rich text editor, and everything I hear from people who have used it suggests it is an unusuable eldritch horror. Cannot verify that experience, but even without using it, I am pretty confident that DW's "WYSIWYG" editing ("what you see is what you get" -- that is, however you format a post while drafting it, that's what it will look like to other people when posting) is extremely far behind other social media sites. If I were to post and format this post on Dreamwidth (and I will), I would be able to do a lot more with controlling how the bulletpoints look and are nested, and I could do things like create sections in the post that make it easy to navigate to specific sections, and I could do things like add tables and collapsible sections because I think Dreamwidth allows almost any HTML5 tag (more so than e.g. what AO3 allows). On the negative side, however, it is much harder to do things like arrange images in a photoset on Dreamwidth. In short, you WILL need some kind of HTML knowledge to do anything fancier than paragraphs of text (images, embeds, polls, bulleted lists, etc.). However, if text is all you're doing, it's a really nice editor. And for power users, HTML is a good skill to have and unlocks a lot of possibilities with your posts, and DW is one of the best interfaces for doing pared-down, simplified HTML editing I've ever used.

Strength: Some more on accessibility: So remember how I said that DW lets you control the way the site is displayed to you? This means you can heavily customize how your reading page and blog looks, what links and sidebar widgets are available and where they're placed on the page, etc. But you know, that kind of freedom can be dangerous. As you might know well from Tumblr, what about people with custom blog styles that are a horrendous viewing experience -- autoplay music, flashing gifs, low text-background contrast, color scheme that makes your eyes burn, etc.? Well, DW has thought about that. Whenever you get a link to a DW post or someone's DW blog and you don't like the style, you can just append ?style=site OR ?style=mine OR ?style=light to the URL and voila -- it's readable again. ?style=site will display the page in DW's standard style which is a light grey + red/pink highlights style that is designed to be easy on the eyes. ?style=mine will display the page in YOUR custom style, so if you've made tweaks to the site style to optimize your reading experience, you can now apply it everywhere you like. Finally, ?style=light displays the page with minimal styling so that it can be loaded quickly in situations where your connection is bad. All of these things allow you to have an optimal reading experience.

Strength: Polls. If you have a paid account, Dreamwidth lets you make polls. This is probably the number one reason why I have a paid DW account, to be honest, because polls are really useful for running communities and getting feedback. Like, when I mod communities and I want to get the opinion of members, I can post a poll, and my paid account lets me do this in any community as well as on my personal journal. I used to run a lot of fanwork contest type communities, and you can conduct voting pretty easily that gives each user one vote, which is hard to ensure through third-party voting mechanisms. The downside here is that the opposite is not possible -- you can't run a poll that is open to the general public. I believe all poll participants need to have a DW account in order to participate.

Weakness: Dreamwidth's image-posting capabilities are still quite weak. It is only relatively recently that Dreamwidth allowed you to upload images to the site at all. A free account gives you only 500 MB, which is enough if you want to post a graphic or a photo here and there but not a lot if you're posting e.g. your full set of vacation photos or gifsets or reams of screencaps or whatnot. The upload interface leaves much to be desired. It is very difficult to add images to posts -- you either need to use the rich text editor (which comes with its own set of challenges) or you need to be pretty comfortable with HTML and understanding what <img src=""> means. DW does provide some copy and pasteable HTML code to put your image into the HTML post editor, but yeah, putting an image in a post is not the click-and-drag experience that it is on most modern social media sites. When I want to add some images to a post, the process is like this: Open a new tab and go to the DW homepage. Click Create > Upload Images. Upload files. Make sure the privacy settings of the images match my post. Get each image embed code and go back to my other tab where I'm editing my post and paste it in. Repeat for all images. Yay. It is certainly not a simple experience.

Weakness: There is no reblog function. This can have some benefits: as mentioned, you own the only copy of your post -- if other people want to share it, they have to give people the URL to it. However, let me be very frank about the downsides: it means that Dreamwidth is not a low-effort content-sharing website like most social media sites are nowadays, which has two major ramifications: First, you cannot create an interesting blog simply by following interesting blogs and curating an interesting feed. I mean, I suppose you can kind of do this by collecting interesting links and posting them as a DW post every so often, but that's still very different from how modern social media works where you just directly share the interesting content and that IS your blog. What this means is that in order to have an interesting blog, YOU have to consciously craft/draft your own interesting content from time to time; you cannot just rely on encountering interesting content from other people. What THIS means is that your DW blog is inevitably going to be quite personal. This can be pretty intimidating for someone who is starting out. I remember my first LiveJournal post (which even 18 years later took me about 10 seconds to pull up on my laptop -- the archival functions of DW are AMAZING) was essentially me saying "Hm… well I got this LJ but I don't know what kind of things to use this thing for or how long I'm going to keep it…" Anyway, it's always very awkward starting up a DW blog because you can't just find some content you find really cool and just share it and people get to know you and your tastes and your interests that way. Nah, you're kind of thrown into the oversharing deep end here. You're going to have to personally write something if you want people to have something to read. Second, keeping a DW blog can be a non-trivial amount of effort. Like I mentioned, you can certainly use your blog to curate content, but it requires some amount of work and effort to do even that. You can't just scroll and click and bam, you've added some content to your blog.

Weakness: Dreamwidth is very lo-fi and text-based. I mentioned the difficulties of uploading images; I mentioned the lack of a share button. What Dreamwidth is geared toward is plain text posts. I recognize this is very not ideal -- where are the visual aids? The images to break up all the dry walls of text? The whole experience of being on Dreamwidth is doing a lot of reading. And a lot of writing. A LOT. Sometimes people just don't have time for that. I get it. I mean, you can choose how often and how much to write and how much of your reading page you want to read, but regardless of how frequently and for how long you choose to engage with the site, it is never going to be an easy scrolling, filling-a-three-minute-lull-in-the-middle-of-the-work-day sort of experience, IMO. The content can be very interesting but it's got a high barrier to entry.

Weakness: Content discovery is very difficult. I discussed this earlier. But Dreamwidth really doesn't do much to shove content in your face. It doesn't have recommendation algorithms. This can be good because it helps you curate your feed to content you enjoy and people you trust, so you rarely have to block people because they are irritating you. You can just not follow them or easily scroll by their posts (DW is very text-based and high barrier to entry, right, so it takes a lot of conscious effort to consume content; it's not the type of site where you can run across the worst opinion you've ever read in your life and by the time you realize what it is, you've consumed the whole post). Spammers also aren't really a thing. But it means that you really do need to build up an interesting set of people/communities to follow or there's nothing for you to read or DO on the site. It also means that people will not just stumble across YOUR posts unless you put forward effort to promote them somewhere (e.g. in an active relevant community, which, you know, may not exist). You're never going to get that dopamine hit of people liking and reblogging your stuff instantly after you post it. And even when you want to share something widely, it can be tricky trying to figure out whether that's possible at all. Strength: On the plus side, I suppose it really is like having a private little sandbox. Like you're over here going "vroom vroom" with your toy cars or whatever, and it's extremely unlikely you'll get some rando barging into your replies talking about how your car-playing is all WRONG and here's what you should do instead.

Weakness: Dreamwidth is "dead." I mean, you can still find plenty of people who are active on DW. I have a great, very active set of friends whose posts I enjoy reading (and they all post different sorts of things; I have enough friends that I can't actually read all the content I'm interested in, but I do try) and who regularly respond to my posts. I'm very happy there. Personal blogs are doing fine. But personal blogs are only one half of Dreamwidth -- the other half are communities (public spaces) and those are not doing so well in my experience. You have a couple of active islands I mentioned above, and if your fandoms are sufficiently big, you can probably find an active discussion comm for them. But if your fandoms are small or even if you're in a big fandom that just doesn't seem to have found a dedicated mod and a critical mass of active users interested in public discussions, then you're shit out of luck when it comes to public discussion venues on DW. Depending on your needs/interests, this might be fine, or it might be a dealbreaker. For me personally, as someone who was on LJ in its heyday, the lack of communities is a bit demoralizing. It's certainly quieter and it has this feel of there being a few towers of refuge in a barren landscape that people are flocking around. And like I said, communities help you make friends. And it's just a different way of interacting with people, which I value in a social media site, and I can't really meet that need on DW with the current size of its userbase.

Weakness: There is no ask system. There are DMs; sometimes people play askbox meme-style games in the comment of posts (someone posts a list of questions, people comment to select the ones they want the OP to answer, OP replies in the comment thread with their answers); and I suppose you could create a stickied post with anonymous comments enabled to act as your askbox, but there's really no equivalent to the big set of functionality that is the askbox system on Tumblr. There's no way to privately ask someone a question, and that question can then easily be published or replied to privately at the discretion of the blog owner. If you'd like to poke someone to check in with them, the only way to do that is with a DM or a comment posted on a random blog entry; there's not really an easy way to ask a question or propose some content to someone's blog with asks the way there is on Tumblr.

Anyway, I think I've covered the main things about using Dreamwidth. I always want more people to come talk to me on Dreamwidth because I feel like that site is the only place that facilitates people getting to know me both on a purely fannish level and on a very personal level (I know people can make the personal + fannish sharing combo work on Twitter and Tumblr, but having everything be out in public just really does not work for me). But I realize it's hard to just start using a site you're unfamiliar with, especially one like Dreamwidth that tends to have a bit of a learning curve and is generally out of step with the direction of modern social media. And especially when you don't have many friends there already, which is probably the case for most people. But it's a site I respect and trust a lot, and I think it facilitates deep, long-lasting friendships. More than anything, I think the main difference between DW and Tumblr is that Tumblr is mainly a site for sharing content with other people and reacting to it, while DW is more geared toward helping you organize your life and your thoughts. They have a lot of overlap in terms of the kind of personal and fannish musings and experiences that can be shared, though. Anyway, if you're interested in joining Dreamwidth but it's intimidating/confusing, please reach out! I have lots more recs for active communities depending on your interests, too!

(Probably the best way to do that is on the Dreamwidth version of this post.)

#anyway posts like this are why I'm not a good fit for Tumblr lol #social media #dreamwidth #complaining about tumblr on tumblr

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tea-cat-arts · 2 years ago

Note

(disclaimer, I am irritated. This is a point I've had to explain to a lot of people who arent designers, and it gets really irritating: you do not have to like a design for it to be an objectively good design. My comments are on what makes an objectively good design, not what I personally like in a design. There are a lot of objectively good designs that I dont like, and plenty of bad designs that I do like)

I AM LITERALLY IN SCHOOL FOR CHARACTER DESIGN!!! I AM SPEAKING FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF SOMEONE WHO REGUALLY HAS TO MAKE DESIGNS THAT PASS THE VIBE CHECK FROM 3 50+ YEAR OLD WHITE MEN WITH VARYING IDEOLIGIES AND MY 1 COOL 30 YEAR OLD LESBIAN PROFFESOR. So, ya, I know damn well I dont know or understand every possible aspect of design and I'll always have more to learn, but I do know what I'm talking about to a degree.

I'm not rationalizing likability of design. The categories I listed are some things I randomly decided, its literally the metric every single assignment I've done has been graded on. Color usage, silhouette, and story telling are basically to design what grammar, spelling, and structure are to writing. And ya- theres still a degree of subjectivity to it, but these are still they're still based in actual design theory and they're the most objective measures artists have to critique design.

Personal comfort is not an objective metric because whats considered comfortable is different for literally every person on the face of the planet. For example, you mentioned finding Vita's design comfortable looking, but it sure as hell wouldnt be comfortable to me (I just hate wearing skirts that go bellow like... my mid thigh? No idea why, I just do). I love wearing skinny jeans, while they make some of my friends wamt to crawl out of their skin. Some people like crop tops, others would rather die than show their stomachs. Some people can do back flips in 10 inch heals where as others cant walk 2 steps in them... you get the gist. If I included comfort as a metric, HoV would be F tier just because I hate tight shirts and lots of tight things around my neck (and like, only an absolute clown would put HoV's design in F tier)

Fetishization is a more complicated category when it comes to objectively judging design and I don't have the time to have that discussion now. My general opinion is "leave minors alone, otherwise horny design is fine so long as your equal oportunity with it," but thats just a me thing #feed the bisexuals 2023 #men deserve tits out ass out outfits too. It sounds like we more or less agree on this though

You called me hauty, but to me it sounds like you're saying "my personal taste in clothes should be included as an objective measure to judge design," (feel free to correct me if thats not what you meant) and that doesnt seem like even remotely fair to the designers (in my opinion). You also completely dismissed the part where I explained how uncomfortable design can be used in story telling, which was kinda just irritating

Also, please know I say this all as someone whos been that bitch (aka, the non-proffesional artists who drives proffesional artists insane by "critiquing" designs based on aesthetics I personally dislike), then spent a couple years getting humbled by my professors and other artists online. I very much had to learn that I didnt know what good design is. (There are so many bad design habbits I had no unlearn ✊️😔. ) Things like comfortability, practicality, and wearability are perfectly fair and rational metrics for judging how much you like a design, but it is completely unfair to call a design bad just because it doesn't cater to your values. Or at the very least if you're just bitching about a design you dont like, try and make it clear thats what you're doing (thats what I do with Hare's design :/)

Am I crazy or are Aponia's sleeves not connected to the rest of her outfit? There is a lot I don't like about her design (which is a shame since I really like her), but this one thing is driving me up the wall.

They're disconnected, you're good 👍 . You are free to like or dislike whatever you want, but here's my perspective on this (not gonna judge if you still disagree after my explanation)

Whether or not a character design functions like regular clothing isn't something that really matters to me? I'm more interested in the amount of info the design gives on the character and how well its communicated. I'm usually pretty neutral on design until after I've stared at them for awhile, and because I've done some pretty detailed drawings of Aponia (and most of the flame chasers) I've spent a lot of time staring at her and oh boy- her design is a treasure trove of tiny details (from the various pieces of her hand made jewelry and lace accessories hinting at her appreciation of luxuries, to the plants creeping up her design and breaking the symmetry eluding to the nature/fate breaking her illusion of control)

Tldr: I think Aponia has one of the best designs in honkai and if this is the hill I die on, so be it

#Yall dont understand just how many of my personal values I leave out of my design rankings #Cuz I have so much beef with how mihoyo handles body type skin tone and hair texture #Also got beef with how they handle children #You think itd be perfectly fair for me to say every Theresa design is bad because I hate legal lolis?#Every time you respond to one of my posts like this I just get a vivid flashback to that post you made like a year ago I think #The one that basically said “content creators arent obligated to make content for you. If you dont like dont read”#But anyways- I wouldn't claim to know more about computer programing than you just cuz I learned scratch #My housemate would probably smack me if I tried lol #But thats basically the energy non-artists have when they critique art #Theres so many more things that count as good design than you'd typically think

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painted-crow · 4 years ago

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*pats pockets* I think I dropped something.

me: hey quiz, have you seen my Puff primary model anywhere?

SHC quiz: what Puff primary model?

me: you know the one, it was really loud. you used to Sort me as Puff even over Ravenclaw.

quiz: besides your obvious Claw, I only see Gryff here. why do you think you have a Puff model?

me: check again

quiz: nope, can't find it. when did you see it last?

me: uhhhhh... I haven't been keeping track of it much lately.

quiz:

me: I may have been... intentionally shutting it out actually?

me: in my defense, it's exhausting having that strong of an impulse to care for strangers hardwired into your emotions during a time when--

quiz: are you 100% sure you didn't set it on fire?

quiz: like, even just a little?

me: ...oops

me: I may have. wait, shouldn't I be upset about that? this is weird.

me: some of its ideals are still here, but it feels really different, like it's just another part of my system. my Gryff tendencies used to feel like this.

quiz: you totally do have a Gryff model tho

me: yeah... I don't mind that either

me: I think it's an upgrade actually

quiz: oh? why?

..........

*swirly flashback fade-out*

claw primary: hey, this dude needs something we're good at. should we offer to help?

puff model: everyone deserves help when they're in need

claw: but should it come from us?

puff: that depends on our situation, not his. we shouldn't discriminate

claw: okay... we have the time, but maybe not the energy. but that's unpredictable, subjective, and hard to measure. this is a bad metric for making decisions.

puff: err on the side of kindness, then.

versus:

claw primary: should we help?

gryff model: nah

claw: why not?

gryff: too tired. besides, he gives off vibes like he'd be a pain to work with. help the next person who isn't a jerk.

claw secondary: so I read a new book and now I know more stuff

puff primary model: that's nice but it's not worth much unless you can use it to benefit others

(An actual sentiment I wrote about, over a year ago, in one of my very first SHC posts. I dug it up and reblogged it, it should be posted by now. Granted, my Claw secondary was burned at the time and I generally felt that it wasn't that useful, but which is the chicken and which is the egg here?)

claw secondary: new skill--hold my ramune and watch this!

gryff primary model: oh sweet

claw secondary: ...you don't want me to justify it, or...?

gryff: uh, why would you need to?

claw: ...no reason ^^

..........

me: it... could have been healthier.

me: also, my system has gradually changed to the point where Gryff just meshes better. I've changed a lot of the parts Puff used to fit into, and for good reason.

me: but that's not why I dropped it initially.

me: I shelved Puff on purpose almost a year ago, like how you'd pop the battery out of an old laptop to minimize the damage if you spilled water on it. I've burned that model before, it's exhausting.

me: and after a few weeks modeling Puff during 2020, I knew that was on the horizon. caring for my family and friends was enough of a task without that deep sense of "there's a need in front of me, it's partly my responsibility to help"

me: so I purposely decided to focus only on things I could actually affect, and that meant blocking Puff out for a while.

me: I wasn't expecting to drop it entirely, but... maybe I don't need it anymore. or not in the same way.

quiz: but, you also mentioned Claw secondary? I was going to suggest Puff secondary first.

me: no sweetie, that's just the model I've been leaning on for the past month because I burned Claw secondary again

quiz: for the love of pizza, someone take this girl's lighter away

me: it's pronounced "depression"

#sortinghatchats #ravenclaw primary #gryffindor primary model #hufflepuff primary model #shc models #paint speaks #this post screams ravenclaw primary #q

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thequibblah · 4 years ago

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directors cut for WTRF? 🥺👉👈 not biased at all obviously just objective third party asking for a directors cut hmmm hmmmmm

literally how could u do this every other word in that fic is an easter egg i can't shut up about..... bestie u are about to have regrets

one thing u should know is that 90% of things in this fic have real-world equivalents and its not even like....... hidden equivalents. serie primo = serie a, for instance. this trend is going to continue and i won't apologise <3

fun fact i named the bar the Bar and the drinks after shapes because i was too lazy to come up with something actually clever

this bit

I’m grinning to myself by the time she approaches my table.

was a very intentional fakeout and if you read this and thought "she" would be lily, feel free to sue me for emotional damages

the biggest conundrum of this AU was, how are jily not going to have met in school when magic exists? the solution was, of course, having multiple magic schools. but i couldn't let one of them have hogwarts, that didn't seem fair. i know i did sort of let lily have it..... but i felt more comfortable making hogwarts a university so there was a legit reason why james wasn't there and in gryffindor (if he'd gone he absolutely would have been)

once solved, i did the fun thing of naming them! ottaline gambol's was easy, i just scrolled through the list of ministers for magic and picked a progressive one. peverell hall was a whim, made all the funnier when lily's reaction is:

Much was made at Otty’s — one of the more progressive magical schools, named for one of the more progressive Ministers of Magic — of schools like Peverell Hall and St. George’s. The latter, I know, is chock-full of pureblooded elite. Peverell Hall is supposed to be slightly better, but still.

dang, it's gonna be funny if she ever finds out james is a descendant of the guy it's named after

fun fact, i included this because peter's question was a real thought i had when reading bond and free, your inspiring writing knows no limits:

The first thing you conjure in Walking Wombat is a yellow quill... “Why yellow?” Peter asked. Eddie gave him a strange look. “Why not?”

i realised i'd put jily in the same conundrum they had in tis the fucking season here:

It’s only then that I remember she’s just bought us drinks. I turn back to my triangle. “Oh, shit.” I suppose I can pawn it off on one of the others.

...but of course the resolution is rather different, and i do so enjoy a james with no filter (aka default james)

I briefly lose control of my brain and my tongue. “Is it too soon to say I’m in love with you?”

by the way, no-filter james will be a theme. wild things sure do run fast but not as fast as this boy runs his mouth!

also, another interesting challenge here was making sure james has a reason to be the way he is in AU. i love playing around with james's childhood/background and seeing how that affects his character while (hopefully!) staying true to who he is. i did that in ttfs by having him move around a lot and not meet the marauders until after the flashback timeline, which is why he's less of a git — he doesn't have the level of comfort in a social setting that canon james has with hogwarts, which is basically his playground from day 2 of first year lol

here, james was probably a fkn nightmare all through school, but of course he gets a big ego check when his quidditch career is derailed. i imagine his years in italy as a continuation of that humility lesson.

I will fully admit I used to be a cocky prick. This is what comes of being a kid who grew up with everything. But one useful thing that the whole fiasco four years ago taught me is humility. I’ve learned how to ask nicely for another chance.

and so much of writing him in wtrf is juggling that typical confidence with the insecurity/fear of losing something he's invested so much in (and has seen slip away before). it's really new to me, because typically i give lily uncertain life circumstances, but i suppose it's both of them in this AU.

the car thing was... i swear didn't start out as smutty, it was purely because i wanted a way to establish lily as muggleborn in a world where the connotations of not having magical parents is very different. more to come on that!

also, come to think of it, by this metric...

I’m now in dangerous territory, since that adds another impressive action to her running tally.

...i think james is already in love with her LOL

this bit:

The street is considered indecent and the downstairs hallway would have our landlady come running at once, so if it pleases Your Honour, we would recommend the sitting room sofa.

...was actually because in draft one lily was a lawyer, but then it was funny enough that i didn't want to take it out, but NOW i realise it makes it sound a little like she's addressing james as your honour, which.... hm. but anyway, we move on

Marc Bolan begs us to get it on through the stereo, vocalising my thoughts exactly.

the song here was initially "you shook me" (h/t @keepingupwithpotters) but i chickened out because zeppelin is SO horny dfjkhgkjs

also, it gave me so much joy to read everyone reacting to lily thinking about her ex (the general vibe was "who the fuck is this guy!!! ew!!!!") — rest assured (or, unassured??) that he has a part to play in all this. anyway, this is one of my fave lines:

He’s just a person, and there’s such a relief in sleeping with James and not the myth of a guy.

because as any come together reader knows....

Just James. Just James. It was never just James.

wtrf lily will learn!

literally the whole world knows i'm obsessed with needle drops that have no subtlety at all, but this one...

We just laugh, tangled together in a sweaty heap, as “Heaven Is in the Back Seat of My Cadillac” plays through the car’s speakers. “On the nose, isn’t it?” James says, sitting up.

...was pure luck, because i was looking up the top hits on the uk singles chart for the week(ish) this scene takes place in so that i could find a song that would realistically play on the radio, saw this, and was like omg the stars really do align

i feel like the thing i enjoy most about writing romance is the importance i get to place in noticing/looking/observing (and sometimes, not noticing!). it's just such a powerful but simple writerly tool, and god knows i am obsessed with pithy descriptions anyway, so this bit i am especially happy with:

James is already waiting, leaning against the car with his hands in his pockets. I feel as though I’m seeing him for the first time, the faint light of the flickering streetlamp catching him in profile: the strong slope of his nose, the hard line of his jaw, the curve of his smile. He studies the facade of our building with open curiosity, and I wonder what he’s looking for.

(one can only imagine james's train of thought in this moment. perhaps "ah. here lives the future love of my life"?)

“Thanks,” she tacks on at the end. I tip my head to one side in confusion. “For what?” “For, I don’t know. Being nice.” She laughs awkwardly. “I don’t do this very much.”

it wouldn't be a quibblah original tee em without some discourse to come about the nature of romantic/sexual relationships, would it? one thing i enjoy about this AU ("one thing" i say as if this isn't the billionth thing in a list) is that i get to write a romantic lily who's squaring that romanticism with what she perceives as the culture of the times. (this is a bit of a staple in all my characterisations of lily, but it is not often paired with casual sex, the complication of all complications!)

oh this bit literally wrote itself like i didn't even pause to think just vomited it out:

In the morning — and it must be early still — the sun streams through Lily’s sorry excuses for curtains with aggression that cannot be ignored. I crack open an eye to find myself sprawled out across her bed, quite literally spread-eagled. She’s attached to my side like a barnacle. Or a very pretty barnacle, anyway.

i'm especially proud of james's voice in this story. i don't often write first-person fic and i was worried how it'd turn out, but i think james as a character/narrator typically colours his own 3rd-person narration so strongly that it ended up a smoother transition than i'd feared!

also i just. i can't resist throwing in comic relief and i hope that this whole segment was a gentle enough preparation for the awkwardness that followed LOL

All of a sudden, the balcony door bursts open. I nearly drop the mug. “What the—” Mary pokes her head around the corner, sporting a righteous smile. “Morning, handsome.” Over her shoulder she shouts, “He’s on the balcony!” I blink. There’s a sound from inside the flat, as if something very large has just been dropped. Then a swear. “Oh, shit,” I say, realisation dawning, “you weren’t looking for me, were you? It’s so loud out here—” Mary cups a hand around her mouth and stage-whispers, “Lily was frantic.” She’s quite violently yanked back, and Lily herself appears in the doorway, slightly out of breath. “Should’ve checked the balcony first,” she says, and closes the door before Mary can insert herself into the space again. “Hi,” I say, which is agreed-upon best practice for greeting a woman you’ve just had fantastic sex with and ideally would like to have sex with again.

to this day i don't know what lily dropped. let's hope it wasn't expensive!

Captained the under-17 English squad at the World Cup some years back, Serie Primo’s lead goal-scorer of last year… Only an injury in what should’ve been his first season at Puddlemere mars his record. I wince reading about it and comparing it to a heap of press clippings. James Potter was hurt, and Puddlemere didn’t fancy paying for him not to play, so they shipped him off to Milan.

(you cannot imagine how much pointed interrogation of my brother it took to gather this intel.) i constantly worry that i've got dates or timelines wrong somehow — you might notice i tweaked under-17, which used to be under-19 until i realised that made no sense (even though in terms of its career importance i would much preferred it to have been u-19.... anyway). i also found out that u-17 football squads don't actually have captains but i said fuck it on that count.

but obviously i started writing this AU for the sports possibilities, only to discover i'm going to have to interfere a great deal with the Timeline (you shall see in future instalments).

god i really went through the whole fic. like i reread the whole thing to do this. here u go clare jfbghjfd

#this has no right to be this long #wtrf #clareee75 #ask me #director's cuts

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bellojewels · 4 years ago

Text

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toddlazarski · 4 years ago

Text

Last Suppers Vol. 5

Shepherd Express

“In this past I long for, I don’t remember how even then I longed for the past.”

— Denis Johnson

In the El Tsunami parking lot in mid-January snow turns tumor-black and gets pushed, in some unholy unseen hour, into jagged triangle wedges up against the brick building, clearing space for the subsequent gray slush and glut of cars and those cars’ passengers, all trying to avoid ice-flecked black puddles and questions of why any of us would live in such an environment so threatening to dry socks. My daughter somehow eschews usually prominent stranger danger notions to cheerily, proactively, greet the panhandler just outside the door, leveling the playing field, at once, for all three of us, erasing discomfiture in smiling unexpectedness, seemingly validating good vibes therein. Inside, nursing a sportscar-red michelada, in a frosty mug of the size and depth and seriousness of an extra in that scene from Indiana Jones, the rim coated by a grainy quilt of spicy salt rendering the straw a silly suggestion, there is a pulse, well aside from the bumping telenovelas on all the TVs. It almost feels like there is a no-sitting rule for children, as they bounce around, between tables, blurring the distinctions between families, pirouetting by waitress trays, skipping and skirting and flaunting even pre-pandemic social graces. Parents look appropriately tired, waitresses overwhelmed, the end-of-week Saturday reward day is aglow, salsa-amped and horchata sugar-lit, even before a wandering mariachi duo wanders in, seemingly at random, as if they were traversing South 13th in the 30-degree day in cowboy hats, with classical guitar and accordion. By the time the oompa of alternating bass line balladry and emotively stretched squeezebox reeds mix—table to table they go, for a palmful or two of cash—with the svelty green table sauce, the ceviche dip, the warm chips, fierce, charcoal-kissed carbon tacos, or greasy smoky housemade chorizo, or oily flaky fish, it is easy and instant to forget what life resembled back in the parking lot. We’ve all, communally, arm-in-arm, with collective vision, forged the perfect escape plan.

At Vanguard, when it’s summer, or spring, or any time when the Packers are not on and it’s not a wrestling night or Halloween, when there’s room for small chat and the usual backdrop—Soul Train, maybe an O.J. Simpson workout video—there is no better feel than happy hour with exactly one open swivel black chair near the end of the bar. Even though the bartenders render me not cool enough, probably too old, far from properly bearded, I will stake a claim, rope off my spot with a hoodie on the back of the seat, like delineating property lines, as close to Manifest Destiny as I might get, sticking out elbows just a bit in subtle “don’t tread on me” histrionics. You can hover, sure, go ahead and take my drink menu, yes, food menu too, fine, oogle away at my curds and beer stein aioli all bloodied with house hot sauce, you can even talk close and ask for suggestions and pat me on the back when you lean over the shoulder to catch the barkeep’s eye. Just let me sit in the middle, in the beating heart, like the front row at a boxing match where part of the excitement is getting hit by a little sweat, like the Stubhub offerings we click just to see, front rows price tags to voyeuristically consider, to think what if? While I’m in, while the place fills to capacity—only now a nightmarish notion—-behind me, I slow-sip and savor a hungry evening bustle and a draft Manhattan, I delay gratification with menu pondering, possibility appreciating, before inevitably tackling a chilli cheese dog, a Velveeta-blanketed and appropriately-named “Durty Burger,” the whole thing a silly gesture of why not gluttonous indulgence, barely leaving room for the IPA I’m always about to order—like some kind of metaphor for the stuffed barroom itself.

These will be my first stops, when we’re all back, fully rubbing elbows, finding space in standing room only occasions. When we can be, what I’ve heard more than a few service industry folks refer to, “nuts to butts.” If and when the unidentifiable health metrics in my heart all check green, these are my buzzing Milwaukee mind spots, of food poetry yammering, of context being an ingredient, of flavor deriving as much from the atmosphere, as much from the flutter of a true peak social experience. I think of an Istanbul market, the group teem, the contrasting currents of crowds lending pick-pocket anxiety, general personal space ruffling, some dangerous enticement to the prevalent smell of roasting, rotating meat; a pizzeria in Naples, needing to engage in mosh pit antics for a spot on the list; Steny’s, for an Eastern Conference Finals Bucks game. The times to eschew ease, embrace struggle, deal with an annoyance for this will be worth it. When all is well, again, when I can cruise the city streets, casually pop in for a taco or four, stop for a beer or beers, such spots are where I might set my aims. Once so small-town, so simple-minded, now the idea of someone handing me a menu is a memory seed I treat and water like the notion of the one that got away. Here are the daydreams I’m afraid to risk, but keep tucked away in some kind of hope chest of sights to get back toward, one day, comfortably, normally, the good food times that come as much from the setting, from the moment, the people.

And I don’t even really like people.

Another thing I’m not crazy about—outside. And yet, here I am, often these days, and not just because the weather has turned friendly, ironically, as the country seems to burn, standing in my backyard, staring at the stars or the clouds, or the military-hued helicopters, sometimes, waiting for my gut, or my meat thermometer, to tell me it’s time to turn back to the Weber, flip the sausages, burgers. Always aggressively testing the tongs, grabbing at ghosts as they waft, I wistfully wonder how the maestros at Vanguard always avoid the flare-ups, the drying-out, nearly always get it all so right, the snap, one order after another, without looking like they are trying, cool in backwards hat insouciance, even when confronted by an endless stream of hungry scenesters.

Here I am, too, with makeshift picnics of Foxfire takeout fare, of taco truck tlayudas, cautiously staking a blanket claim or bench at Sheridan Park, its meandering jogging path and sweeping lake vistas leaving space for grass-tabled meals. Or at Humboldt Park, by the grimey pond that might as well be Walden’s, for the existential dread I’ve brought to it these past three months. It seems like a sanctuary of sorts, emblematic of anywhere there is space, really, from headlines, and health metrics, enough of it for nobody to be near enough to be afraid of. But of course there is no one to say gracias to after a salsa refill. There is fresh air, yes. And there is also the fending off of the geese, the dancing around of the geese poop, the chasing of napkins— inherent that any picnic venture provide at least this bit of Charlie Chaplin skit performance—and, inevitably, the throwing out of napkins because they probably touched some geese poop.

Still, with a double patty Foxfire burger, coated and buffed in salt and love and oozing American goo cheese, or with some foiled-taco steam, anywhere I might end up, today, isn’t so bad. And also, before wasn’t always good. The past is only painted in technicolor ideals in our minds, and especially now. Vanguard was many times just far too crowded, and sometimes, too many times, they forgot to toast my bun. And it felt too loud to even mention. Tsunami, despite my perpetual best efforts and bad dietary habits, has never cared I’m there, that I keep coming back, that I talk about it and write about it and bloviate. Every time I hit the door they almost always collectively look at me as if I’m lost or am about to ask to use the bathroom and then leave. In general, how many restaurant tables are too dirty? How much service is too slow? How many menus are so alike? Oh wow, look, a Southwestern Burger! How many bartenders have that attitude that this next shake of the shaker—no, this one, above the head!—could be the one to cure cancer, and how dare I interrupt or not be appropriately captivated?

The now, at least, has options. Such as, when it’s rainy, or too cold, or suddenly, too hot, we can sit in the car. The radio sounds better from in there anyways, the wind can’t steal and confetti-toss all the napkins like a cruel game of keepaway. We can think of ourselves as trying new things, embracing fresh thoughts, getting stains on our pants and shirts in different places, from different sit-and-eat situations. This month brings a new Bob Dylan album. It certainly won’t be Blonde on Blonde. It won’t even be Love and Theft. But there will be something you’ve never heard. Likewise tomorrow will bring something new, another distraction tactic, another approach, another appetite, and, if we’re lucky, another way to satisfy it.

Meanwhile, so much of the future seems to be being written for us, by unseen authors with little writing experience, the lot of them banging away on outlines behind scenes, on drafts where they can’t even fully commit to a genre. Post apocalypse-ism mixes with an economic playbook, fantasy meets self-help meets realism. Throughout, uncertainty seems to blend with malfeasance, announcements are unmade or surprise-made, or made and reversed, or misunderstood or ignored. Restaurants are not open, but tomorrow, at precisely 2pm, they can be and we will all be safe. Go ahead. Our reality, our way forward, seems tenuous, a bit dreadful, a venture out still coming with constant subconscious risk assessment, a survey of an unpredictable and maybe cataclysmic thunderstorm before a bike ride, the checks and balances on fun and need. Skipping headlines for more than a few hours seems to be willful ignorance. But maybe it’s more simple: if I can’t safely see my restaurant servers face, this situation is probably not quite right.

In our bubbles, in our political allegiances, it was easy to know where to stand, especially gauged by the actions and virally-spread photos of a bunch of boneheads at a bar Platteville, when the Supreme Court struck down caution and reason to make Wisconsin, again, a national laughing stock of unawareness. It seemed a slap in the face, the wake-up kind, a dose of belligerent selfishness. Yet, maybe history will see it all differently. Perhaps they, us, are all simply, naturally, hellbent on togetherness. On connection. With the country seemingly schisming more by the day, with fractures leading to offshoot fractures, maybe we actually just need something, somebody, each other. We invented taco trucks, and then, eventually, taco truck parks, as if even our restaurants should socialize with each other. We came up with small plates so that the same table could legitimately hold, say, at La Merenda, goat cheese curds alongside Jamaican goat curry next to seared Sockeye salmon. And they could all become friends. Cheers has always been so popular, held up, not just because it is pretty funny, but it represents an ideal, of comfortable cahoots, of escape from the real world. We can see, hope ourselves, there, all of us being our self-deprecating and whimsical best, with buds and brews and wisdom found. It represents a coming together, in the face of our absurd existence. A mariachi duo, or far too much to eat and drink, can show that our time is still now, that we—me, and you over there, at the same spot, in the same moment!—deserve something, sometimes.

These days I think often of a long-shuttered Bay View corner tap I used to freely and proudly proclaim to anybody listening as my Cheers. It was a strange, dim nook of the world I drank and wedged my way into, forging a musical and lyrical brand of late-night conspiracy. By the time I became a regular, my bartenders, my Sam and my Woody, would occasionally let me stay after hours, would pour me a shot of Bulleit at 2:30, would joke about me having my “shift drink,” would not kick me out until I kicked myself out. We would bitch, complain, jostle, josh, give each other hurried TED Talks in the sporadic crowd lulls. I knew the names of their siblings, the health statuses of their dogs, they were invited to my wedding. All those nights, eventually, I would stumble out the door, solo stagger home, bleary-eyed but content, untouchable to Monday, knowing, simply, far from sober but assuredly, somebody got me. In the hullabaloo existence of parking lots, indifferent masses, I had a spot. I don’t know when, I don’t know who will tell me it’s time, I don’t even know where, but I know I need to get back to that place.

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mydigisalon · 4 years ago

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55+ Salon Marketing Ideas To Attract New Clients

Digital marketing has opened a huge portal for every business to reach its goals. But we often get distracted by things like the “ Viral video concept” that we forget to build a solid base for a brand and dive right into accomplishing bigger goals.

While experimenting and trying new tricks is a must in marketing, it’s never too late to perfect the basics. Salon Marketing is the backbone of your business growth and plays a major part in the success of your salon having all strategies in place.

With fundamental basics, you can never go wrong while building the foundations of your salon. These basics are the tried and tested salon marketing ideas that can be tweaked and improved according to our needs.

Salon Marketing Basics:

Visual Branding

Website and App

Social Media

Facebook Ads

Email and Social Reviews

55+ Salon Marketing Ideas and Trends

Get Your Spa or Salon Listed On Online Directories

Form Partnerships with Other Local Businesses

Offer Referral Discounts

Loyalty Programs or Punch Cards

Salon Promotions that Work

Share Your Promotions on Social Media

Make Use of Facebook & Google Ads

Run a Contest in Your Salon

Create An Email Newsletter

Holidays, Special Events and Gift Certificates and 41 other marketing ideas

These basics will help you out at any and all stages of your business to reach out to potential clients and build your brand image. There are 5 things you need to work on for a strong base for salon marketing ideas. Let’s dive into it without further discussion.

Salon Marketing Basic #1: Visual Branding

#Visual Branding: Visuals always speak louder than words. So, it is important to understand the following points in order to analyze the salon marketing ideas that can work for you:

The visual appeal of a salon should be consistent everywhere from their social media, website, email right to their offline pamphlets.

Make sure the color scheme goes with your brand aesthetics and expresses your brand perfectly.

To get all this right you need to make sure that everything is just perfect.

Focus on key pointers like what your salon personality should be like. Some of the brand themes which you can try are artistic, edgy, indie, wacky, or calm, you can even go for the abstract.

Make sure whatever salon marketing ideas you choose are in sync with what you want your brand to express.

#TargetAudience: Second thing is that you should keep your target audience in mind at all times while implementing your salon marketing ideas.

Think of all the demographic and characteristic traits they might have.

Apart from the age group, consider their business interests, shopping behaviors, likes, and dislikes, etc.

Only after all this is sorted, go for your brand logo and color palette. E.g. yellow and teal can be used if you are going for an edgy punk rock look and rose gold or peach if you want to get a more classy and feminine vibe.

To sum it up, your brand image should be consistent, meaningful, and attract the right audience.

Salon Marketing Basic #2: Website and App

Salon owners don’t give websites and salon booking apps much thought and this is where they go wrong. The first thing that potential clients look for when they think about researching a business is to check the website. To help you get the importance of the website we have listed down 4 points:

It helps to connect with your clientele and tell your story in your own words along with pictures of your work. You can tell them about the time where you started, what you believe in, and what your vision is.

It gives your salon a sense of legitimacy because the users will have a place to get in touch with you even if they are within your vicinity.

It will help in SEO and SEM optimization. The easiest way to get on top in google search is through SEO optimization and you need to have a website in order to do so. You can even link your social media accounts on your website to reach a broader set of audiences.

You can put valid and updated information on your website. Things such as services available at your salon, prices, timings, your best workers and specialists, etc.

Benefits of Salon Marketing Apps

Salon marketing apps are important because they give a more personalized feel to the user.

Clients can look up for their previous and upcoming appointments along with the pricing for other services all in one place.

It is important to keep in mind that all these things should be branded and follow a color palette or theme that represents your brand to your clients in a way that they get a sense of familiarity.

They should be able to associate the colors or theme with your brand and recognize you.

The website is the best way for clients to book an appointment instead of calling the salon to schedule it. Give your clients as many options as you can.

Salon Marketing Basic #3: Social Media

Social Media has to be on the list of salon marketing ideas, a lot of salon owners are already on it. However, you have to know how to make it work and get potential leads through it.

There are a lot of social media platforms available out there, you can get the best salon ideas via social media. However, not every platform is good for everything. E.g. your brand page on LinkedIn might not be the best option. Facebook and Instagram are better suited for interactive brands. Instagram is perfect for creating a visually appealing vibe with filters, colors etc. It works more like a portfolio for your work. Facebook, on the other hand, is text and videos. The algorithm these days demands more videos like Live podcasts to get more likes and engagement.

Salon Marketing Basic #4: Facebook Ads

Social media marketing or SMM is to reach out to potential clients that you can convert into customers with a little push. Regular social media updates will help in getting people more acquainted with your salon. But Facebook and Instagram ads are important beauty salon advertising ideas to get real-time customers for your salon. Facebook ads with proper targeting and budget will give amazing results. There are 5 things you need to keep in mind about getting everything right.

Friendly and personalized language.

Try to go for short video clips instead of pictures

Keep time-sensitive promotions with a call to action button.

Use Facebook ads manager to keep a track of the metrics and analyze the numbers as frequently as you can.

Change the text copy and creatives timely. It will help to optimize your ad campaign and get more clients.

Salon Marketing Basic #5: Email & Social Reviews

Apart from a website and social media marketing, the marketing suite for salon should also include email marketing and social reviews; two things you can not afford to miss at any cost.

To connect more often with your customers you need email marketing because there is no guarantee that they will check your content on your social platform.

To make sure that they do not miss out on important deals and other offers, send them a personalized email. It will help them re-book more often.

However, make sure they are not sale mails, they’ll go directly to spam or get deleted. Fill your email with personalized content like staff images, stories, etc. It will help your clients feel more connected with you. It is vital to add emails to your beauty salon marketing plan.

The last point is social reviews, always ask your users to rate and review you on Google, Facebook, Yelp, etc. This helps your clients to become your brand advocates by publicly vouching for your work. New customers always go for genuine reviews, they check different platforms for reviews and ratings before spending their money.

It doesn’t matter how good your services are, if the clients are not aware of your brand then your business is as good as closed. You need to make sure that your brand is visible and stands out to get more clients.

Looking for salon marketing and advertising ideas to grow your salon business?

Let’s take a look at these easy, tried-tested, and effective salon marketing ideas to help you secure more clients.

Still thinking how to market your beauty salon? To help you secure more clients, you can definitely on these salon marketing tricks for an easy win. They are easy, tried-tested, and fun.

1. Get Your Spa or Salon Listed On Online Directories

Source: Giphy

Users have a habit of searching online before spending money on services or products. This is the reason why your brand should pop up in search results like google my business, yelp( this is really important, make sure you have an account on Yelp with good ratings), and other social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram etc. with a business profile.

2. Form Partnerships with Other Local Businesses

In order to get new clients and enhance your beauty salon marketing strategies, form new alliances with local businesses with similar offerings. Eg. buy dinner, get a haircut free or movie free etc. These are some of the best hair salon advertising examples that can work for your salon. Offers and deals are really important when it comes to new user acquisition.

3. Offer Referral Discounts

Referral discounts and offerings are a great way to retain old customers and at the same time acquire new ones. You can even work with local businesses for referral schemes. E.g. refer 1 get 20% off, these offers are really lucrative and will surely get you good on foot traffic in your salon.

4. Loyalty Programs or Punch Cards

For your loyal and recurring clients make sure that you have an ongoing loyalty card or offer at all times. It will help you build a good rapport with them and they will keep visiting. E.g. hair spa free after 4 transactions.

5. Salon Promotions that Work

Customers love offers and discounts. Offers like first time visit, last-minute specials or monthly on house discounts or yearly visits etc. You can give clients offers when they first visit or during any time slot when the traffic is low etc. It will pique the customer’s curiosity and they might end up booking an appointment because of these offers. All in all, the ultimate goal is to build salon promotions that work.

6. Share Your Promotions on Social Media

If you have a running promotion or offer, do not forget to list out on Facebook and Instagram. Even if you put a story and your reach is organic, make sure you do it. It will give the vibe that it is an exclusive offer for your social media followers.

7. Make Use of Facebook & Google Ads

Facebook and Google Ads help in bringing legitimate leads for the business. When users look at an ad they tend to go for it 40% of the time. The success of these ads will depend on your targeted audience and other creatives. When a customer visits your website you can use these ads to re-target them by showing banner ads and redirect them back to your page.

8. Run a Contest in Your Salon

Social media contests are a great way to acquire clients. Run a referral campaign e.g. the user with the most number of referrals will get a day of free services or a hair makeover etc. It is one of the best hair salon Facebook post ideas to increase your salon’s engagement. Think of it as more like a small gift if they get you an adequate number of new clients.

9. Create An Email Newsletter

When your clients book an appointment with you or are paying for the services used, you can ask for their email addresses. When you have enough email IDs in your database to work on, you can blast monthly emails to keep them updated about your salon promotion ideas and offerings. You can even personalize this experience by sending individual reminders addressing them with their names along with the promotions that they can avail.

10. Holidays, Special Events and Gift Certificates

Source: Giphy

Holidays are a great way to catch potential clients. E.g. Mother’s Day, Black Friday sale, New Year, Christmas etc you can give small discounts like 20% off for all mother’s hair spa on mother’s day.

You can even include your client’s anniversary and birthdays to make them feel special and cherished.

Offers like a free manicure with haircut will get more traffic before valentines and proms etc. will get more teenage traffic to your store. And offers like blowdry free with facial will get more mid 20s woman.

Apart from these offers, Gift certificates can also help you attract new clients around the holidays.

Campaigns like free $10 gift cards with every $150 gift certificate purchase. So when a client comes to use the gift card and gets another 10$ service gift card there is a high probability that they will end up using your services again.

11. Create a Profitable Front Desk

Your front desk staff is the face of your brand when a customer enters your salon. Apart from that, it is one of the main rebooking sales interactions. You should make sure that your staff is well trained to upsell or cross-sell to the clients before and after your services.

12. Set up a Selfie Station with your Salon’s Hashtag

Source: Giphy

The selfie trend is not going to go away anytime soon. You can benefit from it by creating your own mini photo booth within your salon. Just make sure the lighting is great and your clients will post the pics on their social media channels for sure. You can add props like a hashtag cutout or image in the background to make it more authentic. Ask your clients to use the same hashtag while posting and all the posts will come under it.

13. Create a Memorable Client Experience

The main motive of visiting a salon is not just to get a haircut, people expect luxury and pampering with it. Make sure that you create a memorable experience for your clients right from the moment they enter your salon and it should continue till the moment they step out.

14. Carry Exclusive Products

Exclusivity is a factor that can help build brand value. If you keep high-quality products that are available only at your salon, it will differentiate you from the competition. Try to upsell these products, if the clients end up liking them then they will keep coming back for more.

15. Cultivate High-Quality Relationships

If you have recurring customers you should work on developing a long term relationship with the. It will only help you get a loyal customer connection but they can also help to recommend your services to potential clients. Ask them to rate your salon on social media platforms and refer offline to their friends.

16. Simplify your Pricing

Pricing is the first thing that customers check when they ask for services. Too many options can confuse the customers, you should work on simplifying your pricing structure and menu. Let your services speak for themselves, keep in mind that customers spend more if they understand everything in one go.

17. Branding at its Best

Just the salon space is not your brand, your employees are representing your brand at all times. Make sure that apart from your salon theme their clothes, hairstyles, makeup skin and behavior are always on point.

18. Offer Add-on Services

If you have any add on services, like free blow dry with hair spa etc, then make sure that you coach your staff properly. They should be able to naturally up-sell add-ons or retail while serving the customers.

19. Hold a Super Sale

Source: Giphy

Running discounted services or offers is a great way to acquire new customers. Running an end of season sale once or twice a year is a good strategy. During this period you can offer all your products and services at 25% off to stimulate retail sales.

20. Referrals to the Rescue

Another way of acquiring new customers or generating potential leads is Referrals. If you have your salon app, you can run an offer for referrals, like refer 2 people get 25% off on your next salon visit.

21. Online Reviews

Online reviews are really important. More than 70% people look for the salon/business online before availing services. You should request your clients to leave an online review when they visit your salon.

22. Offer Express Services

Source: Giphy

On the go services are a lifesaver for clients. You can offer express or mini services as add-ons to the original service or as a quick service session in between. E.g. basic manicure while getting their hair colored.

23. Social Stylists

Make your stylists a social media expert. Teach them about the techniques to capture good pictures and end results after the services. Their profiles should speak for themselves, it will help draw new clients while boosting their and your brand image simultaneously.

24. Manage Your Reputation

Positive and negative reviews are a part and parcel of an online presence. You should engage with both of them in order to provide a better customer experience. Listen to their queries, and try to resolve their issues. Make sure you are always polite and professional while interacting with your customers, even when they are rude.

25. Search Engine Optimization

When clients search for salons in your area, make sure that your ranking is good and you appear on top of the search results. Top result + good reviews = New clients. Hence, your beauty salon digital marketing is quite helpful.

26. Google Ads

You can run search and display ad campaigns on Google ads in order to appear on top. Organic search results are great but paid results will get you reliable clients at a much faster rate.

27. Facebook Ads

Everyone is on social media, so clearly it makes sense to advertise on it. Reaching out to clients via Facebook Ads can help you target them based on their interests and demographics. You can be as picky and as broad in selecting your audience.

28. Update your Website

The website is really important, if you do not have one get it made. My Digi Salon can help you with that. You need to get a simple and easy to follow website that conveys your message and brand language clearly.

29. Publish your Salon’s Own Blog

Original content and timely updates on your blogs not only helps clients, it also helps maintain your brand image. You can post blogs related to the current market trends or your offerings and their benefits. If you still do not know where to start then download our app and know about the trendy hair salon marketing ideas.

30. Contribute to Guest and Top Salon Blogs

Guests posts and blogs are important to maintain digital presence amongst popular salon publications. IF you content is accepted by the guest sites, you can get free coverage and traffic while reaching out to a new set of users.

31. Polls, Quizzes and Feedbacks

Source: Giphy

Social media can be used for a two-way communication for businesses instead of just posting content. You can run a weekly series of stories with polls, quizzes and feedback on your social media channels with incentives for participation. It will help boost your online presence and engage with customers who normally wouldn’t.

32. Update your Third-Party Pages

Third-party websites like Google and Yelp can help you grab potential opportunities. Make sure your profile on all these partner websites is up to date at all times. If you receive any review or feedback, reply, and engage with customers. It will give the impression that you are listening and boost customer experiences.

33. Promote Visually Engaging Content

One of the most popular yet trendy salon marketing ideas is promoting visual content on Instagram. Instagram is all about visual content. Anything and everything that grabs their attention within the time span of the first 2 seconds will help increase engagement. You should use beautiful pictures in your blogs, posts, and website with clear communication. You can try My Digi Salon’s inventory for getting beautiful and appropriate content that you can post on your social media channels.

34. Create an Explainer Video

Small videos are really helpful for increasing reach on social media. Engaging videos or mini shoots during services like boomerangs etc. can help you connect with a wider set of audience.

35. Try Tik-Tok

Try Tik Tok videos for hair colors showing before after, they are in trend and people love watching them for hours. Create engaging videos that tell your brand’s story, or shoot mini-videos during and after your services to show off new styling and color techniques.

36. Define your Brand

You should be clear about your brand personality and theme. It will totally depend on your clientele e.g. macho for men-only salon and quirky for edgy looks etc. Make sure that it is reflected in all your online and offline communications.

37. Tag your Clients

When you click your client’s before and after pictures, make sure you ask for their social handles. You can tag them in your posts and stories and they can repost them. Clients love getting featured on salon pages, it’s sort of a social validation checklist.

38. Sell Beauty Products Online

Offline upselling is great but to reach out to a new and untouched audience you should try selling your products and services online. You can either add a shop here section on your website with product listings or host an e-gift section.

39. Build Joint Ventures

Partnering with the local business by co-hosting events is a great way to cross-promote your services. Offers like “Visit us, get 10% at Henry’s” etc. will get more customers in you salon as well as your local business.

40. Get involved in National Events

Third-party and national events are a great way to unlock potential clients. By participating in national educational events or trade shows can be a great networking exercise. You can learn how to improve your business, get new B2B working opportunities and at the same time improve your brand image.

41. Create Professional Business Cards

One of the traditional yet effective salon marketing ideas is creating a business card. All your staff members should have professional business cards that they can handle to clients and partners. It should ideally have their name, number, email address, and contact information. You can even add social media handles to make it more trendy.

42. QR codes for Social Media Handle Links

Instead of typing the handle names on cards and pamphlets, you can get QR codes printed. These QR codes can be scanned by your clients and will redirect to your social media handles. It saves time for the clients who might not make the effort to look you up online.

43. Team Up with Local Schools

Tie-ups with local schools, universities, and institutions, especially fashion and hairstyling, can help you get quality interns for your salons at a cheaper price.

44. Birthday Offers to Clients

You can offer small rewards or discounts to your loyal customers on special occasions like birthdays. Send it on the day or a day before to remind them that you care and their pampering session is due.

45. Bridge the Gap Between Customers

Source: Giphy

If you can not give discounts, then try to send out gift cards or text wishes on important dates. These little efforts can help you bridge the gap between you and your customers to help make life long relationships.

46. Networking Events

Stay connected with other top players and professionals in the business. It will help you stay on top of the market with the latest trends. Trying registering and attending events taking place in your vicinity. They are a great way to improve networking.

47. Become an Educator

You are a professional, share some tips and ideas with your followers. You can post and share educational content on your social media channels for your clients. Moreover, you can even host live sessions on Instagram where you can go for Q&A and share educational content or host classes that clients can attend to show them how to maintain their services at home.

48. Apply to be a Talk Guest

Instead of just hosting these classes on your social media channels you can expand your reach by getting on talks as guest speakers. E.g. During virtual events for hair and beauty, you can participate as a guest speaker and share your experience with the attendees.

49. Host a Client Appreciation Event

Thank you loyal clients by hosting an appreciation event once a year. Send an invite to all your VIP clients for a full day or multi-day event. You can go out of the station or just party all night in a 5-star setting. Client appreciation is the first step in establishing strong relationships.

50. Retarget clients who have Left

If you note that your loyal customers have stopped coming to your salon, e.g. zero visits in the last 4 months. You can drop an email or SMS with some discounts for a new appointment. Communication matters so make sure that you convey your message clearly.

A Must Read: How to Generate Leads for your Salon Business

51. Learn from the Best

Make sure that you are up to date with fellow successful and professional leaders. In order to procure their skills and accomplishments, try to follow in their leads. See what they are doing and how they maintain an online presence.

52. Give Away Freebies

Everyone loves freebies, instead of offering discounts you can go for merchandising. Give small gifts like shirts, pens, and other items with salon branding as a token of appreciation.

53. Re-Do your Retail

If you feel that your growth has gone stagnant or is dropping, you need to re-evaluate your retail strategy. Take help from us, My Digi Salon is a complete marketing suite for salons to establish the most effective sales strategy.

54. Offer Discounts to Senior Citizens

Senior citizens tend to be more loyal to brands and businesses. To make it easier for them to opt for your services instead of your clients, offer senior discounts to your regular and loyal customers.

55. Send Appointment Confirmations

As mentioned above communication is the key. How you communicate with your customers will directly affect your brand image. To improve it, you can start by sending appointment confirmation texts and emails to your client as a reminder. It will help avoid unnecessary hassles and misunderstandings. Moreover, it is one of the most effective salon marketing ideas.

56. Automated Scheduling Reminders and User Journeys

Automation is the future and you can take advantage of the features available now. You can work on client or user journeys. E.g. welcome email, first appointment, referral emails, etc. apart from that you can automate reminder emails like an email 5 weeks after a hair color appointment. You can even send them a ‘we miss you’ email with incentives.

57. Get a Beauty Salon Marketing App

Instead of running here and there for all the things we mentioned above, you should invest in a beauty salon marketing app. Get a customized salon app by My Digi Salon with all the features that you believe are required for your salon e.g. side menu navigation, banners on the homepage for new offers, etc. You can get in touch with your customers directly via in-app pop-ups, push notifications, etc.

Conclusion

We are sure that the above-mentioned salon marketing ideas will help you in your salon management. They will definitely help you in retaining your customers and at the same time acquiring the new ones. You just need to make sure your brand language and visualization are consistent and resonates with your goal.

Originally published here: https://www.mydigisalon.com/blog/salon-marketing-ideas/

#book online hair salon #book hair appointment online #salon software #salon app #salon scheduling software #salon booking software #salon marketing

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wlreports-blog · 5 years ago

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India's Transformational Leaders 2019 - Ganesh Somwanshi, Krescendo Communications

Decision making is crucial to all dynamics that involved in the ecosystem. Over the years, I have come to realize that it takes a combination insight and foresight to make the right decisions.

The evolution to this philosophy has taken a few years though. When I started out as a young professional, like most others, I was only executing the decisions made by seniors. However, it didn’t take long for me to realize that each cog in the wheel is an important aspect of decision making. An organization is only as good as its team. Gauging situations correctly and being able to think laterally are other important aspects that have helped me immensely in being prudent about the decisions I make today for myself and on behalf of my clients. A project or an accomplishment that you consider to be the most significant in your career? The most significant accomplishment during my career was the launch of Piramal Sarvajal, seeded by the Piramal Foundation in 2008. It was a unique mission driven social enterprise that designs and deploys innovative solutions for creating affordable access to safe drinking water in underserved areas. Sarvajal is at the forefront of developing technologies and business practices in the safe drinking water sector that are designed to make a purely market-based model sustainable in both rural and urban deployment conditions. The mileage generated for the project not only garnered attention of policy makers but also corporates and apex bodies in India. It also had the privilege of being mentioned as the most promising initiative in a White House press release. How do you integrate corporate philanthropy or corporate social responsibility as a part of your business strategies? We are an integrated communications agency and are actively involved in providing communications strategy and support to large corporate houses and Independent charitable funds. As part of our giveback to the community we undertake pro bono projects for NGOs involved in development of the underprivileged, on a regular basis.

India's Transformational Leaders 2019 - Ganesh Somwanshi, Kresendo Communications What has been your driving force or philosophy in life? ‘Knowledge is Power’ is the philosophy that I believe in. Increasing one’s knowledge of just his/her own domain is simply not enough. Knowledge of one’s clients businesses, relevant sectors, geo-political conditions and overall global business trends are a must to stay competitive. Keeping to this philosophy, we at Krescendo strive to provide knowledge powered insightful business solutions to our clients and partners. What are the other philanthropic works you are involved in? Some of the prominent works that we have undertaken are as follows: Peace On Wheels – World’s first Mobile meditation van Impact - This initiative came to my mind and was the result of close study of the stressful lives that millennials lead due to over digitization and increasing work pressures. With this noble concept of we took meditation to those who are stressed, right to their door step be it home or work. The initiative was launched in partnership with Jawaharlal Nehru Udyog Kendra in Pune, Maharashtra, India by the Commissioner of Women and Child Welfare and Development department Wings Rainbow in partnership with Humsafar Trust- India’s First and only LGBT driven radio cab service Impact - Post launch got an appreciation by The U.S. Consulate, Mumbai. Special invitee to attend a round table discussion on LGBT Issues in India along with EXIM Bank Chairman Fred Hochberg which was organized by U.S. Consulate General, Mumbai. The dignitaries present for the round table were Radhika Primal, MD, VIP Industries, Matt Beven, Export-Import Bank of the United States, Nisaba Godrej, Director, Godrej Industries and Pallav Patankar, Director, Humsafar Trust. Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation – Launch and free distribution of India’s first beetle flavored condoms for sex workers in Mumbai Impact – Ground level connect with sex workers to understand their problems. Conducted AIDS awareness workshops and educated them on the repercussions of unsafe/unprotected sex. How do you define success and how do you measure up to your own definition? Success is a result that one sets out to achieve. According to me process is the key element that helps one keep checks and balances and ensures success in any sphere of life. A systematic approach to designing solutions is imperative to ensure and maintain a successful success rate. However, it is also very relative in nature. What may have seemed like success five years ago, maybe irrelevant today. Hence I reset my success metrics every year to ensure that I cover, knowledge, experiential growth along with business. We are constantly making things better, faster, smarter or less expensive. In other words, we strive to do more with less. Tell me about a recent project or solution to a problem that you have made better, faster, smarter or less expensive? Our entire proposition at Krescendo is about providing better, faster, smarter, cost effective solutions. Krescendo started out as a pure play Public Relations agency and within three years of inception moved on to become a wholly integrated communications company that provides reputation management, brand strategy, digital media solutions, advertising and production, content management services to name a few. We have now also moved on to providing strategic partnership consulting as well. This ensures that all communications are seamless and cost effective. As the most recent testament to our evolution as a turnkey partner, we launched India’s most reputed online music learning school, Shankar Mahadevan Academy in Singapore. For this project we scouted for a local partner, brokered the alliance with Maharashtra Mandal Singapore and also designed and implemented communication campaigns to reach out to the entire ASIA market. Our carefully designed and implemented strategies witnessed a stellar response from ASIA and had the highest recall value during the launch and post launch phases. Enquiries grew manifold; student traction ratio increased thus making it a successful launch. In your opinion what is the most significant aspect of leadership? Leadership qualities are tested the most during the time of a transition. Clarity of vision and dexterity of the strategy that goes into the decision making at such a crucial juncture, defines great leadership. In my opinion, the most significant aspect of leadership is the ability to understand flux, convert it into actionables and inspire your team to collaborate and produce winning results. Your perception of an empowered society. How far your industry has/can contribute for the same? An old adage makes a lot of sense here - “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day, teach him to fish and you feed him for life.” Empowerment of the society is the only way to building a strong and successful nation. Our industry has been an evangelist for empowering the society ever since inception. Apart from creating new job opportunities and being equal opportunity employers, we also are the information bearers for the society who empower them make better informed decisions in life. PERSONAL GRID One thing you wish to change and one thing you wish to retain about your industry? Paucity of skilled workforce is something I would like to see a change in. As our industry becomes more sophisticated, cross functional and global in nature, industry ready skills is the need of the hour. Mediocrity has no space here and I wish to see that change. Thoroughness in approach to solutions is a vibe that is auguring well for the industry and I wish we retain that and even better; take it a couple of notches higher. One thing you have to let go off as an entrepreneur/leader? Since the day I have become an entrepreneur I have let go of feeling the need to micromanage work. Whom do you owe your success to? I owe my success to Ajay Piramal and Swati Piramal of Piramal Enterprise for believing in me and making a difference in my life and also, my parents and family who believe in my dream and stand by me as pillars of strength. Best thing about your job? Best thing about my job is that it helps me be on track with what is happening around the world in real time. This profession has made me a smarter, better organized professional and gives ample opportunity to add true value to brands that impact us daily. A message from you to all the future entrepreneurs/leaders? Entrepreneurship is a huge responsibility. It means that while you will create jobs and help the economy, you are equally responsible for the people who join you as they believe in your vision. There is no short cut to success. As entrepreneurs you might come across many challenging situations that seem overbearing. Self-belief and relentless pursuit of excellence will bring rewards for you and your partners. Be diligent. Read the full article

#TransformationalLeader2019

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ncmagroup · 5 years ago

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by MELISSA ROSEN

Great customer service experiences drive growth as long as you know and follow these guiding principles:

Understand what customer service experience is and its inherent value

Revolve company-wide best practices around serving the customer

Seek out unique touchpoints to build positive customer experiences

Customer service experience goes way beyond the actual one-to-one interaction between agent and customer. Today, it moves past call centers and email correspondence, nudging its way into social networks, live messaging, and self-help databases.

At this point, there’s not much that isn’t covered by the term. Anything that serves the customer is a customer service experience. Understanding this concept is key.

When running customer support at a startup, I quickly learned that everything was our responsibility. That’s a good thing. You want your customer service team to feel this way. Come with me, I’ll explain further…

What is customer service experience?

Customer service experience is the sentiment associated with a company’s ability to provide positive experiences to their customers. Services range from one-on-one interactions where a support agent resolves a customer issue, to exchanges with the brand on a more public scale.

The definition of customer service experience must go above the archaic understanding of siloed support. What is considered customer service experience today is much more comprehensive than it was years ago. We now know that 55% of customers sight a reputation for great customer service as a reason why they chose one company over another.

This reputation doesn’t live solely within the inbox or on a phone call. People experience customer service more publicly than ever. A good business strategy capitalizes on this free publicity and ensures the sentiment is positive.

Build a great customer service experience mentality at your company

Whether you’re a founder, CEO, or customer service manager, building a great customer service experience comes down to people. Hire the right team and prioritizing customer service comes easy.

Let’s break down those “people” into three distinct groups:

Customer service team

Getting the best people on your customer service team requires a nuanced hiring process. But the “best” people aren’t necessarily the obvious choice.

Customer service skills come from far and wide. Don’t pigeon-hold yourself by only hiring those with specific customer service experience on their resumes.

When I applied to my first job as a customer service rep, my resume didn’t include a single iota of customer service experience. It did, however, boast a prolific amount of writing experience, a ton of inter-departmental communication examples, and a boatload of problem-solving abilities.

Hire based on skills, not previous titles.

To really stay ahead of the game, bring in some fresh blood to think outside the inbox. A team of non-traditional agents can bring a unique perspective to your overall business strategy.

Company-wide employees

A customer-centric company expands the service mentality beyond the support team. Each department abides by the customer mindset. The simplest way to encourage company-wide customer care is to respect your customer service team.

Invite customer service agents to all relevant meetings, include customer service metrics in high-level presentations, and encourage other departments to go the extra mile for customers whenever possible.

This starts at the top. When a founder cares about the customer service experience, the entire company follows. If you’re in a leadership position, take the initiative to create systematic check-ins to empower employees to prioritize customer feedback.

Industry at large

Depending on the content, customer service in the public sphere is either a blessing or a curse. For good customer service experiences, it’s the kind of free publicity a business would kill for. Bad experiences, though, amplify the space just as loudly (if not louder).

Taking a birds-eye view, customer service provides another value proposition in competitive industries. The stats back it up: By 2020, customer experience will overtake price and product as the key brand differentiator.

If you’ve got happy customers, shout it from the rooftops! Tell everyone on social media, release it to the press, and add it to your website. Promise good customer service for all potential customers to see. It may be the differentiating factor in getting them to go with your company over another.

Apply the best customer service experience examples to your business

The best customer service experience examples show how seemingly small things can make a big impact. You don’t need to overhaul your entire company structure. Nor do you need to allocate a huge budget to create loyal customers.

Let’s take a look at three different examples to see how you can exceed customer expectations in realistic ways:

Example 1: SaaS company offers international support

A New York-based SaaS company suddenly gains traction in the Asia markets. As more and more customers pour in, so do the customer service requests.

Every day, the customer team scrambles to make sense of the packed morning inbox. While their response time looks okay on paper (still under 12 hours), their customers complain about getting responses in the middle of the night and not being able to talk to someone during business hours.

Hiring and training a remote customer service employee in Asia won’t be easy, but the CS manager knows it’s what their customers need.

Once the new team member gets ramped up, he’s able to cover Asia business hours and respond in minutes rather than hours. Meanwhile, the US-based customer team breathes a sigh of relief seeing the inbox isn’t flooded every morning.

The bottom-line speaks for itself. Revenue was already rising in Asia, but after adding a dedicated agent, they see an even more intense spike. CSAT is way up. And the company is primed to bring on more agents to help them cover international territories as they grow.

Better customer service experiences lead to increased satisfaction

Example 2: E-commerce store adds personal touches

The support team at an e-commerce store is having trouble hitting their CSAT goals. The company’s marketing is known for its friendly vibe, so the customer service team decides to mirror this.

Each team member adds a headshot to their Inbox profile and a few things about themselves to their email signature.

Email example with personal elements used to improve customer service experience

Immediately, they notice that more customers address the agents by name in their responses. Others mention loving the personal notes in the email signature. The agents even admit to feeling more ownership over their emails. The whole customer service experience seems more human.

When they check CSAT the following month, the results confirm what the team already assumed. Not only is customer satisfaction up, but the amount of customers who took the time to respond to the survey tripled!

Example 3: Tech startup beefs up Knowledge Base

A tech startup hypes up their customer service experience to stand out from the crowd. They offer phone, email, and live chat around the clock. But customer inquiries on all of these channels typically ask the same question: Where can I find this online?

The team builds a knowledge base with answers to common questions, including photo and video guides. The base draws more than ten times the amount of customers than a phone, email, or live chat.

Knowledgebase welcome page for self-serve customer service

Marshall McLuhan’s “the medium is the message” holds true in every form of communication, customer service is no exception. By listening to their customers, this startup was able to reduce inefficiencies and ramp up self-service.

They eliminate phone and live chat support, and use email to mainly point customers to the knowledge base. Customer happiness increases, time spent actually talking to customers decreases, and the founder doesn’t have to worry about answering the phone line during his 12am-8am shift anymore (startup life, am I right?).

Propel business growth with positive customer service experiences

Business success relies on more than just a good product or service. Focus on how your customers feel. They are the ones keeping you in business, after all.

Three out of four (74%) consumers say they have spent more with a company because of a history of positive customer service experiences. The proof is in the stats. Positive customer service stories correlate to positive revenue.

Let a customer service mentality permeate throughout your entire organization. Hire the right people, both within the support team and the company as a whole. Build an internal structure that prioritizes customers. Then, blast out your efforts to the industry at large. Promise excellent customer service in the public eye and your entire team will feel accountable.

Don’t worry about spending the most money or having the biggest support team. Start with small, practical acts of kindness towards your customers. Put in the effort to show customers how important they are to you, and let word of mouth do the rest.

Go to our website: www.ncmalliance.com

Customer Service Experience: Fuel Business Growth with Attention to Customer Care by MELISSA ROSEN Great customer service experiences drive growth as long as you know and follow these guiding principles:

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