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As a UX/IA Strategist, I recently had the good fortune to be a part of the second annual Design for Impact bootcamp at the Austin Center for Design. The day-long session was intense and collaborative, a great opportunity for everyone involved to learn more about guerrilla ethnography, research synthesis, rapid ideation and prototyping. The main […]
Fontself is a font-serving service that’s sort of like the consumer version of Typekit. It lets users use custom fonts on sites like Facebook and Blogger, mostly of the novelty kind — the sort of fonts that a Typekit-toting designer would shy away from, but the average net denizen loves.
Aside from the handful of novelty fonts available in Fontself’s library, the main draw of the app is the ability to print out a template, fill it in with letters, scan it and upload it — creating a font out of your handwriting (or whatever you choose to fill the boxes with).
Today, Fontself announced some more serious additions to the service. The Fontself Developer Network kits allow Fontself fonts to be used in apps, in HTML and in Flash. Previously, Fontself fonts were only usable on a range of supported services, including Facebook, Yahoo!, Myspace, Netlog, Blogger and in HTML widgets that could be appended to a site.
With these new introductions, developers will be able to use the fonts in their applications as part of the user interface, and they’ll be able to allow users to bring their own fonts into the app.
I’m just hoping that I don’t open up Twitter or Gmail one day to find their design teams have moved over to one of Fontself’s colorful novelty fonts. That is when I am officially quitting the Internet.
Will Fontself begin to appeal to serious designers? No. But in Fontself’s defense, that’s not what it’s for. The added developer functionality will help those building frivolous apps that appeal to a certain demographic to add a bit more levity to their interfaces.
If life is comprised of moments defined by people, places and time, then startup Conga is a matchmaker, weaving together these elements to help users turn missed connections into shared experiences.
Conga, launching in public beta in New York and San Francisco Wednesday, defines itself as a proximity-based social network. It’s designed to connect individuals from different social spheres who have or will gather at the same place at the same time.
“It started with a simple idea,” explains co-founder Ryan Kennedy, “What if it was possible to go back in time, to nearly any moment in life, and reconnect with people around any of the places we’d ever been?”
Kennedy tells me that part of the motivation for starting Conga came from a personal desire to uncover missed romantic connections — he was, of course, single at the time. Now happily off the market (but not thanks to Conga), Kennedy still believes that there’s something magical about making missed connections not so missed.
“We go through life and interact with all these people, but how do we tap into relationships with people sitting right next to us?,” he says. “We’re looking to fill that gap.”
Conga is structured around the notion of the moment, tapping into the user’s location history via Foursquare and Twitter to build out a replete record of where he’s been and who else has been. The user can manually enter moments as well.
Each moment has its own page and serves as a point of rendezvous. The site manufacturers a layer of collaboration over these moments to introduce users who have crossed paths and give them a means to communicate and share information.
The startup’s most intriguing feature is its ability to list the people the user “congas” with (ie. crosses paths with) under the People tab. Here, Conga unravels the mystery of the unknown and presents the user with his most frequent missed connections. I can, for instance, see that I’ve crossed paths with Noah, someone I do not know, at least 13 times. Clearly, Noah and I have more in common than we may realize. Conga has merely surfaced these commonalities to subtly suggest that we should connect.
But Conga’s purpose extends beyond these person-to-person connections. The founders speak of Conga as a place to reconnect with people you’ve interacted with in the real world. Weddings, conferences, reunions and other group gatherings are all Conga-worthy because users can come together around a specific place and time to share things that happened at that moment.
The service has a few drawbacks. At launch, it’s limited to users in New York and San Francisco, the site is a bit difficult to navigate and overlapping activity will be minimal until more users sign on. Still, there’s certainly something to the notion of using location data to fill in the blanks.
Conga is self-funded by co-founders Ryan Kennedy and Todd Fast. The startup is in the midst of raising an angel round to finance operations.
Image courtesy of iStockphoto, RonTech2000
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Clay McDaniel is the principal and co-founder of social media marketing agency Spring Creek Group. Find him via @springcreekgrp on Twitter.
Do you remember life before Evite, Facebook Events, and Eventbrite? Handwritten paper invitations and RSVP phone calls seem like relics of a forgotten age. The web has dramatically changed the way people plan special occasions. Social media is making it easier than ever before to plan, promote, and execute a wide range of events from industry conferences, client events and partner symposiums, to large social gatherings and charity events. What’s more, social media allows you to solicit feedback and extend the life of your event by inviting attendees to connect via online communities before and afterward.
Whether you just want to generate a bit of buzz or instead have specific goals to increase ticket sales and attract top speakers and attendees, social media can make the planning process smoother by leveraging digital word-of-mouth. Here are eight tips for best results.
The months and weeks before your event is a critical promotional period. Use every social media channel at your disposal to get the word out about your event, and encourage people to share information on the event in return for small rewards. For example: “Share this event with 20 friends for 10% off your admission.” Start by creating an event page on Facebook and an event hashtag on Twitter, then create an event blog where you’ll post updates about it (new speakers, registration discounts, etc.). Make sure your Twitter hashtag is specific to your event or organization, without being too long.
Once you’ve created these pre-event social links, populate them with lots of content. If it’s a social event, post video or music clips, create a pre-event contest, or connect event-goers through socializing and games. For a social or community event, content should be engaging, fun, and shareable in order to drive word-of-mouth interest. If the event is more corporate in nature, offer fans and followers sneak peeks at topics to be discussed, or special pre-conference articles and presentations.
Make sure that everyone who follows or likes your event on Twitter and Facebook is rewarded for their interest. Offer fans and followers special discounts or content. To incentivize people to register for the event, offer them early-bird discounts, invites to pre-event parties, or other rewards. If you really want to boost the power of word-of-mouth, you can use tools like Meteor Solutions to identify your key influencers, then actively motivate and reward them for sharing information about your contest.
Don’t forget to use a social registration service like EventBrite, which not only makes registration easier and more streamlined, but allows attendees to share their event activity with friends. Other popular social event invitation platforms include Plancast and Twtvite. Most of these services are highly integrated with social networking platforms and can be configured with user caps and privacy options.
Geo-location sites let you set up a page with rewards including badges, coupons, specials, or gifts. These location based services are easily integrated with other social networks such as Facebook and Twitter, so checkins will be shared with larger networks. When attendees come to your event, you can reward them for checking in at different stations, panels, or activities. Rewards such as free ice cream, a gift card, or other small incentives can be redeemed after the show.
Using social media during an event can mean the difference between a flat, boring affair and one where attendees are engaged and excited. But too much real-time social interaction can also derail the main presentations or talks.
First and foremost, encourage attendees to tweet during the event using the established hashtag. An active Twitter stream during your event not only engages participants in real time but also allows people who could not attend to get a feel for the sessions and topics being discussed. Some event organizers set up a huge screen behind speakers to display hashtagged tweets in real time. But again, this “backchannel” can backfire if the tweets become negative or go off-topic. All that interaction can derail speakers as they try to respond in real-time to all the “interference.”
Don’t forget to set up a livestream during the event using Facebook or UStream so fans can follow along online. Facebook enables you to store this stream so that people can watch it after the event proper. You can also create a YouTube channel for the event to post videos before, during, and after. Encourage non-attendees to ask questions through Twitter or Facebook during the event and answer them live.
Your event doesn’t have to end the day it’s over. Social media can keep the momentum going for many weeks and months afterwards. On your blog, post a “wrap up” of all the key highlights. You can add links to presentations, key learnings, and other downloadable documents. Of course, you’ll want to post photos on the blog and on Facebook, and continue tweeting about the event even after it’s over. You can post thoughts, ideas, or links to longer articles that might be of interest to those who attended.
Another great way to keep your event from fading fast from people’s memories is to create ways for attendees and other interested parties to continue socializing, discussing, or debating topics covered there. Do whatever you can to keep the conversation alive.
Consider using online surveys to ask attendees for feedback on panels, venue, speakers, topics, and other facets of the event. Facebook polls are fun, easy ways to get quick responses and feedback from attendees. Be prepared for honesty. If someone has a negative comment to share, make sure to address their comment or concern and store the information to improve next year’s event. Lastly, pull total social media stats from sites like Search.Twitter.com and Social Mention, or set up Google Alerts ahead of time. If the results are positive, don’t be shy about publicizing some of these metrics to highlight the reach and impact your event had.
Interested in more Social Media resources? Check out Mashable Explore, a new way to discover information on your favorite Mashable topics.
Image courtesy of Flickr, dhammza / off
More About: business, event, event planning, List, Lists, social media
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