How to Make the Most of Your Facebook Cover Video

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Social Media

Starting in April, Facebook began experimenting with allowing pages to use videos as their cover image instead of a static image, and now they’ve rolled out the feature to everyone! Here at Solamar we recently decided to take advantage of the feature, and put everyone’s favorite sign-spinning video (featuring yours truly) as our cover on the Solamar Facebook Page.

We love it! It provides a lot of personality right up front, in a manner assured to grab the attention of our visitors.It still contains a visible representation of our brand, but wrapped in humor and not too “in-your-face”.

Like what did there? Want to get your Facebook page cover set up with a video? Then you’ve come to the right place! Stay tuned, and we’ll go through what you need to know to get going. Continue reading →

Growing With a Client — A Case Study

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Client Relationships, Clients, Design

One of the most rewarding client relationships you can have is one that grows and develops over time. Sure, there will always be clients that are in and out — they have a project, they accomplish said project and then they move on. And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that! But here at Solamar, we’re not just about the work we do, we’re also about the relationships we cultivate. We love our peeps!

Which is why it’s so rewarding for us when a client decides to work with us over a longer period of time. We get the pleasure of seeing them grow, watching the effect our work has on their business and the success it produces. Nothing brings the joy like helping someone realize their dreams.

Take as a case in point our client Paul Sigafus. About five years ago (woah, 2012 feels like ages ago, how did that happen!) Paul came to us looking for a brand new website design for his counseling business Colorado Counseling Center, who provide therapy services for couples, individuals, and families.

The resulting design we created for him was focused on transforming his online presence with a warm and hope-inspiring look. It became one of the designs that clients we brought in later on down the road often pointed to as something they liked, and more importantly, it became a catalyst for growth in Paul’s business. Continue reading →

What’s Hot In Web Design — July 2017 Edition

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Design

design trendsWe recently posted about popular web design trends you should avoid, so how about we flip that coin over and look at some emerging design trends that are making things better (or at least cooler)!

Without further ado, here are some interesting elements we’ve started to notice pop up here and there in designs we think are well done. They won’t be for everyone, but if they catch your eye, and you want to stay on the cutting edge, think about incorporating one or two. Continue reading →

What’s Up With Twitter?

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Social Media

TwitterAh Twitter, the social media giant that everyone loves to hate. Forced to rapidly adapt to a changing landscape after years of little-to-no growth and the rise of numerous other players in the space, they’ve recently rolled out changes and updates at a rapid pace, finally leading to what looks like the first positive year they’ve had in a long while.

And while there has (of course) been some backlash to both the pace and substance of these changes, they’ve largely been for the better. Since Twitter is still considered one of the “core” social networks that every business needs to be engaging with, this should come as good news!

You’re probably already familiar with some of the changes, such as the total redesign of both their web and app versions they introduced in June of this year, but some things have probably flown under your radar as well, so let’s take a look at what Twitter has been up to, and what that means for you. Continue reading →

5 Popular Web Trends You Should Avoid

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Design, Social Media, Techy Love

avoid web trendsThe web design world is a lot like the social media world — things go viral quickly. Someone comes up with a solution to a problem, it catches on and all of a sudden you see it everywhere, even long after it becomes clear that the particular solution has more problems then it does benefits.

It’s not surprising, really. The deadline pressure web designers are often under, coupled with the desire of both clients and designers to produce sites that are modern and fresh often leads to the adoption of new trends before they can really be tested for usability.

But once a trend has had time to really percolate throughout the web world, and we have plenty of time to test it, there’s no excuse for continuing to use a design trend that doesn’t deliver, or irks visitors.

So, what are the web trends you should use carefully or avoid altogether? Stay tuned, and we’ll go through a few. Continue reading →

WordPress Plugins We Love: Yoast SEO

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Biz Systems, Blogging, Content, Content Voice, Copywriting, Search Results, SEO, Techy Love, Wordpress

Yoast SEOOne of the reasons we love WordPress so much is the vast number of plugins it has available to extend the built-in functionality. But since there are over 40,000 plugins available in the repository, we thought it would be fun to help you sort through the pile by recommending a few of our favorites. These will be plugins we use all the time, have thoroughly tested and highly suggest using if you are looking for what they offer.

One of the great things about WordPress is that it’s already optimized for Search Engine Optimization (SEO), so just by installing it, you’ve taken a major step towards lifting your place in the rankings. But that doesn’t mean you can’t do a lot more than what it provides by default. To that end, we used to use a plugin called the All-in-One SEO Pack, but a little less than a year ago we made a switch to a new SEO plugin called Yoast SEO.

With a year of testing under our belt, we can now safely recommend it to you! And for good reason. While All-in-One SEO Pack was no slouch, Yoast SEO goes that extra step further in functionality and ease-of-use, making it a no-brainer for our go-to SEO plugin.

So why choose Yoast SEO? Stay tuned, and we’ll look at some details. Continue reading →

6 Ways to Overcome Creative Block

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Self Care

creative blockWhatever creative endeavor you may be involved in, whether it be writing, painting, web design or any of the other myriad creative pursuits, inevitably you will run into a creative block.

If you’ve ever tried to exercise your artistic muscles, you probably know what I mean! You try and try to come up with a great idea, but no matter how hard you struggle, nothing good seems to come up. In fact, the more you struggle, the harder it seems to get.

So what do you do when such a block rears it’s ugly head? Try a few of these tips, and pretty soon you’ll fins yourself unstuck. Onward! Continue reading →