is technology just for geeks?

The latest advances in technology can literally change the world. Yet explaining them often holds companies back. Engineers, scientists and developers can talk technology but sometimes they can’t communicate it. So potential customers, clients, investors and partners stay in the dark – and the technology stays hidden away, potential understanding clouded by strange words and phrases spoken in hushed whispers between geeks.

It doesn’t have to be that way. When technological and scientific thinking is translated into everyday language, the cloak of mystique disappears. Suddenly, what was incomprehensible becomes unmissable.

I was once approached by a geek who had created an automated weather system for airports. He could – and often did – talk about it for hours on end. Problem was, he didn’t have a clue how to turn his exuberant and often confusing babble into a clear, structured argument that would persuade airports to look at and actually buy the system.

I’ve got to be honest here: I was as excited about the automated weather system as he was. I’m like that. I get fascinated by technology, even something as outwardly unappealing as a new way of monitoring the weather at airports.

The end result? The talk about advertising to the world became a tightly targeted campaign aimed solely at airports. The budget that had looked small was suddenly big enough to create a brochure inside a slipcase that had, on the cover, a flashing LED. The babble was now a series of compelling headlines that explained the system in a clear, consistent, creative way. The geek’s idea was transformed into a brand. ‘MetVoice’ was born.

It’s not the biggest job in my portfolio but it remains one of the most satisfying. It demonstrates that, given a little creative thinking, technology isn’t just for geeks. It can be for everyone.

To see why, read about MetVoice.

cheese or font?

I like fonts. At their most basic, they shape the words I play with every day, helping to turn briefs and challenges into clear, consistent, creative communications. But they’re a lot more than that.

Fonts are one of the building blocks of brands. With the right font, brands are maintained and enhanced. Choose the wrong font and a brand can be diminished, damaged even.

The Web has made them seem less important because it limits text on websites to Times or Verdana, Arial or Helvetica. Beyond the Web, though, they remain one of the unsung heroes of branding, working to illustrate the brands they illustrate typographically.

That said, I thought I knew quite a lot about fonts and more than a little about cheese until I came across a weird and wonderful website called, simply, ‘cheese or font?’.

Visit ‘cheese or font’ and you’ll see what I mean. The challenge is to choose whether a series of names displayed on screen are a cheese … or a font.

Believe me, it’s a lot harder than it looks …

it doesn’t have to be like this

Spam. I hate the stuff. Not just the rather strange meat mixture that comes in a can, but those awful e-mails that are blocked by e-mail filters like SpamAssassin.

Truth is, the economic downturn has had no impact on spam at all. According to the latest figures from www.viruslist.com, it’s still averaging 76.2% of all e-mail traffic. And with more than 247 billion e-mails being sent each day, that’s an awful lot of junk to deal with.

The response from corporate mail servers in particular is to filter out more and more e-mails. Not just the spam, but perfectly legitimate, opted-in e-mails that are being blocked before they even reach the people they’re meant to reach.

So how do you do get around it if you’re planning to create an e-marketing campaign? Simple. You make damn sure the e-mails you want to send are written and designed to get through those spam filters.

• In writing terms, that means looking at the subject line, the e-mail address of the sender, and the text within the e-mail carefully. Making sure you don’t raise spam flags and consign your e-mail into the junk folder.

• In design terms, it means catering for the sometimes odd vagaries of e-mail clients like Microsoft Outlook, AOL and Hotmail so that what’s been designed is what recipients actually see.

The result? You’ll hit the open and click through rates you need to make your campaign work, your bounce rates will go down and you won’t be contributing to the spam pile.

Big promises, but it’s not hard to achieve. Find out how by downloading the guide to writing and designing e-mails. It’s short, snappy and full of tips to make writing and designing your next e-mail campaign smarter.