Do designers dream in Pantone with visions of rainbows in their heads? Color is a vital part of any graphic designer’s life – after all, they’re the ones paid to come up with pleasing color combinations that will sell a product. That’s why you often see a bold use of… read more
This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.
Name: Scordit
Quick Pitch: A social site where you… read more
Last night at its Campfire One event, Google officially launched the Google Apps Marketplace. The Google Apps Marketplace offers third-party developers and services a way to integrate directly with the Google Apps platform and sell that integration at whatever price point they choose. This is a huge win for… read more
If you’re seeking a job in social media, we’d like to help out. For starters, Mashable’s Job Lists section gathers together all our resource lists, how-tos and expert guides to help you get hired. In particular, you might want to see our articles on How to… read more
<popular as Ngmoco and its games are, whenever we seem to post about them, the subject of their business model seems to rise to the top again. While they have emerged as one of the iPhone's top original developers, they've also lost a lot of fans by sticking with a… read more
When it comes to competition, CNN president Jon Klein fears Facebook. The man at the top of the news network believes that the social network is more of a threat to his business than other broadcast media organizations.
In a recent question-and-answer session with BusinessWeek, Klein specifically states, “We want… read more
Styles in webdesign: the features of corporate/business layout
Daytrotter is celebrating its fourth anniversary promoting music discovery of emerging bands with a new business model. Now bands who sign on for one of Daytrotter’s unique daily live sessions have an opportunity to sell high-quality digital recordings for a revenue split using a new in-house payment system that… read more
<ptopped by Ngmoco's suite at GDC 2010 on the afternoon of the first day of the show, and got a chance to preview two upcoming titles they're working on testing and releasing soon. Both of the games follow Ngmoco's popular (and yet much-maligned) "freemium" model, in which you download the… read more
YouTube will now display banner ads on the mobile version of its website. Google made the announcement in a blog post today, enticing would-be advertisers to sign up by saying that users of its mobile video website are tech-savvy early adopters with cash to spend — the ideal ad… read more
Today Get Satisfaction is bringing their popular social CRM tool inside Facebook Pages with Social Engagement Hub. The new app, created by Invovler using the Get Satisfaction API, gives brands and businesses the ability to integrate the entire support experience into Facebook.
That means the Ask A Question, Share an… read more
When you start a website, no matter if you have chosen a top business hosting package or a cheap website hosting package, you will find various website analysis tools in your web hosting admin panel. Website analysis tools, such as Awstats, are typically included in both business hosting and cheap… read more
Once Again, we’ve got something special for our community. InstantShift again came up with cool freebies giveaway as promised. This is our way of saying thanks to our readers for being part of the instantShift community and helping us make it to where we are right now. We at InstantShift… read more
To find a career to which you are adapted by nature, and then to work hard at it, is about as near to a formula for success and happiness as the world provides.
One of the fortunate aspects of this formula is that, granted the right career has been… read more
Dear freelancer, listen up – this is important: You need to track your time and expenses. Nowhere is the axiom “time is money” more obviously true than in the life of a freelancer. If you don’t pay enough attention, you will find money dribbling away – in unbilled… read more
We had a chance to step into MySpace HQ for a chat with new Co-Presidents Jason Hirschhorn and Mike Jones, who preside over the News Corp.-owned social network from a shared desk in Beverly Hills. The joint office speaks to how closely Hirschhorn and Jones are working together to… read more
In November, Phonebooth.com released the beta version of Phonebooth OnDemand, which is a full-featured phone service that lives in the cloud, but can communicate with both cellular phones and IP desk and conference phones. Today, that service — which costs $20 a month per user — is becoming generally… read more
Today at the Google’s Campfire One event at the company’s headquarters in Mountain View, California, the Internet search giant is launching its new app store for business, known as the Google Apps Marketplace.
Last week, we broke the story of today’s Google Apps Marketplace launch. We learned that it… read more
Next Day Flyers has offered to give 1,000 business cards and $25 of printing credit to a lucky reader of Designm.ag.
If you’re not familiar with Next Day Flyers they provide offset printing services and specialize in quick printing, mailing and finishing marketing materials. They are available to print business … read more
Hulu struck a deal to host content from The NFL Network in January, including eight shows and highlights from every team in the National Football League. The network has been adding new content to the site ever since, and this week Hulu has posted an impressive 400 hours of… read more
By Jodi Friedman of MCP Actions: Photoshop Actions and Training
There are literally dozens of ways to saturate your colors in Photoshop. For this post I am going to focus on one way to pop colors using “Channel Mixer” adjustment layers.
To start with, locate an image that could benefit from more… read more
This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.
Name: ShiftPlanning
Quick Pitch: ShiftPlanning Provides free… read more
Launch
Right off the bat, the introduction screen is new (after the splash screen “wobbles” into view). It’s wider with more options, like a link to the online resource center. There you’ll find video tutorials, starter solutions (more on that later) and access to consultants. They’re all extremely useful… read more
Email communication has not changed much in the past decade, but the amount of email we get daily has grown exponentially. Be it relevant communication or spam, the sheer volume of emails received impacts our email productivity. Inboxes are inundated with too many newsletters, product updates and countless other services… read more
The Foursquare platform currently caters to consumers and offers businesses the ability to provide specials. Today, however, we’re learning more information about a business dashboard — complete with checkin analytics — that’s being gradually rolled out to business owners.
While the dashboard is still an alpha product, it’s already able… read more
Rebecca Zook, whose current favorite fashion item is a sparkly ladybug necklace, is an online female math tutor who has been helping students get math into their brains for seven years. Her blog, Triangle Suitcase, is about unpacking the process of learning in all its complexity and delight.
Over… read more
Ordinarily, a comment like this might not be significant, but in this case it adds fuel to the fire that Apple will replace Google with Bing as the default search engine in the next iPhone OS. Google and Apple are increasingly at odds and it’s possible that Apple may see… read more
Launching in beta today, Go Tribal tackles the other side of the equation from formal event services like Meetup or Plancast by helping members organize informal group plans. By identifying when users are free and available to hang out, Go Tribal hopes to eliminate some of the hassle involved… read more
This post is an excerpt from my eBook, The Blog Business Funnel. It teaches freelancers how to run a profitable freelance business, fed entirely by a healthy and thriving blog. This excerpt is from Chapter 7: Scaling Up. FreelanceSwitch readers can claim a special discount at the end of this… read more
We’ve compiled 30+ excellent corporate WordPress themes from ThemeForest for your next corporate client. Either download the themes and customize them to your client’s needs or use these designs as inspiration to create a unique WordPress template from scratch.
Corporate WordPress Themes
Dark n’ Clean
Agivee
idea Business Shop
Creative.Biz
Universal Business
Spacio WP
Today at the #140tc Twitter Confernece in Seattle, Washington (which I keynoted this morning), Hootsuite CEO Ryan Holmes announced that its popular Twitter application will be integration with both MySpace and Foursquare, starting this week at the South by Southwest Interactive conference.
Hootsuite is one of the more popular Twitter… read more
Each of those applications must be registered with a unique app identifier, each one takes up a separate slot when installed on your iPhone’s home screen, each application occupies a separate App Store listing, complete with its own screen shots, marketing material, reviews, and so forth. Each one must be… read more
DotNetNuke Community Edition is a leading free open-source content management system for ASP.NET websites. With DotNetNuke, you can quickly and effectively deploy dynamic web applications with almost no technical knowledge, however if you are an ASP.NET developer, you can customize it in the way you want to fulfill your specific… read more
Google is testing a new television programming search service in conjunction with Dish Network, according to The Wall Street Journal.
The service, which appears to be very much in a limited testing phase, runs on a special set-top box and apparently searches content from both the Dish programming guide, as… read more
The Real Results series is supported by Gist, an online service that helps you build stronger relationships. By connecting your inbox to the web, you get business-critical information about key people and companies. See how it works here.
Whether you’re looking for your first job, exploring a career change, or… read more
How to design a print ready business card design in photoshop
Sharlyn Lauby is the president of Internal Talent Management (ITM) which specializes in employee training and human resources consulting. She authors a blog at hrbartender.com.
Remember Google Wave? Clearly, Google Buzz has recently overshadowed Google’s other hotly anticipated social communication platform, but before you ditch your Wave account, give… read more
The iPhone has failed to thrive in China, due in part to an active black market and the Golden Shield Project (GSP), which censors certain Internet content. To comply with the GSP, devices that include wireless Internet have been required to use China’s own WAPI standard. Meeting that requirement forced… read more
Ugly designs abound on the web, and behind each and every one of them is a “designer”.
In many of these cases the designers behind the sites are simply incompetent.
They’re often amateur designers or those who have little or no design training or people who design their own… read more
We’ve seen some great gadgets and equipment for designers. So many cool stuff, that we could actually assemble infinite perfect office spaces! Every week we’ll assemble a perfect office, and we’d like you to help us. What equipment would the perfect office have?
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Not only gadgets and equipment, but also furniture,… read more
It’s a bit funny to hear Microsoft referring to any other company as the “Goliath,” but when it comes to the business of search, there’s no doubt that Google has managed to overshadow Microsoft’s efforts, which prompted Microsoft to ditch Live Search and start anew with Bing.
It’s therefore no… read more
The design profession is full of happy folks, and understanding why so many designers enjoy their work is not hard. But not all are so happy. If you’re not careful, the joy of getting paid to pursue your passion can be tainted by the less joyous realities of the professional… read more
This week, of course, the big news was the announcement of the on-sale date for Apple’s newest platform and the teaser of Steam for Mac, but there’s also a lot coming up at the Game Developer’s Conference over the next few days; we’ll preview it with you. As always, your… read more
To begin with, reader efinkGr had a comment for Sang Tang’s post “Mac 101: Going Commando with Command-key shortcuts in Mac OS X,” saying “You know i wish they never got rid of the apple icon on the command key. I miss it :’( ”
That prompted some… read more
Cliff Atkinson is author of The Backchannel: How Audiences are Using Twitter and Social Media and Changing Presentations Forever (New Riders, 2009).
What do you do when you’re giving a presentation, and notice that your audience is looking down, busily typing on their laptops and smartphones? And what about… read more
Running an e-commerce website is a never-ending task, from trying to squeeze that extra bit of conversion rate out of the check-out page to figuring out which referrers give you the best traffic. There’s also a plethora of tools out there to help you achieve your goals. But which ones… read more
This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.
Name: TextMarks
Quick Pitch: TextMarks group text… read more
<p Square credit card reader for the iPhone has gotten most of the buzz around here, especially after we saw that impressive demo at Macworld a few weeks ago. But VeriFone's competing reader has been given the green light by Apple itself: the unit has been granted a deal for… read more
Digital Sky Technologies, the Russian venture capital firm that has invested $400 million in Facebook, has apparently made an offer to buy a piece of Chatroulette, the webcam network where you can chat with random strangers.
According to Spiegel Online, DST made an offer to 17-year-old Andrey Ternovskiy to buy… read more
*The Visible Measures Top 10 Webisodes Chart focuses on digital studio-driven Web series that appear on Internet video-sharing destinations. Each Web series is measured on a True Reachô basis, which includes viewership of both studio-syndicated video clips and viewer-driven social video placements. The data are compiled using the Visible Measures… read more
Google is set to launch an app store for business next week, Mashable has learned from sources close to the company. It will be focused around creating software for Google Apps and could launch as soon as Tuesday.
Early last month, news leaked about Google working on its own… read more
Apple’s announcement earlier today of an on-sale date and presales for the iPad seems to have struck a major chord with investors. Never mind the fact that April 3 only equals “late March” for unusually large values of March; when it comes to magical & revolutionary, Wall Street votes “yes,… read more
Mat Fogarty is the Founder and CEO of Crowdcast, a leading provider of collective intelligence and prediction market solutions. You can read more of Mat’s posts on the Crowdcast blog or follow @crowdcastinc.
Collaboration and crowdsourcing are the realities of today’s public Internet, and the trend is now gaining real traction in the workplace…. read more
YouTube may be closing in on $1 billion in annual revenue according to some new research performed by a Wall Street analyst.
Using MySpace’s estimated CPMs and YouTube’s estimated page views, Mark Mahaney of Citigroup calculates that Google’s video site generated $727 million in revenue for 2009, and will pull… read more
20 cool & creative business cards for your inspiration
The photographic industry is one of the most challenging, difficult, and competitive for start up businesses. The statistics prove it. Take this 3 year study discovered by Dane Sanders in his book Fast Track Photographer: In the 1st year, 60% of photographers give up their business. Of that remaining… read more
A recent Apple job listing for a Senior Interactive Web Developer pretty much confirms that Apple is entering the mobile advertising business head on. The listing begins “Apple advertising is an opportunity to redefine the advertising on mobile devices. It’s an exciting environment and a fast-paced development… read more
Although much valuable information for all sorts of web and print professionals can be found online, it is often difficult to weed through all the noise and find good quality content. I believe it’s vital that professionals in different creative fields supplement their online learning and research through well-edited and… read more
As a freelancer, I’ve tackled plenty of projects. Not all have been enjoyable, naturally, but I’ve been able to keep a steady flow of work. I don’t think every job has to be perfect, and as long as I’m making good money and maintaining my freedom, I’m generally satisfied with… read more
For this Sites of the Week we have selected some great sites such as FWA and Cog’aoke. Also we’re featuring a wonderful Wordpress Theme called Simplify Business and much, much more! As usual we would love to hear from you, keep sending your suggestions to us and we will be… read more
This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.
Name: Suite Arrival
Quick Pitch: Travelers customize… read more
In Fortune Magazine’s annual ranking of “most admired companies”, Apple has once again walked away with the top spot. Apple was voted #1 for the third year in a row in a poll of executives, industry analysts and company directors. This year, Apple actually took pole position by its… read more
In a blog post today, Google essentially reminds its enterprise customers that Google Apps provides an alternative to expensive, complex solutions as far as data disaster recovery goes.
Synchronous replication is a system that Google Apps uses to store customer’s info in two data centers at once, so that if… read more
While Apple doesn’t allow 3rd party apps to run in the background on the iPhone or iPod touch,* Silicon Alley Insider notes that you can listen to audio in Mobile Safari while using other applications. It’s this trick that MLB exploited with At Bat 2010. With the tap of a… read more
This year American Idol made headlines for pushing out individual Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace accounts for each of its 24 finalists. However, the show made a drastic change in strategy last night by consolidating all of them under the AI9Contestants username across sites.
Twitter followers of each of the individual… read more
If you’re seeking a job in social media, we’d like to help out. For starters, Mashable’s Job Lists section gathers together all our resource lists, how-tos and expert guides to help you get hired. In particular, you might want to see our articles on How to… read more
As a freelancer or independent designer, the most valuable asset you have is your own time. Your ability to earn a living relies upon your own time management, which will allow you to perform income-generating services for clients. With effective time management you may be able to earn… read more
Since Vlingo first introduced its voice control app for the BlackBerry more than a year and a half ago, smartphones and voice-to-speech technology have evolved quite a bit. Today, the company has launched a pretty major update to its iPhone app, adding the ability to send e-mail and SMS… read more
<poesn't take much to make yourself look like a fool, but in the case of The UK's Sun and Daily Mail newspapers, they have to be feeling quite idiotic right about now. Perhaps not, as these tabloids have a history of running fabulous stories about celebrities, politicians, and the supernatural… read more
According to Billboard, participating labels entered into the program with Amazon in 2008 without paying a thing. It was simply meant to increase the store’s publicity. Two years later, that’s changed. An unnamed major-label head of sales told Billboard that “[the] promotion morphed into something where the labels make arrangements… read more
For the moment, the valuations we have for private companies like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn are based mostly on what we know from venture capital investments that have been made in the companies.
SharesPost, however, is a company that lets owners of shares in private companies sell them to prospective… read more
Dallas Lawrence is Chair of the Social and Digital Media Practice at Levick Strategic Communications, the nation’s top crisis communications firm. He blogs on emerging digital media trends and best practices for social media engagement on Bulletproof Blog. Connect with him on Twitter @dallaslawrence.
If there was any doubt… read more
Everyone is still trying to figure out just how big a business social networks are, how much is Facebook worth, and how much money it’ll be making in a couple of years. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, however, doesn’t seem worried at all.
Asked about Facebook’s plans to launch an initial… read more
As a freelancer, you may find yourself either a) too busy or b) too clueless to handle your own marketing. This happens more often than you might think, and even some excellent freelancers with a strong reputation aren’t doing a very good job at marketing.
But you, you’re smarter than that…. read more
This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.
Name: RootMusic
Quick Pitch: RootMusic is all about making… read more
News Corp. and WSJ boss Rupert Murdoch confirmed in a Q&A session yesterday that an iPad application is in the works for the Journal.
It doesn’t come as a big surprise considering Murdoch’s stated plans to charge for mobile access to News Corp. content and Apple’s desire to woo publishers… read more
Back in December, Yelp for Android arrived, joining the local review site’s stable of iPhone, BlackBerry and Palm Pre apps. Since then, the app has been steadily updated with new features and options for Yelp users, and today, version 1.4 is being released with even more updates.
Yelp… read more
Recently, the notion of killing the design community has come up on a few blogs (sometimes indirectly), creating many intense conversations on the direction the design community has taken over the past couple of years, and what can be done about it.
The possibility that such discussions… read more
This post originally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum, where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business.
As a business owner, you know your product, service, market and customers. But sometimes one of the most challenging aspects of operating a business is… read more
Sacconaghi believes that the iPhone’s high gross margins could change Apple’s business model as the iPhone’s share of Apple’s overall revenue stream grows from 30% in FY09 to an estimated 45% to 50% in FY11.
Philip Elmer-DeWitt over at Apple 2.0 notes that while the Street generally assumes Apple’s… read more
The Internet is filled with useful resources for business owners and especially for web designers and developers. From free icon sets to CSS templates, and from web design inspiration to stock images, websites like these have everything one may need. There are a number of tools, useful pieces of advice,… read more
A perfect layout, A Good Design and Nice Resource can produce a creative output. Layout, textures, typography and patterns are used more often than one may think but the outcome of different combination can result verity of excellent designs. Professionalism is built upon knowledge and experience. However, When it comes… read more
Tired of clients? Sick of toeing the line between artist and “mad man” (without the added bonus of the martini lunches)? Want to get paid? Want to get paid on time?
Me too.
photo by yushimoto
I was sitting on the plane from New York to Los Angeles racing to finish a project… read more
Eric Curry was born in 1956 in Los Angeles, California. A graduate of the Art Center College of Design in 1980, he lived in Scandinavia for the next 12 years, running his own advertising photography studio based in Copenhagen, Denmark, returning to the states in 1992.
Originally trained and specializing in… read more
Staying motivated isn’t easy – we often convince ourselves not to be. We often give ourselves excuses, allow other people to put us down, or look at the success of others and think, “That’ll never be me.”
There are two basic types of motivation: intrinsic motivation, and extrinsic motivation.
Intrinsic motivation comes… read more
According to MacRumors, a new job listing has been posted on Apple’s website for “Manager, iBooks Asia Pacific & Canada.” Part of the managerial position’s role includes being “the primary person responsible for building the book business in Asia Pacific and Canada” — for now, “Asia Pacific” is only loosely… read more
The survey gives some insight into why students found their iPhones so addicting: 74 percent of students surveyed said they ‘felt cool” when they got an iPhone, but more importantly, a quarter of surveyed students said their iPhones felt like “an extension of their brain or their being.”
I… read more
Macmillan is sticking with an old pricing scheme even in a brand new marketplace. Just what exactly makes the difference between a “hardcover e-book” and a “paperback e-book”? Read on to find out.
The first question is: “Why would someone buy a hardcover book?” I can… read more
Google advertisers can now add click-to-call phone numbers to their mobile ads. The move expands the offering from just local advertisers to national advertisers.
The setup is quite simple and means that all advertisers running mobile ads can add a phone number via the adwords phone extensions menu (make sure… read more
This post originally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum, where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business.
Unless you are a creative agency, most small businesses don’t have the luxury of having an in-house designer. There are literally thousands of freelance designers and… read more
Nokia has unveiled a new “smartphone,” the Nokia C5, a Symbian S60 third edition handset offering decidedly mid-range features in a slimline candybar design.
While Nokia calls the device a “smartphone in a feature phone body,” what the C5 offers isn’t arguably that smart in an increasing competitive market.
The Cseries… read more
The University of Maryland’s Smith School of Business looked at the relationship between social media and small businesses and found that the technology adoption rates in the U.S. have doubled in the past year from 12% to 24%.
The data comes straight from the university’s third installment to its Small… read more
We all know that as web designers, we should market ourselves both online and offline.
For online purposes, a great portfolio website or blog is a perfect way to spread the word, but for offline purposes, nothing beats the traditional business card.
We’ve partnered with UPrinting to bring an amazing contest to… read more
Rapleaf Inc. will collate information about individuals and sell it to companies that want to learn about those customers and what they do online.
Personal finance reporter Erica Sandberg, who covered the issue of social media datamining in a story for CreditCards.com, said that if a data mining company turns… read more
CoTweet, the Twitter CRM tool used by several massive brands including Best Buy and Ford, has been acquired by ExactTarget, an email marketing firm.
In a statement, ExactTarget CEO Scott Dorsey said,” By combining the power of ExactTarget and CoTweet, we can provide businesses a complete solution to tie together… read more
Popular professional Twitter app maker HootSuite has just updated its iPhone app and released three new mobile applications.
HootSuite’s mobile arsenal now includes a total of four apps — iPhone and Android apps in both full and free versions.
You may recall that HootSuite’s iPhone app retails for $1.99… read more
The market for freelance web design is huge. Being able to design a beautiful site in Photoshop is one thing. Programming a website is a whole other story.
So when clients come knocking at your door asking for web design services, what do you, the non-programmer but rockstar designer,… read more
We are always in search of great free resources, tips, tricks, etc. for our readers. Every day we work hard to find new resources and inspiration for designers like you. Today, we have another great post, “Discover the Best of the Web” on SmashingApps. In this, we made a list… read more
Speaking About StartupsEnvato has emerged as one of the most exciting companies in the creative world. Can you please give us a brief history of your startup?
Envato started out about four years ago initially to build a marketplace for Adobe Flash files. Back then we were… read more
Google, the world’s largest search engine and the owner of the world’s largest online advertising platform, has been granted a major U.S. patent for “determining and/or using location information in an ad system.” In other words, Google now owns a key patent for location-based advertising.
The patent, which was… read more