centre{source}

We recently launched a new site for Nashville Center for Laser and Facial Surgery. The practice is lead by Dr. Brian S. Biesman, a world-renowned authority on cosmetic, reconstructive, and laser surgery. For the site, the goal was not only to tell about Dr. Biesman’s practice, but to serve as a repository for helpful resources on a wide range of industry topics, including his own “Face Facts” resources. It was a lot of content — nearly 150 articles on research, services and treatments — and our goal was to make it user-friendly and easy to navigate. Think Wikipedia.

It’s happened to most all of us. We see some site that has great deals on products or services, and we sign up for an email list. But then, after receiving an email a month/week/day/hour, it gets to be too much noise and we hit that all-too-familiar “unsubscribe” link in the footer of the email.

When a leader in global supply chain solutions contacted us about overhauling their Web site, our top priority was to make sure that we delivered on their expectations. That is why we are proud to announce the launch of the new OHL.com, OHL Excellence and the OHL Media Center.

Ozburn-Hessey Logistics (OHL) specializes in third party logistics (3PL) services, meaning that they partner with other businesses to meet their supply chain demands on a rapidly scalable platform. Our goal for the site was to communicate nearly 60 years of experience in a way that appeals to logistics decision makers. One of the ways that we achieved this is by producing a video that you can view right on their home page. The video features two people representing very different businesses, but one shared need — a partner for their global distribution network.

We just wrapped up work on a site that we did for Ocean Futures Society, a non-profit marine conservation and education organization. The group’s chairman and spokesman is Jean-Michel Cousteau, son of the legendary ocean explorer Jacques Cousteau. OFS serves as a “Voice for the Ocean” by communicating in all media the critical bond between people and the sea and the importance of wise environmental policy.

Over the course of the past few months, our designers and strategists have been hard at work brainstorming and creating a new centresource.com. We’re nearing the completion of this site and can’t wait to share it with you! One thing that we found to be helpful when strategizing the format and features for the new web site were observations that we made while using a tool called ClickTale.

I live in the wonderful town of Pleasant View, Tennessee. It’s located about a 30 minute drive northwest of Nashville. Yesterday, as I passed exit 31 on I-24, I saw a sign in bold red letters proclaiming… “FIREWORKS Sold Here!” Nothing too fancy or flashy, just red paint on a white sign.

I began to recall fond memories from my childhood… memories of the all-too-seldom family vacation fireworks stop. At every exit with fireworks I would beg my parents to pull over and let me partake of explosive goodness. I’m not sure if it was the idea of blowing something up, or the large red arrow that caught my attention, but regardless…I wanted them…NOW.

At CentreSource, we include planning and/or strategy in every interactive and web project we begin.  The goal of this on-the-forefront project work is to assess the estimated scope, timeline, and budget as discussed during the sales meetings and re-evaluate it through a more refined lens.  Very often, this refining perspective is comprised of an interactive HTML prototype developed using Axure RP Pro.

While many projects can be successfully planned using by-hand sketches (and our simplest ‘portfolio’ sites are, in fact, prototyped this way), as the complexity of the desired user experience increases, so too increases the value of an online, “clickable” prototype rendition.  Axure RP’s integrated development environment (IDE) makes it quick and easy to create such prototypes.

How do I fix the red ring of death on my Xbox 360?

Can dogs eat pears?

Why doesn’t H&M sell clothes online?

Can you bring your own alcohol on a cruise ship?

I love Yahoo! Answers. If I have a question, someone there has already asked it… And more than likely, someone else has already answered.

I cannot imagine the number of minutes and hours I have saved customer service representatives by consulting with others on Yahoo! Answers to give my questions answers before sending an email or making a phone call. Sure, the answers are not always accurate, but knowledge is power and there is power in numbers.

I was recently recommended Protoshare by some of the team here at c{s} and tasked with giving it a thorough look-through. I browsed the online docs, signed up for an account, and played around with it – here are the results of my digging:

Initial Thoughts:

Protoshare is tailor-made for what we do. I can’t ignore this – it seems almost too good to be true. Naturally, I was suspicious at first. My initial, gut reaction was “this is TOO simplistic. We’ve spent time refining our plans so they cop Drupal/slideshowpro/symfony to a T. This is a great idea, but one that probably lacks the finesse (extensibility, documentation, community) to be viable.” Well, I’m happy to announce that at least some of these fears have been assuaged (but not all).