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Part 2: How Apple is Proving that Less is More

April 27th, 2011

In part one of this article we took a quick peek at how Apple looked on the web during the late 90′s and at the turn of the century. As you’ll see in part two, the KISS rule is certainly in effect at Apple.

So, a lot happened in 4 years since 2002, but you wouldn’t really know it from first glance at the Apple website (and that’s not a bad thing). In case you haven’t heard, those little mp3 players that Steve Jobs peddled as the future of music… well, it turns out that they kind of caught on. Apple sold like a couple kajillion or so.

apple2006

But as the website continues to maintain the status quo, the product line keeps growing with the Macbook Pro and 30-inch Cinema Displays, all pushed by a brilliant marketing campaign that has devoured mainstream media from TV to radio to web: the Mac vs. PC ads. You remember the ones, with the uptight Microsoft corporate hack bantering with that kid who could barely keep up with a 50 year old John McClane in Live Free or Die Hard. The Mac vs. PC ads were widely popular and ran from 2006 to 2010 and no doubt helped Apple sell a few extra Macs.

Skip ahead 5 more years and you can’t even swing a sack of Palm Pilots without hitting someone with an Apple product. In fact, they’re probably so fixated on Angry Birds that they won’t even see it coming. So surely we’re due for the next great website redesign right? Not so fast Mr. Sulu…

apple2011

And there she be… a sleek new menu and an even bigger showcase area for the newest product. There’s no question that Apple knows how to pimp their products. You’ll notice, though, that besides small tinkering like adopting a 1024×768 standard and other small graphical updates, the Apple website has kept pretty much the exact same layout for the past 10 years with a menu on top, a few badges on the bottom for various newsworthy items and a big honkin’ spot to plaster the newest and greatest product that will have you throwing your underwear on stage during Steve Jobs’ next keynote speech like you were at a Tom Jones concert.

So keep in mind that although it’s good to keep your brand fresh and in the spotlight, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you need to redesign yourself or your website every 6 months. Sometimes less is more and having a reliable identity that stands firm goes a long way in establishing your business. A company that can’t decide what it should be doesn’t leave a reassuring feeling to its customers. And hey, if you can take over the world while you’re at it… Bonus!

If you’re sick of trying to find your lasting identity, contact Point Click Media.

Posted in Branding Reviews, General News

Part 1: How Apple is Proving that Less is More

April 13th, 2011

You probably remember the iconic 1984 Superbowl ad with the young woman throwing the hammer at the giant TV screen representative of the large faceless corporations of the time *cough*IBM*cough*. Who would have thought that Apple itself would someday turn into the very dragon it had attempted to slay during the Reagan years?

1984-steve-jobs-ipad

This guy. After falling and rising again during the nineties like a carpenter on Easter Sunday, Steve Jobs and Apple can’t wait to charge you $84.99 for a digital copy of Kung Fu Panda. photo credit: mallox


It’s interesting, though, to watch Apple’s rebirth leading all the way to today that, although the company itself has undergone a massive facelift with its product line, the Apple website has remained virtually untouched during the entire post-1990’s evolution of Apple products.

apple1998

Here is the Apple website in 1998. It is ultra clean (get used to it) and it certainly resembles the Apple website that we know today. We can see that Apple has always been great at producing clever marketing slogans (“Blows minds not budgets”). Apple isn’t resorting to flashy gimmicks or a bold, elaborate interface to knock your socks off. They’ve always been about letting the product do it for you. It’s nothing special, but it works. As you’ll see throughout our trip through time, this 1998 website still holds up well even today.

apple2002

Don’t adjust your set folks!  Although we’ve eclipsed 4 years you’ll notice from here on out that there won’t be any drastic visual changes to the Apple website for the next decade. We’re not quite at the  ‘i’ age yet with iPods, iPads and iTunes, but the website gives us our first glimpses at the glassy-glossy ‘web 2.0’ style that has been widely adopted by web designers everywhere. This is the major change to the website in 4 years – adding a menu to the top of the page. They’ve kept the page clean as a showcase area for their products and main content.

In part 2 of this article, we’ll look at what kind of effect the world-wide boom of the  iPod has had on the Apple website.

Posted in Branding Reviews, General News

Rebranding Reviews: Tampa Bay Lightning

February 24th, 2011

Note: Point.Click Media was not involved with this project. This is merely a review for study purposes.

The Tampa Bay Lightning originated in 1992 as part of the NHL’s modern expansion era during the early 1990’s into the southern United States along with the San Jose Sharks (1991), Anaheim Mighty Ducks (1993) and Florida Panthers (1993). Relocated franchises to Dallas, Phoenix and Raleigh, NC and further southern expansion to include Atlanta and Nashville would soon set the table for the NHL landscape as we see it today. The Tampa Bay Lightning’s history is peaked by a Stanley Cup championship in 2004.

The Lightning have had a rather lengthy history of logo, uniform and overall identity changes since their inception. Most recently noted is a full rebranding when the NHL switched to a new jersey model provided by Reebok in 2007. The official press release on the change for the 2011-12 season states:

“The Lightning worked with SME, a strategic brand development firm servicing the sports and entertainment industries, to create the new logo. “Bold”, “classic”, “iconic” and “hockey-centric” were the words that inspired the new designs. The previous circular logo shape was evolved into a contemporary oval shape to better represent the speed and power of NHL hockey competition as well as the upward direction of the club. One color, Tampa Bay Blue, was retained to honor the past and represent leadership’s commitment to the area.  In order to create a more uplifting overall presentation – bright, wide white stripes replace the silver and black, providing a brighter presentation of the Tampa Bay brand.”

tampabay01

tampabay02

There’s always been a certain “crowdedness” to the Tampa Bay Lightning logo. I’ve always felt that the city name just looked like it was crammed in there for the sake of it. You can see it in the former logo and also past versions of the logo. Although they’ve moved it up above the lightning bolt itself, it still sticks out rather oddly. By eliminating the wordmark on the alternate logo (on the blue home jersey) they’ve restored balance and allowed the bolt to stand on its own as an iconic image for the team. It’s a bit strange to see different elements on each jersey, but the change isn’t drastic enough to overwhelm you. By removing the black and silver from the color scheme they’ve also restored a classic hockey look that fits in with the other classic franchises of the NHL. The one problem with removing the secondary colors however is that the icon loses some definition and combined with the new stylized oval it could be passed as a logo for a cartoon superhero.

mr_incredible

Stan Lee's Guardian Project never saw this one coming...

Overall the change is an improvement, albeit not a dramatic one. The Lightning have accomplished what they set out to do as outlined in the press release. You can’t help but think however, that this certainly won’t be the last of the brand tinkering that we see from the Tampa Bay Lightning.

Let us know what you think.

Posted in Branding Reviews

Rebranding Reviews: MySpace

December 1st, 2010

By Matt Cook
Point Click Media

Note: Point.Click Media was not involved with this project. This is merely a review for study purposes.

Just in case you haven’t been following the evolution chart of social media, let me fill you in. In the beginning there were forums. Forums are a place where users can group together and discuss their favourite topics, everything from collective bargaining agreements to collecting belly button lint. Today, we have Facebook and Twitter to eat up 85% of our workday. But sandwiched in between the evolution of forums and Facebook is an interesting transition phase that is the subject of our study.

Evolution

MySpace launched in 2003, and quickly became the place for stylin’ and profilin’ by allowing users to customize their own little corner of web. Users could design their own profile by adding virtually anything they wanted to it, from color schemes and photos to video to music. Basically, MySpace allowed anyone to swipe and plagiarize anything they could get their hands on to show off their individualism. However, in 2008, MySpace was quickly left to pick up the pieces of their shattered empire and suck in the dusty desert air after being slammed by that Mac truck that is Facebook.

But to their credit, instead of folding up like a cheap tent, MySpace has stuck it out and begun to make strides in winning back their clan. They’ve started with a swift facelift.

myspace

Now, contrary to popular belief or as this wordmark may have you believe, MySpace is not flat lining. MySpace is not dead. What they’ve done is taken an incredibly bold risk in allowing you to interpret the concept behind MySpace by making it whatever you want it to be. Although the above image is now the official corporate logo, there is also an accompanying wordmark that contains the full MySpace name, so for those of us who just don’t get it, there’s still a secondary logo to fall back on. There’s a lot that can be done with this logo, and I believe that’s what MySpace wants.

Although this rebranding makes me wonder about the endless amount of mockery that could fall on MySpace with that open ended logo… kudos to MySpace. They’ve taken a huge risk in adopting a logo and brand that can easily be misunderstood or misread. It’s a huge gamble, but they did it anyway. Sometimes big risk comes with a big payoff.

Let us know what you think.

Posted in Branding Reviews, General News

Rebranding Reviews: The Gap

October 6th, 2010

By Matt Cook
Point Click Media

Note: Point.Click Media was not involved with this project. This is merely a review for study purposes.

You know the Gap. It’s that staple of every overcrowded North American shopping center that’s almost the symbolic image of everything that’s wrong about buying a $47 pair of socks. You’ve seen the commercials. They’re the ones with the popular, trendy, teen-aged students, dressed in denim or khakis and jostling playfully or performing synchronized dance moves in front of a stark white backdrop. You can almost smell the hair gel and nipple rings through your TV set.

This video was embedded using the YouTuber plugin by Roy Tanck. Adobe Flash Player is required to view the video.

Much like their clothing, the Gap brand has never been anything to really brag about. It’s nice, it gets the job done and gives a hint of classiness, whether it’s authentic or not. The Gap has always done an excellent job at marketing their brand and it’s tough to argue otherwise, but the folks leading the way towards enslaving another generation of youth into the corporate brand have decided to go in anther direction in the form of rebranding.

gap

The original Gap logo has a certain elegance to it as I alluded to earlier. By fashion standards, the Gap is not really a high class brand like Gucci or Dolce & Gabbana. It’s marketed toward the everyday American family. However, the old logo gives the illusion of high class. The new logo literally looks like they hired one of the students from their commercials to throw something together in Microsoft Word. There’s certainly something to be said about companies that use Helvetica for their corporate wordmark.

Overall I don’t see what the new logo brings in the way of marketing power. Then again, I’m also part of the generation that’s been willing to shell out $98.50 for a rainbow scarf and pink tuque for your daughter’s Christmas recital at the community college of performing arts.

This video was embedded using the YouTuber plugin by Roy Tanck. Adobe Flash Player is required to view the video.

On a side note, where do these kids live that they need all these winter accessories – boots, hats, scarves, mittens… but no coat? If a kid came cartwheeling down the street in February wearing that around here, their parents would be lynched in the town square.

Let us know what you think.

Posted in Branding Reviews

Rebranding Reviews: MapQuest

July 21st, 2010

By Matt Cook
Point.Click Media

Note: Point.Click Media was not involved with this project. This is merely a review for study purposes.

Remember MapQuest? Back in 2002 you felt like you had the technology at hand to build the atomic bomb because MapQuest allowed you to embed their web-based global mapping system right into your website. How cool was that?

First of all, does anyone still use MapQuest? It seems like in recent years MapQuest has fallen so far behind Google Maps that it wouldn’t shock anyone if they just fell off the face of the earth. Nevertheless, MapQuest is actually a subsidiary of AOL who have also recently rebranded. Perhaps the two coincide in some form in order to try and distance themselves from old, outdated, inept technology. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Branding Reviews, General News

Part 2: Travelling the Amazon

July 7th, 2010

By Matt Cook
Point.Click Media

Last week we began looking at how Amazon has solidified itself as a leader in e-commerce without having to undergo any major face lifts or radical changes in layout.

We’ve come across two active trends right away that can be attributed to Amazon – the tab menu system and the fluid layout. As we move toward the present we begin to see a few subtle changes to the website that don’t necessarily call for any alarms, but are still notable enough to change the way users navigate the website. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Branding Reviews

Part 1: Travelling the Amazon

June 30th, 2010

By Matt Cook
Point.Click Media

With web trends dipping and diving into new avenues every day, and with the increasingly rapid evolution of technology in online shopping, there’s one website out there that has seemed to weather every storm and, in many cases, set the trends themselves.

There’s no questioning Amazon’s place in e-commerce history. They’ve been among the pioneers since the very beginning. Their very first business model was simply to be an online bookstore in the mid-1990’s. The Amazon brand has since expanded into selling everything from A-to-Z, just as their latest logo incarnation says. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Branding Reviews

Part 2: How Larry King is Defining the Universe

April 28th, 2010

By Matt Cook
Point.Click Media

Last week we started looking at CNN as a trend setter and how we can gauge the evolution of the web by following the progress of one website. The biggest things we’ve noticed from 2000 to 2004 is the increasing demand for interactivity but also the lack of direction for presenting it. In the years following 2004 we really notice multimedia bursting into the mainstream with no signs of turning back. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Branding Reviews

Part 1: How Larry King is Defining the Universe

April 21st, 2010

By Matt Cook
Point.Click Media

There’s a common expression that’s used here at Point.Click Media and within the web industry when you want to find out about mainstream trends relating to web design or development. For example, if you want to find out what the current resolution trend is for the web or perhaps a new trend in advertising placements, the answer always comes back the same: Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Branding Reviews

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