Monday, 21 June 2010 10:30

MirrorBall Express

One of our first online projects for CCE was to create a microsite to promote their corporate music performance group, MirrorBall Express.

The brief was to create a single page that provided pertinent information about the band, a small image gallery, a video promotion, testimonials, contact details and social integration.

We delivered all of this and ensure that for most users, all content also fell above the fold.

As a static site, there was no need for our usual content managed solution, so the project was able to come together quite quickly.

Using Web 2.0 javascript techniques, we created a stunning 'lightbox' style gallery and a testimonials section that cross-fades through the glowing recommendations.

Determining the correct video host was also important. Rather than use the more plebeian YouTube, we streamed the corporate video through Viddler. This allowed us to use an attractive player while offloading the immense hosting costs of using video on a website.

Please note, thinksync did not develop the MirrorBall Express logo.

Monday, 21 June 2010 10:24

Ambient Living Micro

When Ambient Living first came to us, they were ready to go right out of the gate with a Valentine's Day promotion all cued up.

Unfortunately, Valentine's was just a few weeks away and their website had not yet been built!

Fortunately, we were able to produce a microsite offering a select product range that captured the spirit of their burgeoning business prior to our development of the full site.

The site was launched in time to take sales prior to Valentine's and created their first online income.

Monday, 21 June 2010 10:22

Sustainergy

Sustainergy are an electrical engineering recruitment company with ties to the largest industrial firms in the country.

Owner Ray Pavri has an excellent understanding of the potential for doing business online and created the Sustainergy site to function as more than just an information resource.

The site is structured to provide carefully targeted content to the various demographics of users that vist the site.

To that end, we used an online document management system to provide order to all downloadable content. It also allowed us to create a hierarchy of information access - only those with the right permissions get access to the documentation.

We also built an interactive mentoring system, with recruits able to connect with industry mentors to aid in their professional development.

Sustainergy uses the blogging platform provided to publish the results of their regular research projects and through this have become an active voice in the Electrical Engineering industry.

Monday, 21 June 2010 10:10

CCEntertainment

CCEntertainment needed a platform to publish upcoming show information, show galleries and engage with their growing legion of fans.

To that end, we created their online presence, building a site that has a unique visual appeal, bold, sophisticated and loud - just like the band!

Each show season, the front page is dominated by a ticketing page which provides an immediate call-to-action for current fans (and fans-to-be!) to purchase tickets, provide show information, testimonials and seating details. This page is schedule to appear at the top of the page until the day after the final show, at which point it begins to slip below newer posts. Each show page is heavily customised to reflect the style of the show itself.

Additionally we built an advanced polling plugin that allowed us to run opt-in promotions on the site, featuring the hefty prize-packs that CCE acquire from their sponsors. The polling plugin drives customer acquisition and retention, allowing members to further engage with CCE.

Ad-hoc galleries can be created on the fly within articles, which is a vital consideration for such a visual group, featuring the work of Russel Cherry, Jomar Reyes, Stuart Harris and more.

The site also features Twitter integration and promotes their other social media marketing endeavours on YouTube and Facebook.

Monday, 21 June 2010 09:51

MacTheMag

MacTheMag is a network of sites managed by celebrity ex-MacWorld editor Matthew JC Powell.

Incorporating MacTheMag, MacTheBlog, MacTheForum, MacTheNews, MacThePodcast and MacTheReviews, we were asked to produce a series of sites that met the need of each specific endeavour.

The resulting network incorporates a fully-featured reviews system that allows users to add their own reviews to the officially produced articles a podcast that allows for both direct and iTunes streaming of regular shows and an RSS-fed main page allowing users to immediately access all the latest content in one place.

Additionally, the sites are progressing towards a single-sign-on system that integrates with the vBullettin backend of MacTheForum.

Monday, 21 June 2010 09:49

Hazeldene

Hazeldene Yarra Valley is a Victorian retreat like no other.

Catering to up to 16 guests per night, groups book the entire lavish premises, relaxing in one of the Yarra Valley's most gorgeous and serene locations.

For their online presence, it was necessary to convey the beauty and majesty of this property immediately that a vistor enters the site.

To that end, we applied our internal process of defining the emotional and informational attractors of the site, creating a call to action that appeals to anyone with a love of fine living while allowing pertinent information to be easily found.

We defined evocative terms to be used consistently throughout the navigation to add to the emotional attraction of the content and ensured that even the pricing tables were presented in an unusual and polished display.

The end result, due to be launched in July 2010 is a visual feast that compels the user to discover more.

Monday, 21 June 2010 09:47

Energy Superfoods

When Carole Keast came to us with an idea for a revolutionary online health store, we jumped at the chance.

Carole has true passion for her business, having founded Energy Superfoods after using the principles she espouses to create her own health and fitness regime.

As such, we needed a platform that could allow Carole the unfettered ability to manage both her online store and the marketing and communication that is vital to building a loyal customer base.

Thanks thinksync for the awesome welcome page and wall box they created for us. It looks fantastic and you do a great job!

While it would be possible to create a similar system using Joomla, Campaign Monitor and Google Analytics, an all-in-one solution was called for. Business Catalyst was the only platform that fit the bill.

Monday, 21 June 2010 09:43

CCE Magazine

As CCEntertainment's prestige grew, becoming known for their high-concept tribute shows featuring top Australian artists, it became clear that there was in interest in the history that CCE represented and in the artists that perform in their shows.

From this the CCE Magazine was born.

A fortunate happenstance meant that we were able to acquire the rights to use previously unseen shots of the Rolling Stones by famed rock photographer Philip Morris, lifting the quality of magazine shots enormously.

We were contracted to produce and launch this unique Australian magazine. Feeling that most music-oriented magazines lacked the class of a reputable magazine, we used classic publications as our inspiration to produce a clean and prestigious look.

Part of the plan was always to produce the magazine online. We used the K2 content construction kit to produce a flexible and unique magazine site that caters to promoting the current features while still organising the content in an edition-based hierarchy. This type of organisational method is unique to online magazine conversions and one we think particularly suited to this type of content.

Monday, 21 June 2010 09:38

Creative Masters Forum

A part of Digital Content Networks, the Creative Masters Forum is a community site with a difference. Focusing on the absolute masters of their craft, the CMF runs regular articles on significant contributors to the creative fields; film, photograph, music and art.

A main point of difference from similar types of sites, the CMF also branches out into real-world events, creating opportunities for creative workers to get first-hand exposure to the visionaries in their field.

To drive engagement, single-sign-on for commenting is encouraged, through the use of the Disqus commenting engine. This allows users with FaceBook, Twitter or OpenID logins to use those to participate in group conversations without having to create yet another login.

The site is built using Joomla and the massively powerful K2 content construction kit, allowing us to present content in a variety of ways - driving home the central focus of creativity for the site. It also allowed us to build one-off microsites to promote events that still tie into the core of the site.

Creative Masters Forum is part of the DCN network, TV Production Forum and Music Producers Forum

Monday, 21 June 2010 09:36

Panalysis Govt Microsite

When Panalysis released their Web Analytics in Government Report, it was decided that a dedicated microsite was needed to drive sales.

Focusing squarely on a call-to-action, the microsite was dedicated to providing compelling reasons for government agencies to purchase a copy of the report.

As such we sourced an appropriate hero shot from a Flickr pool and sought permission from the photographer for its use. The hero shot clearly demonstrates the microsite's governmental focus.

To make it as simple as possible we structured the text in an easy-to-read and compelling style, while providing simple, brightly-coloured buttons for immediate conversions.

Further, the Panalysis contact details were prominently located, allowing all relevant information for potential purchasers to be available above the fold.