Dear Mississippi Music,
As a long time customer of both your stores here in Hattiesburg and Jackson I know customer satisfaction and quality are important to you. I have long recognized your commitment to providing quality services and products. I also know how important communication of any kind to your target audience is important. I'm sure you realize that consumers now have many choices available when purchasing music equipment and that each consumer over the years has become more intelligent with their purchases. The Internet plays a key role in product advertisement and target audience. Using the Internet to shop and make informed decisions about purchases is a common practice with most consumers. This is an especially common practice with todays economical standing: people want to get the best product for their dollar. It is my understanding that your company is a family owned and operated business and that individual attention and quality products are important to you. Thats why I am writing to you about your current website. I hope to help improve your websites appearance and attractiveness through a series of suggestions.
My first suggestion would be to change your main logo. The design is dated and looks like it has been around since the Internet was invented. A simple, clean logo would be more effective than the neon sign type font you are currently using. This font, to me, looks unprofessional and should be replaced with a simple logo. The next suggestion would be for your overall color scheme. There are over 8 hues of blue on your home page, all clashing together. It's true the light blue and black have a nice contrast, one might consider sticking to one or two hues of a color. The third suggestion I would make would be to update your navigation. It's obvious who ever built your website choose the fast way out with premade graphics. These could be replaced with a simple html table and plain text, reducing loading time and making it easier on the eye. The title of your page needs to be edited also, when the page loads the actual name of your html document is “Untitled Page”. This can be fixed with a simple <> < / title > tag in the header section of your code.
My final suggestion would be too include pictures of your store and maybe an actual catalog of products. With current technology a businesses website can automatically be updated by taking stock. This would open up a whole new revenue of online sales, reaching a whole new world wide group of consumers.
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
Blog 5
For this blog we are suppose to create a progress report for our group project. A good way to start would be a simple explanation of what we plan to do. Our group project will be a small users manual for Adobe Illustrator with a concentration on the basic elements a student using the lab would need to effectively use the program. In this report I will cover what I consider to be important basic elements of Adobes Illustrator a student using the University of Southern Mississippi's creative writing lab. I have analyzed the past and future projects presented to us during the term of the semester and have selectively narrowed down what key features of this program can be utilized to effectively complete these project using Illustrator.
My personal work on this task has consist of creating the graphics and information for this project. No one in my group knows Adobe Illustrator so I have to provide the knowledge associated with the program. Although this is frustrating I feel it shows how helpful a manual could prove to be. I have done a good amount of research for this project and produced a few “hot key” graphics and explanations of the Adobe Illustrator tools located in the tool box. I plan to include a detailed explanation of each of these tools and possibly include graphical examples of the tools in use.
The work that has yet to be completed is a vast and hard to predict. The major concerns that need to be covered are the fact that I will be doing the vast majority of the work which will leave me unable to devote a large amount of attention on each of the functions covered in the manual. But looking past that, I know I need to devote a section to the basic tools and their sub categories. I will further research the brochure project and decide what tools would be the most useful for the design. I will also include manual on the file menus. This will include things like opening a project, printing a project, importing a picture, and other useful features.
In the next coming week I expect to have the majority of this project done. Including a basic design of and actual placement of information into the manual. This task should not be difficult with my prior knowledge of Adobe products. This knowledge helps me quickly come up with information and express information, and then quickly place the information on to a reader-friendly design.
Overall things are going relatively well. Other than time constraints and a little bit of a lack of help this project is piecing together and i hope that'll help future students in English 333.
My personal work on this task has consist of creating the graphics and information for this project. No one in my group knows Adobe Illustrator so I have to provide the knowledge associated with the program. Although this is frustrating I feel it shows how helpful a manual could prove to be. I have done a good amount of research for this project and produced a few “hot key” graphics and explanations of the Adobe Illustrator tools located in the tool box. I plan to include a detailed explanation of each of these tools and possibly include graphical examples of the tools in use.
The work that has yet to be completed is a vast and hard to predict. The major concerns that need to be covered are the fact that I will be doing the vast majority of the work which will leave me unable to devote a large amount of attention on each of the functions covered in the manual. But looking past that, I know I need to devote a section to the basic tools and their sub categories. I will further research the brochure project and decide what tools would be the most useful for the design. I will also include manual on the file menus. This will include things like opening a project, printing a project, importing a picture, and other useful features.
In the next coming week I expect to have the majority of this project done. Including a basic design of and actual placement of information into the manual. This task should not be difficult with my prior knowledge of Adobe products. This knowledge helps me quickly come up with information and express information, and then quickly place the information on to a reader-friendly design.
Overall things are going relatively well. Other than time constraints and a little bit of a lack of help this project is piecing together and i hope that'll help future students in English 333.
Blog 4
To: T. Leoni, Manager, Personnel Department
From: Donald Pryzblo, Manager, Data Processing Department
Subject: INCORRECT PAYROLL CHECKS
I have been reviewing the the situation involving the errors in the computer files dealing with our companies payroll, and I think we both can agree we have a problem that needs to be addressed.
After our meeting I put a good bit of thought and consideration towards this matter and reviewed the time sheets and time tickets. I have found 35 errors out of the 37 entries. This leads me back to my original statement that it is clear cut that the majority of the errors were made by your clerks. Due to the corporate hierarchy it is my department that gets blamed for these mistakes for correctly copying the faulty time tickets prepared by your clerks.
You and I discussed the requirement of my computer operators of comparing their entries against the time sheets from which your clerks prepare. This has proved to be time consuming and I will not hire additional employees to monitor the mistakes made by yours. It is clear we have to come to a middle ground here to keep both of our bosses happy. Unfortunately my people do not have the time to check and correct errors made, it is only their job to copy and enter them into the system. I would recommend that you instruct your clerks to carefully review their work before submitting it to the computer operators.
In this letter I have revised the body of the text to be a little more personal and try to help explain the importance of why his personnel needs to double check their work before submitting it. The first thing I did was change the opening lines. The very first two
sentences were very abrasive and could set the reader in a defensive mind set. This is counter productive and needed to be changed. I tried to extend the shortness of each sentence by expanding on the subject being discussed. This, I felt, took away from the snappyness of the letter, while it still holds a forceful, yet polite, tone. I didn't feel this letter needed to be incredibly polite or pleasing because in a company mistakes in payroll like that would not be accepted and both of our jobs would be on the line. Due to the nature of the letter I felt the tone needed to be forceful, yet polite, so things could quickly change.
From: Donald Pryzblo, Manager, Data Processing Department
Subject: INCORRECT PAYROLL CHECKS
I have been reviewing the the situation involving the errors in the computer files dealing with our companies payroll, and I think we both can agree we have a problem that needs to be addressed.
After our meeting I put a good bit of thought and consideration towards this matter and reviewed the time sheets and time tickets. I have found 35 errors out of the 37 entries. This leads me back to my original statement that it is clear cut that the majority of the errors were made by your clerks. Due to the corporate hierarchy it is my department that gets blamed for these mistakes for correctly copying the faulty time tickets prepared by your clerks.
You and I discussed the requirement of my computer operators of comparing their entries against the time sheets from which your clerks prepare. This has proved to be time consuming and I will not hire additional employees to monitor the mistakes made by yours. It is clear we have to come to a middle ground here to keep both of our bosses happy. Unfortunately my people do not have the time to check and correct errors made, it is only their job to copy and enter them into the system. I would recommend that you instruct your clerks to carefully review their work before submitting it to the computer operators.
In this letter I have revised the body of the text to be a little more personal and try to help explain the importance of why his personnel needs to double check their work before submitting it. The first thing I did was change the opening lines. The very first two
sentences were very abrasive and could set the reader in a defensive mind set. This is counter productive and needed to be changed. I tried to extend the shortness of each sentence by expanding on the subject being discussed. This, I felt, took away from the snappyness of the letter, while it still holds a forceful, yet polite, tone. I didn't feel this letter needed to be incredibly polite or pleasing because in a company mistakes in payroll like that would not be accepted and both of our jobs would be on the line. Due to the nature of the letter I felt the tone needed to be forceful, yet polite, so things could quickly change.
Blog 3
When I think of the criminal justice field what usually pops into my mind are those snazzy commercials involving all the CSI forensics and “glamorous” side of the field. Being a television fan, I often see a national advertisement for Phoenix University's criminal justice program in Phoenix, Arizona that depicts the criminal justice field in a misleading way. They basically framed the commercial as a CSI episode, and anyone in my field knows that the CSI TV show has very little to do with actual law enforcement work. So I decided to visit Phoenix University's website (http://www.phoenix.edu/information/online-criminal-justice.html) hoping it would be flashy and convincing. This, surprisingly, was not the case. The department website, like the rest of the educational institutions, is boring, hard to navigate, and underdeveloped. The website consist of a single image and relatively few links concerning actual information about the field. The site offers curriculum offered and required for a degree but there's no real convincing element as to why I should apply to their school. I searched around for a brochure and all I could find was a youtube link to their nationwide commercial. The second website I looked at was Florida State Universities (http://www.criminology.fsu.edu/). This website consist of a very well thought out color pattern, design, and is easily navigable. Their website includes a “Info” section that contains convincing evidence to join their degree program.
These websites will help mold the way I design my brochure. When I first thought of this project I decided I wouldn't include any Hollywood elements of television shows like CSI, but after reviewing other universities websites I have found this to be the most convincing way of luring people to USM's criminal justice department. It's a sad fact that one would need to use misleading methods to acquire students, but thanks to popular media it's become an incredibly popular field. The websites will also help me with the design of my brochure. It's easy to see how a simple color scheme and layout looks clean and appealing to the eye. This combined with interesting pictures, maybe of people working in crime lab, help boost the effectiveness of the work. The sites also helped me decide on what information to include. I decided to keep my brochure relatively vague, letting the graphical elements due most of the talking. I will give basic information about our program, contact information, and will probably include fields that accept Criminal Justice majors after graduation.
These websites will help mold the way I design my brochure. When I first thought of this project I decided I wouldn't include any Hollywood elements of television shows like CSI, but after reviewing other universities websites I have found this to be the most convincing way of luring people to USM's criminal justice department. It's a sad fact that one would need to use misleading methods to acquire students, but thanks to popular media it's become an incredibly popular field. The websites will also help me with the design of my brochure. It's easy to see how a simple color scheme and layout looks clean and appealing to the eye. This combined with interesting pictures, maybe of people working in crime lab, help boost the effectiveness of the work. The sites also helped me decide on what information to include. I decided to keep my brochure relatively vague, letting the graphical elements due most of the talking. I will give basic information about our program, contact information, and will probably include fields that accept Criminal Justice majors after graduation.
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