We’ve had the pleasure of working with Iaomai Medical Ministries, a San Diego  medical outreach non-profit, and in nearly record time, we launched their new, fully-custom website: check out the live site here!!

Not only was it wonderful working with Iaomai because of the inspiring advanced healthcare they provide to those most in need worldwide, but President Sean Burgess was extremely helpful providing content, managing some multi-browser testing and supporting our artistic efforts along the way! As a thank you to Skybox Creative for our work on the project, Burgess kindly sent our staff an incredibly beautiful and exotic floral arrangement that literally dropped all of our jaws – it has the largest lilies we’d ever seen!

It was very gracious of Iaomai to offer such a warm gesture, and we in turn commend the organization on their medical outreach, which includes both clinical and surgical procedures during their medical trips. Iaomai specializes in the mobilization of advanced healthcare services to under-served populations around the world. Photo galleries for their most recent trips to Guatemala in 2009 and Jamaica in 2008 are available on the site click here, as well as photos of their most recent fund raising event at the Hotel Del Coronado click here.

Without even asking, Burgess provided a testimonial about the entire web development experience and end product:

“Skybox has been one of the freshest breath of business air I have had in a long time. I am so glad we have done business. I hope your business continues to be a huge success and other potential clients see your diversity and creativity in delivering unique and relevant websites.”

Last night, Skybox Creative attended the “Grand Premier” Showroom Opening for our client, OfficePlanIt + Olab Studio in downtown’s East Village. We completed their custom website in September of this year, and also worked with the contemporary office solutions company to create large format wall art, email campaign designs and postcards.

Their spectacular space, highlighted by premier dealer Inscape’s office systems, brings together the simplicity and edge of contemporary design with the unique character of their space – the original Wonder Bread factory building, heralding rich brick walls and industrial-style ceilings.

A showroom full of guests enjoyed a wide selection of delectable appetizers and cocktails, and most importantly, the lavish atmosphere created by presidents Theron Williams and Jim Edmondson, and their masterful OfficePlanIt team.

For more information on how OfficePlanIt can build your office interior dreams, visit OfficePlanIt.com

SEO is a term that is tossed around on a daily basis yet there are many people who still do not understand what it is. Firstly, there are 2 components to SEO and generating traffic online: Organic SEO and PPC. The term ‘Organic Search Engine Optimization’ refers to ranking well on Search Engines for specific keywords without paying on a per-click basis. Then there is PPC, which stands for, you guessed it Pay-Per-Click! There are a slew of local and national organizations offering SEO, but it is important to do your homework before hiring any of these companies. There are some basics that everyone should understand, so we are going to educate you here on just a few of the main points.

Defining your keywords and keyword combinations is a vital first step in the process. For instance, Web Design San Diego is a different keyword combination than San Diego Web Design, so selecting the appropriate keyword combinations is tricky. Getting thousands of ‘hits’ is not nearly as important as attracting relevant traffic. A great way to start your research is to sign up with a Google ‘Ad Words’ Account. You do not have pay anything to start the set up, but once your account is activated, you will have access to a tool called: Search-based Keyword Tool and the Keyword Tool. It is good to understand which keywords generate the most traffic, but also to make sure the ones you choose will help drive sales. For instance, a term such as ‘Brand’ will generate over 1,000,000 searches on Google monthly, but the term is too generic to sell ‘Branding’ or a specific brand for that matter, besides, you will be drown out by the 617,000,000 results, try getting to page 1-3, it will take A LOT of work!!

If you have a product or service that people will search for locally vs nationally, you are in luck! Whenever you add a city name to a search it narrows down the results tremendously. Take the Web Design example, a search for ‘Web Design’ generates 375,000,000 results, where as a search for ‘Web Design San Diego’ generates 11,600,000 results, you just eliminated 363,400,000 competitors from the running…not a bad place to start! If you have local seekers, you also have the benefit of Map listings which show up above the organic listings when a city name is added to a search. Google offers a free map listing, you can even add coupons and many other business details through their Local Business Center. Yahoo has a similar product as well, I would recommend setting up a listing with both Search Engines. A couple of factors will help you get to the top of that list, number one is location, but you can also submit your listing to specific categories + sub-categories and fill in keywords that way. It also helps to have customers go on and rate your business, if they like you! When visitors find a business with multiple testimonials and a five star rating up front, they will automatically feel a stronger sense of trust vs. your traditional Organic Search Results.

Ok, now to the on-site details.

Now that you understand the importance of keywords, you should know that your top (2-5) keywords should be all over your website. Developing a site entirely in Flash is fine if you don’t care about search engines, but if you want your site to be found, you should limit flash to a certain location on the page, keeping the navigation, title tags and body text in HTML/CSS. There is also a rule to be aware of called: Keyword Stuffing. If Google catches you trying to ‘trick’ the system, they can potentially blacklist your domain, which is definitely no good! Ok, so how do you repeat keywords without keyword stuffing, let me count the ways: title tags, url strings, meta keywords + description, h1 tags (proper definition of header text), body text and links (internal, inbound and outbound). If you have more questions about how these elements can be implemented on your site, please email us info@skyboxcreative.com I have attached a graphic below visually illustrating the elements I have mentioned above. The live site used as a reference model can be seen here: www.drgram.com

Read the rest of this entry »

One of our clients, Vigor Systems, was recently an attendee at the National Association of Broadcasters Show in lavish Las Vegas, Nevada.

More than just broadcasting, the NAB Show™ is attended by leading media, entertainment and communications professionals who share a passion for delivering the next generation of audio, video, and filmed content across multiple platforms – from televisions, radios and computers to phones, the big screen and beyond.

Amidst all of the giant plasma screens, graphic and web design (Skybox Creative’s niche) were showcased as important elements supporting the latest and greatest in broadcasting and technology. Digital Production BuZZ, NAB’s team who provided live radio coverage, interviews and podcasts, saw their show producer Cirina Catania win an Inky Award for her work getting the event’s information and breaking news out to the masses.

For more information on NAB 2009, click here

Skybox Gets Even More Creative with New Account Manager

At Skybox Creative, we love providing the best in web design + branding without ever compromising client care and support. With that in mind, Skybox welcomes to the team Carly Bartkiewicz; account manager and latest addition to an already impressive pool of design field professionals. She’ll be hitting the ground running Рensuring your design, branding, eCommerce, search engine optimization, print and related needs are given their necessary attention to detail and some TLC, too.

Leadership, editing and project management fall directly under Carly’s wide-ranging and knowledgeable skill set. She comes to Skybox from Wheelhouse Media in North County, where she was the managing editor of Carlsbad Magazine, Encinitas Magazine and several contract-publishing projects. Outside of the office-world, Carly enjoys long walks on the beach and puppies. Seriously? Well, no, and although that may be partially true, you will more likely see her out on the soccer field or debating the latest March Madness upset. (She’s a Syracuse University journalism graduate, a central New York college known in part for both their basketball program and top-notch communications school).

Carly is here for our clients, community, friends and fans, so feel free to pick her brain or ask for some web design and branding solutions by emailing carly@skyboxcreative.com.

Skybox Creative – providing Web Design + Branding in San Diego since 2006 is now on Yelp!

As an SEO effort, we encourage our clients to get in as many online directory listings as possible. There are many highly trafficked directories that offer free listings. This can help your business in two ways, firstly it increases the likelihood of people finding you on the web, secondly it  improvs your page rank by increasing back-links to your site. For those of you who are unfamiliar with page rank, Google provides a page rank based on a scale of 1-10 that helps determine the relevancy of the information on your web site.

Here are a few online directories for San Diego businesses:

www.kudzu.com

www.bizsandiego.com

www.yelp.com

www.dmoz.com

Click here to add a comment/star rating to our business listing on YELP!

For more industry specific online directories, type your primary target keywords in any major search engine and several directories should pop up for each keyword or keyword combination. For a longer list of general business directories, contact us and we will happliy provide you with more.

So you have 3 kids, a lively variety of ages, and the toys are piling up faster than you keep track, not to mention the bills. Guess what, it’s time to move to a new house! You cringe as you peer into the garage where dozens of barely-used toys are tossed in a heap covered in a thick layer of dust. If dust was the only problem, you might be able to sell them, but the sun has gotten to them, so there is really no good option. Sadly most of them end up in the trash…you think to yourself, there’s got to be a better way!

This is exactly what happened to Carlos Algarin, founder of rentAtoy, Inc. (http://www.rentatoy.com).

With a genius idea on his hands, he started his research and found out that a few successful toy rental companies already existed, most of them outside of the U.S. It was confirmed, he had a valid business idea on his hands, the brainstorming process began. How would rentAtoy create a superior brand in an industry that is still unfamiliar to the average consumer?

Enter Skybox Creative (http://www.skyboxcreative.com). With extensive B2C experience and local landmark clients, such as Pangaea Outpost (Pacific Beach), Flower Hill Promenade (Del Mar) and the San Diego Film Festival, rentAtoy sought out their award-winning branding + web design expertise. Skybox Creative pulled up their sleeves and got to work on the promising new brand.

Everything from the candy color palette to the shinny, playful logo scream ‘kid-friendly’. Skybox Creative wanted to create a memorable tagline that would drive the message home for parents: Happiness Delivered. Short and sweet. The tagline curves under the logo to form a smile, reinforcing the message non-verbally. The meerkat mascots were modeled after Carlos’s 3 munchkins, personalities, favorite toys and all.

Brand Identity + Character Development

The biggest challenge of all was that often the first thing that came to mind was germs! With a ‘clean feeling’ baby blue in the background and an impressive flash video reinforcing that the toys are GUARANTEED Safe and Clean, the web site was an instant hit! Skybox Creative also encouraged a safety tab in the main navigation for those concerned, where they could read about rentAtoy’s strict safety standards. As a father of three, Carlos would never allow anything to be shipped that he would not give to his own children.

On the Back of their business cards, it says it all: fresh toys delivered to your door every month. save time. save money. be green. This concise statement became the staple of their advertising and branding campaign for one good reason, people get it.

San Diego is excited about rentAtoy! They have already received tons of press from Channel 8 News to Channel 6 News (Select Rent-A-Toy video on the left to view), Fox News and more. Their stellar brand image and messaging give rentAtoy a competitive advantage over their single U.S. competitor who clearly did not invest much into their brand identity.

Filled with ambition and armed with the right tools, rentAtoy is on their way to the top. Thanks to Skybox Creative, their dream is now a reality. Watch as they grow.

There are now forty iStock Inspectors around the world. It’s their job to dig into the Queue and give every single submission the thorough eye-balling that it deserves. Many of our designs have been selected for display on the worldwide iStock community’s Designer Spotlight! Have a look at some of our featured web designs below:

Skybox Creative Web Design

http://www.istockphoto.com/design_spotlight_details.php?ID=20628

Gelato Web Design

http://www.istockphoto.com/design_spotlight_details.php?ID=11666

Skova Design Website

http://www.istockphoto.com/design_spotlight_details.php?ID=20629

Your Fit Friend Web Design + Social Network

http://www.istockphoto.com/design_spotlight_details.php?ID=20630

Century Transportation Web Design

http://www.istockphoto.com/design_spotlight_details.php?ID=20631

Our client rent A toy launched their new website this month!

The website is http://www.rentAtoy.com/, it is the Netflix of the toy industry. A green company with a big idea. It’s genius really. Already showing a promising future, on December 4th, they received thousands of hits to their website from around the world.

rent A toy is steps ahead of the competition. 1. They have a better selection of toys (including Nintendo Wii, Leapster and more!) 2. More affordable monthly rates 3. Toys for a wider age range 4. An impressive brand image + website 5. They are local! In fact they have a booth set up at the Fashion Valley Mall for the holidays (next to Santa)

rent A toy Booth - Fashion Valley Mall

Skybox Creative was responsible for the brand creation, character design and web development including complex Flash animation and back-end database system.

Watch the News 8 feature story