Executionists

To help you get to know our team here at Executionists a little better, we thought we’d let you in on a little of the behind the scenes excitement. This particular segment is called: Phil’s Shirts.

Phil Cady, our Technical Director has been with us for over a year. Over the course of that time, he has rarely, if ever, repeated a shirt. Yes, he has an entire closet full of “unique”, one-of-a-kind Hawaiian and ‘god-knows-where-he-got-that’ shirts. Like a poison dart frog’s brightly colored skin, Phil’s fashion statements let us know to be wary – lest he start lecturing us on web standards, mod rewrites or the half-life of plutonium. Some of his shirts are velvety, some are sparkly, some are illustrated with the most intricate cartoons you’ve ever seen; and none ever cease to amaze. We are constantly intrigued by Mr. Cady’s fashion sense, and hope you are too.

A sampling of Phil’s weekly wardrobe…

Well, I’m pretty sure the same concept works for web design. This is my third summer as an intern at Executionists, I’ve learned a lot from the experience. Just like cooking, it takes a lot of ingredients, all mixed together in the right amounts to make a good web site. Here are a couple of things I’ve learned about the gritty details of web design.

1. Web design is about communication
To the untrained eye, web design is making text and images look pretty. Except, what that’s really saying is that web design is about communicating content from businesses to clients. I’m always amazed at how much time the people at Executionists take to work with clients to ensure their content is presented perfectly. At the end of the day, if your website is empty, nobody will want to look at it.

2. Experience matters
I used to think that anyone could wake up and declare themselves a web designer. Heck, I sure did. Maybe anyone can, but the difference between a good web designer and a great one is experience. An experienced web designer knows when to avoid silly little trends or gimmicks and when to accept and implement important new standards. The team at Executionists has been creating web sites for 12+ years, and designing print for more, and it shows.

3. Balance is important
The team at Executionists has three types of people: managerial types, artistic types and coding types. I work mostly as a coding type, and it is really nice to be able to focus almost entirely on the task at hand. The system that Executionists have developed is effective and helps us crank out web pages quickly. It really shows that the Executionists know what they’re doing.

Executionists definitely has the right mix of skills to make your website work. Richard and Co. have really refined their methods and skills and I now know so much more about the web design industry than I did when I started. It’s a great place to intern, and an even better place to learn.

-Zach Margolis
Executionists Intern

Here at Executionists, we work with just about any type of business you can think of (large or small). Many of the larger companies or corporations tend to have a set marketing plan or strategy dictated by their “in-house” marketing departments, or outsourced marketing companies. In these cases, we tend to cater and customize our creative web solutions to expound on their existing formats. Most of our clients in the Small Business sector seem to have a broad scope as to what they are trying to accomplish via the internet, but are confused by the complexity and various options of strategic internet advertising. Lot’s of our small business clients spend an enormous amount of time (and money) on the aesthetics and presentation of their sites, but then have a hard time grasping marketing ideas to reach out to their prospective client base. Here at Executionists, we pride ourselves in assisting small businesses with web solutions beyond what we refer to as “Phase I”.

Example: You’ve signed off on the website we’ve created for you. We’ve completed all the navigation and aesthetic revisions, all of your content is uploaded, interactive forms completed, etc. The client’s website is finally “Live”. Congrats; you’ve completed “Phase I”. Now it’s time to roll up your sleeves. This is when strategic internet marketing & advertising comes to play. Welcome to “Phase II”. How are you spreading the word about your company and it’s fabulous new site? One of my favorite marketing strategist wrote “Without online advertising strategies, your site will be like the proverbial tree in the forest, falling with no one to hear”. Unfortunately, this is true. However, Internet advertising can help you reach millions of people at a fraction of the cost of traditional marketing techniques. (more…)

Web presence is pretty much business standard nowadays, regardless of the size a company. From “Mom & Pop” boutiques to large Corporations, public information about your company and it’s products/services should be readily accessible via the internet. As this is common knowledge, most businesses establish some type of web presence, but tend to get lost in the competitive internet marketplace. How do you stand out amongst the rest in addition to building “the perfect” website? How well are you marketing your brand? In order to wrap your head around the various combinations of internet marketing, let’s take a basic look at the Web Marketing Family. (more…)

We’re proud to announce some of our recently launched projects!

Studio DNA Salon
www.studiodnasalon.com
November, 2007

The Million Lights Project
www.millionlightsproject.org
November, 2007

The Festival of New American Musicals
www.lafestival.org
November, 2007

Discrimination Attorney
www.discriminationattorney.com
October, 2007

The Safe Sippy
www.thesafesippy.com
September, 2007

As a project manager at Executionists, Inc., I view website development in three phases: pre-production, production, and post-production. (Can you tell we’re Los Angeles-based?) The quality of the pre-production phase will generally establish how quickly a client’s site will be completed. Clients love to help, sometimes to the detriment of the project (see: Executionists Take on Dogbert). However, this is the stage of the process where client input is crucial and greatly appreciated.

Meaning: content, content, content. The most important way a client can help us help them is by being prepared with content for all sections of the website. During our initial meeting with a client, we will establish a content checklist, complete with a listing of all the approved navigation within the site. While we do our job designing the site based on this navigation, we expect the client to do their job by providing all content that will eventually be placed on our neatly designed pages. (more…)

Illustration: Dave Abston (www.graphicsbydave.com)

Scope Creep (also called requirement creep, feature creep, and sometimes kitchen sink syndrome) in project management refers to uncontrolled changes in a project’s scope. This phenomenon can occur when the scope of a project is not properly defined, documented, or controlled. It is generally considered a negative occurrence to be avoided.

Typically, the scope increase consists of either new products or new features of already approved product designs, without corresponding increases in resources, schedule, or budget. As a result, the project team risks drifting away from its original purpose and scope on unplanned additions. As the scope of a project grows, more tasks must be completed within the budget and schedule originally designed for a smaller set of tasks. Thus Scope Creep can also result in a project team overrunning its original budget and schedule. If budget or schedule are increased along with scope, the change is usually considered an acceptable addition to the project, and the term ‘Scope Creep’ not used. (more…)

For all of our competition: please follow this Dogbert tech support scenario (credit to, Scott Adams).

Tech: Help desk, what’s your issue?
Caller: My computer won’t….
Tech: Shut up and reboot.
Caller: Hey! It worked!
Tech: Shut up and hang up. (My call time is improving!)

However, I believe that dealing with problem customers is an art form that should be handled with tact and duplicity diplomacy. (more…)

So you’ve spent XX amount of hours of your time or paid someone $X to do it for you and now you are the proud owner of a blog. (Lucky you! Congratulations!)

Now the real work begins, because no matter how eloquent and topical we think we are, making a commitment to write blog content on a regular basis is… well… a commitment. In our office, we had the bright idea to rotate blog writing duties among our staff of talented project managers, designers and coders, but here it is “blog deadline” and nothing’s been submitted by the designated blogger. So here I am, stuck with the posting duties again. (more…)

We are proud to announce that we are the recipient of a 2007 WebAward for
Outstanding Achievement in Website Development
presented by the Web Marketing Association!

Our award was presented in recognition of our work on the Christopher Laue Productions site.

Christopher Laue
Executionists, Inc.
Events Standard of Excellence

Creative Director: Richard Parr
Senior Designer: Kaoru Wood
Flash Designer: Conrad Julian
Project Manager: Temy Gu

Our overall scores:

We are thrilled and grateful to be recognized!