I’ve been busy the last few months and I’m please to finally be able to share what I’ve been up to.  All three sites are custom WordPress designs. For the later two I also designed the logos and business cards.

DAWN (Domestic Abuse Women’s Network) has been providing services to survivors of domestic abuse and violence in Seattle and South King County for more than 30 years! My friend, niece and colleague,  Jeanna Riggs of Jenna Riggs Collaborative has worked with them for years. She was brought in to do a full re-branding of their visual identity. Then with the new logo and colors in hand I created the new website in WordPress. It was great fun to get to work with Jenna. If you ever need a great illustrator, Jenna’s your gal! DAWN is very excited to finally be able to control content themselves. Their site design also included a staff training which everyone found quite empowering. Check it out at www.dawnonline.org.

About 10 years ago I designed Karen Kane’s first coaching website. She has just launched a new business focused on helping  established leaders and their teams develop and refine three fundamental skills for achieving their best results: Clarity, Connection & Presence. Visit the new site at www.stillpointleadership.com. You can download free 10 minute audio leadership tool…“Developing a Centered Leadership Presence”.

Teresa Sisk was looking to completely re-brand her offerings, new name, new logo, new colors. She wanted earthy colors but bright and vibrant. And she wanted a simple logo that conveyed the pathway concept. This redesign in WordPress allows for easy updates. Teresa works as a mediator with couples going through divorce that want to preserve family, relationships, and dignity throughout the dissolution process. Visit Teresa’s website at www.pathwaystoresolution.com

Resources by others I think you’ll find helpful

• Writing Better Blog Posts by John Hayden
• Facebook Tips: How To Use The Social Network Like A Pro 
• 7 Steps to Creating a Google Plus Page for Your Business
• Email Timing

 I considered several website designers before making the easy choice to work with Sheila. Her expertise, work ethic, and guidance made what would otherwise have been an overwhelming task, much more manageable. Her one stop shopping service was perfect for me; she handled everything from logo and website development to business card delivery. Can’t thank you enough Sheila.

— Teresa Sisk
Pathways to Resolution

…I really like it – it’s easy to navigate and gives all the info without complicating anything…clean, fresh and organized … BEAUTIFUL… soothing… you get there and feel a need to take a deep breath…

I would normally have at least one design project to share with you, but I didn’t want to hold up this issue any longer. WordCamp is about to sell out! I’ve been part of the  WordPress Meetup team for the last year. We are planning the 3rd annual WordCamp Seattle. It’s a full day of sessions for all levels of WordPress users. Scheduled for Saturday, May 19, it’s only $20 including lunch and a t-shirt. Registration opened a week ago and it will be sold out before this week is over. If you’re interested, don’t delay…sign up today. You’re also welcome to attend free WordPress Meetups on any 2nd Thursday of the month. The next meeting is this week, 6:30-8:30 pm in downtown Seattle.These are great for getting comfortable with WordPress and networking with others who use the tool.

Hoffman Graphics to close for Summer!

My husband Spencer and I are fulfilling a long-time dream to bicycle cross-country this summer on our tandem. We’ll be traveling with a supported tour group leaving Seattle mid-June and reaching  Boston the middle of August. You’ll be able to follow our adventures on our blog at www.2012.s2cycle.com. I will be completing all projects I currently have committed to and will not be taking on any new projects until September. If you’re a current client and we haven’t talked about your needs yet, please shoot me an email so we can setup a time to talk.

Cool Tools, Tips & Resources

• Trello is a collaboration tool that organizes your projects into boards. In one glance, Trello tells you what’s being worked on, who’s working on what, and where something is in a process.
• Funambol is a central hub in the cloud where you can securely sync & share content
• One Page Only is a free online time tracker
• Relationships Rule in Social Media 
• Six Ways To Integrate Your … Email List With Social Media (written for nonprofits but totally useful for small business)
• Email Timing: A Look At 6 Marketers

Spring Forward!

Don’t forget that this Saturday night is time to change your clocks…Spring Forward!

I have so many blessings to count this holiday season, it’s an embarrassment of riches. I’m grateful for my good health, my dear family and my fabulous friends. I’m also blessed with wonderful clients who are fun to work with and I have plenty of work to do. It’s been a very busy fall quarter here at Hoffman Graphics. I’ll just share the two biggest projects with you.

Herbalist book design

The first project was a 130 page book called Flourish: Go-To Guide for Herbal Medicine by Tierney Salter of The Herbalist. It was really fun working with Tierney again, who’s been a client for more than a decade. This is first print job I’ve worked on in several years! If you’re local and interested in knowing more about a variety of therapeutic herbal formulas, single extracts, 35 common health conditions, and diagnostic tools, Tierney is doing a book signing at her store in the Ravenna area tomorrow, Saturday, December 17.

Writing It Real membership site makeover

This is by far the most complex website I’ve ever developed. It was nine months in the making. During that time we re-engineered the entire business/marketing plan, establishing multiple membership tiers and a community forum, among other features. If you’re a writer or know someone who is, you can try out the offerings for two weeks for 99 cents!  This membership site offers a world of writing tools and writing instruction developed by master teacher, poet and author, Sheila Bender, including one-on-one consulting, workshops and conferences.

Important News for WordPress Users

After many months, WordPress has just this week released their newest version, 3.3. If your website is based in WordPress and hosted with me I’ve already updated your site for you. Next time you log in you’ll notice a new look. A couple of the changes you’ll notice are a slicker sidebar with “flyout” submenus which put everything in the admin site just a single click away and a new drag-and-drop uploader, which means you can drag and drop images from your desktop right into the media upload box in the admin. There are little first-time tool-tips which you can dismiss once you have the hang of the new stuff.

Cool Tools, Tips & Resources

• JoinMe, a free screen sharing tool: One of the most indispensable tools I used while developing the Writing It Real site
• 5 Simple Tips To Remain Safe on Facebook
• Going to Florida: marketing gobbledygook explained by friend/colleague Barbara Breckenfeld
• Tag, You’re It! The Storytelling Power of a Great Tag Line
• For Marketing Success, Skip the Social Media Hype

After spending the better part of 2011 restructuring the offerings, we’ve launched an all-new, fully WordPress-based site. We’ve expanded functionality to include a multi-tier membership strategy and a members’-only community forum.

Working with Sheila Hoffman is a dream come true—her knowledge of design, her attention to detail, her quick responses and her customized understanding of how an individual business will benefit most from its website has helped my business take giant leaps.

—Sheila Bender
www.writingitreal.com
Client since 2007

I cannot believe the last time I wrote was in June! Where did the summer go? After a glorious week riding our tandem bicycle in Eastern WA & Idaho during July I’ve been keeping busy with projects. Here’s a quick summary of work completed recently:

• Word & Raby: a small press publisher’s new graphic identity and WordPress website with shopping cart.
• Forward First Publishing: a makeover from a commercial WordPress theme to a customized version of that theme.
• Kernes Consulting: first time site, included a graphic identity & business card using a QR code.
• Seattle Collaborative Law Training Group: using an existing logo, greatly expands and enhances the original site’s content and structure.
• The Herbalist: 128 page print book called Flourish! Just went to the printer this week. It’s the first big print job I’ve worked on in several years. It was great fun to be working with Herbalist’s owner and book author, Tierney Salter again.

Cool Tools, Tips & Resources

Because it’s been such a long time, I’ve accumulated a wealth of items to share. I hope you’ll find something useful in the list. I’ve divided them into Free Online Tools & Business Articles.

Free Online Tools

• Free email stripper Removes those pesky symbols and extra lines in forwarded emails.
• Hello Fax I gave up my fax years ago. This service also lets you send officially signed emails–for free (first 10). It’s an efficient and affordable way to send faxes (which are still necessary for most legal docs).
• WorkFlowy This is the coolest, FREE, work tool I’ve ever used. It’s an addictive, simple and FUN way to organize your life including your work and share any parts you want with others.
• TitanPad Similar to WorkFlowy in its ease of use, this one lets people work on one document simultaneously.
• Prezi: Create “game changing” presentations online.

Business Articles

• Five Easy Tips for Getting Referrals
• How To Make Quick Web Videos For Social Media With Your iPhone
• The Truth about LinkedIn 2-3 Degree Connections (and whether to ignore them or not)
• Facebook vs. Email: Which List Should You Build?
• Social Media Marketing – Why it might not be working for you!
• 10 Tips for Posting on Your Business Facebook Page
• Understanding how to get the most from Categories & Tags on your WordPress site
• What is Vook? (clue: video-book)

Office Closed December 17, 2011 to January 2, 2012

Please note, the office will be closed December 17 to January 2 to celebrate the holidays.

Wishing you a healthy & happy holiday season.

Sheila is a magician!  She took four seperate visions and wove them into a website that shines for us.  Style, skill and patience were the hallmarks of her interactions with us.

—Anne R. Lucas MA LMHC
Seattle Collaboration Law Training Group

Administration Tools

• Statistics: Google Analyticator
• Site map on custom 404 Error page: Dagon Design Sitemap Generator
• Bonus link:
• Anti Spam: Defensio

Search Engine Optimization SEO

• Google XML Sitemap Generator
• All In One SEO Pack
• I use Headway Theme’s built-in SEO

Social Media

• Sexy Bookmarks: a little different & fun, one of many
• Facebook Tab Manager: for custom FB landing pages
• Bonus links:
• Digg-Digg & Sociable: recommended by Bob Dunn

Community Building

• Envolve Chat: easy to use and free up to 25 simultaneous chats (with ads)
• Mingle Forum: easy to use and free

Making over a live site?

• Maintenance Mode: I always use a sub-domain of my business to develop new sites and use one of the above tools to migrate.
  However, if that’s not an option for you and you need to develop on your live domain be sure to this plugin.
• Redirection: If coming from a traditional html site you’ll want to use this plugin to assign every html page to your comparable WP page
• Bonus link:
• Theme Tester:  Test a new theme while showing the old theme to visitors

Migrating Sites?

• BackupBuddy
• Free alternative to Backup Buddy is Backup & Move

Developing sites for others?

• WP Status Dashboard: Helpful for keeping track of many client sites. This plugin keeps the dashboard informed on the status of all your websites. This includes indexing status, WordPress version and active plugin updates. NOTE: This plug-in is currently not available for download. The developer will still sell it to those who would like it (without support) for $20.  Email justin@scheetzdesigns.com
• Meanwhile, I’ve discovered the new tool that does significantly more called ManageWP. This plug-in is in beta. They plan for it to remain free for up to 5 sites and thereafter the fee will be minimal (currently  projecting to charge ten cents per site per month).
• Bonus link:
  • Outbound Links: So you don’t have to teach your clients to always set the target. This does it for you automatically.
  • White Label to customize the Dashboard for clients

Event Registration & Calendars

• EventEspresso: Lite or Premium
• Event Calendar Pro: works with Gravity Forms

Membership Plugins

• S2Member (free)
• Wishlist (easier to use)
• DAP (more powerful)
• Bonus links:
• Membership plugin review compares WPMU Dev with Wishlist & MemberWing and goes on to list all the other options
• Another Membership plugin review with comparison chart for Wishlist, DAP, YourMembers & MemberWing

Unique Uses

• Co-Authors Plus
• Dynamic Headers
• FAQ-Tastic paired with AJAXify FAQ-Tastic
• Page Peel
• Bonus link:
• Better Protected Pages
• Free assortment of jquery mega menus, tabs, accordions, etc
• J Shortcodes: Allows you to add custom buttons, content boxes, tabs and accordion panels, build call to action and information boxes. You can choose color, size and shape for any of these elements.

Premium Plug-ins

Downside?

• Fee is set based on number of sites, usually the lowest is for 1-3 sites and the highest for unlimited sites
• Fee is typically for one year. They’ll continue to work thereafter but if you want updates and/or support you will have to pay a reduced renewal fee annually.

Then why pay?

• Best of class (quality you can count on)
• Ongoing development, updates, improved features & support

My Top Premium Plug-ins

• iThemes’ Plug-in Buddy Developers package which includes:
• BackupBuddy
• Display Buddy
• Gravity FormsPippity
• Pippity