Tuesday, Sept. 14th
7:30 am to 9:00 am

Akasha Restaurant
9543 Culver Boulevard
Culver City, CA 90232

Come join us September 14th, 2010 at the renowned Akasha Restaurant for Groop Skool’s Executive Breakfast Series: “Digital ADD” Breaking Through. A panel of experts from some of LA’s Top media and entertainment companies will be discussing how to break through the clutter of today’s complex digital media ecosystem.

The breakfast will be held at Akasha restaurant located in beautiful Downtown Culver City’s restaurant row. Enjoy a locally grown, organic menu to the insightful discussions of our talented and experienced panel. Come prepared to jump in the conversation as we intend to answer all your questions on developing digital products that reach and engage today’s hyperactive users.

For more information or to sign up visit www.executivebreakfast.eventbrite.com

Thank you to everyone who came out to this educational and fun filled event, we hope you got a lot out of it and look forward to seeing you again at the next AIGA/LA event. That being said, the event rocked. We interviewed quite a few of you and believe we answered most of your questions, everything from budgets, scheduling, wire frames, browsers, user experience, collaborating with programmers and more. If you missed out watch the videos of Jose’s talk and view the presentation on how to move from print to web design.

As promised, you can find a template for user profiles in The Groop’s Welcome Kit Sample below:

For more information about upcoming AIGA/LA or The Groop events, contact Wesley at wesley@thegroop.net

Are you struggling with managing online products? Do you wonder where in the project things went wrong? Have you asked yourself if there is a better way to do this? We have been addressing these questions with our clients for 10 years and would like to share our experience and solutions with you.

A typical digital project consists of 6 distinct phases: The Idea, Project Initiation, Designing, Building, Releasing and Iterating. Let’s start with the First Phase: The Idea. During this first phase Executives often make some crucial mistakes that will determine the success of the entire project moving forward.

Here are the Top 3 Mistakes:

1. Wanting a product simply because your competitor is doing it

As media and technology continue to advance many companies are feeling anxious that they’re being left behind or not capitalizing on the next big thing. This “herd mentality” leads to jumping the gun and not defining what the problem was in the first place. In the end you’ll find you’ve spent a load of money developing a product that doesn’t serve a need. Even worse, you’re not quite sure what it does or how it will generate a revenue.

2. Not brainstorming with the rest of your team

With most corporate business models, planning consists of top down decision making. The top tier being management, who are often unclear of their own creative and tech team’s capabilities. Without considering the important aspects of the project on their end, expect a jungle of speed bumps, miscommunication and don’t even think about making it on time or budget.

3. Not knowing your users intimately

Defining who your users are may be one of the most important steps of your digital project. If you begin developing without determining the “for who” and why they should care, your end product will have no relation to your target users. Develop a deep understanding of your users, or your product might find itself without an audience.

Stay tuned for our next Groop Skool posts where we’ll introduce Groop Tools to help you avoid these mistakes. Remember, digital projects should be fun and engaging vs. frustrating and exhausting. (Really)

For more information about Groop Skool visit
http://www.groopskool.net

or contact Wesley at
wesley@thegroop.net

AIGA LA & Adobe Series: Moving from Print to Web Part 3- Interaction Design, Planning and Presentation
July 22, 2010 at Downtown Independent Theater