Web Design, Business Card Design, Web Copywriting

Twenty years ago I began doing creative design work on the first Mac computer. Much of what we enjoy with the internet originated with a program called Hypercard on the Mac platform. They led the field in wysiwyg (what you see is what you get) and in gui (graphic user interface) setting the standard we enjoy today.

One of the things I remember from that time is the idealism of all the techies involved in the industry during the 80's. People got involved in the those days with the inspiration of shorter work-weeks, more personal freedom, a new avenue of creativity, and much more. It was an exciting time as I became more and more involved with developing and implementing solutions for user groups within a national corporation of over 60,000 employees nationwide, moving billions of pieces of mail every year! What a time and place for the mind to explode with possibilities!

I had been asked many times in the past to assist with the design and implementation of websites for fellow coaches. I felt okay about helping to a point when someone already had a site and just needed maintenance. Since then, my own website maintenance evolved to the recreation and fine-tuning my own site while learning and keeping up-to-date on the technology, search engines, and effective online marketing techniques. Pragmatic and idealistic, content is King!

If content is King then you need to have the ability to maintain and control your website content with great ease and comfort. Why pay someone when you can do it yourself? You already know how to use Microsoft Word, an email program, possibly you've been blogging already, but you've learned your way around a computer. Courageous to a fault, you know to backup your hard-drive, your important files, and how to reformat and reinstall your operating system and applications back onto your computer. If you don't, I highly recommend you make it a point to become acquainted. These skills are invaluable in developing a sense of confidence when learning new things on a computer. Knowing how to rebuild what you destroy removes all fear of messing up! So much like life.

Having the skills myself and working in tech for so many years, I have a comfort level with learning. The process takes more time as it isn't a full time occupation - or hasn't been - and I juggled writing, coaching, part-time work, and life while maintaining and deepening my website design and development skills. Even so, there are still so many exciting things to learn! Recently, a shared success with my fellow coaches came at an opportune time in the disguise of creating a website for Little Buddies. What you see is the complete creation of their website from the knowledge acquired about the two of them, their business, interests, and concerns, as well as a business card.

The site information and pages were organized in my mind as I came to understand them and their business. I applied my background within the tech during the systems-development days, where our team primarily served the customer service, human resources, and sales & marketing departments information systems needs. It's the language and fun of my career past that serves me well in achieving a fulfilling experience for my client and myself.

I am currently finalizing the business card design for these gentleman. It's smooth, cool, crisp, and fun business card design came about through a collaborative brainstorming hour where mock-ups were played with in Microsoft Powerpoint. Even though color blind, the color code id's give me the freedom to create collaboratively with the client and delivering exactly what they want. Seeing the net effect of the almost finalized design is a thrilling ride of joy and excitement as the creative process unfolds. Play time for work, who could have asked for anything better?

In the coming month, I anticipate completion of two other web projects and I'm looking forward to doing more. Creative freedom, creative collaboration, and witnessing the birth of a vision into form is an exquisite journey of metaphor for life and its joys. Reminders that what we're about is important. Let me help you tell the world!

I can be contacted directly at lee.down (at) onemancan.ca and One Man Can is my website. My site is buggy - it's a massive time hog to recreate and that is my goal. In the meantime, I keep adding pages from what already exists perpetuating a number of kinks that developed over time. To go back and fix everything is also very labour intensive, so I prefer to start from scratch and do it right the first time, much like I did for Little Buddies. You can expect the same commitment with your site and when it is handed over, you'll learn directly from me how to maintain your site without fear! My own experience with my site has been a great learning project and the final fruits will be so appreciated once the resurrection is complete. It will contain four corners: Coaching; Web Design & Consulting, Published Writer, vacant. I have so much life to embrace!

Best wishes and much love, Lee

One Man Can (make a difference)