I love dogs. Mine always clamour all over me when I get home.

I think I am going out to get some Dial today….(An advertisement with a clear message and funny execution)

Soapdog

I love “Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader”.  Truly a reality check for me.  So when I found this I was really happy (given that I am a Math Fiend).  Taught me how rusty I really am and how long ago high-school and college was.  Check it out at the link below and have fun.

r-u-smarter-than-a-5th-grader

The winner of the papervision3d king contest held by adobe.

http://13flo.com/
A very cool carousel rendition.  It swivels and does funky things:).  Ofcourse, this is just an entry to a competition so it does not have a finished look interms of copy etc, but the programming is pretty interesting.

http://ecodazoo.com/
Be educated through Ecodazoo on how to be environmentally friendly. The transitions in this site are extremely fluid and it loads relatively quickly.  The Eco friendly message is spot on.  Again, navigation is not very explicit, but once you get the hang of it you kind of figure out what you need to do.

http://www.wontbelieveyoureyes.com/
From the URL name, to the music, to the LOOONG pre-loader that builds a spooky anticipation, the message is clear.  You won’t believe your eyes.

http://www.getahappyface.com/
We love the user interface for this product.  The transitions are smooth.  The music, copy and pre-loader are in line with the product.  Its got a weather widget that will help you decide which St Ives product you should use for the day.  The drawback is the drop-downs in the form which could be smoother, and last but not least, it is hard to locate “Contact Us” which in our opinion should be apparent.

http://www.designspongeonline.com
This location is especially for someone who is refurbishing their house and wants to give the old an extreme makeover :)  Some great ideas can be found here.  Check out the sneak peek sectgion where they feature beautiful homes/offices etc of normal people. The before and after section is an absolute gem for people who hate to throw out old pieces and believe in recycling like we do.

http:http://automatedphonehell.com/
How many times have you called a help line and received an automated voice mail. I REALLY DESPISE THEM. I feel that in the hope of being more efficient customer service and customer interaction are really going out the window. The people at vCom seem to agree with me so check out their key proposition here. Sure hit home for me.

In the quest for big, bold, sexy design, we sometimes forget about its less sexy cousin - boring ole’ copy. We don’t blame you. After all, we’re often told audiences have no time or inclination to read on the web, right?

But it’s precisely because people don’t like to read that your copy has to be punchy and doubly hardworking. The usual rules apply: don’t write three sentences where one will do; don’t waste your reader’s time with reams of text that go nowhere. Beyond those, however, here are a few more tips for helping us to help you with your copy.

• Ideas need time to develop. Don’t rush things.
  We understand you may sometimes need to roll out a campaign on short notice. But for major campaigns that demand a creative angle, remember this - good copy, like good design, demands a long and involved process. For most people, ideas come after a good night’s sleep, not in the feverish, caffeinated haze of working overnight to deliver the job.

  We’d love to do good work for you, but faced with a six-hour timeline from brief to draft, you leave us with no recourse but to rehash old copy - not deliver the ‘fresh’ ideas you want.

• Give as much information as you possibly can in your initial brief.
  Beyond the usual mandatories such as focus, target audience, goals and objectives, tell us specifically what we can and cannot do. It might take you some time to gather all this information, but it’ll be worth it.

  You know your bosses. We don’t. We don’t know that your boss has an aversion to a particular phrase, expression, or colour. Bring this up early, so we don’t conceive an entire idea based around this offending word. It’ll save you some time, and save us some angst.

• We’re copywriters. Not magicians.
  We do not own a magic copywriting wand, nor do we have special access to a secret repository of magic words which say in one word what you want to say in 10 or 20. So don’t give us a 20-item bullet list or a 500-page white paper and ask us to summarise it (because you know web copy should be short), but still insist on keeping all the content.

  Yes, we can make your writing more concise - up to a point. Beyond that, however, the onus is on you to help us determine which points are the most essential. Your website should include only the most vital information on its front page - further details can be broken down into second and third-level pages.

• It’s harder to edit than to write from scratch.
  You’ve gotten a first draft of your copy. It “mostly looks good” except you’d like to add this bit here, tweak that bit there, and completely re-arrange this sentence here.

  Resist the urge to do it.

  Not only do you risk ending up with some schizophrenic copy with multiple tones and styles, it’s often much harder for us to decipher what you want to say, rewrite and edit it, and rework it in to the copy so that it flows. It’s more efficient to simply tell us what’s wrong or what needs to be added or removed. After all, you’re not paying us to do the work yourself, are you?

Put these tips to practice and see if your copy start to work better for you. We think they’ll really help.