Client Story: Stonehaven B&B
Valarie and Art Green have one of the best jobs in the world… inviting guests into their architecturally designed home perched on the southeastern entrance to Halfmoon Bay’s expansive and aptly named Welcome Beach.
The couple knew that they needed their web site to do a few key things for them and their business:
- allow for easy posting of daily updates of photos, video and text
- reflect the environment and beautiful structure and presentation of their home and suites
- integrate with other marketing tools like Facebook and Smugmug
A visit to the web site illustrates the natural beauty of the location and the stunning design of the home. An overall treatment for images on individual pages offers a collage-style presentation that allows for the inclusion of a greater number of images, and image groupings, to help reduce scrolling or force a uniformly small image size on all of the images.
An integrated SmugMug feed allows for the automatic addition of all new photos uploaded into the Stonehaven galleries on Smugmug, where they are also viewable by the significantly large SmugMug community, further broadening the B&B’s reach and introducing Stonehaven to an entirely different pool of potential customers.
Valarie and Art also use the site’s Wildlife Page to share the frequent sightings of killer whales, dolphins, sea lions, otters, deer and other local creatures in a continually changing showcase. It’s powerful sharing when a passion such as wildlife is combined with hospitality, and web visitors recognize authenticity when they see it.
Valarie is further able to leverage the Stonehaven B&B web site to drive traffic to her other services as a local Realtor. This synergy builds on the typical real estate visitors’ combined needs of finding a reputable realtor for coastal tours and also enjoying a great waterfront mini-vacation while they’re at it – truly the best of both worlds.
From the wall…
Facebook Status
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 17, 2012 at 10:56 pm SEO-focused professionally distributed press releases. Do they work? These results are shown on the second day post-release date. Outstanding.
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 17, 2012 at 10:52 pm Check out the new Pinterest-inspired site for travel writer Lesley Peterson at CultureTripper.com. Loads of fun to work on! All long distance - Lesley lives in Toronto and is also often traveling. http://www.culturetripper.com
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 15, 2012 at 7:29 pm Studies show: Timeline covers with faces attract the most attention.
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 15, 2012 at 7:16 pm Don't use third-party apps like HootSuite or Tweetdeck to post to Facebook - 3rd party posts don't bring share button.
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 15, 2012 at 7:13 pm In depth Facebook marketing tips at http://www.marismith.com - 98% of posts should have an image.
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 14, 2012 at 10:08 pm Top Twitter stories to your email inbox? Aiyaiyai. Redundancy on top of immediacy = idiocy
Twitter Blog: The best of Twitter in your inbox
blog.twitter.com
Share and discover what’s happening right now, anywhere in the world.
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 11, 2012 at 5:24 pm 15 second videos, as prettified as Instagram photos. Free in Apple Store.
Viddy - Life in the moment.
viddy.com
Viddy is a simple way to share well-produced, bite-size videos with the world. Our app makes it easy for anyone to capture, produce and share life's most beautiful moments instantly.
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 11, 2012 at 5:16 pm dejavoodoo
Mozilla and Google Cry Foul Over Browsers in Windows 8
mashable.com
If you had plans to use Firefox or Chrome on a Windows 8 tablet, that might not be in the cards.
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 9, 2012 at 5:54 pm Google announces Drive - add any kind of file and work collaboratively on it with team members you invite, or just work on it remotely from any Internet connection. Image editing, spreadsheets, documents... over 30 file types supported. First 5GB free, upgrade to 25gb for under $2.50/mo.
Will you use Drive?
Google Drive. Keep everything. Share anything.Access everywhere.Google Drive is everywhere you are—o
drive.google.com
In Google Drive, you can create new documents, spreadsheets and presentations instantly. Work together at the same time, on the same doc, and see changes as they appear.
Bad Dog Design Inc.
T-Mobile CDO Phillip Humm said, "Facebook’s social networking app was his company’s “number one app right now” and has customers “picking up their phone 150 times a day.”
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 3, 2012 at 8:12 pm Well, THAT's a nice surprise... check out the google results for a search on vancouver getaways in Google!
Bad Dog Design Inc. Saltspringspa.com is pwning it too... all without spammy keywords all over the front door :)
May 3, 2012 at 8:14 pm
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 3, 2012 at 7:00 pm I am SO stoked about using Volusion Ecommerce. The support even in the research/pre-sales phase has eclipsed by an entire galaxy any other solution I have looked at.
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 2, 2012 at 9:15 pm Morse code comes back! You can even type two different emails with one hand at once. How cool is that!
Introducing Gmail Tap
www.youtube.com
Tap into the future of productivity with Gmail Tap for Android and iOS. Double your typing speed with this revolutionary new keyboard. http://www.gmail.com/t...
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 2, 2012 at 9:08 pm Now coming to your inbox: kuajiri yangu kwa ajili ya kazi yako ya kijamii vyombo vya habari!
Rapid Edge - Apple Specialist This is an excellent new feature. Universal translator is almost here
May 2, 2012 at 9:21 pm
Bad Dog Design Inc. Yes, and I we could soon be understanding insults too... remember the old Star Trek Next Generation episode with the nano-organism that called Picard 'Ugly-Bag-of-Mostly-Water'
May 2, 2012 at 10:14 pm
Bad Dog Design Inc.
May 2, 2012 at 7:02 pm If anyone is using WooThemes for their Wordpress site, a Public Service Announcement of denial-of-service attacks & fix here
PSA: WooFramework Vulnerability
thecollegestartup.com
Don’t get caught with your pants down, here’s how to fix the WooThemes/Framework vulnerability and two excellent alternatives.
Bad Dog Design Inc.
April 30, 2012 at 4:56 pm One seriously happy dog... from photographer Seth Casteel
Bad Dog Design Inc.
April 27, 2012 at 8:59 pm The office soundtrack today, can't get it out of my head - beautiful artwork in a dark, melancholy way
Gotye 'Hearts a Mess' By Gotye
www.youtube.com
View more videos by Gotye on http://portable.tv Animator and film clip director extraordinaire Brendan Cook emerged from his studio with this amazing film cl...
Bad Dog Design Inc.
April 27, 2012 at 7:04 pm I would love to go the sassy route with some local companies... who is up for it?
10 Sassy Brands on Social Media
mashable.com
Brands are showing more personality as the web becomes more social. Here are 10 hilarious brands killing it right now.
Bad Dog Design Inc.
April 27, 2012 at 7:01 pm It's happening... cue scary scifi music.
Asteroid Mining Mission Revealed by Planetary Resources, Inc.
www.youtube.com
Planetary Resources' mission is mine near-Earth asteroids for raw materials, ranging from water to precious metals. Through the development of cost-effective...
Bad Dog Design Inc.
I had a great meeting today with Cheri from 'The Skylight Guy'... not only do they make skylights, they make them - and a whole bunch of other things - for Westfalias and Volkswagen Vans. How much fun is it going to be to work on this project??? I love VW vans, so I'd guess... A LOT!
Bad Dog Design Inc. https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Skylight-Guy/189997493779
April 25, 2012 at 10:16 pm
Bad Dog Design Inc.
April 25, 2012 at 10:04 pm IMPORTANT: check your connection at this address before July 9 2012 to ensure your computer (mac or pc) is not infected with the trojan virus DNS Changer.
Bad Dog Design Inc.
April 25, 2012 at 10:02 pm Noooo... next gen password technology to read brainwaves or heartbeats, which are apparently as unique as fingerprints. I knew something weird would come up today.
Your brain could become your password › News in Science (ABC Science)
www.abc.net.au
Researchers are looking at way to use brain scans and heartbeats to identify people in ways that can't be faked.
Earl James and what would be fed into your brain during this 'scan'.....
May 1, 2012 at 8:38 pm
Cheri LePage
Awesome course Laurie! I hope you will call me soon re follow up on private for my FB page - I am just at the peak of the start of my sales season now...and will be travelling in about a month.
Bad Dog Design Inc.
New profile pic dimensions for April 26... are you ready? The new profile picture will be 160 x 160 pixels and will sit at 23 pixels from the left and 210 pixels from the top of the Page. What do you think of the change?
Bad Dog Design Inc.
April 18, 2012 at 8:55 pm Here's a nifty way to see how your site looks on an iPhone...
CreativeTechs Tips » Test Your Website on Apple’s iPhone Simulator.
creativetechs.com
Interested in Adobe Creative Suite? This is a weekly newsletter for creative professionals who use Macs (but Windows users are welcome too). If you're new here, you may want to subscribe via RSS or Email or Twitter for a mix of new tips each week. Thanks for visiting!
Have a smartphone? Grab the Q code!
Check out the QR Deal...
About
I've been designing web sites for primarily Sunshine Coast based businesses since 1997. My strengths are brainstorming, wordpress template implementation with customization that makes sense, and content generation. I am the President and founder of Bigpacific.com, the guide to everything Sunshine Coast for over 14 years.
I also volunteer my time in the community, especially in the area of economic development, high-tech, and community initiatives. RESOURCES
Bad Dog Design Inc. Keep in mind that the audio slider actually refers to canned audio music, NOT the sound levels for your recording.
May 14, 2012 at 10:03 pm