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Raleigh Highlights

Setting up our Web design shop in Raleigh, NC has been great for us so far, but it isn’t all work! We’ve found some truly unique and fun stuff in Raleigh, and we wanted to share! 42nd Street Oyster Bar and Seafood Grill508 West Jones Street, Raleigh, NC 27603   (919) 831-2811  This establishment has been around for [...]

Websites Designed For Kids

People tend to focus entirely on Web design for adults. It hit us the other day, “why not look at web design for kids?” Doing some searching we narrowed down some of the most popular, best designed, and most unique websites for kids. Some are a lot like typical ‘adult’ sites, while some are vastly [...]

Our 5 Favorite Raleigh Websites

Alter Imaging is opening a new office to bring our unique approach of web design to Raleigh, NC. Now that we’re working out of Raleigh, we thought it would be fun to find our favorite Raleigh business websites. We chose 5, and rated them based on speed, design and usability. Each site is the best [...]

10 Quick-Fixes For Your Business Twitter Account

Every once in a while I browse through my followers list and often find very poor business accounts. Here’s a few things that take very little time to do, but will really help make your Twitter account better. 1. Get a Better Username Make sure your username will clue people in to your business. Adding [...]

Why Your Business Should Consider Podcasting

Podcasting got its name when the words “iPod” and “Broadcasting” were combined. The concept of creating a broadcast specifically for an mp3 player has really taken off in the last 5 year and podcasting is now consider mainstream. Major broadcasting companies have turned much of their content into podcasts, and podcasting networks like TWiT have [...]

Email Marketing Basics

Email Marketing can be a tremendously useful way to get a message directly to your customers, and it can also be a way to annoy them out of doing further business with you. The concept of email marketing is essentially the same as mailing out a short catalog or flyer to customers. You create a [...]

Forums are your Friend!

Internet forums, or message boards, are essentially the oldest social networks online. They are places for like-minded people to chat about certain topics, get help, and more. Today it is easy to overlook forums when thinking about social media. Their age plays a part, and the “niche-ness” of them prohibits massive amounts of members. Still, [...]

What Does Your Logo Say About Your Brand?

A company’s logo tells people a lot about the company. A well designed logo can be many things, but it will almost always benefit the company it represents. On the flipside, a poorly designed logo can make a company look lazy, old-fashioned, or simply less attractive. A quality logo should not only look great wherever [...]

Writing for Search Engine Optimization AND People

Having a business blog can be incredibly beneficial in building trust with current and future clients, and on top of that it can bring traffic to your site! Blogs give businesses the opportunity to branch out and cast a wider net online, by allowing them to write about topics that may not be explicitly covered [...]

Sun Tzu and Competitive Analysis

Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War”, a book about military strategy in feudal China, found a significant following in the business sector in recent years. Although the text is written for generals, much of it can be directly applied to businesses. One particular line deals directly with competitive analysis, and serves as something of an [...]

Does Your Website Look Like Circa 1999?

It’s 2010, and the web has been around long enough that people recognize what is current in web design, and what is outdated. Having an outdated website can have the same effect on a customer as you showing up to a meeting dressed in clothing that is distinctly not from this decade.  A poor website can [...]

AlterNation Episode 11: Personally Branding Your Business

Welcome to AlterNation! Today we’re talking personal branding with social media- what it is, and why it’s important. Personal Branding is a pretty new concept for regular people. In reality though, it’s simply a new form of reputation management; one that takes place online. Put simply, personal branding is marketing the brand of you. There [...]

Using Foursquare for Business

Foursquare is a location-based game and social networking platform. To clarify, you check into places you go, get points, unlock badges, see where your friends are, and sometimes find specials and deals. Foursquare has made setting up a business account extremely easy, and they give business owners a lot of power. All you have to [...]

AlterNation Episode 10: A Couple of FourSquares

Welcome to AlterNation! Today we’re talking location-based services! 2009 saw the rise of location-based social applications, such as Foursquare and Gowalla, which have tremendous potential for businesses. Though barely a year old Foursquare has nearly 1 million users. Gowalla, its main competition has about 150,000 users. April 16, 2010 was declared Foursquare day by the [...]

How to Blog if You’re Boring

We preach blogging for business pretty relentlessly, and while there is a lot of information (read: endless) on how to blog, there isn’t a lot to help you if the product or service you sell isn’t particularly interesting. Keeping this in mind, I picked three examples of boring professions or industries, and outlined the challenge [...]

AlterNation Episode 9: Twearching for Answers

Welcome to Alternation! Today we’re talking Twitter search! It’s common practice to monitor your brand on Twitter, but Christopher Penn has written about what he calls“Three nearly guaranteed Twitter moneymaking words”. Wordiness aside, his suggestions are really great. He says “recommend“, “suggest“, and “anyone” are the words, and that they should be used in combination [...]

AlterNation Episode 8: The Facts of WordPress

Welcome to AlterNation! Today we’re talking WordPress; what it is, why it’s great, and how you can make it better. For the uninformed, here’s a description of WordPress pulled from WordPress.org: “WordPress is a state-of-the-art publishing platform with a focus on aesthetics, web standards, and usability. WordPress is both free and priceless at the same [...]

27 Social Media Blogs You Aren’t Reading, But Should Be

Chances are you’ve read some of the big social media blogs, like Mashable and HubSpot. These are great blogs, no doubt, but what about the internet’s vast collection of other social media blogs? I went hunting for quality blogs that weren’t as well known but still had excellent content, and no surprise, I found a [...]

AlterNation 7: Business Blogging and You

Welcome to AlterNation! Today we’re talking about blogs, and why companies should have them. Why Your Business Should be Blogging SEO benefits Pushing out new content keeps giving google more to pick up, and helps you rank for more keywords. You can target specific keywords by writing posts referencing them in the title; to branch [...]

AlterNation Episode 6: Twitalytics

Welcome to AlterNation! Today we’re talking about tools to make Twitter easier to use, and more powerful for you. Management Twitter’s website may be fine for the average user, but it isn’t that handy for someone looking to use the service for business. We suggest using <a href=” />HootSuite to manage your account or accounts. [...]

AlterNation Episode 3: Using the ‘Book for Business

Welcome to AlterNation Episode 3! We’re taking a close look at using Facebook for business and marketing, and we discuss all sorts of tips and tricks. Getting Started Facebook has a decent system in place to show you how to set up various portions of your page, but after that they don’t give any instructions. [...]

AlterNation: Everything You Thought You Knew Is Wrong!

About gaming, that is. Welcome to AlterNation Episode 2! This week we talk online social games, location-based services and the dangers invovled with them (oh my!), and look at a case of schools using webcams to spy on students, big brother style. For show notes, click more.

How to Write a Tagline that Sticks

When you hear “Just do it” or “Think Different“, what comes to mind? If you’ve been conditioned enough, you’ll recognize that the two phrases are the taglines of Nike and Apple. The same thing goes for other taglines like “Who ya gonna call” (Ghostbusters) and “Snap! Crackle! Pop!” (Kellogg’s Rice Krispies). These taglines stick for [...]

2010 Social Media Predictions

Well, it’s that time of year again!  Time for the Internet to be bombarded with posts about predictions of what is to come. It happens every year. Some predictions come true while others still remain to be seen (Second life? We are still waiting to see that take off…) At Alter Imaging, we just couldn’t resist the [...]

Social Media Real Estate – Stake Your Claim!

If you are just starting to get into the social media world it can be hard to know where to start. We here at Alter Imaging, believe that different social media sites are more or less effective depending on what type of business, vertical, or industry you are in. However… Knowing what will be the [...]