Archive for the ‘Cool Tools’ Category

Easy photo editing with Picnik

Posted by 428 Designs

Lots of clients ask about simple photo editing. Not crazy Photoshop kind of editing, but something simple and easy.

Here’s where you go: http://www.picnik.com/

Crop, resize, rotate…add special effects right from your browser. And, yep, it’s free… and no registration required even! Upload your photo and go at it.

Picnik

Of course, there are more options when you pay for a premium account ($24.95/year), but for simple photo editing, definitely check this out – perfect for bloggers and simple photo sizing/cropping for your website.

BACKUP, BACKUP, BACKUP

Posted by 428 Designs

In the past tBackblaze Online Backuphree weeks, I’ve heard the same number of  people’s horror stories about losing everything on their computers because they did not have a backup. My first question is always, “Why don’t you have a backup?”

This, obviously, doesn’t come with any response that makes any sense to me. I’m sort of a backup freak. I backup weekly to an external hard drive, backup certain files daily to iDisk and have my online backup through Backblaze – which gives me great peace of mind – which you might enjoy as well.

Backblaze is an online backup which securely backs up everything on your computer (except for operating systems, temp files or files over 9mb). After your initial backup, Backblaze continually backs up your files as they change – no need to remember to backup. Be warned, the initial backup will take some time.

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Clicky – REAL time web analytics

Posted by 428 Designs

This is the coolest web analytics tool ever. Can’t believe we didn’t know about this sooner! (Thanks Jodi!)

So, we’re all tracking via Google Analytics..but those reports can a bit confusing (and a day late). Clicky is REAL time analytics…which means you can view your stats right now and see your online visitors and what pages they are visiting on your site (plus a lot more).

Clicky is a really awesome tool and actually, can be a bit addicting at first. Super user-friendly interface…”Clicky is designed to be the easiest web analytics service you’ve ever used”.  And it’s true.

There’s no problem adding Clicky to your site if you are using Google Analytics, they work fine together.

Try it out on the “Pro” level for 30 days. There is a free version, but we think for $60 a year it’s worth it to go “Pro” after the trial. But check it out for yourself, you’ll dig it.

Register for an account here!  If you’re using WordPress, there is a Clicky plugin to easily add your tracking code to your site/blog. Just search for “Clicky” and install the one from Joost de Valk.

MailChimp – Email Marketing Awesomeness

Posted by 428 Designs

WE LOVE MAILCHIMP!

The more we use MailChimp, the more we love it. For small businesses that send email newsletters or contact customers not so regularly, you can start out FREE up to 500 subscribers and 3,000 free sends! When your list of subscribers grows MailChimp has a “Pay As You Go” option or a regular monthly subscription.

MailChimp also makes it easy to track everything – so you can see quick, detailed reports for your campaigns and even send out an automatic tweet to your Twitter account when you post to your blog.

That’s just the beginning…sign up for a free account and check it out.

Contact us for our special MailChimp set up plan for help with list setup, campaign setup and customizing your templates. We’ll add your opt-in form on your website to start growing your email list and also import your existing permission-based list.

Sign up for the 428 Designs newsletter.  We’ll share tips, resources and more “cool tools” we’ve been trying out lately.

Apture – Share and Search

Posted by 428 Designs

Have you noticed the bar that appears when you scroll down on our site? You’re given the option to share on Facebook, Twitter, via email or search. Try it… scroll down, you’ll see it. It’s a cool plugin called Apture and it’s free*.

What is Apture?

From the Apture site: Apture is a service that allows bloggers and publishers to layer in nearly all media from across the web into their sites with one click. By transforming flat web pages into connected multimedia experiences readers can fluidly dive into related information without losing their place on the page so they can see, hear and truly experience the ideas on the page.

Search feature: You can enter a term in the search box within the Apture bar as well as highlight any word or term on the page and click “Search” and you’ll see results from our site, Wikipedia, Google and more. Try it, it’s pretty cool.

Check out the Apture site to see what else it can do.  The bar is fully customizable so you can match the colors of your site and you can add your logo.

We’re still playing with it, but let us know what you think. If you want to try it out on your site just let us know.

Apture

* For sites with less than five million page views per month.