So I was checking out the hubub over at adweek on our new site. We were winning the vote earlier on, but I’ll let Grey have their way. That’s cool. Luckily other reviews have been more positive.

It’s interesting, though. I note two threads in those comments: first, that we were known as a Flash house, so why do we have such a “boring” site? And secondly, “too many words!” Who has time to read all those words? I felt a brief surge of panic that I always feel when hit with a little criticism, but I figured hey! We have a site where we have to write all the time now! I may as well write out our thinking on the matter.

It’s true, I think, that we’ve primarily been known as a “Flash production house,” historically. That’s been a source of pride, but also of frustration. We do so much more, and we have forever. Our work on Kashi, for example, is something I’ve been continually, insanely proud of, but it’s never been noticed enough on our old site (and look! a picture!) We have a great team of back-end developers here – hard core coders that came from places like mag.nolia, nerve.com, and the like. We have a fully-capable technical practice that’s one of the best in the business that’s never gotten enough attention. And we’ve never really highlighted our awesome strategic and creative thinking. Heck, even though Flash is still probably the topic in the Barbaripedia with the most individual projects associated with it, the majority of the work we do these days isn’t in Flash. People that “know Flash” in the company are outnumbered 5-1 by those that don’t.



We wanted to start showing people what else we’ve done. What else we can do. What else we think about. The CNN job today is a great example. Yes, there was a little Flash (though it was mainly used in a development capacity, not our famous mad Flash visual skills), but there was also amazing creative concepting, strategy, client service, production, user experience design and more. All of these things need to be called out more at the company.

The only real benefit, I think, of having an awesome Flash site as our company’s site is to showcase our mad Flash skillz. Yet we’re really only talking about the home page here. This is a website. Few people enter through the front door. Right now, after 4 days running the new site, we have people entering in roughly equal numbers through the portfolio, the blogs, the software section, and the home page. Those that want to see our mad Flash are probably the ones that are coming in through the portfolio. Though we are going to move the “recent projects” module up to the top of the sidebar tomorrow to reinforce “the work.” We hope after six years, if you’re looking for mad Flash skillz, you know we can hack it. Have you seen Frank Gehry’s office?

And the words. Yeah. It’s true. We have a predilection for words. We get that a lot. Sometimes, I think, people are surprised when we pitch them and we plop down a 40 page proposal along with our concepts. I wish it weren’t so. But this isn’t television. There is no “storyboard” for what we do. Interactive marketing has more stakeholders at an organization than just the CMO and the marketing manager. Often, we have to convince 5-10 stakeholders. The brand agency, the marketing manager, the it department, the affiliates/dealers/franchisees, the website stakeholders. Each one has different concerns. Right now, I’m on a 5 city roadshow pitching a project to no less than 40 stakeholders, each with different concerns or questions. The words add up. Everyone needs to be bought in to make the project go off without a hitch.

On top of that, we wrestle with a wide variety of topics. The 70 some people here are from a myriad of disciplines, and all of them have something to contribute.

The site is, as another recent reviewer noted, more of a brand utility than a site to be just visited once. The content is an offering. We imagine and hope that over time, many people will be reading the site’s various blogs through their feed reader. And, to aid in that, here’s an OPML file of every barbarian’s blog, the main blog, and the home page. Throw it into your feed reader, and presto – all the Barbarian Banter you’d ever want.

Of course, that’s probably the opposite of addressing “too many words,” so, in that case, here’s a nice picture of a dog with sunglasses and a wig.