Here’s an excerpt:

A New York City subway train holds 1,200 people. This blog was viewed about 6,400 times in 2011. If it were a NYC subway train, it would take about 5 trips to carry that many people.

Click here to see the complete report.

If you haven’t shopped there before, you’re in for a treat. The cards I bought on Etsy from Vandalia Street Press just arrived and they are really lovely.

I say, get keepsake-quality handmade artisan cards and support working artists at the same time. It’s a win-win!

After spending seven months writing content and managing development for a new website for GeoEngineers, I was ecstatic when the site launched today.

Taaa-daaaaa! I’m very proud of the end results of my first really big website experience, and even more glad that it’s done at last. (My brain is toast.)

“Done” is relative when it comes to websites, it turns out. When I managed print projects, there always came a moment when they were, in fact, done: printed, folded, boxed and delivered. My print-related friends know how much I loved the tangibility of holding a finished printed product in my hands and examining it. I could assess its successes, learn from its flaws, and call it good.

But websites aren’t finite or tangible, and I am learning that they don’t really wrap up in the same way print projects do. I had already received suggestions for major design revisions and additions before the thing had even hit the street!

Experiencing New Dimensions

There are other differences, too, new dimensions to consider. Yes, I’ve still needed to think both about the visual aspects and the functional ones, just like I did for print projects, but the functions and interconnections have proven to be so much more complex on this site than on even my most complex print campaign:

• What tagging choices will reinforce the desired interconnections between one part of the content and another?
• How often should a fresh selection of connections display?
• Are we getting the expected relationship results?

My colleague and I found the abstractness of the tagging vocabularies challenging to wrap our heads around until we experimented with them.

• Where will the visitor go next? Are we leading him/her toward any dead ends? Are the choices logical? Thank goodness for an expertly created design and wireframes, but all these things must still be checked.
• Is the site design legible, with adequate contrast, even for color-blind viewers?
• Is the development mapping to the design, and are adjustments needed?
• Does the site work? (How many ways can I break it?)

Then there’s the matter of the content:

• Is the copy cohesive in tone? Structure and presentation?
• Do the captions work with the stories?
• Is everything spelled and punctuated correctly? How easily errors sneak in!
• What about the behind-the-scenes things it’s easy to forget? What should search results screens say? Courtesy confirmation emails? All of it adds to (or detracts from) the visitor experience.

What details could possibly be missing at this point? There are hundreds, if not thousands, to choose from on a single website. After our team spent months working on and checking the site, our trusty previewers identified nearly 600 more things for us to review again, correct, or consider adding/changing.

Some skills transferred, new ones learned

I can report that my skills as a trained visualizer and project manager have transferred as well as I had hoped they would. My penchant for detail has, too. My ability to run everything through a mental branding filter has been a boon.

My abstract thinking abilities have expanded. My web vocabulary has, too, (from “hover state” to “pager” to “taxonomy”), along with a much more intimate familiarity with the concepts—thanks to one extremely patient web developer, Brad Wressell.

The GeoEngineers website, built in Drupal, designed by Fell Swoop and developed by Sixteen Penny, is at once an experience, a thing, and a tool for creating more of a thing and experience. How cool is that? Please visit the site at GeoEngineers.com.

He was shocked when I replied and told him I was no longer buying printing, but was now a copywriter for the web.

We emailed back and forth about some of the changes in the printing industry. He mentioned that the large, highly regarded company where he works had sold off a couple of its large presses and reduced capacity. I told him about my tour last year of an all-digital plant that didn’t have a prepress department, but did have an HP Indigo web press, one of the first installed on the west coast.

The changes in the print industry away from artisan printing and jobs for print specialists like me were what made me decide to make a transition to my new work as a copywriter.

My print acquaintance wondered whether there would be enough print work to sustain him until his retirement. I told him that I had wondered the same thing for myself and decided that for me, at least, there probably wouldn’t, unless I wanted to move into ugly, commoditized advertising printing (ew!).

The companies I know that are doing well have embraced digital printing and now offer both digital and offset. Mohawk Paper is diversifying beyond paper for offset printing. The company has invested in Pinhole Press, its own digital printing venture, has invested in related software, and is expanding its line of digital press papers.

Disaster avoidance tip

I must say, I’m not optimistic about the future of printing as I knew and loved it. I told my print acquaintance what I’ve told friends who are still in the industry: If the future isn’t looking rosy from where you sit, don’t wait to make steps toward your next career, or to influence the evolution of the one you’re in. Do it now, while you still have some income and flexibility, and before you find yourself right up against that dead-end wall you had hoped you wouldn’t have to face.

What about you? What’s your experience been? What do you think the future of printing will look like? Please leave a comment.

Em-Dash, January 20, 2000 - June 18, 2011

I took Dash to the vet this morning for a check-up. Right after we walked into the examining room, Dash suddenly crumpled to the floor and cried out. At first we thought that he’d just lost his footing and fallen awkwardly. But Dr. Kung listened to his heart and said he thought Dash was “trying to pass.”

He gently lifted Dash onto the table and he died within a few short minutes as I stroked his face. He didn’t seem to be in any pain and seemed mostly gone by the time he got to the table. Dr. Kung thought that Dash’s final cry was probably more surprise than pain.

Dash was my sweet, funny and gentle companion for 9 years and I’ll miss him so much. Goodbye, Butternut.

This is Em-Dash. He’s the red fawn greyhound who I brought home to his “forever home” with me when he was 2-1/2 years old. My canine companion of nine years is sweet, reserved, gentle and funny. He doesn’t have a mean bone in his body. Dash is my heart dog.

In February Dash was diagnosed with kidney disease, a progressive illness that prevents the body from using the protein in food to maintain muscle. Since the diagnosis, he’s gone from 73 pounds to well under 60 and his muscles are wasting away. His formerly muscular haunches are shockingly concave and bony now, his spine prominent and his ribs deeply corrugated.

Em-Dash, February 18, 2011

Treatment with medication and prescription food hasn’t worked all that well, because the food recommended for kidney disease is hard for my dog’s sensitive digestive system to handle. Acupuncture treatments for digestion, organ function and pain relief seem to help, but it’s clear that the disease is progressing toward its inexorable end. The vet says all treatments are delaying tactics at this point.

So my dear Dash is disappearing a bit more each day. Today when my neighbors caught a glimpse of how skeletal his poor body has become, I saw the tears in their eyes. That made me cry, too.

Em-Dash, June 12, 2011

The cost of loving is the risk of a broken heart

Yes, it’s a pensive and sad time at our house. A wise old Quaker friend remarked, “I am so sorry to hear about Dash’s situation, I have enjoyed being kept up to date re his beloved companionship to you. We do get to continue learning the cost of loving someone, the eternal risk of a broken heart at some point.” It’s true, there’s a broken heart in my future. The breaking has already begun. But I wouldn’t have missed the heart-opening of loving—and being loved by—this creature for anything.

Dash’s spirits are good and it’s not quite his time yet. A friend’s gift of homemade dog cookies came in the mail today, and I had to laugh when Dash enthusiastically ate the first one, then pranced back to me to get another! I cherish our snuggle time, our short walks, and giving him his daily ritual, post-morning-walk “loves” backrub. I smile when I hear Dash pounce off the couch and jingle his collar tags, his wake-up call to me to climb down from my sleeping loft and take him outside. Sometimes I just lie down beside him and put my ear to his ribs to listen for the reassurance of his big heartbeat and deep breaths.

This afternoon I brought his bed out to the deck and set it close to my chair so we could bask side-by-side in the late-day sun, companionably, like the old friends we are.

Old friends

Anywhere from $29.95 to $400, apparently

I’ve been snapping photos to consider including in my third annual CD-case calendar this coming December. This one is in the running. I took it at Flower World, a large plant nursery near Maltby, WA.

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The page design makes it clear to the recipient which way is up.

A couple of years ago, the United States Postal Service made changes to Standard Mail mailing panel design rules that frustrate designers and print managers no end. Just trying to parse out what the postal service rules are can be a challenge.

One of the main changes is that the mailing block now has to be in the upper half of the page of a flat. From a design perspective, that’s some awfully choice real estate to give up!

The cover sheet of this Print magazine direct mail piece follows the letter of the law, while masterfully playing with the question, “What is top?” It’s also a great example of aligning content to context.

For mailing purposes, what's up is down!

Notice the mixed direction of the type in the enlarged mailing block below. A pitch for a tempting subscription rate is right-reading to the reader, while the permit and address are right-reading to the USPS. I wonder if there’s a rule that says that the return address has to be right-side-up?

The mailing block was also designed as a Business Reply Card that the reader can just tear away on the perforated lines and mail to subscribe.

Highlighted in yellow: the mail-to address and mailing permit

Disaster Avoidance Tip

Will a solution like this one always work? That will depend entirely on who is doing the approving and how strictly he or she interprets The Rules. A by-the-books stickler might reject this design, while someone more flexible (or harried or overworked) might not.

The last thing you want is for a direct mail piece to be rejected after design, printing, and mailing prep have already been done! Most mail houses have someone on staff who already has a good relationship with the USPS postal regulations person in your town. It is definitely worthwhile for you or your mail house to solicit the input of the approver early in the design process to ensure that your most creative solutions meet USPS requirements.

Learn more about mailing considerations in these two Printing Disasters stories: On Passing Postal Muster and Avoiding Postal Disasters.

© 2011 Nani Paape

Over the weekend I bought an Apple iPod Shuffle to use at my new writer’s desk. I could hardly wait to unwrap it and start using it!

Apple’s industrial design choices were smart and beautiful, as usual. The iPod came in a sweet little clear plastic cube, sealed with clear plastic tape with a subtle arrow that showed me how to unwrap it. Inside the box, the iPod sat on a little tray, beneath which were the earbuds, a USB cable, and a booklet labeled, “start here.”

Every customer action had been thought through, so taking the components out of the box was like unwrapping a specially wrapped gift. Lovely!

I did not love the instructions, though. They were extremely minimal and were set in tiny type. Nowhere in the booklet did it say, ”For complete instructions, go to: support.apple.com/manuals/ipod.”

If I need a magnifying glass to read the instructions, they are too small!

Instead—on the very last page—it said, “For important safety and instructional content, see the user guide: support.apple.com/manuals/ipod.” Instructional content? What is that? As usability expert Steve Krug says, “Don’t make me think!”

Start Here: Check for blind spots

Apple’s choices to create such minimal printed instructions—and provide them in 4-point type—are clues to their audience assumptions:

• Everyone who buys this product is young, so reading tiny type will not be a problem
• Customers will just mess around with the device until they figure it out; nobody reads instructions anyway
• Customers will just plug the iPod into their computer and the online set-up will work flawlessly (Not so!)
• Everybody who buys an iPod already knows iTunes and synching

Once online, I got locked out of resetting my iTunes password for the next eight hours, and couldn’t figure out how to skip the registration step and proceed to setting up my iPod. I called customer service and eventually we got everything worked out, but if Start Here had directed me to the (excellent) online manual at the beginning, I wouldn’t have needed to make that call.

Disaster Avoidance Tip

You get the hairy eyeball in the marketing world whenever you identify the audience for your product as “everyone.” That’s because the broader and less differentiated the audience is, the harder it is to make targeted, effective marketing decisions. In other words, if you try too hard to appeal to everybody, you run the risk of appealing to nobody!

But I think the converse is true, too: Define your audience as only the young and the hip, and you run the risk of frustrating some older folks who are all ready to  love you and your products. (I bought my first Apple product in 1988. I’m a loyal customer who plans to buy more of them in the near future.)

As an “older” consumer, I appreciate companies that go out of their way to make it easy for me to use and enjoy the products that I’m already pre-disposed to buying from them—and my generation has the buying power that makes a compelling bottom-line case for doing so.

Path? What path?

Three years ago, I quit my job over an intolerable boss (along with 8 coworkers, at last count) and aimed to find work as a print production manager in a creative firm again.

There was just one problem: My liberation, the decline of the print industry and the country’s near-Depression were about to collide.

Design firms laid off staff and eliminated print manager positions. My job hunt became disheartening and seemingly endless, interrupted only by welcome stints of contract work.

As unemployed friends underwent voca- tional re-training for replacement careers, I wondered if I’d ever have an “ah ha” that would reveal a new path for me, too.

First one toe, then the whole darn foot

Then my favorite writing teacher encouraged me to start a blog, saying that if I wrote about things I knew well, my writing would continue to improve. He even offered a name for the blog: Printing Disasters!

Right around that same time, the job coach I was working with advised that every 21st century job hunter needed to establish an “online brand.” Clearly it was time to dip my toes into the web world.

I created my blog, Printing Disasters—and How to Avoid Them. To my delight, people enjoyed what I wrote. I joined Facebook and LinkedIn. I tweeted on Twitter as @NaniPrints and got to know interesting, creative folks. Some even hired me to do projects for them!

Gradually I evolved from an inadvertent entrepreneur to a deliberate one and morphed my blog into a website that promoted both my print management and writing services. I also looked into HTML, SEO and content strategy.

So was writing my ah ha? I didn’t think so. It was too easy and natural to feel like a thing. It was something I’d always done, I was just doing it more often. I did feel a shift coming, though. Inspired by an article by life coach Martha Beck, I wrote about the shift in my story, Thoughts on Reinvention.

Beck says that things are changing too fast for that tired old “staying on track” metaphor; tracks and paths are being replaced by an ocean of fast-changing developments. She was talking about technological change, but I think her metaphor is equally apt for vocational change today.

“Perseverance furthers.”
…………………………………………—The I Ching

Life as a solo creative or “virtual team” member proved to be lonesome and too unpredictable for me, so I persevered in searching for a job and creative tribe where I could continue to evolve from print manager to writer.

My perseverance has paid off: I’ve been invited to join an in-house marketing and communications group as their corporate storyteller!

This new role will include doing what I do here on my blog: delve into an interesting specialty, and then write about it in approachable, everyday language.

I’ll also be contributing production planning and content strategy to the company’s major website overhaul project. And yes, I’ll be a member of a small, spirited creative tribe.

Wish me well and stay in touch. I’ll be busily navigating through a different part of the waters, doing my best to stay nimble and buoyant. You can find me on Twitter as @NaniWrites!