I had the chance to connect with Greg Verdino, the Vice President/Director of Emerging Media at Digitas, about some words he uses to discuss, explain and understand web 2.0. I referenced the six categories of web 2.0 and he responded with three additional terms that help us continue to get our arms around this broad topic:

• Filters: A corollary to aggregation, these could be destinations that bubble up the best content in a category (like Digg), tools (like RSS) or even the recommendation engines in commerce sites like Amazon.com.
• Distributed web: The notion of a content provider/creator providing content in a widely distributed fashion. Rather than drawing consumers to a central destination or hub (any traditional web site) the publisher surfaces the content and syndicates it broadly (even if in a controlled fashion) so that the content finds users where they are as opposed to requiring users to come find the content. Think of widgets, RSS (yes, there is overlap between this and filters), affiliate players from companies like Brightcove or syndicated video/content models.
• Community: A term used in conjunction with conversations about social networking. Community can also include the entire social media category of blogs, photo/video sharing, etc.

In my daily work I have a chance to interact with a lot of graphic designers. Our company has three designers on staff…two for print design and one for web design. Add to that a full arsenal of freelance print, web, and video design specialists along with an occasional art director and I’ve got a world of creativity around me on a regular basis.

I don’t know if I’m simply more aware of good design (and bad design too) now more than ever or if it’s just becoming so pervasive (it’s probably both or these) but design for everything these days is HUGE! Look at how important design is to so many of the products we have. Every coffee company in the world has adopted the Starbucks style of coffee packaging. It was a design that’s come to symbolize high quality coffee and now even the old school coffee companies like Folgers are on board with this…they call it their gourmet coffee. Here’s another example…look at Apple computers, they’re a combination of both good form (visual design) and function (ease of use).

This trend toward high quality design is inherent in many things web 2.0. Yes, there are certainly some exceptions like MySpace, but for many sites it seems clear there is specific attention given toward and open, intuitive design. That design is often combined with a plain-talking, straight-forward tone. There are four things I’m seeing regularly in many of these sites:

• An attention to the use of white space - The attention to using white space is most noticeable at Google, but I’m seeing it all the time like at eBible and myChurch. One great thing about a lot of white space is that it leaves little room for doubt as to what is most important on your site…and that’s a good thing.
• Predominant graphics - Many of the good web 2.0 sites focus on showing a few predominant images rather than multiple (and often smaller) images. Compare Flickr to Kodak to get the idea. Again, the focus is on directing people down a very specific road rather than the “shock and awe” approach where you overwhelm them with information or options.
• Straight-forward information - The straight-forward information an approach that communicates “mean what you say, say what you mean” kind of attitude. It is also a non-corporate approach…which is also fitting for most web 2.0 organizations. I love the way FeedBurner uses this tone on their site.
• Simplicity - It’s all about ease of use and accessibility. If the person can quickly find what they’re looking for then the site is sufficiently simple.

The distinctions are becoming so stark that the very design of any organization’s website communicates a lot about it. Does your site say you’re accessible and personable or rigid and corporate? Does it communicate with clarity or confusion? Does it show that you’re clunky or nimble?

With the trend on an every growing importance on good design, it would be worth a little extra consideration toward your next project..particularly if that next project is a website. It will say more about you than you can anticipate…so will that be a good thing or a bad thing?

Jon Haarstad sent me a link to check out a podcast giving further explanation about web 2.0 on Business Week’s website. The guy interviewed on this podcast (Tim O’Reilly) was one of the people who had a hand in coining the term “web 2.0″ so he’s certainly got a good perspective on it and provides some valuable insight.

If you’re still trying to figure out what this is (and like I was asked again yesterday when a church pastor said, “so what the heck is web 2.0 anyway”) this is worth a listen. So is this.

I had a tough conversation recently. It was tough because I had to let a client make the wrong decision. In fact, I told them it was the wrong decision, and I was tactful, but they got the message. After my gentle protest and suggestion for taking another approach I was met with a resounding gong of silence (insert cricket sounds here) and it was then that I knew they were going to do it anyway. What is it? IT was banner ads.

The goal this client came to us with was to drive more traffic to their website but they already had decided they wanted to try to accomplish this with banner ads on a particular website they selected. After a few minutes of listening to them I just had to tell them that it isn’t generally a good idea and that there are better (and much cheaper) ways to go about it. As I mentioned above they wanted to do it anyway…and so they are…but here’s where we’re really going to test this…

In addition to the banner ads we’re going to put some video for this company’s same product on YouTube. We’ll be able to track the number of views and links from both areas and see what happens. I don’t quite know what they’re going to pay for a month of banner ads…but I know what they’re going to pay for the YouTube video…$0.00. I’ll let you know how it turns out.

I’ll admit, I’ve got an issue with banner ads. I rank them right up there with the people who sell email lists that are usually just spam. Banner ads are the very reason I was interested in switching from Hotmail to Gmail a year or so ago (Gmail only has text ads). Banner ads just don’t work most of the time. They’re not a wise expense. An effective banner ad would have to be highly targeted on a very specific kind of site to even have a chance. For instance if Apple had a banner ad for an iPod accessory they’re going to have a good chance of getting some attention for the ad, but even then most people still ignore them. By and large banner ads are ignored and with all the effective (and free) web 2.0 options today like blogs, YouTube, Flickr, Digg, video blogs, Wikipedia, etc. there are much better ways to go. Needless to say I’m excited to see how this little experiment turns out! In the end I expect the score to be: Banner ads - 0, Web - 2.0.