In the initial concepting and strategy of this site the idea of “mobility” was key. Though I am a large flash advocate – that is basically how I started my career in this industry – there is much more than just cool transitions and snazzy effects that make a great website, there is accessibility and that makes a website functional.

Content is key as well and in the Burrell 2.0 design I know I wanted to incorporate a blogging mechanism. The necessity of this component became clear to the client once it was asked “WE all know Burrell has done some great work, work which started at Burrell yet completed at a larger agency, but does the public know?,” “For the ideas that started out at Burrell, and got published in Case Studies and White Papers for other agencies, was Burrell ever recognized or referenced?” Needless to say the answers to these questions was “No.” This is where it would make sense to have a company blog – to publish great thoughts and ideas which may help inspire better work.

Having the website become more content focus also did one another thing, outside of the fact that it is now more SEO-friendly and better to look at, Burrell now has the chance to share their viewspoints on African-American advertising – making them specialists in communicating to the African-American community.

Simplicity and imagery were two other ingredients that I wanted to ensure was implemented within the site while wire-framing the infrastructure. By keeping minimalism in mind within the layout we were able to showcase the images with less distraction from surrounding graphics – making the images and portfolio the hero and having them become the color to the canvas.

We looked to the assistance of Flique Creative to help develop the site – Jude – our Art Director did a great job in completing the vision for the rest of the website. This is just the beginning of the site and I feel we’re on to a great start – Burrell v 2.1 ideation has begun – within this new implementation we will be making the site more social.

Seeing older businesses grasp where technology is able to take them and evolving their business according to those changes, just proves that you, as a business, always need to look outside the box and see what is happening in the world around you. Although, the path to getting to that point may be a daunting one – this is why having the proper education as well as key people on your team to be able to explain and reach out to the decision-makers is vital.