Unlocking the Potential of AR Web Design and The Push Forward to Web 3.0

Unlocking the Potential of AR Web Design and The Push Forward to Web 3.0

Today is going to be a dive into AR Web Design, so buckle up butter cup because we are going on an adventure! 

In this blog post, we’re going to take a look at Augmented Reality and its incorporation into web design.

 

Augmented Reality

Businesses are always constantly trying to set themselves apart from their competitors and the race has already begun towards the push to web 3.0. Those who can keep ahead of the curve will ultimately have the winning edge and the web developers, designers, and engineers will be there at every step of the way to build the path into a more interactive and immersive web experience.

Augmented reality is not a new term by any means and has been around for quite some time, but what has been on the forefront is the advances that augmented reality has made in the last five or so years. Augmented Reality is otherwise known simply as AR has made leaps and bounds in the mobile app realm with breakout projects and apps such as Pokemon Go, Google Lens, Snapchat filters, and even the popular furnishing store Ikea with their own uses for the new developments in AR technology.

AR is an evolving technology that web developers of today need to be aware of and actively planning to learn in order to keep up with the trends and web standards of tomorrow.

Digital agency director having a meeting with his team

A Brief History of AR

Augmented reality, or AR, is a technology that lets a person use a device between themselves and the real world. Only, when they look through the device, they have the ability to alter what they see. In other words, think Snapchat or Instagram filters which can be applied to change your appearance or when everyone was outside catching Pokemon from the Pokemon GO craze of 2016. Using a combination of real and virtual world elements with real-time interactions.

The term ‘augmented reality was actually coined by a Boeing researcher named Tom Caudell and was first used as a way to virtual control and guide machinery to perform different training tasks for Air Force pilots. In 1994, Julie Martin, a writer, and producer created the first Augmented Reality Theatre Production by using virtual objects along with a graphics computer and the Polhemus sensing system to project an object and an environment for the theatre dancers to immerse themselves within.

1998

1998 was the first time NFL fans witnessed the virtual 1st and ten graphic system- aka the yellow yard marker. The new technology allowed a yellow line to be overlayed on top of the feed so that viewers can quickly see where the team needed to get to in order to get the first down.

2013- 2014

2013 to 2014 Google unveiled it’s Google Glass which implemented augmented reality experiences with a pair of glasses and could access Google apps such as Google maps, Google+ and even their Gmail accounts.

2017

2017 IKEA released their augmented reality app called IKEA Place and being the first of it’s kind by allowing a user to view what their product would look like in your home or space and allowing the consumer to virtually preview their home décor before actually making a purchase.

Today

Today Augmented Reality is everywhere and with more and more people browsing the internet, shopping, and making purchases through their mobile devices. It’s making it easier than ever before to take advantage of AR.

 

Chatbots can be good and bad

The Value of Mixed Reality

The combination of real-world and the augmented reality transforms how we work, learn, play, shop, and connect with the world around us. It’s a rather perfect way to help visualize things that would otherwise be impossible to see. There has been a steady increase in AR/VR technology, but only recently in these last few years, we’ve seen a real emphasis on augmented reality along with virtual reality due to the pandemic and with more people than ever moving to operate online whether if it’s for business or pleasure and the trend is skyrocketing.

Tech giants such as Google and Apple are at the forefront and now Facebook or (Meta) has officially taken a stance by developing its own metaverse increasing the push towards web 3.0 and a more augmented world. It’s becoming an increasing concern for smaller companies to try to figure out how they can also get in on the action and use AR/VR to increase both work efficiency and overall business profits.

The Problems of AR

According to a recent study by GlobalWebIndex, 90% of people surveyed were aware of virtual reality while only 65% were aware of augmented reality and only 23% said they engage with AR in the last month. These low numbers of people aware of AR along with a lower number of engagement is an issue with AR advancing to the mainstream along with the perceived notion that most people confuse AR with VR and think that they need an expensive headset to have the experience.

It boils down to a general misunderstanding of the technology and what we can do with it as consumers and developers. Consumers right now feel that AR is mostly used for gaming, film&tv, or social media. However, the survey also shows that a third of consumers understand that AR could have some use within marketing and eCommerce applications.

Additional problems can come in the form of hardware issues such as devices malfunctioning or problems connecting to a local server. Content glitches can range from 3D objects not loading correctly or not functioning as they’re expected to. Perhaps your IKEA chair only wants to anchor to the ceiling.

 

ManyChat Chatbot Platform

Use Cases

Here are three use cases and examples of how AR is currently making waves for website visitors.

1: Virtual beauty & apparel

Sephora Virtual Artist is an app, but is also available right on their website as a web app. The basis is that the consumer allows the website to have access to their camera in order to activate “live mode” so they can see what a certain product will look like on their face as they move around. They can also choose the model mode to see what it would look like on a model’s photo or they can also choose to upload a photo of themselves and apply the product to it.

2: The ColorSnap by Sherwin-Williams is an app and web app that you can use on your desktop, mobile phone, or iPad to scan your desired room or area and then simply select your preferred color to see what that particular color would look like in your space.

3: IKEA Place is by far one of the more popular use cases and one of the first to utilize AR by allowing an ever-expansive list of products to be virtually dragged and dropped right into any space just by using your smartphone or tablet device. A user can choose a dining room table set and view it virtually in real-time right in their kitchen.

4: Jeep allows users to see if the new Wrangler will fit in their garage and what it would look like next to their kayaks and camping gear. Customers can use their smartphone to go in-depth with a virtual Jeep Compass changing the colors, tires, and more. Customers can even open the car doors and look inside the vehicle all the while customizing it to their liking.

5: A tattoo shop can now utilize AR a few different apps to not only draw up their artwork for their clients, but they can now show their clients what the artwork would look like on their body before any needle is pulled from the package.

 

ManyChat Chatbot Platform

The Bottom Line

Major companies such as Google, Apple, And Facebook are already heavily investing in both AR/VR technologies and due to the recent covid-19 pandemic, those investment numbers have gone from a modest $12 billion in 2020 estimate to a whopping $73 billion in 2024 estimate. AR improves conversion rates by up to 40% and by using these technologies on your websites, landing pages, and web applications you will provide an experience for users to view a product in a more in-depth way.

As Web developers, we can utilize AR in order to make the content more immersive and interactive which will increase overall engagement and in turn produce more sales. These AR experiences can do everything from helping to tell a brand story to view a product virtually in real-time. By incorporating AR these companies will become more memorable and help the business stand out from the competition.

Those who understand the value of AR now will be the ones that will gain future success as we push forward toward the path of web 3.0. Take advantage of AR and help your business be ahead of the competition.

RESOURCES & CREDITS:

Photo by UNIBOA on Unsplash
Photo by David Grandmougin on Unsplash
Photo by Mika Baumeister on Unsplash

Web 3.0 – Virtual and Augmented Reality on the Internet

https://www.editorx.com/shaping-design/article/ar-and-vr-web-design

https://www.designial.com/augmented-reality-a-comprehensive-guide/

 

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Curious to learn more?

Read: What are Chatbots and Do I Need Them?

Don’t stay in your competitor’s shadows, make the leap forward by incorporating AR technology today!

Schedule a free consultation to see how we can incorporate AR for your business.

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What is Voice Search? (The Basics)

What is Voice Search? (The Basics)

Today I want to go over the basics of voice search. What is voice search? Why do we as web developers need to learn to optimize websites for voice search and more!

In this blog post, we’re going to take a look at voice search and the overal basics of what voice search entails. 

 

Back in my day we didn’t have Google

Do you remember those gigantic yellow books that would just randomly show up at your door step? They were so big that you could build a fort with them that was stronger than ft. Knox? If you threw one at your brother it would knock him out. ( That may have actually happened ;). If you needed to find a plumber you need to thumb your way through to “P” and search the hundreds of plumbers and then decide which clipart listing you liked best. 

If you didn’t have a pen or paper you would just rip the page straight out of the book and then the next poor guy would never even get the chance to know that Bob the greatest plumber on earth even existed!  Oh the good ol’ days. 

Digital agency director having a meeting with his team

Today we’re spoiled

Today we have the internet to search for Bob the plumber and gone is the day of those yellow pages, however with the massive amount of information and our increasing human inability to be patient, as the average time a person will spend looking at a website is less than 15 seconds. We now have advanced into the future of search!

 

Chatbots can be good and bad

Introducing voice search!

I’m sure everyone has at least seen one of these devices and whether you own one or not they are becoming increasingly popular as they can control your smart home to turn on the lights, turn off the tv, tell you about today’s weather and so much more! The best part is that they are also installed on every smartphone and this actually quite powerful as you can now search with just talking to your smartphone. 

Over 56% of all voice searches done are done on a smartphone and a user is 30 times more likely to go with a business that pops up after a voice search response. These numbers are only going to sky rocket over these next few years. 

How should my small business use voice search?

With stats like theseit’s going to be imperative that local businesses optimize their sites to not only be found on Google search but also at the top of voice search. I’ll dive into it more next time, but the main point to get across is that all voice searches will start with a question. Who, what, when, where, why, or how. It will be important for businesses to answer those questions by using different SEO methods.

For example, the local Mexican restaurant “Senora” could write a blog titled “Why Senora makes the best tacos in Asheville” and then by including those questions it will help them to get found on regular search but also improves their chances to get found on voice search.  

 

ManyChat Chatbot Platform

Okay Google, who has the best tacos in Denver? 

The Bottom Line

The bottom line is that no one is searching for your business the old fashioned way anymore and as users switch to using voice search more and more your business will need to find different ways to stay ahead of the curve. Optimizing your website and business for voice will give your business the leg up on the competion and at global giraffe media we can help you find success among the ever growing popularity of voice search.

 

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Curious to learn more?

Read: What are Chatbots and Do I Need Them?

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How to Set up Facebook Ads with ManyChat

How to Set up Facebook Ads with ManyChat

Last week I covered the dashboard and explored a few of the features and automation that is provided on the backend of ManyChat.

Today as part the 3rd part to the ManyChat series, I wanted to touch upon the subject of using Facebook ads and collecting different metrics from those campaigns. 

In this blog post, we’re going to take a look at intergrating Facebook ads and data metrics to help drive sales for your business. 

 

Facebook Ads + ManyChat

One of the key features to ManyChat is the option to work directly with your already existing Facebook ad campaigns by importing them directly into the ManyChat dashboard and even better than that is that you can also create ads right from the ManyChat dashboard. You can set these ads as messages or traffic. 

Messages basically means that you are targeting users that are more likely to message your page, website, or business profile. Traffic is more geared towards those users that will likely make a purchase or they will click on a link to be directed to a specific page. 

Digital agency director having a meeting with his team

Who is your target audience?

Just like any other ad campaign that you’ve ever set up, you can specify the audience that you want to target. You can choose age, sex, location, or interests. If you set up any type of ad campaign then this won’t be anything new to you. If your business is a local gym, then you’ll want to target users with an interest in fitness. 

 

Chatbots can be good and bad

Video, Images, Text. You choose.

For each campaign  you can choose to use images, videos, or just regular text. Add a title, description, and a call to action button. Once you have it started you can see the preview of the ad all from right inside of the ManyChat dashboard. You don’t have to create our chatbot and then move over to Facebook ads and back again. You can do it all from ManyChat. 

You want metrics? We got metrics

Inside of ManyChat they also provide all of the metrics and data based on either how well or how bad your ads did and if they hit your goals. You can tell how many people saw your ad or how many of them interacted with your chatbot messages. Anytime a button is clicked or even if a purchase was made will all be recorded and tracked. This in in turn will give your business an incredible amount of insight on what campaigns work or which products sell better. 

 

ManyChat Chatbot Platform

The Bottom Line

Being able to stay inside one platform to create the chatbot automation and then being able to create ad campaigns along with messaging ad campaigns all from one spot makes this one of the go to spots for chatbots. Saving businesses time and money is always the name of the game and these features from ManyChat do exactly that. This is a great solution for any business that is looking to get its sales to the next level. I highly encourage you to start playing around with ManyChat to see how you can create a profit earning machine. 

 

 

Curious to learn more?

Read: What are Chatbots and Do I Need Them?

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How Does ManyChat Work?

How Does ManyChat Work?

Last week I covered the basics of chatbots. What they are good for, why businesses would want to use them, and some of the companies that offer them. This week I want to dive further into the chatbot system offered by ManyChat.

Today I’m going to show you a little bit of the backend of ManyChat’s dashboard and go through a few of the basic automation flows.

In this blog post, we’re going to look at some of the automation flows and setting up a basic flow using ManyChat.

 

I forgot, what is a chatbot again?

Just as a chatbot recap, an AI chatbot is software that can simulate a user conversation with a natural language through messaging applications, but as we learned last week these can also be set up in a more hybrid way to have preprogrammed responses along with real human interaction.

It’s a mobile-first world and people prefer chatting, 2.52 billion people use chat apps every day with that number expected to reach 3 billion by the end of this year. whether it’s Facebook messenger, Instagram messenger, WhatsApp, Twitter direct messages, telegram, wechat, or snapchat.

Customer-Service-Platform-To-Grow-Your-Business-Tidio

Why ManyChat

As I stated last week, I’ve been exploring opportunities with a chatbot system called ManyChat.

ManyChat Helps you chat directly with those people and enables you or your business to drive sales, get more leads, and ultimately allows direct connections to the customer by utilizing these same chat apps that they are already using.

Best of all ManyChat makes it easy enough for anyone to set up and launch in less than a day all while making it free to signup and start today.

Chatbots can be good and bad

The First Step

The first step is to connect your ManyChat account to your Facebook page that you manage. If you’re someone like me, you probably have hundreds of pages that you manage. It’s important to note that you can only connect one ManyChat account to one Facebook page at a time. Once you are connected to your Facebook, then you’ll be able to also connect to other platforms like Instagram. 

ManyChat Dashboard

The ManyChat dashboard is quite easy to navigate through, but is packed with features like adding in contacts, growth tools, live chat, Facebook ads, and automation templates. It’s this dashboard that you’ll spend most of your time in creating your different automation depending on what your goals are. The dashboard also provides help articles and blog articles that go through all of the different ways to utilize the platform. 

ManyChat Noob? Start Here!

There are plently of templates to explore within the dashboard from simple automation conversations to multifaceted complex conversations with your customers or fan base. However they best one that I think is the best one is the simple “Conversation Starters” this section allows you to set up simple questions that you can start out with whenever a user just clicks on the chat bubble. You can it set to show a faq page, show a product page, show your latest work, or simply start a simple conversation to help the user find what they are looking for. 

 

ManyChat Chatbot Platform

The Bottom Line

I’ve had an absolute blast learning the ins and outs of this chatbot system and while I don’t know the entire system yet, I do look forward to exploring it more to see how I can best utilize it for my business and also for my client’s businesses as well.

Try out one or two of the chatbots that I talked about and see if they’ll work for you. Let me know down in the comments if you use a chatbot on your website or mobile app or let me know if you have any additional recommendations?

 

Looking for photography services? Click here to see the current services that I offer. 

 

 

Curious to learn more?

Read: What are Chatbots and Do I Need Them?

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What are Chatbots and Do I Need Them?

What are Chatbots and Do I Need Them?

By now I’m sure you’ve seen some version of a chatbot on a website or mobile app. You know the little chat bubble that hangs out in the bottom right corner of the screen? It might have a little pop-up that says something along the lines of “How can I help you today?” 

Today we’re going to explore these chatbots on what they accomplish and help you figure out if you need one for your site?

In this blog post, I’m going to tell you all about chatbots, the different kinds, where to find them, and whether or not if you need one for your site or app.

 

What is a Chatbot?

There are a few different kinds of chatbots, so let’s talk about the AI Chatbot first. The AI (Artificial Intelligence) Chatbot is software that can simulate a user conversation with a natural language through a messaging application. Typically this kind of chatbot has been programed with hundreds to thousands of responses to commonly asked questions.

For example, your favorite restaurant may have a chatbot to help answer questions like what’s on the menu for today or what time does the restaurant closes and even can take your reservation all directly from the one chatbot.

These AI chatbots can be very convincing in that it can make the user think they are talking to a real person when in fact it’s all just preprogrammed responses. I saw one AI chatbot that other day that was named “Susan” with an avatar picture of a middle aged woman., but after about 10 minutes I quickly realized that “Susan” was in fact a robot and not a real person, but It did have me fooled for a hot minute because you don’t associate the name Susan with a robot, you associate the name Susan with a middle-aged woman.

On the opposite side of that are chatbots that are actually real-life humans. A lot of car dealerships for example will have a dedicated online sales representative whose, the sole job is to attend to the online chat and was always ready to help answer any questions that a prospective buyer might have. After the user leaves, the sales rep would also gather any information from the user to follow up to help land the sale.

Customer-Service-Platform-To-Grow-Your-Business-Tidio

Why are Chatbots Popular?

The main benefits and the argument for chatbots is that it helps give the user or website visitor the answers to their questions they need within seconds and with AI Chatbots they can deliver those answers 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and by engaging with your customer at any time. 

When is the best time to make a sale? As soon as possible and with chatbots they can really help with customer engagement in order to help the customer decide to make the purchase. 

Benefits Include:

  • Deliver Faster Chat Support
  • Cut Down on Support Costs
  • Offer Proactive Customer Service
  • Helps with collecting data and customer leads

Chatbots can be good and bad

The Bad Side of Chatbots

In regards to AI chatbots, they can only provide the support or answers to questions that they are programmed to answer. So while they “chat” they can’t “think” If the user asks a question that the chatbot hasn’t been programmed to answer then the chatbot won’t be able to comprehend the question thus leaving the customer frustrated.

There are other companies that have used AI chatbots but claimed that it’s a live chat or that it’s a live person, but customers can usually tell right away if it’s a robot and doesn’t appreciate the facade. This is a sure-fire way to eliminate any brand loyalty or trust in that company.

Other chatbot bubbles can just be straight-up annoying with constant bubbles that pop up asking if you need help or assistance. It’s like walking into a department store and being bombarded by 5 sales reps every 2 seconds when you’re just there to browse around in peace and quiet.

Not to mention that some chatbots can get in the way of the actual content that you are trying to look at on a site especially on mobile when the screen real estate is a lot more limited.

JoinChat

Where Do You Find These Chatbots?

It really just depends on what type of chatbots you’re looking for, but here are a few to look into.

Join.Chat is a WhatsApp WordPress chat plugin that gives you the option to activate a chatbot to answer FAQ’s related to your business or product. $24 for one website, $48 for the three websites, or $149 for unlimited number of websites. 

Collect.chat WordPress chatbot is great for service based businesses. It allows you to choose a template to allow visitors to set up appointments by providing a calendar feature that will also connect to your Google Calendar. They have a free plan of up to 50 responses a month. A Lite Plan for $24/month or a Plus Plan for $99/month. 

Tidio features a clean interface and an easy to integrate into any WordPress website. They offer the choice between setting it up for live chat with you or one of your team members or you can also choose their virtual ai chat with access of up to 20+ templates that you can build upon. They offer a free plan for 100 unique visits, $39/month, and a $15/month (Billed per operator) 

Drift is your more robust chatbot that offers a fully scalable chatbot sales and marketing solution. Featuring personalized customer experiences that you can implement across all channels. Pricing for Drift is not accessible, but you can go here to learn more about their different plans.

Those are just 4 of the many chatbot plugins and companies that offer them. Just remember that not all chatbots are created equal and they really range among all price levels. 

ManyChat

Which Chatbot Do I Use? 

 

I saved the best for last for a reason!

You’ve decided that you don’t want a robot talking to your potential customers, but you also don’t want to be logged into your website or the backend of your chat platform 24 hours a day. What do you then? Is there a happy medium that can solve this? Well, you’re in luck because there is!

Introducing ManyChat!

ManyChat is what I’m currently using here on my website. It allows me to have a chatbot or chat like feature on my site that I can directly connect to my direct messages on Instagram, Facebook, and also directly to my text messages on my phone.

This allows me to increase my engagement with website visitors and help to generate more leads by providing instant or near-instant support. Since I’m already checking my DM’s (Direct Messages) throughout the majority of the day and night ManyChat helps direct my website visitors to my DM’s.

I don’t need to code anything and I also have the option to program it if I want with responses as well all with a drag n’ drop interface. ManyChat also allows me to capture information in order to send out coupons, discounts, promotions, newsletters and even booking confirmations.

If you use Google Sheets, MailChimp, Hubspot or any of those other tools, you’ll be happy to know that they can be easily integrated with ManyChat.

The best part of ManyChat is that it’s free for the basic features and engagement for up to 1,000 contacts, which is perfect for my small business. If you plan on more than 1,000 contacts their pro version starts at only $15/month! This price then scales from there depending on the number of contacts.

ManyChat Chatbot Platform

The Bottom Line

Love them or hate them, Chatbots are here to stay. I highly recommend doing your own research on the different kinds of chatbots that are being offered and if they will either help convert sales or if they will scare potential customers away. It’s a delicate balance, but I can say from experience that I’ve had a lot more personal interactions with my website visitors than otherwise, I wouldn’t have been able to.

Try out one or two of the chatbots that I talked about and see if they’ll work for you. Let me know down in the comments if you use a chatbot on your website or mobile app or let me know if you have any additional recommendations? 

 

 

Curious to learn more?

Read: Landing Page: Back to Basics

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Going from a Junior Web Developer to a Digital Media Superstar

Going from a Junior Web Developer to a Digital Media Superstar

Featured Photo by Hello I’m Nik on Unsplash

If you’re reading this, it means you finally got your foot in the door of that web development company that you’ve had your eye on. Congratulations, this is the beginning of a very rewarding career path, but now I bet you’re wondering “okay, cool, I’m a full-fledged (junior) web developer, but what now? Where do I go from here?”

The first thing you probably think is that you’ll just work towards that senior developer position, but what if you work for a small company and that person doesn’t seem to be leaving any time in this decade? What do you do then? What should your goal be?

I hope to help you young padawan and help answer some of these questions to help prepare you and help you shoot for the stars in this vast digital media world. (Don’t worry, I’ll try to keep the Star Wars references to a minimum, but no promises.)

 

Please note* That most of this blog refers to being a web developer as it refers to building websites and mobile applications. 

 

In this blog post, I’m going to touch upon the different job positions, starting salaries or possible salary rates for those positions, the overall job description, and the skills required to thrive.

Grab a coffee or today maybe grab yourself an iced latte get crazy, and let’s dive in!

 

Senior Web Developer

You already know what is required from your current job as a junior web developer, but do you know what might be required from you as a senior web developer? 

The first thing you’ll need to do is to make sure that you have a good grasp of everything that is currently required from being a junior web developer, which could include everything from working with HTML, CSS, Jquery, and JSON to graphic design with a strong knowledge of WordPress and at least one of the top 5 builder platforms.

Once you believe you can do your current job in your sleep then it’s time to start looking at that senior position. This position could mean doing the same work that you do now, but just on a slightly higher level. Lower-level tasks you can now hand off to your junior developer. It could also mean that you are in charge of the project making all of the design decisions and you might start delegating the actual coding or website building to your team.

As a senior developer, you’ll be responsible for the final say on a website or application and if it’s ready to be launched or if there is more work that needs to done. You could also spend time on doing researching new design trends, Google standards, and conduct other tests on plugins or methods that could help your team’s workflow. I think the most overlooked skill for any developer is making sure they have great communication skills. You’ll need to be able to effectively communicate with both your team and in most cases also directly with the customer.

At the time of this writing, the current salary for a senior web developer for Western North Carolina is $70,000 to $90,000, but those numbers are much higher in bigger cities.  Salary Estimates from ZipRecruiter.

Divi Builder from Elegant Themes

Project/Team Director

The project director oversees the entire team and in most cases, this could also mean overseeing different teams from the developers to the SEO specialists, project managers, and customer support team members. For this position, you’ll need to be ready to have an understanding of what everyone does and if you don’t know how to do every job, then you will be required to know the people that you can direct to get the job done.

In this position, you probably won’t be doing too much of the actual design, code, or even dealing directly with customers (unless of course it’s an angry one) and in most cases, you’ll be required to make sure that the team and project are all operating as a well-oiled machine. You’ll need to keep close tabs on whether or not the team is meeting goals whether that is sales goals, timeline, scheduling goals, or other goals that are specified by the company.

Director salaries are harder to estimate because this will be different according to the number of job duties set forth, but on Glassdoor.com they have it set at an average of $83,575/year.

Digital agency director having a meeting with his team

Photo by Austin Distel on Unsplash

CEO / Owner

Whoa, that was a short ladder to the top. One of the biggest things when it comes to being a web developer and being in the digital media industry is there is a lot of different avenues that you can go down, but most of these paths won’t always have a ton of different positions within them.

You can be a junior marketing specialist to a senior marketing specialist or you can be a junior AR designer to a senior AR designer. As the CEO, I’m assuming you already know that this basically means you’re the king of the castle and you make all of the big decisions for the company and for the salary, well the sky is the limit. The same with being the owner of the company, you’ll have all of the main responsibilities, and more than likely you’ll spend your days in meetings or zoom meetings with your team that could be located anywhere in the world. I’m not going to dive any deeper into the CEO position, but instead, I want to pivot and talk about being the owner of a digital media company that specializes in a handful of digital services.

Design Agency Services

Photo by Eva Elijas from Pexels

Website Design & Marketing Agency

Now this might not be for everyone and honestly, this option is arguably the hardest one to achieve, but if done right could help you reach your highest goal of building a company from scratch, and with great risk, comes an even greater reward!

If you’re someone like me, you enjoy all aspects of digital media and you don’t want to limit yourself to only building websites for plumbers or whatever websites you are currently building. You love building WordPress websites, but you also have a passion for SEO and Google analytics. You enjoy being creative to the highest degree in you take that energy to dream up new marketing campaigns. Maybe you also love to spend hours upon hours in Adobe Illustrator coming up with branding concepts or logo design. You might want to consider going out on your own and building a website design and marketing agency.

Here are a few specialized services your media company could offer:

1: Brand Identity & Logo Design.

2: Website Design & Development.

3: WordPress Hosting & Support.

4: UI/UX Design & App Development.

5: Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

6: Pay Per Click Advertising (PPC).

7: Social Media Marketing.

8: Package & Mechandise Design.

9: Mobile App Development.

10: Photography & Videography Services.

That is just a small portion of what your digital agency could offer, but the list could really go beyond those listed above! For your salary, well as I said before it really just depends on you and what you want to value your services at and of course you’ll also need to research what other agencies charge for these services and whether or not if your services are specialized or ninched down enough to warrant the extra fees and price levels.

The biggest thing to rememeber with this path is that you’ll need to not only help with marketing for your clients, but you’ll also need to do marketing for your own company. The best plan is start small by offering a few services to start and then scale up from there and once you are able to hire on, then you’ll be able to offer additional services and also hire out help for customer outreach among everything else that a company needs to be successful.

Next Steps for success

Next Steps

Remember to always keep investing in your own learning. Subscribe to newsletters on web development, marketing, videography, or whatever you think will make you stronger in the industry. If you don’t have experience of owning a company, I would highly recommend either taking a few business classes or even just starting a small business like selling candles. This can teach you more valuable lessons of entrepreneurship than any teacher can teach in a classroom. Everything I learned from managing a business comes from my 10 years of owning a clothing line, where I wore all of the hats and did all of the things required to have a successful business. The lessons that I learned from that experience still holds true to everything that I continue to do today. Remember this is only the beginning and it might seem like the road ahead is long, but with enough passion and drive you can make anything possible!

 

Curious to learn more?

Read: Landing Page: Back to Basics

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