Creative Stream | Blog - Sorbrook - Website Design Banbury

The Creative Day – are we really productive for a full 8 hours in a day?

sshepherdApril 18, 2017 New Business, Business, Technology No Comments

I have seen lots of posts over the last few months providing an argument that working the standard 8 hours from 9am to 5pm is actually not productive. Lots of creative companies out there are now switching to remote working or freelancers to provide resource in their agencies. Freelancers can work within budget and time frames but don’t work regular hours meaning they can work when they want or have to. Other countries are looking into 6 hour days to capture those key productive hours and give employees more free time in the day. So where does the the whole 8 hours a day and 40 hours a week come […]

Windows 10 is coming

sshepherdJune 1, 2015 Tech Blog, Business, Technology No Comments

Windows 10 the new operating system from Microsoft is being released at the end of next month – 29th July To remind you of this if you are running Windows 7 or 8.1 you will find a windows icon in your tool box (bottom right of your screen) offering the Free upgrade to Windows 10 when it becomes available. So as a small business do I take the plunge head first into a new operating system? Or should I bide my time and await feedback from the wider public on release? I personally loved Windows XP and when Windows Vista came a long and I jumped right in. At that […]

WordPress Hacking Woes…

sshepherdMay 12, 2015 Wordpress, Security No Comments

After starting my business in December 2010 the rise of general Hacking trying to infiltrate the standard WordPress CMS has grown exponentially. We all keep a lot of information and personal work within our websites so when it has been hacked it is heart breaking. I am always asked by clients “why would someone do this to me?” Well the main reason for a hack is normally to gain access to your information and in some cases to redirect your site to somewhere they feel will gain them money through advertising. Though I have encountered some hackers who just want recognition for their work which seems to be a breed that […]

Facebook “Like Box” is due to disappear!

sshepherdApril 28, 2015 Branding a Business, Marketing, Social Media No Comments

I have seen and created sites which utilise the Facebook “Like Box” to engage with people on a website to urge people to like a Facebook page. If used well these can not only display your number of likes and faces of the people that like your page but they also can display your post feed and tell you if any of your friends like the page also. Well The Facebook Like Box is about to be no more! With the release of Facebook Graph APi v2.3 the Like Box plugin will become deprecated and thousands if not millions of websites around the world will end up with a blank […]

Becoming a featured supplier

sshepherdApril 27, 2015 Tech Blog, Marketing, Advertising No Comments

About 2 months ago I was asked to be a featured supplier on their website to promote their services in a more personal way, this company is a company I have used since 2002 for all my domain needs. little did I know there would be in a few months time a picture of me on one of their high traffic pages where they provide email services, so is this going to help my business? Well the feature was live on the 5th March and judging by my analytics this tripled my visitor rate for that month, though in our nature of business this is difficult to quantify. As a rule […]

Mobile friendly day

sshepherdApril 21, 2015 web design, Wordpress, Mobile No Comments

Tuesday 21st April is the day when Google has finally said all websites should be mobile friendly to receive more beneficial ranking. Yes that’s it Google have released another update and to be honest its a pretty sensible one as more and more of your traffic on the internet is now entering via a mobile device. As website providers we at Sorbrook for the last 2 years have been supplying responsive website to our clients which are optimised to be used on mobile devices making them instantly mobile friendly. But even some of the biggest websites out there have not made their own websites mobile friendly, some of these are […]

The Science Of Persuasion

sshepherdFebruary 3, 2015 Creative Stream - blog, New Business No Comments

I love these illustrated Youtube videos, though this one got me thinking about how I use the 6 scientifically proven short cuts of persuasion. Have a look at this video from http://www.influenceatwork.com/ on what these 6 short cuts are and how you may be already using some of them in your day to day work. I was really surprised to find I was already using half of these persuasion techniques within my business and personal life, In some situations I am certain that some of these principles have positively increased how my business has expanded over the last 4 years.

Skeuomorphic design

sshepherdJune 21, 2013 web design, brand design, general, Marketing, Social Media, design for print No Comments

Well the other week when “Apple” announced the upcoming “iOS 7″ was being released later this year a strange and wonderful word was banded around… Skeuomorphic design…What the? It seems that this is the thing which “Apple” are trying to come away from in their latest UI design, so I know it is an epic! and hench! word but basically its what they are trying to shelve. So what is “Skeuomorphic”? To start with it has been an age old challenge to design and create things which reflect real life as closely as possible, this is the basis of Skeuomorphic or making stuff look like stuff. If you produce a button on […]

Moo.com… Amazing Lux Business Cards!

sshepherdMay 6, 2014 brand design, design for print No Comments

Its not often that you come across a services which is so outstanding that you want to shout and scream about it. Well I have been extremely impressed with the service and quality of moo.com since I started using them a few years ago, their whole system seems to make me smile every time I use it. My last order was to take advantage of their Easter sale and try out some of their high quality Lux business cards, for those of you who are not savvy with their Lux range these are cards which are made in 3 layers which give you an amazing slice of colour through the middle. […]

Shop Locally for Your Website and save thousands!

sshepherdSeptember 16, 2014 Creative Stream - blog, web design, Advertising No Comments

Just to make people aware… I have just had a look at the Yell Business website and I can’t believe that they offer you a website for such an expensive package. Check it out via this link – http://business.yell.com/websites/ So you have to pay £399 upfront and then £65 per month after this which amounts to £1179 in your first year, this sounds a little pricey to me but thousands of small businesses take them up on it. Not only that but you will then carry on paying £780 every year to keep it going. So why don’t businesses go with small local webdesign companies to sort out their on-line presence […]