If you’re a savvy shopper like us, you’ve surely heard of Half Off Depot, the social commerce site that offers discounts from 50-90% off to the best shops, restaurants, bars, attractions and events in each of the 30 cities it serves. Well today, the whole Pyxl team is excited to announce that we’re going to be helping Half Off Depot continue on its path of growth by delivering integrated design, development, public relations and social media services.

Brian Conley of Half Off Depot said it best…

“Our industry is rapidly growing, and we needed to partner with a marketing firm with a strong technology background to help us achieve our goal of being a market leader in the social commerce industry. We evaluated numerous website design and development firms and marketing agencies, but Pyxl’s integrated marketing services, combined with the team’s unique ability to bridge technical details with business needs and requirements, separated Pyxl from everyone else.”

(Thanks, Brian!)

We’re excited to be working with Brian and the rest of the Half Off Depot team! The online coupon industry is expanding like crazy, and we’re sure there’s still a lot of room for Half Off Depot to grow and differentiate itself from the competition. We’re thrilled to be on board!

So stay tuned for more from us on this one (like a very cool iPhone application coming soon). And in the meantime, head over to Half Off Depot and select your city to start saving today!

I recently received a letter from my cousin who has just started her senior year in high school and is trying to make a difference. Lyla created a program, Thirst for Change, dedicated to bring clean water to Haiti.

I read about Thirst for Change and my first question was… “are you online? We need to get your word out!” I immediately thought of the global reach of social media. I began to explain to her how just as she is reaching out to her local community, there is a a huge opportunity to reach out to the online community. Out of those millions of people, if just a few of them chipped in a few bucks here and there, it would make an enormous impact. The thing that is the most impressive is that if we can’t help donate, we can help spread the word. Sharing her story gives the charity life, spreading it through multiple mediums and letting her story inspire millions.

This is Lyla’s story.

Dear Friend,

My name is Lyla Wasz-Piper, and I would like to share my story with you. I am a student at St. Francis High School, I am an activist, I am part of your community and I represent the youth of today.

In March of this year, I had the opportunity to travel to Serbia with eight other students from across the country. During my time there I was mesmerized by the haunting undertone of apathy in the conversations I had with local youth. I was especially stricken when one student turned to me and said, “We are not taught that we can achieve our dreams. We are too young to make any real difference.” My curiosity became voracious, and I began to explore whether youth in the U.S. felt the same way. I quickly realized that my peers were also under the false idea that their voice didn’t matter; that, as youth, we could not yet make a change in the world. They are wrong. Every young person the world over should be empowered to achieve their dreams, and change the world. I will show my peers that with passion and dedication, anything is possible. My story is the journey of transforming the world and inspiring others to do the same.

During my time in Serbia, I met a remarkable woman named Cynthia who had recently returned home from Haiti. She showed me pictures and shared stories that brought tears to my eyes. She said everywhere she went, people begged her for water; the entire time she was there, not once did she find an area with clean water. I began to research just how serious the global water situation is, especially in Haiti. What I found was startling:

• Haiti now ranks 146th of 177 countries in the United Nation’s Human Development Index.
• UNICEF has found that a child dies every fifteen seconds as a result of unclean water in Haiti
• If basic human needs for water are unmet globally, as many as 135 million people will die from water-related diseases by 2020.

That night in Serbia Cynthia said something else that I will always carry with me, something I urge you to deeply think about: “with knowledge comes responsibility.” My motivation and enthusiasm kicked in and Project Thirst for Change was born. It combines my passions of impacting the world with inspiring young people, like myself, to be empowered when it comes to making a difference. 

In December I will lead a group of eight students and two adults to Léogâne, Haiti, the epicenter of the earthquake. We will be there for 10 days, dedicating our hearts, bodies, and minds to helping the country recover. We will be living in tents, just as the people there must do. While in Léogâne we will be working as part of the EDGE Outreach team―building two water purification systems with our bare hands and teaching about health education. My project will serve more than 5,000 people, changing the lives of Haitian families for generations to come through giving them the gift of clean water, and empowering them to become self sustainable. My project will also show youth all over the world, especially those partaking on the trip, that we can and will make a difference.

I met with EDGE Outreach, an organization dedicated to purifying water in third world countries, my school officials at St. Francis, and my contacts at the Muhammad Ali Center. These organizations and I have partnered together to make this project a reality.

You, too, can join the effort. My team and the people of Haiti need your help. In order for the project to take flight we must raise $20,000. Your donation goes towards the purchase of travel, shipping, meals and equipment. Your donation has the power to save lives. If we all come together we can make an immense change. Checks can be made payable to St. Francis High School, Memo: Haiti Project Thirst for Change.. All donations are tax deductable!

Please, let us partner together and bring this project to life. Thank you for taking the time to read this letter, and allowing me to share my story. Together we will change the world.

Your friend,

Lyla Wasz-Piper

If you would like to help out, please make checks payable to St. Francis High School, Memo: Haiti Project Thirst for Change and send it to:

Thirst For Change
c/o Brenna DeLeo
2099 Thunderhead Rd. Suite 301
Knoxville, TN 37922

I’m hoping with her story, youth around the world can realize that everyone can make a difference. Just imagine what all that time playing video games could amount to if put to a good cause.

One of the most important qualities a public relations practitioner should have is the ability to listen and listen well. In fact, half of the work that goes into PR is listening and monitoring! After all, PR isn’t about shouting out your message to the world anymore. It’s about engaging with your target audience, so listening is the first step.

While there are many tools I personally use to listen, Google Alerts is one of my favorites, and one of the tools I’ve been using the longest and most faithfully.

Simply put, Google Alerts are email updates of the latest relevant Google results (news, blogs, videos and online discussions) based on your choice of query or topic. To use Google Alerts, all you have to do is enter the topic you wish to monitor, and Google will do the rest.

So let’s say you’re a business interested in utilizing Google Alerts — what should you search for?

• Your company’s name and all iterations of it.
  • For example, for my client FlutterToday, my search term is “FlutterToday” OR “Flutter Today” to ensure all relevant results are captured.
• Your name and your employees’ names.
  • For this one, I don’t use quotes because you never know if they’re going to include a middle initial, etc. My search term here is simply Nicole VanScoten.
• Your industry.
  • Let’s say that we, at Pyxl, created an alert on our industry, we would probably create a few that looked something like this: marketing | knoxville AND marketing | digital AND marketing …the list goes on.
• Services you offer.
  • For instance, my client CorasWorks offers services that tie in directly with Microsoft SharePoint, so it’s important for me to keep taps on what’s happening with SharePoint itself.
• Your competitors.
  • Whoever you consider to be your competition, be sure to create a Google Alert for each.

Google Alerts are a great way to keep track of what’s being said about you, your company, your competition, etc. and are key to any good public relations campaign. Are you using Alerts?

*Image from sfllaw. Used under Creative Commons.

With the rise of social media, the field of public relations has taken some drastic changes. While I officially came into the field right around the same time social media exploded, I can still see some major differences between what I was taught in school and at internships, compared to how I function now as Pyxl’s PR specialist.

But the transformation of PR isn’t over. Myself, along with 13 other PR pros, recently chatted with Mashable’s Erica Swallow about the future of PR and social media. Head over to Mashable to see what we had to say about the industry, where we’re at now, and where we’re going…

*Image from bionicteaching. Used under Creative Commons.

There is a lot of buzz going around that Google is creating a “Facebook killer” called GoogleMe. While it very well can be solely a rumor, as the dry erase girl has taught us, we can’t believe everything we read. Regardless, I am going to address the foreseen Facebook murder and call it bull hockey.

I do not doubt that Google is attempting to tap into this $11 billion dollar market and reach its 500 million+ active users.

But will they do it? I say no.

Let’s take a look at what Google’s been up to. They recently purchased the social technology company, Slide, which they can add to their collection of Social over-takings including Blogger, Picasa and YouTube. Could they possibly be combining Slide technology with Zynga gaming (whom Google just recently invested over $100 million in)? And then let’s add in some virtual currency from the recent purchase of Social Gold... So maybe what Google is actually up to is a new social gaming platform that integrates in virtual currency — perhaps involving geolocation as I predicted in my look into the future of social media (#5) ; ). If this is the case, then it is not in competition with Facebook at all, and I would be quite impressed. But let’s humor the rumor and take a look at if Google was an attempt to kill off Facebook.

While Facebook has been having its share of privacy issues that are thoroughly pissing off its users, people are too comfortable to leave. To replace a fully-matured social media site, there would have to be a smooth transition. There is only a small percentage of early adopters who are going to switch to a newly formed platform that does not have a base of users. Why move to a lone island when the point of social media is to socialize?

Google has an opportunity here because most of these users already have Google accounts. However, the giant doesn’t seem to get social media, and it keeps trying to integrate it into areas that it is not wanted. For example Google Buzz, which was a flop because users could already get those interactions elsewhere and did not want to integrate it into their email foraging, which for many of us is quite time consuming already. There are some things that just make sense to keep separate. One day there will be a platform that integrates all communications into one, and that’s what Google keeps striving for. I just don’t think we’re ready for that yet. It’s an adoption process that will take time. We are easing ourselves into the multitasking, always-available mentality. Each platform must one up the next. There is a process, and while the idea is always there, you can’t skip to the future before the market is ready.

Let’s not forget about the multitude of other social fails that Google has been behind. Remember Orkut? Maybe not because it never caught on. Meant to be “an online community designed to make your social life more active and stimulating” sounds a lot like what GoogleMe would be. What about Google Wave? Which just recently flopped because Google is creating solutions for problems that don’t exist.

Google has the reach, it has the resources, but it doesn’t have the patience to do it right. And I’m ok with that. I’m ready for the little guy to rise up and kick Google in the ass.

What do you think?

As of August 5, it was officially one full year since we launched our new name and identity and started to become known as Pyxl. So where did we come from? And what have we accomplished in our first official year?

For those of you who don’t already know Pyxl’s past, we started out as Image Communications, a traditional advertising agency. But by early 2009, we had significantly evolved into a full-service digital marketing services firm specializing in strategy, online branding, campaign management, social media, public relations, graphic design and web development. We all agreed a re-brand was in order.

To put a creative, new spin on the naming process, while saving us time and money, we created the Help Us Name Us contest. The contest was simple: visitors to HelpUsNameUs.com could enter their name ideas. Our team then narrowed down our favorites and allowed users to vote. In the end, two people won an Amazon Kindle2 – the person who submitted the winning name and someone randomly chosen from the pool of voters.

“HUNU”, as we came to call it, reached participants from all 50 states, 52 countries and 6 continents. It reached thousands of people and generated thousands of name submissions from people of all walks of life – all in only a two week time period. And of course, it gave us our new name: Pyxl.

Armed with a strong new identity, we continued to grow. Over the past year, Pyxl has…

• Added some great new employees. With the addition of Creed, Franny and Chase, we’re now up to 8 full-time team members!
• Moved into our new, eco-friendly office at Northshore Town Center.
• Worked with some cool new clients on very major projects such as the Consumer Electronics Show website, FlutterToday’s launch, the Howard Baker Center’s poll worker recruiting project, the Knoxville Challenger, and many others.
• Won a Gold ADDY Award for our website, along with 3 bronze.

And it wasn’t just a good year for the company. Our team members have purchased homes, had babies, gotten engaged, launched Social Media Club Knoxville, got involved in AdFed and AIGA, spoken at local events and on television, run successful events, traveled to conferences, and have really grown in their given fields.

All in all, I’d say our first official year as Pyxl was pretty successful. I can’t wait to see what else is to come! What have been your biggest accomplishments in the past year?

We’ve all been there – your deadline is approaching and you stare at your blank screen hoping that the words will magically appear. Panic sets in and you become increasingly discouraged and frustrated. You have been bitten by the notorious Writer’s Block bug.

Have no fear; there are several ways that you can overtake this pesky critter.

1) Take it one word at a time – All great works started with a single word. Remember that you will get it done, so for now, take a deep breath and simply write.

2) Get inspired – Sometimes it’s great to just marvel at something and take time to settle your thoughts. Read a book or magazine, go for a walk, take a nap, eat something or listen to music. When I get stressed, I tend to put on some feel-good music, close my eyes and let the song take me away. This simple act of removing myself from my work automatically makes me less anxious and ready to tackle my project once again.

3) Reward yourself – Remember back in elementary school when your teacher would give you a treat, a star for the day or extra time at recess for completing all your work? Go back to that time and implement the same strategy. Make a deal with yourself to have 15 minutes of uninterrupted writing and give yourself a treat. You’ll be happier and your writing won’t be full of complete nonsense.

4) Don’t over think it, just write – Nothing is ever perfect in the first draft. One of the best pieces of advice I received was, “Step away from the work for a bit and come back to it. You’ll get a fresh perspective and be able to see things more clearly.” Free write and see where you end up. You may be surprised as to what you come up with.

So next time you’re struggling with your next sentence, take a breath and take pride in knowing that you’re a great writer and you will overcome this block.

*Image from Rennett Stowe. Used under Creative Commons.

I guess you can say the Pyxl team has been into mobile apps lately…could be because we’ve been busy developing some for ourselves and our clients. Business aside, we’ve been coming across some pretty fun ones in the iTunes store.

You may have noticed that earlier this week, we tested out FatBooth. Today, we decided to take a peek into the future and figure out what we’re all going to look like down the road. (Oddly, all of our hair stayed in tact — we got lucky there.)

So if your curious what we’ll look like and what we all hope to be doing by that time in our lives, on to the AgingBooth…

Brenna: “A karaoke-ing, Indiana Jones-ing, fully functional little ole’ crazy lady.”

Chase: “Coding on my fishing boat.”

Creed: “Decomposing.”

Franny: “Lovingly designing my grandkids’ tattoos.”

Josh: “Living in Boca and playing Bocce ball.”

Kervie: “Driving a Winnebago cross country going to every yard sale looking for a first generation iPod.”

Nicole: “Hopefully just hanging out on the lake and relaxing (maybe wishing I had used sunscreen more often).”

Wes: “Relaxing in my multi-million dollar house built by my Dr. Pepper re-selling business.”

(Side note, for those of you who do not know, we’re all too lazy to go to the store for our own drinks. Instead, we keep giving Wes dollar bills to drink his.)

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What do you hope to be doing when you’re older?

Aside from our great marketing skills, Pyxl is pretty well-known for one thing — our amazing and fun corporate culture. This is the first in a series of posts where we show you why we all love our jobs. Here’s a peek into life at the Pyxl HQ…

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You may, or may not, have seen or heard of the popular iPhone app, FatBooth. We found it today…

The following is a post from Pyxl’s graphic design intern, Pete Green.

I went to a school in a graphic design program strongly rooted in what are considered old school technologies, in a world where much of content production has migrated to the digital realm. While this created benefits I could not foresee, I may never again have the opportunity to arrange furniture in a Vandercook letterpress. To design a program which strikes a balance between those worlds and connects and intertwines them has therefore become critical in contemporary design education.

Much of our first year, and plenty of the second, was spent in what seemed to be a suspended animation bubble, a direct portal between a long-forgotten past and the unsuspecting outside world. We cut blocks from linoleum, perfect-bound cute little books, set type by hand for the press, stitched binding with thread and other activities which often left us confused as to whether we were going to be graphic designers or set up a craft booth at the flea market. It was enjoyable, but there was a collective anticipation for the real projects to begin.

Did they ever! The following few years were a blur of animations, branding, books, strategy, illustrations, experience design, posters, invention and much more, all bound by the theme of relevance to the modern condition, evidenced by the education sequence. There was no question that we were working on things that translated to the real world, projects that we could potentially be working on shortly after graduation. From this work came brand books worthy of start-ups and business loans, a plethora of material presentable in our portfolios and a real segue into the professional world. Yet there are so many more contemporary tools that I feel vulnerable without, ones which are close to necessary for the modern graphic designer, which inevitably causes me to question what exactly is gotten from old school techniques and whether they were at the expense of more recent tools.

The answer came from observing a friend, one who has a difficult time getting started. He second guesses himself at the outset at the risk of being wrong and failing and gets locked indefinitely into analysis paralysis. His background does not include non-digital techniques, and realizing that is why he stares at a blank screen for so long while my sketchbook rapidly increases its population has been solid justification for a wider range of tools than mastery level of The Program People Use Right Now CS7. Ultimately, the old school technologies taught me to think in different ways, to compose in odd spaces and to rapidly adapt to something new. From these have come absolutely invaluable personal characteristics: a natural desire to mix media and a disturbing amount of overconfidence. Learning so many strange, antiquated means of making has created a sense in me that I can, and should, do anything. The reality of the situation is that while software may evolve and build upon itself over time, it is fleeting. This is more about teaching a man to fish. I’ve come to realize that a great design program should waste little time on software itself: we must be vigilant in our own self-education through experimentation and tutorials, as both students and professionals.

In my time at Pyxl, I’ve had the same internal argument as to whether I was properly prepared for this, leading to the same conclusion. While I could have been better taught the most intimate corners of Photoshop, I’ve found a way to fill in those gaps. While I could have had more exposure to web, I’ve done a wide variety of mockups already. Despite an entirely new batch of challenges and learning hurdles, I’m always excited to take it on, learn and succeed.

Considering the solid core of fundamentals between the two ends of the argument which are not up for debate (form = content, proportion, grids, hierarchy, sensitivity to type), the means of making on the periphery of this core become paramount. Striking this balance is a critical element in design education.

*Image property of Harvard Design School.