Have you noticed that, when showing cross-sells and upsells, many eCommerce sites hijack you off the page you’re looking at to view the suggested item, often with no way back to the other page without hitting back?  Surely this is not the most usable way to suggest products and improve merchandising conversion rate. The same bad experience is applied when you wish to view your cart… why is this?

Surely cross-sell usability is a factor in their effectiveness. But how can you show customers information about cross-sells without forcing them to abandon the page they’re viewing? How do you create a fluid experience that is based on years of ingrained ‘real world’ habits. Not just reinvented and forever changing behaviours of a fledgling medium.

Answers on a postcard? No! Just wait for the launch of Sugagloss. Our soon to be launched flash based eCommerce / Magento driven site that is 100% SEO friendly. By reviewing best practice and rethinking how shoppers behave (and applying the real world physychology employed by successful retailers) we have advanced the design and user experience of the online shopping experience for our client, creating on page (and relevant) cross / up selling and purchase process that doesn’t break the rich user experience. We have taken one step in removing the barriers…

Keep checking back for the big launch!!

Loading classes from external swfs can be very useful, especially as the size complexity of Flash and Flex applications are increasing. Including all the various tweening, 3D and util libraries can result in a very large swf file. Flash player 8.5 and above features a nifty API to dynamically load swfs and their classes at runtime, using the Loader and ApplicationDomain classes.

package com.welove72 {

     import flash.display.Sprite;

     public class Tracer extends Sprite {
          public function Tracer():void { }
          public function traceThis(strMessage:String):void {
               trace(strMessage);
          }
     }
}

First, we create a simple class that includes a method traceThis to trace a message to the console. Add the code above to a new actionscript file called “Tracer.as” and save in the folder com/welove72. Create a new FLA and set the above class as the document class, “com.welove72.Tracer”. Save the file as Tracer.fla and hit Ctrl+Enter to create an swf.

package {
     import flash.display.Loader;
     import flash.net.URLRequest;
     import flash.events.Event;
     import flash.display.LoaderInfo;
     import flash.display.MovieClip;
	import flash.system.ApplicationDomain;
	import flash.system.LoaderContext;

     public class Main extends MovieClip {
          public function Main():void {
               var loader:Loader = new Loader();
			   var ldrContext:LoaderContext = new LoaderContext(false,
ApplicationDomain.currentDomain);
               loader.contentLoaderInfo.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, onComplete);
               loader.load(new URLRequest('Tracer.swf'), ldrContext);
          }
          private function onComplete(evt:Event):void {
               var tracerClass:Class = ApplicationDomain.currentDomain.getDefinition
("com.welove72.Tracer") as Class;
               var myTracer:* = new tracerClass();
               myTracer.traceThis('Loaded a class!');
          }
     }
}

Add the code above to a new actionscript file called “Main.as”. Create another fla in the same location and save as Main.fla. Set Main as the document class, test the fla and you should see a message from the loaded Tracer class!

This tip and others from We Love are in the latest issue of Web Designer Magazine in the article “55 Pro Flash Tips”! Look out for Gavin Clark.

We are now looking for a couple of talents to join our family at the fast growing and creatively focused agency – We Love.

Based in Maidstone, in a Manor House overlooking the river Medway, we strive to put the love back into the creative process – developing ideas that work through the line for a varied mix of clients and getting shortlisted for and winning recognition awards for our efforts.

We are looking for talented individuals who are top of their game, who want the ownership of a project, who want to prove what they are capable of…

So if you are bored of being over managed, bored of banging out a million banners for a single client, bored of being told what to do by an excel sheet each day and have something to prove in this industry of ours then apply to:

work@welove72.com.

We are currently looking for:

Snr Digital Designer with agency experience with a good spread of work. Someone who can understand a brief, with good business acumen, concept and generate ideas which push the boundaries. An individual who knows when a design is perfectly balanced and right for the market, understand the interaction, see the animation and speak about everything with authority. And can own a project right start to finish.

Front End Developer with a few years under their belt. Can AS3 the ass off Kylie, HTML like a loon and AJAX it with the best of them. A talent who understand the importance of pixel perfectness in a build, Who can suggest, direct and manage a build, making it his own. Someone who is proud of creating beautiful code.

If you are one of these people and are looking to step it up then apply. If you know of people in your network please spread this mail…

Many thanks
Mark

This relatively easy method is especially useful as it does not require your file to be included in a HTML page, as many other techniques do.

Download the AnalyticsLibrary component here: http://code.google.com/p/gaforflash/downloads/list and follow the instructions in the readme.txt file to install the Flash component.

Create a new flash file called Tracker.fla and an actioscript file called Tracker.as. When installed correctly you can drag the  AnalyticsLibrary component from the components panel into your fla’s library. Add the following code to your Analytics.as file.

package {

    import com.google.analytics.AnalyticsTracker;
    import com.google.analytics.GATracker;
    import flash.display.MovieClip;

    public class Tracker extends MovieClip {

        private var tracker:AnalyticsTracker;

        public function Tracker():void
        {
            tracker = new GATracker( this, "UA-111-222", "AS3", true );
            tracker.trackPageview("/initial-load");
        }
    }
}

First import the two analytics libraries we will be using, AnalyticsTracker and GATracker. Then we create a new instance of the AnalyticsTracker, which needs four paramaters:

• The current display object (“this”)
• Your analytics account ID (“UA-111-222”)
• The tracking mode, either Bridge or AS3.
• The debug mode. This defines whether helpful messages will be displayed for errors. You should set this to true when testing and false when your application is live.

Finally, the trackPageview method creates a new page view on your google analytics account. This method can of course be placed inside a button click method or similar. To test, enter Tracker as the document class on Tracker.fla and press Ctrl+Enter to test the movie. See the results below:

If anyone needs it I can also upload the source!

Happy tracking

This tip and others from We Love are in the latest issue of Web Designer Magazine in the article “55 Pro Flash Tips”! Look out for Gavin Clark.

http://www.gestalten.com

German for design… has lots of interesting things on here and I love the book previews. Just encourages me to buy more and more…

Perfect.

We feel that the people that work for We Love are it’s most important assets. In fact, they are the DNA of the company. We are always looking for talent of all shape and sizes. We are currently looking for a:

Flash Developer / Web Developer

You ooze talent, you have vision and can code the ass off Kylie. You know your way round flash and can animate better than the Warner Brothers, ActionScript better than Cyborg. And are willing to prove yourself in a fast growing, fast paced industry.

Good OO principles required, though we won’t tie you down to PureMVC. AS3, php/python and a good knowledge of HTML/CSS a must – anything else will be a bonus. You use bzr/svn/git regularly and nowledge of the Gaia flash framework is favourable. Someone who is mature enough to understand a brief, can take direction as well as contribute and show initiative. A couple of years experience behind you is a must.

Mac happy and PC proud.

So stop arsing around and send your CV and Folio site to work@welove72.com

Domino Pizza logos have been “cleaned” into dirty sidewalks in Los Angeles, Philadelphia and New York as part of a campaign to promote the chain’s American Legends pizza.

GreenGraffiti a business dedicated to clean outdoor advertising, used a high-pressure water hose to spray the eco-friendly images into the grime on the street. The green ads were created early on Thursday, while there was a lull in foot traffic.

Although not a new concept, we like very much… though we envisage a day where you can’t enjoy the outdoors without being exposed to advertising in some form wherever you are. Right lets green-tag Stonehenge….

Well… what can I say. Cheesy as hell… I mean use a dog or baby and everyone will love you… but this I thought was quite amusing. Watch the movie…

http://www.evianliveyoung.com

Early Adopters

[Cue Led Zeppelin's "Whole Lot of Love"]

Last week Digital Gurus flew into the Design Charts top 10 at a knee trembling No.8. This week the Guru’s are not only holding their ground, but fighting their way into the top 2.

Will next week see the Guru’s claiming pole position? Only time will tell… now leave me alone, I need to get back to clicking through from the top 10 portals the Design Charts draw their stats from