When we look at business owners, a lot of times we tend to think they’ve got it figured out. We see a lot of successes — but oftentimes don’t see the bad decisions that come into play. Every business owner makes them. I’ve made them & I make them more than I’ve ever discussed. Until Read More
Early in 2020, the Martha O’Bryan Center reached out. The organization, whose work focuses on empowering “children, youth, and adults in poverty to transform their lives through work, education, employment and fellowship,” had an existing website that they were requesting to be redesigned and built on WordPress for ease of content management. As well, they Read More
The government’s role in public health work is important, but it’s not always sexy. We were tasked with building a website for the State of Tennessee to educate the public about preventable ailments and addictions. Tennessee already has a robust web presence in Tennessee.gov. So why create a separate site? The hope is to break Read More
Doug Hoekstra is an artist who shines across mediums as a singer-songwriter, visual artist and author. He had an existing website that needed some attention and updates. We added a new theme, reordered the menus to direct the viewer in a sensible path through the site and added structure and photos to generate visual interest. Read More
Bobby Stark launched Stark Marketing in mid-2020 and approached us to build his new company’s website. A veteran of the Nashville marketing scene, Stark focuses on the content side, and believes great storytelling is key to getting effective brand messaging out. We kept it simple: two pages to start, keeping most information on the home Read More
In 2019, we were approached to develop a complete overhaul of the website for Tile Roofing, a one-stop information hub for the Tile Roofing Alliance, an organization “dedicated to building awareness of both clay and concrete roof tile’s benefits, providing technical expertise, and offering training and certification for code-approved tile roof installation.” It would be Read More
Memphian Perre Magness has been writing about food for many years. An accomplished cook, her website, The Runaway Spoon, had design that needed a refresh and needed a few updates to give visitors a better user experience. Perre had a few simple requests: she wanted the website to have a more contemporary design, add printable Read More
Rural and Progressive covers progressive topics as they relate to rural communities as told by progressive Georgia activist Katherine Cummings. Katherine shines a light on environmental and healthcare issues as they relate to the population of rural areas while keeping abreast of the goings-on in her state legislature in Georgia. Permelia Media gave the Rural Read More
The Problem: The Werthan Lofts community had signage in place from when the property was converted from a factory to condos in 2004. In early 2019, the gate entry system was updated to a new ButterflyMX entry system and the signage needed to reflect the location of the entry boxes for visitors and delivery people. Read More
It dawned on me recently that I’ve been working with Adobe Photoshop since 1997. I recall very well the days before Photoshop had layers and the massive pain it was to save a version before making any changes to how I edited a file. The good old days weren’t so good. Flash forward 22 years: Read More
Twenty years ago when I began my career in digital media, I worked as a graphic designer who focused on the print side of things. I was properly trained at an accredited university to not only begin designs on paper, but how to translate what my hand created into a digital file format using a Read More
I own and maintain two personal websites – one that dates back to when I worked solely as a graphic designer for print. It showcases the work I completed at the time. The other is the one you’re reading now. Both operate with plugins that perform various operations for specific functionality, for example finessing SEO, Read More
We were honored to be asked to create a logo for Balance and Breathe Yoga, a new yoga studio in Gallatin, TN. Balance & Breathe Yoga is owned by Megan Wage, a yogi with five years of teacher training experience, who is also owner of NashvilleSUP and Yoga. Needless to say if you practice flow Read More
In a previous blog, I discussed a few tactics to increase a website’s SEO. One approach I presented to increase Google ranking is including alt tags on images within a website. We’ve had this option for a few years now and it’s a cemented website SEO “best practice.” Recently, I uploaded an image to Instagram Read More
By now, everyone is familiar with computer viruses, even if they have had the good fortune to not have dealt directly with one. Most of the time when people are talking about computer viruses, they’re actually referencing malware. Malware is a word derived from “malicious software.” It’s an umbrella term that describes any hostile program Read More
Let’s face it, nobody wants to call tech support. NOBODY. The mere thought of it used to crank my anxiety up to eleven. After years of managing other people’s web properties, I’ve gotten fairly comfortable with speaking with the folks on the other end of the line or chat window. Over time I’ve gotten pretty Read More
Because I build websites, one of the more frequent questions and requests I field is about SEO. SEO, for the unfamiliar, is Search Engine Optimization. In short, it’s how you get your website to the first page of a Google search. Full disclosure, I am NOT a SEO expert. I don’t have to be a Read More
For the second year I attended WordCamp US in my home city of Nashville, TN. Wordcamp US is the Western Hemisphere’s WordPress conference, a companion to Wordcamp Europe. The event consists of two days of sessions, loads of networking, several after-parties, the annual Contributor Day and the Annual “State of the Word” by Matt Mullenweg, co-founder Read More
We’ve just returned from a fun and information packed weekend at WordCampUS – the western hemisphere’s global WordCamp conference. We saw old friends, made new connections, took in a lot of information in a short amount of time and sat in on Matt Mullenweg’s “2018 State of the Word.” The big discussion centered around Gutenberg, Read More
When I sit down to write on my blog, it’s usually prompted by a real world scenario that I use to help the reader avoid a potential pitfall. Today, let’s talk about website photos; specifically, don’t be cheap with your website photos. Here are two reasons why: Your website photos are what jumps out at the Read More
When building websites from the ground up, there’s a three step process: Wireframing Designing Coding The three steps taken are similar to that of constructing a home. Wireframes Wireframes are like blueprints. They’re called wireframes because they’re literally lines, which look like wires. For example, a logo is represented by a rectangle with the word “Logo” Read More
One of the great features of WordPress is not having to write custom code to get robust functionality, but rather using existing plugins to get the job done. Some are free, some cost money – and almost all add a special something to a website. Here are a few that I like and use regularly: Read More
The Salemtown Neighborhood Association of Nashville, Tennessee reached out needing graphic design to go on products for their members. Below are the logos in black and white as well as color. Need graphic design work? Let’s chat.
Permelia Media’s own Beth Downey will be speaking at the inaugural Nashville Design Week. “A roundtable conversation focused around imposter syndrome, negotiating compensation, and getting paid. Have you ever felt like you’re the only person in the room who doesn’t know what’s going on? Or felt like you couldn’t as for a raise because you Read More
There’s a constant when it comes to website design and development: Whether you’re working with a solopreneur who manages her own website or a larger business with a marketing team, clients want their websites to have a custom look that’s tailored to their brand. No matter the size of the business, the clients I deal Read More
Below you will see two logos. They’re remarkably similar. I have no idea which logo was produced first so I have no idea who copied whom. But to use the exact same fonts and everything – that’s super blatant. This is an example of why you should know your logo designer as well as why he/she Read More
As a web developer and small business owner, I believe it is my lot in life to advocate on behalf of my clients even if I am advocating for them to them. It’s a “help me help you!” plea in most cases. When the same issue pops up multiple times to the unsuspecting owner/manager of Read More
Within a span of two hours this morning, I drafted and sent almost 15 emails on a variety of topics. I’ve scheduled two work meetings, coordinated with members of a crime task force in my neighborhood on safety initiatives, and made notes to aid others with the co-planning of an annual spring event we’re organizing Read More
I’m often asked specific questions about and recommendations for WordPress themes. “Which theme is best for a WordPress site?” or “What WordPress theme is best for my business in my industry?” The short answer is, there is no one size fits all. Choosing a theme is a lot like choosing your next meal. You’ve got Read More
A few years ago, at the beginning of the New Year, rather than commit to resolutions, I began performing a simplification of my life. Part of the plan is closets get sorted and clothes go into bags to be donated to second-hand stores. I get rid of as much physical clutter as possible. This purge Read More
I have lost count of the number of times I’ve heard these words from a potential or current client: “Yeah, so my last web developer just disappeared on me.” And it’s not just me. I hear my tech colleagues talk about this phenomenon often. Who are these people who apparently have piles of money to Read More
Recently, the UK’s Guardian published stories detailing the activities of Cambridge Analytica and what actions it took to mine user data from Facebook in order to influence the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election. Today, the FTC announced it would be investigating the social network over privacy practices. Meanwhile, Facebook is losing millions of users. For years, Read More