Here's our first draft.  Sorry about that late post, we got confused about the due dates for this and the White Paper revision, and we figured it out too late.  When reviewing, remember that it's a brochure, so the page folds won't show up in the pdf file.

 

Team 6:

Alex Johnson

Jason Railton

Emily Tyler

Drew Hooker 

Discuss a situation involving work with a document template -- either during today's class, or on a different occasion -- during which you encountered a task, a toolbar, a menu item, a palette, etc. that was not intuitive in its completion method and/or its location/presentation on screen or within the program.

 

I choose to look at the Volkswagen Rabbit sample technical marketing document. I thought that the document did a very good job in presenting its information. The website is very interactive, in that it allows the user to design the type of Rabbit that they want, both inside and outside. Throughout that process, the website constantly gives information on the specs and features of the specific car that the user is building. The website does this in a very aesthetically pleasing, and non intrusive ways. I thought that another positive aspect of the website was the site navigation.

Change Perspective - Originally I was picturing the project to be more fluff than substance, meaning that there would be a lot of pictures, and one liners about the product, but we wouldn't get into too much detail about the specifics. However, now that I've looked over a few things, it's clear that a nice balance between the two needs to be found.

 

Innovative = sleek = Macintosh

Stylish = smooth = sunglasses

Unique = special = nothing

Traditional = classic = Coca-cola

Durable = tough = Ford

Effective = strong = laundry detergent

Enduring = long lasting = Chase

Advanced = aliens = HP

Endorsed = sports = MLB

Convenient = fast = McDonalds

Standard = basic = TurboTax Basic

Re-designed = bad first draft = iPhone

Elegant = crystal = chandelier

Simple = efficient = straw

You are developing technical marketing communication for a large RV that gets 8-10 miles per gallon on the highway -- and gas prices have increased, again. They're now at $2.88 a gallon. With news reports and studies showing that consumers are ditching large SUVs for smaller, more fuel-efficient cross-over vehicles, what kind of emphasis will you use to market this RV? Post your response to your blog by midnight Friday.

 

Our group decided to do our Technical Marketing Project on the SMART Interactive Whiteboard. At the following URL, http://presentationtek.com/?p=64, I found a review of the SMART Board 600i Interactive Whiteboard. It detailed some of the features and functionality of the board, and seemed to give a good general overview. Here are some of the key points that I found while reading through the article:

 

I will add weekly comments to this blog that talk about how the Technical Marketing Project is going for myself and my group. 

After reading about the Technical Marketing Materials Project, I am slightly worried about it. The previous two projects dealt with software, which as a CS major, I like to think I'm fairly comfortable with. This project scares me a little because even though we can pick some cool item to do it on, I am not artistic or creative at all. I like to think of myself as a problem solver, so I can be creative in that regard. However, it seems like to have a good finished product, this project will require at least some artistic ability to see what goes well together.

Discuss at least two kinds of visuals that you plan to incorporate into Draft 2 of your white paper. What kinds of information will be presented? How will these visuals communicate information in ways that text might not be able to handle as effectively? How will these visuals enhance your target audience's understanding of the issues you address within your white paper?