Writing, designing and publishing new content on a daily basis to a huge list of subscribers is no easy task. And it wasn’t made any easier with two outdated systems (one for email, one for the website) that needed to be updated separated each and every day. And after several years, it was also time for a facelift to the trendcentral website.

So the Kickstart Concepts team came to the rescue. Using two industry-leading software platforms, WordPress for the website and MailChimp for the email newsletter, we took the client’s internal design files and relaunched the new and improved site. We also built a custom integration between WordPress and MailChimp, allowing everything to be done in one central place.

Now a process that used to take several hours each day takes less than an hour, all combined with a new look and powerful analytics.

In case you don’t know, Google TV is a new entertainment platform that combines TV, web, apps, and search all in one easy to use experience. The platform was announced in May 2010 at Google I/O and will be open-sourced in 2011. Devices from Sony and Logitech are now on sale in the U.S., and more devices will be launching in additional markets next year. More details can be found at google.com/tv

Before I started Kickstart Concepts, I was a former Creative Director at online television pioneer Joost, and have spent a nice chunk of the last few years thinking about the opportunities offered by the convergence of TV and the web. With Google TV, it looks like a platform is now truly available to see a lot of those opportunities actually come to life.

We have a ton of ideas already and can’t wait to get started hacking around. We’ll be sure to post updates as we release our concepts into the world.

And thanks again Google!

The concept behind Pinnokio was simple: we all brag to our social network about all the cool things we’re doing, so why let the truth stand in the way of a good story? With Pinnikio, a user connects the site to their Facebook, Twitter, and foursquare accounts, then selects a “story” to share. The site had several prebuilt stories, such as being out on a date with a beautiful woman or meeting with clients. Once selected, Pinnokio would then push out status updates, send tweets and even upload photos to a user’s profiles, sharing an exciting story with their social network. So what if it isn’t really true!

Interesting. Now Show the World!
At Disrupt, it’s not just enough to build your idea. You then have to present. This is about as punishing as a presentation can get. You have 60 seconds to demo something you just built, that you aren’t sure will even work, to a room of over 400 experts, with zero prep or practice, all after working for 18 hours straight with no sleep in the last 32 hours or so. If you can pull that off, be honest: you’re a rock star.

We enjoy participating in these hackathons for a few reasons. Not only is it a real test of your ability to churn out great work under a tight deadline, it also validates everything we believe about product development here at Kickstart Concepts. That when you’re focused on agile development and constant tweaking, amazing products can be built in a short amount of time with limited resources. We preach it constantly, but it’s always nice to see it put into practice outside of our normal business.

And kudos to the Techcrunch team for another great Disrupt. Looking forward to the next one.

Flymodo allows people to use Twitter to “check-in” to a flight by simply tweeting a hashtag of their flight number. They can then see who else is on their flight and read tweets from other travelers. The site also provides information such as your gate number and baggage claim carousel, all from just one simple hashtag. The entire site was built and designed from scratch at the conference’s hackathon in less than a day.

A Little About the Event
This year Techcrunch launched their first Disrupt conference right here in New York City. The conference aimed to gather “both Web innovators disrupting media and technology and also executives successfully navigating disruption to talk about turning change into opportunity.” In the spirit of disruption, they also included a hackathon as part of the agenda.

For those that don’t know, a hackathon is where programmers and designers get together to build things in a constrained time period. For this hackathon, we had about 18 hours to work. Besides that, there were no limits on what we did.

After a long night fueled by pizza, snacks and a few beers, the team presented our concept to a room of over 300 other hackers. With no sleep and battling complete exhaustion, everyone was given 90 seconds to present their concept. It was great seeing what the other teams had worked on. We were definitely in the company of some great minds.

Overall, we had a great time building Flymodo and it was exciting to see our philosophy of prototyping and rapid development produce one of the most polished products in the competition. The next Disrupt conference has already been scheduled for September in San Francisco. You can bet the Kickstart Concepts team will be there!

Kickstart Concepts worked with FanBridge to relaunch their website, www.fanbridge.com, as well as redesign sections of their hosted fan management software. Past projects have also included the design of the FanBridge logo, development of email newsletter templates, and the creation of print advertising.

But when you’re revolutionizing an entire industry, it can be hard to quickly explain to potential customers how your product improves the status quo.

So ESS turned to Kickstart Concepts to develop a series of infographics to illustrate how their products and services stack up against the current document management process. After working with the client to gain a detailed understanding of how the shipping process works and how ESS improves on it, we developed a series of graphics depicting several different document management methods and the benefits or drawbacks of each.

Now customers can understand, at a glance, what ESS has to offer and why their products will bring the shipping industry up to speed.

After redesigning the identity, Kickstart Concepts designed a website that injected more personality into the FanBridge brand, appealed to the desired audience and focused heavily on increasing subscriptions.

Since the launch of the new site, FanBridge has seen an increase of over 20% in user sign-ups.

The resulting website positioned Kazam as offering premium video content through an easy-to-install application. Media partners were featured prominently and the site successfully drove users to download the beta software, beating initial performance expectations.

The WingDipper is now served alongside buffalo wings in bars and restaurants around the country.

The team launched a successful beta version and was involved with the project until the company closed the first round of venture funding from Amazon and Second Avenue, at which point the company relocated to Seattle, WA.

The company, later renamed Atomic Moguls, went on to partner with Fox Sports Interactive.