Jackina Stark (her first name has a long “I,” rhyming with china, and the accent is on the KI. phonetically it’s like this: Ja-KI-na) was unlike any client I have ever worked for. Mainly because she was my English Grammar professor in college. I am one of the few that can say I survived her class. Jackina recently retired from teaching English and has moved on to pursue writing fiction novels. Her first book was published in February of 2009 and she has two more on the way in the next year. She knew that having a website to help promote her writing would be a very helpful way to build connections with her readers and further her audience.

I was also tremendously excited about doing this site because during my preliminary research I noticed that most authors websites are really rather poor. So I knew would not be hard to get a website that not only help Jackina get a presence online, but helped her stand out in the industry. I am hoping that the quality of the site will bring a little more beauty and quality into the industry.

Building this site was a unique experience for me because you rarely will you have an intimate feel for who the client is when you start. I really did feel like that worked to my advantage. I was able to more accurately capture aspects of her fun and down to earth personality and portray them on the site than with other clients.

Jackina wanted the site to have a very intimate and informal feel. I felt like the best way to approach that requirement was through the concept of a desk. I focused quite a bit of time trying to make it feel like you were sitting at her desk reading her thoughts on paper. So, instead of just simply adding a basic repeating woodgrain background, I added some depth and shadow to the background to imitate the light from a lamp.

There were quite a few obstacles to work through within this project. Much of her reader base comes from a generation that is not entirely familiar with the internet, websites and blog protocol. So much of the site had to be simplified for the most novice user. Navigation had to be natural and intuitive, forms needed to be easy and make sense. It was also fun getting some who had been writing for decades to understand the concept of a blog and what it can be used for. Fortunately, Jackina was an amazing sport and was up for the challenge.

The aspect of the site that I am most proud of is probably the comments section. This is the first site where I was able to utilize a content management system (Expression Engine) to harness and promote interaction with the end users. One of the ways I did this was by setting a simple conditional statement so that before comments are made on a blog post a simple message displays encouraging people to use the form and comment. I am a huge of fan of websites that are intentional about encouraging interaction, instead of simply being passive. I think they feel more alive and real, which means it will be less cold and corporate.