Understanding the difference between a toolbar and a browser theme can be difficult for the average user. Here is one way to think about it: a browser theme can have a toolbar as part of its interface, as a toolbar can be integrated within a theme. The reverse is not possible. It is important to understand the functionality of a toolbar versus a browser theme.
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Marketing Sherpa gave an in-depth look at how the Ohio State University and Fathead used an interactive browser theme to engage OSU fans and offer them a special chance to win an OSU Fathead.
Compelling data for using the browser to create a persistent communication channel with your audience. Read the rest of this page »
I’ve had my home on the market lately and had to live “show ready.” At a moments notice, the realtor could (and did) call saying “we’ve got a showing scheduled for today.” The house had to be ready to sell. Part of the difficulty in these moments is to see the issues with the items we live with every day.
When you’re getting the house ready it’s easy to spot the cracks that need patching, or the paint that needs a fresh coat. It’s much harder to see what’s part of the everyday that might turn a buyer off, like when I forgot to clean up the yard after my dog. I got dinged from a buyer on that.
When it comes to your web site, what are the things that get overlooked and your customers might step in? Here’s a check list of considerations:
Hope your site is “show ready” and it sells! What are the other easy to miss items to review?
COLUMBUS (May 3, 2010) — Brand Thunder LLC (http://www.brandthunder.com), the browser customization specialists, announced today its series of design forward themes that offer strong visuals with a selection of interactive links to popular websites plus a multimedia sidebar featuring a video player of headline news stories. More than 50 designs that range from abstract art to a Sierra sunset are available for free at http://brandthunder.com/gallery.
Interactive browser themes are like an extreme makeover for the web browser. With an easy-to-install browser add-on, end users transform their drab web-browser into an immersive experience. Where many Brand Thunder themes feature official logos, content and functionality like video, music players or other Internet widgets, the Expressions line limits functionality to popular sites like Facebook and Twitter and a sidebar with headline news videos.
“Many of our themes leverage the affinity relationship between a brand and its fans,” says founder Patrick Murphy. “We heard from our users that we were under serving an audience who prefers to change the style of their browser more frequently. Expressions were designed for more visual focus than our average interactive browser theme.”
Brand Thunder’s interactive themes provide an extreme makeover of the Firefox and Internet Explorer browsers. They are free, lightweight active customizations that can include themes, toolbars, sidebars and other content or functionality. Users can switch real-time between any installed Brand Thunder themes.
About Brand Thunder:
Formed in April 2007, Brand Thunder creates extreme makeovers for the Internet browser. Brands enjoy a persistent connection to their Internet consumer driving more website visits and increased revenue. Through a software installation, end users change the drab Internet browser into an immersive experience from their favorite sports team, entertainment franchise or Internet site. The interactive browser themes feature official logos, colors, content and functionality, and can also extend capabilities including video, music players or other Internet widgets. Current business partners and clients include Bing, The Daily Beast, Huffington Post, Major League Soccer, NASCAR, NBA, NCAA, NFL, NHL and Universal Music. Samples found at http://brandthunder.com/gallery/.
Contact:
Patrick Murphy, CEO
Brand Thunder, LLC
614-408-8202
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Between Firefox Personas and Google Chrome’s Themes, browser themes are getting a lot of attention this year. Brand Thunder is pleased to be at the front with such distinguished company. While each of us helps you move beyond the dull gray of the standard Internet browser and personalize your browser with enticing visuals, Brand Thunder is the only one to move the theme into the realm of experience. We make things happen in the browser to increase engagement, connection and interaction.
And to go a step farther, we are the only ones to bring this level of customization to the Internet Explorer browser. It’s an impressive feat and is in the early stages of rolling out.
Here are some of our themes that showcase the interactive capabilities of our browser themes.
The Weather Theme is a full integration using WeatherBug’s API and Brand Thunder design elements to create a browser theme that pulls in weather forecasts, local conditions, alerts, weather maps and more. The theme itself changes based on your local weather conditions. It also pulls in up to three days of forecasts into the theme (the user can set the number). Location can be set by the user, or the can choose Firefox’s built-in location services. The multimedia sidebar is a full weather station window with current conditions, radar maps, local weather cameras and more. It’s a truly amazing infusion of weather information in a stunning visual context.
The Daily Beast is a leading news site and their theme pulls an image from the latest feature story directly into the browser theme. The user can hover over it to get the story headline or click through to read the full story. The sidebar keeps users connected to the latest news via special views of the Cheat Sheet, Buzz Board, Blogs & Stories and Video sections of The Daily Beast. The Daily Beast Theme demonstrates several methods to keep their users connected to the breaking news of the day, and how to get users back to your site more frequently.
Brand Thunder’s Movie Premier Theme is a fun and functional theme for us movie fans. Like the Daily Beast theme, Movie Premier has a feature block that updates regularly with the movie posters of opening movies. Clicking on the poster takes you to an overview page of the movie with reviews, synopsis and more. The theme is also tightly integrated with Fandango for instant access to reviews, showtimes, tickets and even trailers and other videos in the sidebar. It’s a great example of how content and commerce fuse together in an interactive browser theme.
The Baseball Theme for Internet Explorer demonstrates a new frontier for building community and connection within the IE browser. The visual capabilities created through this add-on have not been seen in the Internet Explorer world. It makes the visual takeover as seamless of the end user as it’s been in Firefox. It’s a significant advance and will help us better meet the needs of our clients.
I think these are killer examples of what a browser theme can be – a better and more engaging browser experience. What do you think?
Do you feel safe downloading a program from the Internet? Do you give more thought to visiting a web site or installing a piece of software? It’s questions like these that create challenges for web applications. If you’re offering a software download, you’re already operating at a disadvantage in the mind of the consumer — whether it’s conscious or not.
It’s an act of trust when a consumer downloads and installs your product. You’ve been invited into their life. That invitation is a powerful opportunity to connect with that user over a potentially long period of time. Don’t blow it. Here are some of the things we do and have learned to encourage adoption of our interactive browser themes.
In the connected world, it doesn’t pay to try to hide information. You will be found out. Just ask John Edwards. That’s why we put our disclosures upfront and prior to install. We include a default search engine with our product. Even though users can change it any time they like, we tell them up front that it’s coming.
It’s the proper protocol for software distribution on the web. Your user can then make an informed decision about everything they are receiving. It won’t protect you from negative comments, there are always dissenters. At least you’ve been open and can avoid greater negative fallout.
The best move we made was to change our product and allow consumers to switch between any theme they want. In the web 1.0 world, you got your hooks into the consumer and you didn’t let go. That doesn’t cut it anymore. Your fans are going to go wherever they want, whenever they want. If you’re doing right by them, they’ll be back.
Our themes help create return visits to our client site, and it’s powerful. Having messaging capability in the browser means you can reach them whenever they’re online. So, making it easy for your fans to change the theme and step away from a client’s experience can be a hard thing for clients to favor. It’s shown to be the right thing.
Our sports teams have a steady core of users that stay with the theme throughout the year. There’s also a large number that return each pre-season or join as the season rolls along. Recognizing your fans may have other interests and welcoming them back each season makes for a much stronger relationship. Giving the ability to switch between themes means you keep a foot in the door instead of creating a complete uninstall scenario.
We all wish we could remove the barriers to entry. We try to minimize them by making the call to action clearly visible to the user, reduce clutter on the page, sell the sizzle and so on. Showing the graphics included in our themes is a big boost for us.
With Firefox at roughly 25% of the browser market, offering a Firefox-only theme would generally be perceived as a huge barrier to entry. Fortunately, the visual strength of our product and the affinity to the brands we work with has greatly reduced this obstacle. We’ve had clients double their Firefox penetration – outpacing Firefox’s own overall market share. We’ve also had clients get 30% of their total audience using their custom theme. Quite astounding numbers.
Our browser themes are an affinity marketing tool. We build them to help brands connect to their fans. And let’s face it, brands and the companies behind them are out to make money. If you’re sending stuff out into the market, it’s eventually got to make you some money or you’re out of luck.
As much as our product offers new sponsor and ad inventory, and there’s a persistent communication channel available to them, I think it’s great that the product owners tread lightly in this area. This is not the place for the hard sell. To coin the phrase of social media, this is for joining the conversation – you’ve got to be a part of the dialogue. Ongoing, timely and useful information will make the long-term connection where the marketing appeals are accepted. We’ve seen this respect around communication rewarded with an average of 10% click through to commerce offers from within our themes.
As mentioned above, timely and useful information is vital. The power of putting a message up front and visible to the user has resulted in phenomenal return visits to our partner sites. Most sites have feeds that are great tools to reach your fans when they’re not on your site. The question is “Are you offering enticing news?”
There are two items to consider. One, a killer headline gets attention. The Huffington Post is a master at this. You can also look to leaders in your industry to find out how they write to engage their readers. Two, inside information is a powerful way to build a relationship. Relationships get tighter when you share personal information about yourself. This can apply to businesses as well. You can get a good feel of this if you look at how Toyota mishandled their PR crisis. Take a page from the Tylenol scare years ago – open and immediate information sharing goes a long way to shoring up your consumer’s trust.
These are some of the things that are working for us, and why. What would you add to the list?
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COLUMBUS, OH — January 28, 2010 — Brand Thunder LLC (http://www.brandthunder.com) and CollegeHumor (http://www.collegehumor.com) announce the launch of an interactive browser theme fully capable of infusing Firefox browsers with a sense of humor. Fans of CollegeHumor can find the free download at http://www.brandthunder.com/collegehumor.
Through a small browser add-on, users’ web browser skin will get a complete CollegeHumor makeover including links to the most popular sections of the website and a multimedia sidebar.
“CollegeHumor is already an incredibly addictive site,” said Patrick Murphy, founder and CEO of Brand Thunder. “By creating this kind of visibility in the browser, we think this could lead to a whole new 12-step program.”
Brand Thunder’s browser Booms! are lightweight active customizations that can include themes, toolbars, sidebars and other content or functionality. With a Boom!, users can switch real-time between any of the browser looks they created without restarting their browser.
About Brand Thunder:
Formed in April 2007, Brand Thunder creates extreme makeovers for the Internet browser. Brands enjoy a persistent connection to their Internet consumer driving more website visits and increased revenue. Through a software installation, end users change the drab Internet browser into an immersive experience from their favorite sports team, entertainment franchise or Internet site. The interactive browser themes feature official logos, colors, content and functionality, and can also extend capabilities including video, music players or other Internet widgets. Current business partners and clients include Bing, The Daily Beast, Huffington Post, Major League Soccer, NASCAR, NBA, NCAA, NFL, NHL and Universal Music. Samples found at http://brandthunder.com/gallery/.
About CollegeHumor:
CollegeHumor.com was founded in a dorm room in 1999 as an online depository for all of the content that floats around collegiate computer networks. The site has since grown into a daily updated source of original web content and now boasts a loyal following of 10 million unique users per month and more than 30 million monthly video views. With major blue chip companies such as Ford, Universal Pictures and Procter & Gamble advertising on the site, the release of Penguin Books’ The CollegeHumor Guide to College and Faking It…How to Seem Like a Better Person Without Actually Improving Yourself, and a movie with Paramount in the works, CollegeHumor has quickly emerged as an icon of online humor. CollegeHumor is an operating business of IAC (NASDAQ: IACI).
Contact:
Patrick Murphy, CEO
Brand Thunder, LLC
614-408-8202
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COLUMBUS, OH – September 4, 2009 – Brand Thunder LLC (http://www.brandthunder.com), the custom browser specialists, announced today the availability of clickable sponsored placements within the browser chrome of its custom browser Booms!. These sponsored placements are visually integrated within the browser theme, remain regardless of the website being visited, and fully take advantage of the hours users spend online.
The sponsorship program was designed to simplify implementation for Brand Thunder clients. It leverages Brand Thunder’s ad server allowing for a full range of tracking and reporting, plus providing easy updates for sponsorship graphics. The browser chrome placement assures high-visibility and engagement due to its proximity to the web address bar and browser search box.
“Our clients have expressed a need to provide new and exciting opportunities to their corporate sponsors,” said Patrick Murphy, founder and CEO of Brand Thunder. “These new sponsor placements will allow us to meet that need in a manner that integrates seamlessly and stylistically with the rest of the Boom! and keeps the overall user experience intact.”
A Boom!, a free, lightweight, active customization, is unlike other browser-based tools with its visual immersion, integrated content and added functionality. It has proven to be a popular way for fans to personalize their web experience with their favorite sports team, music star, newspaper, news site and more. Users can switch real-time between any installed Booms!.
About Brand Thunder:
Formed in April 2007, Brand Thunder creates custom-browser experiences. Brands enjoy a more persistent connection to their Internet consumer through the custom browser Boom!, which increases website visits and revenue. Through a software installation, end users change the look and feel of their Internet browser into an immersive experience from their favorite sports team, entertainment franchise or Internet site. The custom browser Booms! feature official logos, colors, content and functionality, but can also extend capabilities including video, music players or other Internet widgets. Current business partners and clients include the Huffington Post, Major League Soccer, NASCAR, NBA, NCAA, NFL, NHL, Universal Music and Yahoo!. Samples found at http://brandthunder.com/gallery/.
Contact:
Patrick Murphy, CEO
Brand Thunder, LLC
614-304-1316
###
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Brand Thunder prides itself on the immersive visual experience our browser Booms! deliver – but sometimes less is more. For those times, Brand Thunder built a Small Boom! (toolbar only) view of our Booms!. It’s as simple as clicking on the B/T button in the toolbar and choosing the Small Boom! option. That’s it. The full functionality of the Boom! is reduced to toolbar size.
So, if that’s it, then why a blog post? One reason is it tells people about the feature. The other is that its a good reminder for the challenges facing product managers and UI designers. Less really is more in so many ways. Every step you place in between the user and their goal significantly increases the abandonment rate. For example, each screen in an installation or sign up process results in a 30% abandonment. What is the equivalent for the product and features essential to your business and consumer? How many barriers are you putting in front of your consumer from reaching them?
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Congratulations to the Mozilla community on the launch of Firefox 3.5 today. It’s an outstanding product that can be found at www.getfirefox.com. If you’re using one of Brand Thunder’s newer browser Booms!, you’re most likely enjoying a seamless transition. If you’re using one of our older browser customizations or an older Boom!, you’re likely enjoying Firefox 3.5 but without the Brand Thunder customizations you want.
To those of you experiencing problems, we’re sorry and the rest of this post may seem like a series of excuses. We are working diligently to get the updates live and this is our foremost priority at this time. Once an update clears our quality assurance tests, it will push live. I’d anticipate a stream of updates occurring over the near term.
Now to move on to the excuses, most companies run very lean and we’re no exception. Many times, it feels like there’s a wave of impending doom curling but never breaking. In this instance, the wave came down on us. We had an influx of high-profile clients with fixed deadlines and a moving 3.5 delivery date. And whether there were late term changes in the 3.5 betas, or just bugs found late in our review process, we had troubleshooting to perform at a time we should have been in build.
The result is a delay in timing our updates with the release of 3.5. We regret this inconvenience.
Feel free to try our first NFL Boom! (Colts) or our latest NHL Boom! (Wild) and I’ll place a list here of all the functioning Booms! as I get them.
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Company Profile | |
| Founded: | 2007 |
| Founder: | Patrick Murphy |
| Investors: | TechColumbus Ohio TechAngels North Coast Angels |
| Contact: | Send us a note 614-304-1316 |
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January 31, 2012 - Brand Thunder Acquires BrowserNation Clients, Expands Global Reach of Chrome, Firefox and Internet Explorer Themes
November 29, 2011 - Brand Thunder Develops First Browser Theme for Twitter Users
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