Vision Studios working with Classic Kitchens
05.10.11
Vision Studios, a full service media firm in Harrisonburg, Virginia, has added the city of Classic Kitchens to their list of valued clients. Classic Kitchens provides superior kitchen and bath remodeling services for their clients.
Classic Kitchens has long been known in the Shenandoah Valley for their attention to detail, top quality products, and outstanding customer service. They are exactly the type of business that we love to work with, and we are excited about the opportunity to continue to support Classic Kitchens with their web, social media, and online marketing needs.
Vision Studios Supporting Harrisonburg VA Tourism
12.20.10
Vision Studios, a full service media firm in Harrisonburg, VA, has added the city of Harrisonburg's tourism department to their list of valued clients. The city's mission is to position Harrisonburg as a premier travel destination.
Vision Studios is helping to support the city's mission by utilizing search engine optimization and marketing. In order to attract visitors and stimulate economic growth in and around Harrisonburg, Vision Studios is integrally working with the city to promote area attractions by ranking their website higher in search engines, leveraging social media and utilizing pay-per-click advertising.
Vision Studios shares the city's passion for building a distinct presence for Harrisonburg's tourism market through online promotion tools and increasing awareness of tourism marketing opportunities. Furthermore, Vision Studios is helping to enhance the visitor experience by providing information about our areas rich history and heritage. The goal with this SEO campaign is to ensure that the Tourism office's online visitors become actual tourists.
In order to meet the City's needs, as well as the needs of their other clients, Vision Studios implements a strategic Internet marketing plan based around search engine optimization (SEO) meant to increase traffic. The team at Vision Studios, led by CEO Mike Vanderpool, is constantly improving their knowledge and skills related to online marketing strategies and provide their clients with a proven process that delivers results, both for SEO and for website design.
Vision Studio's CEO Mike Vanderpool was excited about this project, saying "We are proud to help the City's Tourism office bring positive attention and exposure to what our area has to offer." Vanderpool continues, "I fell in love with this area when I came to JMU over 10 years ago and want other people to enjoy all the treasures that this area holds."
Vision Studios featured in Shenandoah Valley Business Journal
12.10.10
These Guys Have an App for That! -Development Firms Branch Out to Mobile Applications
By Alana Massey
With a booming market for smart phones, software development firms are taking advantage of a potential goldmine: mobile applications.
A few Valley businesses are striving to make big waves in the mobile development world by designing applications for Android, iPhone and Blackberry platforms.
"As more and more people get these smart phones, the market for applications will continue to grow," said Mike Vanderpool, president of Vision Studios in Harriosnburg. "This opens up a whole world of possibilities for people like us, as a development firm, to help people get into a market that is worldwide."
When developing an application, a firm needs to consider the marketplace in the next five to ten years, not just next month or so. According to Vanderpool, mobile apps should have releases and features that are added constantly. It essentially needs to grow as the market grows.
Vision Studios provides web, print, motion and marketing services. The company also created TextGuage, a safe driving app for Android that doesn't allow you to text while driving.
"We kind of take an Apple approach in much our development in the sense that, when we come up with an idea for an application, we put it on the white board. Then, we start taking away features to get it down to its very bare bones," Vanderpool said. "That way, we can extend the lifespan of the app by introducing features and bonuses here and there."
Kevin Hopkins, lead developer and assistance administrator at Found in Harrisonburg, emphasizes a similar idea in maintaining and application's longevity on fast-developing platforms.
"As these new phones are released, they are released with the newest operating systems. This forces people with the old OS to upgrade," Hopkins said. "So to maintain usability, we do a lot of content changes and such to keep it working on the latest platforms."
At Found, mobile development is a small subset of a larger package. The firm also handles Internet marketing and website and custom application development. According to Hopkins, mobile development will most likely never become its sole money maker, though it will continue to grow along with its business.
Vanderpool, on the other hand, sees mobile development outpacing his firm’s web development. Like Found, Vision has several divisions, a web design development, internet marketing, and a graphic design division.
"Although we are broken up into segments., I see mobile development being our fastest-growing division," Vanderpool said. "As the market grows and reveals itself, we will continue to develop ideas internally and try to stay on top of it."
Jonathan Lutz, vice president of Vision Studios, emphasized that the future of mobile development is limitless in terms of growth.
"We are starting with mobile development, but eventually, these apps are going to work on television, in automobiles, even on airplanes," Lutz said. "The technology and applications now are in their infancy. In the coming years, there will be applications that can do some neat things while people are on the go."
Vanderpool agreed: "It will be interesting to see what the future will bring."
Vision Studios Launches Jack Brown's Mobile App
11.29.10
The creative minds at Vision Studios in Harrisonburg, VA, have released their latest smart phone app, the first of its kind in the area. This unique, user-friendly and free app was custom-built for a beer and burger joint in downtown Harrisonburg. Jack Brown's is known for tasty burgers, delicious fried oreos and a beer list so extensive, it can be difficult to make a decision on what to wash everything down with.
To help elevate the beer enjoyment experience, Vision Studio's CEO Mike Vanderpool and his innovative team of designers and developers conceptualized the idea and built an android-enabled app that matches customer likes with a beer based on a simple key word search.
Customers who download the app, available under "Jack Brown's" on the Android marketplace, can enter terms like "hops", "IPA", "stout" or "amber" and the app will quickly respond with suggestions. A description and price accompanies each beer selection made available via the app. Think of it like a pocket beer somellier! For customers who want to try something new and different, the app can also "roll a beer" by randomly suggesting a beverage.
Mike Vanderpool and Aaron Ludwig, the owner of Jack Brown's, have been friends for a long time and are excited to work together. Mike sees the launch as a definite milestone. "Mobile apps are a way for restaurants and other businesses to provide unique offerings to their customers, it is a competitive advantage for many." As far as what he thinks this app will mean for Jack Brown's, Mike says, "Aaron has created a group of loyal patrons and he quickly latched on to the idea of offering them a mobile app." Aaron couldn't agree more, "The app Vision Studios created will help educate my customers on different beers, providing them with a mobile beer menu they can use in and outside of my restaurant."
Mike Vanderpool hopes that other businesses in the restaurant industry will follow suit and he and his team are poised to answer the call. "I am really energized about applications that engage the customer, offering them unique services, like deals and specials." Mike says, "We want to do apps for large restaurant chains as well as the local favorites around the country."