Dorrit Tulane Walsh    
Resume & Work Samples    

June, 2006

I'm actually not looking for a job right now. I just got a great new job and expect to be there for quite some time. However, I am leaving my writing and Web samples up for anyone who still wants to read them. Ditto "My Rules for Doing Any Work Online," and the HTML version of my resume.

Thanks for coming by to look at my resume and work samples.

Resume

This one is HTML

Published Writing & Web Samples

 

My Rules for Doing Any Work Online

  • Before starting anything, you MUST understand your audience. You need to know who they are and what their online capabilities are. This is especially important with a company intranet, but it does apply to public sites as well.
  • Don't assume that just because someone has produced a public site, he or she will understand an intranet. While they do have similarities, they're basically two very different products.
  • Don't think that your external persona has to be the same as your internal one, i.e., just because your company has a conservative public image, that doesn't mean your intranet has to look and feel conservative.
  • When you're doing something for internal employee communications don't disregard the basic principles of marketing. Whatever it is has to be fun and exciting enough to hook your internal audience. It doesn't matter how great your message is if employees aren't motivated enough to read it.
  • REAL-LIFE TRANSLATION OF THE ABOVE: Even if you have a large intranet that contains lots of very useful information, if on the surface it's a big dull dud and your headlines are a snooze, people aren't going to go there and use it as much as they should. And that's just a waste.
  • For public sites, content and marketing have to work together. If you have great content but no one knows about it, you lose. If you have great marketing but don't have the content to keep people coming back after one visit, you lose again. You need to get people to your site and then keep them coming back with relevant content that's regularly updated.
  • In regard to content, quantity does not equal quality.
  • Always cross-browser and cross-platform check everything you do.
  • Writing for the Web (inverted pyramid) is different than writing for other media, although you DO still have to be a good writer and understand the rules of grammar. Most content I see on the Web is still just too long, and the headlines aren't strong enough to make someone read the story.
  • If a person hasn't ever designed or written a printed piece, said person shouldn't be designing or writing online either.
  • Less is still more--the only people who like complexity for complexity's sake are show offs and insecure designers and producers, not clients or your audience.
  • If you want to do it, you have to be able to explain why.
  • WHITE SPACE IS YOUR FRIEND!
  • Everything simply can't be on the homepage.
  • Flash is the most overused online tool ever created (especially on intranets), but when it's used sparingly and has a purpose it can be great.
  • Within the above guidelines, be as creative as you can while still giving your clients--even internal clients--what they want and what they need.