The Blog - Ideation Through Writing by Sterner Stuff

Capitalize on SEO and appear genuine in 2017: The 2017 Edelman Trust Barometer

By Ethan Clevenger / January 27, 2017 / Industry Trends

Every year, Edelman does a survey of people across the world to determine how much the average person trusts government, business, media and non-governmental organizations (NGOs). 2016 started strong, with respondents showing higher trust levels than at any time since the 2008 recession. However, after a rocky 2016, trust levels have dropped across the board. …

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6 digital resolutions for 2017

By Ethan Clevenger / January 18, 2017 / Industry Trends

New year, new you. Or that’s what I hear. For business owners, the laundry list of resolutions is often inseparable from their business. “Reorganize the filing cabinet.” “Paint the ceiling.” “Be a little more hands-off this year.” While sorting out all the things you want to tackle in 2017, don’t forget about your business’s digital presence! …

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Add Google Fonts to the Divi customizer

By Ethan Clevenger / December 27, 2016 / Development

Divi is a powerful WordPress theme and page builder from Elegant Themes that allows folks like me to quickly generate modern and professional designs when a custom job just isn’t justified. It’s one of the most popular theme solutions for WordPress out there and offers a lot of customization options. Out of the box, Divi …

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Snapchat group chat, and why you need user research

By Ethan Clevenger / December 21, 2016 / Industry Trends, Services

The latest update to Snapchat includes a feature that has a lot of people excited: group chat. This new feature targets folks who use the app as a primary way of communicating with friends, rather than something like Facebook Messenger, Google Hangouts or traditional text messaging. Like those other apps, users can now set up …

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WordPress 4.7 brings video headers, PDF thumbnails

By Ethan Clevenger / December 7, 2016 / Industry Trends

The WordPress 4.7 update just dropped, and it comes with a variety of great changes. Like most WordPress releases, 4.7 is named after a famous jazz musician. This time around, the WordPress folks celebrate vocalist Sarah Vaughan. Take a listen while you soak in the new features. Justify and underline removed from editor If you’re …

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Getting the most out of Bootstrap, Part 2: Efficiency!

By Ethan Clevenger / November 25, 2016 / Development

Part 1 of this 2-part series covered compiling CSS extension languages like Sass or LESS. If you haven’t read part 1 and aren’t comfortable with that concept, you’ll want to start there. Rather, if you’re already a pro about compiling your Sass or LESS and want to know how you can start using CSS extension …

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Start a new project and support Eugene Extra Life

By Ethan Clevenger / October 26, 2016 / Values

One of my big dreams with Sterner Stuff is to use the brand to support causes I’m passionate about. The world has been kind to me, and I’m ready to be kind back. My first foray into that will be channeling some of Sterner Stuff’s revenue to Extra Life, and you can help! Every year, …

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Meeting new projects with arms wide open

By Ethan Clevenger / October 21, 2016 / The Business, Values

To maintain the deep portfolio that large web design firms often have, the staff will ultimately end up with some “9-5ers”. Folks like these probably don’t have the passion shared by their coworkers and, likely, the company owner. And that’s a bummer for you. Nothing against these folks–they get work done just like the next …

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Getting the most out of Bootstrap, Part 1: Compiling your own CSS

By Ethan Clevenger / October 6, 2016 / Development

Bootstrap is an extremely popular CSS framework. It offers a responsive grid system and is highly customizable. That being said, I run into a lot of folks who aren’t using it to its full potential. A lot of folks aren’t customizing it effectively for their own projects, and some are using a lot more of …

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What’s in a name?

By Ethan Clevenger / September 28, 2016 / The Business

What’s in a name? that which we call a roseBy any other name would smell as sweet; While the context here has little to do with Sterner Stuff, let’s get a quick recap: Scene: Romeo approaches yonder window through which Juliet appears. The two lovers, from warring families, mourn that the feud keeps them from …

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