WHAT WE SAY

1. Amazon: the giant American online retailer is entering the local advertising battle

   > By Jeff Mignon 01.19.12 - 19:56 PM

   For two days, I have been receiving email coupons with local publicity offers.  Nothing out of the ordinary.  Except that these deals are being sent by Amazon.  Seizing the advantage of its phenomenal base of qualified data, Amazon, the American giant of on-line distribution, has thus decided to try its hand as an advertising platform.
   
   This launch of Amazon locally in the New York metropolis was announced this past August 24.  They now have a site that aggregates the full list of Big Apple offers:  AmazonLocal.  For Amazon, this evolution is nothing but nature taking its course.  In the New York Times, Mike George, VP of AmazonLocal, explains:  "This is a very logical, natural extension of what we do now: helping our 144 million active customers buy anything they want.”
   
   This strategy is an open attack on heavyweight coupon providers, such as groupon.com.  But it is also a new threat for the local press who is witnessing a new competitor arrive on the terrain of local advertising.  This strategy is not a surprise for RevSquare team.  It's not that we have access to Top Secret files at Amazon. It is just that, for a certain number of years, we have observed:
   
   1:  The press has lost the monopoly on advertising distribution.
   2:  The ROI ("Return on Investment") has become the goal numero uno.
   3:  The constitution and the qualification of data bases are thus the key of the advertising battle that is now underway.
   4:  And in this battle, distribution forerunners may potentially have their own two cents.
   
   With AmazonLocal, we have moved from theory to reality.  The American giant of on-line sales has understood that they had already had presence in this terrain.  Clearly, Amazon can also use this implicit presence on the national scene, by offering to diffuse ad campaigns on the basis of consumers' centers of interest.  No doubt that if the strategy proves to be profitable, Amazon will extend to other markets in the US and abroad.  
   
   No doubt as well that other distribution giants will enter the game in the years to come.  I will give the example of the supermarket giants, such as Target, or the French 'Carrefour'.  Imagine a tomorrow where they decide to become advertising platforms …
   
   The race for the piece of the advertising pie has only just begun.

2. Sephora launches new presence online in Canada

   > By Stéphane Lagrange 12.01.11 - 20:51 PM

   RevSquare had the privilege to design and develop two websites for the internationally renown Beauty brand Sephora.
   
   Sephora is a the leading chain of perfume and cosmetics stores in France and has a powerful beauty presence in 24 other countries. In the United States and Canada, there are over 280 Sephora stores and over 270 Sephora inside JCPenney stores.
   
   Working closely with the Sephora head office team in San Francisco and Revsquare's regional team in Montreal (Canada), we recently delivered the following websites:
   www.canadasephora.com the bilingual regional website for Sephora in Canada which is a relay site to Sephora's eCommerce website in the USA
   www.canadasephora.com/catalogue the bilingual regional seasonal online Sephora Catalogue
   Our services for Sephora included: user experience (UX), design, CMS implementation, PHP App development, flip book integration, content translation.
   
   On an ongoing basis and at the demand of Sephora, Revsquare will be managing the content of the Canadian website with weekly updates.
   
   We're looking forward to more projects with the Sephora team.

3. Example of media sites using responsive design and media queries

   > By Jeff Mignon 10.07.11 - 01:42 AM

   Two months ago, the Financial Times launched a new mobile website using HTML5. The occasion, for us, to write about responsive design. Since, I have been looking for news sites using media queries and the responsive design or adaptive design concept. I only found three examples. 

   So here is my very short list. Reduce slowly the size of your browser, down to iPhone size, in order to better understand the idea. Please, if you know of any other news sites using media queries, send us the URL by using the comment section.

   - Boston Globe (US) 
   - Chigago Tribune for its election center (US)
   - Toronto Standard (Canadian)

   And, for the pleasure, here is a list nice site using media queries. Enjoy!

   - Foodsense.is
   - Ribot.co.uk
   - My.opera.com
   - Kristalia.it
   - lynn m fisher
   - about.com

   If you want to read about adaptive design, I recommend "Adaptive Web Design" by Aaron Gustafson.

4. Hiring a part-time admin

   > By Nancy Wang 09.20.11 - 20:27 PM

   NO PHONE CALL PLEASE - SEND EMAIL TOO : info (at) mignon-media (dot) com

   We are looking for a part-time entry-level position to help manage our growing client and consultant base. This person would be working directly with the CEO and COO (among other partners) providing support for managing record keeping for client accounts, organizing our consultant network, marketing support, book keeping, etc.
   
   The ideal candidate is a go getter who is willing to take on different tasks and be a team player. The position is new and this person should be motivated to make it their own. A candidate who has the ability to think beyond basic solutions and apply smart decisions is ideal. We are looking for someone who will want to grow with our team and is excited to be in an entrepreneurial environment.
   
   Responsibilities:
   - Organize and manage book keeping for invoicing/billing
   - Support development of presentations and proposals
   - Manage client lists: both current and leads
   - Assist with managing our consultant network worldwide
   - Help with marketing efforts for the digital agency: events, branding visibility, etc.
   - Assist with a large variety of ad-hoc requests on a regular basis with attention to detail and creativity
   
   The ideal candidate:
   - Detail-oriented (but doesn't get lost in the details)
   - Strong communication skills; both written and oral
   - Strong proficiency in MS Office Outlook, Word, PowerPoint and Excel; Keynote a plus
   - Excellent organizational, planning, and problem solving skills
   - Demonstrated strong interpersonal skills
   - Self motivated, reliable, resourceful
   - Flexible and adaptable personal style with a passion for excellence
   - Interest in working with an international team
   - Conversational French or an understanding of French (a plus, not necessary)
   
   SALARY: Negotiable
   HOURS: 10-15 hours a week to start
   
   This position could potentially be a full-time hire. This opportunity will most likely be a great fit for self-motivated, high-achieving college seniors or recent graduates who are looking for the opportunity to get a foot in the door, and take on greater responsibility over time.

   NO PHONE CALL PLEASE - SEND EMAIL TOO : info (at) mignon-media (dot) com

5. A new site for the geo political TV show "Le Dessous des Cartes"

   > By Guillaume Pousseo 09.14.11 - 12:37 PM

   The RevSquare French and American teams have been working together to rethink and develop the new site of the geo political show "Le Dessous des Cartes" aired on Arte, the Franco-German TV channel. The project has been develop by Benoît Raphaël, Jeff Mignon and Guillaume Pousseo the new CEO of RevSquare France. Elisa Riteau overviewed the UI and the interactive design.

   Benoît Raphaël gives some more details, on his blog (in French), about the editorial concept: "explanation journalism". A concept that the RevSquare team has been pushing for now many years. In a real time world, people need more and more contextualisation, analysis, prospectives... in one word: explanations.

   Following this principal, Art Presse, a member of the RevSquare network, has developed long form informational graphics for the new site.

   The site has been developed with the PHP framework Symfony 1.4 (open source). The RevSquare team has been focusing on two frameworks Symfony (PHP) and Django (Python). Regarding Symfony, our team is now moving to Symfony 2.0.

Follow us

We are on twitter

The voices of our team members

1. Trois mauvaises habitudes journalistiques à laisser tomber

   Posted by Benoit Raphaël Posted on Feb 22, 2012

   Ce n’est pas moi qui le dit, mais John Paton. L’an passé, j’avais déjà relayé ses 10 tweets pour transformer les journaux. John Paton est le patron du Journal Register Group (170 journaux et magazines), un sénior de la presse écrite, et un visionnaire radical. Il fait d’abord quatre constats : La presse écrite papier a perdu [...]

2. Datajournalisme : l’exemple du Los Angeles Times

   Posted by Benoit Raphaël Posted on Feb 17, 2012

   Deux bonnes initiatives du Los Angeles Times sur le web à découvrir si vous ne l’avez pas encore fait : - Le journal a créé un vertical (c’est à dire un site entier consacré à une thématique de niche) autour des “Awards” (prix) : “The Envelope“. Les habitants de la région, dont l’économie tourne en grande [...]

3. Mort de Whitney Houston : comment Twitter a (encore) échappé aux médias

   Posted by Benoit Raphaël Posted on Feb 16, 2012

   Ce n’est pas la première fois qu’un événement est annoncé quelques heures avant sur Twitter. Après l’exécution de Ben Laden et l’interpellation de DSK, c’est la mort de Whitney Houston qui a été annoncé en premier sur le réseau social Twitter. En mai dernier, j’écrivais que les historiens devraient penser à conserver la trace des tweets [...]

4. Silicon Valley startup’s best friend

   Posted by nrapp Posted on Feb 13, 2012

   In the crowd of hoodie-wearing twentysomething entrepreneurs and flashy stars that he often hangs out with, Ron Conway is easy to spot He’s the 60-year-old guy with an ample girth, a full head of snow-white hair, khakis, and a crisply pressed shirt that might have come from the Brooks Brothers catalogue. He sits at the [...]

5. Minute Buzz lance “Minute 2012″

   Posted by Benoit Raphaël Posted on Feb 11, 2012

   Je salue l’arrivée du nouveau bébé de l’équipe de Minute Buzz, emmenée par l’ami Maxime Barbier. Fidèle à sa stratégie de déployer Minute Buzz en verticaux, Maxime lance aujourd’hui “Minute 2012“, une nouvelle plateforme consacrée à l’actualité de l’élection présidentielle à travers le prisme des réseaux sociaux. En partenariat avec le nouvel Observateur. 2 points forts [...]

The Team

In our lab