UNIT 2

in this unit, we are going through Step 3 of the Pirouz's 7 Steps.

Step 3 is to see whether the website we chose, in this case www.singnet.com.sg, is effective in communicating the site's key purpose of using visual language.

in this step, we learnt that there are two aspects to design:
- design elements

• the colours, lines and shapes in the design

- design principles

• the way the colours, lines and shapes are put together to make the design look nice

Question 1
(a) Use of Colours in the website

in the website that we have chose to work on, they used red colour (with a hint of grey) as a their basic webpage colour. this is good because the one of the rule of using colours for a website is to limit the number of colours used. this website used only two colours to avoid making their website looked like a disaster.

(b) Use of fonts

we are not really sure of the font type that is used in the site but we know that it fulfills the criteria of choosing the right fonts for a site. the criterias are readibility, legibility and colour.

the sentences on the site was easy to read, legible enough to be read and the colour used did not clash with the colour scheme of the website.

(c) Use of other graphics (example images)

there are a number of graphics used in this website. most of the graphics used acts as a link to another page. once the graphic is clicked, another designated page will load. the graphics on the site has a good contrast as it stands out in the site and do not blend in with the background.

the use of images in our chosen website is effective as the message it wants to send across is done, the size of the images are just right (viewers do not have to scroll up and down to look for them) and the load time of the images are fast.

(d) Overall effectiveness of graphics

as a whole, the graphics used are effective on the website. this is because the buttons are just nice for viewers to find and read, the animated graphics do have some pause in between (it does not just continue playing) and viewers do not have to keep on scrolling to see the whole graphic.

Question 2

we believe that there is a consistensy across the site.

the reason why we say this is because firstly, the colours are consistent. for example, they used the colour red and grey for the homepage and they used the same colour scheme throughout all the other links they have. secondly, the fonts that they used are not changing. they are the same for all pages and this do not create a clash between the fonts on the site. lastly, the graphics used in the site are all consistent with the colour scheme and also the design of the site. the graphics do not just appear out of nowhere and the colours just 'mix and match' with the whole site.

therefore, we think that there is a consistency across the site based on our findings abovementioned.

UNIT 1

Understanding the Key purpose of the chosen website and whether it meets the needs of its target audience segments.

The site we've chosen is Singtel.

Singtel's website targets a few audiences. These include: mobile consumers who can query price plans and phone prices&information, mobile shoppers who buys phone online(online shopping), media streaming services(e.g video), telecommunications for businesses ranging from small to large corporations, (An example would be SmartCab who "rents" Singtel's GPRS network. More info can be found here.) foreigners and businessmen who needs to make frequent international calls overseas and internet subscription plans for different types of users.

Not only does Singtel provides adequate information for potential customers, they also have plenty of services available for existing customers. Existing customers can visit their website for Internet SMS- free-of-charge, settling of phone bills online, downloading of ringtones, pictures, games etc, backing-up of phone data, many other value-added services and most importantly, they have a section which concentrates on customer service.

The website offers comprehensive information for visitors/ customers who are probably looking for a service from Singtel.

Direct Competitors: M1 and Starhub
Singtel has a very good after-service for their customers. This may be a value-add for them as customers feel satisfied and they know where to get help in case they encounter any problems.

Indirect Competitors: Mobile retailers
Singtel has to offer a more attractive prices by having promotions and discounts for loyal customers in order to compete with the retailers.

****edited****

In response to the different segments of customers. In addition to our second paragraph (to be more exact), we feel that Singtel segments its customers through demographic variables. Some of the variables which falls into this category are: age, gender, family (size), education level, income level, occupation, education, religion, language, race/ nationality etc.

One of the variables we feel that Singtel uses is the occupation variable. For their Internet service, they categorize they services based on occupation. A very good eample would be from here. This allows their customers to select whichever services which suits their needs. And it is easier for them to find the plans that cater to them. This saves lots of time and effort as customers don't have to navigate all the pages to find what they are looking for.

Another possible variable for the corporate customers would be the size of the business. As you can see from here, they've divided their corporate customers to "small business" and "medium/large enterprise". This has the same benefits as the above case.

Our group feels that Singtel's customers has a wide range.
This includes -(for Internet) basic home users, students, family users, users with extra needs like gamers, corporate users - small businesses to medium/large businesses.

Customers who are looking for value-added services. E.g. IDEAS for live Media streaming

and lastly their core customers for mobile services.

OCC

this is our blog for our module Online Communications.

our group consists of
Khalisah (crappyqueen)
Shuyan (a buffet of veggies)
Adam (adam)

here, we will be blogging abt the Pirouz's 7 Steps on our chosen webiste:
www.singnet.com.sg

cheers :)