Amy

I have worked in marketing and communications roles for over ten years, with an intense focus on web content and online engagement strategies for at least half of that time. My early career was spent working for arts organizations across Canada, including funding and advocacy agencies, and museums. While employed at the MacKenzie Art Gallery, I proudly participated in planning, writing and implementing online material for a number of projects of international acclaim including the touring exhibitions Warhol: Larger Than Life, the Joe Fafard Exhibition and Bob Boyer: His Life’s Work. Through these projects I’ve worked closely with organizations ranging from the Warhol Museum, the Canadian Museum of Civilization and the National Gallery of Canada. Recently, Bob Boyer: His Life’s Work became a Virtual Museum of Canada online exhibition.

The last few years of my career were spent with web agency Box UK as their Head of Marketing. My responsibilities included overseeing large projects such as the design, copywriting and development of the new company websites; I was also heavily involved in planning and overseeing the development of a comprehensive bespoke social media network for Box UK clients including the National Gallery (London), the British Computer Society, Investec Asset Management, British Energy Direct and World Vision. Designing and implementing strategies for creating engaging online content – including on social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook – was a core part of my position.

During the past two years, I have also maintained an active consulting practice focused on issues of content strategy for international organizations including Exuberance Beauty and the Saskatchewan Arts Board. I also co-founded Ignite London, the first event of its kind in the UK capital. Ignite London #1 and #2 were both sold out with speakers ranging from Ben Hammersley Editor at Large of Wired Magazine, to Cory Doctorow of Boing Boing.

In my personal life, I am an avid reader, writer, photographer and traveler. You can find me online in a number of places including on my personal blog Making Strange, writing for The Januarist, co-editing and managing the wanderlust inspiring travel website A Tramp Abroad, and on Twitter and Flickr.

Get in touch with me at amy@contentini.com

Dan

I have created websites since my university days, back in 1994 when Mosaic and Viola were the browsers of choice. After gaining a first class Masters degree in Astrophysics, I began my PhD but decided to quit after two years in 2000 to concentrate on building a web agency I co-founded at university.

The award-winning agency Box UK now employs 50 web experts in Cardiff and London (UK) offices, and generates millions of dollars in revenue annually. During my time at Box UK, I was the original architect of the company’s Amaxus Content Management System, which powers websites for world-class organizations including the BBC, The National Gallery (London) and Tombraider. I also conceived the company’s Clickdensity usability analysis tool, which some of the world’s largest retail, financial and online businesses rely on to optimize the critical transactional elements of their websites.

Content and communication have always been at the core of everything I dedicate my time to. My achievements include:

• Blogging for leading technical publishers O’Reilly Media, with posts for their xml.com, oreillynet.com, onlamp.com and digital media websites.
• Blogging for Box UK, with popular posts positively mentioned and shared by social media influencers including Mashable, Smashing Magazine, Kevin Kelly and Robert Scoble.
• Blogging as a guest author for numerous websites, and creating popular personal side-project blogs.
• My blog posts have reached the number one position on Hacker News, the front page (‘most popular’) of Delicious and the front page of Digg.
• I have created dozens of manual, semi-automated and automated Twitter accounts, with tens of thousands of organic followers between them. I have started globally trending Twitter memes, and one of my accounts has even been mentioned across the NBC news network websites.
• I have authored two chapters and sat on the expert editorial advisory board for Twitter for Museums, have written usability articles for .Net magazine, and am currently writing Web App Success – to be published late 2011 by Five Simple Steps.
• As a metadata old-timer, I have been invited to contribute to the Dublin Core Accessibility Metadata working group, to contribute to an important BSI standard on Learning Metadata, and to be a member of the Museums Semantic Web Thinktank.
• I co-founded the Cardiff Web Scene community and meet/tweet-ups, and co-organised the first Ignite events in the UK: Ignite Cardiff and Ignite London.
• I have presented on topics including the Semantic Web and lightweight website tools at Internet World, the British Computer Society, international museum conferences and all-day workshops.

Get in touch with me at dan@contentini.com