Well, it’s been a busy one! We’ve been meeting new clients, integrating new systems, and fielding a lot of inquiries. Our first week under 100% Webhost ownership went by quickly, somewhat in “stealth” mode before we made a public announcement. We (the 100% crew) were learning a lot of new systems, taking in the platforms that Modern Earth had been using for things like project management, issue tracking, and record-keeping, merging or integrating those with the ones we use. Some (hello, cPanel!) were easier than others (I don’t know how people use Outlook every day), but we’re getting there.

100 Percent boasts one of the only local web hosting operations with full Manitoba data residency.

Winnipeg Free Press, June 8, 2021

With the public announcement came the attention, including nice words from Martin Cash at the Winnipeg Free Press, and a number of people reaching out to us on social media and via email with congratulations and well-wishes. (If we haven’t gotten back to you yet, we haven’t forgotten!) These are all very much appreciated. Add to that the new clients we’ve been meeting now, and we’ve been busy! From all that, I can say that we’re really enjoying meeting the new clients and getting to work for them. Barrett from Neovation has been outstanding with his help to make the transition as smooth as possible for every client.

Leading up to June 1st, we relaunched the 100percentweb.ca site with slightly updated brand, changing the font treatment to match the way we wanted to refresh the Modern Earth logo with updated font styling based on IBM Plex Sans. The Modern Earth logo got a bit of a shift in its icon to reflect some new direction and a more streamlined – you might say “modern” – look. A logo refresh like this is often done, where you don’t shed the old, you just revise it to reflect the times with newer design trends. (I’m a Coke drinker myself, but Pepsi is great at this.) By setting up both logos with the same icon placement and font treatment, we intend to reflect the two brands’ association with one another, even though they offer different products with slightly different messaging.

This is not a “rebrand.” You could call it a refinement, a refresh, or a refocus. Doing it with two separate brands at the same time is the challenge, but we love a good branding challenge, and we think we’ve achieved a good result. Don’t they look good together?

At the same time, we had to completely rebuild two websites with new content and sharpened messaging, which meant revisiting everything. I don’t typically recommend doing two full logo revisions and then using them to build two complete websites from scratch, and launching them in just two weeks, but that’s what we did. (Good tools help a lot. Thanks, WordPress.) On this site, we made use of a lot of photos from the NASA gallery (within the usage guidelines under their license, of course), and so far we’re loving the “look to the stars” vibe.

So we’ve been fielding calls, writing up proposals, updating websites, checking SEO reports, meeting clients, reviewing documentation, and updating systems everywhere. I’ll say one positive thing about remote meetings during COVID restrictions: I’m not spending any time driving between meetings! While I don’t miss that part at all, it’ll be good to see people in person again – or for the first time. Soon. It’ll be soon.

So how’s your June going so far?