Jeremy Helms

You're probably saying the same thing we said when we were handed this project: "Fred Figglehorn? What?"

Truth is, Fred Figglehorn is the doppelganger of teenage actor Lucas Cruikshank who plays a hyperactive child in a popular video series that is generating a six-figure income and some Big Media interest. This 15 year old's videos have been watched over 15,500 times, his subscriber-base is closing in on 3/4 of a million people, and he's had almost 18 million channel views; with YouTube statistics like this, maybe you too could make the headlines with news agencies like CNN, BusinessWeek, LA Times, and CNET!

SourceGas, the former retail division of Kinder Morgan, is a leading supplier and distributor of natural gas products to residential, business and agricultural customers in Colorado, Nebraska and Wyoming.

When they decided to make their split from KM, they chose Denver-based PGM Integrated to assist in their branding and broadcast production campaign. Part of what PGM was tasked with was the ground-up build of a completely fresh corporate website for this new company. PGM approached me [through our sole-source partnership at the time] with providing this entire solution, and we worked hand in hand (even face-to-face in some cases) with the staff at PGM and SourceGas to provide exactly the solution they required.

An elaborate .NET-based content management system (CMS) powered by an arsenal of custom developed ASP.NET server controls and features, like:

• 3-mode WYSIWYG editor
• 10 different page content types
• Historical content versioning w/ rollback
• Self-contained resource manager
• Advanced user modes for departmental and managerial workflow in editing and publishing
• Easy-edit contact form creation
• Per-page start/stop publishing schedules

What's more, there is a "sister" site to this one powered by the exact same CMS framework which we also constructed (see the SourceGas Energy Services project).

This site is powered by the exact same system built for it's parent site, SourceGas corporate. Sort of an afterthought in a matter of speaking, this site became a reality in approximately one week. Once the modules, hierarchy and templates were designed for SourceGas corporate, we:

1. Duplicated the resource system and web server configurations
2. Brought a new MSSQL database online
3. Pushed a handful of people into the CMS admin all at once doing content entry
4. Deployed the site on a subdomain a week later

This website is part of a viral campaign, where somewhere between 400 and 1000 beach balls were distributed across NYC by being left inside of cabs for riders to puzzle over. Each beach ball had a printed tag containing the web address and password required to enter, and visitors who log in can submit their personal story (via text, image, or video) of how far they would go for something or someone they care about. Each submission goes into a moderation tank, and once approved the submissions merge into the collage of submissions made by other visitors.

Powering the site is a custom PHP+MySQL management system, atop of a built to order LAMP cluster. All presentation layers were built with standards-compliant XHTML (1.0 Strict), CSS3 (with graceful degradation), and heavy use of the Prototype JavaScript framework combined with the script.aculo.us Web 2.0 effects library. The site consists primarily of one actual page with all interaction being done using a lightbox style overlay combined with AJAX.

With their minimalist approach, pixel perfect critique, and to-the-hex color requirements, this site has been one of the most scrutinized sites I've ever been involved with (and that's saying something, considering the simplicity of the site overall). But you can't hate on the T&F team for their attention to detail, in a way it was refreshing to see the level of passion they brought to the project.

This project was a ground up replacement for a site apparently built in the late 1940's. This project covered it all -- rich meta-data, clean separation of content and presentation, an elegant and intuitive web-based interface for administration, complete e-commerce support, a career portal, news & event modules, global site search, user account management, multi-user authoring with permissions, and the list goes on. And, to support the site, we've built a clustered Linux server configuration that features real-time server synchronizing and floating IP automatic fail-over.

The goal of this project was to develop a product, around the requirements of the Colorado BMA chapter and how they operate, that could be duplicated for other chapters, with features meeting the exact specifications of BMA. Below is a generalized list containing some of the top features:

• Event registration system with joint registrations for up to five additional people
• Banner advertising system with sponsorship placement purchasing and template control for multiple banner sizes and configurations
• E-commerce store, tied into Authorize.net for merchant processing
• Career portal with job and job candidate listings
• Newsletter and PR article publishing with auto-archiving
• Online membership system with support for multiple membership levels
• Integrated resource management system for controlling resource files (PDF, DOC, etc) with support for versioning
• WYSIWYG, friendly Word-like editor for content editing with point-and-click resource browser for linking to managed resource files (above)

This site is powered by a unique set of custom plugins that convert WordPress into a CMS-platform opposed to a blog-platform. PGM provided the [beautiful] comps, I sliced & diced them, blended in some XHTML+CSS goodness and the dynamic, SEO-ready website was launched in mere days.

This client was seeking a static, brochure-style website and was surprised when I turned out a full Flash UI. What's more, I punched it up a notch by adding some SEO-ready support and a pseudo-CMS back-end using WordPress. I also integrated SimpleViewer into the Flash interface and wrapped it with a custom WordPress plug-in for a slick looking photo gallery. All together, this back-end system gives the site a great looking slideshow viewer, dynamic content, an easy to use interface for the site owner to update the gallery photos, and an SEO version of the site that runs in parallel to the Flash version for search engines to use for indexing.

This website uses much of the same core framework powering the BMA Colorado website. Not requiring preservable shopping cart, Authorize.Net gateway integration, visitor account registration, and other additional features, this ground-up renovation was deployed in just a few weeks.

• Complete top-level & nested sub-section oriented CMS controls for page content
• E-commerce shopping cart system using PayPal for merchant processing
• Product identifiers for things like sale, clearance and "daily special"
• Integrated resource management system for controlling resource files (PDF, DOC, etc) with support for versioning
• WYSIWYG, friendly Word-like editor for content editing with point-and-click resource browser for linking to managed resource files (above)
• Integrated gallery management system with identifiers for "featured" galleries and "use this image for gallery thumbnail"
• Flash widgets supporting dynamic image embedding based on gallery identifiers

HyperIDX is a robust stand-in for the common, out-dated public MLS solution provided to REALTORS® by their local [and state] organizations. HyperIDX is available for all real estate professionals, REALTORS® or not. Aside from visual appeal, what radically distinguishes HyperIDX from most other MLS solutions is that as a subscriber of HyperIDX service, your website can handle more than just MLS data — you can also manage and display your own exclusive projects such as land & development and pre-construction that normally wouldn't be found on an MLS.

HyperIDX started as a proof of concept for my work with The Realty Group. The buisiness model of The Realty Group wasn't the standard "we sell houses" that most real estate businesses follow. Thus, a custom system was charted and built for their website. I realized after building this system that many other businesses [and even independent REALTORS® working on their own] could benefit and dramatically improve their ROI by using a system like this in place of the downtrodden framed MLS wanna-be that most real estate websites use. So, here it is, standardized, fully functioning and includes a developer API for those who want to get down-and-dirty with custom integration.

The Realty Group set new milestones for this project after I demonstrated what their website could do rather than adhering to the low standards in real estate websites set by their areas local competitors. For this project I designed and integrated a custom IDX data transport to allow site-centric MLS searches, not the typical, ugly, framed MLS searches you see on most real estate websites. To pair with the custom MLS searching, I also developed a self-contained "project listing system" (PLS) so that the client could provide visitors with a searchable interface for finding available land & development projects they are involved in that you wouldn't find on the MLS.