Product

Raveal Portfolio Management

By Mike Wille | Published September 10th, 2009

I have always believed in progressive reveal of advanced features. New users don’t feel overwhelmed and something more is always hidden away for people when they get comfortable with the system.

Unfortunately, that works against you if you are selling a product on features. But I won’t compromise on this. So how do we show everyone how absolutely cool this stuff is? More video please!

You’ll notice the advanced controls are hidden until you click on a file. The description pane isn’t shown until you decide to edit the description. The crop tool isn’t shown until you want to crop. Once the advanced control is brought up, you can control it completely with the keyboard.

Pretty darn fancy, huh?  Find out more about Raveal at http://raveal.com

Your Voice

By Mike Wille | Published August 23rd, 2009

Increasingly, employers are looking at the online social aspect of your life and basing part of the hiring decision on that. It may just be a search for faux pas or it may be a search on your expertise. You might have heard about the recent Best Buy marketing position that required applicants to have at least 250 twitter followers. Isn’t that incredible? Sure, they yanked the requirement after no marketing dudes had the chops, but this is definitely a trend.

We all know that Raveal provides a place to showcase your work and who you are. This is a great tool. We started with a resume. But we all know how limiting a resume is. Does anyone actually remember that it is ideally one page in length and at most two? We added a portfolio to showcase examples of your work. It certainly helps supplement the resume.

However, something was missing. How do you introduce employers to the “social” you?

There has been a lot of bad press lately around employers finding damaging “mistakes” on social networks. But “social” can be beneficial to your career. If you have a voice in your industry, no matter how small, that is a good thing. It shows you are passionate about your work. And if there are even people listening on the other end? It shows you are a leader in your industry.

I’d like to announce a new feature in Raveal: your online “Voice.”

The Voice will cover your online life in the same way that the resume tab covers your work life.

We are pulling in your blog, twitter, tumblr, facebook, and many other social feeds. In one spot, you can showcase to employers and clients exactly how much of an industry player you are. Of course, what you choose to showcase is up to you.

This has quite a few advantages. Maybe you keep your personal life on Facebook and you blog about your professional life. Pull in only what makes sense for your employers to see.

Check out the video to see how easy it is to set up your Voice.

Voice is immediately available to all Pro accounts.  Initially, we are launching with seven networks and more to follow. If you want a network included that isn’t currently, tweet us @flowz.

http://raveal.com

Raveal Demo

By Mike Wille | Published August 10th, 2009

Find out more:

Raveal Website: http://raveal.com

What is your Personal Brand?  http://over.flowz.com/2009/09/personal-brand/

Detailed Feature Demos:

Raveal Voice: http://over.flowz.com/2009/08/your-voice/

Audio Introductions: http://over.flowz.com/2009/09/best-foot-forward/

Innovative UI: http://over.flowz.com/2009/09/raveal-portofolio-management/

Flash Dance: New Theme

By Mike Wille | Published August 3rd, 2009

Just launched a new theme for you professionals out there.  One of the things we kept hearing about was the desire for a nice Flash animated gallery.

Well, here you go:

Tabbed galleries and image zooming.

Tabbed galleries and image zooming.

Zoom allows navigation at the same time.

Zoom allows navigation at the same time.

Resume, high on contrast, low on color.

Resume, high on contrast, low on color.

To get access to this new theme, click on “Style & Theme” in your Profile and choose “Flash Dance” under Default Themes.

Company Profiles & Job Postings

By Mike Wille | Published July 31st, 2009

It has been a busy month.  The previous post touched on it a bit.  Let me jump into the rest of what is out there.

(You’ll have to excuse the screenshot smorgasbord, video is coming…)

picture-33

Tell your company story.

Rich HTML editor allows you to tell your company story and attract talent with your wit and business acumen.

Add your company locations.

Add your company locations.

It helps to geographically pinpoint where you need help, and where talent will be working.  Raveal provides a simple way to add locations.  Only fill in what you need.

Post open positions within your company.

Post open positions within your company.

Creating a new position is straightforward and concise.  You aren’t hassled with poor UI of typical HR recruitment systems.

Your company's public profile shows your company story, locations, and open job positions.

Your company's public profile shows your company story, locations, and open job positions. Job positions also show in the Job Board on raveal.com.

Your company profile is clean and professional.  Add your logo and leverage the rich HTML editor to customize.

Applicants can directly send you their Raveal profile along with an introdution.

Applicants can directly send you their Raveal profile along with an introdution.

Raveal account holders can apply to your job with one click of a button.  It is easy for them and easy for you.  Of course, Raveal is not a walled garden.  People without accounts can email you directly.

New applicants are conveniently listed with the position.

New applicants are conveniently listed with the position.

For every position, a quick heads up on how many new applications you have received and how many total.

New applicants are tossed in the "Undecided" bucket.

New applicants are tossed in the "Undecided" bucket.

A simple workflow enables you to quickly sort out who makes the cut and who doesn’t.  Each application shows either a concise resume summary or a portfolio summary depending on the type of candidate.

You can share your applicants with others via a Guest Pass that requires no username or password.

You can share your applicants with others via a Guest Pass that requires no username or password.

How many times have you needed to share the list of applicants, but couldn’t because of cumbersome UI or licensing?  Raveal Company allows you to hand out Guest Passes to others to allow them to view and decide without a user account.

Track your notes with the applicant during the interview process.  Give a "Thumbs Up" or a "Thumbs Down" to organize.

Track your notes with the applicant during the interview process. Give a "Thumbs Up" or a "Thumbs Down" to organize.

Again, straightforward, “Thumbs Up” or “Thumbs Down.”

Notes and other info show in a HUD when viewing the applicant's Raveal Profile.

Notes and other info show in a HUD when viewing the applicant's Raveal Profile.

When you bring up a user’s profile, your position information and candidate notes are available as a heads up display.

Whew!  That was a lot to digest.  But what can I say.  There is a lot of functionality there.  Why don’t you go try a free account out.  It allows one job posting (have as many as you want, but only one active at a time).

http://raveal.com/pricing.html

People Showcase

By Mike Wille | Published July 30th, 2009

We are in the process of rolling out some major changes to Raveal.  The first that I would like to introduce is our Showcase:

raveal-showcase

The showcase displays a random selection of talent on Raveal. There is some stunning work out there!

With the short amount of time Raveal has been open to the public, we have seen some tremendous talent poor in.  It quickly became apparent that we needed to put this talent on public display.

There is now a link to it at the top of Raveal’s website and you can go directly to it via:

http://raveal.net/showcase/people

If you are interested in being showcased, all you need to do is make sure your profile is marked public and we’ll find you.  The list changes periodically, so you never know, you may find yourself on the Showcase.

(Don’t worry, we ask for permission first.)

Flowzit Updates

By Mike Wille | Published June 22nd, 2009

We just rolled out a new version of Flowzit. The major gist of it is:

  • User Photos – Users can add a picture of themselves in their profile.  User photos are shown wherever they leave their mark.  For example, next to each reply in a message.
Add your photo

Add your photo

  • Account Logos – Previously, the top of the page would show your account (company) name as text.  Now you have the option to upload an image.  In addition to being shown at the top of all pages when you are logged in, your logo is shown on the login page.
Account Logo

Account Logo

  • The attachment display for messages has been polished up with touches that only OCD people like us will notice.
Message Improvements

Message Improvements

  • Lots of polish for Internet Explorer Quirks
  • For accounts with the option for SSL, you can now disable it your Account Profile for speed improvements.

We’ll be back with more updates in a few weeks.

What is Flowzit?

By Mike Wille | Published June 5th, 2009

Flowzit was brought to life because there was a process out there that people were using that is just plain asinine. The process is always messy with differing approaches people try at making it easier. They bolt on extra tools and controls to track changes. At the core, it is always the same. Cumbersome.

Of course, Flowzit, bring simplicity to the table. The problem we had was attempting to show people how life could be better. First, we tried it with words. But that just wouldn’t do. So we added screenshots. And that helped, but we knew the only way was to demonstrate it.

Now, a demonstration only took 2 minutes until people suddenly had that bright light shining down from heaven all around them. Great! Unfortunately, in-person demos take time to setup and don’t work for the self-service intertubes dispenser.

Of course, you know where I’m going with this. So, I’ll get right to the point. Here are two new videos demonstrating some of what Flowzit can do.

Approvals
Minisites

Raveal Themes

By Mike Wille | Published June 4th, 2009

I missed posting about this because I had to immediately turn my attention to Flowzit. But that is a post for a different day.

Last week we launched a new feature for Raveal: Themes.  This was one of those things that I really, really wanted to have at launch but just didn’t have enough time to do it right.  And you really do need to do something like this right.

Bottom Shelf

New Dark Theme

What we have with Themes are pre-packaged skins for your public profile.  There are 4 we provide.  Of course, you can tweak your theme with custom CSS you provide.

On top of CSS, you can choose from one of two different layouts.  The layouts affect how your portfolio and resume is laid out in the browser.  The layout we launched with (and shown above) is called Grid Matic.  The second layout is for people desiring a minimalist  showcase and is called Bottom Shelf.

Additionally, there is a community forum for people to contribute new themes for all to use.  Anyone can contribute their theme.  In doing so,  you get credit on the theme and a link that points back to your profile.  Just a little way to help spread the word about YOU.  Cool, huh?  Once there is a suitable number of community themes, we’ll be showcasing them on the Raveal website.

The instructional site is at: http://raveal.com/themes.html

Raveal Updates

By Mike Wille | Published May 11th, 2009

This (very early) morning, we updated Raveal with some new goodies.  Check out the fun facts:

1.  You can now send your profile as a personalized email.  Setting up an email is very easy with expert options to present yourself in a professional manner.

thumb-email-form

Quickly send your profile

2.  If you have a portfolio, you can choose to include your featured images.  You can also attach a PDF of your resume.

thumb-email

Add images, personal note, and a PDF

3.  You can choose whether or not to include a link back to your public Raveal website.  If you do include a link, Pro users will see web hits from that email reflected in their profile activity page.

thumb-activity

Pro users see if their email garnered a response

4.  Portfolio galleries are now included in the PDF along with your resume.  The gallery images are high-res versions.  This results in a stunningly crisp, printed version.  Remember, there are still employers out there that want to have paper in their hands.  Click the thumbnail below to see the PDF zoomed in to 400%

thumb-portfolio-pdf

Hi-res portfolio included in Resume PDF

5.  Lastly, public profiles are now indexed by Google.  On top of our own search engine, people can find you without even knowing about Raveal.

You can see Raveal in action at http://raveal.com

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