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bloody-britt26 · 5 years

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Hello! Inspired by that pastel crush post, may you share headcanons or a drabble of Raihan falling for a witty n strong jock/goth trainer who is basically trying to become the flying type gym leader in Galar (w a few dragons on their team too, like a noivern or an altaria), they came to the region due to their fascination w history/ruins, so Raihan's first meeting w them is in the vault as they admired the tapestries? (the dragon finds a new treasure within his vault 🤭) Love your writing btw 💖

Thank you! Again, I apologize for the delay. I have no excuses besides being a slow goof who is easily distracted by absolutely everything. I made a drabble for this, so I hope you enjoy! ♡

🐉 Raihan crushing on a future Flying-type gym leader 🐉

The atmosphere of Hammerlocke's vault was eerily quiet, not a single sound from the outdoors pierced the walls. It was the perfect environment for you, allowing you to be lost in your thoughts as you admired the tapestries. They told the story of Galar's beginnings, and it was fascinating to you.

Galar was a region filled with such a rich history, supported by vaults, ruins, monuments and art. It was the perfect region for a trainer that held passion and fascination for history such as yourself.

You held back a chuckle as you felt your pokéballs containing your main partners, Altaria and Salamance, shake impatiently. They hated being contained for long periods of time as they would rather soar through the skies, keeping a watchful eye on you.

They have been with you since you were a young child. The three of you have been through many adventures together, and they have travelled all around your home region of Hoenn by your side. They were the ones who fought their hardest for you to achieve your dream of someday becoming a gym leader specializing in Flying-type pokémon.

"Simmer down in there. I swear, I'm almost done," you said, lightly patting your pokéballs.

As you plunged back into your own little world, you hadn't noticed that a new presence had entered the vault.

When Raihan was notified by one of his gym trainers that a newcomer had entered his vault, he was curious to see what kind of person it was. Needless to say, he was pleasantly surprised to see how invested you looked. Hell, you hadn't even noticed him enter the vault, or approach you. He was a man of history himself, so he could respect any trainer that showed the same respect and admiration for Galar's history.

As you were admiring historical treasures, he found himself admiring you. You had a style that he was particularly fond of: varsity jacket, ripped jeans, baseball cap and military boots, all in dark shades and colours. You seemed to be going for a darker jock look, and it suited you quite well, in his opinion. Your eyes seemed to shine, expression cutely contorted into one of concentration.

With a smirk, Raihan cleared his throat, wanting to get your attention

Your eyes darted to your side, blinking at the new presence. "Oh, sorry…. I didn't notice you there."

Raihan shook his head, waving you off. "Don't worry about it. You looked like you were deep in thought there."

You chuckled. "What can I say? I've been a sucker for history ever since I visited my home region's ruins when I was a child."

"Foreigner, huh?"

You grinned. "Yes! Proud Hoenn native!"

"Well then, welcome to Galar. The name's Raihan, Hammerlocke's vault keeper and gym leader," he said, puffing his chest slightly as he was very proud of his titles.

"Gym leader, huh? Lucky man, it's always been a dream of mine to be a gym leader. I'm (name), by the way," you said.

"Really now? Is that why you came to Galar?" He asked.

"Well, partly. I also happen to think that Galar is one of the richest regions in history, and it's absolutely beautiful. It's nothing like the humid forestry environment that Hoenn has," you said.

"Hm… maybe we should battle someday. We could test if you've got what it takes to be a gym leader," he said, partly joking.

You looked at him with a small smirk gracing your features. "Sweetheart, I know I've got what it takes, and I'll gladly take you up on your offer. That is…. If they're not just hollow words, yes?"

Raihan blinked, surprised at your eager acceptance to his little challenge. You had a similar confident attitude as he did. He couldn't help but smirk slightly as he wondered what kind of pokémon batted by your side for you to be so at ease in the presence of a powerful gym leader.

Once again, you felt your pokéballs shake, making you roll your eyes. "I should probably go… my Altaria and Salamance will have my head if I don't let 'em out of their pokéballs. Plus, I promised my team that I would let them roam around the Wild Area."

You chuckled when Raihan stood there, visibly looking like the cogs in his brain were spinning at the mention of Altaria and Salamance. The man was a dragon lover, you could tell that much by his physical appearance, choice of colours and clothing.

"Be seein' you, right? I still need to kick your butt in battle," you said with a brow raised.

As you started to walk away, Raihan snapped out of his stupor. "H-Hey, wait!"

You peaked behind your shoulder. "Yes?"

You had to hold back a laugh as Raihan fiddled with his hoodie. He looked like a child that was about to ask his parents something outrageous.

"Would it be weird if I come with you? I just-"

"You want to meet my dragons, right?"

He nodded rapidly, a big dorky grin on his face. "We don't have them here in Galar! Pleeease?"

"It's fine with me. Come on, dragon boy."

~~~~~~

Your time in the Wild Area had quickly turned into a playdate between your pokémon and Raihan's. His Goodra rested her head in your lap, seeming to have taken a liking to the head pats you had to offer.

Your Gliscor, Talonflame and his Flygon raced each other in the sky. His Duraludon and your Aerodactyl were play fighting while your Gyarados preferred to swim in the lake on his own.

Your Altaria and Salamance were getting smothered in attention by Raihan. He was an absolute dork when it came to dragons, and it showed quite a bit.

Raihan was ruffling Altaria's feathers, cooing about how fluffy she was. Altaria had no idea how to react, she sent you confused glances here and there that screamed 'Help, mom'. Salamance sounded like he was laughing at her, which probably was a bit of revenge for him as Altaria had laughed at him when Raihan kept taking selfies with him.

Raihan glanced at all of the pokémon that surrounded both of you. He had to admit: he was impressed with your team. Specializing in a specific type meant that you would need to have good type coverage to counter your weaknesses, and your team delivered. Your Gliscor could deal with rock and electric pokémon, and your Talonflame and Aerodactyl could deal with ice pokémon.

Your pokémon definitely looked well trained. Looking at Aerodactyl and Duraludon who were play fighting, he noticed how his ace dragon was visibly struggling to keep up with the prehistoric pokémon. The urge to battle you was growing as he felt that you could give him a run for his money.

He looked back at you and smiled softly at the sight. You were laughing loudly as his Goodra nuzzled you affectionately, you didn't even care that you were all slimy.

If you would let him, Raihan would love to get to know you on a more personal level, and maybe he could help you achieve your dream of being a Flying-type gym leader right here, in Galar. You had so much potential.

In the end, he ended up finding an extra treasure in his vault.

#pokemon imagines #pokemon sword and shield #raihan imagines #raihan headcanons #raihan x reader #raihan #reader insert #pokemon #pokemon headcanons #pokemon shield #pokemon sword

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severalspoons · 4 years

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Liveblog: Rewatching Trigun, Episode 20

Surprise, this blog series continues! I have no intention of letting it end at episode 19. (I mean, that’s not even a nice round number!) While these aren’t liveblogs any more, they still give me an opportunity to discuss meta.

Life lesson learned: once you start a series of anything, do not stop until it’s finished--no matter what other projects come up, no matter how shiny they are, and no matter how much you’re dreading watching episode 23. Since I do my best work when feeling inspired, I hate to wait and let my enthusiasm for the new project cool, but jumping ship only ends in two unfinished projects instead of one.

This is going to be arranged by theme, not so much chronologically. Also, it ended up being more about Wolfwood than originally intended. Including a spoiler, so be careful.

Millie’s Transmitter

Millie reports that the Chief of Bernadelli gave her a transmitter/tracking device, which must be a rare, valuable piece of technology -- to prevent anyone from outwitting her. Meryl replies that this is nothing to brag about. I disagree.

First of all, the chief cares about her enough to entrust her with this bragworthy technology. She must have earned his trust and good opinion, also an achievement. He could easily punish or fire her, but instead gives her a tool to perform better. Countless people with learning disabilities dream of bosses like this.

People tend to take a harmful all-or-nothing attitude towards disabilities. Either PWD are incapable of doing things and nothing can be done about it, or they are capable of doing things, and shouldn’t need help. Since people with disabilities themselves live in society, they end up indoctrinated and taking the same attitudes towards themselves. Shame and self-hatred often result. People strive for years, often with therapy, to get to the matter of fact acceptance Millie shows here.

***

Vash in Hell

Everything is red, from the beginning. The sand, himself and his clothes, the sky. Knives comes into view, blurry and mostly in shadow, only one eye visible. What looks like meteors, probably chunks from the ships, fall through the sky like rain. We’re seeing from Vash’s point of view.

When waking Vash, Knives’ voice is normal, sounding like a real child. It doesn’t change to his growly evil voice until Vash accuses him of being a murderer. Then, his eye loses its pupil, and he suddenly appears to have fangs. He looks like he’s become some sort of monster. Not human, as Vash says.

Knives beats him up for even daring to compare him to a human. What hurts the most about this is you know it’ll be a long time, and probably many more such beatings, before Vash leaves.

Was it ever possible to take care of Knives? Was Rem’s last request reasonable?

Vash announces he’s finally ready to face Knives. What impresses me most: he’s finally making a significant decision for himself.

***

Meet the Folks

How is Vash more attractive in normal clothes than his signature coat, even in scenes showing only his face? Speaking of which, this episode is full of beautiful shots of Vash’s face. Wolfwood’s, too.

How the hell did Wolfwood get here? He said he was concerned about Vash crying then jumping off a cliff, and followed him. However, he seems to have climbed up from below. How would he have found a floating platform? Certainly, none is visible below him. And since he seems to know nothing about the flying ship, he can’t have taken Vash’s strategy and jumped onto a platform at just the right time.

“Come meet the folks!” Yes, they actually do have a summer cottage in the sky. Ever wonder why Vash’s head is always in the clouds? ;)

Wolfwood actually says “I’m getting sick of your lies.” Hypocritical much?

Wolfwood is the first guest Vash has brought “home” in over 20 years (in other words, since he became The Stampede)!

Does that mean that the whole time Vash has been on the run, he hasn’t visited the SEEDS ship (probably to prevent anyone tracking him from discovering it)? Vash could have simply hid out for the last 20 years in the SEEDS ship; it’s his home, after all. Instead, he chose to go out and protect people from Knives, and each other. (How many of us would have made the same choice?)

***

Inside Legato’s Lair

What does this informant know about Chapel’s duties? From the way Legato dismisses his concerns, it seems like Knives’ followers aren’t given much information about each other.

Wolfwood is now doomed. “You’re such a fool. Had you behaved, you might have lived to see Doomsday. But I’m pleased, for I now have the opportunity to carry out another of my master’s wishes.”

A surprisingly restrained evil chuckle from Legato. Thank you for sparing us a full-on villain laugh.

How does Legato get shoulder padding that sticks out that far? Each shoulder is almost twice as big as his head.

***

A Series of Awkward Events

The ship has a whole observation team. No one should be able to get up here without the SEEDS leaders knowing, right? Right? ...

The old man tells Brad Vash has changed over the years. How?

After all this buildup, Brad opens the door, letting in blinding light, and this is what he sees:

The legend acting like an idiot and getting his butt kicked. Very dignified.

This is Brad’s reaction:

“Is that your great legend?! Huh?!” “What a relief! He hasn’t changed at all.” (A relief? What were they afraid would have happened to him?)

Brad is not amused by Wolfwood’s touchy-feely ways.

“Who’s he?” Vash, looking embarrassed: “I’m not sure.” Fair enough, but not very helpful, and Wolfwood doesn’t elaborate. We already know and love Vash’s embarrassed grin, but I can’t get over Wolfwood’s almost sinister smile in the mirror.

A cute moment where Vash looks back like, “isn’t my place great?” and Wolfwood just gapes like an idiot. (Close your mouth, my dude. Flies are gonna get in).

Vash last visited about 20 years ago, and Jessica was a small child then, so she should be about 23 or 24. However, she looks and acts like a teenager. Vash inadvertently becomes part of an unwanted love triangle.

To his credit, Vash tries to put her off, in a joking way (”I have a reputation for being easy but even I need a bit of advance warning”). Wolfwood makes the whole situation worse by teasing Vash about his “girlfriend” in front of a fuming Brad. It’s as if he were going out of his way to antagonize the people on the ship.

When Vash actually has a chance to look at Jessica’s face, he remembers her. Think about that. He may only have met her once, it’s been 20 years, and he still recognizes her and remembers her name. How many other people does he remember from the past ~130 years? This is how he uses his powerful plant brain--Knives would view it as a waste.

Jessica cooks a feast for Vash, which, tragically, he won’t get to enjoy. How did she cook all this food so fast? It’s enough to feed the whole ship.

***

Wolfwood is mistrusted for the wrong reasons

Wolfwood actually takes off his shades and armor of acting like a jerk while introducing himself to Jessica. This is unusually open and vulnerable of him. He actually is trying to behave. But Brad, worried about “a bunch of outsiders” bringing war to their flying paradise, hits him where it hurts.

...Did I mention Wolfwood has beautiful eyes?

Anyway, everyone gathers around staring at Wolfwood from a distance, while he drops cigarettes on the ground. There’s an entire pile lying at his feet. The whole scene is the definition of passive aggressive.

What seems to anger Wolfwood is not so much how they treat him personally, but their denial combined with moral superiority. Not to push a metaphor too far, but these folks are able to take the moral high horse because their literal high position keeps them safe. Yet, they use this immense privilege not to help the world below, or to prepare for the ship’s inevitable fall, but to hide in their castle in the sky. It clicks for me that Wolfwood probably feels about running away the way Vash does about suicide (think back to episode 11).

The SEEDS dwellers do not seem to understand that Wolfwood is both trying to help them and a little resentful of what they have. To them, he is everything they’ve been taught to fear and hate, up here poisoning Paradise for them with his unpleasant ideas. Of course this sort of dynamic never happens in real life.

Also, keep in mind that none of them know anything about the people below directly, only from hearsay. They’re not wrong about Gunsmoke as a whole, but they treat Wolfwood like a monster rather than a person. That also never happens in real life.

Then he gets to the scene of a crime too late--but just in time to look like the one responsible. Although the ship dwellers would love to see him dead, he leaps to defend them against his own colleague. Knowing, perhaps, that doing this would confirm he switched sides, and his own days might be numbered. He doesn’t even pause to think, he just goes, the same way he did when the child went missing in episode 9.

***

Vash Will Save The Day

“Like you care. Five years is probably like a blink of the eye to you anyway.” Vash denies it, but the second part is probably true. He looks so surprised to hear it’s been five years.

It can’t be easy for Vash to admit that he was responsible for the “Fifth Moon Incident,” and is probably more dangerous than Knives. Once again, his only argument is “please.” But there’s no buffoonery or melodrama here. He’s dead serious, and that’s more convincing.

Wolfwood tries to stop Leonoff from saying his name. No one who would understand the significance or matters to him is present, just Brad and Jessica. Is he merely afraid others will hear? Does he still consider himself to be Chapel?

Even facing Leonoff, Wolfwood still hasn’t put his shades back on.

Now imagine if Vash managed to find ways out of no-win situations and save the day without all the whining and crying.

Wolfwood can pause and wait for once, having faith that Vash will show up. He knows there’s always a third option for Vash. He does not yet see any for himself. Still, progress nonetheless.

***

Unfortunately for me, Vash is back with his red coat in Vash the Stampede mode, yellow glasses hiding his face.

OK, I can see how Leonoff’s puppets get into the ship without being noticed, but how on Earth did the big guy even get here?

#liveblog #liveblogging #trigun anime #trigun #millie thompson #meryl stryfe #vash the stampede #nicholas d. wolfwood #seeds ship #legato bluesummers #gung ho guns #leonoff the puppet master #character analysis #meta #brad and jessica #love and peace #ethics #faith

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inhumansforever · 6 years

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Lockjaw #4 Review

spoilers spoilers spoilers spoilers spoilers spoilers spoilers spoilers spoilers

The wild ride comes to an even wilder conclusion as Lockjaw and D-Man face off against the dreaded Annihilus! The final issue of a terrific miniseries from the creative team of Daniel Kibbelsmith, Carlos Villa, Roberto Poggi and Chris O’Halloran. Recap and review following the jump.

A mysterious signal has sent Lockjaw on a quest to ensure his siblings are all safe. The down on his luck retired superhero, Dennis ‘D-Man’ Dumphrey, has stumbled into accompanying Lockjaw as the adventure has traversed nearly every corner of the multiverse.

It turned out that the signal was sent by Lockjaw’s sister, Doc Jaw, a highly intelligent doggo from he anthropomorphic universe (just roll with it, okay?). Anyways, Doc Jaw had sent out this signal hoping it would beckon Lockjaw so he could save his brother from the Negative Zone where the evil Annihilus was trying to use him to gain an unlimited portal through which he hoped to conquer the multiverse. What, what?

But first Lockjaw must remember how to teleport tot he multiverse and recalling this information requires venturing into the dreamscape where the memory can be unlocked from his unconscious. Huh?

Whatever. In the dreamscape, Lockjaw and D-Man meet Sleepwalker, defender of the dream-realm. As Sleepwalker explains the dreamscape offers visages of distant memories and Lockjaw is able to see the circumstances of his origin.

Many years ago, an Inhuman of the lower caste named Myrren Barabus ventured beyond the confines of Attilan into the forbidden world of mankind. There she saw a mistreated dog and mistook it for a human infant. Myrren took the dog back to Attilan hoping to save her.

Myrren was arrested by the Royal Guard and the dog she abducted was handed over to the Genetic Council and it’s unscrupulous Surgeon Supreme. The Surgeon Supreme had been made privy to King Agon and Queen Rynda’s efforts to expand upon the potentialities of Terrigenesis by exposing their unborn child to the Terrigen Mists whist still in the womb. Before they conducted this experiment, however, Agon wanted to ensure the process was safe and tasked the Surgeon Supreme to conduct preliminary trials on in vitro Terrigenesis.

The Surgeon Supreme utilized animals as test subjects in his experiments and the dog Myrren had unwittingly brought to him proved a successful subject. The Surgeon Supreme used cloned cells to make the dog pregnant and then subjected her to a specially rendered form of the Terrigen Mist. The experiment was a success and one of the puppies gestating in her womb was endowed with Inhuman powers.

This pup was Lockjaw and along with enhanced strength and size and the ability to teleport over vast distances, he was additionally empowered with a preternatural sense of awareness. Even as a pre-born pup, Lockjaw was able to ascertain that his siblings were at risk of being test subjects for the sinister Surgeon Supreme’s ongoing experiments. So to save his brothers and sister, Lockjaw used his teleportation powers to transport each to a safe location… his brother was taken to Brooklyn, his sister was taken to the Savage Land, his other sister was brought to the Larval Earth and anthropomorphic universe, and his other brother was taken to the Negative Zone (which Lockjaw had mistakenly believed a safe location).

Seeing and reliving these memories is difficult for Lockjaw, but does achieve a goal. Doc Jaw has been monitoring his and D-Man’s journey through the dreamscape and when Lockjaw relives the process of depositing his brother in the Negative Zone Doc Jaw is able to get a fix on the frequency of the teleportation which can now be used to enable Lockjaw to return there and save their brother from Annihilus.

Which they do… barely giving D-Man a moment to catch his breath… And before you know it, the duo are facing off against the dreaded Annihilus. The villainous lord of the Negative Zone is just as fond of exposition as Doc Jaw and he explains that he utilized technology stolen from he High Evolutionary to recreate a temporary version of Lockjaw’s teleportation powers rom his brother (or something like that).

But Annihilus wants the real deal, he wants to use Lockjaw himself and thus have unlimited access to the multiverse; and is pleased that D-Man has been so foolish as to so deliver his dog to the Negative Zone.

D-Man declares that Lockjaw is not his dog, he is his own dog. And with this, the time for exposition is done and battle is on.

Lockjaw attacks Annihilus, mayhem ensues. D-Man can barely breath in the toxic atmosphere of the Negative Zopne. He realizes he still has the special inhaler Doc Jaw had given him. He doesn’t know what this inhaler does, but is desperate enough to try it. It turns out that the inhaler contains a temporary DNA recombinant formula that transforms D-Man into an anthropomorphic dragon-like creature. Holy crap!

The dragonnized D-Man jumps into the fray. Lockjaw’s powers seem to surge during the battle. The whole lot of them are transported all over the multiverse as the fight rages on. They bounce from Asgard to the Ultimate Universe to the DC comics universe and even the realm between universes where Val and Franklin Richards have been kicking it with their parents ever since the Secret Wars event (great to see them again!).

The finally end up in prehistoric times. Lockjaw head butts Annihilus off of a cliff. Yet Annihilus can fly and he goads him for his stupidity. No sooner does he do this then a giant Megalodon springs up from the ocean below and gobbles Annihilus up!

The villain has been defeated and Lockjaw’s brother has been saved. D-Man’s dragonization wears off and Lockjaw teleports him back home where his sister is quite relived to see him. D-Man is a good guy and has been a good friend; and Lockjaw is confident leaving his brother in his care.

Lockjaw then returns home to Arctillan and waddles by Luna, Karnak, Black Bolt and Medusa to make sure all is well.

He gets a knowing nod of approval from Back Bolt and then snuggles up for a well-deserved rest whist thinking about his beloved siblings. And it is here that the adventure comes to its conclusion.

Bananas. Lockjaw is a wonderfully wacky character and Daniel Kibblesmith and company craft a story that is equally wonderful and wacky, very wacky. The plot is hugely complicated, overly intricate and relies too heavily on exposition to explain itself. Yet the plot is sort of beside the point. It’s just there as a means to tell Lockjaw’s origin, introduce his siblings, offer up some action, show off the more bizarre corners of the Marvel Universe and re-present D-Man as a character we need to see much more of in the future.

The convoluted nature in which Lockjaw’s origin is shown notwithstanding, the origin itself is extremely cool and inventive… it succeeds in rooting Lockjaw into the darker, more unsavory backdrop of The Inhumans of Old Attilan. Like Black Bolt, Lockjaw is the product of cruel experimentation, both victims of science without scruples and the ruling Inhumans’ unyielding quest to advance their genetic evolution. Kibblesmith does a neat job of linking up Lockjaw’s backstory to Black Bolt’s origin (as it has been told in previous tales) yet does so in a fashion that remains true to the tenor of the story at hand. Which is a rather fancy trick considering how easily the matter of animal cruelty can derail a story (looking at you, Wes Anderson).

The art by Villa, Poggi and O’Halloran matches perfectly the tone of the story, fun and silly but with pronounced hints of real peril. The script makes some serious demands of the art squad, packing in a lot of action in a lot of different settings... including illustrating the interior of a dog’s womb... but Villa and the gang are more than up to the challenge.

Despite the overly hectic plot, this series was just a joy to read and I just loved meeting lockjaw’s brothers and sisters. Most surprising was how much I liked D-Man and I do hope his story gets picked up on elsewhere some time soon.

The Death of The Inhumans is right around the corner and I’m already steeling myself for the direness that tale is certain to bring about. In the meantime, I’m just going to bash in the unadulterated silly fun that this series has offered up.

Four our of five Lockjaws for the issue…

Five out of five Lockjaws for the series as a whole.

#Lockjaw #Inhumans #Daniel Kibblesmith #Roberto Poggi #Carlos Villa #Chris O’Halloran #review #spoilers

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roypstickney · 7 years

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Master Your Next Feature Launch: How Vimeo Uses Unbounce Landing Pages to Go to Market Faster

You’re a product marketer and it’s five weeks away from a major launch.

The office is buzzing with excitement and tensions are rising by the day. Your marketing team is busy prepping all the essential pieces in your marketing launch toolkit, from email communications to paid advertising to PR initiatives and beyond.

But something’s missing.

Your website needs updating to reflect the launch of your new feature or product… and then you need somewhere to send your paid campaign traffic.

If you’re relying on your developers to build a new page for you, it could take weeks (or longer). Besides, shifting your devs’ focus away from the product launch probably isn’t the best use of their time. Adding work to their plates could mean having to delay going to market (and miss your launch deadlines) — and that could be deadly for business.

The marketing team at Vimeo has experienced this stress first-hand. Garrett Bugbee, Manager of Search and International Marketing, recently described to me how product launches have put a strain on his team in the past:

We had a huge creative backlog, especially during product launches. We relied on our devs to build our pages for us. It was a slow and painful process, from design to the kick-off meetings and then actually waiting for it to be built and QA’d… It was a massive issue.

Fast forward to today, Garrett and his team have removed many of these pre-launch bottlenecks. When it came time to launch their new product, Vimeo 360, they’d mastered the art of going to market with new products on time and on budget.

So what’s Vimeo’s secret recipe to making every product launch a smash hit?

Garrett teases at it in the video below. Have a look, or read on for the blueprint to their success.

Make every product a smash hit: Watch this video to learn how Vimeo removed bottlenecks from their launches so they could go to market faster.

Meet Vimeo and their latest product, Vimeo 360

As one of the internet’s most popular video sharing websites, Vimeo attracts more than 100 million unique visitors per month and is home to over 50 million creators worldwide (and counting).

As their popularity increases so too does the competition.

In order to stay on top, Vimeo has to evolve and innovate. With at least four new video products or features being introduced to the platform each year, a failed launch for Vimeo could mean a loss of thousands (dare we say millions) in company dollars, so there’s infinite pressure to get it right — every time.

You can imagine then, the pressure that Garrett (the hero from our intro) must have felt when he and his team set out to launch Vimeo 360, a new product that allows users to upload 360-degree videos in stunning high quality:

vimeo

Because some of Vimeo’s competitors were already dabbling in 360-degree video, Garrett knew they had to launch quickly — and with a splash:

It’s a tool that other platforms have already, and it’s something that we wanted to give our creators so they have a new venue for expression and a new way to produce, make and showcase content.

Removing bottlenecks from the campaign launch

Vimeo’s main goal for the 360 launch was to drive engagement, measured by new subscribers and 360 video uploads.

While part of their homepage was to briefly feature Vimeo 360, Garrett and his team wanted to build out a page to better explain the product and all the amazing things it could do, including:

An example of a 360 video for prospects who were not yet familiar with the technology (shown above)

A showcase of 360 video content created by some of Vimeo’s power users

A detailed breakdown of features that make Vimeo 360 stand a cut above the rest (high-quality resolution, intuitive controls, powerful integrations)

A promo for their 360 video school, which teaches creators of all stripes to make better videos

That’s a lot of heavy lifting for a website that is also serving a general audience, so Garrett and his team turned to Unbounce to create a click-through landing page for their campaign:

Garrett’s team used Unbounce design features like parallax scroll to appeal to his visually-inclined user base. Click to view full-length landing page.

Beautiful isn’t it?

Garrett explained why empowering his marketing team to build this page themselves was key:

The big benefit here is the flexibility we have to produce a marketing-specific landing page without the help of our engineering team.

Our devs get to focus on building a great product, and we can focus on designing a page built specifically for marketing purposes without pulling our front-end devs away from their work. We can go to market a lot faster by parallel-pathing both the product build and the page build.

Don’t pull devs away from work – your marketing team can build launch landing pages themselves. Click To Tweet

The best part? The campaign landing page that the Vimeo marketing team created drove engagement, which was the campaign goal.

Garrett explains:

[Using scroll mapping,] we saw people scrolling all the way down the page, interacting with the content throughout. It really achieved the goal which was to drive engagement, not just with our paid subscribers but with everybody on the platform.

Better performing paid and social advertising campaigns

A beautiful, engaging landing page is well and good, but at the end of the day, your boss wants hard numbers that show that your campaigns performed.

Since adding dedicated campaign landing pages to their marketing launch toolkit, Vimeo has also seen better results for their paid and social advertising campaigns.

Some paid ads created by Vimeo for Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, the Google Display Network and DoubleClick Bid Manager.

Before Unbounce, Garrett humbly admits that they were letting their website get in the way of their campaign success:

Before Unbounce, we simply directed prospects to a page [on our website] with a pricing grid, and that’s pretty extreme to just throw that in someone’s face right away.

But now that Vimeo is sending paid traffic to product launch-specific landing pages like the one above (as opposed to generic pages like their /upload/ page and homepage), their campaigns are kicking serious butt. Check out these impressive results:

730% increase in subscribers from 360-related paid keywords

4529% increase in total video uploads from 360-related paid keywords

Bonus: Dedicated landing pages aren’t only bringing Vimeo better campaign results — Garrett explained that they’re also improving user experience and Google’s relevance score:

Unbounce has allowed us to target specific landing pages for top keywords, which is a huge win. I think that this one of the best use cases for Unbounce.

You can use Dynamic Text Replacement or make specific pages, and you just target your top terms, it’s highly relevant… I have complete control of that experience and that’s the marketer’s dream.

Unbounce’s Dynamic Text Replacement (DTR) feature gives Garrett and his team the capability to swap out text on their landing page — so that their ads and landing pages present exactly what visitors searched for.

Unbounce’s Ryan Engley explains how Dynamic Text Replacement works. See DTR in action here.

That level of message match across the entire buyer journey is key to strong PPC performance.

When prospects click on an ad and see a landing page with a headline that matches exactly what they searched for, they’re reassured that they’ve made a “good click” and are more likely to stick around (and even convert) — and that in turn positively impacts Quality Score in AdWords.

What you can learn from Vimeo’s success

If there’s one thing we’ve learned from Vimeo’s 360 campaign, it’s this:

Yes, product launches are a lot a pressure, but they don’t have to be painful — not when marketing teams are empowered to move nimbly without bottlenecks.

According to Garrett, it’s all about focusing on your core competencies:

With Unbounce, we can now generate marketing-specific landing pages quickly and easily and translate those across different languages.

It takes the pressure off our devs and engineers, and lets them focus on what’s core — what’s vital to the business — which is building video tools for creators. We handle the marketing side.

By making Unbounce landing pages an essential part of your marketing launch toolkit, not only can you gain the competitive edge by going to market faster, you’ll also:

Free up dev resources so they can focus on building and innovating your product

Convert more prospects by sending paid traffic to relevant, high-converting pages

Create beautifully designed pages that showcase your product in the best light possible

Make your boss really happy by saving the company precious time and money

And that folks, is why you should NSAPLCWADLP… Never Start A Product Launch Campaign Without A Dedicated Landing Page. ;)

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archiebwoollard · 7 years