About
What’s It All About
Welcome to the Designdamage site, I’m glad that you stopped by!
This blog is aimed at those interested in Web Strategy and Internet Marketing. The purpose is to provide insights and ideas on how to leverage digital marketing tools to complement and meet both business and personal objectives.
Whether you’re a global conglomerate, a start-up business or a marketing professional, you should understand the power of today’s remarkable brands. People not only buy products and services, they buy promises and reputations in the form of brands. A brand is a desirable and exclusive idea embedded in products, places, services, people and experience. You can read my 12 Principles of Brand Strategy to learn more about how it applies to you.
In order to deliver value continuously, businesses and individuals must stay with the rate of change on communication strategies and disruptive technologies. Effective brands adapt and transform in an effort to find new opportunities that hold the greatest potential. And most successful businesses deliver communications via direct response marketing realizing that marketing is leverage and has to be measurable.
Fresh content will be added regularly, including analysis, industry-related data and how-to instructional articles dealing with current hot topics like social media, content marketing, effective advertising and web strategy.
I’m also a contributor to Social Media Today, My Venture Pad and The Customer Collective sharing my thoughts and ideas with like-minded industry professionals.
I hope you will enjoy your visit and look forward to having your feedback regularly. I welcome suggestions and comments so feel free to dig through my old posts and let me know your thoughts or complaints. Agree or disagree, this is a public forum to share your opinion.
Who is Eric Tsai?
BACKGROUND
I am a design thinker, strategist, entrepreneur, and student of life.
My mission is to help people grow their passion whether it’s their businesses or their personal lives so they can make better informed decisions to change the world.
My ideas are for motivated individuals to do extraordinary things. I write through personal experience, including lessons learned from failures and successes. I believe the road to success is paved with incremental actions from knowledge. And knowledge without actions is just potential power.
PROFESSIONAL HISTORY
I help smart companies stay on top of marketing trends, advising them on how to create and implement robust web strategies that complement and support business objectives. In addition, I provide thought leadership, research and advisory on media strategies to create engaging brand experiences that drive real-world results, not just aesthetics. I’m a firm believer in utilizing direct response marketing on the web via education to get results.
(Area of focus, company, title , what I actually did)
Web & Social Media:
- Visual Duration Studio, Principal and Web Strategist
Provide coaching on web strategy, business communications, social media marketing and campaign creation.
Integrated Marketing:
- Pointivity, Director of Marketing & Communications
Advised and delivered web strategies to drive leads, grow revenue and foster engagement.
- Bridgetech Holdings International, Director of Global Marketing
Developed multiple global healthcare brands for the the start-up venture that eventually went public. Launched and managed multimillion dollar digital assets with emphasis on community building.
Leadership & Brand Management:
- Fieldsheer Motorsports, President
Led company’s portfolio of brands to profitability including short and long-term blueprints for market share and revenue growth.
DISCLOSURE
The views, opinions, postings on this blog are mine alone and do not necessarily represent the opinions of my employers or clients. I strive to give my honest opinions, findings, beliefs, or experiences on topics, products, services, and companies. Designdamage and its employees will not accept direct payment for endorsements of products, services, or companies — any endorsement that I make will be because I believe in the merit of the product or service.
EDUCATION
My piece of paper says I have a Bachelors of Fine Arts degree from the University of California Irvine. I studied heavily on conceptual and digital arts that challenges authorities and conventional thinking.
ART & DESIGN
I make art to communicate my perspective on culture, people and ideas. Specifically I like to use digital media and photography as my weapons of choice. Here are the damages done while batting the world:
Brands, Spaces, Interactions
Public Exhibition
Empathy Photography Series
Font Shop International
Designdamage V3
Unconventional Design Archives
Legacy Art Exhibition
Seven Degrees Gallery
PERSONAL STUFF
I’m a first generation Chinese-American, I was born in Taiwan and then came to the United States when I was 12. I lived in a completely different social environment until I came here and was quickly fascinated by marketing and the concept of brands. I grew up mostly near the heart of Silicon Valley, Cupertino, where the Apple headquarter was 2 minutes away from my house. Ironically, I never owned a Mac but I do have an iPhone now and am looking to find a reason to own the iPad.
Since I was a kid, I started drawing characters to tell stories, even on exam papers I would leave my marks on them. Of course it didn’t sit well with teachers but that didn’t stop me from doing it. I was always drawn to Japanese animations and cartoons, and would always dream up my own stories, so I decided to publish my own comic book when I was 9. My friends would ask to borrow my comics to read and I would continue to draw after I came to the US.
I fell in love with photography ever since I took my first photography class in college. I became obsessed with images, I got my hands on medium and large format cameras and experimented with different printing techniques. This was just when digital cameras startsed to get popular but I still insisted on using film. I would take rolls and rolls of analog film, develop them as soon as I got a chance and then print them myself in the darkroom. I will stop and take pictures regardless of where I’m at or what I should be doing (not taking any drive-by photos anymore after I was pulled over by the cops once).
I soon realized that photography, just like knowing how to use Photoshop or Illustrator, is simply a tool, what’s in your head is what really counts. In the latter part of my college years at UCI, I picked up graphic design and soon was working part time as a web designer. That’s when I launched designdamage.com as my personal digital playground while posting industry news and showcasing my work.
At 25, I was lucky enough to lead a 30 year old company that sells products I’ve never used (still today) to record sales while working with amazing people around the world from Europe to Asia. After learning the marketing dynamics in the action sports and motorsports industry, I realized that marketing starts with product ideas and should be implemented throughout the product development process. I then had the entrepreneurial opportunity to work for a start-up that went public in the health care sector.
Over the years I managed to successfully bridge the gap between design and user experience from consumer products to marketing communication.
I’m a social media addict and can’t stay away from the internet. I used to watch a lot of History channel but now I just surf the internet. I love to eat and wish I could try some of those dishes on Food Network especially the Iron Chef stuff!
Just like most boys, I love cars, sports and gadgets. If you know cars, these were my previous rides: Nissan 240sx, 300zx tt, VW Mk4 Jetta, Audi B5 S4, VW MK5 GTI, VW MK5 Jetta. As you can see I tend to pick turbo-charged vehicles and no, I don’t drive fast 
In my free time you will find me playing basketball at a local gym or anywhere with a basket. I play a lot of pickup games and make no mistake, I’m a career 40% 3 point shooter but can take anyone to the hole if you dare to guard me close. I enjoy watching the NBA and NFL most but my teams totally suck these days! I am a hopeful Golden States Warriors fan and a loyal San Francisco 49ers follower (the good’o days of Joe Montana, Jerry Rice and Steve Young). I kind of got away from baseball for awhile but the emerging San Francisco Giants pitcher Time Lincecum got me watching the Giants again, yeah The Beast!
Feel free to drop me a line, I read every comment and value every opinion even if you just want to tell me something about you, let me know.
