by Kara Queen

Hello everyone and Happy Holidays! It’s that wonderful wintery time of year again with lots of reasons to celebrate. To join in the celebration, here at Zapd we’re excited to invite you to enter our first-ever Best Holiday Zap contest. Be sure to enter because you’ll:

1. Get the chance to win awesome prizes!
   • Grand Prize: iPad mini
   • Second Place Prizes: iPod Shuffle (10)
   • Third Place Prizes: $25 iTunes Gift Card (50)
2. Save and share your wonderful holiday traditions on your very own website
3. Be the coolest and most creative kid in your circle

More reasons to join the fun:

• No purchase necessary
• No coding necessary
• No hosting or other techno-issues for you to fret about

Just need an iPhone and download Zapd (free) to get started.

How to Enter

1. Open Zapd on your iPhone and click “+” to get started
2. Create your Holiday Zap. Ask others to join in and make it with you if you like (it’s more fun this way)
3. Share it with us to enter. Share it via email to holiday@zapd.com directly from your Zapd app
4. Submit it no later than midnight PST on Saturday, December 29th
5. Winners will be contacted and announced on Friday, January 4th

How it Works

Our judging will be based on quality, originality, story-telling and engagement. We’re really looking to see how users celebrate the holidays around the world. Give us your cultural and other family and friend traditions! Some guidelines and suggestions include but are not limited to:

• Christmas trees
• Christmas cookies/Gingerbread houses
• Decorations – outdoor and indoor
• Christmas Eve/Morning/Day
• Hanukkah
• Festivus
• Holiday traditions
• Holiday foods
• Holiday drinks
• Office holiday parties
• Snow days
• You get the idea..

How do you celebrate the season? What makes this time of year special for you? We’re excited to see what you’ll have to Zap about and share with us. Always feel free to let us know if you have any questions by sending an e-mail to care@zapd.com. Stay connected with us on Twitter @zapdapp or facebook.com/zapdapp.

And of course, Happy Holidays!

Kara

Contest Rules – the Fine Print

No purchase necessary. Void where prohibited. 1 Grand Prize winner will receive an iPad mini. 10 second-place winners will receive an iPod Shuffle. 50 third-place winners will receive a $25 iTunes gift card. Winners selected at the sole discretion of Zapd. Limit 5 entries per person (Zapd author). You can collaborate on Zaps that are not your own and this does not count as an entry. The original Zapd author will be the sole recipient of any prize awarded. Submissions must be received via sharing Zap to holiday@zapd.com no later than 11:59pm PST on Saturday, December 29, 2012.Winners will be contacted via email no later than 11:59pm PST on Friday, January 4, 2013. Winners will also be published on facebook.com/zapdapp and the Zapd blog.

by Gavin Donnelly

After you’ve downloaded and installed Zapd it’s time to  sign in and start making your mobile-friendly, personalized mini websites. We call those Zaps. If you haven’t already created your first Zap here is a step-by-step video guide to get you started.

by Gregg Makuch

Here are the Top 10 themes since we launched Zapd 2.0. The Top 10 account for over 50% of all Zaps created since 11/8/12. We have over 45 unique themes in 3 families: Grid, Marquee, and Vertical Blog.

Top 10 Zapd Themes

What’s really interesting and exciting to see is the popularity of our new theme families, Grid and Marquee. These account for 8 out of the top 10. These themes will format and optimize your Zap to be best displayed on a mobile device, iPad or tablet device, or computer.

Here are screen shots of the Top 10 themes:

We’ll do another post on the rest of the themes as well so you can see how those stack up.

Which themes do you like the best? What kinds of themes would you like to see more of in the future? Let us know by connecting with us on Twitter @zapdapp or facebook.com/zapdapp.

Gregg Makuch | Chief Marketing Officer
Zapd Team

by Kara Queen

Making Zaps is easy, sharing is even easier. Zaps are all about capturing the little chapters of our lives in one mini mobile website. Most folks want to share these with friends and family and this is built right into Zapd.

In a matter of seconds, you can share your Zaps via

• Twitter;
• Facebook;
• email; or
• text/SMS

Simply select your Zap, and then hit the”share” icon in the lower tool bar. Go ahead and watch the video below for a quick walk through.

When a friend receives the message that you’ve published a Zap, they just click on the link and their browser will go right to it. It will open up on a computer browser, iPad browser, or mobile browser. And if you’re using one of the new Zapd themes (Grid or Marquee), your Zap will automatically be formatted for best viewing on each of those 3 device platforms.

Was this helpful? What is your favorite way to share?

Hope this helps with getting your Zaps shared all over the place!

Kara
Zapd Team

Don’t forget to connect with us on Twitter @zapdapp or facebook.com/zapdapp.

by Kara Queen

Everyone loves receiving those little text or email notifications letting you know someone has liked one on your photos, or started following you, right? But then again, sometimes getting notified about everything can be overwhelming. Luckily, there’s an easy way to fix either situation! Here is a tutorial that will help you turn your notifications on and off, and what each setting means.

It’s fairly simple: just drop down the main menu, then select the gear icon in the bottom right of the menu- that takes you to your settings.

Scroll down a bit, and you’ll find two different groups:

1. Friend Notifications
   • deals with notifications of people you’re following, or that are following you
2. Social Notifications
   • deal more with comments, likes, and collaborations

Next to each option you’ll see an image of a phone, or an envelope for email. Tap on one and it’ll be highlighted in orange to turn on those notifications, or tap it off to stop receiving them!

Let us know if you like the notifications feature. Did you find this video helpful? What other tutorials would you like to see?

Don’t forget to connect with us on Twitter @zapdapp or facebook.com/zapdapp.

Kara Queen
Zapd Team

by Gavin Donnelly

We rolled out two shiny new families of themes with the release of Zapd 2.0, Grid and Marquee. Now you can choose from a total of 46 themes in three different style categories to personalize your Zaps. Grid and Marquee each have 6 new themes each. Not only do these new themes have great designs, they automatically optimize their formatting when viewed on a mobile device, tablet, or computer. Totally cool! Here’s a breakdown of the different styles:

• Grid layout (new): image thumbnails and other posts are displayed in a grid of either two or three columns.
• Marquee layout (new): one large cover image at the top with other posts displayed in a grid below.
• Vertical blog style: traditional blog style with a single column display of photos and other posts.

When you create a new Zap, the first thing you’ll be prompted to do is select a look for your site from our list of themes. Scroll through the thumbnails to get an idea of how each one displays on different devices. You can change the theme of a Zap anytime if you decide that you don’t like the look you first landed on. Here’s a quick video to show you how to select or change a theme and what the different styles look like:

Which theme do you like best? Why? Let us know what you think and keep on the lookout for new themes in the coming weeks. We’ll do another post soon with data on which themes are getting used and how much.

Connect with us on Twitter @zapdapp or Facebook.com/zapdapp.

Gavin Donnelly
Zapd Team

by Gavin Donnelly

We just released an update for Zapd (2.0.2) that fixes some minor bugs in the app. Here’s a list of the things we fixed and other minor changes:

• Some users were receiving an error message when they tried to invite friends to Zapd from their contacts even if they were allowing the app access to their iPhone Contacts / Address Book. Now everyone will be able to invite friends/colleagues directly from Contacts.
• Notifications in the activity feed about people liking or commenting on photos were only taking you to the Zap, not the actual photo. Now when you click on a notification it will go the specific photo within the Zap website.
• When you share a Zap via Facebook or Twitter the default text doesn’t say “check this out” anymore in the subject line or post. The default is now your Zap title, which will go right into the subject line. The URL will be displayed first in Twitter and Facebook posts and in the body of an email.

Please get the update in the App Store now! Let us know if there are any other issues you find, feedback and suggestions are always welcomed. Please rate this new release in the App Store as well if you have a moment.

Connect with us on Twitter @zapdapp or Facebook.com/zapdapp.

Gavin Donnelly
Zapd Team

by Kara Queen

Welcome back! We hope everyone had a great holiday weekend. It looked that way from all the Thanksgiving entries. Believe it or not, we DID get hungry for turkey and the fixin’s (again) after reviewing the scrumptious Thanksgiving Zap websites, with beautiful food shots and the warmth of friends and family.  Thanks to everyone who submitted.

GRAND PRIZE WINNER: Stephanie Rosell

Who would’ve thought the inaugural winner on this quintessential America holiday would be living in Sweden? Not sure if Stephanie is an American living in Sweden or a native Swede but it didn’t matter. She’s the creator of this freakin’ awesome Zap, our Grand Prize winner and recipient of an iPod Touch. Check her out!

Thanksgiving-in-Sweden

RUNNERS UP

Your awesome Thanksgiving Zaps have won each of you a $25 iTunes gift card. Enjoy!

1. Hughes-Relander-Thanksgiving
2. Renee-Fishman-Thanksgiving2012
3. Ray-Leonard
4. TheEclecticGentleman
5. DaveJimenez-Nov-24
6. Adam-Hosp/yulelog
7. Joel-Johnson-Nov-23
8. Joel-Moenkhoff/Fernvale-Turkey-Day
9. Sean-Kruger/Thanksgiving2012
10. Tara21/Thanksgiving

All winners will be contacted via email with instructions on how to redeem their prizes. Please make sure we don’t go into your spam folder. If you have any questions, send me a note at thanx [at] zapd [dot] com.

Thanks again to everyone who participated and Happy Holidays!

Which one is your favorite?

by Gavin Donnelly

We introduced some new photo-editing tools in Zapd 2.0. Now you can:

• Add filters and effects
• Crop photos
• Enhance and adjust brightness

All from your iPhone!

This short video demonstrates how to use these tools when creating a new photo-post on your Zap.

Have you used the new photo effects? Which ones do you find most helpful?

Follow us on Twitter @zapdapp or Like us on Facebook.com/zapdapp for more how-to videos and other posts. Don’t forget to download Zapd if you haven’t already done so already and please rate us on the App Store as well!

Gavin Donnelly
Zapd Team

No purchase necessary. Void where prohibited. 10 winners will receive a $25 iTunes gift card. One grand prize winner will receive an iPod touch. Winners selected at the sole discretion of Zapd. Limit 5 entries per person (Zapd author). You can collaborate on other Zapd author Zaps and this does not count as an entry. The original Zapd author will be the sole recipient of any prize awarded. Winners will be contacted via email no later than 11:50pm PST on Monday, November 26, 2012. Winners will also be published on Facebook.com/zapdapp and the Zapd blog.