I recently completed the custom Typepad design for Aliblog - a blog for suppliers, manufacturers, importers and exporters brought to you by the folks from the AliBaba Group, a Chinese-based e-commerce/auction company specializing in B2B (business-to-business) global trade that recorded over 23 million visitors in 2008, so far!…

I worked closely with Jimmy Lau from Alibaba.com on the design and layout of their new blog at Aliblog. They had a very specific direction they wanted to go with this that included using some of the branding from their company’s main website - including color schemes and some use of their logo - and incorporate Typepad functionality to allow them to run and maintain an regulalry updated blog written by several authors and employees from Alibaba.

Using their preferred color scheme of blue, orange and white - I created a custom template for their Typepad blog that is clean, professional - yet still fun and very functional for what they were looking to do. Along with the usual functions that Typepad users enjoy - like widgets, TypeLists, social media, etc - I also incorporated their Yahoo! search, a flashy/custom RSS display and social bookmarking, Flickr display and e-mail subscriptions so visitors can subscribe to their blog using their e-mail address.

Working through Jimmy - I had a corporate team behind him that was reviewing my work every step of the way, and they were all extremely happy with the design, layout and functionality of their new blog and were happy to launch it to the public in April 2008. From the entry in Alibaba.com’s Wikipedia page:

Customer Communications in North America

On 3 April 2008, 2008, Alibaba.com started their first official blog targeted for the international small and medium sized enterprise (SME) community, with a special emphasis on communicating with merchants in the United States. Their blog, the AliBlog (www.aliblog.alibaba.com) is marketed as “the latest word from Alibaba.com on our news, events, and community” while promising to be an official source for information and opinion from an employee’s perspective on Alibaba.com

I’m happy to have played a small part in helping Alibaba.com successfully launch their first official blog. Thank you Jimmy - and the corporate team at Alibaba.com - best of luck with your new digs!