Drew McManus

In addition to my consulting business, I'm also the Principal of Venture Industries Online but don’t let that title fool you into thinking I'm just a tech geek. I bring 20+ years of global broad-based arts consulting experience to the table to help clients break the cycle of choosing one-size-fits-none solutions and instead, deliver options allowing them to get ahead of the tech curve instead of trying to catch up by going slower. With the vision of legacy support strategy and the delights of creative insights, my mission is to deliver a sophisticated next generation technology designed especially for the field of performing arts. The first step in that journey began in 2010 when The Venture Platform was released, a purpose-designed managed website development solution designed especially for arts organizations and artists. For fun, I write a daily blog about the orchestra business, provide a platform for arts insiders to speak their mind, lead a team of intrepid arts pros to hack the arts, lead an arts business incubator, and love a good coffee drink.

Level Up Your Accessible Text Over Images Design Skills

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Regular readers know that web accessibility is a topic we’ve covered frequently, especially when it comes to color contrast. One of the real challenges is mastering the art of maintaining color contrast for text that sits above an image. The text will shift across different parts of the image across different device types and sometimes, it feels impossible to find a balance. Fortunately,  SmashingMagazine.com recently published an article by Hannah Milan that takes a deep dive into a variety of design techniques you can use to handle any type of photo that … Read more

ALERT: Google Domains Shutting Down And Selling To Squarespace

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On June 15, 2023 Google unexpectedly announced they sold Google Domains to Squarespace. Not only did this come as a shock to the online provider community, but it comes as especially bad news for nonprofits. Must-Have Details Any domain names you or your organization have registered at Google will be transferred to Squarespace. The timeline has not been defined but information from Google indicates it will be as soon as Q3 2023 to Q1 2024. Squarespace is not a dedicated domain registrar. The registration service is tied to maintaining a paid Squarespace … Read more

The Calendly Replacement You’ve Been Looking For

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If you are like me, online meeting schedulers are one of those tools you can’t imagine what life was like before you started using it. One of the big providers in that sector is Calendly, which offers a range of free to paid options. Casual users will likely get along with the free version just fine, but those needing features only available in paid plans will rapidly discover their tiered service levels are designed to force you into paying a lot more than you really should. There are three fee-based tiers: Essentials, … Read more