August 25, 2010
The year 2010 started out with a bang. I was laid off of my job on January 1 due to a failing budget, the result of the company’s failed product. We all know how difficult the economy is right now and I have many associates who are unemployed and have been for some time now. It’s not easy to find a new job.
Having learned so much over the past few years, networking and meeting so many great connections, I came to the conclusion that I needed to start my own business. As it turns out, it was just the right move at just the right time.
I’d like to introduce to you my company, Fresh Squeezed Creative, and also my business partner Chris Vandeventer.
Through referrals from our contacts, we haven’t had to do a lick of advertising to remain busy and even successful. That said, we have been so busy that we haven’t even had time to create a website or a logo for ourselves. As a matter of fact, our website redirects to our Facebook page that includes a pretty full portfolio. All of our business has been generated via word-of-mouth marketing and social media. That’s when I knew I’d done something right.
So there you have it. My newest endeavor with my new business partner. Right now we’re working primarily with smaller to mid-size businesses on website development, social media and marketing strategy. Do you know someone who needs a website or advice on how to use Twitter or Facebook to help market their business? Give them our website: FreshSqueezedCreative.com! We’d love to help!
Posted in Announcement 
No Comments »
August 3, 2010
Someone asked me a question about HTML includes recently.
I want to make changes to the footer on one page and make it change across all of my pages. How do I do this?
Well, it’s pretty simple. Here’s a quick tutorial.
- Create a new HTML page with empty code. If your editor inserts code automatically, delete it.
- Go to your original HTML page where you have your existing footer. Cut the code (Edit->Cut). Paste (Edit->Paste) it into the new HTML file you created. Save it as footer.html into the root directory (wherever your index.html is located.
- Now we want to insert the code that includes the newly created footer on the page. This is called an HTML Include. Go back to your original HTML page. In place of where you originally had the footer code, you’re going to insert this code:
<!–#include file=”footer.html”–>
- Save your file.
- Upload both files to your server and everything should work perfectly.
For all other existing pages of your website, you’ll need to go and delete its current footer and add in the HTML Include footer code. If you’re using a program like Dreamweaver or Microsoft Visual Web Developer you can do a Find and Replace of the entire solution to make it quick and easy.
You can also do the same thing for your header, a sidebar or anything else that repeats throughout your site.
Any questions?
Posted in Technical Advice No Comments »
April 7, 2010
In January I reviewed a local restaurant on Yelp (an easy way to find, review and talk about what’s great – and not so great, in your area). I admit, I wasn’t too thrilled with the service at the time of writing my review. We waited for over a half an hour just for initial service, and in my opinion that goes far beyond ridiculous. So with my review, I laid out the facts. You can see it here, if you like. The business owner logged in today, April, and responded directly to my review with the comment you see above.
This business owner was obviously angry but also doesn’t seem to understand how reviews work. You have to start with good service and good product in order to get a positive response and good reviews. Not everyone is going to have a good experience, or even the same experience. This owner’s comment on my review has only reinforced my service complaints.
If you own a business and someone gives you a bad review, don’t react. You need to respond. Here’s what you need to do. Take a step back and calm down. Once you have your head on straight, take some time to think about what it is this person is really saying in this review. While some people can exaggerate an experience, there’s likely some truth within what this person has written. Take their complaint and see what you can do to improve your product or service for your next patron. At that point, I’d recommend extending a coupon to the person who wrote the review and ask them to come in for an improved experience.
What it comes down to is this, you don’t want to lose customers. Someone can have a bad experience, and as an owner you’re in the business of service. So work on the best customer service that you can. If something went wrong, make it right. Invite the patron back once you’ve got your ducks in order. Make sure to give them a reason to come (discount) and start a conversation that shows you care.
Doing all of this can help to create a raving fan of your business, rather than a lost customer and a review that turns others away from your business. If the owner whose business I reviewed had done this, I’d have gone back to Yelp and written an update saying something along the lines of what they did and “Hey things have changed! I love it now! You should all go!” But no, I’m left with a bad taste in my mouth about this restaurant. Prior to today I still ordered carry out. With this lovely response from the owner, I will no longer be a patron of any kind.
Remember, respond and don’t react.
Posted in Business Advice 2 Comments »
March 30, 2010
I know I’m not the best at writing for myself very frequently, but I thought I should come back over here and share a bit of what’s been going on in my world. Aside from clients consistently keeping me busy (thank you, you rock), I’ve been doing some things for myself that are just plain fun. And we all need a little fun in our lives, don’t we? I’m even learning quite a bit, bonus!
I’ve Got a Little Sumthin’ For Ya
In preparation for a new business that I’m starting, I launched a website and campaign to get others to Help Us Name Our Business. The concept was simple, yet rushed. The plan was that within less than a week to have a name for this business. All a participant needed to do was email, comment, write on a wall or @us on twitter with their name idea. That entered them into the contest to win a Kodak Zi8 HD Video Camera. We had over 200 people participate. Starting from nothing surrounding this project, that’s a pretty significant number of participants. All of this was accomplished via social media: blog, email, Twitter and Facebook. Submissions came in from more than 7 different countries. Interesting to note is that most of our submissions were given through Facebook. That shows the power of friend suggestions over disconnected marketing on Twitter.
Make a Little Noise, Do a Little Dance…
It’s been a couple of years since I’ve ventured into the land of producing podcasts. Last week that all changed. I decided to take the amazing relationship that my grandmother and I have and share it with the world. I’ve called the show Gram Loves Dancing with the Stars. Obviously, we talk about Dancing with the Stars. The show is about 20 minutes long and gram gets saucy about all kinds of things on the show from the boobs and hair to the dresses and the dancing. We have a flowing intro to the show and a moving exit. Right now our focus is on Facebook, iTunes and the website. I’m experimenting a bit with some different ways to get the word out about the show. I didn’t want a venture that felt like work, so this is my little bit of fun each week and a simple idea to play around with some different marketing strategies. I’ll keep you posted on what I’m doing and how it’s working. In the meantime, if you like Dancing with the Stars, you should listen. It’s free, it’s easy to listen to and, if I do say so myself, it’s rather entertaining.
Posted in Random Thought No Comments »
November 29, 2009
I have always said that if a song or a television show can evoke an emotion from me, that’s the sign that they’ve done their job. Really, if I’m laughing my head off, crying my eyes out or feeling the emotions of love, then I’m more likely to talk to others about what caused all of that in me. What does that do? Well, the people behind what I saw just created a marketing officer in me by doing that. I start spouting off about how great their show is. Yes, when you talk about a show (in a positive light) you’re promoting their show (negative light.. well you get the idea). For example, when the show Glee premiered, I told everyone that they should watch it. Seriously, I lost my mind over this show. I still think you should watch it. It’s great! Particularly the pilot episode. I felt like I was on top of the world at the end. I didn’t want to stop believing because I felt so powerful and was truly energized by the music and the characters.
This doesn’t just work for television or movies. This concept can work for basically any brand. You’ve got to find a way to connect to your audience. What can you, your product, your service or your brand do that is interesting to your target? Once you can find what they want, all that’s left is finding a way to grab onto a sliver of emotion. What can you get them to identify with?
Have you ever seen a picture of a poor neglected puppy in the newspaper accompanied with a story about how it desperately needed a home. It’d been beaten, left for dead on the side of the road and had been nursed back to health by the great men and women at the local ASPCA. Generally those newspapers are flooded with phone calls from would-be adopters. That animal and its story struck a chord with so many of those people and they chose to act on that specific thing. After they were told someone else was already adopting the animal, most of them realized and found that they were interested in pet adoption and at the very least were now talking about action. They wanted the thing that they’d identified with. When marketing your product, you have to give them something that matters to them.
So when it comes to creating a new campaign or promotion, you need to ask yourself the question “How can I get my audience to feel something?” If you don’t get me something to be compelled, intrigued or entertained by, then why should I care about it?
Just one last question. Have you set your DVR to record Glee yet? You should. [See!]
Posted in Business Advice, Random Thought 1 Comment »
937.757.1331
