VernonGirl

Lava Marketing changes its name to The Original Lava Marketing Co. and officially registers in BC

Is it important to register your company's name? I would argue: "Only if you're taking it to the bank." (which is pretty important).

For over ten years, I have been doing business as Lava Marketing. This was never a problem until I recently wanted to start a business account under that name. The first thing my banker asked me for was proof of business registration. My GST number wasn't enough even though I've been paying GST under that business name since 1999. And, up until now, I have been running all accounts payable and receivable for my business through my own personal bank account with the cheque made out to my personal name. I'm a Sole Prorietor, so it's never been an issue.

Recently, I've been thinking that I may want to separate my personal and business accounts. So, I went on the search to see if I could register the name Lava Marketing in BC. I couldn't. There is another company with a similar name (although not the same I should clarify).

What I didn't know, is that I should have registered my business name within three months of starting the business. In fact, the BC Name Registry website states:

"If you choose to carry on a business under a name other than your own personal name and are engaged in business for trading, manufacturing or mining purposes, you must register with the Corporate Registry within three months of your business start date."

 So, I had to pay $35 to register my business name in BC. My new company name is now The Original Lava Marketing Co.

The word Co. represents the fact that my business is a Sole Proprietorship. I had to add the words The Original so it separated my company name from other similar ones with the words Lava Marketing in them.

If you want to trademark your name, check out NUANS.

Now, once I registered my business name and received a NR (name registry) number, that wasn't enough. I then had to officially register it through the One Stop Business Registry in BC and pay another $40.

Also, an industry code had to be chosen, so I chose to be listed under Graphic Design in BC.

So, there you go. My new "official" company name is The Original Lava Marketing Co. and I'm officially a graphic design business.

If you require business advice about starting your business, you are urged to contact a lawyer and/or an accountant. If you would like marketing or strategic advice about your business, or graphic design, please contact me.

Thanks for reading, Courtenay Pitcher

You need a new logo designed for your company, wedding, event or sports team...now what?

Do you have any of these dilemmas:

• You need a logo for a new business you are setting up.
• Your sports team needs a logo.
• You are getting married and you want a logo for the invitations or seating place-holders.
• Your company's logo needs to be refreshed, revamped, modernized, or recoloured.
• You have a logo, but it's never been the greatest quality (it's a little fuzzy).
• You have a signature event that requires a logo.
• One of your printing partners is requesting your logo in a vector format.
• You have a colour logo, but you need to provide it in black.

If you find yourself in any of these situations, don't worry. It's usually quite fun and interesting to have a logo created or updated. Having it put into various formats is not that hard either. You just need to know who to work with, what to look for, which questions to ask and what you can expect.

What is a logo? A logo is a mark, insignia, symbol or emblem with distinguishing characteristics. Often, it is made up of words and a picture or illustration, but sometimes the words are the picture. Some of the images that come to mind are the Playboy bunny, the Nike swoosh designed in 1971 for $35 USD, McDonald's golden arches, Audi's four inter-connected horizontal rings, Apple's partially-eaten apple, Mercedes Benz's three point star in a circle, World Wildlife Fund's black and white panda, and Starbuck's two-tailed crowned mermaid. 

Logo designers usually come in the form of Graphic Designer, Print Designer, Creative Firm or Marketing Company. Prices can vary from seventy-five dollars right up to ten thousand dollars depending on who you hire, the type of clientele they work with and the size of your company, event, team or project. Before you call them to discuss pricing, take a look at their logo portfolio to see what they have developed. If you like their style, contact them. If they get back to you quickly, it's probably a good start to your relationship.

Once you contact a logo designer and agree on the price, you can expect your designer to ask you questions like:

1) What is the name of your company, team or event?

2) What is your tag line, mantra, positioning statement or objective?

3) What does your company, team, or event sell or do?

4) Who are your primary customers?

5) What kind of feeling do you want your logo to create?

6) Do you have any colour preferences?

7) Is there anything symbolic that you would like to make reference to?

8) What is your team, event or company's history?

If your logo is being designed for your wedding, the designer will want to know the colours associated with the big day, where the wedding will be held, how you met each other, the wedding theme and your names. A Western wedding logo (cowboys, horses) would warrant quite a different style than an Eastern wedding (tiger, temple, lamp, lotus) logo.

A logo for a sports team would need to take into account the team name, gender of the team, uniform colours and if there is a mascot or not. It makes sense for The Calgary Flames hockey team logo to have flames coming off the C just based on the name alone, doesn't it?

Here is a logo Lava Marketing recently developed for candy vending machine company NRG Vending Co.:

Once your designer establishes a feel and general direction for your logo, he or she will produce a number of designs for you to look at. It is important to know how many initial designs you can expect and how many rounds of revisions are included when you are negotiating the price. You can usually expect the designs to be emailed to you in a .jpg format which is easy to open. If you are in the same geographic area, some designers or illustrators will sit down to show you them and to see your reaction. If you are working with a long distance designer, email proofs work great.

Sometimes, you'll see a design that works for you right off the bat. Or maybe you like the imagery, but you can't read the wording (font-type). Maybe you like the overall design and the wording, but not the colour. Colours and font styles are quite easy to change unless you want an expensive font that hasn't been budgeted for in the project. A lot of times, logos are designed with free fonts. Sometimes this makes the logo less unique. Sometimes, there is nothing wrong with free font and it fits in nicely with the rest of the design. 

If you hate all of the designs that are shown to you, your designer may have to change direction and/or ask you more questions. It's a process of getting to know what you like. Often, it works out well with several versions going back and forth. It is a good idea to have a "kill fee" laid out during the price negotiation process just in case you and the designer simply cannot agree on the design. That way, you can both walk away from the project with you having paid a little bit to learn what you don't like and them making some money for the effort they put in. It happens.

Most of the time, the design process works well and you will receive an excellent logo that portrays your team, event or company with nice visual impact.

Once a design is chosen and the colours are picked, the graphic must be turned into several colours and formats.

Usually full colour, black on white and white on black will be more than enough colour choices to fulfill most marketing requests.

In terms of format, file types including .psd (Adobe Photoshop), .eps (encapsulated post script), .ai (Adobe Illustrator), high resolution .pdf (Adobe), and .tiff or .jpg are all of the file types you will ever need to provide to any number of print or online marketing partners.

What if you have a logo and somebody asks you for a vector file? Vector files come in .cdr (Coral Draw), .ai (Adobe Illustrator) or .eps (Encapsulated post script). If your logo was not created in any of these file types, don't panic. Often, a good designer can recreate your logo into one of these formats. It may cost a couple hundred bucks to have a designer do it for you, but once you have it in that format it will save you time and money in the long run. Because of its scalable nature, vector format will definitely ensure that the integrity of your logo is maintained whether it's on a tiny pin or a large billboard.

Embroidery companies can be the exception. I have come across the occasion where an embroidery company needed a different type of file than any of the types mentioned above. There was nothing I could do to get them the file type they wanted and they charged my client a set up fee to get the logo into their specific file format made for their machines.

What if you already have a logo that you have been using for years, but it's kind of fuzzy when printed or shown on websites? An existing logo can be remade into the file formats I mentioned so that the quality of the logo will be perfect in future print materials. You just need to provide a picture of the logo to your chosen designer.

A good quality logo can make your team, business or event look like a million bucks, so don't be afraid to invest in one. Who knows....maybe someday it will be as well-recognized as McDonald's golden arches, The Calgary Flames' flaming C or Nike's Just Do It swoosh.

Thanks for reading.

Courtenay Pitcher, Logo developer

 

Email marketing autoresponders explained

You've probably heard of the word "autoresponder" in email marketing, but do you understand what it means or how it works? Autoresponders are a really slick way of automating email campaigns.  If you want to save time or ramp up sales, consider their benefits.

I admit, it took me a while to wrap my head around the word. Mostly, because it has the word "responder" in it which implies that it responds back for you.

It really should be called auto messenger, auto promoter, auto sales letter, auto newsletter or auto trainer because it sends automated messages for you in the order you define. Auto-responders are also called follow up messages. You can choose daily, weekly, monthly, bi-weekly, twice daily, or any frequency you like. You must plan your campaign, create the content and pre-load the messages, but the system does the sending, or follow up, for you.

The system is useful for blogs, newsletters, training materials, incentives, special offers, tips or any kind of message you want to use to stay in touch with customers, sell products, inform, prompt, promote or remind.

Here is an example of how it can work:

1) When someone signs up to your e-newsletter, it automatically asks the user to double opt-in by confirming their email address. (You have the option to turn the double opt-in off, but it is recommended to keep it.)

2) Once the email is confirmed, it sends a thank you note and tells your reader how often to expect your newsletter or tells them whatever message you pre-load.

3) After the thank you note is sent, it sends out the first edition of your newsletter.

4) One week later, it sends the next edition of the newsletter.

5) A week after that, it sends the third edition...and so on.

The emails can be sent in plain text format or html (pretty pictures).

Here is an example of a 52 Tips Weekly E-Newsletter by my good client Stephen Hammond who uses the Aweber system.

Aweber is recognized as one of the leading email marketing softwares to use auto-responders. (Disclosure: I am an affiliate.)

What I also find useful with this system are the email sign up forms that I can create myself using their system. (Make sure you work in Firefox and not Internet Explorer when you are creating these.)

If you are interested in starting an email campaign, contact me.

Thanks for reading.

Courtenay

9 Holiday-Themed Website Marketing Ideas From Majour Brands

Your website is a marketing space that can be taking full advantage of the holiday season to inspire purchases and promote holiday-themed products, incentives or specials. Here are nine holiday marketing promotion examples from majour brands. I hope they give you some ideas to help you plan promotions for next year:

1) Tim Horton's Candy Cane Doughnut

2) McDonald's Canada

3) BCLC Gambling Gift

 4) Harley-Davidson Canada Holiday Gift Guide

5) Fido - Unlimited Joy Calling Plan

6) Future Shop Big Screen TV

 

7) Amazon.ca - free shipping on orders over $25

 

8) La Senza Hot Lingerie Gifts

9) Boston Pizza Gift Cards

If you would like ideas for New Years Eve, Valentine's Day or Saint Patrick's Day, give me a call. I can develop ideas and visual marketing materials around any theme.

Thanks for reading,

Courtenay

Seven Ways Games Reward the Brain

This new video, that gets really interesting eight minutes into it, examines a very unique and out of the box perspective...what if we use rewards and processes found in games to motivate us in learning, business, health, government, or marketing?

Watch this video to get a new perspective about motivation and think about how you can apply these principals to a problem you are working on, or a product or service you need to market. It's wonderful.

Thanks for reading,

Courtenay Pitcher

Vernon, B.C. Creative Firm Lava Marketing Erupts New Website

Lava Marketing, the creative firm I launched in 1999, erupted with a new website yesterday. It features a portfolio, our clients and packages for search engine optimization (also known as getting your website to the top of Google), Content Management Systems, Web Design, Logo design, Corporate Identity Design and Brochure Design.

Lava Marketing works fast.....

Lava Marketing is a unique creative firm because we can produce high quality work that is affordable, and ready fast. If you need a web site design, ad design, packaging design or logo design, we can provide you with first concepts within 48 hours, guaranteed.  

We break all the rules, and give you original design files....

Have you ever felt that your hands were tied because you couldn't get the original design files for your logo, a print piece or your website design? Lava Marketing does what most web designers or printers will NOT ever do....once you make your final payment for work completed, we turn over all of the editable design files to you immediately. This gives you more freedom in sourcing suppliers (like printers), saves you time, improves the quality of your marketing and especially saves you money.

We work with all file formats....

We know that some of your advertising partners may not have all of the latest design software. That's why we design in Photoshop (.psd) AND Adobe Illustrator (.ai). We also provide .pdf, .tiff and .jpg file formats. This allows you, our client, the most flexibility when transferring files to your advertising partners like printers or online advertising.

We're really quite small, but our experience is vast...

When you hire Lava Marketing, you're hiring me. I personally take care of you. There is lots of me to go around. I have several suppliers, over fifteen years of marketing experience, own two companies, have worked with various sectors (manufacturing, wood products, mortgage, real estate, public speaking, training, health care, leisure and tourism) and I have a very broad perspective.

Ask us for a Quote...

If you are wondering how affordable I am (we are), fill out our quote request form.

I look forward to being your marketing partner.

Cheers,

Courtenay Pitcher

3 Ways to Network on LinkedIn: Promote, find, attend events

 
 

Are you looking to promote your event? Are you looking for local networking opportunities? Here are three ways events can be used as networking tools on LinkedIn:

1. Find an event to attend.

2. Promote your own event or seminar.

3. Announce that you are attending someone else's event.

Step 1.

Sign into LinkedIn.

Step 2.

Find the "More" menu at the top of your home page. Click on the "Events" tab in the "More" dropdown menu.

Step 3 - Find Events.

You will come to the "Events Home" page. On this page, you will see Network Updates of events that people in your network are attending, hosting, or are interested in. This is a great way to find common interests with your network, or start conversations in order to build relationships with those in your network.

Click the "Find Events" tab.

To find events happening in your area, fill in the "Specific Location" radio button and enter the location you would like to search. I did one for Kelowna. You can see it here below:

Hit the Search button and it will return searches for the location you specified. Searches can be refined by: Upcoming, Within a Week, Within a Month, Within a Year, Past, or Any.  Event Type can be refined by All, Conferences, Tradeshows and Conventions, Networking and Meetups, Training and Seminars, Fundraisers or Other.

Step 4 - Add Events.

Click the Add an Event Tab. Here, you can enter the event title, date and time, venue name, location, website and whether you are attending, are interested or are not attending. If you are not organizing the event, you would simply click that you are attending or that you are interested.

To have the event appear on your LinkedIn profile, select "Attendee", "Presenter" or "Exhibitor" from the grey box that will appear when you select the box next to "I'm attending."

If you are the organizer of the event, you click "Yes, I am organizing the event." and then Add more details. The "Add more details" screen will ask for all of the above details plus Address, City, Region, Country, Postal Code and a description. This image shows the screenshot.

It will also ask you to categorize your event by Type, Industry, Keywords, Who should attend and Organization, as you'll see in this screenshot below:

Step 5 - Publish.

Click on "Publish Event".

What events are you attending? Make sure you promote it on LinkedIn.

Thanks for reading!

Courtenay Pitcher

Use LinkedIn to find new clients in your geographic area, city or town

 

Have you ever wanted to find people to connect within your city or general area using LinkedIn? As long as you are a member of LinkedIn, one of the best on-line networking business resources right now, it is easy to do and it is free:

Step 1:

Make sure you are signed in to LinkedIn.

Step 2 - Advanced Search:

Look for the Advanced Search link on the top right hand side of your LinkedIn screen. It is located to the right of the People search box. It looks like this (highlighted in blue):

Step 3 - "Located In or Near" search:

In the Location box, use the drop down menu to search "Located in or near". Then type which Location you would like to search. You can search within a certain distance of your local area and it will pull both members in the area and members who are willing to travel to your area. It will pull results from your postal code and the surrounding postal code area within that distance you specify.

You can also sort by Keyword, First Name, Last Name, Title, Company, School, Industry, Groups, Interest (all members, industry experts, potential employees, consultants/contractors, entrepreneurs, hiring managers, or deal-making contacts), or when they Joined LinkedIn.

Hit the "Search" button at the bottom of the page and get your results.

Step 4 - Filter:

Now, you can filter your search results to: 

Current Company: All companies, or specific ones in your area.

Relationship: All members, 1st Connections, 2nd Connections, Groups or 3rd and Everyone Else connections. Use the 3rd and Everyone Else connections to find those people that you are not yet connected to.

Industry: All industries, Real Estate, Construction, Financial Services, Health, Wellness and Fitness, Hospitals and Healthcare, etc.

The filter section is on the left side of the page about mid-way down. It looks like this image below:

Do you have questions about using LinkedIn? Let me know. If I can answer them in a simple post like this, I will. Or, if you would like a longer training session on LinkedIn or other Social Media, I offer those for groups or individuals for a very reasonable fee.

Cheers,

Courtenay Pitcher

Is your database big enough to fill a movie theatre?

Lisa Salt is the Owner of The Salt Team, a Vernon, B.C. Real Estate Team. Last night she held a private viewing of SALT, the movie, for all of her clients. The place was packed. She had to start the movie about ten minutes late to process her clients (including my husband, our two boys and me) through the popcorn and pop line-up. Everyone got a free ticket to the movie and one free pop and popcorn.

She began the evening thanking everyone in the theatre for all of their referrals to friends and families over the years and especially in this market. "This is our little way of giving back." She said. "I can only hope they make a sequel."

She and her agents (real estate that is) were dressed in black with T-shirts that said "Who is Salt team." They greeted everyone at the door and thanked us for coming. There was a large RE/MAX balloon propped outside the theatre at the front door.

It was brilliant of her to capitalize on Hollywood's millions of marketing dollars to promote a movie with her same name. All of it was possible because she keeps a very good database of clients. Invitations were sent by email first, and then I received a follow-up physical invitation by postal mail.

Do you have a list of email and postal mail addresses you could access if the right marketing opportunity came along?

By the way, we loved the movie. It was action-packed and had a great twist at the end.

Thanks for reading.

Courtenay Pitcher

How to ruin a networking opportunity in three seconds and seven ways to recover

Last night I was at a networking event. Beautiful scenery. Great food. But someone I met just didn't get networking.

I asked, "What do you do for a living?" She said, "I'm a Financial Planner."

I yawn, but being the experienced networker that I am, I try to build a connection with her. "I tried Financial Planning for a while," I said. She asks me if I found it hard. "Yep," I say. "I enjoy it," she says. "What do you do?" she asks me.

I answer, "I create logos, business cards and marketing materials." She replies with what I call a conversation-opportunity-networking-ender: "Unfortunately all of that material is created for us through our head office."

Here are some other replies she could have used to build a relationship with me and get referrals:

1. That sounds like really creative work. How did you get into that?

2. Neat, do you have clients locally?

3. Cool! Are your clients successful? Who are they? (After listening for a while she could have asked: Do you think you could introduce me to them?)

4. You were in Financial Planning? Did you sell your clients or give them away? What solutions were they looking for? Do you think they would appreciate a call from me?

5. Knowing that most of my materials are created for me through my head office, do you think there are services you provide that I could still take advantage of?

6. What kind of marketing tricks do you recommend for Financial Planners?

7. Tell me more about your business. Maybe I have clients or friends you can help.

Listening and showing interest in other people's businesses can help your own business. If you know what people do, you can connect them with your clients or friends. By doing this, you help your friends/clients, but you also have a higher chance of gaining referrals from the business person you sent them to.

What other questions would you have asked me?

Thanks for reading!

Courtenay Pitcher

http://www.vernongirl.com

Slideshare - Grow Your Business With Social Media

Grow your business with social media

View more presentations from Courtenay Pitcher.

Here is a slideshare presentation of a recent presentation I made about How To Grow Your Business With Social Media.

There was a question that came up during the presentation:

"How do I invite people to become Fans of my Facebook page if they are not already my friends. I have their email addresses."

Answer: You must first "Friend" them on Facebook, using their email, and then you can invite them to be a Fan. If you don't want to "Friend" them, you just have to make sure that your Facebook Fan Page is engaging enough that they will Fan you themselves.

Remember, you could send them an individual email and ask them to become a Fan. I'm not suggesting that you SPAM everyone. But one nice personalized note, popped through the email, is still okay, in my opinion.

Thanks for reading!

Courtenay Pitcher

What are your website objectives?

An Internet presence should begin with a website.
Here are some objectives that your website can accomplish:

*Attract new customers
*Reduce the time to market of certain products or services
*Make announcements to current customers
*Reduce paper and postage charges by using email
*Inform and educate clients about products and services
*Service existing clients
*Advertise your business around the world
*Advertise your business locally
*Increase the value of your company
*Increase your company’s credibility
*Improve your company’s image
*Help you and your staff spend less time on the phone with customers
*Attract new employees
*Show examples of your work
*Replace your brochure with quicker information fulfillment
*Replace service manuals
*Help your customers locate key personnel
*Promote upcoming events
*Attract entrepreneurs to business opportunities
*Offer on-line product purchases and/or product knowledge
*Demonstrate that you are great corporate citizens
*Attract shareholders
*Open a new communication channel to media
*Explain who you do business with (partnerships)
*Book appointments or reservations
*Take applications

Establishing credibility is one of the most underestimated powers of a good website…and a dangerous one for some consumers. A colleague of mine – a webmaster – told me about his pawn shop client who has a website. If you walk into the guy’s store, you see carpet that hasn’t been changed for 30 years and dust that’s at least that old, too. Yet, he has the most incredible website – with nice graphics and professional design, great information and a sophisticated shopping cart system. (That’s because my colleague, the webmaster, designed it for him.) His customers from around the country who buy products off his site will likely never know what a pigsty his store is. His website is first-rate and that is all they will ever see. (Boy! You gotta be careful with Internet blind dates if this principle applies!)

Think of it the opposite way. Sometimes you are better off to pull an ugly website off the Internet if it creates a bad impression of your business. One of my clients had a large website for their Optometry business when they hired me to help them update it. It was so outdated we pulled it off immediately and posted a single page that said: “We are currently renovating our website to serve you better. Please enter your email address and we’ll notify you as soon as we launch our new site.” The former site just didn’t reflect the quality of their service and products and so they were better off not using it at all.

To meet your objectives of what you want to accomplish with your website, here are some items to include:

*Frequently asked questions
*Company structure and staff, along with phone numbers and email addresses for all key personnel
*Products
*Services
*Prices
*Hours
*Locations and contact information, including physical addresses
*Directions or maps on how to find your stores
*Testimonials
*Warranties
*Employment information
*Business or franchise opportunities
*Vision/mission statement or corporate philosophy
*Number of years in business
*Upcoming events
*Community involvement and sponsorships
*Newsletter
*Shareholder information
*Search tool – especially if your website contains lots of information
*Portfolio (for designs, plans, art work, etc.)
*Listings (real estate agents)
*Reservations (accommodation)
*Vehicles (used and new cars)
*Book your appointment (vehicle maintenance, dental, etc.)
*Activities (travel, tour companies, event company)
*Packages
*Mortgage calculator (mortgage broker)
*Site Map – for larger sites
*Applications – financial industry
*Partners (companies you work with)
*Resources (links to helpful sites)
*Promotions
*Customer Care
*Awards

Realistic Expectations…

 “A friend called me up the other day and talked about investing in a dot-com that sells lobsters. Internet lobsters. Where will this end? The next day he sent me a huge package of lobsters on ice.
How low can you stoop?”
--Donald Trump

The owners of a manufacturing company came to me to help them develop a website. They did not have a marketing budget and were struggling to sell their quality wooden fireplace mantels into the state of Washington. They thought that if they had a website, residential home developers would phone them to buy wooden mantels.

It is a myth that a website is the overnight answer to your marketing problems. Like a brochure, your website must be designed, published (or in the case of a website – launched), distributed (emailed or advertised in social media sites like Facebook, Twitter or StumbleUpon) into the right hands, read (or seen), have a ‘call to action’ and target a willing participant who acts on the call. If you expect new business from your website, it needs to be promoted properly, measured for effectiveness, maintained and kept ‘fresh’.

For most people, giving birth to an effective website requires a substantial investment in time, planning and money. Although most websites take from three to six months from concept to launch, a nine-month investment in your website baby is not unrealistic if you expect a quality result (unless you have a superior marketing company to project manage for you).

Websites also serve certain marketing functions. Getting new overnight business from them is definitely not one. There are pros and cons to consider before deciding to put the website bun in the oven!

Website Advantages

*A great way to get information into the hands of your customers immediately
*Can be updated immediately
*Can present information statically and dynamically
*Are interactive – providing you with valuable customer feedback
*Are visual and can include audio
*Have unlimited space (very affordable)

Website Disadvantages
 
*Require frequent maintenance
*Can be costly to set up – both in time and money
*Are somewhat of a mystery – kind of like your car if you’re not a mechanic. Your webmaster, like your mechanic, has a lot of power and knowledge and you are subjected to trusting him or her.
*Have continual yearly and/or monthly fees including hosting, domain name renewal and maintenance

Consider Your Timeline…

 “If I had to sum up in a word what makes a good manager, I'd say decisiveness. You can use the fanciest computers to gather the numbers, but in the end you have to set a timetable and act.”
--Lee Iacocca

A typical website project, from design to launch, takes at least three to six months. The majority of the time is spent gathering ideas, images and text. Set a timeline for yourself and your web design team upon starting this project. Here is a check list that will help:

1.    Gather information, plan your site, and develop a bid document
2.    Have three design companies bid on your project
3.    Choose a design company
4.    Meet with design company to begin your project
5.    Wait for initial design concept
6.    Review the home-page and sub-page concept. Provide feedback.
7.    Review the home page and sub page again, give the web design company the go ahead to develop the remainder of the site.
8.    Wait for the design company to incorporate all of your images and text into the site.
9.    Review the completed site, test links, proof read, and provide feedback.
10.    Wait for the designers to make final adjustments to the site.
11.    Review the final design and sign it off. Have meta-tags (we’ll explain later) programmed into the site.
12.    Launch the site.
13.    Submit the site to key search engines and announce it to media and customers.
14.    Get your backup and passwords from the design company and make your final payment to the web design team.
15.    Promote, Promote, Promote!
16.    Track your success.
17.    Keep it fresh!

Patience and planning are key to making your website project a positive experience.

Don’t get e-screwed!

 “There was a time when a fool and his money were soon parted, but now it happens to everybody.”
-Adlai E. Stevenson

When your gut feeling tells you that the prices are ridiculous, they probably are. Continue reading and you’ll know whether you’re paying a fair price for the services you are about to receive!

Budget…
Establish a budget to determine what you can afford. Most website designs start at $900 and up. This cost does not include your domain name ($25 - $45/year), hosting (from $180 per year and up), database ($1,500 and up), or e-commerce ($3,000 and up). Other charges can include maintenance ($40/hour and up) and promotion ($100 and up).

When considering your return on investment, determine ways that a website can save or make you money if it:

*Eliminates or reduces the need to print brochures or catalogues
*Cuts postage and faxing charges
*Cuts time for stuffing envelopes and packages
*Cuts long distance phone calls to customers or staff
*Saves printing charges for brochures, catalogues, annual reports, owner’s manuals, etc.
*Saves personnel time speaking with customers
*Saves personnel time searching for information
*Brings new customers
*Sells products

To do Internet marketing well, it requires its own marketing plan. Every activity in your Internet marketing plan should have a budget, an objective, a market and a way to track success.

Each activity should include costs for creative, time (human resources) and items such as hosting, advertising, maintenance or design charges.

Target Market
Consider who will use your website and it will be easier for you to determine your objectives. Will it be…
*Staff
*Present Customers
*Suppliers
*New Customers
*Distributors

Important for pricing and language considerations, is to determine where your website will be accessed from…
*Locally
*Nationally
*Internationally

Determine which age group will use your website as it will help you consider the information, type style, graphics and technology that you include in the site…
*Kids
*Teens
*Adults
*Seniors

You get the idea! As with other types of media, you have to know your market before you can design an effective website for it.

Revenue
Consider the ways that your website can bring in new revenue streams….
*Support existing products and services
*Offer New products and services
*Advertising or link exchanges
*New customers

Expenses
Consider some of the expenses of website development and marketing…
*Photograph acquisition
*Copywriting
*Design
*Hosting
*Maintenance
*Promotion

Price
Pricing of the website design, hosting and maintenance is important to consider as part of your marketing plan. I always advise my customers to start small and build. Get on the Net with a small investment. Begin promoting the site and generating traffic to it. Then expand.

You also need to consider how to price your products on your website. For example, will you offer discounts for on-line ordering? Will you use your website to blow out slow moving products? Will you offer your purchases in Canadian or US currency, or both?

If you feel that the website will be worth your time, energy and money, then let’s get started!

Blogs are also great alternatives to a website. Read more about blogs.

Thanks for reading.

Courtenay Pitcher, Webmaster, Website content writer

This article was adapted from my book: Secrets of Internet Marketing

How a luxury real estate brand for Kelowna, Vernon and Calgary is born

When Gord Fowler, a dually licensed RE/MAX real estate agent in Calgary and Vernon, came to my company Lava Marketing to create a luxury real estate brand for him, I was delighted.

Obviously, everything about a luxury brand must scream:

professionalism,

quality

and class.

When a new brand is developed, we also make sure that elements like colour, font choices or design touches are consistent throughout the client's marketing pieces. 

For Gord, we developed a proposal that included a new logo, tagline and marketing photo. Once these projects were complete, he hired us to do a web page design, business card design, web page programming and 8.5 x 5.5 flyer.

Gord was decisive about choosing his new brand name: Fowler Luxury Homes. 

We came up with several tagline choices. The one that took first prize was:

You Deserve The Best.

This tagline has a double entendre....not only do you deserve to live in a luxury home with a luxury lifestyle, but you also deserve a specialist and seasoned professional in dealing with Okanagan luxury and resort properties, Gord Fowler.

Here is the logo with the tagline:

 

Every great real estate agent needs a really great photo. Our original intent was to take Gord's picture in front of a crackling fireplace inside a luxury home. As it turned out, the location we used for the photoshoot had a fabulous balcony in front of the Vernon Yacht Club. What better backdrop to scream "luxury" and "Okanagan lifestyle" than yachts? (A blue suit is always a safe and professional choice too.) Here is the result:

We integrated his logo/tagline, with his image to create a web page design that we uploaded (in pieces) to Ubertor, a template website system popular with real estate agents. I have to admit that working with a template system like Ubertor is challenging. We had to adapt our original design to fit into their rigid template. But I'm pleased with the results:

Here is the business card (front and back) that incorporates many of the same elements:

Business Card Back (notice the background with elements of the logo):

This is the 8.5 x 5.5 flyer design just approved:

What do you think of Gord Fowler's new marketing pieces? Do you think we hit the mark so that when you are looking to buy a luxury property in Calgary or the Okanagan, you'll call Gord Fowler? Please leave a comment at the bottom of this blog.

I really enjoyed working with Gord on this project. Thanks Gord!

Thanks for reading.

Courtenay Pitcher, Personal branding specialist

Five Tips For Giving a Blog Interview

As blogging becomes more popular, you might be approached to give an interview to a Blogger (aka Writer, Journalist) so they can create a story about you or your business for their blog. Here is some etiquette on giving the interview and interview follow-up that I have learned by working with various media and publicity personnel over the years in traditional media. I have updated it here to apply to social media as well.

1. Everything is on the record. Bloggers are typically very good interviewers and they will ask you to provide the highs and lows of your business. The Blogger will also assume that everything you say is okay to print. So, if you do not want something in print, don't say it.

2. Make time for the interview. Typically, a Blogger is on a time schedule to make a deadline.  If you can provide the interview when they call you, that is typically most effective. You can ask the Blogger to schedule the interview at another time, but this can lose momentum. You want your story to get out immediately. A third party endorsement is great publicity. So try to make time for the interview as quickly as possible. You may lose the Blogger's interest, or get smaller exposure, if you delay.

3. Be honest and intimate. Bloggers are like bloodhounds. They can sniff a story and don't appreciate bull. Be honest. Be yourself. It goes a long way. They can tell when you're holding back information. Try to give the Blogger a nice new tidbit of info that nobody has written about you or your business before. Maybe a new revelation you've had, an award you've just received or a new client would be something to talk about. 

Reveal something sort-of intimate or personal, like an "inside scoop" or breaking news or developments. If you make a mistake and say something personal that you don't want in print, tell the Blogger that right away. Say, "Oops, I didn't mean to say that. Can you make sure that stays out of print?" Yes, this goes against the "Everything is on the record" point I made above. But Bloggers want to be able to come back to you later-on for more stories, so they don't want to damage their relationship with you. They will recognize your mistake and respect your wishes, usually (unless you are the former Mayor of Vernon and you are fudging receipts, lol.) 

4. Follow up with information or photos quickly. Bloggers are usually working with inspiration, or a timeline in mind. I write when I feel inspired. Then, I want to get the story posted as soon as possible so I can rest easy and feel a sense of accomplishment. I'm not as organized as other Bloggers who have a story plan and a publishing schedule.    No way.     So when I ask someone for a logo or a photo, I want in NOW. (Sorry, I'm a Type A personality.)

Additionally....a story looks better with a photo. In fact, your story gets greater exposure with a photo or video and has more credibility. If you can provide large web resolution photos to the Blogger for their use with the story, it will get you more mileage.

In terms of information...if you don't have it at your fingertips during the interview, tell the Blogger you'll get it right away and then do it. If you can't get the information you want right away, let the Blogger know when you can get it and see if that timeline is adequate. Maintain your integrity as a good source of information by updating the Blogger about the status of that information or following through with it.

5. Thank the Blogger publicly. Once the story is published, leave a comment on the blog endorsing the story or adding something extra to it. Tweet or retweet the story on Twitter. Promote the story on Facebook and/or leave a Facebook comment. These are great ways to build links and traffic back to your website, to show appreciation to your local Blogger who took the time to write about you, and to "toot" your own horn.

Blog interviews are now the new "media" interview. They are important and necessary for promoting your business. Bloggers are often looking for new, refreshing stories, so don't be afraid to approach them about your business.

Have you given a blog interview lately? Leave a comment at the bottom of my blog with a link to the story. I would love to read it.

Thanks for reading my blog.

Courtenay Pitcher

June 21st - Vernon - Grow Your Business With Social Media Event

When Brenda Hala approached me to provide a workshop on behalf of The Professional Photographers of Canada - BC (PPABC), I was delighted to say Yes!

Formerly called the Professional Photographers Association of BC, the association now calls itself Professional Photographers of Canada - BC to create a stronger voice across Canada.

The Association promotes and fosters the personal ethics and professional development of the working photographer and/or specialist.

Brenda Hala says that the principle focus of the PPABC is the advancement of their members and associates within the photographic industry through education, fellowship and public awareness.

Brenda is the one who takes my portrait photo. I always enjoy working with her because it's fun.

Join me for a workshop about marketing with social media, presented by the PPABC! The event is open to anyone.

Monday, June 21, 2010
8:30 a.m. - Networking and Registration
9:00 a.m. to Noon - Seminar

Location:

Village Green Hotel
4801-27th Street, Vernon, BC V1T 4Z1

Cost: $25 per person. Please pay at the door.
Cheque or cash only. No credit card.

For more information, and to pre-register, please contact:
Brenda Hala
250.542.3010
brendahalaphotography@shaw.ca

Topics will include:

LinkedIn - Learn how to network with LinkedIn for advancing your career or small business. Create a LinkedIn profile, get and give recommendations, connect your LinkedIn profile to Twitter, customize your website link, start or join a group, share what you are reading, or promote your blog or RSS feed.

Blogs – You’ll see how cheap and easy it is to begin blogging. Learn how to post articles, photos and YouTube.com videos to your blog. Learn what a category cloud is. Understand why you should comment on other blogs to promote your business. Learn why blogging can leverage your marketing, earn trust, gain you clients and increase your credibility.

Twitter – Set up a profile, tweet, retweet, direct message, reply, customize your Twitter background, and schedule tweets. How to brand yourself, increase traffic to your blog or website, build relationships and increase your profile using Twitter. Learn how to use Hootsuite.com. Learn powerful automation tricks to save time.

Facebook – Set up a Facebook page for your business. Learn how to engage people on your page. Get people to write on your wall and start discussions. Learn how to automatically bring in your RSS or blog feed.

See you there!

Courtenay Pitcher, Social Media Workshop Presenter

Interior Transmission Shifts its Marketing into Overdrive with New Logo

Interior Transmission, here in Vernon, B.C., recently worked with my company, Lava Marketing, to develop a new logo (pictured above). When I started this project, I didn't know anything about transmissions. I actually think that was a good thing. It allowed me to leave all assumptions aside and create an image that an uneducated customer, like me, could relate to at-a-glance.

In fact, transmissions aren't sexy at all from an imagery standpoint. They don't really look like anything one would recognize. And most people don't know what they look like. There are many styles of transmissions too, so there is no ONE icon to represent them. Not like Michael Jackson's glove, or Nike's checkmark, or McDonald's yellow arches, or Dolly Parton's....well....you get the point.

When I sat down to talk to Cindy and Kim Myers about their company, I asked them to describe the symptoms of a broken transmission. Kim told me they are a clutch that won't go into gear, a clutch that grinds, leaky fluid, pink puddles, a burnt smell, a "check engine" light coming on, jerking, banging and overdrive lights flashing.

So there are lots of things going WRONG with the interior workings of the car when the transmission is not behaving.

But, how could we get that across with imagery? Well, first, we came up with this:

The logo above was a good start. But the colour was all wrong, the car was the wrong style and its interior workings were too intricate. A logo should be clean, simple, modern and reflective of its owner's values. A logo should be easy to recognize when it is very small and details should be kept to a minimum.

In comes the sexy 1963 Split Window Corvette aka...the Sting Ray. Here is the image my client asked me to replicate in their logo:

Now, this image doesn't say anything about Transmissions, except that if you have one, you would probably want it to be sitting in this car....right? Yah......! I know I would.

But this image DOES say a lot about Kim and Cindy Myers. They like classic cars. Kim likes to fix them. And they REALLY like the Sting Ray. In fact, they might even own one. (Maybe they'll take me for a cruise in it sometime.)

Hence....the creation of the Interior Transmission 2010 logo:

I can't take credit for "Get Your Shift Together." They already had that tagline picked out. But I sure do like the logo....and the hot colour. What do you think? Please leave a comment on my blog by clicking the comments link at the bottom of it.

Thanks for reading.

Courtenay Pitcher (Wishing I was sitting in a hot red Sting Ray cruising by Okanagan Lake with my good-looking husband right now.)

p.s. If you have any of the symptoms of a mis-behaving transmission, go see Interior Transmission in Vernon. According to Cindy, Kim is a genius when it comes to fixing transmissions. He's honest too. And if his wife trusts him, I would too. Shouldn't you?

p.s.s. I would like to give a photo credit for the photo of the Sting Ray above...but I don't know where this photo came from. If you come across it, send me the link so I can link to it.

3 creative tips for promoting your business with donations or sponsorships

Today I am collecting swag bag gifts for the ten women who have been nominated for Vernon's Woman of the Year Award. A swag bag is a bag of gifts that the Woman of the Year committee gives each nominee as a thank you for service they have provided to our community. It is part of the honour of being nominated for Woman of the Year, but it can only be done with your support since the event is run on a shoe string budget using volunteers like me and givers like you.

I am asking you to donate ten of the same item either from your business or to promote your business.

Here are some questions you might have about donating or sponsoring an event:

1) What is the difference between donating and sponsoring?

Donating is often providing something and expecting nothing in return except perhaps a tax receipt. Sponsoring usually means you provide cash or product in exchange for marketing promotion displaying your logo, web link or company name.

In  this case, the Woman of the Year committee will provide you with printed recognition of your company name in the programme on the night of the Gala (Thursday, May 20, 2010). So, in essence, although you are giving something away, it is not really a donation, it is a sponsorship.

2) How can I sponsor an event with product or gifts if I don't have anything?

Some companies keep a host of mugs, bags, pens, water bottles or other items in their goody bags so they can give them away at events. Often, they have the company name printed on them. However, if you do not have such a thing, then it means you need to be creative in order to support the event with your sponsorship and get your business name out there.

My husband and I own Rhino Curbing, a residential decorative landscape concrete curbing company. This year we are sponsoring the event at the Platinum level. This level required a cash investment. In return we receive marketing exposure with our logo on newspaper ads, email blasts through the Vernon Women in Business and the Greater Vernon Chamber of Commerce, website, poster, programme and nomination brochure to name a few. We jumped on board to sponsor the event early (we were the first), so that allowed us to negotiate another little perk with the package....wine sponsorship.

Our company name and logo will be on each bottle of wine on the night of the Gala. However, to get back to how you can be creative even if you don't have product, consider this: for the past two years, we gave each nominee a bottle of wine for their swag bag. Last year we attached a business card to each bottle along with a congratulatory note. I'm not sure if it got us any direct business, but I did receive thank you cards from some of the nominees. That sure felt good and it does create goodwill in the community and get our business name out there in a positive way.

My point is that you can think outside the box. If you are a concierge service, give away a free grocery shopping day, free house cleaning, free flower arranging or free home decorating. If you are a senior's care service, give away a free foot massage. If you are a Re/Max real estate agent, give away a gift certificate for a free cup of coffee or one balloon ride for ten in the Re/Max balloon. Be creative to come up with ideas to support your community and promote your business.

3) What's in it for me or my business?

If your business name or business card is on the item that you are giving away there is the potential for business. It is called promotion. The more your company name is out in the marketplace, the faster you will build momentum, good will, contacts and customers. Don't give away the farm. Be smart. Consider donating something you can give with your time, or something of low cost to you and high value to the receiver.

Who is nominated for the 2010 Woman of the Year?

The women are:

Samantha Plovie
Cherie Montgomery
Kath Raeber
Angela Yablonski
Cheryl Schmidt
Daina Bull
Shelley Haslett
Deborah Stoddard
Michelle Antonation
Sharon Mackenzie

Congratulations to all these amazing women!

Contact me at 250-558-1176 or by email info@vernongirl.com to sponsor this event with ten swag bag items. I look forward to seeing you all dressed up at the event on Thursday, May 20, 2010 for the event.

p.s. I have one free ticket to give away to the event (value $40) on behalf of Rhino Curbing to the person who donates the coolest ten items by May 1st.

Thanks for reading!

Courtenay Pitcher, Woman of the Year Committee Volunteer

 

Three lucky charms for thriving in a tough economy – Okanagan business style

Lucky Charm One – Keep Overhead Low

In these tough economic times, Tammi Berzins, co-owner of Berzins Designs in Vernon, B.C. says, “People are still building, renovating and doing a bit of everything.” Tammi has been in business for four years. She says, “I love what I do and enjoy working in the Okanagan.” Tammi and her business partner Carley Sawka travel to interior design related trade shows to make sure they are current in the design world.

Berzins Designs recently completed an FF and E (the interior design and installation of furniture, fixtures and equipment) at Firelight Lodge at Silver Star Mountain Resort, but Tammi does admit these times are difficult. Tammi says, “We try to keep things minimal, and not have a large overhead. We were fortunate that the (Firelight Lodge) hotel project happened at a good time. My best suggestion for business owners is to keep expences and overhead as low as you can.” 

Berzins Designs does commercial and residential interior design work for a handful of builders in the Vernon area.

Lucky Charm Two – Fill A Need, Even if it’s only temporary

Elizabeth Sweezie has a background in accounting and a Business Administration diploma from Okanagan College. She has been organizing offices and their paperwork systems for twenty years. She started her business Office 2 Office one year ago because she knew it could fill the gap for a “temp” service.

Now, she steps in temporarily to help small businesses who are bursting at the seams with paperwork, lack of efficient systems, or expansion to organize their offices. She does collection letters, customizes forms, creates invoices, puts payables and receivables into one place and labels it all so they can find it. She says that the companies she helps just need, “a little specific organizational business to be done. This frees owners up to take care of their business.”

To find clients, she keeps herself involved with several organizations including:

Vernon Women in Business (Website Director)
North Okanagan Referral Association
Toastmasters (Acting VP of Education)
Okanagan Business Exchange.

Next, she will look at helping bookkeepers and accountants.

Lucky Charm Three – Diversify

When Adrienne Harris’ phone stopped ringing, she diversified to survive in business.

Adrienne Harris has owned Lasting Impressions Home Staging and Design for four years and she helps the homeowner or real estate professional prepare the condition of a home or property to sell. She says, “This enhances marketing, because 90% of home buyers look on line before purchasing.” According to Adrienne, when a homebuyer works with a realtor, they look at location and what they can spend. Once those needs are met, they buy that home based on its condition….that’s where she comes in.

(Before shot)

Her husband Adam Harris is a real estate agent with Century 21. Her and Adam have been buying, renovating and selling houses (also called “flipping”) for the past three years. This has led to doing small renovations for others.

“To survive in business, we’ve had to diversify. My husband went from full time real estate to taking on more renovations. I’ve had to diversify too. I’ve had to recreate my business. My phone was no longer ringing. I may do the work myself rather than sub it out to a sub trade. I’m not going to hire someone to powerwash a client’s dock when I’m more than capable of doing it.” Adrienne remarks.


Recently, Adrienne and Adam combined two businesses they own, Lasting Impressions Home Staging and Design and Portico Property Concierge, into a corporation called North Okanagan Property Services. She says, “We want to be a one stop shop service for homeowners whether they need maintenance, renovations or want to sell their home.”

You can follow Adrienne on Twitter: http://www.Twitter.com/okanaganstager

What are you doing to survive or thrive in these tough times? I would love to hear from you. Comments can be left at the bottom of this blog by clicking the comments link below.

Thanks for reading!

Courtenay Pitcher, Business Survivor

Follow me on Twitter (@vernongirl) or subscribe to my blog.

How To Track Your Advertising and Social Media Efforts On-line

This article has been adapted and updated from chapter three of my book Secrets of Internet Marketing: Streamline, promote, communicate and sell more effectively on-line.

Tracking programs


 

As you know, it is imperative to track your advertising – whether it is website banner advertising, television or print. With the advent of social media, it is also good to know how much traffic is coming into your blog or website through Facebook, Twitter, Delicious, YouTube or other sites. You must know where your business is coming from. If you have a banner ad on a website that is costing you big money and your referring URLs from that site are low, you have choices. (More about URLs below.) You can pull the ad, change the ad, change the location of the ad on the site, or negotiate a better rate or location for your banner ad on their site.

Tracking programs or website statistics are excellent for monitoring visitor and customer behavior. With them, you can track where your customers come from, where bottlenecks occur in your site, which content, products or services visitors prefer, how you can improve your customer support, the best way to convert a visitor into a buyer and which advertising campaigns are working.

I use Google Analytics to track my blog traffic. The best part about it…it is free.

Hits

Hits, also called a page hit, are the retrieval of any item, like a page or a graphic, from a web server. For example, when a visitor calls up a web page with eight graphics, that's nine hits, one for the page and eight for the graphics. For this reason, hits often aren't a good indication of Web traffic. Anyone trying to sell you on-line advertising based on hits should be asked to get out of the ballpark.

Page Views
A page view is a web page that has been viewed by one visitor. Rather than hits, page views are a much more reliable measuring tool for evaluating where to place your online advertising and/or your website traffic. You'll see by this image below, how my page views skyrocketed when I added K. D. Lang to my site immediately following the 2010 Winter Olympics.



Search Engine Reports

Software (like Google Analytics) that provides search engine reports can tell you which search engines (Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc.) visitors are using to find your site. By knowing which search engines people are using to find you, you’ll be able to tell which search engines aren’t working for you. Then, you can attempt to fix your ranking in those search engines where you need improvement.

Keyword Reports
See which keyword combinations people are entering in search engines to find your site by looking at keyword reports. Keyword reports tell you that you have content in your blog or your site around those keywords. However, if you want to bring visitors to your site or blog with other key words, and you are not getting traffic from them, you’ll know what kind of content you should add.

Here is an example of my keyword report. Recently, I posted a YouTube video to my site and ever since then, my traffic has gone through the roof for K.D. Lang Olympic video searches.

Referring URLs (or Referring Sites)
A URL is a Uniform Resource Locator. It is a very complicated way of saying ‘website address’. Referring URLs are the websites that refer, send, divert or direct business into your site.

By tracking your referring URLs, you can determine which websites (in addition to search engines) are sending you business. This is extremely valuable information because it allows you to determine where your advertising is, or isn’t, working.

As you can see by this image below, top referring sites to my blog are Twitter, Kelly Diels, Facebook and Hootsuite. (That goes to show the power of blogs and social media to generating traffic.)

Return on Investment Calculation
Compare referring URLs to determine the percentage of traffic each URL brings. Track return on investment for each URL by assigning a dollar figure to the percentage and dividing it by the cost of your advertising. This method is used for comparison purposes. It doesn’t actually assign a real dollar value.

For example: let’s say you are a photographer and you have banner advertising on two sites:

Kodak.com
Gettyimages.com

Kodak is bringing you 50% of your visitors, but the ad cost you $500. Getty images is bringing you the other 50%, but the ad cost you $1000.

Return on investment (ROI) is calculated strictly for comparison purposes – the dollar figure means nothing in this case.

Your return on investment for Kodak 50/500 = 0.1

ROI for Getty is 50/1000 = .05 (half).

While they bring you the same amount of traffic, the traffic costs you twice as much with gettyimages.com.

Therefore, you may want to consider reducing your investment with gettyimages.com to see if you get the same amount of traffic for the same price, or negotiate with Getty to keep the same ad, but at half the cost based on your knowledge of Kodak’s results. As long as all other things remain equal, you may be in a very good negotiating position with Getty. Do you getty what I’m saying?

Most requested pages
Tracking programs also allow you to track the most requested pages on your website. The most requested page on your website is often your home page. But which page do your customers visit next? Is it your contact information, jobs, or what? This is useful information to know.

This is important if you are trying to convince a supplier or associate to buy advertising space on your website. You can indicate where the best place to advertise will be.

When I had a contract with a community Internet portal to sell banner advertising, we sold all of the advertising at the same rate – regardless of whether it was a busy page or a slow page. However, we quickly sold out the busy pages because we were able to prove to our customers that they could capture a portion of the traffic we were getting just by placing banner advertising on those busy pages. Interestingly, some of the busiest pages were bus route schedules on BC Transit, movie listings, and the ‘image of the day’ (a nice picture of the local scenery that the webmaster took each day). Accommodation was hugely popular in the tourism section and the news continually drew visitors to the site.

Tip: Movie listings are a great place to advertise on line if you are targeting teens. Facebook, is another. Ironically, Facebook is also great for advertising to grandmas!

The most requested pages are one of the first things you should ask if you are considering advertising on anybody else’s website. If it is a high traffic site, place your banner advertising on their most requested page, and you’ll see results!

Use your most requested pages as a place to put announcements and news, or move product. If you know it is a well-visited place on your site, use it to your advantage.

Average time spent on the site

    “The 'Net is a waste of time, and that's exactly what's right about it.”
      -William Gibson

A good tracking program can provide you with the average amount of time that your visitors spend on your site. If your visitors are not spending much time on your site, maybe it is not very interesting, maybe your pages download too slowly or maybe your shopping cart package is not user-friendly. Tracking this information allows you to re-think your site layout and/or content. Increase the amount of time a user spends in your site and you will likely increase the amount of money that they spend with you.



Unique Visitors
Unique visitors are measured according to their unique IP addresses. IP addresses identify each computer or computer network that is connected to the Internet. IP addresses have a unique four digit number that identifies a particular network and a host on that network. Except in special cases, one IP address equals one unique visitor no matter how many times they visit the site within a given period. The only flaw in tracking unique visitors is that one IP address can be assigned to a network having 500 employees on it – so the unique visitor will be counted once while up to 500 employees may have actually visited your site.

Unique visitor statistics can be useful if tracked on a daily basis to tell if more people visit your site on a Monday or a Sunday, or in August than March. They will indicate when your traffic increases or drops.

It is also important to know what this term means when you are sourcing information from advertisers about their unique visitor traffic so that you can compare ‘apples to apples’. It is better to ask ‘how many unique visitors do you have’ than it is to ask ‘how many hits do you get’ as an indicator for their amount of traffic. 

Path Reports
Statistics or tracking programs can monitor path reports. These indicate where visitors entered your site, which paths they took and where they exited. This is useful information for determining ‘jumping off’ points that may need to be re-designed. They will also tell you how people travel through your site which can arm you with information on how to improve your navigation.

Return frequency
See how many visitors have returned to view your site a second time, and how long they waited between the first and second visit. If visitors return to your site daily, you know you’ve got an interesting site. If they return monthly, you may need to reach out to your customers electronically more often with an e-newsletter, blog or special promotional deals by email.

Other Items Which Can Be Tracked

Software can track everything from the most common monitor resolution settings used by your visitors to their language setting, country and operating system.

Email Reports

Once you have set up Google Analytics, you can also set weekly or daily email reports to send to you in .pdf format.




Summary

*Tracking programs or website statistics can help you monitor customer behavior and traffic to your site

*Hits are a common, yet unreliable measuring tool

*Use page views to guide you in placing your advertising or to determine the most popular pages within your own site

*Keyword reports help you optimize your content

*Referring URL’s help you determine which websites (in addition to search engines) are directing traffic into your site

*Use referring URL’s as a measuring tool to determine your advertising return on investment

*Put your most important information or product offerings on your most requested pages

*Invest in advertising on other websites on their most requested pages

*Knowing the average amount of time that visitors spend on your site can help you provide better site layout or content

*Unique visitors are a better tool than hits for measuring traffic to a site

*Path reports tell you how people travel through your site and where they leave, giving you hints on how to improve your navigation

*If customers return to your site frequently, you have great Internet marketing. If they don’t, you need to reach out to your customers more often.

*Tracking programs can track just about everything. Focus on the tracking information that helps guide your Internet marketing the best.

More Information

If you would like coaching on how to set up and interpret Google Analytics to track your on-line marketing, please get in touch.

Thanks for reading!

Courtenay Pitcher, Google Analytics Cheerleader

Video tutorial: How to add a Facebook Fanpage to Hootsuite.com

Here is a video tutorial on how to add your Facebook Fanpage to your Hootsuite.com account so that whenever you send a tweet from Hootsuite, you can update your Facebook Fanpage automatically.

Or, here are the written directions:

Open Hootsuite.com

Go to settings > social networks > add a social network




Click the “pages” icon. (as per the image above) Note: Do not click the "Facebook" icon.

Connect with Facebook (It will open Facebook and you'll have to type in your Facebook email and password).

It will bring up a list of Fan pages you have set up on that account and so you can tick the Fanpage that you want to come up.

Cllick "Allow Publishing".

If you're getting this post by email, you can watch the video at this link here.

Thanks for reading!

Courtenay Pitcher
Social media trainer and Hootsuite Fan

How to create a picture-in-picture video for your blog for under $400 USD

Dear Varada:

Thank you for your question:

    “How did you create the video overlapping the background demo on
    Socialoomph presented in your blog.”

Adding video has been an excellent strategy for adding personality and credibility to my blog and getting people to stay for longer. It has also resulted in exposure through Youtube and now my blog has been bookmarked on the site Delicious which pushes traffic into my blog.

Here is how I do it:

First of all, I believe that the video example you are referring to is this video on how to upload tweets and schedule them using Socialoomph.com.

I use two tools to create my demo videos:

1)    A Logitech Webcam Pro 9000 / QuickCam Pro 9000 that cost under $99 USD.

and

2)    Camtasia Studios 5.0 Screen Recorder Software that cost under $300 USD.

I launch the Camtasia Studios Screen Recorder Software and set the recorder to make sure it is using the Logitech® Webcam Pro 9000 to record my face and my voice at the same time that I am clicking on the screen. In the settings of the Logitech Webcam Pro 9000, I ensure that it is tracking my face. This image demonstrates what the face tracking settings look like:

Logitech® Webcam Pro 9000 has exceptionally great audio quality, so I recommend it. And it sits right on your computer screen which means that you don't need a cameraman (or woman) to operate it. You just have to make sure to check that you are centred in the viewer.

For lighting, I have two small table top lights that I set on either side of my computer screen. They seem to do the trick.

In the Camtasia Studios Screen Recording Software, I also make sure that I set the “cursor effects” to highlight the clicks of my mouse with a yellow circle so it’s easier for people watching my video demonstration to know where I’m clicking.

The Camtasia Studio Screen Recorder software records what I am doing on my computer screen at the same time it is recording my face. It essentially makes two video files: one of the video of me and one video of what I’m clicking on my computer screen. It calls this picture in picture (pip) and when you are editing the video, you can decide if the videos will lay side-by-side each other, or one overtop of the other. In this case, I've laid one over the other.

To prepare to take the video, I practice what I am going to do and say a few times before I go through the “real” demo. This is like a sound check to ensure that my audio is being recorded and to see how the video is looking. After practicing, I do the demo in one take so that editing is kept to a minimum. The only editing I do after that is to fade in and fade out the video of me so that the screen recording demo can be seen. Sometimes I also enlarge my video.

When I began producing video, I noticed that my computer was quite slow and this was effecting the quality of my video and causing it to be somewhat stilted. It also took a very long time to render the video, which is also what Camtasia Studios terms as the "produce" phase. So I upgraded to a faster computer. The processor speed is most important. I use an Intel Core 2 Quad Processor Q9300 - 8 Gig System memory - 1 Terabyte hard drive. (I haven't included the cost of my computer upgrade in the $400 USD.)

Occasionally, I will get "chipmunk" voice when I record a video. This is when my audio comes out really fast and I sound like Alvin and The Chipmunks. When this happens, I close all of my programs and restart my computer. This takes care of the problem and then I start the process all over again.

Here is a video from Camtasia Studios that shows you how to place videos through pip (picture in picture).

Thanks for reading!

Courtenay Pitcher

Mitch Joel Video about social media, privacy, equilibrium, group expression

An interview with Mitch Joel, President, Twist Image and Author of "Six Pixels of Separation" as part of the TVO series in an online Podcast called Digital U. 

In this video, you can hear Mitch Joel’s discourse about:

• Group expression: it’s different from a one way or two way conversation.

• How social media sites allow people to congregate and activate their passions.

• How social media sites like blogs or Twitter are creating an equilibrium between “regular people” and large budget advertisers.

• How social media brings transparency. Credibility is hard.

• How “being in the loop” is attitudinal, not generational.

• How it’s a challenge to manage technology and not let technology manage you.

• Privacy and evaluating your public versus private relationships. Your life is being recorded. Anybody can take a picture and upload it to anything without any ramifications.

• How a laptop is no longer needed for travel now with the Blackberry and Iphone.

• Snaptel. Take a picture of a product code, find out where you can buy it, get prices, get a review, and find people to help you buy it.

• Augmented reality: point your phone at a house and see its real estate agent, price and a virtual tour. 

• Meet ups, “Thriller” and facilitating better relationships.

Thanks for reading!

Courtenay Pitcher, Digital Facilitator

Super Affiliate Handbook Review - Monetize and supercharge your website or blog

Have you been writing articles and posting them on your blog and not getting enough traffic to it?

Are you a traditional brick and mortar business who has a website, but wants to add revenue streams to it?

Are you an entrepreneur thinking about starting a blog?

Do you have a website with good traffic, but are you having a difficult time selling advertising on it?

Do you want to start a business with minimal risk and financial investment?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, you’ll want to purchase and read the Super Affiliate Handbook, by the “Affiliate Queen”, Rosalind Gardner.

What percentage of visitors to your site will become your customers?

How much is each visitor to your blog or website worth?

How much does it cost to bring a new visitor to your site?

This book teaches you how to answer those questions.

I’ve been marketing on the internet since the late nineties, but this is the first book I’ve read that really explains in detail how to profit from a website or blog and how to promote a website or blog with software I had not considered.

The Super Affiliate Handbook by Rosalind Gardner was published in 2003, but it has been recently updated. Since internet marketing is evolving with the addition of social media and new technology, I was happy to know that the book wasn’t a dinosaur. It’s current and relevant. In fact, the book even lists changes and improvements since 2003.

First, you’ll learn seventeen benefits of being an affiliate. What stands out for me in this section, is how inexpensive, simple and virtually risk free it is to begin an affiliate progam.

Gardner explains:

 “An affiliate program is a program that facilitates the relationship between online merchants and their affiliates – allowing the affiliate to promote that company’s products or services for a commission. Affiliate programs may also be referred to as:
    *Associate programs
    *Referral programs
    *Bounty Programs
    *Partner Programs
    *Revenue Sharing Programs."

In the book, Gardner, who is a successful webmaster, online entrepreneur and affiliate marketer, shows and links to her own website examples so you can see live working affiliate websites. The well-written book reads like a full-fledged business and marketing plan. She tells you the software and tools needed, the process and steps to take, ways to stay organized, ways to identify a profitable niche, short-cuts, how to evaluate market demand and competition, how to choose a domain name, how to choose a web or blog host, design rules-of-thumb and how to build a website or blog with, or without, a webmaster.

Software she reviews in enough detail to really understand them are: Google Adsense and Keyword Tool, Wordtracker, Google Toolbar, Microsoft Excel, Eudora Email Client, File Transfer Software, Paypal, Wordpress, and Aweber Enewsletter Software to name only a few.

She explains how to create or find content, which content is essential for an affiliate blog or website, how to write product endorsements, secret ingredients every article needs, and how to make your site “Google” friendly. 

The meat of the book is in the middle where she goes into ways to monetize your site simply by adding small snippets of code to them. And, she shows you step by step how to do it and which ones to add. She explains how to evaluate affiliate programs and which ones are profitable and easy to work with. Recurring sales, commissions, lifetime commissions, multiple-tier programs, sales tools and sales statistics are covered. Page 132 of her book has a gem so good, I was too excited to sleep the night I read about it.

After she explains how to fill your site with content, she details thirty-one ways to market your site on-line. I’ve known about many of the tools and strategies she lists here, but she goes into them in detailed ways that shifted my perspective. Also, she reveals software on page 138 so powerful and effective (I watched the video) that I’m scheming of ways to afford it. After all, my internet marketing plan is ever-evolving too. That’s why I read great books like this one.

Like adding icing to a delicious cake, she puts a section at the back of the book called “Evaluate Your Site’s Performance” which explains how to determine:
1.    What percentage of visitors to your site will become your customers.
2.    The conversion rate for each Affiliate program.
3.    How much each visitor is worth.
4.    How much it costs to bring a new visitor to your site.

This section also teaches you how to assess individual product performance (clickthroughs, number of sales, commission amounts), compare products side-by-side for performance, evaluate monthly trends, grow commissions and profit from error pages and exchange rates. The number crunching techniques on these pages will keep your Banker and Accountant happy for sure!

The book is topped off with problem-solving and prevention tips plus a glossary of terms. “Twenty-five mistakes to avoid” is the maraschino cherry of this affiliate marketing masterpiece.

Rosalind Gardner lives in Penticton, B.C. Canada, just down the road (two hours) from me. Her book is 210 pages long and it took me six hours to read. I jumped over some sections I already felt I knew, but took longer on some of the links. This book comes as an e-book. After reading it, I printed it and put it into a binder that I will keep on my shelf and refer to often.

At just $47 USD, this book is excellent value. I give it 10 out of 10.

Buy a copy of The Super Affiliate Handbook here


Thanks for reading.

Courtenay Pitcher, Aspiring Affiliate Marketer

Intoxicating Liquors Act Doesn’t Prevent Gray Monk Estate Winery From Marketing Online

Despite an eighty-two year old law that prevents cross-provincial shipping of wine in Canada, Gray Monk Estate Winery in Okanagan Centre, British Columbia is focusing more marketing dollars to Twitter, Facebook and on-line publications and cutting back on traditional marketing like magazines and newspapers.

Steven Heiss of Gray Monk Estate Winery says, “We are changing our focus. It’s instant, you don’t have to wait to get the information on line. Plus there is the green side of it too, saving some paper and ink.”

A prohibition law from 1928 called “The Importation of Intoxicating Liquors Act” means that it is illegal to cross-province ship wine (and other liquor) unless it is authorized by the receiving province’s liquor board. “If you look it up, you’ll have a good laugh.” says Heiss. The law didn’t used to be a problem until recently when the Alberta Liquor Board started making threats against BC Wineries. So Heiss is watching WineLaw.ca for updates on a solution, which doesn’t seem to be in sight.

“It’s a pain for tourists” he says. Tourists usually visit the winery, purchase wine and then, in the past, Gray Monk would ship it home to them so they didn’t have to crate it around on their trip.

Although shipping is up in the air, and this does effect on-line marketing, Heiss is working with a Kamloops marketing company to develop a new website, brochure and marketing plan. One topic that came up during strategizing was social media.

Now, they have a Gray Monk Estate Winery Facebook fan page and  have jumped onto Twitter (@GrayMonkWinery). Heiss jokes, “Even our Sales Rep Rainer Wilkins was asking about Twitter." Heiss has given Rainer access to the account to make updates also. 

“The hardest part is what to put on there. I always think to myself, nobody wants to know about that. I already know it, so I don’t think it will be interesting.” Heiss is watching what notable wine and food writers are tweeting like: @NatalieMaClean, Jim Martin (@MetroLiquor) and Tony Gismondi  (@TheSpitter). “I’m finding it interesting.” he says.

Gray Monk Estate Winery plans to participate in local on-line tourism marketing through Thompson Okanagan Tourism Association (@totamedia) and Tourism Kelowna. 

Many traditional marketing initiatives will continue. Chef Willi Franz (above) of the on-site Grapevine Restaurant is preparing a list of events for Gray Monk Estate Winery’s participation in the Okanagan Spring Wine Festival Apr 30-May 9, 2010. Those events will be announced in the upcoming weeks. Plus they will attend the Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Festival (delayed this year due to the Olympics) on April 23, 2010.

When I asked Steven Heiss for his official title, he said, “That’s a good question. Janitor to President as my dad would say. Or you could say Sales and Distribution.”

That’s a very humble statement from a third generation member of a very successful and respected wine-making family. His parents Trudy and George Heiss established the Gray Monk Estate Winery in 1972 and his grandparents started a vineyard, first, up the road. The family produces some of the world's finest wines from a breath-taking fifty acre vineyard overlooking Okanagan Lake. The Grapevine Restaurant has a seating capacity of 50 patrons. There is an on-site gift shop and wine tours. It seems to me, they have plenty interesting stuff to tweet about.

Thanks for reading!

Courtenay Pitcher, lover of anything Gray Monk and wine writer wannabe

Follow me on Twitter @vernongirl

 

From Florence to Facebook: Calgary leather handbag designer's career is launched

 

Sabra Mottram is a Designer who makes earrings, cuffs, one of a kind handbags and moccasins out of leather. She launched her design career, Sabra Mottram Designs, a little over one year ago on Facebook. She says, "I started off displaying the things I make on Facebook for my own satisfaction in an album called: Things I Make. I made a bag for a friend on her birthday. Friends of mine would say, "I want one." The more bags that I put up on Facebook, the more orders I got." Now, she has a website, Facebook Fan page, Twitter account and blog. Avenue Magazine, last October, featured a bag of Sabra's as part of the Style section. Calgary Fashion has accepted her as one of their top designers. (Pictured above: Littlest Hobo Airporting Bag by Sabra Mottram Designs. Photo credit: Sanja Lukač)

In 2010 she plans to be part of Alberta Fashion Week and Vancouver Fashion week. "I will have two launches this year. I am going to be adding some clothing to my collection. Most likely some leather, but other fashions as well. The clothing line will be extremely small to start, but it will grow." she says.

Sabra Mottram's current collection is the Fall/Winter 2009 Collection. She hopped a plane in Calgary last Fall and flew to Italy where she hand picked the leather hides at Primorepelli, a leather distributor in Fucecchio (about half an hour from Florence) in the heart of the tannery district of Tuscany where fine Italian leather comes from.

"I picked good Fall/Winter colours I like and staples like black. After my trip to Italy I came up with new designs and decided to change the style of the bags slightly. I created three new patterns, cut out templates and starting sewing. I made a Hard Bag Overnighter style, Saddle Bag style and a completely Hard Bag which is a men's style. I also use Lindsey handbags which are Tandy Kits I stamp and carve myself with designs I make or use stencils for." she says.

(Pictured above: Swallow Lindsey handbag with custom design by Sabra Mottram Designs. Photo credit: Sanja Lukač)

The collection has a lot of appliques, which is the biggest change from the last collection. The collection was inspired by Nice, France and Pisa near Florence, Italy. Sabra says, "I went to Pisa and looked at the architecture in Florence. The architecture was classic looking and there was lots of French influence. I started the collection with one I made for myself, the Fleur de Lis of Florence. It has Fleur de Lis pull tags for the zippers and a large Florence Fleur de Lis on the side of the bag. It is named in French because I was going to France and Italy. I kind of tie things together."

 

(Pictured above: Larsen B Saddlebag by Sabra Mottram Designs. Photo credit: Sabra Mottram Designs)

All of her bags are named by their unique attributes. For example, she made a bag with white patent leather with holes and a turquoise back side. It reminded her of the Larsen B Ice Shelf that dissolved recently. It comes with wooden nautical-looking accoutrements for the zipper pulls.

She purchases all the material for the satin and lace interior linings of her handbags in Calgary. She  chooses lace that accentuates the satin and buys enough satin lining for two or three bags only. "I don't purchase too many materials at once because I do things as one of a kind, so it doesn't go out of fashion. I get bored with styles rather quickly." she says.

Most of her bags have been sold to friends and family, but recently a Calgary Flames player's wife purchased one and and she sold two custom ordered bags to a company as parting gifts for two male employees. "I had one men's bag already made, and I got the call. I asked the client what the bags were for and she told me she wanted a unique one of a kind gift. I ran to Tandy to purchase some leather that was more metropolitan and less rustic to show her. She ordered two."

Sabra has received many orders through Facebook from friends and family. Sabra remarks, "People want to buy local and from people they know. They like to support the Arts Community in Calgary, small endeavours, and the barter system."

Using Facebook, she announces art and fashion shows that she is at or is involved in. "Facebook events are easy because I can upload a picture, give all the details and send it out to everyone in my Facebook, as well as people in my email who are not on Facebook."

She has a Facebook Fan Page for Sabra Mottram Designs in addition to her personal page, which is only for close friends and family. "I have 51 fans. It has brought people from the public into my circle who are not my friends or family. They are friends of friends who I wouldn't normally have access to."

The barter system also works for Sabra. She put a request to exchange photography for a handbag on Facebook. "I got 5 replies immediately and the first I liked I went with." she says.

Using iWeb on her Mac laptop, Sabra created her website through painstaking hours of trial and error. The website features a Gallery to view her handbags in a slideshow format and Shop where purchases can be made by Paypal. Instead of going through MobileMe for hosting, she purchased hosting through Go Daddy. The clean design templates of iWeb suited her style and matched her brand which is her SM signature stamped on all tags and dust jackets for each handbag hand-sewn by her. Every bag is named individually, so it is a one of a kind collector's item. "Most designers use their name as their brand." she says.

Her fan page on Facebook automatically updates her Twitter. If she posts photos to her Fan Page on Facebook, a tweet is sent. For example: I posted 13 photos on Facebook in the album "AW09" http://bit.ly/8YdHw.

Fearless in the social media realm, she just launched Sabra Mottram Design's Blog on Wordpress  discussing the archaeology of style. Sabra is a University of Calgary graduate with a B. Sc. in Archaeology. She says. "Nothing is really an original idea in reality. Styles change through time, they come and go, ballooning out like a battleship curve and then fading away again. You can see aspects of certain styles that have carried through more than just costuming, but in small elements as well."

Sabra's designs are featured on a blog for a store called Worth. She keeps the bags in that store to sell at retail but if one sells through Facebook or other methods, she can pull them out any time because they are on consignment.

"When I was a little girl, I was sick a lot, so I used to stay at home with my mom. My mom taught me how to use a sewing machine.I always wanted to make drawstring handbags like Polly Pocket or Anne of Green Gables. I stopped sewing things for a while because I had so many problems with the bobbins. Instead, I began to bead things and make costumes from scratch." she says.

Sabra was an Account Manager for a sub-prime lender up until about a year and a half ago. When the financial crises hit, she was laid off immediately. She took a watercolour painting class, woodworking class and ceramics class. She says, "My creativity spilled out into new areas where I wanted to work with leather. My grandfather on my mom's side was a leather saddle maker, and on my other side of the family, the Mottrams, they were leather makers. I bought a turquoise deer hide to make a vest and couldn't find a pattern I liked, so I got bored and decided to turn it into a handbag. My friends on Facebook wanted me to make them one."

Sabra follows Fashion Television on Twitter so Jeanne Beker will some day find out about her. There is lots on the horizon, so it's really exciting. And this is just in one year. In three years, I'll be in London."

Sabra's website: http://sabramottramdesigns.ca/Sabra_Mottram_Designs/Home.html

Sabra on Twitter: http://twitter.com/sabramottram

Sabra's Facebook Fan Page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Sabra-Mottram/117153635506

Thanks for reading!

Courtenay Pitcher, Sabra's biggest fan

Follow me on Twitter

Kelowna International Airport (YLW) takes flight with social media

Jenelle Turpin (pictured above with MP Ron Cannan in front of an Antonov) is the Airport Communications Coordinator, Community & Media Relations, for the Kelowna International Airport. She is at the forefront of her industry for using Twitter as a communications tool, pushing the envelope of this medium to make a difference in the government sector to the airport’s passengers and business tenants, the economic development of the Okanagan region and even brides and grooms who want to be married at the airport.

Her experience with traditional media, organizing events for dignitaries such as Wayne Gretzky, Desmond Tutu and Adrienne Clarkson and her determination to find a way to get the job done (learned while wearing Army boots), help her find and implement creative social media techniques like Twitter, Facebook and Flickr for public relations, airport communications, emergency response, marketing and customer service.

Before taking the leap into social media, Jenelle wrote up a social media plan. “I needed to explain it and get the buy-in from management which at the airport was an easy sell.” she says. She started Twitter on September 8, 2009 and her goal was to have one hundred followers by October 30^th, 2009. “By October 1^st I had my first one hundred followers. It’s a strange concept, this social media, it’s like you’re asking for stalkers. If I have five hundred I’ll be so excited. I think five hundred is a good sampling of people using the airport.”

Frustration with Facebook’s inability to provide customer service on setting up a simple fan page for the airport has moved her social media efforts into communicating in 140 characters on Twitter. Although she is disappointed in Facebook, who she has been emailing since September 2009 to get approval as an airport organization, and with no response from them, she likes using Twitter.

“I’m not promoting Facebook as much as Twitter. I’m surprised, because I wanted to focus on Facebook, but it’s not as easy or convenient. I like to explain things [she says putting the emphasis on explain, as if it’s a very long word]. I’m long-winded so it’s hard to explain in 140 characters. Writing on Twitter is still is a whole new culture and this is one portion of my job.” she remarks.

Jenelle says, “I saw not a negative side, but a surprising side of Twitter when we had an incident. A while ago, a Cessna crashed just outside the property at 9:59 a.m.. Thirty-one minutes later when I got back to my computer, I realized a media outlet had heard a radio transfer about the crash and they started tweeting at 9:59 a.m. Then others started tweeting. The media outlet suspected a death. It was twenty-five minutes before it was clarified by the same media outlet on site that there was no death or injuries. That can be dangerous, because what if the family saw that? In future I know to keep a closer eye on it. If I have a majour incident, I will have a staff person assigned just to watch social media outlets and get direction from me. If out of context they can let me know.”

Jenelle proves that social media really can build relationships. Jenelle was seeing complaining tweets from an influential person who follows the wine industry quite closely, about flying in general. “I tweeted to her that there is wine tasting in the wine shop or she could buy a flight of wine at the Wine Café – a new expansion we added in. She was much happier and it turned a negative into a positive.”

“I try to follow every one of the airports we fly to [on Twitter], all airlines as well as other airports to see what they’re up to. Horizon Air, Air Canada and Westjet promote their last minute deals.” she says. She tweets those out to give added customer service to people thinking of flying who want to get the last minute deals.

She communicates with other airports on Twitter. One day the weather was bad and snowing in Calgary and flights were delayed. “I sent a tweet to one of my contacts at the Calgary airport and within moments he posted photos to Flickr. I was able to tweet out links to those pictures that explained the reason the flights were late coming from Calgary.

If I notice people talking on Twitter, I see how flights are running. I will tell them if they are late or on time and remind them that if they are picking people up or dropping off that there is free fifteen minute parking in the short term parking lot. I will tell them if it’s raining or cold to remember the free courtesy ride to the terminal when parking in the long term lot. And with the holiday season what they can or can’t take on the flights, packing smart links, and shuttle rides right from Penticton, Salmon Arm and other locations.”

Jenelle uses Twitter to send media releases. “Media are great ones to follow and they follow me. Don’t just send your media release out by fax or email, but link them and have an attachment on Twitter.” she says

Jenelle will also take photos of their new gift shops and drag them onto Tweetdeck.  And she tweets out links to their Kelowna International Airport Magazine YLW Connection.

In traditional media for years, Jenelle began her career with the Military Police. She was with them for six years and she found herself speaking to school and youth groups and doing many public relations related roles with the military. That positivity appealed to her so she did some research and determined to take a career path that would offer her the chance to make a difference. She then became Public Affairs Officer.

When she was with the Edmonton Army/Airforce base, which was becoming the western headquarters for the Army, the business community tapped into her military knowledge. She said, “I found there was great opportunity to work in business. I was expecting my first child. Wearing army boots and going away for six months didn’t appeal to me.”

After ten years with the military, she began working for the Alberta government gaming and liquor commission and later worked for the Edmonton Mayor’s office in Corporate Communications. Her role involved looking after special events like Desmond Tutu’s visit to Edmonton, Adrienne Clarkson’s inaugural visit to the City of Edmonton as Governor General and the retirement ceremonies of Wayne Gretzky. Little did she know that the Wayne Gretzky event would see 10,000 people and lots of national media coverage.

Her proudest moment was her role in the Desmond Tutu event. All of the events planned for his visit were paid venues. The Edmonton Mayor at the time wanted Desmond Tutu to hold a public event. So Jenelle proposed the idea to invite school children to ask questions to the Nobel peace prize winner. She said, “Questions were submitted and vetted, and they would get up to the microphone and ask questions and Tutu would respond. He accepted only our idea and ours was the only free event to the public. It was a phenomenal event. School children across the city were invited.”

(photo above: Jenelle Turpin at a Valley Wide Chamber event promoting the Kelowna International Airport)

With family obligations in Kelowna, she later returned to Kelowna where she had grown up in her teen years. “I’ve been really fortunate. I did a stint with Tourism Kelowna / Kelowna Chamber and then Pacific Safety Products in public relations, marketing and sales. It was a great opportunity to see what a publicly traded company goes through. But my passion has always been in government.” she says.

About six years ago she landed a short-term contract with Kelowna City Hall which led to a full-time permanent position and then now into her permanent role with the Kelowna International Airport for the past three years.

“The travel industry is constantly changing. I work with three levels of government and the business community who are our tenants. We need them and they need us. For example, Kelowna Flightcraft brings in revenue and employment. When we extended the runway, the Antonov (in this case the world's second largest fixed-wing aircraft) flew non-stop from Russia containing 3 helicopters that needed to be retrofitted. That couldn’t have happened if the runway couldn’t have been extended.

We also have our passengers. They live here [in the Okanagan] for the lifestyle, but they work elsewhere. One point four million passengers go through Kelowna International Airport in one year. Only fifty percent are from Kelowna. The rest are from the catchment area of the interior including Kamloops, Revelstoke and Penticton.

Many go at 6:00 a.m. Monday to Seattle or Calgary, working the week, and then coming home Friday.” Jenelle says. One passenger lives in Penticton and her husband works in South Africa for three months. Even Jenelle’s spouse was working one month in Kelowna and one month in London. “We have the best of both worlds. It wouldn’t be so easy if we lived far away from the airport.”

In January, Kelowna International Airport will be hosting two weddings right at the airport on the mezzanine level. Jenelle says, “In early January, one couple wants to get married here before they fly to Mexico. The couple says that it’s easier to get married here, so they are bringing the Minister in front of twenty friends and family at 6:30 in the morning to toast to coffee and Timbits and then catching their departure at 8:00 a.m. The bride will wear her veil, but the full ceremony, event and costumes will be in Mexico. Usually it’s a happy place. You occasionally see sad. Every day, I see families saying hello or goodbye and they are crying. Sometimes I walk up to my office with tears in my eyes.” (If you’re a chick, this is a good thing.)

Jenelle is a graduate of Grant McEwan University and a member of the International Association of Business Communicators, BC chapter. She says, “It’s a great organization of communicators.”

Thanks for reading! I look forward to your comments on this article.

Courtenay Pitcher, Travel wannabe and Social media maven

Find me on Twitter