helpful tips and fun websites to visit, plus freebies online fresh inspiration from unexpected places, like candles, a wedding invitation, and a notecard a new book deserves a fitting cover Tackling fear of creating original art and other thoughts from Candy marketing tip for boosting sales during the holidays and an odd photo just for fun
A monthly newsletter of marketing ideas, photos, and fun.
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THE REVIEW candyrice design
holidays are near! good things for you and your customers
2: 11 : 09
Helpful Tips & Freebies Rethink Mobile Ads A recent study by online advertising network Chitika comparing mobile vs. non-mobile internet usage found that mobile surfers are HALF AS LIKELY to click on an advertisement as nonmobile surfers. So while there is huge potential for marketing in this medium, click-based efforts are probably not going to work as well. Consider simple coupon or first-come, first-served efforts for mobile surfers instead. Top 50 Websites Professionals Use This list of most-visited sites by web professionals is from an article in the November 2009 issue of Website Magazine. Google ranked #1, followed by Yahoo! and Facebook in 2nd and 3rd places, respectively. Other notables include Twitter at #12, Squidoo at #28, StumbleUpon at #42, and SnagAJob at #49. I’ve posted the full list on my site if you want to read more.
Website Templates Are you a website do-it-yourselfer? If so, you’ll enjoy the templates at TemplateRover. I’m not at all affiliated with this company, but you can find some lovely HTML, CSS, Flash, and other templates on this site. Most of the templates start around $50. If you’re a website designer, you might appreciate the $99/year access to all of their templates. Email Marketing Services Constant Contact is one of the leading companies in this field, and I usually recommend it for my clients. However, another company providing similar capabilities is MailChimp. The pricing is the same as Constant Contact, with one exception that business owners with fewer than 500 emails in the database will love: a free plan!
Freebies Here are some other free items I found this month on Facebook and other websites. Get a free Bloomin’ Onion at Outback Steakhouse when you become one of their first 500,000 Facebook fans. Get 20 free Indie Spotlight songs when you become an iTunes Facebook fan. Get a free download of Martha Stewart’s Thanksgiving Hotline Cookbook from Sirius Radio. Get a free travel-size Rosemary Mint Hand and Body Wash from Aveda. We love to help our clients! There are many other ways to do this. Want more ideas or help with getting new clients? We can help! Call us today!
holidays are near! good things for you and your customers
a
We had a great time creating this book cover for Don Raun, one of the authors at Minnesotabased Bible Alive Ministries. The book was Don’s second on the topic of helping Evangelicals understand Muslims in America by this author, and we were pleased to be tapped for this project after having designed the first book’s cover. The design needed to visually illustrate dawn over a Minnesota landscape, juxtaposed against the traditional garments of a Muslim man. In addition, the visual elements needed to appeal to an older reader. We think simplicity is elegant, and chose to very simply combine these elements for this project. This project utilized just two of the many services we offer to our clients and we’re excited about the outcome and happy to add this design to our portfolio. We wish Don and Bible Alive Ministries great success with this latest book!
Featured project Client: Don Raun Bible Alive Ministries, Minnesota
Solutions Provided: • Design Services • Photography Services
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lifegoing on misgivings about its “coolness,” I have decided that it is good enough as it stands, and you know what? Immediately after I decided to let the piece be what it was, a flood of ideas for other art pieces rushed in! I’m so excited to explore this new track and am looking forward to the day when I can overcome my last “art” hurdle and actually show my pieces to the wider world! As always, we’d love to know what you’re thinking about. Have some questions? Feel free to email them to us at candy@ candyrice.com and we’ll do our best to answer them! Photo by Sohi Photography.
October I’ve been reading a lot lately, and am thrilled to have just received a new subscription to How magazine! Geared toward designers, this magazine is chock full of designs, articles, and new kinds of paper, each of which have set my brain in high gear with ideas for projects. I love the way that something new and creative can conjure ideas, which then have the potential to become reality!
Shifting gears, it occurs to me that most of us love fun events, good deals, and thoughtful gifts. All of us small business owners should be thinking about ways to incorporate this common desire into our holiday push! What kinds of new products or services could you add to your mix as the holidays approach? What clever, cool, or gorgeous (preferably all three!) gift could you offer your clients to get them in the door?
My inspiration for the month came from many places, including designs featured in How magazine, a wedding invitation from a cousin-in-law, and some note cards given to me by a good friend. Other inspiration includes the cabin we spent I have to confess something: I’ve spent a long weekend at in the mountains much of my life afraid to create original recently and a super-cool art piece one art, letting that invidious voice in my of my clients sells at her antiques store. head keep repeating that I “can’t draw,” am not “original,” and don’t know what’s With Thanksgiving just around the “cool.” corner, let’s all take some time to be But no more! I have finally gathered my actively grateful for the wonderful courage in both hands and have created things in our lives as we savor the tastes my first art piece! While I still have some of the holiday season!
thoughts “If
you
want
to
leave
your
footprints on the sands
of
time,
you’d better be wearing
work
shoes.” ~Murphy’s Law
my fresh inspiration
1 cover : Antiques, Colorado a : Embellishments on wood, Colorado all photographs by candy rice 1 : Cabin near Salida, Colorado 2 : You are Beauty full, Old Glory Antiques 3 : Wedding invitation 4 : A bite of snow, Colorado 5 : Notecard, www.storypeople.com 6 : Beautiful vintage pieces, Old Glory Antiques 7 : Illume Candles, www.illumecandles.com
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marketing tip
Cheer-in the Holidays!
Excerpts from an article by Karen Talavera at MarketingProfs. “The pumpkins come out, Think about special ways you can cheer-in your clients!
-Invisible man- who paints himself to blend into his environment, from The Daily Heller.
the days grow shorter, the weather cools, and there’s no mistaking that the holiday season is upon us,” says Karen Talavera in an article at MarketingProfs (read the entire article). And though marketers face the challenge of lingering recession worries, you can still add holiday sparkle to a subscriber’s inbox, Talavera points out. Among her suggestions for making spirits bright: Give your customer a gift. “What immediate nonpurchase-related value can you offer for free?” asks Talavera. “How about some cheer, as Office Max has done for several years running with its ‘Elf Yourself’ program? Or better yet, feature ... relevant and helpful content such as recipes, shopping tips, or ideas for a new holiday tradition.”
We love puzzles, cartoons, and funny photos. Watch this section each month for something new to do or laugh at.
303.947.5527 www.candyrice.com : candy@candyrice.com 12304 north bannock street, #19103 | westminster, co 80234
Draw her in with an intriguing tale. Consider a special newsletter series that tells a story about your company or product; or one that gives specific gift suggestions each week for the people in a customer’s life—from parents to a boss. “Provided you don’t go overboard with frequency,” notes Talavera, “subscribers love a limited-time email series because it clarifies and manages their expectations from the start and promises not to go on indefinitely.” Reward him for shopping online. Lure customers to your website with incentives like Internet-only promotions and inventory they won’t find in your brick-and-mortar store. Keep the party going! “Remember that you can issue post-holiday rewards for holiday-period purchases,” Talavera reminds us. “That strategy prevents erosion of holiday sales margins while igniting postholiday sales during typically slow periods.”