Participate in Community Blogs

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To gain more name recognition for your company and actively participate in your community, consider writing on your local newspaper’s blog. I write as MarketingAction on placeropolis.com a web site maintained by Gold Country Media featuring the Loomis News and other area publications. I report on community news, submit photos, post the marketing class I teach, promote community organizations and make other comments on country living.

On page 6 of the Nov.27, 2008 Loomis News, a cropped 9 x 4 photo that I took at Folsom Lake was featured. The newspaper picked up my photo from the online posting. The original picture was posted at: http://www.theloomisnews.com/detail/99579.html?content_class=2&sub_type=photos&town_id=13

You can see my other posts at http://www.placeropolis.com/user_profile.html?view=4637 The most popular, with over 1900 views, was about local berry picking and other news bites. Occasionally what is written in a blog may be used as a story idea by the publication editors. There are over 6800 users on placeropolis.com.

Make personalized ecards

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I tried Smilebsox to make an ecard using some recent photographs I’d taken including the wild turkeys seen here. The web site is not nearly as intuitive as the wonderful Flip Video Camera reviewed below but it is still pretty easy to use. I got stuck trying to figure out how to add multiple photos until I realized that there was a tab on the right where you choose how many photos you want to use. And there isn’t an obvious button to turn the card off. It was good to have a way to share the shots I’ve been taking on recent hikes. And it is an interesting way to keep in touch with clients and associates.

Surveymonkey.com a quick way to gather information

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Several of my clients are currently using surveymonkey.com to gather information important to their organizations. One has asked employees to confidentially give input to help with strategic planning for 2009. The other asked advisory committee members in which way they may be able to contribute to the program. Both saved the managers’ time by gathering needed information from participants and posting results in one place.

This is a free program or can be subscribed to for less than $20 per month to take advantage of convenient downloads and other services.

The only downside that I have experienced was using surveymonkey.com to directly email out a customer survey rather than have the client email it to customers. The one sent out by surveymonkey.com was blocked by many systems.