Meet CWS: Elijah Parker

Posted on January 19, 2012 by Sheryl Barlow

Name: Elijah Parker

Tell us what you’re busy doing at CWS:  Programming and learning new things!

Describe Yourself Using One Word:  Visionary

Hometown:  Minneapolis, MN

Family:  Married to my beautiful wife, Jackie, and we’re expecting our first baby any day!

Hobbies/Interests:  Photography, Travel, Birding, Adventure, Unicycling, Web Design, Electronic Design (just launched my first product! www.timelapseplus.com)

Favorite Sports Team(s):  I’ve never been interested in sports

Famous Person You’d Like to Meet:  Alvaro Uribe 

Something You’d Like to Learn to Do:  Make iPhone apps

Favorite Website: news.google.com and sparkfun.com

Favorite Travel Destination:  I’m not sure what my favorite would be — I love traveling to remote places. Recently I returned from a two-month trip to Colombia where I was director of photography for a feature film.

Last “Gadget” You Purchased:  Zoom H1 portable audio recorder (it was actually a gift…I’m not sure what I last bought)

Favorite Book:  Usually reference books and the Bible

Favorite Food:  Sushi (Nigiri, don), and a close second would be Thai red curry

Favorite Movie:  Not really into movies, but maybe Man from Snowy River

 

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Is Your Company Being Social?

Posted on January 16, 2012 by Jonny Yucuis

I signed up for Facebook my freshman year of college. When I did, never did I think that a website college students were using for clever status updates and funny (sometime terribly thought out) photo albums could have such a massive potential for marketing a business.   But here we are, just 8 years since Facebook launched and I doubt you’ll find a marketer that still believes this whole Facebook thing is just as much of a fad as fanny packs.

Just listening to Facebook statistics can be a little mind boggling.  For instance there are over 800 million users.   There are more than 900 million objects that people interact with including business pages, groups, events, etc.  And 1 out of every 8 minutes online is spent on Facebook!

That being said, I challenge you to ask yourself, “Is my company being social?”  Social media marketing can seem like a daunting task if you don’t know where to start.  Thus, as former Marketing & Social Media intern and newly appointed Marketing & Social Media Strategist (they’re still calling me Jonny the Intern) I would like to help with those first steps into social media marketing.

I personally recommend that your first step be getting to know social media.  How to use it, where to use it, why use it.   Over the upcoming months we will be presenting a 4 part YouTube series on social media marketing.  We started the first video with the king of social media: Facebook.

Watch the video below then head over to the CWS Facebook page to let us know what you think or ask a question on our wall.

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Don’t Let This Happen to You

Posted on January 4, 2012 by Alan De Keyrel

Every now and then I get caught up in working “in” my business instead of “on” my business. You know, those times where you seem to be focusing on putting out fire after fire instead of the things which are really important. Usually, it takes some sort of revelation to realize that you’ve messed up and gotten off track.

That happened to me three weeks ago.

You see, we’ve been in the process of recruiting some really amazing talent here at CWS. I truly believe that finding and retaining top talent will be the key to our success over the next three to five years. However, I started to hear the following words from more than one of our new hires:

“After pulling up your website, I almost didn’t apply!” They would then explain to me that after visiting our office for the interview they felt much better about the opportunity and had confidence that we were a great company.

Here we are, a web company, and our own website was turning away potential candidates!?!? I even dedicated an entire chapter in my book, JOBLESS, entitled; If Your Website Sucks-So Do You!  ”How could this happen?” I thought.

Easy, I lost focus of what was important.

Old vs New Website

It’s easy to ignore your own website. After all, it seems like just yesterday that you did a re-design, right? Well, unfortunately, it’s been 3-4 years now and in the web world that’s a really long time. To add to the problem, we get caught up in the day-to-day operations of the business and forget all about it. Next thing you know it’s 2012 and your website sucks.

So, as we enter 2012 I encourage you to ask yourself…”What things in your business have you neglected for too long?” What are those things which are NOT URGENT but IMPORTANT that you should be attending to? If you’re like me, you have more than one and it’s probably hurting your business. Take action and start working on them today. Set a goal and get it done this month… it’s probably easier than you think.

As for our new site. We took action and it is now done. We invite you to check it out and wish you great success in tackling your 2012 priorities.

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Launch: Rochester Public Utilities

Posted on January 4, 2012 by Sheryl Barlow

CWS is proud to announce the launch of the new Rochester Public Utilities (RPU) website.

The goal was to update the look of the site and organize the large amount of information available for RPU customers. Google Analytics data on the original RPU site revealed the most-visited areas. RPU wanted to make these popular areas easier to access, like the RPU bill pay. Additionally, they wanted customers to be able to easily find information in the event of a power outage.

The new site contains visible social media links, inviting customers to conect to RPU’s social media outlets for up-to-date information, to connect and to comment.

CWS Designer, Chris Kostelec, headed up the redesign and development of the site.

Congratulations to RPU on the launch of their new website!

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And the Winner is…..

Posted on January 4, 2012 by Sheryl Barlow

Lisa Reicks and Gary Polikowsky; these two Rochester residents were the winners of The Rochester International Airport’s (RST) ”FLY FREE WITH RST” contest. We blogged about this contest while it was running but wanted to do a quick follow up with the results. Besides making a couple of randomly drawn contestants quite happy just days before the holidays, this was also an example of a highly successful contest using Facebook as the primary means of entry.

Contestants were directed to go to RST’s Facebook Page and fill out a simple entry form for a chance to win free air fare from American Airlines or Delta Airlines. CWS worked with RST to ensure all proper Facebook contest guidelines were followed.

The proof was in the analysis of RST’s Facebook Insights (Statistics.)
1. 1427 entries were received. (A nice list RST now has and could use to market to in the future.)
2. Likes increase 138% over the 8 weeks of the contest, to just under 1000.
3. People “talking about RST’s page” increased 374%.

Congratulations to The Rochester International Airport on conducting an extremely well-done social media contest!

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Meet CWS: Eric Reynolds

Posted on December 20, 2011 by Sheryl Barlow

Name:  Eric Reynolds

Tell us what you’re busy doing at CWS:   Programming, SEO, Client Relations

Describe Yourself Using One Word:   Loyal

Hometown: Wheeling IL

Family:   Wife, 4 cats and 2 fish

Hobbies/Interests:    Photography, Hiking, Travel, Guitar

Favorite Sports Team(s):   Go Bears

Famous Person You’d Like to Meet:    Leonardo Da Vinci

Something You’d Like to Learn to Do:  Play the Free Bird solo on my guitar

Favorite Website:   Too may good ones to list, but I waste a lot of time at home on peopleofwalmart  and lamebook.

Favorite Travel Destination:   Massachusetts

Last “Gadget” You Purchased:   iPhone

Favorite Book:   Lord of the Rings

Favorite Food:   Fresh Seafood

Favorite Movie:   Dark Knight or Lord of the Rings

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Meet CWS: Theresa Tucker

Posted on December 20, 2011 by Sheryl Barlow

Name:   Theresa Tucker

Tell us what you’re busy doing at CWS:   Web programming

Describe Yourself Using One Word:   Tenacious

Hometown:   Since 1981 -Austin, Mn

Family:   I am married 27 years to my husband, Troy, have 3 children; (Jenny, daughter 26, Staci, daughter 24, and Brad, son 21). Both of my girls are married to great guys and I have a granddaughter Ellie, who is a year and a half.

Hobbies/Interests:   Cooking,  music,  sports, travel

Favorite Sports Team(s):   (Hurts to say it right now) MN Vikings, Twins

Famous Person You’d Like to Meet:   Oprah

Something You’d Like to Learn to Do:   Play piano

Favorite Website:   Facebook

Favorite Travel Destination:   Dominican Republic

Last “Gadget” You Purchased:  Samsung Galaxy S II

Favorite Book:   Mystery novels

Favorite Food:   Chinese

Favorite Movie:   Thelma & Louise

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2011 CWS Holiday Hours

Posted on December 20, 2011 by Sheryl Barlow

The CWS offices will be officially closed on Monday, December 26 and Monday, January 2 in observance of the Holidays.

For any urgent requests during the holidays, please call our main line at 1-888-426-7793 and leave a message, which will be forwarded to our support team.

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The New Facebook Insights. Content is King.

Posted on December 6, 2011 by Sheryl Barlow

800 million users and 1 trillion page views per month; these are the most recent figures on the number of Facebook users and their activity. Business owners now more than ever need to understand these users and how they interact with posts.

The latest changes in Facebook Insights (stats on usage) are a big step forward in helping businesses understand the impact their content has on followers, emphasizing the importance of engaging content.

I still view the old style of insights (still accessible on the right side of your Facebook page) but spend more time with the new Insights that report:

Total Likes. The total number of unique people who Like your Page.

Friends of Fans. The number of people who are friends with your Fans. The total number of people you could potentially reach if all of your Fans were talking about your business.

People Talking About This. The number of people who have engaged with your page in some form in the last 7 days. This could include Likes, comments or shares of a post, tagging your page in an update or photo, responding to an event on your page or checking in.

Weekly Total Reach. The number of unique people who have seen content associated with your Page — including any Ads or Sponsored Stories pointing to your Page — in the last 7 days.

You can have 1000’s of followers, but if they aren’t commenting, sharing, or engaging in your content, the job is only half done.  These new insights measure how your content has been distributed, which is the whole point of social media.

Examples of Great Posts by Local Companies

It all comes down to posting relevant content so think about your strategy. Post a question, like The Rochester International Airport did with this post and received 11 comments. That’s great engagement. 

Or post something that might be shared, like the University of Minnesota Rochester did by posting a video of a flash mob at the Twin Cities campus.

As it turns out content is still king. This holds true with your Facebook posts. The new Insights are proof of that. Happy posting!

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Launch: Somerby Golf Community

Posted on December 6, 2011 by Sheryl Barlow

CWS is proud to announce the launch of the new Somerby Golf Community website.

The goal was to update the site and provide more visuals. Somerby wanted to portray a lifestyle that’s more than golf. They wanted to depict what Somerby has to offer for the entire family. Another goal was to incorporate and update the Edina Team and the real estate offerings at Somerby.

With such beautiful imagery and photos, CWS web designer, Joe Milbach, used photos as a primary focus. The photos capture the homes, clubhouse, activities, family, golf, beautiful scenery and the community.

CWS Programmers, Steven Kallstrom and Theresa Tucker, are contributing to the project by building the interactive mapping tool for the neighborhoods and real estate section.

Because Somerby has several points and reasons for contact; golf, membership, weddings, business meetings, real estate and club activities, it was important to have contact information and registration forms throughout the site.

Congratulations to Somerby Golf Community on the launch of their beautiful new website.

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