Shout Out for Doug's Tuned In Calculator

I work with Doug Karr, who has so much enthusiasm and creativity, it spills out of his office and every now and then I'm fortunate enough to soak up a little. Admittedly, Doug likes to plan, model, ponder and create and has a great number of ideas 90% completed and he can't remember them all! In a flurry of genius, Doug recently created (and finished) the Tuned In Calculator which has garnered a bit of interest. To help him celebrate this achievement, I invite you to check it out. Here's the result on this blog:

Start up impressions - working for a young technology company

I'm going to try to keep more content coming in to this space on a more regular basis, some topics may just be about "me" while others may take on a more work - life - hobbies tone.

I've been with my new employer for three months now, well into my initiation period. I now see my contributions making a difference (in a small company most everything makes a difference in some way!). Our management team had a good conversation today about the future of the company (we get together every two weeks for financial and strategy sessions) and I truly appreciate the amount of involvement I have with these decisions. There are moments when I want things to happen much more quickly, though. That's my impatient side coming through and I tend to ignore the guy on my other shoulder whispering "you better watch what you ask for!"

Safe landing at Patronpath

So I did it! I'm now director of marketing for Patronpath, provider of marketing and e-commerce solutions for the restaurant industry. (Actually I stared about a month ago, I've just been late in posting about it!) I happen to be working with Douglas Karr, a great marketing and technology wizard who is active in the Indianapolis blogging scene. My days are spent developing and implementing marketing strategies to help this small, young company build a strong, sustainable and growing customer base.

Currently seeking job opportunities

What a great experience at Compendium! Now I'm on to other exciting opportunities and would love to share my experience and know-how with your company. Please see my profile by clicking on the image below, or contact me directly.

This topic now on hiatus; new adventure begins.

So I enjoy the idea of blogging so much I have now turned my profession towards helping corporations use blogs to most effectively communicate with their customers. I'll still be blogging, though it'll be a Compendium blog, and hopefully at some point I'll dedicate this space to another topic. I'm very happy to be starting this new adventure, wish me luck! Cheers.

Ensuring your customers find you . . .

It's well known that the number one customer acquisition tool for traditional retailers is drive-by, that is, customers find you by driving by your location. But what happens if they're on the internet and want to find you? One way is to provide a map, with the goal of driving traffic to your retail location. This is very common as well and today I learned the power of the Google Map API. Without some intermediate level of programming expertise, you'll want to outsource this function. Today I was in a team meeting speaking to such a programmer who opened my eyes to the power of Google Maps. What a great tool for retailers! To make it even easier to "find a location near you" we talked about a way the interface can automatically display the closest locations based on the users originating IP address. Wow! So now when asked "how did you find us?" the answer more and more will be "I was just surfing by!"

Finding a niche

So what do I know? One option was to blog about my daily personal life (boring!). Another was to simply provide reviews of sites I visit and books I read, mostly about technology and business. Then I thought, well what do I know? I'm lucky enough to have a job where I can thrive doing what I love, using technology to help business owners market their customer experience, products and services. How do I do that? Let's find out together. I do a lot of research on current trends that I'll share and I'll also relate to you what's currently working and not working, where I've been and where I'm going along the tech trail.

I happen to apply my knowledge professionally at the company headquarters of the retail franchise Wild Birds Unlimited, therefore many posts will pertain to the franchise business, bird feeding and bird watching. You'd be amazed at how technology has transformed our business of supporting our independent business owners, how they can market their business using technology and how their customers use tech in bird feeding and bird watching.

What kind of readers am I looking for? Small business owners looking to improve using technology with a focus on franchise businesses, franchised and independent bird feeding and bird watching specialty store owners, and customers or fans of this business that might take an interest in how technology ultimately affects their shopping experience. Let's go!