The Artist Within

Last weekend, I was lucky to spend some quality time with friends from high school. We did a girls weekend in the windy city. One of our planned activities was to go to an art studio where you paint a picture following the lead of an instructor. Because of my job as a graphic designer, everyone assumed that my painting was going to be great and theirs was going to be less then stellar. Little did they know, they were about to find the artists within themselves.

We arrived at the studio to find easels with blank canvases lining the tables, gigantic bottles of paint with the colors of the rainbow and an eager instructor ready to guide us through the painting process. We all sat down and took out our brushes, ready to paint our pop art poppy flowers. And then, something awesome happened. Each one of my friends created their own piece of artwork that could be proudly displayed in their homes. Colors were mixed, textures were created and flowers appeared on the canvas. Each painting was unique, showing off the myriad of personalities in the group.

After we were finished painting, it occurred to me that every one of us is an artist in our own way. We have thoughts on color choices and brush techniques.  On a broader level, we have opinions on what we wear and how we decorate our homes. From this wonderful group of women, I was reminded that you don't have to be trained in fine arts to express yourself, you just have to give yourself a chance to find that creative side within.

Baby Mail

In this post, Ann Padley explores direct mail mistake #1: Having the wrong people on your mail list ...



My husband and I fit the young professional, career-loving demographic. We love to try new things, seek adventure and eat really good food. Now, I’ll get personal for a moment; we kind of have a “babies don’t travel well” mentality (i.e.: we’re good with a dog for now).

Now, to my point.


Two weeks ago I received a full box of baby formula in the mail (I’m told it has an estimated street value of $49). Yesterday I received my first of a 12-month subscription to American Baby magazine and a survey about my favorite baby products.


I get angry every time this happens (occupational hazard I suppose), “THEY ARE WASTING THEIR MARKETING DOLLARS!” While it’s true I’m the "demographic," this is not an acceptable excuse. (And, it became even less so when I found out BDC’s madrigal singing, fun-loving, college Freshman, summer intern is on the same mail list).


Now stop and think for a moment. Is this what is happening to your marketing dollars? Are you sending proverbial baby formula to college freshmen?


I went directly to the source – the United States Postal Service website - to find some handy direct mail tips to pass along to you. Here are a couple articles from their Deliver Magazine that might interest you:


10 Direct Mail Mistakes to Avoid (http://www.delivermagazine.com/2010/12/10-direct-mail-mistakes-to-avoid/ )


List Hygiene: Your Smartest Move (http://www.delivermagazine.com/2010/09/list-hygiene-your-smartest-move/)


- Ann

The Importance of Being You.

In this post, Matt Vanderlinden talks about why it's important for brands to be themselves...

There is no one in the entire world who’s more you than you. Obvious? Perhaps, but it’s certainly worth taking a second to explore. Especially when it’s put in the context of marketing a brand or a company. Organizations, after all, are just groups of people. And they’ll exhibit the same behaviors as the individuals who make them up. Bottom line, each organization is unique. It has its own history and its own personality. So why do so many companies try to look and sound like someone else?

I'm going on the record to say that companies need to be themselves. Talk in your own unique voice. Be you.

I’ve seen it time and time again over the course of my work life. Companies focus on features, specs, and price. That’s not to say that those things don’t matter to consumers. They certainly do. But what matters more is whether your customers connect with your brand. Whether they believe your brand is authentic. If they do, they’ll trust you, which leads to the only bastion of brand loyalty that’s left in today’s competitive landscape.

If your only advantage is price, your days are numbered.

Don’t believe me? Does anyone remember New Coke? You know, when Coke® decided it wanted to be Pepsi® for a while? That certainly went over well. If that’s not sufficient, let’s talk about Netflix® and that whole Qwikster® fiasco. Both are examples of brands forgetting who they are, and in so doing, losing a lot of their core customers. Why? Because they weren’t acting like the brands their customers knew and loved anymore. They weren’t authentic, and they lost their customers’ trust.

The good news is that consumers are extremely savvy. If your brand is the real deal, it’ll stand out from the posers pretty quickly. You just have to make sure that your marketing matches your brand’s behavior. Walk the walk, and be you. No one else can.

Love Your Data

Your business data is your business. Think about it: if you lost the list of customers that buy your products or services, the suppliers you work with, or the orders you’ve fulfilled in the past, how would that affect your business? ...

Do You Know Where Your Data Is?

Data comes in many forms. It can be the list of customers and their orders in a database. It can be the customer logo files your art department worked on. It might be the spreadsheet of items ordered from vendors that accounting keeps track of. Start by identifying what data you have in your company.

Where is your data stored? There are many options for storing data. It could be on a server that everyone has access to. It could be on an individual person’s computer, or a USB drive. Perhaps you’re keeping it on the internet, using a service like Google Docs or Office 365. Know where your data is stored.

Who’s keeping track of it? You should know what data you have, where it is, and make sure that information is available to key people. An intranet page or a SharePoint library are some examples of ways to keep track of this.

Is Your Data Safe?

If you had a warehouse of products, you’d make sure you protected it from disaster. You’d have locks on the doors, you’d know who was entering and leaving, you’d have fire extinguishers in the building, and you might even have a secondary location with a backup supply of products. How can you apply the same level of protection to your data?

Have security measures in place so that only people that need specific data have access to it. There is a greater danger of data theft from internal sources than external, such as hackers. Work with your IT staff to implement security on any digital content you have. If you have online accounts, make sure your passwords are strong, and that you aren’t giving them out to everyone. Simple measures like this can go far.

Another important strategy for your data is to have backups. This is especially important for electronic files and data. Electronic data isn’t quite the same as a factory full of nuts and bolts – you can’t call a supplier and order another round of customers. Make sure you have a solid backup plan in place.

Are You Using Your Data?

Data can do much for you than give you a list of customers to call, or supplies to re-order. When entered and analyzed properly, your data can help you spot trends, forecast future growth, and more.

There are simple, free analysis tools available. One example is your Facebook page. It has Insights built in. This tells you how many people like your page, how many views you’re getting each day, and how people are responding to content you’re posting. Another example is Google Analytics. This is a free website where you can analyze the traffic that is going to your website.

Are you analyzing the data you’ve collected to spot trends? Do you know who your top customers or contacts or? Where should you be investing research time and money? Reporting and analytics tools and software are available for you to view and evaluate all that data you’ve collected. Consider your business intelligence strategy as another tool in your business toolbox.

Ensuring that you know what data you have, where it is, and analyzing it will help your business grow and thrive.

Favorite apps

In this post, Blue Door Consulting's Heidi Strand asks for recommendations of apps that improve your life ...

Everyone has their tried-and-true apps; the ones they check frequently or rely on daily. Mine? BBC News, Pandora, iBooks, among a few others. But, the list is small. Even after hours and hours of restless searching, I'm at a loss and faced with a dilemma I'm hoping readers can assist with ...

What apps are truly worth paying for and downloading?

According to the study, created by Chetan Sharma Consulting, mobile app downloads are anticipated to reach almost 50 billion in 2012. Apple promotes it offers more than 500,000 in its store alone.

So, with all the choices available, which ones are truly beneficial? Call me pragmatic, but games simply don't cut it for me.

I want apps that improve my productivity, help me live life more fully and provide a purpose that is clearly value-added.

So, I'm reaching out to Blue Door Consulting's readership and asking the question:

What apps improve your life and why?

Please let me know and I'll check them out! Thanks.

Men in Kilts. Women in Technology. BDC's Jes Borland (and others) connect the dots.

In this TechTarget.com article, Blue Door Consulting Technical Consultant Jes Borland and other members of the Professional Association for SQL Server explain how men in kilts are helping spread an important message about women in technology ... http://searchsqlserver.techtarget.com/feature/Guys-sport-kilts-for-womens-cause-at-PASS-Summit

:) The emoticon

I'm guilty. I admit it. I use too many emoticons and I can't seem to stop. Whether it be texting or emailing, my need to express my facial feelings and emotions through cliche symbols is overwhelming ...

Apparently, I'm not alone and the emoticon has a history. Thankfully, not a torrid one. An article featured on Mashable.com today takes a brief, but interesting look at how today's emoticons came to be. From its inception in 1982, through tomorrow's stylized smiles, you'll think twice when adding that wink to your next phrase. Or, will you? ;)

For me, I can say it may inspire me to use them even more frequently now that there are emoticons for nearly every passing whim.

With that said ... there is still one good emoticon-use rule-of-thumb. If you have to put that :) face behind a sentence to ensure your recipient doesn't take your comment wrong ... you may want to reword or not send at all. Emoticons shouldn't replace rudeness; they should add to what you are trying to express.

:-)