It’s a funny thing that happens when a business is chugging along. Projects and product is moving, work comes walking through the door rather than chasing it – we’re on cruise control baby! Believe it or not there are perils in this situation, the difference between becoming a fat cat or a hungry hunter!

Don’t get me wrong, I might be mistaken calling it a “fat cat syndrome”, that would imply the person sits back, and prints money… not quite! A fat cat can also be someone so busy that they’ve quite chasing new business, the thing that guarantees a bright future! Why would I work on new business when I’m so busy with current business?!

I admit, I struggle with this myself! Luckily I’m reminded by annual slow periods that I have to prepare for. Working 12hrs a day is no excuse, you have time for the minimum you have to do, and it all comes down to a few things:

Reply to your email regularly.
It’s odd, but when I contact a busy business and I get a timely response I’m flattered! Don’t let your customer base think they are imposing on you for some of your time – give it to them! The best system is to clear your inbox in the morning, concentrate in the afternoon – whatever works!

Value past clients as much as future clients
Like any commodity, it’s easy to devalue your client commodity as its abundance goes up – it doesn’t work that way! If a client asks for advice after you’ve closed the project, give it to them. If a problem turns up with your product, drop everything and fix it! So many businesses take their clients for granted and think they could almost stand to lose a few! A free service to your client has huge value to your future business!

Make lists!
Sounds silly, but I can’t live without them, especially while we are concerned with the little things! My lists are broken up into two categories, “large projects” and “small tasks”. This is where finding time for the little things comes together. You have to take a break from any big job you do, the key is to jump to the small tasks between the large ones. By the end of the day you’ll be amazed at all you’ve accomplished! (According to my wife my list of the little things isn’t long enough

Force it
Sometimes you have to say “I don’t have time for this but it has got to be done”. What you paused will always get done. Do you think I have time for enewsletters?! Ha ha!

So, stay hungry and stay ahead! You may be comfortable cornering the market now, but someone is looking to take it away – so stay on top of things! Paranoia will take you far!

If you don’t read any further, check out this wiki: Guerrilla Marketing – it might lead you on an interesting quest… and I imagine I’ll lose half of you right now for good .

Guerrilla Marketing is basically creative marketing without boundaries of what you’d consider “regular advertising”. Think of it as the independent film of advertising – your way and on your terms. A sign company will tell you that you should put your logo on this sign at this size and in this place, when you might put your logo on the rear end of donkey standing in front of your business and get 1000x the reaction… however practical, you get the drift!

There are mild forms of guerrilla advertising all around us; the Little Caesar’s pizza kids on the side of the road holding a sign, garage sale signs on the boulevard, even the Manitoba CanadInns shining their spotlights into the sky – all the same, all creative, all a little different!

The internet as a constant source of invention and accessibility seems to be made for this type of advertising. Creativity is eliminating the need for large amounts of money with the addition of social networking, a perfect transmitter for those ideas – gasoline waiting for the next hot idea! We’ve all been drawn in by some “viral” piece of information and therefore continued to pass it on. Like I’ve mentioned before, referrals are cheaper than any form of marketing and social networking takes referrals to the extreme!

No detailed ideas today, I don’t want to ruin the fun! Replace the value of money with the value of an idea – heck, let’s just say it – your next gimmick! What can you do with what you have on hand to make the most impact?

You’ll find a lot of what I pass on is food for thought – designers and marketers have a lot of thoughts! You never know when they’ll come in handy!

A few weeks ago I mentioned a bang for your buck strategy is to direct your advertising to your core past customers rather than a shotgun public advertising campaign. Now twist that idea around and look at YOUR suppliers! Do they have a stake in your success? Any of them fall over themselves to schmooze you for next year’s account? Now you have someone to help pay your ad bill!

So how does this work? A tried and true user of this method is our local chamber of commerce. At least once a month they mail 800+ newsletters and give the option for members to insert a brochure into the same envelope for a fee MUCH MORE REASONABLE than a Canada Post direct mailing. The chamber pays for their distribution and advertisers penetrate their chamber members’ offices- win win!

So how do you implement this? Well, I won’t dissect any possible politics involved, for instance, you don’t want an advertiser duplicating or providing your service, but if you have a "links" section on your site you might have your call list.

What’s a good advertising medium? Start with your website. If any of my hosted clients charged only $10 PER MONTH for an ad, the annual hosting budget would be covered! Add a couple bucks and you can put in for the company Christmas party!

Think of this idea every time you advertise to the public, you might be able to do it for free!

I admit thoughts about the situation are still brewing for me just like everyone else, but some initial conclusions can be realized.

Daily news will still be found on the radio and in the newspaper- but you have to admit it’s not TV. Big losers are large local events like the Royal Manitoba Winter fair and out of town businesses invested in television advertising.  As a local view myself, I would count myself as someone who looked to CKX for both. I’m the type who only buys the Saturday paper and goes to the internet for radio. This summer I enjoyed the fact that CBC TV I watched at the cabin (where we only get 3 channels including CKX) was far away the best (tired of American news reporting?) and made my wife and I consistently consider cancelling our cable subscription back home. The combination of local TV and quality CBC programs are now gone.

So cut to the chase! What does this mean for advertisers and event promoters? What does this mean for local media consumers?

In my opinion, this makes the average Brandon or Westman resident more of an information seeker than simple receiver. Locals will have to actively pursue their information. At noon and 6 o’clock Brandonites won’t be able to sit on the couch, eat their food and passively watch the news. What’s going on in Brandon? What events are coming up?

So how will Westman find its information? I won’t account for every demographic, but for local information, this is my opinion:

- newspaper and radio will rule the day
- web will rule the night

Marketing as a whole will have to be unbelievably more creative locally than ever before, and for someone that serves all businesses with web and print design that do actively market themselves, it’s very interesting. How will Brandon businesses get their message out of the Brandon bubble? Small town newspapers should be on the ball to catch the dollars of businesses trying to reach surrounding areas. (Playing devil’s advocate, this situation could be very good news for Brandon’s surrounding towns trying to keep their local dollars local). Direct mail may even become a more popular avenue, but as you find yourself farther and farther from Brandon but within the trade area, I would be willing to bet the internet is one of the most valuable – and affordable – transmitter of information. .

This is also good news for Brandon’s local business on the web. The internet isn’t quite as passive as TV, but compared with the TV today, it’s a heck of a lot of fun. There are a lot of laptops on couches each night as people cruise their favourite sites while they ignore the tube – it’s focused and on demand. Have you seen the new ads for Microsoft’s “Bing”  search engine mentioning “search overload”? The way  Microsoft puts it, search overload is all the peripheral pages you find when you search for the one keyword you really want. The new popular keyword could be “Brandon”, and more than ever, local businesses should have their eye on appearing on that page.

From now on Brandon website owners should focus on a better representation of themselves, more complete information, and more current information. Websites, as always, should strive to take advantage of the web and all its technologies – why not still have your own video commercial?

Good luck CKX employees! Good luck as well to everyone who relied on a good local television station for their news, events and advertising. This is an unfolding story with much to think about, and I doubt this will be my last post regarding it!

Though I’d rather ramble on about Reaxion Graphics, I thought I’d mention a few web scams you need to know about! The problem with these scams are they aren’t technically illegal (not yet), which make them harder to point out!

1. Time to renew you listing in the #1 online directory.

This was a new one this week received by a client. The deal is, you are added to their “#1 online directory” without you knowing – which is fine, free advertising! – but call you and tell you your listing is expiring soon and will be $200 to renew! Don’t buy it! I imagine only someone not in the know and holding the company credit card would really fall for that one!

This scam came from a phone number 1-866-328-8551. Google that number and you will find any number of scams attached to it!
2. For $X.XX we can improve your search engine rank.

This one is a bit tougher and I’m sure many of you have received something like this. Yes, you can pay someone to improve you search engine optimization (seo) – I can help with that, and for the sake of capitalism, so can a lot of legit businesses, but you have to do your homework. If the email address attached to the unsolicited email is from India or any other funny place for that matter, walk away, and no matter what, do your homework.

As a side note, nobody can 100% guarantee #1 Google ranking. Period.

3. Your domain is up for renewal – we can renew it.

This scam has been around for a long time and you may or may not have received it. Usually someone holding a number of domain names will receive this. It will come as a very nice and polite letter saying your domain is up for renewal, and if you send all your domain info, they will do it for you. This will hand over 100% control to them, and after that, you’re burned!! For more info on this scam, read this blog post.

Bottom line, if you don’t know what someone is telling you what you have to do with your website, domain name, hosting, etc, send your web designer the information you were given. They’ve seen it all!

On August 28, 2009 we launched our new e-newsletter to help explain what the heck Reaxion Graphics does. Anything that helps us scream “WE DO PRINT, WE DO WEB, WE DO MARKETING, WE DO WHAT WE’VE NEVER DONE BEFORE” is a good thing! No doubt it will only give a glimpse (like this blog) but any exposure helps and it’s the next logical building block in any online marketing scheme.

This new platform is a fun and exciting way to inform and hopefully entertain our clients – ways to thank and reward our clients for their business.

Speaking of reward – yes – we hope to continue an ongoing contest into the weekly e-newsletter, again a reward for your business PLUS a reward for lending your ear! The rule in business marketing is “what’s in it for me”!

We hope you read it, forward it and enjoy!

What to watch out for: three major steps (1) Mock up in Photoshop (2) Creation of a coded site from “cut up” Photoshop graphics (3) upload and debugging of the live version!

This was not created by Reaxion

Enjoy!

What a loaded question! There are ten ways I could approach this subject. I think most of you have an idea what a designer does, and you see it every day. Every website and every inch of a newspaper or magazine was touched by a designer. But what about being a designer are they NOT telling you? What is expected beyond the list of programs you will learn at school or the 1 inch job listing?

I don’t think two designers would give you the same answer. From my experience, no graphic design career is the same as the next, probably because of their random genetic makeup of geographic location (who provides the jobs in your areas, is the market saturated with designers), what the potential designer THOUGHT they wanted to do when they started their education (what were the misconceptions going in about what the career was about – personally I had no idea!), what they DID do when they were finished their education and found their first precious employment (did they have to grab that Corner Quick Print position to pay the bills rather than design Pepsi’s new logo?) and how long did they hold that position before moving on to the next one?

Why would those things affect a career? Geographically, for instance, if you are in a rural area, you are more likely to be creating brochures for farm equipment rather than flyers for hot DJs and chic art exhibits. What was the expectation going into school and what happened after? I thought I was going to be a multimedia designer, doing interactive CDs back when multimedia was the buzz word. A year after finding no opportunities in that area, I fell into print, which was the best ever! I find that is a major factor in deciding how many designers out there make it. If you are happy designing, it doesn’t matter what you are designing, and the old adage of “paying your dues” rings very true. Talk about paying dues? I also wanted to freelance after school, and after a decade of “paying my dues”, I was finally ready! J

So, you’ve probably realized I believe a true designer isn’t born in the classroom, but is born in the field. The real world is filled with an infinity of potential design problems! You can’t call yourself a true designer until you feel you’ve seen it all, and eventually you will. You will have to finish that brochure with half the pictures you would have liked, or get the client’s logo off a matchbook so you can design their highway billboard. Don’t get me wrong, you need a good foundation of education in sound design principles, but you also have to enjoy what you do 24-7, enjoying problem solving hour to hour, and be expected to perform design miracles and fill roles you never dreamed of.

What unexpected roles come with being a designer? That can be determined by how large a firm is that employs you. I’ve found the majority of firms don’t have 100 employees compartmentalized in their tasks. Often design companies will have a hand full of designers and even fewer sales and/or managing staff. That means consulting clients, travelling to meetings, job quoting, phone calls, product sourcing, IT, copy writing, photographer, etc., falls to the designer to get their client’s job done. No matter how kick ass your poster design is, you may be the one to find a printer, a quality printer AND a printer at the right price – there alone are 3 more problems on top of design than you probably didn’t learned in school, all with their own subset of problems!

Speaking of additional tasks, occasionally a design firm will do some material production in house – this can get interesting! In the past, just a few production duties I’ve completed in addition to the design are pressing designs onto t-shirts, cutting vinyl decals and applying them to signs and vehicles, folding booklets, stuffing envelopes, etc. And don’t think anyone will be there the first time you do it to hold your hand, often you have to find a solution, research it, then do it to a quality level you can charge somebody for. I do have to admit the odd manual task is refreshing compared to sitting behind a desk all day!

I might have conveyed that everything I’ve mentioned is a pain and the negative side of designing… quite the opposite! This career is for those who love variety and the unexpected. Like many careers, it can move you to cities you thought you’d never move to, career roles you never dreamed of, and give you the unique ability to personally and directly impact the world with how you’ve graphically delivered a message.

I have only touched on what a graphic designer does, this is destined to be an ongoing subject!

Reaxion Graphics was profiled in the Saturday, May 30, 2009 Brandon Sun. The column is called “Attention Shoppers” and is penned by reporter Colleen Cosgrove who “writes a column each week about the local business scene, focusing on the retail sector”.

I must say the Reaxion Graphics blurb turned out great without glaring errors (not like a blog you can go back and rewrite! Of course you can’t put your life story in 200 words (I tried), but I’m happy to say the message I’m trying to get to my local customers was delivered.

Below is my section of the column! I’m publishing it here since (a) it’s 12:07am and yesterday’s news, (b) it’s easier to do something and apologize later, and (c) I hope my second paragraph gave the proper props, but if that isn’t enough, I encourage anyone (especially small businesses) to go to www.brandonsun.com or email ccosgrove@brandonsun.com to send your information for YOUR profile! It’s excellent press and FREE. You can’t pass an opportunity like that up in small business, more on your advertising dollar in the future!

Here it is – hope the “web borrowed content gods” are in my favour!:

Reaxion Graphics – by Colleen Cosgrove, The Brandon Sun

Brandon’s newest web and print design company, Reaxion Graphics, has been quietly creating some of the region’s most eye-catching websites and print promotions for just over a year now.

Located at the entrance of The Town Centre parkade at 153 Eighth St., Reaxion (pronounced like reaction) is the brainchild of Neepawa native Scott Kasprick.

Kasprick got his start in the print industry at the Neepawa Press, and after a decade of bouncing around Manitoba, Kasrpick said he was glad to find a reason to set up shop in Brandon.

“I recognized Brandon as having a huge hole in the design market, especially when it came to the availability of contemporary experience and choice – primarily in the area of Internet design and marketing,” Kasprick said. “I knew the advantage of coming to a market that generally loses experienced designers to larger markets was a vacuum waiting to be filled.”

Thanks to his rural upbringing, Kasprick says his forte is his ability to identify with the local mindset.

“My goal is to exeed (my client’s) expectation by delivering results expected from firms in the big city to big companies,” he said. “I try to exceed the rural ‘good enough’ trap we sometimes expect. Everyone is good enough to deserve more.”

Although Reaxion’s focus is on raising the bar for marketing and web design and web hosting in Westman, Kasprick has clients across the country and says his “can-do” company knows no boundaries when it comes to wowing a crowd.

See how Reaxion can wow by emailing Kasprick at Scott@ReaxionGraphics.com.