In terms of Content…

-Post content that is relative to your brand, your products, or the your brand’s ‘genre’. For example: If your company sells clothing then post content that focuses on your clothing, store/company, or customers. If you’ve run out of ideas within those subjects then aim for something close to home–like the fashion industry. It’s in the same ‘genre’ as your products but not about your products specifically.

-If you write about something outside of your brand (like recent industry news) then try to add a link to your product, mention a product, or mention your brand so at the very least you’re growing brand awareness. For example: Keeping the clothing company example, let’s say you posted about several influential people to follow on Twitter and Facebook that work in the fashion industry. At the end of your post suggest an influential person to follow on Twitter and Facebook that works for your company, like the lead designer or or creative director. This gives them an opportunity to get an inside view of what goes on in the company as well as growing your brand by adding more ways for people to get connected to the brand. Doing this only takes one sentence or two sentences!

-Note what readers respond to and how long they stay on certain posts in order to know what ideas to use for future posts to continue reader engagement and interest. The best way to track this information is through Google Analytics–become familiar with how it works and get into the habit of checking all available data on a regular basis, then apply what you know towards your blog posts.

-Perhaps you have more than one blog contributor–great! The more content the merrier. Just make sure that the contributors who are not writers, or are not used to writing for a large audience, gets their draft post checked over by someone who is an experienced writer. Blogs can be written in informal voice, but spelling mistakes, flow of content, and grammar mishaps need to be avoided at all costs. Also make sure to maintain the blog voice (the brand voice) no matter who the author of the day is. Readers want to recognize the brand through the writing even if there are different writers behind each post.

Stay tuned for more blog clean up tips regarding comments, titles, structure, and scheduling! Have a question about blog content or today’s content tips? Leave a comment below or post it on our FB page!

1. Valentine’s Day Cards Officially for Sale!

2.) Get Your Blog On Blogging Challenge One-On-One: Meet Brooke Burnett

3.) Fairytale Wedding Invitation Suite

4.) & 5.) Tied. Meet the Challenge Participants of the Get Your Blog On Blogging Challenge! and Reasons to Update Your Website Regularly

6.) Challenge Statistics Update – Highest Web/Blog Traffic So Far

7.) The Get Your Blog on January Blogging Challenge

8.) Sneak Peak! (of New Website)

9.) Follow Up Marketing – Clive and Co

10.) & 11.) Tied. 10 Eye Catching Business Card Designs and Get Your Blog On Blogging Challenge One-On-One: Meet Mili Suleman

12.) Has Google Gone Too Far?

13.)  To Have or Not Have a Business Twitter Account?

14.) & 15.) Tied. Making of the 2016 Rio Paralympic Multisensory Brand and Privacy, Censorship, and Monitoring Oh My!

16. & 17.) Tied. The Do Not’s of Blogging, Get Your Blog on Challenge Update

18.) & 19.) Tied. The Do Not’s of Blogging, Part II and In The News This Week…

Consensus says that you love posts about design (new card designs, website designs, invitation designs) which is no big surprise. People like to mostly look rather than read when on the internet so picture focused posts are always popular.

In fact, that brings us to the next observation of our posts–pictures just in general help in attracting people to posts. We stated this before here, but we want to clarify that it’s not just any old picture that does the job but the quality pictures that do the job the best. We used a quality, professional photo to go along with the Meet Brooke Burnett post and it turned out to be the 2nd most popular post during the challenge. If only we had quality, professional photos on hand for every single blog post!

And, last but not least, you really liked the Blog Challenge idea! Many of you tuned in to learn more about the challenge and how it was going as well as who was participating in the challenge. We’re glad that people were so interested in it since it turned out to be a great success for us and those who participated in it. We’ve learned so much more than we did before about the ins and outs of blogging and had a great time doing it.

What do you think makes or breaks a post? What topics do you like to read about the most? Do you prefer picture filled posts or content filled posts?

But who cares about how we feel about the challenge, we know all you really want to know is…who is the Get Your Blog On Blogging Challenge Winner?! Hint: It’s not us. Since the Get Your Blog On Blogging Challenge was our idea we had a little bit more pressure on us to make sure we lived up to the challenge. So, we think it’s only fair to award an outside participant the title of 1st Place.

Without further adu, here is the Challenge Participant Breakdown:

Launch Private Label produced 6 posts over the span of the challenge (2 posts on Jan 4,  and 1 on Jan 6, 9, 16, & 25). None of these were posted in consecutive order from the start so unfortunately they come in 3rd Place.

B.B. Media Relations produced 9 posts over the span of the challenge all of which were consecutive business day posts within the first 2 weeks  of the challenge (Jan 3, 4, 5, 6, and 9, 10, 11, 12, 13) so they participated in full up until Jan. 14th. which puts them in 2nd Place.

State Thomas Neighborhood produced 19 posts over the span of the challenge, however, a few posts were not posted consecutively and instead were posted in the same day as another post meaning there were a few missed blogging days here and there, but a solid, continuous performance nonetheless which makes them the Get Your Blog On Blogging Challenge 1st Place Winner!

And what’s the point of a challenge without prizes?!

1st Place Prize of a Massage Envy Gift Card (1 full hour massage) will be given to none other than our 1st Place Winner the State Thomas Neighborhood!

2nd Place Prize of a $30 Corner Bakery Gift Card goes to our 2nd Place Winner B.B. Media Relations!

3rd Place Prize of  1 Hour of Free Consultation & Strategy for Blogging for Your Business by yours truly goes to our 3rd Place Winner Launch Private Label!

Congrats to all participants and thanks for your effort over the past month! We hope all of you keep up the good blogging work!

We nicknamed this wedding suite the ‘Fairytale’ suite since that was the angle we attempted to portray in each element of the suite. We stuck to neutral and subtle colors (green, natural light brown) since the idea behind the suite was creative on its own. The Save the Date (below) started the ‘story’ off with the “The start of a happily ever after…” line at the top of the card and we created a vine graphic around the ‘Save the Date’ portion that is so often used in old fairytale books.

The actual invitation was made into a 4×9 book that was hand stitched and binded together with green thread. Our copy of the invitation is currently being photographed with some of our other recent works so the pictures below will have to suffice until we post the professional photos. The front and back covers of the book were printed on 100lb linen manila cardstock.

The inside pages of the book (1, 2, and 3) were printed on 80lb, natural packaging colored paper. Note: Click on each photo below to see it up close and personal.

The RSVP for the wedding was made into a bookmark and recipients opened the invitation to find the bookmark placed inside the ‘book’ with the bookmark ribbon hanging down the back of the book.  The front of the bookmark held the RSVP information and the back of the bookmark acted as a postcard with the return address. Guests simply had to pull the ribbon out from the slit in the bookmark, fill out the RSVP, and place it in the mail.

The bride and groom received many compliments about their creative invitations and everyone especially loved the stitching detail that binded the book together. We just love that we were able to play off of the story of how the couple first met through their save the date and invitation design. Congrats to the happy couple and we will make sure and post the finished professional photos as soon as we get our hands on them so you can see how it all came together in real life!

Note: Names and dates have been changed to protect the privacy of the couple.

Google’s privacy policy is changing on March 1st, 2012. Make sure you know what all the changes entail so you can make an informed decision on whether or not you want to stay with Google or move to a more secure email host and search engine.

Twitter will start to censor tweets depending on what country you live in and what the country’s regulations are.

FBI announces they are going to start monitoring social media by a monitoring tool. They have yet to find the monitoring tool but are currently looking at several options.

And on that positive note we’re off to get our weekend started! We’ll be back next week for our final two days of the Get Your Blog On Blogging Challenge! Expect posting statistics, final challenge results, most popular posts from all challenge participants, and more! Have a great weekend!

We’ve talked about how we recently opened a new branch of Blueprint PR and Design that specializes in creative custom design (cards, prints, stationery, and event decor). We posted about the Christmas card designs that we unveiled in November to kick off the new Blueprint branch with a bang. We even posted about how well they were selling after a month or so of being on the market.

Now, we’re going to post about our new card designs for a popular holiday among romantics and lovebirds that takes place on February 14th…yep, you guessed it! Valentine’s Day cards!

Big Kiss Valentine's Day Cards - Set of 4

Big Kiss Valentine's Day Cards - Set of 4

Valentine's Day Love Tags - Set of 5, choose from small or medium tag sizes

Valentine's Day Love Tags - Set of 5

Sealed with a Kiss Valentine's Day Cards - Set of 6

Sealed with a Kiss Valentine's Day Cards - Set of 6

Pink Lovebirds Valentine's Day Cards - Set of 4

Pink Lovebirds Valentine's Day Cards - Set of 4

And there’s more! Visit the Blueprint Etsy Shop to see the rest of our Valentine’s Day card designs and purchase your favorite set today!

The atmosphere was calm and relaxing, I sipped a glass of wine (it was Friday at 4pm, reason to celebrate in itself!) while chatting with the stylist, enjoyed a nice head massage while getting my hair washed (always my favorite part), and walked out of the door one hour later sporting a beautiful, newly cut hair style. It was exactly what I had been hoping for.

Why should you care about my hair experience, you ask? I’m getting to it–there is a marketing point to this post!

I received an envelope in the mail today with the Clive and Co logo in the top left corner and a sticker on the front that said “Follow us on: facebook.com/cliveandco and twitter.com/cliveandco.” That right there is an excellent marketing strategy. But wait, there’s more!

I opened up the envelope to find a note from the owner thanking me for my visit, briefly stating what sets them apart from their competition, and finishing up by explaining their philosophy of great hair care and service.

And here come the marketing point(s) to take note of:

1.) Follow up note sent shortly after my visit while my experience is still fresh in my mind. In my opinion, this is much better than a courtesy call asking about your recent service. Those calls are just downright annoying and a waste of time. Sending a note is more personal and you can add in marketing plugs like…

2.) Social media sticker front and center on the envelope! The sticker placement immediately grabs the attention of the recipient motivating them to visit your social media sites and stay in touch with them on a regular basis.

3.) Well designed marketing materials. The sticker, simple as it is, still emulates the feel and vibe of the salon. The logo is a clean, crisp, easily identifiable design, and even the design of the note was well done.There’s nothing worse than seeing bad marketing and bad design when you’re in the marketing and design industry. Seeing excellent branding, marketing, and design coming all from one business is like a breath of fresh spring time air after you’ve been stuck inside all day.

To all of you businesses out there–take note from this entire marketing example and implement something similar in your marketing plan! Make sure to think it through instead of just throwing something together that doesn’t have a polished, well thought, well planned execution and appeal.

And don’t worry Clive and Co, you’ve found another happy, satisfied customer that will be returning in 8 weeks for my next appointment.

We’re sad to say that a few of our blogging challenge participants have fallen off the blogging bandwagon since the challenge began on January 4th, but we can’t really blame them since they do have a business to run at the same time. That’s why we’re going to give a few tips today on how to handle regular blogging when you’ve got a lot on your plate.

-Set aside 30 minutes to an hour each morning to focus on blogging. If you aren’t able to prepare blog ideas or drafts ahead of time then break up the 30 minutes-one hour into these segments: ideas/brainstorming (10 minutes), drafting (15 minutes), posting (5 minutes), social media posting and update (5 minutes). The time portions for each segment are just estimates and once you get into the habit of blogging each morning some segments may go faster or slower than others depending on the blogger. For us, ideas and brainstorming takes just a few minutes while drafting the blog takes the longest amount of time.

-This may sound a little strange, but there are times where we feel guilty for blogging. As a small business there is a lot to take care of on a daily basis and so spending time each morning, no matter how little time it may be, brings on a little tinge of guilt since we feel we should be spending time on something more important, like client duties. However, our typical working day begins at 8am and lasts until 6pm or 7pm. Sometimes later. We normally start drafting a blog post around 6:30am or 7am (we’re early risers) which is well before 8am-when we typically ‘open’. While we may not always be able to post the blog by 8am the majority of the work is finished so it only takes a few minutes to post in the middle of the day in between client projects or meetings. If you aren’t an early riser try drafting the majority of your blog post after you’ve finished up everything for the day or even before you go to bed at night. You can think of blogging as your daily wind down project instead of your starting the day project. If you’re still wary of spending time on blogging remember that blogging can be one of the most powerful online marketing tools available to a business. One of the reasons it is the most powerful is because of the regular maintenance and management that goes into a successful blog. If you’re not spending the time to blog regularly than your blog may as well be doomed from the start.

-You’ve tried waking up early and staying up later to work on blogging regularly and setting aside specific amounts of time to handle the task, but you’re still not able to dedicate enough time to manage and maintain your blog. Solution? Bring in some blogging help! We’ve brought in interns to help us with the blog several times throughout the past few years when we’ve had major projects that take over our lives or we’re in the midst of an extremely busy season. Some interns just want the experience and will blog for free and others can be paid for a reasonable hourly rate that won’t break the business budget. Interns can be in charge of keyword/key phrase analysis and Google analytics, or the main part of blogging–the writing. It will be up to you of what you want to hand over to your intern(s), but it will surely lighten your load when you can’t seem to find a minute of your day to dedicate to blogging.

Note: Make sure to check out the State Thomas Neighborhood blog as they’re one of the participants who have stayed in the challenge–way to go STN!

We thought we’d share it since it talks about the creative process that goes into making a successful, strong brand. Loads of research, brainstorming, analysis, drafting, testing,  etc. all goes into a successful logo design–they’re not made in a days work, that’s for sure!

Note: If you’re in a rush watch the first few minutes to hear the logo design team talk about how they went about brainstorming and creating the logo and then skip to the 4:50 minute mark to see the final outcome.

Making of a multisensory Paralympic brand – Rio 2016

1.) How did you know you wanted to be your own boss and take the plunge into the risky world of entrepreneurship?

I have what I like to call the “entrepreneurial fire” in me and I got it from my dad (it kinda runs in the whole family though). Since I was a kid, I was always striking some kind of “deal” selling little trinkets or whatever to my friends. I feel like all my assets are fully utilized when working for myself… I have to apply myself completely and think about all the facets of the business. I love wearing multiple hats and I think that, along with the flexibility aspect, made me take the plunge. I started to save up some money, and eventually took a holiday back home and gave my notice the very first day back to work. I don’t regret it one bit.   

LAUNCH Private Label specializes in branding, packaging design, and marketing for entrepreneurs who are starting their own product lines (or brand), whether it be some kind of food, cosmetics, skin care or what have you.

I love blogging (when I have the time) because once I write something, those articles are in the search engine archives forever! Regular blogging will definitely help with traffic. I haven’t seen a lot of feedback on Facebook and Twitter for the private label/packaging design niche, but hopefully that will change. Marketing a service on Facebook/Twitter is much different than marketing a product. However, I plan on continuing with all social media. I’d hate to wake up one day and realize I am far behind.  

Thedieline.com, gmarketing.com, visiting the bookstores, and browsing a variety of marketing/business sites in general. I don’t have any particular sites I visit regularly. I am a true web surfer and I enjoy the variety and information from various places.

It is a mixture of answering emails, doing some form of social media/blogging, sourcing for products/containers and actual design work. There may be a client meeting or two on busy days. The best part of having my own business is that every day is different.

Follow LAUNCH Private Label on Twitter and like their page on Facebook to stay caught up with all that they do! Miss the first Blogging Challenge On-On-One? No worries, click here to check it out!