6. Take forever to get the point across 

Time is sensitive. Take too long, and they’ll abandon you. Easy fix – get to the point.

5. Focus on product benefits instead of features

Don’t just list the gizmos and gadgets; focus on how they will help your audience.

4. Sound like a sales pitch

Lots of walls go up when you look and sound like you just want the sale. Instead, the focus should be on making a connection with your audience.

3. Be boring

People won’t stick around to hear you out. Try and make your message as interesting/lively/captivating for your audience as possible.

2. Cram in too much 

The clutter and confusion will push people away. So instead, give one clear and direct message.

1. Be irrelevant 

If your audience thinks, “that message isn’t for me,” you’ve got major problems. The message should be at the audience’s level, using their language, and focusing on their problems or needs. 

We've assembled a bunch of different websites and iPhone apps to aid your plan of attack this year. It will help you get organized, get discounts and get down to business for holiday shopping. Hopefully, you can get it all done in a snap!

Websites

Pinterest.com:

Pinterest is a great website if you're looking for gift ideas. Browse through hundreds of photos other people have posted. When you see something you like, you can "pin" the photo to a "board". Your boards are like categories that allow you to stay organized and group your pins together.

The other great feature is that you can add photos to Pinterest yourself. Say you're browsing for holiday gifts online. You come across something you have to get for a family member or friend, but you can't buy it right away. No worries! By installing the pin bookmarklet in your browser, you can pin a photo of the gift to one of your boards! There is no need to deal with writing it down and putting the slip of paper in a "safe" place only to later forget where it is.

It's so much fun and if you're a visual person, this website is definitely for you. Be warned though, it can be another online time suck because there is so much to look at.

Retailmenot.com:

This is an awesome site with thousands of discounts and deals at more than 140,000 of your favorite stores. It's quick and easy, and there are coupons for in-store and online shopping. Make sure to visit this site before you do any shopping or you'll miss out on saving money!

Simply type the name of your favorite store into the search bar at the top. Select the website and scroll through the multiple coupons. If you're shopping in-store, make sure to look for the "printable" coupons. Otherwise, the others are for online shopping only.

You can search for retail or grocery coupons. Anything is possible! If you'd like to be alerted to all these great deals, sign up for the newsletter, too.

Make sure you "share the love." We have to be givers, not just takers. If you have a great coupon, make sure to submit it. This site allows you to gain access to a pool of compelling bargains and great discounts. So by sharing your coupons, you encourage others to do the same.

Apps

Gift Plan ($2.99):

Throughout the year, I come up with ideas or come across things that would be PERFECT for a family member or friend for Christmas or a birthday. Do I ever remember what these things are? No … until I came across this app.

This app allows you to store information for each of your family members or friends for different occasions. You can put in information for ideas, likes and dislikes, clothing/shoe sizes and what you've bought in the past for each person. There is a monthly calendar with customizable color-coded occasion types. You can sync the app with your contacts and Facebook so birthday importing is easy! The app will also send up to two notifications prior to each occasion plus one the day of the occasion for those of us who forget things easily. You have the option to password protect your app as well, so no sneaky kids or peekers can get a hold of this information.

Probably the best feature of this app though is its unique profile view where you can flick through large photos of each person you've added to the app and see their personal tastes, gift ideas, sizes and upcoming occasions all in one glance.

It's perfect for those of you who love to be organized and get your shopping done early. Even if you're not one of those people, but you'd like to become one, this app is a great place to start! It is definitely worth the $3.

Retail Stores (free):

Most of your favorite stores, such as Kohl's, Target, Macy's, Express, Sephora, Etsy and more, have free apps you can download. These are great to have because shopping is easy and at your fingertips on your smart phone.

The reason I love having these apps is because if you forget to print a coupon or you lose it, you can find most coupons on the apps. The cashiers can scan the bar code right from your phone and, voila, you've got your discount!

Some apps will also offer you special incentives for downloading the app, like giveaways, exclusive coupons or free samples.

Scandit - Barcode Scanner & Comparison Shopper (free):

It can be difficult to gather a bunch of ads or go searching online for a specific product to find the best price. I don't even get stores' ads because I don't get a newspaper and I'm sure others are in the same boat. Or, you could be in a store and you find something you really want to buy, but you don't because you're uncertain you're getting the best price. With this app, all your searching and uncertainty is obsolete.

Scan the barcode of a particular product with the Scandit barcode scanner. Reviews and prices from your favorite stores, like Amazon, Best Buy, Ebay, Sam's Club, Target, Wal-Mart and hundreds of other stores, will immediately pop up. You can compare prices and read thousands of ratings and reviews from other users.

Not only will this save you from indecision and sweating up a storm, but you'll also save money. Never spend more than you have to again!

Calculate Discount & Sales Tax (free):

If you're like me, you hate math. I don't want to stand around in the store trying to figure out what my 15 percent discount will be with my $10 off coupon on top of what the sales tax will add at the end. Sure, there are people who can whip out a number on the spot, but we're not all like that. This app will definitely come in handy for those tricky sales.

This great app allows you to put in the original amount with the percentage of sales tax. Not only can you put in the discount, but you can then put in an additional discount. You can enter these discounts as a percentage or dollar amount. So if something is already on sale and you have a coupon, you can figure it out with just a few taps of your fingertips.

Since this is a free app, there is a lot of advertising, just to warn you. But it's free and only takes one extra tap to close the pop-up ads. It's not too annoying or intrusive.

Yelp (free):

We've all been there - you're tired and at the end of your shopping trip when you realize that either a) you're starving and it feels like you're wasting away, or b) you've forgotten one thing on your list and you need to get it today. This can be especially frustrating and even more tiresome if you're in a city that you're unfamiliar with.

With Yelp, you can quickly search for addresses and phone numbers of an open restaurant to extinguish your starvation, a bar to give you that extra “kick" to keep going, or a gas station you can drive to before your tank is empty. There are quick links you can tap to find nearby businesses and you can even narrow down your search by neighborhood, distance, price and what's open now.

Reviews are available so you can make sure you won't be eating cardboard food or going to a gas station where it's likely you'll get jumped. To help others out, you can even add quick tips and reviews, too.

We hope this comprehensive list will help you with holiday shopping this year. But, of course, there are so many websites and apps out there that it's hard to stay on top of them all. What are some other websites or apps you use when shopping? We'd love to hear from you!

Please note that we were not endorsed to advertise any of these websites or apps. This is simply my opinion, and my opinion only. ClearRiver also does not condone what any of these website or apps advertise.

Aside from raising more than its $5 million goal, ClearRiver helped United Way of Midland County put together a Midland version of Judson Laipply's "Evolution of Dance" video. The Midland style video featured more than 70 local community members, from a police officer to Lou E. Loon. Dressed in costumes, participants danced to popular songs from the past 50 years.

We had a blast creating the video. It was filmed over the course of three days in our studio. It brought excitement and laughter to our offices, and we are so happy to be able to contribute to a great organization. Thank you, United Way, for all you do for this community!

People are bombarded with intrusive ads on television, websites, billboards, newspapers, magazines and mail. It’s become easy for us to just ignore these ads. We can skip commercials because of TiVo and DVR, throw out mail without taking two seconds to look at it, and simply click on content we want to read.

I’m not saying traditional tactics, such as direct mail and print and broadcast advertising, are dead. There are always going to be companies who can and will spend money on these tactics because it’s what they prefer. It is just hard to ignore the fact that these tactics are more expensive and produce less favorable results. Content marketing is gaining popularity because it informs and educates consumers instead of slapping consumers in the face and hoping they remember what is being sold.

Content marketing vs. traditional marketing

So what exactly is content marketing? Content marketing is a two-way medium that allows consumers to have conversations, ask questions and be educated. It provides value to consumers. Examples of content marketing include: E-books, white papers, blogs and podcasts. These marketing pieces can be about anything related to your brand, product or service that you’re trying to sell.

Say you have a photography business, so you’re trying to sell your photography services. Instead of posting on Facebook and Twitter all about your great prices and amazing sample photos, write a blog post on how to look good in photos every time or how to shoot an artsy angle. These tips give something of value to your customers. It’s content they can actually learn from.

These tactics are most effective when distributed through social media. So tweet and post your article on Facebook! It increases the chances of it being picked up and shared across multiple platforms online. This can only help the visibility of your company or brand.

Traditional marketing can be defined as ways to promote a product or service to consumers without their interest in or need for it. It is a one-sided conversation that forces the consumer to act if they want more information or engagement. These tactics “talk at” people and don’t engage them.

Examples of traditional marketing include: Direct mail, online and print ads, billboards and broadcast commercials. As stated before, these are intrusive tactics that people don’t seek out. Instead, people are flooded with them everywhere they go, whether they want to see them or not.

Providing value=Loyal customers

The Internet has revolutionized marketing. Companies are realizing this and are giving bigger portions of their budget to content marketing. The level in which we interact with customers has changed and companies need to adapt. Don’t think of content marketing as giving away free tips and advice. Think of it as immediately eliminating the question of whether or not your company, product or service is the best. Customers can read all about your knowledge, opinions and expertise without having to even pick up the phone.

If you’re serious about producing professional and creative content to give something of value back to consumers, contact us at ClearRiver and we’ll hook you up with one of our writers, or our photographer or web designer. Please call us at 989-631-7977 or post a comment on this blog post.

23 Reasons content marketing trumps traditional marketing

(taken from Inbound Internet Marketing Blog)

If what I said above didn’t convince you that content marketing is crucial, I bet you won’t be able to ignore these cold hard facts about why traditional marketing just isn’t working anymore:

1. 200 million Americans have registered their phone numbers on the FTC’s “Do Not Call” list.
2. 91% of email users have unsubscribed from a company email they previously opted into.
3. 84% of 25-34-year-olds have left a favorite website because of intrusive or irrelevant advertising.
4. 86% of people skip television ads.
5. 44% of direct mail is never opened.
6. 61% of marketers will invest more in earned media (content marketing) in 2011.
7. The average budget spent on company blogs and social media has nearly doubled in the last 2 years.
8. The number of marketers who say Facebook is “critical” or "important” to their business has increased 83% in the last 2 years.
9. 2/3 of marketers say their company blog is “critical” or “important” to their business.
10. 67% of B2C companies and 41% of B2B companies have acquired a customer through Facebook.
11. 57% of businesses have acquired a customer through their company blog.
12. 42% of businesses have acquired a customer through Twitter.
13. 57% of companies have acquired a customer through LinkedIn.
14. 48% of companies have acquired a customer through Facebook.
15. Content marketing costs 62% less per lead than traditional marketing.
16. 3 out of 4 content marketing channels cost less than any traditional channel.
17. 55% of companies who blog reported leads from their blog were “below average” in cost.
18. 47% of companies who use social media reported leads from social media were “below average” in cost.
19. 39% of companies who leverage SEO reported leads from SEO were “below average” in cost.
20. 27% of companies who use PPC reported leads from PPC were “below average” in cost.
21. Trade shows were reported as being “above average” in cost by 47% of respondents.
22. Direct mail was reported as being “above average” in cost by 27% of respondents.
23. Telemarketing was reported as being “above average” in cost by 21% of respondents.

Facebook hasn’t always made it easy to figure out what size is best to use for a profile picture or how to control what your Facebook thumbnail looks like in news feeds and other areas of the site.

Some of that is changing and Facebook has made it easier to manage profile pictures; but for many Facebook users, there is still some mystery involved in how to take full advantage of the options that Facebook offers. In this post, I hope to dispel some of those mysteries.

Getting the right size:

Let’s start off with some of the basic specs that Facebook provides. Facebook recommends that profile pictures should be a maximum of 180px wide, while height can vary as needed with a maximum height of 540px allowed. 

One more, important caveat with regard to sizing is that the aspect ratio cannot be more than three times as tall as the width of the picture. To make sure your image is playing by the rules, take the width and multiply it by three. The number you get is the maximum height your image can be.

Let’s see what this looks like in practice. Below are three examples of different Facebook profile pictures that utilize the full width of 180px, but have varying heights. Note that the tallest image does not exceed the maximum ratio of 1:3.

As you can see, with varying degrees of height, there is a lot of room to creatively utilize the space of a Facebook profile picture. I am often surprised at the amount of businesses that fail to take advantage of this space.

Understanding how Facebook crops images:

Perhaps part of the reason that many pages don’t utilize the full depth is due to the extreme measure by which Facebook will crop the profile image. This has forced many users to format their profile picture so that it is square and doesn’t get cropped in strange ways. Left unchanged, Facebook will take a long image and crop it automatically, smack dab in the middle of your picture to create a roughly 50px by 50px thumbnail. The resulting images taken from our examples above would look like these below:

Default thumbnail cropping

As you can see, these thumbnails are confusing to look at. I could never guess who or what these organizations are in a news feed or on someone’s wall. So how do we fix this? 

Let’s start by understanding that on an image that is 185px wide, Facebook will allow for a 15px margin on either side before cropping – so, when making a profile picture, keep this in mind. To demonstrate this, I created the graphic below with a transparent red square that represents how Facebook crops profile images:

Cropping your picture in Facebook:

Now for the part that most people don’t know about. Facebook actually allows you to change the position of the cropping area on your image. This was recently made much easier, so there’s no excuse not to take full advantage of this feature.

Step 1. To see how this works, simply go to your Facebook page and hover your mouse over your current Facebook profile picture. Click on the “Change Picture” link that appears in the upper right corner of your image.

Step 2. This will take you to a new page that displays your current profile image. Look near the bottom of your image and click on the “Edit Thumbnail” link.

Step 3. A dialogue box will appear that gives you the ability to edit the thumbnail by clicking and dragging the image inside a small box, changing the cropping placement on your profile image.

After you have made your adjustments click “Save”.

Design tips:

Hopefully this little tutorial has given you some new insight on how to better employ your Facebook profile image. From now on, it may be helpful to think of your profile image as a banner ad. Using it to promote events, special offers, etc. are all great ways to effectively harness this valuable space. As you design your new profile picture, keep Facebook’s cropping specs in mind from the get go and make sure part of your image - preferably your logo - can be fully represented in the cropping scheme. As you can see below all of the thumbnails from our examples are now fully recognizable and carry a strong brand presence. Applying these ideas to your profile picture will allow you to have a visual advantage on crowded news feeds, walls and other important areas of Facebook.

Custom thumbnail cropping

If you’d like some help getting your Facebook profile picture refreshed or would like some advice on other ways to improve your social media efforts, feel free to contact us - we’d love to help!

1. Leverage your brand to its fullest extent through social media.

If you’re a nonprofit, your brand may have virtues and an emotional connection to the public that other brands may not have. Your messages should reflect that. If you’re not a nonprofit, create a story around your brand to emotionally connect with your audience. People will rally behind a story, like David and Goliath, so give them a reason to care.

2. Determine your comfort level of transparency when determining how to announce or respond to news about your organization through social media.

If you decide to cover everything up and delete negative posts or tweets, prepare yourself for the consequences. If you decide to always respond to the negative posts or tweets, have a plan of action in place. Decide who will respond and what should be said before you actually post it. Don’t wait a week figuring it out though! That is years in social media time. You must act quickly.

3. Think of Tweets as headlines.

You have to hook people in fewer than 140 characters. To get people to respond, use words or phrases that grab attention. A great book on copywriting that outlines words to use in attention-getting headlines is “The Copywriter's Handbook” by David Bly.

4. To be successful with your social media efforts, you must focus on the “boring” stuff first.

According to Pete Brand, co-founder at Mindscape at Hanon McKendry, you have to do some research and planning, just like with any other marketing plan.

• Objectives: Are you using social media as an awareness tool? Do you want to position your organization as a thought leader? Are you using social media for market intelligence? Or do you want to build community?
• Understand and identify your audience: What are their opinions of your organization? How will they respond to your messages? Is there anything about your organization that speaks to them on an emotional level? What social media outlets are they using?

5. Don’t be afraid to experiment or fail with social media.

There are certain best practices that will help you be successful. However, no one has truly mastered social media yet. David Benjamin, social media director at SalesBasix, believes you must work outside your comfort zone. Don’t stop trying if it doesn’t work at first. Take a step back, tweak what you’re doing and try again.

6. Schedule time in your day for social media.

We don’t mean to post content at the same time every day. Schedule a period at the same time each day to do research on social media, play around with a new platform, read an article or write content that you will post later. It will help you get into a habit so it becomes second nature to stay on top of your social media efforts.

7. You can’t always reach your direct market with social media.

However, you can always reach their influencers or decision makers! Craft the messages you distribute through social media to reflect that.

8. You must be a salesperson.

Shannon Paul, social media manager at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan, says that if you're in a position to do social media and you want to do more of it or just do it better, chances are its value will need to be sold by you. The social media expert needs to be able to show company leadership what its value is and how it will meet company goals.

9. Social media is a science.

Many people don’t know if what they are sending out to the social media world is doing anything. Marc de Schweinitz, marketing manager at The Dow Chemical Company, recommends using analytics tools, such as Facebook Insights or Google Analytics. It can really help you learn and understand what works and what doesn't by analyzing the data.

10. SEO and social media go hand-in-hand.

Social media won't fix or replace your website. If anything it will magnify accessibility and SEO problems on your site. Having a website with appropriate landing pages, split testing pages and integrating social media into your website are needed now more than ever for SEO.

If you didn’t get a chance to attend !gnite, we hope these tips help. You can always contact us if you have any questions or would like to discuss anything related to social media by calling 989-631-9560. Our social media gurus are happy to talk with you!

There are numerous page administrators of companies - ranging from small businesses to major brands - that violate Facebook’s guidelines without knowing it. These page administrators are taking the risk that if a promotion is in violation of any policies, it is grounds for Facebook to remove any materials related to the promotion or disable the page, application or account.  It is very important to take these guidelines seriously.

To determine if a contest lies within Facebook’s rules, visit Facebooks promotional guidelines page for the legal terms. It can be confusing so this article will explain in plain English what it means.

What exactly defines a contest? 

A contest can be considered a competition, sweepstakes or other similar offering that is used for promotional purposes. 

According to Facebook, “A ‘competition’ or ‘contest’ is a promotion that includes a prize and a winner determined on the basis of skill (i.e., through judging based on specific criteria). A ‘sweepstakes’ is a promotion that includes a prize and a winner selected on the basis of chance.” 

Therefore, any contest where a winner is selected would fall into Facebook’s terms of a contest. 

What is the best way to run a contest on Facebook?

The Facebook promotion guidelines state that a third-party app must be used to conduct a contest. Check out apps such as Woobox, Wildfire, North Social, Freepromos and Offerpop to get started. 

The third party app must also be used on a separate “canvas page” on Facebook, which is called a link and was formerly called a tab. 

What types of contests can I run on Facebook?

As long as Facebook’s guidelines are followed, a page administrator can come up with any crazy, creative contest. However, here are some tactics to stay away from:

1. Selecting a random fan or requiring a fan to like the page to win. Facebook’s functions cannot be used to collect entries or gain “Likes”. However, you CAN restrict a contest to only fans who like the page.
2. Requiring contestants to post photos on a wall, upload a photo or post a status update. Fans cannot upload photos or content directly to Facebook. Any photos or content that are required for entry to win a contest must be done through a third-party app. 
3. Contact the fan who won via Facebook’s e-mail, chat or posting on a wall. Again, Facebook’s functions cannot be used for anything related to the contest. The winner must be notified through the third-party app, or contact them by another e-mail account or phone. 

Spread the word about Facebook’s rules and make sure to check the promotion guidelines before beginning a new contest. Facebook has the right to modify its guidelines at any time without notice so stay up-to-date. 

For more information or to get in touch with one of our “social media gurus,” call (989) 631-9560 or message us @clear_river. You can also chat with us at mid-Michigan’s first social media conference, !gnite, on Thursday, Sept. 22 at The H Hotel in downtown Midland.  

Now you just need to catch someone's attention. I know from personal experience that the hunt for a job can be long-winded and frustrating. If you're one of those new college grads, I want to help you. 

Here are some tips I've come up with by using my personal experience:

10. Revise and update your resume and cover letter. Do NOT have any spelling or grammatical errors on your resume or cover letter. It will get your application thrown in the trash immediately. Have a couple people read over it before you turn it in anywhere. 

Do not just summarize your resume in the cover letter either. Do some research on each company before you apply. Tailor your cover letter so it highlights your skills specific to the job and how you will contribute to the company.

9. Following up. Despite the anxiety you will have waiting to hear back from a potential employer, do not call or send a million e-mails trying to "follow-up". Yes, it is definitely important to show interest. However, phone calls are disruptive to a person's day and too many e-mails will make you look desperate. Send an e-mail to the human resources department or follow up through a "Contact Us" page on the website. 

8. Be considerate. Please do not go into a business and ask for an interview. It's great to take initiative and have confidence. However, it is highly unlikely that someone will be able to drop what he or she is doing to conduct an interview. Instead, ask if there is a good time to come back and ask some questions about the company.

7. Stay positive. If you've applied and haven't heard back from anyone, don't give up! It takes time; not everyone is going to get a job immediately after graduation. I bet most people will tell you that it took them months or even years to find a job in their industry after graduation. It took me 9 months to get my first job in the biz.

6. Keep your skills sharp. It's easy to coast after graduation. Don't do it! It will only put you behind. Look for an internship, volunteer, do some freelance work. Stay on top of trends in your industry by reading blogs by important and well-respected leaders. It will show employers your initiative and willingness to work hard. It's important at this early stage to challenge yourself and continually improve your skills.

5. Broaden your job search. When you're looking to get your foot in the door, it's hard to be picky about what kind of work you'll be doing. Keep your options open. If you're interested in, for example, public relations, think of all the possible jobs related to PR or even remotely related to PR. 

An excellent source to do a broad search for jobs is http://www.indeed.com.

4. Go to graduate school if you have a plan. If the industry you want to go in to requires a master's degree or higher, then by all means, go to graduate school. However, just because the job market is bleak doesn't mean you should go to school longer. Having a master's degree may hinder you in some industries. In PR, a master's degree may discourage employers from hiring a new grad with higher credentials, but less "real world" experience.

3. Polish up your Facebook page. If you think it's a myth that potential employers check your Facebook page, you're wrong. Even if you block people who aren't your friend, there are ways to still see your profile. Inappropriate statuses and pictures will come around to haunt you.

Stick with sharing professional articles. Post a status about something new you learned. Put up a picture of you in your cap and gown receiving your diploma!

2. Stand out. It's something you've heard time and time again. A good GPA, participation in extracurricular organizations and a couple internships just isn't enough anymore. There is a lot of strong competition out there. 

But how do you really stand out? What can you do to showcase your personality without crossing the fine line between professionalism and creativity? 

Maybe include graphics or a unique, streamlined design on your resume. Submit a video about yourself along with your resume. Use charts or graphs to showcase your skills instead of words. These are just a few things to get you started. What else can you think of?

1. NETWORK, NETWORK, NETWORK! I can't stress this enough. It's how I landed my first job. In today's economy, it really is about who you know. Look for local chamber of commerce events and attend them. Use your Facebook and Twitter account to connect with new people. Ask if you can job shadow someone at a company in the industry you're looking to break in to.

Just remember, your first job is more than likely not going to become your career. It is the next step to beginning your career. It may shape what you will eventually do, but you will probably not be at your first job for 10 years. 

Congratulations on graduating and good luck in your job search! 

Search Basics

Before you are allowed to search Twitter, you must set up an account and be logged on. At that point, you have three search options:

1. A basic search from your Twitter page 
2. An advanced search from search.twitter.com 
3. An advanced search from your Twitter page using built-in search operators.

Let's take a quick look at each option.

1) Basic Twitter Search

Upside: Ridiculously easy and fast

Downside: Limited search options

The built-in search box on the top bar of your Twitter home page is the fastest and easiest place to search. Once you perform a search, you will find your results are categorized into four tabs as seen below.

If you search “advertising”, your search will show up on the tab called ‘Tweets,’ which shows you the most recent posts from around the world with the term “advertising” in them.

The other tabs are pretty self-explanatory. Click the ‘Tweets with Links’ tab to see all posts with “advertising” that also contain a link. The ‘Tweets Near You’ tab shows tweets with “advertising” that are geographically close to you. Finally, the ‘People’ tab shows you all users with “advertising” in their username.

It Gets Better

Many people are unaware that Twitter has extensive search capabilities beyond the four search results tabs. Specifically, built-in search operators can narrow your search results by users, geography, dates, tweet content, posting source and more. Let’s look at how deep you are really able to search.

2) search.twitter.com Advanced Search

Upside: Easy to use and gives you full search capabilities

Downside: It’s a separate Twitter page and is not directly liked to your own account page. This makes switching back and fourth annoying.

This search page is nice because the advanced search functions are easy to use. Everything is laid out in simple input boxes. Just add your search queries to the correct box and you can perform a detailed search. The only problem is that the search boxes and displayed results are all located on a separate page that is not linked to your own Twitter page. I find it a little annoying having to switch back and fourth between the pages so often.

3) Advanced Search on Homepage Using Search Operators

Upside: You can perform advanced searches and remain linked to your own Twitter page

Downside: You have to learn/memorize the search operators and this can be annoying

The available operators are listed below, highlighted in blue:

How Does This Help My Business?

Every business has an audience they are trying to reach. One of the challenging aspects of business is trying to reach these individuals effectively. This is where Twitter’s search operators can help.

If you sell ice cream, you can now see who in your local area has just tweeted about ice cream. Furthermore, you could search an exact phrase like “ice cream social” that was posted within 30 miles of your location, in order to learn about new local ice cream events. You can then follow the users associated with mentions of ice cream, start to talk with the individuals and, hopefully, build a relationship that benefits you both!

**Note** Good business is built on relationships and trust. If you decide to use Twitter to engage potential customers, it is wise to not bombard them with promotional messages. That behavior can destroy a potentially beneficial relationship, and could also quickly sabotage your online credibility.

How Does This Help Me Personally?

I use Twitter’s search function for my personal account (@markkawiecki) to find local people to connect with. I also search out national experts that I want to learn from in a variety of subjects. Generally speaking, I follow people who are interested in the same things I am, so that we have something in common to talk about. The search operators help me find these people.

If you have questions about searching Twitter, about Twitter in general, or about your social media efforts, please contact us. We’d love to help!

• Marci Daniels, director of broadcast,
• Audra Buchanan, office manager,
• Mark Kawiecki, marketing and account service representative,
• Kristen Pelkki, account service representative.

Marci Daniels

We are all excited to have Marci here. She adds new capabilities at ClearRiver by bringing 19 years of experience in the broadcast advertising industry. Marci will maximize her clients' ROI by:

• plotting strategies,
• analyzing research,
• writing cool, creative copy for campaigns.

"She is also a ‘big picture thinker,' and her abilities go beyond broadcast television and radio," Dan Umlauf, creative guru and chief client advocate, said. "Her extensive knowledge about the Great Lakes Bay market gives her the ability to eliminate confusion and make more effective decisions."

Marci is an adjunct faculty in the business department at Northwood University, teaching advertising and marketing strategy, research and creative skills.

Outside of work, she loves to play with her puppy at the dog park and take long walks at the beach in Au Gres. Marci also likes to travel and take photographs of extraordinary places, such as Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Latin America.

Audra Buchanan

The new "Bean Counter and Businesswoman," Audra, came to us from the Central Michigan University Research Corporation. She has the very important role of:

• making sure clients get bills on time,
• we receive our wages regularly,
• human resources,
• keeping track of subcontractors,
• staff birthday parties.

Her organizational skills play a role in keeping the office running smoothly.

For fun, Audra likes to go boating with her husband, hang out with her black lab, read and garden.

Mark Kawiecki

As a "Marketing Whiz and Social Media Maestro," Mark provides marketing and account service, with a special focus on helping clients integrate social media best practices into their marketing strategies. Kawiecki earned a Bachelor of Business Administration in marketing from Grand Valley State University.

Kawiecki is a fan of woodworking and learning new carving styles. He also enjoys sailing, playing and writing music and rowing.

Kristen Pelkki

I will contribute to ClearRiver as a "wordsmith and PR wonderworker." I provide client project management as an account service representative and my efforts for clients will benefit from my special interest and skills in writing and use of social media tactics. I graduated with a Bachelor of Applied Arts in integrative public relations from Central Michigan University.
Any outdoor activities, such as camping, hiking, fishing and sunbathing, are some of my favorite things to do. I'm also an avid sports fan, and even played varsity soccer for CMU.

The Future of ClearRiver

"Based on opportunities I see, we've got a perfect combination of experience and synergy with these new employees," Umlauf said. "I am confident these bright individuals will bring us into the future of ClearRiver."

To get information on more guardian angels and how they can help you, please visit our people page.