Moment for a SMILE!

Every once in a while you get those random opportunities when the camera is nearby and working right when you need it.  This morning was one of those opportunities.  Also in the midst of several distractions and unknowns related to my job, my center of focus is not so centered, but this morning, during these couple of moments with my son, I was reminded about what IS REALLY IMPORTANT.  I took these pictures this morning of him in the action of discovering a new hide out spot.  I couldn't help but smile.  Sometimes it's the little things that make such a big impact.  Thank you Tucker, for making my morning a good one.

Staying Busy

I may not know what my near future holds, but I do know one thing, getting all the little details together and making sure everything is super duper organized, is giving me more than enough to do at work.  I know that I am responsible for the adverting for the rest of April, but what comes of May could be totally different.  As preparations continue, I am delving deep into the world of SEO.  For all you non-computer people out there, SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization.  Over the past 5 years it has become increasingly important to stay on top of the latest and greatest most effective techniques to make your business/business website as available to potential customers as possible.  There is also SEM (Search Engine Marketing) as well, which is important as well, but SEO is more readily available for people to tap into because of all the free resources it provides.  We are all familiar with the main search engines/directories....Google, Yahoo, Bing, Yellowpages....etc.  What I have discovered though over the last couple days is that there are over 50 of these engines and directories out there. 

So why isn't your business getting the any traffic?  Because SEO actually takes a lot of work, time, patience, and a need to create an account to each one of these search engines, go through the process of verifying your business, and fill in the blanks to each search engines unique platform.  I like to think of it this way.  Each time you create a new account with each search engine for your business, it is like you are creating a mini free website, a consolidated version of your own business website, if you have one.  And the more complete you fill it (as much as you can for what each allows for the free part) the more the "spiders and crawlers" in cyperspace will pick up keywords, that essential, are the entries people type in the "search" slot on Google (or whatever your preferred search page is).  As for the Wallace Automotive Group (that has 9 stores) I apparently have only scratched the surface.  After doing a quick scan on Yext.com just on ONE of the dealerships, it turned up nothing but a page of RED....not good.  I got a snapshot of about 40 search engines with a mix of mismatched, misnamed, outdated data.  I love how yext has a "Fix it all" button, and then you get to see how much it's going to cost.....Holy S!!!  The trick is to use that data...go into each search engine, create an account, make the changes, follow through with the verify process, add more keywords to optimize as much as possible, and then from that point its just maintenance.  So DON'T WASTE YOUR MONEY when you can do it yourself for free.

What I've got ahead of me, potentially if this is the direction Mr. Wallace wants me to go in, is 50+ search engines times 9 stores per search engine......this should keep me busy for a while.

SEO can be overwhelming because there is so much to it and it's an ever changing computer technology, but as long as it can be broken down and taken care of one step at a time, the task is not as daunting.

Went to the Park with Jane Winner today!

I so needed a day like today!  This morning Tucker and I left early to meet up with a friend from my past, Jane Winner.  When I was living in Framingham, MA, I got to know Jane through the Christian Science Church in Framingham, and helped her family's Paper2u Business.  We ended up meeting halfway in Melbourne, FL at a nice little park.  Tucker absolutely loved all the different slides, and even caught on to walking up monkey bars that were a little too advanced for him,  We at lunch at the picnic benches, but of course he was more fascinated in the two birds that were interested in his food.  Just before we went our separate ways, Jane gave him a little gift.  Little boys and their trucks!

Tough Week

This week has been a rough week so my apologies for not keeping so up to date on this running and active log.  On Monday, I learned some not so great news.  On the Friday before Easter my boss, Glen, gets a call from Mr. Wallace.  He learns that Mr. Wallace has decided to use an advertising agency and that his services are no longer required once he helps out with the transition process.  I learned that Mr. Wallace wants to keep me though, so there is some small sigh of relief.  If I could get all my "what ifs" under control and remain calm, I should be alright.  On top of this it has been a crazy deadline production week for me as it is the beginning of the month.  Here are all the ads I created this week so that you can see what it is that I do (for now anyway).  I hope that once this transition happen that I will still be doing what I love!