Twin Creek Media has been founded on the principle that business should get personal. I mean that businesses should let emotions and tugs of the heart interfere with business decisions.  Why not?  What is the point of pouring our life into work to mine the precious resources of SPARE TIME and MORE MONEY if those resources are not used to MAKE THE WORLD A BETTER PLACE FOR ALL.  For our time and money to be spent on things that matter, we have to let our passions mix with our balance sheets, bank accounts, and work calendar.

For some reason I was born with a hopelessly idealistic worldview attached to analytical brain - so for the last 10 years I've been trying to make peace out of many of the conflicts in the business world, political scene, and my own inner life.  Some days are better than others, and I often wonder how a person like Bill Gates sees the big questions in life.  Like anyone, a window into his mind is opened through his actions.... you know how loud actions speak.

The infographic below is so inspiring and seems such a thought provoking expression of my beliefs, that I wanted to share it with the local business community.

~ James Shaw, CEO/Creative Director, Twin Creek Media

Source: frugaldad.com

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from the Twin Creek Media team!  For hours of enjoyment, we've made a classic jigsaw puzzle to delight and entertain!  I wonder who can complete it the fastest?

Of the sites that are optimized, ranking is important.

So how does your Kelowna business get ranked in Google and the other search engines? There are no tricks to ranking in search engines.  The key is to generate keyword-rich content and the search engines will find (and love) you.  Having said that, Google loves fresh content and sites that have frequent updates tend to rank well.  One way to generate that frequent content is to have a company blog and this is an internet marketing tactic that our Kelowna-based marketing company recommends.

A company blog will result in more indexable web pages on your site as every blog post results in a new page being generated. These extra pages increase your “relevancy” (assuming you blog about relevant topics), resulting in more leads as there are more pages and therefore more possibility of showing in the search results.

The other added advantage to having a blog is that it draws inbound links as other sites refer to the blog post for reference.  This then goes full circle by boosting your ranking in Google as you become an “authority” on the blog post topic.

What does this mean to Kelowna businesses?

If Google can’t find you, neither will anyone else. Buying paid listings should only be considered a short term strategy until you rank organically as it is a more expensive way to purchase lower quality traffic.

For Immediate Release

Kelowna Marketing Agency brings on New Partner

Kelowna, BC, June 2, 2011: Long time employee, Thomas Berger, has become a partner in Kelowna marketing agency, Twin Creek Media.  Since the company was founded in 2004, Thomas has been involved first as a Web Developer and later as Technical Director.  Until now, Twin Creek Media has been solely owned by James Shaw.

Thomas states, "It made sense to become an owner in a business that I helped build from scratch.  Over the last 7 years James and I have been through all the up and downs, worked 'til midnight, and many weekends to get where we are today.  We've worked with some amazing people and learned a lot.  I'm excited to see where we can take the business from here."

James, the agency's CEO and Creative Director adds, "We've been friends for years.  I can't think of a better business partner to have.  Usually mixing business and friends isn't the best idea, but over the last 7 years we've pretty much been acting like founding partners anyway.  It feels good to make it official.  We work different ends the business with just enough overlap to understand each other.  He's the 'geek' to my 'style'... although maybe it's the other way around!"

Despite what this photo may portray, James and Thomas are both married. To women.

"After becoming a partner, the first order of business was to fire myself", Thomas jokes. As it happens, being a partner allows more creative compensation methods, such as shareholder dividends.  Since regular employment income is the worst type of income when it comes to taxes and other deductions, the partners were eager to explore other options.

The team is gearing up for busy summer with several new projects on the horizon, and others in full swing.  The company has seen a shift in the way businesses approach marketing - especially online marketing.  With people spending more time online and using sites like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, businesses are realizing that just having a website isn't enough.  Twin Creek Media now has quite a few projects that never really end, acting as a sort of offsite marketing department for several companies.  "I think companies in Kelowna are coming to terms with what it means to do business in 2011", says James.  "A few years ago, our clients would ask for X,Y, Z and think they were finished.  Now, most companies understand that marketing is a daily ongoing effort, and is much more of a two way conversation between buyer and sellers."

About Twin Creek Media

Since 2004, Twin Creek Media has been a strategic and creative marketing agency located in Kelowna, British Columbia. The firm has carved a place in the marketing world by becoming known for integrated marketing: combining the best of internet and digital with the traditional mediums of print, radio, and TV.

The agency employs a hybrid team of full time staff and a global network of contract specialists who work on communications projects a range of retail, software, tourism, not for profit, and B2B companies.  Twin Creek Media can be contacted at 250.76.4001 or via email at info@twincreekmedia.com

Social Media Marketing for Kelowna Businesses

The Okanagan newspaper recently published an article on a presentation James gave at  a Kelowna Chamber of Commerce breakfast meeting on using Social Media in Business. The article is a great summary of the key points given at the meeting:

• Use your social media accounts - 15 minutes a day is a good place to start (a tool like Hootsuite will greatly help)
• Offer tips, tidbits and advice to build your trust levels - offer real value in the form of free information
• Once you have followers who appreciate what you are putting out there, the odd business pitch is fine - but it's a fine line
• Build brand awareness by digital word of mouth - earn the right to be talked about and your customers will carry your flag
• Use social media to direct people to your website or store - it's a great promotional channel that businesses should use

If you're feeling lost or would rather outsource social media marketing, give us a shout at 250-762-4001.  We'd be happy to help.

To read the article click on it below if you've got a magnifying glass handy.

Our website sends us regular requests for quoting on graphic design, or Google ads, or web development projects... for the most part they are legitimate.  Every once in a while someone plays a prank.  Usually it's unreadable spam or a bot gone wild.  This time I really enjoyed the joke.  In fact, I responded in all sincerity.

Screenshot of Darth Vader's Request for Proposal

Screenshot of James' response

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Twin Creek Media Named One of Constant Contact’s 2010 All Stars

Company’s use of Constant Contact products and services helped increase its overall marketing performance and deepen its engagement with customers

Kelowna, British Columbia — March 25/2011 – Twin Creek Media Inc., an integrated marketing agency, has received the 2010 All Star Award from Constant Contact®, Inc., the trusted marketing advisor to more than 400,000 small organizations worldwide. Twin Creek Media is one of Constant Contact’s 2010 top performers and most prolific user of its tools, whether within Constant Contact’s email marketing, event marketing, social media marketing, or survey products – or a combination of all four.

Creative Director/CEO, James Shaw comments, “We’re happy to be recognized by Constant Contact for our use of their platform in our innovative email marketing campaigns. Our clients appreciate the ease of use, professional look, and great metrics that we can analyze.”

Constant Contact looked at criteria including the following when selecting this year’s All Stars:

• Frequency of campaigns, events and surveys
• Open, bounce and click through rates
• Usage of social features
• Mailing list sign up tools
• Use of reporting tools

“We work hard to listen to our customers, and we use that feedback to create products and services designed to help them better engage with their customers and prospects,” said Gail Goodman, chairman, president and CEO of Constant Contact. “The Constant Contact All Star Awards are our way of recognizing our customers that have successfully used Constant Contact to market their companies. We have some of the most committed, passionate customers out there and we’re proud we can be a part of their continued success.”

About Constant Contact, Inc.
Constant Contact is revolutionizing the success formula for small organizations through affordable, easy-to-use Engagement Marketing™ tools that help create and grow customer relationships. More than 400,000 small businesses, nonprofit organizations, and member associations worldwide rely on Constant Contact as their engagement hub for starting and driving ongoing customer dialogs through email marketing, social media marketing, event marketing, and online surveys. All Constant Contact products come with unrivaled know how, education and free coaching with a personal touch, including award-winning customer support.

Constant Contact and the Constant Contact Logo are registered trademarks of Constant Contact, Inc. All Constant Contact product names and other brand names mentioned herein are trademarks or registered trademarks of Constant Contact, Inc. All other company and product names may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.

Media Contact:
James Shaw
Twin Creek Media Inc.
250-762-4001
james@twincreekmedia.com

###

Position: Website Developer
Duration: part-time/full-time contract leading to full-time employment
Salary: $15/hr to $30/hr based on skills/experience
Experience: 2 years experience preferred
Location: on location at Twin Creek’s Kelowna office
Reports to: Technical Director

Are you a nerd with heart?

Do you like programming clean, efficient code that is a functional work of art?

Are you driven, fun to work with, on time, and detail oriented? (Nod your head.)

Twin Creek Media is an integrated marketing agency in Kelowna, BC. We work with companies across Canada to create the strategic ideas, words, and images to communicate their products and/or services. By building integrated marketing campaigns, we combine the best of web, print, radio, and video for greater results.

This is an opportunity to develop and grow your career in an expanding, lively, active marketing company where you can gain knowledge every day.

Responsibilities: (don't worry, you're not alone in any of the tasks):

* Web production
* Set up
* Domain registration/set up
* Hosting set up
* Deployment
o Slicing new design mockups for use online (Basic use of Photoshop and how site layouts are put together)
o Uploading/Installing/Implementing a CMS system on new sites
o Data Entry
* Development
o Making custom changes/upgrades to existing CMS (requires development of deployment skills, understanding and modifying pre-existing code)
o Developing entirely new modules as needed ( also requires development of deployment skills; starting from scratch in a pre-existing framework)
o Preparing sites for launch
* Post production
o Maintenance/Tech Support (Same skills as development; ability to debug and troubleshoot problem code)
* SEO (Knowledge of relevant SEO practices)
* SEM (Knowledge of online advertising practices, AdWords, Email Marketing)

Technical skills & Knowledge required:

* Clean, documented and consistent code with cross-browser and W3C web standards compatibility
* Comfortable with working on a Mac development system
* Familiar with server setup and maintenance (Linux, Plesk control panel)
* Basic Photoshop skills, slicing, and how site layouts are put together
* Use of HTML, CSS, Javascript, PHP, MySQL, and other common web-technologies
* Knowledge of CSS and XHTML standards, working with cross-browser issues, quality assurance
* Ability to debug and troubleshoot problem code
* High level attention to detail
* Ability to learn new technologies if required
* Effective with time management, estimation and recording

The following skills are not required but are a definite plus:

* Experience with Adobe Flash and Actionscript
* Knowledge of Search Engine Optimization techniques
* Knowledge of online advertising practices, AdWords, Email Marketing

Next Steps:

If you think you’re the bee’s knees, the bomb, Mr. Fancy Desk, or Ms. Webilicious, then you’d better apply right away. We thank all applicants for responding, but will only contact the short-listed candidates.

At the interview stage we will ask many interesting questions as we seek to understand your strengths and weaknesses and how you will fit in with the Twin Creek team. We will also ask you to sit down for a gruelling 15-20 min computer test related to web development. The test will cover basic object oriented programming skills. It’s fun. Really it is!

How to Apply:

Please send your resume including work examples of recent sites you've programmed to careers@twincreekmedia.com

Brad Trites, Account Manager

Brad joins the Twin Creek team in the role of Account Manager and brings a world of amazing experiences with him. For the past 25 years that he has lived in Kelowna, he has been fortunate enough to receive a great education at UBCO, raise an amazing family, and develop a career filled with “very cool” life experiences. Over the last few years Brad has worked in digital media developing interactive video projects for some of the largest companies in music and entertainment including MTV, MuchMusic, and BFGoodrich. He has also been lucky enough to develop projects involving notable personalities such as Ryan Sheckler, Snoop Dog and Rihanna but as a proud Canadian, one of his favorite projects was working with Hockey Night in Canada. When Brad is not playing in the digital world, you can usually find him on the pitch coaching soccer for Kelowna United FC, climbing a mountain, or planning a surf trip over a beer with friends.

Marina Garrison, Project Manager

It's hard to imagine a person better suited for this position as Marina brings over twelve years experience in the software consulting industry. As a certified Project Management Professional (PMP) with a background in business analysis and marketing, her expertise includes working at Accenture where she led large software projects for utilities companies. At Enquiro she introduced a project management approach to software development and led ground-breaking internet usability studies using eyetracking processes. Marina gained her Law Degree LL.B. (Hons) from London Metropolitan University and her Executive MBA from Athabasca University in Canada. She is an active member of the local project management community, training and mentoring others in project management practices. Marina lives in Kelowna, BC with her family and enjoys photography and painting when she's not "geeking-out" in the Twin Creek office.

Social Media Marketing is a lot easier with the right tools - organize, team share, update, schedule, and generally rock n' roll your Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn pages with Hootsuite.

Twin Creek Media has recently partnered with Hootsuite to make life easier for Okanagan businesses who market themselves on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. It is our tool of choice for social media management.  If you own or market a business in Kelowna, Vernon or Penticton, we can help you connect with other local businesses and customers through social media.  Take the conversation online, and join in the fun!

Hootsuite will save hours of pain and frustration trying to manage a bunch of different accounts and keep up with the blur of activity.  Think of Hootsuite as your Giant Hammer in a world full of Fisher Price squeaky hammers.

If you're just getting started with social media and wondering if there's any point for your business, read our Social Media 101 Guide first and download our handy Social Media Reference Card.

What's it about?

HootSuite - Social Media Dashboard. With HootSuite, you can monitor keywords, manage multiple Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Foursquare, Ping.fm and WordPress profiles, schedule messages, and measure your success.

Scheduled Updates: Optimize delivery by choosing the best time and date to reach your audience.

Monitor Mentions: See who is talking to you, and about you!  Don't miss out on what people are saying about your brand, company, and customer service (or lack of!)

Spread Messages: Update multiple networks at once... easily send your update to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn without logging into each individual account.  You can pick and choose which network is updated - you don't have to post everything everywhere.

Social on the Go: Compose and and converse on your iPhone or Android device.

Track Results: Measure success in real-time by click through to stats and exportable reports.

Team Collaboration: Manage multiple contributors without sharing passwords.

Custom Interface: Create your own lists, tabs, and colours.  Organize your information the way you want to see it.

Assign Tasks: Fine-tune your work and tasks by delegating to your team.