Posts Tagged ‘Coles Marketing’

Today’s news atmosphere calls for up-to-the-second news, as soon as you can get it and as fast as you can post it. That includes social media such as Facebook and Twitter, but it also applies to websites. One essential way to keep your website as updated as possible is an online newsroom with fresh, new content that is constantly evolving.

David Henderson, author of “Making News in the Digital Era,” said, “Static newsrooms are the least-visited part of a website because most are just graveyards of old press releases. Your newsroom needs to present the spectrum of all the things that your company is doing within its industry, and hanging press releases there kills credibility.”

The core audience for an organization’s online newsroom is everyone from shareholders and business partners, to customers, donors, employees… and THEN the media. And because newsrooms are not only for the media, practitioners must use a writing style that draws interest in a way people can relate to.

“Nobody cares what your company does unless you tell them in a way that adds value,” Henderson said.

What are some elements to add value to your online newsroom?

• News articles (300-500 words)
• Short videos (HD for B-roll)
• Links to company facts and contacts
• Search capability

And if you use WordPress as your content management system, you’re not alone. Even The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal use it for their blog networks, said Ryan Zuk. There are over 22 million WordPress publishers as of February 2010: 10.6 million blogs hosted on WordPress.com plus 11.4 million active installations of the WordPress.org software. According to Quantcast, around 250 million people visit one or more WordPress.com blogs every month, and they view over two billion pages on those blogs.

So get reading, writing and online newsroom–ing.

Arcadia M. Washington has been named director of customer care for Bright House Networks Indiana. She has worked with the Birmingham, Ala., division of Bright House Networks since 1997. For eight years, she was a customer service representative before being named customer care manager in 2005. Washington was responsible for overseeing the customer care operation in Wetumpka, Greenville and Eufaula, Ala., including a call center and two service and sales centers.

In Alabama, Washington is an active member in the community, with current and past involvement in the Emanon Group, a non-profit education advocacy organization; the Wetumpka Chamber of Commerce; and Leadership Elmore County. She has served as board chair of the city of Wetumpka’s “Christmas in the Coosa” board, a member of the Elmore County Community Foundation and a participant in the River Region United Way Campaign. She has also been an active participant with the cable industry’s Women in Cable initiative.

Originally from  Wetumpka, Ala., Washington earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Troy University in 2001 and a master’s degree in management from Troy University’s Graduate School of Management.

According to recent U.S. Census surveys, the median salary for college grads is more than $20,000 higher than that of people with only a high school diploma. And the unemployment rate for people with bachelor’s degrees is almost half the rate for people without.

But some degrees are worth more than others, as PayScale.com shows in its 2010 report on the earning power of bachelor’s degrees. Are you surprised at the worst-paying college degrees?:

10. Drama
9. Fine arts
8. Hospitality and tourism
7. Education
6. Horticulture
5. Spanish
4. Music
3. Theology
2. Elementary education
1. Social work

And in a related article, some popular career myths are busted, one of which is: All that most workers care about is their salary. Recruiter Tony Beshara says, “If that were true, we’d all rob banks.” Sure money is important, but workers usually care about more than just money. According to the 2009 employee job-satisfaction survey by the Society for Human Resource Management, employees identified job security as the most important contributor to their job satisfaction. Benefits were in second place, with salary coming in at number three.

Lesson: Money doesn’t buy happiness. (but in my opinion, it sure helps!)

Bright House Networks has named Karen Broach to the post of regional vice president of operations for the company’s Indianapolis and Birmingham, Ala., divisions. As president of Bright House Networks’ Birmingham division, Broach has been responsible for full managerial oversight of the operation, including strategic planning, budget development and accountability, financial analysis, audit compliance, regulatory compliance, human resources and customer-care activities.

Broach has nearly 25 years of experience in the cable industry. Before joining Bright House Networks, she was vice president and general manager Charter Communications’ Southern Wisconsin division. She previously held positions at Time Warner Cable and Fanch Communications.

Broach’s industry involvement includes current participation in the Alabama Cable Telecommunications Association, where she serves on the board of directors. In the past, she participated and was an active member in the Wisconsin and the Pennsylvania cable television associations. She is also a member of Women in Cable Telecommunications and is a 2009 graduate of organization’s Betsy Magnness Leadership Institute. Her community outreach includes involvement with Cable in the Classroom, United Way and Habitat for Humanity.

American Idol season No. 8 winner Kris Allen will be in Indianapolis Thursday night (May 6), making a special appearance during performances by more than 1,100 student-musicians celebrating the successes of a 10-year partnership that has restored music education in all Indianapolis public schools.

Allen recently signed a new record contract with Universal Music. His self-titled debut album has sold more than 250,000 copies and his latest single,” Live Like We’re Dying,” recently reached No. 18 on the Billboard charts.

The 7 p.m. concert at Conseco Fieldhouse is a free event but tickets are required for admission. Tickets are available at any IPS elementary school.

The concert is the finale for the “Save the Music” initiative that began in 2000 by Bright House Networks and VH1 Save The Music Foundation. When Bright House Networks first joined forces with VH1 Save The Music Foundation to help IPS, music programs were virtually non-existent in the elementary schools and suffering badly in the higher grades because of budgetary constraints and the high cost of instruments.

Since, Bright House Networks and VH1 Save The Music Foundation have provided 42 IPS schools with $1.13 million of new musical instruments to restart IPS’s instrumental music program, including band and strings programs, for elementary, middle and high school students.

Not these days it isn’t. I remember the days of playing the game outside at school — also know as squareball. Today, Foursquare is a web and mobile application that allows registered users to connect with friends and update their location. Users “check-in” at venues using text messaging or a device specific application. They are then awarded points and sometimes “badges.”

Is this the next big thing? As it closes in on one million users this month, Foursquare is being pursued by Internet giant Yahoo Inc., which has offered as much as $125 million for Foursquare. Must be a must have!

It’s a new way for you and your friends to explore your city — and it’s available for the iPhone, Blackberry, Android, Palm and other devices. Have you tried it yet? And Foursquare Day was officially declared on 4/16: 4 squared = 16. 4/16.  Get it?

Ideas for how businesses can use Foursquare to enhance marketing efforts and generate leads are already appearing:

• Create incentives for new customers
• Offer promotions, contests and giveaways
• Maximize the success of events

With three million users expected by the end of the summer, it looks like Foursquare is for real.

Vaccines save lives. They protect both vaccinated individuals and entire communities by preventing the spread of infectious diseases.

National Infant Immunization Week is April 24-May 1.This year’s theme is, “Love them. Protect them. Immunize them.” The awareness campaign highlights the importance of protecting infants from vaccine-preventable diseases and celebrates the achievements of immunization programs and their partners in promoting healthy communities.

Managed Health Services, which provides affordable healthcare to more than 211,400 Hoosiers who receive health insurance through the Hoosier Healthwise program, is stressing the importance of infant and child immunizations this last week of April by encouraging members to schedule well-baby and well-child visits for their children and ensure their immunizations are current.

Parents, healthcare providers and the media, says Dr. Robert Baker of MHS, are important partners for promoting National Infant Immunization Week. These groups are all key stakeholders in ensuring children are fully immunized by two years old. The resounding message to parents on the MHS healthcare plan is to set aside 15 minutes now, schedule pediatrician and physician appointments and have their children immunized, he says.

Because of the success of vaccines in preventing disease in the U.S., parents are often unaware that their children are at risk for so many serious and life-threatening diseases, Baker says. Infants are particularly vulnerable to infectious diseases. Nearly 12,000 babies are born here each day and they will need to be immunized against 14 vaccine-preventable diseases before they reach age 2.

Raising awareness about the importance of infant and childhood immunizations is another step MHS is taking to get its members throughout the state to focus on living healthy lives. With a focus on infants and children, MHS hosts quarterly Health Check Health Days throughout Indiana, geared toward providing members the opportunity to complete recommended well-baby and well-child examinations. MHS reminds parents to keep their children’s immunizations up to date through birthday-card reminders and outreach calls. MHS is also in the midst of conducting Healthy Lifestyles events in several Indiana communities which offer important blood pressure, glucose and cholesterol screenings free of charge to its members.

Coles Marketing Communications has been named Agency of Record for SteadyGRO, a product manufactured by floral industry giant Syndicate Sales Inc. Coles Marketing Communications will globally market the SteadyGRO brand.

SteadyGRO is an inert, sterile product used by home and greenhouse gardeners, professional gardners and hydroponic growers that optimizes soilless plant growth. Available in plugs, sheets, blocks and slabs, SteadyGRO helps growers maximize results when growing indoor food crops like cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, popular flowering plants, woody ornamentals, vines, ivy and more. SteadyGRO was created to be used as a substitute to rockwool, a soilless growing media developed in Denmark in the early 1970s that has been the standard for vegetable and flower production in North America and Europe for decades. SteadyGRO has been laboratory tested to produce faster seed germination, higher fruit weights and better overall fruit quality than rockwool and, unlike rockwool, SteadyGRO is eco-friendly and can be reduced from its original form to a mass of less than 11 percent or incinerated for bio-mass purposes

Recently, Purdue University conducted a six-month laboratory study that analyzed the performance of growing cucumbers and tomatoes indoors using both SteadyGRO and rockwool. The study concluded that SteadyGRO outperformed rockwool, producing higher germination and fruit weights, plant longevity, general plant health and overall fruit quality.

“We chose Coles Marketing Communications to market SteadyGRO due to the agency’s long and proven history for building and sustaining brand awareness and getting results,” said Kelvin Frye, national sales manager for SteadyGRO. “We have an innovative, revolutionary and proven product in SteadyGRO and Coles Marketing Communications understands how to grow our presence in the international marketplace.”

SteadyGRO is manufactured by Syndicate Sales Inc., a leading manufacturer, importer and distributor of more than 1,500 items to the international floral industry since 1946. Syndicate Sales manufactures brand names Aquapic©, Aquafoam©, Aquaplus the difference is clear©, Aquahold©, Hydraplus©, Hoosier Glass©, Garden Collection© and Everlastin Baskets©. With subsidiary Hurryin’ Hoosier Transport, Syndicate Sales is the leader in customized distribution and delivery to its customers in all 48 contiguous U.S. states and Canada.

Batteries Plus, the nation’s largest all-battery retailer, has improved efficiency, accuracy and cycle time for purchase order processing by integrating a new supplier management solution with real-time reporting developed by Indianapolis-based Blue Horseshoe.

Prior to implementing Blue Horseshoe’s Vendor Portal, Batteries Plus manually managed its purchase order-to-payment process. This made it difficult for the company to work with vendors to place and manage purchase orders, ensure timely and accurate documentation to U.S. Customs to meet the requirements of new regulations in 2010 and track metrics of their other vendors during the purchase process.

Vendor Portal is a software solution that provides global visibility to the health of a supplier network, a real-time dashboard and reporting on individual supplier performance that enables companies to identify their top suppliers. It provides information that companies can leverage in negotiating supplier contracts, integrates seamlessly into a new or existing enterprise system and provides a live, automated global view of a company’s supply chain.

Within six months, Batteries Plus will roll out Vendor Portal to all domestic suppliers and expand the solution by implementing a new quality control step in the company’s overall work flow.

Recently, Blue Horseshoe announced its acquisition of Ohio-based TransTech Consulting Inc. and a major integrated software solutions deal with Florida-based Amalie Oil.

News about new client SteadyGRO’s impressive performance in a recent Purdue University study hit the national media last week, showing up on the Reuters board in New York’s Times Square (at left) and the Clear Channel message board in Las Vegas.

SteadyGRO is a new product that optimizes soilless plant growth. It’s used by home and greenhouse gardeners, pro gardeners and hydroponic growers to grow food crops like cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, flowers and more. Manufactured by Kokomo, Ind.-based Syndicate Sales, which has for more than 60 years manufactured and distributed more than 1,500 floral related items for the international floral industry, SteadyGRO is available  in plugs, sheets, blocks and slabs.

The Purdue study compared indoor plant growth results using SteadyGro and rockwool, a product developed in the 1970s. A huge difference between SteadyGRO and rockwool is their impact on the environment. SteadyGRO is eco-friendly and can be reduced from its original form to a mass of less than 11 percent or incinerated for bio-mass purposes.

Purdue University research concluded that SteadyGRO H+ was the best-performing soilless growth medium in terms of average grams of fruit harvested per plant in tomatoes and cucumbers. SteadyGRO H+ produced 47 percent more cucumber in terms of fruit weight per plant than rockwool, according to the study, and both SteadyGRO and SteadyGRO H+ outperformed rockwool in promoting the growth of tomatoes by a 23 percent gain in harvested weight.

News of SteadyGRO’s performance compared to rockwool was also picked up by Reuters, Forbes.com, Yahoo! Finance, the Boston Business Journal, the Los Angeles Business Journal, WBTV CBS-3  in Charlotte, N.C., WTHR NBC-13 in Indianapolis and more than 180 other news sites throughout the country.