What’s Your Brand?
Your brand is the sum of all experiences your customer has with you. Lots of marketing gurus say this, with good reason. No matter what you think you provide your customers, it’s what THEY think that counts.
A Pilgrimage of Thoughts
I listened to a wonderful podcast recently on Sister Storylab, a project of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Orange. They are a community of Catholic Sisters in Southern California, where they do meaningful work for underserved people. I’ve been privileged to write for them.
Loving a Small Bird
The smallest tragedies often escape our attention. Usually, actually. They are the tragedies that take place underfoot and along the fence line, where other lives – not human, but no less valuable – are hurt or lost. A beetle is crushed by a foot, say, or a squirrel falls from a branch.
Call for Truthful, Open-Hearted Communication
Catholic Sisters took a public stand yesterday against President Trump’s divisive rhetoric, sending him a letter from which the above quote is excerpted. I applaud them. We absolutely must cease using language of hatred and fear, language that divides and enrages us.
Monarch Butterfly Caterpillar Food + SEO?
If you maintain a website, you know you need to keep it optimized for Google. Search Engine Optimization is not optional! Search terms are at the heart of it.
The (Best Case Scenario) Disaster Handbook
When Jodi O’Donnell asked me to write this series of stories for the summer issue of Iowa State University Foundation’s Forward magazine, I chirped, “Sure!” Little did I know that the stories would follow me to bed every night.
The Virtual Monastery Experience
I was in San Antonio, as I recall, attending the Communicators for Women Religious Conference, when I first got the idea of creating a virtual monastery. That was 10 years ago. I’m thrilled to report it has finally debuted! I’m very proud of the Benedictine Virtual Monastery Experience.
I Was an Immigrant …
Hardly a month goes by without some religious community, somewhere, using this sign. I found it in my inbox again recently! The Franciscan Action Network included it in their call to action on the treatment of refugees. In fact, it’s been in use now for 8 years. I helped create it, with the wonderful collaborative group we call SUN.
Raising Money for Pre-Term Babies
Morgan Jacqueline sounds like a newborn kitten. Muffled. Muted. Almost unnoticeable. Morgan is crying as loud as she can.
Matching Catholic Sisters & Inquirers
Anyone who has worked in communications for Catholic Sisters has wrestled with their declining membership. It’s heartbreaking to watch beloved Sisters die, replaced by no one. For marketing experts, it’s also perplexing. Why are so few women joining?
Making the World a Better Place
This just in, from Porter Novelli / Cone: Three-quarters of US adults expect businesses to positively impact society instead of just make money. A new study of more than 1,100 American adults found that 79% of Americans feel they have a deeper personal connection with companies that share similar values to their own, and 72% believe that purpose-driven companies care more about them and their families. Well, duh.
If You Want to Get Something Done...
By Susan Flansburg
At last, summer seems to have arrived.
Areas to the south of us may still face flooding, but here in Davenport the waters are at last receding, if slowly. I still can’t get to yoga class without parking a block away and stepping wide over sludge, but there’s a light at the end of the tunnel.
(For now. Heaven only knows what the weather might do next.)
Meanwhile, new projects are cropping up alongside the summer flowers. Quad City Design Consulting has recently launched with social media and PowerPoint support. The Quad City Yoga Foundation has nearly secured its nonprofit status, and we’ve already begun fund raising communications. New writing projects for a couple of universities and a group of Catholic Sisters add to ongoing client commitments.
I’ve also undertaken some professional development this spring, including Seth Godin’s Marketing Seminar, and writing classes through MasterClass. Yoga Teacher Training will conclude in August.
There’s a saying that if you want to get something done, you should ask a busy person. Yep.
Good thing there’s more daylight!
Missing Page
I still miss my brother. It’s been so long now – more 50 years – that initially it’s hard to remember anything but the great adventures we shared. Page pushed me to do things I was too afraid to do on my own initiative. Without him, I probably wouldn’t know what it was like to sit in the principal’s office or a police station, watching the big clock move at half the speed of time in the outside world.
One in 74,000,000
When Mr. DeSalvo broke the news to me about my brother, all I could do was stare at the 5 or 6 hairs growing on the bridge of his nose. A bald man would have been proud to have that much hair on the top of his head, I thought. Then and there, I made a solemn vow to always care about my appearance.
How to Write to Your Donors
If you are a fund raiser, you need to send appeals, reports and thank yous constantly. Yeah, you nod. You know that. Hard to find time, though. And … there’s that white screen. Here’s a hint: start with the words “Thank you.”
A New-ish Business
Alan and I have always been a team. I began editing him before we went out on our first date, when we both worked at WQAD-TV. He, in turn, became my first reader for everything I wrote. Still is. In a sense, Flansburg-Sivell Communications has been around as long as we’ve been a couple.