The Best Medicine?

Mars is looking to sell the good-for-you stuff in cocoa (flavanols) in the pharmaceuticals business.

The two Hershey's miniatures that I just ate probably aren't going to prevent a heart attack. (The flavanols are destroyed in the usual preparation of chocolate). It still sounds like good medicine to me.

Mommy Brain!

My friend Renu, found this book review, which I'll have to add to my reading list. How does motherhood affect a women's ability to think, reason and make decisions?

When Morgan was born, I forgot the rest of the world existed for about 10 weeks. I was so focussed on caring for my newborn and doing everything just right, there just wasn't room for anything else.

When I returned to my job, Morgan was 3 months old. I realized what a one-track mind I'd had. It was a major transition, and for a while, I found it difficult to make even the simplest work-related decistions. I was overwhelmed. I relaxed my overmothering after a while, as most first-time Moms do.

Now, I have most of the family and work schedule in my head. Having a PDA doesn't hurt though. It's amazing how much more I need to remember (and usually do!). That must be Mommy Brain!

Finding bits and bunches of creativity

Several years ago, not long after the birth of my second child, I realized that my brain had slowed to a crawl. At first I blamed motherhood and hormones for the loss of my "college word" vocabulary and multiplication tables. Running from full-time job to full-time motherhood didn't seem to help although I thought my brain was always working.

I decided that I needed to (correcting Apple's grammar here) start thinking differently. I used my brain at work and with my kids, but I didn't stretch it often enough. I didn't have enough opportunities to let my brain work hard on new problems or to read about interesting new ideas and discuss them with other people.

I took action. I started reading nonfiction for "fun". I searched for experts that encouraged creativity, not just in art, music and advertising, but in motherhood, lawn work and report writing. I returned to recreational reading too. Picking out books with no educational merit. I found I could sit in the same room with my husband in the evening (he has a bad TV remote habit), and not get frustrated as long as I had a book.

I recently read Blink : The Power of Thinking Without Thinking and The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference by Malcolm Gladwell. Both interesting books with a little spark of creativity. Both also offer interesting insights on marketing. We don't always need to reach the most people, just the right people.

I'm saving Harry Potter, the Half-Blood Prince for vacation, so right now I'm reading Wicked. Aside from being an interesting novel. It's an exercise in vocabulary. I haven't been checking the dictionary regularly, but I probably should be. I'm never sure which words are part of the fantasy languages of the characters and which are just words I've never heard before (or lost to the hormones mentioned above)

I like getting bits of creative inspiration from a couple of web sites too. The link to Worthwhile is on my favorites at the right. The writers at Worthwhile focus on living more passionately in work, family and recreation. The Innovation Network has a bunch of creativity and innovation resources.

Tourism Blogging

I don't travel much, but when I do, I prefer to have personal recommendations about where to eat and where to stay. Without recommendations, I'm probably sticking with the national chains.

The beauty of these new "unsponsored" tourism blogs is that they look like personal recommendations. The Milwaukee blogger at Play in the City was given coupons and discounted or free admissions, but her posts are not edited. She also gets a laptop, a digital camera and an internet connection, but she is not paid.

The Pennsylvania tourism office is featuring a bunch of blogs effectively highlighting the diverse experiences in the state. It's not clear what kind of compensation the bloggers are getting.

Ratings and recommendations are expected from travel sites. This new spin adds the latest trend and a face and voice to the recommendations.

Online Business Communication

There is still a lot of efficiency that could be added to doing everyday business with small, local companies using online communication.

It's still not efficient to search for local real estate or contact a realtor online, at least here in Sheboygan. When we were looking for our house, I wished I could receive an automatic email when a house meeting our specifications came on the market. I wanted it to show pictures of the outside and inside of the house and allow me to download a PDF of the spec sheet. The realtors I talked to couldn't even email me spec sheets since they didn't have them electronically.

When we finally decided to build our house, the contractor did not have an email address. It would have been so efficient to email him our questions. It's nice to send questions and respond to them when it's convenient to me. Plus, I would have had a record of our conversations when questions came up.

We recently planted the lawn at our new house. I got frustrated when I couldn't see the equipment available at my local Grand Rental Station online. I wanted to rent the equipment from another company that listed the equipment online and responded promptly to my email questions. (Unfortunately, their equipment wasn't available when we needed it.)

I'm having similar frustrations with landscaping companies. I'd like to email my plans and plant list to a couple of suppliers, receive a quote, give them my credit card number and get a delivery. Currently not a possibility.

A few simple changes would have a positive impact on each of these businesses. Especially as people in my age and demographic become the buld of their customers.

Pay Per Click Advertising

A lot of pay-per-click advertisers pay a specialized search marketing company to manage their keyword and bidding. That's probably a good idea if you have hundreds of keywords and spend thousands of dollars.

Local companies can manage a few keywords themselves (or ask their marketing partner to help them). PayPerClickSearchEngines.com gives an overview of how to get started. In niche markets, pay per click advertising is still relatively inexpensive. That makes it easy to test and play around with. Take a $50 budget and watch the effect on your web traffic.

I'm interested in how local consumer companies will be taking advantage of pay-per-click or pay-per-call advertising. I'm young enough to be in the habit of looking for local phone numbers and addresses online before checking the phonebook.

Here we go!

I'm the official interactive expert at our agency. I do my best to keep up with trends that might help our clients. I've been interested in blogs since I was working at Bemis Manufacturing Co. (the world's largest manufacturer of toilet seats).

We've made recent recommendations to clients to monitor blogs in their industries.

It's time to take my own advice and start a blog of my own. I know that I've been slow picking up this trend, but I hope to start now sharing what I'm learning every day.