You don't have to LOVE me, just LIKE me - Social media campaign

 

The human connection. That’s what I love most about social networking sites. It’s more than just swapping business cards and trying to sell our services or products. It’s two-way communication, building relationships. How about you? Do you enjoy social networking? What’s your favorite part?

The Smart Way to Attract the right client

   

After six years in America, it is time to look back and take a look at my career as a graphic designer. It has been an exhilarating roller coaster ride! Sometimes going up like a rocket and other times coming down with the parachute closed. But this is part of learning process. This acquired experience has helped me stay in the battle. It is time to pay back and share the strategies that have helped me to get  top clients and become a successful graphic designer in a challenging city like Los Angeles ... in a relatively short time. I have learned some of these strategies through my experiences, reading books, attending seminars or getting invaluable advice from colleagues and friends.
   

You must work HARD to be successful.	You must work SMART to be successful and get repeat business.
You have to work HARD to increase your income when your business strategy is to offer lower pricing.	It is SMART when you compete with quality and great customer service. Clients well consider your service as a great value.
When you just focus on getting the immediate sale, it is HARD to contact a large quantity of clients and first time buyers. Usually that is a temporary strategy to increase your income.	When you focus on building a strong relationship with the client, it is SMART to know their needs if your business is based on a satisfied repeat customer. With this approach, you will have a more stable business.
It is HARD when all your efforts are on improving your company services and products. Maybe you are concentrating on something the clients have no need for.	When you get focused on your clients’ problems, you could get a better idea about their needs and it is SMART to target their specific problems with solutions.
It is HARD to create a new product or service to be different from your competitors and dominate the market.	Even if there are hundreds of businesses with similar services, it is SMART to focus on products and services that meet the client's specific needs and yield results. That is what sets you apart from your competition!
It is HARD try to reach new clients with cold-calls, buy lists of contacts, send unsolicited emails asking for appointments or pitch interested prospects.	It is SMART to attract a new audience by providing valuable information using your website, blog or social media profiles.
It is HARD to use social media to reach ramdon people sending unsolicited requests. Most people are not interested in being your friend or be part of your network.	It is SMART when you use social media to create a stronger network, keep the conversation going with clients and colleagues will help you to reach a larger target audience.
It is HARD try to be on the top working alone and viewing everyone in your field is a competitor.	It is SMART to make alliances and create strategies to offer services that either compliment or add to what your client already has.

I hope you find this small post helpful. Your suggestions and comments are always welcome.

New year, new branding

If this is the first time you are visiting my website, you won’t notice the big change it has had. But if in some way you know me, you will see I have rebranded myself. I wasn’t unhappy with my previous business name (samAdvertising). It was catchy and easy to remember. Some people asked me why Sam, well, it was a short cut for “Samudio”. In spanish it sounds good, but in english is kind of hard to pronounce. When I arrived in the United States, my first thought about my business name was to create something personal and easy to identify across the country. As I said before, to use my last name wasn’t a good idea. That is why I used “Sam” and then combined with “Advertising” it would be the perfect match. Now after six year of hard work and a huge learning process in Los Angeles, I have decided to give a fresh images to my business. It wasn’t an easy decision and sometimes I thought it would be better to stick with my old name. Now that the work is done, I’m sure about this big change. I have been working on this project for some months now. My task was to use a short name that was easy to remember and focused in my target audience, “independents and companies interested in professional design services, preferably based in Los Angeles. Rebranding is more than changing the logo and stationery, it is also important to think about other important aspects such as domain name (website), emails, social media, phone numbers and so on. Here we go.