Marketing Eco (me)

Marketing Eco developed a sticky post-enabled, blog style website for Robert W. “Doc” Hall, Professor Emeritus, Operations Management, Indiana University, and author of “Compression – Meeting the Challenges of Sustainability Through Vigorous Learning Enterprises.” The website empowers Doc to self-publish articles about Compression, create topics for online discussion, and contains an embedded DebateGraph.org mind map that Doc designed and DebateGraph.org founder David Price helped to get started on www.DebateGraph.org. The new website’s sticky post capability organizes content and serves it up in a modular format that makes it easier for his visitors to digest the complex components of Compression Thinking.

About Doc Hall:

Frequently called “Doc” by industry friends, Hall is a founding member of the Association for Manufacturing Excellence and received its award for outstanding lifetime service. For 22 years he was editor-in-chief of AME’s publication, Target. He also received the SME Gold Medal for outstanding service to the manufacturing engineering profession in technical communications, technical writing, and lectures.

Hall has authored and co-authored six books on manufacturing excellence, with topics ranging from the improvement of manufacturing practice to organizational development and renewal. He also has an interest in innovation, and is a judge for the PACE Award (innovation by auto industry suppliers). A prior book, The Soul of the Enterprise (1992) touched on some of the topics in Compression, so he’s been ruminating about Compression thinking for almost 20 years – reluctantly concluding that there is no “easy out.” Compression thinking applies the best ideas seen in organizing for work to the manifold problems of the 21st century.

About Compression Thinking:

The 21st century must be a turning point. Physical economic expansion that accelerated with the industrial revolution cannot continue indefinitely. The earth has finite resources, but our legacy business and economic thinking promotes expansion, assuming that more resources are always available – somewhere. Transforming ourselves to limit consumption while simultaneously increasing human quality of life for everyone is the supreme human challenge of Compression.

What to do? The basics begin with eliminating waste, not doing that which doesn’t need to be done. Then reuse, repair, remanufacture, recycle and so on. Many individuals are doing what they can to decrease their personal waste of energy, water, and materials. But without working organizations creating systems that help them do it, that effect is minimal. And careful conservation is not enough. Every technology can have adverse consequences. Unless working organizations make a new kind of thinking practical, individual measures cannot offset the heedlessness stimulated by commercial incentives.

Compression calls for a change in fundamental economic thinking — a new mindset — Compression Thinking. This begins by contemplating issues so interrelated that single engineering fixes are unlikely to let mass consumption continue. Many different imaginative changes will be necessary, under always changing conditions. Most companies have barely started. Some do a little, but claim a lot, thus laying themselves open to charges of “greenwash.” Our technical and systems issues are unprecedented, but our biggest challenge, always, is us.

So start to look behind financial facades to see the physical reality of what we do. The transformation needed is so great that it amounts to redesign. Remediating excess consumption after it has happened is not good enough — expensive too. One can only go on from the present, devising operational methods that anticipate future problems and preclude them before they happen.

The goal of Compression is in short to greatly reduce global resource consumption while globally increasing human quality of life for everyone. It is a difficult challenge, yet it is possible.

To learn more about Compression Thinking, to download the free 55 page condensed version of the book “Compression” and extended footnotes, and to learn how to start thinking differently, visit Compression.org >

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John Robert (Bob) Browning, Jr. launched ISS Consulting to address the growing need to simultaneously renovate company processes and culture to boost the bottom line and gain market share. He needed both a memorable company brand and a flexible website format to show how his process works and explain the ISS Consulting difference.

Marketing Eco developed a strong logo for Bob’s new company that embodies his vision for his company utilizing the best of breed brand identity guidelines. The website Marketing Eco developed for Bob uses a modular format to give a visitors both an organized and visual walk through of his process using Wordpress and the modular sticky post method of organizing and displaying content and a blog-style back end content management portal.

Today, many companies large and small struggle to gain a competitive edge, failing to capitalize on the fact that they possess a vast, virtually untapped resource within their company walls. Companies with horizontally structured processes often overlook the individual work ethic and the innate human need to be both productive and responsible. By comparison, companies with productivity / gain share programs demonstrate over and over that true employee involvement contributes significantly to the whole health of the company by any measure.

“I founded ISS Consulting because I felt a burning need to help employees by making their working life far more than a simple pay check. Work is the opportunity to make a difference, to express individual creativity and innovation,” said Browning, President and Founder of ISS Consulting. “The ISS process, based on The Scanlon Plan developed by Joseph N. Scanlon in the 1930’s, has been proven to work in any company committed to its people. By tapping unutilized employee resources, the companies I have worked with, and others who believe in true employee involvement utilizing the Scanlon philosophy, see significant positive differences in their organization’s ability to compete, employees report happier and healthier work experiences, customer satisfaction improves, which all leads to a stronger bottom line and improved job security. I cannot think of anything else I’d rather do than help companies by involving their constituents in a way that benefits the customer, investor, and employee.”

Mr. Browning’s mission with ISS provides a proven means of company transformation through a tailored three step process. The process begins with an analysis of a company’s culture to assess potential for embracing gain share. Next, Mr. Browning and his team perform a deep analysis that lays the groundwork for fine-tuning the balance between customers, investors, and employees and creates a benchmark to measure change. After that, Mr. Browning uses over 30 years of experience across a broad array of business niches and company cultures to build a dynamic model for participation that includes productivity councils overseen and guided by a screening committee.

By helping companies implement a model tailored specifically to their company and culture, Mr. Browning has been able to help companies realize dramatic, measurable improvement in productivity and profitability while simultaneously providing their employees with higher levels of job satisfaction and a constant desire to produce at the highest level of efficiency.

“The Scanlon Plan is an innovative management process for total organization development. It consists of a set of assumptions about human motivation and behavior, general principles for the management of organizations based on those assumptions, and specific procedures for implementing these principles,” said Carl Frost, author, Changing Forever.

All organization leaders have the ability to light a match and tap the multitude of talented resources within their employees or remain in productivity darkness. ISS Consulting is well positioned to provide that match and help companies create an ongoing plan of participation and involvement for the long-term success of the enterprise.

Visit the ISS Consulting website >

MarketingEco.com Website Launches Blog Style Website, Website Launches, Websites

If you’re at all like the gang at Marketing Eco, when a way to save energy takes only two clicks of the mouse button to implement, you’re all over it.

Hang on to your hats and get ready to to “click on” your energy savings, because by using Blackle as your browser’s home page and your default search engine you can make an impact, and we all know that even the small energy savings are important ones.

Here’s the scoop straight from Blackle.com:

How is Blackle saving energy?

Blackle was created by Heap Media to remind us all of the need to take small steps in our everyday lives to save energy. Blackle searches are powered by Google Custom Search.

Blackle saves energy because the screen is predominantly black. “Image displayed is primarily a function of the user’s color settings and desktop graphics, as well as the color and size of open application windows; a given monitor requires more power to display a white (or light) screen than a black (or dark) screen.” Roberson et al, 2002

In January 2007 a blog post titled Black Google Would Save 750 Megawatt-hours a Year proposed the theory that a black version of the Google search engine would save a fair bit of energy due to the popularity of the search engine. Since then there has been skepticism about the significance of the energy savings that can be achieved and the cost in terms of readability of black web pages.

We believe that there is value in the concept because even if the energy savings are small, they all add up. Secondly we feel that seeing Blackle every time we load our web browser reminds us that we need to keep taking small steps to save energy.

How can you help?

We encourage you to set Blackle as your home page. This way every time you load your Internet browser you will save a little bit of energy. Remember every bit counts! You will also be reminded about the need to save energy each time you see the Blackle page load.

Help us spread the word about Blackle by telling your friends and family to set it as their home page. If you have a blog then give us a mention. Or put the following text in your email signature: “Blackle.com – Saving energy one search at a time”.

Have a look at our energy saving tips page for ideas on steps you can take to save energy or you can follow Blackle on Twitter and we will keep you updated with simple energy saving tips.

There are a lot of great web sites about saving energy and being more environmentally friendly. They are full of great tips covering the little things that we can all do to make a difference today. Try Blackling “energy saving tips” or visit one of the many great blogs dedicated to environmental awareness.

If you haven’t changed your browser’s default home page before, Blackle has instructions embedded above to set Blackle as your home page.

Thanks to Eco Scout, Marketing Eco has “clicked on” energy savings for each ME computer. We’d love to hear how many people are already on board with Blackle, and how many of you give two clicks for sustainability by visiting http://www.blackle.com now.

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We’re extremely thrilled to announce the launch of Tami Briggs’ new book, Women as Healers: Voices of Vibrancy, and the website Marketing Eco created for Tami to help take the book on an exciting social media journey.

Tami found the fittingly vibrant photo that graces the cover of the book and companion CD and Marketing Eco designed the website header and companion graphics to compliment the book’s design and further communicate Tami’s vision.

The easy-to-use website content management portal has been pivotal, enabling Tami and the talented developer already managing her previously-created shopping cart secure access to add content and code at any time, from anywhere with Internet access.

What the Book is About

Here’s the scoop about the book’s content straight from the Women as Healers website along with an iPhone snapshot of the book and CD just after it arrived at Marketing Eco:

Women as Healers: Voices of Vibrancy is Tami Briggs’ newest book. From Nebraska to the Netherlands, India to Iran, and Serbia to South Carolina (and many other U.S. states), the 31 women featured are all gifted healers. As they share their stories, they give us many insights on how to help heal the world. Some work for corporations and institutions; many of them are self-employed. They are from all walks of life, doing extraordinary things to help make our world a better place. In this book you will read about life-changing experiences from authors, artists, consultants, nurses, educators, leaders, and therapists – creators all.

Many of the contributing authors have suffered great tragedies and losses, yet they demonstrate to all of us resiliency and great strength. They are pioneers – powerful, spiritual and spirited. You will likely see yourself in many of these women’s heart-warming and touching stories. As they reflect on and share their journeys of healing, they model taking risks, beating the odds, being of great service, making significant differences in the world, and living their passions.

A Marketing Eco Reader Experience

When the book and CD arrived by post yesterday, Kari Havir (Principal, Marketing Eco) dashed off with a beaming face and the copy of the book to her favorite garlic-scented restaurant, La Grolla. Kari had everything positive to say about her shared reading experience. Here’s the scoop:

I was so exceedingly thrilled when the book arrived that I just had to show it off immediately. I had a vision of delving into the book with a plate of my favorite cuisine and the happy chatter of contented people surrounding me. I know, you’re probably thinking you’d rather snuggle in under a warm lap blanket and read at home, however there was something about this particular book that made me want to share the experience while in the moment.

I sat down with a glass of wine and La Grolla’s marvelous bread and started reading. One of my very favorite La Grolla people, Rachel, waited on my table last night. When I confessed with a wobbly smile that I was so moved by the first story I was reading, she only half-jokingly gave me a few drink napkins just in case I needed them. I had happy, tear-filled eyes more than once, but I’m not shy about having those in public. Any piece of literature, art, or performance media that can move me to tears while sharing that experience with others is hands-down on my list of favorite things.

As I read on while enjoying a scrumptious plate of mixed seafood, I was again conscious of how wonderful the setting was for my personal experience with the book. The combination made for an absolutely lovely evening.

I am really looking forward to snuggling in for the rest of the book with Tami’s harp music playing in the background to complete the experience. I’ll definitely write an update when I complete my reading journey and share more about this fantastic project, so stay tuned for my follow up piece.

And Now, the Actual Website!

Marketing Eco is proud to point you to www.womenashealers.com where you can hear Tami’s harp music and learn more about the book project.

Call for Reader Responses

Marketing Eco would love to know where you take your Women as Healers: Voices of Vibrancy book copy and how you share your reading experience, so please feel share your book adventures and photos by submitting a comment.

Stay tuned to WomenAsHealers.com for further updates as Women as Healers: Voices of Vibrancy book adventure roles out!

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The American P. I. website has launched and is fully integrated so that media casts automatically feed to iTunes, Blubrry, YouTube and many other podcast and videocast websites in one click of the mouse button.

Here’s a peek at The American P. I. look and feel:

We designed the logo, website, and one page speaking sheet for Paul in a vibrant range of oranges and blues.

The American P. I. purpose:

With The American P. I. website, Paul Jaeb, CEO of the Heartland Investigative Group, set out to create captivating podcast content that would provide helpful and educational information to fellow investigators. His content focuses on everything from the business issues of running a P. I. firm, to legislative issues, continuing education, networking and investigative associations, and of course investigation techniques and concerns. On each podcast episode Paul interviews several seasoned investigative colleagues from across the nation to get at the issues facing private investigators in various geographical areas and investigative niches.

Here’s a peek at Paul Jaeb, The American P. I.:

Paul Jaeb, CEO
Heartland Investigative Group

Paul Jaeb is 20 year veteran private investigator. He is the founder and CEO of Heartland Investigative Group, a premier investigative and security consulting firm based in Minneapolis.

Paul is a founding member of the Minnesota Association of Private Investigators and is the current National Director of the National Association of Legal Investigators.

Paul also sits on the Executive Committee of Investigative and Security Professionals for Legislative Action, and is active in ASIS International and the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners.

In addition, Paul speaks at corporate events, professional associations, and private events bringing his experienced perspective and engaging style as a key note or breakout session for organizations across the nation.

Seamless, easy-to-use, and powerful website technology:

One-click integration isn’t only for Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn these days. We’re really excited how this website plugs The American P. I. into all the big podcast and video media feeds. What’s even more thrilling is that one-click integration can easily be built into every one of our client websites.

Here’s the skinny on podcast recording sessions with guests all over the nation work:

Podcasting session are recorded locally, yet guests on the podcast episodes call in from all over the nation with a clear recording session thanks to Skype.com’s free, 24/7 Internet calling features.

Check out The American P. I. website here and the Premiere Podcast Episode here.

Stay tuned! Down the road we’ll check back with Paul and feature feedback from The American P. I. on his website, podcasts, and further interactive plans in the works. Happy podcast listening!

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Did you know that the EPA’s Environmental Education Web Workgroup (EEWW) meets monthly to evaluate Web sites (potentially yours) to supplement the EPA’s environmental education Web content? Per Eco Scout, it’s true as long as the site meets strict quality criteria, fills gaps in educational content, and is approved by the EEWW.

Here’s the scoop on criteria and how to submit your Web site straight from the EEWW: The EPA Environmental Education Web sites make quality environmental education materials more accessible to Kids, Middle School Students, High School Students and Teachers. The EPA’s Environmental Education Web Workgroup (EEWW) evaluates sites to determine whether they are appropriate to be included as links on EPA’s environmental education portal pages. Read the linking criteria to determine if the site you are proposing may be included in any of the portal sites. The site will not be selected if it: Promotes commercial activities Promotes political organizations Engages in advocacy Is not fact based and neutral [Reference: Above information from http://www.ttemidev.com/eewwRev/] Our audiences We design our environmental education portals for specific target audiences. (Grades and ages may vary for certain content.) Our Environmental Education Portal Web sites Site Audience We link to: Environmental Kids Club grades pre-K-5 or ages 4-10 we link to EPA sites, other federal, state and local government sites, and educational sites (e.g., museums, educational institutions) Student Environmental Center grades 6-8 or ages 11-13 we link to EPA sites, other federal, state and local government sites, and educational sites (e.g., museums, educational institutions). High School Environmental Center grades 9-12 or ages 14-18 we link to EPA and other government sites, educational sites, and some non-government sites. Teaching Center classroom, home school, or non-classroom instructors for youth grades pre-K-12 or ages 4-18 we link to EPA and other government sites, educational sites, and some non-government sites. [Reference: Audience information, method of evaluating sites, and more details regarding criteria can be found on http://www.epa.gov/teachers/criteria.htm] Per Eco Scout, submit a site for EEWW review at: http://www.ttemidev.com/eewwRev/

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Eco Scout has been watching for updates to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) "Guides for the Use of Environmental Marketing Claims" and noticed that the FTC updated eCFR Title 16, Part 260 on July 1, 2009.

A digital comparison of the Electronic Code of Federal Regulations (e-CFR) version dated June 18, 2009 and the current version dated July 1, 2009 revealed that only the date of the e-CFR was changed. The remainder of the e-CFR’s content is the same from one version to the next. Stay tuned! Eco Scout will stay on the trail of this e-CFR and keep you in the loop regarding all future FTC changes big and small. Even though this recent update by the FTC wasn’t much to squawk about, as the FTC continues to hold hearings and gather information we expect to see changes in the regulation of environmental marketing claims. TITLE 16–Commercial Practices CHAPTER I–FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION SUBCHAPTER B–GUIDES AND TRADE PRACTICE RULES PART 260–GUIDES FOR THE USE OF ENVIRONMENTAL MARKETING CLAIMS Try one of these easy ways to stay connected and connect your friends and colleagues to all Eco Scout’s finds on Marketing Eco: Click "Subscribe" in the lower-right corner to receive the Marketing Eco RSS feed via your favorite feed service. Click on the corresponding link in the upper-right corner to follow Marketing Eco on Twitter, Facebook, or Myspace. Share Eco Scout’s Marketing Eco updates with your friends and colleagues via your favorite social media or email, or save us to your favorites using the "Share / Save" button below.

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The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has published "Guides for the Use of Environmental Marketing Claims" to define fair green marketing practices and reduce unintentional greenwashing, outright deception, and overstatements regarding environmental attributes.

For those of you who want certainty about making environmental claims, it’s critical to work with marketing and advertising firms that are familiar with this information and on top of future updates. 

Because the FTC will continue to gather information, hold hearings, and update these guides as needed, Marketing Eco will keep a watch on developments with this e-CFR.

Without further ado, here’s the scoop from the FTC:

The guides in this part represent administrative interpretations of laws administered by the Federal Trade Commission for the guidance of the public in conducting its affairs in conformity with legal requirements. These guides specifically address the application of Section 5 of the FTC Act to environmental advertising and marketing practices. They provide the basis for voluntary compliance with such laws by members of industry. Conduct inconsistent with the positions articulated in these guides may result in corrective action by the Commission under Section 5 if, after investigation, the Commission has reason to believe that the behavior falls within the scope of conduct declared unlawful by the statute.

These guides apply to environmental claims included in labeling, advertising, promotional materials and all other forms of marketing, whether asserted directly or by implication, through words, symbols, emblems, logos, depictions, product brand names, or through any other means, including marketing through digital or electronic means, such as the Internet or electronic mail. The guides apply to any claim about the environmental attributes of a product, package or service in connection with the sale, offering for sale, or marketing of such product, package or service for personal, family or household use, or for commercial, institutional or industrial use."

e-CFR Data is current as of June 18, 2009
TITLE 16–Commercial Practices
CHAPTER I–FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION
SUBCHAPTER B–GUIDES AND TRADE PRACTICE RULES
PART 260–GUIDES FOR THE USE OF ENVIRONMENTAL MARKETING CLAIMS

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	The sparkling new LaGrollaStPaul.com website we developed has a fresh, warm, blog style that enables the restaurant to feed online visitors bits and bytes about new specials and travel advisories as easily as the restaurant lavishes its restaurant visitors with delicious cuisine.
What is so different about the new website compared to the old website?  We’re glad you asked! The new website gives La Grolla the ability to update their website from any computer with Internet access 24/7 through an easy-to-use, password-protected content management portal. This is vastly different from the old site which was a typical static website that required web publishing software in order to make content updates. The addition of the blog-style architecture with its Flash post-rotation feature puts new content front and center for online visitors, makes it possible for them to subscribe to an RSS feed of future updates, and gives them the opportunity to add a comment to a blog post. La Grolla has total control over the approval and visibility of all comments through the content portal. Check-mark boxes in the control panel enable La Grolla to hold all comments in a hidden pending area prior to La Grolla giving digital approval to make each comment visible. This prevents any odd comment from a comment-spam-bot from making it to the live website. La Grolla is very excited about opening up this dynamic communication channel with its customers and we’re currently working with La Grolla to expand the interaction opportunities even further. Are there any green aspects to this website? Absolutely. With this type of web platform, one of the biggest changes clients notice is on the back end in the area of content collaboration which is paperless when a client utilizes the host of back end collaboration features available. Staff contribution permissions are just one part of the paperless collaboration tool set. The client’s staff are each assigned their own user name and password and permissions are set so that staff with "Contributor" status can submit content to "Editors" for review, changes, and publication on the website. Pending content is kept in a pending area where "Editors" can see all pending content at a glance. There are even more back end collaboration tools available, which we’ll post about very soon. In short, we’re as excited about the capabilities as our clients are. This platform empowers our clients in ways they hadn’t considered before and the energy and ideas that are sprouting as a result are thrilling all around. Paperless, collaborative, and empowering. The best part about this specific open source website development platform in our view is that it puts the real power in our client’s hands and they don’t have to call us to communicate to their customers. We’re always available to help, yet rather than being a bottle neck in the flow of information, we can focus on being a creative catalyst and help our clients step into using social and viral marketing techniques as well, which of course is part every interactive and eco marketing firm’s dream. Watch for further updates regarding La Grolla’s online presence as we continue to incubate new viral, social, and paperless marketing ideas with the cutting-edge La Grolla team. Be sure to visit www.lagrollastpaul.com and check out their menu as well.

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Marketing Eco’s 100% solar-powered website has launched! Here’s the latest about the website launch goals straight from Marketing Eco’s news room:

The new Marketing Eco website will start out a little like a seedling awaiting the full foliage that ongoing eco posts and content development will provide. With such an enormous wealth of marketing knowledge here, our main challenge will be to dispense it in bite-size, easily digestible pieces.

The concept for the website is to provide a green marketing twist on cutting edge strategic marketing know-how and wrap that up with useful green business and marketing best practice information provided by our Eco Scout.

By tying our website posts directly to feeds to social media, we look forward to showing by example how green and effective both viral and social marketing really are.

We never stop searching for new ways to improve marketing strategies and tactics and we’re focused on empowering our clients with marketing techniques and tools that they can manage themselves. This both saves clients a great deal of cost, but also makes their marketing fluid and live, versus static and slow moving.

For instance, this website is built on a free, open-source, and very flexible platform that enables a password protected client-side content editing portal that is very easy to use. In addition, a client can edit their website from any computer with Internet access 24/7, a feature that our clients are positively beaming about. We’re in the midst of two client web launches on this platform and we’re looking forward to sharing their after-launch feedback with you all within the next week or two.

With over 18 years of hands-on international marketing experience in various industries, we’re excited about nurturing eco marketing projects for companies from all walks, both green industries and regular companies who want to green up and their business practices. To that end, Marketing Eco’s new website opens up a global, virtual conversation for those interesting in green marketing. 

With the level of enthusiasm our clients are showing for our client-empowering green twist on strategic marketing, we couldn’t be more thrilled about how our combination of marketing ecology and economy is flourishing. It’s a definite win-win for the client and saving the earth through sustainable marketing."

Kari Havir, Marketing Eco

We may be a little tongue in cheek when it comes to the conversational and fun flavor of our website, yet we’re extremely serious when it comes to delivering a measurable return on marketing investment (ROMI). Contact Marketing Eco to learn more.

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