Charlotte, NC - September 7, 2011 - How do you draw a large audience to your site?  Do a viral campaign like Rack Room did.  Converse’s  “In My Shoes” Contest was a success as users in different geo-targeted areas were able to make videos showcasing the Converse product and execute quick videos and upload them to the designated YouTube channel. 

Viral campaigns are a great way to analyze and target untapped market share based on the diversity of uploads and the demographic of who is actually interested in the product.  A viral contest nowadays is always a hit as it can be easily shared on other social sites like Facebook and Twitter.  It helps promote brand awareness and build brand identity with existing and new customers.

Allowing comments on blogs and video channels like YouTube can lead to increased sales.  Promotions and messages can benefit any business if done correctly.

A Few Mini-Stats: The result of the two-month campaign was 25,000,000 impressions and over 5,000 unique users. Our campaign goals were to reach 12,000,000 impressions and 3,000 unique users.

About CGR Creative
CGR Creative is a boutique digital marketing firm that has been in business for 10 strong years. We specialize in all areas of online marketing including SEO, SEM, Social Media and PR services. Our goal is to help our clients achieve their goals and successes through open communication, strategy and hard work ethic to deliver you 110%.

www.facebook.com/cgrcreative | www.twitter.com/cgrcreative | www.cgrcreative.blogspot.com

The Latin Chamber of Commerce went through a rebranding phrase and with the change of the website and all of the onsite optimization; there was a period of time where ranks had to be re-established.

Charlotte, NC - September 1, 2011 - The Board was concerned that locals would not be able to find the Latin chapter if they searched the term Chamber Charlotte, since there was no emphasis on “Latin.”. There are dozens of chapters for each Chamber, in each state; therefore it was seemingly difficult to rank for the keyword phrase, “Chamber Charlotte.”  We implemented a massive SEO campaign strategy to target the area on a local and national level to push our rank all the way to page 1 on Google and place at spot number two.  It did not happen overnight as organic ranking takes time to establish.  We felt that our strategy involved plenty of on and offsite and we knew that we had to remain highly targeted to get the results the Board was looking for in a timely fashion.

Over the course of 8 weeks, we were able to target a competitive analysis and study the other sites in order to establish presence on Page 1.  Although a difficult task, we knew that implementing an array of strategies that worked for our other clients, proved to be very successful.  We were hoping to get ranked on at least the bottom of page 1, to our surprise our hard work paid off and we achieved number 2 on Google.

We reported on every delta change that occurred throughout our entire optimization process.  We knew the Board was interested in knowing every major or minor change, every step of the way.  We were extremely happy to see that out efforts were delivering positive results on the search engines.  As part of our process, we still maintain these rankings as they can slip at any time.  Nothing is absolute in the world of SEO.  What is absolute is our dedication, resources and guarantee to get you on Page 1 and strive to get you to placement 1.  We love to engage with our clients as we had in this instance which worked to our benefit because specific events that the LACCC was holding helped us target those events organically before they transpired, offering a slight advantage to their overall rankings on other keywords.

We rank number one on several keywords that were requested of us for the LACCC and other chapters have called us and requested we deliver the same services; however, it is a conflict of interest so we are grateful that they have thought enough of us to ask for our services.

Both onsite and offsite optimization was necessary to cause a massive change in our client’s placement.  We are extremely pleased with our results and our client is very happy as well.  We continue to conduct optimization ad dedicate a great deal of time to pushing a solid, SEO plan in place and ranking for spot 1 and 2 on Google.

About CGR Creative
CGR Creative is a boutique digital marketing firm that has been in business for 10 strong years. We specialize in all areas of online marketing including SEO, SEM, Social Media and PR services. Our goal is to help our clients achieve their goals and successes through open communication, strategy and hard work ethic to deliver you 110%.

www.facebook.com/cgrcreative | www.twitter.com/cgrcreative | www.cgrcreative.blogspot.com

Student housing supplier, Blue Furniture Solutions has obtained the services of CGR to execute their web and marketing plan.

Charlotte, NC - June 30, 2011 - National student housing supplier, Blue Furniture Solutions, has awarded CGR Creative the task of developing a customized, online quoting application as well as a complete rebranding effort.  The company’s mission is, “provide customers with high quality, well built furniture at prices that can’t be beat.”  CGR’s commitment is to help Blue Furniture Solutions make good on that promise by reshaping the brand and designing tools that increase ease of shopping for buyers.  College students need an easy and user friendly inteface to buy cool, new furniture.

Company officials cite not only creative excellence, but also strong technical expertise and solid search engine optimization (SEO) knowledge as key reasons CGR was selected.  “I interviewed several groups in the Charlotte area and none of them could come close to comparing…,” states Jamie Swick, Vice President of Sales. Additional projects the agency will take on include the creation of new collateral marketing materials and involvement in the company’s business development initiatives, including trade show support.

About CGR Creative
We are an agency capable of maintaining personal relationships with each of our clients. We are able to offer services that most advertising agencies cannot or will not. Our innovative efforts help us deliver strong results at prices that are often well below industry standards. We pride ourselves on our ability to partner with our clients insuring that we provide targeted services that match their needs exactly rather than taking a shotgun approach or offering a cookie cutter solution.
www.facebook.com/cgrcreative | www.twitter.com/cgrcreative | www.cgrcreative.blogspot.com

Charlotte, NC - May 14, 2011 - Experienced talent recruiters like Coors Executive Resources can quickly spot when a candidate has the right stuff.  So when they made the decision to relocate corporate headquarters to the Queen City, it is no surprise that they were in search of a gem of an agency to help them establish their brand presence in a new market.  That’s just what they found when the leadership team signed up CGR Creative to take on the task.

Just as a stone of incredible value bedazzles with its multi-faceted settings, CGR distinguished itself from the competition in the eyes of the firm’s president, Cheryl Coors.  She found unique characteristics like a diverse, professional team and the ability to translate experiences from other industries into assets for her business.

“Job one is to overhaul the company’s brand image to better reflect the first-class service Coors Recruiters provides its clients,” says Jason Ramsey, Partner at CGR.

About CGR Creative
We are an agency capable of maintaining personal relationships with each of our clients. We are able to offer services that most advertising agencies cannot or will not. Our innovative efforts help us deliver strong results at prices that are often well below industry standards. We pride ourselves on our ability to partner with our clients insuring that we provide targeted services that match their needs exactly rather than taking a shotgun approach or offering a cookie cutter solution.
www.facebook.com/cgrcreative | www.twitter.com/cgrcreative | www.cgrcreative.blogspot.com

Charlotte, NC - April 28, 2011 - Decking Solutions company, Fiberon®, has teamed up with CGR in recent weeks to “AMP UP” their online presence. A brand known for quality, innovation and high style, Fiberon® was looking to bring some of that panache to the virtual arena, and further enhance their overall communications plan.

Recognizing the growing number of homes across the country that need deck replacement/repair, the company has been working for years to introduce game-changing solutions in alternative decking. As a part of that strategy, CGR has worked closely with Fiberon® to launch a new product line, Veranda® ArmorGuard™, composite decking available exclusively The Home Depot®.

Other initiatives include online presence development, search engine marketing (SEM, PPC), search engine optimization (SEO), and brand awareness.

“Our partners at Fiberon® are a focused, aggressive group of hardworking professionals. They have big goals,” says CGR CEO Julio Colmenares. “They need a top-notch partner who is not only creatively astute but also strategically grounded in their approach to business. They now can count on CGR to run the race with them and bring winning business solutions.”

About CGR Creative
CGR Creative is a full service marketing, design, advertising, and interactive marketing agency. CGR Creative prides itself on supporting their customers in a way that larger agencies can’t, often times committing all their resources to ensure the success of their client’s projects. CGR Creative’s fundamental belief is that the client’s success is their success.
www.facebook.com/cgrcreative | www.twitter.com/cgrcreative | www.cgrcreative.blogspot.com

Web design is all about driving traffic, without traffic to a site no e-commerce or brand awareness can occur. So your biggest concern when advertising on the web or designing a web site is how you are going to drive traffic to specific pages within your web site. Obviously some form of online advertising is suggested, but there are so many options out there that this can get overwhelming. When you add in the industry terms like PPC (Pay per Click), SEO (Search Engine Optimization), CMS (Content Management System), etc. it just becomes a blur of acronyms and Internet babble. At CGR Creative we do our best to simplify the process. Our clients run the gamut from Internet savvy professionals to novice business owners that know they, "just need a good web site." No matter what your level of expertise we can help make your online based advertising more successful.

We have compiled a list of Web Advertising Tips that we think are the core of a good online campaign. These represent tried and true ways to increase traffic to your site whether it has been around for years or weeks, and while CGR Creative is based in Charlotte, North Carolina these tips will work no matter where you are located!

CGR Creative's Web Design Advertising Tips

1 Update and maintain your website in every way possible using blogs, social media, online articles, etc. Basically branding yourself within your market.

2 Contribute to any and all reputable online forums, groups, or associations within your market. Many of these exist online and it is therefore easy to maintain a more constant presence than with traditional groups.

3 Always collect the name and email addresses of visitors to your business, trade shows, or your web site. Send these contacts relevant updates and a company newsletter.

4 Make sure your site and other marketing efforts provide honest and useful information so that your clients begin to view your company as a resource.

5 Write reviews on products and services in your specific market to establish your name or brand. This will bring about trust if you take your time and are honest.

6 Submit press releases about anything new happening at your company or within your market. This will help keep your name in the headlines of your market.

7 Get feedback and input from your customers. Send out surveys, comment cards, calls for response, etc. The more engaged they are the more likely they are to do business with you. Plus if you ask them they will tell you what they want to buy!

Again these tips are really just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to online advertising, but they represent low cost ways to establish your brand. At CGR Creative we work with all our clients to help place their business exactly where they want it. Call us today to see what we can do for you!

CGR Creative Lists Six Questions your Business Should Answer Before Designing Your Website

Charlotte’s Web Design specialists CGR Creative explains the importance behind answering these six questions before designing your company’s website. CGR takes pride in taking the time to fully research a client’s market and industry before beginning any creative project. Located in the historic South End neighborhood of Charlotte, North Carolina, CGR Creative has been quietly cranking out some of the best web design in the Country.

CGR Creative’s Six Web Design Questions

Who is your client? It is critical that you identify your target market. This is not as simple as it sounds. Often business owners make assumptions about their market that do not stand up to investigation. Knowing your core demographic can inform design decisions and directly influence the effectiveness of your web site.

What problem are you solving? In order to be really successful you must solve a problem for your customers. Your first job is to inform your audience about the problem and then direct their attention to your ingenious solution. The more dramatic the problem the more valuable your solution becomes.

What is your core service or product? What product or service are you most interested in selling? Often this is not the most or least expensive option you have available. At the movies this is called MEDIUM. What product or service has the highest profit to effort ratio? In other words what is your company best at?

What is your USP? Why should they buy from your company? If you can’t answer this question you need to reevaluate your marketing plan. What makes your cookie better? Does it taste better? Is it healthy? Is it made locally? Does it float? Can I see through it? Many times the Unique Selling Point does not have to make a whole lot of sense. Ivory soap designed a marketing campaign about the fact that their soap has more air than their competitors. Ivory soap floats in water… so obviously it’s better!

What is your call to action? Now that you have their attention, what do you want them to do? Should they call your 800 number? Should they, "Click here Now?" Do they need to visit your showroom in order to be sold? You must decide exactly what you want your customers to do and then ask them to do it. Most restaurants do not want you to email their manager. They really don’t want you to fax them either. They either want you to show up and eat or to call and order take-out.

What are the objections you must overcome? Finally what are the likely objections someone might have before making a buying decision? Can you lay the groundwork for overcoming those on your website? If price is a concern you should provide comparisons right on your site. If service is a potential problem you should provide some sort of warranty or quality assurance. If style or size could pose a problem address this clearly and have a return policy that clearly and politely states your guidelines.

Answering these six questions can literally put your business on the map, and you need to do that before you put it on the web! Give CGR Creative a call today to see how we can help meet your business' design needs.

Today Julio Colmenares of our very own CGR Creative addressed a luncheon crowd on the topic of new media and web design. One of the questions from the audience was, "What are the top 10 things you can do do get your site ranked higher on Google?" Julio explained how each of these ideas work and how to gain maximum benefit from them. We think that question was worth addressing again here on our blog, so here is your Top 10 list of Search Engine Optimization Tips:

10. Titles - Each page within your site should have a unique title that is relevant to your business and the content on that particular page.

9. Keyword Rich Content - Every page should have at least 250 words of plain text that contains the relevant keywords from your page title. It is best if those keywords are mentioned in the first few lines.

8. Don't Use Frames - Frames prevent search engines from searching the content on your site. If you view the source of your web page and you don't see the content of your page your site is hiding that content from search engines.

7. Don't Use Graphics in Place of Text - Search engines can't search the content of pictures yet, so they can't read your cool graphic that explains what your business is about. Use plain HTML text throughout your site.

6. Avoid Flash Heavy Content - Just like pictures, search engines can't read the content of Flash files, but worse many browsers and even more mobile phones can't see Flash files at all.

5. Tag All Your Media Files - For the pictures and graphics you do have on your site, make sure you fill out their alt tags and meta tags as completely as possible. Be sure to repeat your keywords here as well.

4. Don't Create Outgoing Links - Outgoing links send search engines the message that your content is not as valuable as that of the pages you are linking to. You never want to have more outgoing links than you have incoming.

3. Create Incoming Links - Incoming links make your content look more valuable. Search engines will begin to treat your site more like an expert on your subject with every additional incoming link. Social media can really help here.

2. Keep Page Viewers Occupied - Search engines actually monitor how long viewers stay on your site. So, make sure all your pages have visually pleasing, fast loading, interesting content.

1. Update Your Content Regularly - The best way to keep moving up the search engine ladder is to continually update your content. This keeps your site looking valuable to search engines and it promotes new visits from existing viewers which also increases your rankings.

Charlotte based CGR Creative is a full service advertising agency offering cutting edge Web Design and more. CGR prides itself on supporting their customers in a way that larger agencies can’t, often times committing all their resources to ensure the success of their client’s projects. CGR Creative's fundamental belief is that the client’s success is their success. The agency, with an office in Charlotte, North Carolina, is fully bi-lingual, with a Latino marketing division that offers a variety of marketing channels that are specifically targeted to reach the Hispanic market.

Thursday, May 20, 2010 Julio Colmenares, Chief Creative Officer of CGR Creative, will be speaking at Working Charlotte Magazine's Lunch and Learn Series. Join us on May 20, 2010 and learn how to leverage technology to build awareness of your company. 

What 'new media' means changes rapidly so the question becomes, "how can I keep current without going crazy or bankrupt?" The answer is simple, "Jump In!" Learning to swim requires that you get in the pool. You can research, compare, look to your competitor, etc. but eventually you must get wet. Julio Colmenares teaches you how to take control of new media and promote your business! Join us for a Business-to-Business Lunch & Learn designed specifically with you in mind, Charlotte's small and medium sized business owners. Let's grow your business! Attending this event only costs $19.50! 

The event will be held from 11:30 to 1:00 at Vivace Italian Restaurant in Charlotte. Vivace offers five star quality at 3 star prices with excellent presentation and service. 

About CGR Creative: Charlotte based CGR Creative is a full service advertising agency, marketing firm, design studio, and interactive marketing agency. CGR Creative prides itself on supporting their customers in a way that larger agencies can’t, often times committing all their resources to ensure the success of their client’s projects. CGR Creative’s fundamental belief is that the client’s success is their success. The agency, with an office in Charlotte, North Carolina, is fully bi-lingual, with a Latino marketing division that offers a variety of marketing channels that are specifically targeted to reach the Hispanic market.

Charlotte, NC, April 22, 2010 - Verve' Beauty, Charlotte's most luxurious Spa and Salon, formally announces the renewal of CGR as their 'Advertising Agency of Record' to manage the Verve' brand image. CGR Creative has worked with Vervé in the past, developing their brand, collateral, and web presence.

Verve' Beauty offers the highest level of spa services from massages and facials to their signature Therapeutic Manicures and Pedicures. Verbena Wilson owns and operates Verve' Beauty with an eye toward merging the relaxation of hair care and spa services under one roof. Verbena has been a Licensed Cosmetologist for over 20 years and she and her team of highly qualified stylists and technicians truly offer a complete experience of beauty and therapy.

"We are proud to have been named 'Advertising Agency of Record' for Verve' Beauty," affirms CGR Creative's, Jason Ramsey. "We look forward to further developments including a possible product launch in 2010." CGR Creative has already partnered with Verve' on several magazine advertisements and email campaigns so this is just the next logical step for a great business relationship to take.

About CGR Creative: Charlotte based CGR Creative is a full service advertising agency, marketing firm, design studio, and interactive marketing agency. CGR Creative prides itself on supporting their customers in a way that larger agencies can’t, often times committing all their resources to ensure the success of their client’s projects. CGR Creative's fundamental belief is that the client’s success is their success. The agency, with an office in Charlotte, North Carolina, is fully bi-lingual, with a Latino marketing division that offers a variety of marketing channels that are specifically targeted to reach the Hispanic market.