Hello!

Hello world! Happy to say that today is the first day I'll be calling myself "self employed (partially)" again! Like any major changes in life, it's a little scary right now, but it'll be fine I'm sure.

When I first moved to Lloydminster, I started a web development company and did a lot of work around town. I created the first Tourism and EcDev sites for the city, freshened up and took shots for the Bandits Hockey team site and created a boutique site for Cornerstone Clothiers, plus many more.

All those websites are gone now. And so they should be. It's been a few years since I did websites and it's a good thing they've all been redesigned and modernized. Websites have a shelf-life.

In the time since, I've done a couple of things: Realtor, bank teller and Marketing & Communications coordinator. While a couple of those things didn't really work for me, like everything in life, I consider them great learning experiences. It was as my time as a Realtor that I got a taste of what marketing on Social Media was like and realized the power there.

After real estate (I'm not cut out for that kind of craziness!!!), I thought I'd try Financial Services. All I'm going to say about that is "How do you know until you try?" I tried and nope, not for me.

I was going to start up on my own again and all was ready to go, except my old computer wasn't playing nice with my new camera and I had to invest in a new computer, which sucked up my staying alive fund. So in an effort to stay alive, I took a temporary job at the Chamber of Commerce. As it turns out, not so temporary!

I love working at the Chamber as the Marketing & Communications Coordinator: great team, great Members and promoting business here where we live is something I can get behind. I get to use all my skills and then some. So it keeps my chops up. Unfortunately, some changes at the Chamber reduced my workload and now I'm there part time.

So we've come full circle and we're back with me being partially self-employed. Back to creating websites and doing shoots, but now with the rise of Social Media and content marketing, doing even more kinds of work. I'm stoked, as the kids say...

During my time at the Chamber, I've seen that many of our Members are looking for marketing tips and advice. And a lot of them want to do at least some of the work themselves, being that some business owners have more time than money in the new reality of the local economy.

My plan is to work directly with business owners or their staff, and help them get their websites up and running, looking good and mobile friendly, coach them on how to market their business effectively with social media and other online techniques, shoot some video here and there and in general, just be a helpful person.

As I wait for the projects to come rolling in (that's some positive projection there, folks), I will be working on content for this site, trying out some new software, shooting video and remembering to blog.

If you or someone you know needs some help with their website, social media or online marketing content, affordably priced (I'll blog about pricing some other day), be sure to get in touch. I'd really love to help you out.