Here is our latest video featuring Cindi Bigelow of Bigelow Tea on how to make a perfect cup of tea.  Enjoy!

As a citizen in the town of Fairfield, CT., and as a female, mother, wife and daughter, I have a favorite website called SuzySaid. SuzySaid is the essense of where the big web guys (google, yahoo….) and the internet as a whole would like to go. It is geared for women and focused on the town where we live. I believe that SuzySaid started in Fairfield, my town, and has now branched out to other towns nearby and gone as far as Texas.

Content is local. Content is constantly updated. Content updates are shared daily with opt in email blasts. Content is geared for the local woman. Content is created by local women. Advertisers love it!

And you don’t need to be local to use it…what if I want to travel to Austin, Texas? Wouldn’t it be smart to consult SuzySaid?

As a woman living in Fairfield, this is my favorite website. As a business person advising smaller local businesses (and soon larger businesses), I say this is the way to go.

Hats off to SuzySaid!

Five years ago, I knew that I wanted to run my own company and do PR, Marketing and Events….and so I did it. Four years ago, I had a feeling about blogs, knew nothing, went to a seminar, knew a tad more, and worked until I understood the blog world and how business could fit in. With the fun and the effectiveness of blogs, I knew we needed to expand into social networking (myspace, facebook and others) and online videos…and so we did it and have helped our clients increase sales and win awards.

This is a great story but the question to ask today is, with all that Creative Concepts offers, can we withstand a recession…more importantly can we help our clients through a period of flat or declining sales. The first answer is we are in great shape and the second answer is yes, we can help our clients not only muster through a possible recession but we can help them come out on top by using PR and social media as a way to reach new customers.

Taking the recession element away for the moment, there have been many studies that say advertising is not as effective as it once was. ZenithOptmedia says that ad spend growth is predicted to be up by 2.5% only for 2008 compared to 3.3% in 2007. Traditional PR still works but based on who you are trying to reach, you need to hit many channels before you get a customer’s attention. Channels would include print, radio and TV, events, and the word of mouth (WOM) sectors. WOM spending which includes social networks, blogs, videos and more is expected to increase 30.4% annually through 2011 to $3.70 billion as noted by Keller Fay Group which means that the corporate world has recognized that working the internet is an effective and successful way to reach your present and new customers.

Now putting the possibility of a recession back into the mix, the next question is where do you, a business, put your money so you get the biggest bang for the buck? Well I can give you the answer but you probably have already figured it out. Talking and sharing information within the online social networks or creating a new community for your customer is easier on the budget than paying for a TV spot or a glossy ad in a magazine!

Common sense will guide you (and so will Forrester Research as reported by Mark Walsh here) to wise spending for future PR and Marketing campaigns…a recession may just force the hand sooner rather than later.