Siewierski Inc, LTD Blog

Wednesday, August 30, 2006 by http://mountainsportsclub.blogspot.com/

Today we received the following response to our blog and I thought it would be interesting to see and a response I made.

The questions was: So I've been searching around looking at blogs because I want to start one at my site ( golf schools ). But I'm not sure how I want to go.... blogger, wordpress, drupal... not sure, and I don't know that much about them. I like the look of this site. If you have time could you email me what you like/dislike about your blog? Thank you if you decide to take the time to help me out, and I understand if you don't. Ultimately I want it to look good with being "hands off" as much as possible. Anyway, keep up the good work.

My response was:
I like this blog format - Blogger.com - as it is easy to use and a clean layout. Those who are reading it do click through to other articles we link to on the referenced web sites. It has been good for other web traffic. I am also starting to use some of the tips from "The Rational Guide to Goggle Blogger" as a reference and marketing and promotion aid. It has proven to be useful. Here is a link to purchase the book if this is something you are interested in using.



Siewierski Consulting is to help you find the right answer and solutions to these questions and issues, and identify the solutions that work best for your business.

Please note we are starting to see more and more questions as we continue to send out our emails and newsletters. Thank you for joining us, reading and sending your questions. To receive our e-newsletter go to our site and register here.

Wednesday, August 23, 2006 by http://mountainsportsclub.blogspot.com/

We are pleased to release the following news release:

TEKgroup Online Newsroom selected to handle media center for all resorts within Ski NH destination site

FT. LAUDERDALE, FLA. AUGUST XX, 2006 – Ski New Hampshire (Ski NH), located at http://www.skinh.com/, is a destination site for obtaining vacation information on multiple mountain resorts within the state of New Hampshire. The Ski NH consumer site contains resort facts on hundreds of lodging properties, restaurants, retail shops and other services.
The media center of Ski NH will soon be managed with the TEKmedia Online Newsroom software developed by TEKgroup International, Inc. The supplemental site will specifically address elements desired by journalists, such as press releases, press kits, photographs, logos, staff biographies, public relations contacts, media request forms and audio/video clip snow reports.
The statewide association represents 37 alpine and cross country resorts and more than 200 lodging properties throughout New Hampshire. Resorts within Ski NH include Attitash, The Balsams Wilderness, Bretton Woods Mountain Resort, Cannon, Cranmore Resort, Dartmouth Skiway, Granite Gorge Ski Area, Loon Mountain, Mount Sunapee, Pats Peak, Tenney Mountain, Waterville Valley, Jackson XC, Great Glenn Trails and Mountain View Grand Resort & Spa.
"Technology is constantly changing in regards to how members of the media find their facts and information, after researching many potential avenues we felt TEKgroup was at the forefront of recent developments and we look forward to utilizing their tools and technology," said Karl Stone, Marketing Director, Ski New Hampshire.

“Sports-related information sites are a line that we do focus on at TEKgroup,” said Steve Momorella, partner and co-founder for TEKgroup International, Inc. “Adding Ski NH to a growing list that includes the Detroit Lions, Vegas Insider, the Specialty Sports Venture family and others only expands our knowledge of what sports journalists want to access.”

About TEKgroup International, Inc. - http://www.tekgroup.com/ TEKgroup International, Inc., an award-winning Internet software and services company, develops E-business solutions for the public relations industry. TEKgroup clients include AOL, Delta Air Lines, Inc., Audi, Volkswagen, Detroit Lions, Ford Motor Company, VMS, Best Buy, Carlson Hotels Worldwide and the Public Relations Society of America.

In June Siewierski Consulting announced the representation of the TEKMedia Newsroom service in our suite of e-business solutions. Siewierski Consulting is focussed on the leisure, travel and recreations markets. SKI NH decision to utilize the TEKMedia Newsroom is validation of our decision to represent this state of the art solution. For more details and to arrange a demo contact John Siewierski at 303.829.1699, or via email at jsiewierski@gmail.com.

Monday, August 14, 2006 by http://mountainsportsclub.blogspot.com/

In a recent email we had broadcast to our clients and prospects one of our readers sent an email asking us what was an email append service. She stated that she did not know what it was and felt there were most likely others in the same position. It was a classic example of us thinking you knew what we were talking about, and we came to discover this was not the case on this particular topic for a good number of the people we are communicating with via these emails.

Therefore, here we go in trying to bring better light and understanding to the service email append. The service is when a business has a mailing list of previous and exisiting customers and/or prospects that do not have corresponding emails to send permission based email and they wish to acquire that email and permission to communicate with the customer/prospect. The email append service takes your file of physical addresses and matches valid emails addresses that have agreed to be contected when a comnpany that has their mailing address requests to add their email address to the company's email subscriber list. They person receives an email informing them that you/the business has requested to add the email address and they then have the option to say NO, or opt out. Once this process has played through - usually 7 - 10 days, the list is updated with matched email addresses. The range of match goes from 15% to 30%.

We avereage around a 20% match rate. In this scenario if you had 50,000 mailing list records, you should be able to match close to 10,000 vaild emails. Costs run $250 per thousand matched records andthere is a minimum fee with a set-up charge. In the example above total costs are $2,800 or net $.28 a record. This leads to the question , "How much is a valid email address of your customer worth??" In most cases quite a bit more than $.28.

Please call us, at 303.829.1699, for any additional questions on email append, and to schedule your next append and build your email asset.

Friday, July 28, 2006 by http://mountainsportsclub.blogspot.com/

Wow is the feeling at the end of weeks like this. It is a good wow. The Mountain Sports Club is taking off as well, adding a variety of new resorts, vendors and merchants extending offers. Jackson Hole and soon to be Hunter. NY and Lake Tahoe. Next week we will turn live a profile registration process and soon sart promoting the service to consumers. I am running a more detailed blog regarding that community and project at - http://mtsportsclub.blogspot.com/

MSC is successfully using the affiliate networks to build more vendors/merchant relationships. We have started with Share a Sale and have found them easy to work with and professional. Next week we will start working through the Commision Juction network and add merchants there. This is part of the strategy to blend commerce throughout the site in a relevant and contextual manner. I realize there are those who have down played the affiliate efforts, but in my expereince they have always proven to be valuable and a profitable efort. They really enable faster growth from both sides of the relationship - publisher or merchant. Send us your thoughts.

Several new Siewierski Consulting projects include an e-commerce effort with Skiers Peak an new online specialty retailer focussed on high end race products. The other exciting new project is a test project with the Van Heyst Group - a Boulder based think tank and events/conference company. We are working with them to improve email efforts - delivery, opens, follow up and lifting of conversion rates to conference/event bookings.

Several new email clients are also coming on board. I will post next week a more detailed description regarding email append. This has been prompted, as one email subscriber mentioned they did not know what the service and process was, and felt there were others readers in the same position. Given this response and how important I believe this is I will be posting in advance of an email on this and other topics. Stay tuned.

Now off to the mountains to escpape the heat. Steamboat here we come.

Have a great weekend,

John Siewierski

Thursday, July 20, 2006 by http://mountainsportsclub.blogspot.com/

Well it has been a scramble getting first segments of the service and site up and running, but we are making significant progress. Deals from lodges and shops have started to flow in and they are appearing with new resort and town listings on the site. The mountain Sports Club is also receiving early committments from resort areas for lift ticket discounts. Most of the resorts will lock down their pricing in the coming weeks and then release offers for members of the Mountain Sports Club program starting later next month (August) and in the follwing months.

One new promotion we are pleased to announce is our partnership with the Northwest Ski resorts through INSA - Inland Nortwest Ski Association - whereby we will be including a FREE Mountain Sports Club membership to all 4th and 5th Grade passport participants. This is a long term partnership and provides a great foothold in the NorthWest market. We expect to announce a major partner in the Northeast in the coming days as well with a similar partnership. These shold encourage further resort participation, builds the memberhsip base and exposes us to many merchants who should be joining and extending offers as well.

New participants on the shopping side include the following e-commerce and shop partners - Sun and Ski Sports in their stores and online, the same for Ski Chalet and Alpine Sports Outlet and next will be the Mountain Chalet with their unique collectibles and posters.

Resorts and shops are responding well to the program concept. We expect to be live with membership registrations for purchase within the next month. Stay tuned as we open new resort areas and offer new services. We will have many promotional memberships in the market this launch season, but also will start selling memberhsips at an introductory price of $9.99 now that value is being established with our new partners.

We are pleased at the response we have received from summer activity vendors as well. There will be bike rental and service offers - first offers are now actually online, rafting, flyfishing and many more offers to come for the balance of this summer/fall season and next year. This will add significant value to the Mountain Sports Club membership and offering.

Rumor has it our initial press efforts will result in the first articles on our service in early September. We will start to run ads in the National ski and snowboard magazines starting in October or November. The one ski show we are comitted to attending is the Denver show. We will anounce others as decisions are made.

Drop a line with thougths, comments and questions.

Yours in Mountain fun and living,

John Siewierski