Last week marked my two year anniversary of being the resident Analyst/Astronaut-in-training at Pure Visibility.

Its been a great couple years taking on the world of internet marketing, and to celebrate the occasion, I requested that everyone create a portrait of me commandeering a spaceship. The results were awesome! They will all be framed and displayed in the hallways of the Pure Visibility office, so next time you find yourself in downtown Ann Arbor, be sure to stop by and check out the “Brent In Space” gallery.

For those who don’t think they’ll make it to Ann Arbor any time soon, I’ll post the pictures here. Enjoy.

Spaceman Brent bring brand advertising to a distant space rock!

*Pro-tip: My profile is one of only 234 LinkedIn results that appear when searching for “analyst AND astronaut”.  Its true, try it.

Pure Visibility’s Catalyst & Co-Founder Catherine Juon is excited to be one of 2011’s Free Enterprise Honorees. The honor comes as part of the U.S. Chamber’s DREAM BIG Small Business of the Year Awards program.

This awards program recognizes small business owners and their hard work and achievements in creating jobs that are needed within the U.S. The 2011 class of Free Enterprise Honorees are applauded for their strong business practices and contributions to the economy. Pure Visibility, Inc. was celebrated by the selection committee for their accomplishments throughout the year and business success story.

Honorees with gather in Washington D.C. for America’s Small Business Summit in May 2011 to advocate for small businesses.

Pure Visibility makes a point to give back to the local community. Beyond giving money to worthy causes, we have a team volunteer offsite each quarter to donate our time to help others. Yesterday, we visited one of our favorite non-profits, Food Gatherers.

As the name implies, Food Gatherers coordinates with other hunger relief providers, distributes healthy food, develops new food resources, and educates the public about hunger. They have great group volunteer opportunities, and our team was happy to be back at their warehouse for the second time in the last year. We spent several hours sorting nine thousand pounds (yikes!) of oranges to be distributed to people in need across Washtenaw County.

Orange You Glad To Work At PV?

We had an awesome time, and appreciate the opportunity to get our hands dirty (or sticky, in this case!) and give back. It’s great to work for a company that has such a strong sense of community, and supports their team in volunteering!

Pure Visibility received a FastTrack award at AnnArbor.com’s Deals of the Year celebration Friday night.   We were one of 10 companies in the Ann Arbor region to demonstrate consistent growth since 2006.

FastTrack awards are presented to companies with consistent records of growth. To qualify, Pure Visibility reported 2009 revenues greater than 2008 revenues and average growth of 20 percent in 2006, 2007 and 2008.

We’re sharing our expertise!  Don’t miss your chance to hear from Pure Visibility’s expert team what you need to know NOW about Internet marketing.

On November 9, Linda Girard and Jeremy Lopatin will talk “Search, Social and Mobile Trends – 2011” at Ann Arbor SPARK’s Marketing Roundtable.  Learn what Google, LinkedIn, Twitter and mobile apps mean to your business in 2011.  Don’t forget to register in advance!

On November 15, Catherine Juon will present “Search Engine Optimization” at the National Multi Housing Council’s Technology Conference. She’ll cover management and operational challenges related to successful implementation of a strategy to secure leads that convert to leases.

On November 17, Catherine will present “Sales & Marketing 3.0,” to attendees of the Michigan Emerging conference.  Catherine, and the team at Pure Visibility, is passionate about creating abundance in Michigan – her talk is aimed at helping Michigan companies achieve greater sales and success through Internet marketing.  Don’t miss it!

Pure Visibility’s Linda Girard will be speaking at the Marketing Roundtable – Search, Social & Mobile Trends in 2011, hosted by our friends at Ann Arbor SPARK.  Join us on November 9, beginning at 5 p.m.  Registration is free!

On November 15, Co-Founder & Catalyst Catherine Juon will speak at the NMHC Property Operations and Technology Conference in Dallas, Texas.  Her panel presentation will focus on the balance between SEO & SEM and how it relates to securing leads and leases.

The Michigan Emerging Conference will host Catherine on November 17, where she will present during the Sales & Marketing Track Session. Michigan Emerging, bringing together resources to highlight and facilitate change in Michigan, takes place at the Ford Conference & Event Center in Dearborn.  Registration is $40 for an all-day pass to learn more about Michigan’s exciting future!

Knitted phone cozy - back

It’s important to bring fun and yourself into the workplace. I’m a knitter, and so for me, this week, my fun was to Yarnbomb the Co-Founders’ office.

When folks are on the phone all day, why shouldn’t the phone bring a smile to their faces? And what is more smile-inducing than a tacky knitted phone cosy with daisies?

Isn’t it time someone’s computer monitor stand sported a vining daisy i-cord?

Knitted daisy i-cord climbs the monitor stand

Want more information on and photos of knitted graffiti aka yarnbombing aka guerilla knitting?

• Yarnbombing.com, “Improving the urban landscape one stitch at a time”.
• Images of knitting graffiti on Flickr.
• Images of guerilla knitting on Google.
• A 2009 New York Times blog article on an “installation” of parking meter cozies.

What ideas do you have for generating a smile or two at the office today?

We use Basecamp as our project collaboration vehicle – it allows us to share files, store conversation threads, and track milestones. For a while, we were also using it to record time on tasks on projects.

I’m a project manager, so my day tends to be spent in smaller chunks on more items than other folks on the team. I might have 10-20 time entries to make in a single day. The analysts work longer on fewer things in a day, but over a month, work on many client and internal projects, so their time entry is similarly complex.

Well, Basecamp requires you to enter time (by clicking into individual projects and recording time) is really sub-optimal when you’re moving between several internal projects and several client projects in a day.

We have been pining for a way to enter time more easily (without several clicks per entry – go to the project, go to the todos tab, click on the clock, enter the time and any comments, go to the next project, etc.). Jennifer, the relationship manager we hired in early 2010, agitated for a system change to make this part of our work simpler. She investigated several systems, and we chose Harvest because it integrated with Basecamp and had an exceptionally straightforward interface. Oh, and it has task timers, which certain members of our team really craved.

We switched to Harvest in April, and our first month garnered lots of positive comments from the team. It is hard to tell if time spent tracking time has actually decreased, because we changed our time recording definitions at the transition. This is anecdotal, but the amount of my time to extract summarized data from Harvest has decreased. And, because we’re getting time entered in a more timely manner, and listening to fewer to no complaints about our time tracking system, we feel this is an upgrade.

For more information on Harvest time tracking, see http://www.getharvest.com/features

At Pure Visibility we think that our company is a pretty awesome place to work. We have quarterly team building volunteer events, an awesome lounge for relaxing or playing Wii on break time. Catherine and Linda, our Co-Founders, are enthusiastic, passionate and always inspiring us to be the best. Last week Catherine and Linda attended the Michigan 50 Companies to Watch awards ceremony celebrating second-stage entrepreneurs in Lansing, Michigan. It’s pretty cool to see that other organizations recognize how great Pure Visibility is! Goooo Team!

Linda & Catherine with their Award

A current college student asked me how I got into internet marketing, and what a typical day is like at my job. In case it would be useful to someone, I thought I’d post it here.

How did I get into internet marketing?

Unintentionally, but I’m sure happy I did.

I have a pretty funny career path so far, which you can see on my linkedin profile. I have a science doctorate, but I eventually found it kind of dry and unsatisfying, and I needed a more team-oriented work situation. After I left academia, I started as a technical writer for a science software firm. I became a project manager when I went to the owner of the company to discuss how a project I was on was foundering. He supported me learning more about project management (and other things). Since that time I moved very gradually from project management for software to web design and development to internet marketing. To round out my “on the job” experience, I pursued professional certification from the Project Management Institute, earning my Project Management Professional (PMP) certification in 2005.

My project management skills apply across fields, but I particularly like internet marketing because it is so quantitative and hypothesis-driven. It combines the science side of my brain with the people side of my brain. We can see the impact of implementing our recommendations relatively quickly, and iterate to make things even better. Software and web design projects take a long, long time. I suppose that I need quicker gratification and more data than I was getting in those two fields.

What is a typical day?

My daily schedule varies based on the day of the week and the time in the month. At our company, we do a fair bit of monthly reporting, so there is a monthly rhythm of analysis and reporting in the beginning of the month and implementing/following up later in the month. What this means is that the beginnings of my month focus on quality assurance for reports and having meetings with clients, and the ends of my months tend to center on coordinating next steps on approved items.

Our weekly schedule also has a rhythm. Monday mornings are internal time, where we as a company review the previous week and plan the coming one. We review budgets, deadlines, and projections.

As a project manager, I am involved superficially in many things. I answer client calls and emails, I coordinate with the team on deadlines and deliverables, I try to troubleshoot issues that emerge and clear a path so that the analysts can actually sit down and analyze things. I work with our calendars to schedule and move meetings (internal and with clients). I route and queue requests from clients and internal team members. I prioritize so that the team knows what must be done as opposed to what’s a nice to have. I have a lot of meetings and quick check-ins during the day. I also am on the phone a fair bit. I’m interrupted a lot. I suppose I also interrupt others a fair bit!

Director of Happiness and her pineapple

There are times when I moonlight as an analyst and jump into the data to answer a client question quickly. In those times, I like the focus and the numbers, but when I surface, I’m glad I work on a team who keep me honest, and whom I can help by keeping things straight.

And of course, I love my title, Director of Happiness .