This whole campaign has been about social media and group effort. First, I polled the Matrix Group staff to see if they wanted to repeat the social media fundraiser from last year. The answer was yes. Then I asked the staff to nominate their favorite charities; I picked the top 5 charities selected by staff.

Next, we reached out to the local charities and asked them to create an informative video that makes the case for giving them money. Not surprisingly, we got amazing, authentic videos from each organization. One was created by a volunteer who did a stellar job.

Next, we came up with a way to fold in social media, increase our reach, and make the campaign fun. So we filmed a kitschy video that explains the campaign and tied the donations to getting new likes on Facebook and subscribers on YouTube. The whole campaign, including creating the video, working with the charities and putting it all together on the web was made possible by my amazing staff.

Check out our funny video on YouTube explaining the campaign and introducing the charities.

Watch the videos of the five deserving organizations on YouTube. The five organizations are Doorways for Women and Families, Food and Friends, SPCA of Northern VA, Washington Animal Rescue League and the Washington Area Bicyclist Association.

Here’s how YOU can raise money for those in need this holiday season:

• Like us on our Facebook page.
• Subscribe to our YouTube channel.
• Vote for your favorite charity or charities by liking their videos on our YouTube channel.
• Spread the word about the campaign to your networks on Twitter, Facebook and Google+.

You’ve got until December 20 to like, subscribe, vote and share. I’d love to raise $5,000. Can you help?

In the corporate world, it’s conventional to believe that the person answering the phone is the lowest person on the totem pole. Worse yet, many companies believe we can replace receptionists with automated attendants: ring the doorbell for service or dial by extension.

Me, I’ll always have someone answer our main line because most people calling Matrix Group are customers who need help or prospects who need our services. So you better believe I want a warm, friendly, knowledgeable and committed person answering our phones! And because it’s not always clear to people who does what in a Web agency (do you talk to the programmer or a front-end developer or the PM about an error on your admin site?), a good receptionist can field and route calls efficiently.

My Creative Director Alex Pineda says that every employee is a brand ambassador for the company. So my receptionist, as the person who perhaps has the most contact with the most people, is arguably the most important brand ambassador I have. Which is why her title is First Impressions Officer. The other admins in the office, who also share customer interaction responsibilities, are equally important brand ambassadors.

Scott Spandauer defines a brand as “more than just your company image. It also includes your customers’ experience and the expectation you set when doing business with your company. In short, it is (a) promise.”

As a CEO, I may set the tone for our corporate culture and brand, but it’s my staff who live and reinforce it with our customers. Company owners everywhere, remember that your customers’ experiences start with the person who answers the phone and greets people at the door.

So when Maki and I went to the beach last week, what did the staff do? They pranked me and prank me good they did!

I came back to find that my blog had been completely redesigned and rewritten. I became Jar Jar Binks, my signature purple was now green, and I had apparently been blogging about our new dress code and drinking on the job (if you know me, you know that I’m not much of a drinker). The net admins went to great pains to make sure that my new, green blog wasn’t available from outside the office.

I was in shock initially. Then I panicked that the blog had actually been replaced. Then I started laughing hysterically when I realized I had been pranked and pranked hard.

Check out the alternate version of The Matrix Files. (If the image comes in small, click it to make it full screen in your browser. Trust me, this will be worth it.)

Kudos to Liz, who masterminded the whole prank, and the whole gang of people who designed, wrote, posted, and hosted.

If you’re at familiar with some of the internal jokes at the office (purple is our signature color, we don’t allow shorts, yada, yada), you’ll get a chuckle at the posts. The writing is so good that I think I’ll recruit some new guest writers for this blog.

If you’re shocked at the amount of time that goes into our pranking or that I even allow pranking, let me just say that pranking is great for office morale and productivity. The prank prep is done during personal time and it’s just plain fun.

How about you? Have you pranked anyone lately? Share stories!

Why so late to the YouTube game? As I’ve explained before in previous blog posts and webinars, I believe that it’s important to create a layered experience across different media. In other words, don’t just post the same stuff to Facebook, Twitter, your website, YouTube, your blog, etc. Have an overall strategy, but take advantage of each site’s capabilities and culture to maximize followers across all platforms.

Until recently, we didn’t have a clear idea of how we wanted to incorporate YouTube into our marketing, sales and client engagement strategy. We had videos from Matrix Group staff events, but we had reserved our Facebook page for information and posts about the project we’re working on and corporate culture. I didn’t want to use YouTube as another place to promote corporate culture. And until we hired a new Marketing Coordinator, we didn’t have the bandwidth to staff an active YouTube channel properly.

But this past week, we launched The Matrix Minute, which is a series of interviews with in-house and outside experts who discuss web technologies, mobile technologies, social media, design and web development. Occasionally, we’ll feature local CEOs who will talk about leadership and what their organizations are doing to stay relevant and vibrant.

Here’s how the Matrix Minute fits into our overall sales and marketing strategy:

• As a company, we’re extremely committed to ongoing education for staff and clients so content-rich interviews make sense for us.
• It’s a way to showcase the expertise we have within the staff.
• It’s a way to leverage the expertise of our clients and partners.
• It’s a way to continue demonstrating thought leadership.
• We get to show off our video production capabilities.
• YouTube is owned by Google and Google favors keyword-rich videos and descriptions so the channel is good for search engine optimization (SEO).
• It’s a way to layer YouTube into our strategy in a way that’s new and different from what we’re doing on our website and social media.

The Matrix Minute has also been a lot of fun.  So far, I’ve been doing all of the interviews and I’m learning a ton. Ray Stankiewicz, New Biz Manager at Matrix Group, is the producer and Melissa Bader, Designer at Matrix Group, does the video editing.

We’ve got a half dozen interviews already online. For example, Jill Foster of Live Your Talk talks about videoblogging. Jennell Evans of Strategic Interactions shares her tips for managing remote teams. And Sherrie Bakshi of Matrix Group talks about why 2011 is the year to start a corporate blog.

BTW, we call it The Matrix Minute, but the interviews are usually 2-3 minutes long. 1 minute just didn’t provide enough time for a meaningful interview and Matrix Minutes sounded goofy.

I hope you’ll check us out on YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/MatrixGroup) and you’ll rate, comment and subscribe. Tell us what you think of our latest initiative!

Matrix Group is competing in the Arlington Green Games, a competition for the commercial office sector (property owners and tenants) in Arlington, VA to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

When we first signed up for the competition, the office was all gung ho. We formed a green team, we filled out the benchmark survey and we got to work on our green initiatives. Turns out, it ain’t easy being green. Here’s why:

• Little Control Over Major Systems. At home, my husband and I ultimately control our energy consumption. We upgraded our HVAC system to a high efficiency system; our house is cold in the winter and warm in the summer; we just upgraded our windows to be triple-paned, argon gas-filled and super efficient; we installed dimmers; we wash our clothes in our cold water; yada, yada. But at work, our options are much more limited because we can’t control many of the systems that generate the most greenhouse gases. For example, as a tenant, I can’t exactly upgrade the windows on the 12th floor and we didn’t install the HVAC system that heats and cools the building.

• Being Green Costs More. As any news article on green technologies and lifestyles will tell you, being green just plain costs more. The Green Games website recommends that we purchase green credits to balance our CO2 emissions. We can also make sure that all of our purchasing (office supplies, equipment, furniture) is green, which can be considerably more expensive.

• There’s Little Incentive to be Green as a Tenant. I once asked a friend if she had switched her light bulbs to compact fluorescents and she said, “Why should I? I don’t pay for my electric bill. My building does.” As a tenant in a commercial office building, it’s hard to see the effects of our energy-hogging or green ways.

So what’s the green path and how are the Green Games making us better?

What I’m appreciating the most about the exercise is twofold: 1) we are focusing on obvious practices like composting our Keurig grounds and making sure the recycling is going into the right bins and actually being picked up by the recycling contractor and 2) we have initiated a conversation about real policy changes at the company that will result in meaningful greenhouse gas emission reductions.

For example, we currently subsidize half of employee parking fees and Metrocheck cards. But we don’t have incentives (financial or otherwise) for the staff who walk or bike to work. What can we do for these staff beyond giving them $50 a month that will mostly get eaten up by taxes (whereas parking and Metro subsidies are tax-free)? Can we alter the IT policy of leaving our computers on at night so that security patches can be installed; can we at least turn them off on the weekends? And how much of our company profits are we willing to forgo in favor of purchasing green products and credits? All tough questions that we don’t have answers to but that I look forward to exploring this year.

When I was in college and taking a course on aid in the developing world, my professor urged us students not to think about what one person can do in a day, but what a community of people can do over time. The Green Games are hopefully helping the business community in Arlington chart a course for real green practices and change in Northern VA. While it ain’t easy being green, the alternative ain’t much better.

How about you? What is your company doing to be greener? What innovative policies and initiatives have you come up with? What’s worked? What hasn’t?

 Matrix Group and Rational 360 work features:

•  News and information organized by topic, including Product Safety, Health & Nutrition and Preserving the Environment.
•  A unified member experience for members who previously had to use multiple passwords to access content on two websites (GMA merged with another organization several years ago), and multiple, separate e-commerce applications. Today, visitors use one username and password to access ALL resources and members seamlessly gain access to protected content and discounts.
•  Complete integration with GMA’s back office. Member profiles are changed instantly, purchased are processed in real-time, and all registrations are automatically saved to GMA’s association management software, MatrixMaxx.

Visit the Grocery Manufacturers Association Website.

 Matrix Group: 

• Developed a user-friendly navigation with a clear understanding of the users’ motivations and behaviors.  Matrix Group considered all types of users for this website, from beginners to more experienced users. The topic-based navigation directs visitors clearly to specific areas of the website based on their needs.
• Created and integrated an online directory of law enforcement agencies that use social media, including the URLs of agencies’ social media pages and blogs.  This directory not only showcases the work that the various agencies are doing, but it also helps members develop their own social networking strategies, policies, etc. Members can now browse or search the directory, and view other agencies Facebook pages, Twitter profiles, blogs, etc.
• Created a catalog of resources, templates, case studies related to law enforcement use of social media. The new website is a “one stop shop” where chiefs and officers can find examples of social networking policies and strategies, download guides and fact sheets on how to create profiles on social networking sites, and read case studies about how other agencies are including social networking in their work.

View the International Association of Chiefs of Police – Social Media Website.

 Matrix Group:

• Developed a robust navigation that helps visitors navigate to specific sections based on their needs.  Visitors can navigate by audience, topic or most frequently requested information.
• Created a design that is friendly, professional but not slick, accurately echoing the image of the Fund.  The design includes prominent calls to action, e.g., Participant Sign in and Employer Sign in.
• Implemented a content management system that allows SMWNPF staff to update the entire site without knowing html skills.
• Supported the launch of the website by developing a postcard and video that showcase the new site.

View the Sheet Metal Workers – National Pension Fund Website.

Most organizations go years between redesigns. It’s a big deal to redesign a website; it takes a boatload of time, effort and money. But in between redesigns, most organizations become unhappy with their sites. We have clients come to us because they’re unhappy with everything on their site, which was last redesigned 3, 4, or 5 years ago. Does it have to be this way? I think not.

There are many, many reasons to redesign your website, including:

• Your organization’s mission, name, logo and/or brand have changed dramatically.
• Visitors complain about not being able to find what they’re looking for.
• Your products and services have changed or you’ve added new offerings and you don’t know where to put all the information.
• You are rethinking how your website fits into your company’s overall marketing strategy and want to redo all or nearly all of the content.

BUT, if you’re largely happy with the design and navigation of your site, visitors are able to find what they’re looking for, and your company branding and messaging remain the same, perhaps all you need is a website refresh. Here are some ways in which clients have refreshed their sites:

• One client changed the headers graphics throughout the site and added social media widgets.
• Another client made the entire website wider (the site had been designed for 800 x 600 pixels) and added another column on the home page for events and a featured publication.
• Yet another client revamped important landing pages and improved pages by editing the text and adding images and formatting.

If you don’t have the budget for a full redesign this year, opt for a refresh and focus on content and making calls to action more prominent.

BTW, here’s a photo of the new Matrix group home page and reasons for the refresh. I’d love to know what you think.

How about you? What’s in store for your site in 2011? Full site redesign or refresh?

We’re taking the money we’re saving by not mailing printed cards to our entire list and once again donating it to charity. This year, however, we’re trying to increase the amount that we give away.  For every new Facebook fan who “likes” our fan page (the deadline is December 14), we’re adding $10 to the charity pot.

Next, we’re asking our entire network of clients, partners, vendors and supporters to tell us how to give away the money.  I polled the staff and asked for recommendations for charities they thought were worthy of a gift.  We came up with the following organizations:

• Back On Your Feet
• Capital Area Food Bank
• Doorways for Women and Families
• Goodwill of Greater Washington
• John L. Gildner Regional Institute for Children and Adolescents
• The Reading Connection
• The Washington Animal Rescue League
• WEAVE

In our Facebook page, we set up a Poll that allows fans to vote for their favorite charity from the list above. So far, we’ve gained over 100 new Facebook fans and nearly two hundred people have voted.

I like this year’s holiday campaign because we’re able to increase the amount of our donation this year, we gain new fans, and we are able to showcase effective and well managed charities in the DC area. It’s also been fun to promote this holiday campaign to our house e-mail list, on our social media pages, and to our network of friends and supporters.

Here’s how you can help:

• “Like” our Facebook fan page at http://www.facebook.com/MatrixGroup
• Vote in our poll
• Spread the word about the campaign to your network of colleagues, friends and family

We’ve got a goal of $5,000.  Help us support some terrific charities this holiday season!

P.S. In case you’re wondering, we decided to still mail printed cards to our key client contacts because we were worried about some clients and partners not receiving the e-card because of a firewall or anti-spam software. In the end, we liked the idea of clients receiving something tangible from us and the ability to sign and personalize cards.  But instead of mailing nearly 1,000 cards, we’re mailing fewer than 200 cards.

I’m having a baby tomorrow

The answer to the first question (how much time are you taking off?) is not clear cut.  When you’re a small business owner, you can’t exactly just disappear for a few months. When you’re the owner, the business is your baby, it’s part of your life and your identity.  That said, I’m giving myself the flexibility to work as much or as little as I want, come in when I feel I need to, and decide when I’m ready to come back to the office full-time.

The answer to the second question (how will the office survive without you?) is “Just fine, thank you very much.”  In fact, just like the last time I was out with my first son, I expect the office to thrive. Here’s what I’ve done to prepare myself and the office for my absence:

What Is It That Only I Do, or Can Do, At the Office?

When I first announced to my management team that I was going to have a baby, the questions I asked of myself, the Directors and Project Managers was: “What is it that I do, that only I can do, that you rely on me to do?”  Then we got to work documenting the list and figuring out a plan for getting those tasks done in my absence.

For example, I review the monthly billing reports after the Project Managers (PMs) have reviewed them to double check that we are properly marking work as billable or unbillable.  Over a period of a couple of weeks, I went over dozens of reports with the PMs, discussed why I question certain items and provided suggestions for how to handle ambiguous items and make sure clients are never surprised by their invoices.  The Director of Client Services will also now review invoices in my absence.

Documenting What’s in JP’s Brain

When you’ve been in the Web business for as long as I have (since 1994 but please don’t try to calculate my age!) and when you’re responsible for landing a lot of the company’s business, you just accumulate a lot of knowledge about clients, process, and projects. Even though I use our intranet religiously to document all of my communications with clients and prospects, there’s just a lot of knowledge that I carry around in my brain.

So over the past few months, I worked with my team to document the strategies, best practices, and potential land mines I’ve encountered while working on myriad projects. I paid special attention to the project components that I tend to spearhead, including Goals and Personas, Content Strategy, Integration with a Back Office CRM (customer relationship management system) or AMS (association management system), CMS (content management system) reviews, and Social Media.  These are now called PM Guides and they live in our wiki. All staff are encouraged to modify them as needed.  The guides are reviewed before the start of each project, and the PMs are loving the sample agendas and notes for running meetings.

Letting Staff Shine

When I took time off with my first son, a great thing happened: the vast majority of my staff rose to the occasion, took on more responsibility and did a great job. Some of them said they wanted to do a great job so that I could be at home with CJ and rest easy knowing that the office was in great shape.  Others saw the time as a terrific opportunity to show what superstars they are.  Still others ran with projects, figuring they should act first, apologize later.  The results were great.

This time around, I’m trusting that the recruiting, training, practices, guides and team process that we have in place will ensure that my stellar staff can do what they need to do, not encounter bottlenecks while I’m out, and do a great job for clients.

Getting Rid of Overhang

Once we all realized I would be out,my team and I identified tasks and initiatives that had been hanging out for a while and didn’t have any movement. We either abandoned them, moved the deadline or completed them.  For example, we got cracking on our mobile strategy, updated the Meet Your Team page on our client extranet, set-up our new data center in Chicago, and moved the deadline for redesigning our demo site.

Protocol for Contacting JP Re: Urgent Items

No matter how much I plan, I know the office is going to need me for certain things, like complex contract negotiations and developing a strategy for responding to big, hairy RFPs (requests for proposals).  So I’ve alerted the admin team that after a few weeks, I will call once a day; whoever needs to speak with me needs to be ready with their list.  And to help me wade through the mountains of e-mail that will collect in my inbox, we selected a codeword that staff will enter in the subject line to indicate that a certain message is urgent and needs my attention. This way, if all I have is 10 minutes to check e-mail on any given day, I can filter by the code word and see the most important and urgent messages of the day.  No, I’m not divulging the code word here, but suffice it to say that it involves Star Wars.

There Will Be Hiccups

Are the plan and system perfect?  Absolutely not. In the end, I will rely on my sterling staff to do a great job while I’m out, which I know they will do.  I’ve warned everyone that there will be hiccups, errors and crises, but if they keep the interests of their clients and staff in mind, overcommunicate, and stay on top of deadlines, they’ll be great.

How about you?  How has your company prepared for an extended absence of your CEO or any key staff member for that matter?  What worked?  What did you learn?  Please share!

Now, I’m off to have some spicy food and go for a brisk walk.  I have a baby to birth!

The Background

Matrix Group has had a Facebook fan page for a couple of years now and we had been slowly building up our fan base. We did all the usual things to generate new fans: we let our customers know about our Facebook page, we linked to it from our Web site and blog, we asked staff to invite their friends to “like” us, we included the link in staff e-mail signatures, and we asked our Twitter followers to fan us.

I had recently read an article about how the Weekly World News got to 40,310 fans in 4 days (up from 3,244 fans!) and got inspired to launch our own campaign.  Weekly World News offered an exclusive video, they changed their ad daily, they did A/B testing on their ads and they leveraged their huge user base.  But what kind of incentive could we offer?  Unlike Snapfish, the photo printing site, which recently offered a coupon for a free 8 x 10 photo collage for “liking” its fan page, Matrix Group doesn’t have products to offer.  And we don’t have a customer base of tens or hundreds of thousands of people.

The Campaign

We decided to use good, old-fashioned corporate philanthropy to incentivize people to “like” us.  The campaign was incredibly simple:  we would donate $10 to a specific charity for every new fan we got between June 21 and June 30.  We selected the National Park Foundation’s (NPF) Disaster Recovery Fund in the Gulf to be recipient of our campaign.  NPF is a Matrix Group client and the entire Matrix Group staff, like the rest of the country, is upset about the Gulf oil spill.  Selecting this fund only made sense for us.  BTW, we put a time limit on the campaign because we know that people are more likely to act when they have a deadline; hence the June 30 end date for the campaign.

We promoted the heck out of the campaign over the past 10 days:

• We posted regular updates to our Facebook fan page
• We tweeted regularly about the campaign
• We asked our staff and friends to update their Facebook and Twitter pages
• We actively asked for retweets
• NPF promoted the campaign to its Facebook followers
• We promoted the campaign on our Web site

The end result is that we’ve exceeded our goal of 500 fans and we’ve raised nearly $3,000 for a good cause. BTW, in case you’re interested, funds raised by the NPF Disaster Recovery Fund until September 1st will go to National Park Service efforts in the Gulf Coast region including park enhancements, education and environmental monitoring.  No funds will go towards mitigating BP’s responsibilities.

How about you?  What are you dong to generate fans for your Facebook page?  What kind of campaigns have you launched?  And with what results?  Please share your experiences!

With all the hiring we’re doing right now, my team decided that we better revisit all of our orientation guides.

When we started reviewing our existing guides, we found that the majority of them were too sparse. If you were lucky enough to do orientation with an earnest old-timer, you got lucky; otherwise, lots of things were missed.

So a bunch of sat down, revisited topics, and came up with 2-4 page guides for each topic.  Each topic has a sub-topic and talking points + specific things to cover.  The guides are working out very, very well.

One new thing we decided to create is a “Matrix Underground” guide, or the things you should know but nobody every tells you. We realized that it’s things on this guide that tend to trip people up or leave people bewildered.  For example, there are expressions that we expect people to know, acronyms,  and Joanna-isms that a person could take years to figure out.

Most things on the guide are funny, but some are dead serious.  Some examples:

• Sumner is the part-timer on the MatrixMaxx team who works in the afternoons (recent hires said they spent six months trying to figure out who the heck Sumner is).
• When Joanna says “can you do me a favor?” or “I need something from you,” it means “she needs something done NOW, not tomorrow, not next week, now.”
• When someone says “the cheese has moved,” it refers to the book “Who Moved My Cheese?” that we read as a company several years ago and it means “dude, the situation has changed, let’s move along and get over it.”
• You should always be super-nice to the network administrators, who just might be the most powerful people at the company (because you know, they can read your e-mail and they can help you recover your new Windows password that you changed yesterday and promptly forgot.)
• You should never, ever, ever say “I’ll try” to your manager, Joanna or a client.  Do or do not. There is no try.

I can’t believe it’s taken us this long to admit we have an underground and that we need to help people get up to speed on it!  The Matrix Group Underground Guide is a work in progress.  The “guide” will be discussed during the walking tour that new hires get treated to during their first week.  The idea behind the walking tour is to familiarize new team members with our physical environment, you know, things like where to get the best sandwich, where the closest ATM is, where to get a good salad.  From now on, we’ll supplement the walking tour with a discussion of the Matrix Group underground!

How about you?  How does your company help new hires get up to speed on your underground?

The Olympics are for the Young

Although there are a few 30-something and 40-something athletes, the Olympics are dominated by elite competitors in their teens and 20s. After a dozen years of competing, their careers are over. I’m grateful that after 18 years in the online business, I still have many years ahead of me. Perhaps I’m a late bloomer, but I feel like it’s really only in the last five years that I’ve really hit my stride and seen Matrix Group really thrive and expand.

In Business, Teams Rule!

Although there are a few relay races, the Olympics are dominated by the talents and achievements of individuals. In business, you can’t complete projects of any significant size and scope without a team effort. Take any redesign project at Matrix Group; these projects involve a project manager, an information architect, multiple designers, at least one front-end developer, at least one developer, and at least one tester. The work of one person affects every other team member and if one team members screws up, the whole project is threatened.

In Business, You Want a Lot of Winners

It’s easy to compare the world of sales with the Olympics: lots of competitors, one winner. But I would argue that the true race or competition begins once the sale has been made and implementation begins. Paradoxically, at this stage, you don’t want any losers. You want the client, the vendor, the third party partners, and the customers to all win with whatever widget, Web site or product you are building.

In Business, I Get to Win Gold Every Week

If Shawn White hadn’t won gold in the Halfpipe competition, he’d have to wait another four years for his next chance. Sure, there are other competitions, but only one Olympics every four years. Me? I heard from two prospects last week that we didn’t make the final cut. But this week, we landed a new account and heard from another prospect that we made it to the next round. More important, we get to “win gold” pretty much every week when we launch new Web sites and apps or solve problems for clients.

The Whole World Isn’t Watching

Can you even imagine doing your job while millions of people watch? Imagine how it feels to be a figure skater and take a fall in front of a crowded auditorium and a worldwide TV audience. Thank God that my team and I get to do our work (mostly) without an audience.

I love the Olympics, especially the Winter Olympics. I’m a couch potato for two weeks as I cheer for my favorites, hold my breath and hope nobody takes a spill. When the Olympics end, I’ll be happy for the winners, and glad that I get to be a winner, in my own way, in my day job.

While I’m sure most of my staff would have loved a snow day or two, as a small business owner, I know that when my staff isn’t working, we’re not generating billable time, which means a bad month in revenues, or worse.  So, since Friday, I’ve kept the Matrix Group office officially open but let everyone work from home. Here’s why:

• Most staff appreciated not having to battle the bad roads to keep working and avoid taking vacation days.
• Although most of our clients are in the DC area, we have clients all over the country; the latter expect us to be open.
• It’s precisely when our clients are not able to serve their customers and members physically that they rely on their Web sites to be open for business virtually.
• Letting staff work from home let us put our pandemic/DR plans to the test.

The results have been mostly good. With the exception of staff who lost power at home, everyone scheduled to work has been able to work.  Here’s what helped:

• The Matrix Group network administrators worked hard to give the entire staff VPN access to their desktops and the network.  In fact, until today, the network admins somehow made it to the office every day.
• We established a protocol for keeping in touch via Instant Messenger (IM).  We each announced to the entire staff when we started work each day, we stayed on IM, and we kept our statuses current to let other staff know if we were AFK (away from keyboard) for lunch, shoveling, etc.
• We used a free conference call service to conduct conference calls between staff and with clients.
• We use Webex to review documents and pages together, as well as Skype and Yahoo!Messenger to do group chats.
• Staff kept in close touch with their managers to discuss their plans, priorities and workload.

On Tuesday afternoon, I polled the entire staff and asked for their feedback re: working from home.  I learned some surprising things:

• Nearly everyone complained about latency on the VPN.  It seems we saturated our two T1 lines with all the remote access connections.
• Many staff members have cell phones only and they reported difficulties doing lengthy conference calls on their cell phones or were worried about running out of minutes.
• Most people missed the energy of the office, being able to conduct business face to face, and the convenience of nice computers, multiple monitors and fast access to the Internet.
• Several people complained about missing their chairs!
• Many staff members reported greater access to their managers (although I suspect it’s because managers were less likely to be on the phone with so many clients not working!).
• By Day 3, many staff were experiencing cabin fever in a big way.
• Those of us who are parents tended to take longer breaks AFK to take care of the kids.

All in all, I’m pleased with the Work From Home experiment.  If we do have a pandemic flu, we’ll be ready.  I’m grateful to have such a hard-working and committed staff; I feel like they’ve stayed in good spirits and have been very productive.  As for me, I miss the office, I miss my staff, I miss my chair, I miss my quiet office and I’m ready for my five-year old to be back in school!

How about you?  Did your company stay open or close during Snowcalypse?  How are you dealing with all this craziness?

This got me to thinking.  What are all the ways, big and little, that we make it difficult for our customers and potential customers to do business with us? Consider these examples.

• A few years ago, my husband and I were shopping around for a mortgage.  I called three bankers.  One was only available between 7am and 3pm.  Another sent me 20 pages to fill out about our assets.  The third asked me when it would be convenient to call (7pm), asked me to send bank and 401(k) statements so that he could fill out all the paperwork.  Guess who got the business?  At that point, I knew each banker would give us a competitive rate, but Craig Miller from BF Saul made it easy for us to work with him.
• During the planning for our office move, I called several vendors about office furniture systems.  One never called back.  One asked me to send her the architect’s drawings and information on what we wanted (I didn’t yet know what we wanted so I didn’t call back.)  The third, Michelle Ferrari from Office Images, offered to come by with catalogs, look at the architect’s drawings with me and discuss our needs.  There was no contest.
• I called a company to get a reference for someone applying for a job at Matrix Group.  It took me 3 tries before I could figure out how to leave a message in the general mailbox.  I couldn’t even imagine calling as a prospective customer.
• I’ve had a relationship with Insurance Designers for a very long time.  Every time I have a question, I call or e-mail Neal or Wendy Cohen and they get back to me promptly.  One time, Matrix Group was applying for some new type of insurance and Neal’s office sent over a very long questionnaire, which I couldnot figure out.  I called Neal and he said, “don’t worry about it, let’s fill it out over the phone.”  I love the guy.
• I was looking for a specific Thomas the Tank Engine train for my son and I found it for less money (than Amazon) on a small retailer site.  I had questions about the train (because a certain 5-year old had a specific request) but, for the life of me, I could not find a phone number on the Web site.  I gave up, ordered the product from Amazon and prayed that I had ordered the right thing.
• I love that live chat is available on so many retail sites these days.  I can get my question answered asap, place my order and be on my way.

The lessons for all of us who sell products or services?

• Make it easy for our customers and prospective customers to contact us the way they feel comfortable doing so (phone, fax, e-mail, Web form, smoke signal).
• When a customer calls your office, make it easy to navigate the automated attendant voice mail system.  Better yet, have a human answer the call, find out the caller’s need and route the call to the right person.
• Call people back (yeah, I know, this one’s a no brainer).
• Don’t put too many any obstacles in the way of you sending a quote and closing the deal. I’m legendary in the office for not being quite human before 9am, but if a customer wants to do a call at 7am, I’ll be on the line at 6:55am.  I’ll be in my PJs, but I’ll be on the line.

As a CEO, I’m always on the lookout for ways to make it easier to say “yes” to Matrix Group.  We sometimes stumble, but for me, the important thing is to constantly look for ways to make life better for Matrix Group clients.

How about you?  What site or retailer do you love to do business with and why?  And who makes it impossible to do business with them?  Got any horror stories?

Me: Hello, Joanna Pineda, here for a 3:15 appointment.
Receptionist: Hello, please sign in. Has any of your information changed since your list visit?
Me: No.
Receptionist: Okay. Wait, you need to fill out new forms. (Hands me blank forms)

I sit down and sigh as I realize that I am giving my doctor all the information she already has.  Not one thing in my profile has changed.  I also have to agree to a 4-page HIPAA privacy statement, which infuriates me because I have about three minutes to review the document.  C’mon doctor, can’t you:

• Print out my information and let me confirm that nothing has changed or let me tell you just what has changed?
• Send me the HIPAA privacy statement ahead of time so that I can really study it?

Thankfully, because of my work, I’m familiar with HIPAA privacy statements and my rights, but what normal person takes the time to read and understand the document and his/her rights?

This doctor visit makes me think of how Matrix Group clients want and expect that we will know them, their organization, their contact information, their projects. It’s a joke around the office that many clients have achieved one-name status around here, kind of like Madonna or Cher.  All the receptionist needs to say is, “Rajani (Rick, Pat, Sue, Merla, or Adrianne) is on the line” and pretty much every staff member knows who she’s talking about.  Of course, more common names like Dan or Tim need a client name, but if you’re a frequent caller, our First Impressions Officer will probably know you by voice.

And when a client sends in a request for an enhancement to an existing design or application, they expect that we know the app inside and out and will think of all the nuances associated with the request.  Even if the app was created five years ago.  Only makes sense, right?

Remember Cheers?  The bar where everyone knows you’re name?  I think that’s what every client wants — to be known, to feel special, to not waste their time explaining information you should already know. So at Matrix Group, we’ve spent a lot of time on our systems, communications and intranet so that clients always feel known when they call or visit the bar called Matrix Group.

Of course, we stumble every once in a while.  A few years ago, when our current receptionist was new, she asked a longtime client the name of his organization, which of course he provided.  But when he got to me, he needled me about how the receptionist didn’t know him.  Mr. client was very sweet about the whole thing, but the message was clear: I’m a longtime client, your staff should know me.

How about you? What do your clients expect from you? And how do you make them feel comfortable that you “know them?”

You’d think that sending out an e-mail over paper would be an easy choice.  But the holiday cards were a big deal.  Each staff member signed the cards for all the clients they supported and partners they worked with.  The new biz, net admin and administration teams signed every single card.  I am famous for signing every card and writing notes on many of them — yep, nearly 900 of them last year!  Clients and friends have told us that they love the Matrix Group holiday card precisely because they are signed by the staff who support them.

So what happened this year that we abandoned a decade-old tradition? I was meeting with Jaime, my Director of Administration, to pick the card design and go over numbers.  It hit me that we were about to spend close to $2,500 on cards.  It seemed like a lot of money.  I also thought about how many of our charities and non-profit clients struggle to raise every dollar and consider gifts of $250, $500 or $1,000 major gifts.

So I did what I always do when I need guidance on a work issue: I consulted with the staff, who promptly agreed it would be a good idea to spend what we otherwise would have spent on printing and postage and make donations to local charities. The choice of the charities proved more difficult.  During a late afternoon discussion, we decided to support our three pro bono charities plus two others.  We focused on charities that are providing the most basic of services to those truly in need during these tough times — organizations providing food and shelter. Our final charity list is:

• ALIVE! House
• Capital Area Foodbank
• Doorways for Women and Children
• Washington Animal Rescue League
• Women Empowered Against Violence, Inc. (WEAVE)

Our decision is not novel or revolutionary, but we’re proud of it.  It’s green to send e-cards and we hope that we’re making a small difference on our community.  If you haven’t been introduced to these organizations, I hope you’ll take a minute to click on the links and learn more about them.  They’re well managed, they have great leadership, and they have effective programs.

How about you?  Is your organization sending paper or e-cards this year?  What organizations are you supporting during these tough times?

We tend to think of traditions as part of our personal and family lives.  But if we look closely, most companies have traditions as well and they bind staff to the company and to each other. Here at Matrix Group, over the past ten years, we’ve amassed a set of traditions.  These traditions include: a pumpkin carving contest during Halloween, funny awards and a white elephant exchange during our holiday party, pie during the June birthday celebration, naming each server after a Star Wars character, and creating a special glass after an especially important launch.

The traditions have become part of our lore and our culture.  It’s part of what we as staff have come to expect, and they bridge the gap between staff of differing seniority.  I, for one, think that we ought to recognize these traditions, no matter how small, and celebrate them, for they make work a better place.

How about you?  What traditions does your company observe?  What do they mean to you?

Happy Thanksgiving!  And may your holiday be full of Thanksgiving tradition, family and togetherness.

What on earth does the Miss Universe pageant have to do with running a business?

Well, it turns out that if you run a business long enough, no matter how successful you, there are times when you don’t take home the prize.  I can remember deals where we came soooo close to winning the account, but ultimately, we came in second place, or 1st runner up.

But unlike a Miss Universe pageant, the 1st runner up in business often has a good chance of taking the prize when:  the first choice can’t deliver, the client’s needs outpace the capabilities of the selected vendor, or a change in staffing triggers a review of the account and the contracts.

When Matrix Group comes in second, yes, it totally sucks, but here’s what we try and do:

• We ask for a debrief so that we can learn why we didn’t win the account. We learn a lot from these debriefs and the prospects know that we care about their feedback.
• We ask the prospect if they’d like to stay on our list and continue receiving news about our launches and webinars, and sign-up for our RSS feeds, blog or social media pages.  This strategy allows us to keep in touch with the prospect with little effort and in a non sales-y way.
• We ask the prospect to please keep us in mind for future projects; this lets the prospect know that we’re not upset (even if we are), that we still want to do business with them, and the door is always open.
• We check back every six months or so and monitor the site to find out when the new site goes online.  If we don’t see the site launching according to the scheduled timetable, we drop an e-mail or check-in with a phone call.

Matrix Group has been a proud 1st runner up that ended up taking the crown in many, many instances.  We landed the Catholic Charities account over nine years ago when the first vendor stumbled; we still have the account today.  Just this week, I heard from a prospect from 2005 that had selected another firm for their redesign; the redesign is still not done and they’ve selected Matrix Group to finish the work!

How about you?  Has your company come in second (1st runner up) and then taken the prize?  What strategies do you use to take the prize away from Miss Universe?  Finally, do you ever watch the Miss Universe pageant and would you ever admit to it?

Then I attended a presentation by Barry Deutsch, CEO of Impact Hiring Solutions, an executive search firm.  Barry’s presentation had such an impact on me and my company that Barry Deutsch is now a verb at Matrix Group.

When a job announcement is not pulling in the candidates we need, I tell my staff to “Barry Deutsch” the description.

Barry says that the top hiring mistakes companies make are:

• Failing to define the job properly, i.e., not defining what will represent success in the job.
• Falling victim to first impressions, i.e., the candidate looks good, talks well, she must be terrific.
• Desperation hiring, i.e., making an offer because you think it’s better to hire someone, anyone.
• Not asking deep and penetrating questions during the interview. This happens because managers don’t know how to conduct success-based interviews or lob softballs at the candidate because they “like” them.
• Failing to check references deeply. Many companies skip reference checks or don’t properly validate the claims by candidates. And if a candidate can’t provide references, RUN!

Ultimately, we all want to hire and retain top talent.  Here is what Barry has to say about top talent:

• Top talent is working; it’s rare that they’re unemployed so don’t pin your hopes on the resume database of a job board or rely on a recruiter that doesn’t have access to working candidates.
• Top talent is usually already well paid and working on amazing projects so don’t believe that paying more money is going to be enough to shake top talent from their current employers.
• Top candidates look for 3 things in order to make a move: Is the new job a better opportunity? What kind of impact will I have on the company, on the clients, in the world? What will I become if I take this job?
• Top candidates ultimately take new jobs because: the opportunity is terrific, they will be working for a boss they can respect, and the company is one they can respect and admire.

Barry has a whole methodology for finding top candidates, interviewing them, checking references, making the offer, etc.  He even has a great, funny, insightful book that I highly recommend: You’re Not the Person I Hired.  It’ s a must read if you are involved in your company’s hiring process in any way or if your company is struggling with recruiting.

So what happened to our open Network Administrator job? We completely rewrote the job announcement and instead of listing minimum requirements, we made the job aspirational. We talked about the opportunities and challenges of working with so many technologies, managing a diverse hosting environment, and the crazy launch schedules.  We even gave the job a new title: Network Admin Superhero. We rewrote the interview questions.  And we spent a lot of time on the phone with references.  The result?

We got amazing candidates within a few days and we filled the job in three weeks. (I am not making this up, just ask Deb, my IT Manager.)  My staff will tell you that I swear Barry Deutsch changed my life and he really did.  We continue to use the Barry method and recently made an offer to an amazing candidate for the MatrixMaxx Project Manager/Brewmaster.  We also recently hired a Project Manager/Cat Herder/Master Juggler.

How about you?  What kind of hiring challenges does your organization face? Do you need to Barry Deutsch your hiring process?

Here are some sample cards that demonstrate what we were trying to achieve.

Here’s my card.  The front is purple so it’s easy to find on a cluttered desk or stack o cards.  The corners are curved because Alex says the Matrix Group brand is curvey, node-y.  The prominent elements are my name and title and the company Web address.  You’ll also notice that my card has all the ways you can contact me:  phone, fax, e-mail, blog and Twitter.

Here’s Maki’s card.  The general format of the card is mostly the same, but Maki’s card has his PGP key ID, which is a public key encryption that allows anyone to send an encrypted e-mail to Maki; only Maki has the decryption key.  You’ll also notice that Maki has two titles: one in English and one in Japanese.  Everyone at Matrix can have a serious title, a fun title or both. Maki’s fun title is Shogun of Lunch in Japanese.  Other fun titles at the company are: Digital Cowboy, Idea Launcher, Master Juggler/Cat Herder, .NET Rock Star, Go To Guru, Server Sensei and Marketing Maven.

Here’s Sumner’s card.  Sumner’s card is most like everyone else’s card.  He’s got contact information (phone, fax, e-mail) and simply a fun title.  Because Sumner is a longtime Linux contributor and he programs in Python on a Linux system, he’s a Penguin Tamer.  Tux the penguin is the Linux mascot, fyi.

Here’s the back of our business card.  The full Matrix Group logo is displayed prominently, along with our tagline: Strategy. Execution. Results.  You’ll also notice that we list the URLs for our Twitter and Facebook pages. Finally, while the front of the business card is smooth, the back of the card is uncoated and white, so that it’s easy to write a message. I’m famous for writing notes on the backs of business cards that I give away.  I write things like “met at ZZZ conference, call about Web design RFP” or “call for lunch.”

I have to admit that the process of redesigning our cards was a bit tortuous, especially since every person had the option of adding a fun title and several of us have a different front.  However, we think the new cards are pretty snazzy and consider them to be bold, mini-brochures for the company.

How about you?  What does your business card say about you or your company? Do you think we were successful with our card redesign?

With those few words, Ray turned my afternoon around. All my tension slipped away as I burst out laughing.  I gave him a couple of calls to return, promised to make calls from the taxi, and headed on my way.

If you Google “sense of humor in the workplace,” you’ll get all kinds of posts about how humor is often NOT appropriate in the workplace.  But I challenge anyone to tell me their dry, humorless office is a great place to work. Personally, I don’t think I would have survived the early MatrixMaxx software releases without Tanya’s dry sense of humor.  And Eric made the recent recruiting process for a Project Manager enjoyable with his hilarious stories from working in a casino.  Thankfully, at least one blogger, Elaine Ambrose, says that “(a) sense of humor will save your job and probably your life.”

A sense of humor won’t get you hired at Matrix Group, but it’s certainly not going to hurt.  And if you can keep me laughing during an interview or Web site launch going south, I may just decide to keep you on the team.

How about you?  When did a sense of humor at work save you?

Matrix work included:

• A Web site that carries over design elements and functionality from the National Parks Web site to the Honor Flight 93 Web site.  Including, familiar navigation, imagery style and messaging.
• A “Give Now” form, encouraging public engagement and donations.
• Implementation of a user-friendly Content Management System (CMS)

Visit the Flight 93 National Memorial Web site

Then it hit me: the company had gone through a fairly large downsizing recently.  The corporate culture was one I was more likely to find in a much larger organization because the culture had not adjusted to the new realities of the smaller organization!  Ick.

Then I realized the opposite can happen as well.  As an organization grows, the culture, communication channels and corporate underground may be more appropriate for a small company, not the realities of a larger one. In fact, it’s happened at Matrix Group, although we’re certainly not large (under 50 staff) and our growth has been slow and steady.  I used to rely on word of mouth to communicate with staff about all kinds of things.  I would chat with a few folks, who would pass along the news.  I would also hold “town meetings” and invite anyone who was available.  Turns out that when we hit the magic 40-staff number, my informal communications style didn’t work as well anymore.  I now have to over-communicate, send out lots of all staff e-mails, direct the Directors and Project Managers to reiterate news and decisions, and hold multiple meetings to get feedback.  Guess what?  I still get complaints every now and then from staff who feel they weren’t consulted or didn’t know a specific decision was made.

I’ve realized something really important as well.  The corporate underground and communications channels always lag behind and must be coaxed and directed to meet the needs and realities of the current organization. And just because I say I have an open door policy doesn’t mean people believe me (even though it’s true!)  So these days, my communications mantras include:

• Assume imperfect communication between staff.
• Send out regular e-mails about the most important things even when I think everyone already has the information.
• Use staff meetings as a means for disseminating news, decisions, policies, new technologies, cool projects.
• Rely on the Directors and Project Managers to reinforce the communications.
• Post as much information as possible to the intranet.
• Solicit feedback directly, especially from people I’m not hearing from.

How about you?  How is your company’s underground working?  Does it fit the size and needs of your current organization?

Here is our Office Move To Do List at the start of the day on Saturday.

• Jaime, the Director of Administration, was the SCRUM Master. She was in charge of managing tasks, answering questions, and making sure people didn’t have any impediments to getting a task done.
• I was the Product Owner since I am ultimately responsible for the office.  I was consulted on priorities and tasks that affected the entire office, like the kitchen set-up, where to put up posters, etc.
• We set-up a SCRUM board in the reception area. As staff arrived, they were told to: go get a doughnut, set-up your work area, then grab as many tasks as you can to help complete the move.
• The SCRUM board was covered with tasks written on Post-It Notes.  Jaime and I populated the initial tasks, but we invited other staff to suggest more tasks to the SCRUM Master.
• When a staff person completed a task, they initialed it, then put it on the DONE board.
• Since Jaime and I were the leaders of the project, we didn’t have as much time to unpack our own offices, so we asked for help by putting up tasks on the board.  We got a lot of help as a result!
• We didn’t have people milling about, wondering how they could help, and feeling frustrated for lack of direction.

Everyone who came in on Sunday helped.  Some people completed a lot of tasks, while others completed just one.  What mattered was that so many tasks that normally get delegated to the admins got done.  The Director of Client Services wiped all the white boards clean then distributed them.  A senior Developer wiped down the credenzas in the conference room.  A Project Manager put up the bulletin board in the kitchen.  Three staff members unpacked the kitchen.

Here is To Do List next to our Done List by Sunday evening.
Nearly all remaining tasks were done by Wednesday afternoon.

The results were unbelievable. By Sunday evening:

• Pretty much everyone had their workstations working.
• The dev sites, network shares and printers were up and running and tested.
• The kitchen was unpacked and the coffee maker functioning.
• The new VOIP (voice over IP) phones and Internet access were working and tested.  (It’s taking a few days to get used to the new phones, I think transferring a call is taking too long, and the hold music needs to be updated — but we’re getting there!)

The best part?  Instead of the move being a drag, we had a party! (Doughnuts, pizza, music and beer helped!)  And I didn’t hear complaints about how things weren’t working as planned because everyone helped and knew how hard the admins and net admins had been working to ensure a smooth move!

We’re now trying to figure out how to use a similar process for other, non-technical projects at Matrix Group.  How about you?  How have you used SCRUM in unique ways and situations to get a project done and done well?

User Experience

• Our construction project began with our Architect visiting our existing space, interviewing staff, and learning how people work together and on their own. This is akin to the user experience part of all of our Web projects where we look at analytics, interview staff and users, and create personas to represent key target audiences.
• The space plan and architectural drawings are akin to navigation and wireframes. In our case, our Architect conducted a test fit to make sure the space would fit our general needs, then created a plan that indicated where we would have offices and where we would have open space.
• Then came design. When designing a Web site, we create multiple designs over multiple rounds for the home page, sub-pages, content pages, print style sheet, etc.  For the office, we picked carpet, colors, office furniture system, lighting, and chairs.

Implementation and Budget

• Just like any Web project, our buildout and move had a budget and we worked with our vendors to get what we needed, and a lot of what we wanted, within our budget. For example, we invested in a mid-grade furniture system for the staff in the open areas, and we got good chairs for everyone, but we’re waiting until next year to get new desks for the managers and new chairs for the conference rooms.  We also didn’t request a lot of fancy finishes on the walls.
• I made sure that we spent a lot of time on the space plan and drawings, but once they were finalized, we were careful not to change our minds, undo our careful planning, or jeopardize our timeline and budget. Matrix Group ended up with a total of 2 change orders totaling about $3,000, which I’m told is nearly unheard of in construction projects.
• For every change order or unexpected delay, we always asked the question, “what does this do to our budget and timeline?” I didn’t want to assume anything because we have a hard August 1 move date.  Nothing could be allowed to derail our schedule.

Project Management

• As with good Web design and development projects, excellent project management is key to success. I have to give our GC (Spectrum Inc, GC), the sub-contractors, our Architect (Planit Design), the furniture dealer (Office Images) the landlord, and the building management (Konterra Realty) a lot of credit.  Our weekly meetings, led by Tommy of Spectrum, were efficient and we were able to head off a couple of near disasters because everyone was engaged.
• Although my participation was not required and I know that our Architect would have represented our interests well, I attended nearly every weekly check-in meeting because I’m convinced that senior staff involvement make projects move more quickly.  As a result, decisions got made fast, and there were no surprises on our part.

As of today, July 21, it looks like we’re on track to move August 1.  The buildout is done, the final inspection is tomorrow (knock on wood), the phone and security systems will be installed this week, and the movers are scheduled and confirmed (including a special mover for the pool table!).  Now we just need to finish packing, but that’s what interns are for. :-)

I learned a lot from this buildout and I’m glad that we were able to take lessons learned from managing Web projects for ten years and apply them to what has turned out to be a relatively pain-free buildout and move.  If you’d like to see photos of the new office, including photos of the demolition and buildout, check out the Matrix Group Flickr feed.

How about you?  Have you lived through an office buildout or home remodel?  What lessons did you learn?  Any disasters or tips you care to share?

10 years feels like a real milestone to us, especially to me. Like I say in my “Where We’re Going” letter, when I started the company, I wasn’t thinking about balance sheets or Web standards. I just wanted to help companies with their Web sites. And when my Advisory Board Chair asked me about my five-year plan (during year one), I just laughed; I was so focused on surviving the first year, five years felt like a lifetime.  So it felt right to create a microsite that lets all of us at the company see where we’ve been and think about the future.

We also wanted to create a showcase piece for the company, one that invited a lot of clicking to learn more and let us create some far out designs we don’t normally get to do.  I love, love,  love timelines, so we scoured our project notes and intranet and created an interactive timeline with important dates, factoids and photos.  We also adore information design, so the Fun Facts portion of the site is a tribute to information design. Finally, I was dying to launch a Twitter visualization project, so ours shows off tweets from the company, the staff, and people we’re following, as well as tweets about topics we follow (Web standards, social media, yada, yada.)

Finally, we want to use the microsite to let clients, partners, staff and alumni share their favorite Matrix Group stories.   Share Your Memory is letting us capture some great stories from the past ten years!

If you’ve got an anniversary or important milestone coming up, think about a microsite!  Let us know how we can help or send us a link!

It feels like just yesterday that I was renting furniture to impress a dotcom client coming in (year 1), getting our own cabinet at the data center (year 3), and celebrating at the Torpedo Factory (year 5).

Looking Back on the First Five Years

I found the e-mail that I sent out to clients, partners and friends inviting them to our 5th anniversary party back in 2004.  Here is what it said:

“When I pondered starting my own company in April 1999, I had no idea how wild the ride would be.  The first year was all about surviving, begging clients and staff to come on board, launching our first applications, figuring out what we wanted to be when we grew up, and feeling poor when every other Internet company had millions to spend.

The second year was about creating a process that would make us different from other companies, figuring out that clients need us to build their sites AND help them stay on top of Web technologies, and building an internal infrastructure that could support our growth and activities.

The third and fourth years were about deepening our knowledge of Web development best practices, strengthening our ties to clients, figuring out how to keep and retain our excellent staff, and launching a software division.

This fifth year has been about tackling integration projects that other companies won’t touch, hardening our development and testing processes, rethinking how we can do our best for clients, discovering that our software has made all of Matrix better, assessing which of our services to keep and which to abandon, and deciding what we want to be when we grow up.”

The Second Five Years

Well, another five years have come and gone.  In the last five years, we have come to define ourselves as an interactive agency. Interactive because we create Web sites that are deeply engaging and interactive, not just flat, beautiful designs.  And agency because we provide a full suite of services so that clients can  be better organizations, more successful online.

We have also developed hard-core software development capabilities and practices. Our software powers many a non-profit and association; for these clients, a good portion of their work is done online and through our software.  For other clients, we have done extensive integration with their back office systems so that, for the first time, their organizations are powered by a master database.  In addition, many more clients rely on MatrixMaxx, our association management software, to manage nearly all aspects of their organizations.  And just as we have developed more back-end capabilities, we have expanded our front-end capabilities, doing more branding and strategy work at the beginning of projects.  Finally, the whole company is committed to complying with the highest Web, programming and security standards; we know that we need to maintain some of this code for a long time, so it better be good!

10 Year Celebrations

All of Matrix Group will be celebrating 10 years during happy hour tomorrow at Rustico in Alexandria. If you’re in the neighborhood, come on down.  Esteemed clients, partners and friends will receive a save the date e-mail and paper invitation for the real party in July.  (We couldn’t schedule the party during the busy association Spring meeting season and it’s the end of our fiscal year; too much going on.)

Looking backward and forward, I am grateful for so many things.  Matrix Group has created a rich history of doing some fun projects for great clients, we’ve created and broken a lot of apps, and we have gotten to know our clients’ organizations and industries very well.  I’ve got an amazing crew, perhaps the best this company has ever seen; these are the folks who do all the great work I get credit for every day. :-)

I’m working on a 10-year anniversary DVD slide show for the party.  If you have a fond memory or funny story about Matrix Group, please be sure to drop me a line.  I’ll also blog in the future about the funniest and strangest things I’ve ever had to do at Matrix Group.  Thank you, my staff, clients, friends and family, for your support, friendship and collaboration all these years!  Cheers!

As a business owner, I get to be manager of staff and projects AND client to our many vendors.  As the chief salesperson for the company, I interact the most with customers and users.  As a liberal arts person turned techie, I know enough to be dangerous, but I can’t write a line of CSS to save my life.  All of this means that I can more easily see a situation from a client’s perspective.   Here’s what I’ve learned over the years about clients:

• Clients are busy, the Web site is usually just a small fraction of their job, they don’t spend all day thinking about the Web site, and there’s a whole lot of  stuff going on that they don’t know and don’t care to know. We can never assume clients know that a new version of Internet Explorer is coming out and it’s going to be more standards-compliant, that title tags should not be more than 64 characters or Google will ignore them, and that a print style sheet is different from a printer-friendly page.

• Most clients are non-techies who need a technical solution. They seek a solution and a result.  We need to give them context for our solution, and enough detail so that they can make an informed solution, but not so much that they get overwhelmed.  We also need to communicate concepts using terms they understand.  For example, when a Web design has been approved and we have to now slice the design, I liken it to going to blueline.  Clients who have ever had anything printed are familiar with blueline; it’s close to a final proof and changes cost time and money.

• At any given moment, clients are cold on a project, which means they don’t remember every last detail of the specifications, prototypes or testing notes.  So again, we need to provide context, we need to bring clients up to speed quickly, and we need to let them know early what we need from them.

• When a site or application is turned over to the client, there better not be any obvious bugs; otherwise, we are wasting their time.  Nothing makes a client go nuts faster than an error message within the first few screens of testing.

• When providing an update, we can’t just report on what we’ve done.  We need to provide the big picture: what we’ve done, what’s not done, what’s next, what we need from them, immediate next steps, and ultimate deadline or launch date.

• Should does not belong in our vocabulary. Should makes me crazy.  It either does or does not.  If you don’t know, don’t say it should.

For all you clients out there, what else do you wish your Project Manager and team members knew about you and your perspective?  What behaviors make you nuts?  What actions make you love your team?

The ensuing discussion was an interesting one. We decided that all talk of what we actually do aside (Web design, integration, content management, hosting, yada, yada), what ultimately makes a client a raving fan is whether or not they have certain experiences with us. Regardless of how much money they spend or the type of work they ask us to do, there are core customer experiences that are critical to a client’s happiness.

Over the past few weeks, I have been thinking non-stop about what constitutes an organization’s core customer experiences.  I analyzed my membership in the CEO organization Vistage.  Vistage offers members a number of services and benefits but the core experiences are: one on one coaching, world class speakers and issue processing with peers.  Ultimately, if I don’t feel satisfied that I am getting my money’s worth in all three areas, I’m probably not going to keep my membership.  In other words, no matter how good the Web site or the social events, if I am not supremely satisfied with my core experiences, I am going to bail.

I’ve been huddling with my team and working to define our core customer experiences.  (We must assume that clients want a fair price for our work, excellent work, and on time results.)  So far, we’ve come up with:

• Regular check-ins, during which we discuss how the Web  can contribute to upcoming events, campaigns, initiatives, etc.
• Visit to the Matrix Group office, which allows us to connect with clients better and lets clients meet team members.  It’s just plain harder to connect with a client who has never met the people working on their site.
• Annual review and assistance with annual Web budget, which we do at no charge and provides clients with a lot of value-added services.  Trouble is, not every client is interested in this service.
• Unsolicited ideas from a Director or higher, which shows clients we are proactive and understand their business well enough to give them new ideas.
• Attendance at Matrix Group seminars and trainings. We have clients who attend every single event, no matter what the topic!
• Hosting with Matrix Group, which means they have regular interactions with us on a variety of topics.

These all sound like good ideas, right?  And we should be engaging in every single one of them, with every single client.  But how do you “fund” regular check-ins and brainstorming for every client, including ones who aren’t doing a lot of business with you and/or who have very limited budgets?  And how do you get people to come to you when they’re busy, you’re always happy to come to them or they’re out of state?  Does this mean we can’t have a meaningful, relationship with clients who don’t host with us?

These are good questions, but over the next few months, we’ve pledged to identify the core Matrix Group customer experiences, get feedback from customers, come up with a systematic way of giving all clients more love, and make more of our clients raving fans.

How about you?  What customer experiences are core to your business?

I typed “joanna pineda” into Google tonight and this is what I found:

• An interview that I did for The Washington Post back in 2003 is the number one result.  This makes sense, given The Post’s Google page rank.  Here’s a wikipedia page on how Google page rank works.
• This blog, The Matrix Files, is the 3rd listing.  This is great, exactly what we wanted.  The blog strategy is working.
• The About Joanna Pineda page on the Matrix Group Web site is the 4th listing.  Fabulous.

So far, so good, but wait, here’s some bad stuff that I found:

• My “public” Facebook profile included a list of my “friends.”  I was very surprised because I was positive that I had made my profile viewable only by friends.  I quickly found the search setting and made only the existence of my Facebook profile public.
• Jigsaw.com has me correctly affiliated with Matrix Group International, but it lists Stephen Brown as the CEO.  Aaargh.  We have tried numerous times to get this listing corrected, but to no avail.  Time to try again.
• Spoke.com has me correctly affiliated with Matrix Group International, but it lists random people I don’t know as my General Manager and Operations Manager.  <sigh>  It’s going to be a challenge to get that listing corrected.
• Huffington Post shows the corner where I live and that I donated $500 to the 2008 presidential election.  So much for paying the phone company for a private listing and being super careful to always use my work address on applications.

So what’s the lesson here?  I’m not actually sure because so much of our lives are public these days.  Heck, many of us do a lot of the broadcasting deliberately through blogs and social network sites.  But I do know that it’s important to review what the Web is saying about you on a regular basis because you never know who is going to google your name.

BTW, check out some new additions to my blog, including:

• New project profiles in the footer
• A feed of photos from the Matrix Group Flickr feed on the right
• A feed of bookmarks from the Matrix Group Ma.gnolia account on the right
• My latest Twitter post

Yeah, I know, I blog, I tweet, I’m on Facebook and I’m complaining about what you can find out about me on Google.  Silly me.

I was recently interviewed by Jill Foster for the Network Solution blog on a variety of topics, including using social media for recruiting and what we’re doing here at Matrix Group to survive this hellish economy.

When our fiscal year ends next June, I want to be able to say that we were counter-trend and that our company grew, despite the recession.  Here are my top strategies for surviving this economic bloodbath.

• Stay close to our customers. We’re listening extra hard when customers give us feedback, request new services, and share their pain points.
• Keep marketing. I’m seeing my competitors cut back on their marketing efforts, but here at Matrix Group, we’ve expanded our sales and marketing staff, we’re doing more webinars, we’re using social media, and we’re looking at every opportunity.
• Manage vendor relationships. When the market crashed, one of my first calls was to our leasing company, whose President assured us that the credit crunch didn’t affect us and it’s business as usual.

Here’s a link to the Network Solutions blog post:
http://blog.networksolutions.com/tag/joanna-pineda/

And here are some great articles I found about thriving in this market.

• Southwest Airlines changing strategy for LaGuardia presence
• How to survive: market segmentation

Geek note: During the interview with Jill, she created a podcast using a service called Utterli. At the beginning of the conversation, Jill dialed a number on her mobile phone, talked into it, then handed the phone to me when it was my turn to comment. At the end of the conversation, Jill hung up and said, “okay, the podcast has been uploaded to my blog.” I was dumbfounded. Jill used her phone to create a podcast!

Note to self: create an Utterli account and create podcasts from the next conference I attend.

Second note to self: ask clients how we can combine our Web development services with Utterli to give them a more powerful blogging platform from their meetings and conventions. Any takers?

Why is why, in addition to interviewing well and having great writing/coding samples, candidates for positions at Matrix Group must have great references. Paradoxically, we’re less inclined to hire a person with a perfect track record and perfect references, you know, the person who has never missed a deadline, never gone over budget, and never had a project go south. Why?

Because top talent has experienced some serious screw ups and they have recovered, and they have seen the impact of poorly managed or poorly engineered projects.

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t want to hear about one screw up after another, but I do want candidates to tell me what they have learned from their mistakes and those of others, and how their experiences will help them avoid FUBARs in the future.

You’ll be glad to know that there is a whole movement devoted to changing the content of the Internet from ephemera to artifacts. Internet libraries are springing up everywhere to catalog and preserve Web pages, images, even audio and video files.

The largest (I think) Internet Library is the Internet Archive, a “nonprofit organization dedicated to building and maintaining a free and openly accessible online digital library, including an archive of Web.” The archive is a collection of snapshots of Web pages from the around the world, taken at various points in time.

Use the Wayback Machine, type in your company’s URL and try not to cringe as you browse pages from five years ago. Check out the archive for the Matrix Group Web site; talk about a trip down memory lane.

The Internet Archive also has special Web collections (or links) for specific topics, like the Asian Tsunami or the 2002 Election. Just think about how much content is online from this year’s election and how much of the news and information you relied on to make your choice is online. The question is: will it be online next year and what will we have lost as a society when that content is gone?

Other terrific Internet libraries include:

• Online Computer Library Center
• Alexa Internet
• Library of Congress
• Project Gutenberg
  
• World Digital Library
• Alexandria Digital Library

In addition, Google takes a snapshot of each page it examines and caches (stores) that version as a back-up. That’s why every search results page on Google has a link to the page and the cached version, which is what Google indexes and searches.

Thank goodness for libraries!

I was pleased to see that Yahoo! has launched a Start Wearing Purple campaign. Even though the logo on the Yahoo Web site is red, it seems that purple has long been the company’s official color. Why purple? Yahoo says purple is associated with innovation and imagination.

Hmmm…. I always thought purple was associated with royalty and girl power, but hey, I’ll buy the innovation and imagination connection. Jerry Yang, Yahoo CEO, says he “bleeds purple.” Hmmm…. even I’m not crazy enough to say stuff like that.

But seriously, the Start Wearing Purple site is fun. You can buy fun purple gear, check out a Flickr feed that features purple products, and read about purple pioneers. Yahoo even has a Purple Acts of Kindness program that provides grants to deserving community leaders.

Back to purple being the color of the season. Fashion Trendsetter says purple is one of the hot colors for Fall 2008. Crate & Barrel’s catalogs are featuring a slew of purple products, like this Radius pillow and a purple leather chair.  And check out the purple boots that Miley Cyrus wore at Disney’s “Concert of Hope.”

I ordered a pair Yahoo purple sneakers on the Start Wearing Purple site. I’ll be sure to post a photo when they arrive next week. In the meantime, take my advice and Yahoo’s — and start wearing purple.

Over nine years ago, around May 1, 1999, I started Matrix Group International, Inc.  We’ve come a long way and we have much to be thankful for — amazing staff, loyal and wonderful clients, supportive friends and partners.  The Washington Business Journal says we’re the 6th largest interactive agency in the DC area.  Some days, I feel the weight of the world on me as a small business owner.  But most days, I’m pretty darn happy to be walking off the elevator, saying good morning to as many peopl as I can, and throwing myself into another busy day. 

To celebrate our anniversary, we held a staff party at Continental Lounge in Rosslyn.  It was your typical office party in some ways – open bar and good food – but not in others – the Continental has a purple room, a pool table and a Wii.  We also held a pool tournament.  How very Matrix Group.  James and Patricia won the pool tournament, each winning a purple iPod shuffle.  Check out our Flickr feed for photos from the party.  And stay tuned for a Save the Date announcement for next year’s 10-year anniversary party, which is sure to be a big bash.

We also launched a new Web site last week.  The new site features:

• a completely new navigation system.
• a completely new look and feel, including an updated logo, modified color palette and new branding mini-movies.
• a portfolio section that shows off samples of our work using an interactive interface; if you check out just one section of the new site, check out our portfolio
• all new content.
• related content cross-linked from nearly every page, since every piece of content is categorized.

We have a lot of tweaks and even some content to finish up, but we found ourselves in the situation that many of our clients find themselves in:  the site was almost ready, we had event coming up (in our case, a job fair/open house), but the site was not perfect.  Do we launch or do we wait until everything is perfect?  In our case, we felt the new site was worlds better than the old site, and we didn’t have glaring errors, so we decided to launch.  We didn’t want to miss the opportunity to show off the new site to candidates and the new site is better for SEO (search engine optimization).  We will tweak over the new couple of weeks, then market the heck out of the new site.  It was terrific for the team to have the new site up and just plain exciting for the entire company.

This redesign was a fun and illuminating experience for me because I got to play the role of client in every way.  I changed my mind a lot, I was late on content, and I made the designers change the font size at the last minute.  I’m going to do a seminar on the Matrix Group redesign this Fall, so stay tuned for an announcement.

Last thing: I’m in Costa Rica this week.  I am in an Internet cafe in Guanacaste, on a sloooowwww line.  If you want to follow along in the adventures, you can visit my personal blog at http://jpmkadventures.blogspot.com.  Have a terrific week!

The strategy, which includes the site title, is most critical. It sets the tone and image you want to communicate. So, the Matrix Group blog had to have a movie-themed title. You see, every person at Matrix Group is assigned to a team and every team is named after a movie. Why? We’re all superstars around here. While movie names can be lighthearted, they can also be inspirational.

I am the leader of the company and I personally lead the new biz team, Lethal Weapon. Our Association Management Software (AMS) team is Reservoir Dogs. The Client Services teams are Fifth Element and X-Men – it’s only fitting, as most days, they are the superheroes around here. The Network Admin team is Fight Club because, well, you don’t talk about Fight Club. And the Administration team is First Contact.

Why the MatriXFiles? In case you missed it, “X-Files” is prominent in the name. Friends, family and co-workers know that I’m a huge X-Files and Star Wars fan. Although we’re not chasing government conspiracies or UFOs in this blog, I will comment on the interesting, the mysterious, the bleeding edge, and the crazy ways of the Web.