A little bit about me...

Well, my name is Carilyn Buschman. I'm 26 years old and happily married to a great guy! I am currently in works of completing a degree in web design. I started out with print and decided since there was so much demand for websites that I would be better off going in that direction. I enjoy learning as much as I can, and doing web is definitely bringing new challenges since I have yet to master it. I hope to launch a business of my own real soon. My goal is to do what I love most to help others!

What do you feel will be the most challenging thing for you this semester in this course?

I hope to God nothing new comes up to make this semester challenging! For now I don't think there will be anything to cause problems for me. I always have personal stuff going on but I don't think its too bad.

five favorite links to design resources

Here's a quick list of some of my favorite links for design resources.

  1. Smashing Magazine.com
  2. Flickr.com
  3. Valencia Wordpress
  4. Dafont.com
  5. Google Font Preview

Words of Advice...

If I were to work with a client who wanted or needed to use social media I would advice them that they should definitly use social media for these reasons:

  • The cost to enter and participate in the social space is minimal. Compared to other forms of marketing, such as print, broadcast and even online advertising, the cost to market your business and your brand in social media is relatively low.

  • You can boost corporate and executive thought leadership. Focus on sharing industry expertise, insight and knowledge so that people view you and your company as a resource first and foremost. This develops a company's trustworthiness.

  • Opportunities for providing customer service and feedback abound. Maintaining and improving client relations, and courting and conversing with potential customers create many opportunities to improve your company's customer service reputation, and also allows for increased engagement with your stakeholders.You can dramatically increase traffic to your company website. Your presence on search engines will increase.

  • You can better manage and monitor your brand. In social media, everyone has a voice. If your customers are not talking about your brand, you don't exist. Whether you choose to listen to the conversations about you and your company is up to you, but realize that people are indeed talking about you.

  • Becuase everyone's doing it!!