About 36 hours before hosting a holiday party for almost 40 people from my business group Million Dollar Ladies, my hot water heater sprang a leak — of course, perfect timing right? When your hot water heater leaks there's no patching it up, you have to do a complete replacement.

Luckily, one of the members of the group is the owner of a plumbing company that does superior work and was someone I trusted. So I called them and they came to my rescue replacing the unit in a just a ... Continue Reading

Though more and more businesses realize they need a website in today’s at your finger tips online information age, there is still a lot of misconception that surrounds having one. A major misconception is that “once I have a website, the money’s just going to start rolling in.” That’s just not the case in most instances. If you do nothing to promote the website, it ends up being like home gym equipment: It’s there, but nobody’s using it. What we tell people is that you ... Continue Reading

Every designer, artist, cook, etc. is influenced or inspired on some level by others in their field. Trends are often started this way. A look or design style starts as a seed and then blossoms across a field and sparks ideas, spin-offs, look-a-likes or those that fully without care steal the idea as their own.

Driving on the way to work today I was listening to entertainment news that involved the band Coldplay. Apparently they didn't just sample Joe Satriani's melody they completely ripped it off. Below is the video that compares ... Continue Reading

Have visions of sugar plums started dancing in your head?

Scheduling your next marketing project by Dec. 19 with Effusion gets your company at least three holiday treats:

• An additional tax write off for 2008 • A jumpstart on your 2009 marketing • An amazing chance to win an iPhone 3G or iPod Touch just in time for the holiday gift exchanges

The first 10 clients to start a project by December 19th are entered into an iPhone 3G/iPod Touch give-a-way. Odds of winning are 1 in 10.

Yes the odds are really that ... Continue Reading

I sure didn’t come from money. Still, I wasn’t deprived either. If anything, I can thank my maternal Grandmother for showing me how being thrifty and creative can make the things that we surround ourselves with really gratifying. That and a general belief that she had:

“It’s better to have one nice thing than to have many cheap things.”

Grandma wasn’t talking about straight label shopping. Grandma was talking about plain old quality — though we know many brands (or labels) that are associated with quality. In fact, that’s what Effusion Creative Solutions ... Continue Reading