This past Sunday, thousands of people came out to the Irvine Spectrum to participate in the 14^th Annual Cinco de Mayo Half Marathon, 10K Run, 5K Run/Walk, 1K Kids’ Fun Run & Bike Tour  to benefit the Pediatric Cancer Research Foundation (PCRF).  Not only was GoldenComm a sponsor of the event, but 8 of our passionate employees put on their game faces and joined the fun by participating in the 5k and 1k kids fun run.

We were honored to participate in such a great event and to support the incredible work that PCRF is doing to find cures and bring hope for children and their families facing cancer.   We look forward to continuing to support PCRF and participating in this amazing and FUN event for years to come!

This is only ONE of the many children’s cancer research fundraising events that PCRF hosts.  Show your support in any way you can!

Today, Jason had another successful Excel-Your-Business Seminar at one of Orange County’s Best Golf Courses, Strawberry Farms Golf Club in the boardroom. Strawberry Farms was a great host and served our seminar attendees a wonderful breakfast. Pictured below is our group from April 26th in the Strawberry Farms Boardroom.

Jason gives these seminars every month so be sure to check back soon for the next available date. Our guests will certainly agree that it’s a seminar that you won’t want to miss!

Located on the corner of Oak Street and PCH Stand Up Paddle Co Laguna Beach is the new epicenter of a growing movement of paddle surfers rising up across Orange County beaches.  Excited to see the boards off the web site and in the water we made our way south from Golden Comm strategic web design offices in Costa Mesa to say hi to Ryan Tropp and the web team at the new shop. 

When I walked in the doors I quickly realized what’s different at SUPCO from many fast growing businesses.  More than screen printed shirts and trucker hats (which are sweet I bought one) you can actually feel the authentic love of and care they put into their products.  You can get a glimpse of the flavor of the brand at supcompany.com.  If you haven’t yet been introduced to  the company you must know that its foundation is built around championship riders and custom SUP board designs from Kala Alexander, Rob Rojas, and Gillian Gibree.  The team is led by iconic local founder Tommy Donnely whose family is part of his inspirational story to design and distribute top of the line signature designed SUP boards to be sold across the country. 

In following with their aggressive mission to bring stand up paddle boarding to the masses, SUPCO offers SUP boards, accessories, and apparel to both beginning and professional riders.  To capture national attention the paddle boarding company in Laguna beach  is now offering free shipping all across the country to a growing group of riders from Florida to the Great Lakes to Austin Texas.  So if you haven’t’ yet checked out stand up paddle boarding for yourself you should go to supcompany.com there is a whole season of summer weekends ahead of you, in fact it’s only Opening Day.

Having developed e-commerce websites using ASPDOTNETstorefront for over 6 years, we felt it was time to make the trip up to Ashland, Oregon, and check out the headquarters of Vortx, the makers of the .NET Shopping Cart Platform as well as their newest product, DOT FEED.

Pictured above, GoldenComm’s pose for posterity of E-Commerce Mania.

Not coincidental Vortx was hosting their annual e-commerce conference and our CEO, Jason Lavin, is on the speaker’s list (view the .pdf program) for a breakout session, “"Moving Around a Store – To Search or To Navigate?"

Jason’s presentation highlighted a few of our advanced e-commerce search and navigation work.  For instance, Pasternack.com’s Coaxial Cable Assembly Wizard, TooFaced.com’s Makeup Products and Accessories Finder, and WineX.com’s Advanced Wine Search feature.

We want to thank the entire Vortx team for the hospitality this week, especially Jon Humberstone, our main point of contact.

Q) What do you get when you put twenty-five “wildly talented” and energetic people together at A’s Restaurant in Newport Beach?

A) GoldenComm’s Q1 off-site team event.

“The quality of work that we are churning out right now is EXCEPTIONAL,” Jason announces at the evening get together at A’s Restaurant in Newport Beach.

You can probably tell from these photos below, the evening had really good energy… and, for good reason, because, “…2011 was our best year, ever!” continued Jason in the Q1 update, “and 2012 has started out to be even better.”

The conversation was light, but serious, with groups of people spending an evening talking about “What more can we offer?” and “What more can we do?” and “How we can best service our clients…”

A special thanks to AllStarEvents for handling the transportation (awesome extra stretch Hummer/Limo) – as just because we know the Best Orange County DUI Attorney (Vince Tucci) – we don’t really want to barter with him.

Bring on 2012.

Have you noticed fewer and fewer people are answering the phone these days? We certainly have… and we’re not big fans of that trend.

Maybe the problem is the misunderstanding of technology. You see, I think most people think adding technology is an excuse/reason NOT to talk to or spend time with customers. Well, that’s just backwards. Technology should exist so you CAN talk to and spend more time with customers.

At GoldenComm, we have over 400 clients, so things can get a little hectic as our team keeps up with their needs. But more than ever, we recognize the importance of customer service.

One of GoldenComm’s 2012 KPI’s is to continue to provide excellent customer service to our clients and ramp up our processes in this area. In February, we rolled out the new GoldenComm Customer Support Ticketing System.

This ticketing system is our latest tool as part of our top notch customer support, offering our clients the ability to submit support requests, track the status of updates, and communicate with us directly through our online Customer Support system.

Our clients will receive increased communication from us as we update tickets, and at any point the system allows you to login and check the status of your support requests.

Oh yes, but don’t worry – just because we added a nice ticket system, does not mean we’re cutting back on wildly talented customer service personnel – as a matter of fact, we’re adding them.

During business hours, “2-Rings or Less” is what we still strive for… so call us, anytime (949) 574-5500.

Some of our favorite customer service companies are:

Rackspace.com – the standard, in our opinion, 2-rings or less, human being, every time. Whoa. A company that lives and breathes technology, but still knows what it means to answer the phone.

Apple Stores – ever buy something there? Talk about a company that leverages technology to allow their sales/service reps to spend more time with you. Try to buy something at the Apple store from the register – it’s hard, they make the transaction with you from the floor. Awesome!

Southwest Airlines – the only airline company that I can recall that answers the phone – and they work really hard (and it shows) to hire nice, energetic employees. No wonder they seem to be the most profitable airline – without charging for your first two bags and now carries more passengers in the USA than any other airline.

Who are some of your favorites? We’d love to hear… comment below.

If you were on the internet yesterday, you probably noticed blacked out sites, black squares over the Google logo, etc. and been seeing the terms “Stop SOPA and PIPA”. So, what does this all mean?

SOPA and PIPA

SOPA – Stop Online Piracy Act

This is bill that was introduced to the House of Representatives in October. If passed, the bill would give U.S. law enforcement and copyright holders greater power to fight online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods.

PIPA – Protect Intellectual Property Act

This bill is the Senate’s version of SOPA, which calls for enhancing enforcement against “rogue websites operated and registered overseas” and defines infringement as the distribution of illegal copies, counterfeit goods or anti-digital rights management technology.

The Debate

Both acts are designed to address a legitimate problem in dealing with foreign-based websites that are engaging in digital piracy and trafficking in counterfeit goods. Some people said that the bills would help in dealing with this problem. Others say that these bills miss the mark claiming that the bills have the capacity to stifle innovation, censor search results, impose monitoring obligations, and will change the way information is distributed on the web.

Opponents of the bills state that the acts would allow U.S. internet providers to block access to infringing domain names, allowing lawsuits to be brought against U.S. based search engines, directories, forums and blogs for links posted to those sites and force the removal of those links.

If this were the case, that could mean that websites could get shut down, which could affect ecommerce businesses. These claims also say that the government would be able to block any foreign or domestic site for infringing links. Sites like YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook could potentially be shut down because they would become liable for everything users post (hence the blacked out pages in protest).

What does this have to do with the eCommerce world? Depends on how you look at it. Owners of websites need to be aware of what’s going on, especially on issues that affect the web and their eCommerce sites. It also helps to have a web partner like GoldenComm that is keeping up to date on changes in the web and can alert you to any potential problems.

When I was about 12 years old, my family took a trip down to St. Louis, MO.  I was living in my hometown, Peoria, IL, and my parents packed up the family, and headed about 3 hours southwest for our family vacation.  This vacation was going to be special – we were going to a St. Louis Cardinals game!  And not only this, we were going to get to see one of the great Cardinals players in that game – “The Wizard” Ozzie Smith – a 15-time All-Star, Baseball Hall of Famer.

This was also special because I was born in St. Louis while my father was in law school.  A couple of years later we moved back to Peoria, IL to be close to family, but St. Louis still holds a special place in my heart, as do the St. Louis sports teams.

The game was awe-inspiring to this 12 year old boy.  I think there’s even a picture in one of our old family albums of me on the field with “The Wizard” in the background.  Every child has fond memories of times where they got close to the people they really look up to, whether it be a celebrity, sports figure, etc., and this was definitely one of mine.  These people inspires us, and we feel like we can conquer the world when we’re watching them.  That’s how I felt that day watching “The Wizard” play.

For the past several years, I haven’t had much time to go to baseball games or keep up.  But, while I was living in Peoria, I would catch up every once in a while on a young rising star who got his start playing in 2000 for the Peoria Chiefs, the single-A Midwest League feeder team for the St. Louis Cardinals (at that time).  Albert Pujols got his start playing in my hometown, had wowed people, moved up quickly in the ranks, and was playing for the Cardinals by 2001.

It was exciting to be following the Cardinals during this time.  Pujols helped lead the Cardinals to victory in the World Series in 2006, and most recently in 2011, with Pujols matching Babe Ruth’s record of three home runs in a World Series game.  The Cardinals hadn’t been this hot since they won the World Series in 1982.

Cardinals mania was at an all time high, and dang, was it fun to be a fan.

By 2011, I was living in Orange County, CA, but still following the Cardinals.  So, I was really saddened when I heard that Pujols was leaving the Cardinals.  “Are you crazy?!” I was thinking.  “You’re letting this amazing player leave?!”

But then, I was thrown a twist.  Albert Pujols would be coming to Orange County to play for the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

This definitely helped soften the blow.  Although saddened by the loss of the Cardinals, here was this All-Star player coming to play in our backyard!  I guess if he had to leave, then this is definitely where I’d want him to come.

And I’m not the only GoldenComm fan to be excited over this news. The day after the Pujols news broke, Jason, our owner, came in to work flashing his big smile and wearing his very own custom-made Pujols Angels jersey.  He proceeded to wear this jersey everywhere for the next week – around the office, in meetings, in front of clients, at his monthly SEO seminar, etc.  You can see him in the picture giving his “Master Your Webmaster” SEO seminar while sporting his new attire.

Pujols-mania is high in Orange County, and Jason and our team at GoldenComm are proud to be a part of it.  We all feel like 12 year old kids again, excited to see this baseball star work his magic in Orange County.

So now, even though I’ll always be a Cardinals fan at heart, I know we’re all really looking forward to Albert Pujols’ first season here in California.

For more information on this All-Star player, visit the Albert Pujols website.

From all of us here at GoldenComm, we would like to extend a warm welcome to Albert Pujols.  We’re excited for the 2012 season, and we welcome you to Orange County!

 

What a great visit we had to Joovy warehouse in Irvine!  Joovy has been a Golden Comm client launching a new site within the past six months.  We have some big strategic plans for 2012 and can’t wait to be a part of such a great company’s growth.

 

Greg Gardner, Vice President Operations graciously showed us around the warehouse and showcased some new products and upcoming  ideas.  As you can see these toys are not just for Joovy kids!  For some great gift ideas check out Joovy Toys.