Last week we were having a little chat and coffee with Janice Tomich of Calculated Presentations about business, life, Vancouver, and more.

As we came to the end of our meeting we asked Janice if we could pull out our Kodak I8 HD camera and ask her a few questions…check it out!

This week we had the pleasure of sitting down with Ryan Holmes, CEO of Hootsuite and Director at Invoke Media. We talked all about productivity, success, failure and why it’s good to walk on your hands…

Hootsuite has over 400,000 users and manages more than 1 million social media accounts. While many of us are enjoying the application without spending a penny, the company will soon start charging for premium accounts…which will likely appeal to the many large brands that use the service, including TED, Facebook, Dell, AOL and many others.

Ryan is a true entrepreneur as you’ll hear about in this interview. Check it out!

Timeline of the Interview for Your Viewing Pleasure
00:22 Who is Ryan Holmes
01:08 Making the Work-Life Balance Work
02:22 How Do You Get Your Day Started?
03:35 History of Being An Entrepreneur
05:35 Why Fun and Not Corporate for the Hootsuite Brand
06:32 Your Secret to Success
07:53 Dealing with Failure
08:57 CEO of Hootsuite Walking on His Hands?

The other day as I was enjoying a strong coffee and a sun drenched morning and I started to think on the importance of undivided attention and showing interest during meetings.

You see I’ve noticed something recently – Many people don’t show enough focus or interest in the meeting and/or the person they’re meeting with.

As a business person, consultant, teacher, and DJ I get the chance to meet and communicate with lots of people! I usually enjoy meeting up with new people but over time I’ve found that many times people are only interested in what they are doing and what they have to say.

So today I decided to write a small list of some common communication pitfalls I’ve noticed in the last few months during meetings I’ve had:

• Checking text messages or answering phone calls
  This makes sense if you’re waiting on your wife to go into labour, or a million dollar deal to come through but in general checking mails and answering phone calls during meetings is just straight up rude!
• Poor eye contact
  I’ve met with people that continuously look around the room and at people that walk by our coffee or dinner table. I’m not sure why this happens but during a meeting try to focus and keep good eye contact with the person you’re talking to as it shows you’re interested.
• Playing with your nails
  I met with one lady who couldn’t stop looking at her newly painted nails everytime I was talking. Maybe she was a bit bored but it surely didn’t show me she was “into” our business meeting.
• Being the main person talking
  If you are the only one talking this usually isn’t a good thing. This is a big one people and it happens often. Make sure you are “sharing” the conversation. Asking questions, letting the other person talk or give opinions, and not interrupting. Seems to be common sense but you’d be surprised how many people forget these points.

So there you have it. A small list on what to avoid if you want to show interest when meeting up with people and working the scene.

Have I missed any pitfalls or tips here? Do you disagree? I’d love to hear your thoughts on this?

Welcome to another Episode of Advicetap TV!

Not too long ago we sat down with the founder of EAT Communications, Cinci Csere. Cinci is a Marketing and PR consultant with years of experience working with companies and organizations to help them successfully create, promote and run events as well as build brands.

In the video below, you’ll learn more about Cinci and her firm, how she’s filled up her schedule with clients, her biggest challenge as a consultant and more.

To connect with Cinci, visit her website at www.eatcomm.ca or connect with her right here in Advicetap – Visit Cinci’s Profile Page

Just a quick update on a big feature we launched this week here at Advicetap:
Gig Email Notifications

We came up with this solution after getting feedback from all of you and also realizing that members had no way of knowing when new gigs were posted (only when they logged in).

So how does this new feature work?
It’s actually pretty straight forward. Every time a new gig is posted into Advicetap our filters will match up the gig category and geographic location with relevant Advicetap members and then send them an email about the Gig.

What if I don’t want to get emails?
No problem at all. If you don’t want to get gig email notifications you can go to your “Account Settings” and turn gig notifications off.

Last week we linked up with Christina Peressini, a Vancouver brand identity designer and small business owner. We talked crowdsourcing, design in a digital era, and much more…Check it out!

Hi there Christina, thanks for stopping by the Advicetap towers! Can you start off by introducing your businesses to the readers?

Thanks for having me Sam.

As a freelance graphic designer and strategist, I have been “giving visual form to important ideas” since 2001. I’ve been working in a range of media (print, web, packaging, signage) for clients primarily in Vancouver but as far away as New York. I invite your Advicetap network to check out my work at www.Disegnostudio.com

Ok let’s talk a bit about how you do the marketing of Disegnostudio. You have a large list of clients and projects and have built up an extensive portfolio of branding work. Any tips on promotion and marketing you can share with us?

My clients have almost all come to me by word of mouth.

The tips I would share with you are communicate, communicate, communicate and when you do, be yourself and be sincere. Tell those who are interested, what you do, how you do it, and why you do it.

In the beginning I put the word on the street that I was transitioning into a new career as a graphic designer. It was encouraging to see how many people responded by sending work my way or by passing my name to others. I still do this when I’m looking to generate new work and it inevitably yields results. I also keep in regular touch with my clients by way of email, phone calls, my quarterly newsletter, holiday cards, and the like, especially those clients I might not have worked with for a while.

When I left my job with the federal government and ventured into graphic design, a good bit of that early freelance work was done for the very group of people I’d just been employed with, and almost ten years later I am still doing work for the civil service on a regular basis. So another piece of advice I would give is to go above and beyond to nurture relationships with those you respect and who respect you.

I have also found clients in the most unlikely places: dog park, house party, community centre, temp admin assignment, and pottery class to name a few, so never underestimate the impact you might have on people in any circumstance. The biggest client I’ve had to date is someone I met at a social event where I didn’t have a single business card on me – a classic blunder. But we ended up working together for four and a half years. Good things can happen when you least expect it. I tend to strike up conversations with strangers quite easily. This sort of friendliness can be both a blessing and a curse.

When we were chatting earlier you mentioned one big challenge you’re facing as a specialized print designer is the whole shift in the print design market to digital/online design. Can you reflect a bit on this shift and how as a print designer you’re dealing with this?

Print is not dead as people may have you believe, but over the past few years there has been a marked decline in the amount of print work I am being asked to design. This trend is also reflected in the closure of many reputable print shops in the city. It pains me a little to see this shift away from print because I know first hand how a really effective print piece will beg to be interacted with, can pack a hefty wallop and can deliver a strong message effectively. I just wish people would be more discerning about what they print and how much they print. There is no doubt that less printed material means less waste, and I’m certainly a supporter of less waste, but sometimes circumstances require you to create something tactile and sumptuous that will allow you to hold someone’s attention longer than an email or a webpage can.

Despite all the wonderful qualities of paper though, there’s no denying that new technologies are making the online experience more and more memorable and are catering to a growing population that is demanding pixels over paper. The print designer has to stay current by taking on a variety of work, both print and web-based. Over the years I’ve been happy to count among my professional network, a series of web developers and programmers who have worked collaboratively to help me deliver digital projects to my clients’ specifications. My recent schooling in web-based technologies is helping me stay current, and I will continue in this direction for the forseesable future. Having said that, if I ever have an opportunity to learn how to operate a letterpress (think Gutenberg), I’ll gladly jump at that chance too. I rarely limit the options. I’ve always got my hands in a bunch of creative pies.

Very interesting stuff…Let’s stay on this digital shift in the design industry for a minute here. There are now many online services around where businesses can post their design projects and then get back a bunch of design options from “designers” from all over the world for a low price. What do you think about these kinds of services and have they affected your business at all in terms of clients expecting lower prices or comparing these online services to what you offer?

That’s called “crowdsourcing” and I believe it is affecting our industry as a whole and affecting some designers individually. At the very least, it’s affecting the smaller designers or firms who cater to those smaller clients who might be inclined to give crowdsourcing a try. Clients are getting wind of these $99 logo sites that allow them to see a multitude of “designs” and choose the one they like best thereby awarding one person with a financial “prize” of sorts, and the rest get nothing for their effort. What these clients aren’t getting is the close collaboration you get when you hire a professional to undertake a professional design process. The proof is in the pudding. If you look at logos on these sites, you’ll see that they are often so generic that they would work equally as well for a plastic surgeon as they would for a landscaper, which is to say, not very well at all.

Crowdsourcing, much like a logo contest, entices primarily low level graphic designers and amateurs which is why a great many in our industry feel unaffected by it. My big concern however is how the proliferation of contests and crowdsourcing will affect our industry over time. I worry that clients will start to lower their standards and choose inexpensive mediocre design over most costly strategic professional design. So, it will be incumbent upon designers to educate their clients about the benefits of hiring a professional designer and entering into a professional and ethical process. Designers have always had to do that but the need will be even greater. Before crowdsourcing, designers had to explain to their clients why the receptionist, who has Photoshop installed on her computer, may not be the best person to design the company’s identity. Our friends at Apple have also made it relatively affordable for the non-designer to own the designer’s tools which means designers have the added task of explaining, in the most diplomatic way possible, that the software does not a designer make. People don’t like hearing that especially after shelling out good money for Adobe Creative Suite.

The real kicker though is when you hear about an established and successful organization asking designers to work in this way. I won’t name them here but they know who they are and you probably know some of them too. I’m grateful that my professional organization, the GDC (The Society of Graphic Designers of Canada), has spoken up and defended their ‘no spec’ stance. This has led to some wonderful and respectful dialogue and, in some cases, a complete change in the mindset of the companies looking for design.

Most recently, the American design community put pressure on One Reel, the organizers of the Seattle music festival Bumbershoot, to reconsider their logo design contest and One Reel announced in late May that they are no longer holding that contest due to the outcry it generated. Sometimes the unethical aspect of this practice just needs to be pointed out and organizations will respond positively. Communication is always at the core.

As we sipped our first round of espresso you mentioned to me that something you’ve started to explore more is “bringing the human element into design”. What exactly do you mean by that and what are your thoughts on that.

By “bringing the human element into design” I mean bringing imagination, wonder and renewed contemplation to the forefront of design. So much of Canadian design is not doing that right now. Most designers don’t have the opportunity to undertake such work because their clients, understandably, don’t want to deviate too far from what’s safe. There is risk in change. But I also think a lot of designers have defaulted to finding safe visual solutions for clients without challenging them to consider a more unique approach. It’s a vicious cycle so I’ve joining the campaign and call on both designers and clients to open themselves up to incremental shifts in what is coming to be known as “design thinking”. This sort of design is a little more risky but by allowing the human element to reveal itself more in the work, it stands to bring a fresh perspective to otherwise predictable visual messages.

The Canadian design community has in its midst a spectacular graphic artist by the name of Marian Bantjes. She embodies this idea and in fact spoke a bit about it during her talk at the Icograda Design Week Conference which was held in Vancouver in April 2010. Her work is about as extreme as any Canadian designer has currently ventured into this direction of wonder and imagination, but evident at the core of it, is the human element. No font can replace her meticulously crafted letterforms and ornaments which she has created in materials as diverse as white granulated sugar and tinfoil. So, it is my hope that more people will be receptive to seeing what wonderful new designs might emerge with even the most tiny of steps in this direction. The result will be design that is stunningly original and elevates the message beyond the typical and the expected.

[Note: The Globe and Mail recently published an article (http://bit.ly/bK3RY3) about just this topic. It explains this concept in detail for those who are interested in reading more about it.]

I always love meeting consultants with the entrepreneurial spirit in them and I know that you have another side business called Nib + Tuck, tell us about this business idea and how it’s been going for you.

Nib and Tuck is my line of die-cut greeting cards (nibandtuck.com) which I sell primarily to corporate clients and almost exclusively around the holiday season. I like to say that the design is not on the paper, the design is the paper.

I started designing these cards in 2005 because I knew, given all the generic, uninspired foil stamped snow scene cards my financial institution and others had sent to me over the years, that there was a market for a more original and inspired corporate card collection. Even the most sincere message when printed inside a cheeseball card is not going to be well-received, and most of the e-cards I’ve seen fall short too.

I’ve had people tell me that my cards have been tacked to bulletin boards and kept on display long after the holidays are over. It’s incredibly galvanizing to know that this work is proving to be a strong and long-lasting carrier for my clients’ messages. I love hearing feedback of this sort. I would hazard to bet that there aren’t too many people tacking e-cards to cubicle walls in downtown Vancouver.

With the cards, I collaborate with clients to customize the inside of an existing design with their logo, corporate colours, signatures, and sentiment. Thus far I’ve found architecture and interior design firms seem to be gravitating most strongly toward the designs. Must be that mutual love of form and function. Price Waterhouse Coopers, Colliers International, Musson Cattell Mackey, Solus Decor, Parkin Architects and Wolski Design are a few who have customized my cards.

If anyone in the Advicetap network would like to be added to my Christmas card mailing list please drop me a line christina (at) peressini.ca. I’m working on new designs as I write this, and will be sending out samples in the fall to promote the line in time for holiday 2010 sales.

Very cool stuff! Lastly and very importantly you’re Italian so please tell us the best place in town to find real olive oil.

It’s about time. I was wondering when you were going to get to the really important questions. Hands down, Bosa Foods on Kootenay Street is the best place for all things Eye-talian. And no, I’m not related to the owners, nor am I getting salami kickbacks.

Thanks Christina!

Thank you Sam!

I’m sure lots of you have already heard that over the past weekend (Sat, May 29th) Freelance Camp hit Canada for the first time right here in Vancouver!

It was amazing to see a turnout of over 150 freelancers, consultants, small business owners, and entrepreneurs from the Vancouver area and beyond come out to represent.

The format of the day was open and any participant that wanted to present a talk just pitched their idea to the crowd and if it got some votes the talk was slotted in to the day’s schedule.

There were all sorts of cool talks given including things like “No more bad days” by Ben Kadel from Emotus Operandi, “Dream projects: Common Threads To Get More” by Ted Morgan from Cabin Works Media, and I even gave a talk called “Biz Card Science”. You can check out notes and more details on the Wiki Minna Van set up that covers the overall event and presentations in much more detail: http://freelancecamp.pbworks.com

All in all it was a great day for the Vancouver freelance and consulting scene (I must say I’m happy to be part of it through Advicetap). As I jumped the bus back home and reflected on the day I couldn’t help but feel how positive and supportive the group was and I think all attendees left feeling motivated and juiced to keep pushing hard on their freelance and business paths.

Thanks again to the Network Hub for putting it on and for photos of the day shot out to the talented Jeremy Lim.

Today we caught up with the entrepreneur, blogger, and savvy business consultant Elie Kochman. Elie shares some interesting views on building a consulting business, power networking, and getting things done. Check it out!

What’s up Elie, welcome to the Advicetap Blog. First off introduce yourself and your company Optimal Upgrade Consulting.

Optimal Upgrade Consulting is about helping small businesses become larger by helping them with the technology aspects of growth. Along the way, information about the types of problems experienced by larger businesses is passed along, so that our clients not only get the solutions they need, but also understand why and how those solutions work.

The consulting balances the need to educate with the need for a real solution. What we offer our clients is that not only will they get the technical solution chosen, but we’ll also help them understand why it was chosen, its uses, its limitations. This helps them going forward because they know what they can and can’t do with the programs or systems we’ve set up for them, and we’ve ensured that it will last them well be being extendable as their business grows.

When did you decide to take the leap from working in a corporate environment to starting and running your own consulting business? What have some of the challenges been for running your biz and how have you been dealing with these challenges?

Well, truth be told, I’m only making my final break from the corporate world now, though I’ve been consulting on the side for the past two years. It’s been a long and slow transition.

The biggest challenge I’ve been facing is possibly the reason it’s taken so long to go fully solo. I haven’t figured out a way to really solve this problem, so I’ve found a couple ways to bypass it. The problem is that my ideal clients are usually completely unaware of the types of issues I solve, mostly because they don’t apply to them – yet. What I try to do is make sure that they never face those problems, or, if they do, that they’ll be properly prepared. But the problem remains of convincing clients that they need my services.

The two ways I bypass this issue are to use referrals from other businesses that offer complementary services, and to offer some complementary services myself. That’s why you’ll see information on my site about website development and custom software development – because these are the types of things that my clients typically also need. By getting them to talk to me about that need, I can often help them with some of the more fundamental issues they’re trying to solve.

On your blog you mention that you’ve come to the realization that “many small business owners do not have the knowledge they need to smoothly expand their businesses”. What do you mean by this and through your services how do you go about helping these businesses out?

It’s really just a question of exposure, and a need or want to know. The average small business owner will know how to run a business of their size, but without a background in larger businesses, they have no way of knowing the kinds of problems that face bigger companies. They also don’t know if some of these problems have already been solved – so they often think that they’re the first ones with this particular problem. Without a background in IT or spending huge amounts of time reading updates on the latest trends, they’ll also be unaware of what new programs or websites are out there that can help them grow to the next level.

In some cases they’re right, and they do need a fully custom solution, but often there’s already something out there that can be tailored to suit their needs, usually at a fraction of the cost. That’s one thing I do – I look for those solutions, and figure out if there’s something out there that will do the required job. I’ll also look at the reason I’m looking in the first place, and make sure that we’re not giving the right answer to the wrong question.

The most common example I come across is when businesses decide to expand to market and sell online. Most businesses would be happy to have more clients, but don’t understand that this can be a mixed blessing if caught unprepared. A client might be hoping that their website goes from making a couple sales per week to thousands of sales per day, but if this happens all of a sudden, things will go wrong, and it could cost them in the long run with unhappy customers.

So part of my job is to look at that potential for growth, and plan for it so that when it happens, the website continues to function properly, the customer experience is kept positive, and things are handled smoothly behind the scenes. The other part is education about what you can and can’t do with various technologies, and what’s already out there that’s been solved. Then the education continues with what it means to this particular client’s business, and what options they have.

This knowledge gap isn’t exclusive to small businesses by any means, but it is more common there. Also, the types of questions they’re asking, or need answered, are very different from those a larger company might ask. A small company is still building up its technical infrastructure, which is what I can help them do. Once they get bigger, then they get focused on the peripherals to their system, and need people who are much more knowledgeable about that system in particular. So I prefer to help get all the pieces in place so that when a problem surfaces later which could be solved with the right technology, they’re already set up to handle it.

The other thing I do is refer all my clients to check out my blog, because a lot of what I’m telling clients I’ve written about before. So it’s like having a library that I can tell clients to browse through, and gives them some insight into why I recommend one course of action over another, or read about some other examples of clients I’ve worked with in similar situations.

Speaking of your blog, I know that you post a lot of content to your blog: (http://blog.optimalupgrades.ca) Do you have a blogging strategy or plan that you follow and how do you come up with so much quality content? Any blogging systems or tips you can share with us would be great?

(LAUGH) This is probably the question I get asked most often about my blog!

There are really two parts to keeping a blog fresh: thinking of new topics, and then writing about them. For me, the hardest part is coming up with new ideas, but once I have a working title, writing the article seems easy.

Most of my topics come from what’s been going on in my business or my professional life. Also, I read a fairly large amount of material on a daily basis. My RSS reader pulls in over 200 items per day, plus I read the National Post daily, so I’m typically reading about 150 articles between the two.

The best tip I can give is to choose a schedule that you can maintain, and then stick to it. For me that’s 5 articles a week, for someone else, it might be twice that, or just one article a week. Also, try to stay ahead of yourself – I usually have 2 or 3 posts ready to go at any point in time. Then when I can’t think of anything to write about, I just use one of my stock posts.

A while ago in a conversation inside Advicetap you mentioned how you only give business cards out to certain people when you’re doing in person networking. Can you tell us a bit more about this strategy and your thinking behind it?

This strategy actually stemmed from a bad networking event, where I met about 30 people and gave each a card. I then got blasted with marketing emails from a bunch of mutual fund salesmen. I tried to get off their distribution lists, but it took months before that worked.

After that, I thought a bit about what it meant to hand out a card, and realized that for me at least, not everyone needed to have it. I can’t offer a service to everyone, and some people just won’t give you a reference until you give them one first, and sometimes not even then. I don’t need to hand cards to people just to have them land in the nearest recycling bin.

So I figured that a better way to handle this would be to convince people to ask me for a card. It pushed me to be clearer about what my business does, and how I can help people. When I give out a card, it’s because the other person wants it, not because I want to hand it out.

What I’ve discovered is that when I give out cards now, I’m often giving them out in bunches. I’ll meet someone who wants my card, and they’ll ask if they can have another for a friend or colleague. So not only did I establish a connection, I’ve even managed to get a recommendation out of the meeting.

When it comes to social media and networking what websites are you active on and which ones have given you the best return for time spent? Also do you have a social media tip you can share with readers of this blog to help them grow their businesses that has worked for you?

Of course, we have to start with my blog, one of the big words in social media. What with writing 5 articles per week, that certainly keeps me busy. It’s a way that I can establish credibility long before I meet my prospects, so even if it never brought in any leads, I think I would continue to write.

Advice Tap itself has proven to be useful, but not in the same way as some of the other social media sites. I find that most sites deal with quantity over quality, but this site is exactly the opposite. The questions asked are generally much more relevant to consulting and the answers deal with the reality of our type of business.

I have Twitter (@ekochman), Sprouter (@ekochman) and Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/ekochman) accounts which all see a fairly large amount of activity. I’m present on a few others as well, usually with the same moniker. Mostly I use those to interact informally with either peers, or other businesses.

I’m selective about which accounts I follow, because I do read the vast majority of the posts in all my feeds. There isn’t a particular criteria, but when I come across a new account to follow, I’ll look at their most recent posts and decide if they’ll add value. So if I choose not to follow someone, it’s either because the account is personal, and therefore not relevant to my use of the website, or in an area I don’t really connect with.

LinkedIn (http://www.linkedin.com/in/ekochman) is one of my least balanced accounts. For a while, I was incredibly active there, answering over 50 questions every week. Now, I go on about once a week, and usually just for a few minutes. I think its biggest use for me now is to check out new contacts. I keep it basically as a resource for looking up people and trying to figure out what people really do, and what some of their contacts think about them.

You really get back from social media what you put into it. On a post I wrote a while back for WordTree Consulting (http://wordtree.ca/content/elies-return-his-time-investment), I mentioned that it took many months of writing blog posts before I got my first lead, but that’s now increased quite a bit. LinkedIn has also resulted in some leads, but that’s really hit or miss, and it takes a lot of time, at least for me, to make that work. So I keep a loose eye on my presence there, but at the moment, it’s not a priority.

The best advice I can give in this regard is to experiment, and figure out what works best for you in particular. As an example, I use LinkedIn as a resource for looking people up, but you can also do business through there. I know of several people who have landed contracts and jobs through their presence there. What works for one person might not work for another, so you have to try.

The second part of that is to try to create an expectation or milestone to help you measure progress. Otherwise, how will you know if your experiment is working or not?

————

And there you have it folks – Thanks so much Elie!

Today we caught up with Vancouver Entrepreneur and Marketing Consultant Minna Van…She’s helped organize an event called “Freelance Camp” that’s coming to Vancouver and we wanted to get the lowdown on what it’s all about – check it out!

Hey there Minna welcome to the Advicetap blog! First off for any of our community members or blog readers who aren’t yet familiar with you and what you do please hook us up with that info.

I wear a few hats but the one I am very happy to elaborate on is my Vancouver Entrepreneur Meetup host hat. Third Thursdays of every month, I host a wine and cheese with a speaker relevant to entrepreneurship at The Network Hub. It is a wonderful opportunity to get new entrepreneurs mingling with established entrepreneurs from all different industries. It is the meeting of minds with a no-pressure, fun twist.

I know we could chat to you for hours about all your interesting ventures but let’s focus on the upcoming Freelance Camp here in Vancouver. Can you tell us what exactly Freelance Camp is, how it got started, and the whole concept behind it?

Freelance Camp was started in San Francisco by Shane Pearlman. The idea of it is, “In business for yourself, not by yourself” and that is a wonderful concept to work with. Many freelancers toil away in isolation and there hasn’t been one event that is specific to freelancers. The great about this is it is presented by freelancers and for freelancers, no theories but rather from experience. It is about the sharing of best practices, resources but more importantly to pull together the pockets of freelancers from different industries who are already out there networking into one big community event.

Nice! So this is the first Canadian Freelance camp to be held…Let me ask you in your opinion what makes Vancity a good place to hold this event and can you reflect a bit on the freelance scene out here?

As a host for Vancouver Entrepreneur Meetup, I get a lot of suggestions from entrepreneurs/freelancers/small business owners and for the last two years, there was an overwhelming request for sharing and hearing of experiences from their peer groups. I think people are tired of hearing about theories and they want to hear from the people who have gone through the same thing as they have. Theories are great to explain in hindsight but practical experience is tangible, applicable and relevant to real life.

Minna you work with all sorts of freelancers, consultants, small business owners, and the like…from what you see what is one of the biggest business challenges these professionals face and do you have any advice for how they might deal with that challenge or overcome it?

In my point of view as a marketing freelancer, I find myself sometimes overwhelmed with the changes in contracts, strategies, etc and it becomes all so frustrating trying to keep up. Great thing about hosting Vancouver Entrepreneur Meetup is that every month I have the opportunity to vent, ask and share my frustration with 80-160 other people who have gone through what I went through at some point. So what has worked for me is just going out there and connecting with other people.

So Freelance Camp is this month on Saturday the 29th of May? Where is it? How much is it? And where can we sign up?

Yes May 29th is the magical date freelancers in Vancouver need to note down. It is happening at The Network Hub – the location is close to skytrain, West Coast express, sea bus and major bus route so you have no excuses as to why you cannot come. It is $10 dollars but 100% of it will go to charity.

You can sign-up online at: http://freelancecamp.thenetworkhub.ca

Last but not least can you tell us one or two cafe’s or cool spots with wireless for a freelancer to do their work out of? Any good secret spots?

Well other than my absolute favourite place for coworking; The Network Hub, I’m also slightly biased as a co-founder of the space! My cool spot for working is Waves because they not only provided wireless, the people who come to Waves are super cool and they are open to talking to you (yes I like talking to strangers). Once in a while, I like going to Central Library to relive my many years of studying exams on the 4th floor.

Today we caught up with communications consultant and Advicetap member Janice Tomich based here in Vancouver, BC. Janice is doing some innovative stuff with her company, branding, and services that she’s offering. We met her to get the skinny for all of you…

Hi Janice thanks for stopping by…first off introduce yourself to the readers. What kind of work do you currently do and how did you get into it?

I am a downtown dweller who thrives on the buzz of Vancouver’s constant action. My husband and I moved from the outskirts of Metro Vancouver once our son grew up and we haven’t looked back.

Living downtown is really convenient and enables me to meet clients easily. Many of my clients are situated downtown and they like to meet in their office space.

My type of work is a bit unusual. My business, Calculated Presentations, helps people develop their public speaking voice. In a nutshell I am a presentation trainer and coach.

The love I have for language and words began at my childhood kitchen table. My father, the orator, would deconstruct political speeches.

I am drawn to the intricacies of motivational speeches and that magical pivotal moment when a speaker holds their audience in the palm of their hand. To understand what that “something” is I returned to academia three years ago.

First at BCIT in the Marketing Communications program, then completing a Bachelor of Professional Communications at Royal Roads University.

When I enrolled at RRU, I had a solid idea of my plans post-graduation. A friend and mentor advised that there was a need of presentation skill offerings for IPOs and Engineering and Scientific presentations and I agreed that he was on to something.

Tell us a bit about your company, what kind of services you offer your clients, and how you’re standing out in a crowded marketplace?

The three primary services I provide are public speaking training, content collaboration, and slidedeck creation. I have an arsenal of techniques that speakers use to engage their audience.

The visual perception of a speaker by an audience can make or break a presentation, which makes voice, gesturing, and stance important. As does clear and concrete content targeted to “what’s in it for the audience.” Along with the trend for visually rich slidedecks, these three key components create presentations that end with audiences applauding and wanting to learn more.

My service is niche in its nature so I believe I stand out already. Instead of standing out, the hurdle for me is to educate the client of how valuable my service is.

The evidence is easily demonstrated – have you noticed the people sleeping and fidgeting (aka Blackberries and iPhones) at presentations?

We all know the importance of presentations for sales and relationship building but often we resort to default PowerPoint and old style lecturing.

Here at Advicetap we love branding. So I need to ask you why you chose to go with Janice Tomich as the main focus of your visual and brand identity (logo, URL, website, etc)? Has this worked well for you? Any positives or negatives you can share on how personal branding has worked for you.

The decision to use my name as my brand was not an easy one. I went back and forth a few times. My decision is a bit waffley as I am the identity (URL, my image on the website) but the company name is Calculated Presentations.

I understand that the trend is individuals being the identity of a brand. The philosophy of Tony Hsieh from Zappo’s Shoes helped me make my decision. He is the face of Zappo’s and leads it but he is not the company.

What I have noticed recently that is that people recognize me, and what I do, but do not know my company name. This is a dilemma for entrepreneurs.

Speaking of branding and visual identity your website is really pro looking. You mentioned to me the whole thing is powered by WordPress even though it’s much more then a blog? How does that work for you and do you recommend this set up? Where did you get it done?

David Maguire of www.davidmaguire.ca and I collaborated to create the site. He convinced me that it would meet my needs and he was right. I’m impressed with the end result. It looks current and we were able to implement my style easily.

Yes, I would highly recommend it. My technical skills are strong and it is easy for me to add content to my site. But even for someone whose computer skills are not stellar, WordPress is relatively easy to manage with a little training.

What role does social media play in your marketing efforts and do you have a social media tip you can share with the blog readers that they may be able to try out?

Social Media is a large component of my marketing and it brilliantly tags onto researching networking opportunities. Six months ago I was rolling my eyes over the use of Twitter, now I love it.

Twitter is an exponential information resource for me, and a platform where I have met many inspiring colleagues.

To benefit from Twitter you have to be a real voice, willing to share and willing to learn. And not be afraid when you connect with someone to ask them out for coffee or a Skype. My philosophy is so what if they say no, it just wasn’t a good match.

I also have a blog and a Facebook fan page. I find that I really like Facebook because of its immediacy. With blogging I have not seen the results I would like and it is still a work in progress. I also use LinkedIn for the formal side of my business but still sit on the fence regarding the platforms usefulness.

I know you only started your company about 6 months ago but you’re already extremely busy and are even turning some jobs down, what’s your secret sauce of keeping the phones ringing?

Networking, networking, and more networking!

I believe that part of my success has been attending every meeting and event that I can. When people see you consistently attending functions a level of trust and a testament to your staying power is realized.

The results do not happen overnight and my efforts are aligned with my relationship-based values. I only work with people who I like, trust and connect with.

I admit it is difficult to maintain the marketing and public relations component of a business plan when jobs are rolling in. But I have diligently put aside half a day per week because I understand the legacy that consistent input makes.

Thanks so much Janice! Last but not least where should we rock out for a good sushi fix in Vancouver?

Tojo’s when you’re feeling flush and Toshi’s when you’re not.