Posts Tagged ‘company’

eHarbor names final MVPs of 2009

Friday, December 4th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

We’ve had quite a few MVPs in 2009. MVPs are eHarbor, Inc. employees who go above and beyond their normal job requirements to accomplish something extraordinary. This month, eHarbor’s leaders selected winners for both November and December in preparation for the big announcement on December 10.

On December 10, at the Hawaiian Christmas Party in the Provo City Library, we’ll find out who is the MVP for the whole year. They’ll select someone from all of the MVPs who’ve been named in 2009. But that’s the topic of a whole other blog entry. For now, I’ll talk about November’s and December’s MVPs.

We had one winner for November and two for December. Designer James Gentry is the November MVP, and Developer Matt Walker and Customer-Support Representative David Smith are the December MVPs.

I can’t take credit for writing all of these MVP descriptions. I wrote the one on David while my coworkers Alyssa Udall and Britnee Nguyen wrote the spotlights on Matt and James, respectively. Britnee was actually last month’s MVP. You can read about her in my blog entry, “eHarbor MVP creates 6-month PR plan.”

On with the MVPs!

James Gentry
eHarbor, Inc. MVP James GentryWith hard work and dedication, James has really made an impression on his coworkers and earned the November MVP! Recent changes to the Design team opened up a position for a design manager, which James was unanimously appointed to.

Coworkers say that James “stepped in greatly” with his new promotion and continues to “go above and beyond and is always available to help and give his advice.” This new position enables him to “make sure customers are happy and that our Design team stays happy with their work,” his team leader said.

He loves recording and mixing music, eating peanut butter M&Ms, tacos, watching the shows 30 Rock and Community, and his favorite color is #669900… green.

Matt Walker
eHarbor, Inc. MVP Matt WalkerMatt’s Web-development skills have been valuable to eHarbor for the last three years he’s worked here. Matt’s the recipient, along with David, of the December MVP award for his combination of working hard behind the scenes and being a nice guy.

With the other developers, he’s been keeping things running smoothly throughout the company. He’s also a friendly guy who assists new coworkers around the office. “Matt always does such great work and is always so nice and pleasant to work with!” said one of his nominations.

Matt enjoys programming, which is a good thing since it’s his job, but he also likes to read, write and play video games. His favorite movie is Dead Poets Society and his favorite dessert is chocolate velvet. You can catch him watching Mythbusters and Doctor Who on TV or eating sushi at Sakura.

David Smith
eHarbor, Inc. MVP David SmithDavid works hard to give top-quality customer service to everyone who calls in. He goes the extra mile in helping customers by answering people’s questions thoughtfully and following up to make sure they are satisfied with their custom Internet-marketing solutions. Well done, Dave!

His favorite candy is Reese’s Pieces and his favorite food is gum. Interesting. Like James, his favorite color is green… forest green. For fun, he enjoys working on cars and playing sports, as well as listening to bands like Weezer, Pearl Jam and Saves the Day. His favorite movies are V for Vendetta and Gladiator, and his favorite TV show is It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

eHarbor’s favorite Thanksgiving side dish

Wednesday, November 18th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

Happy Thanksgiving next week! In that spirit, I’ll simply ask: Stuffing or potatoes? It’s a matter of taste which you prefer at Thanksgiving dinner. At eHarbor, Inc., we have a clear winner in this debate. I sent out a survey last month for the November issue of the eHarbor ePort (our company newsletter) and I got the following results.

November eHarbor, Inc. pie chart on Thanksgiving dinner

Potatoes, preferably mashed, are the best when it comes to complementing a delicious turkey dinner. If you combine the number of people who want solely potatoes with those who prefer both potatoes and stuffing, you get 65.1 percent of the voters, a clear majority.

I’m not sure what deep-fried Thanksgiving balls are, but someone likes those, too. There you have it. Potatoes go better with Thanksgiving dinner than stuffing for most eHarbor, Inc. employees. So which do you prefer?

This is the second time I’ve posted our monthly poll results. You can find our other pie chart in the blog entry, “The most colorful pie chart you’ve ever seen.”

Keep coming back to the eHarbor Blog for company updates. Check out the Submit Solution Internet marketing blogs for insights into free search engine submissions and other Web-design and social-media topics.

Top SEO tactics for small businesses

Monday, November 16th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

I read an article on Entrepreneur.com a while back, entitled, “Rev up the Search Engines.” It gives a helpful rundown of solid SEO principles for small businesses, which don’t have a whole lot of money to spare but need to start generating results from ecommerce.

Bicyclist soaring through the airThis article gives six tips for a small business to get the most bang for its buck, when it comes to search engine optimization. They are attributed to Steve Wiideman, a fairly renowned SEO expert. I already talked about most of these in my SEO series right here in the eHarbor Blog, back in February and March of 2009. But I think a refresher is healthy.

Here is one highlight I took from these tips:

- Search engines are getting smarter. Don’t expect Google, Bing or Yahoo to fall for the same old SEO tricks. Bloggers and other content generators used to focus on their keyword-to-content ratio, but now search engines recognize when you use the same keyword too many times in the same post. Use relevant keywords prudently. If you use keyword-stuffing tactics, don’t expect much success.

You can find the rest of this blog entry on the Submit Solution SEO Blog on November 23, 2009. It will be called, “Getting your business on top with SEO.” The photo of the flying biker is from Flickr, and it is the copyright of Tom Grundy Photo.

eHarbor MVP creates 6-month PR plan

Wednesday, November 4th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

Content writer Britnee Nguyen (pronounced “when”) was selected as the MVP at eHarbor, Inc. at the Halloween party we hosted on October 30. You can read more about that party in my blog entry, “The most colorful pie chart you’ve ever seen.”

eHarbor MVP Britnee Nguyen

Britnee is extraordinary, even for an MVP. Take a look at her accomplishments. Within 90 days of joining eHarbor, Britnee has:

- Helped organize the Submit Solution website launch party.

- Obtained cool Submit Solution “S” stickers for employees to stick around the office.

- Gotten eHarbor CEO and founder Oliver Bigler into the Utah Valley BusinessQ as one of the 10 coolest entrepreneurs in Utah Valley. That will appear in an upcoming issue. I’ll hopefully keep you posted on when it comes out.

- Designed a six-month public-relations plan for Magellan Commerce.

And those are just her four most visible accomplishments. Yeah, amazing. When she’s not performing superhuman feats around the office, she likes to sit outside on a warm day with a Dan Brown book. You can find her enjoying enchiladas or an ice cream cone at the Chunga’s restaurant in Provo.

She also enjoys reading, writing (Does anyone ever like doing one but not the other?), bike riding and playing sports like volleyball. Her favorite color is pink and her favorite TV show is Scrubs. Her favorite movies include The Guardian, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, and Pride and Prejudice (2005).

You can read many of Britnee’s superb blog entries on the Submit Solution Internet marketing blogs. Keep coming back to the eHarbor Blog for updates on our company, and check out Submit Solution’s four blogs for the latest information on free search engine submissions and other topics, like Web design and social media.

The most colorful pie chart you’ve ever seen

Thursday, October 29th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

Do you want to see a pie chart that is full of colors. I mean Full. Of. Colors. You might have seen some colorful pie charts and graphs before, but I’m positive you haven’t seen one this colorful. I’ll show it to you at the end of this blog entry, but first I want to wish you a happy Halloween in two days!

eHarbor Inc. will have its annual Halloween party tomorrow at noon. I wrote about it in a blog entry, “eHarbor Halloween party to showcase culinary talents,” a few weeks ago. This will be a fun event. We’ll have a chili cook-off (hence the title of my previous blog entry) with several eHarbor employees vying for the title of best chili. Yum yum.

I think I’m most looking forward to the creative costumes people will wear. We’re having a competition for who wears the most creative costumes.

This is where the colorful pie chart comes in.

Each month, I send out a poll to my fellow eHarbarians to ask them about different topics. I then include the results in pie-chart form in the next issue of the eHarbor ePort, our monthly newsletter. We have another issue coming out at the Halloween party, so I’m excited about that. Anyway, for the October issue, we asked people what was the best Halloween costume they ever wore or saw someone else wearing.

And these are the responses we got.

There were so many different ones that I considered not putting them in a pie chart at all. But it looked so nice I just had to do it. Usually, there’s a clear winner followed by a few other responses. In this one, almost every answer only got one vote, offering a variety of results. Feast your eyes on the creative minds of eHarbor’s employees.

Keep coming back to the eHarbor Blog for company updates, and go to the Submit Solution Internet marketing blogs for the latest insights into free search engine submissions and other SEO and PPC topics.

October eHarbor, Inc. pie chart on Halloween costumes

Merchant-service expert wins eHarbor MVP

Wednesday, October 7th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

It’s time to spotlight this month’s eHarbor, Inc. MVP. This month it is Jeni Lavea, an eHarbor employee who took on an amazing amount of work with our Merchant Services unit. Remember my blog entry on the new Magellan Commerce merchant services? It’s a lot like that.

eHarbor MVP Jeni Lavea

Most of the content in this blog entry was actually written by Alyssa Udall, who writes lots of great blog entries on the Submit Solution Internet marketing blogs. We included most of this in our monthly company newsletter, which we distribute to our employees at the start of the month. I’m sure she won’t mind me sharing it here, though.

When we asked people around the office, “If you had to describe Jeni in one sentence, what would you say?” we received one response that stood out from the rest: “Jeni is the girl who loves you on your worst day; she works hard and is determined to do everything the best she can!”

Anyone can see that Jeni is very friendly toward everyone and is always cheerful. She always works hard and she never complains.

Originally from Temecula, Calif., Jeni now lives in Provo, Utah. She loves spending time with friends and family. Jeni enjoys Tim Burton movies, Mexican food, Disneyland and reading books like Pride and Prejudice and the Twilight series.

Plus, her favorite holiday is Halloween. I’ll talk more about our exciting Halloween Party in my next blog entry on Friday. Be sure to stay tuned!

This is the fourth time I’ve spotlighted an MVP in the eHarbor Blog. You can read about last month’s winner, Jeff Ashby, in my blog entry, “ThemeFury.com creator named eHarbor MVP.” I’ll keep showing off our MVPs accomplishments in future blog entries.

Submit Solution receives tasty website launch party

Wednesday, September 23rd, 2009

By Robert Lockard

The new Submit Solution website is quite amazing, isn’t it? If you haven’t checked it out, be sure to visit www.submitsolution.com right now to see all the great Web design, SEO and other services we provide there.

In fact, Submit Solution’s new website is so cool that we actually held a launch party in its honor on Monday, September 21, 2009. Alyssa Udall and Britnee Nguyen, the other two writers on the four ecommerce blogs on Submit Solution, and I planned a company-wide get-together in which we enjoyed refreshments and gave out prizes. The refreshments were made up of drinks, as well as orange and white donuts, which were shaped like the new Submit Solution logo. See for yourself.

Submit Solution logo made of donuts

Submit Solution logo

That S-shaped group of donuts was one of my favorite parts of the celebration. After that, we held a fun scavenger hunt. Employees had to search the Submit Solution website for clues to lead them to prizes cleverly hidden throughout our eHarbor, Inc. office. We hid clues on Submitsolution.com in the site’s blog tags, image titles and in the text of Web pages.

The prizes people could win by finding and unscrambling the clues included toys, candy bars, eHarbor mugs and Bigler Bucks, which we affectionately named for Oliver Bigler, the CEO and cofounder of eHarbor, Inc. We use Bigler Bucks to buy company products, like pens, mugs and shirts. Our employees enjoyed this friendly competition. Most of them are used to playing foosball, so this scavenger hunt was quite tame in comparison.

You can read more about this website’s great features in my blog entry, “Submit Solution launches updated website with new design features.”

eHarbor softball comes close

Friday, September 11th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

The fifth game in eHarbor, Inc.’s fall softball season was an exciting confrontation. On Wednesday, September 2, 2009, our eHarbarians fought hard, scoring 10 runs in a single inning. They enjoyed so much success that coming into the bottom of the second-to-last inning, they had brought their lead to six, with a score of 13-7.

eHarbor, Inc. softball team

Unfortunately, the other team came to life in that inning, scoring an astonishing nine runs. eHarbor got two early outs, but after that the other team just kept hitting solid grounders outside our fielders’ range. It took too long to get the last player out – the damage was done.

Our hitters stepped up to the plate to try to make up lost ground, but they all popped out. The other team won the game 16-13. Boy, that was an exciting game. The eHarbarians tried hard, but victory was just beyond their grasp. Our record this season is now 1-4.

We played our next game on Sept. 9 in Orem, Utah and we also lost. Next week, we’ll have double header and then our regular season will be over. If we can triumph in our last two games, we will hopefully be able to get into the playoffs, as we did in the summer season. You can read about our record-breaking summer season in my blog entry, “eHarbor, Inc. softball ends season in good form.” Stay tuned to the eHarbor Blog to find out how our team does.

eHarbor June MVP returns to work after breaking her neck

Thursday, July 9th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

Each month, eHarbor, Inc. singles out one of its employees as the Most Valuable Player or employee of the month. They announce the winner at a company lunch on the first business day of each month. The MVP is someone who has done extraordinary work, going above and beyond his or her duties to help the company succeed. On July 1, Alisha Walton was named MVP for her exceptional actions in June.

eHarbor June MVP: Alisha Walton

It takes an amazing kind of person to come back to work so soon after enduring a terrible car collision, a month-long hospital stay and several surgeries. Alisha is definitely an amazing person.

She was riding a motorcycle in May when a car came and hit her at full speed, knocking her to the ground and breaking her neck. Thankfully, Alisha’s neck injury did not paralyze her. She spent a month in the Utah Valley Regional Medical Center in Provo, Utah. You can read a quote from her about her experience in a Daily Herald article, entitled “UVRMC trauma team: Life in the balance.”

Six days after her June 3 release from the hospital, Alisha returned to work while still wearing her halo and being confined to a wheelchair. Amazingly, she got right back into her job, despite the pain and struggle she faced. She has a great sense of humor about her situation. For instance, she said her hobbies include photography, reading, surfing and now wheelchair racing. Her spirit is truly indomitable.

I’ll keep you updated on MVP winners each month from now on. We have quite a few exceptional workers at eHarbor, so it will be great to give them the recognition they deserve. By the way, I was also named the MVP for June along with Alisha, but I prefer not to call attention to myself. It’s nice to be noticed for my hard work on the blog and other projects, though.

Be sure to enjoy our great blog posts on ecommerce and search engines next week in the eHarbor Blog!

eHarbor, Inc. softball ends season in good form

Tuesday, July 7th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

This is my last blog entry about eHarbor, Inc.’s softball team this season. We played what turned out to be the last game of our season on Wednesday, July 1, 2009. The playoffs were a double-elimination tournament and we lost our second game.

eHarbor Inc. softball fans

We started our season with a perfect 5-0 record. We then ran into some of our league’s best teams and our success was tempered with four losses. But our final record of 6-4 was still the best record we’ve ever had. We put up a great fight in the playoffs, losing after a great effort in our first game and then having our post-season come to an end last week.

All in all, it was a great season. We might play again in the fall, so I’ll keep you posted if we do. Even though the season is over, we’ve still got plenty of great information about eHarbor that I’ll be happy to share in future blog posts. Not to mention all the important updates on ecommerce and Internet marketing.

Stay tuned to the eHarbor Blog!