Posts Tagged ‘oliver bigler’

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.

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Posted in eHarbor | 1 Comment »

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.”

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Posted in Fun, Web Design, eHarbor | 1 Comment »

eHarbor, Inc. softball fights valiantly in loss

Wednesday, July 1st, 2009

By Robert Lockard

What a game our softball team played on Wednesday, June 24! The other team pulled ahead to an early eight-point lead, but eHarbor, Inc. closed the gap and remained tied for several innings before the other team finally scored a few runs at the end to barely beat us. It was an exciting game, even though we lost.

eHarbor softball player swinging

Here are the highlights of our first postseason game:

  • Two players went 4 for 4.
  • One of those players got an in-the-park home run, two doubles and a single.
  • The other player got two triples and two doubles.
  • eHarbor CEO Oliver Bigler managed to hold onto the ball at home plate as a runner smashed into him. Thanks to his effort, the runner was out.

The good news is we are not out of the running, yet. This is a double-elimination tournament, so if we win our game tonight, we’ll still be able to move on. I hope to report good news in my next blog entry about our softball team.

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Posted in Fun, eHarbor | No Comments »

eHarbor, Inc. softball enjoys best season ever

Thursday, June 25th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

eHarbor, Inc.’s softball team closed out its regular season on Wednesday, June 18 with a 6-4 record. That is the best record we have ever had.

Oliver Bigler crosses home plate

The final game gave eHarbor a rematch with one of the teams it lost to a few weeks ago. You can read about that game in my blog entry, “eHarbor, Inc. softball humbled by 2 losses.” The good news is that our loss against this team was by a much closer margin than in our previous game. Hopefully, we’ll meet them again in the post-season, which began this week, and we’ll win when it really counts.

Here are the highlights of our last game of the season:

  • Two players went 3 for 3
  • Our outfielders made several amazing catches
  • Our defense was strong, keeping the other team from scoring too many runs

Some season highlights include:

  • The top batter on the team went 13 for 15
  • Two players had batting averages above 80 percent
  • 12 of our 13 batters had batting averages of 50 percent or better
  • Oliver Bigler, our CEO who is featured in BusinessQ magazine, went 10 for 17

As I said before, our record this season is quite good for an Internet marketing company. We’ll keep you posted on our post-season games in the eHarbor Blog. We hope to make it all the way this year!

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Posted in Fun, eHarbor | 2 Comments »

My eHarbor summer party adventure

Tuesday, June 23rd, 2009

By Robert Lockard

As promised, here is a follow-up to my blog entry on the eHarbor summer party, which was held on June 12 and 13. That was a fun event. Many eHarbor, Inc. employees came to Kelly’s Grove in Hobble Creek Canyon, near Springville, Utah, on that Friday night to enjoy a barbecue and play games.

eHarbor, Inc. summer party games

I had expected to watch a movie on Friday night, but we instead sang karaoke. It was a lot of fun, and we learned more about each other’s personalities through our singing than we would have by watching a movie. Oliver Bigler, our CEO who was recently profiled in BusinessQ magazine, emceed the karaoke and he even sang a couple of songs, himself.

My wife and I don’t have any camping supplies, so we decided to go home that night instead of camping out with many of the other families in attendance. The sky had been threatening to rain most of the evening. We heard thunder and saw lightning several times before we finally headed home.

On the way, the rain became so heavy it was almost blinding. It felt like a flash flood. Being from Washington, I’m used to heavy rain, but this was beyond what I’m normally prepared for. It was as though someone was dumping a bucket of water on our windshield every second we drove.

We stayed off the freeway and took a regular road home because I could hardly see the lanes, and I felt safer going at a slower speed. We made it safely to our destination and enjoyed the rest of the storm from the safety of our home. I love falling asleep to the sound of rain. The thunder was elegant, as well.

On Saturday morning, I had planned on returning to the eHarbor summer party, but the clouds still threatened to rain, so I thought it best to do something indoors. I heard the E-lympics were fun, though. I would have liked to have seen and participated in them. Oh well.

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Posted in Fun, eHarbor | 1 Comment »

eHarbor CEO Oliver Bigler profiled in BusinessQ

Monday, June 15th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

Oliver Bigler, the founder and CEO of eHarbor, Inc., was spotlighted in the summer 2009 issue of Utah Valley BusinessQ on page 63. This magazine highlights good small-business practices and entrepreneurial achievements in the area south of Salt Lake City.

eHarbor CEO Oliver Bigler

The feature focuses on Bigler’s ability to think on his feet and remain flexible in his business decisions. His ideas have led to a change in eHarbor’s and its affiliates’ focus from search engine optimization to website hosting and ecommerce solutions.

Bigler joined what would become eHarbor in 2002 after working as a Strategy Business Consultant for the Monitor Group in Cambridge, Mass. Bigler started targeting a growing segment of the online market: small to mid-size business and ecommerce. Submit Solution was the first entity created under Bigler’s leadership, followed shortly thereafter by Real Estate Promoter, which focused on search-engine marketing and lead generation in the online real estate market. In 2003, Bigler created a new corporate entity to house the increasing number of divisions. That new entity was named eHarbor, Inc.

I talked a bit about Bigler in my second blog entry “eHarbor’s future: Swinging for the fence.” He has big plans for 2009, and many of them have already come to fruition. Be sure to check out the redesigned Magellan Commerce website. You’ll see many other positive changes this year as we work on new designs for our other affiliates, such as Submit Solution. Exciting news keeps coming from eHarbor, Inc.

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Posted in Ecommerce, Media, eHarbor | 5 Comments »

Where eHarbor came from: The birth of ecommerce

Monday, February 9th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

To understand where something is going, I’ve found it’s important to know where it came from. For instance, without a starting point on Google Maps, it’s impossible to obtain detailed directions to your destination. You can still find your ending point, but it takes much more effort. We’ve talked about what eHarbor is and where it’s going, so now is a good time to bring up some of its humble origins.

Cartoon character looking at her creator, a pencil

eHarbor was originally launched as Internet Promotion Services, Inc. in Provo, Utah in 1996. The company worked with small-business owners, doing search-engine submissions to InfoSeek and Inktomi, and it was one of the first companies to work with DogPile, GoTo (now Yahoo Search Marketing) and Alta Vista. Internet Promotions enjoyed great success in the burgeoning Internet marketing industry as website owners began to realize the power of search engines to generate new business.

Oliver Bigler, who is currently the CEO of eHarbor, joined the company in 2002 after working as a Strategy Business Consultant for the Monitor Group in Cambridge, Mass. Bigler launched a new version of Internet Promotions that targeted a growing segment of the online market: small to mid-size business and ecommerce. Submit Solution was the first entity created under Bigler, followed shortly thereafter by Real Estate Promoter, which offered search engine optimization and lead generation in the online real estate market. In 2003, Bigler created a new corporate entity to house the increasing number of divisions. That new entity was named eHarbor, Inc.

eHarbor has emerged as one of the fastest-growing Internet technology companies today. Currently valued at more than $6 million, eHarbor is the market leader in search-engine marketing technology and search-engine lead-capturing services for several industries. It works to bring top placement and qualified Web traffic to its clients via partnerships with the top 20 search portals, including Yahoo, Google, and MSN, and generating thousands of targeted, early-market leads for its client base.

The eHarbor office is located at 505 E Technology Ave. Building C, Suite 2100 Orem, Utah 84097.

Now you know a little more about eHarbor’s origin. I hope to talk more about some of the people who make up eHarbor and its various divisions: Submit Solution, Real Estate Promoter, Real Estate Investor, Direct Home Find, and Magellan Commerce. But that will wait. Soon we’ll talk about ecommerce and its importance in difficult economic times.

The photo of the cartoon character gazing upon her creator is from Flickr and it is the copyright of the prodigal untitled13.

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Posted in Ecommerce, eHarbor | 16 Comments »

eHarbor’s future: Swinging for the fence

Thursday, February 5th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

I love movies. I’ll probably share a lot of movies I enjoy and relate them to ecommerce and other online topics in the eHarbor blog. Today I’ll talk about “The Natural” (1984). I’ve read the book and seen the movie and I think the movie is much better than the book. Much of the book’s somber themes are in the movie, but there are also so many emotional highs and payoffs that I can’t help cheering on Roy Hobbs as he always swings for the fence. Despite his flaws, Roy is a good man who wants to be the best baseball player to ever swing a bat.

The Natural (1984) movie poster.

I bring up “The Natural” because in one scene, when Roy gets to bat in the major leagues for the first time, his coach jokingly tells him to “Knock the cover off the ball.” He takes his coach’s advice literally and actually hits the ball so hard that the cover comes completely off. That marvelous scene reminds me of something I heard at the 2009 eHarbor Kick-Off Meeting on Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2009. Excitement filled the air as all 50 employees filed into a large auditorium, and CEO Oliver Bigler laid out our plans for the new year. In his presentation, Bigler said that eHarbor’s slogan for 2009 is “Swinging for the fence.”

Just like Roy Hobbs.

What do we mean by “swinging for the fence”? In 2008, eHarbor launched two new services: Real Estate Investor and Magellan Commerce. It built new partnerships and dramatically increased its monthly revenue. In 2009, we’re going to do much more. Bigler said he expects the company’s revenue to grow 500 percent. Two new websites are already in the works, focusing on real estate and ecommerce. Plus, the company is going to launch redesigns of most of its current websites: Submit Solution, Real Estate Promoter, Real Estate Investor, Direct Home Find, and Magellan Commerce.

We enjoyed J Dawgs at the close of the meeting. Eating those hot dogs reminded me of baseball games, as well. If you’ve never tried one and you visit Provo, Utah, I would recommend them.

We’ll keep you informed about our goal to swing for the fence, and hopefully the field will be littered with baseball covers by the time the season is through.

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Posted in Ecommerce, Movies, eHarbor | 11 Comments »