Joe Palko, gearing up for the Solid Cactus Cyber Monday programming marathon.

This morning the store development team at Solid Cactus was greeted with a Christmas tree, garland, and a paper Santa Claus — Joe Palko and I went a little overboard at our local party supply store. But, it’s all to get everyone in the spirit for our clients’ biggest time of the year: The holiday shopping season.

Solid Cactus today is hosting a 24-hour programming marathon to ready its eCommerce retailer clients for Cyber Monday, the official start of the online holiday shopping season. Solid Cactus promoted the Cyber Monday programming marathon through an offbeat video starring Scott Sanfilippo and a slew of team members (view the video here: http://bit.ly/scmarathon).

“We wanted to provide a way for our customers to have their eCommerce websites improved upon before Cyber Monday. It’s a tough holiday season for everyone – we all know what the economic climate is- and a lot of retailers may feel like there’s not a lot left they can do in time to get ready for the holidays, but we wanted to give them a chance,” said Gregory Davis, director of corporate marketing and product development for Solid Cactus.

Online retailers who signed up for a new store feature or store redesign before Wednesday’s deadline will have their projects completed for Cyber Monday. The design team put finishing touches on mock-ups to get ready for the start of marathon which officially kicked off about an hour ago, and will conclude at 9:00 a.m. tomorrow morning.

Shopping for the programming marathon

Other members of the Solid Cactus volunteered to attend the marathon to provide support, coffee runs, food delivery, and entertainment during the marathon. Solid Cactus staff will also be blogging, posting video footage, and making updates on Twitter and Facebook about the progress of the programming event.

For more details on the Solid Cactus Cyber Monday Programming Marathon, contact Donna Talarico at (570) 706-7116 or by e-mail at donna.talarico@solidcactus.com

What is Cyber Monday?

Cyber Monday is the kick-off of the online holiday shopping season, the sister to Black Friday. Cyber Monday was first used in 2005, and coined by Shop.org after it was noted in the eCommerce industry that 77% of online retailers saw a significant spike in sales on the Monday following Thanksgiving in 2004.

The tradition continued, an unofficial eCommerce holiday was born, and now Cyber Monday 2009 is right around the corner. Are you ready?

On Friday, June 5th, volunteers from the Luzerne County SPCA converged on Solid Cactus for the first “Adopt the SPCA Day.” In an effort to raise awareness of the many pets that are available for adoption, our local SPCA is asking local businesses to adopt them for a few hours so some volunteers can come in with a few the adoptable pets and show them off to employees. We were more than happy to kick off the program.

Solid Cactus is a huge supporter of the Luzerne County SPCA. Solid Cactus co-founder Joe Palko serves on the board of directors and I sit on the board and am also vice president. We also donate the design of the bi-monthly print newsletter and coordinate its printing and mailing with Independent Graphics who donates the printing and Whiteman Tower who donates the paper. We also donate the bi-weekly send of the SPCA’s e-mail newsletter.

Our Adopt the SPCA Day was a great success! Solid Cactus Cares, our employee sponsored charitable fund, donated 360 cuts of pizza from our neighbor, Pizza Perfect, which in turn was sold for $1 a slice with all money being given to the SPCA. Vince Sweeney, Executive Director of the Luzerne County SPCA, took back $360 which will help care for the many animals who currently call the shelter “home.”

If you’re considering bringing a pet into your home, please check a shelter in your area first, as there are many adoptable pets looking for a “forever home.”

Yesterday, I hosted a webinar with Jeff Stolarcyk and Alicia Magda as my guests. Jeff and Alicia are our resident social media experts and who better to talk about SMO with than them?

When it comes to getting the word out about your business, social media is now considered crucial. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and other social networking sites are free ways for your to spread your message and get people to come to your website.

During the webinar we discussed the most important social networking sites and which ones your should focus on. We gave tours of each and also discussed best practices and how to avoid turning people off, rather than on, to your business.

In case you missed it, or want others to watch, it’s now online for viewing. Enjoy!

Click To Play

Oprah already had her moment in the Twittering sun. Aston had his too. Now it’s time to spotlight some of the resident Twitters here at Solid Cactus.

As you know, I’m going to be hosting a webinar on May 20th at 2pm ET on the importance of adding Social Media into your marketing mix. Joining me will be resident SMO experts Jeff Stolarcyk and Alicia Magda who are both very active in the social media world. I expect this webinar to be very exciting, lively and peppered with plenty of questions, so if you haven’t signed up yet, take a moment to do so.

While on the subject of Twittering and SMO, members of our Internet Marketing team invite you to follow them for timely information and tips. Feel free to “follow” them on Twitter by clicking the links below. If you don’t know what Twitter is, now would be a great time to sign up for that webinar!

Follow Our Internet Marketing Team on Twitter

Affiliate Marketing – Michelle Pushefski
Affiliate Marketing – Ryan Yurewicz
Email Marketing – Michelle Johnson
Pay-Per-Click Management – Bradley Hoppy
Pay-Per-Click Management – Aaron Hagenbuch
Pay-Per-Click Management – Robyn Snyder
Pay-Per-Click Management – Mike Jozaitis
Pay-Per-Click Management – Leigh McGlynn
Pay-Per-Click Management – Eric Colon
Pay-Per-Click Management – Jean Lloyd
Pay-Per-Click Management – Michael Rowland
Search Engine Optimization – Alicia Magda
Search Engine Optimization – Nick Matthews
Search Engine Optimization – Mandy Boyle
Search Engine Optimization – Rebecca Rowett
Search Engine Optimization – Shannon Mullery
Search Engine Optimization – Jeff Stolarcyk

Last evening, Solid Cactus co-founder Joe Palko and myself had the honor of receiving the 2009 Ben Franklin Technology Partners iXchange Award for “Entrepreneurial Achievement.” This award is given to “individuals who best exemplify the quintessential entrepreneurial spirit: a combination of ingenuity, hard work and innovation that has resulted in the creation of a successful and growing business venture.”

According to Ben Franklin, “the Innovation Awards represent the core tenets of the Ben Franklin program: developing early-stage, technology-oriented companies; helping established manufacturing companies enhance their competitive advantage through innovation and promoting a community-wide infrastructure that fosters a favorable business environment for high-growth companies.”

The awards ceremony has held at Lehigh University’s Zoellner Arts Center in Bethlehem, PA and was attended by about 600 people.

During my acceptance speech, I thanked the 150+ Solid Cactus team members who are the real recipients of this award. They are the guys and gals who come to work every day, giving their absolute best to keep our customers happy, bring in new business and work hard to innovate and make us a leader in our industry. Without their hard work and dedication, there would be no Solid Cactus.

Enjoy some candid and not-so-candid video of the event, including the acceptance speech. Blame Beth Hartman for the shaky camera movements, I think she was more nervous than Joe! And thanks to Joe & Katrina Domkowski, Catherine Shafer, John Dawe, Greg Kosicki and of course Beth for attending and sharing in the moment. And thanks to “Candy Pam” from Blair Candy for the flowers that made us look great!

On Friday, I had the opportunity to present one year service awards to several members of the Shavertown Solid Cactus team. Each team member who reaches a 1, 5, or 10 year milestone with us receives a glass award and staff recognition. Recipients of the one year award were:

Molly Harvey – Accounting

Karen Snyder – Corporate Marketing

Justin Verry – Account Management

Sean Handwerk – Store Programming

Lindsey Ranaldo – Store Programming

Keith Schaeffer – Store Programming

Shana Cavuto – Project Management

Aaron Hagenbuch – Internet Marketing

Brad Hoppy – Internet Marketing

Mike Rowland – Internet Marketing

Sarah Kinney – Design

Mark Sanfilippo – Facilities

Joe Pace – SaaS

Jessica Lisowski – Account Management

George Sisco – Technical Support

Isaac Boerner – Technical Support

Brian Emershaw – Project Management

Tim Whitacre – Store Programming

Warren Gunderman – Technical Support

Jeff Stolarcyk – Internet Marketing

Ashley Motter – Corporate Marketing

Laurie Richmond – Accounting

Marina Belkina – Saguaro’s / Food Service

Congratulations to all, and we look forward to having you on the team for many years to come!

It was a simply gorgeous Friday night in Northeast Pennsylvania and the setting was perfect for the closing night of Solid Cactus Boot Camp. Temps in the high 80’s allowed us to take advantage of having cocktail hour outside at the East Mountain Inn with spectacular views of the valley below. After dinner we had our usual “graduation” where attendees got their diploma and a bag of Solid Cactus swag.

The highlight of the evening came when Sam Blankenship of TrickShopMagic.com entertained with some magic before giving the keynote address.

I hope everyone had a great time at Boot Camp and we look forward to seeing you at another one real soon!

View the keynote address online:

Thursday night’s Boot Camp dinner was at Pazzo Restaurant. After dinner we all headed across the street to Mohegan Sun at Pocono Downs for an evening of gaming. Unfortunately nobody came back a big winner, but a great time was had by all!

The final day of Solid Cactus Boot Camp proved that Mother Nature CAN cooperate when she wants to. The near 80 degree temperatures and plenty of sunshine had me firing up the grill and putting together a BBQ that consisted of 15 pounds of shrimp, 20 pounds of hamburgers, 100 hot dogs and 10 pounds of chicken. Most of us slept for the rest of the afternoon!

Photo Courtesy of www.FreeNaturePictures.com

Well, we just had the last Solid Cactus Boot Camp session for this round.  The Solid Cactus Management Team was available for an roundtable open discussion, and entertained questions from the attendees.

Here’s the skinny from the brass:

> As the company has grown, Solid Cactus has made concerted efforts to streamline operations and provide a better customer experience.  Account Managers, Project Managers and Marketing Managers work together to cohesively deliver a positive full-service experience.

> Solid Cactus continues to serve stores and sites on multiple platforms and has dedicated internal teams to handle each.

> New products are constantly in development with Solid Cactus; those products are typically released at Boot Camp.  Such features are not released to the general public until later to help provide our Boot Camp attendees with the very first opportunities to take advantage of new offerings.

> We are always open to feedback, and very much value the Boot Camp survey feedback we receive.  Do you have suggestions for future Boot Camps?  Leave a comment and let us know!

On a personal note, I can tell you that I have worked for many companies and organizations.  The talent and dedication at Solid Cactus is unmatched.  We are intensely passionate about what we do; we are a family.  We forge friendships, have fun and support one another.  We are at Solid Cactus because we want to be, not because we have to be.  A wise individual once said to me, “If you don’t wake up in the morning and look forward to what you do, you are wasting your time.”  I thought that was idealistic, until I came to Solid Cactus.  I look forward to work.  I love to learn about my clients; I know about their lives, their families.  Yes, we provide products and services at Solid Cactus, but more importantly, we foster relationships–lasting ones.

Now, it’s graduation time; we’re off to a fabulous dinner reception to celebrate our attendees.  If we didn’t see you here this time, don’t miss the next one!