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Swine Flu Hysteria
Thanks largely to the news media and the power of social media, the Swine Flu has struck fear in the minds of millions in the United States. It’s literally difficult to go five minutes without hearing about the “pandemic” and the massive amount of danger it presents to the human race. I’ve even been reading Tweets recently linking the outbreak to terrorism…
The truth of the matter is, the regular flu is every bit as dangerous as the Swine Flu. Even still, much of the United States is currently in a frenzy preparing for the pig virus to strike in their region. Here in Maryland and DC, hospitals are distributing masks to employees and patients to prevent the spread of the virus. Schools are closing. Businesses are putting plans in place. It’s full-on hysteria.
Thankfully, a non-profit has set up a website that automatically screens you to let you know if you have symptoms that are indicative of H1N1, the “official” name of the illness. Even better, it tells you how to proceed if you may have the Swine Flu.
Feeling a little weird today? Check out http://www.doIhaveswineflu.org ; )
Via @amywoo
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Digital Reputation Management Event in Baltimore
I haven’t done a whole lot of plugging for industry events on this blog, but there’s an upcoming event that I think is worth a mention for anyone involved in managing their company’s brand online or off—client, agency or otherwise. I think it will prove valuable in today’s social-media driven landscape.
The Advertising Association of Baltimore (full disclosure: I am a board member) is hosting an event called “Digital Reputation Management” on May 7, 2009 at 5pm at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Baltimore. The description from the AAB website reads:
Understanding the ever-changing digital marketplace is a full-time job. But how can you take full advantage of your understanding while maximizing your ad dollars online? “Digital Reputation Management” will walk you through a number of ways your decisions can take your digital reputation to the next level. Sometimes there is more to it than just the click of a mouse…
Speakers include:
Kristopher Hanson, Wieden + Kennedy
Cheryl Lucanegro, Pandora
Eric Eller, Millennial Media
Brian Cusack, Google/YouTube
Adam Lehman, Lotame
The cost is $65 for members and $80 for non-members. To reserve tickets, email director (at) baltimoreadvertising (dot) com and let them know that you’d like to come to the event!
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The Sutter Group Named to Maryland’s Top Business List for 2009
In recognition of the economic power of privately held businesses, DiversityBusiness.com, the nations’ leading business-to-business internet site, recently named The Sutter Group as one of the top businesses in the United States.
This is the 9th annual listing of the Maryland’s top businesses by DiversityBusiness.com. Companies listed on the Top Business Lists represent the Nation’s top multicultural earners and challenge the long-held notion that a privately held business is small or insignificant. Winners are sought after by major corporations wishing to increase spending with small businesses.
“Entrepreneurs are a growing force in the U.S. economy, and a force to be reckoned with,” said Kenton Clarke, CEO of Computer Consulting Associates International, the company that built DiversityBusiness.com. This is a whole business segment that can carry its own, that provides jobs, products and services, and generates wealth for their communities. These are the new leaders in American business.”
“It is a tremendous honor for our firm to be named a top minority owned company in Maryland,” said Karen Sutter, president at The Sutter Group. “One of our core goals as a communications design firm is to strive to stay ahead of the curve in terms of both technology and marketing expertise. This operating philosophy has fueled our growth, but more importantly has allowed us to deliver for our clients as well.”
The List
This List is a classification that represents the top small businesses in the U.S., in sectors such as technology, manufacturing, food service and professional services. Large organizational buyers throughout the country that do business with multicultural, small and women-owned businesses use the list. The List is produced annually by DiversityBusiness.com, the nation’s leading multicultural B2B Internet portal that links large organizational buyers to multicultural product and service suppliers.
The winning companies will be honored at a special awards ceremony at DiversityBusiness.com’s “9th Annual Multicultural Business Conference”, taking place April 29 – May 1, 2009 at the Disney’s Contemporary Resort in Orlando, Florida. For the complete list of winning companies, please visit: www.diversitybusiness.com
About The Sutter Group
The Sutter Group is a 21 year-old full-service marketing communications agency headquartered between Baltimore and Washington, DC in Lanham, Maryland with a diversified client base in the automotive, consumer, government, technology, national association and real estate and development markets The firm blends large-agency technology bandwidth and boutique studio design talent to produce creative communications solutions that deliver proven results. The Sutter Group offers all elements of marketing communications services including: branding and marketing strategy, advertising, corporate identity, e-learning, direct marketing, special events, viral marketing, graphic design and Website and interactive design. The firm is a WBENC certified Women’s Business Enterprise, a certified Maryland minority business enterprise and is on several AIMS GSA schedules. For more information visit www.sutter-group.com.
About DiversityBusiness.com
Launched in 1999, DiversityBusiness, with over 46,000 members, is the largest organization of diversity owned businesses throughout the United States that provide goods and services to Fortune 1000 companies, government agencies, and colleges and universities. DiversityBusiness provides research and data collection services for diversity including the “Top 50 Organizations for Multicultural Business Opportunities”, “Top 500 Diversity Owned Companies in America”, and others. Its research has been recognized and published by Forbes Magazine, Business Week and thousands of other print and internet publications. The site has gained national recognition and has won numerous awards for its content and design. It is a leading provider of Supplier Diversity management tools and has the most widely distributed Diversity magazine in the United States. DiversityBusiness.com is produced by Computer Consulting Associates International Inc. (CCAii.com) of Southport, CT. Founded in 1980.
For additional information, please contact:
Garret Ohm
The Sutter Group
301.459.9129
garret (at) sutter-group (dot) com
www.twitter.com/garretohm
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Clark Construction 2.0
It’s with great pleasure that we announce the launch of a new website for one of the nation’s largest commercial construction firms, Clark Construction, based right here in the Baltimore-Washington region. It’s now incredibly easy to peruse Clark’s impressive portfolio, see the latest news releases, and learn about the company’s history and long-time commitment to quality. Although there is a lot of content in the site (hundreds of projects and news releases, and thousands of photos), it is well organized and logically broken up for ease of navigation. This contributes to the site’s clean, easy-to-navigate feeling.
The new site features a number of Flash and Javascript elements. Two of the most notable are the interactive company history timeline, and the interactive commemorative Clark hardhat. The site also features video integration and search engine friendly dynamic text replacement (which is a fancy way of saying that we were able to use a custom font, as opposed to the traditional web-based-fonts, for parts of the site without losing any ground with search engines like Google).
The site was also designed to be incredibly easy to maintain. A custom-built backend CMS enables the Clark users responsible for maintaining the site’s content to easily add and update projects, awards, news items and photos—with little or no HTML knowledge. The content can be linked in one-to-one, one-to-many, and many-to-many relationships (for example, one award can be linked to many projects). A custom-created photo uploading tool enables the user to select which part of the photo to crop and use, while maintaining proper aspect ratio and respecting size limitations. Once the photo is uploaded, the user can even adjust the photo’s sharpness to their liking by using a simple and intuitive interface.
The site was built with standards-compliance in mind and validates as XHTML 1.0 Transitional. If you don’t know what that means, it’s ok. It’s web developer speak for, “We take pride in our coding and meticulously make sure it is done correctly.”
We’ve enjoyed working with Clark on this project to deliver a site that is in line with the caliber of work they do, and we’re pleased with the satisfaction they have expressed to us. Please visit www.clarkconstruction.com
and let us know what you think!
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Alliance Futbol Club Logo Design
Our creative director, John Cassella, is a soccer fanatic. He also runs a heck of a creative department. That’s why his teammates on the Alliance Futbol Club in Virginia called on us recently to develop the logo for their team.
While we love the range of work we do for our clients, it’s always fun to take on special projects like this that involve our own personal hobbies and passions. Have a look at the logo below and I’ll post an update when the uniforms come in:
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