​When I see flower bulbs blooming such as daffodils and tulips, my energy spikes and my longing for spring and longer lit days subside. This time of year brings new life and celebration. One particular celebration is Holy Week which is celebrated globally and precedes the week of Easter and the last week of Lent, in the West. I thought today would be a good day to share a bit of Guatemalan history of this meaningful celebration, Samana Santa (Holy Week) as we launch into the spring months.

The Spanish tradition of Semana Santa arrived with the Spaniards to Guatemala in 1524. Almost 500 years later, Guatemala holds one of the most elaborate celebrations in the world. With grand processions, extravagant floats and intricately designed alfombras (“carpets”), Antigua, Guatemala hosts hundreds of thousands of visitors every year who yearn to be a part of the religious and cultural festivities–a mix of Spanish tradition and indigenous cultural beliefs. 
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Holy Week is the week leading up to Easter Sunday, commemorating the passion, crucifixion, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. For the people of Guatemala, there is no celebration more anticipated than Semana Santa. Guatemalans show their support of this traditional holiday by hanging textile decorations of purple, red, lilac, and yellow in doorways and windows to signify the suffering and royalty of Jesus.

The most important days of Holy Week are Palm Sunday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday, and finally, Easter Sunday. Beginning Palm Sunday–exactly one week before Easter–Guatemalans flock to the city of Antigua to commemorate the day Jesus entered Jerusalem.
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Wouldn't it be lovely if we here in the United States adapted some of the Guatemalan traditions based in the cultural celebratory norms around Semana Santa (Holy Week), with all of the beautiful textiles and street celebrations that bring so much life and vibrancy to this historical moment in history? I personally would love to partake in a community effort of such a feat!

     US adults are constantly surfing the internet, 28 % in fact according to the Pew Research Center. This statistic is but a part of 81% of Americans who go online every day. However, users are not using the internet in the same way because of the many devices, browsers, sites, and content competing for majority of attention. There are a few ways around this.
     A recent study put out by Finances Online – A Review for Businesses, revealed 14 Digital Marketing Trends for 2021 to watch out for that may help prevail a marketer’s efforts at staying ahead of the game.

1. #Omnichannel Marketing - allows you to keep track of all customer interactions across channels without losing context.
2. #Artificial Intelligence and #Data Analytics - allow organizations to be more data-driven rather than being only steered by inaccurate intuitions, wishful thinking, and gutfeel.
3. Going Mobile and Progressive Web Apps (#PWAs) - mobile and app-like usability is becoming a rage nowadays when it comes to getting your brand not only visible but also engaging. As such, changes have been made to the ranking algorithm to reflect these.
4. Keeping up with #Voice Search – The global smart speaker market has reached 20.7 million units in the first quarter of this year. What this voice search data tells us, is that we can expect voice search usage to continue to rise in the future.
5. #Augmented User Experience with Augmented Reality - Augmented reality allows users to insert digital objects into real-life video capture. You can even mix this up with your Progressive Web App or an app to augment user experience and content.
6. #Native advertising - 47% of all internet users worldwide have ad blockers. To avoid this, you can seamlessly embed ads into content that look and feel like part of the content, these are native ads. Native advertising is not new but there is more to learn. They help to circumvent the problem with ad blockers and keep ads less intrusive.
7. Becoming More #B2C Marketing Focused - When B2B buyers step out of their business suits, they become B2C buyers. Many desire to have B2C experiences crossover to B2B transactions. In other words, B2B buyers and B2C buyers seem to want the same experiences and has become more rampant in the SaaS industry.
8. Create #Experiences: events and promotions - In B2B terms, this is profit and competitive edge approach. For end consumers, events and promotions provide improvement to quality of life making an experience more rounded, essentially, it is a form of omnichannel marketing.
9. More #Video Content Marketing - Internet traffic research results point to the fact that 82% of content will be video by 2022, $90 billion were spent just this 2019 by businesses on video content alone. Audio-visual stimuli induce a sense of spatial and temporal understanding of things that are closer to our everyday experience of the real world than words and symbols.
10. Leveraging User-Generated #Content - Is a good way to measure where your business is with customers, how they use it, and how your marketing efforts are. While social media chatter and engagement may seem the dominant source for use of user-generated content, other uses like creating a knowledge database and listening for inputs for your product development can be used to measure content effectiveness.
11. Podcast Marketing - I relation to digital marketing podcasting is highly targeted at preferred audiences and a good way for brands to reach the right people at their preferred times. Current #podcast statistics indicate that 70% of the US population is familiar with the term podcasting. Also, 51% have listened to a podcast. A respectable 22% listen to podcasts weekly while 6% consider themselves to be ‘avid podcast fans. These mini films of sort can spark engagement and just increase your brand visibility all the way around.
12. Influencer Marketing - #influencers with 1,000 followers generate 85% more engagement than those with 100,000 followers! According to IMPACT, micro-influencers with small audiences tend to have more peers than fans and generates more hands-on and personal engagement. Add the statistical fact that 84% of consumers trust recommendations from peers more than advertising, this is where the action is at for brands.
13. #Chatbots - Experts believe that waves of adoption will come in the next few years. Why? Questions can be answered almost immediately and can cut wait times when you are using live agents. However, they are not as intelligent as they should be or as we want them to be. But Chatbots are a work in progress and should not be overlooked.
14. Mind your Local #SEO - This component focuses more on businesses with brick-and-mortar facilities like restaurants, malls, boutique shops, and the likes. When a local SEO is in order businesses are visible to target audiences. 

     In a nutshell, your digital marketing, omnichannel approach depends upon the requirements of your business. The best way to leverage the #omnichannel approach is to use a mix of everything I have mentioned above. Ideally you want to provide value to your target customers, remembering that ranking is not everything, what is more important is positioning your business to be more profitable from products and services than your competitor’s and that creates #brand recognition. 

Wow, hard to believe we are closing in on #2020 already…this means it’s time to get ‘Year-End Appeals’ in order.

What you need to know, 12% of all charitable giving occurs in the last 3 days of the year – December 29, 30 and 31.  Don’t make the mistake of doing too little donor outreach during this critical time!

Here are 8 tips on crafting a great year-end email appeal that will get your supporters to click the “Donate” button.

1. Get Started Now
2. Segment Your Email Lists
3. Begin and End with Gratitude
4. Write Like You Are Having A Conversation Rather Than A Lecture
5. Create A Narrative Where Your Supporter Is the One That Can Help Save The Day
6. Create A Clear Call to Action “the ask” 
7. Send 2 Emails Out on December 31st ‘end with a BANG’
8. Finalize with Writing and Scheduling Your Thank You Emails Before the End of The Year

What has made your email appeals successful in the past, and what do you plan to do differently this year? Let me know in the comments!

To A New Year,
​Sabrina L. Matson
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​     Mark Canlis, owner of Canlis, Seattle’s premier restaurant shared on a Zoom call hosted by KIROS today his personal identity with leadership. Mark shut his restaurant down due to the current pandemic and had to pivot the way in which he normally conducted business (transitioned from fine dining to takeout, home delivery, Bingo sessions, to holding fundraisers at drive-in movie theaters – a multi concept approach) in order to keep his staff employed and to maintain the operations of his business. One thing that remained steadfast and guided his remarkable and creative ways to continue to serve the community and keep his staff working was to remain soft hearted. Not failing at love gave him the space to divert his eyes on the right things, faith, and hope. His focus and values were recognized by his staff inspiring them to turn toward one another giving them the confidence and trust of self and of collaborative effort to see the hard times through.
     Mark believes in remaining curious which can break down the barriers of fear. When working with a growth mindset, fear can transform into hope which then elevates confidence. Canlis has a mindful Mission, “Inspire all people to turn toward one another”. For him, means to “know you”, “see you”, and “gain your trust”. Between the mission that drives his approach to business and personal relations, and the old adage “Ancient Hospitality – to make space for the other”, proves a great value system for him and in turn seen as a great leader to others.
     While Canlis’s doors will remain closed likely through the end of this year, Mark’s leadership and multi concept approach to a new way of doing business created a new path, a new vision, perhaps a new business model. This pivotal moment became a vessel of curiosity, certainly a path making space for the other. What is exciting, will lay in anticipation of what hope brings next for Mark and his team.
     I am reminded by a comment made by mark during today’s zoom meeting, “becoming to our own desire leads our journey to faith” and through faith, hope inspires us to be better, to love greater, and to except others. I find tremendous value as a leader myself in the leadership values I learned of today.

    Author; Sabrina L. Matson