I’m very excited to announce that GetListed.org’s Local University is coming to the Twin Cities on May 13th, 2010.  This half day workshop is a must for any Minnesota business wanting to better understand marketing online via your website, search engines and social media.

This 4 hour seminar features national experts as well as representatives from Google and Bing, covering an incredible amount of Internet marketing information.

• You can sign-up now for just $89 (Save $40!) by using Five Technology’s promo code:  five2010

This workshop will be held at the fantastic Westin Hotel in Edina, located just off France Ave.  There are two identical sessions, one morning and one afternoon, but seating is currently limited to just 200 per session.

Local University introduces, explains and teaches Internet marketing basics, aimed at the small business owner and marketing person.  Incredible insight, process, best practices, D-I-Y tips and case studies will be provided on:

• Search engine optimization (SEO)
• Local search (Google LBC & Maps, Bing Local)
• Social Media (Blogs, Facebook & Twitter)
• Web Analytics

This event is truly one of kind to hit the Minneapolis & St Paul area.  Take advantage of the opportunity to learn Search Engine Optimization tips and techniques that will lead to sustained, long-term search engine rankings (and new customers).  The last Local University event in Spokane, WA was a huge success.

Local University Presenters
I’m also excited to be part of the outstanding line-up of presenters including David Mihm of GetListed.org, Mike Blumenthal, Matt McGee, Mary Bowling, Ed Reese, Ryan Hayward of Google and Mikko Ollila of Bing.

Register Today
Head over to the Twin Cities registration page (use our promo code) and reserve your spot.  If you’re coming from outstate Minnesota, the Westin is offering a $139/night rate for fantastic accommodations.

You simply won’t find another seminar, with this amount of information here in Minnesota for the price.

Local University Twin Cities is sponsored by Google, Bing, Deluxe and ReliaCloud Cloud Servers from VISI.

Five is excited to showcase our latest web design project for West Real Estate.  West is a Minneapolis, MN based commercial real estate firm that focuses on the development and investment side of the business.

Showcasing The Work Of A Commercial Real Estate Firm
In just about any line of business, Five works to find the best ways to provide case studies and real world examples to feature on a company’s website.  West’s website has specific pages to view both their industrial properties and retail properties.

The West Real Estate sections feature a photo gallery per project, location map, details about the property and the ability to print, share via email, share via social media and bookmark.

Recap Of This Web Design Project
Here is what Five Technology provided for this website project:

• Custom web design
• Photography of all commercial properties
• SEO friendly web design
• Web content creation
• Property feature, photo gallery & details

The West Real Estate web design project turned out just like their commercial real estate projects, valuable and professional.

Visit the website: http://www.westreinc.com

One of our recent web design projects has been grabbing some attention.  Rear Window Media is a real-time, digital marketing start-up that utilizes LCD screens in vehicles to run ads while on the roadways.  Simply put they are mobile digital billboards, but RWM has done so much more with it.

A Complete Web Application
Rear Window Media runs their business right from their website.  The back-end is a web application that allows advertisers to manage their ad(s) showing, their ad budget and other campaign details.  This application (screenshot below) is the hub of their client interaction and gives complete control to their advertising clients.

Incredible Tracking
RWM advertisers also get to view detailed maps on just exactly where there ads are showing.  How’s that for tracking?  By integrating Google maps with their web application, an advertiser can see what block in downtown Minneapolis thier ad appeared or what mile market on Interstate 35W.  Real time advertising, real time tracking.

Here is a screenshot of the map tracking report.

Web Design Project Overall
Five completed the front end of the web design and as well for their marketing interface.  This project really shows our ability to handle both the marketing front of a project and the complex web application backend, far past our great CMS features.

This project included:

• Web design
• Search Engine Friendly build
• Custom WordPress blog for RWM news
• Advertiser account & log-in
• Web application management for advertising
• Custom Google maps reporting
• Content management platform (SMC)

If you haven’t yet, visit the site:  http://www.rearwindowmedia.com

We released another great restaurant web design under our Taste Trend offering last week.  Shorewood Bar & Grill in Fridley, Minnesota opened in the fall of 2009 and now has a new website.

The project is fully recapped on the Taste Trend blog.

Five also photographed the restaurant and many menu items for the Shorewood to use on the new website.  Below is a photo of their Pepper Seared Ahi Tuna.

• Visit the website:  http://www.shorewoodgrill.com

Rear Window Media, a Five Technology client was featured on WCCO news for their mobile digital advertising service.  While the story played to the “controversial” angle of vehicles displaying ads, we’re excited for our client’s exposure of their unique advertising service.

WCCO doesn’t offer a video embed, click here for the video.

Five Technology worked with Rear Window Media’s President Jessica Netter and created both the web design and an extensive web application that runs the Rear Window advertising management.  Rear Window clients can manage ad rotations, budget and track their advertising with GPS mapping right from an online account. We’ll post more on the Rear Window Project in a future blog post.

How valuable for an advertiser to know exactly what spot on Interstate 94 or what block in downtown Minneapolis their ad was displayed? Sounds like smarter marketing to me.

Check out the video, you’ll see the Five Technology logo in a few shots as we have some ads on their network.

Regardless of the service being controversial or not, Rear Window has seen a significant spike in both drivers wanting to use the service and advertisers for their network since the story aired. Any publicity is often good publicity, no matter how the story is spun.

Congrats Rear Window!  http://www.rearwindowmedia.com