One of the things I enjoy about the holiday season is that it gives me the chance to design for something other than a phone or computer monitor.  For the past three years I have used this as a chance to make custom soaps.

Each year I pick a different theme. This year it was butterflies.

My first impulse was to add a bit of life to each insert.

Unfortunately, these details were lost in my first test bars.  With my first direction closed off, …

I recently had the opportunity to go to a fancy wedding boutique and try on some amazing dresses. While the experience was spectacular and having found (as of right now) “the dress”, the price tag was a bit of a shocker… a $9000.00 shocker! Being on a tight budget, $9000.00 is just not doable. Now, I have read on several blogs, websites, etc that it is pretty much a bad idea to go try on dresses that are out of your budget, so I mentally prepared myself. I will say …

In a year-and-a-half I will marry my best friend of over six years (Rashad), and I am planning the majority of my wedding online.

By doing so I take advantage of new internet tools and “go green” at the same time - and I will share what I find with you.

Right now I am using The Knot (www.theknot.com) for the core of my planning. The site was founded in 1996 as a modern answer to the “white-gloved, outdated” etiquette experts favored by previous generations. …

We are sort of crazy about sticky notes at MB/I; there is something magical about those little squares of colored paper with their adhesive strip. Perhaps it’s that they give ideas a tangible quality, or that sticky notes are exceedingly mobile. Regardless, here are three ways we MB/I fish use sticky notes around the office.

Sticky Notes as Creative Tools

At times in our internal meetings, we clear a section of wall and throw a bunch of sticky note pads on the table along with a few sharpies. When a brainstorming opportunity arises - we write down as many ideas as possible, …

As a resident Pediatrician working in the Children’s Hospital Oakland Teen Obesity Prevention Clinic, Jenifer Matthews grew increasingly frustrated with her patient’s lack of access to fresh fruits and vegetables. So she decided to open a Farmers’ Market across the street from the hospital. Two years later, with the help of her husband, Zac Matthews (MB/I Web developer) and two Guerilla produce activists, Phat Beets Produce, North Oakland Food Justice Non-Profit was born http://www.phatbeetsproduce.org. The collective now runs two medical clinic based farmers’ markets, a youth-run school farm stand and nutrition hub, and a youth …

Well, we finally made it to Facebook. Just like any other small business, we struggled with the decision of whether or not to have a presence in Facebook. It’s free to start; it’s simple to use… but the reality is that it’s an investment of internal resources, mostly time. But given the staggering statistics of how much Facebook is used, we decided to give it a shot. Here’s how we did it.
1. We decided on content
We took this as an opportunity to have a balance of work-related posts and fun/personal ones with the goal of showing the world who we …

Lindsay Gower of Blue Ribbon Writing has been Marissa’s friend and ally since before I joined the company. She is kind, insightful, and passionate about the English language. It has been a pleasure working beside her on websites and blogs.

Thank you, Lindsay, I hope you enjoy these treasures we gathered for you from around the web.
Save the Words!

“Pick …

What is Online Ore?

Online Ore is a new feature here at the Gold Mine, and one that has us all fired up.  Each week, on Monday morning we’ll be featuring a new site or service to improve the life or productivity of business owners or their employees.

Online or not, each of these nuggets is a tool that can be used to find value, joy, or efficiency, either inside the workplace or out of it.

So far we have featured

• Mint, a personal finance management site.
• …
  Read More…

Good Morning,

Is this on?

Before I get going, let me introduce myself.  I am Gunther, Feline Director of Operations here at Marissa Berger Interactive.  Though this is my first post to the blog, I guarantee you that I have been part of the MB/I team longer than any of these… fish.

Anyway, I wanted to say a few words about employee productivity.

Stake Out Sunny Spots

Human employees should be busy petting cats, answering phones, designing websites, and testing products.  They should not be lounging in the sun staring at passing butterflies or ripening fruit.  As a productivity officer, you should always take these …

Want to know what a blog really spends time talking about?  Wordle.net provides a fun, visually appealing, and easy to understand way to do just that.

Just type the URL for a blog into the appropriate field and Wordle will create a “Word Cloud” just for you.  Wordle looks through the most recent blog posts, and the more often a word is used, the larger it appears in the cloud.

Here’s what the recent Gold Mine posts look like: