Archive

June 18, 2013 | Terry Luschen: Displaying Images in Salesforce

There are many ways to save images in Salesforce.  I want to share with you how these images from different locations can be displayed on Visualforce Pages.

June 18, 2013 | Terry Luschen: A Salesforce Object Join for Informatica Cloud with VB.NET

Informatica Cloud does a great job with its point-and-click features, but sometimes two non-related tables need to be joined. 

This blog post will show how simple this can be.

June 13, 2013 | Lynlee Espeseth: The Mom Wars Are Still Waging, If You Believe the Ads

One of the buzziest phrases bloggers and media outlets have latched onto in the last few years is “mommy wars.” You probably know it: the fight between moms about what stroller is best, what age to potty train, what the consequences of breast feeding versus formula are and, the granddaddy of them all, stay at home mom versus working mom. Each side in these battles has a set of strongly held, unwavering opinions, and anyone who disagrees is at best wrong and at worst harming their child.

June 13, 2013 | Saurabh Tyagi: Easier way to display multiple markers on Google Maps

If you are one of the developers, like me, searching for an easy way to display multiple markers on your maps using Google Maps API, I am here to solve your problem.

June 10, 2013 | Alyssa Greve: Salesforce Announces Acquisition of ExactTarget - What Does this mean for the Marketing Cloud?

Last week, Salesforce announced they had acquired ExactTarget. As a Marketing Strategist with a focus in social media at Sundog, I’m looking forward to seeing what changes the ExactTarget integration will bring to the Marketing Cloud.

June 10, 2013 | Darin Livdahl: Create an Adaptive Photo Gallery with Foundation 4 and ExpressionEngine

Common discussions over the use of responsive web design to create a mobile optimized website vs. a separate mobile website are sometimes focused on performance and content issues. In most cases, the same resources are delivered to both a desktop web browser and a smartphone browser in a responsively designed website. This can lead to a noticeable load time issue on mobile devices. If you are using Foundation 4 and ExpressionEngine to build your website, the following is an example solution to remedy this problem.

June 10, 2013 | Greg Ewing Lee: Closer Look at Salesforce’s Acquisition of ExactTarget

Last week, Salesforce.com announced that they would be acquiring ExactTarget for approximately $2.5 billion.  This purchase of ExactTarget rounds out Salesforce’s marketing toolset, which also includes tools brought about through the prior acquisitions of Radian6 and BuddyMedia.

June 05, 2013 | Alyssa Greve: Favorite Social Media Resources

For quite some time, I find myself going back to the same social experts to learn and grow knowledge in the industry. Below you will find my list of favorite resources to follow on Twitter, blogs, podcasts and books I have read.

Some of the most valuable resources for me have been podcasts. I find myself listening to podcast while driving, but most of the time listen it again as I take notes for each case study. 

I hope these people, tools and information will help grow your knowledge in this industry and maybe even spark a few new ideas.

June 04, 2013 | Terry Luschen: Connecting to Box API Version 2 using OAuth 2

With version 2.0 of the Box API the authentication mechanism is OAuth 2.  This blog gives details on how to work this authentication using Visualforce and APEX.

May 31, 2013 | Suzy Rokke: Project Management Challenge

I’m taking a break from providing helpful hints and how-to’s to ask Project Managers to look at reality for a moment and challenge themselves.

May 31, 2013 | Brianne Carlsrud: The 2013 Scheels Fargo Marathon Social Media Analysis

The 9th annual Scheels Fargo Marathon has already come and gone. This yearly event began in 2005 and brought in more than 2,400 participants. By 2013 (drum roll, please), more than 20,000 people participated. The Scheels Fargo Marathon offers a variety of races for all ages, including a 1K youth run, 5K fun run, 10K, two and four person relay, half marathon, and full marathon. The event has made a tremendous impact throughout the Fargo-Moorhead area, both online and offline. Social media plays a huge role in raising awareness around the event, and the online community comes together to share their experiences and congratulate others on their success.

May 31, 2013 | Greg Ewing Lee: Non-Developer Understanding of Apex Test Methods

The “Develop” area of Salesforce is typically the domain of the Apex Developer for extending the native features and functions of the Force.com platform.  However, there is one specific aspect of this “Develop” area that all users making changes to the Salesforce organization should be aware of.

May 31, 2013 | Lon Keller: Video Content offers Great Opportunities for Traditional Brands

Businesses outside the broadcast and entertainment worlds have a tremendous opportunity to deliver additional content on their websites that is meaningful, effective and is increasingly demanded by their consumers.

At the recent Brightcove Play 2013 conference, Rob Adams, executive producer of multi-platform video for Rogers Media, spoke with Beet.tv about the opportunities non-television brands have by adding video to their content.

May 31, 2013 | Craig Isakson: Google+ for Apps Users

It is becoming more of an industry norm for businesses to use social applications for collaboration and communication.  Here at Sundog we use Salesforce’s Chatter for a plethora of different use cases and it’s integration with our data has given us the ability to build custom functionality to help it suit our needs.  We are also Google Apps users.

May 31, 2013 | Rob Burke: How come cameras keep shrinking, but lenses don’t?

Cameras have steadily grown smaller over the years with the exception of a few. You are able to pick up an iPhone with 1080P capabilities, but the image quality is still not that great….why?

May 31, 2013 | Shawn Tennyson: Outdoor Displays Illustrate the Dangers of Smoking

Two interactive outdoor displays by truth® illustrate the dangers of smoking with powerful graphics and stuffed animals.

May 30, 2013 | Dean Froslie: Five Reasons Why Confab Rocks

Confab 2013 is only a few days away – and this content nerd can’t wait.

May 30, 2013 | Saurabh Tyagi: Force.com and Amazon Integration

Salesforce recently launched their Force.com toolkit for Amazon users.
It makes it easier for users of Force.com to add Amazon S3 and EC2 storage to their Force.com Applications.

May 30, 2013 | Susanna Oliver: How To Use Child Templates in Site.com

Editable regions in Site.com templates are defined by checking the “make editable” checkbox. All child and grandchild templates, by default, inherit editable regions, but sometimes you may want to turn off the editable region in a child template so that its children don’t inherit the editable region.

May 30, 2013 | Craig Isakson: Key Lime Pie for Android Released

Key Lime Pie for Android Released is the what a lot of people were expecting to come from this year’s Google I/O.  However, this was not the case.  For the most part Google has released a new version of Android at their annual developers conference.  So were they slacking this year?  Not quite.  I’ll explain.

May 29, 2013 | Saurabh Tyagi: Adobe Creative Cloud Shift

If you are one of those people, who are disappointed by Adobe’s shift from individual software to Creative Cloud packages, Adobe has refused to help you with your disappointment.

May 29, 2013 | Terry Luschen: Using Box with Salesforce

While Salesforce has some great features for saving files within Salesforce, there are many companies trying to get you to save your files outside of Salesforce.  One option to keep in mind for storing files outside of Salesforce is Box.

May 28, 2013 | Danielle Naboulsi: Sundog Spotlight: EVAN

This week on the spotlight is one of Sundog’s newest web developers. He’s got a solid collection of funny t-shirts and can find any GIF you need, guaranteed. Meet Evan.

May 28, 2013 | Lynlee Espeseth: Marketing Financial Services To Women Can Work: Here’s Proof

There has been a lot of talk lately about how financial institutions can better serve women. Women are financially more powerful than ever, yet banks, lenders, financial advisors, and seemingly the whole institution can’t figure out how to speak and sell to these potential customers.

May 27, 2013 | Lee Schwartz: The 7 Free Marketing Words You Should Use Because They’re Instantly The Secret To Copywriting Value

Copywriting. Oy.

May 24, 2013 | Susanna Oliver: Is Responsive Email Design Right for Your Company?

The future of email is here and it’s decision time. Is responsive email design right for your company? Here are a few considerations to mull over.

May 20, 2013 | Terry Luschen: The Tradeoffs of Saving Files Inside or Outside of Salesforce

There are some clear tradeoffs on whether to save your files inside or outside of Salesforce.  Read on for some of the main points to keep in mind.

May 18, 2013 | Craig Isakson: Google I/O Initial Thoughts/Recap

This year’s Google I/O was said to be all about the developer.  With no new device announcements as well as no new version of Android announced, this seemed to hold true.  After wrapping up yesterday afternoon, I have had a chance to digest a lot of the content that was presented.

May 18, 2013 | Terry Luschen: Estimating a Software Development Project

You can feel the question coming even before it is spoken: ‘So how much is this going to cost?’  Here are some ways to answer this question to the best of your ability.

May 16, 2013 | Alyssa Greve: Managing Risk in a Company through Social Media

Risk Management is something many companies are exploring today with the ever-changing brand touch points. All mediums from TV, print ads and online ads have risk associated with them and with the growth of social media, risk has become even a larger conversation in corporate offices.  One negative comment online can potentially harm the brand. Ultimately, no matter the touch point, it’s important to have a plan in place to reduce risk. It’s important to keep in mind, companies must be positioned internally to act rapidly and capitalize on the opportunities while managing risks, which can be a balancing act.

May 13, 2013 | Saurabh Tyagi: Google I/O - Rumors/Expectations

Like any other Google fanboy, I am looking forward to Google I/O this year, which starts on May 15.
Since I follow tons of tech news websites, I constantly am flooded with rumors of what people are expecting at Google I/O. So, I decided to combine all the rumors and expectations in one place.

May 07, 2013 | Susanna Oliver: HELP! All I see is a black background in my email!

Seeing the unexpected is something email developers get used to. But when you coded a soft blue background and instead are faced with a glaring black background in Outlook, you might be a little alarmed at this unusual interpretation!

May 06, 2013 | Saurabh Tyagi: Salesforce - How to create onItemClickListener for List Adapter

As a beginner in Salesforce Mobile App development, I am learning new stuff everyday. Recently I had a situation where I wanted to attach onItemClickListener to items in my list that were fetched dynamically from Salesforce.
I tried to look for a solution on Google, but 5 pages in I still couldn’t find the solution.

May 06, 2013 | Terry Luschen: Five Points to Remember when Sending Emails with Salesforce

There are many things to remember when sending emails with Salesforce.  Here are five to keep in mind.

May 02, 2013 | Susanna Oliver: Customize Link URLs with Responsive Email Design

What would you do in this situation? You own Company X and you’re preparing to send out an email advertising your new mobile site…

May 01, 2013 | Craig Isakson: Getting Logged-in userId in Salesforce Android SDK - Mobile App

If you are a developer who works with Salesforce, you are well aware that using the user Id of the currently logged in user is vital to a lot of custom development.  The same could be said for mobile applications that are built on the Salesforce platform.  I have already expressed myself over the lack of documentation for something that seems so important for both iOS and Hybrid applications.  Now comes Android’s turn.

April 30, 2013 | Greg Ewing Lee: Salesforce.com Summer ‘13 Release Highlights

The Summer ‘13 release for Salesforce is set to hit production starting May 10th and contains several great features.  Notable features include the general release of Salesforce Communities as well as key enhancements to Site.com.

April 30, 2013 | Shawn Tennyson: Unique Bus Shelter Advertising

Advertisers have taken the drab, dreary bus stop and transformed it into something fun and interactive.

April 30, 2013 | Suzy Rokke: How to use Smartsheet predecessors to organize your task lists

As Project Managers we all love to do lists!  Sometimes we make lists just to check off what we did for the day!  A great tool for managing lists is SmartSheet.com.  This cloud based tool has become an invaluable tool for me to organize my project task lists, milestones, assignees, task related documents, due dates, and most importantly, task dependencies.

April 30, 2013 | Preston Johnson: Millennials Demand Engagement

The advertising executive David Ogilvy once said, “The consumer is not a moron, she is your wife.” In the 1960s, this was Ogilvy’s plea for smarter advertising. “A mere slogan and a few vapid adjectives [won’t] persuade her to buy anything,” he said. A similar appeal could be made today. A simple website, commercial or print ad won’t effectively persuade Millennials to buy anything. They demand engagement.

April 30, 2013 | Alyssa Greve: Salesforce Customer Company Tour Recap

I met up with two other Sundoggers at the airport anxious and excited to attend the Salesforce Customer Tour on April 18th.  We were welcomed by the downpour of rain, which was a better sight than the snowfall in Minneapolis. When we arrived at McCormick Place, the event had volunteers every 10 feet willing to help and execute with ease. I was very impressed with the event; however did find some volunteers was unaware of the event hashtag. After asking three volunteers, I waited until the keynote to hear the announcement for the Twitter hashtag. Millions of Salesforce branded banners lead us to the Cloud Expo first and then we made our way to the Customer Story keynote, which was the highlight of my experience at the event.

April 30, 2013 | Susanna Oliver: The CSS of Responsive Email Design

The HTML is done. Now what? How does CSS work in responsive email design?

April 30, 2013 | Brianne Carlsrud: Marketo Summit: An Analysis of Sundog’s Experience

We attended the annual Marketo Summit in San Francisco, a three-day event that hosts a number of marketing and sales professionals. As we are one of Marketo’s Preferred Services Partners, we were so excited to attend the event. In addition to sharing our experience across multiple social media channels, we had the chance to meet a lot of great people—both online and offline.

April 30, 2013 | Dean Froslie: The Characteristics of Effective Personas

What’s our ideal persona approach? Here are my most critical characteristics for any persona effort.

April 30, 2013 | John Schneider: Google Demonstrates The Basics Of Using Google Glass

As Google Glass gets closer to its release date (Google claims that it will still release to the public this year) they’re trying to prepare its potential customers by demonstrating the basics of operating the device.

April 29, 2013 | Ron Lee: Consumers to Big Banks: We “Like” You Again

Survey says: Thumbs up! J.D. Power and Associates recently released its 8th annual U.S. Retail Banking Satisfaction Study, and the results show significant improvements in customer satisfaction. That has to be welcome news for banks, which last year got hammered on satisfaction scores, particularly over the rollout of monthly maintenance fees. The new study also provides insights into other attitude shifts.

April 29, 2013 | Rob Burke: Lighting for video

When it comes to production, lighting is ‘key’ for quality production. Oftentimes it is the first thing to go when working inside a tight budget, but lighting does two major things for your video that shouldn’t be overlooked.

April 29, 2013 | Craig Isakson: Designing for Mobile

Midwest Mobile Summit is in full swing.  With that, it is very interesting to see the similarities with key concepts between some of the presentations here and at Mobile March TC which was just a month ago.  I had the opportunity to attend a presentation by Mike Bollinger from Livefront.  He touched on the process and practice of mobile ui design.  While my blogs are typically geared more towards development, sometimes, developers need to put on the designer hat and sometimes it is just nice to know what is going on in a designer’s mind.

April 29, 2013 | Lee Schwartz: What Tech Companies Can Learn From Minor League Baseball

What can technology companies learn from the seemingly low-tech, sometimes-unorganized world of minor league sports?

April 29, 2013 | Lynlee Espeseth: Surveys: The Perfect Time to Optimize Your Content For Mobile

A couple of weeks ago, I took my car in for some work at a Toyota dealership in Denver. At the dealership I was assigned a customer representative, and when my car was finished she indicated that I would receive a survey by email, and it was extremely important to her and the dealership that I fill it out and give my honest feedback.

April 26, 2013 | Danielle Naboulsi: Sundog Spotlight: CHRIS

It’s only his first week and already we’re fired up to have this guy around full-time. Allow me to introduce you to Chris Kulish.

April 26, 2013 | Danielle Naboulsi: Sundog Spotlight: WESTON

This NDSU graduate and all-around good guy joined our team in February. When he’s not causing trouble at work, he’s a High Jump Coach at Fargo Davies High School. Weston Leutz everybody:

April 26, 2013 | Lynlee Espeseth: The 2013 “Women, Money, and Power” Survey: Good News For Some, A Wake Up Call For Others

Allianz Life Insurance Company recently released their 2013 “Women, Money, and Power” study. Their results have implications that should be seen as good news by businesses selling to women, and concerning for financial institutions trying to serve women.

April 25, 2013 | Lon Keller: Why Is The Music Cranked to 11?

The Loudness War is on. Music recording artists and their governing labels have been gradually increasing the loudness level of their music over the past several years. Why? Because they believe that louder is better which can lead to more record sales. However, people from Dynamic Range Day have a different view. Those at DRD assert that loudness does not equal greater sales, but in fact, reduces the overall sound quality of the recording. They have provided a great example using Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” comparing the sound of its original release in 1982 to subsequent releases in 1995 and 2008.

April 25, 2013 | Craig Isakson: JSON GEN - Because you have better things to do

Every now and then I like to make suggestions on different tools I use that I have found or have been shared with me that make life as a software developer a little bit easier.  A couple of months back I showcased some iOS tools for working with JSON.  If you are looking for something similar, only in the Android realm, look no further.

April 24, 2013 | Craig Isakson: Gotcha’s with Using Managed Packages in Salesforce (Controllers in Wrong Namespace)

Managed packages in Salesforce are essentially apps within Salesforce that can be distributed across organizations.  A managed package can be upgraded and the org that installs the managed package does not have any visibility into the code used to create the managed package.  Managed packages give you a lot of options as far as adding and distributing functionality.  Like most any feature, there can be little quirks that can make something that is typically very simple, a pain to deal with.  This blog post will outline an issue I was having and how I was able to work around it.

April 24, 2013 | Susanna Oliver: How Responsive Email Design Works

For those of us familiar with email development and its many quirks, non-standards, and table layouts, you can understand how responsive email design sounds like a paradox. But it’s really not. Read on and you’ll find out why.

April 24, 2013 | Saurabh Tyagi: Google Glass - Pinch to Zoom and Wink to take Picture

Google might be planning on bringing some really awesome gestures to their Glass.

April 24, 2013 | Terry Luschen: 4 Keys to Working with Chatter Files and a Salesforce Portal

Chatter files bring some great flexibility to the table when designing a portal.  I would like to share 4 key features of this relationship between Chatter files and Salesforce portals.

April 22, 2013 | Terry Luschen: 5 Syntax Practices for Maintainable Code

Here are 5 syntax practices I like to follow when writing code.

April 20, 2013 | Terry Luschen: Extending Informatica Cloud With a .NET EXE

Informatica Cloud has great functionality out of the box.  Read on for an easy way to extend your integration toolkit while using Informatica Cloud.

April 19, 2013 | Lynlee Espeseth: How Should We Write About Women?

A very interesting article recently appeared in the Columbia Journalism Review, adding a voice to the ongoing conversation about women and work. The story criticized how female scientists are portrayed when they are written about by journalists or in trade publications. The authors suggest that many stories about the professional accomplishments women make in scientific fields are framed in a way that says, “she did all this, and she’s a woman,” suggesting that being a woman is some sort of obstacle female scientists must overcome.

April 17, 2013 | Alyssa Greve: Is Your Business Social?

Creating a social business is one of the most challenging changes for companies today. It takes time to adapt new communication tools and change an organizational structure to serve the customer. Social media networks play a large role in social business. These tools allow each business to capitalize on new business opportunities through effective and efficient communication.

April 16, 2013 | Craig Isakson: Google Glass Mirror API Released

For all of the developers that are excited to see what you can do with Google Glass, now is your chance!  Google has just released the documentation for the Glass API as well as sample code and best practices.

April 15, 2013 | Susanna Oliver: Spam filters: It’s that guard dog again

Spam filters are kind of like guard dogs; they keep intruders away, but sometimes they don’t let your friends in, either. For this reason, it is important for businesses to optimize emails to clear the spam filter so that customers receive them.

April 15, 2013 | Lynlee Espeseth: Making Mom Into Superwoman Turned Dad Into A Dork

You may have heard the complaint that when marketers portray women as “supermoms” it sets them up for failure, since no one can realistically do everything perfectly all the time. That’s not the only downside, however. When moms manage everything perfectly in the home, dads are left looking helpless, waiting for women to come save them from domestic chores.

April 12, 2013 | Damie Berkey: Easing Into An Inbound Strategy

Inbound marketing seeks to earn the attention of prospects by providing interesting and relevant content. With an inbound strategy, your prospects are in control of what information they receive. This is in contrast to the more traditional outbound marketing that broadcasts your message to prospects through paid media and other traditional platforms. With outbound marketing, you are searching for prospects instead of them searching for you.

April 11, 2013 | Alyssa Greve: Blog Response on Social

I recently read the blog post, The Only 10 Things You Will Ever Need to Know about Twitter and appreciate the author for sharing his thoughts. Mendelson says he is not a social media expert and he wrote the book Social Media is Bullshit. I have outlined a few of my thoughts to his ten items about Twitter. Please read this article first prior to moving forward with this blog.

April 11, 2013 | Danielle Naboulsi: Marketo Summit 2013: 10 Ways to Optimize Marketo System Performance

Discover the top 10 Ways to Optimize Marketo System Performance in this session recap from Nate Mattison.

April 10, 2013 | Danielle Naboulsi: MARKETO SUMMIT 2013: The Social Business Professional Keynote

Find out what Marketo Summit attendees heard during The Social Business Professional Keynote, in this recap by Sundog EVP Jodi Heilman. 

April 10, 2013 | Danielle Naboulsi: MARKETO SUMMIT 2013: How to Optimize Social for Lead Generation

Renee Cook shares the expert advice Jason Miller and Koka Sexton offered in their Marketo Summit session “How to Optimize Social for Lead Generation”

April 10, 2013 | Danielle Naboulsi: Marketo Summit 2013: Leveraging the Dynamic Customer Journey

Find out what Heidi learned at the Marketo Summit session: Leveraging the Dynamic Customer Journey, by Jeremiah Owyang from Altimeter

April 08, 2013 | Terry Luschen: Parsing XML in Salesforce APEX

When doing integrations a very common task is to parse through XML.  Read on for some ideas on how to get this done efficiently.

April 04, 2013 | Alyssa Greve: 5 Common Questions in Social Media

With social being a hot topic in today’s world, let’s take a look at a few common questions from businesses today.

April 02, 2013 | Alyssa Greve: When do you outsource your social media efforts and when do you house them internally?

Many companies are using social media to humanize their brand and connect with their audiences online. According to the Nielson 2012 Social Media Report, people are spending more time on social media than any other category of sites.  As companies are beginning to see why it’s important to be in these networks, they are also finding the time and energy put into managing their social strategies does not match up to their resource availability.

April 01, 2013 | Greg Ewing Lee: Key to Successful Project Discovery: Planning

Just as the discovery process is the foundation for the entire project, proper planning is the basis for facilitating discovery effectively.  Business stakeholders are typically lending the implementation team precious time for conducting discovery interviews/discussions. It is important to have an appropriate plan for these sessions.  Without proper planning, often times the wrong stakeholders can be interviewed and the questions being asked will not actually meet the needs of the implementation team.  As such, there are three key planning activities that should be completed prior to the first discovery interview being conducted.

April 01, 2013 | Susanna Oliver: Responsive email design: Crafting a custom user experience

Responsive design has been applied to websites for years to craft a custom user experience for both mobile and desktop, and at last it’s transitioning to emails, a long-overdue enhancement to the otherwise stiff, inflexible tabular platform emails are built on.

March 31, 2013 | Preston Johnson: Gamifying Education

From getting clean to being green, organizations are using gamification to accomplish their goals. But which industry has the most to gain by gamifying? The answer has become quite clear: Education

March 31, 2013 | Lee Schwartz: “Remember us?”  ~Traditional Media, circa 2013

“Rumors of our demise have been greatly exaggerated.”
                        —TV and Radio

March 31, 2013 | Suzy Rokke: Where were the Project Managers in the Cyprus bank shut down?

I typically refrain from talking about politics, but in the light of project management I’m hoping this will be safe. Hopefully we will all take a different look at the difficult jobs our government officials have managing the needs of all of us.

March 30, 2013 | Shawn Tennyson: 310-foot Digital Billboard Makes an Impression

Located at the corner of Harmon Avenue and Las Vegas Blvd. in Las Vegas, the 310-foot by 60-foot LED wrap-around digital billboard is amazing!

March 29, 2013 | John Schneider: Taking Advantage of Google Trends

Stuck trying to figure out what to blog about? Want to write about something relevant that people want to know more about? Well, take a look at Google Trends.

March 29, 2013 | Danielle Naboulsi: Sundog Spotlight: SARAH

Meet Sarah Nissen! A new project manager, and a downright fantastic lady.

March 29, 2013 | John Schneider: How To Use The ‘rel author=’ Attribute For SEO

Have you seen little pictures next to Google search results and wondered how they got there? I’ll explain what they are, what they’re used for, and how you can set up your own.

March 29, 2013 | Craig Isakson: Getting Logged-in userId in Salesforce Hybrid Mobile App

If you are building a Salesforce Hybrid Mobile Application and like me are having issues trying to find documentation on how to perform certain actions, this blog might help you out.  The issue I was having was the lack of documentation around getting the current logged in userId after you were logged into the application.

March 29, 2013 | Lynlee Espeseth: The Get Real Movement In Marketing To Women

Have you ever noticed how aspirational and unrealistic marketing to women can be? Clothing companies suggest a pair of jeans can make you happier. Furniture stores want you to believe a perfect couch can make your family happier. Even toothpaste commercials try to tell you that whiter teeth will lead to finding the man of your dreams. After awhile, it feels a little stale. And I think a lot of women looking for messages that really speak to them would agree.

March 29, 2013 | Brianne Carlsrud: SXSW: Trending Topics and the Tale of the Grumpy Cat

South by Southwest (SXSW) wrapped up last week in Austin, Texas and it sure made its presence known throughout the online world. While I wish I could have attended the event in person, I enjoyed being a part of the conference by engaging online. I was able to listen to and capture mentions in real time, as well as monitor SXSW conversations before, during and after the conference.

March 29, 2013 | Craig Isakson: Using Reflection with Salesforce Custom Apex Classes—Sort of

If you have ever been coding away on a problem and come to a place where you might need a value of a property on a class or even a specific class without knowing the class name, then you are probably familiar with using reflection.

March 28, 2013 | Dean Froslie: Content Strategy and Your Brand Touchpoints

Even when content strategy accomplishes all of your objectives, it might not be enough to enhance your brand.

March 28, 2013 | John Schneider: 10 Ways Google Is Taking Over Your Digital Life

It seems that every time I turn around, Google is introducing something new. How many of these Google products are you using to manage your digital life?

March 28, 2013 | John Schneider: The Danger Of Going “Full Google”

I don’t see Google ever deciding to get rid of Gmail or its cloud-based office programs; they provide a wealth of user search and demographic information that aids in Google catering ads specific to the user. Still, it would be wise to weigh Google’s trigger-happy tendencies when deciding whether or not to go “Full Google”.

March 28, 2013 | Ron Lee: Advice to Banks: Don’t “Park” your LinkedIn Page

In its annual survey of financial marketers, the team at The Financial Brand found this disparity:  While close to half of banks and credit unions claim they are “using” LinkedIn, very few in practice are actually updating their pages or taking advantage of basic features available to them. Advice to bankers from Financial Brand: “Setting up a page on LinkedIn and customizing profile information does not constitute utilization. It’s called ‘parking your page.’” Here’s how to avoid doing just that.

March 27, 2013 | Darin Livdahl: Mobile March TC 2013: What I learned about jQuery Mobile 1.3

Last week I attended the Mobile March conference in the Twin Cities with a crew of my fellow web developers and engineers. Each of us had the opportunity to pick and choose from a number of sessions throughout the day based on four tracks of mobile strategy, business, development and gaming.

March 26, 2013 | Lon Keller: The Magical “Zoom and Enhance” Button

We’ve all seen it. Pick your favorite crime fighting drama on TV and inevitably the cops will take some grainy wide shot from a random security camera, then run it through their magic zoom and enhance procedures to reveal a clear shot of a license plate parked several blocks away. Real methods do exist that are capable of some image enhancement, but unfortunately, in the real world, those cop drama techniques are simply Hollywood special effects.

March 25, 2013 | Saurabh Tyagi: Four Key Principles of Mobile App Design

1. Be aware of the intimate relationship users have with their phone
People are usually not comfortable when it comes to sharing their phones with others. They will either hold their phone to show it to you or will panic if you have their phone for long time. It is different when it comes to sharing tablets or laptops. Developers should keep this in mind when designing apps for mobile phones as compared to apps for tablets.

March 25, 2013 | Craig Isakson: Mobile March TC 2013

Last week a group of Sundoggers, including myself, made our way down the the Twin Cities to attend Mobile March TC 2013.

March 20, 2013 | Alyssa Greve: The Balance of Mentions and ReTweets on Twitter

In the business world and corporate accounts, there is a balancing act with most things in social media. Do you direct your users back to your website from your Facebook page or engage with users on the page to build trust and loyalty? This is a common balancing act community manager’s face. One of the most recent balancing acts in social I have come across is happening in Twitter. I have seen companies mentioning every account that tweets them and I have also seen companies retweeting multiple promotional tweets.  Let’s take a walk through the pros and cons of each of these strategies and see why balance matters.

March 20, 2013 | Rob Burke: The Story of SmallHD

Shane Hurlbut went out and captured the story of how SmallHD made it’s way into the video production scene.

March 18, 2013 | Terry Luschen: Five Pieces of Advice to Kickstart Your Career as a Software Developer

So, you want to be a software developer?  Listed in this post are five pieces of advice on how to jump start your career.

March 18, 2013 | Lynlee Espeseth: The First Tablet For Women Reminds Us Marketers Still Have No Idea What Women Actually Want

Over the last few days, a new product, marketed specifically to women, has been making some waves. Known as the ePad Femme, the Android device is marketed as the first tablet just for women.