Week 15 blog: Wrapping things Up

 

 

An interesting thing I learned in this class is that there are a lot more Social Media platforms than I thought or had even heard of.  I don’t know how anyone can keep up with all of them.  As you stated in your email, the younger users are always looking for the latest and greatest platform and people in the older group are just getting well versed in programs such as Facebook, YouTube, email and others.  I did learn that I cannot rely on my two children to be up on the latest social media “craze”, as neither one of them are that involved with it.  My son is texting and emails – no Facebook page; my daughter has a Facebook page (and only recently has started to post to it), texting, emails and Instagram – so I might be the one “training” them. 

I had never blogged before this class, and I had never followed a blog before, although I had occassionally looked at one of my bosses’ blogs to check out his latest photographs.

If my daughter and I get our Remnants Reworked business started, I will need to make sure that we get our blog up and running (though I plan to keep writing on this one going, as I will be traveling a lot in the future), keep our Facebook page up to date, get my son’s help in creating a web page, post photos on Pinterest (maybe Instagram), send out Tweets (as I have a Twitter account – though I mostly use it to follow), start selling items via Etsy and other craft sites and eventually create YouTube videos.  I would never have thought of these if I had not taken this class. 

If my daughter gets her dream of her own production company, this knowledge will help me to get her business out there via Social Media too.

I enjoyed the class, I learned a lot, though I have to admit sometimes it was confusing jumping from one textbook to the other.  I am keeping my notes and textbooks to use as reference materials when the time comes.  I may also suggest to some of my friends who have their own small businesses that they might consider using some of these social media platforms to get their businesses better known and increase their customer base. 

Thank you again for your patience and I wish you all the best for the coming new year. 

Week 14/Blog 3: time spent on social media

The first thing I would do is create an email specifically for the business.  I would write on my blog and Facebook and add photos and post to Pinterest also.  Since Twitter is still very new to me, I am not sure how much time I would be on Twitter.  I would check my blog and Facebook every day and I think I would post on each on opposite days.  For example, Monday, Wednesday and Friday I would write on my blog and Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday I would post to Facebook.  At the beginning, I would invite all my personal contacts to check out my new business (via email, text messages, my personal Facebook page).   

I have to view this realistically, and realize that I must keep my 40 hour/week job, especially while trying to start up this craft item business.  I will need to do research regarding craft fairs and markets; places on the internet which could help get my business name out there also, besides Pinterest.  So my time will be limited and it will be hard to identify exactly how much time I could spend on creating my small business, getting the sites up and running and basically, just getting it out there, but still be able to work to pay the bills, feed my family, etc.

Before I could start this business, my daughter and I would need to create some actual items for sale.  This could take a few months what with our actual jobs, school schedules, my one night a week teaching job (including the preparation time for classes) and other responsibilities.  Since we are the only employees it will take both of us to build the business, though I might be able to con my son into helping create the website (he has done this as a hobby in the past).

I would need to create an actual website for my business in which to showcase our product and include a way for customers to order and pay for the purchase.  PayPal would also be a good system to use, so I would need to create that system.    Next I would need to create photographs and put them on both the website and on Facebook.  I’m considering creating a postcard containing a series of photographs on one side and information about our business on the other so we could do a mass mailing via “snail” mail.  A similar type of email could be prepared to send out to my contacts.  I would include some type of a coupon offer in both the mail ad and the email ad and include a code on my Facebook and blog sites which would enable customers to receive a discount or free shipping and handling within the United States.

Google Analytics would be used on my blog and Facebook in order to help me uncover how people are finding my site and how I am obtaining customers.  From this I could learn how to create AdWords and such to build up my customer base.  At the same time, we would need to keep a spreadsheet/database of what items are popular, what colors are most preferred and so on.

I realize it will take a lot of time and effort to create this business and get it off the ground and initial costs will most likely inhibit how much advertising we can do at the beginning.  To start we will need to stay with the free social media sites and keep other advertising costs to a minimum.  However, as the business grows, we will be able to increase what we can do. 

Week 14/Blog 2: sites I visited and commented on

I visited a few sites, and commented on the following three (I hope - I know I typed a comment on their pages and hopefully they are there): 

David Harris:  “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to My Marketing Career”

Jennifer Mencher:  “Six Seconds”

Nathan Scharff:  “Manvolution Blog Page”

 

Week 14/Blog 1: Online Social Media

 

For a craft or handmade business such as the one I envision, the best social media sites are Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, and, of course, my blog which will include my travels and the international purchases made for the business.  These would be best types of social media for us to use in the beginning in order to grow our customer base.  We would augment these with print ads and mass mailings within the local area and contacts with businesses that might like to carry our products.  Since my daughter and I would be the business, the manufacturers and such, I would need to make sure that she is fully capable of handling these three types of social media-she’s not very well versed in them as it is now.  However, we must be able to communicate with our clients as fast as possible in order to build up the clientele and keep the good reputation of our business. 

I thought I might create a new Linked In page for the business (so as not to confuse my full time job with this one).  This could lead to engagement with possible business partners, investors or venture capitalists.

As the business grows, I would investigate other forms of social media.  As we currently have no income from our business yet, and thus no budget, we need to keep expenditures down so we may try some Google AdWords to begin and use Analytics to uncover where our customers are coming from and thus put direct our funds into the areas that might direct more customer traffic to our pages hopefully to order our products. 

 

Lecture 13 – Google Analytics Features

I will get caught up this weekend if it "kills" me.

 

If we start our business, it will be very small to begin with, so I believe it would be best to limit the features we use in the beginning and if the business grows to where we need to add additional employees, I would add additional features from Google Analytics.  I am not sure if we would employ mobile ads in the beginning .  However, I still would need to uncover just what my customer base is and how they get to and work with my site.

I have learned from my current job, that Dashboards are great for a quick overall view of how things are going.  It’s a summary on a single page and it has drag and drop widgets for customization (I find widgets are usually “fun” to “play” with).

The use of AdWords would be helpful in order to discover what key terms to use in order to bring business to our site.  Google offers support and help and you decide how much and what you pay for (clicks).  The Google Display Network allows us to use AdWords to creat and manage marketing campaigns by inserting tags so success can be measures.  Using AdSense would also be good as it allows content publishers and bloggers a way to earn money by placing ads on their sites.  It would also allow me to put ads on my blog to create interest in my business.

Using the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) report would be good as it allows me to see what search queries enabled the potential customers to visit our site.  Using the Content Experiments allow me to create and test variations of my pages and figure out which ones seem to bring in the customers.

The more useful reports would include the Advertising reports which would give us a view of conversion rates and returns on all the social media channels we employ.  The remarketing might be interesting as it would enable us to locate customers who have searched for products similar to ours.

Another report offered is on audience data.  This would allow me to figure out what common factors there may be among the customers or people who visit my site and then I can adjust my ads accordingly.  Then you have the social reports that let you see what impact social media has on your business (both goals and conversions). 

Being able to see how visitors interact with our page(s) using something like In-Page Analytics would be good as would Flow Visualization.  Site Search would be valuable as it would indicate what searches were used by visitors and possibly let me know how I may need to adjust my AdWords.  Alerts and Intelligence Events will monitor my website’s traffic to detect any anomalies and alert me to the same.  This would let me know if there was more traffic coming from one particular area or another site.

Google Analytics offers so many possibilities, it is almost mind boggling.  I hope some day I will get to use it to grow a small business.

Week 12: Blog 2 - Coupon Deal?

Since we sell a unique and one-of-a-kind product, I am not really sure what kind of a coupon we could use for our business.  Neither GroupOn or livingsocial would be appropriate for our type of business.  About all we could do is offer a percentage off or free shipping and list that on one of our ads. 

It must be remembered that we create items to order, and the customer picks what type of item, tells us what colors or color scheme they want, and if they wish, they can also pick the fabric used.  We cut out the pattern for the item, and sew it together.  This is why I could only come up with offering a percentage off on a customer’s first order, or possibly a percentage off on the customer’s birthday, or free shipping.

I would appreciate anyone’s ideas or help if they can come up with another way we could offer a coupon deal. 

Week 12: Blog 1 – Four additional online marketing tools

 

Well besides using Facebook and my blog, the other social media sites that might work for my business are Pinterest, Google+, Yelp and FlipBoard (also a possibility). 

Pinterest would work because the photographs that people pin include the link to the site where found.  I would create a business Pinterest board and I could direct my blog readers and Facebook followers to look at my board. 

I have a personal Google+ account but it is fairly recent and I have not had a chance to play with it yet.  However, according to your lecture, I can create a business Google+ page off of that and keep them separate.  In Google+ I can join communities with similar products as mine, or maybe suppliers.  I can create Circles to separate fans, customers, family and others.

Yelp will be helpful, more so after the business gets up and running.  I’m not sure having only 1 or 2 positives is very helpful.  A concern of mine is that there is no real “control” over the likes and dislikes.  I recently watched a TV program where a well know hotelier would assist other hotels/motels that were closed to failing.  In this show it was a family hotel and it was a bit dated in looks, but he was able to assist with the updating and other parts of running the hotel to keep it from going bankrupt – from the kitchen, the housekeeping staff, the hotel staff and the owners.  One thing that came up was some reviews on Yelp that really denigrated the hotel and even stated things that were not true about the hotel.  He made the owner contact Yelp and have them deleted.  I did not know that was possible until this show. 

FlipBoard is referred to as your personal magazine.  First I would need to come up with a creative name, something that would come up when prospective customers do searches.  I can have a “window” or page related to useful sewing or fabric information, e.g. care and handling of various fabrics.  I can add my Twitter timeline to Flipboard and flag tweets that I feel are most appropriate.  I can link YouTube channels to my flip board that I also think would fit with my business.  I read where a good rule of thumb is:  “if it interests you as it relates to your specialty, chances are good it will interest your intended audience” and also I could use it to promote the work of other folks (and hope it might bring more business to my site).  Once you have created it, you need to hit the Share button so you can promote it via any account you’ve added to Flipboard, such as LinkedIn, Tumblr, Google+, Twitter, Facebook, etc.

Since I don’t have a storefront, Google Maps is not an option at this time.  However, I was thinking that if I was able to get some of our products in a store on Consignment or maybe they purchased it for resale, I could use Google Maps to let people know where they could find our products. 

I do not think GroupOn or Living Social are good for my business or for the type of products we sell.

Finally Google Analytics

Celebrate!  I finally got Google Analytics linked with my blog.  It took discussions with and help from the folks in the IT department at my full time job to help me get it up (and hopefully) running.  The last couple times I tried to do it, I got error messages.  No error messages this time, so I am hopeful that it will work.  If not, it's back to my IT group.

Week 11: Online Advertising

 

 

When I start up my business, I believe it would be advantageous to limit my advertising to Facebook, some direct mail to local people, postcard ads at crafts and street fairs that we would participate in, and possibly print ads if we could afford them. 

I’ve just started using Twitter and I have not received any Twitter ads, so I don’t know what they look like.  I have, however, had numerous ads show up on my Facebook page – though I usually ignore them. 

I designed three possible Facebook ads that I could use:

 

 

Below are also a couple of ads that could be used when folks do Google searches under the words:  “unique”, “one of a kind”, “one-of-a-kind” or “personalized”. 


One-of-a-Kind Gifts - Remnants Reworked
www.remnantsreworked.com
Unique, personal and one of a kind gifts
- create the perfect gift


Unique Gift Ideas - Remnants Reworked
www.remnantsreworked.com
Handmade and personalized gifts created
according to your specification


Personalized Gifts - Remnants Reworked
www.remnantsreworked.com
We will create and send personalized gifts
for any event or occasion.


Pinterest might also work for our business, as people post photos of crafts and items that they like to Pinterest.  This might bring customers or clients that are looking for the type of items we create. 

As for direct mail advertising, I would create a postcard with multiple photos of items we have created on the front side(glossy).  The number of photos would depend upon the size of the postcard.  On the back side, on the left, I would offer an option of a 20% discount on all orders placed before a specific deadline (based upon when I do the mailing) or free shipping.  Below is an example of what I am thinking. 

          Visit our website at www.remnantsreworked.com
          for photographs of some of the items we have
          created for our customers.  After deciding what
          item(s) you would like created, including choosing
          the colors and/or fabrics to be used, then go to
          our order page to fill in all the required and necessary
          information. 

          You may use one of the following codes when
          placing your order: 
               MS12345 - 20% discount on your order
          OR
               MS56789 - free shipping on your order. 

 

Also, I could include the same type discounts on my email newsletter to my current customers. 

Week 10: Why I need a newsletter and when to send it

It seems to me that my first newsletter would be a welcome email, recognizing that they did sign up and maybe having them send a response to confirm.  Once confirmed, I would send out my “get to know us” newsletter, which would be more informative than later ones, since I am formally introducing my business and products to potential customers.  I would anticipate, to begin with, that a quarterly email/newsletter would be the way to go. 

I like the idea of giving a customer a discount for their birthday, and maybe we would give a discount for multiple items of the same type, e.g. wedding favors. 

We are a very small business (just my daughter and I) and I would include notes about the business, photos of products we’ve made, maybe a suggestion area where customers can suggest things they would like to see us make. 

I would include a section on new items.  One of the things I am known for is my flower arrangements, bead work and other craft items besides just sewing.  So as we add new possibilities to the business, I would need to let my customers know.  Another idea would be to include information on the costume design work my daughter or I have done and see some photos (past or present).  

I could use a survey to find out what customers think of possible items we might create and sell.  It is rather obvious that if an item doesn’t sell, then it is not really a good thing to keep making.  But it is a good idea to have customer input as to whether they would like the item.

A newsletter would also be a good way to introduce ourselves, give some of our background, and as the business grows, introduce new employees.  I might also introduce some of our suppliers’ businesses, for example, my girlfriend’s business where she creates and sells hand-dyed and spun Angora yarn (from her own rabbits).

Since I love trivia, I would like to include some bits of trivia and invite my customers to send me some of theirs.  Maybe I could keep a running trivia content section on my blog – entitled “Things I’ve learned from Jeopardy and by reading”. 

Even though I am considering quarterly newsletters, I may decide to put out “special editions” such as a combined one for Chanukah, Christmas and New Year’s ideas, then one for Mother’s Day possibly combining it with Father’s Day.

Week 9 – Blog 2: What categories would I create & how would they help the business grow

 

 

 

A couple of things I read about creating categories are that you need to remember to create a balance between being too broad and too specific. A category should be thought of like a Table of Contents in a book. It should be descriptive, not too many categories and each post should only be assigned one category (if any) with tags should you feel the post might also be related to or good for another category.

My blog is called “Cindy’s World Travels”, and I plan to continue to add notes, photos and other fun stuff from my various world travels. So that my family, friends and co-workers can follow along on my latest trips or check out any previous ones. Thus, I would create a category for each country, e.g. Thailand, Vietnam, Russia, Australia, Switzerland, England, Scotland, US, etc. That way if someone was interested about one of these countries, they could go straight to that particular country.

I would create a category for CSIT155 and subcategories such as “Social Media-Business”, “Sites” in order to keep the class information/homework separate from the other blog items. But if anyone wanted to read them, they could go ahead. I would create a category for my business “Remnants Reworked” to contain information about the company, what we do, and FAQ and any other pertinent information on my company. Eventually I may decide to create a totally separate blog for Remnants Reworked - if my daughter and I get it "off the ground".

Also, I think it would be good to use tags in case something in one category would be relevant to another category. You can think of tags as akin to the Index in a book. For example, under my Remnants Reworked I could have a tag to information that may be “filed” under Thailand or Vietnam categories such as where I purchased material to create items for sale or vice versa.

I could also have a category entitled “Items for Sale” so that if that was all my readers/customers were interested in, they could go to that section immediately and then I would have tags to other sections, depending upon what related to items we created and were selling. 

By creating simple, defined categories, my readers would not have to wade through everything I wrote, and, hopefully, would be able to find what they were looking for much easier and faster.  By using tags, I would then be able to get them to check out another of my blog categories, and thus make them interested in reading others and continue to check out my blog.

 

Week 9 – Blog 1: How personal should your business blog be?

 

A little bit your personality and a few personal items about you would be helpful in a business blog.  Telling some of your likes/dislikes, maybe giving a little bit of a background on how and why you started your business and some other basic items would help your customers, future customers  and business associates realize that there is an actual person behind the business and the blog and maybe have them come to think of you as a friend., someone they would like to see become successful.   

A few small business blogs I’ve read have included photos of themselves, and their pets.  Have incfluded stories about their pets, usually funny anecdotes or how the pet “got in the way” while they were trying to work or "guard" the business.  Sometimes they mention achievements, or as I put in mine, a trip I took that included purchasing some unique fabrics for my business. 

You don’t want to weigh down your customers with your personal feelings, moods, hardships, problems and so on.  You want to inform your customers of new items or services, maybe mention that you are thinking of doing something and would like their input (or use a survey).  This would engage your customers and make them feel they are assisting you in the growth of your business.   You could also ask them to let you know if they have an idea of something they would like to see you do. 

A good phrase to remember when writing your blog is K.I.S.S. – Keep It Simple Stupid.  Don’t get too technical, but don’t be too basic either.  You need to find a good middle ground as you don’t want to “speak” to far above your customers nor do you want them to feel that you are talking down to them (making them feel stupid). 

 

Week 8 - Searching for Twitter Leads

 

 

Ok, so after setting up a new Twitter account for my business, Remants Reworked, customizing it, figuring out how to follow some other students, the next part of the assignment was to use the advanced search tool to find at least five other users who could benefit my business. 

I searched crafts, and came up with Artisan Faire, then I searched using the word fabrics and found both Mood (of Project Runway fame) and Michael Levine Inc. (a fabric store in downtown Los Angeles that I have spent a lot of money at).  I have to admit, when you search “fabrics”, I had to go through quite a few to find the two I wanted.  It would have been easier to just search their names (if I could have remembered the name of the store in LA we go to all the time - Michael Levine).  I decided to do a direct name search for a couple of the sewing magazines I use: “Threads” and “Sew Stylish”.    Finally, just for the fun of it, I searched for Project Runway and decided to follow the official Project Runway and Tim Gunn, but I was amazed that the results included in this search, including various designers that had been on the show, fan clubs, and Project Runway shows in other countries.

I was trying to figure out how to search for costuming and not get all the places that sell costumes, but more like theatres, film and tv who need costumers.  Any suggestions?

One thing interesting, is that although I followed some of my classmates and other specific sites, tweets showed up in my Twitter account from the Gap, Huffington Post and a few others.  This could get rather interesting in the long run. 

I did write one tweet, and that was to mention that although I had only been in Hanoi, Vietnam for two weeks, I had made a number of friends, so I am worried about them due to Typhoon Haiyan.  Don’t know when I will hear from them or I may be able to contact them.  Just keep all the people in the path of that Typhoon in my thoughts and prayers.

 

Week 7 (Get Visual) - similar sites

First I searched under “creative clothing”, “creative accessories” and came up with very few sites that were even remotely similar to mine.  Then I searched under “one of a kind” clothing and/or accessories and found a few similar sites – though most seem to use recycled vintage clothing and not new materials.  Further discussion (before this search) we discussed also using recycled clothing (e.g. purchased from thrift stores – which we have done for theatre costuming purposes).

Creative Clothing by Roxane - http://www.creativeclothingbyroxane.com/; she only has the website with photos of costumes and other articles of clothing that she has made

One of a Kind Clothing Store - http://www.pinterest.com/sexigelrox/one-of-a-kind-clothing-store/ ; shows pictures from a number of different places for ideas and how-to in order to create the type of articles we plan to do.  I have bookmarked this Pinterest site. 

TheSunnySideBiz - http://www.artfire.com/ext/shop/studio/thesunnysidebiz/0/0/12054 ; you can find this shop on Facebook, twitter, her website or her blog and you can share this shop via Twitter, Google +, Facebook and StumbleUpon; she sells one of a kind clothing & accessories, bags/purses, pillows and covers, aprons, pot holders/hot pads, hanging dish towels, eye glass cases, jewelry.  I have never heard of StumbleUpon. 

Chic Stitch - http://chicstitch.com/Accessories.php ; besides its webpage, you can find this store on Etsy.com, but I could not find any other way to access the online store; they sell custom dresses, skirts, clothing and accessories; for the clothing, the customer needs to provide the materials and they are located in Ontario, Canada (somewhat hard to visit for fittings from here)

Glamarita Clothing & Accessories - http://www.thumbtack.com/wa/spokane/handmade-jewelry/custom-one-of-a-kind-clothing-accessories-clothing-designer; found on Thumbtack and can also be found/followed on Facebook or twitter (and you can email them); they make one of a king clothing and accessories using recycled and vintage materials.  Thumbtack is another site I have never heard of. 

All of them showed photographs of the articles they made and sewed.  Some had photographs that were professionally done and others were just the type you would create using your own cameras.  For our site, it would definitely need still photographs showing what we have created in order to sell.  I still don’t know if video would work for our business or not.  I would need to do more research to discover exactly which sites would work best for our business.  We would need a webpage, maybe my blog, Pinterest would be good to “advertise” on and etsy to sell our product.  I’m not sure about Twitter, because I am still not sure just how it works, especially in relation to a business.  I follow specific people on Twitter but I don’t post unless it is in response to something someone I follow says. 

Get Visual (Lecture 7)

After reading the lecture and viewing the links for YouTube, Instagram, Tumblr and Pinterest, I do not see how any of the video formats would be useful for my business - unless someone really wants to watch us search through remnants, cut out the patterns for what we are making and watch us sew it together.  However, ones where we can post photos of our projects/items and maybe give sewing tips or hints on sewing with specific types of fabrics would be useful.  In the past I've actually gotten some ideas of items to create from things I saw on Pinterst.  Instagram might be doable, along with Pinterest, but I am not sure about Tumblr as I am not very familiar with this platform.

Sites I liked on Remants Reworked

 

I chose the following sites as they are online selling sites and could be used to advertise the articles we make, and thus our business. 

Etsy Handmade – this is a good site to use to sell your handmade items; etsy lists items by category or topic as well as a directory of local shops in the area

Artfile.com – this is another good site to use to sell your handmade items, but the difference between this one and etsy is that it is associated with Amazon’s universal wish list

Metaphor Boutique – this is a local shop (which my daughter frequents) that sells commercial items but also handmade/artist items

Handmade Artists’ Shop – this is a combination of a marketplace and community forum and includes a collection of artists and craftspeople learning from one another

Supermarket – is a marketplace, they don’t offer every category but do have “four meta ones: everything, wear + carry, space + place, and paper + prints”, clicking on an item takes you to that designer’s store and it includes a directory of designers.

Cafe Press – I chose this site, as I have used it in the past to put a few images I designed on various items, such as tee-shirts, totes, mugs, apparel, wall posters, bumper stickers and other objects, you also don’t have to purchase large quantities of items at one time.  I thought this would be a way I could create items to advertise my business.- things that I could include when I ship a purchase out as a way to say thank you and remind the buyer of my company.   

Bonanza - has free listings, low fees and live support if you have issues; they have a craft category but they also sell books, CDs and other merchandise.

For suppliers I liked the following on my website: 

Jo-Ann Fabric and Crafts Store - one of the places I purchase remnants and trims

Fashion Fabrics Club – another place to purchase material

Royale Hare – this is one of my girlfriend’s business, where she sells her home spun yarn, which she also dyes and some other goods.

Yardage Town – I tried to find a way to like them on Facebook, but could not locate a Facebook icon or any social media sites listed on their website

Folkwear Patterns – I chose this one because I use these patterns and many of them I can use multiple fabrics to create the items

A website I’ve been trying to get on and investigate, but have been having issues connecting is SpoonFlower which focuses on fabrics and makes it possible for you to design, print and sell your own fabric designs.  I thought I could design fabrics to use in the articles we create.   I plan to keep trying to get on their site. 

 

Two websites I visit frequently: 

The US Patent and Trademark Office:  http://www.uspto.gov/index.jsp 

Starbucks:  http://www.starbucks.com/

 

 

I am on the USPTO site most times due to work.  But besides electronic filing of applications, responses, check fees, get updated forms and such, I go to the Home page to see what news the patent office is putting out and also to see what other news there is in this field.  They have a great section for inventors and a fun kids' page (but I don't get to play much).   Besides the US Patent Office site, I also am on the European site, the World Intellectual Property Office site and other countries' sites.  

 

I go to the Starbucks' site primarily to reload the Starbucks cards.  All members of my family have cards and they are all regisstered under one name, thus, we are able to earn the rewards faster that way.  This works out really well with our college kids - they text me and I reload their cards (especially during finals week).  I can reload the cards when we are overseas too.

 

Why are they effective?   -  The USPTO site is effective because I can find the information I need - there are individual pages for patents, trademarks, etc.  

The Starbucks site is easy to manuever around. and find what you want.    

What specific principles of good design do they include and why?  - The USPTO site is very concise and uses point and click to get to other information.   It has 3 columns (after the header), one is useful informational links, another lists popular links and government sources and the third is patent office news.  The Patent Office site is visually appealing in its set up and the colors used. The left column resembles tabs, with the information data and a corresponding icon, the middle column is just typed links and the third column is the standard news blurb identification.    

The Starbucks site, after you log in, shows all the cards registered to my account which I can update as necessary and reload from that page.  Along the top there are drop-down menus for other information you might be interested in (e.g. music) and information about the company including corporate responsibility.  Starbucks limits it colors to green and black on a white background.  They may also include photographs that relate to the specific information you are looking at.  

            What makes you come back again?   -  The USPTO site I go back to all the time due to my job and to keep up with any new laws and information.  I need to keep up with the information for inventors, as I end up speaking with them fairly often and they want to know why they are required to do certain things and how do they protect their ideas.  
             For Starbucks I normally go on to the site to reload someone's card, but sometimes I check to see if we have any rewards, to find out the nutritional information on various drinks and food and to check out new offerings. 
 
            What could be improved?  -  The USPTO site can sometimes be confusing due to too much information on the page.  They change and update their site fairly often so that sometimes when you get there, the information you are looking for isn't in the same place anymore.  For a government site, I actually find it rather easy to manuever through. 
              On the Starbuck's site the drop downs are white lettering on black background - the font is a little small for me to read sometimes even with my glasses!