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Business Communications

Click to read this sample of my content writing.

Great content legitimizes your business or brand. 
It connects customers with what you do and why you do it.

I can help clarify your story and broadcast it better. 
I can also revise your existing content so it's precise and current.

• Business Plans and Brand Development
• E-mail Marketing - Set-up, Content and Scheduling
• Print, Radio, and Social Media Content
• Website Set-Up and Maintenance
• Tech Sheets, Promotional Materials, Catalogs, Fliers
• Wearables, Sponsorships & Other Visibility
• Market Research, Strategy, and Networking
• Annual Reports, Internal Shareholder Communications
• Staffing Strategy, Company Culture, SOPs
• The Usual Templates: Letterhead, business cards, etc

let's talk.

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SBDC Counseling

Sign up for FREE small business counseling services here.
​Download Marketing 101: Try it. Evaluate. Revise!

In 2019, I joined my local Small Business Development Center as a business development counselor. This means that I take referrals through my local SBDC office to counsel clients in all areas of business start-up and development. 

I specialize in the following areas (and if I'm not the ideal resource, I'll connect you with what you need!):

• Marketing
  -Business branding, messaging, start-up imagery, print materials, etc
  -Website development and content 
  -Customer cultivation strategy and outreach
  -Market research 
  -Editing, proof-reading and repurposing of content across social and other media
  -Business writing tutorials and coaching
  -Grant-writing 
  
• Hiring and Personnel
  -Labor delegation strategy/growth planning
  -Job descriptions 
  -Job advertising and head-hunting 
  -Candidate review/interviewing
  -Hiring negotiation
  -Benefits planning/strategy for small business
  -Performance reviews
  -Contract renegotiation 
  -Firing
  
• Financials and Bookkeeping Setup
  -Projections, revenue mapping and planning 
  -QB company file setup, item lists, classes, parts/assembly, inventory and reports
  
• Cloud- and App-based Business Setup
  -Remote access to QB, time clocks, G Suite, eFax
  -Local networking, printers, cellular setup/plans/tips, international travel setup, etc
  
• Networking and Relationship-Building
  -Seeking and providing mentorship 
  -Industry contributions/presentations
  

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Grant writing

Small businesses need working capital. Grant programs provide it. 
But making the match requires thorough planning and bullet-proof writing.

I specialize in hearing where a business is 'at' and writing a strong application for programs that will serve its needs -- not the other way around.  

Services include drafting or revising a business plan specific to grant-funded activities, financial projections, and the writing and compilation of the grant application, including required materials, such as letters of support.

To date, grants I've written or co-authored have been awarded more than $500,000.

let's talk.

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Creative  nonfiction

Some people know their grandparents only as shuffling, off-smelling residents of nursing homes. I’m a little luckier. 

I’ve shared my life entirely with this particular grandma, my dad’s mom, Verna, just as she shared a bedroom in her childhood with hers (that’s how the ratio of kids to beds worked out).  . . .

Click to read this sample of my creative nonfiction.

I admit, I'm happiest when I'm weaving words together. Or revisiting and revising what I've written. Of course, I hope my work speaks to others, but first, it speaks to me.

If you like what you've sampled here, want to read more, or have a project you'd like me to contribute to, I'm game.

let's talk.

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Freelance  journalism

Click to read this sample of my feature writing.

My first full-time employment was with a start-up magazine publishing company. I had the great luck and privilege of covering the mountain communities of Driggs, Idaho, and Jackson, Wyoming, through all stages of print production: story assignment, writing, editing, art direction, layout, and distribution. Eventually I was a managing editor, with a hand in issue planning, management of contributing writers and photographers, and several layers of operations.

I love the pace and space afforded by magazine--both in print and online--but I've also contributed to newspapers, blogs, technical publications, newsletters,  and more.  I can also take supporting photos on location as needed.

Throw me a lead, a word count and a deadline, and I'll run with it.

let's talk.

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My spirit food?
​Oral histories

In summer 1999, I was a canoe guide for Wilderness Canoe Base in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness on the Minnesota-Canada border. 

On July 4, a weather phenomenon known as a derecho -- or straight wind storm of speeds up to 90 mph -- laid out 25 million trees like toothpicks and obliterated infrastructure in a swath 30 miles long and 12 miles wide across 370,000 acres of the BWCAW alone. The storm developed in North Dakota and also hit parts of Ontario, Quebec, New Hampshire and Vermont, eventually dissipating in Maine.

Without power and 57 miles from the nearest town, we couldn't even contact our parents for four days. In that time, we ran search and rescue operations for the staffers and other BWCA campers--many injured and traumatized--who were caught out on trail and who couldn't get back across tree-blocked portages. One traveler died.

Out of that terror, I found my life marked for good.

My story and those of fellow staff members comprise an ongoing oral history collection.

 I never tire of interviewing people--about what they do, what they've learned, what they've endured, what they hope, and what they've achieved--recently, or long into the past.

Ask enough good questions, and you've got a fascinating record, whether transcribed to written form, tailored into a finished audio clip, or organized as narrative for corresponding photographs. 

This field of work has endless multimedia potential, but it's rooted in practiced, focused interviewing--the asking of meaningful questions and the distilling of valuable truths from complex answers.

If you have a person or a topic in mind, I'd love the opportunity to learn more. 
I'll record and shape it to meet your goals. Also, I'm currently training as a death doula and hospice volunteer to be the storyteller in that rare space.

let's talk.

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