Welcome!

Front Porch Marketing is proud to support Ursuline Academy of Dallas for six years. Ursuline seeks to provide opportunity and a welcoming environment for students of widely varied ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds. Front Porch Marketing meets the mission of Ursuline by providing opportunities for students to grow in a mentoring environment and experience first-hand what marketing looks like in a professional setting. From start to finish, interns are able to learn how to conduct research studies, create content, prepare branding documents, meet clients face-to-face, and more.

This summer, we have the opportunity to work alongside Ann Kurian and Sofia Arce, two rising seniors at Ursuline. We are excited to be mentoring the next generation of businesswomen and extend a warm welcome to our newest interns for the 2021 summer.

Ann Kurian

Ann is a rising senior at Ursuline Academy and currently plays the flute for the Jesuit Ursuline Ranger band. She has plans to be a marketing major and promote products for companies that she believes in. She is excited to meet clients and learn about the world of marketing. Additionally, her interests include creating or supporting products that are environmentally friendly and making the world a better place for others.

To start prompting her inquisitive mindset, we asked her some questions to which she brought a fresh take on. Some examples being:

Welcome to the FPM team Ann!

Sofia Arce

Sofia Arce is a rising senior at Ursuline Academy. With hopes of going into business in the future, she looks forward to expanding her knowledge of marketing by using her organization skills, attention to detail, and diligence. Sofia is very involved in and outside of school with activities such as playing on the basketball team, being an Ursuline Academy ambassador, participating in Global Advisory Council, and much more. Moreover, she has a passion for creativity and enjoys mentoring others.

To gain some fresh insight, we also asked Sofia what her thoughts were about the marketing field in today’s society and life advice. Some examples being:

1. What does good marketing look like?

Good marketing accurately reflects the business and caters to the client’s target audience in a way that is effective and engaging. Marketing also uses strategies that draw people in, in order to spike curiosity in a business and in services/products.

2. How does FPM differentiate itself from other marketing companies?

FPM is made up of people with such diverse backgrounds and experiences. This makes for many points of view and approaches to a situation. The team at FPM is driven to helping a business succeed. It’s evident that they have a culmination of knowledge about marketing, communications, branding, digital media etc. It is important to have a tight-knit team and Front Porch Marketing definitely possesses one. It is clear that they value their clients and will help them market their business in creative and helpful ways.

3. What is the best piece of life advice you have ever received?

The best piece of life advice I have ever received is that there is always going to be somebody better than me. Granted, it might sound harsh, but it has helped me realize that comparing myself to others is a waste of time. This is due in part because burning myself out to meet unrealistic expectations is useless. I should instead focus on being the best person I can be by using my talents and strengthening them to be unique.

4. What are your goals for FPM?

My goals for FPM are to take my interest in marketing and learn everything I can about how to execute it successfully. Without a doubt, I am looking forward to learning more about the professional world and broadening my horizons. 

Welcome to the team Sofia!

In Conclusion

These two bright ladies are going to be great additions to the Front Porch Marketing team. We cannot wait to continue mentoring the next generation and empowering the women in our lives. Here is to year six of supporting Ursuline Academy of Dallas and to the brilliant minds of women everywhere!

Our oldest son plays baseball in the North Arlington Little League. Last year, his team, the Pirates, had an undefeated season and won the championship game. Of course, we celebrated the win.

Players moved up and on, but we returned for another season. It started out smoothly enough – the games were competitive, but the team was winning. Then we had a tied game. Then we lost.

No big deal, right?

Wrong.

We celebrated the wins, we worked for the wins, we appreciated the wins. However, we neglected to prepare for the possibility of a loss. For two years, the team was coached and played to win. We should have also been coached and prepared to lose.

There is value in the lessons we learn from losing and sports give us a good arena to teach these lessons to our children.

These are valuable lessons that can be applied in parenting, business and life:

• Respect.
  For every winner, there is a loser. You have to respect both. Period. Respect your team, respect the other team. Act accordingly.
• Resiliency.
  It’s ok to be disappointed or upset after a loss. But the quicker you put a loss behind you, the closer you are to the next win. Fast recovery serves anyone at any age well. Vince Lombardi said, “It’s not whether you get knocked down, it’s whether you get up.” Recover and move forward.
• Review.
  If you review the why in your losses and strengthen your weaknesses, new opportunities will arise. In sports no game has ever been lost the same way.
• Humility.
  Losing challenges us and keeps us humble. It teaches us there are others who are better. The emphasis should be motivated to be better.

Preparing for winning and losing is critical. It is far better to lose and learn than to always win and not learn how to lose. If winning and losing were not important, we would not keep score.

If you are a business owner, an employee, a student or a teammate, what do you have to lose?

An account, a promotion, an employee, a score, a game? The answer is yes, all of these and more. But the bigger question is – what are you learning and how are you improving?

So what about the 2016 Pirates? Well, they are heading to the championship game. They earned their spot with three consecutive wins in a double elimination playoff. Regardless of the outcome, valuable lessons will be learned. Go Pirates!

Like many of us, I am on my maiden voyage of “USS Raising A Teenager.” As such, I am in a constant state of waiting, watching, evaluating, tweaking and re-tweaking my parenting methods in an effort to discover the magic formula. I may never find it, but occasionally I do unearth a nugget that I feel the need to share.

So the story goes … my teenager was grounded. No after school activities, sleepovers, hangout sessions, and worst of all for her, NO ELECTRONICS. No texting, talking, skypeing, instagramming … the social death knell to a teenager. The first few days she was furious with me. And miserable. And surly.

And then, suddenly … not. Delightfully not. I noticed her head was up and she was smiling. She helped me cook dinner. She climbed into bed with me and we talked about friends and boys. I heard her upstairs laughing and singing songs with one brother, she played two hours of lacrosse in the backyard with the other.

Where had my surly teenager gone? And how could I replace her with this delightful creature on a permanent basis?

The conclusion is obvious. When she unplugged, she stepped outside of her stressful world of teenage tumult. She engaged. She paid attention. She enjoyed. You know where I’m going with this.

Don’t we all need that? Don’t we owe it to our friends, our families, our children to truly unplug and do the same?

• Face facts, you’re online more than you think you are. According to CNN, Americans spend at least eight hours a day staring at a screen. And more than one-third of smartphone users get online before they get out of bed. Um, yikes.
• On-line multi-tasking should make us more efficient, yet it really doesn’t. According to John Medina, author of Brain Rules, once a person is interrupted by something that’s not work related while on-line, it can take up to 50 percent longer to finish an assignment. Further research suggests that each time a person is sidetracked, the brain takes up to 45 minutes to refocus.
• It’s hurting our health. It’s increasing our stress (heard of Social Media Anxiety Disorder?), hurting our sleep, and straining our bodies.
• Our glut of connectivity is making us less connected. We aren’t connecting because we aren’t talking. It’s hurting our interpersonal skills. As one very astute high school student said, “We’re the most connected generation in history, “but we suck at intimacy.”
• And don’t get me started on what it does to kids. Children’s excessive technology use has the potential to cause attention, brain and behavioral problems. No bueno.

Listen, I love my smartphone as much as anyone. But I can tell you first hand, putting it down feels good. Not just to you, but to those around you.

My teenager is no longer grounded. I haven’t shared this with her, and she hasn’t asked. She’s pretty happy these days and I’m riding this wave for as long as I can. I’m enjoying it. And I think she is too.

Perhaps we should all ground ourselves from our devices from time to time?

It started as a typical day, moving forward, stopping at the store to pick up milk. I back out of the parking spot, turn the wheels to drive forward, and realize I’m stuck. In reverse. The gear shift is broken. After several scrapped knee-jerk plans (sit and wait, don’t move, don’t turn off the car, drive the car home in reverse) the final decision is made.

Tow it. Fix it. Move forward. 

During this brief, chaotic situation, it occurred to me that I take two beautiful abilities for granted; the ability to shift gears and the ability to move forward. Thank you, vehicle, for the head smack. How awful it would be to only move backward!! Unfortunately, we find ourselves looking backward far too frequently.

We can’t redo yesterday, last week or 10 years ago, so why do we spin our wheels in reverse?

Companies do this all the time. All the time. How many times have you heard or said:

• We will not carry zuladings because we tried and they don’t sell …
• We will not invest in social media (insert any marketing tactic print, radio, TV, community outreach, etc). We tried and it doesn’t work …

Decisions made from a rear view will hinder future success. 

A couple of real business examples:

1. In 2009, Starbucks breakfast sandwiches were a hard fast no. Too much aroma competition. “Coffee must win.”
2. For most of this decade, Michaels Arts and Crafts’ only mass reach tool was the weekly insert in the Sunday paper. The company would not invest in anything else because, “Only print worked.”
3. In late 2009 Domino’s Pizza changed its pizza recipe! After almost 50 years. “Yes, please” was not the initial response.

In all these cases, they didn’t let their rear view to deter them from moving forward. Yes, history can repeat and lessons should be learned; but what didn’t work once might work today because it is a new day, with a different landscape, different customers, and different needs.

Business strategy should always be forward-thinking and used to drive success.

Everyone has the ability to shift gears and move forward personally and professionally. If something is broke, fix it! By the way, I rode my bike to pick up my repaired vehicle. And you know what’s beautiful about a bike? It only goes forward.