Here’s an opportunity to be a part of the La Mesa Christmas in the Village event in La Mesa, California. Did you know that there are only a few events left in San Diego that use Christmas in their name?

The La Mesa Christmas in the Village celebrates Christmas by turning La Mesa Boulevard into a Victorian-era village with lots of pretty lights and shows throughout the evening as well as a parade that starts at 5 p.m. each night of the event.

You or your business can be a part of the celebration by becoming a sponsor.  Ad exposure and booth space come with each of the sponsor levels included here, but we’re open to any level of giving you’d like.  It’s a great way to be a part of a local community effort that is being promoted throughout the San Diego market. Please make out checks to LMVMA and send your sponsorship to:  Attn:  Janene c/o La Mesa Merchant’s Association, 8030 La Mesa Boulevard, PMB#176, La Mesa, CA  91942.  Thank you.

Are you someone that has always wanted to write a novel but has never taken the time, or you started one and never picked it back up again? Maybe you’re charged with writing your company’s newsletter but you haven’t been formally trained in prose. There are a few opportunities coming up that might be of interest to you.  Every other week I host Tuesday Brown Bag at the San Diego Writers, Ink from noon to 1 p.m.. The sessions are geared to get your writing hand moving and creating content with a prompt. Some of the Brown Baggers have gone on to become New York Times Bestselling authors. Go here for more information. Brown Bag

If you already have some writing done and want feedback, I will be hosting a once-a-month Sunday Evening Read & Critique. It starts the last Sunday of this month, September 28.  We’ll be eating and critiquing simultaneously. It should be fun.  Go here for more information. Sunday Critique

Or, if you just want to check out all that San Diego Writers, Ink has to offer, you can attend one session or an entire weekend of writing and related workshops with a finale reading from Barbarella Fokos’ new book Diary of a Diva, this weekend September 12-14. And, I’m teaching a class on low cost ways to promote your creative projects Fall For Writing

Your business can be a part of the La Mesa Christmas in the Village event December 12 and 13, 2014. Booths start at $200 for both evenings, sponsorship packages are also available, or ask how you can be a part of the Christmas Parade.  Efforts are underway to televise the parade this year.  Contact [email protected] for more information.

According to Nielsen ratings, “Hispanics have the highest propensity to listen to the radio of any ethnic group.”  The research firm’s findings reported “94.2 percent of all Hispanics (aged 12+) listen to the radio during the week.”  Nielsen found the most significant growth in Hispanic radio listening was during the morning drive time (6-10 a.m). It would appear that with the growth of so many vehicles to consume media that radio listenership would be on the decrease, but surprisingly Nielsen found that “Radio consumption across the U.S. continues to grow, as nearly 92 percent of Americans 12 or older are tuning in each week. That’s 244.4 million of us, a record high.”

The top 5 Markets in the U.S. for Hispanic TV Viewing according to Nielsen are the following.

1.  Los Angeles

2.  New York

3.  Miami-Ft. Lauderdale

4.  Houston

5.  Dallas-Ft. Worth

Note: Since we’re located in San Diego, that market ranks 12th.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) experts lately are suggesting looking at Google Trends to see what people are searching for and then writing a blog post on that same theme. So how can your target audience relate to some of these trends?  Recently, the top trends on Google Trends were.

1.  Joan Rivers

2.  NFL

3.  Dancing with the Stars

4.  Gustavo Cerati

5.  Federer

6.  Beyonce

7.  Josh Gordon

8. Russell Wilson

9.  Johnathan Bennett

10.  Andy Murray

You can look at the trends for a longer period than just a few days to see if they’re consistent and not just a one time fluke. Dancing with the Stars, for example, has been a highly rated prime TV show for a long time.  In March 2014 the ABC show garnered 15.4 million viewers nationally and was ranked #2 after CBS’s NCIS.  Maybe your business can’t afford to air a national ad on Dancing with the Stars, but you can find other ways to be associated with the show. There are pre-roll ads that can be placed locally in front of the show as viewers watch online, or you can write a blog post showing how one of the dancers used your product on their hair while on the show. Get creative.  You just might find a way to have a connection with these top trends while potentially increasing traffic to your site.

More classes have been added to the line up at the San Diego Writers, Ink Fall For Writing Conference this month. To wrap up the event on Sunday evening, Barbarella Fokos, new author of the book Diary of a Diva will talk about the writing process and read from her book.

The Fall For Writing conference will hold sessions all weekend from September 12 to 14, 2014. Classes and workshops run the gamut from fiction, memoir and poetry writing, to collage and marketing classes.

Barbarella Fokos was the executive producer and host of Art Pulse TV (which aired on NBC San Diego, COZI TV, and is now re-airing twice a day on County TV in San Diego). The show was all about taking viewers behind the scenes of everything art in San Diego County and Baja. She won a regional Emmy award for producing the show.

She also used to do regular television segments, such as “Stepping Out With Barbarella” on NBC San Diego News in the Morning, and the weekly 5 Questions with Barbarella that aired on NBC’s California Nonstop channel. She writes for the San Diego Reader, from lengthy news features to fluffy food reviews. Her column, “Diary of a Diva,” has appeared in the Reader every week since 2004. Now these are the basis for a new book.

For a fraction of what it would cost to attend a class or two, the San Diego Writers, Ink (SDWI) is offering a full weekend of classes, workshops, and parties at the third annual Fall For Writing Conference. The pre-registration cost is $120 for members or $140 for non-members for up to 10 sessions. At the door it’s $5 more for each or $25 a class. Membership is $35 a year. SDWI is a 501 (c) 3 non-profit organization.

For more information about this and other San Diego Writers, Ink’s events go to: sandiegowriters.org

You have until September 12 to submit an entry for the best media plan of the year through Adweek’s Media Plan of the Year contest.

Categories include:

-Best Campaign

-Best Use of Branded Content

-Best Use of Social

-Best Use of Alternative Media

-Best Use of Mobile

-Best Use of Native Content

Go to: www.mediaplanoftheyear.com to enter.

Writers interested in getting their work published have until July 31 to submit their poetry, prose, or flash fiction for publication submission in the San Diego Writers, Ink 8th Anthology. Eligibility is available to residents of San Diego. Members ($35 a year) can submit up to three pieces at no cost. The non-member fee is just $5 per entry.

An Anthology is a compilation of accepted works by authors that have been published before, and others who have never been published. Accepted pieces are featured in a printed publication.

reg e. gaines, a Tony-nominated writer and Bessie Award winner, is one of the editors of the 8th Anthology and is available for media appearances to talk about the Anthology process. reg e had a brush with fame in New York City with the slam poetry movement. He will be editing the poetry submissions for the Writers, Ink Anthology.

Dean Nelson, the prose editor, is the founder and director of the journalism program at PLNU (Point Loma Nazarene University) who writes occasionally for the New York Times, the Boston Globe, Christianity Today, Sojourners and other national publications and has co-written 11 books.

For more information about this and other San Diego Writers, Ink’s events go to: sandiegowriters.org

Political Climate Affects Advertising

With the general election scheduled for Tuesday, November 4, 2014, expect TV media avails to be impacted throughout the country starting the first week of September.  Non-political advertisers will notice an impact on rates (increases) and available inventory.  If you are a non-political advertiser and want to run TV ads late 3rd and early 4th quarters, get your schedules in now and hope that your ads aren’t bumped out by political advertisers. Impacted dates include September 6 through November 4.  TV stations and cable networks that aren’t as news heavy most likely won’t be as impacted as the stations that focus on news.

NBC 7-39 New Prime Shows

The San Diego NBC station KNSD-TV 7-39,  held their summer pre-view party recently for their new prime time shows that will begin airing in the Fall.

Their new shows include an hour long sometimes funny drama Wednesdays from 8 p.m. to 9 p.m.  called The Mysteries of Laura.  Debra Messing (Will & Grace) stars as an NYPD homicide detective balancing work and family.

On Tuesdays from 9-9:30 p.m. a new half hour show called Marry Me will air. The show focuses on how a couple decides to put marriage on hold after a bunch of botched up proposals.

Thursday evenings two new half hour shows are scheduled from 9 to 10 p.m.  Bad Judge is first and then A to Z.  Since the pre-view party, I couldn’t remember a thing about either of these shows. After looking them up online, I sort of remember Bad Judge. Kate Walsh acts as a strict judge that has a completely opposite personal life.  A to Z looks like a romantic comedy that’s been done before.

Friday evenings right after Grimm, a new show called Constantine will air from 10 to 11 p.m. The show is based on a comic series called Hellblazer published by DC Comics. Although a bit dark, it appears promising.

My suggested picks as ratings winners:  The Mysteries of Laura and Constantine.  Since Constantine follows Grimm and ratings continue to grow for that audience it’s a good bet Constantine will get viewers to continue after Grimm and new viewers that are comic fans. With Debra Messing’s long standing on NBC’s Will & Grace, her show appears promising for interest with viewers that miss Will & Grace as well as other viewers who enjoy a good cop show.

Let me know what you predict will be winners and check back with me in October to see if the ratings follow my predictions, or yours.