Kim Krause Berg Joins LiBeck Integrated Marketing

I would like to announce a big change for myself and my career in search engine marketing and usability web design. Start up company, LiBeck Integrated Marketing, has hired me to be their Search Engine Marketing and Usability Manager.

What Does This Mean?

It means that Li Evans, CEO of LiBeck Integrated Marketing, is going to make me get on planes again for conference speaking, workshops and client training.

It means that our clients will have access to the wisdom’s and practices of human oriented web design and marketing, both on and offline. It means I can deliver what I do best to clients and the LiBeck team. I’ll be working on projects for companies that not only want the 360 degree approach to Internet Marketing and Web Design, but understand that every piece, from social networking, to user experience oriented design and information architecture, to offline advertising and PPC campaigns has a reason for being implemented and benefits their financial bottom line.

This past year, as a result of working on many different web sites and projects, I gained insight into my strengths as a project manager. My training in software application testing helps me tremendously in communicating with IT people. I especially learned that those clients who truly wanted someone who gets the whole usability/seo connection are the most exciting ones to work for. I want more of that.

How Will This Work? Do you Give Up Cre8pc?

I agreed to join this company because they like me as I am. They don’t want to change me. I’ve been self-employed since 2002 and have insisted I don’t need to marry another company. This blog will continue to exist and I hope to post more often. Cre8asiteforums is still owned by me. The staff and community may see positive changes as we add some new things to the overall design and open the door to forums sponsorship.

Most importantly, I continue my consulting work under Cre8pc.com. (Usabilityeffect.com is being weaned off.) I have my existing clients and partners, and am still accepting new ones for usability audits, mockup reviews and information architecture work. Any SEO I do will most likely be performed under LiBeck because with them, an entire plan is created for long-term marketing using a wide variety of approaches.

Why?

As I wrote in my personal blog, Bokimian, I wanted to grow and apply my skills on a wider scale. Since 1995 I’ve had intense passion for the Internet. I love web site and software application development. I marvel at how people use the Internet. It’s like sitting in a cafe sipping tea, while silently watching people go by. What do they want? How do they want it? Did they surf the web today? Email? Chat? Leave cryptic notes on Facebook? (Have you seen what teenagers post?)

I wrote, in Why I Joined LiBeck Integrated Marketing:

I accomplished a great deal in 8 years of being a solo act but what I never had in me was growing a big company. Rather, I grew a family instead. Not only my own kids, but I remarried in 2004 and gained a step-son, house, 2 dogs, 2 cats and a swimming pool. My local community became another passion. I’ve been on the Board of Directors for our local Little League Baseball Association, as well as the webmaster for their web site. I’ve been a high school football booster club member and was elected to the role of President for the 2011-12 season, which started yesterday with weight lifting for the team after a short break. I run the high school’s football Facebook web site and shoot photos of their games. I also teach usability at the Search Engine College. My plate is full. Too full to be running a company.

Over the years I’ve been strongly encouraged to start my own company. I think I’ve been afraid that if I had done so, I’d lose my chances to stop, sip my tea, and breathe in the humanity we design and market to. I’d be worrying about getting the next client or paying bills, which I always do, but on a much larger scale.

So it’s with relief that I tuck myself under LiBeck Integrated Marketing. Within this new company I’ll grow, be part of a team that will grow and expand, and be able to try to new things. Someone else can handle the day to day operations.

For my friends and colleagues, who’ve known me for a long time, your generosity and especially your fighting spirit make this work both challenging and satisfying. I now join Liana Evans, CEO, and Becky Ryan, COO, of LiBeck, as they launch a new company into the search engine marketing industry.