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DailyCandy knows what’s hot. And right now – it’s most definitely Sagrada Wellness (Orma Design & Communication’s rockin’ PR client). Their rejuvenating Ojai, CA yoga, Pilates, surfing, and wine tasting retreats are drawing serious attention. Today, Sagrada Wellness is featured on DailyCandy’s “Last Minute Trips and Weekend Getaways Around Southern California.”


Hey, if anyone knows what’s good for you – it’s DailyCandy. So listen up and get thee to a stress-free getaway asap.

Orma Design & Communications recently helped Tiburon, California kick-off the Shop Local campaign, ShopTiburon. Via branding, blog design and PR, we’re spreading the word that Tiburon is the BEST little town on the San Francisco Bay.

With charm reminiscent of quaint New England fishing villages and world-class views rivaling the most scenic European vistas, Tiburon is an oft-overlooked travel destination. Why visit? The rich, green rolling hills, the deep blues of the SF Bay, the breathtaking million dollar homes – all coupled with unparalleled views of the Golden Gate Bridge, city skyline and Angel Island.

But don’t take it from us, follow ShopTiburon for the most buzz-worthy news, events, and happenings in town. Or better yet, come visit and see for yourself!

Sagrada Wellness is one of Orma Design & Communications’ favorite PR clients so we’re beyond excited to share that they’re featured in the July 2010 issue of SPA Magazine! Enjoying more than 300 days of sunshine a year, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico is one of the great destination cities of the Americas. Situated 6 miles outside the historic, colonial town lies the luxurious, all-inclusive Sagrada Wellness. The retreat sits on 15 open acres and offers panoramic views of the vast and lush countryside. Guests enjoy daily yoga, Pilates, horseback riding, heart-pumping hikes, hot springs, tranquil spa facilities, healthy gourmet cuisine and more!

Orma Design & Communications was thrilled to promote the annual Tiburon Classic Car Show this year. Held on Saturday June 19, 2010, the cars were beyond amazing (LOVED the Packards and Jaguars!), the crowd was huge, and the town was hopping! A huge thank you to all the fantastic media that helped make the event such a great success: Pacific Sun, Bay Area on the Cheap, Blue and Gold Fleet, The San Francisco Chronicle, Marin Magazine, Marin Independent Journal, Tiburon Ark, Fun Cheap SF and more!

photo courtesy Tiburon Classic Car Show

photo courtesy Tiburon Classic Car Show

photo courtesy Tiburon Classic Car Show

Orma Design & Communications had the awesome opportunity to promote The 27th Annual Tiburon Wine Festival event this year. Along with fantastic media coverage in: Wine Enthusiast, Marin Magazine, Wines & Vines Magazine, Napa Valley Life Magazine, Marin Independent Journal, The San Francisco Examiner, MarinScope Newspapers, Pacific Sun, and the Tiburon Ark (to name just a few), the festival has officially sold out!

27th Annual Tiburon Wine Festival in May 2010 Marin Magazine

Located in one of the most picturesque waterfront communities in the world, The Tiburon Wine Festival is San Francisco’s premier outdoor wine event. Boasting breathtaking views, world class wines (vintages from over 60 premium wineries) savory food from over 20 restaurants and vendors, a giant silent auction, and live entertainment – this event is not to be missed!

To quote Billy Joel, “A bottle of red, a bottle of white. I’ll meet you anytime you want….” Hope to meet you at the The 27th Annual Tiburon Wine Festival next Saturday, May 15th.

Besides drooling over beautiful typefaces, amazing graphic designers, and the creative work featured in Communication Arts Magazine, I LOVE classic cars. The design, innovation, history, craftsmanship – I’m fascinated by all of it thanks to my awesome Dad who introduced me to their timeless beauty as a young girl. So I couldn’t be more flippin’ excited to announce the annual Tiburon Classic Car Show on Saturday, June 19th, 2010!

For the price of…well, nothing…Dad’s get to drool over the most rare and beautiful classic cars ever built while taking in the beauty of the most picturesque waterfront community on the San Francisco Bay. Set against the breathtaking backdrop of Tiburon Waterfront Park (with amazing views of San Francisco and Angel Island), the Tiburon Classic Car Show is a BEST BET for a fun, family-friendly way to celebrate Dad’s Day weekend.

After the daytime Tiburon Classic Car Show festivities, evening celebrations abound as the event moves a selection of their stellar cars to downtown Main Street. All attendees will receive fabulous budget-worthy coupons from local merchants (that will last throughout the night and into the following week!) Drink, eat, shop, celebrate, and ogle over the last remaining 1950’s factory team XK D race car – one of the most rare and extraordinary Jaguars ever built. Sure beats getting Dad a lame tie again, don’t you think? Oh, and did I mention – it’s totally FREE.

Details, Details:
Neighborhood: Tiburon, CA
Ticket Price: FREE!
Event Date: 6/19/10
Time: 11am-9pm
Street address: Shoreline Park/Tiburon Waterfront Park, Tiburon, CA (Paradise Drive – near ferry landing)
Phone number: 415-297-2615
Email: tomaoneill@comcast.net
Website: http://www.tiburonclassiccarshow.org

(originally appeared in SF Examiner 04/27/10)

Orma Design’s PR client, Domestic Concierge has a full-page feature in the February 2010 issue of Gentry Magazine! Domestic Concierge is a San Francisco-based life-style consultancy: think of them as your on-call personal assistant, organizational guru, and event planner all rolled into one. Two weeks late picking up dry cleaning? Totally forgot to mail your good friend’s b-day present last week? In desperate need of a vacation but can’t find the time to plan it?  How awesome would it be if there was someone to take care of all the dirty little details in your life (and then some)…Domestic Concierge rocks!

Because of the PR buzz Orma Design created for the Tiburon Chamber of Commerce’s 2009 “A Storybook Holiday Festival,” (as seen in: 7×7 SF,Bay Area on the Cheap, NBC Bay Area, InsideBayArea.com, Marin Magazine, SF Gate,SF City Dish, The Squid List, Fun Cheap SF, SF Station, Marin Mommies, Pacific Sun, MoreMarin,San Jose Mercury News, and more!) it has caught national attention – NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC that is.


Interested in capturing the colour and life of San Francisco Bay Area’s holiday festivities, a smallAustralian Film Crew from National Geographic is tentatively set to record highlights from tonight’s celebration: classic holiday caroling by Oakland’sYoung Performers International Chorus, christmas tree lighting, costumed characters strolling along magical Main Street, yummy gingerbread house making, tasty treats and more!

As typical of most small town holiday celebrations, past PR for Tiburon’s local events included banner’s placed around town and mentions in the local newspaper, the Tiburon Ark.Although, hesitant at first to spend the marketing dollars on PR in an economy struggling to gain momentum, the Chamber is definitely seeing the benefits.

With breathtaking views of the city skyline, Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco Bay, and Angel Island, Tiburon CA is by far one the most under-rated, must-see small town’s in the Bay Area.  So come join in the festivites this evening from 5:30pm to a “twinkling hour” and experience the town’s eclectic shops and tasty restaurants (who will be offering budget-worthy discounts, btw!)

OR make a weekend trip of it! This Saturday the Belvedere-Tiburon Landmarks Society’s will be holding it’s annual Holiday Crafts Fair on Dec 5th from 10am-4pm at The Cottage at the Art and Garden Center, 841 Tiburon Blvd., Tiburon, CA 94920. The Holiday Crafts Fair will feature fabulous indie goodies from Bay Area artisans. You don’t want to miss this!
(originally appeared in SF Examiner  12/04/09)

If your house were on fire and you could only save a few items, what would they be? For me (assuming my husband, cat, and laptop were out of harms way) it would have to be my favorite collection of graphic design books. And what if by chance, you happen to come into a whole bunch of money? How would you spend it? For me, (assuming my husband, cat, and laptop were all in good health) it would have to be – more graphic design books, please!

For the newbie designer and seasoned professional alike, graphic design books offer a wealth of knowledge, fantastic inspiration, and oodles of amazing eye candy (not to mention awesome PR for the designer whose work is featured). In fact, I don’t know a single graphic designer who hasn’t at one point in their career fantasized about having their ownwork reproduced in one of those publications.

So how exactly does one go about getting into some of the best darn graphic design books on the market today, like the wildly successful Big Book of Logos series or The American Corporate Identityannuals? Nancy Heinonen, Publications Director of Crescent Hill Books (and the team responsible for producing those aforementioned titles and a ton more goodies) helps shed some light on the subject, and even offers some juicy tips on how to bring your own design book ideas to fruition. Read on! READ FULL ARTICLE: SF EXAMINER

In promoting my San Francisco graphic design and copywriting firm, Orma Design and my clever greeting card company, She’s SO Creative, I’ve learned a few things about SEO (Search Engine Optimization). I’ve learned that just about anyone can do it.

No, I’m not a programming geek and my companies have definitely not been around for twenty years. But if you Google “SF graphic designer,” “SF book designer” or even “SF logo designer” you will find either my articles as the SF Graphic Design and Branding Examiner or Orma Design itself, on the first one or two pages of Google. Likewise, if you search for “clever greeting cards,” “creative greeting cards,” or “creative mother’s day cards,” She’s SO Creative appears on the first page of Google.

So how did I do it? I used a combination of several tactics, the most important being key words and phrases in the title of the website and in the first searchable words of the web page itself. There are tons of articles on the internet that make this exact same point, yet all too often I see award-winning graphic design and even PR firms (who are paid to know this stuff!) with nothing but the name of their company in the title. This is the easiest, least time consuming, most effective action you can take to improve your graphic design firm’s (or whatever company you have) ranking on the Internet. For example, I literally have the phrase “San Francisco Book Design” in the title on the page where I feature one of my book design projects. Plus, the first searchable words on that page contain the exact phrasing “book design.” Thus, when someone is in a need of a book designer in San Francisco, they can easily find me because my site has excellent rankings for that specific search.

In addition, we all know that writing graphic design articles or starting a graphic design blog are highly effective promotional tools. However, I’ve seen professional design blogs that discuss anything from the birth of their first-born child to the delicious chocolate mousse they ate the night before. Although these are both joyously momentous occasions that you want to share with the world, maintaining a blog is hard work and requires precious man-hours. So how do you make every post count? Relevant, interesting, informative articles with key phrases in the title as well in the writing itself are optimum for both search rankings and attracting readership. Just review this very article you’re reading right now on “How to Increase Website Visitors and Promote Site: For Graphic Designers, Copywriters, and Creatives.” Both the title and it’s content are laden with key words and phrases that will help me come up on search engine results (could I have used the word “design” any more times???)

So what the heck are you waiting for you? Go make these changes now. By implementing these tactics, with just a little time and effort, you can seriously improve your web presence, attract more visitors, and gain new clients. You’re still reading aren’t you? Seriously, I know I’m a good writer, but stop reading this article and go get some business!

(originally appeared in SF Examiner  4/08/09)