Lisa Newby has is our lead webmaster and heads up our outsourced web services team, which provides SEO, social media, newsletter production, web operations and ad ops services to our clients. She also serves as a designer supporting our print outsourcing services.

Lisa comes to Creative Circle after having served as the lead producer for Gannett’s New England newspapers, where she was responsible for optimizing content for the sites and also managing social media posts. Her job was basically to get the highest readership possible from each story and to drive subscription sales by emphasizing content most likely to result in subscription conversions.

Lisa also works as a consultant and trainer and can lead workshops on SEO and social media strategies. So she adds another layer to Creative Circle’s deep training and consulting capabilities.

Lisa has spent almost her entire working career in newspapers, and most of them connected in one way or another with The Providence Journal, where Bill Ostendorf, our founder and president, and two other Creative Circle managers – Scott Kingsley, COO, and Lynn Rognsvoog, design director – overlapped with Lisa’s career.

At the Journal, Lisa moved from a photo technician to photo editor to designer working for Ostendorf. She continued working on the design desk after the takeover by Belo Corporation. When GateHouse bought the paper and largely eliminated the design and photo teams, Lisa managed to survive those staffing cuts and moved into working on the web site. When Gannett bought the paper and continued cutting the staff, she moved to her role as an SEO and social media specialist.

“I’ve always enjoyed working in the news department through changing roles and changing technology,” said Lisa. “I love learning new things and working with different technologies and content so I’ve always been able to adapt to new things.” Her favorite job among all of …   More

Greg Booras has joined Creative Circle Media Solutions as National Sales Director in November, 2022. He is focused on helping us expand into the magazine industry and accelerate the growth of the company across all industries and product categories. He’ll play an active role in product development as well as sales.

Greg had several roles early in his career that made him a tech expert and innovator. He began as an electronics technician with secret clearance in the U.S. Navy based in Norfolk, Va. He was a computer manager for A.B. Dick Company then co-founder and vice-president of HI-TEK Systems, an authorized Microsoft OEM system builder.

In 1983, Greg joined the Small Newspaper Group in Moline, Ill., where he managed the technology staff, led technology decisions and created Quad Cities Online, an early Internet dial-up service. He managed technology for the Moline Dispatch, overseeing computer hardware and software as well as web site operations.

Ironically, his tenure there overlapped with Tim Benson's time at Small Newspaper Group. Tim is now our lead developer.

Greg then switched from technology to sales. He worked for Town News from 2004 until 2016 as vice president of sales. He helped that firm grow its revenues from $5 million to $17 million during his tenure. While there, he served on the R&D advisory committees for both America East the Southern Newspaper Publishers Association.

At Town News, he worked with Sean Finch, our VP/sales.

In 2016, he joined Mirabel Technologies as national sales manager, where he focused on The Newspaper Manager CRM product line, later adding their Magazine Manager products.

"Like everyone at Creative Circle, I want to see newspapers stay in the hands of local and family publishers,” said Booras. “I’m honored to be joining such a talented team and I look forward to playing an instrumental role in shaping the future of Creative Circle.”

Greg passionate about cooking, …   More

Heather is a software developer and programmer and works on back-end development and web site launches at Creative Circle.

Heather has over 29 years of professional experience in systems analysis and design, database design and management, and web design and programming. She has been involved in selling, training, installing and creating a wide range of software in corporate environments. Her lifelong passion for technology, math and problem-solving started at a young age when her father first brought home a TRS-80 from Radio Shack. Heather wrote her first BASIC program and was hooked.

After graduating from the University of Rhode Island with a B.S. in Management Information Systems she launched a professional career that had her designing and programming throughout the United States and Canada.

Heather is passionate about introducing and mentoring young women in the field of technology. While raising two daughters, she took a break from corporate software and she became a teacher at an all-girls’ school, teaching computer science, software development, robotics and algebra.

Now, at Creative Circle, she has come back full circle – back to designing and programming software. Heather loves the fast-paced environment that modern technology brings to the professional world. There is always something new to explore and learn.

"This is a small company and everyone gets a lot of autonomy and trust," says Heather. "It's a supportive team atmosphere."

She and her husband are owners of a family business, East Bay Ice, so she enjoys working at a small, family owned business and helping family owned newspapers and local media entrepreneurs.

"I like learning new things," says Heather.  "And there is a lot to learn here -- both about the newspaper industry and the rapidly changing web technology that we are working in."

You can contact Heather at HSwift@creativecirclemedia.com.

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DuoPictures is a small-footprint production company creating photographs and films for nonprofit organizations and clients in healthcare, high educate, technology and business in Rhode Island and Massachusetts. Scott Kingsley and David DelPoio, both long-time photojournalists and photo editors, have partnered in the venture.

Clients include many entities at Brown University; the Warren Alpert Medical School, Public Affairs and University Relations, the Watson Institute for International Studies and the Cogut Center for the Humanities. Also, Johnson and Wales University, Bryant University, Thundermist Health Center, Coastal Medical, Inc. and many community-based service organizations and businesses, such as Independence Home Care, PACE Organization of Rhode Island and YWCA Rhode Island.

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Scott joined Creative Circle in August 2022 as Chief Operating Officer, but he's very familiar with Creative Circle and most members of the team.

As COO, he oversees customer support and new site launches as well as our facilities and equipment and other stuff. And he has long served as one of our specialist consultants and trainers for audio and video journalism.

In 1994, Bill Ostendorf, then managing editor for visuals at the Providence Journal, hired Scott from the Newport News (Va.) Daily Press. Scott started as a photo editor, working beside Lynn Rognsvoog, who was the Journal's lead designer and now holds the same role at Creative Circle.

Scott became the assignment editor, managing the visual department's day-to-day coverage and resources. While Bill, Scott and Lynn were at The Providence Journal, the paper won NPPA's Best use of Photos and covered major events, including multiple pro championships and the crash of John Kennedy's plane on Martha's Vineyard and the 2003 Station fire in West Warwick. The Journal was named a Pulitzer finalist for its coverage. Scott eventually rose to AME for visuals before leaving the Journal (that is to say, he was laid off in 2009). After recovering from that shock, Scott and a colleague hustled freelance photo and video assignments for colleges, nonprofits and medical organizations for several years — working out of spare space in the Creative Circle offices in East Providence.

While he was building his freelance business, Scott was offered a job he couldn't refuse. So for seven years, Scott worked as Director of Multimedia at the Houston Chronicle. He was once again working with top photojournalists in a great newsroom.

Highlights from his Houston years include organizing and editing coverage of a Final Four, Hurricane Harvey (and several other major flood events), explosions, an Astros World Series win, presidential elections, the pandemic, the murder of Houston-native George Floyd — and, oh …   More

Denise handled a wide range of projects, from producing print products to designing web sites. She does some programming and web site modifications as well as coaching clients on photo pre-press.

Denise's background includes designing ads, pre-press production, color-correction, writing, and photography at two Rhode Island newspapers: The Providence Phoenix, and the Providence Journal, where she worked with both Bill Ostendorf and Lynn Rognsvoog.

She has also worked in pre-press at a printing company and as a web producer at Lifespan, a network of hospitals in Rhode Island.

She is also a freelance photographer who enjoys photographing weddings, events and live music and designing photo books. She grew up and lives in East Providence, R.I., with her husband, Greg.   More

Ellen J. Meany is the publisher of The American Prospect and the president of the Alternative Newsweekly Foundation.

She was the digital director for the Small newspaper group and the creative director for Isthmus — Madison, Wisconsin’s alternative weekly newspaper — where she oversaw art direction, design and production for all editorial and advertising content. Her Isthmus work has been recognized with awards from the Milwaukee Press Club and American Advertising Federation.

Ellen served as a program director for advertising design for the Society for News Design, In addition to leading SND design seminars, she has spoken on editorial or ad design for the Association for Alternative Newsweeklies, the Pennsylvania Press Association, and the New Jersey Press Association. She has been working with Creative Circle since 2002.

After graduating with a B.S. from the Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, she started her career as a production artist, reporter and photographer for the Advertiser PhotoNews in Warwick, NY. She moved from there to graphic arts director at the News/Voice newspapers group in Highland Park, Ill.

Ellen ended up in Madison on a whim in 1991, when she and her husband purchased a farm in nearby Stoughton. She has beautiful son, Aaron, and still owns the farm.   More

Darryl is one of our leading software developers and also a top-notch problem solver.

A native Rhode Islander, Darryl has always been pulled between his creative and analytical sides. He attended the University of Rhode Island intending to graduate with a degree in chemical engineering. However, college had other plans for him.

Graduating with a Bachelor of Arts – majoring in studio art with minors in art history and chemical engineering – Darryl began his career in 1995, for then print-based Auto Trader Magazines as a graphic artist. From there he entered the world of newspapers as the Production Manager for The Jamestown Press.

During his time at The Jamestown Press, Darryl began to recognize the importance of websites for the communications industry and began learning to code web pages. He took those skills to the next level at Providence Business News, where he met Bill Ostendorf, Tim Benson and Lynn Rognsvoog who were all consulting for PBN at that time. Creative Circle redesigned PBN. Twice.

After working with the company as a client, Darryl wanted to join the Creative Circle team, which he did in 2017. "It's an incredibly collaborative environment. One in which the team bounces ideas off each other and work well together. But it's also one where our clients help us push to become more innovative. Each day brings a new challenge. Solving their real-world needs and concerns are what make coming to work enjoyable," he said.

Darryl brings more than 20 years of print-production and graphic-design experience to Creative Circle, along with his programming skills and a unique perspective having been on the client side of the table. In return, Creative Circle feeds both his creative and analytical sides. But when not diving into new coding projects, programming languages, applications, designs or redesigns, Darryl can usually be found exercising his chemical engineering skills at his Warwick home, brewing beer or mead.

He also runs a …   More

On Feline Fridays, Charlotte - the Ostendorf's kitten – sometimes joins our team.

She tries to be helpful, cleaning off our desks by pushing things onto the floor and entertaining us with her exploits. She walks all around the office on the tops of the panels that separate our desks.

All of us enjoy having her around. Don't even ask about the time she managed to get into the ceiling, however!

As she has gotten older, she has become more troublesome and a less frequent office partner. Like many employees everywhere, she has chosen to work mostly from home these days.

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Mirabel Technologies is a privately owned, international software company that empowers businesses to grow. Company President, Mark McCormick, founded Mirabel in 2003 with the original vision to help publishers in a challenging media environment. Drawing from his experience launching over a dozen successful magazines, McCormick introduced Mirabel’s first product, The Magazine Manager, the first web-based CRM for publishers, which now serves more than 15,000 media properties worldwide.

Since then, several other products followed suit including Digital Studio, The Newspaper Manager, Flip and Share, and now its newest, most advanced platform, Mirabel’s Marketing Manager. Like all Mirabel products, Mirabel’s Marketing Manager is supported by experienced web developers and software consultants who ensure our clients have a great user experience.

We've partnered with Mirabel to create a full-service classified platform, integrating their classified front end and print production capabilities with our QuickAds platform, which provides for inovative web classified displays and self-service classified web entry.

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Bill Ostendorf is president and founder of Creative Circle Media Solutions, a network of talent he has been building for more than 35 years. Because he believes that quality journalism is essential to American democracy, he has committed the company to helping local and family owned media thrive. 

Bill has worked with more than a thousand media companies on three continents as a trainer or management consultant and has led the redesign of more than 750 print publications and hundreds of web sites. Bill founded Creative Circle in 1984 at the tender age of 28. Even then, he was committed to the concept of teamwork and named his group accordingly. After 16 years of balancing part-time consulting and full-time work as a newsroom editor and manager, Bill left The Providence Journal to manage Creative Circle full time in June, 2000.

Bill is an energetic and entertaining speaker who has been featured at hundreds of industry conferences in 23 countries. Trained as a reporter, he aspired to be a columnist, but quickly moved from reporting to editing to design. "I wanted to be the next Mike Royko in my native Chicago, but it just never happened. I wasn't funny or engaging enough in print!" he says.

Instead, he became a specialist at helping "word people," "visual people" and "tech people" work together. "My bosses kept asking me if I could take pictures, manage the photo department, design pages or redesign papers – all things I originally had little training for. I kept saying 'yes' to these new assignments when I probably should have said 'no.' But I developed a passion for helping people avoid all the mistakes I had to suffer through learning on the job."

In a similar fashion, he later became an innovator in finding new ways for newspapers and other media companies to grow their revenues, especially online.

In 2004, frustrated with the terrible software options available to Creative Circle's consulting clients, Bill founded a software company arm …   More

Sean is our VP/Sales and is involved in product development and sales of our software and other services – from outsourcing to print redesigns.

He also provides web sales training and leads sales blitzes to help our clients generate more revenue from our web platforms, particularly through web display ads and Premium Pages.

He can bring his sales expertise to your market to lead a sales blitz, training your reps in digital sales while selling enough digital advertising to have a real impact on your bottom line.

Sean started his sales career 30 years ago in Cable Television Advertising with TCI Cable and quickly rose through the ranks to General Sales Manager. He then joined DonTech, a subsidiary of Reuben H. Donnelley and Dun & Bradstreet where he sold yellow pages and was named MVP, winning President Club awards for sales.

Joining TownNews.com in 2000 as one of that firm's first sales reps, he spent 13 years in all facets of the company along with being instrumental in the launch of their SWAT division. He left Town News after a restructuring of the SWAT team and became a founding member of the SPARK Digital Sales Group, a team of ex-Town News SWAT sales folks.

Sean lives in Davenport, Iowa, with his wife Angela and sons Owen and Oliver. He's a big fan of the Chicago Cubs and the Iowa Hawkeyes football and basketball teams.

Contact Sean at sean@creativecirclemedia.com or 309-269-7834.   More

Hello there, and welcome to the CCMS dev blog!

I’m Tim, our product developer here. Not too far back, while organizing this revamped website, I thought it might be fun to start up a discussion about life in the trenches of digital media, so to speak. A techie-to-techie kind of thing, covering things like software, infrastructure, coding, industry trends, and so forth — all as it pertains to our world of online publishing.

Progress in our industry just barrels along at a staggering pace. I’m lucky enough to have “grown up with the web,” so to speak. I cut my teeth in the 90s, writing Perl CGI apps, and supporting Netscape Navigator 3.x

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Grow your top line with effective on-site consulting and sales training from The Blinder Group. The Blinder Group provides sales support for Creative Circle products, including QuickAds and NativeNewsQ.

Choose from strategic planning, and dynamic, classroom training; or have the Blinder Group ride with your sales reps to close guaranteed new business for your media property! The bottom line is: We will tailor a program that will make you money!

The Blinder Group provides:

~ The "Multimedia Master Class"

Starting with the basics of the Web, to how to craft the best solutions, the Multimedia Master Class will offer proven methods that enable and empower traditional advertising salespeople and managers to offer online products for big dollars.

~ Sales Survival Training

We can train the novice as well as the seasoned salesperson on the skills and systems to help them close more business! Attendees will learn techniques in building better customer rapport, uncovering customer needs, identifying new prospects, closing more effectively, and establishing time management skills.

~ Assisted, "4-Legged" Sales Training/Closing Calls

No one has made more money for media companies than The Blinder Group! This is due to our vast knowledge of proven multimedia strategies, as well as a firm belief that the best method to teach a media salesperson how to sell, is show them how to do it! That is why so many media companies take advantage of our "in the car" sales call training, which guarantees new revenue for you!

~ Strategic Planning Workshops

The Blinder Group will consult and provide insights on multimedia program development, pricing, packaging, competitive challenges and sales infrastructure. We can reveal through "best practices" how other media properties are making money. And, then assist in crafting your offerings.

Plus speaking programs, seminars, webinars and workshops.

The Blinder Group

www.blindergroup.com

Tampa …   More

Watch this space for an engaging blog by Bill Ostendorf, president and founder of Creative Circle, along with other blogs from some of our top consultants!

We'll cover hot issues in the industry, talk about the next generation of journalists, share insights into design, writing and multimedia reporting and management.

We're looking forward to it!

– The Creative Circle team

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Lynn Rognsvoog is our design director and has worked in the newspaper and magazine publishing industry for more than 30 years, and has experience in print and web design, art direction, design coaching, word and picture editing, and management.

She has a passion for finding the best way to tell each story – online and in print.

Lynn has worked with Creative Circle since 1998. Among her print redesign projects are Trends Journal, The Sumter Item of Sumter, S.C., the Daily Journal in Kankakee, Ill., the Middletown Record of Middletown, N.Y., the Idaho Statesman of Boise, Idaho, The Berkshire Eagle in Pittsfield, Mass., the Post-Bulletin in Rochester, Minn., and The Record of Bergen County, N.J.

She developed bermuda.com branding and marketing materials, which won international awards, and redesigned and produced their print magazine, The Guide.

She was a lead designer and photo editor for the 13 years she worked at The Providence Journal, where she also worked with Bill Ostendorf, founder of Creative Circle. Large projects she worked on included stories about Noel Earley, a man dying of ALS; Edward DiPrete, the former governor of R.I. who was convicted of corruption; an oil spill near Newport, R.I.; and an historical look at Rhode Island over the course of the twentieth century. Lynn edited award-winning photo columns (Mary Beth Meehan's "Our Times," and Connie Grosch's "Weddings"), and won numerous other magazine and newspaper design and editing awards.

Before working at the Journal, she was art director of the Boston-based Tab Newspapers, and art director and managing editor of New England Business magazine. She held other magazine editing and production jobs before that.

Lynn earned a Bachelor of Arts from Wells College in Aurora, N.Y., and has further training in design, typography and creativity. She lives in Rhode Island with her husband and son.   More

Tim, our lead developer and software engineer, began working with Creative Circle in 2006. He quickly became the person we turned to to get stuff done and he is the engineer behind the core of our entire software stack.

Tim is a techie who specializes in print media. Experienced in programming, server administration and hardware, he has been active in the industry since 1999. He has worked as a staffer for and consultant to a number of magazine and newspaper publications.

He is at heart a web guy, however, whose career has evolved alongside the digital landscape. He enjoys following the rapidly expanding technologies that drive our world, and can be counted on to bring the latest innovations to each project.   More

Adam is leading the charge of developing our newsroomQ platform, which is built in Ruby on Rails.

Adam is a veteran, full-stack software developer who's been working in the field for more than 15 years. He's proud to have had a small part it making the web what it is today and he's always excited to help drive it even further. Over the years, he's worked for small businesses, large organizations, startups and even individuals. He's been a one-man-team, led teams, built teams and trained teams.

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