About Pat Parkhurst Higgins
Expertise:
I am a published writer and marketing communications professional. In 2006, after two decades in the print industry, I discovered the excitement of online media and became the lead voice and the senior copywriter for www.networksolutions.com -- a multi-million-dollar e-commerce website.
I recently left Network Solutions to accept contracting positions in order to have more exposure to new technologies and to discover new content strategies and methods.
My motto: great copy and design begins with understanding your target audience and ends with providing a good user experience.
Bio:
Throughout my career, I have been steadily writing newspaper and magazine articles, business advertorials, advertising copy, marketing collateral, training guides, website copy, and more.
I started as a news journalist wanting to be the next Dan Rather, but I soon discovered the business world and fell into marketing communications and sales. No matter which path my career was on, I always used my ability to write to inform and persuade my clients or my client’s customers. I strongly believe that putting customer benefits first is the only way to positively influence the buying decision.
In the early days of my career as a marcom specialist, I would produce turnkey print collateral. I'd research the industry, discover the product benefits, determine the best medium for reaching clients, write the copy, design and build the material, then work with the printer to produce the final collateral. I enjoyed owning the entire process.
I started my graphic design career using traditional typesetting equipment from a company called Varityper. When desktop publishing came along, I was trained by Apple out in Cupertino to create on the Mac. I was a big Mac geek at one point. I even had a gig providing help desk support to 100 art directors at a major ad agency in St. Louis.
I now work in the Internet industry where everyone specializes and few have the opportunity to own the entire development process. There are information architects, visual designers, copywriters, coders (developers), etc. And while I now focus on the content side of website development, I call on my design skills to help strategize site development in order to provide the best possible user experience.
First and foremost, however, I’m still a writer.