I have been thinking about the previous year and the things that I did and accomplished and the clients I worked for and the partners I collaborated with in business.  Overall, it was an exciting year for me and a year that so some growth and a year for learning.  I had the opportunity to make many new friends and some of those friends came from Hawaii.  I spent a wonderful week in May and June in Hawaii on the So Much More Hawaii Tour, and then organized a conference called the Social Media Business Summit in conjunction with Blog World & New Media Expo where I spent most of the year as their Social Media Director and Conference Director.  One By One Media was a title sponsor of the Social Media Business Summit in Hawaii and we enjoyed the time there.  I am wanting to go back now, not working, and not blogging or being a part of something work related besides enjoying the beach, the beautiful blue water and the waves crashing on the sand.

I was great meeting new friends while in Hawaii, like, Chris, Christine, Bruce Fisher and his wife, Neenz and Noe and Melanie, Marijane, Mark, and Aric, and Leah and Sheila and well you get the idea, it was a year of gaining friends and experiencing life.  Most of all it was becoming a part of a new community.

jim turner on ‘[re]think:hawaii’ from aric s. queen on Vimeo.

I will be recapping much of 2009 and some of what we accomplished as a company and will cover some of the initiatives for clients and how we grew in the world of social media consulting and social media management.

We will be soon relaunching Social Mediasphere Radio, with some new friends, which will also be a part of SMTV.  We are also going to have a new site here soon and we will refocus our efforts to be a trailblazer in the world of social media.  I have some events I will be speaking at soon and I will do a list of those so we may perhaps be able to meet and I will get a chance to make friends in another community.

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I was going through my feeds last night and funneling all of my reads as I tend to do in the evenings and sharing some of what I found to be interesting to my community through Twitter.  This is becoming more and more of a habit with me as I tend to pour through a lot of data.  What I think might be of interest to my followers I share.  I am generous that way.  Actually it is part of my overall plan to let the blogosphere and other platforms know that I exist—I network therefore I am.  I see a t-shirt in the makings here.

As I approached the 11:00 pm hour I noticed that my Tweetdeck was acting up.  I am the type that wants everything just to work.  I don’t care about the Internet service and other stuff I want it to work when I hit the power button.  The same thing goes for Twitter.  When I hit send and let everyone what is happening, I want it to work.  When it doesn’t I just chalk it up to another fail whale.  That is until today when I found out that Twitter was hacked.  Not  hacked by a 13 year old kid in his parents basement but by the “Iranian Cyber Army”.  Excuse me?  I was just watching a Leo Laporte show about Cyber Warefare and making fun of it actually on Twitter, but now I read that headline on TechCrunch.  You can see the rest of the coverage on Techmeme.

Twitter is starting to lose my trust.  Is this what we are going to expect out of Twitter’s future?  There has been numerous Phishing problems with Twitter and there are many other incidents just this year of them getting hacked and Google documents being obtained.  I am losing trust for Twitter quickly.  I hope they will learn from the recent attack and work on making adjustments.  Do you trust Twitter?  I’m not sure I would give them my user and password for…. Ooops!  [Runs to change password again]  I am clearly not trusting the Twitter world at present.

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I have been keeping ahead of the game of new and shiny objects by trying out the latest and greatest in tools that can be used for social media programs at companies. I have always come back to the main point of view as it relates to tools that work.  I was reading a recent blog post by David Armano related to this very idea.  David states better than I can about dusting off some of the old tools before trying out new and shiny ones:

Your Blog(s): Your company is blogging. Congratulations. Is anyone listening? Blogging was the bright and shiny object of 2006-2008 and many companies found out just how hard it is to do well. Good blogging provides value. It is interesting and generates a healthy amount of comments and conversation which in turn generates a good dose of Google juice. It’s also terribly difficult to sustain. It requires cultural shifts within an organization, and has to be prioritized (read: made part of someone’s job). Frankly, I rarely see outstanding examples of a good company blog. That doesn’t mean it’s not worth doing (if it makes sense strategically), but doing it well is another story.

Many companies have still not taken on blogging as a tool that will work for them.  They have gone straight to Twitter or Facebook fan pages or none of the above as yet.  I am of the camp that blogs are a place to start, and a place to start a social media foundation.  I am dusting off the blog here and trying myself to get back into the swing of blogging for business.  This is the message I mention in most conversations.  Is you blog dusty?  Perhaps a little cleaning is in order and some attention given. Then you can go off to find a new and shiny tool.

Tags: Corporate Blogging, Professional Blogging, Bloggers For Hire, Social Media, Social Media Tools

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I have been preaching about blogging for a long time.  I have been an evangelist and telling companies that they had to blog more they had to have a place for people to "join the conversation" and making it possible for them to connect with their customers.  Like some of the preachers of the past, I am my own worst sinner apparently.  I was reminded by people in my company that I am the worst person in the world to tell companies that they are not blogging enough or that they are not doing it right.

I am preaching from the pulpit so to speak and I am preaching to the choir perhaps, but I need to update more often here.  I am trying to get more and more content on here and those that are slinging arrows at me the most may be asked to also contribute now and then to what we are doing at One By One Media and Bloggers For Hire.  I am also on Twitter quite a bit, and I am trying out Posterous, and I am about to start Social Mediasphere TV again.  Of course, you can always come and hear what we are doing at our new radio show at Blog World Expo Radio.

Now that BlogWorld & New Media Expo is over for 2009 I have a few minutes I can breathe, and I will be using that time to try to be more involved here rather than out on the road or on the phone trying to convert the latest in small medium or large business to jumping into the social media pool.  I guess I am like that life guard that actually never swims!

Photo via LeMonde1

Tags: One By One Media, Bloggers For Hire, Twitter, Posterous, Social Mediasphere TV, Blog World Expo Radio, Blog World Expo, Business Blogging, Evangelism

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I am behind the times on this one but I wanted to get it on my site to refer to it later.  This is a great video and worth the watch.

Some of the information in this video is already obsolete.  Social Media is moving at a rate that none of us can keep up with, and I for one sometimes must take a step back to look at the big picture to keep up with the rate of growth.

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I was just reading this morning on Techmeme the various sites that are discussing the closing down of the URL shortener service Tr.im.  I then came across a post written by Robert Scoble called, "Twitter’s platform shortcomings."  I have written a number of posts about Twitter here and we are seeing the company mature and grow before our eyes like a child.  Sometimes a child makes poor choices and sometimes they make us proud, but when I read things like the Twitter "blessing" and I have to cringe a little.  Blessing exerts some connotation of power, and with power comes great responsibility as we all know.  We see companies like Facebook with this same type of power and the same feeling of the hair standing on the back of my neck continues. I must echo Robert’s sentiment here when he states:

OK, most of you probably never have used tr.im to shorten your URLs so they fit into Twitter. But I did. I liked the URL better than bit.ly, which is the service that Twitter has “blessed.” Oh, how I hate Twitter’s “blessing.”

Pete Cashmore, of Mashable has another quote in his post that gives me the feeling all over again:

“…we just can’t justify further development since Twitter has all but annointed bit.ly the market winner.”

That from the Tr.im closing statement.  That is far too much power for one company, but I know that is part of doing business.  Google carries the same type of power and I have heard the likes of Michael Gray talk about the wielding of their power and how they can arbitrarily damn some sites and rise others to the heights of heaven.  I use that metaphor because that is nearly godlike in its functionality.  Google wants to be for good but not for evil and I suppose your definition of good and evil depend quite a bit on the way the ball bounces for you or against you.  In this case it seems that the ball has bounced against the folks at Tr.im.

We see applications come and go and in this particular instance it has implications that might hurt people in one camp over another.  To pick and choose who wins, who loses and how the game is played is far too much power in my opinion to give to companies.  The FTC is dabbling in the game with blogging and "sponsored conversations" and I would assume that some constituents will be contacting their authorities for some regulation of companies that have the power to bless.

Photo via polishamericancenter.org

Tags: Twitter, Techememe, Robert Scoble, Corporate Responsibility, Google

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I have been writing this blog post for the last 5 years.  No, I haven’t been actually writing this post for that long, but I have been preparing to write this post for nearly that long.  You see I have been a strategist a long time in Internet years.  I have put many of those strategies together, and I am happy to say that many of them actually worked, but I must also say unfortunately, some of them and I should say more than I care to admit have probably failed.  I tried most of these ideas and “campaigns” on my own company and used myself as the test subject.  I have always tried them in my own marketing, advertising and public relations and as I said, some work and some don’t. This post is not about the “try” or “the idea”, but the execution.

Many colleagues out there are expert strategists.  Many charge a pretty penny to come up with a strategy.  In fact, I too charge for that, and some would say (you know who you are) not nearly enough, but that is for a another post.  There are some great plans drawn out on the whiteboard of board rooms, and there are some bar napkins that I would like to have in a shadow box case as many of our greatest companies started there.  My company in fact was sort of started as a dare I think one night after having had too many drinks.  Having a good job and a stable company to work for, why would I ever jump into the entrepreneurial pool? I blame the alcohol.

“Build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door.” ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

All of us have the best mousetrap. That is our strategy.  We have the best way things can be done and the way that they should be done according to our extensive research and study. For my extensive study and research, (please see the archives here for a start) I have tried and failed and taken those ideas that have been most successful.  Some of it is still theory after all social media has been around less than some of my young children.  Given what we know of facts and how they are applied to each circumstance, all of the strategies seem to be close to the same Plan A or Plan B depending on which consultant or agency you happen to speak with about your company and needs.

I have noticed a trend based on some of the ideas and strategies implemented.  When companies are happy with a certain strategy it is only after the execution stage.  Most of them are all excited and gung-ho when the strategy is discussed and laid out in front of them, but the truly satisfied are not such until after the plan has been put into place and the results come to fruition.  Be it as simple as starting a company blog, setting up a comment policy, providing a podcast, or research on community outreach and providing that service and seeing your first conversion, the elation comes when the plan is executed.  It can be even more rewarding when a multifaceted and long and expensive journey has been commenced.

I am known for providing a sports metaphor now and then and this is not much different so I apologize for this ahead of time if you hate those. If I draw a play in the sand and at the snap of the football all goes to hell in a hand basket, the best laid plan pf x’s and o’s is not going to get me points on the board.  But when you truly make a plan, draw out a play and then deliver the ball to the end zone, all are happy and we get to celebrate with high fives all around.  Seems pretty simple.  The problem has always been execution.  As consultants or strategist are you executing your plan?  When was the last time you were in the end zone?

Tags: Social Media, Better Mouse Trap, Emerson, Social Media Marketing, Social Media Consulting, New Media

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There is something to say about getting a handwritten note in the mail. It may go back to the day when I was a young boy and we actually walked a mile to get the mail and it was so rewarding just to find that you had a letter from someone.  My mother would read the letter as we walked back home.  Or it could be that it is special when someone takes the tie to sit down and labor out a thoughtful note and spend the money and time to make sure you get it.  Either way, it is an art I think that is slowly going away with new technology and how we can just update our status or send a quick typed out email with LOL typed into 6 times.

I decided I would sit down and do that this time as i had a special reason for thanking this person.  I pulled out my fourth pen amongst the crayons on the junk drawer before I finally found one that would mark a mark, and sat down with pen in hand and began to write.  Yes that type of "write".  I suddenly realized that I was way out of practice with writing.  I realized that I only write chicken scratched notes while on the phone with people, and it has bee months since I actually wrote a check. I am out of practice and not sure I can even read my own writing.

I decided I need to practice this a little more otherwise I can’t look my kids in the eye with a straight face when I scold them on their penmanship at school.  Who knows, perhaps they won’t actually have writing in schools anymore. They may have texting 101 or shorthand for mobile 101.  Sad.  Now the next problem I have is actually finding an address for someone that does include an @ symbol.

[Photo via Wikipedia]

Tags: Handwriting, Mail, Technology, Social Media, Letters

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An old friend of mine is stepping down from b5media and he went public with it today.  I have known for a little while about his plans as we are actually working on a few projects together.  It is nice to see change happen but it can also be a little difficult to adjust.  I have always known Jeremy was a visionary back when I first heard of the fact that he was auctioning himself off as a blog consultant. 

I wanted to take am moment to congratulate Jeremy and the folks at b5media and also welcome their newest CEO Elaine Kunda.  The funny thing is I was not sure this was going public until I had actually read it on one of my own client’s blogs.  Strange how you found out about news.

Jeremy, as always you have been someone that has led the way in the blog world, in the social media world and now we are looking towards some big things from you in the near future with netmobs.

Tags: Jeremy Wright, netmobs, b5media

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I am not sure that anyone in the tech world has written about Twitter more than the popular news site TechCrunch.  You may have a hard time picking out the single most popular Twitter post since after 38 pages of search results on the subject I lost count of the number of articles.  The most popular recently was the scandal involving ill-gotten documents from the folks at Twitter which Tech Crunch promptly published. But more on that in a minute.

Twitter launched today their Twitter 101 pages and of note was their "Key Resources" page which is contained under the domain related to http://business.twitter.com/twitter101/.  I quickly glanced at the people that were listed on the page, and noticed right away that TechCrunch had been snubbed.  Not a single time was TechCrunch mentioned.  You would think with 38 pages of info on the company and some of the best Twitter evangelists on the planet, they could have worked a link back to TechCrunch somewhere.  Some of the best Twitter information contained anywhere is contained on the TechCrunch site.

Now this could just be a matter of numbers or it could be that they could not find a good snapshot overview of their service or it could be some other political reason that Twitter was quick to leave TechCrunch off the list as I mentioned above and wrote about in the TechCrunch and the Twitter Documents post.

This is not going to be too unlike the "Suggested Users" list and I am sure there will be plenty of folks that will be screaming about why they were not one of the featured resources that are listed.  Congrats to Chris Brogan for getting on this page with his 50 Ideas on Using Twitter for Business.  Okay, their might only be 10 in there but 50 was a good number.

Sorry TechCrunch I can assure you that the folks at Twitter are not going to cut you much slack from here forward, but keep up the good reporting and evangelizing!

[Hat Tip to Laughing Squid Links for beginning the inspiration for this post through the photo above.]

Tags: TechCrunch, Twitter, Twitter For Business, Twitter Business 101, Chris Brogan

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I have been a huge fan of BusinessWeek since I can remember.  I am also a big fan because of the likes of Stephen Baker who I have been reading in the blogosphere for quite some time as well.  I found Stephen’s post related to How to Fix BusinessWeek at his The Numerati blog and I was sad when I read it.  It was done in a manner that made me thing that fixing or saving journalism is a simple task but nearly impossible to execute.  I don’t think the likes of newspapers and other periodicals will be saved as they cannot be saved.  The numbers will make it insurmountable.   This opening from Stephen was very telling:

Monday I learned that BusinessWeek, where I’ve worked for 22 years, is on the block. It may be sold, or stay in McGraw-Hill (where it’s been for 80 years). But the business is losing money (I don’t know how much). Whoever ends up with it is going to have to figure out quickly how to turn a business news operation built primarily as a weekly magazine into a profitable franchise for the age of near ubiquitous and real-time information.

Losing money–that seems to be an understatement when you think of the offices and the infrastructure that is all the things that BusinessWeek has.  Huge buildings, rent, equipment, well the list goes without saying.  They have a huge budget to cover to bring us the news and the information or content we consume for free on the Internet.  Stephen follows that post with After The Madison Avenue Bubble.  This post hammers home another point that seems to be putting a nail in the coffin of the likes of BusinessWeek:

I just got up from my desk and took a stroll through these Midtown offices of BusinessWeek. In a matter of months, if someone buys the magazine, we’ll be gone. It’s terrific real estate. Down by the top editors’ offices, the big windows look across the Hudson. The eastern view looks across Rockefeller Center and toward the Chysler Building. These are expensive digs.

It took me a while to get used to working for a magazine that spent money like this.

That seems to be the biggest issue that will seal the fate of the likes of old media.  Spending money like they do and still producing what I can get for free elsewhere.  I am not a mogul in the business world but it seems to me that might be a problem.  It appears from what Stephen ended this latest post with was almost an acceptance stage of grief when he states:

But in the end, my initial  read turned out to be correct. The rich model for a weekly magazine was not sustainable. Those who want to be foreign correspondents today will be lucky to get what I expected: modest pay to work out of their apartments. It will attract mostly young people, which isn’t a bad thing. (They might ask more unschooled questions, but they’re more likely to move to the action and take chances.)  It turns out we rode something of a Madison Ave bubble for a few decades, and now it has popped.

Like Jeff Jarvis however, this seems to me to be quite an asset and something that could and should be fixed or in another word–saved.

Well, now, BusinessWeek is for sale and whoever gets it – it is a valuable franchise with a very valuable and wise crowd – will need to reinvent it. I was going to suggest that the magazine do for itself what we were thinking of doing for GM. But Steve beat me to it.

How do I fix BusinessWeek?  Easy, in a manner of speaking, I would level the playing field.  I have said many times at conferences, at business meetings, and over coffee with colleagues, if the journalists figure out new media, we are all out of a job.  Level the playing field is not as easy as it sounds.  But if we were to put journalists that have been reporting, writing and selling and have been on top of their game into the positions now being held by new media types at the places like TechCrunch, or other blogging networks, we would see the real cream of the crop.

BusinessWeek is taking their overhead, basically a champagne budget, and putting it up against the likes of Joe and Mary Blogger, publishing from free applications downloaded from the Internet from the comfort of their own home.  Joe and Mary’s overhead is nominal at best but they are being compared on the same plane now with those on Madison Avenue.  How do you compete with that?  Well certainly BusinessWeek has better access and better connections than does Joe and Mary, but that is beginning to change as well as bloggers gain access to back rooms and walled gardens that were usually only for "special people."  The scales were always tipped in favor of the "journalist" as they had the access, the diploma, the expense account and the social capital.  The latter of which has shifted in favor of those with the most voice, those with the most eyeballs, perhaps those with the most Twitter followers these days.  That seems to be the competition now, but that is another post.  Getting scooped by the guy in the building over from yours on Madison Avenue was expected, getting scooped from Joe or Mary the Pajama wearing citizen journalist is something entirely different.

Media costs are not even close to level.  You must level them to compete.  That means no more overhead.  Stephen mentions his 5% as being what BusinessWeek has, and Jeff Jarvis said it was what makes BusinessWeek better.  The other 95% has to compete in their eyes, and that can only be done by making the remaining 95% carry the same costs as paying the rent on the corner office, not on Madison Avenue, but on West Elm street in the corner of the kitchen.

Not anyone can write well. I know that there is no possible way I could compete with the likes of Stephen Baker in covering the latest in business news and writing and reporting.  The only way for me to compete is to provide the story hope someone sees it and that gets me recognized.  The only thing I have going for me is I am not being paid a six figure salary and paying $100,000 per month in rent for an office building and paying for the infrastructure that goes with that empire.  When Stephen starts working out of his home like I do and doing the same thing, I don’t stand a chance.  How do they fix BusinessWeek?  Just download Wordpress have Stephen work from the corner of his kitchen and do what he has been doing.  No way does their competition compete.  Now, the remaining problem, how do you charge the companies wanting to advertise for that model?  Welcome to the game BusinessWeek.

photo via BusinessWeek

Tags: BusinessWeek, Journalism, Blogging, Old Media, New Media

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I am not yet an expert, but I am trying to learn to be an expert in my area.  This is why I read experts.  I pay attention to what they are doing and I learn from them. If I listen and store away what they are providing me I garner wisdom.  I read people from all walks of life, I read from the marketer, the advertiser, the public relations person and yes, the baker and candlestick maker.  All of the people I read and learn from provide me a path to the knowledge about how I can help other businesses.

If I comment on blogs and if I leave a question or provide another perspective on a post, it is because I have read the bit of wisdom and have participated.  It is not much different from sitting in a classroom and hearing a lecture and then participating in that lecture by commenting, asking questions or debating an issue.  This is my classroom and how I am hoping to earn my thousands of hours to get to be an expert in what I do (I think I only have 5 years or 10,000 more hours of study).

I tend to read a large number of blog posts.  In fact, I have more than one feed reader and they are broken down themselves into business reader and personal reader, and even that has some cross over between them so I even read some blogs twice just in case.  I try to absorb as much as possible from those around me I do consider an expert to help me get to the next level.  Comments foster learning just like it did in grade school when you wanted to know why clouds produced rain or why the sky was blue and all those things of wonder that come to your mind during class.  Ask questions, get involved, leave a comment.

Photo via Vito

Tags: Social Media Experts, Social Media, Blog Comments, Blogging, New Media

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I have been doing an inordinate amount of reading and testing and looking and feeling and all the other things I try to do to get a handle on the state of the economy and how social media fits in with marketing, advertising, public relations and all of it, and I had in my mind what I would call an epiphany.  It may not be that much of a game changer to some, but to me it boiled a large amount of fertilizer into what I would refer to as the heart of the matter.  People like Seth Godin, Chris Brogan and others have one very difficult to obtain trait–they all have common sense.  That might sound like a "no kidding" statement but to many it seems like a far off planet we will never be able to reach.  They sell their common sense.

Businesses tend to get caught up in the bottom line, the minutia of day-to-day operations, the web of bureaucracy and other things that keep us unfocused and not able to keep our eye on the prize.  What some people offer is a way to get you back on track with the thoughts that started the business or made it successful to begin with and that is basic common sense.  Like a drink manufacturer that gets caught up in the "lime, the lemon and the wild cherry, when what they really need is someone to come in and say "Hey maybe you should just stick to cola."  They have their moment where they all high five in the board room and say, "This is awesome!!", and hand over their check.  I love that scenario in my mind. 

The guy that will be the most successful in the consulting business is the one that can’t really see the emperor’s new clothes.

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I have been talking about 2009 being the "Year of Listening".  This may be a little ahead of its time as we are still getting sign on for the idea that social media as a doctrine is even worth the space or tab for the business plan or model.  I think that social media gives an opportunity to do more listening and less shouting.  I even do this in the real world.  I tend to sit back and gather intelligence in a situation before I ever enter into the discussion or argument or whatever might be the mode of communication at the time.  I get more accomplished by first hearing what is being said and then contributing.  I tend to learn more about a subject and the people discussing that subject than I would if I jumped into the conversation early.  Many times I have done that I find myself with foot in mouth and backing out of the conversation sooner than later.  My first advice to many companies to to listen.

Now the other side of that coin that is usually the first reason many companies are not quick to sign on to the idea is listening does not convert.  I have heard many an executive tell me, "listening doesn’t sell."  After all that is the bottom line in a company selling your product or your service to the person that holds the money.  I recently spoke to a group and later the owner of the company met me in the hall and said "oh good someone that will explain how social media is going to help us SELL."  That four letter word is the only one I tend to hear from the likes of those looking at the bottom line.  I can assure you if sell is not the goal I will hear other four letter words that will describe certain feelings.  It really is only about the sell so how do you impart listening as a way to get the sale?  Listening does not convert.  Sure that statement might be true but when does your program have the ability to know when someone wants to buy or better yet what they want to buy?

I have been showing some companies that listening actually helps them sell.  I like to use the idea behind the tire swing.

Listening actually gets you to the final image, knowing what it is your customer actually wants.  The problem with that scenario is that the CEO or head of the department or whoever seems to be the decision maker has to be thinking about all the other panels in the cartoon above.  They have learned that making all the other departments happy and still coming in under a budget is what it is actually all about.  This is not listening.  If more of us actually listened for a while to find out what the customer actually wants, we could sell them that product every time.  Perhaps the problem is not that they don’t know what the customer actually wants, its what they can provide the customer from their company.  Maybe they sell jungle gyms and not tire swings.  This is a problem, and not something that social media will help them overcome. Listening converts but only if you actually listen.

Photo via sonyradio.com

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I have been traveling quite a bit lately and that has caused me to get seriously behind on a large amount of work that I need to accomplish.  I have finally caught up with my email inbox which usually hovers around 60 unread messages at any given time, which usually equates to the amount of Twitter bios I need to read to approve or discard.  I began digging into the RSS feed readers (yes plural) that I have disregarded that have been so overwhelmed that many of the search feeds I have for the likes of “business blogging” and “social media consulting” are defaulting to the most it will store.  In other words, I have much work and little time to get it done.  I know I play this off with the idea that I am also the stay at home dad of 4 kids at the ages of 9, 8, 4, and 3, and that has some merit but for the most part I have times when they are sleeping or are not in the picture that I spend catching up but I still think I can be more efficient. I know I need to explain the title of this post.  One of the things I need to catch up on that I have not been doing much of lately is finding what my mentors and friends and colleagues are talking about.  One of the people I admire and one that I think has his finger on the pulse of my industry is Robert Scoble.  I don’t intend for this to be a “Rah Rah Sis Boom Bah” about Robert, so let me explain using him as my example.

Robert is a busy person.  I thought that I was busy and had my hands in a lot of things and doing a lot of work, but for the most part I am not much different than your ordinary overworked and underpaid entrepreneur.  I have been to conferences and walked into that blogger lounge at 1:00 a.m. and have seen Robert’s wife Maryam begging to leave but he is still uploading the latest video and editing the last blog post before he turns in.  That is dedication and it is what inspires me most of the time when I am feeling overworked.  It makes me buck up and get things done more often.  Put to simple terms working hard makes you successful.  I know Gary Vaynerchuk preaches that from his own pulpit.  Working hard does actually payoff, but I must say I have worked hard for other people and all it did was make them more successful so I limit that to we entrepreneurs that want to get on top of the heap.  Sure I have been rewarded when working for others, but for the most part my hard work for them is just that, for them. I swear there is a point in here somewhere.

I just spent part of the morning reading blogs.  I have read all of the folks I love to read in my business, Chris Brogan, David Armano, Beth Harte, Amber Naslund, and yes the list goes on and on.  Many of them are also very much like Robert Scoble, and I could have used most of them as my title, but for me, Robert has been a blogger that has been cutting the trail for most of us in this business.  He is consistently good at what he does with his blog.  Let me give you some of the reasons he is good and why I often use him as an example to people when they want to know about how to be a good blogger.

• Consistency -  Even when he is inconsistent he is consistent.  He puts things up to read during slow news days and up when things are going crazy.  Sure he does not have a blog post every single day but posts when he wants and has something to say, which in itself is very consistent.
• Opinionated – He gives us his opinion.  He may be adding to the echo chamber of sorts but he always gets into his posts why he feels it is important.  Telling us why Twitter is cool is one thing but why YOU think it is cool and how YOU are using it or making it part of your life is another.
• Academic – He is a smart guy.  I have made fun of him in the past about being a “camera salesman” and I mean that more in jest than anything, but he is very smart about business.  He has seen the emergence of some very cool technologies that have gone on to be big players and he seems to know what works and has great insights into what businesses can do with their product or service.  I can see why he has VC friends.  They want to know what he thinks is cool.
• Human – He shows his human side.  I know when he is angry or when he is fed up or when he is happy about something.  I can see his humanness come through in his blog posts.  Not many people allow that or even begin to know how to impart that in their blog posts.
• Integrity – In a world full of “sponsored conversations” and sell-outs to the little tidbits of advertising dollars, he stays true to what he does, good blogging.  This has offered far more rewards than a $500 gift card or a free T-shirt.  This has also allowed his access to some of the brightest minds and has opened doors for him that others will never have offered to them.  He keeps his eyes on the big prize.
• Passionate – You can hear it in the way he talks about things.  His job, his wife and sons, and his friends.  I have this passion when I am a Daddy blogger and it helped me become a better blogger.  I have that passion but it does not always come out in my writing here.  Some days I write a post because I think Google might forget about me.  That is the wrong reason to put up a post.

As I indicated before, there are many many bloggers out there that have this very same resume and are doing it just as well in these areas or better.  I merely wanted to single Robert out as I had his RSS feeds on my list today and I began to feel very small in this big pond after reading and then looking back on my own blog and seeing how I have not been doing things well at all.  I have had some great posts and flashes of greatness in the past, but for the most part I can take what I have been taught by those doing it well and try to keep up with them.  I am not sure that is possible but I can hope to some day be like that. It took me back to a time when Robert called me out about my job as a blogger and I think maybe I need to go back to being better.  I am going to see if I can get into that swing and set out some goals for myself to add to the signal and not the noise.  For the moment I will leave you with that as I run into the next room to see if I can figure out what the kids just shattered on the kitchen floor.  Is summer over yet?  Thanks Robert, and when are you going to start that Daddy blog?

Photo via Wikipedia

Tags: Blogging, Robert Scoble, Scobleizer, Business Blogs, Social Media, Gary Vaynerchuk, Chris Brogan, Amber Naslund, David Armano, Beth Harte, Blog Posts, How To Blog

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