SOB Business Cafe 09-10-10
Filed Under Great Finds, Successful Blog | 1 Comment
Welcome to the SOB Cafe
We offer the best in thinking — articles, books, podcasts, and videos about business online written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.
The Specials this Week are
Six Pixels of Separation
Is it a Facebook page? Is it Twitter? Is it posting a video to YouTube? What about creating a Blog? What is the best way to grow an audience?
Fast Company by @KitEaton
Twitter’s traffic skyrocketed 33% over the summer, according to one survey. Meanwhile Digg’s influence was fading even before its controversial makeover.
Late yesterday Twitter announced that it had 145 million registered users–impressive, at around a third of the number of Facebookers and comparable to the number of people Apple’s just opened up its new music-based social network Ping to.
Redhead Writing
Let me get this straight:
You go somewhere to meet friends.
You arrive. You “check in.”
Aaaaaaand there are your friends.
***where’s the part about your phone being a requirement for a meaningful experience?
Brian Solis
There’s a saying, “technology changes, people don’t.” Yet, when we consider the impact of technology on our daily lives, some very interesting observations surface…
Resume Bear
So, you got the interview all lined up and your ready and raring to go…well if you plan on doing well, you better avoid these 50 interview killers (and yes, every single one of these we have seen or have heard about from colleagues)
Related ala carte selections include
Inc Magazine
Participating in a broadcast interview conducted by a television reporter can certainly be exciting—or nerve wracking, depending on your perspective. The presence of a camera frequently changes the dynamic between the reporter and the subject. And it is true that there are some different factors that you need to consider before an interview with the broadcast press.
Sit back. Enjoy your read. Nachos and drinks will be right over. Stay as long as you like. No tips required. Comments appreciated.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
I’m a proud affiliate of
SOB Business Cafe 09-03-10
Filed Under Great Finds, Successful Blog | Leave a Comment
Welcome to the SOB Cafe
We offer the best in thinking — articles, books, podcasts, and videos about business online written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.
The Specials this Week are
Matthew Ebel
Once upon a time in 2004 there was a new media community- back then we called them Podcasters. They were passionate, excitable, and ready to jump on any new opportunity they could create for themselves. Podcasters flew from all over the world to hang out at conventions they organized. For three years, New Media brought people together. Friendships were forged, business ventures launched, and through it all some amazing creations made their way onto the internet. The New Media community felt like a family.
Now it’s gone; the community has dissipated. And that’s okay.
Seriously, it’s okay.
WebWorkerDaily
You may have already experienced social media meltdown: a rapid derailment of your previously neat and tidy social media marketing efforts. Because social media cannot be “controlled,” the very thought of putting marketing messages out into the social web strikes fear in the hearts of many. Without control, how do you avert or manage a crisis that bubbles over and could explode on Twitter, Facebook and the like?
Jim Kukral
I tell a story in my book about how I used post-it notes to get offered a job. I wanted the job. I knew they were interviewing a ton of people. I wasn’t any better then any of them in graphic design. In fact, I was an average designer at best. But I wanted the job.
I tell another story in the book how I wanted to get into the Internet video business. I had a friend who owned a big SEO firm and I pitched him via video on YouTube. I could have sent a resume… c’mon, that wasn’t going to work.
You want the job? Show me.
BIGG Success
On our show today, we were thrilled to chat with Terry Starbucker about leadership. Terry has been a leader for over 27 years, including a gig with a pro football team!
WordPress Community Podcast
Liz Strauss gave a masterclass tonight; at least, that’s how it felt to both Frederick and myself. We talked about communicating with your audience, and Liz shared some experiences about open comment nights. We discussed positioning yourself and your blog, and how important personal branding can be.
Gigaom
The Elance report, which will be released in full next week, found that 70 percent of freelancers surveyed are happier working independently than when they were full-time employees, and more than 60 percent said they would prefer to remain a freelancer rather than take a full-time job.
Related ala carte selections include
Simon Mainwaring
I wanted to share with you this video of a speech by Nicolas Christakis from the Harvard Dept. of Sociology, on the shaping powers of social networks. He does a wonderful job of explaining stastically the forces and dynamics that drive social networks. . . . how our behavior affects others, whether it be family member, friends or strangers.
Windows Experience Blog
This week Windows announced the return of the very popular the Family Pack this Fall. General Availability for the United States is Oct. 3 and it goes on sale in Canada, UK, Germany, France, Australia and many other markets on or after Oct. 22 (Windows 7’s 1 year anniversary!)
Sit back. Enjoy your read. Nachos and drinks will be right over. Stay as long as you like. No tips required. Comments appreciated.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
I’m a proud affiliate of
The 10 Point Plan to Build an Internal Community of Brand Loyal Fans
Filed Under Community, Great Finds, Marketing, Successful Blog, The Big Idea, Writing | 12 Comments
Community Starts at Home
During my years in publishing, I was a serial community builder. It seems that every job I took included “rebuild the department, refocus the vision” in the role. I’m fairly certain that those two challenges are what attracted me.
Even as a teenager, explaining the quest, translating the context, and helping folks bring their best to what they’re doing has been my natural response. I’ve always done that. Not that I’ve always done it well. Still the failures and successes of the past have taught me what moves people to trust in a vision and to join in to build something they couldn’t build alone.
So I was the one they hired
- to rebuild the company and the strategy for growth six months after the company had laid off 40% of the previous employees.
- to re-establish the department identity when it had grown too quickly and lost its role within the organizational process.
- to build a cross functional team that could function with professional ease and confidence from a crew of new hires when the start up started growing.
- to establish a winning brand and a high performance product / marketing team from a single product offer and a squad of contract workers
- to lead an ad hoc SWAT team of 60 professionals to reconceive and bring to market a product in crisis (in 1/6 the time originally budgeted for development.)
Every one of those jobs was the best job of my life while I was doing it, because we built teams that made outstanding things happen. Who doesn’t want to work with people who are “in with both feet,” working at their best level, and having fun?
The 10-Point Plan to Build an Internal Community of Brand Loyal Fans
Now I’m working with two new clients that very topic close to my heart and my business. Both are asking how they might get their teams to “raise a barn” rather than “build a coliseum.” Both companies want a to build an internal community of brand evangelists the expands from team to team, from department to department that will spread from inside to outside their company’s “walls.”
We’re going to use traditional interviews, a social tool called a “histogram,” and tested, collaborative instructional design to build an internal community of brand loyal fans. Here’s a 10-Point Plan to build an internal community of brand loyal fans. It’s exciting to offer a program and a process that grew out of the of the working model we use every year at SOBCon.
- Articulate a clearly defined vision.
- Negotiate a leadership commitment to live that vision.
- Assess and benchmark the current status.
- Identify and enlist a core team of champions to lead the quest.
- Build a brand values baseline by gathering the values that drive the brand.
- Challenge the brand teams to condense and clarify the brand values baseline by talking them through with stakeholder and bring back less than 7 words.
- Align your brand values with your brand value proposition
- Engage the brand teams in identifying and collecting cultural stories, signs, and rituals that exemplify the values of the brand values baseline.
- Move the process outward training teams in — a leadership team that focuses on departmental quality and performance and communications through persuasion.
- Exhibit leadership commitment by investing regular time and resources to ongoing collaborative brand values conversations to build decision models, communication models, and performance / hiring standards that align with the brand values baseline.
Over the next few weeks, I’ll be writing about each step in the process. We will explore what each step is; why it’s important; how to put it into action; and how to know whether it’s working in the way you intended. Then we’ll talk about how to connect that internal community to the community of customers, partners, and vendors who help your business grow from outside.
Any questions?
READ the Whole 10-Point Plan Series: On the Successful Series Page.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!
I’m a proud affiliate of
SOB Business Cafe 08-27-10
Filed Under Great Finds, Successful Blog | 2 Comments
Welcome to the SOB Cafe
We offer the best in thinking — articles, books, podcasts, and videos about business online written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.
The Specials this Week are
Social Media Explorer
Social CRM is being hawked by monitoring services, market research firms, traditional sales software and — if you can believe it — Twitter applications. Brand managers, marketing managers and agencies everywhere are anxious to get them some of that social CRM, by golly. Sadly, most of them don’t even know what CRM stands for.
Smart Blog on Social Media
When the song does come on my iPhone via shuffle, I quickly skip it and move to the next. So why do I get so excited when a song I can listen to anytime comes on the radio? The answer is that someone else, with a far greater reach, has chosen to share one of “my songs” with their audience.
OPENForum
We multitask at work – flitting between 12 browser tabs, chatting on IM, taking phone calls, processing our inboxes. We multi-task in the car – driving, texting, listening to the radio. We multi-task in the kitchen – talking to our partners, chopping vegetables, checking our Blackberries or iPads. Yet, multi-tasking has been proven time and again to be a miserable failure.
So how do we fight back?
Mack Collier
Let me clear up front: If you are going to use social media, you absetively should have a strategy driving your efforts. Totally.
But simply creating a social media strategy and executing it doesn’t mean you are using social media correctly. I can create a blogging strategy for your company and tell you exactly what to do, but that still doesn’t mean you’ll have a successful blog.
Blog for Profit
Should your blog’s domain name be a brand or your own name? Or should it contain search keywords? Grant and I get this question all time from our clients. The answer may surprise you.
EConsultancy
You can measure a thousand different metrics and still fail at social media, because you’re ignoring the hundreds of different methods involved. If you want to create true engagement, then you’ll need to drop any preconceptions you might have about market behaviour and take time to speak personally to each customer.
Related ala carte selections include
Chris Pirillo
I spend probably 80% of my working time writing things. I communicate with people across social networks. I compose missives to be sent to various people. I occasionally author books and articles. I draft items to send to potential sponsors. I dash off the quick email
or hundred. The one thing I do not do is write a letter. Who needs to do such a thing in this day and age of 140 characters or less?
Sit back. Enjoy your read. Nachos and drinks will be right over. Stay as long as you like. No tips required. Comments appreciated.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
I’m a proud affiliate of
SOB Business Cafe 08-20-10
Filed Under Great Finds, Successful Blog | 2 Comments
Welcome to the SOB Cafe
We offer the best in thinking — articles, books, podcasts, and videos about business online written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.
The Specials this Week are
PR Squared
Andrea had been with us for 3 years, and in that brief amount of time — since she was a rockstar — she climbed the ranks from quiet, mousy intern to Senior Account Executive.
Web Worker Daily
Is there an area of your life or business where you just can’t seem to get a grip? You try and try, but can never seem to fix it.
Riding on Dragons
For years I believed something I was told by experts that now appears to be wrong. Which brings up lots of questions.
Pick the Brain
Have you ever wondered why some people are able to weather financial upheaval without breaking a sweat and have confidence to spare when it comes to taking risks such as starting their own business or taking a year off to travel without an enormous safety net?
Servant of Chaos
So, it is with some joy I came across Heather LeFevre’s Planner Survey for 2010. It covers the industry from top to tail – sharing details of salaries, roles, locations and so on. It captures what planners think of their jobs, why they stay, why they go – and who they think is doing the best work. It also lists a bunch of people who the community rate – not because they are famous, but because they get on with the challenge of producing good work.
Related ala carte selections include
Barry Moltz
Congratulations Barry!
over. Stay as long as you like. No tips required. Comments appreciated.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
I’m a proud affiliate of
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