Successful Blog

Thanks to Week 221 SOBs

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Successful and Outstanding Bloggers

Let me introduce the bloggers
who have earned this official badge of achievement,

and the right to call themselves
Successful Blog SOBs.

I invite them to take a badge home to display on their blogs.

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They take the conversation to their readers,
contribute great ideas, challenge us, make us better, and make our businesses stronger.

I thank all of our SOBs for thinking what we say is worth passing on.
Good conversation shared can only improve the blogging community.

Should anyone question this SOB button’s validity, send him or her to me. Thie award carries a “Liz said so” guarantee, is endorsed by Kings of the Hemispheres, Martin and Michael, and is backed by my brothers, Angelo and Pasquale.

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Want to become an SOB?

If you’re an SO-Wanna-B, you can see the whole list of SOBs and learn how to be one by visiting the SOB Hall of Fame– A-Z Directory . Click the link or visit the What IS an SOB?! page in the sidebar.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Want More Fans, a Bigger List? There’s No Skipping this Step …

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We Make It Harder Than It Is

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Sometimes we try too hard. Sometimes we reach too far. Sometimes we take the long way home because we never stopped to think about the easier one.

Are you looking trying to expand your community, your business, your sales, your blog readership? Want more followers on Twitter, more fans on your Facebook page, more members in your community?

I’m going to tell you straight out, there’s one step you can’t skip.

If you want more folks to love what you do, you have to be able to tell them why you love it yourself — clean, clear, fast — in ways they enjoy and understand.

It’s not that hard to do. It works this way …

If we make beautiful glass like this …

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… we have to be able to tell people what’s to love about it. Here’s how to do that.

  • Find the love stories in what you do. You can love the challenge. You can love the chase. You can love the heroic heritage. You can love what it does for people. You can love the time it saves. I love beautiful glass because it reminds me of the beautiful, beveled mirrors my dad used make. He taught me to appreciate the value of hot-sweat and workmanship.
  • Once you have the stories, find the ideal people to share those stories with. The people who love what you love are sure to think a lot like you do. You probably already know some of them. The first ones are probably very close to you. They probably have a few friends who have a few friends. To find the folks who value what you do, just share the irresistible stories and love behind the work that you do.
  • Tell the stories in ways that invite them to share stories of their own. Stories connect us in ways that small talk and transactions never will.
  • Listen carefully for details and doorways. Their stories will reveal their values — some the same and some unimaginably different from your own.
  • Pass on their stories to connect with new people new ways. Those might be people who work with what you make, who want to use it in different ways, who have ideas for partnerships.

The stories of what we value define us and better and faster than anything can. When we share those stories our relationships, our knowledge, our networks and our collections of stories expand. It’s a natural progression.

Whether we’re a huge corporation or a solopreneur, there’s no skipping this step …

If we want more fans, we have be a fan first.

How do you share your love for your work?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Be Irresistible!

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Check Out GizaPage! Bring Facebook and Twitter Fans Back Home to YOU

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Yesterday I got a chance to try out a new white label social media hub for brands and bloggers. It took me seconds to click a link and sign in.

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A click through and I was here. In seconds, I could access my social profiles from one page.

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But that’s not what makes it cool.

GizaPage lets fans engage across all social media profiles from within the brand’s or blogger’s website.

Direct-To-Profile GizaLinks allow a brand or a blogger to send fans directly into their various social profiles without ever leaving their own website.

For example, consider the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History – An original Facebook link on Smithsonian’s homepage would direct the fans away from Smithsonian’s website to http://www.facebook.com/nmnh.fanpage?ref=ts. However, with a Direct-To-Profile GizaLink, Facebook would open within Smithsonian’s own website, http://social.mnh.si.edu/facebook. The fans can then engage on Facebook, Twitter, or any of the brand’s social profiles in one unified environment.

Click this screenshot to see it live.

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And did I say that GizaPage comes with analytics?

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It’s worth checking out.

And after you try it. I’d like to know how it worked for you.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

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How Your Instincts Will Blow It for You, if You Don’t STOP!

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Strategy Is More Than Meets the Eye

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When I was small I liked to hold up my thumb and index finger to frame a tall building in the horizon to make it seem as if the building was smaller than my hand. Today I took picture of the face of my full-sized keyboard that makes it appear as if all of the keys fit into less than a 2-inch high span.

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We know it isn’t true, but our eyes want to believe it. Humans do that kind of thing a lot. Our senses and our instincts sometimes lead us down a shaky path. They tell us that the Earth is flat; that stars are tiny; and that when we are threatened we should fight or run.

It’s all perspective and assumptions.

How Your Instincts Will Blow It for You, if You Don’t STOP!

We have a conflict in a meeting, get a nasty comment on Twitter or some writes a critical blog post about us and instinct kicks in. Our hearts start pumping and our minds begin to form a defense. It’s the “flight or fight” instinct and it will blow it for us, if we don’t watch out.

Few things in our work or social lives need the protection from deadly consequence of the fight or flight instinct. We’re more rational now. Yet the reptile part of our brains still emits the adrenalin that makes us want to respond more quickly than our thinking. We’re ready to put out fires, but the best firefighters focus on the results.

If we respond while we’re still focused on the event, our perspective and assumptions are like the pictures of the building and keyboard — out of proportion to reality. We lose sight of other points of view and possibilities. Other people become tiny enough to squash. It’s easy to snap, crack, bend, or break something or ourselves, only to find out later that we didn’t have the whole plot.

Hard as it might be to STOP and walk it off, a little time and distance from the “event” usually brings a clearer, calmer and more appropriate response.

  • Think about every possible reason, ludicrous and crazy that might have caused the event.
  • Think of how hard it might be to explain your fury to a stranger 10 years from now.
  • Realize the power you give when you take on the defense.
  • Decide how the person you want to be would rise to a response.
  • Think of the impact of your response on the people around you. If you respond on the Internet, think how you’ll see that response 1, 2, or 10 years from now when you see your words again.

You might question the behavior. You might ignore it. You might express your thoughts and future expectations. Or you might end a relationships because you’ve found out that your values don’t match up. It’s unlikely that you’ll instinctively throw water on a grease fire and make things worse.

Strategy is not automatic. Strategy is doing what works.

How do you keep your instincts from blowing for you?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

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To FAIL Is Human, to Respond Is …

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Who Always Gets a Perfect Score?

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So we put our heads and our hearts together into what we do.

In this environment, we think fast. We move fast. We execute with the information that’s available. Sometimes we make the wrong choice. Sometimes the other guy gets there first. Sometimes what we built doesn’t work the way we thought it would.

We could put up a sign to let folks know that working on it.

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But when the sign goes up often enough to become an icon, when people make new versions that involve Home Simpson and tattoos, then we’re an exponential FAIL. We all know about Twitter FAIL FAIL FAIL. But we’re not Twitter and we don’t have millions of new accounts signing on everyday.

One little fail can knock down a whole lot of good that we’ve built up.

What’s critical is our response.

  • Hear the problem.
  • Learn.
  • Thank the people who found it for helping you.

When people point out a FAIL, stand beside them. Look where they are pointing.
It’s so much more productive than standing in front of them and feeling pointed at.

Always remember there’s a person on the other end of the issue.

To FAIL is human, to respond is more than service. That’s when humanity and character show through. Relationships built in a FAIL situation, often become FAIL SAFE in the end.

When has a FAIL served you?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

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What Influence Could Push You to the Magic that Is Missing?

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It’s old news and I think we all know …

If we’re not adding value, we’re taking it away.

So we’re busy adding value, doing great things, working, building, being productive. We want to get on with what we know how to do well. We do something that adds to the big thing and it gets bigger and better.

Somewhere near every one of us is someone who thinks differently. He or she is smart as we are, but has different experience or a different view of how things work. He wants to add his own extra value. She has reasons to care and contribute. He might not know the process, the culture, or the traditions. One’s a coworker. One’s a customer. One’s a big brand client.

Most come with a job. We have to include them.

The temptation often is to move forward. Try to ignore them or keep them from the core of things. Add our value and show them when we’re done. That makes it hard for even the most collaborative and curious to find the right way to join in.

But what if we invite them? What if we ask these different thinkers to sit beside us, to invest in our quest and be part of the process?

They’ll bring ideas, thoughts, and opinions. They’ll influence what we’re doing. They will challenge our assumptions. People who think differently make us uncomfortable … and that can make communication and progress seem a lot slower.

The more different we find someone’s experience and thinking, the more we should consider his or her questions and reasoning. It’s the best safety net and idea test in the population. We love and understand our own thinking. Agree with the guy who thinks unlike us and we’ve got something hot cooking.

That difference — in their experience, how they see things, and how they do things — is added value we might be overlooking. That influence could the the one thing that pushes us to add the magic that was missing.

When do you invite a different influence to be part of what you’re doing?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

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