Successful Blog

Blog Post Fatigue? Please Take the Keys . . . Again!

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The Day I Learned What I Know

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A turning point in my blogging history was called “An Open Thought: Please Take the Keys.” I knew when I wrote that piece that something was wrong; I even had a feeling what it might be. I had been looking for a way to bring it up. . . .

When I did, you were there. You stepped up and told me what I was doing wrong. It was the coolest thing. That was the day this blog became a community.

I’ve always been grateful for the day that you took the keys.

Relationships grow and change.

Last week at BlogHer I overheard someone say something. It’s something I’ve heard in passing on this blog. I’ve also heard the same thing inside the compliments that you give me and in the apologies that come when we talk.

The person at BlogHer said, “If they post more than once a day, they’re banned from my feeds.”

You’ve been more tactful than that, but you’ve been sort of saying the same thing.

Blog Post Fatigue? Please Take the Keys

Not to worry, it’s no longer about me being brave. This time it’s me asking you what you think, what you need, and what you like to read. I can tell from your comments a few things. I’m also perceptive enough to read a bit of what you’re not saying.

On the other hand, I’m as blind as every other human. No one knows that better than this human being.

You’re the people I trust and the people I serve. So, you’re the ones I’m coming to. I’ll lay out the problem, and I hope that you’ll tell me what you know.

The problem: I’m about head and heart, business and life, information and relationships, so I post twice a day at least. When I add in the projects I want to keep up with, references lists and resources, 200 outstanding blogs, and the questions/photos things I like to throw in for discussion, I’m feeling like I post way too frequently.

It’s not like anyone’s advice is going to change who I am, how I write, or maybe even what I do. I’m still the one who has trouble walking in a straight line. . . .

But you took the keys one time and you didn’t steer me wrong then. I’d be downright stupid not to listen now.

I’m many things, but stupid ain’t one of them.

Please take the keys.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Is your business stuck?Work with Liz!!

Don’t Read Your PR, Read Your Marketing Copy

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Diverse Portfolio

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A high-power company in educational publishing, bought three smaller companies and put them together. They think they offer a diverse portfolio. I think they offer a menu of bacon, ice-cream, tofu, and cognac. They are quite equipped to make the district-wide, state-wide sale. But rare is the sales rep who has the time or experience to speak to the details and nuances of the four individual product lines that they offer.

The Emperor has clothes bought by the bean counters. The bean counters think in BIG NUMBERS. The PR says that’s wonderful. The enterprise doesn’t see the world becoming niches and moving online. [Read more…]

Customer Solve Your Own Problem

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That’s Customer Centered

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I still keep my personal blog at two click exchanges. I do that for lots of reasons. I feel a little sentimental. My little blog found it’s first friends in such places and I still like exploring them. I also like to watch how such things work. The business models interest me. I want to watch as they introduce new features. I want to see how each community reacts to them.

Brand You and Me

Over the last year, I got to be good friends with a tech at one click exchange. Rachel was like me, a nice one. They had a problem for a few weeks with a spell of trojans. It seems everyone tried to crawl onto my computer I caught four or five in three weeks. [Read more…]

How THEY Work — Why the Heck Do I Care?

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The Fortune Series

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You might have caught the Fortune Magazine piece by Cait Murphy that featured 12 successful individuals at work. It was called Secrets of Greatness: How I Work. The article presents a gallery of leaders and their work secrets, including those of Marissa Mayer of Google, Howard Schultz of Starbucks, Wynton Marsalis of the Lincoln Center, and Judge Richard Posner of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, Chicago. That was followed later by How I Work: Bill Gates.

After I read these articles, I filed them aside. I thought maybe I might find a use for some detail from the profiles some day. I didn’t know what, and I didn’t know why.

How Other People Work

Apparently, some folks thought this model was worth exploring. They added to it. Here are two more and one that won’t be happening:

  • How I Work: Matt Haughey
  • How I Work: Steve Rubel
  • It could be my “different drummer” flaring up, but I won’t be posting about how I work. If nothing else the word, greatness, in the title stops me cold. I’m the nice one. Secrets of Niceness: How I Work doesn’t seem to pack the same punch.

Though each profile was only a few paragraphs, I kept wondering, “What am I supposed to learn from this?” I needed something, so I have figured one out. I found a “Liz answer” to the question of how to filter and use this kind of information to build a business and a brand. [Read more…]

Ideas in Your Refrigerator

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You Know You’re Procrastinating When . . .

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. . . cleaning the refrigerator takes on a new and miraculous sense of urgency with a heavenly glow.

Go ahead give in and do it, but don’t lose to procrastination. Turn that refrigerator chore into an exploration for ideas. Here are three things you might think about.

  • What is your customer experience of the products that you are tossing out? Can you use those experiences to seed an article for your blog?
  • Refrigerators are filled with products. How do the companies who make those products promote them? Can you twist any of their ideas into ways to promote your business or your blog?
  • Is there a brand in there you are attached to? What do you value about that brand? Can you put your feelings into words? How can you use that brand value you feel to strengthen your personal brand and the brand experience people have when they meet you?

Procrastination just became an idea session, and on top of that you’ve cleaned your refrigerator! That’s productivity where you could have been doing what I’ve done — standing in front of an open refrigerator door thinking about how the light goes on and off.

Bet you can think of more ideas to find inside of that Big Box. How about sharing some with us?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related articles
Don’t Fear the Blank Screen — Be a Miner
Exploring for Ideas at Technorati
Eye-Deas 1: Have You Started Seeing Things?
More ideas in the Idea Bank category and in Writing Power, Thinking Outside the Box, Customer Think, and Brand You Series on the SUCCESSFUL SERIES PAGE

How Was Your Day as a Customer?

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Whatever You Did Today

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Whatever you did today — enjoy a cup of coffee reading the paper, watch TV, work on your computer, clean the house, go to the mall, drive a car, eat lunch, read blogs, take a shower — you used a product. You were a customer.

How was your customer experience? Did anything about it leave you wishing that some business knew you better?

What percent of your experiences leaves you feeling more than satisfied, makes you want to tell people what a great experience you had?

It’s hard to miss when you’ve bumped into a business that values a customer. It’s hard to forget the name of their brand.

Brand you and me.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related articles
Feeling a Customer’s First Response
Customers and Credibility
The Customer Think Series on the SUCCESSFUL SERIES Page