Successful Blog

I'm Speaking at BlogHer!!

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Liz Strauss and Wendy Piersall

BlogHer '07 I'm Speaking

You may have noticed a badge in the sidebar. It says in big letters I’m speaking at BlogHer. Wendy Piersall and I are on a panel with Colette Ellis and Elizabeth Perry. The panel will discuss all facets of mentoring, including ways that friends like Wendy and I act as mentors for each other.

If you’re not going to be at the conference, and I would guess that is most of you, you might notice I’m not around as often to answer your comments on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, July 26-29. Don’t worry. I’ll be doing my best to get here, but I could be far removed from my computer.

I hope you’ll feel at home — look at the header, the name of this blog says you should. Please enjoy each other and the conversation while I’m gone.

Remember, there’s always plenty of free beverages and snacks in the sidebar.

If you are going to be at BlogHer, I hope you’ll look for this tall, blonde blogger. I look like the person up there in the picture.

I’d love to meet you. That would be so cool.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!! Liz can unstick you to help make your business sticky.

The Mic Is On: We're in Hollywood! Be a Star!

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It’s Like Open Mic Only Different

The Mic Is On

Here’s how it works.

It’s like any rambling conversation. Don’t try to read it all. Jump in whenever you get here. Just go to the end and start talking. EVERYONE is WELCOME.
The rules are simple — be nice.

There are always first timers and new things to talk about. It’s sort of half “Cheers” part “Friends” and part video game. You don’t know how much fun it is until you try it.

Hooray for Hollywood!

There’s plenty to talk about. Here’s a few ideas to get us started:

  • Movies
  • Movie Stars
  • Big Houses
  • Scandals
  • Old Fancy Cars
hollywood.jpg

And, whatever else comes up, including THE EVER POPULAR, Basil the code-writing donkey.

Oh, and bring links about Hollywood to share!

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related article
What is Tuesday Open Comment Night?

Open Mic 7pm Chgo Time: Hooray for Hollywood . . .

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Yes the Mic Will Be on Tonight

Join Us Tonight

We’re Visiting Hollywood!

We can talk about movies, movie stars, big houses, scandals, old fancy cars, and whatever else comes up.

Oh, and bring links about Hollywood to share!

The rules are simple — be nice.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related article
What is Tuesday Open Comment Night?

A Model to Describe One Ideal Customer

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Get Specific

insideout logo

Our ideal customers — those folks who love that businesslike thing we love doing, that we do to serve them — they are the foundation of our business. Pick one of them.

One? But the marketing guy said . . .

Yep. One — only one. Get specific. Get up close. Make it a real person. Crawl inside his or her head.

From one real human being with whom you have had a success, we can extrapolate many facets of what will and will not work for a business. Think of the one you choose as your prototype ideal customer. Use this model to get closer to whom that customer is.

A Model to Describe One Ideal Customer

Use these questions to make sure you are specific because we’re building a model.

  • What job or group does this person represent? (designers, new mothers, undertakers, college students, used car buyers)
  • What is this one person’s biggest worry, threat, thing that wakes him or her up at 2 in the morning?
  • How does this one person see him- or herself? What is the value that this one person thinks that he or she brings to the world?
  • What problem did you solve for this person? How long did it take? How would you value what you provided? How would he or she value it?

Answer these questions. Then write, record, or tell a friend a description of your prototype ideal customer. You’re ready to explore what he or she needs, desires, and wants.

We learn as writers that individual readers share common interests. We learn as marketers to meet each individual where he or she stands. I learned as a publisher that a well-defined prototype is exact and as explicit as possible. A strong prototype is like a single stone in the water — we can extrapolate it in rings to larger and larger views.

Who is your prototype customer? C’mon describe one for me.

Next: How to define your niche market, moving from one to a group.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Is your business stuck? Check out the Start-up Strategy Package. Work with Liz!!

Related
To follow the entire series: Liz Strauss’ Inside-Out Thinking to Building a Solid Business, see the Successful Series Page.

Sunday, July 24, 2005: Learning to Breathe

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Breathing Room

They say it takes 5 minutes to start a blog. Whoa! It sure didn’t for me. I had to walk in a crooked line through the virtual halls of Amazon for two hours at least. I had to look at blog templates for another three. And choosing a name, well, I wasn’t prepared for the fact that choosing a name for my son would be easier.

I started in the morning and published in the starlight.

I came to it as a writer. So I thought it was writing. I thought it was about structure and expression, content and presentation, and offering somewhere someone might find a place next to me on the riverbank under the old white oak tree. I was one third in the right direction.

Who’d know I’d be here a short two years later?

Who’d know what I’d discover?

Who’d know I’d hand over my head and heart?

I point to my first blog post — about 100 words. . It’s got stars, life, peanut butter . . . and a quote I still believe.

When I give my soul a little breathing room . . .
everyone I know gets nicer.

I came here to wonder and to find more ways just to be.

. . . and the people who greeted me taught me to breathe.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

The Blog Herald: Social Networking — Am I Person Or an Item?

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Flashback 1997 . . . Flash Forward 2007

For all of our conversation, for the ideas, time, and thoughts share in our comment boxes, I hope that you’ll head over to read this one. Please.

Verbal volleyball can be a kick. When Twitter used the term, people, to mean friends for an Internet second, I got a chance to type, “I’ll have my people call your people and we’ll do lunch.” I’ve always wanted to say that.

Cute, but off the page and forgotten, rightfully so, minutes later.

For the last few days, I’ve been thinking about the realities of going wide and going deep. It’s hard to have the time and the bandwidth to do both. It’s hard to keep up with it all. Every day it happens at a slightly faster speed. The wider I go, the shallower I get.

Read the whole feature in today’s Blog Herald by clicking the logo.

The Blog Herald

It’s about blogging and real life.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
I wrote at the Blog Herald about books, information, and relationships, making connections from the patterns she sees. I consider these keystone articles.
Authenticity and Transparency in the Real World
In the Real World — The Half-Full, Half-Empty Glass
The Universe of People, Black Holes, and Stars
Connectors and Mavens on the Tipping Point
The Writer’s Dilemma and the Blogger’s Secret
The Two Webs: Information or Relationships?
Social Networking: Am I Person Or an Item?