If content is King, then curiousity is Queen.
Here are 5 tips for inspiring journalists, readers and followers to keep coming back for more!
1. Tell them everything, be transparent and ask lots of questions that you don’t know the answer to.
2. If a journalist writes a story about a topic you’re familiar with then take time to dig deeper for your readers in an accompanying post. Recognize the journalist by name (it’s only respectful) and contrast and compare their insights with your own. Stop listening to PR folks who tell you that you have to get your requisite, always the same soundbites down pat. Pat is boring!
3. Be endlessly curious. Every single part of business has its own mysteries. Sometimes we’re all asking the same questions over and over again instead of challenging ourselves to look at something differently. Don’t be a lemming constantly leaping off the dull edge with everyone else. Step back and create new ideas.
4. Don’t make it about becoming a celebrity in your field, make room for everyone to rise to your level of understanding. Do these by asking your readers to ask questions, comment and guest post on your blog. Choose to be different, not “celeb-boring.”
5. Stop trying to be “quotable” and start trying to be perenially memorable.
6. Soundbites don’t drive curiousity, they just get us stuck in the mud of old traditional PR.
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=488e9e16-ea14-47bb-8ace-dca74c429982)
I’m truly saddened about J.D. Salinger’s death today. His book, “Franny and Zoey” changed my life one wintery night during my first residency at Goddard College.
Goddard was where I finally arrived to finish my B.A. in my early 20s and one of the first things you do as part of the work is complete your semester independent study plan with your advisor and fellow group members. The semester’s study is what you will work on throughout the semester once you’ve returned home.
The students there I felt were so hip and artistic and at a depth of soulfulness that I’d not yet experienced. The experience was overwhelming.
I spent several hours during the first few days at Goddard, truly refining what I thought was the magnum opus of all independent study plans. “Oh, this will blow my advisor away,” I thought, full of pride and bravado. “This will go in the halls of infamy as one of the best study plans ever!”
Skipping down to my advisor/group meeting carrying this hallowed six page document, I reveled in anticipation at what I was sure would entail several rounds of standing ovations (from my advisor Rob Tarule and the other six members of the group.) Tripping over a particularly big mound of sidewalk snow should have been my first sign that things were not going to go as I thought they might.
Holding my document in the air as I fell and thereby ensuring its dryness in lieu of my own bloodied knees and wet beret, I walked those final steps to the group’s meeting place.
Finally, it was my turn to present my study plan – rising from my bean bag chair I started reading! Alas, by the fourth paragraph my advisor Rob said, “This sounds very scholarly, but where are YOU in this document? What will change in YOU and your creative work by doing this study?” I couldn’t answer this. Rob gave me one more night to rework the plan -to put ME – in the plan.
It was about 23 degrees that night as I trudged up in my red boots back to the Goddard library to read samples of other plans – anything that might show me what was the RIGHT plan for me.
After spending two depressing hours in one bookshelf area, studying other successfully executed plans, I moved to another row of books. There I spied, “Franny and Zoey” by J.D. Salinger.
Suffering from severe anxiety I sat down on the floor beside the bookshelf and read the book from front to back in the middle of that night in the library. That book was where I found my answer to the block I was feeling over writing the “perfect” study plan.
The answer was this phrase, “An artist’s only concern is to shoot for some kind of perfection, and on his own terms, not anyone else’s.”
I worked all night creating a whole new study plan and in doing so created a plan to be a writer, an artist, an idea-lover not focused on perfection, but focused only on finally meeting and expressing my artistic soul on my own terms.
God bless Salinger for that gift.
Related articles by Zemanta
- In memoriam: J.D. Salinger, 1919-2010 (timeoutny.com)
- ‘Catcher in the Rye’ author JD Salinger Dead at 91 (trueslant.com)
- Rest In Peace, J.D. Salinger (chuckpalahniuk.net)
- J.D. Salinger Quotes: Best Sayings From ‘Catcher In The Rye’ Author (huffingtonpost.com)
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=9c1576a8-f96c-4287-8a1b-27c469a44056)
1. Not only read their work, but print their last ten stories out and look for all the ways they tell a story. Good journalists are incredible storytellers and you can find out alot about how they write, what they look for in an expert source and what interests them by reading several stories all at the same time.
2. In the aforementioned stories, highlight all the adjectives they use in the story and you’ll get a very good feel for their particular slant in stories and the publication’s slant as well.
3. If they are very well-known journalists, then take the time to read interviews they’ve done about writing, their own work and their lives. This is an excellent way to make a human connection. Remember, no matter what your PR firm has told you, journalists are HUMANS too.
4. Go through each story and highlight the experts they’ve sourced in the story. This will teach you what they look for, what caliber of expert they reach out to and how you might position your own thought leadership around this. By the way, don’t create inauthentic content via blogging or otherwise to just “snag” a journalist’s attention. They’re much smarter than that and really good journalists are very intuitive and work hard to find the best possible source.
5. RESPECT, find out what it means to the journalist. Don’t stalk them, don’t email them incessantly, don’t consistently denigrate their angle on a story. If there is something you can add, then by all means add it to your blog post about the story. Add some new insight. We can all help each other to elevate the writing and meaning.
6. Don’t ever expect or think you deserve coverage. It’s not enough to just decide you’re a great expert or big thinker. You have to work harder than that. Don’t even make it about a journalist doing a story on you. Make it about you doing a story for your own community that engenders new discussion. Journalists are always looking for new angles to old stories!
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=e86443bc-97d0-4a0f-85cc-63ff4ce10455)
OPA think “lobster, beer, big belly”- meet author, Dave Simons, Boston Sox fan – a real man’s “eat, pray, love.” Perfect for diet show.
O: her husband left her, her dog ran away, she sold all her pageant trophies to a gold exchange and now she’s going to climb Mt. Everest.
Oprah – My mom just read my book, “My Mom is Happy, and That’s all that Matters,” and said you would LOVE it for your show.
I paid $435 for six webinar series on Oprah. They promised you would have me on your show if I pitched you just once. When is show date?
I know Gayle is reading this for you. Gayle, if Oprah won’t have me on her show, what about your radio show instead? I like your hair.
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=1d973de2-adb9-4897-a5a1-447ca1131162)
Right now in this haymaking world of social media gurus, specialists and your tweeting Aunt Bertha, we’re getting close to someone coming up with a good joke about how many social media gurus it takes to screw in a lightbulb. While we’re waiting for that joke to appear, let’s take a step back and look at what you are creating on the Web.
If “Content is King,” as its oft-said, then perhaps it’s most important the King understands his community will not follow, repurpose, or retweet bad content.
If you’re busy filling up your blog, your twitter profile, your status updates on LinkedIn.com with drivel then it’s really likely that your followers will be the first to win a courtly sack race, but not the first to elevate your ideas across the Web.
So how does one create good content? Here are 7 tips you can use to help your content become King.
1. Ensure that your content is engaging with a story focus. Stats, diagrams, pictures of you conducting a PowerPoint followed by straight text won’t do it.
2. Don’t be snarky. I know it’s been said before, but it’s worth saying again. Anything that you think you can be snarky around, refocus instead to being purposeful for your readership. It was the great Jung who said, “Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.” Apply that to your content and always give your readers a deeper understanding of the issue.
3. Make your blog posts timely and future-focused. Don’t wait to hear the news, instead make the news, break the news, and explain how it will affect your community.
4. Link your content to larger ideas in your space – don’t be stingy and think you’re the only person who knows the real answer! There are always better ideas outside our own that can in turn encourage others to share their insight as well. Don’t be the person who is always right.
5. Don’t hold back your best content. Hit it out of the ballpark everytime and don’t keep the real “secrets” gated.
6. Use the comments on blog posts to start new discussions and respond to comments made through new blog posts.
7. Don’t blog poor me stories. We don’t want to know how tough it is out there, how no one really understands your ideas and how hard you work. We do want to know how you can empower us, how we can all share with one another bigger and better ideas and how much you care about everyone learning from the content.
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=b0f57e39-2be7-4524-a070-1e78a10d68fd)
If you’ve not yet checked out Mediaite - and its PowerGrid, then you definitely should. From the site itself, “Mediaite’s “Power Grid” objectively ranks media professionals across a dozen categories based on their real-time relevance. Power Grid rankings rely on an array of metrics, including anything and everything from circulation to Twitter followers to Google buzz depending on the category.”
I think the site is a superb resource for finding actionable and interesting information about the leaders in tv, radio, tv execs, producers, radio hosts etc. What’s interesting about the site is how it tracks the people who are making news for all of us and their online buzz, metrics etc. Bookmark the site and visit it often.
And if you’re still not sold on online profile/presence and why it’s important, let this site give you another kick toward embracing your online visibility!
You can also find some great Twitter handles on the site and take note how folks are using online tools.
Check out the brilliant Jack Gray (producer for Anderson Cooper), he tops the list of Twitter followers at 1,065,148 Twitter followers. It’s interesting to note how many on the TVExec list don’t have a Twitter profile. (YET!)
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=be8e632e-5054-4587-bc59-29927e28e8ea)
1. Focusing on only blogging about yourself, your services and other yakkity-yak “more about me” content.
2. Spending all your time disparaging other bloggers or your blog commenters.
3. Ranting of any kind.
4. Never asking questions of your readers.
5. Operating your blog like a clique or “inner circle” instead of openly engaging everyone who might want to chime in.
6. Not having a clear mission of what edu-focused content you want to deliver and how you want it to empower your blog visitors.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWEo4M8nZQQ[/youtube]
One of the most important things to ask in the new year is, “What movie is my website playing to visitors?”
What that means is to really identify the changes that are driving this new social media technology usage and ensure you are doing the very best you can to employ those tools as well.
No matter what you are doing in terms of your site, if you’re not incorporating some form of social media with it, then you really are just starring in a silent movie at this point.
I picked the Buster Keaton clip because in watching it I realized that in many ways the tumbles and turns he takes are similar to how many of the authors and thought leaders I work with feel when faced with the task of social media.
Blogging is a marathon, not a sprint. And as many posts over these five years on my blog have noted, this is a long-term investment you’re making. You’re at an incredible place in the Internet. Having been on the Web since 1996, I can tell you that what we are witnessing is a communication revolution and there is still plenty of time to find your place and your community on the Web.
Information for how to start your own social media mojo can be found freely on the Web by reading key blogs that help you understand how Web 2.0 works and how to tap into its power.
Read David Meerman Scott, Mashable.com, DailyBlogTips, Problogger.net, SocialMediaToday.com and others that empower how you market your messages and how to use online tools transparently.
Keep thinking, “From Book to Brand to Beyond!”
The key is to start somewhere and move forward one step at a time. You can do it!
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=2bd9d53d-67d4-4c9d-847e-effc9d752123)
- Image via Wikipedia
Newton’s Law of Inertia: Every object persists in its state of rest or uniform motion in a straight line unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impressed upon it.
Today is the 367th birthday of Sir Isaac Newton and let it be the first day you move out of inertia about Web 2.0 and into the Law of Acceleration with Web 2.0.
Here are Six Ways to Stave Off Social Media Inertia:
1. Stop lying under someone else’s apple tree passively waiting for the Web to drop on you, instead start planting your own seeds on the Web.
2. Stop thinking your web presence will grow without you being a part of it. If you’re not digging your own soil, planting your own seeds and watering your own online thought-garden, then you are not participating!
3. Stop kvetching about how everyone else’s orchards are bigger and it’s too late for you to grow your own platform. As everything continues to move online, you need to do so as well.
4. Start tweeting so you can ensure lots of good “traffic” rain to your site or blog through meaningful engagement.
5. Stop wasting time on the Web. Set up a growing plan and stick to it. Keep moving, growing and seeding new ideas and opportunities.
6. Don’t let the force of fear paralyze keep you from finding new ways to build community online.
7. Stop being defined by your age or place in career, and start becoming ageless on the Web through your unique insight and wisdom.
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=d48df646-8ed9-4129-8bb3-49b431e5f5a6)
Recent Comments