At the LitAgents conference in Austin, I referenced Paulo Coehlo and his superb use of Twitter and his blog for communicating to his readers. Here’s a link to his blog and how he writes from the heart.
I also referenced Neil Gaiman whom I’m a giant fan of and wanted to put a link to his blog as well.
By the way, if you’ve never read, “Good Omens” by Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, you absolutely should.
Here’s one of my favorite excerpts from the book, “It wasn’t a dark and stormy night. It should have been, but there’s the weather for you. For every mad scientist who’s had a convenient thunderstorm just on the night his Great Work is complete and lying on the slab, there have been dozens who’ve sat around aimlessly under the peaceful stars while Igor clocks up the overtime.”
My partner Jennifer Robenalt and I with our B is For Blog, LLC consultancy are offering some superb 2.0 seminars and I wanted to encourage you to attend them if you can!
Total disclaimer: We will actually give you real advice that you can use after the seminar. We do not want to offer ten week e-classes, we only provide actionable insight and tried and true tips for you to immediately implement.
Interesting to see how a company blog and responses to it can really impact a brand image. Southwest Airlines is a good example of this with the recent blog comments over its decision to put a bikini model’s picture on the side of one of its planes.
To see the blog comments back and forth go here and always keep in mind that a corporate blog and the comments, if they’re open, are considered fair game for coverage via the news.
One sample post to Southwest’s blog on this blog-brouhaha:
I agree with some posters, that i find this tacky and somewhat offensive. I am a twenty-something male, and I would not want to have to watch this plane pull up to the gate traveling with my young child, or mother, grandmother, etc. I know Southwest is known for its fun, laid back qualities but this is just completely inappropriate to plaster all over the side of the plane.
The whole thing is in poor taste, and I’m acutally sort of let down that Southwest, a company I really admire, would stoop this low.
And the great irony, as mentioned, is that Southwest would (rightfully) not permit anyone dressed this way to fly in their aircraft so as to not offend other customers. But somehow they don’t seem to mind offending their passengers from the outside of the aircraft.
Jim Dawson — Wed, 02/11/2009 – 14:57
If you’re an author and you want to understand how to pitch to bloggers, I highly recommend Bulldog Reporter’s conference on this. It’s at a great and affordable price point and Brian Pittman and the speakers are a stellar roundtable. (And no, I’m not an affiliate!)
Check out more information about it here.
In lieu of the oncoming Festivus and all other associated merry-making, I’m posting a top ten 2009 Triple Dog Dare You List for Social Media.
Let this list inspire and invigorate you toward prodigious social media endeavors in the New Year, aligned with transparency, honesty and value.
Top Ten “Triple Dog Dare You List” for Social Media:
1. Let your blog power your message, your expertise and your willingness to share them freely to benefit others.
2. Don’t take part in petty blog flame wars.
3. Raise your blog visibility by registering it with Technorati. And give readers of your blog the opportunity to Digg, StumbleUpon, Reddit and Deli.ico.us your posts.
4. For pete’s sake (and all the rest of us) join the blog fracas! Read other blogs, subscribe to their feeds and take value in highlighting their wonderful content as well as yours.
5. Stop asking what a blog can do for you and ask “What can I do on this blog for my readers?”
6. Use more images, vid posts and humor in your blog. Even Bill Gates likes a good chuckle now and then so don’t be so staid. And while you’re at it, start Twittering too.
7. Occasionally share a personal story. (No, not the one about the Red Rider BB Gun you did not get as a child. And , not the one about what your mother-in-law does after she gets overnogged at Christmas.) Instead, share a personal insight about your work method or focus, or your own story about your overcoming a challenge.
8. Post to your blog on a regular schedule and use more tags and categories for each post.
9. Participate in a blog carnival.
10. Write a mission statement for your blog. You’d be surprised how writing a mission statement helps empower your content and what you will deliver to your readers.
P.S. (Go to YouTube and see the real Triple Dog Dare here.)
From my favorite movie “A Christmas Story”:
Flick: Are you kidding? Stick my tongue to that stupid pole? That’s dumb!
Schwartz: That’s ’cause you know it’ll stick!
Flick: You’re full of it!
Schwartz: Oh yeah?
Flick: Yeah!
Schwartz: Well I double-DOG-dare ya!
Ralphie as Adult: [narrating] NOW it was serious. A double-dog-dare. What else was there but a “triple dare ya”? And then, the coup de grace of all dares, the sinister triple-dog-dare.
Schwartz: I TRIPLE-dog-dare ya!
Ralphie as Adult: [narrating] Schwartz created a slight breach of etiquette by skipping the triple dare and going right for the throat!
Here is a list of the top ten things to keep in mind during Thanksgiving:
1. Your mom-in-law will not take kindly to “tweeting at the table.”
2. Sure Aunt Bertha always loves to tell her crazy stories about being a radical in the 60s but get her to sign a release before you post them on YouTube.
3. Your blog will not miss you if you don’t post to it for two days.
4. Your pastor does not think it’s funny when you ask why God is not on Facebook.
5. Your husband does not like it when you’re tweeting during the football game, unless you’re bringing him chips and dip in the other hand.
6. Sure, you love to tell your favorite story about the blogger you had a brief, yet highly vitriolic flame war with over trackback links and how they work, but honestly don’t you think telling it for three years in a row after your third glass of wine is enough?
7. Don’t drink and tweet.
8. Don’t drink and blog
9. Don’t drink and drive.
10. Enjoy a day with real people, try to take a walk outside and feel real grass on your feet and be in bright sunlight. You won’t melt, I promise.
I had a great conversation today with one of my favorite blogging clients, Dr. Steve Curtis and we were talking about how posting to blogs and commenting on other blogs (authentically) is actually sowing the seeds for a beautiful and blooming online garden in the future.
I like that analogy very much as I’m trying to start a fall potager’s garden in my backyard. And in potager gardening one pays attention to the paths you provide to walk in the garden, as well as the greenery and vegetables you grow.
I think this is very much like blogging. You are mindful of the paths you want to take to other blogs that will build up and sustain your own “blog garden” and you know to be careful and respectful of their work and the seeds they have planted so that all can be sustained together in both gardens.
Unlike gardens it’s harder to know when a seed you’ve sowed will bloom online, but if you never sow any seeds then how can one even hope for a bloom.
If you sit in the middle of your blog garden, no paths in or out, no good content (soil) to sustain the blog and its growing seedlings then your garden will never truly expand.
If however, you’re willing to work the soil of your blog, water it freely with true and authentic springs of edu-focused and community building posts then surely you will see a garden that grows and expands and attracts new visitors to the garden.
You will see a perennial blog garden instead of a dying one. See these definitions of perennial:
adjective 1. lasting for an indefinitely long time; enduring: her perennial beauty.
2. (of plants) having a life cycle lasting more than two years.
3. lasting or continuing throughout the entire year, as a stream.
4. perpetual; everlasting; continuing; recurrent.
You don’t need a PR person or an online PR person to help you sustain your garden, you just need to start sowing the seeds one spot at a time and watch it grow.
“In my garden there is a large place for sentiment. My garden of flowers is also my garden of thoughts and dreams. The thoughts grow as freely as the flowers, and the dreams are as beautiful.” ~Abram L. Urban
Great article by Michael W. McLaughlin of RainToday.com on what you need to know before you start blogging!
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