THINKing

Tweeta20 – A Non-Profit Social Media Pilot Project

On Tuesday, May 11, nine Charlotte social media folks and I will spend an hour trying to raise money for Thompson Child & Family Focus, an organization that has spent nearly 125 years providing education, treatment and support for children traumatized by sexual abuse, domestic violence or rampant neglect.

During Thompson’s annual meeting at noon May 11, we will sit at a Twitter Table and encourage our followers to Tweet A $20 or more. Each contributor of $20 or more will be entered to win two tickets to WICKED at Charlotte, NC’s Ovens Auditorium.

We’re using the hashtag #Tweeta20 in all of our social media postings  so we can keep up with the social stream, primarily from our Charlotte area social followers.

How can you help? I’m glad you asked.

• Follow Thompson on Twitter @thompsoncff
• Become a Facebook fan of Thompson Child & Family Focus
• Share news on your blog, in your tweets or Facebook status updates about the promotion and use the #Tweeta20 hashtag
• Follow our Tweets from noon to 1 p.m. on May 11 and please RT our #Tweeta20 tweets
• Go ahead and #Tweeta20. We’re taking donations!
• Send any other ideas you have to tweak our #Tweeta20 promotion.

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Listen Up

Last week digital colleague Jay Ehret asked me to participate in his weekly Marketers  Roundtable podcast along with Bill Schley and Denise Lee Yohn.  We batted around integration, messaging in social media, brand leverage and listening to customers. So, give us a listen here. 

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Seven Things Most People Don’t Know About Me

Scott Hepburn tagged me to play along on this meme, so here goes. I’ve participated once before in eight things people don’t know about me, so I’m repeating that post. See the end of the post for those I tagged.

#1. I’m probably too old to blog.

Yep, this old guy (56) has always been an early adopter of technology, and it’s no different with social media. Good PR people should always figure out how to hold conversations with their constituencies. Analog or digital – it doesn’t matter how the dialogue happens.

#2. I got paid to talk.

I did a daily, one-hour current events talk show called Carolina Roundtable on WAYS, an AM radio station in Charlotte, NC. I also was the managing editor of the radio news team and a media critic for the newspaper.

#3. I got paid to watch basketball games.

I did radio color commentary for UNCC basketball games, and got paid for doing it. Now, if we could have been drinking beer at the same time, that would have been the ultimate job.

#4. I can tune up an airplane.

I was in the NC Air National Guard as an aircraft mechanic. I have worked on 28-cylinder reciprocating engines and on turboprops. Also, I can taxi one of the big fellows like a C-124 or C-130.

#5. I’m armed and dangerous.

I won a marksman ribbon in Air Force basic training, hitting 100 of 100 rounds in the kill zone with an M16. I also can fire a pistol accurately with either hand. I’m usually pretty mellow but I thought you ought to have fair warning.

#6. I was almost killed in a thunderstorm.

One hot summer night, while broadcasting a semi-pro football game from a stadium in Meridian, Mississippi, we moved the equipment out of the concrete block booth because it was so hot. The only place to move was atop the booth. A thunderstorm whipped up late in the fourth quarter and lightning crackled all around us. Luckily, the game was completed and we were able to pack up before the center of the storm arrived.

7. I’ve seen dead people.

On July 4, 1978 I was working as a reporter on the police beat. Our usual cops’ reporter had the day off. We got a call about a multiple homicide and I was the first reporter on the scene. I walked into the house, which was the home of a motorcycle gang, where several of them had been gunned down during the night. The bodies were still there. This case has never been solved – at least officially.

BONUS – #8. I’ve been threatened by a sheriff.

As a police reporter I discovered the Mecklenburg County Sheriff was involved in a lot of unsavory activities. I reported on these. One day prior to a County Commissioner’s meeting, the Sheriff and two of his deputies circled around me and began making threats. I had the presence of mind to turn on the tape recorder. I used this tape in radio news stories. I made it my mission to ensure that this Sheriff would serve only one term. Mission accomplished.

Tag: You’re It!

D.J. Francis, @marketerblog, is recovering from a stint in politics, which gave him a firsthand look at persuasive communcations at the street level.

Jay Ehret, @themarketingguy, says he is a small business marketing coach, consultant, speaker and blog author, and “Don’t Junk Me” gangsta.

Maddie Grant, @maddiegrant, is the diva of social media for the non-profit world.

Mark Harrison, @MarkMHarrison, is a longtime business colleague turned friend. You’ll find him at Opus Communications.

Jason Keath, @jakrose, is a social medialista, and founder of the Stratius Group

Robert French, @rdfrench, of Auburn University’s communications school and PROpenMic.org

Joe Pulizzi, @juntajoe, founder of Junta42, author, blogger, and content marketing evangelist.

The Rules

• Link to your original tagger(s) and list these rules in your post.
• Share seven facts about yourself in the post.
• Tag seven people at the end of your post by leaving their names and the links to their blogs.
• Let them know they’ve been tagged

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No Hanging Chads

Hey, THINKers. I need your vote, if you like this blog.

THINKing is in the running for best marketing blog in the Blogger’s Choice Awards. We were leading, but now are #2. This contest requires registration to ensure that the blogger is not voting multiple times. So, I’d really appreciate your effort and support.  Thanks.

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Social Media Best Practices

The OnlineMarketerBlog threw out the challenge for us to discuss our social media best practice. The blog’s author, DJ Francis, called me “impressively tenacious”. That’s politically correct for cranky, I think! Anyway, here goes.

Social media is public relations. PR is about dialogue, always has been. Social media allows us to extend our conversations beyond our limited geography. Despite that, the best practices haven’t changed from PR to social media. My best practice was said in Shakespeare’s Hamlet: to thine own self be true.

What I mean by this and what Shakespeare meant may diverge a bit. I believe that you must be yourself. No false persona. This is the PR advice I have always given clients and used myself. I don’t want to be one person at work, another at home, another with my friends, yet another online. To have a consistent brand, you must always be the real you. You must not let various publics define you.

This is why we so often dislike politicians. They say one thing in California, another in rural North Carolina. They let the audience and the occasion define what they say and how they say it. This is decidedly not being true to yourself. This also is probably why I’ll never be elected to anything. Want to know where I stand on an issue? Just ask me.

It is just too hard to juggle different selves. Even more so with the advent of social media where everything you say is recorded for posterity and fed by RSS, Twitter, and Friendfeed for the world to see.

So, be yourself. End of sermon.

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Connections Revisited

I asked what social networks you are a part of and several of you have waded in. Let’s see what’s working for our readers:

Ashleigh Hunter of Bank of America wrote:

I am a part of linkedin and facebook actively. I have an account on jigsaw but have not figured out how to effectively use it. I typically end up X-raying linkedin for the right folks as opposed to going through my network. This is the one I find the most useful.

Your PR Guy Blogger Rodger Johnson wrote:

I’m in 5 social networks: Facebook, Linkedin, MyRagan, Smaller Indiana, and Twitter. I’m finding that Facebook is meeting my business objectives the least — but connecting with other professionals has been more fruitful in MyRagan, SMIN, Linkedin and Twitter. I must say, however, Twitter is still new to me.

WebMarketCentral Blogger Tom Pick wrote:

About 40. For standard websites: StumbleUpon (by far – better than all others combined). Then, in order best to least, Bibsonomy, Mister Wong, BeeTooBee.com, Ma.gnolia, del.icio.us and Netvous. For blogs: Technorati (again, by far — as valuable as the next four combined). Then, in descending order, StumbleUpon, Searchles, Facebook, Digg, del.icio.us, Zimbio, IceRocket, BeeTooBee.com, Clipmarks and Sphinn

Social Media Explorer Blogger Jason Falls wrote.

I’m involved in too many to name, but because I’m supposed to know and understand them for my job. (Advising people on how to use them.) But I’m primarily active on the following, all of which have business implications: SocialMediaExplorer.com – My own blog and mini community, Facebook, Twitter, Yahoo Groups, StumbleUpon, del.icio.us.
A number of niche forums/message boards and communities connected to my clients (like RobbysUprising.com, a Ning community for fans of Robby Gordon, Jim Beam’s NASCAR driver.)

Blogger Joe Pulizzi wrote:

LinkedIn is most effective (outside of Junta42 of course). Other network I’m involved in is Facebook. I’ve tried others as experiments, but they are so unimportant at this point that I can’t remember the names.

Sandy Vasseur of Little Architecture wrote:
LinkedIn gives me the best opener a person can have, regardless of whether or not I am personally acquainted with someone. I can say, “We’re linked in via John Doe.” Or, “I’m two-times removed from you on LinkedIn.” Most of us are online for the same purpose, and those opening lines always get me a response.

Blogger Carter Langston, ABC wrote:
I incorporate LinkedIn as one element of my larger email database for my ‘connected’ networking. While I think I understand what you mean by ‘social,’ my offline social networking is much more extensive and diverse. Some very important people in my sphere of influence just aren’t part of the Internet Social Revolution, so my networking takes place online, offline, face-to-face, etc.  Within the greater LinkedIn population, there are sub-groups that I find personally beneficial. For instance, there is the ExecuNet Group, IABC Group, CEO Exchange and more that refine the target audience a bit.  In terms of business objectives: Have I received business directly from those in my network? No. But I interact with people, share information, help other professionals address their issues and concerns. In the process, I learn from others, sharpen my own counsel, build relationships and earn referrals.  In terms of sales objectives: There is nothing more effective than face-to-face networking and talking to people about meeting thei tangible business needs.

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Wealthy Wake Up To Social Networks

It was only a matter of time until the Facebooks and the MySpaces were invaded by older, wealthier people, as pointed out today by eMarketer. See graph below.

The wealthy seem to know a simple fact that others don’t: staying connected is the way to wealth. Doesn’t matter whether it is face-to-face or computer-to-computer. Andrew Carnegie figured this out years ago. Someone once asked him, doesn’t it bother you that you have 15 people working for you who make more than $1 million each?” Carnegie said, “No, because each of them is making me about $15 million.”

He picked the right people to work for him and the right people at other companies to network with in order to expand his wealth. Carnegie then told Napoleon Hill his networking secrets and Hill wrote the first – and still the best – self-improvement book, Think And Grow Rich (free audio file of the book).

Carnegie’s best lesson is that it is not about the money. It is about what you can achieve with the money. DC (digital colleague) Jason Falls picks up on this theme today in his posting investment of giving.

The message is that if you think and network like the rich, you, too can become successful.

Get out there and start networking. Start with me. Visit my profile and connect with me using my harry at my-creativeteam dot com email address.

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Die Damn You, Part Deux

Today’s dinosaur that needs to die is ad agencies. OK, I know I am biased on this subject since it is my sworn duty to become the creative resource for all Fortune 1000 corporations, displacing their agencies. But let’s forget about that tiny detail for a moment, shall we?

Here is what set me off. I’ll not name names because it is not my intent to embarrass anyone. But I ran across something yesterday that summed up how totally out of touch most ad agencies are with what is happening in the market today. On a social media platform that shall remain nameless I saw a message from an agency executive’s assistant that read something like this, “I’m trying to get (executive’s name) photo into his profile on (name of social media platform here).

So, it appears that ad agencies now are utilizing social media assistants to handle their networking for them. It’s like the old “have your girl call my girl and set up lunch” mentality. Now, there are some ad agencies out there doing the right things in the new marketing environment. Digital colleague Jason Falls and his employer Doe Anderson come to mind. But those are few and far between.

Many people in the agency world agree with me. Take Olivero Toscani, creative director for Benetton Group, for instance,

“ad agencies are obsolete. They’re out of touch with the times; they’re far too comfortable. When the client is happy, they stop trying. They don’t want to know what’s going on in the world.”

Or how about this from Dan Santy, principal of Santy in Phoenix,

“The traditional ad agency model is broken and dead. What clients need to know is about how to successfully navigate the shifts in marketing and how to solve their business problems. As agencies, we need to prepare them on how to navigate that shift.”

So, let’s agree that ad agencies should die and that all of their business should come to My Creative Team.

Update: Just ran across this solid post from CustomersAreAlways about how companies want to advertise instead of connect via social media. This is another case where ad agencies don’t show any leadership or foresight. Sometimes you need to tell your client, “No, that tactic is counterproductive.” Here’s a post from Conversation Agent that also points out the bad things agencies do. Bad agency. Naughty agency!

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