Good Works Grapevine

I’m taking some time to do a little housekeeping today and decided to clean out my bookmarks. I always find the best forgotten sites when I decide to organize. So, today, here’s a little link luv for my now organized unsorted favorites.

• Using Social Media to Create Social Media Training – I get asked how to format a social media workshop. I think that this wiki is pretty helpful in getting the training juices flowing.
• Women Grow Business – This is a great blog about how women are changing the face of business.
• Doing an Interview for Your Blog – This is something that I want to start doing more of and Jill Foster provides some great tips on how to get started.
• How to Start Speaking at Events | chrisbrogan.com – Great post on just what it says. Chris – you rock.
• Mean Cards for Many Occasions – This just makes me laugh.
• How to work with nebulous RFPs from clients who don’t know what they want – This is one of those articles that rings true every time I read it.

Enjoy!

I am behind this week. I have forgiven myself for missing 2 days of posts. Do you forgive me? I am also blogging about Twitter…again. I know. I know. It keeps coming up and this story was too good to pass up.

I wanted to share a great story about Embarq (our phone company) and social media. Lately, I have been talking to a lot of clients about what they can “get” from social media. Admittedly, I invest a lot of time contributing to social media channels (Twitter, blogging, Facebook, etc.) and so do you. What can you expect from your time investment. I look at social media as a huge karmic wheel. The more you give, the faster the wheel spins and when you need it your community will come through for you. And along the way you will pick up great information, fantastic contacts and build an effective network. If you haven’t read “Dig Your Well Before You’re Thirsty” by Harvey McKay – read it. It rings so true not only within the social media space but is a good companion in this crappy economy. Networks are important and giving to the network is critical.

So with that said, here is why you should contribute to the conversation. You never know who’s listening.

We live in the middle of the woods in VA and satellite broadband was the only option for a decent internet connection. When we moved in and the phone installation tech came out in September 2008, he told us that there *might* be the potential for us to get DSL. We were 16K feet from the junction box which was in range for decent service. So we called the Embarq customer service line and asked if we could get DSL. We were told NO but that they would add us to a list and that we would receive info should they ever run DSL to our house. We begrudgingly let it go. In early November, Embarq called back and said that they were running “extended reach” DSL to our area and that we *might* be eligible. We were told to look for a card in snail mail in early December. December came and went with no word from Embarq. My husband called them every few days for two months to find out the status. Everyone at Embarq was very nice, but we were consistently told that the matter would be escalated and that someone would call us back. Needless to say, no one ever called us back.

So, last week we had a snow storm and the satellite went out (as usual). Apparently when the satellite ices up there is no service until the ice melts. Technology at its finest if you ask me. A friend and I were tweeting about our satellite woes on Twitter and I mentioned that Embarq had been teasing us with promises of DSL but that I’d believe when I see it. Then it happened.

It just so happens that Embarq is on Twitter (who knew?) and had come across my complaints. @Embarq_Joey sent me an immediate reply asking how he could help. I told him my DSL saga and within 24 hours I had an Extended Reach DSL installation scheduled on 2/27. Amazing! He was helpful, did what he said he would do and followed up. He also went on to help my mom get DSL that had just been added to her rural area last week. And my mom was ready to ditch Embarq altogether.

So after five months of chasing down this elusive DSL service by phone and email, one tweet kicked off a chain of events that ultimately ended in getting something that we desperately needed. I didn’t ask for it. But because I contributed to the conversation, someone was listening..and wanted to help me out.

The installation is scheduled for February 27 and I’ll let you know how it goes. My hope is that by the end of the month we’ll have true broadband that won’t have to be de-iced to function. And a million thanks to @Embarq_Joey for all of his help. We are so psyched! Embarq ROCKS.

What happy endings have you experienced via Twitter or other social media tools? I’d love to hear about them to help me make my case to others. Thanks!

I visited a website this morning that popped a poll in my face asking how long until I ditch my New Year’s resolutions. So, I figured that it was time to revisit them to see how I was fairing. Since its casual Friday, I’m sharing the results with you.

As you might recall, I’ve divided my list into two sections – Tasks and Macro changes. Here’s how I’m doing a month later.

TASKS

• Stop smoking. I’ve been on the patch since January 3. I miss smoking immensely as I truly loved it ( and looked cool doing it), but for my health and my husband, I’m trying to kick it. Bring on the comments all you non-smoker types, I’m ready for you! CHECK.
• Create a more effective plan for my personal social media tactics. I’m doing better with over time management. I’m spending about an hour every morning on social marketing and trying to stick to client work in the PM. So far, so good. CHECK.
  
• Attend more conferences and workshops. I haven’t attended an event yet this year, but it’s in my plan. I would prefer to not drive to DC so I’m looking for something (anything) a little closer to my house. We’ll see how this goes. CHECK.
• Delegate. I’m doing much better. I’ve delegated most of my GoodDogz.org duties so I can concentrate on business growth and am in the process of hiring a personal assistant. Feeling good about this one. CHECK.

MACRO

• Enjoy my family and friends. This is easy. I love my family and friends and enjoy them as much as I can. CHECK.
• Stop wasting time. This is improving. By forcing myself to focus and avoiding distractions, I’m getting more done. This will be a struggle over the long haul, but I think I can get my time under control.
• Forgive myself. This has been really hard for me. My time management issues sometimes tend to put me behind – which in turn makes me angry that I’m not meeting my goals. I’ve had several conversations with folks who are in the same boat and we’ve all agreed. Work will get done and life is short. So, I’m working on stressing less and working more. Again, a long haul kind of thing for me.
• Give more than I get. YES. I feel really good about the amount of time and help I’ve been giving. We adopted an old dog. I’ve helped a couple of dogs find new homes. I’ve helped some friends who have lost their jobs. I’m feeling good. Giving is great. CHECK.
• Live life. ‘Nuff said. CHECK.

I’m not a fan of the resolution, but I think that they help you get through the days if they are attainable and make you feel good. Are you sticking to your New Year’s resolutions?

I have made no secret that I’m in LOVE with LOVESAC. I posted information about our SuperSac a few months ago and wanted to share a little information about the Sactional as well. In one word – AWESOME.

The Sactional gives you the durability of the Sac with the flexibility and style of a sectional. And when I say flexibility, I mean it. The Sactional is really just two pieces – a base and a side. And you can configure them however you want. We bought it because we have a small space where we watch TV and most of the time its just me and my husband. So we didn’t need a huge couch. But when friends and family come over, we need the extra seating.

Our Sactional has four bases and four sides. We typically keep is configured as the Movie Lounger which is essentially a big square with a back and two sides. When my parents came to visit, we reconfigured it as a three person couch with a lounge and it was perfect. The movie lounger can also double as extra sleeping space for guests and is incredibly comfortable.

Reconfiguring is really easy – I did it on my own while my hubby was away. The pieces are held together with a steel clamp that slides into holes within the frame. So you just unclamp the pieces, configure the way you want and clamp it back together.

The covers are really stylish and durable. And for pet owners (or messy people) – they are machine washable. So when two drooly mastiffs muck up a cushion, just throw the cover in the washing machine. Our Jack Russells have little sharp claws and so far, no rips either.

My only complaint is that the base cushions are held on by zelcro so sometimes they slide around. And for some reason ours holds a lot of static in the winter. But all-in-all it was a fantastic piece of furniture for the price. Perfect for us.

We are planning to add one more base to make the could U-shaped so we can put a table in the middle (and we don’t have to sit on top of each other) and our Sactional will be complete. I highly recommend it for anyone who needs practical, flexible seating and especially to those who have pets.

All hail the Sactional (and Lovesac)!

Do you have a LoveSac or Sactional? Do you love it?

I just received an email from JetBlue announcing a new travel service for pets called JetPaws. I’ve always admired JetBlue’s customer service ethics and have enjoyed traveling with them for years. I always choose JetBlue over other carriers when I can. In fact, I’m flying with them on Friday to Ft. Lauderdale!

The new JetPaws program includes specific instructions on flying with you pet on JetBlue, pet travel tips, pet-friendly  destination information, etc. As a marketing ploy, they are also selling JetBlue travel items – hey – everyone’s looking to make a buck.

Now, if only they would use this new program to support animal welfare. My fingers are crossed. =)

I’m dedicating this Friday’s post to my new favorite company, Love Sac. Aside from the fact that I think their marketing is genius (their bags say “Lovesac.com is not a dirty website”), they offer a quality, flexible product.  We went the Love Sac store in Tysons Corner, VA, because my parents were showing up for a visit the next day and we had no furniture in the new house. I needed seating and I needed it fast. First, I must say that the young hipster that helped us was incredibly knowledgeable and accommodating without being pushy. He seemed like he really believed in the product and I drank the Kool Aid. My husband was a little more skeptical, but soon bought into the shpeel.

We went into the store planning to purchase one Super Sac. After the presentation, we were so convinced that this was what we needed that we bought the Super Sac AND a Sactional (Love Sac’s version of the sectional) called the Movie Lounger. Total cost – a little over $2000.00. But here’s the thing, the Sactional can be configured in a variety of ways that I found very practical. The covers are also interchangeable for all products, so you can change the look and color of the room without having to buy new furniture. The covers can also withstand the slobbering, kneading and jumping of dogs which was critical for us. The covers are also machine washable. All, in all, we are sold.

We were a little concerned about fitting the furniture into the truck. No worries. The Super Sac is vacuum sealed into a cube-shaped bag that weighs about 90 pounds. It was heavy but would easily fit into any car.

I dragged it from the car and up the stairs and began to unpack the heavy cube. Unpacking consists of unzipping the bag, pulling out the heavy plastic sealed sac and pulling the plastic off. It’s interesting because the foam on the inside is essentially still in one big block.

So, you get to spend the next 2-3 hours “fluffing” the sac per the instructions on the outside of the bag. Fluffing consists of digging your fingers into the foam through the sac cover and pulling the foam apart. Then you flip the sac over, rinse and repeat. At first, you don’t think that its ever going to fluff up, but the circulation of the air helps the foam inside to expand.

It was a good workout and my fingers and arms ached. I ended up with a blister on my finger from perpetual fluffing, but within about three hours the foam within the sac was completely broken up.

It wasn’t particularly easy or as fun as the website or directions claimed it would be, but all in all, it wasn’t horrible and we did get immediate seating.

Here, you can see that Max truly enjoys the Super Sac.

We covered the Super Sac in the “Earth” Microfiber cover which is working perfectly. Love Sac recommends that you “chair” the sac before you sit in it to help give it the sustained form of a sofa.

We LOVE our Super Sac and highly recommend it for anyone looking for a quality, functional piece of furniture for any room.
Next Friday, I’ll chronicle the set-up of the Sactional. It’s uber groovy. Have a great weekend!

I’ve been talking to my PR peeps about our strategy for 2009. With the economy in the gutter and donors holding back on giving, its going to take some creative ideas to make a nonprofit stand out in a crowd. In a nutshell, I want GoodDogz.org to become a household name, in a positive way, whatever it takes. We promote, a lot, and yet I still meet folks from our area that have never heard of us. And it drives me nuts.

I am a huge fan and advocate of edgy advertising. I started thinking about marketing campaigns that I notice – good and bad – and what I notice about them. Here’s what I came up with in no particular order:

KY Yours and Mine - OK, here’s the thing.  KY Jelly is one of those things that you are afriad to look at in the grocery store for fear that someone might see you. And most people won’t buy it without wearing Groucho Marx glasses. But, IMO, this KY Yours and Mine campaign has almost destigmatized the use of the product. I think that it gives you that “these normal people buy this stuff, why can’t I?” feeling. And that’s power.

AT&T - Some of these commercials are better than others, but I have a sick enjoyment for the morbidity of this commercial. If only he had AT&T, he wouldn’t be…well…dead. Again, kind of weird and controversial. I like it.

Aspercream – “You bet your sweet aspercream!” ‘Nuff said.

True North Nuts – This commercial was never meant to be funny. But the complete miscommunication of the words “nut snack” made this commercial an internet gold nugget.

Yes, these commercials are funny to some and stupid to most, but at the end of the day…we remember them and that’s what really matters.

How will your organization make its mark in 2009?

I’ll admit it. I slacked last week on the blog. Oh well…some times you’ve just got to let some things slide. I’ll forgive you if you forgive me. I’ve been debating whether I should bring you some items that are actually worthwhile or whether I should just give you some random brain droppings. Since it’s late and I feel that I should offer my guests something (even if it is cold tuna casserole), here are a few thoughts from the last few days. I promise to get back on track tomorrow. =)

• Finished up my Christmas shopping on Saturday. Stops included Target (not too terrible) and Fair Oaks Mall (horrible). My advice to all – do all of your shopping online and avoid the aggrivation altogether.
• I put up the tree but haven’t trimmed it yet. This is the first year that George, the mastiff, has been in the same room with the tree so trimming will have to be pet-friendly. Ornaments will be from the middle of the tree and up. He hasn’t shown much interest, but I suspect that once its sparkly it will be hard to resist.
• We love our new Love Sacs. We bought the Super Sac and the Sactional. I chronicled the set-up of both and will blog about it soon as a guilty pleasure. But, seriously, I can’t say enough good things about the products and the company. And remember…its not a bean bag chair.
• I’ve been stuck at home sans hubby since Friday. It’s been nice as I’ve been able to get a lot of non-work related things accomplished (i.e. holiday cheer), but I miss him dearly. Can’t wait to see him on Tuesday!
• I’ve reverted back to my goth youth and bought a pair of boots that I used to own. Can’t believe that they sell them at Hot Topic. I think I want to work there part-time – ah to be 17 again.
• Made a Cheery Cherry Crisp from Tastefully Simple. I love that stuff! Buy it – you’ll like it!

OK, I promise…substance tomorrow. Cheers!

I’m using my Friday this week, to admit that I’m terrible at time management and vow, publicly, to a plan for next week. Maybe this will help you as well.

“How much time do you spend building your social media brand?” This question came up as part of the Social Media Primer I participated in on Wednesday. And it’s a totally valid question. When you start talking about all of the cool tools available and the engagement required – it seems like an incredible time suck…and it can be. Just yesterday, I planned to catch up on business reading. Instead it turned into a day of tweets, Facebook and blogging. And it happened quickly. So to put some perspective on the time that I spend vs. the time required…I’ll map it out.

• I run Twhirl all day in the background to keep up with tweets on Twitter. This is probably a bad idea and I think I’m going to stop doing it. It is distracting and cuts into time that I should be doing other things. So, to guess, I probably spend a total of an hour checking Twitter alone.
• I check Facebook every time I see an update via email, so that probably turns into .5 hours per day. And most of the time, the update has nothing to do with business.
• I usually check LinkedIn once in the AM, so I’m OK there.
• I blog for several different blogs and I do this throughout the day. So, let’s say 1 hour for blogging on any given day.
• I follow-up on any updates on the GoodDogz.org NING community when needed.

So, as you can see, although I think I’m great at time management -I’m not. In fact, this is pretty bad.

Here’s my goal for next week – we’ll see how it goes and I’ll report again on Friday.

• 8:30AM to 10AM – Check Facebook, LinkedIn Groups/Q&A, AM Twitter, Email, 1 Blog Post and HARO (I’m not an early riser so 8:30AM is about the earliest you’re going to get out of me.)
• 10AM to Noon – Work on proposals, prospecting or client work
• Noon to 1PM – Lunch
• 1PM to 2PM – Business Reading (this is something that I cannot seem to make happen so I’m going to schedule it into my day)
• 2PM to 4PM – Client work
• 4PM to 5PM – COB Followup on Email, Outstanding Issues

Next week I don’t have any meetings written in stone so barring anything unforseen, I can make this work. So according to my plan, I’m going to spend 1.5 hours on social media building next week. We’ll see.

A wonderful colleague gave me the book Social Media Marketing: An Hour A Day by Dave Evans. I can’t wait to dig in just to see how much unproductive time I’m spending my brand. Probably a lot I suspect.

Every morning I wake up to about 500+ posts of some sort or another to read, so I decided to pass out a little link luv today to a few of my favorite bloggers.

• Marketing Misfit Blog – Mayra Ruiz is a wonderful lady with a fresh, strategic take on all things marketing.
• Inkthinker | Freelance Writing Blog – Kristen King does a great job with this blog for writers…and she throws in great contests and stories about her dogs.
• Chrisbrogan.com – Chris Brogan is a visionary in the social media space and is an all around nice, accessible guy. If you are the least bit interested in social media or marketing, check out this blog.
• NTEN - I love NTEN. In my opinion, if you are a non-profit, you should immediately run – don’t walk – and join NTEN. Membership is extremely reasonable, the people are fantastic and you will get so much information about nonprofits and technology you won’t know what to do with it all. And…if you sign-up, be sure to tell them that Beth Bates sent ya as I’ll get my renewal for free. Hey – what’s a little harmless promotion?
• FrogLoop – I really like Care2’s Frogloop blog although I do wish they would update it more often. Great resources for nonprofits as well as new initatives.
• Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology – I met Michelle at NTC 2008 and she is a fabulous resource for all things open source.
• The Responsible Marketing Blog – I just enjoy this blog. Patrick Byers does a great job of putting a socially concious spin on everyday happenings and products.
• Happenings, Advice and Other Technology Thoughts! – This blog by my friend, Shashi Bellamkonda, is chocked full of great thoughts, ideas and resources on technology.
• Pop Candy – OK, I get one guilty pleasure. I love USA TODAY’s Pop Candy blog by Whitney Matheson. She is incredible clever and witty and shares my obscure sense of humor. Live it. Learn it. Love it. POP CANDY.
• Basic Instructions – OK, two guilty pleasures. Basic instructions is HILARIOUS.