Archives for Networking category
Whitney and I attended the second annual BlogPotomac bloggers conference on Friday at the State Theater. Hosted by Geoff Livingston and a variety of wonderful sponsors and volunteers, I thought that the presenters, topics and overall format were relevant and timely – they really got to the heart of social media challenges and benefits. I had initially bought my ticket so I could see Ford’s sole social media powerhouse, Scott Monty speak about how he put a new coat of paint on Ford’s brand by actually listening to its customers. (I also got to hang with Scott and Pam & Frank Martin – Pam is in the photo with me – during the lunch break!) But I was pleasantly surprised by the thoughtfulness and quality of the other speakers as well. Topics ranged from utilizing blogging for political activism to the pros/cons of personal branding. Any proceed from the event were donated to DC Central Kitchen, a nonprofit who helps train homeless people in the culinary arts. To date, they have trained over 700 folks with culinary skills.
Kudos to Geoff and team for pulling off such an outstanding event. Can’t wait for October!
Here are a few takeaways from the event:
- Who should own social media? Orgs own their own efforts.
- Engage employees who “get” the mechanics of social media; but these people aren’t your strategists, but they will get things done.
- Understand the resources that you will need to be successful in social media (ex. Southwest Airlines had to hire 2 new full-time people just to moderate comments.)
- Hashtags (ex. #blogpotomac) are incredibly important for following important conversations.
- Folks who blog for orgs or corps – learn to speak with your own voice, not your directors (sometimes this is difficult to overcome). Ask if the single “voice” is speaking to everyone – investors, staff, customers, constituents, etc.
- Personal brands are not created. They are earned.
- Scott Monty stated that he was “not online to sell cars. He is online to build reputation.”
- Crisis is the opportunity to turn a negative into a positive.
- Brands aren’t only built around just a name but larger, the reputation.
- The name is just a label. Never let your personal brand eclipse the greater goal of your company.
- Despite shiny tools, strategy is still key!
There are also a ton of great wrap-ups out there. Check it out.:
Posted on Jun 09, 2009 under Business Tips, Networking |
Ah, the dreaded question. “So what do you do?” With networking at an all-time high, we get asked this question at lunches, networking events, by potential clients and sometimes even at the grocery store. In the past, I hesitated and ultimately over complicated things. “Well, I do this and that. I also do this which really means that and is very important.” Bah.
Over the years I’ve learned to keep it simple. I try to keep the WHAT simple and back it up with the WHY, which to me is much more important to me. Don’t bog your audience down with the details. Use stories to give meaning to what you do.
There is a great post by Stacy Jones @ Philanthropy Journal – Developing an elevator speech – that is a good guide for creating and practicing your own speech. I especially like her suggestion to create a call to action at the end of your speech – I use this a lot when I have an upcoming event to promote.
I personally dislike the “What do you do?” question and tend to use “What do you like to do?” It’s much less formal and awkward and you ultimately find out what the person does for a living anyway. I don’t think we should be labeled by our jobs. Instead, we should discuss why we do what we do and how we can help each other be successful and meet our personal and professional goals.
Hey gang – it’s been a hell of a week with lots of fun projects and proposals for more exciting programs. But all this work has caused me to neglect my readers! So sorry! So, while I try to get through the rest of the week, I’m giving you a few tidbits that I’ve read this week that I think are worth a mention. I particularly like the post from Geoff Livingston on how the basics of making friends have stuck for 80 years and are now so well reflected in social media. Enjoy and I promise that I’ll be better in June!
nonprofit and social enterprise jobs
This is a very interesting time to be alive. The world is changing and although the economy is spiraling and the world is generally in upheaval, it’s inspirational to see how folks are reacting and rising to the occasion. So many more people who have either found themselves out of work or are not happy with the way things are going want to be part of the solution.
Change.org has recently launched a new initiative, Jobs for Change, to help people who want to make social change find a job that will empower them to do so. The program came to fruition with the support of a dozen partners including Campus Compact, AmeriCorps Alums, Young Nonprofit Professionals Network, Echoing Green, New Organizing Institute, Encore Careers, and Network for Good.
The goal of Jobs for Change is to spark a nationwide movement toward careers in the common good – including nonprofit, government, and social enterprise jobs.
The initiative includes a variety of resources including job listings, career advisors, Q&A, and job postings for employers. As of this posting, there were 732 jobs in the live database.
So whether you are looking for a new job or wanting to make a change, take a look at Jobs for Change. You’ll be glad you did.
I was fortunate enough to sit on a panel last night at DC Web Women’s “Social Media Extravaganza” with four incredible ladies who are tearing up the social media space in DC. Many thanks to Jill Foster, Mayra Ruiz-McPherson, Terri Holley and Jen Consalvo for bringing such compelling stories and techniques to the group. A big thank you to TRAK Staffing for providing such a great space for DCWW to host the event. And a million thanks to everyone who attended despite the wet weather and President Obama’s motorcade!
After the presentation I was asked a great question that comes up a lot and I thought that I would share it with my readers. During the presentation I had mentioned that I am pretty open about my life online, sharing it with friends, clients, colleagues…pretty much everyone. The question? Should you separate your personal life from your business life online?
Here’s my short answer – it’s really a personal choice. Some folks like to put it all out there while others do everything humanly possible to separate the two.
I choose to combine my personal life with my professional life. I do this because I want my clients to know me and understand that I am human just like them. I feel like I am limiting my networking opportunities by restricting who I befriend or follow. I tend to avoid connecting with people that I don’t know or are not referred to me, but I do connect with clients through Facebook and Twitter. I think that by being open with clients and potential clients, I tend to ultimately work with folks that are more in line with how I work and my philosophies behind how I consult. I can also weed out folks that may not be a good match. Anyone thinking about doing business with me can Google me to find out everything they need to know to decide whether they want to work with me.
Don’t get me wrong. I do have a filter which I think includes common sense guidelines. I try not to use foul language online. I don’t post photos or video that I think may be deemed as inappropriate. I don’t post anything “too” personal. I’d like to think of my online life as PG-13. For me, email is still my back channel for sending anything that I don’t want to share with the world to my friends and family.
So, depending on your situation, consider opening your online presence up a bit and see what happens. You may be pleasantly surprised by the results!
More outstanding resources from the Social Media Extravaganza:
dc web women social media extravaganza (Jen Consalvo)
#smextra Coverage on Twitter
Photos (Mayra Ruiz-McPherson)
#smExtra by @dcww recap (Mayra Ruiz-McPherson)
WomenGrowBusiness.com (Jill Foster)
Notes on the DC Web Women Social Media Panel (Deborah Ager)
Rainy days and Mondays…aren’t going to get me down this week! There are a bunch of great free (or almost free) webinars this week so take advantage!
Be sure to share your favorite events in a comment.
Since the first post on industry-specific Twitter resources was so wildly popular, and a lot of folks are actually changing their jobs these days – here is part 2 of our Twitter resource series.
Twitter for:
If you have an industry that we haven’t covered, please leave a comment and I’ll include it in part 3 of the series!
I think that one of the best, easiest ways to promote your blog is through feeds into social media properites like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc. While there might be a magical tool that links all of these mediums together, I’ve yet to find it. So here is my step-by-step process for posting your blog posts to almost all of your profiles. I will preface this by letting you know that I use WordPress so all of my techniques are based on WordPress.org.
Feed into Twitter - Use the WordPress Twitter Tools plugin to auto-post your blog post to your Twitter profile upon publication.
Feed into Facebook – There are two ways that I like to auto-post to Facebook.
1) By using the Twitter app in Facebook to feed your Twitter posts into your Facebook status bar, your blog posts will be posted to your Facebook profile automatically.
2) You can also use NetworkedBlogs to set-up a profile for your blog on Facebook. This gives you addtional exposure in general and feeds your blog posts into your activity timeline.
Feed into LinkedIn – LinkedIn recently launched a series of web apps that enable additional functionality for your LinkedIn profile. I use the WordPress app to feed my blog posts into my LinkedIn profile automatically. There is also an app called BlogLink that enables feeds for other blogs.
Feed into your Website - By using Feedburner, it’s easy to feed your blog posts into any HTML page. Simply sign-up for an account, enter your blog URL, configure your settings and copy/paste the generated code into your web page.
While there are literally thousands of social media tools, the feeds above should give you an starting point for effortlessly promoting your blog to your readers.
I have mixed feelings about Facebook, not only for nonprofits but for business in general. I think that its a great tool for networking with family and friends, but I’ve yet to see true value for businesses.
As an experiment, we set-up a Facebook cause for GoodDogz.org and then ran a campaign for our upcoming Pet Fiesta event. Since we launched the Cause about a year about, we’ve received donations totaling $155. We received $0 through our Pet Fiesta campaign. We list our Facebook Cause on our website, in our NING community, in our e-newsletter, etc. But we’ve yet to get any real traction.
Here’s where I see Facebook being a semi-valuable business tool…
- Networking and keeping up with friends, family and colleagues.
- Providing an additional outlet for feeding your blog, Twitter and other status update feeds.
- Sharing information about upcoming events.
- Sharing news about your business or organization.
Here is a great article from the Washington Post analyzing Facebook as a fund generator for nonprofits. It also compares typical nonprofit fundraising with the success of the Obama Facebook campaign – good stuff…
To Nonprofits Seeking Cash, Facebook App Isn’t So Green
Admittedly, Facebook is a mystery to me in terms of business value. I’d love to hear your take on how you are making Facebook work for your cause or business.
Networking is like saving money in the bank; it’s paying yourself first. There are some tried and true methods out there for networking: association memberships, training seminars, traditional advertising. But in today’s world, you can really do it on the cheap, provided you’re willing to spend the time.
Like almost everyone in this economy, I’ve had some clients pull back on work and others turn down proposals simply because of fear of budgetary cuts. Psychology is really at work here; budgets have already been approved but people are scared to spend money because of all the negative media coverage.
As they say, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.” Here are 5 rules for getting your tough going:
- Be nice to everyone. You never know where the next great lead may come from or who may hold the key to the door you’ve been knocking on for months now. One of my clients sits at the end of a long hallway and I always smile at the woman (let’s call her Mary) sitting in one of the offices next to hers as I pass by. Last time I was meeting with the client, asking for leads, Mary overheard the conversation. She came into the office with the phone number of the assistant to a woman I’ve been courting for a while now. Contact has been made and I’m working on opening that door. Power of a smile- it goes a long way!
- Give it ALL a whirl. Invest in the social media tools available; there are so many to choose from and you will have to determine the ROI for each of them. I find you get the best results when you use all of them at once. In the last couple of months I started a blog, improved my LinkedIn presence, created a Twitter personality and leveraged all to make new contacts. For example: while searching Twitter for other advanced Web professionals, I stumbled upon the profile of a local professional who might be able to give me some great projects. I checked him out on LinkedIn and was connected to him through only one other contact. I asked that contact to introduce us, and now I have a connection. Will it lead to work? I’m not sure. But he gave me a powerful piece of information in his email response to me; he told me there aren’t a lot of Web writers out there specializing in healthcare. I now use this piece of information in other pitches to new potential clients.
- It’s not WHO you know, it’s HOW MANY people you know. This is the reality of doing business in today’s economy, as technology and communication move at the speed of light. You have to make as many contacts as possible, or as my mother used to tell me about men, “You have to kiss a lot of frogs before you find a prince.” (I did find one.) Use every opportunity to talk to people about your services and what you might be able to do for them. A month ago, I was at a client’s office and her husband stopped by to take her out to lunch. I asked what he did and he replied that he owns a Web design company. We made an appointment to speak and share ideas.
- Don’t be shy—tell everyone you are looking for work. Some people think it’s best to say, “It’s going great, I’m doing great,” because they are afraid to show weakness. But at during this rough time in the economy, there’s no shame in saying you are looking for new clients or new work. You don’t even have to paint it as needing more work. You can simply say, “I’m eager to stretch into new markets.” I recently mentioned to a friend that a major client pulled back and he immediately connected me to 2 new connections. One encouraged me to delve into social media more (See Rule #2) and one got me thinking about how broad my services really are, even though right now I’m focused on healthcare Web clients.
- Use your time wisely. All these rules are useful, especially when you are really looking for new work. But if you’re like me, with a really great roster of clients, and just looking down the road in six months, don’t neglect the clients at hand. Stay on deadline, be available and watch what you say on Twitter, etc. Everything is out there for everyone’s consumption; both good and bad.
As for paying yourself first, how much should go into that bank account? Good rule of thumb- for every 7-8 hours of work, spend 1 hour networking. That way, if you’ve put in a full day of work, that one hour is spent insuring there will be more full days of work.
Ahava Leibtag is a Web consultant specializing in content strategy, usability and search engine marketing. You can email her at ahava dot ahamediagroup dot com or visit www.ahamediagroup.com. Her blog is onlineitallmatters.blogspot.com and on Twitter at @ahavaL.
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I work with businesses on marketing strategy, tactics and social media tool selection. I help create effective ways to leverage social media to meet business and marketing goals while cultivating customer engagement. How can I help you?
