Zap.

And the brain started churning with the thoughts I had most carefully avoided by reading National Geographic and refusing to allow my conscious brain to wander over into ‘real life’ territory.

By ‘real life’ (and I so want to put that in air quotes) I mean the day-to-day events and people who make my brain swirl as I try to put 2 and 2 together and come up with something resembling “4″ rather than just “ick.”

Things like this tend to float around in my subconscious a long time before they suddenly coalesce into a concrete idea. Then suddenly (like now) I find myself getting out of bed to try and put them into words. Have to get it down before I forget and the morning finds the realizations paler and somewhat muddied.

2009 was a challenging year for me on one particular front — I found myself wondering why basically good people could see bad things being done and not speak out.

I’m not speaking of global atrocities or some great conspiracy. I’m just talking about what happens on the every day, personal, small-scale interactions.

You know what I mean

One guy is dishonest in his dealings with everyone. Good people who have reason to know talk amongst themselves as to how awful his behavior is. But they only talk amongst themselves. Only as members of some bizarre club of people who have been taken in by him or who have narrowly avoided it. They don’t speak out against him publicly. A woman is known to show two faces to everyone with whom she deals. The same people speak amongst themselves as to how she is whomever she thinks her audience wants her to be as long as she thinks it will get her ahead. But when her name comes up in ‘non-insider’ conversation those who talk amongst themselves say nothing to those who would most appreciate the warning. A company is clearly scamming its clients – talking a good game but in the end its nothing but talk.  Still the clients are paying money thinking that it must be a good company or surely someone would say something. Again, the basically good people who know? Nary a peep.

It just didn’t jibe with my world view.

Why didn’t those people who I knew to be honest, caring, moral people speak up? Especially when they knew that to stay silent was to imply that the liars, swindlers, and dishonest folks were okay, as they were busy churning through the unwary?

Then I looked around more carefully

I realized that there are some folks I know who do speak up. They live out loud. They put their feet forward and say with passion and certainty what they believe.  Whether it’s about a person, a company, or an event that has ignited their passion, they speak up.

I have to say that I don’t always agree with my friend Erin Kotecki Vest (aka @QueenofSpain). But damn how I wish I had her courage. I’ve never seen Erin back down from a fight. You want to know if she thinks someone is good people or bad? Ask her. She’ll tell you outright. Then again, you don’t always have to ask. She’s out there putting it black & white for people to read. She doesn’t hide behind a persona. She is who she is. Trust me – the first time I met her in person it was like just finally sharing oxygen with someone I’d known for a long time.

And Micah Baldwin (@micah)… another one of those people who is about as fearless and open as anyone you could imagine. Moreso, actually. Micah puts things out there that consistently blow me away. His fearlessness when it comes to stating what he experiences and believes publicly and standing behind his words is a little terrifying, to be honest. The first time I met him I rather expected him to growl instead of grinning like he did.

So why then are there folks like these two (and believe me, I could start listing more, but they’re extremely good examples!) but also so many who seem so afraid to speak out?

I didn’t get it

Again – my subconscious went quietly (and sometimes noisily) about working on the puzzle. It started breaking things down a little further. There were folks like Erin and Micah who don’t pull the punches. There were folks who were “in the know” about the men, women, and companies that were dishonest but didn’t say anything while personally avoiding working with them. And then there were folks who knew, but still went along as if they didn’t. Working with, being pleasant to, and even tacitly endorsing those ‘bad eggs.’

Suddenly as I lay in my bed thinking that I needed something more distracting than iPhone games to keep my brain from working on this it clicked.

Mostly because I finally examined my own silence.

You see, I figured out that I fall in the “publicly silent but unwilling to endorse the bad guys by pretending they aren’t” group.

Why? Fear mostly. Fear that is based on past experience.

In the past, when I’ve called someone out for dishonesty, disreputable behavior, and being unethical it’s just proven to be something that was used against me. “Oh, well, Lucretia… you know. She can be a problem.” The problem? That I didn’t go along with the charade. The people I thought might appreciate the warning didn’t. Either they convinced themselves that things would be different for them, or they convinced themselves that the problem really lay with me.

The inevitable “wow, I should’ve listened to you” conversation just hasn’t been worth the personal cost of being someone who spoke out.  In fact, altogether too often, I had friends who told me I really ought to quit speaking out.

So if it happens that way with me, why not with those others? Of course it does. They don’t risk it either because they know that the potential negative impact to their own reputation isn’t worth trying to ’save’ those who don’t want to be saved… those who want you to be wrong because it benefits them if you are.

Which kind of brings up that last group. Those who know, but are still working with, endorsing, and engaging with the ‘bad eggs’ despite their knowledge.

What motivates them? In a word: money

Okay two words. Money *and* pride. That last group thinks they can dance with the Devil, skirt the danger, and come out unscathed with money in their pockets. They think that they’re smarter, savvier, wiser, and somehow will avoid the fate of everyone else who has been burned by the individuals and companies that are no good.

Yes. There’s money to be had if you deal with the crooks, liars, and cheats. But the thing so many of the last group don’t get is that unless you *are* a crook, liar, and cheat? They’ll always get the better of you. You can’t come out unscathed. You can’t take money from a thief and turn it into honest money. You can’t align yourself with a cheat and not end up cheating someone else.

There is no honor among thieves

So then, back to my friends Erin & Micah and others like them. What makes them so fearless? I don’t know. But I intend to find out. Because I’m tired of being the person who is afraid to point out the Emperor’s lack of clothing lest the rest of the court shun me.

I’d rather be genuine.
I’d rather be moral.
I’d rather live my life out loud.

And then I promptly fell off the face of the blogging planet.

I’ve been really busy working a lot since then. I’ve also been really busy learning a lot since then. Mostly, I’ve learned more about the traditional side of marketing. But there were some unexpected lessons as well.

One of the most important lessons I’ve learned I should’ve probably figured out somewhere in my twenties, but seemed to have missed in the quest to acquire such useful skills as casting bronze and living in a tent.* It seems that having two totally diverse visions only works well in collaboration if you are John Lennon & Paul McCartney (and even that didn’t last forever.)

In Plain English

Let me just ditch my tendency toward metaphor for a bit and put things down here as clearly as I can.

Over the past four and a half months, I’ve had the privilege to be the Director of Social Media for Collective Bias. But increasingly it’s been evident to both John Andrews (managing partner) and I that we weren’t heading in the same direction.

John and I have known each other since July of 2008 when he started the Walmart ElevenMoms program and asked me to be a part of it. We worked well together on that program and became friends along the way, so when he asked me to join his newly formed Social Media agency? It seemed like a natural fit for both of us.

But in a startup, the pressures are different than they are in an established company. Leadership really must be on the same page and the vision has to be pretty clear. You don’t have the luxury of spending a lot of time negotiating every little detail – there’s a lot of work to be done if you want to make it past the startup phase. And there are always too few people to do that work even in a well-funded startup. No man hours can afford to be wasted on anything that isn’t going to help the company move forward.

Striking the Wrong Chord

It didn’t take John and me very long to figure out that we weren’t harmonizing well. (Yes, we’re back to the music metaphor. I can’t help myself, it fits!) It’s not that we weren’t both accomplished artists, it’s that we were singing entirely different tunes. It was confusing the rest of the band… it was making things sound horrible to the audience… it was generally just not working for anyone.

When John first suggested to me that we really needed to re-evaluate the nature of my role in the company, I couldn’t hear what he was saying. After all, except in the fast-paced world of the Internet, we had barely started.  I heard instead that he didn’t like my tune. So I resisted and kept insisting that we could figure it out if we just tried harder.

I was wrong. Trying harder isn’t always the solution.

It’s kind of like singing louder – it doesn’t make the tune any more pleasant, it just means that you either drown someone else out or you end up shrieking trying to be heard.Neither makes sense.

So a couple of weeks ago, I came to the same conclusion John had already reached. Something had to change. Someone had to back down. And honestly? It had to be me.

I had to realize that just because the band wasn’t going to sing the tunes I have in my head didn’t mean that those tunes weren’t good, and just because they weren’t mine didn’t mean that the ones John was creating weren’t good either. But I’ve been the metaphorical equivalent of a jazz singer trying to fit into a rock band.

Yeah, it took mere months & not years for me to figure out that this band wasn’t the right band for me and for John to figure out that I wasn’t the right singer for his band. So sue us. Maybe we don’t need to have a Yoko Ono to bear the blame. Maybe we’re smart enough to figure it out before we end up only talking through our press agents.

Whether or not anyone else thinks it was enough time to figure it out? We do. So after much conversation, we’ve worked out a transition plan that works best for us.

A Long, Lingering Note

So, at the end of November, I’ll be leaving Collective Bias as their Director of Social Media. We decided to take our time and do it right, so we can get everything transitioned and get the right person/people in place that will help John and his company to move forward with his vision.

If you’ll forgive me for sticking to my band metaphor past the point of prudence? I’ll be finishing a few gigs we already had agreed to while Collective Bias auditions my replacement and s/he learns their songs. I may even sit in from time-to-time down the road if they need me and I’m available (we call that ‘working contractually’ or ‘consulting’ in the non-music world.)

So, was it my dream job? Yes. And No.

But it was definitely worth pursuing to find out – as are all such dreams – and I would do it all over again. I was privileged to work with an amazing team of people and I learned a lot from each of them. I consider myself very fortunate to be given the opportunity.

Are we “breaking up the band” as I said in my title? No, not really. Collective Bias will go on to make their own Social Media music without me.But, after next month? I’ll be able to hang out in the audience enjoying their performances, while I keep working on the songs that are in my own heart.

*Those skills are real, but that’s a post for another day.

I figured though, if I could find the headline for it, that would make it much easier to write. Fortunately, two women I admire greatly have already written their own variations on this post in the past couple of months — Shannon Paul when she went to work for Peak6 in April and Steph Agresta when she went to work for Porter Novelli just a couple of weeks ago. How could I do any better than to borrow the title both of these amazing women chose to use? Third time is the charm, right?

And it is a good title, you know.

Gig’s a great word for what we do. Dictionary.com offers up this as one of the 22 definitions it has:

gig (2) “job,” first used by jazz musicians, attested from 1915 but said to have been in use c.1905; of uncertain origin.¹

When I say gig, I think of jazz. I think of music as simple as a snare drum and a piano riff that can become as complicated and syncopated as a city street at full tilt.

Social Media is kind of like that to me — something that’s as natural as one person talking to another; and as complicated as one million people talking amongst themselves. Yeah, gig sounds right for a job that involves Social Media. I think both Stephanie & Shannon got that one bang on the nose.

So if you’ll bear with me? I think I’ll let this unfold a bit more like a piece of impromptu jazz – from the soul, without a plan, but starting with the song in my heart.

The BackBeat

Last year, I was lucky enough to find myself sitting in Las Vegas during BlogWorld Expo at the TechSet² party at Bare, talking to Tony Hsieh. Tony is one of the lowest key guys you’d ever want to meet, but also one of the smartest. There’s a reason his company (Zappos.com) has had such exponential growth under his leadership. His insights are that scary-kind-of-smart that makes you laugh nervously and wonder why you didn’t think of that and then realize that he’s just that sharp.

We were talking about a lot of things and nothing of importance — certainly not talking about the panel he’d graciously agreed to be on for me the next day — when all of a sudden, he looks at me with one of those shrewd looks he gets and says “so tell me… What’s your dream job?”

I was totally caught off guard. So I laughed nervously (like I mentioned above) and told him I’d think about it and get back to him.

That conversation has sat in the back of my mind with every career decision I’ve made since last September. Because I didn’t really even have the least notion of what my dream job was. In fact, I think I’d pretty much stopped believing there was such a thing.

But it did occur to me that a guy like Tony doesn’t ask silly, idle questions about things like that. I mean, his company pays people to quit if they don’t really want to work there after training — because they want people who really want to be there.

The Melody

My dream job… What the heck was that? I guess it meant not working for someone else… because I was tired of having a solution for a problem and not being able to implement it. Tired of seeing an easy fix for something and knowing that meant a lengthy battle to get it applied. Tired pretty much of seeing people & companies hit the wall because it was better to go full-speed ahead into it on the word of “someone very important” than it was to admit that it was a good idea to hit the brakes no matter who pointed out the looming wall — be it the janitor or the receptionist.

I couldn’t imagine the kind of company or bosses that would make working for them a joy rather than an impediment. So I thought I might as well continue to work for myself so that I could fire the client if need be.

You see, I absolutely, positively, no-holds-barred love the field that is currently being called Social Media. Yes, I know – I argued against the term because it originally meant the tools used to have a multi-way conversation. But over the past couple of years it’s come to mean more than that. It has come to mean those who use the tools, what can be done with the tools & the communities, and how it’s being done. Not just marketing, or real estate, or even personal conversations – but all of those – and more.

And I love it. Because it’s this ever-changing, ever-developing, exciting, intriguing field with no ‘this is the way we’ve always done it, so this is the way you have to do it’ ruts.

The Complicated Solo

So I decided to go it alone!

Okay, not quite alone. No one can work in Social Media alone. Whether working for themselves or for a company or an agency — it’s impossible to be the Lone Ranger in this arena. There is no such thing as a community of one.

I just decided that I’d keep working for me and consulting for others and see where it went. It was going pretty well actually. Just starting to get really interesting… and then…

Then? A Whole New Rhythm

You know what happened next? Someone offered me my dream job.

No really. I mean… I had thought it didn’t really exist. But in the back of my head, all these months, I’d been trying to suss out what it would look like if it did exist. So trust me, when it showed up on my doorstep? I knew it. I knew it like you would a lost child that had returned home long after anyone reasonable would’ve given up hope for the doorbell to ring.

The part that I was missing before? It was those great bosses. The visionary ones? The ones who can make things happen if you just say that you’ll work as hard as they do (and they do) and who don’t care who says it if it happens to be right or a good idea — and who know that CEOs can be brilliant, but so can janitors. The ones who make you want to give something your all because you know they are and there’s a joy that comes from the exhaustion of a good job.

Are You Swinging Yet?

Because I am. And as Director of Social Media for Collective Bias — a company that grew out of MARS Advertising — I plan on riding this train through many stations. I’m in the most amazing place in my life — one week into the dream job I had pretty much given up dreaming about. Because honestly? Before I went to work for myself and stopped wondering what a “dream job” looked like, it didn’t exist yet.

And honestly? I already know and love my boss. I’ve worked with John Andrews since last August. Granted, he was working with Walmart when our association first started and I was trying to decide if I wanted to be a part of what has become the Walmart ElevenMoms. But we’ve worked on a lot of projects together over that period of time and I’m really looking forward to working for & with him at Collective Bias. Along with a lot of other amazing folks who I know I’ll wax on about in depth as we go.

Side-slipping to a Minor Chord

But now that I’ve mentioned the ElevenMoms we have to introduce a sad note into this metaphorical jazz jam of mine. You see, there’s a price sometimes when it comes to following your dreams.

For the past 10 months, I have had the immense privilege and pleasure to be a part of the Walmart Elevenmoms. I can’t tell you how much this group of women has come to mean to me. If you had told me last year at this time that I would meet such a diverse, smart, savvy, incredible group of women and not only learn from them, but also make lifelong friends over what started out as “just a small foray into social media by Walmart”? I surely wouldn’t have believed you. But that is the case, I assure you.

I am very proud to be able to say that I have been a part of the Walmart Elevenmoms program. I consider it a huge honor just to say I’ve worked with the women who are, and with the people at Walmart & Rockfish Interactive who made it possible for me as well.

But you’ll have clearly noticed that I’m speaking in past-tense here.

After discussing it with Wanda Young at Walmart (whom I admire greatly), we’ve kind of both come to the conclusion that it’s probably for the best for me to leave the program at this time, as I take on the huge responsibilities and time commitment that go with working full-time at Collective Bias.

I appreciate so much her willingness to work through this with me to try and find the right solution. It’s hard to even contemplate leaving the program — as it feels somehow like I’m walking away right as the group is about to evolve again. And I have no doubt that what is going to happen will be amazing, given the women and people involved.

I count myself very fortunate to be granted this long to be in the company of such amazing folks! But sadly, it is time for me to move on and to make space for those who are to come.

Please make sure though, that you understand that the Walmart Elevenmoms have my continued support and I am 100% behind them in whatever they choose to do and to pursue. This parting is amicable all around and in fact, I will sorely miss being a part of such an incredible endeavor.

Time to Walk it on Home

So then, where are we? Well, I’m living my dream job as Director of Social Media for Collective Bias. I’m leaving my good friends the Walmart ElevenMoms to continue doing what they do so well, with my best wishes and firm support. I’m still blogging and twittering like I’ve always done… but I’ll also be blogging Social Media over at the Collective Bias site when it’s up and running.

What else do you need to know? Nothin’ but man… dig that Jazz!!

¹ Dictionary.com. Online Etymology Dictionary. Douglas Harper, Historian. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/gig (accessed: June 22, 2009)
² That makes 2 things I owe the lovely & talented Ms. Agresta for!

]]> http://geekmommy.net/2009/06/22/my-new-gig/feed/ 61 http://geekmommy.net/2009/06/09/hostedcontests/ http://geekmommy.net/2009/06/09/hostedcontests/#comments Tue, 09 Jun 2009 20:13:27 +0000 GeekMommy http://geekmommy.net/?p=710 We’re back to one of my favorite topics — Bloggers and Compensation.

There’s a few folks out there who will tell you that if you ever pay a blogger for anything, you’re violating some ‘purity code’ – some imaginary Blogger Code of Ethics that we all got to vote and agreed upon (there isn’t one, getting bloggers to agree on anything is like herding cats.)

The thing is? There are different types of commercially related blog posts. There are reviews (where a blogger gives you her opinion on a product, company or service), there are announcements/informational posts (similar to press releases, usually just a heads up – but sometimes links to deals or sales) and there are contests/giveaways (where opinions don’t necessarily enter into it, but prizes are given away on the blog that are supplied by a 3rd party.)

But these are *very* different types of posts from the blogger’s perspective.

Even though it may take someone about the same time to read each of them? It doesn’t take the same amount of time to create or maintain them.

We constantly get emails from PR people that seem to think that all we really ought to post are the announcement type.  It seems that they often mistake bloggers for “new reporters” and think all we should do is repackage whatever info they email to us.  (Come to think of it? There are some blogs that do seem to do just that… but not most.)

We also often get emails that say “we would like to send you a sample of our product or service for your review if you are interested.”

But lately, increasingly, companies are turning to the contest/giveaway model and approaching bloggers to see if we want to hold promotions to give away either samples, trial-codes, or prizes to our readers in order to promote their company or products.

Some of them get what it is they’re asking for and some don’t.

We don’t have “web guys” who do the work for us.  Hosting a contest? Means figuring out the details, creating all of the content, posting the contest, running it fairly, monitoring entries for validity, choosing winners and notifying them, plus either fulfilling it by shipping at our cost, or acting as a go-between for the company and then posting the winners.

But it seems that there’s people out there who think that all that work isn’t really work.  That they shouldn’t have to pay bloggers for doing the same work they would have to pay the guys in marketing, PR, and those who do their own websites.

If you, as a business, went to your web guys and said “we need you to run a contest on the site – create the design, the contest rules, the elements and the content, run it, monitor the entries for validity and to make sure no one is cheating, then contact the winner(s) and get back to us with that info – oooooh, yeah, and we can’t pay you your salaries this week, but would you like some free laundry detergent or diapers instead?“  They’d laugh their butts off.  Well, before putting in a complaint with the local labor board and putting their resume on Monster.com, that is.

Yet that’s what keeps repeatedly being asked of us.  “Will you work for free?” And for many of us, the answer is now becoming “well no – I’ve got this other company over here who is offering to compensate me for the same work and isn’t treating me as if being a blogger and/or a mom somehow made me lose my business skills and common sense.” Because seriously?

Yes, I love helping my readers experience new things and potentially win something… but I’m not going to be the only person working for free in this equation.

And that’s not because I’m some sort of prima donna who thinks I’m important.  Yes, you can tell me that there’s “a ton of mommy bloggers who would jump at this opportunity.”  But all you’re telling me is that you will take advantage of anyone you can.  Whether a blogger is an “A-Lister” or someone who is still building her audience? They still have to do the EXACT same amount of work.  Essentially, you’re asking people to work for free for you “for the exposure” or for “a product sample” but you? Yeah you there offering me this wonderful opportunity for my readers?  Are *you* getting paid?  Or do you just do that PR & marketing gig out of the goodness of your heart because you love it so?

How much is a bottle of laundry detergent or a package of diapers? Somewhere between $15-25 depending on the size? That’s just horrid.  It works out to about $2-5 per hour or less if you run a contest right.  One that isn’t just a few lines of “hey, company X is giving away a year’s supply of potpourri”  or “this author wants me to hold a contest to give away 5 copies of his new book  comment here to win.”   One with no promotion, no concern about running a fair contest, no checking to make sure you’re doing a good job.

Would YOU work for that?

Sorry – I just needed to get this out there.  When bloggers ask to be paid to host your contest on their sites? We’re not being demanding or unethical – we’re getting fed up with being treated like “mommies”  or clueless bloggers who don’t know any better.  You’re sure as heck getting paid by whatever company you work for or are doing PR for.  Are *you* being demanding or unethical expecting someone to value your time and effort?

And yes, I love being a part of the chain that gets awareness about your client, your product, or your business to your potential customers – but while I may write for the love of it? That’s different than working for you for free.

In the interest of disclosure? This post was in no way contributed to or sponsored by anyone.  These are my own thoughts & opinions and I’m more than willing to give you this piece of my mind for free.  Or, well, at least for the price of the bandwidth that I’m paying for and the server hosting that I’m paying for and well… you get the point.

We were talking about how unless you are speaking to someone who works in Information Technology, you always end up “dumbing down” your job description when someone asks you what you do for a living.

Yes, I know, there are other fields and jobs that also require “dumbing down” for the average person not in that field, but at least there’s usually some level of basic comprehension. For instance, if I said “I’m a medical doctor” or “I’m a lawyer” – the average person would nod and say “oh!! Okay!” and have at least a general idea of what that means. Yes, they might not know the difference between a Litigator and someone who works with Intellectual Property rights – or the difference between a GP and an Oncologist… but there’s no look of utter bafflement.

I attribute this to the fact that those professions have been around for a few centuries – whereas 99% of the jobs in technology field didn’t exist before the past one.

Granted, there are a few jobs in tech that people nod and ‘get’ – programmer, tech support – but they really have no idea what you do unless you care to get deeper into it. Ask any phone support guy how many times he has to deal with a customer who thinks he can “just go right in and change that” or any programmer how many times she’s had to explain to a relative that “no, she doesn’t know what’s wrong with that software, she’s never used it before.” It’s right up there with asking your podiatrist dentistry questions.

So when GeekDaddy recently accepted a Director position at his company – we both laughed at how much easier it would be for our extended families to answer what he does when asked now. Just around the same time that it got much, much harder to describe what I do for a living.

You see, before Buttercup was born, it was easy for friends & family to say that I was a “College Professor” as they didn’t have to really explain what I taught – just say “something to do with computers” and whomever was asking didn’t inquire further.

Today though?  My “job description” is pretty much threefold. I’m a Blogger, I’m a Speaker, and I’m a Social Media Strategist.

Now, the odds are pretty good that if you’ve been coming here for any length of time you have a general idea about the first two, and a better understanding of the third one than most people.

But the odds are also pretty good that if your own job title has the phrase “Social Media” in it? You try to figure out ways around that when you’re talking to the average person as well.

Mostly, I find that when someone asks me what I do for a living any more, I usually just try to laugh it off and say “I play on the Internet for a living, and when I’m lucky, I get paid to write about it or to speak about how I do it for others.” This has actually, unfortunately, backfired more often than not and required a much lengthier explanation than if I said “I’m a Social Media Strategist, Blogger and Speaker.”

It turns out that there is no easy way to explain what I do, unless you work in the same field or have had to listen to the long version.* And usually, when I do go so far as to give someone the “long version” it’s met with “but why would anyone pay you to do that?”

It’s usually at that point that I try the old patented “well enough about me… Let’s talk about you. What do you do these days?”

But lately I’ve been thinking about just telling folks that I’m a wizard when asked. I think it’s a bit less mysterious. And maybe they’ll think twice about sitting around for the “long version.”

*trust me when I tell you that my “long version” is the edited version evenso…  I could go on for days about Social Media – but it’s only really interesting to someone who works in the field or wants to. And they already get it.

There’s been a bit of hubbub lately about automation on social networks like Twitter. Prominent folks have come out saying how anti-social it is to automate certain functions because it simulates engagement without actually being genuine.

I get dozens of automated Direct Messages (DMs) in my Twitter inbox daily that say something along the lines of “Thanks for following me! yadda-yadda-yadda…” After awhile I was on the band-wagon. “Don’t send me your auto-DMs! I don’t want your free e-book, or a link to your website! Be real!!!”

But I kept seeing these DMs despite the seemingly general sentiment against them. Then I realized something – those calling for the ‘end to the robots’ are also power-users. By power-users, I mean they’re folks who a) are followed by thousands of people and b) follow most of them back.

It’s that following back part that triggers these automated messages. Sent out from a variety of different services, the average user signs in once, sets up a generic “Thanks for following me! yadda-yadda-yadda…” message and doesn’t think twice about it afterwards.

So clearly, there’s a discrepency here: the usage/impression varies depending on how the user interacts on Twitter. If you follow less than one person a day, say maybe 5 a week, and only a couple of them send those messages – the annoyance factor is going to be far less.

That got me started thinking about automation in general. Since I had gotten behind on my own ‘followbacks’ in the month of December (to the tune of about 1500 people!) I turned to a friend of mine who really ‘gets’ thewhole automation thing – Jesse Stay [@jessestay] the creator of SocialToo.com.

The reason I contacted him was that I knew his service offered an option to “automatically follow back” those who followed me. I asked Jesse if that was “from the time I registered” or if there was a way I could retroactively follow all of those people whose notifications were sitting in my inbox, pushing it over 2,000 unread emails.

Jesse told me that he had been working on a premium option (now live) that allowed the user to run a ‘one time’ catch-up script. Was I game? Sure. Because at that kind of number, it would be easier for me to go back through them and unfollow people that I didn’t want to interact with than it would to a) open each email, b) click on the link to their twitter, c) click on the follow button (or not), d) go back to the email, close it and go on to the next. For fifteen-hundred-plus people. So Jesse ran the script for me. About 10 minutes later, what would’ve taken me hours was done.

Do other ‘power-users’ use this automated follow-back? I suspect so. There are some who probably do what I do and try to manually do it every day – but you know what? That’s a lot of time spent just going thru the notifications.

So is some automation good but other automation bad? My analysis? No. It’s how you use it that makes it effective or ineffective. To that end, I wanted to ask Jesse some questions about SocialToo.com and find out a bit more about what he’s done and why.

Here’s that Interview

GeekMommy: Jesse, I hope you don’t mind if I write about the fact that I turned to you for help with the automated following.

Jesse: That’s no problem – I’m probably going to turn that into a one-time payment, or possibly donation tonight or tomorrow as a new feature on the site if others would like that. I’m thinking maybe $15-$20 to turn that on once, but I may just make it a donation. (Note: the service is presently live at a one time fee of $5 on the SocialToo site ~GM)

GM: Your script took literally *days* off of my timeline for that. After the script ran, I went back through my following list and pared it down a bit based on whether or not people were following/engaging with me and also if they were spammy or scary – and I still had to go thru 348 pages of following folks on Twitter for that!

Jesse: I’m glad it could help. That’s why we started this – there were too many time-consuming tasks like that, and as Twitter grows that will only get worse.

GM: I really think that people are mistaking the tools for the issue. Anyone can use automation – but how they use it may or may not ‘work’ for someone else.

Jesse: Exactly. My goal is to try and satisfy those for automation, and those against automation, too. If you don’t like the auto-dms people send you, we’ll provide an option for that as well (I should note that I currently have a beta feature turned on for just my account that disables socialtoo-generated DMs from being sent to me.) Many, if not most people I hear from don’t mind them. Most of those people also aren’t following 4,000 people. We all have different circumstances, and should be able to control the way we use the service, and enhance the relationships we have as we use it.

GM: To me, the real issue with DMs is that they shouldn’t be tied to following. Just because I read your blog doesn’t mean I want to give you my home phone number too…. Likewise, just because I’d like you to have my home phone doesn’t mean I’m interested in reading your blog… The issue lies with Twitter, not with automation.

Jesse: Very true – I’ve got a post I’ve been meaning to write about this as well. Twitter relationships are broken. On Facebook, if I want to be your friend and follow your updates, you have to approve me doing so, and vice-versa. Once you approve me, there is a mutual relationship there, and both can know that they can see and follow each others updates if they choose. It’s built into the system. Then, Facebook has built in Friend lists and privacy filters to control what you want to see amongst those you have agreed to be friends with. Twitter gives no protection to users – relationships can be one-way, which IMO hurts the network. People can follow me but there’s no guarantee I’m listening, or even have the chance of listening down the road.

Then again, some people like that, and that’s how they use the service. There’s no wrong or right way to use the service – this is just my perception.

GM: That said, automation is a good tool used effectively. Ask anyone complaining about it if they have voicemail or not?

Jesse: Twitter itself is an automated tool – I don’t see people criticizing Twitter. These are all tools, and they’re built to give you flexibility to build the strongest relationships you can, and retain those relationships. I call it Relationship Metrics – the tracking of those you follow, and those that follow you, and finding ways to retain those followers and build strong relationships with them. The more people you can build a strong relationship with, the more “authoritative” (for lack of a better term) you can become.

GM: What made you decided to start SocialToo.com? Was it more a matter of wanting certain functions yourself and making them available for others, or of seeing people ask for something and fulfulling that niche? (or something else entirely!)

Jesse: It was a combination of the two. I don’t ever like to do things manually that could be automated. I was already manually following everyone who followed me on Twitter – I like to solidify the relationships of people that are interested in me. It’s just my policy, and it’s important to me. At the same time I wanted a way I could choose not to follow certain people. I believe it was Chris Pirillo [@chrispirillo] that mentioned he wanted a way to follow those that were following him on Twitter automatically, so I wrote a script for him to run on his servers (or Mac – not sure which). I ran the script for myself as well, and I built blacklisting functionality into it so I could exclude spammers and the like from being followed if I didn’t want to follow certain accounts.

Then, after following Guy Kawasaki [@guykawasaki], I noticed when he asked for the same functionality. I offered him my script, but quickly realized not everyone was going to be able to set up my script, and setting it up for them would require me asking for their Twitter credentials in person, which I really didn’t want to do. So I wrote a UI (user interface) around the script, put a database on the backend, and enabled it to support multiple users, allowing them to enter their own Twitter credentials in so I didn’t have to see them. And that was the beginning of SocialToo.com – I believe this was around April or May of this year.

Chris Pirillo also gave me some great advice as we were building it (along with Ponzi [@ponzarelli]) contributing to the auto-unfollow capability. Guy then later approached me with an idea about creating surveys you could Tweet to your friends, in similar manner to TwitPic, but for surveys and polls. I gave him some ownership of SocialToo, we built it out, and launched all features of SocialToo, officially to the public in November.

TechCrunch featured a survey Guy posted on our first day of launch, and we knew it was an instant hit. In just a month we have garnered near 5,000 subscribers on the service, and I expect that to at least triple in the next month.

GM: Do you foresee premium services down the line?

Jesse: Yes, we will be building on a Freemium model. The base features that are currently there should remain free. Our target market is small to even large businesses that want to better track the relationships of people that follow them on the social networks they belong to. We’re establishing a new concept I call “relationship metrics”, which tracks statistics around the relationships you create, along with another concept I call “relationship retainment”, helping you to retain the relationships you build. We’ll provide premium features on top of an already rich feature-set that will support these concepts.

GM: You managed a function for me by running a script that followed back for me over 1500 people in a matter of minutes – do you plan on offering something similar to users down the line? What about a script that does the opposite – unfollowing everyone for someone so that they could ’start over’ on their follow lists?

Jesse: Unfollowing *everyone* is a novel idea – I’ll think about that one, but I could certainly imagine that being a feature. To answer to the function we ran for you, the answer is yes, and hopefully in the next couple days. There is a chance that will be a one-time pay feature*, or perhaps at least a donation of some sort. We’re a completely bootstrapped company, so I’m very eager to start monetizing some of this! A family of 6 is not easy to support as an entrepreneur! (*again, this feature has been implemented since our interview, for a small one time fee of $5 ~GM)

GM: What are your plans for SocialToo.com in 2009?

Jesse: Expect some interesting partnerships with other products and services. I’m not going to say what right now, but we’re going to be launching some unique services that will make these partnerships much easier, and will provide a wealth of information for other products and services. Expect some interesting monetization strategies – in particular around the SocialSurveys themselves. There will always be a free option, very similar to what we provide now, but I have some ideas that could be win-win for our users and us as a company.

My hope is, as we become profitable, to hire several more people and build out the statistics much more than they are currently. I’d also like a much more solid and feature-rich Survey product. There will also be several new products released – remember, our goal is to be your “companion to the social web”. Whatever we can do to further complement your experience on the social networks you belong to, we’ll be working to do so.

Oh, and Twitter will not be our only focus. Very shortly, as soon as we solidify our focus around Twitter, we’ll be expanding features around the other networks we support (Facebook and Identi.ca), along with some new networks we haven’t yet announced. Keep an eye out for that, as I think that is what will make this service very powerful.

GM: How do you deal with people who are saying that “automation” or “robots” don’t have a place on Twitter?

Jesse: Those people are right, based on the way they use the service. People that don’t mind “automation” or “robots” are also right. Personally, I don’t enable auto-dm (except when I’m testing new features, which is happening currently) for my personal account [@JesseStay]. At the same time, I think it’s appropriate to auto-dm for our company’s @socialtoo account. We thank them for joining SocialToo and tell them how to contact us. I don’t think that’s any different than an auto-responder for new subscriptions to any new service. We’re just doing it through Twitter.

Some people have thousands of followers however. Getting a new auto-dm every minute gets annoying, especially when many of them are generic and meaningless. It’s my intention to provide solutions around this as well – our goal is to stay flexible enough to where we can satisfy the way multiple types of users use these Social Networks. For instance, I’m testing a feature right now which we may or may not release, in which you can opt to not receive SocialToo-generated auto-dms. That may or may not be released, but it shows that I am aware of the other opinion. We’re also working on better ways to make the auto-dms much more personal, and more real. For instance, I’ve found when you mention a person’s real name in the dm they are many times more likely to start conversation with you, and appreciate the message. People should have choices, depending on the way they use Twitter. At the same time we all have a responsibility to be responsible, and considerate of different types of users that may be overwhelmed by such features. There’s no wrong or right way to use these services.

After talking to Jesse, I changed my policy. I now have an auto-DM set up – it says “Nice to meet you <<firstname>>. This *is* an automated message, but only to say I will check out your Twitter shortly” because I’m all about transparency. I’m not going to pretend it’s not an automated message – any more than I pretend that you’re talking to me when you reach my voicemail. But I do think it’s nice to acknowledge to someone that I’m not just going to ignore them just because I’m not online 24 hours a day.

Am I using the auto-follow feature of SocialToo right now? No, I’m back to my old methods of adding manually. Which means I need to quit writing this and get to back to my inbox. Thanks for reading (if you did) this lengthy post. I really think we’ll see people adapt to the automation tools the same way we have to voicemail and call-waiting… but until then, we may have to slog through a few unwanted DMs.

Last year was amazing on a lot of levels for me. So many amazing people I’ve had the privilege to meet. So many amazing experiences I’ve had the good fortune to be a part of. I couldn’t have foreseen some of the events of 2008 in a million years before they happened and I’m still not quite sure I believe all of them have!

But this isn’t a ‘year in review post’ although perhaps it ought to be… It’s just that I had the chance to write about that stuff over the past twelve months. If I didn’t do it? It’s time to move on and get up to speed with 2009 instead of putting it off until I get the other done.

One of the things that made this blog so sparse last year was that I kept saying “oh I’ll post about such-and-such just as soon as I get X, Y, and Z done first.” Here’s one of those self-realizations: that just means that X, Y, Z and now A thru G aren’t getting posted in a timely manner either.

So while I’ve got a doozy of a post in the works for tomorrow and another one I want up right after that? I’m going to do this right this very moment.

I’m going to sit here and write out a preliminary list of my New Year’s Resolutions.  Will it be comprehensive? No.  Will it be well-fleshed out? No.  Will it be here in case I do get around to adding to it or adding to the detail? You betcher boots.

In 2009 I Resolve to:

1. Get things done in a more timely manner. I told you this would be on here!  I’ve had a horrid time the past six months or so with this.  I just deleted a huge, long “too much information” paragraph with details about it.  The short story? Moving from ‘procrastinates at times but gets things done’ to ‘can barely get through a day and get 1 out of 20 things on the to-do list done’ was the apparently-common side-effect of medication I have been on for health/pain issues over the past year.  The worsening of which coincides directly with dosage changes.  That will be changing.  Pain + productivity and a sense of accomplishment is better to me than less pain + non-productivity and resulting depression.
2. Lose weight, get healthy, get fit – yeah, I know… way to lump huge goals into 6 words!  But you really can’t separate them out. I can’t get fit & healthy without losing weight, I can’t lose weight without doing the other two.  The three are mutually dependent in my book.  Yes, I actually do have plans on how to achieve this.  I’m just not going to detail them here.  Changing my diet, exercising regularly, dealing with the side-effects and changing my medical approach? All parts of that. Which should help me more with the first goal too!
3. Set & achieve new career goals – can I be more vague? Yeah, I could. I could’ve left out “career.”  I know what it means – I’m hoping I can post about some new developments very soon.  I’m working on a few possible projects for this year that I think will enable me to both do what I love to do and benefit my clients and colleagues more regularly too.   But some things need to come out in their own times.
4. Strike a better balance between branches of my life time & energywise.  The social, work, and family aspects, specifically.  Less Twitter, more blogging.  Less internet for play, more family time.  More internet for work, less play time. You know the routine!
5. Travel more. There are some places and events I will find ways to be at this year… they will enable me to learn, teach, share, grow, and spend time with others who have similar passions.  But as much as I plan to ‘go more places’ I will remember that there’s no place like home.
6. Put my houses in order – all of them.  The place I spend each day, my online homes, my spiritual homes, and my places in the hearts of those who love me and whom I love? I will nurture them and care for them this year – so that next year, this list is shorter in “big” things and longer in detail.

That said? Specific enough or not, it’s time to quit making lists and get cracking on crossing items off of them! Wish me luck – I’ll wish it back to you.  Hopefully, what we both lack in luck, we can make up for in determination.

2009!!

picture source

Right now, my darling daughter is over at the neighbors taking them mini-webkinz that she got for them at Walgreens (yep, I shop a lot of places – just like you!) and GeekDaddy is with her.  So I’m taking a moment to get this up.

Are you here for the first time? Then you’re probably a bit curious about me… and why someone calling herself “GeekMommy” is listed amongst a bunch of Frugality Blogging moms.  Guess what? I was too.

When the folks from WalMart contacted me thru Twitter.com about participating in the Eleven Moms project, I was sure they must be mistaken.  After all, I’m not a personal finance or frugality blogger – I’m just a GeekMommy who blogs about my life.  I figured they had contacted the wrong gal.  But then we got to talking and I realized that we all do what we can to cut corners and get the most out of our dollar.

Today’s economy makes everyone stop and think about ways to save more and live better – and that’s what WalMart’s current motto happens to be – Save More, Live Better.  Just like anyone reading this, I want to provide good food, nice clothes, and a comfortable home life for my family – but unless I win the lottery, I’m doing that on a budget.  I do shop at WalMart myself fairly regularly and I love a great bargain as much as the next gal… So yeah, why not me? Why not you? We’re all trying to make ends meet and make our dollars stretch further – so I realized that maybe they did get it right.

So Let’s Hit a Few FAQs, Shall We?

• Am I “doing this without getting paid?” Yes. I don’t work for WalMart.  If at some point in time there occurs a situation where WalMart enters into some sort of financial agreement with me, you can trust that I’ll be transparent about it.  That’s just how I am.  I don’t do “secret agreements.”
• Am I “doing this for free?” No. Free is a funny word.  Personally, I think if I were working for something for ‘free’ I’d be called a volunteer.  I’m not.  I am getting benefits from this.  But they’re non-monetary benefits.  I’m getting exposure to a wider audience.  I’m getting connections to new and different people I would’ve never met without participating. I’m also learning a lot from my fellow 11 Moms.  Seriously, I’ve learned so many cool things from these ladies that I wouldn’t have if this project hadn’t brought us together!  I’m also getting the  opportunity to help other folks.  That’s a big deal to me.  I like being able to help other people.  This is letting me do it on a MUCH bigger scale than I could achieve on my own.
• Do I really believe that WalMart is trying to do the right thing? Yeah, actually, I do. Look, I did my homework.  I know that WalMart’s reputation hasn’t exactly been ’stellar’ in all areas (yes, I’m understating.)  But I believe that they are doing what they can to change and improve that.  I think that this Money Saving Moms project is designed with that in mind.  If I didn’t and I thought this was all some publicity stunt? I wouldn’t be involved.  Because this is MY reputation too.  I’m working *with* WalMart to try and reach out to internet savvy (and novice) Moms (and other shoppers) to try and make their dollars stretch a little further.  Just like I believe that the Dove Women are working to change our society’s impression of what is actually beautiful and the Disney Moms are trying to help Disney bound families have the best time they can.  Sometimes, every day individuals can achieve huge change just by being willing to try.
• “Okay, but aren’t you just being naive not making WalMart pay you for this?” Um, No. To be honest? I don’t think I would’ve done this if WalMart had come to me initially and said “hey, we’d like to pay you to represent WalMart.”  They didn’t.  They asked me if I’d like to take part in a community of Moms who were helping other moms to save money.  And I didn’t say yes right away.  I thought about. I researched it.  I weighed whether or not I thought I could contribute and whether I wanted to tie my blog and myself into this project.  You already know the answer was yes.

So, I’m going to be busy migrating my site this weekend.  This post might not be accessible during that time – but it will be on my new site.  As will more information about me.  But if you want to ask me any questions about this? Feel free to comment and I’ll email you back.

Then again, if you decide just to leave an angry, vitriolic, attacking comment, I reserve my right to laugh at you and delete it, knowing you didn’t read this whole thing.  I’m willing to talk about it with anyone – but that means talk – so as I always tell my daughter? Use your ‘princess manners’ before you hit send.

Lucretia

In other words, I’m selling the vacation homes & town houses and putting all my efforts, time & money into making this my dream home, if you will.

Things you’ll be seeing in the near future should include:

• Moving this site to a hosted server and off of the WordPress servers
• Minor site redesigns to make it more readable/navigable (pictures are good too!)
• More frequent & regular posting (yay!) and structure (did I mention pictures?)
• Video Blogs (or vlogs) in conjunction with an upcoming project I’m going to announce in a later post
• More transparency – yes, I’ll probably still refer to people including my family by pseudonyms to respect their own right to privacy – but there will be more of me here – name, pictures, information.  About what you’d expect from someone who wants to really interact with you!

What’s new structure-wise

As of next week at the latest (later this week if I’m on my toes!) you can expect me to start posting daily on particular topics.  That is to say, there will be at least one-post on each designated day inline with that day’s topic.

Here’s the line-up as it stands now

• Money-wise Mondays – posts about money matters, including how to save a few $ in this increasingly bad economy, when every penny counts!

• Technology Tuesdays – posts about tech/geek things that catch my fancy.  Could be hardware, could be software, could be Internet or social-media platforms. You know me… geek talk!

• Weight Loss Wednesdays – these will hopefully be shorter than most the others, but to the point and with information.  I’m on a weight loss journey and I want to lose 50 lbs by my birthday next year (July 26, 2009) at the latest.  After that, it’s my intention to convert this to Wellness Wednesdays, but one step at a time!

• Thoughtful Thursdays – let’s face it, sometimes you just need to blog about stuff that is on your mind. I suspect that in the upcoming months there will be political posts in this category as we reach the November U.S. presidential elections – but it could be anything from education, to pop-culture, to social dynamics.

• Freeform Fridays – Exactly what it sounds like – might even mean I choose not to post – or post links, things that could’ve been on a different day, whatever. You can’t be bohemian without some built in spontaneity!

Don’t worry – the Mommy posts will still be there too… they’ll just be the frosting on the cake, as it were.

Oh – and did I mention there would be contests? Yeah, there will be contests & giveaways.  Something I’ve kind of avoided doing until now.  I just took a poll amongst some close internet friends and found out that people like having the chance to get free cool stuff (go figure!) from sites they like… so who am I to argue?

I’ll also be setting up a product review page as I got some serious feedback on that last one I did for the Brownies & the Wrinkle Releaser and it seems that those are also welcome.  In the past, I haven’t reviewed anything submitted to me or pitched, but the more I think about that, the more it seems like I’m refusing to acknowledge good products (or warn about bad ones) simply because I didn’t stumble on it all on my own.  Setting the hubris aside, I’m changing that policy.  But I PROMISE you that I will always disclose if something I’m reviewing has been sent to me or pitched to me at the time I review it – and that my reviews won’t be colored by that, but as candid and honest as I’ve always been.

So – are you ready? I’m not entirely sure I am! But if you’re willing to come along, I’m willing to give it a go.

Oh, and just a note? I know that not all of those topics will be interesting to all of my readers.  I’ve been a “life blogger” for a long time now and realize that not everyone is interested in every topic.  So I’ll keep up on the tags and titling on the topical posts so you can customize your own reading experience.

If there’s something you think I’ve missed or just want to put in your two cents, any feedback would be appreciated.  If not? Well, I’ll see you on the next post – which is even bigger news, if possible! The times they are a’changin’!!

~ Lucretia (aka GeekMommy)

I’m going to post two links that are going to make your life much easier. At least one, if not both of these applications is going to make the day-to-day stuff so much easier that you’ll wonder how you got along without them.

I need to credit Chris Pirillo [@chrispirillo] for bringing my attention to the first one and Aaron Brazell [@technosailor] for the second one.  All thanks go to them, not me.  I’m just sharing my giddiness!

Ready?

Okay then…

Application #1
http://whenisgood.net/

Not any more.
Now you go to When Is Good?

screen shot of the whenisgood grid

1) Click the grid for all the times that are good for you – you get a link to email to your invitees.
2) They see your proposed times and click on when they are free.
3) You visit your results page and see when everyone can do.

No sign-up form. No password to choose. No fuss at all.

And when you’re done marveling over how easy it was to find a time that everyone can get together this time – you’ll be sending the link to everyone who ever asks you ‘When is good for you?’

Yes, if we’re in the same town you can send me a link some time to let me know when is a good time to celebrate your freedom from this little scheduling dance!

Application #2
http://awayfind.com/

landing page awayfind.com

Now this one is Private Beta still. So you’ll have to apply for an invite on the homepage – or wait until they go open to the public – but if you wait, you’ll be kicking yourself when you do get around to it for not applying sooner!

What exactly it does is a bit more complicated – so rather than reinvent the wheel, I’ll let you go to AwayFind.com yourself to see the full description. But what if I told you that you could stop obsessively checking your email all the time – and only check it a couple of times a day – knowing that if it’s something really important, you’ll get notified?

The Reader’s Digest version is that AwayFind.com allows you to manage your inbound email whether you are in the office or out on vacation so that the truly urgent stuff finds you. Need to delegate a certain type of email? You can do that too. Want to be able to ‘pre-sort’ your email so that it goes to different email addresses depending on the type of contact it is? Yep. You can do that too. How about having notices sent to your phone if it’s an emergency or even just that one email you’ve been checking obsessively for? Yep. You guessed it.

Alright – I won’t keep you any longer. If you’ve read this far, you’re already itching to get over to AwayFind.com and see what the heck I’m talking about. Go on. I’ll be around.
But later? Let me know what you think of it.
Because after all… that’s the only way I know whether to post more of these things for y’all or not.

Have fun being more productive!!