Marketing Roadmaps

Archives for April 2006

BlogHer 06 Room of Your Own Update

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Our proposal for a Business Case Studies Room of Your Own at BlogHer 06 made the cut. Toby Bloomberg, Yvonne DiVita and I will be leading a "rap session" about business blogging on Saturday July 29 from 1:30-3:00pm.

 As I’ve written here before, this is an "unpanel" (borrowing the un-nomenclature from Dave Winer’s unconference).

We’ll kick off the conversation, but the underlying concept is that everyone in the room is the panel. Our goal is both to learn from each other in the room and produce a business blogging tips set so that others can benefit from our collective wisdom (and mistakes!)

I’m really looking forward to the session. I already know that two of my favorite marketing bloggers will be in the room with me. There’s no artificial dividing line between the panel and the audience — no somebodies here, we’re all nobodies, and everybody has an equal voice. And we have the goal of a specific work product from the session, the tips. We won’t just be talking to hear our own voices, we’ll be focused, working toward delivering something of value.

On the subject of conferences, and the oft-heard complaint that it’s always the same speakers saying the same things,  you won’t find that at BlogHer. BlogHer deliberately seeks out new voices. The sessions will definitely not be the same old same old.

And, oh yeah, you will find a higher percentage of women speakers than you’ve probably experienced since Girl Scouts 🙂

Hope to see you there.

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Cleaning out my Bloglines Closet

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I read a lot of feeds, on a variety of subjects, and take advantage of bloglines "keep new" to save things to look at/blog later. When I’m busy, the "blog closet" gets pretty full, and quite often, many of the things I’ve saved for later are over and done with.

But some things are timeless.

Others worthwhile.

And of course, some things, you just know I am going to comment on.

Like character blogs.  At Beyond Madison Avenue today, Mack Collier writes that character blogs would be a good solution to carry on cancelled TV shows. You betcha. Just take a look at the sheer volume of fan fiction on the Internet.  I would still pay for a Whedon-produced character blog featuring the characters from the Buffy/Angel-verses.

Great advice from the Copyblogger. Writing about this week’s NY Times article "This Boring Headline Is Written For Google," which discussed the ramifactions of search engine optimization on the news business, he reminds us: "Write for people, people." Amen. We don’t need fancy footwork (or cute headlines) as much as we need clear, concise writing. A little time spent there can save a boatload of hassle, not to mention cost.

Bonus links

Two from Neville Hobson: a European business blogging survey and some info on search behavior

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Nobody and “just me”

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I’ve been beyond busy this week with my client Bid4Assets’ special auction next week, so this is the first time I’ve had to say for the record, I am more than happy to proclaim myself  a nobody. As Ike Pigott said, the company is stellar.

Once again (as I often am,  it’s amazing how many situations lend themselves to this),  I am reminded of Alice’s Restaurant (Arlo Guthrie):

"You know, if one person, just one person does it they may think he’s really sick and they won’t take him. And if two people, two people do it, in harmony, they may think they’re both faggots and they won’t take either of them. And three people do it, three, can you imagine, three people walking in singin a bar of Alice’s Restaurant and walking out. They may think it’s an organization. And can you, can you imagine fifty people a day, I said fifty people a day walking in singin a bar of Alice’s Restaurant and walking out. And friends, they may think it’s a movement."

And to some degree, that IS what blogging is. It is a movement, and it makes all of us nobodies, somebodies. I am both proud and humbled to be part of it.

Speaking of nobodies who are really somebodies, somebody I’m pleased to have gotten to know better in the past week is Robert French from the  University of Auburn. Robert invited Andrea Weckerle, Kami Huyse and me to speak with two of his classes earlier this week. Conversation ranged from the unfortunate PR character blogs to what it is like being a professional businesswoman to the issues/ills of the PR business to career planning.

 It was absolutely terrific to speak with the students. And we were all honored when Robert asked us to become contributors to Marcom Blog, a blog in which PR and MarCom professionals mentor his students. Robert, your students may have had momentary angst when you assigned their final projects, but I am sure they know how lucky they are to have you as a professor.

On a semi-serious note, to end this post:

When I phone my mum, I often self-identify as "just me." The other day, she called me on it and told me that "just me" was a pretty important person. Now, she’s my mum and she’s supposed to say things like that. But…. all joking about nobodies and somebodies and fake characters with delusions of grandeur (if you follow this blog you know who I mean), one of the things that I like most about blogging is that even a nobody is somebody to someone. All you need is one reader and you can make a difference.

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Hear ye, hear ye, Boston-area pr/marketing bloggers, lend me your ears

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A couple of geographical items.

First, Elizabeth Albrycht is in town speaking at the American Association of Museums Annual Meeting at the end of the month. Let’s get together for a Boston Blogger Meet-up on Saturday evening, April 29th. Leave a comment in the blog or email me if you’d like to come. Once we know how many and who, we can figure out where.

Second, about a year ago John Cass and I started talking about developing a Mentorship program for the Boston chapter of the AMA. Well, we are finally, nearly, almost ready to take the covers off the program, and start recruiting mentors and accepting applications from students and young professionals who’d like a senior marketing mentor. If you’d like to know more (and especially if you are willing to be a mentor), drop me a note and I’ll fill you in. Non-binding 🙂

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What do Thomas Edison, Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley and Tupac Shakur have in common?

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No, it’s not that they are all dead, because Elvis? Who really knows for sure?

The answer is that rare signed memorabilia from all of them — plus dozens of other famous (and infamous) folk —  is part of a special auction event next week at online auction site Bid4Assets.

Full disclosure: Bid4Assets is a client. Also, unlike previous auctions that I have written about here, this is NOT a charity auction.

But there is some really cool stuff in this auction — worth checking out just for fun. And if you happen to be a collector, you just might find something worth adding to your collection. Here are some of my favorites.

And my personal favorite, the

There are tons more signed items — Beatles, sports figures, presidents, celebrities. The auction also has a lot of jewelry and rare coins, plus real estate in prime recreation areas, including the Southeastern US, Hawaii and the California/Nevada border. 

One day only. Bidding starts at 5pm Tuesday April 11 and ends at 11pm Wednesday April 12.

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