Let's talk Facebook and share a cup of coffee

Tomorrow's "When to boost Facebook posts," marks the fourth event in KGW's Social Media and Digital Marketing series. Each event features a specific business interest for those who use social media as part of their outreach efforts.

As a social media fiend, I am especially looking forward to tomorrow's event with Krys VanSlyke. He's the Senior Manager of Social Media for G/O Digital, a division of Gannett – KGW's parent company.

Senior Manager of Social Krys VanSlyke

I sat down with VanSlyke this morning to glean some insight on how his team in Phoenix is using Facebook. It's pretty fascinating what they can accomplish with a target and the right budget. Doesn't have to be large, it just has to be enough.

Their work runs the gamut of one-man shops to national corporations. Each company has it's own goal, VanSlyke's team creates the strategy, creates the ads, does the testing, optimizing and resetting to figure out how to hit those goals.

Most of the tools G/O Digital uses are readily available to anyone who wants to run an ad campaign on Facebook.Should you do it on your own? Sure. If you want to practice guesswork and ride the slow train.

Or you can take the fast track. VanSlyke says his team knows what questions to ask to get the campaign focused on the right targets and G/O's proprietary tools allow them to do more testing, do the testing faster, and build on areas creating success.

And VanSlyke emphasizes team.  "If someone gets stuck they're not alone."

So, if you're in the neighborhood tomorrow at 8:00 a.m., drop in for a jam packed morning of Facebook advice and a great cup of coffee.

Here's the scoop:

Parking

Plan on arriving early. Visitor parking in our lot is limited. If you miss out on a visitor spot, please do not park in spots marked reserved. These are provided to other tenants in our building. On-street parking is available along Jefferson Street, but we've got a full house, so if you're a teensy bit late you might have to hoof it a bit.

KGW Studio, 1501 SW Jefferson St, Portland OR 97201

Remember pen and paper

Summaries but not the full deck. Our presenters share their summaries, but don't dish out the whole enchilada. That means you'll want to take notes. If you arrive empty handed find me quick and I'll fix you up with pen and paper.

Bring a business card

The sponsor CenturyLink Business usually brings some bling so remember your business card in case there is a drawing or someone you want to connect with later.

Do you Twitter?

#KGWSoMe is the event hashtag. We're hoping to have a live stream so you can ask questions, so bring your smartphones and tweet away.

Contact me to set up a marketing consultation, to get updates on the next event, or to grab a cup of coffee: cdoane (at) kgw (dot) com.

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See you in the morning, I'll be next to the coffee

Tomorrow marks the third installment of KGW's Social Media and Digital Marketing event series. Each event has keyed in on best practices for businesses using social media.

As a data fiend, I am especially looking forward to tomorrow's metrics roll out, not that I think it will stop the naysayers who complain about social media in general and offer a litany of excuses of why they don't like it, why it is a waste of time and why they hate all the advertising in their Twitter stream, but because I do like social media. All parts of it. Including the advertising.

Don't confuse me with people who sell advertising — I used to think I did. Of late, I've come to the realization that I no longer sell advertising. I sell audience.

No one cares which website their desired target is on, they care about the person they want to reach. They think that I can only reach people who visit KGW.com, but that is only a fraction of what I do.

With a myriad of tools that are available through our parent company Gannett, I can deliver audiences on just about any website you can think of, and about 100,000 websites you didn't know existed and through in a little search engine marketing to drive it home,.

In the meantime, drive over to KGW tomorrow and join us for a jam packed morning and a great cup of coffee.

Here's the scoop:

Parking

Plan on arriving early. Visitor parking in our lot is limited. If you miss out on a visitor spot, please do not park in spots marked reserved. These are provided to other tenants in our building. On-street parking is available along Jefferson Street, but we've got a full house, so if you're a teensy bit late you might have to hoof it a bit.

KGW Studio, 1501 SW Jefferson St, Portland OR 97201

Remember pen and paper

Summaries but not the full deck. Frank Mungeam is a great presenter and he shares his summary, but not the whole enchilada. That means you'll want to take notes. If you arrive empty handed find me quick and I'll fix you up with pen and paper. (See my card below for contact info).

Do you Twitter?

#KGWSoMe is our event hashtag. We're hoping to have a live stream so you can ask questions, so bring your smartphones and tweet away.

WIN a Kindle!

Our partner CenturyLink Business is sharing the love with a business card drawing for a Kindle. I want YOU to WIN, so remember your business card.

Here's mine. Contact me to set up a marketing consultation, or to get updates on the next event, cdoane (at) kgw (dot) com.

Smashing digital marketing events continue at KGW

Frank Mungeam addresses a Portland, Oreg. audience on developing engaging social media content.

The simplest, most basic information can be the most compelling. People want to know stuff. They want to know the stuff experts know.

Sometimes we listen to someone promoted as an expert and think, “I knew that, what makes everyone think this guy is so smart?”

Then there's the brilliant people who teach, and the chatter overtakes the room, “That would have taken forever to figure out.” “That was awesome.” “Thanks for making it easy to follow and understand.” “When's the next event?”

That smart person bringing the Portland metro area up-to-speed in business social media is Director of Digital Media Frank Mungeam. He knows stuff, good stuff, stuff other people want to know. In fact, people pay to hear what Mungeam has to say in pursuit of degrees from Washington State University Vancouver, where Mungeam is an adjunct professor in the Creative Media and Digital Culture Program.

I had heard Mungeam speak before we ended up working for the same company. I came in to his session at Washington State University Vancouver pretty skeptical, and like many before me, I left a big fan.

At a recent event hosted by KGW Media Group and CenturyLink Business, Mungeam shared with a full house of Portland and Vancouver businesses, nonprofits and government entities how their organizations can create engaging social media content. It gets down to basic stuff, listen, test, gain insight, do what works, and at the heart of what works always seems to nestle: do good things for your customers.

Do I think that having a Twitter account is going to create sales for your business?

No more than me creating a business prospecting email. But, over time, as we have a conversation on Twitter or LinkedIn or SlideShare or Facebook and connect through email, you'll see what is genuine about how I approach what I do, what is consistent, and what is remarkable.

Eventually, you'll figure out I've gleaned good insights about online marketing by creating and optimizing effective campaigns and by asking good questions as a campaign progresses, ends and renews. These experiences have developed good instincts on advertising and PR.

You can take a long time to figure marketing and online advertising out, or you can have me help you.

Either way has a cost. One is cost effective.

You can also attend the next social media and digital marketing event at KGW Media Group. It comes with it's own price tag – your time. The benefit is that you get Frank Mungeam's time, as well.

Sign up below for alerts on upcoming KGW social media and marketing events:

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Tomorrow the clever crafting begins

For everyone who has signed up for Crafting Engaging Social Media, here are a few reminders:

Parking

Plan on arriving early. Visitor parking in our lot is limited. If you miss out on a visitor spot, please do not park in spots marked reserved. These are provided to other tenants in our building. On-street parking is available along Jefferson, but we've got a full house, so if you're a teensy bit late you might have to hoof it a bit.

Remember pen and paper

Summaries but not the full deck. Frank Mungeam is a great presenter and he shares his summary, but not the whole enchilada. That means you'll want to take notes. If you arrive empty handed find me quick and I'll fix you up.

 

WIN a Kindle!

Our partner CenturyLink Business. is sharing the love with a business card drawing for a Kindle, 6" E Ink Display, with Wi-Fi.I want YOU to WIN, so remember your business card.

Do you Twitter?

#KGWSoMe is our event hashtag. SoMe is short for Social Media and SOME really great info. Remember to connect with me, @TheClassicCarol so we can have fun during the event and tweet at each other after the event.

 

Lastly.

I'll share my notes if you share yours. When do you want to have coffee?

Frank Mungeam teaches on how not to be boring

Frank Mungeam, Director of Digital Media at KGW.

In December KGW Media Group launched a quarterly digital event for businesses to enable them to get a better understanding of social media and digital marketing.

KGW Digital Director Frank Mungeam leads the workshops. He honed his teaching technique in various roles including as professor of Creative Media & Digital Culture Program at Washington State University (WSU), a role he's had since 2011.

He’s a former television producer with a degree in psychology from Harvard University, a Masters in Communication and Leadership Studies from Gonzaga University who somehow morphed his career into the digital landscape.

Today, he is the resident digital guru at KGW NewsChannel 8 where he’s built a confident content development team and a highly successful social media strategy.

I met Mungeam when he first started teaching at WSU back in 2011 at one of his presentations for businesses. I came in with a chip on my shoulder because, of course, I think I know everything.

I was quietly wowed and became a Frank Mungeam fan on the spot. I wrangled a copy of his presentation – something he doesn’t do anymore, because, if you want the highly prized Mungeam insight on the lay of land in digital, you come and get it first hand and you take your own notes. Everything else is considered proprietary.

Today, I’m lucky enough to work for the same company as Mungeam. That detail, of course, makes me biased, yet smart enough to be in a place where I can keep honing my skills and continue to grow my knowledge of digital marketing. I'm not the only person that smart, even social media gurus like Jimmy Fallon drop in on Mungeam's presentations.

What about you? How do you cash in on the learning bonanza?

Send me an email.

Frank Mungeam is holding the next session on how to leverage the power of social media. He'll be teaching us how not to be boring.

There are ten spots open, so don't delay. The presentation is Wednesday, March 5, 8:00 a.m. – 9:30 a.m. and all it takes is a quick email to cdoane@kgw.com and you’ll receive a link to the registration page.

If you come, bring a business card and enter to win a Kindle courtesy of CenturyLink Business the sponsor of the 2014 Digital Series.

Can't come? No problem.

Invite me out to coffee and I’ll share my notes. You’re buying.

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Jimmy Fallon visits the office

Post by KGW-TV.

For those of you who don't know, I work for a local television station inside their digital sales department. On Wednesday we had the studio full of clients for a social media seminar. When things wrapped up we brought out our surprise guest from NBC, Jimmy Fallon.

It was a day of thank yous spiced with a lot of Fallon easy to love humor.

Who received your last thank you?

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Social media central drawn in a real life perspective

An engaging graphic, released recently by Column Five Media, illustrates what social media networks would look like if they were actually real life. Imagine online as an apartment complex and each apartment as a different social site,It may look something like, "What if social media sites were your neighbors?"

I'm wondering how they'd draw my blog, 360 Convos. A table of analytics with little crowns on the best days? A web of intertwining thoughts, an assembly line of sweet and sour topics. A thought bubble of what I'm thinking, but not saying . . .

What's your guess?

(to enlarge click image)

Embed the above image on your site

a href="http://columnfivemedia.com/the-social-neighbors/"><img src="http://columnfivemedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/socialmediarealife-918x4029.png" alt="The Social Neighbors" /></a><br />Infographic by: <a href="http://www.columnfivemedia.com/" title="Column Five Media - Infographics Marketing">Column Five Media</a>, referred by 360 Convos

Infographic by: Column Five Media

Is it time to cut the cord on the television?

Penetration of traditional pay TV services may have peaked.

A decade ago, I was a media sales rep and consulting with a spa store owner on an advertising buy. I was learning his business and digging down deep into his business acumen in order to create a sound marketing plan.

As our discussion progressed, I realized that Mr. Golden had read everything he could get his hands on to be successful in business. I was impressed and began to enjoy our discussion even more.

We entered the point in our conversation of sizing up the competition.

He had come to the conclusion that the other spa companies in town were not his competition. He could beat them hands down on quality, service, knowledge and price. The real competition, he believed, was everything else in life vying for his customer's leisure time.

I was young enough to be surprised by his conclusion.

I was old enough to consider it.

Mr. Golden was right.

The competition was not other businesses trying to be a mirror-image of his, or a even a close second cousin. It was all of life's distractions that diverted his customer's time, energy, money and motivation from visiting his store and buying a spa.

I thought about Mr. Golden today. Several years ago, he died unexpectedly, and at his funeral I clenched my emotions tight to be able to share what his friendship meant to me and how we had laughed when I'd leaned back in a patio chair in the store, lifting the two front legs off the floor, and almost fell over backwards when the plastic chair wobbled. His unexpected leap to save me from falling on my head is an embarrassing yet favorite memory.

Right now, it feels like the front legs of business are lifted off the floor and we're balancing precariously between who we think our competition is and what really stands in the way of reaching our intended destination.

I read with interest a forecast from research firm SNL Kagan estimating the number of US families who will cut the cords to their cable, satellite or telco TV service in deference to Internet video options. I've never understood pay-TV, and I've never paid for cable. Why would I pay someone to watch their commercials? I may not have the variety of choices on Hulu, but I when I push play, it's on my time, not theirs, and without any fancy equipment programming.

The competition is not a better cable company, a better television program, or even unlimited channel choices. It might be Hulu. It might also be Facebook, Foodspotting, Foursquare, Gmail, Goodreads, LinkedIn, Plancast, Posterous, Slideshare, Twitter, Upcoming, Yahoo or UStream.

It may be my blog.

As the online landscape morphs and rolls in earthquaking variations, I wonder where the legs of the business chair will land.

I just hope there will be someone like Mr. Golden who can see what will happen if someone doesn't jump in before it's too late, grab the chair firmly and get all four legs on the floor so we can focus on our business model, understand who or what the competition truly is and plan accordingly before we fall on our head.

Who is your unexpected competition?

The truth about seniors, teens and the sexes online

A year ago, I wrote on the numbers of men vs. women using the Internet and the portion of men using the Internet who were not white [Are you man enough to be global].

It was an arrow aimed at a variety of assumptions that had been made in marketing circles and coffee conversations: people over sixty are not tech savvy, if you need a social media guru hire a teen, more men than women are online.

No longer an overlooked segment, seniors are now recognized as an online audience to market to. In an August 2011 report by the Journal of Information Systems Applied Research, it says that senior citizens are “rapidly growing into a major segment in the online social networking market place.” [JISAR PDF]. The report also asserts that this growing group of online users finds a wide-range of benefits including building relationships.

While technology may be enriching the lives of seniors, Sherry Turkle, Professor of the Social Studies of Science and Technology at MIT, says that overuse of technology stunts the emotional development of teens. Teenagers flooded with communication gadgets are, “unable to converse effectively, to develop empathy and – just as importantly – cope with being alone or with awkward social situations by ‘bailing out’ via their cell phones.” [Source]

While I subscribe to the philosophy that smart marketers will observe college students to forecast the future of entertainment industry, and thus the future of online, we should not, nor do we need to, rely on a teen to craft our company's next social media campaign.

Reality is that social media is no longer only My Space and Facebook. It is no longer considered a hobby for high-schoolers. A recent report defines it as a career with social media evangelists embedded in multitudes of companies.

As proof, take a look at the latest study by the Altimeter Group. Their report demonstrates how deep the commitment to social media runs in the corporate community. The corporations they talkied to are not mom and pops where the family’s online fanatic chains him or herself to a computer, but in corporations boasting up to 100,000 employees: 1 in 330 Employees Publishes on “Official” Social Media Accounts.

People witb skill in the social media venue can make a living at it.

No longer seeking a career, but rather relationships, senior citizens are harnessing social media as a hobby. According to the JISAR report, it is imperative for organizations to identify the emerging senior market, assess how it will affect business models and plan accordingly, “knowing who uses social networking sites and their motivations may facilitate marketing of products and services.”

Purchasing capability means power.

Or does it?

Aileen Lee, partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, wrote an article for TechCrunch: Why Women  Rule the Internet. Feminist geeks took offense when she touted purchasing influence as a flag of female power. Fem-Geeks rebutted that women should be focused on creating not purchasing. “Yeah, I’m not really thrilled at being told I rule in the cutting-edge areas of shoe shopping, diapers and coupons. And I say this as someone who buys a lot of shoes and diapers,” wrote Terri in the article’s comment section.

So, women know who they are, but they don’t like it?

Lee’s article makes a case that women are better at advanced planning, care more about saving money, and are likely to listen to advice. Lee suggests businesses should take a look at their team. “Do you have women in key positions?” She goes on to say that a business can rock the world if they “figure out how to harness the power of female customers.”

Advanced planning, saving money, and the ability to take advice–wouldn't that person make a good leader?

What happens if businesses harnessed the power of female employees?

Will women craft a rebuttal for that, too?

No memory of the conversation, meet Tyler Presnell

I didn't know him before. I didn't know him during. I met Tyler Presnell after.

The moment that marks the 'after' point in Tyler Presnell's life was a vehicle collision that occurred when he was 14-years old. The misjudgment of a teenage driver slammed Presnell's side of the car into a telephone pole. His sister crawled out of the car. His twin brother took off running and collapsed when the resulting hyper-adrenalin surge maxed out his ability to function.

Crumpled inside the car, Presnell could only moan, moments he doesn't remember. Memory he might trade, if the trade-off meant the reversal of his incurable inability to remember the thing he just said.

Tyler Presnell and Tai Telford

Last year, Presnell and I spent Saturday mornings with his girlfriend Tai in a coffee shop.

He'd discovered my phone number on the internet, placed a call to me between speaking gigs, mentioned he couldn't believe he had remembered to call me, and asked for my help.

I knew who he was. I'd read this article in the local paper. It stuck in my head because I'm a mom. There's a teenager in the house. I considered whether my teenager has the fortitude to resist peer pressure, the one thing that could have saved Presnell from waking up from a coma and discovering he was a 14-year old baby who had to relearn everything he took for granted: walking, talking, feeding himself.

I agreed to help get him started developing an online presence. The three of us mapped out a plan to create a blog, some social media accounts and some simple, simple steps that would get him closer to creating a speaking career that would allow him to get his story in-front of the audience who needs to hear it, young drivers.

My career took an unexpected direction when I decided to change jobs. My extra time evaporated into other responsibilites. I realized I would have with less and less moments to work on my heartfelt pro bono project, and I put Presnell in touch with others who we felt might be able to take him through the next steps. Now he has a website, more speaking engagements,more opportunities, more friends,' but some things are the same.

Presnell remains plagued by constant pain, half of his right leg is still paralyzed and he continues to struggle with memory due to the brain injury he sustained in the collision.

He's so real. He has real struggles, he makes real choices--less life or more life, and he also has real influence, but it all comes one-on-one and no amount of social media, internet SEO, or fancy online gyrations will replace the personal conversation with the man who lived to tell the story.

The story isn't about compassion or feeling sorry for his situation, his message is to stop being self-centered. His message is to start to respect each other on the road. It's not about us getting to where we need to go, it's about all of us arriving safely.

Drive friendly, today.

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Tyler Presnell's Foundation.
Tyler Presnell speaks to Congress.
Tyler Presnell podcast, on couv.com.
Tyler Presnell raps on respect, seriously, YouTube (and below).

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Confessions of a social media strategist

I have taken two different tactics in practicing social media. One is to pursue connections and the other is more organic, allowing connections to find me and after they do, following an established a set of criteria to determine if they truly want a conversation with me or uncover if they are just trying to boost their numbers.

I am more curious about what makes people want to click my 'follow' button, so I enjoy the observation mode more than the pursuit, but you can learn from both.

For my personal research, I have two Twitter accounts. One is focused on writing and publishing connections. I have used that account to see if I can drive the follower count with various tactics that do not require purchasing followers or purchasing advertising. The answer is yes. It works best when you work in conjunction with a second party. I'll probably teach a class on this, so I won't release all my conclusions. The short path is to find someone with an average follower count (not a celebrity), follow the people they most interact with and create conversations.

The second account began as a way to test how the work environment could take advantage of Twitter and watch those interactions develop. That Twitter account grew into a something much bigger. That one is my observation account.

It is time to come clean.

There is one place I apply no science.

It's LinkedIn.

Pre-dive bombing into social media, I had received various emails from people stating, "I'd like to add you to my professional network." That just sounded like the dumbest thing I'd ever heard. Most of the invitations came from people I either did not want further connections with, or they were so far a strewn from my daily business interactions I had no idea what would be gained.

When I finally joined LinkedIN it was more of a surrender to the media. Someone from work helped me understand the statistics portion of LinkedIn and unfortunately (for me), I noticed that they had better stats then I did. My competitive nature kicked in (former salesperson) and I began a pursuit to improve my numbers. As soon as I beat the co-workers stats I found someone else to beat. Once I beat his stats, I was hooked. My circle of trusted professionals leapt past 500,000 and closed in on a million.

Be still my ego.

As I watched the ticker rachet up I wondered how many people in my master database are actually on LinkedIn. In an attempt to find I out, I uploaded a vast list into the system. Instead of being able to review who's in the LinkedIn database, I was directed another direction. I hit the button that sent a behemoth pile of LinkedIN invitations out.

I hopped and jittered all over the keyboard attempting to go back, to log-out, to somehow undo what I had done: intiated a bagillion annoying LinkedIn invitations to people who barely knew me. Bestselling authors, people at my daughter's school, emergency contacts from the neighborhood, people from boards I serve on, and an ex-employee I would have had to of fired if they hadn't quit all received, "I'd like to add you to my professional network."

That created a personal and public relations nightmare. If too many people click, "I've never heard of her," LinkedIn would determine that I was a spammer and would cut me off. I would lose the option to send invitations to anyone. How to stop this? Perhaps a follow-up email. How do you think you would have reacted to my proposed email?

"I'm sooooo sorry, I didn't mean to send you a LinkedIn invitation, please ignore."

After careful consideration, I decided it would confirm I was an idiot or disclose that I didn't really value their association.

What to do?

I decided to ride it out and accept my fate.

The emails began trickling in, picked up steam and my stats grew. Currently, my group of trusted professionals sits at 5.2 million.

What's new in your social community?

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Carol Doane on LinkedIN
Carol Doane on Twitter
Carol Doane on Facebook

When is it time to put the laptop to bed?

A thumb brushes over the keypad while a finger clicks and  flicks through the multiple tabs of the favorite browser. Eyes burn and stare at the 15-inch screen. The gaze grows fuzzy as the eyelids droop and the head lolls.

Suddenly, the eyes fly open and the head bobs.

Is it time to set the laptop aside and go to sleep?

On my reading list: 
OnStar FMV Hits Best Buy; Ad Campaign To Support
New marketing campaign to sell On Star in Best Buy using prime time, cable, network and social media via a Facebook page.

Altimeter Group Is Growing Like A Weed | SiliconANGLE
Former journalist Tom Foremski has soft spot for consultants with a mission to educate corporate America about the value of listening and engaging with customers.

Savvy BTS shoppers using smartphones, social networks to score deals
Inflation-related concerns will prompt back-to-school shoppers to use tactics such as smartphone and social network use, to save money.

Craigs List
Everything under the sun...

What's your bedtime reading?

36 CONSECUTIVE POSTS

Brain atrophy. Can the internet be blamed?

Embedded in the city of Oxford in England is the University's Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences dedicated to research. Deep in their neuorology halls they document, debate and decipher brain changes.

One of the methods employed is called SIENA (Structural Image Evaluation, using Normalisation, of Atrophy). SIENA uses 'brain extraction' tools, along with others that don't sound quite as extreme.

I stumbled on this research after reading an article by Nonprofit Tech 2.0 called 11 Nonprofit Websites Designed for the Social Web, and from there tried to find more out about the conclusions they made. The nonprofit article noted that social media is not only changing how we communicate, but it's also "changing how our brains process information."

Nonprofit Tech encourages their readers to use this information to change outdated concepts of website design, stating, "design principles of just five years ago no longer apply." They propose that websites should have less text, more images, more video, and larger social networking icons. Progressive sites would employ simple navigation, offer ease of subscribing to e-newsletters, and make it obvious how to "Donate Now." The resource they quoted came from the Nominet Trust.

I reviewed the Nominet Trust documents they sourced. Nominet states that our online well-being comes not only from protecting our online privacy, but also understanding how digital technologies effect our OFF-line life, as well.

What do we do with all this information?

The Nominet report exhorts parents to monitor online use by younger children and monitor older students use of instant messaging. Online is basically a massive distraction that causes the brain to atrophy.

To combat this, they made some sound suggestions, kids should get more sleep, more exercise, and  schools should take action to teach about overuse of online during learning hours. The report also noted, "More research is needed in a number of areas, to help evaluate the risks."

I'm wondering if common sense could give us the same understanding.

I'm less cranky when I get a good night's sleep.

I'm less irritable when I actually accomplish something versus wandering aimlessly around online, only answering an occasional email, but not enough to actually clear out my inbox.

The brain research will continue in England. Brains will grow and recede. Before mine completely dissipates, I'd like to get to the bottom of this.

Let's you and I cut to the chase. What does your personal research tell you — are you happier online or offline?

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Read more:
Copy of the Nominet Trust study, download pf a PDF:
The impact of digital technologies on human wellbeing.

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Since the post, these references have popped on brain and the Internet:

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POSTED	BRIEF	LINK
July 22, 2011	UC Berkeley research on 24 adults determined viewing content on stereo 3D display hurts eyes and brain. Eye constantly adjusts to both distance of physical screen and that of 3D content, reaction to placement of sound is different for iPhone and movie screen. End result is visual discomfort, fatigue, headaches.	3D Hurts Your Eyes (and brain)
	-

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UPDATED 7-24-11

Social Media Spotlight on Thank You's

Awesome feedback on Social Media For Writers

At the end of all great projects is a moment in the sun to bask in the glow of accomplishment. That is the fancy way of saying I HAD A BLAST, and forget the sun, this feedback is like a rocket to the moon.

Thanks again to the full house at the gallery and the 700+ SlideShare viewers in the first two days of loading the presentation online. I'd like to capture your feedback because it made me feel good, and all of us should be encouraged to step forward and share our expertise with our community.

Group hug :-)

Dec 4: Thank you for presenting valuable social media education this evening.You have helped me so much! Kathryn

Dec 5: Great presentation at @Angst last night. You rock! Ron

Dec 5: Thank you, for the invite to hear Carol  Doane. I usually take many notes, but tonight I arrived with no paper, no pencil. Carol gave us a recipe for successful communication, didn't she?  WOW!! Will we receive an email with address,  links? Thank you again. - Kathryn

Dec 5: Thanks again for pitching in to do this – terrific job. Carolyn

Dec 7: Thanks for the links, Carol. Your presentation on Saturday was full of great information presented in a way that made it easy to receive. I appreciate your energy and your expertise. All Best, Deb

Dec 7: Thanks for the info!! bob

Dec 7: Thank you for sharing your expertise and for doing this for free! I enjoyed my time there and got a real good feel for the local writers and what they are all about. Thanks for your time, Jeff

Dec 7: Haven't made time to join Twitter, but feel embarrassed that you thanked me before I'd thanked you! So I sent an e-mail to you, but it was rejected. So now I'm trying this--through your Blog. I know you'd prefer a Tweet, but haven't jumped in yet, and really want you to know how much I appreciated your talk! So this is the tweet I'd like to send: To Classic Carol: I am very grateful for your fun, comprehensive, inspiring intro to Social Media for Writers last Saturday in Vancouver. The friend I brought actually has a media project to work on and is very excited. Wow. Amazing. THANK YOU for sharing your time & know-how. Gratefully, Karla Joy

Then to top off the good vibes, I received the above message from SlideShare: Congrats! Your presentation 'Social Media for Writers' is showcased on the 'How-to & DIY' page on SlideShare.

I am now enjoying my 16-20 hours of 'fame' which is suggested on slide 60 of the presentation as noted below.

Social Media for Writers

View more presentations from Carol Doane.

It did not go unnoticed that all the hoopla gave me another fan on my Facebook page. Thanks, Annie.

Social Media for Authors

Vancouver Writer's Mixer

Social Media for Authors

Saturday, December 4

5-6:30 pm

Featured Speaker: Carol Doane

Saturday Carol Doane speaks to the Vancouver Writer's Mixer. She's got the internet wired for fun, for feedback and success! She's the doyenne of Twitter, Facebook, Blogger, and many other virtual publicity websites.

Carol will be demonstrating the basics of navigating these treacherous technical waters. Find out why you should dabble, even just a little, on-line. By the time we're finished, you'll be amazed and eager to get out there and start networking!  It's so easy, even Smedley the bookstore cat tweets. Carol will touch on hot social media topics such as Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare, YouTube, Plancast and blogging.

Learn quick tips, easy to use shortcuts and what to do if you hate the idea of marketing yourself.

Carol was a top finalist in the 2010 SoMe Awards (Social Media Awards of the Pacific Northwest) for her volunteer campaign for the Southwest Washington Blood Program. Winning campaigns awarded to Air New Zealand, Travelocity, PAX East, Mio Gelato, Portland Fit, Hotel Max, Mio Gelato.

She is also a published writer (chapter in Laughing Nine to Five: The Quest for Humor in the Workplace) and she has two completed fiction manuscripts now in the hands of literary agents on both coasts.

Many, many thanks to Angst Gallery owner Leah Jackson for allowing Cover to Cover Books to hold their monthly mixer in the gallery. The bookstore remains closed due to smoke damage until renovations can be completed. Cover to Cover is taking special orders via email: mail@covertocoverbooks.net.

If you want to chat with Carol after the event we'll be taking over the couch in Niche Wine & Art next door.

Online event registration for Social Media for Writers powered by Eventbrite

Can social media motivate?

The Pacific Northwest is known for beautiful landscapes, diverse, rough-hewn history and nature-loving populations with large hubs around Seattle, which boasts 3.3 million coffee lovers, and farther north a hub of 2.3 million around Vancouver, British Columbia which can boast about not being original.

Vancouver, B.C. has the dubious distinction of usurping the name 'Vancouver' from the original: Vancouver, Washington.

My city.

A slightly smaller grouping of people, barely over 400,000 in the entire county.

Vancouver, Washington grew organically from the outreach and marketing of the Hudson's Bay Company, the oldest commercial corporation in North America and one of the oldest in the world.

Vancouver, Washington benefits from the proximity of Portland, Oregon, a mere 2.2 million, and just an interstate bridge crossing away from great modern day advertising agencies such as Wieden + Kennedy.

I swim in that pool. Advertising. Marketing. Media.

Marketing is a staple of our lives. Millions of messages pound at us everyday. Experts try to estimate how many. Who can be sure? It's pervasive in every part of our lives. So, how can any ONE be heard?

Brian Solis, principal of Future Works, suggests in his blog post The 10 Stages of Social Media Business Integration that we find a voice and a sense of purpose. Someone in Seattle found their voice and spoke to me. Sean Debutts of the Puget Sound Blood Center asked me to spearhead a local event. Our connection came through social media. I decided to dive deeper into social media, use it, test it for this event, and discover if social media can motivate someone else to take action.

I chirped, twittered and cajoled the Portland/Vancouver hub to celebrate my birthday by donating blood. A month later, I'm wondering how many more would have come forward had we used traditional media. Actually, that's a lie. I'm not wondering, I know. A series of ads in the local paper, a jingle on a targeted group of radio stations and public service mentions on any of the local television stations would have pumped up the numbers. But this event had no dollar budget. Only time and complimentary venues.

Irregardless of the results that traditional media provides, businesses are flocking to social media as if it's traditional media's dynamic replacement. But it's not. It's not targeted (yet), it's not controllable (yet), and message frequency is not viewed as a good campaign, it's viewed more akin to spam. It's like standing inside the ramparts of Fort Vancouver (pictured above) with a single shot rifle and trying to connect with one 'prospect' at a time. It takes a lot of effort and determination as you fine tune your aim.

My blood drive event was a mash-up of crazy shots as I tried every gun in every arsenal within reach. The results? I had a blast.

My efforts placed me as top finalist for a SoMe Award – Pacfic Northwest Social Media Award. Included on my resume are many awards from PNNA, Pacific Northwest Newspaper Association, and I'm proud of them, but all happened when I was in sales and madly dashing from 'post to post' trying to create something spectacular to motivate businesses to market together. There's strength in numbers. If everybody fires a lot of shots we will hit something. I guarantee it.

The number of participants in the blood drive was very small. But, I think we can say there's strength in those small numbers, too. The potential affect on the overall community for each person who participated as a blood donor is priceless. Each donor's gift could save up to three lives.

Saving one life makes a stronger community.

Social media is our new community. It's still an untamed venue whose impact has not fully been explored, exploited or fully exported into traditional marketing campaigns. It's also very personal. It's a conversation. It's putting the advertising gun down, coming out of the tower and having a conversation with the person you want to connect with. It builds a stronger relationship.

Okay, wish me luck. SoMe winners are announced tonight. We get two drinks and dessert. I hope one is coffee, and when it's all said, awarded and done, I know what I will come home with—more connections, more friends and more victims to hit up for my next blood drive.

What motivates you to use social media?

The new media of traditional media congratulates social media

The e-newsletter BusinessTODAY produced by The Columbian, the largest daily newspaper in Southwest Washington, included this information about the Pacific Northwest SoMe Awards . . . and me :-)

 


People
Carol Doane, advertising sales manager for The Columbian, is a finalist in the Pacific Northwest Social Media Awards' Scrappy & Engaged Award category. Doane is being recognized for her response to Sean Debutts, Social Media Coordinator at Puget Sound Blood Center. Debutts had sent a direct message to Twitter follower Doane asking if she would spearhead a blood drive.The Scrappy & Engaged category salutes best brand awareness/user engagement for less than $500. Doane dubbed her campaign, "Carol's Save A Life Birthday Party." The awards will be announced Thursday, May 6, at an event at the Multnomah Athletic Club, 1849 S.W. Salmon St.in Portland. The event starts at 7 p.m. Registrations are accepted online at  http://www.someawards.com/.


(View the slideshare that describes the birthday event: http://www.slideshare.net/TheClassicCarol/carols-save-a-life-birthday-party)

Carol Doane top finalist in Pacific Northwest Social Media Awards

It's real. Here's the Press Release for the SoMe Scrappy & Engaged  Award (I'm a top finalist!)

Every two minutes someone in Western Washington needs a blood transfusion. Sean Debutts, Social Media Coordinator at Puget Sound Blood Center, sent a direct message to Twitter follower Carol Doane to secure Doane as a champion to spearhead a blood drive. Carol Doane, the Advertising Sales Manager and Social Media Strategist at The Columbian in Vancouver, Washington, quickly agreed.

Doane's social media campaign and resulting blood donation event placed her as a top finalist for the Pacific Northwest Social Media Awards in The Scrappy & Engaged Award category. Winners will be announced after the Portland, Oregon InnoTech Conference. InnoTech is a business and technology innovation conference and expo sponsored by top brands IBM, Microsoft, Integra Telecom, Advanced Systems Group, Smarsh, MSI and others. Besides Portland, InnoTech conferences also take place in Austin, Texas; San Antonio, Texas; and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

The Scrappy & Engaged category salutes best brand awareness/user engagement for under $500. Doane dubbed her campaign, "Carol's Save A Life Birthday Party," and estimated the cost at $14.99, the cost of a birthday cake. As part of her submission she created a SlideShare to describe the event, http://www.slideshare.net/TheClassicCarol/carols-save-a-life-birthday-party. "A crew of social media enthusiasts in Texas and beyond were the SoMe Awards judges," reports Sean Lowery, Executive Director of the InnoTech Conference which is spotlighting the awards.

"Social media is very personal and this campaign struck a chord for me," says Carol Doane. "I have an innate curiosity to see if I can drive people out from behind their computers to share a cup of coffee and many will, but this project asked them to extend past surface conversation and participate in a needle-in-the-arm way."

Sean Debutts, the initiator of the direct message that launched Doane's participation notes, "Carol deserves the honor after all the hard work she put into her drive and all the visibility she gave the concept."

The Puget Sound Blood Center maintains eleven donation centers in Washington and continues to benefit from Doane's efforts. "For an hour the SlideShare I created to describe the campaign was Hot on Twitter and featured on SlideShare's Health and Medicine category," notes Carol Doane. "It's all these little wins that makes diving into social media fun."

What's next on the agenda for the Social Media Strategist? "The hardest part now," she muses, "Is explaining what a social media award is to my parents."

Social media is an all encompassing term for the mixing of technology and social interaction to add value to the community. The SoMe Awards honor the best social media projects, programs and campaigns in the Pacific Northwest. The SoMe event takes place at the prestigious Multnomah Athletic Club, 1849 SW Salmon Street, Portland, Oregon 97205, Thursday, May 7, 2010 from 7:00 PM to 10:00 PM.

Registration is $20 and includes two drinks and dessert. Event registrations are accepted online: http://ow.ly/1FZ1s

Information about the awards can be found on the SoMe website: http://www.someawards.com/

Award categories include:

• Best Brand Awareness/User Engagement (over $25k) – The Sugar Daddy Award 
• Best Brand Awareness/User Engagement (under $25k) – The People Like Me Award
• Best Brand Awareness/User Engagement (under $500) – The Scrappy & Engaged Award
• Best ROI (over $25k) – The Rich Get Richer Award
• Best ROI (under $25k) – The Keep Your Job Award
• Best ROI (under $500) – The Soon-to-Be Wealthy Award
• Best Social Media App – The Next Big Thing Award
• Best Agency – The House Party Award
• People’s Choice Award
• Best in Show

Carol Doane blogs on business themes at 360Convos.blogspot.com and as @TheClassicCarol on Twitter.