The Thinking Woman's Thinking Woman

Getting Political: Haters Gonna Hate

2012-02-21T08:11:00.000-08:00

Note: I've been aiming to have my latest set of posts focus on marketing and social media, but something happened recently on a social network, and I want to write about it, even though it's super political.

It began with a romantic thought for Valentine's Day. My husband and I are fairly demonstrative about loving each other, and since we say "I love you" at least once a day (usually 20 or more), neither of us really gets into the whole candy and flowers part of Valentine's.

This year, Nate asked me if he could give me a different kind a present: a donation in my name to a feminist organization. This was thrilling to me. I originally asked for a donation to Planned Parenthood, but Nate asked to pick one himself. After researching several different organizations, he chose NARAL.

Who is NARAL?

We are made up of pro-choice women and men across the United States. Together, we protect a woman's right to choose.

How do we protect the right to choose, exactly?

We lobby Congress to convince your elected representatives to support your right to choose.
We organize women and men to make sure that lawmakers hear from the pro-choice people they represent.
We connect what happens in Congress or in the states to how it affects your ability to make private decisions, like choosing legal abortion.
We work with our state affiliates to advance ideas that are good for women's freedom. We fight back against the bad ideas that threaten our privacy.
NARAL Pro-Choice America uses the political process to elect lawmakers who share our pro-choice values and defeat candidates who don't.

We are passionate about our work—and we couldn't do our job without the great people who stand with us.

That's why Fortune Magazine has described NARAL Pro-Choice America as "one of the top 10 advocacy groups in America."

I am very much pro-choice, and so are many people. One in three American women has had an abortion. It's a very personal choice for a woman to make, but it is important to keep the option open.

I was proud of Nate's gift, so I tweeted about it:

I was thrilled when NARAL's twitter account re-tweeted it.

And then the torrent of anti-choice tweets directed at me started. Lifepeeps accused me of funding the ripping of limbs from babies, Toupsfamily told me that I was lying when I said NARAL promoted contraceptives, saying that the only "birth control" NARAL supported was abortion. Then led to many anti-choice myths being spewed, such as abortion causes breast cancer.

I've been trying to engage these people in conversation about reproductive health, and eventually it comes down to the fact that these people believe in God, and what they really want is to keep women from having access to contraceptives. In fact, MateoDHoffman has spent the better part of this morning telling me that sex is not necessary and no one needs to have it. He does not agree with my point that sex is a basic biological function, and it offers many health benefits, not to mention psychological benefits.

I've also been informed that doctors never tell women the risks of birth control, which I find odd, since I have to answer questions every year and undergo tests for blood clots, heart function, etc in order to be prescribed my pills. I get a big pamphlet of information when I pick up my prescription that outlines those risks. They're mentioned in the ads for contraceptives on TV, along with all the scary risks for taking any medication.

These anti-choice folks insult my intelligence. I accept that we're not going to agree, and I'm not going to convert them, but I am compelled to let them know that they do not speak for all women (in fact, I'm pretty sure none of these people are women).

I read a few posts recently from some feminist writers that I truly respect, talking about the exhaustion of being a feminist, in having to constantly be ready for action and to defend women's rights and choices. I'm not the most active feminist in the world, but this anti-choice stychomythia makes me tired. I have to take a break at some point, but I'll come back. I don't want these people to think they've beaten me with their obsfucation and religious rhetoric. Because they haven't. I will continue to fight for women's rights, 140 characters at a time.

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Komen's Bad PR Decision

2012-02-08T09:52:00.000-08:00

It's not breaking news anymore, but since it's still a major topic of discussion in my household, let's talk about the Susan G. Komen (For the Cure™) Foundation and the defunding of Planned Parenthood debacle.

Komen describes its work as:

Today, Komen for the Cure is the world’s largest grassroots network of breast cancer survivors and activists fighting to save lives, empower people, ensure quality care for all and energize science to find the cures. Thanks to events like the Komen Race for the Cure, we have invested more than $1.9 billion to fulfill our promise, becoming the largest source of nonprofit funds dedicated to the fight against breast cancer in the world.

As part of that work, Komen grants funding for research and prevention, including "Community Health and Outreach":

Our community health grants ensure quality care for all by funding breast cancer education, screening and treatment projects for those who need them most. Through community needs assessments, more than 75,000 volunteers working through local Affiliates identify unmet needs in their communities and provide Affiliate community health grants to fill these gaps. Komen’s Global Headquarters also administers the National Capital Area Grants Program to address breast cancer disparities in the medically underserved in the capital area. And to ensure quality care and access around the global, our Susan G. Komen for the Cure Global Promise Fund works with local communities and International organizations to develop innovative education and outreach programs.

As part of those screening projects, Komen provided funding to Planned Parenthood to provide breast cancer screening. PP is often a resource for low-income women without access to regular health care. And cancer screenings make up about 16% of what Planned Parenthood does:

Recently, Komen decided to not fund grants to any group under investigation by "local, state, or federal governments." This included Planned Parenthood, under investigation by Rep. Cliff Stearns, R-Fla., who is "seeking to determine whether public money was improperly spent on abortions."

Planned Parenthood was temporarily blindsided by the defunding move, and then the Internet began to rally around the cause of providing cancer screenings to women in need. Soon, the anti-abortion stance of a VP at Komen emerged. Karen Handel, it was alleged, designed the new rule in order to exclude Planned Parenthood from receiving funding because the group also provides abortion services (a mere 3% of PP's output).

After major outrage across the Internet and among donors:

Why Komen Yanked PP's Funding - Delusions of Grandeur
Komen's PP Decision: Seems Like it Was About Abortion - Mother Jones
Komen Decision Results in Spike in Donations to PP - Washington Post

Komen decided to apologize. And reinstate funding. And accept Karen Handel's resignation.

Time for a small disclaimer: I have never supported the Komen Foundation, and never given it any money. Mostly my perception of the Komen Foundation has been as a purveyor of Pink Kitsch:

Yours for only $20! Not smartphone compatible.
http://www.shopkomen.com/cart.php?m=product_detail&p=1723&catID=327

However, I think it's important to respect an organization that provides funding for cancer research and screenings, and generally works to prevent and cure cancer. It's a lofty goal, and I respect that.

Looking at the Komen incident from the perspective of a marketer, there are multiple mistakes to consider here. Leaving aside the political arguments, there are some valuable lessons to learn in terms of public relations:

Never underestimate the power of the Internet, particularly social media sharing. In the digital age, it only takes a few clicks or a copy and paste command to share bad news. And we all know that people are far more likely to share a bad story than a good one. Combine that with auto-sharing, auto-tweeting, and you have a massive echo chamber to contend with. Consider about how your audience will perceive your action and how they will react.

Know your audience, and know your industry's audience. Certainly Komen knows its customers, donors, patients, and researchers. Any good foundation will know the position of its stakeholders. But when you consider that Komen is in the business of providing health services to women (industry grouping), it's astounding that the foundation didn't realize that it was also in the same industry as Planned Parenthood. They're not competitors, but they serve an overlapping audience. You have to consider if you are going to make a radical change that affects a stakeholder (PP), you need to consider how that will affect your supporters who also support that stakeholder.

This video neatly encapsulates both these points:

Be transparent in your governance, and stick to your principles. People can find all kinds of information about your organization these days, so if you make a radical shift, don't make up a silly cover story. If Karen Handel honestly wanted to defund PP because it provides abortion services, she should say so. She should stand up for her anti-abortion stance and be honest. No one, especially donors, likes to be lied to. Once you've obsfucated, it's ridiculously difficult to re-earn the trust of the public. But additionally, the Komen foundation should stick to its principles of serving people in need, providing breast cancer screenings. Moving away from its original principles and lying about it will keep the Komen foundation in the doghouse for a while.

Be alert and be prepared. The real winner in this showdown is Planned Parenthood. By playing off this issue, it's pulled in a lot of funding, including a $250,000 match grant from Mayor Bloomberg plus $100,000 from the anti-cancer LiveStrong group. PP used its vast network to spread the word of the defunding to give itself a back up plan to continue to provide cancer screenings, a key service it provides.

Do you think Komen can recover? I'd like to see a major retooling of its organizational structure, including ditching the pink kitsch.

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Just the Same, Only Different

2012-01-26T09:56:00.000-08:00

My dad is full of great phrases, like the classic "Don't do that... it only does that so many times." As in: "Don't zoom the lens in and out on your camera, it only goes in and out so many times." Or: "Don't play with the automatic locks on the car door, they only lock and unlock so many times."

Another one he likes is "Just the same, only different." This phrase works wonderfully when explaining why you should try spinach, when you already like lettuce.

Currently, in my line of work, I'm immersed in new gTLDs. What are they? Put simply, a gTLD (generic top-level domain) is the part of a URL at the very end, to the right of the dot. You probably know about .com, .net and .org. Well, this year, corporations and organizations will be allowed to apply for new gTLDs. It's starting to push into the mainstream media coverage, but mostly I read about this issue in domain industry media and IP law media. And there are a lot of people who oppose this expansion. To sum up the basic arguments:

IP attorney: "Creating new domains means that we'll have to protect all of our trademarks from cybersquatters across hundreds of extensions and that will cost us a lot of money and time so don't do it!"
Domain investor: "New domains are always worthless, we can't make any money off them, so don't do it!"
Businesses: "No one will ever learn to type anything other than .com at the end of a name, so don't do it!"

And I look at all these arguments against new gTLDs, and I want to say:

It's just the same, only different.

You already love and know .com. So why can't you love .web? Wikipedia relies on .org, but surely the Clinton Foundation would look nice on .ngo.

Another gem of wisdom from Dad: "Put it where it belongs." This also applies for new gTLDs. Shoes belong in the closet, and hotel websites belong on .hotel. We have complicated classifications systems for libraries to sort our information, why not classifiers online?

What I see is a lot of people not wanting to change because "it's always been like that." Well, I'm telling you, don't stick to the same old thing and get the same old result. It only does that so many times.

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Slouching Toward Feminism

2012-01-25T11:30:00.000-08:00

Nate: "I had a feminist moment the other day."

Me: "What do you mean?"

Nate: "I was working on a project and pulling a list of all the town planners, firefighters and police in a certain region and I noticed they were all men. There weren't any women at all."

This led to a discussion about why that might be, beyond general hiring sexism. That part of the conversation isn't what I wanted to write about.

I wanted to write that I am so proud of Nate's ability to notice the issue, and willingness to acknowledge there was a lack of women in these types of leadership roles.

Not everyone takes the time to look around them and see these things. For myself, I see a huge gap between the number of male leaders and female leaders. I don't worry about this so much for myself, as I do for women and humanity in general. Half of our country's population is made up of women, and yet the majority of the decisions about women's health issues, including birth control are made by men.

The way toward progress is for people to recognize the gap, and to ask themselves, why aren't there more women leaders? This goes for the local level up to the White House.

Look around you today. Do you see women in powerful positions? Who are they?

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Does the Government Really Care How Much Time I Spend At Starbucks?

2012-01-23T12:38:00.000-08:00

Fast Company reported last week that the government is tracking my iPhone usage. [Link:
Use An iPhone? Yup, The Government Tracks That]

I have a few friends online, mostly that guy from college who really, really wishes he could go be a student protestor in the late '60s, who have been posting about the same topic, claiming that the government is out to get us, tracking our every movement, etc.

But I seriously doubt that the government is interested in a detailed log of my iPhone's whereabouts:

7:00 AM - on the kitchen counter
8:00 AM - on the MBTA
9:00 AM - in my office
10:00 AM - in my office
11:00 AM - in my office
12:00 PM - in my office
1:00 PM - in my office
2:00 PM - at Starbucks
3:00 PM - in my office
4:00 PM - in my office
5:00 PM - in my office
6:00 PM - at the gym
7:00 PM - on the MBTA
8:00 PM - on the kitchen counter

You get the picture. It's entirely possible that President Obama could decide to look up my iPhone locations and determine that I spend too much time at the office and call my boss and tell him I need a vacation. But plausible? No.

I do not object to the government having access to the cell phone GPS data for people who are suspected of criminal acts. And if that means they are going to have access to everyone's data, but probably only use it in criminal investigations, I'm on board.

Technology keeps advancing and at some point we could all have GPS chips implanted in us, for all we know now. In comparison, a little data storage from cell phones seems pretty innocuous.

Or, you could all just unplug and stop carrying your cell phone around with you everywhere you go.

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Sound Bite: Scoreless

2012-01-20T07:22:00.000-08:00

I'm a hip social media player, and while you'll find me bopping around Twitter, LinkedIn and G+, you won't find me on Klout. Or Kred. Or Empire Avenue.

Today I got an invitation for ProSkore. And you know what, I'm not going to join that one either.

I am a real person and I engage on social networks in my own way. I don't want to be standardized, because I use every social network differently. It's not possible to objectively score my social media presence, because there's no objective way to use a social network. Twitter is not an SAT. G+ is not the GRE. Even the power players on social media are doing radically different things, and scoring them is useless. Lady Gaga uses Twitter one way, and President Obama uses it another. Both are pretty darn influential and have a lot of followers, but there isn't a way to score that.

If you want to engage with me on social media, great. I'm open to meeting all kinds of people online, and I love those I meet that are writers, marketers, political activists, photographers, technology fans, and everyone else that I talk to and hang out with.

Just don't tell me I need a number by my name for that.

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Sound Bite: Why I'm not a top blogger

2012-01-18T08:02:00.000-08:00

Are you a high schooler looking to establish a personal brand? Fast Company can tell you how to do that: U R What U Tweet.

After spending literally years learning about personal branding, I've decided I don't want a personal brand. If you're Dan Schwabel, and you've got a solid brand, I applaud you. But I don't want to narrow myself into a core mission or elevator pitch. I am a complex person, with complex thoughts, and while my day job is marketing, my weekends are packed with history, art, science, and a whole host of other topics. In fact, I love my weekends so much, you won't find me on Twitter on the weekends. Or Facebook, Google +, or even on a laptop. That alone is enough to make sure I'm not a top blogger.

In a lot of my online reading, I encounter people who have to admonish themselves to step away from the screen. I am not one of those people. I enjoy a good cuddle with a cat and Law & Order reruns. I love bicycling in the warm weather, and helping my husband build his model train layout.

I know yesterday I was complaining about being "old" and not accomplishing anything. But today, I realize that if I wanted to be in that whiz kid group, I'd have to stop having a life offline. I'm not willing to make that trade.

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Sound Bite: Age shouldn't matter

2012-01-17T14:43:00.000-08:00

Glancing through this evening's HARO requests, I see one journalist looking for "Tech/Social Media Professionals Under 30 in the DC area."

I don't fit this profile, mostly because I'm not in the DC area, but also because I'm 31. It's irritating to think that I work hard and achieve good results in what I do, but I'll never make that list, because I've hit my "Sell-By" date.

But hey, I'm sure I can still make a 35 Under 35 list. I have 4 years to nail that one.

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Mobile Marketing: QR and Snap Tag

2011-11-29T07:08:00.000-08:00

My new favorite online marketing resource is iMedia Connection. It comes to my inbox with a list of very relevant articles and the community has a lot of active discussions. It's almost as good as chatting with the #UsGuys on Twitter.

Yesterday, I read Sean X Cumming's piece: Why the QR code is failing.

An excerpt:

In my informal "on the street" survey of 300 people last month, I held up a sign with a QR code on it and the phrase: "Free gift if you can tell me what this is."I was not asking them to decipher it, just tell me what it actually was. Here are the results:

11 percent correctly answered QR code or quick response code

29 percent responded with "Some barcode thingy"

Seven percent guessed some variant of "Those things you stare at that get 3D when you cross your eyes. What picture is it? I can't seem to get it"

The remaining 53 percent tried everything from a secret military code, Korean (uh really?), to an aerial street map of San Francisco

My survey was conducted in San Francisco, the veritable Mecca of the planet for tech, so it only goes downhill from here.

A lot of this echoed my own dislike of QR codes: they're ugly. They're not intuitive. They break up good visual design. They DO look like secret codes, not something designed to bring you helpful information.

So today, iMedia delivered this piece by Jeff Hayzlett: TrendWatch: Why SnapTags are replacing QR codes.

SnapTags are 2-D barcodes that include a brand's logo (or a Facebook logo) in a notched circle design. Contrasted with the familiar QR code, the result seems minimalist and polished. But it's not just a new design. The interactivity and analytics are updated, as well.

Here's a quick visual for you:

SnapTags

QR code

Which one of these images makes you want to engage with it?

There's still the general point that neither is effective unless the person looking at it has a smart phone, and an application to scan the code, and knows what the expected outcome will be. However, I'm glad someone has come up with a solution to the visual problem posed by QR codes.

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On Knowledge, or My Nickname is Google

2011-10-21T12:32:00.000-07:00

My dad, a terrifically clever man, has taught me a lot of things. How to ride a bike, how to mow the lawn, how to change the spark plugs in my moped. How to work hard, how to fish, how to use a lathe, vertical miller, drill press, and various electric saws. He read me stories about archaeology and mythology and helped me build model pyramids out of clay. And if you had a question, whether it was "why is the sky blue" or "how can I reassemble this jumble of bones into a raccoon skeleton," he would know the answer.

(A favorite story was when my Aunt took me and my cousins to the beach, and my cousin asked her something about a shell or creature she found in the sand. My Aunt didn't know the answer, and my cousin sighed deeply and said, "I wish Uncle were here. He knows EVERYTHING.")

Now that I'm a grown up, I like pursuing the idea of knowing everything. Socrates said, "All I know is that I know nothing," and Oscar Wilde said "I am not young enough to know everything," but I treat pursuit of knowledge as my job. (Just not one I get paid for.)

On one of my favorite TV shows, Bones, Dr. Brennan sometimes employs an assistant Mr. Nigel-Murray who has a love of spouting out random facts. His habit gets on the nerves of most of the rest of the cast, but I love this character, because often times his random knowledge provides a vital clue to unraveling the mystery at hand.

I find that while my collection of knowledge is useful for trivia night, it often helps me in other ways. I enjoy discovering shared intellectual pursuits at networking events. Learning about foreign cultures has been very useful in navigating my current role in an international industry, from etiquette on accepting business cards to deciphering idiomatic speech patterns.

But the sheer joy of knowing something is its own reward. As we are so often told, knowledge is power. Power to master statistics or analyze current economic and financial trends. Power to immerse yourself in another language and read all the nuances of a culture. Power to know exactly where you have come from, and to determine where you are going.

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IMBO: Being a Feminist

2011-10-07T06:57:00.000-07:00

Though she doesn't like the word feminist because the term is so loaded within her community, she's a staunch egalitarian in a world in which there's an ongoing debate over whether husbands are the masters of their wives.
--Ruth Graham, writing on Rachel Held Evans in Slate

Why can't we like the word "feminist?" Is it because Rush Limbaugh recast feminists as "feminazis?"

In the religious world, Christianity is a huge umbrella religion. It includes Catholics, Protestants, Congregationalists, Lutherans, Evangelicals, and many, many more sub categories. Well, Feminism is a lot like that as well. There are conservative feminists, second-wave feminists, third-wave feminists, grrl power feminists, liberal feminists, Catholic feminists, Jewish feminists, socialist feminists--there are all kinds of feminists. Why must we all shy away from this word?

I'm not shying away from this word. I am a feminist. Feminism, and the notion of pushing for women's equality, and for that matter all kinds of gender equality, informs my daily life. When I vote, I vote for the candidate that will best promote women's rights, whether that's a man or a woman. When I have looked for jobs, I try and consider the one that is most fair to its women workers. When I shop, I look for items that come from companies that have women in leadership positions, or employ women fairly at least. When I have conversations, I tell people about women's issues, I point out that rape jokes aren't funny, and I let people know that I won't let others talk in ways that bring women down.

I'm proud to be a feminist. I know this designation gives people all sorts of pre-conceived notions about me, but that's not important. What's important is that I continue to be a feminist, and to use my daily life to make the world a better place for everyone, a more egalitarian place. Whether that means shrinking the political gender gap in Congress or just succeeding at having one less person tell dumb blonde jokes, I am making a difference. IMBO

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Juxtaposition

2011-07-13T11:19:00.000-07:00

A quick hit of something that sparked in my mind through some of reading.

First from New York Magazine: What Happens to All the Asian-American Overachievers When the Test-Taking Ends?

This is a thoughtful piece on the "Bamboo Ceiling," or how rote memorization can hamper Asian-Americans' advancement in a socially-interactive corporate setting. It also touches on Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother and the stereotypical expectation that Asian-American children will grow up to be doctors, lawyers, and bankers.

Then today, from the New York Times: New for Aspiring Doctors, the People Skills Test

Again, it's a push about the social skills lacking in doctors that make them poor team members and how to teach them to inject more emotion into their work. So, I have to wonder if this catches on, if we'll see fewer Asian doctors.

There's so much more to this conversation, so please feel free to add your own thoughts.

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Loving What You Do

2011-06-06T12:55:00.000-07:00

Today, I'm typing gingerly, because I have blisters on my fingers. I have blisters because I spent 8 hours yesterday reupholstering my dining room chairs. The old upholstery was held in by thousands of tiny staples, and my husband and I worked side by side, prying them out with screwdrivers.

And though it was hard work, and the staple gun didn't always cooperate, and the dust from the decaying foam under the old upholstery got in our noses and eyes and we sneezed and coughed, I wouldn't take back that day spent working on this project. It's important to me that I can do this kind of work.

At my real job, my output is measured in abstract things, rows of numbers in excel spreadsheets, bytes of emails answered, phone calls made. At the end of the day, there's nothing to hold up and say "I did this."

In my own life, my husband and I do a lot of things for ourselves: bake our own bread, jar our own jam and pickles, bicycle for groceries, repair holes in clothes, rewire light bulb sockets. I really can't imagine living a life where I didn't do these things.

At the end of my Sunday, we ate dinner at our kitchen table, in our newly cushioned and clean chairs. That is far more of a personal reward than any row of numbers will ever be.

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Life Without Headphones

2011-05-26T11:07:00.000-07:00

When I first bought my iPod in 2005, I can remember people saying that soon after I started using it, I would begin to wonder how I ever lived without it.

I don't think I ever got to that point, but I did begin to rely on it to avoid those people on the street who accost you ask ask you to give money for charity. And then it was important for blocking out the squeals of the subway system. The iPod drowned out people talking near me on cellphones, whiny children, and any noise I didn't want to hear. (I confess that I am not very good at tolerating small repetitive noises, particularly when I can't identify the source.) They became my own little haven as I walked the streets of my city and rode the subway. Since I tend to walk the same routes, it was easy to autopilot and focus on the latest KT Tunstall album or my favorite Mozart Symphony #30.

I went to San Francisco recently, and while I was there, I had to focus more on where I was, since it's not a city I'm very familiar with. I left the headphones in my purse, and spent more time looking at the people around me, spotting costumes from the Bay to Breakers run. I looked at the plants that are common there that aren't so common at home. I listened to the voices, street singers, casual conversations, other out-of-towners.

Not surprisingly, I found all of this very calming. Instead of trying to decipher whatever the heck Tori Amos was singing while I walked, I could focus just on the moment in front of me.

It's amazing how plugged in I am all the time. I sit in front of two screens every day, pop on and off my iPod Touch and BlackBerry on the subway, and Tweet constantly. So after discovering the joy of hearing what's around me, and seeing it fully, on the West Coast, I'm leaving my iPod in my purse here while I commute. (Of course, I'll still use it at the gym, because I can't stand the techno music they play there.) Today, I was able to stop on my way to lunch to give someone directions.

If I'd had my headphones on, I probably would have walked right by.

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Building Professional Networks Online

2011-05-25T13:09:00.000-07:00

Let's say you are a recent college graduate, looking at a terrible job market, and you are very tapped in to the online world like most whipper-snappers these days. So you decide to set up a LinkedIn profile.

As one of those aged Gen Xers, I want to tell you, do not think LinkedIn is Facebook without games. Because it isn't. It's the online version of going to a real networking event. People talk business, check out your experience, follow up with leads on Facebook.

And please, don't just start your LinkedIn network by dumping all your email contacts in and asking them to connect with a generic message. Just don't.

This afternoon, I got an email from "Jessica Powers" (not her real name), asking me to join her LinkedIn network. I was just at a conference last week, and met a ton of people and I'm still following up, so I thought maybe this was someone I met there.

But the name didn't match any of my notes, so I ran the name through my email inbox at work. Turns out Jessica had applied for a job with me, when I was hiring two months ago. I still had her application filed in the folder with all the other people I sent emails to saying "Thanks for applying, but you're not what we're looking for." I hadn't even phone screened this person, and it was only because I'm an email packrat that I had a touchstone at all to remember who she was.

This is what I wrote back to Jessica:

Hi Jessica,

Thank you for inviting me to join your LinkedIn network.

I use LinkedIn to only connect with people that I know personally or professionally, so please do not be offended if I do not accept your invitation.

I would recommend that you start building your network by reaching out to only those people that you work with or network with personally. Once you have built a good network in real life, you will find it easier to build a professional network online.

Best regards,

Kate Hutchinson

It's good advice, so I thought I would share it. Build a network in person first, and then take it online. You can't build credibility if no one can remember who you are beyond an email address. Networking is very hard work, involving attending events, calling people, writing emails, and remembering details about people and making deals that help everyone get something they want or need.

Networking is not an address book dump into a website.

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I Wear A Watch

2011-05-11T11:18:00.000-07:00

Seth Godin writes:

Nobody wears a watch any more.
Nobody wears a tie either.
Nobody shops at a bookstore, at least nobody I know.
The market of nobody is big indeed. You can do really well selling to nobody if you do your homework. In fact, most companies selling to nobody outperform those that are trying to sell to everyone.

News flash: While a lot of our commerce has become e-commerce, there is still a market for watches, ties, and books from bookstores.

I appreciate that Godin works hard to analyze the trends of online life and marketing, but this brief soundbite gets my dander up.

Maybe I'm biased, since I won't leave the house without my watch. I'm not a Luddite, since I also carry a BlackBerry, an iPod and a MacBook on a regular basis. But I will always check my watch for date and time before I pull out a cell phone.

Godin's making the point that companies who do not move forward and embrace change will end up losing their market, or any market. But he's overlooking human irrationality. My daily watch is an Invicta, but on fancy occasions, I wear my husband's grandmother's wind up silver Gruen model, or my own grandmother's gold Hamilton. I buy a new watch every now and then, and I have one in chocolate gold, one powered by a solar cell, and one that's old and battered that it's okay to scratch and beat around.

Do I really need so many watches? Do I need a watch at all? Certainly not. Everywhere you go there's a clock, on your phone, on your laptop, on the wall, scrolling on subway announcement boards, on whatever electronic gadget is in your hand... you don't need an extra time piece on your wrist.

But the watch is a reminder of routine. It's something that keeps me grounded. It's got enough dials to remind me what day of the week it is when I'm so busy I forget. And really, there is a market for this. There is a market for watches. There will always be a market for watches. Just because it won't be made of the same people doesn't mean that the market disappears.

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Is Imitation Really the Highest Form of Flattery?

2011-03-22T12:18:00.000-07:00

An invitation to a Investment Management and Hedge Fund Roundtable plopped in my Inbox this afternoon. It wasn't a relevant topic for me, so I was on the verge of just trashing the message when I noticed in the preview pane a familiar logo. I thought it was from the Boston Business Journal, but no, it wasn't. It was the logo for Pepper Hamilton, LLP.

Huh, I thought. That really looks like the BBJ logo. So I checked the BBJ site. No, they had a new logo. So I searched Google Images. There it was. So you can see the comparison, I put the two logos next to each other:

This really struck me as odd. Pepper Hamilton has been around since 1890, has offices nationwide, and seems to be a fairly well-off firm. Couldn't they hire a graphic designer to create a logo for them? I'm also curious if perhaps no one at Pepper Hamilton read the BBJ when their logo looked like this, so maybe they didn't notice. For me, it conveys an image of laziness; it looks like they saw the BBJ logo, liked it and only modified the name to suit their company. (Although, I'm willing to think perhaps the BBJ stole the Pepper Hamilton logo... if anyone knows someone at the BBJ or Pepper Hamilton, feel free to pass the info on.)

Logos often serve as the first visual introduction to a company. Think of all the hoopla around the recent logo updates for Gap, Starbucks, and JCPenney. Now granted, a law firm does not target the same demographic as major brands like Gap, Starbucks, or JCPenney, but I'm willing to bet that the folks that the Pepper Hamilton Boston office work with do read the BBJ, and would recognize the logo.

If you were shopping for a law firm, and found a similar situation, would it impact your impression of the firm?

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Customized Customer Service

2011-03-04T09:51:00.000-08:00


Image (c) 2010 Matthew Inman aka The Oatmeal

I had a quick watercooler chat with a friend this morning. He asked me how my morning was going, and I replied that it was a good morning, because I had managed to clear my queue of customer emails. And I mentioned a small bug in our system was causing a small problem, so most of the emails were about the same thing.

"Yeah, that's when you hit copy and paste," he said, grinning. I smiled back as I picked up my water bottle and headed back to my desk.

But my real answer to that is: I don't copy and paste.

I work for a small company and we are establishing our niche in a mature market with some very big dogs. Last year, after surveying the landscape, I began building a strategy around competing on service and experience. (Not to mention that my personal business principle is based on the highest standard of service.) Part of this strategy is that we never respond to customer emails with a cookie cutter answer.

This means that if you purchase a domain from my company, and you have a problem and you send me an email, I will actually read your email. I will look at your problem, and you'll get back a real email written by me just for you. Sometimes, I include a link to our FAQ section, but I'll always explain my answer personally. Not only that, but if I wrote you back, and I didn't have a complete answer at the time, I'll write you another email when I have more information.

All of this grows out of my personal vision for business: high quality customer service. I pay attention when I am shopping, and I notice good and bad customer service. Yesterday, I bought a microphone for my office computer to record voiceovers for a video tour I was building. I got it back to my desk, and found the adapter wasn't the right kind, so I walked back to the store and returned it for a different model. The whole time I was there, the clerk didn't say a word to me, except for "Can I see an ID?" Instead, she chatted away on her headset to another clerk somewhere else in the store about weekend plans. This had the effect of making me feel like I was invisible. Sure, I got my replacement without hassle, but it would have been nice to have my existence acknowledged during the transaction.

Now, when I consider that my customers will never actually see me, since I work for an online company, it becomes even more important to write those personalized emails. I won't have the opportunity to smile and greet them the way this clerk did. In the online world, everything seems to be automated. We have automated emails to confirm purchases, but I want our customers to know that there is a real person behind those emails, someone who cares about their concerns and wants to help them.

Yesterday, I got a customer call with questions about a new program we have on our site. I spent a long time answering his questions and explaining the program to him, and then he said, "On one of your FAQs at the bottom, there's a lot of marketing fluff in the answer, but no real answer." And I admitted he was right, because he was. I spent the afternoon rewriting the answer.

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In My Brazen Opinion

2011-02-04T13:40:00.000-08:00

In my brilliant courses at Simmons School of Management, I had more than one professor who noted that women often being their sentences, particularly in larger groups with "I think" or "I feel." In fact, Debbie Kolb, who taught my negotiation class, wouldn't let us continue speaking if we started our sentences that way. She'd interrupt and say "You think?"

Since then, I've made a conscious effort not to start my sentences with discounts like "I think." Since most of my work and networking takes place on line, where I can see what I'm typing, it's fairly easy to catch myself from writing it out. (Also, the brevity of Twitter makes it difficult to add in those extra 7 characters!)

So today, I thought about another self-inflicted put-down used so often on the Internet: IMHO. This acronym translates to "In My Humble Opinion." Go search Twitter right now for these four letters. You'll pull up a string of tweets on everything from Colin Firth's performance in The King's Speech to the complexity of bioethics... all of them qualified with "IMHO."

(Interestingly enough, IMHO is not limited to women users. I'd love to have the time to sample a cross-section of tweets and find out which gender uses the acronym most.)

I'm fed up with people not taking responsibility for their opinions. As I posted today:

Eric Andersen brilliantly replied with:

ha, I like that, maybe IMBO (in my brazen opinion)?

And so, I'm lobbing this out there. Let's make it a movement, a hashtag! #IMBO

Stop qualifying your opinions, and be brazen about them. If we can't lay claim to our own opinions, what can we lay claim to?

PS: Thanks to @Lipsticking and @DowntownWoman for helping to push this!

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Social Engagement for Small Business

2011-02-01T08:47:00.000-08:00

Recently, I was explaining to a friend what Etsy was. Mostly, this was because I wanted to show her the blog Regretsy, which makes no sense if you don't know what Etsy is. Quick summary: Etsy is a site for small time crafters to sell their wares, like a giant online art market, and Regretsy is a great blog that highlights some of the weirdest, wackiest, and funniest stuff on the site. Because it can't all be beautiful.

So, once my friend saw Regretsy, she wanted to know, does anyone sell anything good on the site? And I had to say, "Why yes!" It's entirely true. For every misspelled greeting card or taxidermied squirrel with a fish head, there is a gorgeous photographic print series or hand knitted lacy scarf.

But my favorite Etsy retailer is LotusPad. I first became acquainted with her on Twitter, following her tweets about daily yoga practice and battling Boston weather on her commute by bicycle. And then I noticed she would tweet links to items in her Etsy shop.

This is a great way to connect with potential shoppers on Twitter that a lot of big companies miss. Some companies simply tweet over and over again about their product, but LotusPad is selling handmade jewelry and eco-friendly yoga mats. These items are very personal, and the people who buy them, the demographic wants more than just a "thing" to buy, they look for relationships. So it's nice to read LotusPad's tweets, and talk to her about what she does, reads, or thinks, and then see the product of her handiwork.

The night I showed my friend some of her jewelry, I realized that I really wanted to buy another necklace from the shop. When I got home, I went to look for the item, but for whatever reason, it wasn't popping up. So I used Twitter to write to LotusPad to ask if she could find it in her inventory. My description was a little lacking, but LotusPad kept searching until we found it. That's an amazing level of customer service, something every small business should aspire to. It's especially amazing, considering she was answering my tweets after 9:00 pm! This is a time that I would expect her to be home from work, and taking a break from the "office."

Most of the time, buying things online is so impersonal. Amazon has an algorithm to tell me that I should try Patricia Cornwall books because I like Kathy Reichs books, but it's just a computer. It's nice to meet someone I can have a conversation with, who makes a great product to boot.

Image from LotusPad's Etsy shop--I love this necklace and own a similar version of it.

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What's Ahead: My Predictions for 2011

2010-12-21T13:50:00.000-08:00

Since I've seen so many of these lists in and around my RSS feeds and Twitter, I thought I'd make my own little "Predictions" list for the coming year. Then next year we can look back at them and laugh. Unless they come true, then we can all hail me as the next Oracle of Omaha or something.

Prediction #1: Facebook will be the new AOL.

Yes, I am a social media marketer, yes I am a constant Facebook user, and yes, I think Mark Zuckerberg is a twit. But at some point, Facebook will have to hit a growth wall, just like AOL did in the '90s. Facebook has had a very turbulent year with snafus, feature rollouts, and more, and the more I think about it, the more Facebook looks like AOL. What was AOL's idea? To create the only place on the internet you'd ever actually need to go to. Which is what Facebook is doing now--they integrate with everything, and if they can't beat it, they duplicate it (see: Facebook Places vs. Foursquare). Eventually, they're going to move away from their original mission, which might have been to take over the world, but I think was actually to share photos or maybe rate hot girls. They are going to get too big for their britches, and unless Zuckerberg suddenly matures 20 years in 6 months, I foresee a disaster.

Prediction #2: New TLDs will happen and they will be hot property

I say this as someone who works for a domain registrar and has been reading about this plenty. If you don't know what a TLD is, basic explanation is it's the ending on your URL, like .com or .net. This year we saw the launch of .co as a gTLD, and it's been pretty darn successful. So a lot of applicants have started clamoring for their own TLDs, and some look super promising, like .nyc, .movie, and .africa. Today people are excited about country code TLDs that let you have cool URLs like bit.ly (.ly is the Lybian TLD), but the new TLDs will be better. With hyper-local marketing the current big thing on the internet, how much easier would it be to do location based marketing in San Francisco with the .sfo domain in your URL?

Prediction #3: ...

You tell me what you're predicting!

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When Your Logo Isn't Loved

2010-10-06T14:08:00.000-07:00

Before I begin, I want to take a moment to appreciate all the designers out there, graphic and web. They do a lot of hard work, and often lead the way with beautiful, eye-catching, iconic images.

That said... Gap unveiled its new logo today, and if the poll on the Huffington Post is any indication, people are not happy with it. (Almost 80% think the new design is "Terrible" last I checked.)

So let's examine this. Who is the Gap, anyway? What do they stand for? And why the change?

At one point, I owned a seriously awesome vintage Gap vest, circa 1980. I wish I had a photo of the tag for it, which said "Gap, Inc. Est. 1978." Gap has always been a preppy sort of place, with cable knit sweaters and khakis. The old logo really captured this old school feel: tall serif letters on a plain, patrician blue background. It was simple, nautical in colors, since Gap clothing was perfect for an afternoon on a sailboat or yacht.

So what's up with this new logo? My first impression was that it reminded me of a gas company logo. I'm not sure why Gap felt they needed a change, but I can guess that they wanted to update their image to keep up with their shoppers. The majority of Gap shoppers are currently in the under-30 set, so it makes sense to try and to appeal to them even further in a down economy when retail sales are slumping. The designer here is trying to capture the feel of Web 2.0, with a sans-serif font and a tiny, gradient colored decoration. Also key is that unlike the original serif-fonted square, this new logo will survive copying and pasting onto social media sites without being blurred or distorted half as easily.

But, will people like this new logo? So far I've only seen negative reactions:

Now Gap probably put a ton of work into this new logo, so it's unlikely they'll simply scrap it based on a few shots fired around the Internet. But we'll see how long it lasts.

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Behind A Good Marketing Campaign Is A Great Product

2010-06-04T09:14:00.000-07:00

I don't travel very much (ironic, since I live within walking distance of Logan Airport), but I am very certain that the next time I stay in a hotel, it will be a Westin.

It's not because Westin hotels are cheaper (I'm sure they're not), or because there are good locations, but really, because I'm in love with the in-house soap. Kid you not. Westin has a fabulous marketing hook in their white tea aloe "Heavenly" spa products.

My mother-in-law, Liz, is a road warrior, and she always brings me back the extra sample soaps/lotions/shampoos from her hotels so I can use them at the gym (and not lug around big bottles). She brought back some white tea aloe shampoo for me about a month ago, and I'm hooked.

But of course, I'm looking at this from a marketing perspective. I've never stayed in a Westin, but I did buy a full size bottle of shampoo and conditioner from their Westin At Home website. What the company has done is to take something that is often taken for granted--the tiny bottles of giveaway bath products--and created something that people actively want, outside of the hotel experience. And it's a killer WOM idea. The last time I traveled (admittedly over 2 years ago), I picked the cheapest hotel I could find in the location I wanted. Next time, I'm going to actively seek out a Westin.

This reminded me of a post over at Brogan Media on business models. Chris mentioned the classic story of Ray Kroc:

Ray Kroc used to quiz MBA students as to what business he was in. Everyone thought he was in the hamburger business. When I heard this, I thought, “A-ha. No. He’s in the franchising business.” But no, I was wrong, too. Ray was in the real estate business. McDonalds owns more real estate (more PRIME real estate, by the way) than even the Catholic Church. When you look at a business, the model isn’t always immediately apparent.

So while some might think Westin (and its parent group, Starwood Hotel Group) is in the hotel business, or also the real estate business, or franchise business, I think it's in more of a customer service business. Or an experiential business. The idea here is to make Westin's so appealing as an experience that you will want to take it home. A lifestyle business?

It wouldn't work if they hadn't invested so much in creating great products though. I can't think of any other giveaway items I've loved as much as the Heavenly bath line. And the genius in this particular product line is that it's a giveaway that links intrinsically with the atmosphere, the experience of the Westin hotels. At a recent conference, I got some seriously awesome swag, but a gorgeous silk tote bag or keychain doesn't necessarily make me was to hire a particular trademark protection service.

Takeaway: Make a great product, one that creates a lasting impression and is integral to your business model. Give it away, or create easy access to it. This creates a signature that customers (and potential customers) will recognize and return to.

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To Tweet or Not to Tweet: Is Social Media Really Stealing Company Time?

2010-05-20T10:07:00.000-07:00

Did you know that Americans work 10 hours fewer per week than they did pre-recession, and yet somehow we're still producing the same level of goods and services (the almighty measure of GDP and the economy)? It's true, according to the Harvard Business Review and Ben Bernanke.

And yet, according to the Wall Street Journal, we're facing an epidemic of cyberslacking at work.

So, to sum up: we waste time at work on social networking, but we're still as productive as we were before the economy crashed. Interesting.

My take on this has to do with the benefits of social media, and the fear of job loss. We all work a lot harder now, because no one is safe from layoffs, and those shorter hours are explained by the number of workers whose hours have been cut. And yet, social media provides a much needed break in the day for overworked, overstressed employees. I know it makes my day a little brighter being able to send a few instant messages to my husband while I'm at work. (Of course, I really like my current job, and my job involves being on social media all day, so I'm probably not the best example.)

Plus, there are a lot of benefits to being involved in social media. Twitter is a great place to look for potential customers, and post links to sales, conference appearances, or e-books. Facebook is a great place to interact with customers. And there are tons of tools out there to measure engagement, number of fans/followers, reach and so forth, so you really can calculate an ROI for your time investment.

This doesn't mean that employees don't have to behave while online--it still applies that you shouldn't trash your boss, download porn, or otherwise jeopardize your job with bad behavior. But workplaces should really cool it about banning social media in the workplace.

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My Strangest Networking Invitation

2010-05-07T06:59:00.000-07:00

I posted recently about joining a new networking site, Xing.com which has a more international following than LinkedIn, and now, I have received my strangest "Join my network" message ever:

Hey Beautifull

You attract people by the qualities you display.. You keep them by the qualities you possess..The best thing about loving and being hurt is that you get to know what true love really is. For as gold is tested in fire, and so will love be perfected in pain never let you past Run over your Life...When we Get Hurt we Need to Keep On With Life...No matter how ugly you think you are,that special man that loves you believes you are the most beautifull and irresistable thing on earth and nothing can ever change that...Love is not about finding the right person, but creating a right relationship. It's not about how much love you have in the beginning but how much love you build till the end never give up about life and also be positive .you really Look Great to me..if you care to know more about me...you can get me through my personal email address...

Tim

Can you top that?

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