Illustration by S. Kelly

Hometown News, the local paper I receive in North Brevard County reported recently that “Brevard County state legislators strongly favor creating a law in Florida similar to the Arizona law that would authorize police to verify the status of anyone who might be in the country illegally.” The following is my Letter the the Editor I submitted in response:

In regards to Brevard County state legislators desire to introduce a bill to create an immigration law reminiscent of the one passed in Arizona, I’d like to offer up the following points to the discussion.

Of the 18,537,969 Floridians responding in the last census, 21% are hispanic. That’s 3,892,974 legal citizens of these United States.  The most recent estimates of the state’s illegal alien population put it just under 1 million.  So for every illegal immigrant this law is meant to catch and remove from the country, 4 US citizens will have their civil rights trampled, being forced to carry a level of identification above and beyond what those of non-hispanic races would. Keep in mind that a driver’s license is no indication or proof of immigration or legal status. What we are talking about is carrying around birth certificates and passports in your home state, which is not only offensive for a free citizen of the United States of America, but puts people at incredibly increased risk of identity theft. Identity theft is an over 50 billion dollar problem in the US annually and can destroy the lives of it’s victims. It is common advice that things like social security cards, passports and birth certificates should be kept locked up and secured until you absolutely need them.

We should also take into account the percentage of the over 80 million visitors we see annually that are hispanic. Let’s give the economic impact of illegal immigrants figure of $3.7 billion the benefit of the doubt. Let’s also keep in mind this number is 2.2% of ALL Florida state and local expenditures in 2009 ($169 billion), not a large amount of where our tax dollars go at all. If the affect on our tourism is to turn away just 5.5 percent of the $68 billion tourism brought in during 2009 with these proposed laws, then we have already lost more than illegal immigration is purported to be costing our state in the first place.

I completely agree that illegal immigration is a violation of law and should be addressed, but mirroring the terrible approach Arizona has taken in Florida is the wrong solution. So what is the solution?  Let’s take a step back and understand the problem first. A novel thought, I know, but stick with me.

The types of documentation we are wanting illegal immigrants to hold is H-2A visas, for temporary agricultural workers, or H-2B visas, for non-agricultural workers (hospitality, tourism, construction…) Only 66,000 H-2B visas are even allowed to be given out each year, it should be noted. These visas are actually the responsibility of the employer to pay for and obtain, not the worker. The process by which the system was designed to work is the employer would put out a call for workers anticipating a shortfall of labor for an upcoming season. The employer must show that they have made an attempt to hire U.S. workers first and provide favor to hiring them over immigrant labor (this must be proven via documented advertising.) Only then can they apply for visas 45 days in advance for the foreign workers they have recruited. It is not the case that a worker from Mexico goes to some immigration office, pays a fee and then comes in to go looking for work.

What is happening is that employers are not obeying the laws and not following these procedures. They have instead created a situation where the immigrant labor must risk their life and risk imprisonment so that the employers can save themselves the cost and hassle of doing things the legal way. They do not recruit the labor in Mexico and then work out the paperwork to get them here as they are supposed to. For every illegal immigrant working in this country, there is an employer who has committed several crimes, including immigration violations, tax evasion and violations of wage and workers’ compensation laws. In other words, for every illegal they employ an employer has committed multiple federal crimes.  We are talking about organizations that are responsible for a laundry list of multiple violations… yet we are more concerned with a single visa violation by an individual.  This is the area we feel we need to focus legislative action, not the employers committing serial violations on a massive scale, but the victims of their crimes. Given this I have to question either the motivations or the intelligence of those wishing to place the immigrant, not the employer, in the primary responsible party role.

If you truly believe in tackling our immigration issues you will put 100% of your efforts, that is every last bit of it, on forcing employers to comply with the law. Punishing the victims of their actions is ignorant and cruel. And if you believe in the fundamentals of citizenship in a free and just country governed by the rule of law, you cannot support the sacrifice of the civil rights and security of legal citizens based on their appearance. And finally, if you have any sense of economic reason you cannot justify taking actions that will needlessly damage the financial well being of our state in an already precarious time.

I think what disturbs me most about our legislators contemplating such a dangerous and ill conceived notion as these immigration laws is that I, just a common working man seems to have put a heck of a lot more thought into the issue from multiple angles than they have. I wasn’t elected to spend my entire day researching and developing legislation that makes sense and serves the better interests of Floridians, they were. With all due respect, in that light they are extraordinarily horrible at their jobs.

- Reduce government spending, as if we could cut anything more. We are laying off teachers, killing off maintenance of public parks, closing fire stations and police sub stations, considering farming out libraries to be run privately by the lowest bidders… the list goes on and on. Shit Rick, let’s just shut the whole thing down and declare anarchy! Everyone knows the role of government is to do absolutely as little as possible for anyone. We wouldn’t want to offer any services to the populace (the… “society”) for fear of being labeled a “socialist” do we?

- Reduce property taxes, you know, that thing that started Florida’s budget issues well before the recession (we had a head start getting used to it over the rest of the states.) It worked so damn well when Christ did it, so let’s just do it some more and really put our nuts in a vise! We don’t need the money anyhow, because we aren’t coughing up any jack to pay for anything useful for the citizenry anymore.

- Eliminate the Florida corporate income tax, which works nicely with giving residents a token decrease in property tax. Nobody could say he only cut taxes for businesses! Considering the fact that Florida is already one of the most attractive states tax wise for businesses, further reducing state income by 100% eliminating the taxes they receive is not only unnecessary but reckless. Does he plan on holding bake sales to raise money? Oh wait, I forgot, we won’t have any services, so who needs money? This one could get sticky. Rick Scott seems hell bent on convincing the Tea Baggers that he’s a populist but I’m not sure how he would answer a likely question they might propose of why he doesn’t want to nix 100% of personal property tax and give the smaller reduction to corporate taxes. I’m sure the answer will be something about trickle down economics, he’ll say 3 “Hail Reagans” and every one will be satisfied though.

- Removing corporate regulations… yeah, in the wake of Wall Street and banks raping the entire country (a direct result of Greenspan’s failed theory of a unregulated market) and oil giant BP ignoring what little safety regulations they did have to end up polluting the Gulf of Mexico, Rick Scott wants us to loosen up the reins even more. What’s that saying about doing the same thing and expecting a different result?

I’m not even going to go too much into his support for the completely racist and unconstitutional immigration law they have hatched in Arizona. How he thinks he can hold that opinion in Florida, a state that is populated by hispanic and hispanic-looking people (hell, even half the whites in Florida are tan enough to pass), and get elected is beyond me.

So yeah, Rick Scott is pretty much mentally insane, or maybe just a corporate whore, or maybe an experienced and seasoned douchebag. I’ll let him pick which we should know him as.

Licensed under Creative Commons by Barack Obama

The more editorial content regarding President Obama I read, whether it be letters to the editor, columns or articles in various publications, I can’t help but see a disturbing disconnect. That disconnect is between what Obama is said to be for (Socialism, making us all poor, being evil, etc…) and what he actually has done. In other words, a disconnect with reality.

Since in office President Obama has signed legislation that has lifted the ban on concealed weapons in federal parks and opened up oil drilling off the Eastern seaboard and Alaska. The healthcare markets that replace the public option in the now passed Health Reform Bill is essentially the same proposal Nixon had floated. Iran and North Korea, the axis of evil conservatives assured us Obama would be kowtowing to, are furious with Obama’s nuclear stance. I imagine they are angry because the conservatives had all but assured them Obama would be helping them build their nuclear arsenal himself. In reality he has passed more legislation that supports the conservative agenda than either Bush presidencies. If he has been alienating anyone it’s the far left. The ones people purport that he is beholden to in reality have the most to be disgruntled about.

Even the more recent talk about a national sales tax in lieu of increasing funding through income tax channels is more in line with the philosophy of the Fair Tax. That piece of well thought out conservative legislation, which used to be centerpiece of the Libertarian Party platform, seems to have been all but forgotten in the fervor to demonize Obama. Here is a President that has shown a clear ability to not be afraid of big changes if the numbers and the plans indicate a likely chance of success. Given the complete cowardice of all but a few Republicans to risk stepping out on the Fair Tax ledge, Obama is probably the best chance that bill has of getting passed. If conservatives would just stop calling him Hitler long enough to hold a sane dialog and pitch their plans like adults they may find him more open to supporting their ideas than many of their own party leaders.

Everything in the conservative world has taken a backseat to the goal of preventing our President from accomplishing anything productive. They will not be supportive of anything he does, even if it aligns with their own previously stated goals, which should immediately be signaling alarms in your head. If it is not his actions they hate so vehemently, then what is it? We should all think very honestly about that question and come to terms with the true ugliness that applying Occam’s Razor in this situation implies.

From Food

Sunrise Park at Sunrise
Justin and I launched the canoe just after 7:30 and caught a perfect sunrise to start our day. I kept the phone in the Aqua-Pac the entire time, so this is the only picture from the water, but it pretty much does the job.

From Food

The Haul
Fish weren’t biting and an approaching thunderstorm chased us back to shore by 10:30. Saw a perfect slot sized Redfish by the boat but not really much in the way of bites. I was able to harvest about 15 Hardshell Clams of various sizes.

From Food

Locally Gathered
I picked up some mussels, chopped a locally grown yellow onion and tomato, and grabbed some Lakeridge Southern White Wine (also locally produced.) I decided to make a quick and easy Florida Cracker Paella. I think I’d like to in the future use a key lime here instead of normal lime juice. Some chopped garlic to bring it all together.

From Food

Melt Wet Ingredients
Melted butter spread with a dash of the wine and lime juice.

From Food

Shellfish and Veggies
Added all the clams and mussels, garlic and veggies and let simmer until all the shellfish opened. I only had 2 clams that didn’t open so I made sure to remove them and toss.

From Food

Shells Out, More Seafood
After a bit of siimmering the clams and mussels just give up their shells, falling right out. I carefully made sure to remove all shells and then added some shrimp and crab leg meat.

From Food

Simmering Meat Goods
This time I used alaskan king crab leg meat because it was on sale real cheap, but to make this even better I want to use Blue Crab that I also catch. Can’t get any fresher than gathered by hand. I think you could also through in some cuts of fish fillets if your trip happens to yield some.

From Food

Grain and Spices
I tossed in cous cous (probably about a cup, just 2 scooper fulls) along with a dash of hot sauce and a sprinkling of dried red pepper flakes. You could use any kind of grain here, yellow rice or maybe even grits would be an interesting take. When the grain is cooked, the meal is done.

From Food

Portion and Leftovers
Made enough for one epic meal and a sensible lunch the next day. It would easily be enough for 2 or 3 people, probably would need a bigger pan to make enough for 4 or more, but I have a large cast iron I could call on to do the job.

From Food

On the Plate in 30 Minutes
I was suprised at how fast I was able to get this seemingly complicated meal to the table. It was exactly a half hour on the nose. Pairs Nicely with Yuengling.

Recipe Timeline

Full Sail University has been a well known design and art school for some time, more than 30 years, mostly in the areas of music, film, design and gaming. In the last couple years we’ve expanded to offering degrees in such areas as Entertainment Business (including a Sports Management elective track), Internet Marketing and Education Media Design. So how have these fit into the Full Sail family of education offerings? All these degrees include elements of using media in creative ways to solve problems and objectives. They teach people how to take the creative aspects of their personality and use tools to instruct, persuade and deliver messages. Full Sail University is really about teaching creative problem solving, whether it’s related to production, design, business, marketing or instruction. That’s why we are the University for Creative Minds.

Pay to Play? Brevard County considers elimination of free parking at public beaches and boat ramps.

District 3 County Commissioner Trudie Infantini thinks only people who visit the beaches or boat ramps in Brevard County should pay for them. To me this shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the role of the governing body to which she was elected. We pay our taxes together so that we can provide the community with several services and benefits, one of which is access to the natural beauty for which Brevard County is famous.

Her line of reasoning is a slippery slope: Some days I don’t have any garbage to take out, why not weigh everyone’s garbage and make them pay for only what they have to collect? How about the roads I never drive down? Why should I pay to have those repaved? My child is not yet of school age, I am just being robbed of tax money aren’t I? I don’t ever have any need for building permits, why is all my money going to pay for the salaries of that office? Does Infantini envision a county where we have little coin slots on every park bench, a toll booth on every mile of road, or a bevy of itemized bills we have to wade through each month that list every time we flushed our toilet or every ounce of can we put out to recycle? I’d bet she’d say no, but Commissioner, I’d have to point out the logic is one in the same.

Look, we all pay taxes so that we can provide a lot of things for each other, some we personally might use right now, some we don’t. It’s part of living in an organized community, and if you get right down to it, the entire reason we have them in the first place. If not, why have a county at all? Why not just go live on your sequestered compound somewhere and let the surrounding area descend into anarchy? It just sounds to me like instead of finding ways to make us pay more for less services (because let’s be clear, they are not simultaneously proposing a drop in everyone’s tax rate) they ought to be working to find creative ways to be more cost effective and create new revenue streams, just like every other resident is having to do right now. Just slapping a meter on services we already are taxed for is a failure of problem-solving.

Now that you know, go buy your Formula For Success T-Shirts now!

I mean to say this in the kindest sense, both to marketers and Social Media itself. Social Media has changed everything. It’s given us a channel that provides immediate and unfiltered observation and communication with our target audiences. Heck, it’s blown apart the concept of “target audiences” as we know it. We no longer have to conjure up archetypes from our imaginations to give a face to those demographic homogenies that we use to target our campaigns. We merely have to “follow” someone to learn how a typical customer ticks, their likes and dislikes, their hopes and their fears…  We can get feedback and answer questions in a direct way that contact forms and one way copy never could. It only makes sense that we direct resources and time into these new arenas.

But, like any good crack addict, some become hooked. First it’s just a couple times a week. Then it’s an hour a day (just a little social media after lunch to get in touch with our customers, man…) Pretty soon you are shoving aside the time you spent optimizing your paid search accounts, traditional SEO activities and even detailed analysis of traffic and A-B testing of your content. But, you don’t mind, because it “feels” so good. When the executive board of your company asks for you to give them the ROI and performance data on these new efforts you can only throw up the peace sign and say, “How can you hang a price on the love and outreach we are experiencing with our customers, man. That’s like, bringing me down, man.”

Then they fire your hippy ass.

So, we all know there is something potentially valuable to be gained from engaging your customers in Social Media platforms. Why do you have to resign yourself to not being able to assign real value to it? Heck, you should DEMAND it of yourself, especially if you are devoting a second of time away from other marketing pursuits. You wouldn’t stand for your paid search or display advertising efforts to continue without knowing impressions, clicks, and conversions down to a very small margin of error. You should require as much from your Social Media campaigns as well. I guarantee you those who cut the checks and approve the budgets will. So, sober up and dust off those books you bought about metrics and analytics and get back to business.

I don’t believe in intangibles when it comes to marketing. Intangibles are just tangibles that you haven’t taken the time and effort to apply a measurement scheme to yet. The best way to tackle this is to make your Social Media metrics analogous to your other campaigns’ metrics.

Impressions

You monitor how often you ads are viewed don’t you? Well, then do the same for how often your brand comes up in discussion. Make online conversations = impressions. With Social Media you get the extra added benefit of being able to measure your impressions in terms of varying contexts. By that I mean, positive, negative or neutral, etc… Are people bashing you on a forum thread? 1 negative impression. Did someone post a blog about a great experience with your staff? 1 positive impression. Find a tweet where someone asked a general question about your product? 1 neutral impression. Feel free to make the impression categories as simple or complex as you like. Count every post in a thread or the whole thread. Classify impressions as questions, answers, praise and criticism. Whatever it makes sense for you to count is fine, the important thing is that you are counting.

Clicks

This is probably the easiest one to do. Virtually any analytics package out there is going to provide you with referring page data. Simply give any of those impressions you counted a “click” if your site received traffic as a result of that online conversation.

Congratulations, you now have a click-through-rate for that blog post or thread. Not only that, you can now see CTR on negative vs. positive impressions. You can report a CTR on Twitter traffic in relation to how many brand mentions you had. All of the sudden you are able to see a relative value of scaling efforts in one Social Media platform over another in terms of driving traffic, not just current sheer volumes.

Conversions

To me this is the most important piece to the puzzle.  You have to know the bottom line or it’s all just fun and games. Pulling a conversion metric out of that “fuzzy cloud” of Social Media is where you can impress the boss (or your bank account) and gain true support for ramping up Social Media efforts.

You’re going to need to use some kind of analytics package that tracks conversion or goal data.  The easiest option might be to use Google Analytics with it’s built in goal metrics. It may take some work tagging your lead forms, or cart receipt pages, but be sure to use the full depth of what your analytics package provides.  If you are e-commerce based, then try to gather total order value. If lead generation, then make sure to gather the type of lead (if you collect multiple interests.)

Once done (and really, you should already being doing this if you do any paid advertising) you’ll know what platforms and types of conversations convert at what rates. These numbers should truly define where you priorities get placed, both among your Social Media initiatives and in relation to your overall marketing strategy.

Cost Per Action and ROI

Social Media is free, so your Cost Per Action is $0 and the ROI is infinite!

WRONG!

Thinking like that is how Social Media efforts get hamstrung and tossed onto the plate of an already busy person, doomed to never be scaled up. Take the time spent on Social Media and multiply it by the implementer’s hourly rate, or their entire salary if you have dedicated personnel. Are you going to Social Media conferences, spending money at “Tweet-Ups”, or buying books to learn new strategies? Count it all up, and don’t be scared you are going to blow that “marketing freebie” image of Social Media. It’s much worse to report a $0 CPA and then ask for budget money than it is to provide a real an accurate accounting of what it costs to manage your efforts right. If you don’t get an accurate CPA and ROI down now, you are going to run into big problems when you try to scale your efforts up and run into budget shortages.

Analysis

Okay, so that may all be pretty much a no-brainer for most marketers. You know how to do all that.  But, are you doing it? Are you keeping a spreadsheet or database of those data points broken down by each month, week or day? Are you graphing out the changes in impressions, clicks, CTR, conversions and conversion rates over time? Are you comparing that graph with the timeline of your Social Media activities? If not, get to it! You need to know the impact of what you are doing and take informed deliberate actions based off your data.

So now that you have all this data gathered, you simply factor in Social Media platforms into your marketing mix and optimize like any other source you are using. Examine your data points and see if creating or engaging in existing conversations about your brand drives more clicks, or even improves your CTR. Learn what types of activity you initiate give you a better conversion rate. Find well performing scenarios and work to scale them up to maximize your potential in those instances.

Compare these efforts to other things like paid search networks, and display placements, and then prioritize your efforts based on what the numbers tell you are the most productive and have the best ROI. You may learn that spending half your day chasing down detractors or answering questions on blogs yields considerably less sales than using that time developing ad campaigns. Or, you may find that your audience converts ten fold when you interact.  the numbers may tell you hiring a staffer full time to man that effort would increase business 20% while raising your overall ROI.

Conclusion

The point is, let the numbers tell their story and be prepared to respond appropriately, even if you don’t like it. Sure, it may be more fun to make a Facebook app than adjust bids in AdWords, but you have a job to do. Always be sure to measure what you market and don’t let the glitz and glam of Social Media turn you into a junkie. Network responsibly!

Terry Howard is the Internet Marketing Strategist for Full Sail University, which offers an Online Bachelors in Internet Marketing and an Online Masters in Internet Marketing.

It is said that with great power comes great responsibility… this is a lie. With great power comes Mark Gormley… and vice versa. Your only responsibility is to hear the words of Mark Gormley… and try not to weep in his presence. It makes him uncomfortable, and we don’t want that.

If you rearrange the letters of Mark Gormley‘s name in alphabetical order, remove all instances of A, E, K, L, M, R and Y… and then add a D to the end, you will see the true face of Mark Gormley. This is no coincidence, it is proven science and algebra (which is Latin for science of letters.)