The Flurry Blog

A few weeks ago I spent time with two thirsty men.  They were passionate about their business, innovative, and already on their way to leading a tribe.  Wake owns an electric bike Shop called The Ebike Store in Portland Oregon and Jason is the Senior Director of Marketing and Communications for the YMCA of Columbia-Willamette. So why do I call them thirsty?  Without pitching my services, they were compelled to ask more about what I do and how I do it.  No matter what service you provide, unless someone needs it, and actually understands they need it, then you really are wasting your time and theirs.

A while back a young ambitious college age painting contractor came by my house and offered his company’s service.  After letting him do his pitch I informed him that I was not interested.  He went on to tell me that my house was in need of a new paint job and it could not wait another year.  What he did not know is that I painted houses and businesses when I was his age and the house at the time in fact had about two years left before it needed painting.  Plus, when I am ready to paint, I will be doing it myself.  His problem was simple, I was neither in need of what he offered nor was he able to convince me otherwise.  I was not thirsty.

Now a better salesman could have convinced me otherwise, but it takes a lot of effort at the risk of an unsatisfied customer and your brand being damaged.  If you spend all your time offering a service they were not really interested in the first place, chances are they will not value it in the long run.

“You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink.”  It seemed like an odd statement to my young ears, until I witnessed it my self.  When I was ten years old it was my chore to get our horses to drink water before our long day on the trail.  We usually had 5 or 6 horses on our extended trips into the Wallowa Mountains, and there was always one stubborn one that would not drink.  As much as I tried I could not put my ten year old weight into dragging him to the stream.  It was futile.

Later in the day though he was the first to put all his energy into making a bee-line to the lake at the end of the day.  He was finally thirsty.  This goes with most businesses I encounter.  They are bombarded daily by salespeople who offer ways for them to make their business more profitable.  Some offer real value and others are just wasting their time with snake oil.  The difference for you comes when you can connect with the ones that are seeking what you offer and see the value in it.  They are the ones that will benefit and in the long run they will also be the first ones that will tell anyone they can about how you helped them.

I have learned this after many attempts to convince those that are just not thirsty.  Keep listening and doing what you do best.  If you truly are doing a remarkable job, the businesses that are a great match for you will be easy to find.

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When I first heard about www.helpareporterout.com or HARO for short, I thought it might be a good service to check out for the brand communities I work with.  What surprised me is what resulted after using it for a week.  I found myself sending multiple story leads to friends in my network. I had signed up to find ways to promote my brands, but more than anything, it has turned out to be a valuable tool for my network.

HARO is a free service that allows reporters to post story requests that then go out to the nearly 135,000 subscribers.  Each day the subscriber receives an email listing all the reporter requests sorted by category. Who would not benefit from direct access to reporters that are asking for either expertise or leads?  I first heard of HARO from its founder and CEO Peter Shankman during his keynote at the Portland Social Fresh Conference.  It was not only after hearing him speak at The Portland Communicators Conference that I decided to sign up myself.

At that keynote, I remember an attendee asking Peter where he finds cool things to share.  This group was mostly made up of late adopters, peppered with some innovative new media users.  I am not sure why Peter didn’t just say, use Haro?  Would it have been self promotion? Probably, but so what, if it is true.  There has not been one day yet that I have not found a perfect fit lead to send on to a friend.  It is too early to tell if any of the leads will result in them being in a news story, but one thing I know for sure is that each person has been very glad I thought of them.

Last year I read Andy Andrews book The Noticer.  In it the name sake of the book goes in and out of peoples lives noticing things, and thus really seeing people.  People react when you notice something about them.  It shows them that you really see them.  Chris Brogan begins his talks with the Zulu greeting, “Sawubona” which means I see you.

Drop HARO in your tools box as a way of helping not only a reporter out, but someone in your network of friends.  It is a great way of saying I see you, I’m in this with you.

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On Friday a group of friends congregated to spend some time in our small downtown. Our mission was simple. We planned to take and upload as many pictures of and about local businesses as we possibly could. What surprised me was the response we received. Many shop employees didn’t know what to do with us. As if working from a script, many of them just looked more worried than anything, having a handful of people wanting to take pictures of their store for free promotion. One store though gave us an incredible experience. Even though they were closing, Brett of City Barber Shop welcomed us in and even agreed to a free youtube video while he gave a mohawk cut. Brett told us about the history of the shop as the clippers hummed and my friend Loyan got his mohawk. The whole group was thrilled as he went on about the shop he loved. We even learned they have a vintage barber chair that once was used on the Vegas Strip. Brett had no script. He readily lapped up the free publicity. It was like watching a skilled improv artist.

Do we have set ideas of how to get our word out? Do we resist new ways because we are afraid of them?

The businesses and connections in my network throughout the country are thrilled if you share their link, take a picture, leave a review (good or bad). They see it as free and sharable promotion. How would you or your employees react if given the same opportunity?

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This post is in response to Seth Godin’s post on calls to action.

Yes “all calls” are annoying, when we can’t filter them out. We live near a car parts lot, and every day they used to make loud announcements from the classic horn. This became intrusive, if you were anywhere outside your house. I have not noticed it for a long time. It may be that I have just filtered it out.

That brings me to why there are still good reasons for some all calls. I have made some great discoveries using the all call on Twitter. It has mainly been when I was trying to wade through a massive google search for either a product or service. I found Drop Box via a friend’s suggestion, a cool BlackBerry tool from @nanpalmero (he is especially helpful), and many other solutions by just asking simple questions of my community. Now mind you, I try my best to search out my answer first by asking a specific expert or I use the search tools at hand. But I don’t hesitate to ask my community if my quest is not fruitful. Is that wrong? I don’t believe so. Have I annoyed anyone? I hope not.

My key point is that the all call is useful, if you have exhausted all other means or time is critical. Example: (tsunami approaching Maui and my nephew and his wife were only able to receive text messages. They received news, after I sent out an all call via Twitter. They were sitting at an evacuation center waiting to hear if their house on the beach had been destroyed or not).

Would I not follow you if you constantly sent out annoying all calls that could have been answered with simple detective work? Yes, but I have seen the occasional all call stimulate discussion and problem solving when used well from Twitter, facebook and other community sites.

There are several types of all calls that feel negative: email spam, mindless cc’s (people have learned to not send them to me), facebook’s insistence on sending email to notify us of every follow up comment in a thread. But besides these, all calls work. If you have social capital with your network they can be a great resource. I enjoy helping others out when they ask something I know. We build community to be a community.

Regarding social capital, here is a great post by Mitch Joel.

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Something has changed profoundly in my reading habits.  I am beginning to choose books and the authors that write them for a whole new reason. I look for authors who engage in conversation with their readers.  A few years ago authors never would have dreamed of interacting with readers outside of book tours, signings and readings.  Now authors and readers are communicating via many formats.  Personally, when I choose my next read I look online to see if the author is connected.  Are they engaged in conversation already?

So would Hemingway have been willing to communicate with his readers?  I hope so.  With the way publishing is going today, authors need to engage and build communities involving their readers.  (For more information on getting published today see my friend Jon’s blog post)  They win both financially and relationally.

Here is a short list of authors and organizations that are doing this well and willing to risk engagement.  Their risk is paying off.

Mary Russell (The Bee Keepers Apprentice), Tony Hsieh, Seth Godin, Steve Garfield, Gary Vaynerchuk, Chris Brogan, Andy Andrews, Dr. Tim Erwin, Ransomed Heart, Dr. Emerson Eggerich, Jane Kirkpatrick, Rick Warren

To find your own authors, search Facebook for their name or title. On twitter search for the book name or author. Many readers create a search term if the author has not (you can do this by simply posting on twitter about your book with a #hashtag in front of the term).

Please list add any you have found engaging.

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What goes through a marketer’s mind that makes them hire a booth babe? I can just imagine.  “Our product is a bit boring so let’s throw some sex at them.”  In the long run it does not pay off.  It is a leftover from traditional advertising.  It cracks me up to see men talking to scantily clad beauties as if the girl was an expert on the product.  Yeah, the customer will remember you but probably not what you were selling.

Here is an idea. Instead tell me a story, engage me in conversation, build a relationship with me.  Most of all let me use your product.  That is how you will make a lasting impression.  Your goal is to gain and hold the attention of your followers, not for two seconds via human billboards.

*Image in gallery above used under creative commons license : flickr user nDevilTV

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The kindness of strangers by Ed Yourdon used under creative commons license from flickr

I could go in so many directions with this topic.  This last part was the hardest for me to write. We have covered shutting up and focusing, but being a good listener eventually boils down to action.  Action indicates to the other person that you have actually heard them.  However, sometimes the best action is to do nothing.

So you have actually heard what the other person has said.  Now it is your turn.  Most likely they will give you a chance to act.  The action required of you depends on the conversation.  Did they ask your advice? Did someone post a blog and end with a question?  They are prompting you for a response, so turn up the value meter and act.  We all have something to say, but is it of any use?

I asked one of my best friends and mentors, Rick Herbert to chime in on the topic and he nailed it.  Here is what he had to say:

So Action – To Act or not to Act, may be trite but true… does this conversation provoke or require more than words? Is there something I need to do, for this person with whom I have been listening? After hearing their point of view, their concerns, their information, what do I need to do? Purposeful action is determined in the context of the conversation.

Converstaion – convesari is the Latin root.  It means “to live with,” “to keep company with,” “to dwell upon,” “to move to and fro,” and “to turn oneself about.”

Since Conversing is much more than words, we must listen to one’s life and internal movements in order to engage in their lives… we determine our purposeful response based partly on their life and words and partly on what we choose to say, to do or even merely to be in the context of that information.

I have been moved to tears because of conversation.  I have been moved to acts of charity or compassion due to conversation.  I have chosen to become a different person based on what I’ve seen and heard in others.

Purposeful action – always! Regardless of my awareness of reasoning, there is always some compulsion…

Wow, I could not have said it better.  Thanks Rick.  So there you have it. Act.

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Be yourself, be remarkable, be unique. This past week I had the chance to meet a few people from Keen Footwear. Keen’s CEO gave the keynote at the Willamette Innovators Night (WIN) 2009 and did a great skit.  The main point of James Curleigh’s skit was to be an innovator…not an imitator.  I was first introduced to the company by a friend who had a great customer service experience. I am now a big believer in Keen and a recent convert after finding their shoes were the only ones that did not give me pain while I am recovering from foot surgery.  To say the least, they have left an impression on me.  When I came home that night from WIN 09, I posted a few things online about my experience. As I usually do, I look for  a company’s or individual’s twitter account to either engage them in conversation or reference to them in a post on twitter.  It took a bit of digging to find Keen on twitter since there was no link on their home page or blog.  This surprised me at first but, then again, Keen does not do things like anyone else.  I finally did find Keen.  They had one post and a little over 200 followers*.  Their single post is a request for feedback, a great start; “heard a lot about this twitter phenomena – want to know what the “tweeple” want us to tweet. Ideas and suggestions are very welcome”.  In true form they are asking their followers what to do next. So here is my suggestion. Don’t copy anyone.  I hear this all the time “I am on twitter now what”?  I tell people, “be yourself”. I love the movie Hitch. In it Will Smith plays a relationship/dating coach. He guides men through the dangerous world of relationships with women.  His tried and true method has been to drive out the individual and get them to conform to a few key principle that will land them the girl. Like any good PR pro, he teaches them to pose. What he eventually realizes is that true happiness comes when a woman falls in love with a man for who he really is (if he is genuine, kind and honest).  The same works for businesses and personal brands.  Be who you are and no one else (even if it is a bit ugly at times).  Anything else is posing.  A company like Keen has an amazing product to stand on (pun intended) and a great following to go with it.  All they really need to do is find that tribe and join in on the conversation that is already happening.  And like anyone, they are finding ways to reach out to their community with true innovation.

Don’t be mistaken.  While Keen has obvious fans, so do you. I just saw someone comment tonight on Facebook that they have no fans.  I beg to differ.  It might take some digging (not much on Keen’s part) but everyone, if they have a web presence, has some following . When it comes to finding great followers, you are your best researcher .  The ones that will shout the loudest will say the most via the web. We have the greatest search engines at our fingertips.  I look forward to Keen’s next move.

*Looking further I found Keen’s active twitter account @Keen_Shoes via Keen founder @MartinKeen

And a quick side note to Keen – don’t be like everyone else and hire a marketer with 10 years of traditional marketing experience…which would likely result in you doing exactly what everyone else is doing.  Invest in someone that will encourage and guide you in just being you (even if that results in still doing the “Q-tip”), help build on your incredible community, and encourages you to invest in continuing the tradition of developing remarkably innovative products.

Want to know more?

Seth Godin’s Tribes and Purple Cow
Using a social media framework to grow your tribe
Go watch Hitch

*Looking further I found  Keen’s active twitter account @Keen_Shoes via Keen founder @MartinKeen

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I found this video via @jdale and @tshuttleworth and I had to share it with you.  I have had several people this week ask me if Social Media is a fad.  Well my simple answer is no.  In fact I agree with the statement in the video that “it is the biggest shift since the Industrial Revolution”.  It is changing our habits, how we digest media, how we connect and engage with people and our description of community.  Socialnomics09 did a great job pulling together my favorite quotes and statistics. Enjoy. I would love to hear your comments.

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The world is beginning to fill with self proclaimed social media experts and Trust Agents (even though Chris Brogan and Julien Smith warn against calling yourself such things).  These people can not possibly be experts.  We are all learning in this space. Yes, some have a true uncanny ability to connect and build communities.

An expert though, by definition, is someone who knows everything about a subject.  Social Media is such a new frontier that there really is no way that someone could honestly claim to fully understand it.  It is constantly changing, and rules of the game are continually being remade and broken.

Like climbing guides, a good consultant is someone who has survived a few impressive journeys and now wants to offer help to others.  And like a guide, they usually fail when they become too cocky.  When I was growing up, my dad would tell me stories of pilots who died because they were too confident.  The good ones are always learning, always correcting and experimenting.

Recently I was watching an episode of Globe Trekker.  Adventure diva Holly Morris had chosen to attempt a personal life goal of climbing the Matterhorn. She could have tried the climb alone with some chance of success.  She chose wisely though to use a trusted Mt. Guide, Ricky Andenmatten.  Her guide is what caught my attention.  He was humble, kind, and most of all knowledgeable.  He also offered a sense of safety and confidence to his client.

Guides are simply people who have gone before us.  They come back from the journey and offer us the chance to succeed where we might have failed. They also offer tips for avoiding some of the least obvious pitfalls, as well as nuggets we might miss if trekking through the web on our own.

Guides can range from seasoned veterans to those just starting out.  Right now we have a new frontier still being explored.  Some of us have been to the far reaches and are now offering our help to others. Others are just starting out.  If you have survived, offer what you found, but please leave the expert out of your title.  Let others call you an expert, trust agent, or guru.

*Matterhorn image used under the flckr creative commons nordique

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