Source: SXC

I received a pitch from a personal email address at yahoo.com from Kat. Kat had found my SA Busy Kids blog, and she said she liked it. She also “found” some great information about a local franchise that was offering free kids meals and thought I might want the info for my site. She threw in a little blurb from the press release just to help me with the official language.

It took me about five seconds to do a quick Google search to find out that Kat is the official spokesperson for this restaurant and works for its PR firm. Now why didn’t she just tell me that? And why didn’t she just use her business email address? Why did she feel the need to cloak her words as if she was a casual visitor to my site just trying to be helpful? Frankly, if she had just been honest and let me know was trying to get some press for her client…I actually might have lent an ear.

Better yet, if she had come at me with an outreached hand and tried to develop a relationship with me first…”Say, Debi, have you ever tried our restaurant? It’s great. Can we entice you to stop by? Bring your kids because they get a free kids meal … etc. etc. We know you write about camps and we’d love to send you some of our recipes that are easily created around a campfire…” or something along those lines. Wow…that would have gotten my attention.

I kind of wonder if Kat really read my blog. Sorry, Kat. Maybe next time, try a little more transparency. Try to be a little more genuine. You might get lucky. At least you’ll stand a fighting chance.

This story in the Wall Street Journal says it’s because I think I’m too important. Well, since I’m a one-man shop, doesn’t it sort of follow that if I’m not around work won’t get done?

Not necessarily true: an epiphany, thanks to San Antonio organizer Shana Prichard of realign, inc. Shana offered to come into my home office and get me ready for vacation. I was a bit skeptical, but she managed to turn me around.

She and her cohort Donna (yes, it took two of them to tackle me) started by reorganizing my de facto office downstairs. That meant emptying out my buffet of stored dishes and filling it with used-daily office supplies like my printer, laptop and files. It also included a to-be-filed box that Shana said I’d better clear out once a week…or else.

We weren’t quite sure how my better half would react to my moving things around, but he took it all in good humor. Especially since the paperwork and hardware are out of sight and no longer cluttering the kitchen table or the floor around the kitchen table.

I feel better already. I remember my husband once telling me that his internal world is more ordered when his external world is in order. I see now what he means.  For Shana, that means taking the processes for organization that are in your head and making them work in the physical world.

Shana also helped me organize a chain of command for handling incoming client calls and emails. She also emphasized the importance of actually letting my clients know I’ll be out of communication *entirely* for the duration of my vacation. Now, while that’s kind of a scary thought, the escalation flow chart we put together makes me feel a little more comfortable.

In other words…if you are one of my clients and you are reading this…no worries. Shana has me all prepared to handle whatever comes your way during my brief – but necessary – absence.  And I’ll come back all relaxed…brain cleared…and ready to get down to work.

Oh, and for the record. Check out this pic.

Yes. It’s my email inbox. Cleared out. Emails caught up on, answered and filed away.

I feel like doing a Snoopy dance.

special events checklist

budget worksheet

timeline for volunteers

resources

You may notice one critical piece missing – the processing of incoming funds. That’s intentional. Each organization has it’s own unique bookkeeping system. I’ll leave you to fill in the blanks for that.

Missing something? Just let me know what you are looking for!

And I always ask the same question. If you were going to build a house, would you go buy a bunch of wood and nails and start banging them together? Probably not. You would start by thinking about what kind of house you want. You’d likely look around at other houses and pictures in magazines to see what features and styles most appeal to you. You might talk to some friends, an architect, a builder. Finally, you’d draw up a plan. A blueprint to guide your building.

In all likelihood, that’s probably how you built a successful business.

So why, when somebody mentions social media, does all that wisdom fly out the window? We grab our hammer, wood and nails and jump into the social media pool with both feet. And then we wonder why it’s not working.

Ironically, that’s not what most clients want to hear. They want to hear, “Sure. We can do that.” Worse yet, they hear they can’t wait another minute from people who a) have had success in personal branding in the social media environment and are convinced it’s a panacea for all business or b) are technical experts who are great at execution but come up a little short on strategy.

From my perspective, the first questions that must be asked are: Where are my customers? Where are there conversations happening about me? What are my goals in engaging with my customers?

From this foundation, you can begin to develop a strategy in the environments where it most makes sense.

If your market is converging at networking meetings, then that’s where you need to be. If you don’t want to engage (which I don’t ever recommend), you need to be in a one-way push medium like newspapers. If your buyers are heavily involved in charitable organizations, you should be involved in those communities. And, by all means, if they are talking on Facebook, then join in the conversation.

Meet your market where they are. And, please, lay that hammer down until you know what you are going to do with it.

One such recent campaign is the Choose You Campaign by the American Cancer Society. It combines social networks, blogging and fundraising all within a platform designed to encourage health. I’m loving it. If you haven’t signed up yet, you should!

In San Antonio, we’ve hosted an Action Camp specifically for nonprofits who want to be more involved in mindful communications through social media. Rackspace recently held a nonprofit summit. We’re following both of those up with what we hope will be a growing community of charities interested in using social networks for the greater good.

Our first event, SMOOCH Coffee Hour, will be held June 2. You can get all the details and register by clicking here to go to our wordpress blog.

If you are involved with a nonprofit, we hope you’ll join us!

Click here for the prezi: It’s About the Relationship

Yesterday, I had a client tell me to call the hotel where its speaker had been staying, ask them to check the refrigerator for some items he had left behind in the refrigerator and retrieve it for him. Oh, that would have been easy enough if it had been a special drink or even medicine. But no. In this case, it was a cauliflower with rubber eyeballs.

Oh, yeah. This is definitely a glamorous job.

How about you leave me a comment with your most interesting PR assignment. Can’t wait to find somebody with a story that beats rubber eyeballs.

It’s an interesting piece on malleable social graphs, and he certainly makes some good points. I love trying out new social networks like Whrrl, Foodspotting and Miso. I get great ideas about where to go and what to do from people who like the same things I do. It makes sense – birds of a feather and all that.

However, take this to its logical conclusion and I begin to have concerns. Scoble writes “I told Facebook that I’m a liberal Democrat. So why am I still seeing Republican crap in my news feed?” He goes on, “so, its newsfeed is still presenting information to me that I might not care about and, in some cases, might make me angry.”

And here is where I stumble. Are we creating a society that can no longer tolerate differing opinions? By being able to pull only that information with which we agree, are we becoming one-sided, shallow individuals?

Scoble goes so far as to define “REAL friends.” Caps all his. “You know, the ones that are like you.” Yikes. Why would I want to surround myself only with friends who are like me? Doesn’t my life become richer for knowing and enjoying people who aren’t like me? I may not agree with someone, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t be his friend. More likely – I should listen even more closely. I might (gasp) learn something.

I want my kids to grow up in a world where they not only welcome differing opinions, but seek them out. And yet, we seem to be going in the opposite direction. Don’t like someone’s opinions? Just block them. Looking for validation of your own viewpoint? Google it. Want to know what shoes to buy? Instead of doing your own research into quality, just check out to see what your networks are doing and follow along.  Trust someone else’s opinion. It’s okay. They are just like you, so they are probably right.

Yikes.

Has critical thinking become a thing of the past? That scares me. How about you?

Why Talk is Really Cheap by Mark Earls: Truth is…I like just about anything related to science, including this article on why word of mouth may be really over-rated. And it may offer some insights into this post on why twitter is making us lazy by my friend Kami Watson Huyse.

Kami follows up with her thoughts on how to move buzz into action in this post on what she’s coined as relationship chaining.

Social Media is the Last Mile by Josh Hallett: This is an interesting look at social media from an internal perspective.

And that’s what I’m reading this week. How about you?

So it’s no surprise that the one thing about social media that really makes me crazy is to see companies leap into the network, develop relationships around a product or cause, only to abandon the outreach when they realize they (a) just don’t get it or (b) don’t have the time for it.

I’ve got news for you. You don’t have to be on Twitter. You don’t even have to be on Facebook.

If you feel the need to be present because that’s where your customers are living, working and talking about you, then do your legwork first.

Listen. Find some people you admire and who seem to “get it.” Follow them and see how they do it. Determine if you have something useful (and I emphasize the word useful) to contribute to the conversation. Think long and hard about the time, energy and effort you are willing to put into this venture. Focus on long-term. Will you be able to keep it up for six months, a year, three years, ten years – even as it changes and evolves? Are you willing to commit to staying up with an ever-changing, ever-evolving, albeit extremely exciting environment? Will you work it into your overall business strategy across platforms?

You wouldn’t go find a customer, befriend him for a few exciting weeks and then abandon him in person. Don’t do it online.