The Monster Must Be Fed!

Here is a free pdf with a satirical description of some popular social networking sites and how to deal with them. Feel free to download it and pass it around if you feel it has value to others.

TheMonsterMustBeFed

*clicking link will automatically begin download.

In my latest blog series I’ve been asking people I follow on Twitter or their blogs to guest write a blog for mine on certain given subjects. I asked Bruce DeBoer of www.DeBoerWorks.com and my favorite www.permissiontosuck.net to write on the subject of “Anything worth doing is worth doing badly” and I let him have free reign on how to fill in the subject matter. Bruce was kind enough to say yes and to write on the subject below:

Humility is the Quiet Skill of Creativity
“When weaving a blanket, an Indian woman leaves a flaw in the weaving of that blanket to let the soul out.” – Martha Graham - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martha_Graham

Reading words were once hieroglyphics. With talking, early on I was incomprehensible. With walking, ask a stroke victim how hard it is to relearn those first steps. Apparently we’re not afraid to be terrible when desire is high or fear is low. Conceivably, groundwork might be easier without speech so we couldn’t talk ourselves out of trying.

Enjoy your badness because once you’re accomplished there will be times where you think you were once better than you are. Backsliding is much less fun than improvement; there is fulfillment in working your way up from the mail room of creative talent.

If being an expert at anything means you abandoned your need for approval then it has real value. Unfortunately, revered talent has much more to lose than those rewarded for trying. There is something to be said for that grammar school soccer ribbon given for hard work – win or lose. All we have to do is try hard to win – you’ve already won. Life is that way – most success is just being there; so be there. Finding humility is the quiet skill of creativity. The justly successful are high achievers in creative humility. It’s why the most talented genuinely rebuff compliments, it keeps expectations low, both internal and external. “No really, I suck – don’t expect me to do this again anytime soon.” – is what the artist is thinking.

“The common idea that success spoils people by making them vain, egotistic, and self-complacent is erroneous; on the contrary it makes them, for the most part, humble, tolerant, and kind. Failure makes people bitter and cruel.” – W. Somerset Maugham

Accordingly, I believe sustained creative failure to be a refusal to accept humility, and an error isn’t failure unless you give up the fight. Authentic creatives have a passion for doing; they can’t not-do, and the results are secondary to the act, but no less important than their original idea. Sooner or later, humility provides freedom to fail.

If something is worth the effort, the rightly talented risks embarrassment. Only the arrogant and conceited perform solely what they look good doing. Humility shrinks our need for approval.
I don’t know about you, but I’m going to wait to begin painting until I’m an expert. How absurd. “If a thing is worth doing at all, it is worth doing badly.” – Gustav Holst - http://www.gustavholst.info/

You can follow Bruce at these sites:

www.permissiontosuck.net

www.DeBoerWorks.com

Twitter: @http://twitter.com/brucedeboer

For all those wonderful “social media experts” out there, Scott Stratten has a message for you about facebook. I loved it so much I’m posting it here, making it officially ripped off.

I most definitely feel Scott’s pain with app invites, farmville, mafia wars, notices to attend a local event in a country I don’t even live in…. Anyway on to the next Un-Amercian Idol

Today’s guest blog on creativity comes from @Mike Brown who is a very brilliant mind. I invited Mike to tackle the subject of having everything open for discussion during a brainstorming session, but how to deal with what “everything” means. See his wisdom below:

You’re probably very familiar with standard brainstorming admonitions such as any topic being okay for discussion and “no idea is a bad idea.”

But what’s your attitude toward these concepts outside a creative session? Specifically, if you want to foster a more creative workplace, are you willing to extend them into day-to-day work life?

Learning and experience has shaped my belief you’ll have a stronger, more creative team and organization if you are willing to consider observations on unexpected or potentially unwelcome topics pretty much any time. Doing so has provided many valuable, unanticipated insights into how people are thinking and reacting.

This openness isn’t without challenges though, particularly with people whose personal agendas get in the way. Here’s how as a leader to manage three less productive open discussions you may encounter:

When Something Doesn’t Matter – The standard I use for strategic discussion is focusing on “things that matter,” i.e., they create real results. In business though, much time gets spent discussing topics which ultimately have little material impact on real world outcomes. This can happen when someone fixates on a topic important to them, but of little relevance in the bigger scheme of things. Protracted discussion distracts from what really needs attention, leading to wasted energy and slowed progress.

How to handle these situations? Scuttling discussion on marginal subjects every time they’re raised signals the expectation you’ll only focus on things that matter. But doing this risks individuals shutting down on more important topics too. As a leader, it’s important to give in and discuss some of these issues, especially if valuable team members are raising them. You’ll more than make up for what seems like wasted time by cultivating a more engaged team.

Tackling Things That Matter a Lot – Maybe it’s a strategic decision, a company’s values, or a moral or ethical principle. Whatever the case, when a topic matters a lot, determining how open it should be for discussion is challenging. Typically, a decision has already been made or a very visible position taken suggesting those in charge aren’t open to further discussion or debate. Yet these very topics, when left untouched for extended periods, can result in blind spots. They may prove to be organizationally crippling long-term; in the near-term, ignoring the discussion can off-putting to team members who have legitimate, sincere, albeit conflicting points of view.

How to handle these situations? One way to allow conversation on seemingly unchangeable topics is through defined periods where they are open for discussion. This could be in conjunction with annual planning (with consideration of a company’s values, vision, or strategic foundations) or during a specific forum (i.e., a special meeting or conference) where discussion is entertained and deliverables expected. By opening windows for conversation on these topics, you’ll benefit from new and potentially impactful insights without wasting discussion time when there’s no realistic consideration of change.

Dealing with a Biased Point of View – I’ve dealt with a variety of co-workers so convinced of their own correctness that discussions on sensitive topics quickly become unproductive. They expect their desired resolution and every statement is geared toward force fitting a personal viewpoint without considering others might have legitimate perspectives.

How to handle these situations? There’s a maxim in courts of equity that “one who comes into equity must come with clean hands.” In short, it means if you’re asking for aid from another’s wrongs, you must not have committed a wrong yourself. I’ve adapted this concept as a guide for determining how open I’ll be to listening to someone who appears biased or dug in on a particular point of view. A person has to enter a conversation honestly – intellectually and ethically –with an openness to consider alternative positions. If someone expects an issue to be discussed yet is unwilling to consider alternatives or rethink a personal position, the privilege of having a topic re-considered isn’t earned. Set the stage by sharing ground rules upfront, making it clear an open conversation, or none at all, will take place.

So what do you think? If you’ve been using an “open discussion” policy, how are you managing them productively? And if you haven’t followed this approach, are you willing to give it a try and reap the creative benefits? - Mike Brown

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Mike Brown is an award-winning marketer and strategist with extensive experience in research, strategy, branding, sponsorship marketing, and social media. He’s a frequent keynote presenter on innovation and is a Strategic Innovation Catalyst at Brainzooming™.

I thought this song from Phineas and Ferb’s Christmas Special was rather funny and thought provoking on a few levels. Take a listen, and after you can’t get it out of your head, the lyrics are below the video.

*Side note: if Phineas and Ferb are supposed to be on ‘permanent summer vacation’ then why do they have a “Christmas” special?? …just a thought.

You see Valentine’s is torture, and my Birthday is a mess
New Year’s is a lot of noise, and Arbor Day’s a pest!
Halloween’s a horror but I guess I must confess
That I really don’t hate Christmas!

You see Flag Day is infernal, April Fool’s is just a bore
Mardi Gras is a waste, unless you own a candy store
All these other holidays I can admit that I abhor
But I really don’t hate Christmas.

Now it isn’t that I like it, at the most I feel ambivalence
But should I really just destroy it? I’ll admit that I’m still on the fence,
It makes me tense!

From the evil scientists’ community I’m sure to get ejected
But for Christmas I can’t seem to summon any true invective
Because what is there to hate? I mean it’s really so subjective
No, I really don’t hate Christmas.

I hate puppy dogs and kittens, I hate flowers in the spring
Heck, I even hate the sunshine and the birdies when they sing
I can work up animosity for almost anything
Tell me why I don’t hate Christmas.

Though my childhood was atrocious, Christmas never was that bad, you see
So the most that I can muster is complete and total apathy
What’s wrong with me?

How can I prove that I’m an evil villain worth his salt
When with a holiday so jolly I can’t even find a fault
If I didn’t feel ambiguous I’d launch a big assault.
But I really don’t hate Christmas

Oh, what the heck. Kickline!

No I really…
No I really don’t hate Christmas!

I have an intense BURNING indifference!

So I had a thought, “I wonder what type of creative or funny Twitter List names people have come up with for some of the famous people on Twitter?” And I did some checking. I looked up www.wefollow.com to see types of people on Twitter and the most popular tags for types of people. Then I did some digging. Lots of digging. After almost a thousand page views of “listed” lists for these famous people I had to stop. But I did notice one thing on the political celebrities. It seems that Republican followers follow Democrats but Democratic followers don’t seem to follow Republican. The way I noticed it is by the list names from people. The Republican celebrities didn’t have any outstanding list names. They were all “republican” or “politics” or bland. But the Republican bent people had names for the Dem’ people they were following. You’ll note President Obama had quite a few funny or creative list names.

I also noticed that the more polarizing of a celebrity you were the harsher the list name was. Note Perez Hilton’s list names. I chose not to post some that were very harsh or quite vile.

I’m still compiling list names but for now here’s what I found. Some are funny, weird, mean, and well some I just didn’t understand:

Rev Run

@trevord209/lots-of-updates

@KimmieTex/brain-food

@pancakes4life/hollyho-s

Ellen DeGeneres

@ElleHadley/amazing-land-mammals

@daylenickee/i-be-creepin

@juancpgo/dicas

@chalitkid/just-trying-something-new

@bibiliybob/celebrities-or-santa

@netpup/misc-dribble

@Sk8eR_GiRL4ever/will-never-follow-back

Ashton Kutcher

@Cashblessings/network-markerters

@Satayar/hahalol

@psycrystal/design-resources

@bevolk/queenbees

@MPCheesecake/would-like-dinner-with

@WeblogofWeeds/passesthetime

@jorgedemelo/outofbrazil

@TulipFlower1/tulip

Perez Hilton

@HULAgate/unemployable

@celeb/gadfly

@CALLINGuOUT/fabricators

@OfficialMsBling/ugly-ones

@indehed/hollywood-post-a-lots

@misterdisco/horrible-people

@marconibeam/matteroflifeanddeath

Barrak Obama (note he is listed on over over 22,000 lists. I gave up looking after 500 pages)

@YWCAChicagoCEO/wonks-and-pols

@inbtwnrthedoors/people-i-don-t-know

@alissbiss/chessey-people

@boriiss/spy

@EffingTobster/naked-and-famous

@dubiouslygreat/you-may-have-heard-of

@razamabrar/ho

@Aritra_sen/anime

@innocentwood98/these-idiots-r-mah-lyf

@DolpheenaIDF/antisemitesnazisypathizer

@soulslikestars/fancy-pants

@joemsie/deaf-blind

@endlessummertan/tanning-specials

@Caitlinwoods/mypuddings

@StrickFit/odd-men-out

@tracd12/crazy-people

@junebuggy61698/gummie-bear

@QPRISEllc/dogs

@SaveTheBluefin/savethebluefintuna

Fireproof is bulletproof. Men, read this book.

I’m not the kind of reviewer who tells you the whole story in a book review. For me that’s like telling a potential reader they don’t need to read it. What I will tell you is that the novelization of Fireproof by Eric Wilson is well worth the read. I’m sure many women will buy the book just based on the marriage issue that the story is based on. But I’d like to tell all the men out there that this book is a great read. Its a book that even the toughest guy can read and not feel like he’s reading a mushy romance novel being marketed as a man’s book. Fireproof the book will keep men interested and page turning till the end. Its part action adventure and all the “hero” dreams men have of wanting to do something great, part love story and part “how to deal.” Men you won’t be disappointed and I can almost guarantee you’ll learn a lot about life without having to feel less of a man.

Fireproof

More details on the story here

As many of you know I market my book primarily through social networking. As each site is different in focus I also use different strategies and tactics according to how the audience allows marketing messages. I’ve also commented in my “The Monster Must Be Fed” downloadable pdf I posted here a while back that some of these social networking sites (”monsters”) will likely change just as soon as you get a handle on how they work best. So I’ve changed how I deal with Twitter.

Here’s what I’ve done. A while back I read a blog post by Dave at Area224 on Five Signs You’ve Got the Wrong Social Media Marketing Consultant. In his list #2 struck me a bit, he says of Celebrity and Social Media Marketing experts “[if you are a celebrity] …you are allowed to follow less than 200 people and be followed by more than 59,000 people. [and also if you] are a best-selling author and are not trying to sell your SMM Consulting services. Otherwise, your potential SMM Consultant must follow people back [to gain followers].” I’m borderline celebrity myself. I’d probably be a few letters below Cathy Griffith’s “My Life on the D-list” but I’ll take what fame I have. I can offer plenty of examples of either media coverage or Google rankings but what got me to thinking was the follow for follow idea. I disliked the idea from the start, but in order to play the game, you have to be in the game. I hated having to filter out and hunt for people I was interested in.

So one might think there’s a lot of programs that will filter out for me the people I want to read. The problem was that when I used them I was no longer on Twitter, I was on a third party application. Which means I don’t see the things Twitter wants me to see, many of which I need to know and want to know about. The other thing is that this third party software was a massive drain on my computer. It slowed my computer down by 15% when having it on and ever since I installed it I noticed a dramatic slow down of my browser even when the app was not active. And lastly this third party app creates more garbage to sort through, meaning each time I follow someone back I then have to either put them immediately into a category that I want to follow and then take them out of that focused category if I do not find them interesting. So one way or another I am handling my “follows” too much. And I have to receive a lot of garbage followers in order to show how popular I am.

These garbage followers are magazines, multilevel marketers, affiliate marketers, porn, Bible verse of the day, motivational quotes, real estate postings, the list goes on ad nauseum. As a marketer I love to spin things into my favor or to lead you to believe in a product and to ignore the downside of a product. And this is where I get into trouble with my advertising and marketing kin… eventually “your sin will find you.” Meaning that the spin will collapse on you, while it is great to promote a bunch of hype, jokes in commercials, and “cool ideas,” eventually you have to have a real dollar base in order to stay in business. For instance I can spin that I have over 4,000 followers on Twitter when I have a potential speaking engagement offer. But of those 4,000 followers you can bet that at least half of them are an automated twitbot and that no human is actually reading my posts. Another good chunk of those are also following a few thousand people too and one or two of my posts will not be more than a blip in their Tweet Stream. It is likely that only 300 people will see my post about the engagement posted on Twitter.

300 solid people is still a good number, but the odds of those 300 people attending the event is slim. Even some of these high profile celebrity expert posters will not likely fill a conference with their followers alone. I’ll take a stab in the dark and suggest that for every 10,000 followers only 20 to 30 will show up at a major event because of them directly following the celebrity expert tweeter.

SIDE NOTE: Something I did for fun and to prove a point was I created an account called @5minuteGenius The idea was to create an automated account to hit back at some of these “followers” of mine that I thought were garbage followers. With this auto account I posted one post that gave a link to my book on Amazon, then I went to a third party online software system and opened an account. I set the account to automatically follow the people that followed the account and set it up so that when the account gets a direct message it would automatically send a direct message back that said something like “thanks for the DM, I’ll return the favor and let you know about my book.” Then I went back to the automated Twitter account and followed some of the garbage accounts I knew about. I followed about 40 MLM and Affiliate Marketers and then let the system take over. In about a month the account was mentioned by two of the followers without any type of interaction by me. I find it amusing as well that now the account follows over 300 people and has 260 followers. And it has over 130 direct messages to it from “followers.” I’m sure these numbers would increase if I had targeted some other groups of people too. But I don’t need my book to be associated with spam, which I’m sure the account will eventually become if I don’t turn it off soon.

So back to changing my Twitter account and why I think the whole follow for follow system will collapse. As I followed more people I noticed I had less motivation to interact with people. I wasn’t interested in their posts, I really didn’t know who they were or if they even responded to people who responded to them. I also found myself dreading getting on the site because now I had to hunt for people to interact with and found myself looking only to see if people mentioned me in a post. If not I got off the site quickly.

Again, back to Area224’s post. I let it sink in for a while and decided my Twittering needed to change. I was missing opportunities to interact with my fan base, people of interest and media opportunities. Here’s what I’ve done:

1) I immediately quit following people who started following me. Unless of course it was someone that I had interest in.

2) Each time I got on Twitter if someone’s post was not related to any of my interests I unfollowed them. At first this scared me because I know that some people use software that unfollows anyone that unfollows you. But then it hit me, it doesn’t matter. If the only reason they follow me is because I followed them, then they really weren’t fans or friends in the first place, meaning they are not in the market. Having a smaller but solid follower base is better than a lot of “air” to spin to clients that can’t be backed up when the dollars want a reckoning for the effort.

3) I unfollowed posters that did only “push” posts. A push poster is someone who does not interact with their audience but simply posts things about their company, product, quotes, sayings, links, news retweets, etc. I checked each one I saw, if they only pushed, I unfollowed. If they interacted and I might have interest in what they post then I kept following them. Although some eventually are getting unfollowed based on the shear volume that following 4,000 people still has.

4) I decided it is okay if people do not follow me back. Sometimes people are following you just so you will follow them back. They don’t have interest in you or what you have to say. I had to decide that not following someone is okay. If I follow someone I no longer am concerned if they follow me back. I also will not be checking to see if they follow me or unfollow me. What is becoming more important is that I like what someone posts.

5) It still is not enough. There was still too much clutter. I used to use a software program called Karma so that I can unfollow those people who unfollowed me. The idea was good enough, but now that I am no longer concerned about that I use Karma for another reason. Karma has a great interface that puts all my followers on one page instead of like Twitter, where I have to page through a few hundred pages to see who I follow. With Karma all the faces and links being on one page I went through and found all the names that said anything like MoneyMaker2000, AffiliateFreak, BibleVerseToday, SexyJen, JimFollowMeSmith and the like. Then I told Karma to bulk unfollow these people. While I still have some filtering to do, afterall going through 4,000 names you are bound to miss some, you would not believe how much more I get out of Twitter now. I can see the people I want to follow without a third party app. I can respond faster to media requests. And best of all I am no longer tied to the burden of the popular “YOU MUST FOLLOW BACK.”

6) Its still a process. Some people I’ve continued to follow even though I don’t have interest in what they post. But since they interact with me, I’m fine with that, for now anyway. I think eventually my follow list will dwindle down to under a thousand. What that will do for my follow numbers is anyone’s guess. Even if it gets down to a few hundred people who follow me, I know they are likely following me because they have interest in me. And as a marketer, interest in my product is better than boring a market that has no interest.

7) After I get more of the spammers, autotweeters, mlm, and other garbage posters off my list I’ll be following these rules for me to follow you: A) Your account can be beneficial to my business and book. B) Your posts are interesting to me.

And here are my rules to unfollow you: C) If you post multiple posts (more than five) in under one minute, you will be unfollowed. Not even Peter Shankman who makes his living from posting journalist requests all day can get away with that. D) You do nothing but Push posting. Even if you are not peddling a product you will be unfollowed.

I repeat. It is ok if you do not follow me back. And don’t be offended if I do not follow you back. Its going to be all right.

The whole follow for follow concept is a flawed idea. It is essentially building a house of cards. When the market realizes that inflated numbers don’t translate to dollar sales, the market will turn against you. You will be considered “all hat and no cattle.” Even if you are using social networks to simply interact with people you cannot maintain good interaction with thousands of followers by yourself. You will have to unfollow the bulk of who you follow back. You don’t have thousands of friends in real life do you? The rules of real life will eventually kick in on these social networking sites. You’ll even unfollow people you do like.

Companies will demand hard data on your follower list. Do they actually buy your product or service? How many will actually show up if we announce an event? Basic business practices will overcome the joy of high followership.

The so called “influencer” will have to actually influence. And the reality of those numbers that are influenced will shock you.