Social Media – Guinness Atticus

April 23, 2011April 23, 2011

Ignite Detroit 2

The much anticipated Ignite Detroit 2 took place the evening of Thursday, April 14 at the Sound Board in the Motor City Casino and Hotel. The air was buzzing with energy, anticipation and the chatter of networking and of online friends meeting in real life.

The event is based on a popular arts movement called Pecha Kucha, where artists, entertainers and designers are given 20 minutes to make a presentation of 20 slides that are set to automatically advance. Ignite’s pared that set-up down to only 5 minutes per presentation, but still with 20 slides automatically advancing. Ignite is geared towards the tech community and the area where it’s held. Detroit’s second annual event hosted 15 speakers ranging from professional business tips to a sexual healer.

The evening started with Mike McClure, Vice President and Creative Director of the Yaffe Group and President of the Detroit Social Media Club, speaking on, “How to be a Better Boss by Encouraging Failure.” He did a great job of opening the evening, entertaining the sold out crowd of over a thousand attendees with his wit, humor and experience. When asked if he was nervous to be the first presenter he replied, “No. I don’t get nervous. I met my wife in a Theater group when we were 15 and I’ve been on stage ever since.”

From there the event was off and rolling and the organizers Brandon Chestnut and Norm “DJ Meph” Witte did a great job of trying to keep the crowd’s attention focused on the presenters and of MCing the evening. They utilized tech with a contest (not yet announced at this publishing) for the best Twitpic’s of the evening, with $25 gift certificates to iTunes going to the top three pics and a prize of a hotel room and dinner at Iridescence to the top presenter, offered by the Motor City Casino and Hotel and voted on by the attendees via Texting in their vote. Each speaker was assigned Ignite1, Ignite2, etc. based on the order of the presentations.

The presentations wowed and amazed at various levels. The range included Adam Kempa from www.whatwasthere.com, which is home to an Application that marries photos from days gone by to more current images, giving the viewer a look into the changes Detroit and the Metro area has under gone. Evelyn Chou, who started her presentation speaking Mandarin and shared with Ignite the differences in doing business in China and the U.S. and was voted as the runner up for her humorous, authentic and informative presentation. Then there was the only now speaking presentation of the evening – Mr. David “Dixon” Hammond. Dixon got on stage, and played an electric violin through a sequencer, which allowed him to become his own orchestra! He was wowed by the only standing ovation of the evening and Mr. Chestnut came out before he could leave the stage to inform him that the Motor City, based on that five minute performance was offering him the chance to open for comedian Jay Mohr when he appears there at the Sound Board. Dixon was humbled and amazed buy that generosity. You can share in that moment in the picture posted here, taken by Angela Watts, of Wattyz Photography. She got the moment of elation perfectly. It’s no surprise that Dixon was voted the best of the evening; which, along with his invitation to perform made the slides of his presentation, “Doing the Impossible,” all the more real.

The presenters are listed below, and you’d do well to check any and all of them out online.

Mike McClure: How to be a Better Boss by Encouraging Failure
Ken Wohl: The Mysterious Community that Controls Viral
Emily Doerr: The Creation of Hostel Detroit
David “Dixon” Hammond: Doing the Impossible
Shawn Neal: The Sugar People present “Live From GrooveBox Studios”
Daniel Eizans: Bringing Game Models to the Workplace
Dan Redford: The Glocal Life
Evelyn Chou: China’s No Panda Express
James Lu: Social Entrepreneur
Henry Balanon: Dad’s Guide on How to Handle the Birth of Your First Child
Hubert Sawyers III: “Cool as Ice?” Universal Life Lessons to Learn from Vanilla Ice’s Folly
Adam Kempa: Time Travel for Lazy People
Laura Farms: You Like Trivial Things, And That’s Okay!
Dave Linabury: How I Beat a Billion Dollar Company with My Blog
Leslie Blackburn: Transformation from Engineer to Sacred Sexual Healer: Learning to Let Go!

December 14, 2010December 14, 2010

What Do You View as Social Media Necessities?

Image via CrunchBase

“Do you have profiles on sites like Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and LinkedIn?”
Yes I have all the above – Facebook, which I use more socially, MySpace, which is more used for Music likes and discovery these days. I use Twitter more and more and I keep up a personal, business and two client Twitters. I do have a LinkedIn account and am working on updating it to make it more professional and current.

“Do you have a Google profile?”
Yes, I really like Google! I use Gmail, Google documents, Google Reader and Google Voice. I’m especially loving the new phone options that Google has recently implemented. Anytime I’m on my computer I have my Gmail account open and if someone calls my cell phone or home phone, they are forwarded instantly into Google Phone and I can click and answer and talk to the person right through my computer!

“Are your profiles linked together?” All my business accounts are linked together and my personal accounts are linked together, My blog posts to my Facebook and MySpace and my personal Twitter posts to my Facebook. As do my FourSquare and Yelp location accounts.

“Do you use a consistent name across profiles?”
Yes, I use the same name for each personal account and for each business account the names are consistent, too.

I searched for my name as first name last name, middle name and last name and full name and got a couple things here and there – mostly references to obits or other non-related people around the country. When I searched for my name as “gndearmond” I found a full page of information on myself! I was both pleasantly surprised and shocked. I did some promo items for a local band – unfortunately, they are called the Serial Killers! So, all the links to their items that I’d created showed up. gndearmond…Serial Killers, this and that – several findings listed as such. I’ll leave the site links up until the end of the month, but it will come down ASAP, just to clear up what would have been a great persona, otherwise.

“What do you want your online persona to be?”
I’d like it to be professional, but not too stuffy. To correctly represent myself and my company and to convey just the right amount of information, but nothing unnecessary.

“Given your goals, what services/sites do you think you can use to develop an online persona that will help you build your personal brand?”
I think that both personally and as a Marketer/Web Developer it is currently necessary to have all the “Big 4” services under your belt: Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and then your choice of either Yelp or FourSquare (or both). Lately, I’ve been experimenting with GoWalla and other Apps on my Android, too. I love the convenience of having my Android as an extension of my cyber world (just wish the battery would hold up to my power usage!).

It’s amazing how you can link all the above sites, use them to announce an event, post an opinion or link to your companies site or Blog. You can even run campaigns and contests utilizing them – all in hopes of driving your persona or product/service. Give it a try – Here’s a challenge for now, through the coming new year – Try something new, experiment and you may find a new techy/Social Media love.

Two tools to generate your basic profile info from LinkedIn (techattitude.com)
Social Networking: The Present (techcrunch.com)

November 15, 2010

Helpful Tips for Social Media

I’ve been coming across a large number of posts, articles, tweets and links for tips on using Social Media. Everything from, “10 Tips on How to Write Less Badly,” to, “30 Kick-Ass Premium WordPress Plugins and Themes.” In the article about the 10 tips on writing I especially enjoyed some of the author’s humor and candor, “#4. Give yourself time. Many smart people tell themselves pathetic lies like, ‘I do my best work at the last minute.’ Look: It’s not true. No one works better under pressure.” That couldn’t be more true! And I suppose I have to point out that I’m writing this on Monday, the day it’s due.

The article on the 30 WordPress links was largely links to premium plugins and themes, but even on these, I gain knowledge by seeing what’s new and often there are great comments at the end of the article that give me more insight into areas I’ve not previously been aware of. “I really do think the occasional roundup isn’t as bad as you put it. Remember that roundups occurs maybe twice or thrice *a month* here. Our focus is still squarely on in-depth articles and useful tutorials.” This let me know that I might want to either save a bookmark or subscribe to the page’s RSS to keep an eye on future posts that may hold more hints, tips or possible freebies and tutorials.

The next article deals with Twitter and the humorous title grabbed me, “Useful Tips For Network Marketers On How NOT To Become A Total Twitter Twit!” The author goes through 10 tips to keep you from being a Twit and the humor is carried throughout. I enjoyed several of them, but found myself going all the way through tip #10, which was really a list of some must follow people on Twitter. Check it out – if you are into Twitter (which of course you MUST be as a Social Media/Internet Marketer) you’ll enjoy this one. There’s even this great cartoon!

The next post was “Social Media Marketing in 8 Simple Steps.” Right off the opening paragraph grabbed me! “Online social marketing and social networking has been around a long time, but only recently has it been experiencing an explosion in participation and promotion from around the world, in every market imaginable. It has definitely gone ‘mainstream’ and is now even more important as a tool in your internet marketing strategy.” That term “mainstream” means a lot – it means more and more businesses are recognizing the need for and the importance of Social Media.

The article is only attributed to a “guest blogger,” which I found annoying, because I would have liked to read more by this author. They’ve written it as another list of things to do. And the closing grabbed me, just as the opening had, “Begin to learn and implement these strategies so you can see for yourself how an integrated social media marketing initiative will not only increase your web presence but will ensure your continued success on the internet and put this powerful social marketing initiative into play...”

The last post I’d like to bring to your attention is one that covers one of the “heavy hitters” of Social Media, Brian Solis and one of the groups I’ve written about before, Social Media Club. SMC is hosting an event called, “Social Media Masters.” Mr. Solis will be their keynote speaker, giving a speech on, “A Master Workshop for Marketing Professionals from Social Media Club and OMS.” These programs are often streamed live on the web and are certainly worth checking out. Again, I’ll say, if you live in an area with a chapter of Social Media Club you should do yourself a favor and check them out (you can find a list of the local chapters here). I am very much looking forward to what our Detroit Chapter has for us in the coming year.

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