Posts Tagged ‘social media’

I like it wherever it lands

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , , , ,
2

Today I got a message from one of my friends to post where you like to leave your purse as your Facebook status.  It’s a follow-up to the bra color trend that overtook Facebook last year in honor of breast cancer awareness.  I immediately sent it out to a horde of my female friends, then saw that one of my male buddies had posted a remark about how it doesn’t make sense and he’d rather people just donate to breast cancer research:

Why are girls playing another cryptic “game” to raise awareness about Breast Cancer? It worked last time because it actually had something to do with breasts (bra color), but this one (where you put your bookbag/purse) is just a ploy. You want to raise awareness? Donate and tell a friend to donate at www.komen.org and actually make a difference. I donated in honor of my Mom, the strongest woman and survivor I know.

To me, he completely missed the point of the potential that doing something as simple as this can have.  You don’t raise awareness just by putting money towards a cause – that’s merely funding it.  Raising awareness is to get dozens of others to think about the issue and get involved in their own way, whether through donating, volunteering, or otherwise.  That is so much more powerful than just donating money yourself and asking your friends to do so too.  To make something viral, it has to be more than just the usual message and this is something that gets people talking, whether they are baffled yet again at what is going on, or explaining what those “I like it” posts are about.

So here was the rest of our exchange:

Me:  Hey, it got you to talk. And what else can be said about breasts after bras? The idea is just to make people think about it, which should in turn get them to act and/or donate.

Him:  To think about it, it shouldn’t be some kind of secret game that men can’t play. That eliminates half the possible donating population. Instead of it just being a game, we should be encouraging each other to really make a difference.

Me:  Only by making it a game does it catch a virus effect that can make it spread fast. Unfortunately traditional “hey you should donate to ____ cause” just doesn’t catch people’s attention. There are thousands of great causes and you gotta get creative with how you approach it. The secrecy lets women have some fun with it and men try to find out, which gets them involved too.

Maybe it shouldn’t be limited to something just women can participate in, but seeing as most cases of breast cancer are women, it makes sense that they are the ones who are allowed to lead this little campaign. Nothing wrong with a “ploy” if it’s meant to get people talking about an important issue like this. After all, every advertisement is just a ploy for your attention, much like this is.

I believe it’s a matter of taking this to the next step.  Yes, it would be silly and foolish to just leave it at that, with no explanation.  I was actually thinking of setting up a Facebook page to help explain, but getting enough people to it for it to be worthwhile would be difficult.  I think the best thing would be for the Komen Foundation or another breast cancer awareness group to pick it up and each year come up with the theme, which is distributed virally.  A week into Breast Cancer Awareness Month, all those in the know who had changed their statuses would then all change their status to something like “Join me in supporting breast cancer awareness by going to komen.org and donating to the cause!”  The rest of the world, if they hadn’t caught on already, would then have a clear follow-up to the previously mysterious status messages.

And here was another person who wasn’t so sure about this whole thing:

I’m not saying this isn’t creative but will posting where you put your purse really cause people to think of breast cancer though? At least bras were directly connected to breasts but I know a lot of people who didn’t even know what the point of that was..

i think it would be better to be more “in your face” because people won’t know what this is about at all until waaay after the fact. i think it’d be better to maybe post a link to purse companies that give to breast cancer research or something like that.

i’m all for “out of the box” ways of spreading the message but as long as people can tell there is a message. it will just seem like any other facebook meme that has sexual innuendos..

sorry, i’m done ranting. don’t let me stop you from doing it though, if you really think it’ll put the message across.

And my response:

One of my friends wasn’t fond of it either and he said he’d rather people just go donate at komen.org, but I think that this is a good idea if after a few days of the status being up, everyone switches to something like “Support Breast Cancer Awareness Month! Donate at komen.org” And my thoughts on your friends points:

1. Other than bras, what is related to breasts? Not much else. By continuing this from last year, it builds a movement and each year more and more people can get involved, FEEL involved, and then donate money or volunteer or act in some way. So of course each year needs a new theme, so it’s fun for people to join in. It doesn’t have to be a “silly” Facebook fad that comes and goes – it can be something much more powerful. And seeing as how women get breast cancer something like 100:1 over men, obviously it makes sense to make it a female-centered thing to empower us to be the ones spreading the message. When guys see it and wonder what’s happening, it’s up to those participating to spread the message of awareness.

2. Posting a link to a purse company that supports breast cancer is so… YAWN. I’m sorry, but if I saw that, I would completely ignore it, like the 1000+ unread FB messages I’ve gotten from this group and that group. To create interest, you need to capture people’s attention and another “yay you should donate” message just gets lost in the hubbub of all the other junk we see. This movement is just like the NFL players wearing pink – what does that actually TELL you? Nothing. It’s up to people in the know to share the message and those curious to find out. And when things like that get noticed, news outlets cover it and they do a pretty good job of explaining.

3. Granted, it’s true that this trend needs a bit more clarification, but last year after the bra thing it got national coverage. How’s that for clarification? So that’s why I’d suggest a concerted effort to get people to actively get involved in supporting breast cancer research/awareness/prevention by changing the status right after this provoking one as a follow-up.

Traditional ways of putting the message across don’t get your attention like this kind of thing has the potential for. It is very viral, and therefore very powerful by putting the power in the hands of each participant to get involved and get others involved.

Social media timeline

laelene Posted in photo blog,Tags: , ,
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timeline of the development of social media

A cool timeline showing the progression of technology and social media. Take note of some of the hilarious phrases.

A very special treat

laelene Posted in photo blog,Tags: , , , , , ,
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Sprinkles gives away free cupcakes daily, if you follow them on Twitter and get to their shop in time to be the first 25 to say the secret word of the day.  Sometimes, that free offer is a flavor not sold at their stores – a much coveted prize (for me, anyway).

This day, it was this lovely chocolate cupcake with chocolate ganache and marshmallow filling, which isn’t a special flavor, but came in a very special way.  I was surprised to get it so fresh that the ganache hadn’t even firmed up yet; now there’s a rare occasion!  It was just about the last one left too.  Beautiful.

chocolate marshmallow and red velvet cupcakes from Sprinkles

On the left, the chocolate marshmallow with fresh ganache. On the right, the classic red velvet.

Shorty Awards

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: ,
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Please take a moment to vote for Shorty Awards, particularly Opportunity Green in the Green category!  Pass this on to all your Twitter friends and followers too!  🙂

Vote OppGreen for the Green Shorty Award!

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: ,
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Opportunity Green is entered in the Twitter Shorty Awards in the Green category and I want you to support them in taking first place by voting!

Here’s what to do:

#1 Go to http://bit.ly/8u7KFw.

#2 See the box with “I nominate @oppgreen for a Shorty Award in #green because…” filled out for you?  Well, add in your own reason, or choose one below!

#3 Click “Tweet your vote!” and follow the instructions.

#4 After you have voted, you should be able to see your tweet listed on the page.

I nominate @oppgreen for a Shorty Award in #green because…

they always keeps us informed about what’s going out there!

they are so passionate about building the green community!

they share great content, from clean tech to eco-fashion!

they facilitate the movement to transform business!

they’re the best at starting green conversations!

they get what “going green” is all about!

they just plain ROCK sustainability!

their green conference leads the way towards change!

they’re paving the green path and not looking back!

they know what’s up in the green space!

And see what else the voters have been saying.  🙂  They truly are tech-savvy and used Twitter for their OG25 competition, streamed tweets live at the conference, and put out so much great content all the time.  So what are you waiting for?  GO VOTE!

Blogosphere, really?

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , ,
2

Sooo I’ve been trying REALLY hard to find blogs to follow, but something is wrong.  The blogosphere is not quite as I had hoped.  I recently joined 20 Something Bloggers after this sudden motivation to start connecting with other blogs.  So far I’ve been keeping a low profile with this blog, with just about 15-25 unique visitors a day.  I haven’t told many of my friends about this blog (except recently, when I was publicizing the whole job competition thing), I don’t really follow personal blogs (I seem to lean towards news and other informative ones), and I haven’t really made any blog friends (except for some loose acquaintances, but pretty much the “blog friends” I have I knew in real life first).

I’ve come across a few decent ones that I may or may not follow long-term, but nothing that draws me by the belt loops and makes me want to them like a faithful puppy.  Is there something wrong with me?  Do I just not connect with 20-something bloggers as well as I’d hope?  Perhaps I should be looking elsewhere.  I’ve met some really nice gals so far and started to read their blogs, but it seems that I only obsess about things I find on ABC7, like 20/20, and CBS, like 60 Minutes.  Once I get into those, I stay up all night reading.  Blogs?  Not so much.  Perhaps my standards are too news-focused in this blog search.  Perhaps I need to learn to read less educational and informative in an immediate way.  Perhaps I need to learn to connect with my peers a little better.

I don’t really know what it is, but it is somewhat frustrating to read blog after blog only to find much of the same.  Drinking, partying, fashion, drama, sex, complaining, and cursing.  None of which I’m interested in.  Is that what my generation is all about?  Or there’s a blogger who writes about entrepreneurship, which is great, but his pompous tone is just too annoying for me to read regularly.  Plus it seems everything for him comes back to sex and materialism, neither of which I want to hear about.  In fact, I ended up going from one girl’s site to the blog of this lady, the Pioneer Woman, as she calls herself.  Her entries were far more interesting to me than all the opinionated ones of those my age.  Then again, I always had a soft spot for the countryside, snow, animals, and farms (or ranches I guess are close enough).

I know there are plenty of great blogs out there that I would love to read!  Now where are they?  I need some help navigating the blogosphere.  Having been a loner for this long, I don’t know what to do with myself and there’s no instruction manual for me to turn to!  Then there’s also the problem of RSS feeds… I’m the “send me an e-mail when you post” type of person, but most people just have standard RSS feeds, which means I’ve been adding them to the Google Reader that I don’t use.  Great.  Now I need to get used to yet another thing to check on a consistent basis!  Can the reader perhaps e-mail me a daily summary?  Hmm…

2010

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , , , ,
2

A new year, a new decade.  I haven’t thought much about resolutions, but here are some things I’ve been working on:

vidli logo with their avatar, the blue-footed booby~getting a job.  This is definitely the year I get one.  Let’s just hope it’s sooner rather than later.  I’ve definitely got a great lead right now!  I’m pretty confident that I won one of the 5 interviews that Vidli is giving out for their Social Media Expert.  Here was my blog entry about it.  The competition is now closed and results are coming out today or tomorrow!

reqall logoevernote logo with their mascot, an elephant~electronically organize my life with Evernote, reQall, Dropbox, Skydrive, Live Mesh, or something along those lines… I just started using Evernote after getting it in October and I want to make a habit of uploading things so I can access information from anywhere with the internet.  I’ve been using reQall to help me remember things.  Too bad I’d have to pay to link the two accounts.  I’m still trying to figure out what to use for what between Dropbox, Skydrive, Live Mesh, and others similar to them.

google voice logo~start giving out my Google Voice number exclusively.  This way it doesn’t matter what my number changes to in the future, people can always find me.

picture on blog of mary qin~use my mary@maryqin.com e-mail as the primary contact.  I’ve been reluctant to in case I stop using my website, but I’ll probably always keep it and just use it for different reasons over the years.  Plus if I use that e-mail, it will be an added incentive to keep my site going.

~begin sprinkling in some video blogging.  I’ve done pure text blogging, then posts with pictures, and added in photo blogging.  Now it’s time for the next stage with some video, whether of me talking, something interested I filmed, or (in the way future) something I edited together.

This will also be the year that I figure out what my life will be like more or less for the next couple of years.  As soon as I get that job, I want to start creating a routine.  Figure out when and where I can work out.  Look into a physical therapist, chiropractor, or masseuse to help with my weak back.  Go visit the dentist after way too long!  Think about my next step in education – maybe take some online or night classes in the years leading up to that MBA.  Save up for emergencies, future investments, and other such important items.  Find a routine that fits Panda in frequently (which will of course change as soon as he starts working!).  And then I’ll know how I can work my social life around that.  🙂

It’s a year of big change and I’ve been more than ready for awhile now.  So here’s to 2010!

Competing for an interview, literally

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , ,
2

Hello!  I hope that you were redirected here from one of my social media accounts and that you’re interested in helping me WIN a job interview with Vidli.  (They’re giving interviews to the top 5 candidates!)  Here’s what to do:

1. Go here: http://bit.ly/5YDsVK and http://bit.ly/5MAMGM

2. Vote for Vidli on both (I get 3 points)

3. E-mail jobs@vidli.com with the subject line “Mary Qin asked me to vote for Vidli – so I did. Long Live Boobies!” (And CC me, mary@maryqin.com or just leave a comment and let me know you did, so I know who to give eternal thanks to!)  If you voted for both, no harm mentioning it in the body.  If you only go for one, do the Keiretsu Forum Angel Competition (first link).

4. Then, go sign up here: http://vidli.com/SE150BW (I get 1 point for that)

You will have earned me 4 points for doing all that!  Contest ends the moment the clock strikes twelve and Dec. 31st becomes Jan. 1st, so please act now! 🙂 THANK YOU!

By the way, their avatar/mascot is a Blue-footed Booby, hence the ‘Long Live Boobies’ in the subject line.

UPDATE:  As of December 29th, I am #5!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Help keep me there (or get me higher) and recruit everyone you can please!  😀

Special Sprinkles

laelene Posted in photo blog,Tags: , , , ,
1

An exclusive version in early November!

A special flavor they only had in the back for Twitter followers: dulce de leche.

A special flavor they only had in the back for Twitter followers: dulce de leche.

Mmm, chocolate cupcake with caramel frosting and chocolate ganache! :)

Mmm, chocolate cupcake with caramel frosting and chocolate ganache! 🙂

Innovation overkill?

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , , , , ,
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web 2.0These days I’ve just been bombarded with new sites for every imaginable aspect of web 2.0.  Many are overlapping in services, which makes it hard for me to figure out what I should actually try.  As I found a few days ago, I’m actually quite an early adopter, though I never considered myself that before.  I never realized that all the sites I’ve started to use are so new and foreign to most of my friends.  I have discovered that I’ve been using sites that many of them have never heard of and that most of them don’t have accounts on.  When I share them with friends, the ones I like best I often convey in such a way that they want to join too.  This ranges from Baseloop to Google Wave to Swagbucks.  There are so many choices out there that I don’t know what to use anymore.

facebook logoflickr logopicasa logoLet’s take sharing pictures, for example.  There’s Facebook, Flickr, Picasa, and many more that focus more on printing photos.  Facebook is useful because you can tag your friends and use the existing social network to share your photos.  Flickr is good to share your stuff with the world and make your pictures show up on image searches.  Picasa has a fun face recognition algorithm that allows you to have people pre-tagged whenever you upload new pictures.  Those people are also linked to your Google contacts, so if you already use one of the other Google services (Gmail, Voice, Wave), you can use existing contacts to tag, much like Facebook.  So when you want to share pictures, where do you go?!

google wave logoNow let’s say you want to plan an event.  Facebook comes in as a contender once again, as does Google with its new Wave.  Then there’s the up-and-coming Baseloop fully intended to cater to this need.  For Facebook, the edge in this area is once again the existing network you have on there.  Most of my friends are on there and I can easily invite them (or one of my groups) to an event I create.  Wave’s biggest setback at the moment is the lack of people using it.  I’ve finally got more than 5 people on there, but it’s still a long ways to be able to invite all of my friends to something through Wave.  I do like how you can embed a map of the location, include the weather for that day, and other nifty features that would be useful.  baseloopFinally, Baseloop caters to both events for your friends and more public events.  What I like best about them is they allow you to suggest things to do and they show you a public calendar of events going on in your area.  That way, if you’ve wanted to do something but could never seem to find the people to do it with, you can put it out there for all your friends (and even random people) to see.  Much easier than e-mailing or messaging all my friends just to see if they’re interested in a particular activity.  You can also quickly see what things there might be to do on a Saturday night when you’re bored and want to go have some fun.  But of course, few people are on it now, so when I invite friends, they’d need to set up an account.  So which of these is best for event-planning?

Similar issues arise for just choosing a social network.  There’s Facebook, Baseloop, Plaxo, Brazen Careerist, Ning, MySpace, Hi5…  Then for blogging or micro-blogging there’s WordPress, Twitter, Tumblr, Blogger, Livejournal, Xanga, Plurk…  Even video posting and interaction has a wide selection with YouTube, Vimeo, Tokbox, Stroome, Nurphy…  Plus search engines, like Google, Yahoo, Bing (ok technically a “decision engine,” but you get the idea), Ask, Swagbucks, Goodsearch…  Let’s not even get into the online shopping sites, mapping and direction sites, online game sites, dating sites, etc.!

Aaaah!  It’s overwhelming and there are still more sites like this popping up ALL THE TIME.  I suppose that’s what happens when it’s relatively easy for people to start online businesses.  You have little startup cost beyond the website itself and whatever you need to do to create and maintain it.  The only physical stuff you really need is computers and computing power.  Beyond that, it’s all your programming skills, creativity, and customer service put to the test.

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