Posts Tagged ‘social media’

Expertise

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , , , ,
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So many of the things I want to do require me to be an expert in my field first.  But see, the problem is, I’m not an expert in any field!  Unfortunately, what I’m interested in (mostly administrative stuff and management) require little education.  Instead, they require a certain way of thinking and behaving that nearly any intelligent person can be trained for and/or develop over the course of years of experience.  I can’t say that I’m a scientist or engineer who later wants to go the management track.  At least that way my skill sets are more tangible initially and the degree I earn, a bit more meaningful.  Instead, I learned two useful majors that will be good for me in the business area, but I don’t want to pursue either of them the way they’re meant to be.

What I’m good at doesn’t really need technical skills that can only be learned from tertiary education and lots of people can pick it up or be trained for it.  I also have broad enough interests and experience that there’s no “one thing” that I’ve concentrated on.  That means that it’s much more difficult to focus one on aspect of what I enjoy and work to make myself an expert in that field.  It also means I lose out on a lot of job opportunities to people who have had 3-5 years work experience already.  I guess it’s a testament to how people are willing to work entry-level jobs for longer now because there’s nowhere up for them to go.  The rest of my skills aren’t deep enough to make a career out of – like my passion for technology.  I am a self-taught programmer, which means I can get by with HTML and some CSS.  PHP still confuses me and forget about the rest.  I know enough to be tech-savvy, but not enough to work for a highly technical company like many of the start-ups these days!

The good thing is that one of my interests is social media and there’s not yet a degree centered around that, so any experience is more personal than professional.  My networks in the sites that I’m active on are respectably large and enough for people to see that I have put a lot of time and effort into them.  Additionally, I got a chance to explore those interests while in Singapore as I worked on a social media plan for the company there.  Much of it wasn’t ready to be implemented yet, but at least I had the thought process completed and a plan ready to implement.  I’m now getting some social media managing experience at my current internship, so perhaps that’s the way to go.  The problem with that field is that because there is a lower barrier of entry, competition is high!  So many people want to go into this area because it’s something they can do without a college degree or certification or something.

So here I am with a dilemma… which interests do I focus on and develop into a noticeable strength?  Which ones do I maintain as hobbies and leisurely pastimes instead?  I suppose that will be partially determined by the job I can eventually land!  I got a second wave of enthusiasm after looking at some more opportunities and there are a few jobs I’ll be applying for in the coming weeks that I’m really excited about.  I just hope I can get one of them!  I think things will probably slow down this month as people start to mentally check out for the holidays and stop working so hard in the time leading up to the break.  I’m still hopeful to line up something for early next year though.  Fingers crossed!

Baring all on Facebook

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , , , , , ,
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facebookI came across an article today detailing the dangers of giving too much away on Facebook.  People are forced to make a choice between sharing whatever they want with their friends and not “friending” anyone at work or being very cautious of what they share on their accounts and allowing people from their company to view their profile.  To a certain extent, I can understand why it is important to be more reserved and not let your wildest personal moments leak into your professional life.  However, I think some companies have taken things too far and are basically stalking their employees.  Are we not allowed a mistake here and there?  A fun day/night/weekend out with our friends?

One of the unfortunate side effects of being involved in social media is that sometimes people get to know you too much.  Whereas previously what you do on your own time rarely made it back to the office, now people don’t need to run into you to find out what you’ve been up to.  Plus, since we list our professional affiliations on our profiles, we are judged much more harshly for what we do, since it also reflects upon the company we work for.  It’s human nature to see one bad instance and suddenly discredit the person entirely, or even the organization(s) they belong to.  And so, corporations begin to crack down on this to prevent their name from being tainted by an individual within.

I’ve always struggled with how much to share.  I innately want to share much more than I probably should at times, but hiding aspects of my life just feels fake to me.  I don’t want to go around living some sort of secret, underground existence!  I don’t do things I’d be ashamed of and though I may not always do things I could tell my parents, I never do something I couldn’t tell my friends.  Some people in the world may be too uptight to appreciate some of the fun I have, but should I limit myself just because of them?  Am I not allowed to participate in silly things like Undie Run?  Am I not allowed to express my femininity in a photo shoot?  My actions aren’t always G-rated, but they’re PG-13 (which is probably the best you’re going to get from young adults!).  That’s pretty mild, yet I still feel unsure sometimes about how older generations will view me from a single picture they may have seen.

I would hope that any employer who stalks me on Facebook would be realistic enough to understand that the two or three times a year I do something unconventional do not define who I am.  I mean, I don’t curse, don’t drink, don’t smoke, and don’t even have a coffee/caffeine dependency!  If I’ve got the discipline to maintain that despite everything that’s going around me, certainly I can be trusted to have some responsible fun occasionally.  In the future when I’m running my own venture, I’d want to have a culture that accepts the alter-egos people sometimes have on their own time.  I saw a company that gives two “I just didn’t want to get out of bed” days to their employees annually because they recognize that sometimes you may not have a family emergency or be sick enough to get a day off, but you really need one anyway.  Now there’s a company that understands that employees are people!

Do the Wave

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
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Google is a company that knows how to create.  Create lots of online applications for people to use, then create huge hype over them when they (slowly) release them.  Remember the days when Gmail was invite-only?  Well, now it’s happening with their newest project: Google Wave.  Apparently it’s also going on for their service Google Voice, which will be opening up to the public eventually.

google waveToday I got an e-mail from a friend, asking around to see if anyone has invites for Google Wave.  That prompted me to go on a wild goose chase, first trying to figure out what exactly it is, then of course trying to find people with invites.  My search didn’t get far – after all, Google’s got a central location to explain what Wave is.  At first I read about it and understood the general concept – a collaborative tool online, with live interactions.  It’s like being in a meeting room, throwing around ideas and sharing documents, but in electronic form.  That wasn’t enough to really interest me, but I am a persistent person and I like to help others to make myself feel good and useful.  So, I watched the one-hour, twenty-minute, and twelve-second video outlining all the fun little doodads that come in Wave.

The screenshot provided by Google.

The screenshot provided by Google.

Now that is what truly sparked my interest.  The usability looks fabulous, there are a lot of functions for all the things you ever might want to do, and plenty of fun widgets!  It is open sourced, so there will certainly be a LOT of cool features to come as programmers get their turn at it.  It can integrate with websites and sync the information on your blog and in your Wave so that comments from one show up in the other.  Same thing goes for Twitter – you can link your account and post tweets from within Wave.  It is truly live to the point of being able to watch the other person typing out what they want to say (you can turn that feature off if you make a lot of mistakes or don’t want to have to take back something you didn’t mean to type).  It’s easy to drag and drop things into the Wave you’re working on, or take part of the current Wave and create a new one.

Some of the extensions they have are really what caught my eye.  Right now it’s smart enough to spell and grammar check in a contextual way, so even if you misspell something and end up typing another word instead, it can catch it and change that for you.  Sometimes it will change automatically and sometimes you will get that telltale red underline and then be given options.  It recognizes links without needing the http:// to indicate so and you can paste links in from a Google search without having to copy-paste the URL.  You can embed Google Maps, pictures, videos, and the like very easily and it recognizes YouTube links as videos and offers the option of embedding that with a quick click.  There’s also a real-time translating function that can translate between any two of 40 languages!

photo credit: marketingfacts on flickr

photo credit: marketingfacts on flickr

Once I went through that video, I got curious.  Suddenly, I was interested in trying it out for myself.  First I thought of the people I know at Google.  Oh wait, there aren’t any.  I have an acquaintance who works for them in Australia last I checked, but I haven’t heard from him in ages.  I checked LinkedIn and found that one of the people that Panda knows works for them, but he doesn’t know the guy well enough to ask for favors.  So there I was, wondering if I knew anyone who would have access to this kind of thing.  I decided to go to Twitter to post a funny observation I had made while watching the video.  While I was there, I searched for Google Wave and noticed that it was the top trending topic.  I guess this is all newer than I thought it was, since the hype was intense.  There were people selling invites!  That’s just insane.

I then read a few tweets about people giving them away (most were fakes, claiming they had 1000 invites) and couldn’t really find any leads.  I came across a lady who looked legit and messaged her just to try my luck.  I then noticed a lot of people offering Google Voice invites for Wave ones.  Well, the moment I saw that, I remembered a good friend of mine who has set his Google Voice number as his status for quite some time now.  Whenever he signs on, I see a message: “(XXX) XXX-XXXX new google voice phonenumber.”  I couldn’t resist telling him how I was reminded of him (and ask what exactly a Google Voice number is for).  As we chatted, I learned that not only did he have Google Voice, he has Google Wave as well.  After clearing up what Google Voice is for, he mentioned that he had one more invite to Google Wave and asked if I was interested.  Well, of course I was!  So I took his offer and I should be receiving my invite sometime tomorrow.

Then, let the Waving begin!

Pictures

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , , , , ,
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Pictures tell a story.  Pictures capture things that the mind may never think to include in writing a novel.  A picture’s worth a thousand words, as I’m sure you’ve heard.

photo credit: kidstechreview.com

It only looks like a toy. photo credit: kidstechreview.com

To me, pictures are a way of life.  I am ever grateful for the advent of digital cameras and the ever-growing memory capacity their chips can hold.  I still remember my very first camera, which I got on my birthday when my parents and I were in Florida visiting Sea World and Disneyworld.  It was a pink rectangular wind-up thing that looked more like a toy meant for Barbie than a functioning camera, but it certainly did work.  Rolls of film were precious to me at that time, over a decade ago, so I took pictures sparingly and carefully.  After that came a more professional-looking black camera complete with neckstrap and nice fancy buttons with a digital display screen to indicate photos left.  No more of those little numbers rolling by a magnifying glass (except on disposable cameras).

photo credit: dphotonews.com

My current camera model. photo credit: dphotonews.com

At some point in high school, I began to use digital cameras and never looked back.  From that point on, I felt the freedom of taking pictures as I wanted, pretty much whenever I wanted and as much as I wanted.  It was liberating.  I don’t think my picture-taking obsession hit full swing until college though, when so much was going on that I wanted to document.  I generally go for action shots that tell a story, but I’m a sucker for some good food or just posing with friends for posterity as well.  Mostly I try to get a candid shot, probably a little goofy if there are people in it, and definitely one that explains why it was taken.  My observation skills got put to good use as I documented all the little things I would find, from the insects around us to the odd sign or cool building.

Perhaps the influx in college was also due to the birth of Facebook, which became a great way for me to share the photos I took for myself that most people never even saw.  Now I had a way of showing them as well, which just encouraged me to continue capturing all the action around me.  Soon enough, my friends knew they could always rely on me to have a camera at hand for any occasion that may spring up.  In fact, it is well known that I have well over 3000 pictures tagged of me now and certainly thousands I’ve put up in the dozens of albums I have.  I used to go through and delete it all every few months, but at a certain point about three years ago, I decided I may as well leave them up – after all, there are no limitations on storage!  It’s a pity I didn’t keep everything up though; it would be a fantastic chronology of my life starting in the fall of 2004, as I embarked upon my years at UCLA.

Because of the significance pictures have had on me, I am drawn to photo blogs (phlogs?), where a picture is posted each day to depict a certain moment during that day.  Marylin kept something like that, meant to chronicle her life in a year picture by picture.  I don’t know if she ever got to 365 before stopping though.  I am tempted to do that here and let the images of my life do the talking.  I have been considering whether I should finish up an entire year of writing an entry per day and then do another year of photo blogging, or just start integrating it now.  I’ve been trying to use images as much as I can to help illustrate my entries for many months now, which I find is a nice break amongst all that type.  I suppose I could try doing one of each for awhile, or switch off every other day, or just do whichever whenever I feel like it.  It might be a slight challenge to have an interesting picture every day, what with my policy of not including people I know in the shots.  Guess we’ll just have to see!

Timeless dilemma

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Truly like a ninja.

Truly like a ninja.

I have a friend, Ninja, who lives his life in such a way that it should be worthy of being made into a movie.  In everything he does, that’s how he’ll treat things.  It’s quite fitting that everyone sees him as a ninja, prowling around doing all kinds of cool moves and getting into spectacular “fights.”  I’m sure everyone would love to have his approach to life.  It’s really quite cool, because then he’s always having exciting adventures.  It helps that he’s extremely athletic, so he can escape situations if needed.  One of the examples was when he went to the midnight showing of Indiana Jones (whichever one just came out in the past year or so) dressed in a leather jacket, leather hat/fedora thing, and (real) bullwhip.  After the show ended, he stood up on the balcony and cracked his whip to cheers and whistles until security approached.  He then made a run for it and got out unscathed.  Now how awesome is that?!

Having too much fun to write about it!

Having too much fun to write about it!

Well, the thing is, if you’re out having such a fantastic time all the time, you never have time to record it for others to enjoy or for it to be passed down in the books.  This is a dilemma that I face all the time as I ponder how worthwhile it is for me to maintain a daily journal.  It started back in 4th grade, when I wanted a diary from the Scholastic Fair, but my dad would only allow me to buy it if I promised to write in it every day.  I did, and he got me the diary, but never again asked about it.  It was only in the months and years following, when my parents would find me scribbling away at yet another volume of my journal, that they realized I was serious.  Maybe they didn’t hold me accountable for my promise, but I did.  They used to scold me that I was wasting my time writing so much and it was just a liu shui zhang, or ‘running water account’.  Basically, it meant that my writing was as useless as a bank account where all the funds were drained, or something to that extent.

Nonetheless, I pursued until about a year ago, when I truly started to get behind on my writing.  When I can’t find the time to write an entry each day (which has been the case for many years), I’ll keep bullet point notes to remind me of what to write about when I do have time to catch up.  I used to be able to catch up on a weekly basis, which then evolved to a monthly basis and now… yearly?  I still have tons of notes for all the days I’ve missed, though even those I’m behind on now.  I’m not too worried though, since with the brilliance of the internet, I can just check my Facebook, blog, texts, and IMs from a particular day to piece together what happened.  Not the best way to keep track of my life, but it works.

Have fun playing with friends or chill out writing alone?

Have fun playing with friends or chill out writing alone?

My constant struggle with keeping a journal was that when I had a lot to write about, I had no time to write about it and when I had plenty of time to write, I had nothing to write about.  After all, if you’re too busy out doing fun and interesting things, you won’t have time to stop and spend some time writing about it.  Conversely, if you’ve got plenty of time sitting around, you aren’t really doing much exciting stuff to mention.  So I always question the existence of my journal and whether or not I should maintain it.  Even now, being so far behind, I fully intend to catch up on it eventually.  But is it worth the time?  Should I be doing something more notable instead?  I used to write when I couldn’t really do anything else, like when I was on planes or in a waiting room, but that doesn’t happen much anymore, so most of my time I can spend doing something else.  I’d like to live a storybook life, but I’d like to document it as well.  So where is my balance?  I don’t know if I’ll ever find one, but I will certainly always be striving towards one.

Best Job in the World

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Ah, back when I was visiting Australia...

Ah, back when I was visiting Australia...

Today marks the official first day of Ben Southall’s new job as Island Caretaker on Hamilton Island.  For those who don’t know, he competed to earn this job through a highly publicized “Best Job in the World” campaign that has seen its copiers: The Next Best Job (which had to be canceled due to the economic downturn) and A Really Goode Job (yes, it’s supposed to be spelled like that).  Back when this Australian opportunity first appeared, my mom showed it to me and suggested that I apply.  Were it not for the video entry, I probably would have, but video is not my forte.  I love to blog, I love to swim, I love wildlife, and I love what I’ve seen of Australia, but I do not want to spend hours editing film footage to vlog about.  Another thing stopping me from going crazy over this chance to live and work in Australia is the lack of company.  I’d have to live alone, or maybe bring my mom along, but everyone else in my life would be far too busy to join me.  Other than that, it’s really an amazing job and I’m sure Ben will have a spectacular time.

This was truly a great publicity stunt on the part of Queensland tourism.  It generated a lot of buzz and coverage because of its unusually generous offer.  Plus, they had international reach, with nearly all finalists from different countries.  Additionally, it didn’t take much effort on their part to set it up and share the news.  I’m sure a lot of viral marketing took effect to help spread the word, like how I found out from my mom.  Now that the hype’s over and things have settled down, I wonder how Ben will do in maintaining public interest in his activities.  I wish I could do something similar to that, visiting all the exciting places in a beautiful place like that (or, even better, in an entire region of countries).  I also wish I could do something fun like Matt, going around the world and doing a silly dance like that (and sharing the joy of the goofiness of it all).

Ben Southall

Ben Southall

Of course, this “dream job” is not without its challenges, what with the constant updates on various social media mediums and the constant activity.  I’ve never really wanted to be famous because I don’t want people tracking me all the time and I want the freedom to be lazy on the weekends or sleep through something I shouldn’t, or any number of the other flaws that people have.  Looking at his itinerary so far, it’s like bam, bam, bam – visit here, visit there, and then off to the next place.  I hope he has more down time, or else it could get quite tiring to be trying things all the time without a day or two to lounge around in bed or not have to absorb everything new and think of how to write about it.  Overall, I’m sure it’d be absolutely fabulous to do what he will get to in the coming months and I look forward to keeping a loose eye on his activities.  I look forward to the day that I can go to Australia again, and this time actually go in the ocean!

Midsummer celebration

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
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Our office hosted a dinner party for two dozen people tonight and it was a spectacular time!  It started with a fun invitation specially made for the occasion, with a fanciful menu to entice our guests. In the mid afternoon, Lorry and Starfish left to buy food to prepare and when they came back everyone started hustling to help make the dishes and entertain the guests.  The invited ranged from SMU students who had done a case study on our company culture to associates and potential associates of the training branch.  It was a good chance for us to properly meet some of the people Zen had been mentioning (and for them to all meet each other too).  The whole affair felt a bit like a big extended family gathering, complete with feast, courtesy C&S.

Pictures will show this better than words can describe, so let me include tasty visuals of the menu items offered:

Crunchy snacks and wine to start.

Crunchy snacks and wine to start.

Seasonal salad with summer dressings.

Seasonal salad with summer dressings.

DSC04941

Baked potatoes with sour cream, bacon bits, and chives.

Bruschetta with rubbed garlic and fresh tomatoes.

Bruschetta with rubbed garlic and fresh tomatoes.

Prosciutto with cantaloupe.

Prosciutto with cantaloupe.

Smoked Norwegian salmon with caper and cream cheese.

Smoked Norwegian salmon with caper and cream cheese.

Choice cold cut of ham and cheddar cheese cube.

Choice cold cut of ham and cheddar cheese cube.

Spit roast whole chicken.

Spit roast whole chicken.

Honey-glazed ribs of pork.

Honey-glazed ribs of pork.

I don't remember what this was.

I don't remember what this was.

C&S cheese cubes!

C&S cheese cubes!

Belgian waffles, strawberries, marshmallows, and cookie sticks with dark chocolate bath.

Belgian waffles, strawberries, marshmallows, and cookie sticks with dark chocolate bath.

We had a lovely time between the food and the company and I started to lose my voice from the great conversations and laughter I took part in.  After the event was over, we all pitched in to clean up and ended the night happily collapsed in our seats unwinding before heading home.  Initially, we were going to share the pictures I took on Photobucket, but then decided it was more sensible to set up a Facebook page, which I happily set out to do.  After some detours I inadvertantly chanced upon, we finally got it up and running!  Now everyone can become our fan!

Fire in the soul

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Perhaps it is time for some soul searching of sorts (in terms of career potential).

Demoing health food forever?

Demoing health food forever?

A few weeks ago, Starfish requested a list of my passions to help me figure out what I want to do and where I can go.  It was surprisingly harder than I thought – after all, who doesn’t know what they love, right?  Yet, it seems that my trouble is what I truly love not always being a viable source of work to pursue.  First let me share what I came up with:

~ emerging forms of media (especially social media at the moment)

~ people’s stories (whether hearing them or sharing them)

~ observing people (their behavior, interactions, and body language)

~ novel things, places, and experiences (travel, broad interactions)

~ health issues (diet and exercise/fitness, organic/all-natural foods)

~ environmentalism (conservation, recycling, and sustainability)

My darling Simon.

My darling Simon. How can you not find him adorable?

~ volunteering with animals (mostly cats)

~ background/support work (researching, planning)

~ the military (particularly the Marine Corps!)

Ok, so where does that put me?

1. I’ve hardly used social media enough to claim expertise as so many do.  However, I am very dedicated to my blog and have made it a point to post on a daily basis.  Still, at best, this would be a supplementary service for some sort of package integrated marketing consultation service.

2. Though I like to hear people’s stories, I’m certainly not interested in journalism nor do I feel like the right vessel to help share those stories.  I’m also not that great a storyteller.  I have had dreams about talking to homeless people to find out how they got into their situation and then helping to groom them to reintegrate to society.

3. Noticing the little nuances in how people go about their days doesn’t exactly translate into a career and is more of an enhancement to how I learn to deal with people.  Maybe I’ll start a little side blog with snippets of the things I observe.

One of my favorite views - out a plane window.

One of my favorite views - out a plane window.

4. Being introduced to new people, new places, and new things would be a cool temporary thing to do or a nice addition to my job, but isn’t exactly a career in itself if I want to settle down.  This is where my dream of competing in The Amazing Race comes into play.

5. I’m not enough of a fitness or health food nut to delve into this so deeply.  At best I could be an advocate for eating less meat to save the environment, eating organic and local to save your community, and exercising regularly and eating well to save yourself.

6. I’ve been doing a lot of research and reading in the green field, since it is what I want to build a company from sometime in my life.  Starfish made a very wise suggestion in mentioning I can start to attend conferences of the sort, get involved in the field.  I’ll certainly be looking into that (hopefully there are free ones).  I’ve been meaning to go to the UCLA Institute of the Environment to see if there’s anything I can get involved in.

My precious Jerriey.

My precious Jerriey. Great for stress relief.

7. I actually started looking at cat sitting services and boarding houses to see the rates they charge at.  I’m not sure how I would handle spending time with all these adorable felines and not getting to keep them.  I think I’m more of a cat owner at heart, though I do like to go play with and take care of them at shelters.

8. Researching and other support work is yet another one of those things that I prefer to use to enhance my work rather than to define my work.

Yeah, I wanted to be one of them.  The first Marines I ever encountered.

Yeah, I wanted to be one of them. The first Marines I ever encountered.

9. Once upon a time I had fantasies about being a Marine.  Then lots of things got in the way and I decided that I was not meant for that path.  However, my love/obsession/fascination for the military will always be strong, so I’d love to find a way to work with them.  At one point I considered trying to do their marketing.  That’s still an option…

What really invigorates me?  Sitting at my computer reading articles about green technology, environmentally-friendly

One of the half dozen military boot camps I want to.  That's me holding the red guide-on!

One of the half dozen military boot camps I went to. They're strangely invigorating for body and mind. That's me holding the red guide-on!

products, and fresh wholesome natural food.  Spending time with and observing animals.  Traveling around the world and getting a peek at the lives of others so different from mine.  Hearing about the interesting backstories of people’s lives.  Spending time alone pondering and introspecting; also, watching people pass me by.  Contemplating (and trying to go out and do) fun ways to be fit and well.  Hearing about anything related to the military.

What I’m really looking for is freedom.  Freedom to sleep in and stay up ridiculously late.  Freedom to get work done in different places on different days.  Freedom to meet new people and learn new things all the time.  Freedom to step away from society.  Freedom to be on my own.  Freedom to think.

At the same time, I want financial security.  Enough to live comfortably, to support a family, and to send the kids off to college without loans looming over them.  Basically, what I had the privilege of growing up with.  There are few gifts like responsible and successful parents who allow you to start your working life loan-free.  I’d like to be able to provide that as well.  In terms of long-term career goals, my main focus is sustainability in all aspects – mentally, emotionally, financially, physically.

So… any ideas?

Cosmopolite

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Today I got followed by @nanyate on Twitter and I was intrigued enough to go to her blog because of an offer for free SoyJoy for your office!  Turns out she’s one of five bloggers competing at SoyJoy‘s GI Joy challenge.  I’ll admit, I was tempted by her offer of a free customized WordPress theme!  Nonetheless, I love to help people out, so I went to vote for her and posted on Twitter about it.  The person who helps her generate the most votes will earn her prize.  I don’t know how she can track it, but hey, no harm in trying, right?  So everyone, go vote for her!  Her name is Ivy and she’s the girl shown doing the half squat that the SoyJoy commercials have been using.

Ok, now that the backstory is out of the way, let me get to the point.  I am a huge fan of “about” pages, so of course, what else did I do after being entertained by the SoyJoy challenge she wrote about but go check her story out?  Turns out she has a fabulously-written and immensely cute section dedicated to who she is.  Not only do you get the basics of her life like her educational background, but she also has five “Ivy the _____” sections detailing herself in different roles.  It was from here that I learned of this term third culture kid, which apparently means someone who moved abroad with their parents and took both their culture of origin and their culture of assimilation to create a kind of mesh of cultures, or a third culture.  As such, they tend to consider themselves more of citizens of the world than of any particular country.  As I was reading through the description, I kept thinking to myself, “Gosh, that sounds like my life.”  Yet, I felt like something was off and that I shouldn’t fit the bill, even though I moved with my parents and my culture is very much a confused mix of both cultural influences.

chinese and american passports side by side

Adopting both cultures.


Initially, I thought that maybe it was because these people moved later in life, like after they had started school in their birth country, but from the description, plenty of people could have moved as toddlers and still be considered TCKs.  So why, then did I feel like I shouldn’t belong?  Well, it turns out that I came across one line that made is all clear to me: “TCKs are distinguished from other immigrants by the fact that TCKs do not expect to settle down permanently in the places where they live.”  Ah ha!  I knew there was a tangible difference in being a first/second generation American and being a TCK!  And it’s a critical difference – I plan on spending the rest of my life with my home base in my adopted country whereas they plan on returning to their country of origin, so their immigration is always temporary, transient.  So in the end, I am an immigrant but they are essentially visitors, passing through (even if that takes many years).  We’ll both adopt certain parts of the cultures that we come from and live in, but in different ways and for different purposes.

screenshot of laelene's livejournalWell, in reading about all of that, it led me to the idea of being a cosmopolite – someone who is cosmopolitan.  I’ve never really paid attention to the word, probably because of the magazine that takes its name, which I find to be too focused on looks and being superficial.  I never thought of it as a useful way to convey being “at home in all parts of the world,” so I guess it was meant for the meaning of “conversant with many spheres of interest.”  Mostly I think they were just going with the image of being “sophisticated and cultured” without actually really going for a well-traveled woman.  Whatever the case, this is the first time I’ve actually given a second thought to the term and I find that I connect with the description quite well (except for the sophisticated part, perhaps… I don’t know if I can claim that much).  I feel like I am made up of many components from around the world, can feel comfortable in all parts of the world, and can connect with many spheres of interest.  This is exactly the look and feel I was going for in my most recent LiveJournal blog – a jetsetter who is elegant and sophisticated.  Well-cultured, well-mannered, and well-read.  So thank you Ivy for leading me to give this term a chance, this word that so describes what I’m striving for.

Viral/grassroots marketing: spreading like wildfire

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: ,
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Since there’s all this talk about the swine flu and worries if it possibly spreading to epidemic proportions, I thought it was appropriate to address this idea of viral spread.  After all, the concept of viral marketing is based in how things spread like diseases.  You can have widespread influence without having to be a hot shot nowadays, much like one little mutant germ multiplying can cause havoc.  The tools on the internet allow you to share with complete strangers, so now it’s all about how you work the system to get your ideas out.  Play your numbers right and you can go far.

I don’t know if it’s just my interest or if grassroots marketing really is as hot a topic as I think it is.  I personally believe it is a powerful way to get your message across, but it certainly does come with its downside.  So let’s explore the pros and cons of this type of marketing strategy.  Traditionally, marketing has been all about reach through huge audiences via mass media – newspapers, magazines, television ads.  With the advent of "social media" or what have you, individuals are empowered to connect with each other on a scale never possible before.  Along with this comes a lot of unforeseen opportunities.

First of all, social media has a much lower upfront cost as compared to established media.  However, the trade-off is a lot more time spent to maintain it – after all, it’s all about creating and sustaining conversations and relationships.  You can spend a lot of money on a marketing campaign or you can spend a lot of time building your brand and reputation via social media.

Secondly, social media has a far reach.  It basically operates on the word of mouth spread that can function much like compound interest, multiplying in power over time (or in this case, people).  Everyone’s got their own personal and professional networks that they can tap into.  Then each of those people in turn have others who they know outside of the original person’s network, people they can tell the news to and continue with this branching out.  Much like a tree, one original trunk can yield so many more branches!

Similarly, being able to get to so many people and gain this level of visibility is one of the main benefits.  And this can all be done with little planning in terms of marketing strategy.  In fact, it can’t really be controlled.  Instead, this acts as a sort of quality control, ensuring that the product, service, or information must be good and valid for it to get the kind of spread it wants.  Of course, there will always be those bad apples that get through, the spam of the social media world, but the value of viral spread far outweighs the drawbacks of those and smart consumers can easily spot and filter out the useless stuff.

Yet, because it is nearly impossible to control what people choose to say or do, especially with a certain level of anonymity in nearly all sites, it can be dangerous tool too.  When people hide behind a facade, they get bolder with their actions and do some harmful things.  It’s hard enough to track who did it, much less prosecute them for misbehavior.  The difficulty in regulation can breach upon a lot of rights yet also be defended by the freedom of speech.  This is definitely something that the lawmakers of each country should be looking at, to protect people from abuse of the system.

Finally, everything that goes up at any point, even if only for a few seconds, may leave a permanent mark.  Between tracking and the immediate spread of sensational news, even if you slip just once, it’s hard to ensure that that won’t be following you for a long time to come.  Even things sent in private or confidentially can be leaked, so tread carefully in everything you do.  Things in digital form can be permanent in ways that you never want.

Social media can be a robust medium for grassroots marketing, if used carefully and well.  There’s a lot to explore still and I’m sure people’s mindsets will change along with this new way of reaching out to them.  Now it’s a matter of keeping up with the new forms of media, but also not forgetting about some of the old methods.  A good mixture can be achieved and it will vary depending on the aim, industry, and target audience.  Nonetheless, social media is sure to be a key new part to a revamped recipe.  It offers the personalized attention that people have been lacking!

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