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Chris Brogan

Aug 16
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Six Ways to Keep your Blogging Commitment

By Communications

More than 95 percent of blogs are abandoned! By virtue of sticking it out, staying in the game and continuing to blog, you (and I) become leaders in the blogosphere. Here are six ways to keep up the blog:

1. Schedule your time to write. What time can you give to your blogging efforts? 20 minutes a day when you’ve turned everything else off and you’re in a chair tapping away at a keyboard will do the trick. Are you a better writer in the morning or evening? Put that time on your calendar and protect it like it’s your child.

2. Get a blogging partner – keep one another accountable by reading and commenting on each other’s posts.

3. Guest post for someone else – sometimes a deadline on someone else’s schedule will kick your butt into gear.

4. Institute a bribe (or get your partner to do it. ) I will share with you that I just offered my teammates for the collaborative corporate blog I manage an opportunity to win a Jar of Pie. Suddenly everyone is enthusiastic.

5. Join a group of other local bloggers and meet them for coffee, lunch, drinks — whatever — just get together in person periodically to talk about the blogging process, to learn from one another and be inspired.

6. Think about why you started your blog. Why was it important to you? What is the blog’s purpose? Write that down and stick it on the wall or the fridge or somewhere you’ll see it and it will remind you, often, of why you’re here, blogging like the rest of us nut jobs. It’s important, and you ARE making a difference to someone.

Need more help? I highly recommend Chris Brogan’s post How to Blog Almost Every Day.

Dec 01
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Arrogance and the Social Media “Expert”

By Uncategorized

I eschew the term expert when talking about social media – preferring the term “specialist.” I don’t think anyone can be an expert in social media – with a field so new and ever growing and changing there are only specialists – people like me who devote lots of time and energy to staying on top of the game. I think there are people who are passionate about social media and the power it holds, but to call oneself an expert smacks of an undeserved arrogance.

A word about arrogance, though, as I acknowledge that those of us in this field have a certain amount of it. I argue that it has been necessary and it is an attribute that has grown out of a need to be absolutely convinced and convincing when sharing the benefits of engaging in social media for business. We are the self-taught forerunners of this field who have spent, in most cases, the better part of the last seven years defending the internet. We’ve had to stare down corporate leaders afraid to dip their toes into online waters and demonstrate beyond the shadow of a doubt that the benefits far outweigh the risks.

When most of us started in this area the word blogger was said in the same tone as cancer; bloggers rose from the pasty-faced basement dwellers to a chosen few who make millions and others who just make a difference. By definition, a blogger almost has to have some level of conceit to trust that their thoughts and online ponderings would be of interest to anyone at all.

I’ve been part of an audience of those learning at the feet of those who have taught social media in the PR industry, this guy, this guy, this guy and this guy in particular. They all have one mannerism in common – a dismissive shaking of the head when a member of the community begins down the road of denial (it won’t work! we don’t have time! we can’t allow our people to self-publish! we need control!). I’ve noted this move and truly don’t find it arrogant (although corporate leaders, uncomfortable still with this deep end of the pool into which they’ve been thrown most likely do). I find it admirable – and it’s that confidence, that absolute gut-deep knowledge that you’re right and you know what you’re talking about and can prove it that I believe I’ve realized for myself. Does that make me an expert? No, but I’m practicing that head shake for the next time a doubter is in the room.