Who says everything you do has to be productive?

There are probably better, more productive ways to spend a Friday evening, but fuck it. I like to get together and have a few beers with friends.

More often than not, I'm doing that at #evfn, or East Valley Friday Nights. #evfn is shorter. And yes, dammit, you need the hashtag. And yes, dammit, it's lower-cased. Don't make me get all typographical on your ass.

The history of #evfn and the other #_fns here in Phoenix is well documented. I wanted to talk tonight about why I put forth the energy to organize it each and every week. And since I love the bullet points, let's go that route:

Image by sheiladeeisme via Flickr

• It's a lot of fun. See the title of this website. Fun means a lot to me. And the people who make up #evfn are fun people. That's the one underlying factor -- if you're not fun, stay home. You won't like hanging out with us. Or you'll sit off in the corner and never come back. That sucks, because we're a damned inclusive group. So get out of the corner and introduce yourself to me. I'll do my damnedest to make sure you have fun and meet these cool people.
  
  
• It has no deeper meaning. I heard someone once call it a networking group. I almost coughed up my beer. Which really would have pissed me off, because I like good beer. Leave the business cards at home, please. Yeah, more than one person has met another person that wound up becoming a client or co-worker, but that's not what this is about. If you walk in with a stack of cards and start passing them out like fliers, you probably won't come back. Not because we'll call you out, but because you'll quickly get that our event and your goals aren't aligned. Oh, and we'll make fun of you after you leave. Early.
  
  
• I don't do it alone. Often times -- this week, for instance -- I put the word out for others to handle the organization. They do. Thanks, Derek. This isn't my event. I don't own it. Sure, I have a lot of say in where it happens and not everyone always agrees. Hi again, Derek. But that's OK. If you don't like where it is one week, don't go. Hell, there are only a few of us that go almost each and every time. That's completely OK. In fact, it's by design. And if you have a place you want us to go to, I'll happily give you the reigns for an evening.
  
  
• It gets me out. I work too hard. Or at least too much. You probably do, too. I come home from work and get on the lappy. So does Sheila. I work on the lappy most weekends. So does Sheila. If it weren't for #evfn, I'd become a true hermit. So in effect, you're all helping me say sane. And allowing me to pretend I'm really social in front of my wife.

So that's it. That's why I do this. This coming Friday, we're going to a new place in old town Chandler. After that, we're back at our normal Final Friday stomping grounds -- Whole Foods off Ray. And next month...? Lots of great places. Lots of great people. You should do something like this. Really, it's pretty easy.

Tonight: Social Media 101 - Facebook privacy settings

Image via Wikipedia

Tonight's Social Media Club Phoenix will be doing a deep-dive into the world of Facebook. The session is all about tips, trends, and tactics for winning Facebook marketing. Some really smart friends of mind are on the panel. If you're in Phoenix and are free tonight at 6:30, you should go.

Prior to that, I'll be once again hosting a Social Media 101 talk for those who are new to the field. It's a safe place to ask what you think might be silly questions. I try and keep the old-school pundits away from the meeting, as I want all you noobs to have your chance to get up to speed. Get a few "experts" in the room and it quickly devolves to an inside-baseball conversation that few beyond the inner circle cares about.

My topic tonight dovetails nicely with what you'll learn in the big room later. I'll be addressing Facebook privacy settings. They've been through some revisions recently. You should know what your sharing, to whom your sharing it with, and how to change things to better suit your needs. Facebook is a growing microcosm of activity. Knowing what is happening with the data you provide -- or maybe don't provide -- the service is a Good Thing.

My talk begins promptly at 5:30. We only have about 45 minutes before the troop starts to show up, so be there a little early so you don't miss anything. It's at the Jobing.com corporate offices near the Biltmore.

If you feel like staying for the full SMC meetup, go ahead. Or go home afterward. It's your choice. Both events are free. They are also highly attended, so come get a good seat!

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Social media defined

Ask a dozen social media experts to define social media and you'll get a score of different answers. I don't understand this. The concept just isn't that hard.

I sat down with local-legend Jeff Moriarty to prove that very fact. Luckily for us -- hell, for you -- Joe Holt was there to capture the definition of social media on video.



It's simple. It's elegant. It's completey accessible. It's the type of advice anyone can quickly and easily implement immediately. Social media doesn't need to be hard.<sup>*

* - But who says it can't be funny?</sup>

My pants are coming off in public this Sunday

Image by ousooner44 via Flickr

Last year, over 100 people came together for a common cause: the cause of taking off our pants and riding on the Light Rail.

OK, so we didn't try and cure cancer. But we sure had a lot of fun! We got great local, national and even international news coverage. Rumor has it my bare legs were seen on Scandinavian television the next day. Guess they don't have a lot to do up there. That, or looking at my gams keeps them warm at night. My money is on the former.

It's time to do it again. This coming Sunday, January 10th. You really should come out and take your pants off with us, as it's a grand old time. I'll be there again. With no pants on.

Breaking off the business

Over the last 45 days or so, I've used this blog to see if I could change my focus. Specifically, I wanted to know if I could write posts tailored to entrepreneurs, organizations and businesses. I've been encouraged by those entities, whether at speaking engagements or as a consultant, to talk more on business topics. And as this is my primary vehicle to communicate, I went deep down the rabbit hole.

I used a site called Wordle to track how I've been doing. I feed Wordle the my blog's feed and it did the rest. As my feed only contains posts from November 30th on, it's a true picture of what I've been writing about.

[caption id="attachment_1267" align="alignnone" width="500" caption="Word cloud based on the content of this site for the last month."][/caption]

With the exception of the "fishing" post I made for fun, this rings quite true with what I was trying to do. It clearly shows emphasis on doing business in the web-world of today.

But does that match what people actually want out of the blog? I don't get a lot of traffic here from search engines. It never was the goal. But that means that any key words that are used to actually bring people to the site might be more "pure" than if I had embarked on a huge SEO campaign. With the magic of Google Analytics, I can easily export the keywords used to bring traffic to the site. And when I export that list over to Wordle, the picture changes:

[caption id="attachment_1268" align="alignnone" width="500" caption="Word cloud for keywords used to find this site"][/caption]

It would appear that my reputation precedes me. There are few "business" words here, and a fair amount of social media. But the key terms seem to be all about me. And that makes sense, since this blog was all about me and the fun things I was doing. Until about a month ago, that is.

So it's time for some changes. Yes, again. Those who were missing the old me will see more of that. Those that liked the new me and didn't even know that apparently I'm an asshole shouldn't fear too much. I'm keeping the near-daily posting going. Hopefully here and there. But most certainly there. Where, you ask? I've revived an old brand I created -- A Simpler Way -- and am repurposing it to fit my modern needs. The site isn't close to done, though I hope to be spending some quality time with it over the holiday breaks. If you want to keep up with my digital business content, I'll be posting it over there.

This site will also go through some changes, going back to it's original intent -- things I'm doing that are fun. So if you want to subscribe to both, feel free. Or if you want just one side of me, that's OK. Expect the occasional cross over. And I'm pulling lots of archives from here and posting them over there. If you think you're seeing double, you're not. It's just me moving things around.

Thanks for hanging out with me through the experiment. And hi to all the new people!

The battle between the biggest and the best

Image by daftgirly via Flickr

It's hard to become the biggest at something. For companies, it often means understanding market opportunities, what the masses want and beating the hell out of the competition in price. It's not a field in which individuals can play without being a part of -- or leading -- an organization.

It's hard to become the best at something. Becoming the best often means relentless dedication to excellence, innovation and detail. Here companies and individuals are on more of an even field.

But becoming the biggest and the best at something? It seems those two things are at odds with one another. And if you take stock of the companies that purport to be one or the other -- or both -- you'll see how rare it is.

The brand of beer that outsells all the rest by orders of magnitude? That doesn't make it the best. I'd argue all the ones in my refrigerators (Yes, I have more than one. I like beer.) could vie for the best, but they are a proverbial drop in the bucket when sales volume is examined.

The author making the rounds on the talk-circuit with a book that's burning up the charts? Neither are the best. But any that hard-core book fans would agree is the best is likely unapproachable by the masses.

Though it's argued often, biggest is a quantitative measurement that leaves little to interpretation. I understand that best is subjective, but it's a demonstrable qualitative characteristic. So while companies often say "we're the biggest and the best", they aren't. They may be one or the other, but it's difficult to be both.

Or is it? Here are a few examples of where I think the biggest is also the best. I'd love to get your opinion on these as well as some other examples.

• MP3 players - The iPod reigns king in sales and in usability.
  
• Ketchup - Not that I use it, but I have it on good authority that Heinz is pretty tasty.
  
• Blizzard Entertainment - I'm no gamer and I understand there is a wide-range of opinion on this, but WoW seems to be one of those waves that didn't quit. And when Diablo 3 hits the stands, it'll do it again.
  
• Search engines -- Google. No further discussion required, though I'm sure some of you are Quixotic enough to try.

There have to be others. Please discuss in the comments.

The missing revolution

Image via CrunchBase

What if you threw a revolution and no one came?

Contenture is shutting down. No, you probably never heard of them and probably won't miss them. And since I didn't even know of the company until I saw notice of their demise, I won't presume to offer cogent reasons why their business model never got off the ground. But here's the key reason they gave on their blog:

[W]e were unable to get any big publishers to use the service, which was going to be the key to our success. Without any large publishers, the economics just don’t work.

I bring this news up here as a cautionary tale in two parts:

Labels are important.
Contenture billed their service as "The Micropayment Revolution". That phrase was part of their logo on their blog. That revolution lasted exactly 192 days from launch-date to shut-down announcement. And as they say above, the revolution wasn't adopted by key entities. Revolution is a pretty serious word. It brings up serious connotations.

Lesson: Be sure the words you use match the reality of your intent.

Don't ignore the Convenience Arrow
After reading the links above that describe the business model, it seems to go backwards. Sure, blocking ads would be nice, but it does little to enhance convenience. And it's certainly not worth paying for. At least not to me. And obviously, not a lot of other people either.

Lesson: There exists a difference between annoying and intruding. One I'll pay you to get rid of. The other I'm really good at ignoring.

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