Image by Jobriga via Flickr

Since I was a day late with my last blog post, I have decided to be a day early with this one. That is just the way I am.

I have been working all week on a grant proposal for one of my clients. It has been about 15 years since I did something like this and I am having to relearn a lot of stuff. Still, I had a $70 million track record back then and I think that I can still do it. It just takes some time to catch up. As far as I can see, the fundamentals have not changed–but the details certainly have. I do have to say that it is not real easy to make a living as a professional writer and that it probably helps to have a range of skills for producing a range of products–press releases, articles, newsletters, grants, etc.

The hardest part for me has been convincing myself that I can still produce. I spent the last twelve years or so creating and managing various forms of social media. Returning to more conventional forms of the written word has proven to be much harder than I expected. Read the rest of this entry »

I’m a self-confessed social media amateur and a twitter addict. It started when I started hanging around with a techy crowd and now it’s taken over. We live in the instant age. Message and branding has to have instant impact, websites are dated in a week and it’s a full time job just keeping up with the terminology. We now speak a whole new language and have had to learn on the hoof how to communicate a clear message.

In my business I’ve been developing the SM channels for the last 6 months and have managed to integrate this as central to our sales, marketing and delivery plan. (We deliver consultancy and training to recruitment Businesses.). From this I have 10 commandments to pass on when deciding on social media strategy that I hope will help you in choosing your path: Read the rest of this entry »

Social media is changing the definition of community. If you break the word down, you get “common” and “unity.” Fitting, since communities form between people who have something in common; they are united by the things they share. Often, communities form among people who see each other on a regular basis, but in the digital world, they can also exist among groups of people who may never meet.

There are millions of people who log onto social networking sites every day, from across the globe. These sites provide us with an invaluable opportunity to connect with people from different states, countries and continents, people who we have so much in common with, but would never have crossed paths with otherwise. It’s even possible for some of these “connections” to become friends, if you spend the time and effort to get to know them one on one, beyond what you read on each other’s blogs and Twitter feeds.

Online communities, like friendships, take extra time and effort, but there are a number of pre-formed community sites that are a great place to start: Gen Y sites Brazen Careerist and 20somethingbloggers, for moms who tweet: twitter moms, and BlogHer for women bloggers, just to name a few. But, these are only starting places; it’s from these greater communities that we can form our own smaller circles. Read the rest of this entry »