This is my last post….

At least on Mentalbreak.wordpress.com. I started this blog in April 2008 to practice my writing skills (putting my journalism degree from IU to work) and to take a break from the daily routine of corporate marketing. Now, after a six-month break to participate in Seth Godin’s Alternative MBA (SAMBA), I have a new direction. That direction is The 150 Project. You can read an update about SAMBA on Seth’s blog, here.

Please make sure to update your RSS reader or email subscriptions to my new blog and webpage (that I created myself) located at 150project.com. You will find a few old post from Mental Break and my new ones that focus on social media and online communities.

If you have any suggestions on how I can improve The 150 Project blog and topics you would like to see, please let me know!

See you at The 150 Project!

The White House joins the conversation

President Barack Obama started his career as a community organizer in Chicago 20 years ago. In the Presidential Campaign he applied these skills to create the successful community organizing website, MyBarackObama.com. Now that he is in the White House, Obama is turning to the American community again to help embody his goal of making government inclusive, transparent, accountable and responsible. This past week he announced the launch of the Office of Public Engagement with the mission to serve as an open front door to the White House. To do this, the goal of the office is to engage in online and offline conversations with American Community. Online they have created Whitehouse.gov as a way to communicate the latest happenings in the US Government using social media such as blogs, YouTube, Flickr and Twitter. The website also serves as an online outlet to send questions, comments, concerns, or well-wishes to the President or his staff. Offline they plan to hold town halls and other in-person events throughout his term (not just during the campaign).

Gone are the days of the one-way, closed communications. In a Web 2.0 world, where the consumer holds the power through the web and social media tools, companies must adjust to survive. The Office of Public Engagement is a great example how one of the largest organizations known for red tape and one-way conversations has made the change. It’s all about having conversations with your customers and not at. What are you doing to engage and listen to your customers?

I think the White House has done a great job to incorporate social media and conversations with their community on their website. I have highlighted how they do this on my Squidoo lens – Tribe Communication Tools: Whitehouse.gov. Check it out!

Lessons from my conducting debut

Conducting an orchestra is like leading a dynamic company. I learned this first hand at the Music Paradigm this past week. This amazing experience is the creation of world renown conductor, Roger Nierenberg. Here are a few takeaways I experienced:

• Listen from a different angle – This was my first experience sitting inside the orchestra – It was amazing! But I realized it does not sound as good when sitting in the audience (or the conductor stand). I realized the horns on the left side did not hear the same full effect as the Cello on the right side. They all looked to the front to receive the direction from the conductor. When you are in an organization you hear and see what is around you and receive instructions from the top. Not everyone can stand at the front and conduct. What would happen if you moved around and traded places with an oboe? Would you have a better understanding of what they do and hear? When you went back to your position, you may view the orchestra and sound in a different way. It is always good to move around once in a while to hear things a little differently.
• Find the sweet spot – There is a fine line to walk between giving too much direction or not enough. He conducted the same song twice. First, with little direction and enthusiasm and the second with overpowering force and exact direction. By talking to the orchestra after each song he was able to learn that after the first song they would prefer more direction and for the after the second song they felt micromanaged and unable to reach their full-potential. The key was communicating and receiving feedback on his style. By communicating he was able to better adjust his approach and find the sweet spot to lead.
• The dynamics of a team – One of my favorite instruments is the violin. Roger did a few exercises with the section of 4 violins to show their team dynamics. When someone did not play as well or played to their own tune it still sounded okay. Each time the three other team members were able to adjust to carry the team. Ofcourse, it sounded best when they all played in perfectly harmony. The lesson was that things do not fall apart if you have your own style or someone on your team is slack. Hopefully, you have a team that works together to balance out your style.
• Leading without a leader – For two songs, Roger walked away. What was the orchestra to do? They were given a song and asked to lead without a conductor. There was a moment of hesitation, and then they knew what to do. One person took the lead (as expected it was the first chair violin) and then the teams began to lead each other. You could see their eyes straying away from the music sheets and towards the first chair violin or the teams around them for direction, however, they were reliant on each other and not the conductor in the front. A successful company is able to still function without a leader.
• Every small move makes a difference – I actually had the chance to go on stage and conduct the orchestra (with Roger’s help, ofcourse). With Roger leading my hand I was able to conduct a full orchestra. When asked what it was like, I could only sum it up as, “magical!” Standing in the front where all the sounds come together in perfect harmony was a powerful experience. Before we started conducting he let me in on the plan that we were going to have smooth movements. He noticed earlier that the orchestra had the tendency to hit hard notes and wanted to smooth that out. I could hear with the slight move of my hands how the orchestra would change their tempo. It made me realize that a good leader can see and hear everything fits together at the top and adjust accordingly with the smallest movement to make everything come together


This was an amazing experience that has changed the way that I look at leadership, dynamics of a team and orchestras! All the lessons from The Music Paradigm are soon available to all in Rogers upcoming book, Maestro: A Little Story About Leading by Listening. This is published by Portfolio and will be available on October 20, 2009. I have already added it to my wish list!

*Click on photos to enlarge. Photo’s by Glenn Wasserman.

The Ego vs. Smart Marketer

15% of the audience in a Broadway shows only attends one show in their lifetime.

All over NYC and beyond you see ads targeting new show goers. This is the ego marketing wanting 1% more of the new audience.

The smart marketer would focus on how to get showgoers who attend 4x shows to increase to 6x.

The smart marketer would focus on the conversations they are having with current customers and how they are enabling/encouraging them to have conversations with their friends.

Building a plane in midflight

I attended the Behance 99% Conference last month. It was a conference for creative professionals about how to get things done. As a former conference planner and attendee of conferences large and small, I have to say that this was one of the most organized and well done conferences I have attended in a long time. Especially since it was their first one. I would recommend it to anyone (creative or wannabe) in the future.

My favorite speaker (next to Seth Godin, ofcourse), was Scott Thomson. If you are an avid reader of my blog, you will remember that I wrote a post in mid-April titled, Lessons on community organizing from the Barack Obama Campaign. Scott Thomson was the lead designer for MyBarackObama.com. His speech was great – engaging slides (with little type), well organized ideas and he connected with the audience. My favorite line of his was, “Designing and building the community was like building a plane in mid-flight.” I thought that was a great description of the times where you just have to get things done and move on. I look forward to seeing what he does next!
Here is a a video from his presentation.

4 Easy Steps to Pick-up a Girl (or a Customer)

For the first time in history, companies have the ability to have conversations with their customers and not just talk at them. Tools such as Facebook, Twitter and Ning allow them to join in on the conversations. The conversations are going on, however, companies are often hesitant and scared to participate. It is a new way of interacting with their customers. Questions arise such as: Will they talk back? What if I am rejected? Will they like me?

These questions sound familiar?

These are the same questions a single guy may ask when wanting to pick-up a girl. Think about companies as a single guy on the prowl for a girl at a bar. The same steps in The Art of the Pick-up can be applied to companies looking to become involved in the social media conversations.

Step 1: Just say ‘hi’. Saying ‘hi’ takes little effort and can yield high rewards. If you hear they are already talking about something you know about such as your products, you already have something in common. Just say hi and introduce yourself.

Step 2: Focus the conversation on them. Ask open-ended questions such as, “What do you like about the product?” What would you want to change?” “Tell me more about yourself.”

Step 3: Ask them to dance or buy them a drink. This is not a necessary step, however, it helps you engage. It is a way for them to learn more about you. You can show off your skills or offer them insights or free offers to your products. If they say ‘yes’ you know there is some interest and they are committed to talk to you longer.

Step 4: The close. The conversation is going well, but eventually it has to end. You must be focused on extracting something out of your interaction with the girl, either her phone-number, a promise for a new meeting or a kiss (aka a sale). This is the most important step to success. Get their number and permission to call them again to continue the conversation.

The secret to success is to not be afraid. It is just a conversation. If you are genuine and follow through with these 4 steps you are sure to find a date!

Should you have an online community?

I have blogged about The future of marketing and Do you have a community? By now, you can probably tell that I am really big on community building. There are many benefits to having an online community, or, what Seth calls ‘creating a Tribe.’ However, you have to ask, “Should you have an online community?” The answer could be NO. Here are some reasons you should NOT have an online community:

* If you do not think your community will enjoy connecting with others with the same interest.
* If you have several unhappy customer and you are afraid they will talk to each other.
* If you want complete control over everything said in the community.
* If you cannot deliver “services” the community wants.
* If you cannot tie back the community to your core business values.
* If you do not think a community will scale your business.
* If you cannot figure out who your community is (after you read this).
* If you have other successful methods of permission marketing.

After reading these questions and your answers are YES, an online community is not for you. If you answers are NO, it is time to start thinking about the goals of the community. To be continued…

I did not get the memo

On news stands now is the Forbes April 27 issue, ‘The World’s Best Companies.’ Turn to page 66 and you will find this:
I did not get the memo that we were not supposed to smile. To read the full article, “The Apprentices” click here.

Lessons on community organizing from the Barack Obama Campaign

The March 2009 issue of Fast Company magazine has a great article titled, How Chris Hughes Helped Launch Facebook and the Barack Obama Campaign. It is the untold story of how Chris Hughes, today only 25 years old, helped create two of the most successful start-ups in modern history, Facebook and My.BarackObama.com.

The article is a great story of how online communities can make a difference in your organization or company. It is a clear explanation of how Facebook and the Barack Obama campaign are both dedicated to the proposition that communities and the way we share and interact within them are vitally important.

The online community platform was My.BarackObama.com, or MyBO for short. It allowed Obama supporters to create groups, plan events, raise funds, download tools, and connect with one another. MyBO also let the campaign reach its most passionate supporters cheaply and effectively. By the time the campaign was over, volunteers had created more than 2 million profiles on the site, planned 200,000 offline events, formed 35,000 groups, posted 400,000 blogs, and raised $30 million on 70,000 personal fund-raising pages. Wow!

Here are some of the key points about community building that I pulled out from the article:

• Improving life digitally – At Facebook and the Barack Obama campaign, Huges was just, “Helping real people do what they want to do in their real lives.” In the case of the election, people wanted to be involved and help to make the change, they just did not know how. Barackobama.com and MyBO.com allowed them to connect virtually and in person. It provided them the tools to get involved and organize new communities.
• Make the organization all about the community – The rules were set from the top down. Obama was clear that he wanted the theme of his campaign to be about the community and wanted a nation of organizers. Having the online platform and tools was a critical piece to making this happen and supporting the rapidly growing community.
• Online communities are about being ahead of the game – When the campaign needed to turn to the community, they were already there. When heading to caucuses in Colorado and Missouri, they were surprised to see that the community was already half-organized. The online tools provided the support they needed to organize and prepare. They just had to be there to support the community (see above).
• Build around a commonality – Whether it’s a company or a campaign, you must build around a commonality. It’s only valuable if its real people and real communities, otherwise its just playing around online. In the campaign the commonality was Obama.
• Creating a new position in the organization – When you community grows as large and fast as BarackObama.com/MyBO.com operations also grows. Hughes put a new position on the campaign organization chart – New Media. MyBO became only one of their activities under this umbrella. They were also part film studio, part media outlet, part design shop, part analytical geek squad.
• People need structure. When creating an online community or holding a conference call or meeting, create an organized structure or plan for everyone to follow.

Hughes biggest lesson of the campaign: Trusting a community can produce dramatic and unexpected results. Click here to read the full article.

Do you have a community?

A community is a group of people who share the same interest. The question is not, “Can you build a community?” Communities exist or they do not. The correct question is, “Do you have a community and how can you harness it?”

It is not always clear from a business context if every product or service has a community. Think about toothpaste. Not a lot of people care about their toothpaste. However, you can think about community from a different perspective such as a dentist or a mother. Tooth care professionals such as dentist have an interest in researching what toothpaste is the best for their patients. Mother’s who are concerned with their children’s teeth are very interested in finding and discussing which toothpaste is the best. How can you harness these two groups who have a common interest and create a community around the product? The community always existed it is just creating a forum to bring them together.

The future of marketing

In my former life (pre-SAMBA) I was a marketing manager for a start-up technology company. The common theme was, “Do more with less.” Less money, people, technology and time! This was 4 years ago when social networking platforms and tools were just taking off. If I had the same tools available today, the first thing I would do is build an online community. Then shape my strategy for sales, marketing R&D, and support to utilize my community:

Sales – Customers are inundated with marketing messages. It is proven that word of mouth marketing and recommendations have much larger success rate. An online community will serve as your volunteer salesforce.

Marketing – Integrated marketing is expensive and hard to break through the clutter. Posting a message to your top customers through a community platform is free and towards highly qualified leads.

Research and Development – The solution to a problem cannot always be found in-house. Crowdsource your idea, solution, advertising, packaging, etc with your online community.

Support – Hiring a person to answer questions is expensive. Having a community driven online support team is free.

The future of marketing is strategically building and leveraging online communities. For examples of how companies are utilizing their online communities visit my Squidoo Lenses on Tribe Communication Tools: Etsy and HAIR the Broadway Musical.

Online Community Business Forum Recap

It has been one week since the OCBF conference. I am very glad that I made the trek to Sonoma. It was a tease only being there for a few days and not being able to enjoy the gorgeous scenery. Overall, the conference was top notch — from the high quality of speakers and attendees to the meeting area. I have about 22 pages of notes, however, I have highlighted a few takeaways:

The importance of context and reputation on any website! I participated in the break out session with Randy Farmer discussing the six types of community context. Here is a link to learn more about reputation systems. This is actually the first chapter of his book on the topic. You can give feedback on the chapters as he is writing – a true crowdsource project.

We are a ‘buffalo culture’ we consume and throw away the rest. Thor Muller, CEO of Satisfaction taught us to rethink how we are interacting with our customers. Great explanation on Tom Hambargers blog.

Traffic & behavior DO NOT EQUAL VALUE (but they do help drive it). ROI comes from when the community is not there, you will see ROI drop.

Social media services taking off combine social interactivity combined with content discovery. Examples include: Twine, Facebook (not del.icio.us – because does not have social interactivity).

When you notice a dip in the flow of your community, explore beyond your application. Oftentimes it is an external application not reporting back to your site.

Undervalued measurements of communities – 1) a new user encouraged to join by a current user. 2) Measuring community wants to a CRM system.

Need to know when ‘not’ to build a community. Be able to articulate why not do it and why/why not benefit company.

Best insight into community is not software such as Radian6, it is the people who are the watchers.

The open source community is unique with its natural transparency, bottom-up innovation and interaction. Not all companies and communities have this model (but strive to do so).

New definition = Econometrics. Taking data on two sides of the equation (output – what driving trying to get more customers and revenue) and on the other side is all the inputs getting from the arena of social media. Take the results and put into optimization routine to determine what marketing budget should be and where allocated.

The Online Community Business Forum

I was very fortunate to receive an invitation to the Online Community Business Forum in Sonoma, California March 19-20. Even though this is very far from NYC, I think it is one of the most valuable events all year for anyone in the business of online communities. The two-day forum is full of great sessions and excellent speakers.

I am excited to discuss The 150 Project at the conference and learn about the newest community technology and trends for 150 Project clients.

Sessions I am most excited about:

Community Strategy: Thriving in a Challenging Economy

Measuring & Improving Community Performance

Sourcing Innovative Product & Service Ideas from Communities

Speakers I am most excited about:

Allen Blue, Co-Founder – LinkedIn

Craig Warner – Google

Jen Burton, Community Manager – Digg

Erica Kuhl – Salesforce.com

I will be taking plenty of notes, twittering and blogging about the event.

To follow the twitter stream visit: http://twitter.com/ocbf2009

The 150 Project

Sorry I have been absent from my blog, but my excuse is worth it! I’ve been very busy working on The 150 Project. What is that you ask? Let me explain…

Dunbar’s Rule states that 150 is the maximum number of people that one can maintain a meaningful social relationship.

Think about it…You probably have hundreds of ‘social’ friends on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, etc. How many of those do you really interact with? I personally think there are only about 150 people that I have a meaningful and stable social relationship with. These are the people I could run into at a bar and have a thoughtful conversation with (I’ll remember their name and know what was happening in their lives).

Malcom Gladwell does a great job of applying this rule to businesses. In The Tipping Point, he explores how groups smaller than 150 cannot influence many people outside them. Larger groups tend to become impersonal. Knowing that, we begin to realize that one creates a large fad by first creating a series of smaller groups.

Applying this to marketing and sales, many questions arise:

Do you know who your 150 customers are?

Are you connecting with the core 150 customers and beyond?

How are these 150 customers connecting with each other?

What are best practices to enable and grow multiple groups of 150?

This is where The 150 Project comes in.

The focus of my career has been creating customer communities for sales, marketing, support and R&D. At JBoss and Red Hat, I created several successful marketing programs to bring the open source community together online and off. Now, I have the fortunate opportunity to study marketing under Seth Godin, the author of Tribes. I am taking my past experience building communities at Red Hat, plus, my studies with Seth in the SAMBA program to embark on a new journey to help companies build meaningful customer communities applying the rule of 150.

There is much more to come from The 150 Project. The website will be up soon and I have already begun my manifesto. If you would like to discuss The 150 Project further and best practices on how you can apply Dunbar’s Rule to your business, please contact me at beccaNY@gmail.com

Learn more about Dunbar’s Rule of 150. Follow my Del.icio.us tags.

Things I did last week

1. Attended the first ever JBoss Virtual Experience. It was a great success and kudos to the Red Hat team. Check out the recorded event on-demand!
2. Met for drinks with Dan Caplin to talk about all the good things going on at My Daily Thread.
3. Our SAMBA team blog post, Hamster Burrial Kits & 998 Other Business Ideas made it to #1 on del.icio.us!
4. Created a Squidoo lens on A Better Place and the BCG Growth-Share Matrix.
5. Caught up with long time JBoss friend and new resident of San Francisco, Chantal Yang.
6. Had lunch with Rich Wilson, a colleague from my first job in advertising and his business partner, Jim Harris. It was great to catch up with hotlanta friends who are starting great companies such as Picture This.
7. Posted the blog post on the public SAMBA blog about Karaoke in Cambodia and Just remember – quick, funny and to the point.
8. Worked with Marissa Kristal on her upcoming e-book!
9. Had dinner with my favorite IU/ATL/NYC gal + photographer, Maria Ponce and her boyfriend Eric (who is the best photog assistant in the city!)
10. Attended Adam Lowitt’s comedy show, It is It. Saw hot comedian of the moment, Demetri Martin and Kirsten Dunst raving about the show and befriending Lowitt. Next show is Feb. 23rd.
11. Read Word of Mouth Marketing by Andy Sernovitz – highly recommend it!
12. Went dog sledding, cross-country skiing, tubing, snowshoeing and skating in Huntsville North Muskoka Ontario Canada….amazing.

Looking forward to a new week!