Social Media Week is coming up next week. I am not speaking this year but planning to attend a handful of sessions and events. This morning I stumbled across this pretty funny video produced by Social Media Week, “Future Hipsters,” which I had to share.

While traveling over the past two months, I have had a lot of time to think about “work.” Does a job have to be work? Should it be? I’ve lived my life up until this point under the idea that you should love what you spend your time and energy doing. There must be some level of passion.

When I return from my travel at the end of this year after four months in Europe and two months in Asia, what will I do? What is next? Will I stay in Atlanta? Will I finally try a new city? I have about ten years of experience under my belt. By the time I’m forty years old, I will have more than doubled that. How should I spend that time? I could learn a lot in thirteen years.

There are many possible answers to these questions but a few paths. I could choose to continue down the social media rabbit hole, which is very interesting and dynamic but not as fulfilling for me as it once was. Re-excite me. In many environments, the creativity this field once required has been stripped away. I want the creativity and bend back in my routine. I have been studying user experience design and mobile development. I can integrate this into a role. Perhaps combining these with my previous experience, I am looking at a broader digital role that requires an individual who can wear many hats. Oversee a digital team or work as a link and communicator between fields. Strategy!

These ideas appeal to me especially if I can find a way to acquire more global experience. How can one conquer the world if they don’t know how to handle the world? Where the lines and boundaries are? What is appropriate? What are new considerations? How does all of this scale? These are challenges I crave.

In short, I’ve begun exploring options for when I return and I don’t expect it will be easy for me to find this dream job. I’m considering school though this largely depends where I land geographically. I will figure it all out over my remaining four months of travel. Bring on the rest of Europe and Asia.

Hello New York! I’m very excited to be back in town, this time to speak on an Internet Week panel with a set of very sharp women. Hope to see you tomorrow!

The panel discussion entitled, “Women Leading 2.0: Business Insights into the Social Media Revolution,” is being hosted by Shearman & Sterling on Tuesday, June 7 from 5-8PM (with the panel discussion running from 6-7PM) in their New York offices at 599 Lexington Avenue.

This annual women’s networking event strives to provide a platform for top women business leaders, including executives from corporate communications departments and general counsels from major media companies, to engage in a discussion about why social media matters in business and how its risks and rewards are assessed, as well as to provide an opportunity for networking with our clients and the other panelists.

My fellow panelists include Janet Abrams, Senior Counsel, Business & Legal Affairs at MTV Networks; Stacy Gratz, Director, Digital Brand + Social Marketing at American Express; Gillian Lusins, Vice President, Legal Dept. at NBC Universal, Inc.; Linda Boff, Global Director, Marketing Communications, GE; and as a moderator, Rachel Sklar, Editor-at-Large at Mediaite.‬

Wednesday, March 23 was my last day as an employee of Engauge. It was a friendly parting. In short, it wasn’t the best fit for either one of us. Nothing but happy thoughts. What have I been doing since this separation? Relaxing. Refocusing. It’s been lovely.

Jeff Hilimire, Engauge’s Chief Digital Officer, who recruited me and ran the Digital Innovation Group, once called me a free spirit. These feelings are echoed in a few blog posts published on my personal blog back in February when I hit a particularly frustrating block at work. I’ve since readdressed these frustrations and testaments to decipher the “why”. What caused this position and how could I avoid falling back into it moving forward? By making a few changes.

The Non-Traditional (aka “Scary”) Approach

My friends and family know I haven’t exactly taken a traditional or safe approach to life to date.

Some examples:
- I dropped out of six Advanced Placement/International Baccalaureate courses my senior year of high school to accept a Marketing Coordinator position in the music industry, opting to complete a GED instead of graduating.
- I co-founded and lead marketing initiatives for a nationally distributed record label through eleven albums at nineteen years old.
- I became a certified lifeguard with no previous non-recreational swimming experience.
- I recently drove 5000 miles by myself across 32 states and Canada during two weeks of deep winter.

These are the stories that typically gain me incredulous stares, admiration or eye-rolling. Who does these things? Plenty of people. I’m by no means alone in my drive or impulse. The more I read of others’ similarly atypical experiences and lives, the more I want to pursue myself. Commence the finger pointing at Tim Ferriss, Chris Guillebeau, and the like.

Adventures Ahead

What’s next? A voyage towards finding my best fit. How do I do this? Stop taking the safe approach. Begin taking bigger risks. Stop doing what people tell me I should be doing. Do what is best for me. I’m starting with a one-way plane ticket to Spain. I have family in Barcelona I have never met and hear it is a fantastic city, especially for young people. From there, I have allocated roughly the following five months to cities around Europe and Asia, with possible stops in Jordan, Canada and the States.

For Hire

I plan to pursue remote contract and freelance projects to fund my travels, in addition to my initial fund. See LinkedIn and my bio for information on my experience and qualifications. References are available.

Examples of contract/freelance work you could hire me for:
- Strategy (digital, social, mobile, search, experiential)
- Creative (user experience, copywriting, web design)
- Development (front-end, blogs, soon: iPhone)
- Social Media (analytics, research, process, infrastructure/workflow)
- Publicity (blogger outreach)

I intend to only take on a maximum of two projects at a time, dependent on scope, and must be able to work remotely. This is to ensure I can deliver quality without latching myself to a 9-5 or 40 hour working week, as that would cheat my adventure. I am open to brands, agencies, startups and local businesses alike. I want to help you achieve your goals while pursuing my own.

I may be crazy. I may run out of money. I may never come back. I may find my best fit. I’m working on the logistics right now of what to do with my car, apartment, and expenses. I’m very excited to begin this adventure because as the saying goes, even if I fall short, I haven’t landed in a terrible place. At any point, I am free to stop. I can go back to Atlanta. I can pursue a new home. I can commit to new directions.

I created this for the team at Engauge but received many requests to share. Hope this gets you started and let me know if you have any questions! See you at SXSW.

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Update 3/4/2011: Slideshare has featured my presentation on their How-To & DIY page. Thanks guys.
Update 3/5/2011: It is now one of the most tweeted presentations and featured on the front page! Thanks again.

I have received my first Klout Perk, along with twenty-nine others in Atlanta (which looks to be consistent quantity-wise across targeted markets). I was sent a tweet by @KloutPerks that led me to a custom branded campaign page on Klout where I could RSVP for the appropriate screening.

Klout also included their “Influencer Code of Ethics” at the bottom of the page:

- Klout will never sell or give away your contact info.
- Participating (or not participating) will not change your Klout Score.
- If you accept the offer you are not required to do anything. We do not want to “buy” your tweets. You are receiving the product because you are influential and have authority on topics related to the product. This is a more targeted form of receiving a sample while shopping at the grocery store. You are welcome to tell the world you love the product, you hate the product or say nothing at all.
- If you decide to talk about the product we will ask you to disclose that you received a sample (http://www.cmp.ly/2/va).

I am attending the screening tomorrow and curious to see whether it will be limited to the 30 to 60 (you can bring a guest) influencers RSVPed through Klout or will Universal Pictures open it up to the usual slew of radio winners? I am hoping for the first, as the latter would take away any type of exclusively to the event. I’ll report back.

A few weeks ago, I received my fitbit. I saw this health startup pitch at TechCrunch50 in San Francisco and a few years later, finally had one of my own. I eagerly unpacked it, examining every piece of packaging as I pulled out my new little bite-sized gadget, excited to try it out. fitbit features a great online dashboard that displays your exercise and sleep data among many other fantastic features available online, once you’ve created your online profile. I had one minor issue and one more important issue right off the bat. The first issue: I couldn’t upload a profile photo to my account despite the fact it met all of the upload file criteria. The second issue: I wanted to add food I had eaten into their dashboard to calculate how many calories I had consumed and ran into aggravation finding what I needed in their database.

How did I handle this? Did I think to submit a support ticket? Nope. I complained about it on Twitter.

fitbit’s Vice President of Interactive reached out to me on Twitter (see screenshot above) asking if I had contacted support about my issues. What an idea! It had not even occurred to me. Why would I fill out a generic form about my issues that would be emailed/queued up for a support team to acknowledge, assign then respond to me when I could just shout about it on Twitter and get an immediate response? I was immediately shamed and responded that I would send my issue to their support team.

It took a week for me to finally get a response from fitbit but the interchange brought back to life the idea that our social media “customer service” is conditioning consumers to complain as loud as they can within their social media channels. We have become the toddlers of the internet, stamping our feet and raising our arms over our heads, crying out loud until mediated by our cable company, favorite online retailer or bank. Brands must find a way to strengthen and grow their customer service offering outside of these channels so consumers don’t run straight to them in order to find their immediate gratification lollipop. It’s inefficient for brands, annoying to the ether and can still leave consumers unsatisfied with the resolution, assuming one is met. Their complaints remain visible online, are buried or searched, and web conversation a little messier than needed. It’s time for a diaper change.

Back in October, a colleague of mine asked me for recommendations for books on “affiliate marketing, social or interactive media.” I apologize to her because I literally took months to get back to her on this. It’s honestly taken me this long because there are so many mediocre books out there, I wanted to be sure to give her solid recommendations that I would stand behind. That said, I still don’t have much for her.

I tend to gravitate and find most value out of books that challenge the way marketing, interactive and business are done because they provide insight on both how things have been done and where the author feels it is going or should be done. I feel if you learn what to look for, how to approach everything from an analytic point-of-view and some general basics, you can learn and understand a good chunk of marketing, despite it’s rapid-changing nature. 

The other important thing to remember is that all forms of marketing center around one thing — influencing behavior. When it comes to learning on how influence behavior, the scope of learning material stretches far beyond marketing and even business. I look to those around me who inspire me and cause me to change my behavior. What are they saying and doing that is prompting my shift? How can I apply this to X, Y, or Z?

SCOTT BELSKY
Scott Belsky, CEO and Founder of the Behance Network, wrote a fantastic book last year, “Making Ideas Happen: Overcoming the Obstacles Between Vision and Reality.” No, Belsky is not a marketer, he is a creative. A creative who has committed his professional life to help organize creative individuals, teams, and networks. I read this book in two days and it immediately changed my behavior. I go back and reference it often and have referred to at least a dozen people.

SETH GODIN
Seth Godin. I’d hire him to copywriter, give inspirational speeches or manage a team anytime. Pick up any of his books. Pick up three. It doesn’t really matter. Godin’s gift is in his ability to change the way that people think. Through his repeated successes, he has garnered a massive audience and a world of respect from a wide field of professionals and entrepreneurs. His most popular publication, “Tribes” focuses on leadership. Recommended books on leadership is an entire different blog post but one best to venture down after you have a better grasp on changing behavior.

MALCOLM GLADWELL
Another popular favorite, Malcolm Gladwell. In particular, “Blink.” The number one reason I recommend this novel over his former and more successful, “Tipping Point“, is that Gladwell discusses how marketers can manipulate our first impressions. Through his fantastic storytelling, he provides some key insights into our jobs as marketers which some of us subconsciously manufacture campaign after campaign. Taking a step back and analyzing these insights can open great new ideas and approaches to further sharpen our craft.

VIRAL MARKETING, SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY
That might be it. I am instantly turned off by excessive typos, cheap grammar and preachy texts which disqualifies ninety percent of the rest of the options out there. (Not that I’m an expert at avoiding any of these things but I’m not publishing books.) One hundred thousand Twitter followers doesn’t lead me to believe you are capable of helping me learn through your experiences. Pick up an old text on viral marketing — all of the same concepts are relevant to social media marketing. They haven’t changed; only the tools have. Delve with two feet into social psychologies.

Others I read and constantly learn from are linked in my blogroll on this blog, in the right column under “Game Changers”. They’re from many different backgrounds, disciplines and beliefs but continuously make me question everyday tasks. Subscribe to them.

The Atlanta Interactive Marketing Association (AiMA) unanimously voted me onto their Board of Directors as Co-Chair of AiMA Partnerships in 2011 together with Susan Wilhelm from Disney Interactive Media Group. I’m quite excited to serve in this role with Susan over the upcoming year and continue to help bring great interactive events and content to the Atlanta market.

About AiMA
Founded in 1999, the AiMA is a dedicated group of new media and interactive marketing professionals focused on providing the Atlanta Interactive Marketing Community a place to network, share, and learn about proven leading-edge interactive strategies and tactics.

AiMA stimulates new ideas, promotes best practices, helps professional development, and provides a forum for discussing the critical issues. Experience first hand the energy, enthusiasm, and wealth of knowledge found at an AiMA event.

This morning I am being interviewed by David Cohen on his “Be a Beacon” podcast on BlogTalkRadio.

We will be discussing how social media has helped me develop my career and brand, and how I maintain a personal brand when transitioning between jobs and roles.

“Be A Beacon” Podcast
Monday, December 13 — 10:30AM EST
Call-in Number: (347) 989-8132
or #BeABeacon on Twitter