June 16, 2009
Posted in Commercial Real Estate, global marketing/PR, social media networking, Twitter tagged architect, Atlantic Station, career, Dolce, eco-friendly, environment, Facebook, green, industry, LinkedIn, marketing, new job, non-profit, PR, reconnect, story, sustainable, Twitter at 3:24 pm by lcochran
A couple of weeks ago I had a friend join me at the Type-A event at Dolce-Atlantic Station. The networking event brings together professionals in the commercial real estate, “green” and other industries who have the gumption to care about the environment. I was able to reconnect with those whom I had met while doing PR for the last firm where I worked but met a couple new people.
My friend (a trained architect), who is NEVER star struck, met her “rock star”, a developer who is transforming Atlanta with his out-of-the-box sustainable development ideas. I had never seen this “giddy as a school girl” glow about her the entire time I’ve known her. After meeting and chatting with “Mr. X”, he moved on to mingle with others…and left.
As my friend and I were about to leave, I was approached by the aformentioned “couple people” chatting about business. The next thing I knew, my friend came over and said she was going to dinner with Mr. X. My friend had impressed Mr. X so much that as he was walking to his car, he went back to get her and take her to dinner. My friend started at Mr. X’s firm last week, with a permanent position, when she had initially offered to be his intern for the summer (did I mention she has over 10 years experience and getting a master’s degree?).
The two people I met…one I had lunch with the next day and he requested a proposal for PR work, launching his new product…decision is still pending, but I hear it’s between me and two huge firms in NYC. The other, referred me to a non-profit coordinator who needs assistance with marketing and PR. We are in talks about doing pro bono work.
My point: With all the opportunities social networking presents, it seems that staying online still has not replaced the need and value of old-fashioned, face-to-face networking. Two opportunities for business arose for me in two hours of networking vs. the countless hours spent on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. Maybe I’m not doing the social networking “thing” correctly?
My friend was hesitant to go because she thought her story was not very interesting. Someone is always interested in your story, it’s just how you present it. Remember, it only takes meeting that one person to turn the tables around.
So RUN, don’t walk, to your next networking event, even if it’s not in your industry. You never know who you are going to meet!
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May 23, 2009
Posted in global marketing/PR, Twitter, wine marketing tagged Brazil, California Milk Advisory Board, cheese, China, CMAB, dining, emerging markets, global investment, headaches, Indonesia, investment, New World, NY Times, Philippines, Russia, specialty cheese, tweet, Vietnam, wine at 3:06 pm by lcochran
I love wine. Even with as many headaches it may give me, I can’t help it. I’m still weeding out the “ones that cause headaches” with the wines that are “safe”. The New World wines, like California and Australia are on the “headache” list, though I love them. So, when I read a Tweet from the NY Times Dining this morning on investing in wine, it really caught my attention.
The article “Investing in Wine: Now May Be the Time” was pretty interesting. Not only did I learn that wine asset management is growing as it can now be traded as a commodity like pork bellies (or they are working towards it), but it also got me wondering…has there been a wine “bubble” or is the market just correcting itself?
Basically, wine is now like real estate. The prices of wine have decreased 20 to 40 percent on most vintages. What I found even more interesting correlates to my line of work in global marketing, emerging market populations in China, Brazil and Russia are starting to invest in wine on the open market. I know that China and Brazil produce their own wines (not sure about Russia). With the rise in incomes and lower prices, there has been an increase in investment, whether it be in real estate, wine or anything else (the capitalist way of supply and demand).
This is particularly true for my client, the California Milk Advisory Board (CMAB), now marketing specialty cheese globally. With the emerging markets the CMAB is currently targeting (China, Indonesia, Philippines and Vietnam), the rise in income brings demand of higher quality food and other products. Wine sales are also up in those countries.
Point being that we need to look outside the US, where 96 percent of the world’s population lives, in order to help pull us out of this global recession, whether they are investing in wine, pork bellies, real estate or toothbrushes. Believe it or not, the recession has not hit some countries as hard as others.
With global investments of wine increasing, this is very good news for the California cheese and wine industries!
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February 22, 2009
Posted in social media networking, Twitter tagged dating, Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, Rupert Murdoch, social media networking, tweet, tweeting, Twiduction, Twitter, Xing at 5:52 pm by lcochran
I attended a workshop, hosted by the Atlanta Press Club, on February 18 at The Commerce Club in Atlanta. The topic: Navigating Social Media Sites.
The hour long presentation included a brief introduction of the top four social networking sites, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and MySpace. MySpace, the website in which Rupert Murdoch invested millions ($580 million to be exact), we learned, is dying a slow death. Facebook is at the top of the social networking sites, with LinkedIn and Twitter following behind. (Quite frankly, I never joined the MySpace craze. I finally, though reluctantly, joined Facebook. My Facebook “addiction” has gotten so out of hand that I’m taking a “hiatus”, thus prompting to deactivate my account. My initial “hiatus” will be for three weeks. We will see how that goes-especially since I can still read everyone’s status updates on my Blackberry.)
The question of the day: Which is the best way to promote yourself/business? According to the presenter, LinkedIn is the best way to promote yourself professionally. I am still learning the benefits of LinkedIn. (I must admit that LinkedIn has been the best thing for me. I reconnected with a former colleague and we are now partnering on some business.)
The more complete your profile, greater number of questions answered (scored “good” to “best” answer) and the recommendations received by others, the higher/more often your profile will show up in search results. Who knew? Not me. (After my lay-off in June, I found myself increasingly addicted to LinkedIn. Getting contacts, quality contacts, became my drug. Facebook replaced the addiction to LinkedIn.)
Facebook was not really a site that I was planning on using to promote my business (the hiatus is now throwing a wrench in things). But, I have discovered you can have your personal page and a professional page. With the personal page, you have friends and with the professional page, there are fans. The more I think about using Facebook for promoting my business, the more “narcissistic” I become. What if I create a page for Glocal and no one wants to be a fan? It’s elementary and high school all over again (which is the majority of people who are my friends on the site…I digress). Then there is Twitter…
Ah Twitter. I have to admit, this is becoming my new “drug” of choice. It is so easy but difficult at the same time. You only have 140 characters to describe your actions, “tweets”. Everyone else has so many followers that it is so easy to get lost in the shuffle and get any type of response from them (if that’s what you are looking for). So, you have to add these applications to be able to keep “tweeting” when you are busy with other things (maybe work), much like programming a DVR (I think). There’s TweetDeck, TweetLater, newsletters to keep up with the newest applications and the upgrades to the old ones and notification application of those who stop following you (and which comment you made to lose them), among many others. My goodness, there is now an e-book on how to date on Twitter! Seriously! And as if I have enough time to figure out Twitter, I was just told about another social media network…Xing (crossing).
I registered on Xing today because it’s more international in scope. Within 10 minutes of registering and doing the bare minimum of posting my profile, I received 10 – 15 requests to connect from people that I have no idea who they are. I think I only have one contact who is on Xing that I know (the one who told me about the site in the first place).
With only 24 hours in a day, who can keep up with this stuff? Between my work for clients, playing with a puppy and socializing, how do people with spouses and kids do it?
Just in case, follow me on Twitter…
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