Social Networking Thoughts - Welcome!

So, my story online is a long one... I have been working in the social networking field since before they called it that.  I worked on the AOL Instant Messenger 1.0 team, a Music Comminity site, student networking and marketing and advertising for the last 17 years.  I recently opened a winebar.  So much drama was going on with opening it, that I decided when working online, I would only take the high road.

This paid off.

I am a NJ girl, sarcasm and negativity drips off me naturally.  But online, I have always been positive.  And it works.  It also rubs off on others and even me.  I have never been insincere when online, I have only told things that were true, and tried to always see the positive in everything that has to do with my business.  People feel it when they come into my bar.

I have a lot of opinions :)

Being in this "internet space" for as long as I have, I have seen a lot.  I have seen good businesses and ideas fail as well as bad businesses succeed in what seems in spite of themselves. I don't believe in luck.  I think that it's math... Product + Attitude > Nothing

Product + attitude must be greater than the reason to do nothing or to use another merchant, product, service...

When I worked in software, I verified that the products worked according to requirements given by marketing or the client...  I worked with upper management, developers, artists.  These people often had hard personalities to work with.  It always came down to one thing though... What they produced needed to be better than how they behaved. So if Developer X made things that didn't work, and was a jerk... then, truly he exceeded his behavior allowance.  If Developer Y was an awesome guy, but his software didn't work, same thing, exceeded his behavior allowance.  Developer Z who made things that worked consistently with no issues, had a much bigger allowance - and maybe could be worst than Developer X in attitude.

That said... I think it works in my business too, and especially in Social Networking...  Let's look at some sayings...

• Laugh, and the world laughs with you, Cry and you cry alone.
• If you have nothing nice to say, don't say anything at all

 No one wants to be with a "Debbie Downer".  If you write nasty things about other competitors, it will come back to haunt you.  If you complain about products, their competitors, or even partners may stray from your business.  There are things that make me livid with customers, distributors, and others I work with... but I am in customer service... it's just not appropriate to share it with the world... it will come back and bite me.

So what is this Blog about? I personally think it's to dispell the myth that you need to spend thousands of dollars to get advice about Social Networking.  You can do this yourself, especially if you know how to run a sucessful business... you just need to learn to translate it for your business, and for your voice.

I am going to invite some of my marketing friends to post to this, as well as small businesses to give their thoughts and suggestions.  Will I post every day?  Probably not :)  But hopefully this will be fun for those participating and informative for the passer by.

Talk more soon :)

Kari