Category: Community

When you first start blogging (or even reading blogs) it is hard to find a community where you feel you belong. After all, there are a couple of hundred MILLION blogs (more than half of which are written in Chinese!) — so sometimes it can take a little bit of digging. This is why ongoing lists like Mack Collier’s excellent Top 25 Marketing and Social Media Blogs and Meg Tsiamis’ Top 100 Australian Blogs are important. For while those of us who have been using these lists for a couple of years may feel they are tired or outdated (or even too myopic), we are still on the margins of the mainstream — and the real benefit is not for us, but for the thousands of people newly discovering the blogosphere each day.

Recently, Mack considered stopping his index, but after community input, decided upon a format change to include blogs that include "social media" as well as marketing and branding blogs. You can check out his latest list here. But Sean Moffitt points out that blogs come and go (and change focus). So finding currently active, thought provoking blogs that provide quality content is always a challenge. With that in mind, Sean has compiled a great list of blogs which focus on "community building, brand communities, citizen tribes and the intersection of social networks and marketing" — and I am pleased to see the Servant of Chaos is included (check the full list here.

There are also a number of my personal favourites like Jeremiah Owyang’s Web Strategist Blog and Chris Brogan. But I am most excited to begin reading Sami Viitimaki’s Flirting with the Crowd and Rob Kozinets’ Brandthroposophy which are completely new to me.

It’s not the end of "conversation" … it’s just the beginning. Always.

If you are going to Blogger Social 08 … tell me why and what you are most looking forward to … add your video to this Kaltura!

A while ago Peter Kim setup a list monitoring the rankings of blogs written by client side marketers. He called it the M20. On the list are some of my favourite blogs — along with a few that I am just getting to know.

1. ExperienceCurve :: 74 
2. Strategic Public Relations :: 70
3. Listen Up! :: 59
4. BeRelevant! :: 53
5. Conversation Agent :: 51
6. Todd And – The Power To Connect :: 48
7. Flooring The Consumer  :: 42
8. Decker Marketing :: 41
9. The Lonely Marketer :: 41
10. Marketing Nirvana :: 40
11. Consumer Generated Media :: 38
12. Churbuck.com :: 38
13. The Digital Mindset Blog :: 36
14. Bernaisesource :: 35
15. Biznology :: 34
16. Cross The Breeze :: 33
17. AttentionMax :: 33
18. Masiguy :: 32
19. Community Group Therapy :: 31
20. Buzz Marketing For Technology :: 31

As of this week, the M20 has moved to its own domain. Make sure to update your feeds!

Mack has a great post on what makes a "successful" community. He focuses on the efforts of Pat Coyle who is asking the difficult marketing and business questions around social networking — what does success look like? And perhaps, if it were to walk up and bite us, would we recognise it for what it is?

As I was reading Mack’s post, it started to remind me of my early childhood and the sense of community that was in place around my Nanna’s house. She as an old-fashioned Nanna … she knew all the neighbours (and probably knew their business), she knew the streets and who lived where and how the families fitted together. She knew whose children my father played with, their mothers, fathers and grandparents. It was where she belonged.

When I would visit, everyone in the street would wave and look out for me. They knew who I was by who I was connected to.

Years later I visited my old school on the weekend to play basketball with my sister. In the distance I could hear my name being called. I thought I was hearing things … I looked around but could see no one. We kept playing.

But the voice was persistent. G-a-a-a-v-i-i-n …

Across the playground and way down the street there was a man yelling to me. He was older, much older, than I … and I did not recognise him. Slowly I walked towards him wondering who he was and how he knew me. He could tell I was confused. Up close his face was still a blank canvas to me. "Sid Shannon", he said. "Ahh" … he was a friend’s father — his daughter was born the day after me in the same ward.

"How did you know it was me?", I asked. "Oh, I would know you anywhere", he replied.

I looked like my family. And time and distance was not going to change that.

Do you know where you belong? How do you know? What are the pointers to this? And how do you own it?

Perhaps "old" is the new, new … and social media is igniting not the desire for connection but ENABLING the reconnections between people.

In a true activation of this article’s premise, I was reading through some Twitter messages for the first time in a long time and found this one from KG. Here I was stepping through the process that Clive Thompson was talking about — re-extending my virtual limbs after an absence. And where did I find myself? In a shared space of old friends …

There was Drew McLellan welcoming me back. Scott Monty was asking about Spock invites. Ariel Waldman was marvelling at her life as a quasi-sex-blogger. David Armano was being "supervenient".

Why is this all important? Why should anyone care? As Clive says, "because it’s experiential" … it fulfils the desire to connect but in a completely mediated way. It means you can reach out without effort. It provides you a space to play … not EXACTLY private but certainly within earshot of others. You don’t need to be geographically close, but you can still feel part of a community. A group.

It doesn’t take a sixth sense to figure out that this sense of belonging is important.

Mr Community, Mack Collier, has had yet another busy week — this time giving the Top 25 Marketing Blogs a makeover. From this week, Mack is rating marketing blogs based on Technorati’s "authority" rank rather than the site ranking available through Alexa … and this has drastically reshaped the face of the Top 25 (for example, Kim Klaver’s excellent blog has dropped out of the list — and Seth has finally been knocked from the top spot by Kathy Sierra).

There are SEVEN new entries, six of which are first time entrants. Amongst these are some of my personal favourites — Sean Howard and Becky Carroll. Of course, when the Z-list booster shot runs out sometime around July, we may see yet another makeover. But that is what makes Mack’s list so vitally important — the Viral Garden is like the Viral Watercooler … we all love to drop by for a chat and a gossip — and no matter who is on the list, you can always be assured of good conversation and witty company.

I have been resisting putting this little logo onto the site for a couple of weeks. When I first entered Mack Collier’s Top 25 Marketing Blogs a few weeks ago, I thought it best to wait a month and see if I was still around. And, thanks to you all, it seems that I am. But it could all change again next week … especially as Mack is now changing his ranking approach from next week onwards. He is switching from Alexa over to Technorati … so it could be a very different looking list from here on in!

And if you are new to Mack’s list, it comes out every Wednesday (my Thursday), and it provides links through to some of the most interesting and influential marketing blogs around. Be sure to check out the list and the blogs on it.

I was not planning to post tonight, but I read this great post by Mack Collier and the title popped into my head. Mack is talking about how a good community evangelist can transform the WAY that your customers relate to your brand … and he provides a great example of Mario Sundar’s new role as LinkedIn’s community evangelist. With a single, strategic hire, LinkedIn have transformed not just the way that the company talks to its network, but also, transformed the MANNER, method and TONE through which its network of members converse with each other and with the company.

But what is most heartening, is that LinkedIn is not just talking. LinkedIn is LISTENING. Even better … action is taking place, feedback is being received and improvements/changes are being made. The feedback loop is working and it is being amplified by a million individual trumpets …

Is this going to drive a unique competitive advantage for LinkedIn? Is it going to re-energise or re-activate low-velocity users of LinkedIn’s services? Is a community evangelist a wise investment?

Time for me to stop talking!

Today is Anzac Day . It is a day that has become a deeply significant day for Australians … it marks a historic event from which there is now only one living survivor, but it has also on some level, become generally linked with a sense of Australian identity.

The origins of Anzac Day lie in the futile assault on the Gallipoli Peninsula during the First World War by the Australian and New Zealand Army Corp. And while the campaign was a military failure, it became a defining moment for the newly fledged Australian nation … for the acts of bravery and mateship that occurred, despite the horrors of war, echo down the years, ringing of truth, reminding us that those men were once young like us, like our sons. And in every ANZAC story we hear, we hear also the laughter, the irreverence, the respect, generosity and seriousness that deeply informs the nature of what we know to be "Australian".

But there is something that has been missing in the Australian character for some time … the sense of generosity for which the Anzacs were also known. Thankfully I have noticed it raising its head again recently. When l heard, last week, that the Rats of Tobruk Association were no longer able to meet the costs of maintaining the building where they had been meeting since the end of World War II I was saddened. In a truly generous act, the ROTA had decided to donate the proceeds to the Royal Children’s Hospital for cancer research — but would find themselves without a space for their monthly meetings … and this Anzac Day would be their last in Tobruk House.

Bill Gibbins is the founder of Australian transport group FCL, and after hearing of the situation, emerged from the Tobruk House auction this week as its new owner. He has allowed the ROTA to continue to use Tobruk House as long as they want it, and even went so far, during today’s Anzac Day celebration, to extend that invitation to all returning and returned services groups. I am sure this act of generosity will not go un-remembered.

All across the country today, the following verse by Laurence Binyon has been recited. The haunting middle stanzas of "For the Fallen" I copy out and share with you all … in remembrance.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,
They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old;
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

If ideas are the currency of our times then this is, undoubtedly, the age of conversation, for without the art of dialogue, the cut and thrust of debate and discussion, then the economy of ideas would implode under its own heavy weight. Instead, the reverse is true. Far from seeing an implosion, we are living in a time of proliferation — ideas build upon ideas, discussion grows from seeds of thought and single headlines give rise to a thousand medusa-like simulations echoing words whispered somewhere on the other side of the planet. All this — in an instant.

Technology in the guise of social media is giving rise to not virtual connections, but real conversation. The human desire to reach out, meet, share and converse is tapping into digital networks in an effort to transcend and obliterate the tyrranies of time, geography and, in some instances, culture. And the resulting explosion in content, commentary, activism and community is causing academics, marketers, advertisers, politicians and social commentators (amongst others) to call into question many of the demographic standards that have been relied upon for years.

In response to these changing (and quite exciting) conditions, Drew McLellan and I are calling upon a wide range of bloggers to contribute to an e-Book entitled The Conversation Age. We are looking for a maximum of 100 bloggers to contribute one 8.5×11 page — approximately 400 words OR a page of diagrams, pictures etc — on the topic of The Conversation Age.

All proceeds from the sale of this e-Book will be donated to Variety.

If you would like to contribute to The Conversation Age, you can do so by clicking this image and letting Drew know the topic that you would like to cover (we need to make sure that we don’t double up!). But be quick, you only have until 11 APRIL 2007.

This is a great opportunity to participate in this fascinating global debate!

REMEMBER, ALL CONTRIBUTIONS ARE DUE 30 APRIL 2007.

Thus far, those who have committed to contribute include:

• Christina Kerley (CK)
• Valeria Maltoni
• Emily Reed
• Katie Chatfield
• Greg Verdino
• Mack Collier
• Lewis Green
• Sacrum
• Ann Handley
• Mike Sansone
• Paul McEnany
• Roger von Oech
• Anna Farmery
• David Armano
• Bob Glaza
• Mark Goren
• Matt Dickman
• Scott Monty
• Richard Huntington

Oh, and of course, Drew and I are contributing! While there is a large focus at present in the marketing area, we welcome contributions from other subject areas. So, what are you waiting for? JOIN THE CONVERSATION!

UPDATE: I forgot to thank Mike Sansone for the great button! Thanks, Mike!