Posted by Gabe on February 3, 2010 under Kids are Heroes | 
Have you ever been involved with something that made you feel like you were the snowball at the top of the hill and someone just gave you a push? That’s how I feel right about now. I was recently approached by someone who asked me if I would consider a partnership. Now I am starting to get these requests all the time. I’m certainly not complaining, but some of the “partners” see our social media numbers and picture nothing but opportunity for them. I was naturally guarded at first. However, it didn’t take long for me to figure out that Mary, this new contact, was genuine and smart, and that this relationship could greatly benefit the both of us. Mary works with Levar Fisher, who after a stellar stint as an all-pro linebacker at NC State (Go Wolfpack!!), enjoyed a career in the NFL as he played for the Arizona Cardinals and the New Orleans Saints. Unfortunately for him, at the age of 27 he had a career ending knee injury. “Unfortunate” is how many would view this situation. Not Levar. He sees this as a godsend. “I was a check writer when I was in the NFL” Levar told me. “If people needed money for charity, I was happy to write them a check. But don’t ask me to appear at your function. I’m not comfortable with that.” Levar laughs when he looks back because now this is his livelihood. And boy is he happy doing it! Levar travels around the country as a motivational speaker. He speaks to all ages, but his true love is when he gets to speak to kids. He speaks of choices that face our youth, and encourages them to make the right ones. In high school he was bullied because as he puts it, he was “fat and slow”. “I’m going to be in the NFL!” he would tell people. “Levar, you’re crazy!! You’re way too fat for the NFL – you can’t even play for our high school football team!” his peers would tell him as they laughed and joked. Rather than let this ridicule beat him down, Levar was actually motivated by those disparaging remarks. In his sophomore year in high school he was the best player on the varsity team. He received a full scholarship to NC State. And you know the rest. “Don’t EVER let anyone tell you you can’t achieve your dream!” Levar tells kids.
In 2002 while just entering the NFL Levar founded a non-profit organization called “Fisher of Men”, which provide resources and opportunities for youth inspiring good decision-making and boosting self confidence. Levar is currently embarking on his brand new ”Believe Again 2010″ tour that will have him traveling the country speaking to kids of all ages. In addition to his usual message he will be telling stories of the kids on the Kids Are Heroes web site and what they have accomplished. This fits right in with his confidence building speech. He will be telling kids all over the country that they too can affect change by emulating the children on our site. I am so excited about this relationship as this is the kind of boost we need. But I wouldn’t enter in an arrangement like this just because someone wanted me to. For me the final test before we sealed this partnership was that Levar had to sincerely believe in what we are doing. During one of our conversations as he was recounting some of the heroes’ stories back to me I could tell he was full of excitement and anticipation. I sat back and listened as all of a sudden paused and said, “This can change the world!” That’s when I knew this partnership would work.
When I first watched a tape of Levar speaking, I immediately sought out our local Toastmasters club as he made me realize how much improvement I need to gain as an accomplished speaker. For forty minutes he was fluid and eloquent, with no need for notes of any kind. And when I heard the speech he gave to a large group of kids I was even more excited. He engaged them and they hung on his every word. They laughed and giggled at his jokes. He is intelligent, funny and very pleasant to listen to. He was able to keep their undying attention for the entire time.
If you are an educator I would highly suggest calling Levar and having him speak at your school or kids’ group. He can be reached through his web site. I look forward to witnessing the fruit that is borne from this relationship, and I just can’t wait to see what happens next!
Posted by Gabe on under Social Media, Twitter |
I was trying to think of a catchy title for this post, but when it really gets right down to it, I am simply laying out my follow strategies for everyone to see. People have asked me what they are, so I am coming clean. These are not necessarily the strategies everyone else should use, but they are mine and I will explain why I use them.
I have mentioned many times that my main goal in my use of social media is the promotion of the Kids Are Heroes concept and its web site. On a daily basis, the more people that discover it, the more people get behind it, the better chance we have of becoming a global organization one day. And I humbly believe this strategy is working, as I hope to be making a major announcement real soon.
Some people are intimidated by big numbers. They won’t follow people once they have crossed a certain threshold. I can understand that sentiment to a point. Many celebrities do not follow back very many people. This isn’t a conversation, so I am not interested. I really love it when someone wants to put on airs that they are a celebrity by using this practice. But if you think that people will no longer connect once they surpass a certain number think again. Each week I meet new people. The occurrences of me speaking to them on the phone are becoming more frequent. Some are “newbies” and some I have been conversing with for a long time. I see and pay attention to every reply I get. I respond to almost all of them. The only replies I do not respond to are ones that do not warrant them or ones that have “worn out their welcome” in terms of the nature of the request.
Follow other people. Simply stated, this is the most effective way to get people to find out about us. Many are sent an email that notifies them of the new follow, and that’s when they check us out. If they like what they see, they follow back. So I bet you are saying, “Great! I’ll just use a follow program to automate this and sit back and watch my followers grow!” I have never used, nor will I ever use an auto-follow program. First off, some of them are nefarious to say the least. Secondly, some of them take over your twitter stream advertising themselves. Once I see this, I instantly unfollow that person as do other people. Even if you gain followers this way, they are empty, non-qualified followers that probably won’t listen to you and will do you more harm than good.
So, what makes me follow one person and not follow another? Here’s my list:
1) Fill out your profile. I can’t stress how important this is. If you do not do this it appears like you don’t care or are hiding something. The more information you put in your profile, the more people can use to break the ice with you. Use a good picture that can be enlarged so we can see the real you. I discourage the use of an animated gif file, or something else that is designed to attract my attention, like putting your picture upside down. I don’t follow people who do this. If you are promoting a business with your Twitter ID that’s okay, but at least use a full name as part of the profile so we know what to call you.
2) Engage with others. If I see an entire page where all you do is either send out a quote or repeat a news story, then I’m going to assume you don’t want to talk to people. I want to see those ‘@’ signs.
3) Don’t spam. This should go without saying, but unfortunately there are many spammers on Twitter. Most people block them. Some people however just don’t know any better. They do believe in their product and want to tell the world about it. Get to know us first, then we will ask you about what you do.
4) Be very careful about asking for retweets. I get asked to retweet stuff all the time. People think that just because my numbers are larger than theirs it will really further their cause if I tweet about it. They don’t understand how many requests I get and how my twitterstream would be nothing more than a compilation of other people’s tweets if I gave in. If in the tweet you say (Pls RT) that’s one thing, but sending me a direct message asking to tweet about something is totally different. Depending on if and how well we have connected it can cause an unfollow, even a block.
5) Be active. My typical rule of thumb is that if a person hasn’t tweeted in more than three days I will not follow them. That may sound drastic, but the more often people are on Twitter the better chance I have of connecting with them.
6) Connect with people any way you can. I often follow people after a retweet or an @reply. Why does this work? Because when people I am not familiar with do one or the other I look them up. They are usually following me. I see their profile and stream, etc. and they look like a good person to connect with. The fact is I simply missed them when they followed me.
7) Comment on my blog. This is similar to #6. Your twitter stream might have indicated to me that you do not connect with people, but you have just proven that you do.
8) Don’t protect your tweets. I used to think that people who protect their tweets had a tendency to be more genuine. I have not found that to be true, (or false for that matter). They have their reasons for doing so, which whatever they are I respect, but I typically won’t follow them because I can’t see what they tweet about and how they interact with people. I usually just move on. And if you think you can connect with others that are not following you by sending them an @reply, think again. I had this question posed to me as a comment on one of my blog posts. I showed how the person you send the tweet to will not see it if they are not following you.
9) Don’t use profanity. No matter how long I have followed you, or how we have connected, I will unfollow anyone who uses profanity. This has always been my stance. I believe it’s not professional and I am also trying to protect my 11-year-old nosy daughter who is always in my office.
10) Don’t be negative. Recently I had a customer service issue with a printing company. I think good customer service is one of the key ingredients to being a respected company and when it goes bad it for some reason sets me off. I couldn’t control myself, I had to tweet about it. However, the tweets were not in vain as the company saw them, sent them to the right person, and the situation was rectified and I will now continue to use them. But I still don’t recommend ranting on Twitter. It’s the same as being at a party. People don’t gravitate toward others who are always spouting negativity.
So how do I find people to follow? I use wefollow.com to find categories (parenting, education, philanthropy, etc.) I am interested in which people have aligned themselves to. (NOTE: Use this service with caution. I just saw a tweet that warned me about a nasty practice that they are using that can be avoided.) I pick out followers I really connect with and see who they follow. If you respect them that means they have done due diligence and are concerned about who they follow, so it’s almost as if they have done the work for you. I use a great tool called TweepSearch to search the profiles of people for keywords. And as I mentioned I follow people who connect with me in some meaningful way.
Now keep in mind that this is hard work. It can sometimes be tedious going through profile after profile and sifting through the bad ones. But the more it pays off the more I do it.
So that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. Let us know what strategies you use.
