The other Buffett Rule: If Warren Buffett joins Twitter, you should too

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warren buffett faceLast Week Warren Buffett joined Twitter.

This must come as a shock to many small business owners who’d gobble up his investment advice, but would just as soon do everything in their power to avoid using Twitter. (This must also come as a disappointment to self-proclaimed social media gurus who spend hundreds of hours trying to gain followers, whereas Warren Baby {as I call him} already has 390,000+.)

 

A late bloomer, perhaps, but when an investment tycoon joins up with a web platform that is currently overlooked from many in the small business community, maybe it’s time to give it another look?

warren buffett twitter

If you’re ready, here are 6 uses for Twitter (compliments of AM:PM PR) that may help you on your way:

1.  Demonstrating thought leadership. You’re an expert on your brand and in your field and your target audience is already looking for you.

2. Demonstrating your brand. You can demonstrate your brand image with tweets related to your expertise or related to your business or products. You can also share related industry news to show you are a source for news and related information.

3. Search Engine Optimization. We’re guessing that you established your other social media profiles because you recognize that different people use different technologies. Further, Twitter has its own search engine independent of Facebook, Yahoo, Google, Myspace, etc., etc., etc. Therefore, when people search for information using Twitter, they are potentially discovering information unique from those other search engines. How can you brand your Tweets so that your target audience can find you more easily on Twitter?

4. Research. We’ve worked with businesses and non-profits who’ve been “discovered” by journalists researching a given topic for a story. Conversely, you can use Twitter to research targeted bloggers, podcasts or publications that may not be so apparent when searching with Google.

5. Social Interaction. The “social” in social media insinuates that you use the media to interact with others, and not to simply trumpet your ego to the world. If you’re not interacting with others, you’re not doing it right. Find Twitter users who are sharing information relevant to your brand, and build rapport with them.

6. Promotion of your brand. I made this last, just because it should be your last priority. It’s cool to share exciting news, achievements or great interviews – but if you’re constantly sending off self-aggrandizing tweets, you’re doing it wrong.

In conclusion, you’ll notice that Warren has only posted two tweets since he joined up last Thursday. This is not a technique or strategy that we recommend, unless you are already incredibly famous. We’d recommend that you carve out a minimum of 15 minutes per day for regular social media upkeep.

Medium: A blogging platform for writers

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Last week I learned about a new social media platform called Medium and was given an exciting directive to explore their new website and report back to the rest of the team. I didn’t know much about Medium going in, other than it proclaims to be based on the belief that the sharing of ideas and experiences is what moves humanity forward. Sounds great!

Truth be told, after several days of exploration I’ve come to the conclusion that Medium is my kind of platform. It’s for the 1% of us that like to write opinionated quasi-intellectual notes on Facebook that unintentionally alienate half of your friends. The best part is that your parents, employers and colleagues haven’t discovered Medium yet, so it’s like Facebook circa 2006 when you could still get away pouring your heart out over the course of an evening (and a bottle of Chianti) with no repercussions.

Medium is currently in über beta start-up mode, but I thought it might be fun to poke and prod around their website with the proverbial stick. The following is what I’ve discovered.

Blogging Platform Reimagined

When I went to explore Medium, I did it from the perspective of their motto, ie, someone trying to move humanity forward, and I was immediately drawn to this post: Stop working (so hard).

medium logoYou don’t have to worry about that, Medium.

But in all seriousness, from what I understand, Medium is trying to reimagine the concept of a blog by making it more socially interactive than current designs allow and by facilitating longer conversations and extraneous dialogue in the process.

It became immediately apparent that this platform is geared towards a certain type of person. You know the Facebook friend who posts cute kitty photos and gets all twisted whenever someone talks about politics, science or demonstrates critical thinking? Yeah, this site is not for them. Medium is more accurately for people who like to write, or those who like to critique what other people write.

Comment Makeover

In a typical blog format (Tumblr, Facebook, Blogger, WordPress) all of the comments on a given post are archived at the bottom of each post. With Medium, the comments are displayed to the right side of the post, which results in a more fluid interaction. When you comment on a given post you can highlight the exact word or phrase you want to comment on, and subsequent users can comment further. This feature makes for more functional interactions with a post, and I like it.

Check this out:

medium image

Formatting blogs

Do you remember how crazy Myspace got when people could add pink backgrounds and floating sparkles and snowflakes to their landing pages causing your Pentium III computer to freeze up? Do you hate it when you arrive at a blog with an orange background with white typeface? Medium has simplified the way people format their blogs by eliminating choice, essentially subtracting a lot of the functional ability and formatting options that you may be used to with other platforms. They also allow only a single headline image for each post. I think this works because it makes their blog system cleaner and easier to read.

Here is an example of what I mean:

medium image 2This is what the blogging tool looks lik

medium image 3You’ll notice the following:

  1. You can only add one image
  2. Your title is large and bold
  3. The body of your writing is in smaller font

That’s it. You cannot change the font, add italics, underline things, create orange backgrounds or add snowflakes to accentuate a wintry theme. This is blogging simplified.

Categorizing Blogs

In the following image you can see that Medium allows you to review posts, and collections of posts (demonstrated below).

medium image 4

You can customize your own collection of posts under the heading “Collections” or if you don’t want to go with the ones that they select for you, you can create your own, which could be a fun way to stimulate conversations about topics that are relevant to you personally. My favorite category is “Armchair Economics” because the topics flatter my unquenchable thirst for knowledge and/or ego.

Who should use Medium?

I’m answering this question wearing my PR professional hat as clients are often asking for the return on investment (ROI) on social media platforms. I haven’t done enough digging around to fully understand Medium’s policies, but if you have a business or a brand that relies on the dissemination of ideas and information to relevant communities, Medium may be a good platform to keep your eyes on.

I’m a little conservative when investing too much time in new platforms – I like to watch others jump in to see how they may be benefiting before I invest my most precious commodity, time. It is unclear to me if writing a blog-like post in Medium will create any less or any more SEO for your brand.

Medium challenges the notion that attention spans are getting shorter or that people require all information to come in 140 characters or less. Medium is embracing the idea that everyone can write long, drawn-out prose, and that there are people out there that want to read your meanderings.

Go ahead, check it out and explore for yourself.  http://medium.com

On branding and social media

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Have you found yourself censoring images, ideas or other posts on social media platforms because you feel they might cause negative feedback from certain members of your online community? This is an example of managing your brand identity, whether you’re conscious of it or not, and many people and businesses have been struggling with the act of branding ever since the first adorable baby animal images started circulating on the Internet.

Make no mistake, managing brand identity on social networks is a difficult task. Additional considerations include when to post, what to post, how to post, where to post, how to respond to criticism or a communication crisis. With all this pressure, some folks are on a personal quest to determine a special formula or to instill a set of rules to follow that will ensure social media success. I don’t know that there really is a secret formula, but I suspect it comes down to one of the first social lessons that most of us learn at an early age: you’ll be far more successful being authentic and empathetic to others, versus a self-aggrandizing type-A loudmouth. In other words, just be real and be aware of your audience.

There have been some pretty atrocious examples of brands and business leaders failing to “be real” on social media and it’s had disastrous (if not amusing) effects on their brand identity. Curiously, many of these missteps have occurred after national or international tragedy, in some ill-advised effort to capitalize on a hot topic of media intrigue. Other missteps have occurred when brands have taken a stance on social issues, temporarily unaware of the people that inhabit their target audience that they’ve spent building over a period of years.

In recent days we’ve seen the following PR disasters:

*  Epicuroius advertising some scones and breakfast treats, tying the promotion into the Boston marathon bombing

*  Eden Foods opposing the contraceptive measure imposed in the new healthcare law (do they NOT know who their target consumer is?)

For a list of more social blunders, check out this article from Mashable. These examples offer a teachable moment for AM:PM PR friends and clients.

We’ve drummed up a list of five additional suggestions on branding and social media to ensure your brand doesn’t follow in these footsteps.

  1. Don’t try to attach your brand to a crisis. I would argue that you shouldn’t do it at all, but some folks have big hearts and feel the need to express their sympathy for a tragic event. If you must, let your audience know that the employees of your business have their hearts and minds in the right place. That is real human emotion and it’s fine to express. Once. But trying to tie a product promotion or sale into a disaster is just gross, and above all, not what a real person would do. Several brands including Kenneth Cole and The Gap have had their brand images tarnished by thoughtless Tweets.
  2. Share information that interests real people.  I like kitty posts as much as the next person, but for brand integrity I try to limit myself. As challenging as it is, I do so because sharing kitty images and related social media memes does nothing for my brand. If I do ten kitty-like posts and then one post related to something business-related, my target audience may have already tuned out (or worse, hidden ALL of my posts).
  3. Don’t oversell yourself. When I was a kid, this guy Jack Roberts was famous in Seattle-area TV commercials for his many, many commercials saying “I wont be undersold.” While his marketing message has stuck with me for 25 years, it’s not an effective strategy for social media. People will get annoyed and tune you out. However, if you get a windfall and want to buy a bunch of TV advertising, give it a shot. Also check out Chuck Curcio for inspiration.
  4. Don’t create alter egos to bash your critics or competitors. Falling under the “be real” requirement, the founder of Dilbert and CEO of Whole Foods have something in common. Both created fake alter egos to praise and defend themselves online, generating some negative publicity for their brand as a result. Here’s a feature in the NY Times for John Mackey, which is usually a good thing, but this time it wasn’t.
  5. Make sure you know your customers before sharing your beliefs. In the case of Eden Foods, CEO Michael Potter (no relation to Harry) obviously had temporary amnesia of his customers when he sued against having contraception covered for his employees. Then he kept digging that hole deeper, as shown in this piece from Salon. You have to be careful when taking political postures that represent your public brand or image.

This is a snapshot of some considerations to keep in mind when branding your online business or persona, based on our observations from recent events. While the platforms are always changing, the same general rules always remain. Be authentic, be real, and in the immortal words of George Carlin’s character Rufus, from Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, “be excellent to each other.”

 

Using video for branding offers ROI

Video Branding – Guest Post by Mikee Shattuck

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By Mikee Shattuck

mikee shattuck logo

 

 

Technology and the rise of social networks over the past decade have put practices used by communications professionals in a constant state of flux. It’s admittedly difficult for organizations to determine which tactics will elicit the greatest return on their marketing investment and it’s common for many small business owners to overlook opportunities that are actually within their budget.

Video is often overlooked due to what is perceived or imagined to be extraordinary costs. However, due to recent improvements and cost reductions in camera and software technology, you can now produce a slick video for a fraction of the price. When coupled with developments in e-newsletter and social media technology, your return on investment with video starts looking pretty good.

Benefits of Video

Brand Personality

Video offers a way to put a personality or personal face on your business, which in turn allows you or your business to connect with prospective customers on a “real” level, if that makes sense.

Demonstration

You can use video to communicate directly to your target audience or to demonstrate: how to use a product, new ideas, your areas of expertise, or the practicality or application of a new product or idea.

Virality

When coupled with social media, a thoughtful and creative video can be shared among audiences through various social media channels – which can actually make it it one of the most measurable marketing tactics too. In Software Advice‘s recent B2B Demand Generation Benchmark Survey for 2012 video was shown to be one of the most successful ways to generate engagement through content.

mikee shattuck video chart

 

Video is Popular

Some crazy facts:

  • YouTube is the world’s second largest search engine.
  • More than 1 billion unique users visit YouTube each month
  • Over 4 billion hours of video are watched each month on YouTube
  • 72 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute
  • 25% of global YouTube views come from mobile devices

Speed and Simplicity

Finally, video is easy for your end user: your target audience. Unlike a well-written essay that requires your target audience to spend 5-10 minutes of brain power to read and digest, a thoughtful video can get your messaging across in less than a minute.

Video doesn’t have to be expensive or take a lot of time to produce, but it does have to be well planned and shot as thoughtfully as possible. Hiring a video producer will help to amplify online campaigns and may share insight and personal connections to your audience in a manner that is hard to reproduce otherwise.

Mikee Shattuck is a Portland, Oregon native with over 10 years of marketing and advertising experience. He offers quality and efficient video production service for an insanely affordable value. Mikee can be reached at: http://www.mikeeshattuck.com

Check out examples of Mikee’s work:

BioLite CampStove from Mikee Shattuck on Vimeo.

Dick Hannah Service Xpress from Mikee Shattuck on Vimeo.

MapleXO Vulture Couture Fashion Show from Mikee Shattuck on Vimeo.

Immigration reform is good for the economy.

The economic case for immigration reform

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– by Bill MacKenzie

“It’s the economy, stupid,” a strategist famously stated in Bill Clinton’s successful campaign for the presidency in 1996. That’s still true today when making the case for comprehensive federal immigration reform that would cover both legal and undocumented immigrants in Hillsboro.

A more practical guest-worker program would ensure a dependable supply of labor for Hillsboro’s agricultural industry, which now struggles with a costly and unwieldy federal program allowing foreign nationals in for temporary or seasonal agricultural work.

It’s not just farmers and nursery operators who would benefit from an overhaul of the immigration system. Revision of federal laws that unnecessarily restrain the hiring of foreign nationals would also aid Hillsboro’s cluster of technology companies.

Local tech companies use what’s called the H-1B visa program to employ foreign nationals in specialty occupations — such as scientists, engineers or computer programmers — that require theoretical or technical expertise in specialized fields.

Lisa Malloy, an Intel spokeswoman in Washington, D.C., says H-1B workers have consistently represented about 6 percent of the U.S. work force at Intel, which has regularly been one of the top U.S.-based companies using the visas.

Typically, Malloy says, Intel’s H1-B visa holders have graduated from a U.S. university with an advanced degree in science, engineering or math, and many work as component designers, process engineers and software engineers. Comprehensive federal legislation that would remove the arbitrary cap on the number of H-1B visas each year and allow visas to reflect the U.S. economy and what businesses need would be welcomed by Intel and Hillsboro’s other tech companies.

Allowing talented foreign nationals who get advanced degrees at U.S. universities to stay in the United States, rather than sending them (and their talents) packing after graduation, would also make sense.

The same holds true for foreign-born founders of U.S. start-up companies in the U.S. It would be far better for these economy-boosters to have the option of becoming U.S. citizens, and potentially building a business here, rather than pulling up stakes and nurturing their dreams elsewhere. President Obama had it right when he said in January, “Right now, in (an American classroom) there’s a student wrestling with how to turn their big idea — their Intel or Instagram — into a big business. We’re giving them all the skills they need to figure that out, but then we’re going to turn around and tell them to start that business and create those jobs in China or India or Mexico or someplace else. That’s not how you grow new industries in America. That’s how you give new industries to our competitors.”

These immigrants are already boosting Hillsboro’s healthy economy and stand to strengthen it even more if they are brought out of the shadows. They’re working in farmers’ fields, nurseries, restaurants, hotels and other businesses, large and small.

They’re starting new companies. They’re buying and renting homes. In addition to supplying labor, they’re adding to the local demand for products and services.

Making it so the undocumented immigrants already here can live and work here legally would bring an even bigger economic payoff.

Comprehensive immigration reform that allowed all of Hillsboro’s immigrants to come out into the open would pull them out of the underground economy, make it much less likely they will be paid off the books, generate more taxes and allow them to play a more vigorous role in Hillsboro’s economy.

It is also in our best interest to educate the children of undocumented immigrants so they can contribute more to the city’s economy. As Edward Glaeser of Harvard has amply illustrated, cities with educated and skilled populations will achieve more. On the flip side, cities burdened with ill-educated, low-skill populations will struggle.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development reported in 2011 that the United States is the only country where education attainment levels of people entering the labor market (25-34 year-olds) don’t exceed the levels of those about to leave the labor market (55-64 year-olds).

The same holds true for Oregon, where the older generation is more educated than the young. In a globally competitive economic environment, Hillsboro’s economy, and Oregon’s, will pay a heavy price if we fail to educate the children of all immigrants to their maximum potential.

Bill MacKenzie is a former congressional staff member, reporter and communications manager for a Hillsboro company.

*First appeared in the Hillsboro Tribune.

Case study: Small business boosts online revenue with Etsy

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Last fall I met with Margaret Phillips, the owner of Vintage Passementerie, a business sourcing antique millinery and vintage ribbons and trims from around the world, and selling them at Monticello Antiques in SE Portland, and through various online channels.

A graduate of the City & Guilds of London Institute, with a diploma in Design and Embroidery and a certificate in Textile Design, Margaret’s stated goal is:

“to share these beautiful finds with textile artists, designers, costumers, textile conservators and those interested in fine quality from the past.”

The Challenge.

In late 2012 she inquired if she could use my professional services to solve her online sales dilemma. For several years she’d had robust sales at her mall space and through Ebay, yet her Etsy sales remained flat. Being a savvy businesswoman, she knew she was missing out on social media opportunities, and figured Etsy provided the chance to diversify her revenue stream. I agreed to help because I felt I had a unique insight to her specific situation. In April and May of 2012 I accompanied Margaret through flea markets in Paris and old musty shops ran by ornery German octogenarian mercers in Bath, England – all to gain a better understanding of her unique selling proposition.

Oh, and did I mention Margaret is my mother?

 

Sandy Row Belfast

My Mom, at the entrance to Sandy Row in Belfast, Northern Ireland.

I should note that my trip to peruse antique ribbon galleries and vintage fabric depots wasn’t purely altruistic … the visits came during a family jaunt in which I traded time, minute for minute, in exchange for dragging her through the doldrums of Northern Ireland’s sectarian violence.

I digress …

Etsy.

We started with a question: How can we boost her Etsy sales? Upon logging into her Etsy account, the first thing I noticed is that Etsy has tools to help vendors understand the origin of their web traffic, allowing them to see the specific items and keywords that are drawing consumers to their Etsy shop. So, much like the tools we use in our practice at AM:PM PR, I was excited to learn I can use Etsy’s tools to determine which posts and keyword choices are bringing customers to her Etsy account.

SEO.

We started our work in late October 2012, and after a week of meddling around, it had already become her highest traffic month to date with 200 shop views, 323 listing views, but 0 orders. Despite the lack of sales, we felt encouraged by the dramatic uptick in traffic.

Etsy chart 1

Together we performed a communication audit for her Etsy shop-profile and determined which items, images and words were drawing the most consumer traffic to her shop. We then altered the language of her Etsy shop to include more of the most popular keywords. Using the Google Keywords tool, we contrasted and tested high volume search terms and included those words in her Etsy profile as well.  The results were immediate and gratifying.

This is her web traffic for all of 2012. You can see the dramatic doubling in web traffic to her shop, and quadrupling of traffic to her listings, beginning with our revived efforts in October 2012.

Etsy chart 2

Social Media.

Ahh, “social media.”  Are there any two words in the English language responsible for driving more disdain and nausea into the hearts and minds of the Baby Boomer generation? Just the mention of these two words cause many boomers to cringe like Dracula to a cross. In fairness, who wants to spend the afternoon sitting in front of a computer typing gibberish into the blackhole of the interwebs? Or so the thinking often goes. But when we discovered Etsy has unique social media capabilities, Margaret was thrilled … to have me look into it for her.

The first thing we noticed – Etsy allows consumers to “like” items in a given Etsy shop without actually buying them – as a way of bookmarking them. As a shop owner, you receive notifications allowing you to see who “likes” your shop, or items in your shop, and you reciprocate by “following” these profiles, presuming that most people will in turn follow you back. If they liked your items, why wouldn’t they want to be your friend?

This act of reciprocal following may seem social and friendly, but it serves a greater marketing purpose as well – alerting your followers every time you upload a new item onto your Etsy account.

After training Margaret to update posts/items regularly and follow “likers” often (two tasks that require steadfast vigilance) we got to work creating a schedule for updating her Facebook page, which I linked to a dummy Twitter account that automatically updates every time she posts to Facebook. I admit the Twitter account has been a bit of a killjoy in terms of results, but considering she spends 0% energy on Twitter, it’s merely another search engine optimized baited-hook dangling out in the ocean, waiting for an antique ribbon-loving fish to swim by and bite. Similarly, with each new Tweet, we are continually linking potential customers back to her shop and as a result we’re seeing that her small business boosts online revenue.

Listings.

Another important step has involved the increase in listings, and the updating or reposting of old listings. As she gains more followers, each new item she posts goes directly into the newsfeeds of these new followers, many of whom are likely to see what would be considered “old” items for the first time.

How effective is this effort?

The following is our results from the past two and a half months alone.

Traffic:

  • 8,551 Shop Visits (vs. 4,176 in all of 2012)
  • 863 visits resulting from Direct Traffic (those who bookmarked/liked the shop). This is over 10% of all visits.
  • 165 visits originating from her newly redesigned website
  • Direct Traffic From Facebook has increased by 50% during the past month
  • Google search engines from Korea, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and more are directing people to her Etsy site

The most dramatic results come from comparing sales and traffic results from all of 2012 with the first 45 days of 2013.

  • Sales have tripled
  • Site visits have doubled

Further, with 1/4 of the month left to go (at the time of this writing) we have more site visits this month than we had all of last month.

The other beautiful thing about her results is that they are measurable. The practices I used are the same public relations practices we use at AM:PM PR to spread brand awareness and drive web traffic for our bigger customers.

Stats for 2012:

Etsy Stats 1

Stats for 2013:

Etsy Stats 2

Or, if you are a more visual person:

Etsy chart 3

Twitter puts it all out on the Vine

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You may have heard of micro processors, micro blogging and micro machines – but have you heard of micro video? Well if Twitter has its way, their acquisition of a new company called Vine will help them branch out to the next big thing … an app that allows you to share 6-second video clips.

I can hear your eyes rolling from my office. In fact, you may be asking, “Cam, why should I pay attention to yet another app?”

Here’s why:

Debuting on January 24th, this product has already caused quite a stir in the social media world. In two weeks, online Vine users shared 113,897 videos on Twitter on over a single weekend. That’s over 2,000 videos every hour.

Major brands like Urban Outfitters, Lucky Magazine, GAP, Red Vines, Moose Tracks, Coke-a-Cola and Pepsi have already put up videos.

Brands are currently using this format to demonstrate how their products work, to hold contests and to share creative content that they hope will resonate and connect them with their target audience. Still skeptical? Check out three of my favorite videos, and perhaps I can change your mind.

1.


2.


3.

 

4. BONUS – If you want to be endlessly entertained follow James Urbaniak

 

For more information:

Wired Magazine – “Why Vine’s Going to Grow Into Something Huge”

Entrepreneur Magazine – “The Pros and Cons of Using Video App ‘Vine’ for Marketing”

 

Unplug for your kids.

Unplugged Bots on Wired’s “GEEKDAD” Blog – Shared Post

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By Erik Wecks, GEEKDAD

 

At his day job, Gary Hirsch is a business consultant running a company called On Your Feet which uses improvisational theater to help businesses communicate and collaborate. When not working with managers from Nike and other large corporations, you might find Hirsch busy painting robots on the backs of dominoes or out and about Portland, Oregon, leaving his creations all over town for people to find.

BotJoy fan Jeff Probst with artist Gary Hirsch

In early 2012, his “What Brings Portland Joy?” project asked finders of his bots to post pictures of their bot with things which brought them joy. In true Portland style, he soon had pictures of kale, roller derby, and beer. Recently, Hirsch was asked to have his bots included in the swag bags for both the Emmys and the Golden Globes. Joy Bots and other Bot creations by Gary Hirsch have now been showing up with the likes of Downton Abbey‘s Elizabeth McGovern; cast members from Glee, True Blood and Breaking Bad; and Survivor host Jeff Probst, who recently ordered 100 of them to give to the guests on his talk show.

 

Not only are Hirsch’s bots hobnobbing with the rich and famous, but they are also becoming well traveled. Hirsch says that he has received pictures of his bots from all over the world. “There is a part of the website ‘Where in the world is your Bot?,’ and folks love sending in photos of their Bot in exotic places: Bali, Egypt, Nairobi, and the Arctic Circle to name a few.

 

After meeting the art therapist at Randal Children’s hospital in Portland, Hirsch asked if he could make a special “Brave Bot” for kids being admitted to the hospital. Now each child admitted to the day surgery unit gets a special Brave Bot with instructions that read:

  1.  Allow your robot to get to know you by letting him hang out with you in your room, on your windowsill, in your pocket, or wherever you like to spend time.
  2. Listen carefully, when needed, your Brave Bot will use his robot powers to give you a little bit of courage to face the things that feel uncertain and scary.
  3. Keep your Brave Bot with you anywhere you go for a little bit of courage where ever you are.

Gary Hirsch's Brave Bot

“I hear some amazing stories of how the Bots are helping,” says Hirsch, “For instance: Ava, a wonderful 8 year with type 1 diabetes holds on to her Brave Bot every time she gets an injection. Her Mom just told me that now Ava is able to give herself insulin injections with the Brave Bot watching.”

When asked why he thinks these bots seem to have helped, Hirsch answered, “The Bots are small, feel great in your hand, the kids are always bigger then the Bot, they can talk to it, they feel in control. Somehow the Bots help you have conversations with yourself that you might not have otherwise. I have really no idea how they work. I just make them and let the people that have them do the rest.”

I asked Hirsch how he came up with the idea for the bots.

“I had this idea about 5 years ago: What if you had an imaginary robot that followed you around all day and gave you outrageous compliments? It was a fun idea to imagine, so I included it in an illustrated journal that we made for our On Your Feet clients and gave them out when we were running innovation and creativity sessions. The image of a robot following you around giving you compliments kept haunting me… I mean seriously, how cool would that be? It would be invisible, and only you would know it was there, and it would say things to you like “Nice pants” or “That was a smart thing to do” or “You made the right choice.”  So two years ago, I thought, “Let’s make the robot real” and after playing with several surfaces, I stumbled onto the domino. Now instead of an invisible robot, you have a small one that you can take anywhere.”

One of the things I love about each bot is that it is a numbered piece of art. I have bots which Hirsch gave me in the 15,000 range. He told me that recently he passed number 17,000 and has left hundreds of them around cities like Portland, Oregon, and Austin, Texas. Hirsch is incredibly generous with his bots, giving away thousands of his creations. The rainy night I met him, Hirsch stuffed the pockets of my jacket with several bots for me, and some for my kids as well. He also produces large scale installations of his bots which used hundreds of individually crafted pieces. Hirsch says that he can lose himself for hours while painting bots and is nowhere near bored with the project.

Gary Hirsch original bot.

Hirsch has branched out from the original joy bots. There are now 26 different Bots. “You can see them all on my Etsy site with new ones sprouting up all the time. My favorites are:

The Launch of the Unplugged Bot:

Recently, Hirsch’s brother came up with an idea for a new bot, the Unplugged Bot. The Unplugged Bot assists its owners to unplug once in a while and re-connect with the real world. Like all his bots, they are hand-painted and one-of-a-kind.

“Do you know someone who needs to unplug? Who has to check their electronic devices every 20 seconds?”

 

Read more by Erik Wecks

Follow @erikwecks on Twitter.

Branding, Communications and Public Relations: Questions to Answer Before Working With a PR Firm

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At AM:PM PR we begin each new client relationship with the hope it will lead to a long-term partnership. We believe the more we know about a prospective client’s business, the better we can understand the qualities that differentiate them from their competition, thus allowing us to do a better job helping to communicate each client’s unique story to targeted audiences.

During our information gathering process, we like to ask a lot of questions – a process that is beneficial to both parties. Answering the following questions provides potential clients an opportunity to think about the way they communicate about their business, product or service. If you’re ready to ask us how we may help you, copy and paste the following questions into the body of an email with your answers and email them to: info@ampmpr.com.

As you ponder your answers, are you learning anything new about your business, your brand, or your current need for marketing and PR assistance? Here are some branding, communications and public relations questions to ask yourself before working with a PR firm.

Introductory Questions:

What short-term and long-term goals are you hoping to achieve with PR and marketing services?

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AM:PM PR hosts an evening with author Bill Carter

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Next week we have a special guest coming to our office, author Bill Carter. 20 years ago he helped to end the Bosnian war when he teamed up with Bono & U2 during their Zoo TV tour, bringing concert goers face to face with the normal, everyday people trying to survive the conflict, and inspiring the famous Pavarotti/U2 collaboration “Miss Sarajevo” in the process.

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Carter has written a new book titled “Boom, Bust, Boom” that is a thorough exploration of the worldwide copper industry, and puts the spotlight on a proposed copper mine near Bristol Bay, Alaska that affects thousands of commercial fishing families in the Pacific Northwest.  Sebastian Junger (“The Perfect Storm”, “War” and the film Restrepo) says “Boom, Bust Boom” is “the best sort of journalism: beautifully written, rich in detail and impossible to ignore.”

If you’d like to join us for the exclusive event next Thursday, please comment below with your contact information to RSVP.  Space is limited.

In the event you can’t make it, we asked Bill to discuss his work and why he’s talking about this proposed mining development.

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Bill, first off, what did you do to bring world attention to the Bosnian War, and how did you do it?

My first jolt of harnessing some world attention to the Bosnian War was when I arranged satellite link-ups between Sarajevo and U2 concerts. These link-ups were live and unedited and could have gone horribly wrong. A true risk when beaming live into a show of 75,000 fans out for a night of music. But, in the end, all the link-ups were successful. I would credit that to the people I found to speak live. They could have started yelling in anger at the European audiences that were watching them on 90 foot screens, but instead they were always polite, respectful and fully understanding that the kids at the show were their potential allies in getting politicians in Europe to do something.

Then I made Miss Sarajevo, a documentary that vividly shows the alternative life in the besieged capital of Sarajevo. The life of the artist, teenagers, school kids. It is a story of the spirit of survival in the face of utter death and humiliation.

I also helped organize the U2 concert held in Sarajevo in 1997, a promise kept by U2 from the day I first met them. A promise I suspect not many others would keep. They spent their own money and got 50,000 people to come to a rock show, with 4,000 NATO troops guarding the event. It was the craziest single event I have ever been a part of.

And finally I wrote “Fools Rush In“, which tells an epic story of love, grief and redemption. It offers up a great deal of hope in a sea of hopelessness. And why this is true for any situation in our personal lives. There is always a way to see out of something, even if it looks incredibly dark at the moment.

There were many international media agencies present in Sarajevo during the war, how is what you did different, and why did it seem to have a deeper impact?

Quite simply, I didn’t know what I was doing! This is important. Professional journalists and newscasters have a formula they are required to crank out everyday, in a war or working the sports beat at the local college. It really doesn’t matter. They hit their marks, like actors on a stage. The only thing to look forward to is the possibility of the unexpected. So, they fail to actually connect to the human side of us, the side that reflects. Worse yet, as news sources continue to expand, the news now tends to be not even that good at giving us the “news.” I think what I was doing was completely based in the human aspect of the war. My motto was not to inform you to the “facts” of the war, but to make you actually care about the person on the film, the screen, the satellite enough to stop and listen. If empathy can be conjured up in a person, we are very powerful creatures. This is when we are able to actually make differences in our world.

Have new technologies like Twitter, Facebook, Kickstarter and YouTube made it easier or harder to make the same kind of social impact?

In some ways easier, and in some ways harder. Easier if you think of the Arab spring or Wikileaks. Impact can be dramatic and instant. At the same time there is no filter and we have quickly become overwhelmed with too much information about every thing on earth. This sensory overload can make it difficult to ascertain which cause to focus on, or who to believe. There is just so much information.

Do you have any advice for young social activists? 

First and foremost, you must be a curious person – a naturally curious person. This will help a lot. Then, follow your gut and your heart to get to what you care about.  Then add some strong dashes of common sense and a pinch of perspective.  Now, go for it. I have found blind heartfelt activism usually leads to a bleeding heart, which leads to activism dead on arrival. On the flipside, too many facts and no heart leads to the same empty grave. The key is a mixture. Or in the language of writers, the key is a unique voice. Hit them from an angle they didn’t see coming.

Your new book “Boom, Bust, Boom” is about copper.  Why did you decide to write this book?

Like all my books, it is the topic in which I suddenly realized I was actually living. I lived in a copper town, in a copper state, in one of the largest copper belts in the world. Then I was poisoned by my own soil and realized I don’t know a thing about the place where I live. This triggered a curiosity in me, which led to a book.

What are some of the bigger copper-related issues facing America today?

The biggest issue is getting the message across to people that we are massive consumers of copper, and thus directly responsible for the highly toxic open pit copper mines throughout the Southwest and beyond. We are dependent on copper to maintain our current civilization and yet copper mining is highly destructive and has real damaging effects on our lives and water.

What should ordinary Americans know about the proposed Pebble Mine project near Bristol Bay, Alaska? 

They should know that this mine, if built, will sit 14 miles from Lake Iliamna, the single largest natural hatchery of sockeye salmon on earth. The headwaters that flow from Iliamna carry up to 50 percent of the total sockeye salmon run of Bristol Bay, which is the world’s largest salmon run. There are no large-scale copper mines that don’t somehow pollute or ruin the surrounding groundwater. The scale they operate at is too large.

How will it affect people living outside of Alaska?

If built this mine will adversely effect the water and thus seriously threaten or kill the fishery. To threaten this fishery in any way should alarm anyone, in Alaska the lower 48 or the world. No one is making the argument that the mine will destroy a beautiful landscape, which it would. They are specially saying this mine will destroy one of the last great sustainable fisheries. A fishery that provides thousands of jobs, feeds millions and has been at the heart of a native culture for 8,000 years. And for what? Copper. For me this battle is not just about this mine, or this fishery. This fight to stop this mine addresses a question we must ask ourselves going forward for the next 50 years: what is more important to us as humans, minerals to sustain our civilization, or water and food we need to actually live. This will become the heart of a battle fought around the world for the next 100 years. When do we say no to mining when it threatens a vital source of water or food. Pebble is this fight. And it is now.

What are people doing to fight this development? 

There are many organizations joined at the hip in the battle against the mine. Many bed partners that normally don’t speak to one another. Fishermen joined with environmentalist, Republicans joined with Democrats. This is one of those issues that unites those wanting to salvage a great resource against those that see our natural resources as something can be forever extracted for our consumer driven society and maximize shareholder profits. Enough is enough and it is time to say no to big business and keep the fishery alive and well.

Bill Carter will be speaking at the 16th Annual FisherPoets Gathering in Astoria, Oregon Feb. 22, 23.  Friday he will read at Clemente’s Restaurant during a fundraiser to support Trout Unlimited’s efforts to spread awareness about the proposed Pebble Mine.  For a full schedule of events, visit:  http://www.fisherpoets.org/fisherpoets-gathering-2013.html

To learn more:

Trout Unlimited/Save Bristol Bay

Alaska Conservation Fund

The Natural Resources Defense Council

The Wild Salmon Center