5 Ways ExactTarget will Change Social Media with CoTweet Acquisition

It is huge news that ExactTarget is acquiring CoTweet. Huge news because of the ramifications this business “deal” will have on the world of social media and corporate communications. ExactTarget is already a leader in the world of email marketing and soon will be the pioneer of cross platform collaboration in the social media environment. So why is this important? Why am I so excited with this transition? Here are 5 ways why this is important and will change the world of social media.

1. One Enterprise System is Needed for Collaboration.

The technology world has been scrapping to produce one system that will manage all accounts across the worlds of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Plaxo…. etc. ExactTarget and CoTweet now have the means to create an integrated system that will help in building out that platform. Don’t get me wrong, this is not a system that can be used by the individual but is closely tied to the return-on-investment (that is extremely needed) in the world of business development.

2. Measurement will Be An Investment and Priority

It is extremely hard to find a system that will measure ROI when it comes to using social media. I know that we can search, scrap, and put together a unique system that will measure influence and coupon discount codes but we are still lacking. Radian6 does a great job at measuring influence and helps in tracking a brand name across the different social sites… but it is hard to find a unique system to measure one-to-one online marketing. In order to monetize and work CoTweet into the enterprise system of ExactTarget measurement will have to be a priority. ExactTarget prides itself on ROI and measurement of email campaign and the same thing will apply to CoTweet.

3. Email and Social Need to be Combined

The next logical step for social media tools and marketing online is for email and social to be combined in one fluid marketing message. It is hard to find a system (Flowtown has started) that has combined all forms of Internet marketing in one cohesive message. If you send out an email you must copy and paste the same messaging to a blog… to Twitter.. to Facebook… and so on. This is speaking strictly from a corporate perspective. If you are a sole entrepreneur or a rock star like Chris Brogan it may be easy to build out a system that combines all forms of your online marketing…. for the corporate world it is extremely difficult.

4. Corporate Checks and Balances for Social Media

It is not a mystery that the majority of Fortune 1000 companies that are not involved social media because of the fear of…. content… plain and simple. Social Media is untamed and there is a huge need for one system to support PR, Marketing, and HR in their pursuit of using social media for content sharing. ExactTarget and CoTweet will create a system that allows for managers to double check all content being shared by individuals within the company. With almost two-thirds of Fortune 100 companies using Twitter and other social media platforms… now is the time to develop a unique product for content distribution.

5. Perfecting Customer Engagement and Communication

There is a power within social media that is just underneath the surface… ready to break through. We are talking about the power of the multiple customer touch point. If you can drive a users engagement through email marketing you could (and should) drive engagement on the other social media platforms that user is involved. With the integration of CoTweet and the investment into development from ExactTarget we are going to see a complete solution towards driving customer engagement online. I know that ExactTarget was not interested in just bolting on some functionality into their system… they were interested in meshing with a solution that has a proven track record.

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This is huge news for social media, the city of Indianapolis, CoTweet, and ExactTarget. I am extremely excited to be on the front lines. Here’s to the future of social and online marketing!

(Also a good post about this news from my friend Jay Baer)

ExactTarget Acquires CoTweet. What Does It Mean?

For most of my readers, you heard it here first.

I have had the privilege to meet, chat, and work with the brilliant team at ExactTarget over the past month. It is always fascinating to meet people that want to change the way corporate culture uses social media. It has been said that the future of social media is in enterprise expansion and we are officially witnessing the push into one virtual platform (thanks to ExactTarget).

As of 11 am (EST) ExactTarget officially announced that they will be acquiring CoTweet, a Web-based collaboration platform that allows companies to manage multiple Twitter accounts from a single dashboard, support multiple editors, track conversations, assign roles, and create follow-up tasks. Social tools have been random and sometimes carelessly developed because the developers did not have the financial means to build a top quality product.

I don’t know about you… but I am overly excited with this step into an enterprise system social media platform. I am overly excited because ExactTarget is an Indianapolis, Indiana based company… and… I am overly excited because Jesse Engle (co-founder of CoTweet) is an awesome guy.

This deal will result in (finally) the expansion of social platforms into a unique collaboration system for one-to-one marketing. I love it. See press release below.

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ExactTarget Acquires Twitter Pioneer CoTweet, Creates Social Media Lab in San Francisco

Businesses Now Have Complete Solution to Manage Social Media, Email and Mobile Communications

SAN FRANCISCO (March 2, 2010) – Global on-demand email marketing and one-to-one marketing provider ExactTarget announced today it has acquired San Francisco-based CoTweet, creating the industry’s first complete solution for managing communications across all interactive marketing channels including social media, email and mobile.

CoTweet will operate in San Francisco as a business unit of ExactTarget and will lead the company’s social media product development.  CoTweet co-founder and chief executive Jesse Engle will lead the San Francisco operation and spearhead the creation and expansion of the company’s social media lab.

“What we’re seeing in the market is organizations are moving quickly to try to capture the potential of social, but are discovering that it’s siloed and not integrated effectively with other forms of digital communications,” said Scott Dorsey, ExactTarget co-founder and chief executive officer.  “By combining the power of ExactTarget and CoTweet, we can provide businesses a complete solution to tie together all forms of interactive communications and drive deeper customer engagement online.”

Founded in 2008 and based in San Francisco, CoTweet is a Web-based collaboration platform that allows companies to manage multiple Twitter accounts from a single dashboard, support multiple editors, track conversations, assign roles and create follow-up tasks.  The company has a growing client list, including Whole Foods, Oracle, McDonald’s, Microsoft, Ford, Dell, Pepsi, Sprint, Target, Intuit, Salesforce.com, USA Today and Coca-Cola.

“We see a huge opportunity to build on ExactTarget’s incredible business and customer relationships to help companies drive more measurable value from social media,” said Engle.  “As part of ExactTarget, we’ll have the global resources to cement our early lead, rapidly expand our platform and develop the next generation of social media communication tools.”

Forrester Research predicts social media marketing will grow faster than any other form of interactive marketing.  In its 2009 U.S. Interactive Marketing Forecast Report, the independent research firm estimated social media marketing will grow at compound annual rate of 34 percent, reaching $3.1 billion by 2014.

“This acquisition is strong validation that valuable, sustainable businesses are emerging from the Twitter ecosystem,” said Dick Costolo, Twitter’s chief operating officer. “An ExactTarget and CoTweet combination should lead to even further digital marketing innovation through use of the Twitter platform.”

The acquisition of CoTweet follows ExactTarget’s record-breaking 2009 that welcomed the company’s 36^th consecutive quarter of growth in the fourth quarter 2009 and saw annual contracted revenue soar to $114 million and total GAAP revenue exceed $95 million.  In 2009, ExactTarget also secured $145 million in venture capital investment, opened its first international office in London, earned the title of a “leader” in email marketing in the “The Forrester Wave: Email Marketing Service Providers Q4 2009” (December 2009) report and added NIKE Inc., Best Buy and Universal Music Group to its client list.  Headquartered in Indianapolis, ExactTarget now employs more than 600 associates worldwide.

About CoTweet, Inc.

CoTweet is the real-time business collaboration platform for Twitter. Working with companies such as Whole Foods, Starbucks, JetBlue, Ford, Pepsi, Sprint, Coca-Cola, the City of San Francisco/311 and Twitter, CoTweet has established itself as the tool of choice to brands to connect and engage with customers and stakeholders. Founded in 2008, CoTweet is based in San Francisco, Calif.  For more information, visit www.CoTweet.com

About ExactTarget

ExactTarget is a leading global provider of on-demand email marketing and one-to-one marketing solutions. The company’s software as a service technology provides organizations a single platform to connect with customers via triggered and transactional email, integrated text messaging, voice messaging, landing pages and social media.  Supported by collaborative global services teams, ExactTarget’s technology integrates with more sales and marketing information systems than any other in the industry, including Salesforce.com, Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Omniture and Webtrends among many others. ExactTarget’s software powers permission-based multi-channel communications for thousands of organizations around the world including Expedia.com, Aurora Fashions, Papa John’s, CareerBuilder.com, Gannett Co., Inc., The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, The Home Depot and Wellpoint, Inc. For more information, visit www.exacttarget.com or call 1-866-EMAILET.

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Media Contacts:

Cybele Diamandopoulos (FOLIO Communications for CoTweet) – 512.431.5759 or cybele@foliocommunications.com

Lindsay Tishgart (FOLIO Communications for CoTweet) – 512.327.1818 or lindsey@foliocommunications.com

Mitch Frazier (ExactTarget) – 317.670.9611 or mfrazier@ExactTarget.com

Carol Sacks (Tenor Communications for ExactTarget) – 650.520.8261 or carol@tenorcom.com

Lauren Sanders (Dittoe PR for ExactTarget) – 317.202.2280 X 10 or lauren@dittoepr.com

Why Aren’t You Integrating Your Marketing?

I need to rant. I picked up REACH magazine while hanging out in my apartment yesterday… do we all know what is inside the Reach magazine? Coupons… a ton of coupons from local

businesses…spreading their message and product across the city.

I am all about coupons. I use coupons to buy food, clothing, and services. There was only one problem with the hundred (or so) ads/coupons in the magazine. There were no links associated with social media on any of the coupons. I could not find one logo from  Facebook, Twitter, or Myspace throughout the entire catalog.

This does not make any sense to me… not one bit of sense.

Why wouldn’t you integrate the different forms of media on your coupons? Why wouldn’t you show every type of touchpoint to a buyer? Even the website addresses of the companies failed to show the social media connections on the homepage.

This is absolutely idiotic and ridiculous.

Setting up a Facebook Fan Page, Twitter account, or Myspace page is FREE. The only thing that social media can cost you (initially) is your time. Why wouldn’t you setup different accounts to capture potential clients in multiple ways… multiple touchpoints… multiple places.

There are multiple levels of marketing to capture the interests of an individual. It is absolutely ridiculous that a social networking was not mentioned ONCE in the catalog.

In my mind… I would want to capture every single individual who was on social media and was ALSO picking out my coupons… why would I want this type of individual? THEY ARE THE BUYER. They are the influencer. They are the one that spends money with your brand. They are the one you need to communicate with on a daily basis. If they are on social media… why not connect with them on a completely different level then Reach Magazine or newspaper coupons.

And on a second note… their friends are with them on the social networks. Welcome to the best viral marketing you could ever possibly want, need, or desire.

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5 Tips to Being Productive in Social Media

We had a packed house yesterday for the Staying Productive in Social Media seminar! It is always fun to communicate the importance of managing your time effectively. I wanted to send out the slide deck I used for the presentation… and… give you a few basic tips for staying productive.

Tip 1: Use the 4-Points Model

When using social media you should keep in mind the 4-points model. There are 4 points social media applications should touch in regards to your daily life: Business, Local Business Networking, Social, and Information. Choose four main networks where you spend the most of your time.

I use LinkedIn for business applications, Smaller Indiana for local business networking, Facebook for social application, and Twitter for information. LinkedIn can be described as my connection Rolodex. Facebook is to keep me updated on my friends and acquaintances from college and high school. Twitter is a wonderful information aggregation tool where you can follow influential people and the information they share. Smaller Indiana is a great place to connect to local professionals and share ideas on how to make Indiana a better place.

Tip 2: Commit Yourself

You get what you put in. How many times have we heard that? When using social media commit to a set amount of time a week to using your applications. You will find yourself spending to much time on your applications if you fail to designate a certain amount during the week.
I try to designate an thirty minutes to an hour of each day to information sharing (writing blogs, commenting on blogs, perusing my Google Reader) and an hour a day to using my other networks (Facebook, LinkedIn, and Smaller Indiana).

Tip 3: Setup Time Blocks for Social Media Management (Facebook Meeting)

If you use Outlook or Google Calendar (well.. any calendar) it is important to setup time blocks for use of social media. Some people may disagree with me but I find it extremely valuable in helping in building a habit and setting aside time.  Setup up social media meetings!

Tip 4: Try Rescue Time

RescueTime is an AWESOME time management tool for Internet use.  RescueTime is a web-based time management and analytics tool for knowledge workers who want to be more efficient and productive. If you own a company and you are looking for a great tool to help manage your employees time online… this is for you. Check out the video below:

RescueTime Reports from Tony Wright on Vimeo.

Tip 5 : Do Not Get Sucked into the Social Media Black Hole

Everyone knows the problem of the social media black hole…. let me run the scenario. You get on Facebook at 10:00 am. What are you doing? You are probably checking your messages… updating your status… and looking at pictures.

All of a sudden your chat box ignites with a flurry of activity. Friends from long ago are tweeting you, texting you, Facebook chatting you, and frankly… destroying your ability to get anything done. This is the social media black hole. Easy fix > turn off chat functionality on everything.

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I Don’t Care About Your Clients. I Care About Their Friends.

Here is a quick thought for your Monday morning. I always try to get a point across in all of my seminars surrounding the concepts in social media and the Internet. it goes something like this..

“As a marketer in this age of online communication.. I don’t care about your clients… I care about their friends.”

This concept has been gaining importance according to the rules of viral marketing and online marketing. When we are focusing on lead generation through social media it is extremely important to understand what SELLS your product or service. What story do you tell the end-user that pulls people toward your brand? How do you get people involved passed the direct mail piece or the tweet you sent out yesterday?

You get your current customers to tell the story for you.

You train your happy clients to tell their version of your story!

It is a fact of nature right? We tend to have friends that are similar to us… your friends… your business contacts… your important professional network… the closest people tend to have the same type of values.

We want to our clients to sell our story. Referrals are the best way to gain business leads and social media has created a platform to make that sharing… so much easier.

Education and the ability to teach your customers the art of sharing is and will be… extremely important to growing your business in this new age of online communication.

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Social Media Enhances Personal Experience in Business

Why do we tend to shorten experiences? Why… as a society… do we keep inventing new ways to make things faster, harder, stronger, and compiled. Information flying this way and that, overloading everyone from the iPOD Millennial to the AM Radio Baby Boomer (sorry stereotyping is a spiritual gift of mine). Technology has managed to help our society do more in less time. But (hat tip to Seth Godin on this one) the “do more in less time” philosophy has taken the personality out of the every day encounter. Seth makes a brilliant example in his post, Old Marketing with New Tools:

Cost and speed pressure means that when you get your car serviced, it’s unlikely you’ll be greeted by the mechanic himself, wiping his hands on a greasy rag, telling you exactly what he did to your car. Instead, you’ll get a difficult to decipher printout.

In some cases, new technology has taken out the face to face interaction with the business to the client. BUT we have seen an increase in social interaction (both online and off) in the realm of social media.

I overheard a gentleman talking about a social network (whether Facebook or LinkedIn it doesn’t matter). He was making reference to social networking on the Internet as impersonal and stupid. First off, I about flipped out of my chair and set him on fire. I understand that online social networking is not for everyone but the least someone can do is recognize the fact that it has VALUE. I turned around thinking I would be face-to-face with a twenty-something year old. Unfortunately he looked around 50 with his real age probably being closer to 35.

The simple fact that a gentleman/business owner was implying that social networking was impersonal is completely ridiculous. If you do it right.

The right way to make social networking work for you is two fold.

1. Join a social network (preferably a geographically local network). In order to know and be productive in the different social networks refer to my post: How To Be Productive in Social Media.

2. Use the social network to meet members of that specific network off-line.

Combine face-to-face networking with your online social networking experience. I use Smaller Indiana to meet new business owners/creative individuals in the Indianapolis community. This does not replace my off-line business networking with groups like Rainmakers but it does add value in meeting people who usually do not attend networking events.

The combination of off-line and online social networking is a powerful tool you can utilize for YOUR business. Try it out. Spend a few minutes on a local network and set up a meeting. If it doesn’t work. TRY AGAIN. If that doesn’t work. Third times s charm?

Also, if you ever hear anyone degrading social media, please call me. I’ll bring the blow torch. You bring the gasoline.

The Only Thing That Matters Is Your Story

We are experiencing a change in the world of customer communication. It is no longer the company that is controlling the brand management but the consumer. Forget the concept of social media… we have been witnessing this transition for the past decade… and it is increasing exponentially since the inception of the Internet.

Customers are now talking about you at a staggering pace using sites like Twitter, Facebook, Myspace and LinkedIN… and the list goes on. I was watching TV today and taking note of the increasinly terrible advertising that is taking place on the cable networks. I began to realize that I (along with millions of others) are no longer making buying decisions based on traditional advertising. You can take the definition of traditional advertising any way you want but in my terms it means old ways of doing business.

A great book to read is Made to Stick (from the Heath Brothers) which talks about the concept of creating a story to push your company into the next decade of communication. I have read, reread, and read again the excellent points made throughout the book and began to realize one thing… if you do not create a story that your customers can retell and share.. you will lose market share steadily over the next couple of years.

We might not be seeing a steady decline because social media and the Internet is still bleeding edge when it comes to market penetration in a global sense. My question is simply this: What happens when we do reach the peak of market penetration for social media? What happens when your customers ARE using the tool and using it effectively? What do you do when you reach the point? Are you ready for the onslaught? Is your communications department familiarizing themselves with the tools?

All that matters is your story. You are going to be creating a story based on a marketing process but we might come to the point where it doesn’t matter what you want your story to be… your customers are going to create a story anyway. Experience is the key to the future of marketing and customer communication. They (your customer) are going to be talking NOT about your sales or PR release but how they personally experienced your product or service.

Are you preparing yourself for the new age of communication?

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Does Your Employee’s Personal Life Matter to Your Company?

There have been a few conversations circulating among my network pertaining to the personal life of employees being spread through the social sphere. Here is the overall question:

Does your employee’s personal life matter to your company? Does it affect your company brand?

Some say yes and some say no. The way an employee acts and talks outside of the work has never been more scrutinized than right now. We are living in a world where a mis-sent email, random tweet, or Facebook picture could damage a company and the guilty employee. Let’s run a scenario:

Employee A sends out a Facebook status update to their friends about a club they attended the night before (this could even be a tweet). The status update reads:

I had such a good time last night at Club XYZ. We were really boozing it up and I might have went home with a somebody, but I woke up at my apartment. So we are okay!

Now, I’m not saying that anyone would actually send this… it is only for this scenario. Let’s say that a follower took offense to the comment because the employee worked for a company that touted “ethical values” and shared the comment with their friends… which in turn was shared by a few other people.. and a few other people.. and a few hundred people.

Now the question is… does that affect or hurt the employer? Should employers be more conscious of their employees use of social media? I am torn on the issue and because of this… I decided to ask the opinions of Abbie Fink, Jay Baer, and Jason Falls.

Abbie Fink is Vice President and General Manager for HMA Public Relations :

It is important to remember that there is a very fine line between personal and professional when you are in the social media space.

At our office, I want my team to have some personality and encourage that, in fact.  But knowing that they are representing a variety of different clients, we periodically remind them that any statements on their personal pages must reflect well on us as a business and that of our clients. It is also what I advise when working with clients who are finding their way around Facebook, Twitter, etc.

My guess is that one such post from one employee on their personal page would not damage the employer’s brand. But again, it will be important for that employer to have guidelines in place and monitor what is being said.

Jason Falls is Founder and Tough Guy at Social Media Explorer

That’s why employers and employees need to have social media policies. It’s disappointing that an educated adult would say something offensive or potentially damaging to their career or their company in a public forum, but people mistakenly think that protected Tweets or certain privacy settings mean no one will see it. If you post it, people can see it, capture it, index it and even replicate it so it never goes away.

I tell people they should assume everything they post on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and so on can be seen by their spouse, boss, priest, rabbi, minister, children, grandmother, employees and competitors. If you know that and then post something foolish you get what you deserve.

Companies need social media policies for instances just like this. It can take me less than a minute to see the Tweet, find out who sent it and who they work for. Even if things are private the individual can be found on LinkedIn and Google is really smart and connects the dots. If the individual had been through social media training and been given a company policy it may have stopped the offending tweet.

Jay Baer is Founder and Consultant at Convince and Convert

The lines are continually blurring between personal and professional lives in the online environment. Does it affect you if your employee is a closet dominatrix and readily shares that information to world? Of course it does! It didn’t matter ten…twenty…thirty years ago but it matters now.

It is important to educate your employees on the use of social media and without a policy your dominatrix sales person could sink a client or your bottom line.

There you have it. Jay, Abbie, and Jason are thought leaders in the industry of digital communication and I highly value their opinions. It is important to have a social media policy in place when you encourage your employees to start using social media. The world is an open book and your employees could harm your brand or potential business.

For more information on social media policy development check out Jason’s blog : What Every Company Should Know About Social Media Policy

5 Ways to Not Be a Complete SAP on Social Media

Maybe… I am just in a bad mood. Maybe… I am just upset because the Colt’s lost the Super Bowl last night. Maybe… I am just being honest and open with my opinions… whether right or wrong. Either way… I have a bone to pick with a certain group of people that use social media. I am going to preface this  by saying that I have also been guilty of this activity and have been trying to change my ways…

There are a certain group of tweets, status updates, and posts that are sent out every day that consist of what I call “The Tony Robbin’s Smile Tweet-Post-Update.” If you are familiar with Tony Robbins… you can understand where I am coming from here… Here are some examples:

“Let’s have an awesome week! Lot’s of great stuff planned and new clients rolling in. Good luck everyone!”

“Just believe in yourself and all your wishes will come true!”

“If you don’t climb the mountain, you can’t view the plain.”

“Just talked to @abdcd and it was the best conversation ever! So Awesome!

Now… the last one in that list is not necessarily bad because you might truly think that the person was awesome  (I’ve done it) but does it really have to be every person you have a phone conversation with… and do I  need to know… every… time? There should come a time when you strive, yearn, and want to create something more…There should come a time when you want to create content and updates that make people think and strive to be more both intellectually and emotionally…

Where do you draw the line as a person and as a brand? I think the issue I am having with so much irrelevant content is that… it is not new… it is not fun… if I wanted an ego boost I would turn on Joel Osteen or Tony Robbins. And most of all… it is not real. So let’s talk about how we stray away from terrible human development content and get down to creating content that will be extremely beneficial to your life, business, and social media tribe.

1. Share thoughts and emotions surrounding an experience.

“This weekend’s funeral left me pondering: Do you celebrate the life lived, or mourn for what is gone and what will never be?”

This is an important development in the world of social media. You can share business and info about your company but you can go to an entirely new level with an update like the one listed above. (This is more for the personal business account than a company account) It is a tasteful update that will get a response and bring the community closer together.

2. Do NOT re-tweet, re-share, or re-post every quote on God’s green EARTH.

I am okay with one or two quotes a day but when I keep getting “live your best life now” or “this is the first day of the rest of your life” quotes it gets fairly annoying. I do appreciate the individual trying to pump me up but I don’t need self-help gurus in my face every day.

3. Share quality content around your company, service, or life.

If you are a self-help coach… I understand the concept of sharing thoughts and ideas about self improvement… when you are not in the self-help world and everything is absolutely (over-the-top) positive that flies off the keyboard… it strikes me as a little fake. I want to know real. I want to know substance! I want to know how life is being led… treated… and dealt with… We can all grow if we are honest with our positions.

4. Don’t share about every success, new client, or project development in your company.

It is okay to celebrate with your community but there is a fine line between blatant self-promotion and excitement…. because the truth of the matter remains… If you were actually signing all the clients and success under the sun… you wouldn’t have the time to use social media 14 hours a day.

5. Be real. Be real. Be real.

It is important to share information and content that excites and drives you through life. If you want to share gobs of emotionally insignificant content… that is your prerogative… but remember that the best strive to be real, honest, and raw. I want to know about the little things in life… I want to know when a community member is upset because an individual flipped them off on the road.

I want to know when they are hurt, exhausted, and emotionally raw.

I think it comes down to the point of not going over the top… everything is okay in moderation… do not share every pain and do not share every success… just be who you are… period.

Social Media: The Haven for New Ideas

Ali is a 2009 graduate of Hanover College. She works at an Indianapolis SEO company, Slingshot SEO, Inc., where she integrates the importance of SEO and social media in the blogosphere. She is an avid Tweeter and blogger. Ali is an upbeat person who loves working and communicating (in any form!) with everyone.

As I caught up with my daily blog feeds this week, I stumbled across a very interesting blog post by Copyblogger’s Jonathan Morrow entitled “The Alexander Graham Bell Guide to Changing the World.” Turns out, this post (and a swift kick to my backside to keep up with blogging) helped to sort through the mess in my brain and I was finally snapped out of my case of writer’s block. Halleluiah! So what DOES Alexander Graham Bell have to do with changing the internet marketing world?

Of course we all know that Bell changed the world with his invention of the telephone. Right? Actually, it’s safe to say that we were lied to as elementary school students (GASP!). Yep, according to the research, two men created the first two models of the telephone BEFORE Bell. Who knew?!  More importantly, how did Bell jump ahead of these fellow inventors and gain the credibility for the telephone?

Bell was a smart cookie. Instead of hording his communicating device idea in his bedroom, he spent years fighting to get his idea out in the world. He fought for the right to get HIS idea patented. Through his journey of changing the way people communicated, it was evident that Bell understood the most important aspect of getting information to the people. Morrow explains, “He [Bell] understood that what matters isn’t who thinks of an idea first. It’s not even who takes action first. It’s who spreads the idea the farthest.” Smart, huh?

This phenomenon is still alive today, possibly more than ever. We ALL have ideas upon ideas upon ideas (IDEAS, get the drift?) that we would love to ONE day share with the world…and then someone else finally DOES and then “my idea” becomes “his/her idea” and then you are back to square one. Is this you? I know I am definitely an idea pack rat (as Morrow describes). I’m sure I’m not alone.

So, what now? GET THAT INFORMATION OUT THERE! If you take the time to come up with a new, brilliant idea, why wouldn’t you want to share it? Fight like Bell did and your passion behind your ideas will be revealed and people will notice. Be that person who shares information and ideas with the rest of the world. Heck, isn’t that what the internet is for anyway?

My hope is that you see that I’m not saying that you need to create immensely creative and amazing inventions or come up with the ‘next big trend’ (although, face it, that’d be pretty sweet), but the internet allows us to take information that we learn from others and add our own understanding and thoughts (of course giving credit where credit is due!). We all have thoughts, right? Well, use social media to get those thoughts out instead of becoming an idea pack rat!

As writers in the internet-driven world, we know there is more of a focus on getting the information OUT to the masses, rather than being the first one to do so. This directly relates to Bell’s advice—spread it the FARTHEST. How do we do this? Social media. We tweet, post, blog, Flick new information 24-7. The new age of information and idea exchange is at our fingertips, only a keystroke away, how much more cliché can I get?

Have a case of writer’s block? Winter blues got you down? Dig through those ideas you have packed away and start typing. Fight for your ideas and be the passionate one who gets the word out, just as Alexander Graham Bell did, and who knows where you’ll end up!

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