See my ongoing list of the 100 books I’m reading in 2012, and check out their (sometimes) pretty covers on my Pinterest board, cryptically entitled: The 100 Books I’m Reading in 2012. As always, if you’ve got a book you want me to read/review/spill chai tea on, just drop me a line.

And now, for some irreverent book reviews.

Little Princes: One Man’s Promise to Bring Home the Lost Children of Nepal (Conor Grennan)

This book will go down as one of the best I read in 2012, and I’m fine with that.

During my trip to Nepal this winter with my husband, I was cold. Very cold. Since the last time I was in that fine country it was summer and I was climbing to Everest Base Camp in tank tops, it didn’t occur to me to do things like check seasonability of vacation plans before packing my lone sweatshirt. Being cold led itself to staying under the covers in our lovely hotel, drinking tea and reading books by candlelight when the power went off (de rigueur in winter in Kathmandu).

Thankfully, when not laying in bed we went to bookshops, where we picked up this lovely story about one twenty-something American’s fascinating non-profit adventure in Nepal. Love, adventure, and adorable orphans collide in this one. It’s like Three Cups of Tea. But true. (And far better.)

I would also like to state for the record that I wish Conor Grennan had been in my business school class. (Yes, reading author bios is useful).

 Salmon Fishing in the Yemen (Paul Torday)

I don’t read many novels, and so when I do I hope that they are good ones. This one was.

One highlight of our Nepal trip this winter was staying in a hotel with the best host library I’ve seen in 55+ countries. I wanted to bring the whole darned library home with me, but it was heavy, and I was tired.

This novel by Brit Paul Torday was languishing in the “Novels” section (yes, this hotel library had organized sections and comfy couches!) and immediately caught my eye with it’s arresting cover.  (Mine looked a little different than the one above — see my cover, as memorialized on Pinterest via my instagramming iphone below.) I read it and loved it. Witty prose, hysterical storyline, and absurd premise to, well, trout fish in the yemen, of course.

(If confused, I encourage you to look up the habitat requirements of trout, and the geographical location of Yemen.)

 

Have you read either of these books?

Don’t forget to check out the full list of the 100 books I’m reading in 2012 on this page, or peruse The 100 Books I’m Reading in 2012 Pinterest list.

Related posts:

1. Book Reviews: A Homemade Life, Gluten-Free Girl, Alice Waters and Chez Panisse
2. Great Author Tip: See What People Like in Your Book
3. Why I Read 100 Books Each Year

The Agenda

Introduction 9:10am – 9:25am Claire Diaz-Ortiz
Session Time: 15 min.

Using Twitter for Good: 9:30am – 10:30am
Claire Diaz-Ortiz, Twitter
Session Time: 1 hour w/ Q&A

How to use Twitter to make a difference in the world around you. This tactical session will teach the 5 step T.W.E.E.T. framework for excelling on Twitter.

Coffee Break 10:30 – 10:45

Using Facebook for Good: 10:45 – 11:30am

Paull Young, Charity Water
Session time: 45 min. w/ Q&A from the audience

You don’t need a content calendar and formal process to do Facebook right. Forget about how many likes you have and act like a human – your fans will appreciate it!

Using YouTube for Good: 11:30am – 12:15pm
Mark Horvath, Invisible People
Session time: 45 min. w/ Q&A from the audience

This session will explore the incredible power of Youtube to make a difference in the world around you. Using stories and lessons learned from his successful work, Horvath will show participants how to navigate the world of video.

Lunch 12:15 – 1:30pm

Stories for Good: Thinking About the Content, Not Just the Platform 1:30pm – 2:00pm
Megan Stielstra, MyGreenLife
Session Time: 30 min.

In this session, Megan will explore the ways that the importance of story plays into the success of a cause campaign on social media.

Blogging for Good 2:00 – 2:45pm
Cassie Boorn, Devries PR
Session Time: 45 min.

In a world where we are constantly bombarded with issues, causes and charities it is hard to choose where to focus our efforts. Cause fatigue has made rallying support around important issues increasingly difficult. Cassie will explore the issue of cause fatigue and show how storytelling and blogging might be the way to drive people to taking action.

Case Study of Social Media for Social Good 2:45 – 3:15pm
Tim, Mightybytes
Session Time: 30 min.

In this presentation, Tim will discuss how Climate Ride, a growing nonprofit focused on cycling and sustainable solutions, uses social tools to grow the organization and keep the roads safe for riders.

Closing/Networking 3:30 – 4:00pm

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The Speakers:

Cassie Boorne

Cassie Boorn is a Social Media Specialist at DeVries PR, where she works on digital programs for brands including  P&G, Pepperidge Farm, Materne and E&J Gallo. Cassie also writes regularly at her personal blog CassieBoorn.com which has been featured on NPR: All Things Considered, New York Times.com and more.

Mark Horvath

Mark Horvath knows about being homeless. He lived on the streets of Hollywood more than a decade ago, and, fours years ago, when he lost his job and his house in foreclosure, he essentially began recording homeless people’s stories and posting them online. Horvath’s ultimate goal for WeAreVisible.com would be to connect homeless agencies directly with the people seeking services, what he calls “virtual case management.” Connect with him on Twitter @hardlynormal.

Paull Young

Paull Young is Director of Digital at charity: water, a non-profit devoted to bringing clean and safe drinking water to the 1 billion people without. Frequently nominated as one of the leading digital non-profits, charity: water was the first non-profit to have 1 million Twitter followers and has 75% of its fundraising come through digital channels. In just 5 years charity: water has provided clean and safe drinking water to over 2 million people and raised almost $30 million in 2011.

Paull formerly was Senior Account Director with social media agency Converseon, where he led award winning campaigns for Fortune 500 clients such as Graco, Kohler, Telstra and Citrix.

Paull has been a well known PR and Marketing blogger and commentator since 2006, firstly at Young PR and now at PaullYoung.com. His work has been featured on FOX News, Wall St Journal, Sydney Morning Herald, CNN.com, NY1 and the Australian Financial Review. In 2011 he was named an industry ‘Rising Star’ by the Direct Marketing Educational Foundation. You can follow Paull on Twitter @paullyoung

Tim Frick

Tim is the author of media and marketing books that are used for professional development and by higher learning institutions in the U.S. and Europe, including Johns Hopkins University, the Art Institutes, and Full Sail University, among others. He is an avid environmentalist, a cyclist, and owner of Mightybytes, a triple bottom line-friendly B Corp in Chicago that creates rich user experiences to tell client stories, brand their products, and meet business, technology, and marketing needs.

Tim regularly presents at conferences and gives workshops and seminars on various aspects of marketing, digital media, social responsibility, and entrepreneurship. He is also on the board of directors of Climate Ride, a national bike ride for sustainable solutions.

Megan Stielstra

Megan Stielstra is the Literary Director of 2nd Story, a storytelling series dedicated to building community through storytelling, and the author of the story collection Everyone Remain Calm. She teaches creative writing at Columbia College and The University of Chicago and is a 3Arts Teaching Award Finalist for her work with 2nd Story, helping people of all ages get their stories on the page.

#

All About Ideation

Our goals for the conference are simple, but bold: facilitate in-depth, peer-to-peer conversations that lead to actionable pathways for practitioners, provide meaningful access to thought-leaders, and accelerate innovation through new ideas and technology.

The theme of our 2012 conference will be “Be Human.”

We believe that what connects all of our passions and pursuits towards good is our humanity. Humanity cuts through culture, socio-economic boundaries, politics, religion, etc. There’s something profoundly beautiful and powerful about tapping into our humanity. It reminds us as to the why of our how and what. Our hope is that the stories and ideas shared during our 2012 conference will cause us to re-engage what it means to be human, develop meaningful relationships, and create new paradigms for thinking about human good.

There were quite a few responses to my post last week, I Didn’t Email You Back Because I Wanted to Personally Offend You.

Fittingly, many of them came to me via email. And many were quite good.

I’ve pulled together some of the best ones, with hopes that they might help you (or enrage you!) in your quest for true email etiquette domination.

Without further ado…

Six Tips for Email Etiquette (from you readers):

1. On Salutations:

I highly recommend you encourage readers to say hello, hi, buon giorno, anything that gets the ‘hello’ across (especially when they’re asking for something!). It’s easy, it’s nice and it warrants a response other than ‘Why should !?!’

2. On Writing a Good Subject Line

Make your subject heading useful to the recipient.

3. On Not Saying the Wrong Thing

Never email anything you wouldn’t mind having on the front page of the newspaper (you never know when someone will forward the message or who knows what).

4. On Not Receiving a Response

In the business world (the one inhabited by fast-moving strangers asking questions) has a Cardinal Rule: If you don’t receive a reply, the answer is “No.”  People don’t call back to say,”No.”

5. On Using the Phone (!)

If it’s slightly tricky or a very nuanced message where you want to make sure not to offend, pick up the phone!

If what you need to say is too long and complicated, pick up the phone! In other words, keep emails short and to the point

6. On Keeping the Peace

Thich Nhat Hanh advises to “write in such a way that the other person is receptive toward reading”…

There are pacifists who can write protest letters of great condemnation but who are incapable of writing a love letter. You have to write in such a way that the other person is receptive toward reading; you have to speak in such a way that the other person is receptive toward listening. If you do not, it is not worth the trouble to write or to speak.

To write in such a way is to practice meditation.

These are great tips, and aside from the tips about picking up the phone, I pretty much agree with all of those. For more on why I recommending avoiding 90% of all phone calls, see my post next week…;)

For the discerning reader: The Skoll Foundation sent me to Business School at Oxford, so I have a thing for them.

{grin}

About

The Skoll World Forum is the premier invitation-only event for causes, nonprofits, social enterprise, CSR. It’s like Davos, but for social good types. About 1,000 delegates from 70 countries once a year.

Things That Happened:

• A delegates live tweet-up of twitter best practices for social good.
• Twitter chat with Skoll Foundation CEO Sally Osberg.
• Live Tweeting the Horizontal Media session with NPR and others.
• Fascinating discussion of how horizontal media is changing the landscape for the Saudi women’s movement.
• The presence of the BBC World Challenge, and the day-by-day blog about it.
• Live Tweeting Arianna Huffington’s talk.
• Tim Harford grilling Hans Rosling on population and Larry Brilliant on pandemics.
• Video questions (summarized on Twitter) from backstage at the Skoll World Forum.
• Discussions online and off about philanthro-capitalism, innovation and flux.
• My piece on being an Accidental Social Entrepreneur.
• More highlights over at Guardian Sustainable Business.

 Other Attendee’s Perspectives: 

• Top 6 take-aways from the Skoll World Forum Opening Plenary (Skoll Scholar Daniela Papi)
• Waking up to Gordon Brown, Nick Danziger, Eve Ensler and Pamela Hartigan (Skoll Scholar Andy Thornton)
• Three ways women in conflict zones are changing the world (Skoll Scholar Christopher Adams)
• Lost ducks, lucky pants and portaloos (Vlog from Jess Search)
• Healthcare beyond hospital walls – creating transformative ecosystem change (Skoll Scholar Andy Thornton)
• Social Entrepreneurship: Why It Matters (Sally Osberg orignally on HuffPo)
• Demanding Prosperity for People and Planet (Skoll Scholar Adri Kerciku)
• Building corporate partnerships is more like dating than a lopsided wrestling match (Skoll Scholar Ira Leeds)
• Part II: Reviving the Moribund Corpse of Capitalism (Leo Johnson)
• David and Goliath: How Social Entrepreneurs are Making Big Business Part of the Solution (Skoll Scholar Tyler Spencer)
• Young and Not Dumb! How youth are being overlooked to the world’s detriment (Skoll Scholar Joshua Grehan)
• Notes from a new convert (Founder and CEO of Innovation Alchemy, Parvathi Menon)

Thanks to everyone who pointed out some of these great articles and recaps;)

Here’s a list of useful Twitter webpages that can help you do everything from file a ticket to the Twitter Support team when you’re having a problem, chat with other developers about what they are doing on the Twitter platform, and even look at pictures of what employee won the last Halloween costume contest.

Related posts:

1. Best Links of the Week
2. How to Get a Verified Twitter Account (Tips from a Prime Minister)
3. How to Use Twitter: Twitter Best Practices and the T.W.E.E.T. Framework

Here’s episode 6, and it’s all about social media marketing.

Specifically I’ll be telling you the top ten social media marketing mistakes I see individuals, brands and organizations making every day. Hopefully you’re not making them — and if you are, stop. Now.

This podcast is based on the ten mistakes I discuss in my social media manifesto – How to Be Social. If you didn’t get it free on Kindle last week during it’s 48 hour freebie “sale”, you can download a free PDF version here.

And now, for the podcast:

Podcast Show Notes

I mention a couple things in the podcast that may (or may not) be of note.

• My friend Scott Stratten (@unmarketing) singing his heart out in his absurd viral video, Why Don’t You Leave Me Alone. If you listen to the podcast, you’ll listen to me spend about 45 glorious seconds trying to remember what song he was singing and what it was called. Well, here it is.
• Be nice. Rate my podcast.

I already told you about this manifesto I wrote.

It’s called How to Be Social, and it’s free for another 9 hours on Kindle. Timezones (and math) confuse me, so all you need to know is that you can download it free on Kindle until 11:59 pm PST.

Giving away free things is awfully fun, and it (for the most part) brings out the best in people. When we gave away thousands of copies of Twitter for Good the day it was published, I got lots of nice comments. And only a few yelling at me for things I am not responsible for (technical issues, clock reading issues, anger issues).

Here are some nice things people said about How to Be Social, a short, snappy social media guide. These are just a few of the amazing people who are being amazingly nice and who I love for their great work and kind support.

Disclaimer: Some or all of these individuals may or may not have been paid in garbage bags of chocolate for their comments.

Ready?

Go get How to Be Social.

P.S. Want the PDF version? You can get that free here.

Summary:  How to Be Social: A Social Media Manifesto is free on Kindle until 11:59 pm PST April 26. Walk at an average speed!

Related posts:

1. How to Be Social is FREE on Kindle for 12 More Hours!
2. Why Would You Want to Give Twitter for Good Away Free? {Follow Up}
3. Want to Give “Twitter for Good” to Your Blog or Mailing List for *Free*?

Last month, I told you about this manifesto I wrote.

It’s called How to Be Social, and it’s a manifesto (as I said) all about social media marketing. How to use it, how to not use it, and how to know when your social media marketing efforts are sucking or #winning.

One thing I love in life is my Kindle. And one thing I love more than my Kindle is getting free books via Kindle. My last book, Twitter for Good, was free for its first 24 hours of publication, and 13,000 of you picked it up. Some of my favorite authors have also had their books free on Kindle for a day or two, with equal success.

The fun starts again, now.

My new manifesto – How to Be Social – is free on Kindle for the next 36 hours (until 11:59 pm on April 26, 2012). After that time, it’ll bump up to it’s wallet-breaking price of $2.99. Get it now, save $2.99, and then buy yourself a big ole cuppa something to drink as you read.

P.S. Want the PDF version? You can get that free here.

Summary:  How to Be Social: A Social Media Manifesto is free on Kindle for the next 36 hours. Go!

The emails were much more dramatic versions of the following:

“This is my second email in one week to you. Frankly, I just don’t understand why you haven’t responded. I’m trying to convince myself there is some email problem because I am really shocked by this.”

and

“I need you to write back, as I explained in my earlier note. Why are you tweeting if you aren’t emailing? Everyone says you are communicative, but this experience has certainly proved otherwise. Why are you doing this given that you know how important this is to me?”

Keep in mind that both emails came from people I do not know, who were asking me to do things to benefit them (not me). Such emails (which come in varying degrees a few times a month) create in me two conflicting desires.

Desire #1: Never respond to the person’s original query because they have annoyed me so thoroughly.

Desire #2: Offer myself as an email consultant to the person to explain that this is not how email works.

This kind of behavior can best be described by a bizarre term I once heard that is both immature and horrid sounding and unbelievably accurate. The term is “butt-hurt“, and my theory is that it comes from the emotions that arise during children’s playground kickball games wherein you kick balls at other people’s backsides and make them cry when you make contact. Essentially, this playground potty-talk denotes the feeling of “Shucks! Ah man! She/he doesn’t like me!” personal offense wherein one hangs their head low and croons loudly.

The main thing about being “butt-hurt” is that the hurt is disproportionate to the offense.

And getting personally offended by a stranger who isn’t responding to your email (or responding timely enough for your liking) about something that you are asking them to do for you (because we all know if it were the other way around you wouldn’t need to hear from them so urgently!), is the essence of butt-hurt.

It is also the essence of dumb.

(And the essence of annoying.)

Instead of assuming the stranger is trying to personally offend you, why not consider a few of these (Plausible! I personally promise!) conclusions:

• The stranger gets 250 emails every day and cannot respond to all her emails.
• Of those 250 emails, 100 of them are people asking for stuff (favors/insight/help/support) that does not directly benefit the stranger herself. Since the stranger cannot live her entire life doling out favors, she cannot be expected to respond favorably to all such requests.
• Your email was just not that important to the stranger.
• Your email was actually really important for the stranger but she lost the email/deleted it/archived it/forgot about it mistakenly because of the typical organizational mishaps that occur when you get 250 emails a day.
• The stranger has been sick, offline, having a baby, or otherwise engaged for the 72 hours in which your response did not come. Forgive her.

Email is an art.

Knowing how to email people you want to do things for you (especially when they have little to no incentive to do what you want them to) is an even higher art form. It’s a balancing act of gentle pitching and kindness and deference and always assuming the best about the other person’s intentions, and the worst about the other person’s free time to respond to emails.  If you’re unclear of the rules of email, don’t come to the table wearing your heart on your sleeve ready for personal offense to slight you when responses are not immediate.

Many of you have (thanks!) downloaded my free manifesto — How to Be Social. In it, I lay out the top ten social media marketing mistakes people make on a daily basis. It’s an “irreverent” guide, in the same way this blog post is, because I don’t sugarcoat things.

Now I know I need to write just such a guide about the rules of behavior on email. If only to help make my email inbox a more pleasant place to be.

As I work on this new manifesto defining the basic rules of email behavior, are there any key best practices you would recommend I include? How do you tame the email beast?

Can’t read my tiny screenshot?

Basically if you’re an author and you want to see what people are highlighting in the Kindle versions of your books, enter your book title here. 

See what sentences/paragraphs/pages folks are loving (or hating) in the books you’ve written.

Here are the results for Twitter for Good. Pretty standard — folks highlighting sentences and paragraphs that have an overview of the tactical information I share (i.e. the T.W.E.E.T. model for how to best use Twitter).

Cool, no?

Here’s hoping they like what you think they should be highlighting.

Related posts:

1. Book Launches Are Better When Ellen Degeneres Shows Up
2. The Day I Forgot The Great Gatsby Wasn’t Real
3. Book Reviews: A Homemade Life, Gluten-Free Girl, Alice Waters and Chez Panisse