By Gina Blitstein

Social media is taking the internet by storm. It provides a way for people to communicate efficiently, spreading a message to as few or as many people as they wish. The practice of utilizing social media channels for business communication and marketing can be highly effective. Indeed, a goal of marketing is to reach as many eyes and ears as possible; social media can help you do that in a very targeted way.

Among the social media channels you can use to interact with customers and those in your industry alike is Twitter. Twitter is a great place for personal and business networking. It also is a great place to participate in targeted chats about your interests and/or profession. Twitter chats are discussions that take place on Twitter on a specific topic at a designated time. Participants "meet" at an appointed time to take part in an online "conversation" about a particular topic.

A Twitter Chat is established and moderated by the party who developed the chat. The process of developing a Twitter Chat simply entails deciding upon a topic, naming it and letting people know about it. Naming it is necessary so that people can find it. Twitter Chats are identified by a hashtag (#) followed by the name of the chat. For example, a Twitter chat could be, "#biztalk." Twitter uses the hashtag to identify content, so a user can filter tweets so that all messages with a particular hashtag will appear in his or her Twitter stream. At the appointed date and time of the chat, the moderator will welcome the participants, run down the rules and begin the chat by asking the first question. All participants add the chat's name to each of their tweets for its duration so their comments will be identified as part of that chat.

Why would a small business consider beginning a Twitter Chat of its own? According to Shonali Burke, ABC (accredited business communicator), Principal, Shonali Burke Consulting and one of TopRank's 25 Women That Rock Social Media, you should first determine your goals: "What are your goals in introducing the chat? What do you want to achieve from it? Begin with the desired outcome, and work backwards from there. Do your research and see if there are other Twitter chats that already function as a conversation platform for the topic you want to discuss. If you've done your homework and believe your chat will fulfill a conversational gap about your area of expertise, begin pulling together the outline for your chat."

Shonali continues, "Twitter chat is something you should consider doing if your research has shown that's where you can reach and engage with your audience. Nowadays it's difficult to find a company that does not have a Twitter presence, but far too often I think they use the medium only to push out information. If you've found Twitter effective for not just disseminating your information but actually interacting with your customers and influencers, a Twitter chat could be a smart move in increasing that engagement as well as establishing your thought leadership in your field."

Then, of course, you must find the right person within your company to act as moderator. Shonali suggests, "Content expertise should be one of the primary factors in deciding who is going to moderate the chat. Another should be the person's level of familiarity and ease with Twitter itself; if you choose someone who's a content expert but feels uncomfortable engaging on Twitter, they're probably not going to be very successful. So look around the company and ask, among those you believe possess the relevant expertise, who would be interested in doing this. You might find folks from several different practice areas interested, and having more than one moderator could be a great way to stave off "chat fatigue."

How tech savvy would those running the chat need to be? Shonali assures us, "If you know how to get online, you can run a chat... which is pretty much anyone, these days. What becomes important, as I've mentioned before, is how good they are at engaging, understanding the questions and responding to them with the requisite level of expertise. Twitter chats themselves are very easy to participate in via a platform such as Tweetgrid, Tweetchat, or even a dedicated search in your Twitter desktop platform of choice (Hootsuite, TweetDeck, etc.). None of these require you to be significantly tech-savvy; again, the savvy needs to be in the area of expertise, relevance and conversation.

How does moderating a Twitter Chat look? Shonali says, "I usually start my chats by welcoming everyone, asking everyone to introduce themselves and then welcoming the "guest" (if there's a particular person serving as the guest for that particular chat). Prior to the chat, I let the guest know what the questions I'll be asking will be (or ask them if there are questions they'd particularly like to discuss), as well as invite participants to email or direct message questions to me. Then I start the Q&A by labeling the questions as Q1, Q2 and so on. This gives both the guest as well as participants an anchor for their tweets, so that everyone doesn't get confused about what's being discussed." From there, participants chime into the chat with their responses to the questions posed by the moderator and other participants' replies.

How much additional time investment would be necessary on a regular and continuing basis? "This depends on how often you plan to host the chat, so you should factor that into your planning," says Shonali. There will, of course, be the time taken by the chat itself; whether or not you plan to post recaps/updates from the chat, and how often, how much time you spend in promoting the chat and recruiting participants, and so on. So this could range from as little as 20-30 minutes the weeks you're *not* hosting the chat to much more... all dependent on the factors I've outlined above.

Hosting a Twitter Chat may serve your business well if you have something to offer participants and have someone willing to moderate. As Shonali says, Twitter Chats are as much about listening as about broadcasting, so you could both give and receive value from hosting a Twitter Chat of your own.

Does your business have something worthwhile to offer in a Twitter Chat?

Edited: 06/28/2010 at 07:11 PM by Gina

By Gina Blitstein

No one can build a successful, fulfilling career completely on her own. It takes the experience of those who have navigated the seas of success to guide us along the way. There will no doubt come a time in your career when you need to take the next step - or a brand new step - and you won't want to do it without some guidance from someone who has been in that situation before. You will need a mentor.

In what areas could mentors benefit your career? Kathy Korman Frey, Entrepreneur in Residence at The George Washington University School of Business, CFEE, provides some insight and advice for women who may experience difficulty envisioning the areas where mentors could help. Kathy says, "At the Hot Mommas Project and in my Women’s Entrepreneurial Leadership Class I tell women to think of mentors as sitting around a table. I call them “a personal board of advisors.” If you are struggling with work-life balance, you may have a seat for a woman you know who works a lot, but also seems to have a happy family life, and doesn’t seem frazzled all the time. It could be as simple as that. You may want to start your own business, or grow your business. You need an “entrepreneur” seat at the table. Let’s say you have a particular area where you want to make connections and learn: Fundraising, tech, health care. That is a seat at your table. If you are not high on the “self-insight” category, you might want to sit down with a friend and talk this through to help figure out what the seats at your table should be. I recommend between three and eight seats at the table."

Once she is satisfied that there are areas where mentoring could be beneficial to her career and life, how can a woman identify suitable mentors for herself? Kathy suggests the following strategy:

• Identify the seats at your Personal Board of Advisors (PBA) “table.”

• Keep your ear to the ground for those people as you’re living your life (at work, in the community, at events). If you want to be an over-achiever about it, start Googling people for each seat, and asking friends about referrals.

• Try to meet these people at some point. If they are well-known and or/uber-busy, attend talks where they are speaking. If they are “normal” people, call and email them. Say you want to ask them about their career path, or that you’re going through the Hot Mommas Project mentoring checklist and would love to ask them a couple of questions.

• Do you like the person? Would you like to talk to them again? Did they express an interest in you? If so, you have a good candidate for a mentor.

Now that you've determined those areas of your career and life in which mentoring can help you and you've identified likely mentors, how do you actually embark on a mentoring relationship? Kathy explains, "It’s important to note that this is all about relationship management. I get a surprising amount of questions about basic social skills and relationship management. For instance, “Here is someone I would like to be my mentor. How should I approach them?” In my class and outside of class, with professionals already in the workforce, the questions in this area is on the rise. I speculate there might be a loss of skills around face-to-face and phone interactions in the wake of email, Twitter and Facebook (all of which I’m on, and addicted to, so I’m not judging here). There is a lot of anxiety around how to approach people, and what to say. My message is “Try it!” When you have a positive experience, you’ll be fueled to keep filling your table over time. Also, keep your social skills honed. Use email, Twitter and Facebook as an “and” along WITH verbal interpersonal communication, not as an “or” in place of verbal and face-to-face communication. I predict a type of Darwinian social skills shake-out where, at some point, people who have employed the “and” strategy will triumph markedly over those who have employed the “or” strategy."

Here we've broken down the process into three "hows" in relation to mentoring: How to decide what you need, how to decide who you need and how to begin a mentoring relationship. Kathy assures us that it's not such a foreign concept to seek out those who can help us find our way to greater success and fulfillment in work and life. It's important to keep our minds open to the possibility that there are potential mentors and mentoring opportunities all around us and take advantage of them when we can.

How could you benefit from a mentor? Where could you find him or her? How can you begin that relationship?

 

Edited: 06/19/2010 at 09:09 PM by Gina

By Gina Blitstein

Sometimes the urge to strike out into an entrepreneurial venture is undeniable - a person feels born to it. Other times the entrepreneurial bug bites when we least expect. Such was the case for Rachael Smith.

Rachael was a first grade teacher when an "accessory malfunction" inspired her to consider a new career path. She explains, "It all started with a dripping wet diaper bag at Tucson International Airport. My son was crying and I was trying to find his favorite toy in my generic diaper bag. It was so unorganized that all I succeed in doing was spilling milk on everything in the bag." That incident provided the spark that set Rachael on her way to starting her own business.

"I searched the marketplace for a bag that would help me stay organized to better care for the needs of my children, but was unsuccessful. So I designed and manufactured my own." That's how Rachael's business, Mrs Smith's Bags, was born. Mrs Smith's makes diaper bags that are fashionable as well as practical and intelligently designed, taking into consideration the needs of the parent as well as the child.

"The idea first came to me in December of 2005. In the summer of 2006, I designed my first diaper bag using a cardboard box and tape, and with kids in tow visited a local manufacturer who made my first prototype."

A fantastic idea is one thing, but how was Rachael emotionally able to make the leap from the steady paycheck of a teaching job to the dicey proposition of manufacturing her own products? "My family was very supportive," Rachael declaares. "My grandmother told me constantly that I could do anything I put my mind to. After hearing of my plans she wrote me a card that says “Go Get’em Tiger” on the outside. On the inside she wrote, “There is not one doubt in my mind that you will succeed in anything you set out to do! You need to pursue this with great passion!” I keep the card in my desk drawer."

It wasn't unanimous support for her new venture from the outset, however. "On the other hand," Rachael says, "My husband was fairly unsupportive. He is not a risk taker and worries about money a lot. I remember one cold evening I went down to his office and sat there crying. I said, “I want to quit, this is too hard,” and all he said was, “Ok.” That just made me angry, so I pressed forward even harder. So in a strange way I have to thank him for getting me to keep moving forward."

My friends were intrigued, to say the least. It was a foreign concept to them. We were all mothers who would attend playgroups with our children where we would talk about which kids were walking, not about what product we were inventing. Now that my diaper bags are on the market, however, they are quite thankful as they all use Mrs. Smith’s Bags now.

The most rewarding part of being an entrepreneur mom for Rachael is that she now has the opprtunity to serve as an inspriation to other women who may also be "unintentional entrepreneurs." She offers them following advice based upon her own experiences:

• Be brave
• Talk about yourself
• Ask lots of questions
• Listen
• Be forthright
• Stay the course
• Most importantly, take one day at a time

Rachael may not have had a lifelong ambition to be an entrepreneur but when she identified a need and a solution, she seized the opportunity, despite the well-meaning concerns of her husband. Rachael defied the odds and made a success because of her determination to make a product that solved a problem and filled a need in the marketplace. Her success is now, "In the bag."

Would you have the wherewithal to strike out as an "unintentional entrepreneur" like Rachael?

Edited: 06/14/2010 at 12:55 AM by Gina