The problem of visiting your in-laws (among so many others) is that you miss out on cool stuff when you are away from your computer (along, while anguished sitting on Interstate 95, I did my first mobile post).

Thanks to Neil Corman, I felt a) informed about Peter Shankman (he of the HARO – Help a Reporter Out)’s trivia giveaway on Boxing Day, December 26.  The bottom line, well-described by Neil, was this:

It was an interesting Boxing Day on Twitter, and if you even checked out your timeline at any time during the day you most likely saw ‘@skydiver‘ appearing.  On this day after Christmas Peter Shankman continued something he started on the day before Christmas with the intention of clearing the piles of SWAG from his office by playing “Twitter Trivia”, however this suddenly took off into a huge event with the help of the PR Rep of OGIO who wanted to give away a bag.

Peter asked trivia questions on Twitter, took the answers on the same, and handed out what sounded like a boatload of some cool stuff, including a four days three nights lodging in either Reno, Sparks, North Lake Tahoe or South Lake Tahoe, lift tickets included.  Peter also mentioned that his Twitter following grew by 400 in the first 30 minutes (there is another “I TOLD YOU SO” for all of the people who think that Twitter is useless).

My take away?

First, like the blogosphere, we are starting to see some real leaders emerge in the “Twitterverse.” People who know how to use it — and attract more followers.  I think that folks like Peter and Chris Brogan who are emerging as Twitter “A Listers.”

Second, you don’t have to be super hi-tech to be a thought leader or an “A Lister”  (although apparently Peter and Brian Shaler set up a Web cam so people could watch what was going on);   it still amazes me that Peter’s “Help a Reporter Out” email is plan ol’ text, started that way and remains that way.

And believe me, this is going to the last Boxing Day that a) I sit in the car all day and b) miss out on some cool trivia and subsequent schwag.

Mark

Chris Brogan has a nice piece in the form of a “top ten” (or “top twelve” list) of ways to help “sell” social media in your workplace.  As someone who has sold it as a consultant as well as an in-house person, I can tell you that there is some good advice in the article.

My favorite selling points are:

1. Blogging can act as a way to reduce customer service calls (if there’s helpful how-to information on the blog).
2. Social networks are now used frequently by your customers, your prospects, and your competitors. Connect with people, learn their business needs, and respond more simply and flexibly.
3. Blogging helps a business differentiate and establish a thought leadership position.

What I would add to this is the underlying resistance that I have found to social media in the workplace is fear — plain and simple fear of what people don’t understand.  You can be the social media expert at work, pushing blogs, Twitter, even identi.ca, but if educating the people that you need to sell is as important as listing some of the benefits like Chris did.

For example, explain that a blog is something that is about opinion — and there are likely thousands of people who are discussing your problems, issues and products anyway.  If you are not in the blogosphere, it’s like forfeiting a seat at a political debate.

Good luck explaining Twitter as a “microblogging platform,” but I tell most people that it’s a cross between IM and a very short blog.  I have found that by breaking things down into little, digestible pieces of information, then hitting them with some of Chris’ tips, sometimes you can push that rock uphill.

The benefits?

For example, many companies still pitch traditional media and bloggers (I promise I won’t get started back on the pitching bloggers thing again), but ideally, in a matter of seconds, if you could get a reporter to a) understand that you get how to communicate with them and b) get you pitch in the form of a “elevator speech,” wouldn’t you do it?

All of the above sounds like Twitter to me;  doing a search to find reporters and bloggers who cover your issues, following them to see what they write about and maybe — just maybe — they will start following you back.

My two cents.

Mark