Dance With Strangers

The other day I got an email from Pam O’Neal (my Vice President of Marketing, for those of you new to our adventures here) telling me to check out an article in Washington Technology on using social media to connect to the top contractors, agencies and influential companies in the government space. Not only was Pam pointing out the article as a resource for us at BreakingPoint, but also how the author used LinkedIn at the end of his article.

Mark Amtower, the author, is a B2G marketing consultant and his resolution for 2010 was to be connected to at least one person, preferably three, at each of the top companies listed by Washington Technology by the end of March. Aggressive, most certainly. But Mark is a smart man obviously because he understands how to harness the interconnectedness of social media. Just head to the end of the article and presto, a hyperlink to Mark’s LinkedIn profile.

Nothing amazing at this point though, right? The magic actually didn’t happen until I connected with Mark on LinkedIn, that is when the addition of resourceful content, as usual, made it’s mark.

Within minutes of connecting with Mark there was a personalized response to me in my inbox. How do I know it was personal and not a really great form response? Pam had connected with Mark about an hour before and the emails were completely different. Nice touch. But here comes the move that I found to be brilliant; two invites to join groups that Mark had set up on LinkedIn, both extremely focused and full of resources.

Mark had gone from a random contact to a source of information in minutes and someone I was really looking forward to talking with and probably talking with about his services. Ultimately that was his goal through his resolution and he is making it happen by using some of the social media principles we have discussed here on the blog. But let’s rehash:

1. Be Accessible–Include links to where people can find you.
2. Integrate Social Media–Make sure you are integrating social into your byline articles, events, emails, etc.
3. Be Personable–There is a strong connection built quickly with personal communication.
4. Provide Resources, Not Promotions–Mark didn’t push me to a website that touted his skills, he introduced me to groups that can help me with my job.

Content is king and social media is the way to spread the word. Let’s all use Mark’s example as a social media best practice, whether for B2C, B2B or B2G.

Oh, and you can connect with me on LinkedIn too.

Perhaps you are sitting in your office right now catching up on your RSS feeds and looking forward to a nice dish on B2B Marketing or social media marketing or Twitter marketing…alas, I will disappoint you on this day. Do not fret however, because you are about to get an enormous benefit for reading this post, this picture of me:

Oh sure it was a long time ago and fortunately a few pounds shed since and perhaps I was dressing up for Halloween (I wasn’t), but that was the sweetest stache I ever did grow…until this month. During November I’ll be participating in Movember. Instead of writing my own description I’m stealing from the captain of our follical foraging team, Aaron Strout:

The essence of Movember is for gents to grow a mustache during the month of November for the purpose of raising money and increasing awareness in the name of “Changing the Face of Men’s Health.” The 30 second video below gives a good description…

OK, thanks Aaron, now we are back. I’m really excited about this opportunity since I’ve written in the past about my own family history with Cancer and most importantly raising money to fight Cancer. Could there be anything better than raising money for a worthy cause and having an excuse to grow a mustache? The answer is yes actually. Doing it as part of Team Austin and facing off against many of our old pals, many of them area actually old, in Boston.

Now you are saying to yourself, “Kyle is so amazing and really, really handsome with a mustache, plus, I hate Cancer too! How can I help?”

Great thoughts reader, and I appreciate the compliment. There are a few ways to help out:

1. Join our team and help us raise money.
2. Donate to our team (we’ll take any amount – $1 up to whatever you feel comfortable with, our end goal is $20,000!).
3. Pass the good word along about what we’re doing via tweets, Facebook updates and blog posts.