Fingerprints Music, Long Beach, CA

With so much of our time being spent gazing at our reflection in a glass screen, having our personal “Likes”, “Fans” and “Friends” responding with resonant echoes of our thoughts, an opportunity to get out and rub elbows with real honest flesh and blood to really socialize is welcome relief. And on April 16th, a world-wide event gives us all this chance to return to the land of brick and mortar. Record Store Day , founded in 2007 by Eric Levin, Michael Kurtz, Carrie Colliton, Amy Dorfman, Don Van Cleave and Brian Poehner is a celebration of the independent record store.

There are legions of young folks that have built their music libraries of nothing but zeros and ones via the numerous download sites and don’t know the beauty of a wall of  oversized vinyl albums, much less the excitement of getting their fingers dirty flipping through stacks of previously loved treasures to discover a rarity. Sure, I still listen to almost everything through a digital device, but my favorite memories of my musical history lie in the places I once wandered the aisles listening to the whims of whoever was working that day and piling 10-15 must-haves that would be whittled down to the two that I could afford to take home.

For me it was a weekend ritual of taking the bus to the now defunct Arcade Music in the seedy downtown of San Diego of the 70s. My brother and friends would eventually build libraries of thousands of jazz LPs and teach ourselves the history of  this great American music on the recommendations of various clerks, and even strangers who would overhear our conversation or  see with a sidelong glance what we had picked up. In college it was Morning Glory Music in Isla Vista, CA. Alas this small independent is gone as well.

In Long Beach, CA , Fingerprints Music has opened a brand new store in the burgeoning East Village Arts District. Rand Foster, the owner has dedicated the last 18 years of his life assuring the Long Beach community that they had a place to come and share their passion for music. Rand and Fingerprints was featured in a recent article in the LA Times that focused on the importance of these stores.  You have an excellent opportunity to be sure that your favorite shop survives by attending a local Record Store day venue. There are special live in-store performance events scheduled as well.

On April 16th, shut the lid on the laptop (after you Google search the location of a store near you naturally) and spend a few hours hanging out in a real chat room. A room full of others like you and maybe not like you in many ways, but kindred spirits in the love of all that is music.

As someone who spent over 10 years earlier in my career as a salesman, I know that these words promise a slow, but sure death of a successful salesman or business. I no longer am in the sales field, nor do I list my occupation as sales, but to be honest isn’t sales what we do every day? All of us?

What brought me to this post was a Facebook post by an exciting digital engagement agency based in Portsmouth, NH called Piehead. It was a link to an article over at Mashable about how sales has been slow to adopt social media techniques that other areas, such as marketing have made a required part of their operations. The article, “Why Sales is Still Missing from Social CRM” was a reminder to me that one can never stop prospecting for the future.

I had a great job for 14 years as a project manager at a Southern California design agency. We did groundbreaking work for a major power sports client. There were wetsuits hanging from the balcony in the courtyard, monthly BBQs on the patio,  and it seemed that it would last forever. Nothing does. And for those 14 years, the company stopped prospecting as well. Too busy. You can probably guess how that worked out.

So for the better part of a year, while I looked for a job, I began to sell again. The product was me. I engaged on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. I began to use social media as a sales tool. And what I found, was that it was what I would have dreamed of having as a tool back when I was selling print. To be able to connect with my clients as well as prospects by engaging them daily, to share their work with others, to find out what they were interested in, both within and outside of the office would be incredible. So I was stunned to read in this article that sales forces were not utilizing social media in their daily work.

I am not going to reiterate all that was said in the article (that’s what the link is for), but what I learned from it was that it was time for me to re-start my sales engine. I know how to use the tools, in fact I use them everyday. But I swore over a year ago, to never stop prospecting or looking for new opportunities. You never know what the next digital engagement will bring.

With Facebook’s over 400 million users, that’s a pretty good base to start with. The question quickly becomes, how many of them will be attracted to an enterprise whose primary focus is connecting individuals to causes and concerns around the globe, not just connecting old classmates to each other or brands to consumers.

Jumo, is a word from Yoruba meaning, “together in concert”. And with Jumo.com, Hughes hopes to create a place where people can really engage.

As Hughes explained the project, “We’ll be matching people based on their skills and interests with organizations around the world that need their input. It’s a discovery process that first matches, then helps people build relationships, then let’s people share their resources.”

Watching the recent outpouring of money through social media during both recent earthquakes has shown that people are willing to click to pay, or text to pay to show support. What remains to be seen is whether the current social media model can sustain the long term needs of an organization like Jumo, whose goals are so lofty. I for one will not bet against Hughes.

I am curious as to how others feel about Jumo, and what its chances are of succeeding in the long run. Take a moment to check them out at jumo.com, and I would love to hear your comments.

Our recent recessionary economy has stimulated enormously creative ideas in marketing. And this is just the beginning. But just as established bands (meaning they’ve been around more than just 5 years) play SXSW alongside bands just looking for an audience, so too are the young upstarts in social media looking for their groupies! And just as with the bands, we’ll be hearing people tell us that they were in Austin in 2010 and saw the introduction of, say Stickybits.

Many of you have not yet heard of Stickybits. In fact, I had not until today. But trust me you will. The startup founded by Billy Chasen (Chartbeat) and Seth Goldstein (Socialmedia.com) introduces its seemingly quirky but potentially groundbreaking location based service.

The concept is simple. With the advent of barcode scanning in hand-held phones, consumers have a wealth of information at their fingertips. With Stickybits, you can attach digital data to any barcode. And when someone scans that barcode with their phone, that digital data is then fed to their device. Let’s say you as a young band playing at SXSW is giving away CD singles with a barcode on the sleeve. That barcode could be linked to a video of your band along with a link to your website. Or maybe your product has a distinctively low carbon footprint and your customer is interested in how the product got to the marketplace. Fine, attach a link to your website or a video that traces it’s journey.

There are no limits to how these little gems can be utilized. And no doubt this week at SXSW there will be a lot of creative and hilarious applications. Free adhesive Stickybits will be handed out to many of this years’ 12,000 attendees. These barcodes can be followed, so if your girlfriend slaps you on the ass when she heads back to the hotel, be sure and have your buddy check to see that she didn’t leave any Stickybits behind.

As for me? Well to be honest, I’d probably just assume see Avi Buffalo in their first SXSW appearance. I mean, I saw their first gig in a vegan restaurant in Long Beach!

I spent the entire day today, save for a brief walk in the fresh snow with my dog, in communion. And this blog post is but a continuation of that communion. There are of course different definitions of the word, but my favorite is this: communion as the interchange or sharing of thoughts or emotions; intimate communication.

There are many detractors to social media. There are those that say that we are becoming more disconnected everyday even though through our social channels we are sharing so much, with so many. But if, when we engage those in our communities, we are being thoughtful and honest, how could this be?

Today I read probably 2 dozen blog posts, countless web pages, Facebook links and emails, mostly driven by those juicy 140 character kernels in my Twitter feed. Just about anyone who takes the time to write a blog, or create content of any type, wants to share his/her thoughts and or emotions. The great thing is that these are the people who I have chosen to commune with. A congregation of sorts.

Tomorrow I’ll probably spend the lion’s share of my day continuing to interview with potential employers, following up on emails etc. But for today, it was all about you. Thanks for taking your time to commune with me.

These are the times we live in. But in a world where traditional broadcast media’s 24/7 isn’t immediate enough, do we want to model this medium in the same way? Is the need to be first in social media trumping the need to be thoughtful?

Sure, newspapers and networks have adopted the mea culpa fallback when things go awry. But usually, a well researched and thoughtful analysis of information prior to broadcasting is more beneficial for everyone. It builds trust through reliability. In our businesses, we don’t just shout out loud or repeat every idea or message to everyone within hearing distance. At home we are sure to get the whole story (both sides) before meting discipline. So why the rush?

In the end, if one steps back and considers the issue, researches the sources and takes a deep breath, many times, their contribution will be of more value. Sometimes the best way to receiving recognition is by not being the first to seek it. Think about that.

With the introduction of Google’s Buzz application this week, I have been thrown for a loop. Not because of the inherent implications of yet another social media channel but more so by the broader effect on the mediums’ consumers as relates to overload.

It’s obvious to anyone who is reading this blog post, that I have not put my thoughts down on this blog in over 8 months. What have I been doing? Well in a word, reading. Reading all sorts of material by others. It’s a very convenient excuse to just explain it away as, “I’m too busy to write”. And at times, this may be true. But might there be just too much information out there? How can we keep up with it?

Just in the realm of the social media world alone there are over 119M blog page results listed on Google. Add to that Twitter feeds, Facebook pages, Linked In updates and whatever news media you regularly check, and it is a daunting enterprise to keep “current”. As I have been “re-branding” myself over the past 10 months, I have found loads of great information, made innumerable new contacts and even landed a few interviews, all with the help of these social media channels. I have learned much about the dos and don’ts of social media interaction. I have seen a very healthy growth in the number of “old school” print people dipping their toes into the future. And I know that for me, there is no turning back.

I love the conversations and the communities that are being formed. I am witnessing an incredible sense of knowledge sharing. And when we share what we are passionate about with those who are interested, everyone benefits. I am going to strive to keep up. Maybe I can cut down the number of blogs I read about blogging. That should give me more time.

If Twitter is indeed a conversation, some people just don’t know when to shut up. A conversation is between two or more people. And a conversation requires that participants listen to each other before responding with another message. It’s “what’s not there” that tells the story. It shows introspection as well as respect. The message becomes much clearer if it isn’t surrounded by all the noise.

We have all seen the “twitter flurry”. When someone logs in to their account and tries to catch up on time lost by making 10 or 15 posts in an hour. I know that when I see a stream of this type, I tune out. It’s as if someone walks into a room where people have been talking, and suddenly just rambles on, not even caring if anyone is listening, and subsequently walking out.

A good conversation is like jazz, there’s a lot of listening, learning and sharing going on. And when that happens, we all benefit.

Everyone knows Cronkite’s title of “most trusted man in America”. And most agree, that we will never see anyone in the unique position that he held in America for over 20 years.
The very way that news is gathered and disseminated, and by whom, guarantees this.

But it also should remind us, that although there will no longer be a single, trusted source for our news, we are all now responsible for what information is disseminated. Every link, every tweet, every rumor has the potential to influence people.

In virtually every post I have read about blogging, the mandate is stated. “you must establish trust” with your readers. But maybe even more important, is that all of us as consumers of information must be trusted as well. Trusted that we will research a story before re-tweeting. Trusted that we will think about the potential consequences of a story before hitting “send”. And trusted that we will use these incredible channels of communications that sit on our desktops to do good, and not just a channel to sell goods.

One thing that Walter Cronkite gave us was a great example of what to do when given such incredible responsibility. He showed us the way, and it is now, our responsibility to respect it.