Ideasabound

Download the Handout  (PDF) Last night I had a fantastic time meeting up with a wonderfully energetic group of people working in Social Media Marketing, looking to get into it or just curious about it. Yesterday I posted the presentation that I was going to use. But during the day, as I thought about what the goal of the forum was, I decided to redo the entire presentation and focus on some core ideas. How to create a good content. What are the critical elements of an effective tweet. How to manage it all. How to analyze your social media's effectiveness for generating traffic. I found that on SlideShare, some images didn't quite work out so I created a silent movie version of the presentation in video format. When I have time, I will add my voice to it but nothing can compare to the Q&A that came during the actual presentation. If you have any questions, pose them to me here or on Twitter @ideasabound . Here is the SlideShare just for those who wo...

Tonight at 7:30pm (JST) at the ACCJ Office in Chubu, I will be part of a discussion on Social Media. I will talk about Twitter for business and strategies for getting seen and growing your following to generate and nurture B2C as well as B2B leads. You can join in using the hashtag #NGOibc. Below is the presentation I will be giving. No Audio but I bet you can guess what it is all about. Twitter for business basics from ideasabound

Social Media has brought a whole new way of engaging with your customers that has both benefits and pitfalls. Now firmly entrenched in the mainstream, social media is an essential element of a business's marketing toolkit.  Whether a professional marketer, social media enthusiast, or business person, this informal networking and information sharing session will bring together people to discuss the topic in as great a depth as the interest of the crowd will bear. Bring questions, answers, and a desire to participate. To start us off Mr. Justin Dart, Social Media Marketing Manager at JapanTourist.jp , will introduce some strategies for utilizing twitter effectively. This promises to be an interesting and informative event, and a great opportunity to network. As this event is designed to be an open forum of discussion, attendees are encouraged to bring any information that they wish to share, as well as any questions that they have. Although active participation is not...

Photo by Ceclia Chan   Every year the coordinators of the Namekuji (slug) festival ask me to start it off with an Odaiko solo called  "Hitoyosei". It is to call people to the main stage and get things going. I don't know if they ask me because I like playing solos and not afraid to perform or because I am the most visible foreigner in our community. Either way, for the past 5 or so years I have been starting the festival. Ever since I started Taiko, I have been playing with solos and mixing the feel of east and west. But when it comes to these solos, I try to stick to the foundation of Toko Ryu style taiko. This is the style of my group and many groups in the Mino basin (Gifu), a few in Hida (gifu), parts of Hokuriku (Fukui, Toyama, Ishikawa) and the Nagoya area. The big problem is that there are no formal "solos" or "hitoyose" for our group. So, I create them myself. I think of a feeling, look at how things have been in the weather and for th...

I woke up on my birthday and went to read the news. Those that know me well, know that I love space and science fiction. When I learned that Neil Armstrong had died, my first thought was not sadness but that he was old. After all people die; even the great ones and the heros. My second thought was that of the men who walked on the moon, only 8 remain. Buzz Aldrin (11), Al Bean (12), Edgar Mitchell (14), David Scott (15), John Young (16), Charles Duke (16), Gene Cernan (17), & Jack Schmitt (17). Of all the crews that flew on Apollo only the crews of 8, 9, 10, and 16 are all still with us. My birthday wish: Before all these men and the people who supported them leave us, we should be back in deep space. I would hope that before Gene Cernan and Jack Schmitt die (last men to walk on the moon) that we land humans back on the Moon or on Mars. Neil Armstrong will always be remembered for Apollo 11 but we must remember he was also the commander of the first in-space emergency; G...

What is a life proof? A life proof is made by taking an everyday, ordinary event and connecting it to history, culture, religion, languages, food, countries and even the universe in 60 to 70 sentences but using 90% of your own knowledge.  Writing a life proof is easy.  Write a simple sentence about something you did. i.e. “I made Pesto .”  Now take the last 1, 2 or 3 words from that sentence to start the next sentence. Basically the direct object becomes the subject for the next sentence. “ Pesto is made with Basil.”  Now using your own trivial knowledge, connect it onward to other things.  By the 60th or so sentence you should be getting close to returning to the original subject.  Of course just saying, “I made pesto” proves you did it; especially if a picture is provided. But connecting your menial task to the events of time and the universe certainly makes your 10 minutes of pesto making far more exciting.  You can connect anythi...

Jinternet (n) =blend of the Japanese word for people “jin” (人/hito) and “internet”. 人ターネット An ever growing network of friends of different backgrounds and walks of life from which one can share life lessons and knowledge. To jinternet (v) the process of meeting new people, sitting, talking, asking questions, listening and learning. Jinternetting is done in person. Neat and Simple, isn't it? Well I wish I could take full credit for it but I cannot. The idea of Jinternet came from a local friend by the name of Kusakabe Katsuhiko, a carpenter and father of three. While on a taiko and shishimai trip to Ise Shrine, we became acquainted and shared many perspectives on the world. He has not seen much of the world but grasps ideas through meeting people. He said, “I can’t use the internet worth a damn but I can use the Jinternet pretty darn well.” He explained that people use the internet to look things up and learn. He prefers to ask questions and listen. He knows that if the perso...