It reminds me of the shower scene from Psycho.  

A youthful blogger is relaxing at the keyboard as they patiently sip a warm cup of coffee.

The computer beeps, letting them know some new mail is in their inbox.

Outside the window, a brisk night wind ever so slightly rattles the window.

A moment passes as our enthralled blogger whimsically clicks through inspiring articles.

Then, without warning, they browse to the bottom of the article completely oblivious to the danger approaching them.

With one button-click they jump back as they feverishly try not to scream.

What did they find?

• A link to the secret formula that will forever increase their love life.
• A guide to finding the perfect partner.
• The cure for male pattern baldness.
• A free laptop.

Simply put-

BLOG SPAM

Blog Spam has become one of the most challenging aspects of my occupation. Many businesses that I speak with are often terrified of it. Just like the shower scene in Psycho, they have become intimidated by years of horrid e-mail offers landing in the inbox and fearful that what they have to say online will be drowned by inappropriate commentary.

As part of my daily life, I often educate professionals on the technical and social devices in place that help us with blog spam. Occasionally some blog spam gets through, but luckily we have some highly effective defenses-

COMMUNITY- The very nature of online communities is self-correcting and self-defining. While some members would or could SPAM us, they are kept inline by social doctrines that are often left unspoken by the community. This is actually the most effective form of inappropriate comment control, as every one of us is psychologically concerned with how our professional peers, family members, and friends will treat us if we break the rules of our own community.

THE EDITORIAL QUEUE- Most blogging platforms support the ability to place a comment “on hold” until a live editor takes the time to read it. This is time consuming, but provides an almost surefire way of keeping SPAM off your articles. The downside to this is that it derails the “live” aspects of blogging and requires someone to watch those comments coming in. If you happen to visit the site during Christmas break, that active dialogue may take a few days to be highlighted on the web.

ACTIVE LOGIN- Requiring individuals to login translates to effort. Effort translates to time. SPAM bloggers hate wasting time, so deterring them with twenty seconds of logging in generally annoys most of them to death.

CAPTCHA - (Stands for “Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart”, trademarked by Carnegie Mellon University) A common type of SPAM control that requires a user type the letters of a distorted image, sometimes with the addition of an obscured sequence of letters or digits that appears on the screen.

RATINGS-  Another community enforcement tool, some blog platforms support ratings on comments so that they may be audited by the system if enough readers deem them inappropriate.

E-MAIL VERIFICATION- requires the user posting a comment to confirm that they have submitted a valid e-mail address. This doesn’t guarantee it isn’t a junk e-mail account, but it does add another step to the spammers time commitment.

AUDIT E-MAIL- most platforms have the built-in ability to notify everyone involved in an article or comment thread that a new comment has been posted. While this allows comments to go live, someone in the hierarchy of blogging can generally pull down offensive materials before a huge impact has been made.

As bloggers and as busy professionals, we all pay a high cost to individuals looking to spray mass-marketing messages to us through inappropriate methods. For every control we put in place or for every one that we don’t- we either pay they price of lost hours reading worthless materials or we lose time going through the extra steps forced upon us to maintain a palatable community.

As you go through your daily articles, keep in mind that moderators, editors, technicians, and YOU create a layer of defense against SPAM commentary. When adding information to someone else’s blog, make sure it is on target and relevant to what is being discussed. Keep your ideas focused on the subject at hand, and if you want to diverge from the topic have the respect to do it on your own blog.

This is what happens when Barry is left at his keyboard without proper supervision. I had to spread a little Christmas humor and practice some of those poetry skills.

Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the net
Not a reader was stirring, as no one was ready to post just yet.
The comments were hung by each article with care,
In hopes that St Yahoo would soon be there.

The authors were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of google-ratings danced in their heads.
Some snuggling computers at their desk, some on their lap,
All having settled our brains for a long winter’s gap.

When out on the net there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the computer to see what was the matter.
Away to my Windows I flew like a flash,
Tore open my in-box and browsed the latest mash.

And soon the best of the new-fallen posts
Gave the lustre of mid-day ideas to host.
When, what to my wandering eyes should appear,
But a celebrity blogger, his words felt so near.

With my old laptop nearby, acting more like a brick,
I knew in a moment that we must blog it quick.
More rapid than spam the commentors they came,
And then edited, and deleted, and approved them by name!

“Now Mr Chaney! now, Bubny! now, Hurd and Nacht!
On, McKnight! On, Barnett! on, on Heaton and Turner!
To the top of the ratings! to the top of the wall!
Now blog away! blog away! Blog away all!”

As dry jokes appeared before the wild audience fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, they just ask why?
So up to the blog-top the readers they flew,
With the blog full of Toys, and St Yahoo too.

And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the net
All the laughing and hawing that each blogger could get.
As I drew in my head, and was turning around,
Down the ratings St Yahoo came with no sound.

He had blogged all in blur, from header to foot,
And his articles were so tarnished with dashes, that no one would look.
A bundle of thoughts he had flung on his page
And he looked like a creature, trapped in a virtual cage.

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And filled all his bloggings, then commented with a smirk.
And lending his thoughts to topics he knows,
And giving them each a blog, up google he rose!

He sprang to the web, to his readers gave an idea to enjoy
And out came a laugh, as he practiced his google ploy.
But I heard him exclaim, ‘as he turned off the light,
“Happy Blogging to all, and to all a good-night!”

Being a blogger is much more than just writing, its about expressing who you are on a personal and a professional level. It defines you and builds your brand, but you must first be willing to break the mold and celebrate how unique you are.

Blogging does not have to be about breaking an idea for the first time, it only has to be about conversing on the topic with zest and energy. If you compare blogging to mass media like talk shows and weekly columns, you soon realize that old news is often rehashed fifteen ways from Sunday.

Yet even with having heard the same story over and over, each viewpoint presents a different outlook on a situation. Just like politics, if you get one hundred bloggers in a room you are bound to get one-hundred and one opinions (yes, bloggers don’t stop at only one opinion!)

In today’s ever changing web, the competition to create a unique brand for yourself is immense.

As individuals define themselves, I always find my associates labeling themselves with the same old titles and descriptive phrases. Some classics-

Real Estate Professional

Home Buying Agent

If you really wanted to be creative- ask yourself what would a room full of kids describe you as?

Lifestyle Building Expert

House Matchmaker

You probably read those and think “I’d never put that on my business card!”

Yet ask yourself, have you ever heard of another House Matchmaker? When was the last time you were at a cocktail party and told the group you were a real estate agent and everyone went “Oh yeah, one of those..” and nothing happened?

If you add flare to your basic title using a little creative energy, the conversation is going to go straight into questions the next time you introduce yourself as a House Matchmaker. People will ask “What in the world is a House Matchmaker?”

That question is invaluable 

Rather than find a brief dismissal from a group, you enter the conversation and immediately have the opportunity to describe what a house matchmaker is- and everyone is paying attention. Rather than describe yourself using an age old title, you have a moment to separate yourself from all the other real estate agents of the world. 

The key is setting yourself apart from everyone else 

If everyone else in your office is doing “Five Easy Steps to Home Ownership”, try something different. Work out of the box. The next time try defining your five easy steps as “Five easy steps to saying adios Landlord!”

The point is to break away from the expected, yet not be off target with your audience. If your primary market is 25 to 35 and single, use some catch phrases from the local community night scene. Declaring yourself as a unique professional requires that you try a different approach to reaching the same crowd.

I always knew I wanted to become somebody when I grew up. Now I realize I should have been more specific. - Lily Tomlin

Anyone can be an expert, yet few of know how to define themselves in the spotlight. For several years my effort on social networking was focused on defining your personal brand.

I cannot stress the importance of creating a unique identity for both yourself and your business, when a potential or existing client says your name or slogan, you need to have defined it for them (or they will happily define it for you.)

When I used to introduce myself I would say “I’m an online marketer.” But most people would quickly get a strange look on their face and categorize me into the realm of banner advertising, keyword optimized searches, or even the dreaded niche of being an e-mail SPAM agent.

As with all occupations, from vacuum salesman to real estate agents, there are those individuals who cast such a shadow on an industry that everyone gets branded by a few bad souls who abuse the market. Yet for every evil doer out there, there is someone in the industry who serves as a sparkling example of how things should be done, the right way.

Aside from people mindlessly throwing me into a category I didn’t belong, a lot more people also had no clue what an online marketer actually did. They had heard of Google and Yahoo, yet they didn’t know what a SEO expert was, or more recently didn’t know what a blog was.

So like most human souls, few people are willing to admit they don’t know what you do. They would rather make assumptions and categorize you into a definition of their own making. But were does that leave you?

It leaves you standing there, by yourself.

I finally realized this huge mistake. Ten seconds into defining who I was, I had given editorial control of my life to the person listening to my description. The words were all wrong, the listener filled in the blanks, and I left them with a random “wheel of fortune” decision to whether or not they could utilize my skills.

To recover from this error, I built my personal brand. 

I started to do this by changing the words I used to describe myself. Rather than focus on ordinary words, I chose to narrow down my brand to statements that encouraged inquiry or that sounded inspirational.

My original answer of “I’m an online marketer” changed to-

“I help people build a name for what they do so that they can establish themselves in their community. When someone asks them what they do or who they are, I’m the guy who helps them answer that question. I also teach them how to carry that idea over to the online world, and I consult with them to understand how communicating online in a community is a lot easier and more effective than they think.”

That answer details what I do. It doesn’t leave room for someone else to define the benefit I offer my clients. However it does lead them to the question – How do you do that?

That question is exactly what I want. My original answer left closed off the inquiry before they ever really knew the benefit I offered. The new answer encouraged questioning and opened the door to more conversation, giving me a chance to engage them on an intellectual level and support my opening statement with examples of how my professional expertise could impact their business.

In my last article The Red Balloon, I talked about how certain very basic aspects of social relationships open the door to introduce yourself and establish a relationship with someone you have’t met.To relate this idea to blogging, I’ll detail one of the most common questions I get from business owners across the nation.

“Why is everyone so hyped about Blogging? I keep hearing it as a buzzword and I just don’t get it.”

The short answer- Blogging is word of mouth marketing on steriods. It opens the door to an almost unlimited number of social interactions that can all be used to introduce both yourself, and your company.

The long answer- Blogging gives you the abiltiy to engage an entire community of readers as if it was a small party sitting around the dinner table. Unlike holding a live conversation with one hundred people, holding a blogging conversation with one hundred people grants you the ability to search, archive, and ponder your thoughts without making an immediate social error.

Imagine going business networking event and being asked the question “what do you do?”

This is a simple question, but most people fumble it with ten seconds of pause and an almost incoherent answer. The successful live business networking experts I know have a 30 second elevator pitch down, but even some of them faulter when they don’t realize who they are speaking with or they happen to be in mixed group of personalities.

Think about that situation and apply the technology of blogging to it, you gain some amazing new benefits-

• take five minutes and think about what you are going to say.
• investigate who you are responding to by searching google or a company website.
• review previous comments they have made that you may not have originally read.
• state the benefits of your professional interaction by customizing your response.
• have 10 people talking at once, yet not have to worry about what one of them said.
• invite other experts into the conversation
• immediately point at materials that add support to your conversation
• spotlight the conversation so other people hear your thoughts
• save yourself from repeating the same thing over, and over, and over
• organize your thoughts in a more friendly manner
• create interest in your experience and your personal brand

That is just a short list of additional benefits.

If you want to read up some other viewpoints on the benefits of blogging try these articles-

Benefits of Blogging- by Darrell Zahorsky, About.com small business guide

Niche Blogging Benefits – Tammy Powley on ProBlogger

If you like “hands on” books

Realty Blogging- Blogging for the Real Estate professional
Publish and Prosper- Blogging for Your Business

Usually I learn the best lessons of my life from the perspective of a child. Kids are wonderfully aware of the world in the most direct kind of way, yet the lessons they learn are the same ones that so many of us miss.

Tonight I was watching my son play with a young boy that was his age. They quickly bonded and became best friends on the playground. The boy was a cute little guy with a red shirt and blue jeans, dressed almost identically to my son. Yet his father had tied a bright red balloon to his belt so that it danced happily above him by several feet.

Half an hour the two boys became separated. My son was very dismayed by the occurrence. He searched the crowded playground for ten minutes looking for his friend and simply couldn’t find him. There were now three red balloons on the playground, and all of them were being held by adults.

He came to me with this frown on his face and said “Dad, I can’t find my friend. I even look for his balloon and its gone.”

I thought about it for a second and quickly realized his dilemma. I told my son to go around and ask questions of the people holding the three red balloons, and sure enough he found the boys father. He had also found two new friends by speaking to the parents holding the other two balloons.

I often think of business like this. I see a lot of my colleagues jumping to conclusions about what the red balloon represents to them. I also see them frequently falling under the false idea that the red balloon isn’t the same balloon they are looking for.

Now think of it like this- the red balloon is a social network. It is the after hours cocktail party at the lounge down the street. The red balloon is not the end goal, it is merely the most notable item of merit. The red balloon serves as a target to ask questions of people and to introduce yourself. The simple act of them holding a red balloon give you a reason to network, and even if its not the exact thing you were looking for- there is a likely chance the person holding a red balloon is standing in the bulls-eye of your target market.

For my son, adopting the idea to step outside his box and introduce himself to the world opened the door for him to meet two new friends by virtue of their parents holding a red balloon.

For the networking professional, adopting this idea is an easy way to use word of mouth introductions to convey the message of what you are looking for in a friendly socially accpetable manner.

What do I need to know about the online world?

You need to know how to get your name out there. You need to realize that your personal brand is one of the key reasons clients choose to do business with you. By developing a visible presence on the internet and utilizing a toolkit of professional online networking skills, you can add a huge asset to how you interact with both new and existing clients.

In the recent past, certain elements of the web have been nicknamed “Web 2.0”. The 2.0 ideology is that the latest focus of the web has been to define conversation, or social aspects of relationship building.

If Web 2.0 is social, how does that benefit me?

The social foundation of the modern web allows businesses of all sizes to compete on an entirely new level. Everyone from the small business owner to the largest of the Fortune 500 is defined by one voice, the brand of the company shares the brand of the people who are part of it.

How does my company define its brand?

It can begin by embracing an ideology. Some of the most important aspects of a true professional is the sense of family, the dedication to have a strong relationship with a client, and being able to carefully balance all of the karmic gray areas in business.

Karmic gray areas?

Those are all of the areas of business that you don’t find on accounting sheets; employee satisfaction, executive inspiration, community involvement, customer relationships, and everything else that can create a “warm and fuzzy” feeling in how your business functions.

Don’t make a mistake- every single karmic gray area also has the potential to create highly destructive impacts to your business if left unattended.

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I woke up to an e-mail saying “Web video is a powerful recruiting tool.”

This has been a topic addressed by several members of the recruiting community, but this time it was more of a great note to see our own Blogging Systems video listed as a “Video of the Week”.

Our piece isn’t about recruiting specifically, but it does detail how our community publisher platform can be used as a social tool to build relationships and community, we all know that a good relationship leads to referrals, and strong referrals produce great candidates.

This whole “word of mouth” technique is great. I personally love it. Our model has proven successful in having Radio shows, magazines, newspapers, blogs, and technical summits giving honorable mention to what we are doing at Blogging Systems. Our team is working day and night to enhance our community products and build real value for our clients, and I’m very happy to say that our team rocks.

I also have to add that Paul and Richard’s Realty Blogging book is receiving great reviews from the real estate industry. It has become a top seller in the blogging and marketing categories on Amazon, and is a benchmark for any professional looking to maximize the benefits of blogging (it may be real estate focused, but the lessons within apply to almost any consultative industry.)

You can read more about some of our daily coverage at www.bloggingsystemsblog.com 

Why would I use a job board? More importantly, why would one go through the effort of putting anything on a board unless it was laying flat in front of you so that the board was now a table?

The difference is between a career board and a career community.

If it was a board with five users: you could post something to it, watch the statement be interpreted, then wait for a response statement to occur. This is an advertisement.

If it was a table with five users: you could speak across it, hold a conversation, adapt to the way people react to your statements, and nurture a relationship. This is a conversation.

In the table option, consider this- just like a good cocktail party the best conversational size for a table is four to six people. Too few, you don’t have enough members. Too many, you lose people in the conversation.

Regardless of the size of the table, a critical element of holding a great conversation is a coordinator. You need someone to ask the right questions, throw out the occasional piece of humor, and keep a positive yet neutral tone to help recover from those accidental statements that offend someone.

Now move onto the web.

Blogging is a conversation. Small and direct, yet benefiting from being able to be heard at a moments notice. The best bloggers define personal community not only by having the best cocktail party conversation, but by also coordinating the members of the gathering.

Blogging Systems has been developing community blogging platforms for a while now, trying to help different people nurture a sense of community and share common ideas. It seems our team is way ahead of the bell curve on the official 2007 findings of the University of Southern California’s Annenburg Digital Future Project.

Some great bullet points-

“Online communities are the future of our economic, political, and social lives.”

”Development and leadership of online communities is critical to the future success of a wide array of industries, including communications, marketing, political campaigning, advocacy, social networking, professional networking, intellectual property, entertainment law and management, nonprofit management, social support and illness support, and healthcare, to name just a few.”

• 43% of online community members say that they feel “as strongly” about virtual community as real-world community.
  
  
• 20.3% of online community members say that they take action on behalf of online communities that they belong to.
• 64.9 % of online community members in a “social cause” indicate that they were unaware of the social cause before they began participating on the net. (meaning they were recruited through the net!)
  
• Over half of online community members log in once a day and 70.4 % say they sometimes or always interact with other members while logged on.
• Internet users report having met an average of 4.65 friends on line whom they have never met in person; they report they actually meet 1.6 online friends in person.
• 42.8% of Internet users say that going online has increased the number of people they regularly stay in contact with; this number has decreased slightly from the 46.6% who said the same thing in 2002.

So the question we further define as we design dynamic community portals is how to draw visitors into the user-centric experience that defines a relationship. It takes repeated motivational, intellectual, and emotional cues before a visitor feels they are part of a “community” either in the real world or online.

The essence of our online communities seems to be touching deeper and deeper. Over the next few years I suspect that we will see exceptional growth in all of the above areas, and we will also see that our geographic communities redefine themselves using informational connectivity rather than spatial connectivity.