Upon my return to the grid (meaning my iPhone on the drive back), I realized that my longing for technology was really in communication of key information and emotional connection through my inbox (email is not, nor will it ever be dead in the foreseeable future), not through Tweetie, Tweetdeck when I returned to my laptop at home, Facebook, LinkedIn, or any website at all – it was spending 6 hours of catching up on all of the things that are hyper-relevant to me in my inbox.  Interestingly enough, I could only really scan and internalize all the issues brought up through hundreds of emails on my iPhone for about an hour, and the other 5 hours of digging way deeper and responding happened through my Outlook inbox on my laptop.  It’s a totally different mode of thinking on a 14″ screen than a 2″ screen.

There is a lot of chatter over the past several months among Email Marketing industry execs (over a hundred of us on a private email list) about whether or not Twitter is a complete waste of time or if it will kill Email, and it seems so obvious to me that Twitter is a useful conversation piece that has its place in the marketing mix, but is not yet the killer addictive app/platform/communication channel that email is.  In each of our daily lives, the large majority of us prioritize our Inbox over everything else.  It took almost a week in the woods to be able to articulate this simple gravitational pull towards email.

I’m usually curious enough to click on the links she offers and yesterday I found myself at her new site.  What I was surprised and delighted by was the ease at which she engaged the user in a multitude of interactions.  As a first time visitor to the site you are invited to “Get The Zoe Report” by simply giving your email address and zip code.  The call to action is straight forward and simple.

Next you are taken to a thank you page where they segment your gender, age and preferences with an option to add a category they haven’t listed.  I think this page starts to build the relationship with the user.  You are asked about what is important to you and given the chance to elaborate, in a way it sets the tone for the pages that follow.

Next you are asked to engage with Rachel Zoe via social network.  “Have an idea for the Zoe Report? Send your suggestions to Rachel through Twitter!”  Underneath the headline there is a text box set up to instantly @reply to Rachel on Twitter.

Finally they encourage more social interaction in the final thank you page with a call out to share on Facebook.

Each of these steps is voluntary with a link to “skip this” and with a full top and bottom nav bar to navigate away from the information gathering pages at any time.

Once you are done you are greeted with a thank you email with information on what you have opted into, a suggestion to add the newsletter email address to your address book, share on facebook and the option to unsubscribe.  The copy that surrounds all of these options make them a little more special.  For example “The Zoe Report will never go out of style, but if at anytime you wish to stop receiving it, you can unsubscribe.”

I think this is a great example of a website taking the extra step to engage their users and get them excited about visiting the site while collecting valuable information for their email campaign.  Well done Rachel Zoe!

Check it out for yourself »

Comment below and tell me what you think of the process.

Statue by the Penguins holding the event program and enjoying Cascade Brewing’s Razberry Wheat

Luckily for me, Ryan was going to our New York office to meet with clients so I happily went in his place.  It was a perfect day for music, beer and friends.  This fact was only enforced when all the tickets were sold out by 6:30!

The deliciously potent Lagunitas 2009 Correction Ale 7% ABV

With over 20 breweries to choose from and 10 tastings included with admission, who could blame the throws of thirsty Portlander’s enthusiasm?  There was a selection of seasonal summer ales along with tried and true favorites.  The only line that seamed to suffer was the one for root beer.  We don’t proudly state “Keep Portland Beered” for nothing.  My only complaint is that there is only one a year.

Beer lovers lounge in the field while listening to the Crazy 8’s

Photos by Keith Kunis

Leading the frenzied mob was Christine and Don who fought their way to the Red Star for a chance to grope the 7 foot 1 mammoth.  Christine, a dedicated Blazer fan, saw the tweet, took off her earrings and ran the seven blocks in moccasins with Don at her side.  Somehow, with the will of true Blazer fans and the hearts of eROI employees, Christine and Don the magnificent were able to reach O’Neal and claim their prize – two tickets each to a rocking basketball game.  A proud day for all.

Follow eROI on Twitter!

So then I turn to Twitter and gag. Gee, any of this is really worth a tweet, right?  Then I get distracted by someone or something else that needs immediate attention. By the time I get back to Twitter the moment has passed and I’m on to 6 other things and the cycle starts all over again. Yikes! Therein lies my dilemma. I want to share these things but I don’t want to be one of the those folks suffering from “Twitterhea” either –you know who you are. Your constant blathering has to be a sign of some sort of neurosis.

Back to me. Do I need to make the decision to go all personal or all professional? I am finding the mix a little distracting from some of the people I follow. I’m also not sure how I should feel reading the personal bits about my colleagues. (Sorry the garlic pizza didn’t go so well Meggan!) I imagine some of them don’t feel comfortable that I’m following them because I’m their supervisor. I’ve actually chosen not to follow some people for that very reason. I know I wouldn’t want my boss to have a front row seat to all of my personal goings on – and we have a pretty open work environment here at eROI too. ALSO – who are the random people that decide to follow me? So far I’ve had 3-4. How should I feel about their sudden interest in me?

Which leads me to the other twouble with Twitter that I’ve been discussing with other Twitterphiles here at eROI.  I am finding that some companies are pursuing a full blown Twitter creep out strategy. Please stop. I don’t want the fact that I’ve shared my one too many glasses of wine the night before story to suddenly open me up to be followed by some wine company because they’ve heard the news and want to share their love of the vino. Okay, I also don’t want AA unnecessarily following me because they’ve heard and now they’re concerned for my overzealous love of the divine grape. I’m okay, really!

Don’t get me wrong – Twitter is an up and coming force that companies need to reckon with. It is already gaining a serious footing as a marketing channel. The best strategies for using Twitter are surely yet to come but so far most brands are pursuing a couple of solid yet simple strategies. For instance, piggybacking broadcasts of recent posts to drive traffic. Another strategy is using Twitter to widen a campaign’s reach for topic driven outreach to achieve broader messaging and soliciting feedback. Be open to experimenting but stay true to your brand.

One great local example is the way Travel Portland uses Twitter to get info out about local happenings, hot spots, restaurants and the like. In fact they have just launched the first “Twisitor Center” for visitors to our fine city to use for help and insider information. By far though, one of the most powerful uses of Twitter to date taking  place today is Twestival an international charity event bring together Twitter communities 175+ cities around the world for an evening of fun and to raise money and awareness for charity: water. Find your local event!

So if you’re just getting to know Twitter, what should you/ your company do?  I’d suggest you at least secure an account(s) for your company and any brands under your umbrella. If you are already tweeting as a company or brand, step one;  don’t be creepy. Step two; review step one. Ask yourself what your audience would want to hear from you or your brand frequently. Also, are your  tweets achieving any strategic objective? Is your audience going to get anything from what you’re saying? Keep in mind Twitter could be a qualitative strategy providing a way to promote the personality of your brand and the people and the things around it rather than a call to action soap box. (I’m personally looking forward to the real Captain Crunch tweeting.) Above all keep it simple and sane and please avoid becoming a purveyor of “Twitterhea.”

In the meantime on a personal note, I’ll keep working on what the right call for me is– all personal, all professional or a saucy mix of the two. It may be like seeing how sausage is made for awhile but follow along if you dare –yes, even if I don’t know you! http://twitter.com/mpimley

In Portland, we’ve had huge windstorms. During dinner at a friend’s house, a massive tree branch came crashing through my Prius back window. I love nature, but this time, my love affair was tainted for a night and the next morning.

So, after having seriously f@*#ked up dreams all night, I went for a long run in the morning and began processing my thoughts.  Before, my run I glanced at the NY Times front page article titled “Poll Finds Faith in Obama, Mixed with Patience.” In many of my blog posts, I’ve talked about 2009 being the year of optimism and it has been an optimistic year until the bloody tree limb incident last night. But, I knew I could mentally power thru these dreaded pessimistic thoughts.

The sub-header in the NY Times article was “Most say they expect progress to require at least 2 years”, but I think we as a people in the technology age of immediacy have much less patience than 2 years. My belief is that the Obama administration needs to make significant traction on at least 1 issue and 1 industry within his first 3 months. If not, I think more and more people will become jaded and let their proverbial f#%*king tree limb, pessimistic feelings last longer than 12 hours. So, I put the question out there to 400 followers on Twitter and Dylan Boyd replied immediately with a 1 year horizon to make real changes happen.  Mark Kelly, an online marketer from Seattle, replied “@ryanbuch re: obama I think we will give him the typical 2-3 mos because of our extreme short term focus. Dems will be more patient.”

Whatever the timeline is, you gotta give Obama credit for his ability to inspire. I’ve been listening on NPR to today’s 750,000 person celebration, speeches, musical performances. Yes, there are huge expectations on our new President, but let’s give him some credit for jumping into the trenches with us on economic issues and global political issues 2 1/2 months before his job starts. As an entrepreneur, I have a lot of self-motivation. But sometimes, it helps to know that we are part of a larger effort to make a hugely positive impact on the world and create some amazing jobs and opportunities in the process.

“(Reuters) – Social networking company Facebook recently held acquisition talks with Twitter, the micro-blogging company, the Financial Times said.

The negotiations, put a valuation of as much as $500 million on Twitter, which has become one of Silicon Valley’s most closely watched start-ups, the paper said.”

Read the rest of the article here >>

I used to think Twitter was primarily a distraction with no practical business purpose, but now my latest Binge Tweeting session has provided some epiphanies from first-hand experience.  I tweeted about Zappos as a great case study in creating employee evangelists and within an hour, Tony Hsieh (@zappos), CEO of Zappos, began following me on Twitter (which is a good thing for all you non-tweeters).  We struck up a conversation on twitter and now I’m an even bigger fan of Zappos. I also realized that over 60% of our eROI employees use Twitter, which is awesome.  We can benefit from knowledge sharing, internal quick communication, and even help in some customer service scenarios.  The next step is to create a Group within TweetDeck, a sweet Twitter application, with the Twitter handles of as many of our customer contacts as possible to engage in those daily conversations as well and continue to be a resource to them.

To check out other CEOs who use Twitter, read the rest of the blog post.

According to this BusinessWeek article, which has incredible imagery for an article on folks typing on their computers, the following CEOs are major Twitter users:

 Kevin Rose from Digg
Tony Hsieh from Zapppos
Jasaon Calacanis from Mahalo (former Netscape no?)
Michael Arrington from TechCrunch
Loic LeMeur from Seesmic
Tim O’Reilly from O’Reilly Media
Jack Dorsey from Twitter
David Sifry from Technorati
Christine Perkett from PerkettPR
Michael Hyatt from Thomas Nelson
Jeff Bonforte from Xobni
Mike Troiano from Matchmine
Jonathan Schwartz from Sun Microsystems
Shafqat Islam from NewsCred
Barry Libert from Mzinga
Eugene Lee from SocialText
Kel Kelly from Kel and Partners
Lois Paul from Lois Paul and Partners

Freedom, A Twitter Away For UC Berkeley Student Arrested In Egypt

“As surreal as it may sound, Twitter can get you out of jail! The catch…send the right message to as many people as possible as fast as you can and voila!

UC Berkeley journalism graduate student James Karl Buck (29), former Oakland Tribune multimedia intern, was arrested during a demonstration in Mahalla El-Kobra, an industrial city in the Nile Delta.

What the Egyptian authorities didn’t probably expect was the prompt reaction of a large circle of friends in the United States and the anti-government bloggers in Egypt, who were sent an instant text message from his cellular phone: “ARRESTED,” the San Jose Mercury News reports.

The micro-blogging service allows users to send text messages up to 140 characters long, and the message Buck sent had the desired outcome: his friends called the University, the American Embassy, as well as the Associated Press, the International Herald Tribune and other media.

The result: he was released the next day, although according to his affirmations, the Egyptian authorities told him just hours after his arrest, in the middle of the night, that he was a free man.”