Savor the Success

The American Society for Journalists and Authors (ASJA) has asked me to serve on the Social Media panel for the spring conference. It will be me, Peter Shankman, and one other person.


I'm so flattered that I don't know what to do with myself. I also have this incredible "I've made it" sensation because:

• I'm on a panel with Peter Shankman! Peter is the epitome of social media grace. In fact, I learned most of what I do from studying him. Note: if you don't know Peter, he's the guy who established the HARO-Help a Reporter Out-list, building his list to more than 35,000 subscribers in just a few short months. More than 13,000 people follow him on Twitter. (To think I thought I was getting a lot of followers when my list broke 90).

• I'm basically a shy person. At parties, I'm the woman who is standing in the middle of the room, nervously glancing around in hopes that someone will take pity on me and walk over and strike up a conversation. I am NOT the type of person who walks up to random people and talks easily. I'm just not. Some people are outgoing. Others prefer to stand against a wall and stare at our shoelaces. I'm with the stand-against-the-wall types. Yet someone thinks I'm a good networker?

I'm sure I could come up with other reasons why this opportunity makes me feel so good, but those should suffice. Someone thinks I know how to network? Wow. When did I learn how to do that? Exactly when did it happen?


Of course, for shy people like myself, networking on the Internet is a lot easier than networking in person. I love to write, so writing tons of emails every day comes effortlessly for me. Still, certain aspects of it are hard for me even on the Internet. For instance, let's take the concept of friending people on Facebook. For the longest time, I didn't do it--unless I was already truly friends with that person in real life--because I was mortified that someone might deny my Facebook friendship.


The same was true with Linked In and Twitter and various other sites that allow you to have friends, followers, pals, loved ones and such.


Then I started to see it from a different perspective. Had I ever denied my friendship to someone on Facebook? Well, yes, just once, to some man I didn't know. He had no friends in common with me and he looked kind of scary in his photo. He was obviously up to no good, so I didn't accept his friendship advances.


Other than that dude, I've embraced virtual friendship from every single person who has sought me out. More important, I'm not scary looking. (Right?)


So one day I got really bold. I let Linked In send an invite to nearly everyone in my address book. I avoided the people who were technologically challenged and who wouldn't know Linked In from a Wordpress Plug In.  Soon, I was linked to nearly 150 people.


In my Facebook profile, I wrote, "Alisa only needs two more friends to break 100."


Various people sent me good friendship vibes. Within an hour, I broke 100, too. In fact, to be completely accurate, at this given moment, I'm at 104.


I sent invites for people to friend me on StumbleUpon and Digg. I've also got Posh Mama friends and Twitter Mom friends and Savor the Success friends.

More than 90 people follow me on Twitter. I have no idea why, but they do.


Interestingly, while some people are friends with me in nearly every location, most are friends with me in just one. Which means I can feel good about adding all of those numbers together. Wow: I have more than 300 virtual friends! I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and gosh darn it, people like me.


I'm nowhere near Peter's stats, mind you. I'm not even close, but I have to say this. I feel like I actually have a relationship with many of the women I've met over the Internet, especially the women at Savor the Success. I've only met a few of you in person, but I know you have my back--and I trust you to have my back more than I trust some of my real life pals. It's true.


Honestly some of you know more about me than most of my real life friends. You know about my dreams. You know about my dark place. You know about my frustrations. Sheesh. You even know about my sex life.


And I know about yours, too. (Well about your dreams and stuff, and not about your sex life).


Which brings me back to the beginning: that I'll be on a social media panel at a writing conference. People will be counting on me to say something important. Please feel free to share your best social media and social networking tips in the comments area here. I'd love to assemble them into a report so I can tell my real life audience what my virtual Savor the Success friends want them to know about this topic. So, please help. Let me know your answers to these questions:

• How can you use social networking to your advantage in business?

• What is the best way to network over the internet?

• What's more important: the number of friends you have on the net, or the quality of your friendships?

Oh, and while you are at it, think about following me on twitter http://twitter.com/Alisabow linking to me http://www.linkedin.com/in/alisabowman or friending me on Facebook (I'm not sure of the direct link, but you can click through from my website www.projecthappilyeverafter.com). You can also friend me on Digg http://digg.com/users/adbowman and Stumble Upon http://alisabow.stumbleupon.com.

Alisa Bowman

www.projectbappilyeverafter.com