Are you an aspiring blogger, but don’t know where to begin?  Or, do you already operate a blog, but want to take it to a higher level?  As I mentioned to you in yesterday’s blog article, Lara McCulloch (aka @ready2spark in Twitter) is rolling out a webinar series aimed at helping folks start and grow their online businesses.

The first of these webinars is entitled “Kickstart a Killer Blog in 7 Days.” It will be held on Wednesday, October 13, 2010 from 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM (ET).  Earlier this week I was treated to an advance preview of the webinar.  I wasn’t disappointed, as I was very impressed with its flow and strength of information.

Lara artfully presents a complete top to bottom 7-day plan for setting up a blog for success.  The program’s components are well articulated, comprehensive, and easy to understand/follow.  There were some really solid takeaways from her presentation and here is a taste:

Key Learnings

Focus (Day 1) — A successful blog begins with thinking very carefully and thoroughly about what your vision is of what you wish to accomplish.  Investing this time to get yourself laser focused on where and how to direct your energy will help pave the way for successful results.

Positioning (Day 2) — I was particularly interested in Lara’s suggestions regarding how to craft a “positioning statement” to convey to potential readers the intent and focus of a blog.  She suggested the components outlined below as a means of developing that framework.

Personality (Day 6) — Many of the most successful blogs have very distinct and unique personalities.  It is well worth a blogger’s time and energy to reflect upon their persona, and then model their blog design after that.   This approach will create a more personal connection with readers, and help give the website a unique and recognizable brand identity.

Who Will Benefit From This Webinar?

If you are looking for a kickstart to your blogging efforts, or a healthy boost to a blog already under development, I believe it would be well worth your time to attend this Ready2Spark webinar.  Here are the registration details:

1. Click here to reach the registration site
2. If you register by 11:55pm tonight you automatically qualify for the early bird registration rate of $64.99, a $20.00 savings off the standard rate.
3. After 11:55pm tonight the first ten (10) McCurry’s Corner readers will still qualify for the early bird rate by entering the following code into the “Discount Code Field” of the registration page:   Type “MCCURRYSCORNER“

In the spirit of full disclosure, I do have an affiliate marketing relationship with Ready2Spark.  However, I also want you to know that if I did not believe in the high quality of this webinar, I would not recommend it.  If you do choose to attend I look forward to receiving your feedback regarding your experience.

As some of you know I started this blog about 18 months ago.  Since its inception I have worked feverishly to create content that consistently delivers useful, quality information.  Some of my articles have stimulated some very interesting conversations.  I am honored because you, my readers, have made this blog successful, by embracing it, contributing your comments to the conversations, and sharing my messaging with your social networks.  Thank you for that!

Strategic Vision for McCurry’s Corner

When I began this blogging adventure, I first spent some time developing a strategy for what I wanted to accomplish with it.  It was probably one of the smartest things I did, because it helped me get focused.  In brief, my goals with McCurry’s Corner were to:

1. Build My Personal Brand — Strengthen my reputation and broaden awareness of my thought leadership across the events profession.
2. Drive Change in the Meetings & Events Industry — Share new business ideas, technologies and processes with other like-minded people, with the mission of making the events industry better and stronger than before.
3. Grow my Circle of influence — Expand my network of contacts and build some really meaningful relationships.

Blogging Strategy Centered on Helping People

My blogging strategy, which is centered on helping other people, was built around these goals, and to this day I remain true to this thinking.  One thing missing from my blogging business plan, was any kind of consideration for generating revenue.  In  hindsight, I believe the reason I overlooked this business piece was because I was not sure whether there would be any real sustained value to my blog.  I also had no clue on how to monetize a website.

Recently I have been doing a lot of research, and thinking, regarding how to add an income stream to my blogging effort.  Realistically, I need to see some revenue generated to justify the time and expense of maintaining this blog.  However, I adamantly refuse to compromise on my original blogging promise, which is, first and foremost, to help other people.  That is not going to change!

Delivering ROI to McCurry’s Corner

I have decided, after considerable thinking, and research, the best approach to providing some reasonable level of business results to support this blog is to very selectively participate in some affiliate marketing programs.  In the spirit of full disclosure, affiliate marketing is a marketing practice in which a business rewards one or more affiliates for each visitor or customer brought about by the affiliate’s marketing efforts.

For example, the blog theme I use, Thesis, has an affiliate program available whereby if I refer them business opportunities, by promoting their product, I will be compensated by them, for every business referral.  This is accomplished by utilizing personalized hyperlinks, which identify me as the referring affiliate.  Make sense?

Three Value-Added Features

In the very near future you will see three additions to McCurry’s Corner Blog.  My plan is to add convenient resources to this website, introducing products/services I myself use, or have used, which I find valuable and think you will too.   My commitment to you is:

I will not promote or support any product/service I don’t myself believe in.  Also, the prices offered through the links I provide will be identical to those offered directly by the product/service provider.  There is no markup.

Here is a preview of whats on the horizon:

Lara "Ready2spark" McCulloch

Ready2spark Online Education — Many of you know, or are familiar with Lara McCulloch. (aka @ready2spark on Twitter)  Lara, a brand strategist, social media expert and event professional, is also a veteran of the adult education speaking circuit.  She is now featuring a webinar series, targeted at assisting business people start and grow their online businesses.  I have agreed to assist Lara by providing some affiliate marketing support for these events.

‘Thesis’ WordPress Theme — I will add a banner to the upper portion of the sidebar on my blog page, offering readers the option to click on it to preview and purchase the blog theme I use for McCurry’s Corner.  Over the past few months many people have asked me about the theme I use, so I am responding by making access to it available right at my website.

McCurry’s Books of Interest — I plan to add a bookstore link (affiliated with Amazon.com) to the menubar at the top of this page.  I will feature only books that I have read, and recommend, because I found value in them.  In fact, in most cases I will have written about them, or their author, in one of my blog posts.

I am excited about offering these new features to McCurry’s Corner.  I am even more enthused about continuing to write and publish articles that deliver value to you, my readers.  Thanks for bringing life to my blog, as it would not thrive without your participation and readership.

Question:  If you operate a blog, what features have you added to your site that not only delivered more value to its visitors, but generated operating revenue for your website?  What questions do you have about my goals and mission here at McCurry’s Corner.  Please share your thoughts!

Do you agree that people/organizations create and maintain blogs for different reasons?  I do.  Some are selling products and services.  Others are looking to build personal/enterprise brand awareness, or maybe just looking to grow their circle of contacts.  Others might be on a crusade, desiring to share a message they are passionate about.  Whatever the reason(s) there is, for the most part, one universal objective in blogging … to generate a conversation.

The Importance of a Blog Conversation?

What’s so important about a conversation?  Well, for one, it stimulates interaction.  It creates energy.  It hopefully fosters learning.  And … It’s social!  Human beings are social creatures, for the most part, and when you give them a comfortable platform in which to engage in dialogue they gravitate towards it.

Relationships are often born through conversation.  They begin to grow, when people discover something in common with one another.  They flourish when there is a mutual benefit attained through the interactions.

Blogs are common platforms for initiating new relationships and sustaining them.  For context, I am connected to Four blogs at present, and have published approximately 200 articles, over the past eighteen months.  In addition I am a frequent commenter at other blogs.  My blogging journey has been enlightening.  I wouldn’t trade the experience for the world.

While I don’t view myself as a blogging expert, I do take my writing efforts seriously.  And, like many other bloggers, one measure of success is stimulating a robust conversation, with my articles.  I have made mistakes along the way, as you can imagine.  The great news is these mistakes have led to valuable learning lessons.

Five Blogging Mistakes that are Conversation Killers!

Arguably, the absolute “kiss of death” for any blogger is to lose credibility with, or stifle the energy of his/her readers.   The following is a partial list of blogging mistakes I’ve encountered that are ‘conversation killers.’

Mistake #1:  Control the Conversation — Most bloggers write an article with a desired conversation flow in mind.  Interestingly I have found, in my experience, that the ensuing comment string, following a blog post, may go in a different direction than the author may have envisioned.  Efforts to keep the discussion “on track” may have unintended results… they may end the conversation altogether.  Worse yet, the blogger may lose frustrated readers.  In my opinion it’s better to take a granular approach and let the conversation take on a life of its own.

Mistake #2:  Moderate, Moderate, Moderate — Another tactic that may backfire on a blogger is to closely control who is allowed to comment on their blog posts.  In the spirit of fostering community and conversation it is optimal to allow readers to freely express themselves.  While understandable that a blog needs some level of protection from spammers, and inflammatory comments, I would recommend keeping these controls at a minimum.  Reality is, if a blogger makes it too difficult for readers to comment on their articles, there will be no conversation.

Mistake #3:  It’s About Me! — As with other social networks, too much self promotion will turn people off.  Think about it… how many people enjoy talking to a ‘used car salesman’  or  the ‘vacuum cleaner’ guy.  It’s OK for bloggers to strut their stuff occasionally, but ultimately their larger aim should be to deliver reader value and generate conversation.

Mistake #4:  Being Disagreeable — As the old saying goes, “just because we disagree, does not mean I am wrong.”  Having different points of view is healthy.  Taking the stance that other people are wrong, or uninformed, is not ok.  It will impact a blogger’s reputation as a writer, and alienate people from being comfortable interacting with them.

Mistake #5: Over-promoting Blog Articles — Bloggers must be very careful not to re-publish identical copies of their articles in too many places.  The search engines, especially Google, perceive this type of activity negatively.  Repeated behavior of this nature will result in lower search engine scores.  A solution for bloggers re-purposing their blog content, is to alter each version slightly, differentiating them from one another.  This action will ensure that search engines don’t flag them as a spammer.

It’s important for all blog authors to remember one thing … their readers are the oxygen that brings life to their work.  By fueling reader energy, through a thoughtful blog design, and flexible, yet positive interactions, bloggers have set the stage for a healthy readership, and repeat traffic.  Quality content, of course, seals the deal.

Question:  If you are a blog author, what mistakes have led to learning moments that helped you enhance the quality of your writings?  For those of you that are blog commentators, what blogging idiosyncrasies are a turn-off to you?  Which blogs are really doing it right, and why?  Look forward to hearing your thoughts.

This past weekend I participated in my first “WordCamp” Chicago Conference. In short, this Chicago-based, two-day Blogger event was a gathering of WordPress users, and developers, with the objective of collaborative learning, and networking.

The education portion of the event was divided into two concurrent tracks, one for developers, and one for users.  I paid $30 to register for the event, which included all programming and two breakfasts. In my mind, this was a real bargain!

Of course, this engaging event was full of social media activity, especially on Twitter.  Throughout the conference there was an active back channel.  For a transcript of the tweets please click here.  Here is a graph summarizing the Twitter activity for that week, courtesy of WtHashtag.com.

I plan to write about the topics discussed in upcoming blog posts but in the meantime here is a listing of the user track presentations I attended:

• Using WordPress and BuddyPress for Education
• Creating Custom Menus with WP 3.0
• WordPress UX Flight Check
• Maximize All In One SEO plugin
• WordPress SEO Optimization
• Rocking Out Your Website With WordPress
• Backing Up and Upgrading WordPress

Copies of the slide decks are available Here.

I have been blogging for nearly 15 months.  In that time I have learned much about this online world of writing, and collaborative learning.  One topic that continuously mystifies me is the subject of SEO (Search Engine Optimization).  Does SEO confuse you too?

Conceptually, I completely understand the point behind SEO.  I have made small tweaks, along the way, to my blog, with the notion of improving my ranking among the “Big Boy” Search Engines.  Yet, I have been yearning to dig deeper into this topic and understand, with more depth, some best practices to really improve my blog traffic.  After all, that’s why I have a blog, right?  I not only want to write, but I want my content to be read and provide value to people!

This weekend I attended WordCamp Chicago, at the Holiday Inn Mart Plaza.  This was a terrific event, and I thoroughly enjoyed the outstanding education content and F2F networking! I plan to generate several blog posts, sharing my insights and takeaways from the conference.

I participated, in two sessions addressing SEO topics, and learned a great deal from both of them!  I discovered, while I  have been doing some things correctly, with SEO, I’ve also been making some fairly significant mistakes, which have been inhibiting my blog traffic generation efforts.

Five SEO Best Practices

Here are some tips that should be helpful to any blogger seeking to improve their website traffic through SEO:

Tip #1:  Choose Blog Post Titles Wisely — Search Engines only acknowledge the first 70 characters in a blog post title.  Depending on length of words, this translates to 8-12 words, on average.

Tip #2:  Assign Only One Category to Each Blog Post– If you assign more than one category to a blog post, you run the risk of Search Engines perceiving this as “duplication” (AKA Spam) which can result in a “ding” to your search engine ranking score.

Tip #3:  Attach a Maximum of 12 tags per post — To point to additional tags is overkill, and may be perceived by the search engines negatively.  In addition it is most effective to have some tags present in both the Blog Post Title and the body of the article itself.  This is called “keyword density.”

Tip #4:  “Broken Links” Will Choke Your blog — Before publishing an article double check that all your links are operational.  Search engines don’t look kindly upon blog sites that are dysfunctional.  Essentially their perception is if you don’t invest the time to ensure your blog posts are functional then why should they bother pointing users to read them.

Tip #5:  Website Size & Load Time is Very Important to search engines (and readers) – Do not overload your blog with excess CSS Code, graphics and plugins.  In general, the website should load in less than 30 seconds.

This list is not intended to be a complete list of SEO techniques, as there are other points to consider.  I will address those in future blog posts.

I would like to acknowledge two people that contributed helpful information, making this article possible.  They are Scott Stawarz and Shannon Steffen, both presenters at WordCamp Chicago, and very knowledgeable, helpful people.

Question:  What are some techniques I did not mention that you have used, or know of, that have a positive impact on SEO?  I can’t wait to hear about them!

Have you ever read a book where you can’t wait to finish it, so you can start experimenting with what you’ve just learned? Your mind explodes with all kinds of creative ideas you want to use immediately.  In short you are fired up!

I had one of those moments this morning.  The book responsible for my “kick in the pants” is one written by fellow Chicagoan, and influential blogger,  Liz Strauss.  Entitled “The Secret to Writing a Successful and Outstanding Blog” it is available, via ebook, for $29.00 US.  In my opinion it is worth every penny!

So, why was I attracted to this book? Well, for some time now I have been contemplating ways to elevate the caliber of my blog.  While my blog content is solid, based upon feedback I am receiving, I am disappointed in my readership growth.  I perceive there is much room for improvement, but am not sure where to begin.  Thus I embarked on a quest to find a new formula for success.

I did not have to journey far.  I have been following Liz on Twitter, for quite some time. (I recommend you follow her too)   In fact, at Jeff Hurt’s suggestion,  I made contact with her a couple of months ago, by telephone.  I instantly liked her, and we had a terrific conversation.

Liz Strauss

At some point Liz mentioned SOBCON 2010, an upcoming conference for bloggers, which will take place in Chicago, 4/3- -5/2, 2010.  In her words, “SOBCon is the think tank of the social web, where the best minds in the Internet space gather to present models, discuss insights, and determine best practices.”

Based upon the recommendation of several colleagues, and my conversation with Liz, I will be attending SOBCON 2010.

While registering for the conference, I noticed an ad for  her book.  The timing was perfect, being in “fix myself” mode, so I bought it.  Easily, it is my “purchase of the year.” … at least so far, anyways.

What are the top learning lessons from the book? There were many nuggets of wisdom offered throughout this ebook, too many to list in this article.   So, here are my “Top Five” takeaways:

Takeaway #1:  Get off the podium — so true … in my efforts to provide high quality content, I sometimes unintentionally come across as a lecturer, rather than a collaborator.  Ironically, I detest lecture-based presentations and embrace community-based learning.

We don’t like to be taught, but we like to learn. And learning is easier, more fun, and more meaningful when we do it in the company of friends who support us. Rather than be the “sage on the stage,” be the “guide alongside.”  –Liz Strauss, SOBCon 2010

Takeaway #2:  Information is all over the Internet, but your viewpoint isn’t — Once again, another trap I sometimes fall into …  The information driving  a topic may not be unique, but my viewpoint of it is.   I believe this is a great truth to remember when writing.  Regurgitating facts to readers does not stimulate much of a conversation. Sharing viewpoints, or experiences encourages it!

Takeaway #3:  Let folks who read help you as much as you help them — If I leave the door open, with my writing, for people to offer constructive ideas I have started a  conversation.  A productive technique is to ask an open-ended question, without providing the complete answer.

Takeaway #4:  Leave what you say a little unfinished — Don’t obsess with providing all the  relevant information on a particular subject.  It’s ok for me to leave out some details. In fact, that is a good thing, as it will provide my readers with an opportunity to add something to the discussion.

Takeaway #5:  Follow up a comment response up with a question — the whole goal of a blog is to start a conversation and keep it going.  Asking a question during a response to a reader’s comment invites more interaction with them.  What a great concept! 

I am really excited about the upcoming SobCon Conference, and to strengthening my connection with you, my fellow community members.  If you are a blogger, you need to read Liz’s book.  She has a wealth of knowledge, strong instincts, and a warm personality to go along with it.  I know she would love to hear from you!

Question:  Do these ideas resonate with you?  For you bloggers, what practices have you incorporated into your writing style to keep you on track, and connected to your readers?  Or, if you are a reader, not a blogger, what could I, or the blogging community, be doing better, or differently?  Do tell!

Recently I realized one of the most overlooked marketing opportunities, for organizations, is the potential “free press” they can receive from their “social technology savvy” customers.  With the evolution of web 2.0 applications more channels are available for marketing and “news-type” communications than ever before.

As the “micro-blogging” culture continues to grow and thrive, more and more journalism coverage of events is occurring outside of traditional channels.  Whereas the power of media once existed exclusively within the walls of newsrooms, magazines, newspapers  and the syndicated news networks, that is changing rapidly.

Emerging real-time voices of current events are Bloggers, micro-bloggers and other social technology users. Ironically, mainstream journalism networks  are starting to acknowledge these people and their tools as a recurring resource for much of what they report, as well.

The "Twitterati"

The true tabloids of today’s news are Blogs, Twitter, Facebook, and Flickr. Writers utilize, as their tools of choice, laptop computers,  smart phones, and flip cameras.  Social media reporters don’t chase celebrities on motorcycles, or swarm around political figures at public events.  Instead they listen, observe and efficiently report their experiences and opinions using social technology.

Interestingly, an initial news clip, submitted by its author,  is really just the “tip of the iceberg.”  As other social media users read it and weigh in, with their perspectives, the depth and impact of a story grows… it becomes a discussion.  If there is massive interest in the discussion, by users,  it may achieve viral status and become a trending topic in the online world.  This frequently happens in a matter of a few minutes.

Communities of Micro-bloggers are beginning to form a “Twitterati” at conferences and events.  This social media press corp relentlessly shares their perspectives and opinions with other social media users, of the event content, the presenters and the event experience itself.  And… this is happening with, or without the blessing of the event organizer!

Organizations are beginning to acknowledge the relevance of bloggers, as an effective tool for press coverage of their events.  Some Event Managers are even starting to offer these “live” bloggers discounted, or even complimentary registrations for events, in exchange for their reporting prowess.  That is pretty exciting!

So I say out with the Paparazzi and in with the Twitterati!  Whats your opinion?

Do you operate a personal blog?  It is difficult to pinpoint exactly how many blogs there are in cyberspace.  According to Technorati, there have been at least 133,000,000 blogs indexed by them since 2002.   Universal McCann, a company specializing in social media research, states 73% of Internet Users have read blogs.  Clearly, blogs are a prevalent channel of communication on the Web!  So why are so many people jumping into this arena?

Technorati, in their article “70 Usable Stats From The 2009 State Of The Blogosphere” cited the following as the top motivators, for bloggers, in an annual study they conducted in December 2009:

• 72% blog in order to share their expertise.
• 72% of those who are self-employed and blogging are interested in attracting new clients.
• 71% blog at least in part to speak their minds.
• 70% say that personal satisfaction is a way they measure the success of their blog
• 63%  say that blogging has led them to become more involved with things they’re passionate about as a result of blogging.
• 61% blog in order to supplement their income.
• 53% of professional bloggers are interested in attracting new clients from blogging.

I am often asked by my friends and colleagues why I chose to create a blog.   Any successful blogger will tell you it is a ton of work to maintain one, let alone generate income from it.

I entered the blog world as part of an overall personal strategy to build my credibility and network, in an industry significantly impacted by the recession of 2008-09.  My vision was to find ways to strengthen my position and value as an Experient employee, and create leadership opportunities for myself.

Lets be clear, I do not blog for a living.  In my world blogging is a part-time, “off-the -clock” venture.   The following are my ongoing blogging objectives:

• build credibility as a thought leader in my job as a Strategic Account Manager for Experient and on the personal side, as an individual.
• Create connections with other like-minded professionals, expanding my existing business and personal networks.
• Maintain a collaboration channel to engage with others in brainstorming innovative solutions for pervasive meetings and events industry issues.
• Share life experiences and insight with other people helping them enrich their personal lives.

So why should you create and maintain your own blog?  My own artistic instincts urge me to respond by asking,  why not?  Realistically, though, Blogs are not for everyone.  Ask yourself the following questions, which may help you determine if a blogging venture will be the right decision for you:

**Key Question — Do I enjoy writing? If your answer is no to this question, then you should stop here! Blogging is most likely not for you.  If you answered yes read on…

Question #2 — Are there topics, either business, or personal, I am both knowledgeable and passionate about?

Question #3 — Do I enjoy interacting with other like-minded individuals, engaging in collaborative learning opportunities?

Question #4 — Am I interested in expanding my personal network of business and/or personal contacts, building new meaningful relationships?

Question #5 – Do I seek to enhance my credibility as a person and build my reputation as a thought leader in my business sector?

If  any combination of questions #2 to 5 resonate with you, then you should strongly consider initiating a blog.  There really is nothing to lose, as if you try it out and don’t find it enjoyable or productive you can discontinue.  There is no financial investment to get started, assuming you have a computer with reasonable features.  A number of hosted blog applications are available free-of-charge, such as Blogger and wordpress.

The blogging community is a huge network of intellectually passionate people, who are enthusiastic about writing.  They are  eager to enhance the learning process, by exchanging ideas, best practices, and experiences with other users.  Intertwined with other social media tools, blogging will continue growing exponentially.

Where do you fit into the blogging spectrum?  If you are not yet a part of the Blogosphere, did you take the above litmus test, to determine if blogging may be a good fit for you?  If you are already an established blog author, what motivates you to write articles?  What advice do you have for our readers?  I look forward to your comments and contributions!

Happy Monday everyone!  I announced on Saturday that My Blog, McCurry’s Corner, has been nominated as “Best Education Blog” for the EventProfs Blog Awards 2009.  This is one of six blog categories being awarded.  For information regarding all the nomination categories please click here.

I am so flattered by this distinction and there are really some terrific blogs in the competition!!  I would sincerely appreciate your vote for my blog if you feel so inclined !!

Here are the voting details:

– Voting has officially started…  and will conclude on September 21, 2009 at 5pm EDT.
– To cast your vote click here.
– Only 1 vote can be cast per person.  All duplicate votes will be disqualified.
– The winner of each category will be announced by September 28, 2009
– If you have any questions regarding the voting process please contact by email lara@regaltent.com.

Back in July I decided to experiment with an idea… to write a blog recapping an event I did not attend.  A further twist to this project was to create the article purely from tweets posted on the event’s Live Twitter stream.  Sounds like an interesting challenge?  Well, it certainly was ……

The event of choice was the Opening General Session for Meeting Professionals International World Education Congress.(MPI WEC) To provide some context the meeting took place on Sunday July 12, at the Salt Lake City Convention Center and contained a live audience of approximately 2,400 ppl.  The Twitter Hashtag, #WEC09 generated the following activity for that session, which was the reference material for my article:

• # of Tweeters — 74 (including me)
• # of Tweets — 358

Within the Twitter audience, roughly 25% of the participants were virtual, like myself.  As a point of information, a Virtual Access Pass (VAP) was available from MPI for $19 MPI member/$59 non member entitling the purchaser to view a live or archived webcast of the event.  I, like many people refused to pay for the webcast, which is what inspired this experiment.

So, here is a recap of the steps I followed to organize my thoughts and write the recap article:

• Step #1 — Sort tweets by presenter… there were three speakers so tweets were copied and pasted from chat archive to Microsoft Word Document in three columns.(one column per speaker)
• Step #2 — Condense Tweets … Locate redundant tweets and purge them.
• Step #3 — Tweet analysis to identify common sub-themes … examining the tweets more closely I discovered three recurring “lessons” amongst the presenters.  Within each presenter’s column I grouped the tweets by lesson 1, 2 or 3.
• Step #4 — Designed Article layout … created an outline illustrating a high level overview of the blog document.
• Step #5 — Write the Article
• Step #6 — Finishing Touches — Added some pictures of the speakers, and an embedded version (in the article) of the Opening Session Video. (obtained from Youtube.com)

The finished article was entitled “MPI’s WEC — The Opening Act” and contained 756 words.  The response I received for the article was very positive, amongst both live and virtual participants. To this day, 6 weeks later, folks are still clicking on that article at my blog site.

From this experience I learned the collaborative nature of a live Twitter stream.  The success of this article is less about my writing skill and more about the power of Co-creation, as the ideas I presented were the collective thoughts of 75 individuals.  Clearly, this is a lesson in crowdsourcing!

Question:  Have you had an experience similar to mine, or perhaps slightly different.  Do you find collaborative creation of content to be a valuable asset?  Lets hear your thoughts!