Miri McDonald

Imagine the life of a 12 year old girl...

 

Do you imagine her...

• Living in poverty?
• Being married by the time she's 14?
• Being pregnant at 15?
• Selling her body to support her family?
• Being HIV Positive?

This is the reality for many 12 year old girls that live in poverty. They have no choice about who they can marry. They are impregnated often against their will. They are faced with no options for making money to feed their children. So, they use their bodies and sell them to make sure their kids can eat. Then they get HIV. Then they die. And the cycle continues.

But it doesn't have to be that way. The Girl Effect is a powerful movement to bring our attention to this problem and more importantly to the solution.

Watch this short, powerful video to learn more.

I learned about this movement a while back and my attention was brought back to it this week by Tara Sophia Mohr, a coach, writer and speaker who helps women find their true calling and works to amplify women's voices. She started a Girl Effect Blogging Campaign, asking women to post an entry this week about the Girl Effect. I had to do my part to bring more attention to this movement. We can make a difference - one woman at a time.

At 12, most of us reading this blog (and this woman writing it!) were happy, healthy kids with parents that had enough money to educate us, keep us safe and help us get what we needed. We were able to choose who we married and when. We had access to birth control so we could choose when and if we wanted babies. We also had access to education about HIV and learned what it meant to protect ourselves.

As women, mothers, sisters, grandmothers, daughter, leaders and citizens - let's do something about this! Let's be part of the solution.

Learn more about how to be part of the solution here.

For more facts - read this fact sheet.

"Stop, Listen, Connect" and other words of wisdom by Chris Brogan

Chris Brogan, author of Social Media 101 and co-author of the New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestselling book Trust Agents, spoke in Madison, WI on Monday evening 6/21.

Trust Agents has been on my "to-read" list because I feel that trust has become an even more important success factor for businesses with the globalization of the economy and the advent of social media. We are in an era where people are more often doing business without ever meeting in person. To me, trust is key for this leap of faith. Or in Chris's words, "Trust is the new currency in social media."

Chris said some things that resonated with me. For example, he asked us to "bring humanity back into what we are doing." To illustrate how we've gotten away from this, he brought up an example of someone being grateful to get an @reply* directly from Chris on Twitter. "Really?" Chris lamented. Expressing disappointment that an @reply is a surprise rather than commonplace. He suggested @replying more often to connect with people and comment on what they are saying. I used to shy away from @replies for fear I was muddying things up for my followers but now realize its importance as a way to connect my followers to other great people.

Here's my top 10 list of more great tidbits I learned from @chrisbrogan for businesses trying to build trust and use social media more effectively:

• 30/60/30 rule: Spend 30 minutes of listening, 60 minutes of connecting, 30 minutes of publishing per day.
• Ask provocative questions: Ask your customers questions that will provoke honest and useful feedback such as, "How much do you think we suck?"
• Grow bigger ears: Meaning, really LISTEN and use tools that can help you do so (examples, Radian6, SAS, Crimson Hexagon).
• Use LinkedIn: Spiff up that LinkedIn profile because, surprisingly, more people are using it than you think! Update your status but filter your twitter feed with #in so you don't muddy up the LinkedIn status with your foursquare check-ins to Walgreens!
• Connect globally: Make connections with those you are making repeat contact with outside of your industry and geography.
• Really serve your customer: Instead of shamelessly promoting your product or service, talk about the things that enhance your product for your customer.
• Do things other people are afraid to do: For example, talk about the competitor's product when its better than yours. What a way to build trust and perhaps partnerships down the road!
• Email still rules: Use email marketing tools (Blue Sky Factory, Constant Contact, My Emma) but don't just use it to sell your products. Provide useful content and stun readers with a personal style letter now and again.
• Go where your customer hangs out: Find your customers favorite social media "hangouts" to maximize your use of SM using tools like Rapleaf or create a special space and build the community.
• Let people "Like" you: Add the Facebook "Like" button to your blog and website to increase traffic.

What are you doing to build trust with your customers and followers?

* For non-twitter users, an @reply is when you tweet directly to someone's Twitter username. It's like a sending a short, public email message. However, your followers will only see it if they also follow that other person's tweets and vice versa. However, if you go to any given person's twitter page, you can see all the @reply messages they've sent.

The power of acting selflessly and building community

Thanks to all of you that commented and voted on my blog posting about the TRU USA unconference. I actually won the ipad! I still can't believe it. Thanks again to Pinstripe for donating the ipads for the contest. For those of you coming in late on this, read my previous posting about the contest.

When Geoff Webb (one of the founders of the TRU conferences) announced me as the winner, he asked me how I got so many votes and comments. In the moment, I just said, "I posted it on Facebook and Twitter" but on my drive home I really thought about it. How did I get so many votes? Then I remembered something pretty powerful that Ryan Paugh of Brazen Careerist said during their session this afternoon at TRU USA. Ryan is Brazen's community manager and he said (I'm paraphrasing here), if you do things for people in your community they will do the same things for you.

I realized that this was EXACTLY how I won that ipad. It really was all about the community I've built and the power of acting selflessly for my colleagues and friends. I connect people, offer to help, offer advice, go out of my way, comment on people's blogs, re-tweet great comments on twitter, share facebook postings, and more. I do these things without looking for something in return. I do these things because it brings me joy to help others. So, when I connected with my community and told them I blogged about TRU USA, not only did they WANT to read the posting, but they wanted to help ME by voting. They may have been partially motivated by the chance to win their own ipad, but I am not sure this was enough of a draw on its own. I think the main reason they did it was to help and support me.

So the next time someone asks you to help them, just do it! Don't think about what it will get you or how you can get a return on the favor in that moment. Just do it for the fun and joy of it. You never know, you may win an ipad!