One day I went to Home Depot and found a yellow rose bush for five bucks. Most traditional roses do very poorly in Austin because we don’t get the rain they need and it gets too hot for them. For five bucks though, I couldn’t resist.

I did some research on the variety and figured it would last through the spring, but that I’d have to trim back for summer. No worries. Unlike many roses in the United States that are cross bred for their looks at the expense of their smell, this rose had a sweet aroma that struck you every time you passed by. Worth the risk.

I gave it rose food, plenty of water, and put it in a good spot with just the right amount of sun. And sure enough, I had a huge yellow rose bush that all my neighbors loved. It was every Texan’s dream.

So how does this relate to marketing campaigns?

Preparation is key. Before you plant anything, you want to make sure the soil is the right pH for the plant. You should lay down some compost to enrich the soil. I’ve seen products launched before they were ready and the result is a disaster. You can try to be agile, but if people already have it in their minds that your product sucks, you could be doomed. Or at least, having to work a lot harder than you should have to be.

Some businesses will be doomed from the start if you don’t know where to put them. English roses are beautiful. I’d be an idiot to put English roses in Austin because we get a fraction of the rain they get. I’d really be stupid to put it out in full sun and somewhere far from me where I couldn’t water it easily. Where are you marketing your company? Are you putting it in the right target audience? Putting a company in an inappropriate spot is just wrong, because everyone else in that company is working hard to build the product, and you are squandering it by not putting it out there to the people who want it.

Certain businesses need certain elements to grow. Roses generally need very acidic soil. They generally do best with rose food. Are you supporting your team properly? Do they have the tools and knowledge they need? Do your customers have the information they need to differentiate your product from someone else’s?

Don’t be lazy. If you clip roses back, they grow back stronger. If you water them regularly, you get better results. Having a routine helps you figure out what you’ve done and what you need to do. This could be checking analytics, reading blogs, or sending newsletters.

Plant at the right time, and diversify. Yesterday I ate a salad from the lettuce I’m growing in the side yard. I want to plant zucchini, but you just don’t plant zucchini when its cold. It just doesn’t get what it needs when it needs it and it can’t take the frost. If you have to wait to launch a campaign for the right moment, wait. It could give you exponentially better results.

Don’t grow what you don’t understand. If I moved, you better believe I’d be studying up on my zone before wasting my money on plants. Home Depot makes a fortune off of people who couldn’t tell you the difference between a perennial and an annual. These people pick based on “what is pretty”. If all the bloggers are talking about an industry, don’t just decide you want to do marketing for that company because “it’s shiny”. You could end up with nothing but a pile of dead snapdragons in your yard and a huge balance on your Home Depot card.

Be prepared for the worst. I was out of town and it snowed out of nowhere. My neighbor, who shares the plot with me, didn’t cover my basil and I lost all of it. I should have told him to watch out for it but was not anticipating such wacky weather. Sometimes disaster strikes when you least suspect it. That’s why it’s important to know every objection for why someone would buy your product before you go in. It’s also important to have a strategy if your budget gets cut. Bad things will happen.

Pick and maintain relationships with your partners, affiliates, employees and any alliances wisely. Why is that rose bush dead now? Because I moved out of my ex-boyfriend’s house, and he purposely killed it. The little boys across the street would have no more random roses to deliver to their mother. One person can really poison a campaign if they want to.

And most importantly, if you don’t like it or can’t grow to like it, don’t grow it. It doesn’t matter if you have a great spot for a particular type of bush. If you don’t like that bush, don’t grow it. By working for a company whose products you don’t believe in, your campaigns will never be as good as those done for a company you love. Remember that.

Laura Fitton is a blogger who always seems to be picking up good causes to champion. Today I saw no exception as she is trying to raise money to build a water project in Africa.

OK, it’s really messed up that there are people on the same earth as us who don’t have the basic necessity of clean water so they can properly function. Come on, now.

(Steps off soapbox) But you knew that already, right?

If you’d like to be awesome by helping, donate at least $2 to this cause. If you tweet it out by just following these directions, TipJoy will match up to $10,000. Sweet.

And just to let you know, often when people like Laura put themselves out there by championing a cause, they tend to get a lot of people who see that they actually care about something who then ask them for more help for other causes. And when you put yourself out there and you see people coming to you for more help instead of with help, it just breaks your heart. As the Bible says, “The harvest is plenty but the workers are few”. Remember that.

Social media tools are free, but that doesn’t mean that you can get something from nothing. Whether you are spending time or money, social media marketing requires investment, just like growing food or building apps or anything else in life.

That’s why I was so happy to hear that Richard Kirkendall, the CEO of NameCheap and a client of mine, was interested in giving away free domains in a trivia contest on Twitter. I added the element of overall winners to it and a tracking page, wrote the questions, and worked on the automation of the questions with the CTO, and we were on our way.

What were the results?

There is no way we would have got these results from just doing SEO alone. It cost Richard some domains he might have not sold anyway, the price of a couple of press releases, a few people’s monthly salaries and four iPods. Bloggers are on Twitter. Do things on Twitter that get bloggers talking about you and you get backlinks without spending a fortune on SEO and paid links. It’s that easy.

Stop talking about social media and just use it. Seriously.

I am sitting next to my sister in the ICU at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center I hate this place. My sister was diagnosed with leukemia three years ago, struggled with host vs. graft disease, and recently relapsed. I hate cancer. Every day I leave here, I feel like I’ve just seen war, to the point where it makes it difficult to sleep or even enjoy life. My sister’s pained face and voice are etched into my memory and it’s hard to think that someone who took care of you growing up is in so much pain. If having a family member with cancer feels this bad, I have no clue how it must feel to actually experience it firsthand.

I have gotten over the part where I blame myself for not doing enough. Now I’m angry at our government. Is our government responsible for cancer? No. Could they be doing a lot more to fund research to prevent it or at least make the treatment seem somewhat humane? Absolutely. We’ve spent more money on the war in Iraq than in over 30 years of fighting cancer. And yet, I am more afraid of terrorism than before it started, and I’m still very much afraid of cancer. How could we let this happen?

To the politicians who falsely led us into this war, you should seriously be ashamed of yourself. From an opportunity cost standpoint, you have caused more suffering in the world than I can possibly imagine.

If you aren’t a politician who got us in this war, please write our current politicians and tell them to quit wasting the money we work so hard to get. If you think they didn’t waste our money, read Imperial Life in the Emerald City and then talk to me. Read this report which shows a 14% decrease in NIH funding since the start of the Iraq war. Or just look at someone in the ICU at M.D. Anderson or meet the families of the 1500 people a day who die of cancer each day in this country. I’m sure you’ll think otherwise.

Zappos. Everyone loves their use of social media. They are the poster child for how a brand can use social media to evangelize.

*Scooby Noise* Errr? Did not have such a good experience.

I put up this post about a pair of shoes I wanted. I then went into Twitter and said “Hey @zappos, maybe you can help me out” and linked to the post. All I wanted was someone from Zappos to send me a few URLs with shoes that were similar so I didn’t have to comb through the site myself. And it took them a month to finally catch on, and I got three different people sending me messages on the subject. One of them found the exact pair for twice as much as I’d bought them for, but by this time, I’d already bought a similar pair of shoes from a department store for 30 dollars less. I was in Europe with limited internet access by the time they got back with me. Meh.

I COULD NOT HAVE MADE THIS SALE ANY EASIER FOR THEM. I took a pic of the shoe I wanted with the size. Go and find it and send me a URL and NOT a product code, and do it when I ask you to and NOT weeks later. I give you money. Done. I operate the Twitter feed for @sunandski, and if someone made a sale this easy they would get a response within hours and perhaps minutes.

Zappos is not the cheapest shoe site online by any stretch. Yes, they give you free shipping two ways, but if they charge more than even the manufacturer of the shoe, who cares? You can charge more if you offer the service, but in this instance, my shopping experience was not made any easier by going with Zappos.

Crucify me for pointing this out. I really don’t care.

Putting yourself online always feels a bit voyeuristic. As time goes by, I am slowly getting over this thought. By putting ourselves online, we are eliminating trust barriers between each other. The more we know about each other, the less we all have to guess when it comes time to be friends, do business, share information, or whatever human transaction may take place. We are creating a human database that is both studied and evaluated by peers.

However, what we put online is much more deliberate than what we choose to be in real life. After all, we are not going to publish what we are ashamed of in our social profiles. The more degrees of separation stand between us, the more I can continue to control how you see me. This is perhaps why web 2.0 seems so polished and innocent still. I see very few disruptive characters among bloggers, and I’d almost wish I’d see more just to keep it honest.

Anyone who has watched a Twitterstream or follows their work associates on Facebook appreciates that the lines between our business and personal lines has and will now always be blurred. The question is: how do you choose to control it? Are you the same person online and offline, or do you control or even alter your personality because it is now not only observed, but archived?

The easiest way to think of this is through superheroes, of course. In many comics such as Superman, Spiderman, and Batman, the protagonist has double life. The characters seem to cherish both roles–the closeness of relationships with others in the standard life and the power and responsibility of the superhero life. In other comics such as X Men, the hero and the person are the same. Wolverine, although sometimes escaping into solitude as Logan, is always a Mutant. Jean Grey is always Jean Grey and Storm is always Storm. There is no separation of character and alter ego here.

Do you use the internet world to escape or improve your current life? Do you have a deadbeat job and use it as an outlet for your talent? Or do you use it to show what you do on a day to day basis, with no need to escape your current situation? Which superhero are you when you are online?

Ha, I love writing ridiculous headlines to catch the attention of RSS subscribers. Just a note: every time you use “literally” when you are actually speaking figuratively, an angel loses its wings. Sorry, Clarence.

So PR Guru Kristine Gloria put together a panel aptly titled “Women Under 30 Kicking Ass in Social Media” and I am on this panel. For this honor, I must thank my parents for having me in 1979 vs 1978, in which case I would be too old to be able to speak here.

Although we haven’t prepared for this (one of the advantages of a “discussion” vs. a “speech”), I’ve collected some discussion points we could talk about. Social media 1.) facilitates action and 2.) is not merely a means to evangelize–it is a way to listen. I have concrete examples of how social media feel the pulse of a potential audience to better generate ideas. It also 3.) can create rifts between you and your employer, as it requires you to build a brand at a personal level rather than a larger one and 4.) can require you to further examine yourself, as private and public spheres become incredibly muddled.

And now for your viewing pleasure, the ultimate ass kicker, Kung Fu Jesus!

Random, yes. Funny? Definitely.

I was quite dismayed that Zappos was laying off people. I love Zappos use of social media, but am a bit put off by their prices as I am a cheapass.

Being a cheapass doesn’t always pay off, especially when you are trying to get a marketing company off the ground. The time you spend shopping ends up costing you the time you could be working. So I’m going to try and make Zappos social media strategy work for me.

If someone at Zappos can ping me on Twitter with a fairly affordable brown shoe like this one in an 8.5, I’ll buy it. As you can see, the seam tore on one side and it’s sort of embarrassing. I know Zappos is expensive, but if they can save me the time of shopping and hassling with a return if I need it, I don’t care. It’s worth it.

Here’s the shoe to be replaced:

I’m always on the lookout for cool Puma kicks, but I’m all right there for the time being. I hope this search for a personal shopper works out.

So I got an email from Matt at WebHostingBuzz that we are going to start a Twitter blog. He is at PubCon and saw that Microsoft was doing it and thought it was cool, so now we are.

Me being me, I was naturally jealous. Why? It’s not that I care to see a presentation by Microsoft’s use of social media (although I give props to Phil Wheat for getting out there on the scene). It’s that I just love Las Vegas that much, and I like meeting new people in my industry.

So I booked a ticket and should be hanging out in Vegas this Thursday through Sunday.

Business first, if you meet me, please know that I work for the following companies:
WebHostingBuzz: Hosting company complete with published uptime each month. Proud host of hashtags.org and soon to be host of Platformic.
NameCheap: Domain registrar with easiest domain admin interface on the interwebs. API for complete domain reselling.
Sun & Ski Sports: Crazy cool gear for skiing, snowboarding, cycling, wakeboarding, and all things outdoors. @sunandski

and last but not least:
The Discovery Network: We are launching a blog for the Science Channel called Nerdabout. Stay tuned!

So business aside, I have been so busy/broke blogging, taking pictures, uploading video, etc around Austin, I haven’t been on a vacation in almost two years. So I’m hoping I can take somewhat of a breather and enjoy myself for once. I doubt I will as I always worry if I’m doing enough for my clients…

If you are in Vegas, please say hello. I am @michellegreer on Twitter.

I love my marketing friends. I like bouncing ideas off of them. You know what I don’t like?

When I send you an email about something random and then all of a sudden I have to unsubscribe to your email newsletters.

Seriously, when did this become kosher? When I want to be on your email list, I will subscribe. To me, this is like a store asking for your address so you can make a return and then signing you up for their catalog without your permission. I get a deluge of emails everyday, and I’d appreciate it if the only newsletters I get are the ones I choose to get.

Friends don’t spam friends. I’m setting a precedent right there, folks. If you send me your newsletter without my permission, just know that you are essentially giving me permission to 1.) mark you as spam and therefore get you one step closer to being blocked by ISPs and 2.) make you look silly in some public manner.