Start of Day Twitter Stats: Follow: 129 Followers: 110 Listed: 6
Missed yesterday? Go here to read what happened on Day 21 – December 4, 2009 (Fri): Do Some Off-Twitter Marketing
I must admit, I actually started doing this a few days before in anticipation of robotics consuming my day today. That’s correct, gentle reader, no sooner had I completed one major event, but it was smack dab right into another. Talk about jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire! Come to think of it, fire does have a mesmerizing ability. Perhaps you’d first like a glimpse at the fire before returning to the experiment.
I spent most of today off-line in the HFL High School computer room – or ferrying various parts and equipment back and forth in preparation for tomorrow Finger Lakes First Lego League Regional Championships at the University of Rochester. The GearFreeze kids worked feverishly finishing some details on their presentation and repeatedly testing the two robots they had kitbashed over the last two weeks. Whatever we ended the day with would represent our final product. We had a great project, but our robot needed a dramatically improved performance from the qualifiers two weeks ago. I told the team if they could consistently score above 250 on the robot run, we’d have a chance. When we left, they got the robot to accumulate 295 points.
They took me at my word and started talking about earning the top spot at tomorrow’s Championships and an invitation to the FLL World Festival in Atlanta. I had to quell their expectations because, personally, I still feel we have a rather high mountain to climb. Our experience at the FLL U.S. Open Championship in Dayton last May showed how environment conditions can ruin even the best laid plans. There, an unexpectantly slick surface caused our wheels to slip. As a result, perhaps due to overcompensation on our part, our chain drive seized on the third run and literally exploded into pieces. That was cool. I got it on video. If there’s one thing the kids remember about Dayton, they remember the robot blowing up.
Besides, [as we exit the flashback and fade back into real time] if we improved so much in two weeks, just think how much the other teams improved. I exited the high school thinking at least we might (and not without justification) earn a project award. That’s all.
Which meant I didn’t have a lot of time to exercise Joel Comm’s plan for Day 22. Luckily, as I alluded to earlier, I had already begun experimenting with other social media tools. And, by other social tools, I mean LinkedIn. Now, I use my LinkedIn account primarily for my professional writing purposes, and since the ChrisCarosa Twitter account exists for creative writing purposes, I’ve placed my FiduciaryNews Twitter account as my LinkedIn Twitter link. Rather than follow the suggestion Joel offered (it was only a suggestion, after all), I extrapolated and posted my review of twitter power on several social media LinkedIn groups. In addition, I started a few discussions asking what people thought of my little 30-day experiment. I even asked them to guess how many followers I’d get.
Here’s the response I got:
Not a lot.
Granted I could have been more forceful (i.e., active) like I’ve been when posting other questions, but, remember folks, I’ve got a day job. No, instead, I interacted a little but eventually let the discussion die on the vine. Before it completely withered away, however, I did notice a couple of interesting responses. One person expressed her opinion that all social media – and Twitter in particular – is nothing more than a time-suck. (Hmm, that’s an interesting hypothesis and perhaps might make a good experiment someday. Another, perhaps feeling a competition with Joel, offered her own “Twitter Domination” formulae. I bit on this one (it was a free e-book).
I’ve spoke with CoachJudy before, so when she responded with an offer of a free e-book, I took her up on it. I gave her my e-mail (she already had it) and she sent me her e-book “How to Build Your Business in Just Six Months with Twitter and Other Social Media Networks.” It’s a mouthful, but it is comprehensive. It also might be slightly out of date given the changes that have occurred on both (and at least) Twitter and LinkedIn (I can’t comment on Facebook because its last change had me throw up my hands and go inactive). At the end of her book, Judy asks the reader to follow her on Twitter and she’ll follow back. So I followed her.
I’m not sure if I got any followers from LinkedIn, but ChrisCarosa.com has received about 14% of its traffic from LinkedIn (as opposed to 28% from Twitter and 41% directly).
And so I retire early, knowing I’ll have to wake up early to catch the school bus to the U of R. I just hope the kids aren’t too disappointed.
How many followers do you think I’ll have after 30 days? Click here to enter your guess on my Survey Monkey survey “Chris Carosa’s 30-Day Plan to Dominate Twitter Experiment.” There’s no prize, but the fan who guesses the closest correct number the earliest will “win” and I’ll mention you if you want me to.
Find out today’s results on Day 23 – December 6, 2009 (Sun): Drive Followers to Purchase a Special Offer
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