What’s your process?

I’ve had the opportunity over the last few days to discuss my writing process at length – specifically my process of writing for other people. I talked to interviewers, friends, clients and writers-to-be…

One of those times, the conversation was with a brilliant photographer named Randi Baird. I was asking her about her process of documentation through pictures for a presentation she’s giving. I listened to her talk and wrote this from our exchange:

I marinate in the ideas before I photograph for an article; then, I illustrate the author’s words. Working with chefs, the ingredients become the colors, tools, shapes, textures within an image. Documenting a family, the ingredients are the personalities, the ages, the setting, the history. In each case, we all benefit from collaboration, communication, the strengths of our individual visions…and their fusion.

After she read it, she said, “You’re really good!” And I said, “No you are…you said it!!!” True, I wordsmithed it. But it was her energy, personality, intention, words and phrasing that served as the ingredients for writing the piece.

Here’s my process:

1. Meet with my client in person or on the phone for an hour or two and ask them tons of questions. Making it easy, natural, conversational.

2. Listen to them talk about themselves, their business, industry, goals, mission, philosophy.

3. Hear the words and phrasing that they use and the way that they talk – inflections, emphasis, accent, colloquialisms, industry-isms.

4. Marinate in all of this…especially their personality, energy, essence, je ne sais quoi…

5. Take notes, audio or video record – whatever it takes.

6. Find out what information needs to be relayed and to what audience. I like to do this oftentimes in the form of questions. And I ask the client directly for an answer – let them share their expertise.

7. I answer the questions, solve problems, inform and illustrate in the copy I create.

8. When writing as a ghostwriter / marketing writer, it’s like being an actor in a play – I become the character, channel their voice…and deliver.

What’s your process?

Image credit: Chotda

To throw or not to throw yourself under the bus, that is the question.

Yesterday, I went for an epic rollerblade. Eight miles, bright blue skies, forest all around me. And, ‘they’ (don’t know who they are, just know that I love them) had just come through to clear the path of debris – something they do on a monthly basis. So, I was cruisin’…to the point that I kind of stopped paying attention.

Around mile 4 I glided up a small hill and passed a guy walking – who just so happened to be beautiful – and I was busy being grateful for his smile and friendly ‘good morning’ when suddenly I realized that I had reached the top of the hill…and that it was the hill. The one with a treacherous and steep downhill on the other side.

I know this terrain well. My usual M.O. on this slope is to approach it at a snail’s pace, criss-cross in a horizontal fashion and get to its pine needle and dirt ‘gutter’ as soon as possible, where I then proceed to walk down the hill like the chicken that I am gracefully. But, alas, I wasn’t paying attention and I was going really fast. Really, really fast.

I had two choices:

1. Go for it. Engage my core, tuck down, watch the pavement for rocks and sticks…and fly down the hill.
2. Throw myself on the ground to immediately stop the madness.

I chose #2. In my defense, I did panic a little first. And then, I basically did my most unglamorous rendition of sliding into second base. I got a nasty raspberry with a side of road rash on my leg and a bruise on my tuchus, I gave myself tennis elbow somehow and this morning I woke up and felt like all of my bones were off-kilter – like someone hung my skeleton the wrong way on the hanger.

Anyway, I peeled myself off the pavement and started back to my car – lest you forget, I still had about 4 miles to go. This, not surprisingly, gave me plenty of time to over-analyze the hell out of my decision.

• Is this how I live my life?
• Am I so cynical that I assumed I was going down no matter what?
• Would I rather cause my own pain than let the world do it to me?
• Do I throw myself under the bus?
• Am I cutting myself off from opportunity?
• Do other people do this too?

And, of course, like the answer to all of my questions, there isn’t one. I’ve charged down ‘the hill’ at top speed more times than I can count – hair flying behind me and screaming, ‘WOOHOO!’ all the way down. But, like we’ve just seen, I’ve also hopped off the trail or taken my own dive, consequently not putting myself at risk – not only of failure, but also of wild success.

Sometimes flying down the hill gleans brilliant results, sometimes huge mistakes. Sometimes I can’t believe I dropped out and missed an opportunity, sometimes I praise my intuition and near escape.

There’s ’self-preservation’ and there’s ’self-sabotage’ – and there’s a marked difference and a place and time for each.  One of the secrets of life is being able to tell the difference. Can you?

Image credit: The Rocketeer

Un-Selfishing your Presence

When I was about 7 years old, we got my dad the best Christmas presents ever…three new Atari games: Frogger, Pitfall and Space Invaders. The brilliance of our gift was that we looked like great kids, my older brothers and I, but we weren’t at all because my dad didn’t play with Atari - we did. So, in effect, we bought the games for ourselves.

They weren’t really the best presents ever, they were the most selfish presence ever.

Cheesey as it may be, this little fable teaches us an important business lesson – and it’s simple. Whether you’re a company or a freelancer or a whatever you are, you have to do some marketing, right?

When you (and your copywriter) create your outreach message – make sure that you:

• Listen to your audience first.
• Find out what they want.
• Answer their questions.
• Solve their problems.
• …as opposed to yours.
• Because this isn’t about you.

If we’d listened to my dad, for example, we would’ve found out that he really wanted cheesey music a Loggins & Messina record (literally vinyl), a toy for his mid-life crisis Mazda RX7, Cardinal’s baseball tickets or a cigar…not Frogger. Not even close.

The result for us was lousy allowance rates, fewer trips to get ice cream and some eye rolling…what’s yours?

Image courtesy of sokabs

Did Shakespeare have an editor?

As I walked this morning, I was thinking about the book I was writing and the books other people have written (specifically Geraldine Brooks’ People of the Book which is outstanding and masterful) – and the editing process that surrounds them. I pretty quickly made the leap to the copywriting work that I do – and the editing process that surrounds them.

In each case, the writer/artist begins with a pure moment of production unfettered by anyone esle’s opinions. Or does s/he? Are there thoughts always lingering in the back of the mind about what the editor, readers, customers, clients, boss wants? And if not, certainly the inner editor is there.

Many of us have been lucky, we’ve had those moments. Those beatific dips in the space-time continuum when the words gush in a direct beam from mind to paper (er, keyboard). And in those moments, the editorial thoughts are silent.

Which got me thinking about Shakespeare. He didn’t have an editor at Harper Collins breathing down his neck or telling him that the story would work better if only Juliet was hanging out of her window instead of standing on her balcony…right? Of course, he did have the Queen and the theater owners to contend with (yes, I saw Shakespeare in Love, too).

But imagine him before he actually became Shakespeare. For that matter, imagine us before we had bills to pay or dreams of fame and repute.

Is this what we should be striving for? Writing for the love of writing? Purely that?

Of course we should…

When I got to my computer, post-walk, I had an email directing me to Chris Brogan’s latest blog post (actually he wrote it yesterday but I only got it today because Feedburner sucks). In it, he urges us to “work backwards” – it’s a wonderfully inspiring article that supports the wackiness of my work life. He writes:

In the beginning, you might feel a bit uncertain. Try things out. Build secret labs. Run things by friends. Then, don’t listen to what they say. You think visionaries have safety nets and advisory boards and case studies?

Someone had to hunt the first mammoth.

That’s right, I thought. Someone, or some people, wrote before there were bosses and editors and clients and customers. When they wrote because they were called to create and share. Because they couldn’t resist.

So. Can we clear our minds, in whatever pursuit we’re engaged, and – essentially – go back?

Image courtesy of gadl

Lessons From an Addict

Once upon a time, I was an exercise addict. Under the guise of being a triathlete (not Ironmans! sheesh. just some local sprints: 1/2 mile swim, 12 mile bike, 3 mile run), I worked out like a fiend. If I had a 7:00 meeting, I biked at 4am. If there was a freak New England blizzard in April, I ran anyway. If the pool was closed, I found a pond or an ocean. Welcome to one of the delights of being me…

And then one day, during a 10 mile road race, I injured myself beyond repair – or at least beyond repair back to where I had been that morning. So I started walking and doing yoga. Religiously and without fail, I practiced yoga every morning. At first I thought I’d been transformed. But really I’d just transferred my addiction.

I’ve continued to do so. I still do yoga and walk most every morning (my children, upon being born, released me from the severity of my routine), but over the last few years, my commitment to writing has grown to effectively hold a prominent place beside my sneakers and my yoga mat.

You know, there really is something positive to be found in my manicopia of exercise. Sure I liked the endorphin high, the fitness, my yoga butt, the health of it all – but what I am really enamored by (and the writing practice has made this abundantly clear) is the knowledge that within minutes of opening my eyes, I have already accomplished something.

No matter what happens the rest of the day, I’m buoyed up by the knowledge of my morning success. I love that it’s totally up to me…and my tools – body, mind and laptop.

Image courtesy of wiccked

Social Media Tips and How-To’s for Beginners

Social Media Quadrupled My Business Last Year

When people talk smack about social media – calling it a waste of time or a fake world – I just smile. “Go ahead with your bad self and your bad attitude,” I say. “Social media helped me quadruple my business last year.”

The relationships are real. Most of the people are genuine and kind. Because the social media world is growing so fast, there’s room for us all to learn, thrive, fall down, get back up…and everything in between.

Social media has increased my exposure * given me opportunities to write in some awesome venues * provided new jobs * helped me grow as a networker, writer & business woman * offered new speaking opportunities…and introduced me to Ron Miller.

Click and Clack

Do you have anyone in your life that you share a brain with? I met one of those people on Twitter. Ron and I can’t remember our first tweets or how we connected so instantly – but we did. Complementing each other perfectly with all of our opposites:

• He’s a guy/I’m a girl
• He’s a tech geek/I just like that things work when I plug them in
• He’s a journalist/I’m a marketing writer
• He’s old/I’m not

And, before long, we became trusted colleagues, attached at the Skype-hip, editors & thesauruses for each other, confidants, sentence finishers, virtual office mates…and now partners. I’ve lost count of the number of times that we’ve IM’d each other the exact same thought at the exact same time.

Why Am I Telling You All Of This?

The ’social media is good’ part is because some people still haven’t engaged. Why? Because they’re scared and intimidated by the LinkBooks and the FaceINs, not to mention the Tweetering. And I think that’s a crying shame. It’s all doable if someone helps you do it.

The ‘Ron Miller’ part because our first partner venture is the creation and launch of Soc Media 101: a blog about social media for the beginner. Full of how-to’s and tips from Ron & I and an exciting gang of guest posters.

So…check it out:

• Digestible info if you’re a newbie.
• Great place to point the unfamiliar, the scared and the unconvinced
• Guest possibilities for the well-traveled.

And stay tuned for everything else we’ve got cookin’!

Image by our fantastic designer, Shauna Callghan.

The Big Unplug

I once read somewhere that one of the biggest blog writing faux pas was to start a post with something like, ‘It’s been forever since I’ve blogged!’ Which I totally understand because:

1. Why call attention to the fact that you haven’t blogged or have a hard time with commitment?

2. Many people will land on specific blog posts due to a referral link or a specific search – and they aren’t necessarily repeat customers – so this information about your blogging habits will be superfluous, fairly ridiculous and, quite possibly, a turn off.

But what about the flipside? Beyond those random visitors, we all have regular readers and subscribers – don’t they deserve an explanation if there’s to be some sort of blogging gap?

Me…In a Hole

That said, I wanted to let you all know about a little experiment I’m about to begin. My brother is getting married this weekend in a state far, far away – and the family is in full pack it up and move it out mode.

I’ve been stuck in my little hole here, working away for some time now…years without air, years without an unplug beyond maybe a day. Wait, who am I kidding. My Blackberry never leaves my side, so it really has been years without taking a break.

The Big Plunge

So, I’ve decided to go on this trip without my MacBook and without my Blackberry.

When I first considered it, I immediately began to shake. I thought I must surely just be kidding. But I’ve been working so hard, that – now – I’m pretty gosh darn excited. The idea grew rather fast in my head over the past month.

As such, this is the last post for a good week…and I wish you all productive, valiant and fabulous days while I’m gone.

Oh, and if you hear something on the news about a woman that ran screaming into a Best Buy and smothered herself in Berrys, phones, laptops and headsets…you’ll know it was me – and that I just couldn’t take the ‘ripping out’ of the cord.

Image courtesy of FHKE

One Flu Over the InterNest

So, I got the flu. And, besides the obvious bummerosity of feeling like (for lack of a better word) crap, I have to deal with the issues that surround being a sick and incapacitated freelancer and business owner while the rest of the world swirls on.

As a freelancer or owner of a business where you do most or all of the work, it’s quite smart to have a plan in place to protect yourself in the case of illness, injury, computer malfunction or any other catastrophe you care to imagine.

The Pitfalls

• We can’t call in sick and rely on our co-workers to pick up the slack.
• Our work is usually time sensitive and firing rapidly without a lot of downtime.
• We don’t get paid sick time, so if we don’t work we don’t eat (ish).
• When we literally can’t work, or at least not at our usual speed, the aftermath when we finally can will be piled higher than Everest.
• Personally, I loathe sitting around doing nothing. You?

The Solutions

• When it’s an emergency, talk to your colleagues. Whether they help move things along, contribute significantly or take over the project, your client is the most important consideration. In other words, get the job done if you can.
• Along the same lines, you might have a colleague that you trust so much that you create an agreement to help each other out in the event of such a situation. Make sure this agreement is fair and makes sense to both of you. (Don’t sign on for this with a chronically ill person if you never get sick, for example).
• Remember that you’re only human and take care of yourself. Most clients will understand that we all get sick (or that life happens) and will provide some leeway. My father seems to believe that you use as much energy thinking as running around, so you have to do the deep sleep to recover. (I’m currently not listening to him.)
• It never hurts to have some non-time sensitive blog posts waiting in the wings, so that your blog doesn’t show a huge, gaping hole while you’re using your using your minimal coherency to work on client projects.
• If that little voice calls to you and tells you to get work done ahead of time, listen to it. I swear it knows that illness or roadblocks are near.
• Then, there are always the preventive measures: get enough sleep, eat right, take your vitamins, laugh and enjoy life – all as a means to build your immune system.
• And, of course, this too shall pass. Sick, better. Busy, looking for work. Overwhelmed, under-stimulated. This is all part of the ride.

Add your tools and ideas in the comments below, if you would. I have this feeling that I’ve forgotten something really obvious, but I have a good excuse – it’s called the flu.

Image by melyviz

Your Personal Brand Doesn’t Belong to You

No matter how hard you work to build your personal brand, it won’t be airtight. Not everyone will get the impression you’re hoping to express.

Do you remember English class back in the day? One of my all time favorite teachers, Miss Riddle – swear to god, ask my mother – is the one that first implanted the concept of poetry on my brain. Not the rhyming or the rhythms – but the meaning of the poetry. And then, Dr. Puhr – the one who turned me into a feminist – explored the meaning of prose, of stories, of novels.

Both of these women showed me that, when interpreting someone’s writing, there is no one answer and essentially there is no wrong answer. The color purple could represent the heart of a woman, the ‘fount’ of a woman, bruises, emotion, the sky, femaleness. It could be just one of those things or it could be all of them, to another reader it could represent something that you and I – even Alice Walker – never dreamed of.

The analysis, the interpretation – all depends on us. As readers and be-ers, we attach our histories, our very souls, our experiences  to what we read and see. And from there we create our own understanding. It may not be what the writer intended – but it isn’t wrong. It’s real. As in ‘interpreter-based’ reality.

When you’re creating your identity for your self, your business, your work – you, just like a writer, craft your words and your message with a specific intention and meaning. But your clients and customers, just like readers, will bring themselves fully and without excuse to their interpretation of who you are and what you represent.

Your personal brand, therefore, is not singular or definitive – and I’d hardly call it your own.

Image courtesy of Earth and Eden

Sit on it.

This morning, my children (Sophie 3, Jack 2) were sitting together on the floor, looking at photo albums and having a grand old time – when Sophie decided she’d had enough. She’s entered this sassy, bossy stage of late – and so, in rare form as usual, she jumped to her feet, hands full on her hips, and started barking directives at Jack:

Jackie! Pick that up. Jackie! Go find my horse! Jackie! Stop that right now!

She kept it up for a few minutes, rattling off orders – one after the next – while he ignored her and kept looking at his book.

Until he couldn’t take it any longer.

He looked up at her – and there was silence as they locked eyes for a nice, long moment.

Then, he stood up, knocked her over and sat on her.

What do you do with that nagging voice inside your head?