The "Firsts" of Many Firsts

Aaahhhh... mid 80's, pure sunshine, bright blue sky, slight breeze out of the West... it's summer time baby and I couldn't be more happy. We heralded in this season in style, at Round Hill Bath & Tennis Club in Overland Park, KS. The doors opened at 11AM and the stream of smiling faces and pasty white bodies poured in.

We could smell grills being fired up right away and the amount of floaties, colorful inner tubes and rafts in the water would make any Macy's Day coordinator smile. As the morning progress, my main goal was to get a photo of the first person in the pool. Turns out, there were two who had a long standing bet as to who would get that bragging right. I don't know if they worked this out or not, but rumor has it, they entered the pool at the same time. That was sweet. So hat tip to Gabe and Isabel for our season's "first".

Then more "firsts" started being noticed. At 11:15AM, Bill cracked open the first beer of the season. Proud moment for all of us Bill... Congrats! Then we had the first member with crutches enter the facility... Michelle's crutches because of her torn ACL during running... well, that's a FIRST of the season. (there's always someone on crutches... a tennis player, a mom showing off her cheerleading skills from 15 years ago, bicycle accident... LOL!) Then we had the first birthday boy come in to celebrate with this family. 44 Year old Gordon! Happy Birthday Gordo!

At one point, I looked around the packed pool decks, courts, in the pool and I thought "Wow... I know everyone here." That brought a huge smile to my face... because I like all of these people and for what they bring to the club. I am on the Board of Directors VP representing the lifeguards and the pool facility itself. It is waaaaay more than the membership I am reimbursed for... and for the first time, I'm thinking "I am tired". I've been frustrated and disappointed by fellow volunteers. I feel... if you're going to volunteer for something, do it because you are an advocate and an evangelist for the not-for-profit you believe in. Not to get a free membership or to have a title. If you're going to volunteer... actually volunteer! Yet, as I watched all of these people yesterday, it made me again excited for the season. Thank God for summers.

I need a beer, grilled kabobs and do a flip off the diving board. All would be my firsts for the season.

WEAR SUNSCREEN!

Measuring You on Twitter ... It's Easy!

I attended a really great workshop today called "Extreme Social Media". It was hosted and conducted by Giovanni Gallucci. http://www.gallucci.net/ His Twitter name @giovanni He is a "thought leader in social media and online buzz marketing." He didn't look as nearly as Italian as his name would imply. LOL!

He was very charming, witty, smarter than sh*t and an excellent story teller. He knows all the in's and out's of how to make a business or brand succeed on the web. It was mind numbing and exciting at the same time. I'm grateful to have had the opportunity to spend the day with him.

We hit on several tools within the social networks to help you measure your success (or failure) to increase your presence on the web and increase your web ecosystem. Here are a few:

http://www.twhirl.com/ for to manage your open tools for several accounts

http://www.tweetdeck/ to tie into Facebook and any other social networks you're on, at the same time! One update and the all update. Cool.

http://www.brightkite.com/ for uploading phone pics.

http://www.huitter.com/ for mutuality and so you can automatically unfollow anyone who is not following you on twitter, with the click of a button. Brilliant. Because you really do want to follow everyone who is following you... even steven. It sends the right message.

http://www.tweetstats.com/ You can gather your twitter stats here! How many tweets per hour, per month, get a timeline and reply statistics and so much more. Great for a work from home business to help you measure your progress and hitting of your goals or if you have someone else doing your tweets on behalf of your company. This is how you check what they are doing and when.

http://www.twitalyzer.com/ This is another tool for measuring on Twitter, your Influence, Signal, Generosity, Velocity and Clout. It's interesting.

http://www.twitterholic.com/ Show the 100 top Twitterers. Right now, Ashton Kutcher is number 1, with the most followers. Then CNN, The Ellen Degeneres Show... you get the idea. You can also type in their name and get a graph of their trend.

http://www.tweetgrid.com/ allows you to SEARCH multiple search words on several screens at the same time! Any business would love this... looking at REAL TIME tweets about key words they are searching for. You can even send a message to a tweeter as you see the message and not have to get out of the screen. Brilliant.

Giovanni focused on search engine optimization as well as blogging so the most people can see it. I'll post more about that shortly. I'm trying out the other sites tonight so I can post more soon. Stay tuned!

Happy Twittering and searching for cool ways to measure your awesomeness! LOL!

For some fun... go to http://www.faceinhole.com/ and put your face on the cover of a magazine like this one! Hilarious fun!

It's a Mystery to Me

What's going to happen with Round Hill this summer? Are we going to gain members? Are we going to lose members? With the economy tanking, friends getting laid off, everyone in DEFCON 4 with their finances... What will happen with our favorite dairy barn turned Clubhouse? hmmmm... We'll find out soon enough.