The first thing we did was get off the interstate.  We could have driven 6 hours, non-stop along the interstate.  That would have been six hours of missing local sites and sounds.  Instead we headed across Highway 18 in Iowa.

Family Table Sheldon Iowa

We stopped at Family Table in Sheldon for breakfast.  There were a lot of cars in the parking lot and that’s always a good sign in a small town that the food is good.  Like many small towns, there were several groups meeting for coffee.  Breakfast was delicious.  On the table was a red sheet of paper listing all of the events occurring in town for the month. There was the usual fourth of July celebrations, Rotary meetings and church events.  What drew my eye was the book club meeting at Prairie Moon Books.  It was only 8:30 in the morning and I figured the book store would be closed.  I asked the waitress where it was – what the heck, let’s at least go look at it.  In a small town of under 5,000 people it’s unusual to have a bookstore.

Prairie Moon Books Sheldon Iowa

It was my great fortune to see Prairie Moon Books.  Their hours are 7:30 a.m. to 7 p.m.  Now how smart is that? They are open when people are actually in town!  There is also a coffee shop connected to their store.   They had kids books, women’s books, travel books, half priced books and oh so much more.  My mom bought a book about traveling in the 99 counties of Iowa.  I bought a stack of books.  What good is a vacation if you can’t while away a few hours reading a book?

My grandmother worked in a Hallmark store that also sold books.  At nine years of age, I got to choose a book and go to the back room and read it while she worked.  Now, I have this great love for book stores and appreciate a town that has one, especially the locally owned ones.  We left and drove around the square.  Every store front had a store in it and there were lots of people walking around and talking to each other.  How encouraging to see a small town with no For Rent signs in the downtown store front windows.  I’m going to encourage my Chamber director to contact Sheldon’s chamber director and find out some of the things they are doing to remain so vibrant.

Next stop was DeSmet South Dakota.  We have been there several times and toured the Laura Ingalls Wilder Homestead.  It’s a nice tour and I recommend it for

families and those interested in prairie history.  It’s one of the sites featured in 1000 Places to See Before You Die.   Find more information at www.ingallshomestead.com

We were simply hungry – it was lunch time.  The Oxbow Restaurant was on the road we were traveling and it looked like a place to stop in. We walked in and at first I worried this was going to work.  There were two people eating, one waitress and the seats had tears in them.  We sat anyway.  Upon further inspection it was clean and the menu prices were quite reasonable.  Our waitress could have been Flo.  She was johnny on the spot, took our order, brought our drinks quick and was more than willing to accommodate what we wanted.  We ordered the hot roast beef sandwich – but we wanted to share it.   She returned about 5 minutes later with TWO plates, each containing 1/2 half a hot roast beef sandwich.  And the food was excellent!

Crocheted Necklace from Woods and Things

Finally we made it to Clark, South Dakota.  Our cousin Eleanor showed us around town and we visited the local Used Clothing store.  All profits go back to the community.  I got a kick butt pair of jeans there.  We visited the local Mercantile and were reminded of how much it was like the old Woolworth’s used to be.  Woods and Things is a shop where local craftspeople sell their wares.  You can find them at 119 N. Commercial Street, phone 605-880-5861. Mom got a vase with pheasant feathers and brush grass in it as a gift for a friend, we both got crocheted necklaces as gifts for family members, and spent many minutes browsing all the unique handmade items.  It was my pleasure to support local artisans!

Clark is a town of about 1,200 people and one of the best things I found there was a little coffee shop called SS Espresso.  Not only was the Coffee Toffee frozen drink I ordered just great, so was the wifi access.  I plugged in my computer, drank coffee and ate a turnover, and worked away.  There were two older gentlemen at the next table talking about the U.S. Presidents and what they thought about each one.  You can also get a bite to eat for lunch.  I was content to be viewing my emails on a screen larger than my cell phone!

Holly Hocks in Clark SD

There’s a gentleman who hates to see trash, empty spaces and lots and he loves flowers.  He has gardened all over town.  This man plants flowers where nothing used to be. He’s his own little beautification committee.  Makes me think – this is something that can be done everywhere!  How would your block change if there were flowers where there used to be nothing?

What does this trip have to do with social media and small business? Every trip can be an opportunity to notice where people are doing things the right way.  Loved what the town of Sheldon has done for their small businesses and tourism.  Really enjoyed Clark SD and their use of locals to create things.  I saw opportunities for Debworks to help small businesses use some simple online marketing tools to further increase their business.  And I had a great time away looking at small towns with a tourist’s eye.

Crain resting in lake in SD

I saw many things we don’t have in Iowa; fields of rye, pelicans, and land that stretches for miles and miles.  We visited with friends both old and new and heard the stories of the early pioneers – the utter desolation, the winds that never stop, snow and winter so cold you’ll think you’ll die.  Yet the people of South Dakota stay.  They love their land.  They’ve adapted and grown very proud of where they live.  Isn’t that sometime we all aspire to?

Becky McCray and Sheila Scarborough have created Tourism Currents – designed specifically for tourism folks.  Visit www.tourismcurrents.com  Sign up for the newsletter.  Look at the details.  Take the class.  I did last year – and it was an eyeopener.  I learned all kinds of tips and tricks for bringing tourists to my town (and my business).

Instead of teaching “how to use  Twitter,” Becky and Sheila take it one step further and show how to reach a network of people who can promote your destination. Twitter is just one part of networking through social media. The focus is not on the tools, but on the application of those tools.  One of the biggest roadblocks they hear consistently is “lack of time” to implement such a program for destination marketing. Both women understand this all too well themselves; Becky is an incredibly busy small business owner (with four businesses) and Sheila is a professional writer and speaker, a parent of two and writes for three different blogs.

Developed with busy professionals in mind, the Tourism Currents workshops were born. From understanding the basics of social media to utilizing a small army of supporters, these four online workshops will get the word out and bring visitors to your destination.

They work with tourism people and destination marketers.  It’s their job to help you find your way through the maze of social media.  Their focus is on tourism.  But I’m going to tell you a secret. What they teach works for every small business who wants to bring in more customers. There are scores of events, conventions, grand openings and attractions to promote. Planning is essential weeks (or months) before the event and a strategy must be in place to follow up afterwards. Small business owners want  to assure all visitors leave with a positive experience. Visitors love to post photos and videos – you want to make sure they are a positive reflection on your event!

Tourism Currents is the single, most important source of learning available to those businesses who want more tourists in their areas (isn’t that all small businesses?).

They have several opportunities to learn.  An introductory workshop, two short courses or the full course.

Introduction Workshop: Social Media for Tourism

This course removes all doubt about social media. See what the buzz is all about!

Three lessons and three videos to help you understand and escalate your tourism efforts

Short Course 1: All the Basics

Master the basics and grab visitors’ attention

Tune in…start connecting…expand your reach

Lesson 1: How to Listen

Lesson 2: Building a Home Base

Lesson 3: Intro to Outposts

Short Course 2: The Results Multipliers

Build networks, promote and let the tours begin

Unleash online fans to rave about your tourism destination

Lesson 4: Building your online champions network

Lesson 5: Promoting special events

Lesson 6: New ways to do tours

Full Course: All the Basics and The Results Multipliers

Save money and explore everything the workshops have to offer

Plus receive the introductory course as a “FREE” bonus

So glad you’ve decided to read this whole article!  Head over to www.tourismcurrents.com and get all the details.  Spend some time and look at the information with the view of how could this help my local business.  Aren’t we all destination marketers?  If you answered yes to that – then you’ll want to be involved with these workshops and Becky and Sheila.

Sheila Scarborough is a travel writer, certified Navy Master Training Specialist and drag racing fan who is known for turbo-charged enthusiasm, a wicked sense of fun and a love of telling stories on the Web about destinations around the world.

Becky McCray is a small town business owner, with a liquor store and a cattle ranch. She works with tourism clients, small town governments and small businesses on projects and marketing. Her passion is helping small towns reach the world through these tools.

They’re not some marketing or PR agency cranking out products for a bunch of different businesses; they are two smart women who are hyper-focused on their members and how they can use tech to tell stories.

Almost three years ago, an online conversation between two marketing pros—an American and an Australian—evolved into a collaborative writing effort by more than 100 bloggers from nine countries, and was aptly titled The Age of Conversation.  Fast forward to today and the abstract experiment is now a concrete treatise on the state of social media and marketing best practices as a whole. With Drew McLellan and Gavin Heaton still firmly at the helm, the third book in the Age of Conversation series has become a veritable “who’s who” of the world’s leading marketing bloggers.  Age of Conversation 3 (202 pages; hardcover; paperback; Kindle; ePub) was published by new digital publishing company Channel V Books (www.ChannelVBooks.com), and is now available through all major online retailers, as a Kindle e-book, and will soon be available as an ePub for other digital readers.

“I was asked to contribute and write about getting to work.  After all, small businesses need to know how to practically apply social media tools” Deb Brown of Debworks in Franklin County Iowa said.

Age of Conversation 3 captures the distinct shift from social media as a hypothetical consumer loyalty tool, as it was considered only a little more than a year ago, to its current state as a staple in the modern marketing toolbox.  Although the book covers more than just social media, the topic is ubiquitous among the book’s 10 sections: At the Coalface; Identities, Friends and Trusted Strangers; Conversational Branding; Measurement; Corporate Conversations; In the Boardroom; Innovation and Execution; Influence; Getting to Work; and Pitching Social Media.

“We have seen an incredible shift in the role of social media over the past three years. It has moved from an outlier in the marketing mix to one of the strategic pillars of any corporate marketing or branding exercise,” said Drew McLellan. “And it doesn’t end there,” adds Gavin Heaton. “As the many authors of this new book explain, the focus may be on conversation, but you can’t participate in a conversation from the sidelines. It’s all about participation. And this book provides you with 171 lessons in this new art”.

The genesis for the series itself has all the makings of a thrilling read: regular correspondence between people around the world; a proactive collaboration between 15 countries; and two marketing professionals who have never met each other face to face, scrambling to learn how to publish a book from the ground up.

It all started when McLellan blogged about a similar collaborative book effort and Heaton wrote to him to suggest they get a few fellow bloggers to produce a marketing book in the same vain. Three emails later, and they had named the book and set what they thought would be an impossible goal: 100 bloggers.  Within seven days they had commitments from 103. Back then, the marketing industry was abuzz about how citizen marketers were changing the landscape, whereas the second two editions have revolved primarily around the growing field of social media and how its methodologies have affected marketing as a whole. What all three books have in common is that they each capture a uniquely global vantage point.

The first Age of Conversation raised nearly $15,000 for Variety, the international children’s charity, and the Age of Conversation 2 raised a further $10,000 for Variety. This year’s proceeds will be donated to an international children’s charity of our authors’ choosing.

McLellan, who heads McLellan Marketing Group, a Des Moines, Iowa advertising agency, has been writing DrewsMarketingMinute.com for several years. Heaton, who works for global software giant, SAP, writes ServantofChaos.com from Sydney, Australia. McLellan and Heaton have used their blogs to promote each book’s crop of contributors.

Needless to say, an ambitious online marketing book will be paired with an ambitious online marketing campaign. All 171 bloggers will use their respective online platforms—their blogs, Twitter, Facebook and other social media profiles, and websites—to promote their co-authors and book sales.

(this was the press release submitted to local papers)

How do you get someone to know, like and trust you?  You ask a lot of questions.

Feel Good questions.

How did you get started in business?

What do you enjoy most about what you do?

Use the FORM method of asking questions.  Ask questions about

Family, Occupations, Recreation and Message (what’s important to them)

Then follow up with these people you’ve met.  Send them a thank you card with a little note.  “Nice to meet you at Seven Stars.”

Or send some tidbit of information that might be of value to them.  “You mentioned you liked collecting elephants.  Here’s an article I saw on elephants you might enjoy.’

Give them referrals.  “  You might send the real estate broker you met a note that says “I heard that Joe Johns is thinking about moving into a smaller house.  His number is 123-2345, let him know I referred you.”  And be sure you’ve called Joe to let him know you’re giving the broker his number.

Develop real relationships.  Stay in touch.  Be Likeable.

Many thanks to Bob Burg for pointing out the above information.  Read his book Endless Referrals.

Take some time – check out all the authors listed below.  They are experts in their field and have blogs and sites you’ll enjoy.  This is one of those blog posts you will add to your favorites (or bookmarks) and return time after time.

Stay tuned for all the information on how to find the book – and what’s in it!

I‘m looking for people who care about rural America.

Rural America is often ignored for the flashy lights of both coasts.  Where the money is perceived to be.  They call us rubes and yokels.  We don’t call them anything – we’re too busy working and getting on with the business of living.

Here’s what we know:

1. We read and follow those coast guys, and then we do what we know is right.

2. We live in the best places of the United States.  Where our word is our bond.

3. We support each other.  No need to beg – we pay attention and know when you need help.  We show up with food, money, time – whatever you need.

Are you part of rural America?  I’m looking for you.  I want to talk about you.  I want to tell your stories.  I want the world to know I too am a rural American.

I attended a scheduled 3 hour presentation on Search Engine Marketing Essentials given by Jordan Hasler from Orange Soda, sponsored by the Gannett Company (owners of the Des Moines Register).  I took a client who is just getting her feet wet on the internet.  It was an opportunity to network for me.

In this post I’m talking about the things that worked and didn’t work.  I’m planning a conference to happen in June and I took away some valuable planning lessons!  (The next post will cover the actual SEO things I learned.)

The Ankeny Chamber of Commerce was the location host.  Easy to get to location, lots of room, clean offices – and no one greeted us at the front door.  That’s a particular pet peeve of mine.  The front desk person was working with another person and she had another staff member helping her.  A simple recognition, “hi, be right with you” would have been fine.  After about 60 seconds someone came up front from the conference room and asked if we were there for the conference.

I always sit towards the front of the room so I can see and hear better.  The room was completely full with about 15 people from the Des Moines Register in the back of the room.  There were people sitting in chairs on the sides.  A larger room would have worked better.  Then, the air conditioning was not on for the first hour. It was 79 degrees outside and a small room full of people needs air.

Jordan did an admirable job with very little “use our services” hype. It made you want to use his services.  However, he forgot his business cards at home (Utah) when I asked him for one.  And he didn’t take my information when we talked.  He did give me his personal email address to contact him.  He was gracious and answered all my questions and I got a small interview.  I did ask what his stats were on how many people convert to customers for Orange Soda as a result of attending these seminars.  He had no idea.

To recap:

Good things were:

• great location,
• good content,
• personal attention from speaker.

Not so good things were:

• no greeting,
• small room,
• room temperature set incorrectly,
• no business cards,
• missing stats.

Not major things all by themselves, but put together they could leave a bad taste in your mouth.  The content was exactly as promised and that went a long way towards making up for the small slights.  Still……

I am selling my 1991 Cadillac*.  Over 200,000 miles and a gas guzzler.  I’ve bought a smaller car and it’s time to let Baby the Cadillac go.  That means I had to clean it out.  It’s been parked since January.

That’s only three months.  I had 3 bags of garbage, 2 boxes of old clothes and assorted items like a blender and many tools.  In the car!  I threw out or gave everything away except for the tools. I feel so much lighter!

Where else in my life can I do that?

I’m headed to the bedroom to pull out my spring and summer clothes.  I’m going to give away a lot of the winter things – many I’ve not worn.  I think “this used to be cute, it may come back in style.”  “Maybe I can fit this if I lose a few pounds.”  “I might gain the weight back, better save it.” All of those items are going to Goodwill.

I read a blog post from Christine Kane in July 2009.  She was cleaning out her house and got to the furniture in the basement.  She just didn’t want to let it go.  Never mind she wasn’t going to use it, she could afford to buy new and it was just taking up space. She discussed it with her therapist.

He said that everything in our lives has energy. Everything has our thoughts and emotions embedded into it. Old furniture is no exception. In essence, what  Christine was saying to the universe and to her subconscious, creative self was this: “I believe so deeply in my own failure that I’m holding onto physical things that represent that possibility. Every time I walk by these items in my basement, I will be reminded of my inevitable failure. Every moment I’m in my house, my subconscious will know that in the very foundation of my life (my basement), there are items that prove I don’t believe in my own success.”

Smart guy.

Over the weekend, after I get the taxes worked on, I’m tackling the paperwork.  Any suggestions for a cohesive sorting method?

Performer, songwriter, and creativity consultant Christine Kane publishes her ‘LiveCreative’ weekly ezine with more than 4,000 subscribers. If you want to be the artist of your life and create authentic and lasting success, you can sign up for a FRE*E subscription to LiveCreative atwww.christinekane.com.

(runs, needs a charge, hit a deer 2 years ago and put $1000 worth of work into the front end, has a brand new heater core — $800 or best offer.  Call me 641-458-1114, let’s talk)

Terry’s mom is a real friend of mine.  She’s 86 years old.  We became friends when she attended one of my presentations for Melaleuca and became a customer.  We volunteer together at the Old Stone House.  She’s loaned me books about the history of the county.  She calls and checks on me and asks after my family.  Her daughter died of cancer many years ago.  Her husband passed away a year and a half ago.  Now her son is dead.  My heart weeps for her.

My husband doesn’t make many friends.  Terry was a friend of his.  We bought Terry’s corn burner from him a couple of years ago.  He delivered it, helped Kev install it and spent some time just talking with Kev.  They didn’t talk of much – just things men talk of in quiet moments.

Terry was that kind of guy.  Quiet, interested in what you were doing, reflective and kind.  Terry farmed the family farm and lived there too.  He spent a lot of time doing just what he loved to do. He also ‘tinkered’ with threshing machines and steam engines.  Call and ask for his help, he came.  We’ll miss him.

As I get older, I’m 54 now, I realize the importance of spending time with those you love.  It’s more than that though.  There’s an importance to spending time with those you like too. I’d been thinking of Terry since his dad died.  And that’s all I did – thought of him.  Now, I wish I’d gone out to his farm and just talked with him a little.

Here’s a link about Terry.

I  just watched the movie Precious.  Young black woman, pregnant, abusive mother, raped by her dad twice – survives and goes on with life.  In a nutshell.  I think most of us could just shed a tear, recommend the movie and then probably forget about it.

Except there are a few who won’t be able to let this one go so easily.  Mo’nique, who played the abusive mother, struck a chord – I almost felt sorry for her.  Almost.  I didn’t see enough of her mother and wanted to know if she was who she was because of her mother.   Gabourey Sidibe played Precious and showed resilience and imagination that was her saving grace.   Who among us has not daydreamed of being famous  and loved?

What am I alluding to?  There are many stories of abuse. 68% of children abused are done so by a family member or a relative.  There are a lot of grown ups in the world who were abused as children.  1 in 6 women have been sexually abused.  I’m one of them.  Everyday I think about it for a minute or two.  I then tuck those memories back into their hiding place and continue with my day.  This movie made me take those memories out and look at them just a little bit longer.

I know that Precious wanted to forgive her mother, she really did.  She just wanted her mother to love her.   Precious also had someone to talk to, and someone in her corner to help her.  Granted – it was too late to have prevented the abuse.  But believe me when  I tell you, sooner or later you have to tell someone.  Often, it’s when you are an adult with children of your own.  More often, you never do and you repeat the pattern.  Or you become a drug addict.  Or you commit suicide.

Look around you – someone you know has been abused.

(statistics taken from www.childhelp.com – I’m just now talking about my story, and it’s not easy.  One day I’ll share – but today is not that day.)

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• Child Abuse – 1-800-4-A-CHILD (current.com)