Category — Social Media Dads

This guest post comes from Chris Brogan. Chris is the author of ChrisBrogan.com and the eleventh in my series featuring social media dads.

Being a Social Media Dad

One of the frequent questions I receive is, “How do you find time for your family?” People see my hectic travel schedule, my rigorous blog posting and other writing projects, my conference attendance and speaking gigs, and they imagine that my family has no idea who I am. The thing is, social media has done more to bring my family closer together than one might think.

Connectivity

When I’m away on a trip, I’m not relegated to my cell phone. I can use iChat, Skype Video, or ooVoo to reach home and share a visual of where I am and what’s going on with my children and wife. If not live, I can at least shoot video using a Flip camera and share that with them later. I’m more connected to my kids now, which is nice.

Collaboration

My daughter has grown up using social media tools. She was my intro voice for my first (and second and third) podcast. My son and my daughter both use my Mac’s photobooth software with reckless abandon. (Sometimes, I have to remove some of these photos, because one of them loves to put up pictures of one’s bottom). We do some of this stuff together, and we have fun doing it. I recently wrote my daughter a Happy Birthday blog post, sharing my feelings with her to the web. I shot a video for my son’s first birthday. So it’s a way to collaborate.

Knowing When

But the truth of the matter is, what people don’t know much about, and what can’t be accomplished by software, is that when I’m home, I’m really home, and I spend a lot of time and affection and attention with my children and wife. I’m not nearly as fidgety as I used to be when I didn’t work in social media and when I didn’t travel around sharing my dreams and aspirations with the outside world. I LOVE spending time at home with my family, and they get a lot of tickling, tumbling, imagining, playing, and story time from me when I’m there.

I hope this helps others who are wondering how it all blends. It takes work, but you can definitely maintain a creative and media-filled life while raising a family. I’m grateful that I have a job that allows me to spend as much time with my family as it does, and further thrilled that I get the best of both worlds. Here’s hoping you’re every bit as fortunate as I am for that.

Follow Chris on Twitter here or on Plurk here.

I have been featuring a series of posts written by some fantastic social media dads. So, in honor of Father’s Day, I want to honor those dads that have contributed to this blog as well as those dad I am hoping to feature here.

Happy Father’s Day Guys!

Brian Wallace

Darren Rowse

Tim Jackson

Jeff Quipp

Jason Falls

Doriano Carta

Mark Dykeman

Marty Weintraub

Jim Stroud

Scott Monty

JD Rucker

David Harry

David Armano

Jeff Tippet

David Wallace

Matt McGee

Derek Semmler

Brian Clark

Chris Brogan

Alex Iskold

Please forgive me if I did not include every social media dad in the blogosphere. Leave me a note if you are a social media dad and of course, Happy Father’s Day to you too!

This guest post comes from David Wallace. David is the founder and CEO of SearchRank and the ninth in my series featuring the top social media dads.

Getting Your Kids To Speak Your ‘Social’ Language

My oldest daughter is a TV and movie fanatic. She and her roommate have amassed quite a collection of DVDs and have a long list of television shows that are regular watches for them. As a parent, I would typically view such an obsession as being a time waster but in all reality, she could be out doing much worse things. She also has the talent of being able to write, which she does very well. As someone who struggles with writing, having to work very hard at it, I find myself envying her talent often.

So, instead of giving her the usual parental scorn of not wasting all her time watching other people’s lives, I decided to encourage her to profit by it. How? By blogging of course!

She already writes on her MySpace Blog as well as a Blogger account she has, however those posts are mostly comprised of her current feelings or interesting things she has come across. When I proposed that she engage in celebrity blogging and that she could earn revenue from it, she was very interested. I told her that I’d set up a Wordpress blog, host it on our company server, throw AdSense on it and she could blog away. I pointed out that a lot of people are making decent money off their hobby blogs these days, not only with AdSense but additional advertising opportunities that pop up as blogs gain exposure.

She is currently searching for a unique and snazzy domain name. Unfortunately, everything she has come across so far has been taken. Being anxious to get her started, I registered her full name as a dot com and hope to get a blog going soon. That way I figure she can at least start and so long as she finds a different domain within 6 months, we won’t lose too much time in getting the blog (or blogs) established and drawing in traffic.

As a search and social media marketer who is also a blogger by profession, her interest in blogging thrills me. For so long, my children (all three of them) have really not understand “what Dad does for a living.” They know I spend lots of time in front of a computer but have never really grasped anything beyond that. My daughter is beginning to understand.

Even my son who is about 3 years younger than my daughter is beginning to show an interest in what I do with regards to search marketing. He is currently reading Jennifer Laycock’s “Small Business Guide to Search Marketing.” My youngest, who is a licensed cosmetologist, has yet to show any interest in search or social media. However, I am confident that one day when she gets the desire to market herself online that she will get the bug as well.

It is refreshing to see my children begin to expand themselves from being strictly limited to MySpace and AIM. Blogging seems to be a good first step in getting them to speak my “social” language. Now if I can only get them interested in Facebook and Twitter.

You can follow David on Twitter here.

This guest post comes from Marty Weintraub. Marty is the founding father of the aimClear Blog, and the eighth in my series of Social Media Dads.

Teenage Girls, Social Media & the Pretty Pink Looking Glass
Let me start by saying that I have the best 2 daughters a social media dad could ever ask for. They’re both superlative academically at a very difficult school, accomplished athletes, beautiful young ladies of 12 and 14 and gifted socially. Sure we get our dose of up-your-snoot-daddy teenage angst, even to the point where I feel compelled to share that they’re hurting my feelings. Of course that’s tempered with priceless expressions of their love and dedication to family.

They have their baggage, I have mine and we have some of each others’. Still we’re extremely close in mystical ways that can’t be adequately described with words. Being a father is the most exquisite privilege.

Social Media as an Analogy
Growing up male offers little preparation for understanding the blessed emotional push-me/pull-you of raising teenage girls. *sigh* Luckily my work in social media marketing amongst the MySpace, Youtube, and Facebook pop-cultures has provided serious insight into sociological patterns of both adolescent genders, at least from anthropological vantage point.

The Tao of Being a Social Media Dad
Timeless axioms of social media success hold true when peering into the pretty looking glass lens of raising daughters and I’ve learned a lot about kids from my day gig herding unique visitors. Reciprocally raising 2 teenagers offers incomparable insight into the very wheels of social media.

When dealing with daughters and social media marketing alike, dads are like account managers who manipulate to serve. As parents it’s our responsibility to teach life’s lessons and help guide our children in ways that foster their ability to independently choose their own special direction. Kids need to be told what to do and need to think of it themselves.

Issues arise in teenagers when they don’t quite know what to do and STILL need to think of it themselves. The subtlety involved in helping them to resolution is not much different from the most holistic of social media pitches. Every day aimClear contacts bloggers and “lets them think they thought of it.”

Unselfishness begets mutual support in functional relationships in parenting and blogging alike. The analogy is poignant for me. Sometimes today’s teens are lacking in interpersonal and communicative skills and our challenge is to teach that true love is unconditional while at at same time drawing a line in the sand.

Being a blogger is like the process of unconditionally loving our kids. We give and give and GIVE until there’s sometimes not much more left to give. THEN we thank those who disagree with us for participating in our community…our family if you will.

When diagnosed with lymphoma my daughters Lee and Sylvie were 9 and 11 years old. I swore that day to live until at east 60 years old, to see my precious children graduate from high school and college, independent and stable in this world. Through the healing process and over the years it became perfectly clear: it was not only Lee and Sylvie who needed me …I needed my kids in the worst kind of way. Out of all the monikers assumed during my life, “dad” is the closest thing to “purpose” on this earth that I can find.

The lessons I learn every day at work as a social media marketer help me to understand the delicate balance of give and take. Being a social media dad provides incredible insight into the workings of human nature in a microcosm. I have one very cool life and such beautiful children.

You can follow Marty on Twitter here.

This guest post comes from David Harry, aka The Gypsy - David is the founding father of the HuoMah Blog, and the seventh in my series of Social Media Dads.

Lamentations of a wandering Web Gypsy

Hi, my name is Dave, I am an algo-holic - not so sure that I am much more than a social media flirting father; more so than a Social Media Dad. While I have been noted for Sphinning, called a Social Media Ninja; I am but a humble search geek at heart.

And from time to time my own curiosities have lead to muse and investigate the world of social media marketing, but nothing more. Though addicted to Sphinn and I ocassionally Stumble and Twitter, it is rare to see this Gypsy Digg or Mixx it up and I have never bothered to put my Face(book) in (My)Space. Mostly I enjoy socializing with chatter about search… but Social Media Dad? Maybe..

In many ways the lack of social space activity is directly related to me being a father. You see, there was a time last year that I began to understand that my children were spending far too much time looking at the back of my head as the hours melted away. Between the three companies we operate, dozens of websites I manage and time spent networking, there was little in the way of quality time left to nurture and enjoy my children’s growth.

Please stop the ride I want off!!

One thing is for sure, you’re unlikely to catch me at a conference, Twittering my life away nor Stumbling past my children’s youth anytime soon. In the years to come when the teens are upon us and my kids forget what I look like, there will be plenty of time to consume with further ventures and social affairs, but not now.

And so, since I have been tasked with giving advice about social media or endeavours for greatness it is this; be true to yourself. Now and again the ’15 minutes of fame’ may come your way; enjoy it for such that it is. Fleeting and often unsatisfying, little measure of worth. Sometimes it is the quality of your efforts, other times blind faith, neither is worth your soul. Go for the enojyment of others not the adoration of sheep, the journey should find you more fufilled.

If you are participating in the social sphere for personal reasons or as part of your daily grind, remember it is but a small measure and unlikely as important as it is to be a father, husband or child in this life. Healthy, happy and wise are the benchmarks for success in life, the social dramas there but to amuse. Don’t take social spaces too seriously; it is unlikely worth the potential price…

“The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself”. Friedrich Nietzsche - German philosopher (1844 - 1900)

… cya on the trails – Dave

P.S. one can’t be a great father without a great wife…

Follow the Gypsy on Twitter here.

This guest post comes from Doriano Carta, aka Paisano - Paisano is the founding father of the American Pai Blog, and the sixth in my series of Social Media Dads.

My son Nicholas had a special project for school that seemed extra interesting to me. They were covering the basics of business, which I thought was very cool for nine-year olds to learn. Each student had to come up with a unique product and/or service to pitch to their fellow classmates. They had a dollar limit on how much to spend and had to document exactly how much they spent and had to come up with pricing. They then had to learn how to determine how much profit they would earn by applying the formula of income generated subtracted by the amount they’d spent on manufacturing their product or service. I found it quite fascinating to hear my gameboy, soccer playing boy talking about business and revenue streams.

The EGGcelent Idea

Nicholas showed me his cute idea of The EggFamily which was simply leftover plastic Easter eggs that he had colored and decorated into different funny looking characters including pet eggs. He said he thought his friends would love it because they were into collecting funny looking things like Pokemon. I thought that was rather clever but what he said next blew me away. “Dad, I was thinking, wouldn’t it be cool if I had a website for anyone who bought an egg family?” I looked at the wife who was just smiling and shaking her head no as if to answer my silent question of “Did you give him the idea?” I asked him why he thought a website would be cool. “Well, we all like going to that Webkinz website. Why not one for the egg family members?” I scratched my head and chuckled, thinking “That’s my boy, all right”. He added, “I could charge them each $5 a month for a basic account which will mean $60 a year!” I had to stop my prepubescent Donald Trump in his tracks before he got too carried away. “Woah…woah…woah. Why would they pay $5 a month? What’s going to be on this website?” He stopped calculating his windfall long enough to reply “We can add a live chat room so we can all send messages like we do on Club Penguin.” I interrupted again, “WE?” He gave me that infamous devilish grin and I knew I was toast, “Uh, hello, Dad…what do you do for a living? mr. Computer man!”

So, off we went to build his social network for egg family members and their owners. All I did was launch a free wiki and let him do most of the work. He painstakingly worked on all the graphics, using a paint program to design the logo and image of an egg family. He came up with all the corny but cute slogans like “We’ll Crack You UP!” It was a wonderful experience watching your child use their mind and creativity and I enjoyed the time we spent together on this project. Best of all, it was all his idea and he was so proud.

The Big Pay Off

Nicholas brought his eggsamples (sorry, see where he gets it from?) to school and gave his presentation to the class. Needless to say it was a big hit. Everyone wanted to own an egg family along with the website membership with live chat room. Nicholas told me that he laughed as his classmates were literally throwing their play money at him as they stormed to sign up for their very own egg family. He gave them all the website address and later that evening several of them started appearing in the EggChat room where they had a good time.

Final Thoughts

I hate to sound like an old fart but I find it so amazing that kids today can be so entrepreneurial so young. I think it’s incredible how tech savvy they all are too. I started all three of my children on computers at around two years of age so that doesn’t shock me as much as it should. I’m filled with wonder and hope for the future every time I try to teach my children something because ultimately I’m the one who learns the most from the experience.

Follow Paisano on Twitter here

This guest post comes from Matt McGee. Matt is the author of the Matt McGee blog and founder of @U2, the the oldest independent site for U2 fans on the web. He is the fifth in my series featuring the Top Social Media Dads.

“Social Media Dad … Raising a Social Media Son?”

My son wants to start blogging. He’s 10 years old.

Should we let him?

That’s top of mind these days for this Social Media Dad (and my wife), who’s thrilled that his son knows what blogs are and wants to have his own, but also a little bit concerned about him becoming more of a Social Media Son than a Do-Well-In-School Son.

Not long ago, I was sitting on the couch in the family room, banging away on my laptop (no doubt writing a blog post, reading a blog post, or playing/working on Mixx, StumbleUpon, Sphinn, or maybe Yahoo! Answers), when my son said the magic words: “Dad, I want to do a blog.”

I stopped everything I was doing.

“Really?,” I said. “Why do you want to start a blog?” Because it looks fun, he said.

“What would you write about?” He didn’t quite know what I meant, so I explained to him that most blogs have a theme or topic that they focus on, like my Small Business SEM blog is about search marketing for small businesses.

“I guess I’d write about video games and sports and maybe school,” he said.

I told him I’d think about and let him know, but it would have to wait a little while because of all the travel I had coming up (which is almost over).

He’s still waiting for an answer. I’m still thinking about it. Like this:

• He’s a great kid and gets very good grades. I’m pretty sure it won’t impact his schoolwork negatively. We can always tell him that he can’t turn his computer on until all the homework is done.
• The one school subject he doesn’t like is writing. So, maybe blogging will help with that. He’ll be forced to come up with an idea, put it in words, etc. — but without the pressure of a pre-assigned topic and deadline. It might be really good for him.
• Think of all the money he could make! We Social Media Dads and Moms don’t click on ads, but 10-year-olds do! Seriously, we could slap some AdSense ads on his blog, and you know his classmates and other kids his age will click on those video game ads every time they see his blog! This is better than giving him an allowance — it’s teaching him how to make money online with a blog. You won’t learn that stuff in 4th grade, I can tell you that.

There’s also an SEO-related reason for him to start blogging: I registered his name as a .com domain not long after he was born (his 6-year-old sister has her .com name domain, too). If he starts using that domain now, starts putting content on it, letting the domain grow over time, he could be well on his way to having a highly trusted, authoritative domain by the time he really needs to use it. Nice.

So, the question again: Should we let him? I think we probably will. And this Social Media Dad will have a Social Media Son. Look for him soon your favorite social news or bookmarking site. And vote up his stuff, would ya?

You can find Matt on FriendFeed here.

I just wanted to interrupt my series on Social Media Dads to take a minute to say thank you to some very special people.

Let me begin by thanking Jason Falls, for sharing with us about the birth of his daughter and how being a social media dad is not only good for him but good for his kids.

Thank you to Mark Dykeman who not only proves balance between family and work can be attained but it’s really the “dad” part that is the most important.

Thank you to Jeff Quipp for sharing with us the 6 P’s of Social Media Parenting and the similarities between parenting and good social media development.

And let me end by thanking Darren Rowse for teaching us all to approach social media with child-like abandonment at times, in order to have fun with it.

I would also like to thank all of my new subscribers, readers and Twitter followers and welcome you to the Social Media Mom blog.

My series featuring the top Social Media Dads continues next week with even more awesome dads and their social media tips, tricks, and family anecdotes. You won’t want to miss it!

photo by Athary