10 Underrated Pleasures

The go-go techy lifestyle means we often lose touch with the simpler pleasures of life. As someone who is in the midst of launching a new business, I speak for myself more than anyone here. Maybe it's the sunny weather we've had, but over the last few days I have noticed that many of the activities I often rush through or treat as chores are actually some of the most enjoyable. Here's the list I came up with:

1. Folding laundry. Lifting warm clothing and sheets out of the dryer. Spending time to fold them with care. The fresh scent from the detergent and dryer sheets. Way underrated.

2. Chopping vegetables. Slicing into a bright radish, with its ruby outer skin and streaked white and pink flesh. The pop of the spiciness as the scent rises up. The natural, rapid pace of the knife on wood. Just about every sense is involved in this task--a real break from staring at a two-dimensional screen.

3. Feeding the cats. I talk to my cats while I put the food in the can and place it on the floor. This seems to calm them down while they wait. It gives us all time to appreciate the bond we have as pets and pet owners.

4. Watering the plants. As with the cats, I have taken to talking to my plants while watering them. (So far, they haven't answered back. Still hoping for that.) I often use water that I've just used to wash vegetables or fruit. There's a good feeling that goes with the idea of not just pouring it down into the waste sewage line.

5. Listening to the birds in my yard. The other day, we sat in awe as a tiny roseate finch belted out some scat worthy of Ella Fitzgerald. I've heard that springtime is when bird songs become more complex. This is the time of year when they need to attract a potential mate. The rest of the year, they are basically singing, "stay off my branch, buddy."

6. Reading a novel. I'm not talking business books, biographies, or anything published by the "For Dummies" or O'Reilly people. I'm talking made up stories about people who never existed. To me, the delivery mechanism isn't important. Kindle, audio book, dead tree, whatever. I know I'm in the true reading zone when my husband says something to me and I don't answer for another 15 minutes.

7. Strolling around the neighborhood. Not power walking, or hiking, or anything involving high tech footwear or pedometers. Rather, one of those languishing, pointless, late afternoon or post-dinner meanders that involves noticing architectural details on houses or a neighbor's daffodils. The other day we took one of these types of walks and stopped in front of a yellow house to admire the small amount of jigsaw trim on the porch. The man who lived across the street spotted us and began telling us a great deal about the history of that house, and the entire neighborhood.

8. Listening to slightly boring stuff on the radio. NPR is great for this. I love to semi-tune out and half listen to Noah Adams, the Car Talk guys, or-- this is the best--that really badly done quiz show, "Says You." The trick, for me, is to not really pay attention, yet not go so far away that it turns into background noise. For some reason, this has a really pacifying effect on my brain. It doesn't work with shows I really like, such as "Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me."

9. Writing postcards. For my birthday this year, a friend of mine sent me a huge, honking box of what looks to be about 1000 postcards. The series was put out by writer Dave Eggers' publishing company, McSweeney's and is labeled, mystifyingly enough, "Greetings from the Ocean's Sweaty Face." At first, I was intimidated. Who would want a postcard from me? Did I even know how to write one anymore? Slowly, however I've discovered a certain facility for writing these little missives. They're kind of like extended tweets.

10. Unplugging. Don't do enough of that. But I did start a new austerity program in which I no longer keep my iPhone by my bed. I can't believe how different my mornings are. Instead of immediately checking email and Twitter, I give myself a few minutes to awaken more slowly. My mind wanders a bit, which actually leads to more creative thinking. Highly recommended. And apparently, this is how I used to live.

Cruvee - get your social wine on

It's a new day for wine enthusiasts. With the help of social networks, we oenophilic types can meet, greet and chat about our love of the grape with thousands of other like-minded (and paletted) folks. There are myriad ways to get into discussions online about all things related to wine--from social networks like CellarTracker and Cork'd to Tweetups to wine focused blogs, and beyond.

How are wineries dealing with this new onslaught of online discussion? Well... it varies. But overall, the impression I get is that they're a little overwhelmed. In the past, wine reviews were limited to a small, select group of VIPs like Robert Parker and the folks at Wine Spectator. These people perhaps wielded too much power, but at least there were ground rules. You knew when they were going to write their reviews, and there was an agreed upon system of points to rank the best wines. It was a simple, if limited world.

Contrast that with nowadays. Social media has unleashed a total free-for-all. Anyone with a Twitter account and a corkscrew can say anything they like about a bottle of wine. Not only that, but there's a good chance other people will listen and take heed, no matter what the so-called experts say.

Last week, I took a trip up to Napa and met some folks who are working to bridge the gap between this old world industry and the new media landscape. First stop, digital think tank for the wine industry, VinTank. Housed in a sleekly designed office with touches of both old and new, the company represents a fresh perspective on the intersection of wine and technology. I spoke at length on video with the company CEO, Paul Mabray, and will post the interview on our new site as part of the launch (look out for it). Meanwhile, also check out this great interview with Paul on the Vin65 blog.

Paul is a remarkable guy. A boyish 38, he has amassed an immense market knowledge and understanding about the wine industry. In addition to being a sought after advisor for wineries seeking to make the most of the new digital landscape, he's also turning his firm into something of a business incubator. I predict VinTank will do more to bring wine into the 21st century than any other single force in the Napa Valley. One of his investments is in social media monitoring service for the wine industry, Cruvee. I sat down with the two founders of that company, Evan Cover and James Jory and got the lowdown.

Cruvee (rhymes with "groovy") was originally envisioned as a social network for wine enthusiasts.  When he met them, Paul recognized something much more useful in what Evan and James had built. What they had was a giant, living database that could be used to monitor online chatter about wine. The service as it now functions is comparable to Radian6, Meltwater, and other social media monitoring services, but with a big difference: it's completely focused on the wine industry.

As Evan and James explained, a laser focus on one market translates to much better quality results. Anyone who has run a social media program knows about the hours of fruitless searching, endless keyword tweaking and other time-wasting frustrations that often go with getting ramped up. One social media director I spoke to said that he was spending hours every day combing through bad results because the name of his winery had a common meaning in a foreign language.

Cruvee casts a wide net, then delivers a manageable chunk of quality results on a daily basis that reflect real conversations across the open web about specific vintages and wineries.  They estimate that they take 250,000 conversations a day and boil that down to 10,000. "We find the needles in the haystack," said Evan.

The engine they have built can also understand wine lingo. It can tell that when someone is talking about a Cab Franc that they don't mean a taxi in Paris, and that in certain contexts, a post about a Chard isn't going to be a recipe for stir fry vegetables. Above and beyond that, their algorithms are designed to find wine references made in that new language we're all developing known as Twitterese. For example, what if someone tweets something like "Uncorking '08 Twisted Oak Cal Cty Viogner - neutral fr oak, 91 pts."? Chances are, this will be of interest to that winery, even if it sounds like gobblydegook to the average human.

The demo of Cruvee that I got was impressive. It has a clean, readable interface and seems intuitive and user friendly. Below find some screenshots for one of their clients (and one of my favorite Napa wineries) Cornerstone Cellars, below.

Here is the dashboard:

This shows a report on tasting notes from wine social networks. They have a partnership with CellarTracker, and Cruvee also delivers results pulled from over 20,000 online forums.

Here is the screenshot of one of their "campaign manager" pages, which tracks microblog results in near real time:

Evan and James also demonstrated some of the results that Cruvee can get that are on the fringes of wine social networks. For example, they found an obscure post on a forum for audiophiles about which wine the user planned to bring to an outdoor concert. This represents the kind of valuable customer data that takes place on random forums all over the worldwide web.

The price for a yearly subscription to Cruvee is very low (I'll leave it to you to find out just how low.) The reason for this, they said, is that they believe that ultimately the cost of all the social media monitoring services are working their way towards free. And in fact, they offer another service that is completely free to wineries, called OwnIT--or "Your Wine, Your Way" that aims to standardize wine information across the Web and mobile platforms. That might not seem like a big deal to you and me, but for winery owners, there is a huge problem with misinformation. For example, one winery owner told me that someone wrote a scathing review on an online wine forum of one of their offerings because he confusedly thought the bottle he was drinking was supposed to be a dry white, when in actuality it was a sweet dessert wine. For an industry that depends almost entirely on reputation, this service could make the difference.


I look forward to seeing where Cruvee goes next. They shared a few tidbits about their roadmap that sounded very exciting to me. I'd also like to see them (or someone else) build out a few more of these industry-focused monitoring services. There could be a major opportunity to fill in where the more generalized services can't be or get to. In sum, this is a company to watch in an industry that is going places.

Foursquare - are we missing the ball?

The blogosphere has been all a-Twitter about location-based services like Foursquare and Gowalla recently. Between the buzz of SXSW and a rumored $100 million Yahoo acquisition there's a whole playground-ful of questions about where the ball will bounce next, and onto whose square. Will Gowalla score big during the last few minutes of recess? Or maybe Facebook will pull a "big college kid" on their butts and steal the ball away entirely. Amid the speculation, I think there are some huge, obvious uses for these applications that most of us have overlooked.

Bloggers and industry observers Louis Gray and Robert Scoble both wrote some of the more interesting posts on the topic this past week, exploring the potential--and potential pitfalls--of these services. They point out that despite the hype, adoption is spotty and limited. It's still pretty darn easy to be named "mayor" of somewhere on Foursquare. Even in tech hubs like Silicon Valley, you rarely find a lot of simultaneous check-ins, unless it's at the Apple store on iPad release day. Louis raises a number of good questions, such as the one in his headline: "Should Boring Married People Check In On Location Apps?" (He has the good humor to include himself in this category.) I also liked Robert's ideas for how to make the services more appealing. He calls for a "malleable social graph" where we get tips and reviews from folks who share our tastes.

All well and good, but in some ways too subtle for where we are right now. We're so immersed in the social networking headset that we have failed to recognize that this is a case where more conventional marketing and sales techniques could be very effective. After all, it's all based around the idea of a game, with its rewards and competition. As Louis notes, game theory really does apply here. There is a lot of talk about the "tips" and other social elements of these games. But what about that amazingly prominent, hard to miss "Special Nearby" button? We don't hear much about it. But that's where companies are going to find immediate value. As Gary Vaynerchuk so succinctly put it, brands get this stuff because it's about moving people around.

There's a reason that Starbucks has signed a partnership deal with Foursquare. They see it. You can use these services to offer rewards and discounts to customers--the types of rewards that keep them coming back day after day. For all the talk about adoption, the smart brands realize this isn't such a huge barrier. If your customers aren't signed up with Foursquare now, give them a reason to do so.

There's nothing onerous here for the user. It's a free application for anyone who has a cell phone. Foursquare doesn't even require a smart phone--there's a text only version of the game. Just the way department stores get you to sign up for credit cards by offering you a 10% discount, your local clothing shop can get people to sign up for Foursquare for an instant cost break. What retailer isn't hurting right now? This trend doesn't need to be limited to big brands like Starbucks or Tasti D-Lite (another company that has leapt into Foursquare with both feet).What about your neighborhood coffee shop, Pilates studio, or wine bar? Or that really great car wash that Robert Scoble sung the praises of on Gowalla?

By creating a Foursquare or Gowalla game within a game, retailers could make shopping into a scavenger hunt. Or, they might creatively reward regular customers. It's great that lots of businesses are offering "mayor" discounts and specials. But really, how many people can be mayor? How about this: two check-ins a week for a month, and you get a free latte. And we all know how hard it is to win the "gym rat" badge on Foursquare. So what? Your neighborhood fitness center can decide to give a different reward every week for active members. Have a "check-in" at every weight station, elliptical machine and spinning class. Then give a free t-shirt to the person who tried a new routine every other week.

In short, this could be huge for businesses of all sizes. No wonder Yahoo wants to own it.

Image: Foursquare demo video (http://foursquare.com/)

Who was Ada Lovelace and why should I care?

I was recently contacted on Facebook by a group asking me to participate in a worldwide event to celebrate the achievements of women in technology. It was hard to tell that much from the email, except that it was named after a female historical figure, Ada Lovelace. The group designated March 24 as Ada Lovelace day, and encouraged one and all to blog, tweet and generally spread the news about women in technology on that date.

I'd heard the name Ada Lovelace, though the only thing I could dredge up about her was a vague memory that the programming language Ada was named after her. As I discovered, her story was a tale of intrigue worthy of any Hollywood blockbuster. In fact, someone did make a movie about her--or kind of: "Conceiving Ada," a sci fi thriller with a historical twist. But her real story has yet to be told on the silver screen.

Here's the synopsis, based on my online research. Augusta Ada Byron was born in 1815, the only "legitimate" daughter of the famed poet Lord Byron and Anne Isabella Milbank. She never knew her father, who separated from her mother and who died when she was nine years old. Ada was often ill as a child.

Her mother, in an attempt to keep her safe from what she perceived could be inherited madness from her poet father, had her tutored in math. As it turned out, her talents in mathematics were immense. She eventually developed what is now considered the first algorithm, for Charles Babbage's analytical engine. There's even some speculation that she came up with the idea of using punch cards to program his machine. For that reason, she is credited with being the first computer programmer. According to the Wikipedia entry on her life: "She also foresaw the capability of computers to go beyond mere calculating or number-crunching while others, including Babbage himself, focused only on these capabilities." She had a long and fruitful professional friendship with the mathemetician for the rest of her life.

Her social position meant that she had to make her way in English society. She was frequently seen at court as a young woman. It's amazing to imagine the young Ada spending her days poring over notebooks detailing Bernoulli sequences and sketches of the Babbage engine (which was never built in his lifetime). Then, somehow she tears herself away from these important musings in order to be stuffed into a massive hoop skirt, boned corset, and sheath by some maid or other, her hair primped, her face powdered in order to be "presented" at court and sized up by the eligible bachelors.

She married a man named Charles King, who later became the Earl of Lovelace. This earned her title of the Countess of Lovelace. They had three children. Meanwhile, she learned that her father's half-sister Augusta Leigh had also been his lover, and that her cousin Medora Leigh was the result of that union. Wikipedia says that she blamed Augusta, calling her "evil." From such a distance, how can we judge any of those involved? Still, one can only begin to guess at the heartbreak and family divisions that plagued those who were intertwined with Lord Byron. Ada died at 36 of uterine cancer, and, according to Wikipedia, the bloodletting she received from her physicians. She was buried next to the father she never knew.

Taste and Tweet

While much of the social media world was in Austin crowding in to hear Ev wax philosophic on Twitter last week, a handful of us headed up to the Napa Valley to enjoy sun, wine and general good times. The first annual, or "inaugural" Napa Valley Tweetup" was held this past weekend and included such tasty activities as an evening of heavy sipping at Robert Mondavi Winery and a panel on social media. Driven by Silicon Valley Tweetup founder Gabriel Carrejo of Excite Social Media, the event drew over 100 participants and raised thousands of dollars for charity.

This seems to be the moment for social media and wine. The Facebook fan page for the event continues to drive all kinds of posting. A week down the road, the Twitter hashtags #NapaValleyTweetup and #NVTweetup are going strong. For an analysis of the buzz that was created during the event itself, go to this post on The Cork Board. For a rundown on the whole event, Hello Vino has a lovely post.

I was part of a an intrepid group of die-hards who toured some of the Valley's hidden wineries on the second day of the event. Among our group were such social media-ites as Rich Reader, who had much to say, ask, photograph and video, and photographer Laura Iriarte, known as @lauralovesart on Twitter. Here's a picture I snapped of her before we took off. She and I both made the mistake of thinking that a dress and heels would be the right garb for the event, with no idea that we'd be hiking through muddy vineyards. But she seemed to take it all in stride.

Our tour guide Steven took us to three boutique wineries: Hall, Krupp, and Chappellet, where we guzzled chardonnays and merlots, sauvignon blancs and cabs, learning about harvesting, mulling, mixing, and cooperage. We were quizzed on the five varietals of Bordeaux and lectured on the finer points of soil mineralization. We found out about must and bladders, malolactic fermentation and the benefits of French oak. At Krupp Brothers, we were unloaded from the bus and packed into four-wheel drives so as to climb an impossibly steep, rutted dirt road. Then stood shivering the wind while sipping wine made from rare varietals.

There's a lot of talk about the wine business in general--and Napa Valley in particular--being in trouble. A recent study predicted that in the coming year, as many as ten wineries in the Napa Valley could be sold under distressed circumstances. Yet, this is also a time of immense promise. Many are realizing that the traditional barriers between wineries and end customers are crumbling. Blogs and forums, Facebook and Twitter, the fame of Gary Vaynerchuk, all are conspiring to change the face of this ancient, traditional industry forever.

A handful of folks are leading the charge into social media in Napa. Among the notables are Rick Bakas, social media director of St. Supery Winery (who was at SXSW during the tweetup) and Paul Mabray, cofounder of tweetup sponsor Vintank, a "digital think tank" for the wine industry. Paul was one of the panelists at the event, along with social media heavies Jennifer Leggio and Michael Brito. Coming from a wine ecommerce background, Paul's built an impressive company so far in Vintank. His clients Stag's Leap and Opus One, along with some wine technology plays like social media monitoring service Cruvee and ecommerce solution Vin 65. After the event I reached Paul by phone.

He explained that wine is very much a "long tail" business. It's hard to think of any other product in which there are over 750,000 different labels for customers to choose from (yes, you read that number right). Compare that with the number of wine reviews that come out each year, and you realize how hard it is to get noticed.  Even one blog post that reaches 10 people can serve as word of mouth, he said. In short, this is the place that wine and social media can be blended to create a full-bodied, toothsome creation with plenty of tones and structure.

Inspiring Teen Women to be Techy

This past Saturday, Foothill College hosted a crowd of 250 female middle- to high schoolers for a day of learning about everything from game programming to how to lead a tech startup. Dare2BDigital was designed to give young women in the 7-10th grades a chance to learn about exciting possibilities in computer science and engineering. This was the first year for the conference, which I hope will become annual event. This seems to be the moment for girls in tech. Similar conferences and events are popping up around the world. (There's even one in Israel, organized by two Israeli Google engineers--if you read Hebrew, check out this article.)

Looking around the room at the end of the day, I flashed on the final dinner scene near the end of every "Harry Potter" movie. There they all were at long tables, packed into the cafeteria. There was the same sense of inspiration and celebration; a feeling that we had all come through the experience and as a result, something inside us had changed.

 
Then it hit me--the difference was that I was standing in the middle of a room full of Hermiones. If you want a good sense of the day, check out the Twitter hashtag #Dare2BDigital. One of our two live bloggers, Vania of Vabulus Media has posted a good chunk of the tweets on her blog. Our other live blogger, Liz Burr (known as @calinative on Twitter) was on the spot with plenty of interesting observations. This was one of my favorites--tweeted directly from a workshop on web site programming:

Why this age group? Studies show that this is the age when most of us start thinking about what kind of career we'll pursue. At the same time, the computer industry is hamstrung by outdated and inaccurate stereotypes. Many young women are just like I was at that age--they're good at math and science, but they can't picture themselves locked in a basement somewhere, slamming Jolt colas and coding till their eyes go funny.

As conference leader Anne Hardy of SAP explained to me on my weekly women in tech podcast, TechnoGirlTalk, many young women want to do something that gives back to the world. They want to help animals, or the environment. They're also interested in work that involves being artistic and creative. What they might not know is that computer science offers all of this in spades. The workshops and speakers at this conference gave the girls plenty of food for thought. Morning keynote speaker Fei Fei Li, assistant professor at Stanford University Computer Science Department, told the girls that she had a number of challenges as an immigrant to the U.S. from China--but found a home and many worthwhile challenges in computer science. Afternoon keynoter Karen Gundy-Burlet, research scientist at NASA-Ames talked about how her testing and designs enable astronauts to function better on missions. One of her designs was even adapted on a Star Trek movie!

Why an all-female conference? Honestly, this wasn't something that was discussed very much during the event. Maybe because the answer seemed obvious--when girls get together without boys they're more likely to speak up, take risks, and generally take in more learning. But I think there might be another, more subtle reason. Watching the young women interact throughout the day, I couldn't help but notice how much they had to say about what they were learning. They weren't talking about makeup or boys (or if they were, I didn't hear that). They were talking about the Zynga game they'd created, or the fun they had simulating the course of a bit of information as it travels through the pipes of the Internet. In other words, the participants were directly experiencing what it is like to be in a career in computers.

When they looked around at one another they saw a whole lot of other female faces looking back. There's little danger women will entirely take over the computer industry (and this is obviously no one's goal), but there was a sense of creating a new digital culture. It will have many different skin tones, a diversity of skills, and a rich mixture of thoughts and ideas. If this was a peek into the future of high tech, I want to be there.

Photos: Martin Stein, conference co-founder. The remainder are at this link. Also please look out for a video created by the students in my workshop on tech reporting, which will be posted soon.

Born to Brand – Adam Metz, Metz Consulting

This is one of several in a series of interviews, all part of a larger book project tentatively titled “Social Media Success: What these Folks Know that You Don’t.” (Also see my interviews with Louis Gray, Francine Hardaway, and commentary.)

Adam Metz is the Principal of Metz Consulting, a San Francisco-based management consulting firm that works with brands to to acquire, monetize and retain what he terms the "social customer." I first met Adam when was the Social Media Director at LaunchSquad, an SF digital PR firm where I also worked. He stood out a mile with his crazy checked shirts and turbo-charged energy, even in that hyperactive environment.

At the time, he was one of the few people around who knew social media well enough to advise others about it. Turns out, he’s still ahead of the curve. Eighteen months later he’s running his own firm, working with an enviable list of clients that includes several California wineries, numerous apparel brands, Mighty Leaf Tea, SF Convention and Visitors Bureau and  a handful of consumer service brands.

Our interview is slated to take place in person, but at the last minute he apologetically calls to say he’s sick (“something that never happens to me!”). I tap out our interview from a Tully’s on Van Ness, using a combination of my iPhone and AIM to communicate with him. Throughout our interview, he IMs me links and information without ever losing the flow of conversation.

When I ask him what he does for his clients, he answers that Metz Consulting is not unlike any other management consulting firm. They help clients better serve their customers. The difference? Well, for one thing, there are still only a handful of firms that exclusively offer social customer management consulting to mid-sized consumer brands. (His best known competitor is Altimeter Group.)

There are other distinctions. He uses a combination of strategy and customer relationship management (CRM) software that automates the complex and difficult tasks associated with brand management in today’s social media saturated world. We live in a time when like it or not, customers can (and do) say anything they like about a company on very public forums such as Twitter and Facebook. As their advisor, Adam’s number one priority is getting companies to a place where they can track and monitor and engage about everything that is being said about them. This means they can respond in ways that go way beyond crisis management.

Ultimately, they learn how to tap into consumer loyalty and enthusiasm.

“We don’t feel it’s enough to write a social web strategy,” he said. “All collateral has to go to one source. One dashboard. They need to prove a successful ROI. We’re the only shop getting certified by Salesforce Oracle and Microsoft Dynamics.”

An example: one of Metz’s clients’ customers (a thirty-something man) went out to a winery on a Friday night with his wife for their sixth anniversary. Despite a reservation, the couple had to wait an inordinate period of time. They were eventually seated and then all but ignored by the wait staff. Enraged, the man tweeted about his experience. Normally, that would’ve been the end of it, but instead, says Adam, “we immediately got it to them. The chef got through, texted and tweeted a response. The couple got a free tasting dinner. And that person came back as a paying customer.”

“But why the focus on consumer brands? Isn’t high tech still where it’s at?” I ask. “I mean, don’t you miss Silicon Valley?”

“I talk to Silicon Valley companies every day. They’re partners now. Take (cloud sales 2.0 intelligence provider) InsideView. They used to be one of my clients. Now I implement their technology. There’s nothing more fun than going to wine tasting –as I’m planning to do tomorrow--and realizing, this is my client. I’m writing strategy for these folks.”

He talks of fun, but later in our conversation it comes out how dedicated he is to understanding each industry he serves. His engagements substantiate multi-million dollar returns, and he takes his clients intensely seriously. As he admits, if you see him on Muni, he’ll probably have his nose buried in BevNet or Gourmet Retailer—trade publications for the wine and food industries.

There’s another reason he’s chosen to focus on consumer brands. The word “enthusiast” sums it up. Folks often get deeply personal about their favorite beverage or hotel. To illustrate, he had me search for his dad’s favorite brand of scotch on Twitter, Lagavulin. The query yielded hundreds of tweets from around the world.

“There are more reviews on the latest Mighty Leaf tea flavor than there are on the new Dan Brown book on Amazon,” he tells me.

This is beyond brand enthusiasm—it is outright passion. Metz has clearly hit on something. And he’s not keeping it to himself. He’s working on his second book: Dance on the Volcano due out early next year on how to do a million-dollar social customer management implementation.

He describes the book in the following terms: “If Groundswell was Sgt. Pepper, this is Born to Run.” Nice analogy. Think I’ll use it in my headline.