I’ve been in sales and marketing since I was 3 years old. That’s right. Always working toward things I believed in. I’m still the same way…only as an adult, it’s with my ghostwriting and social media business, my band, Neon Love Life and our rock n’ roll summer camp for girls, Girls Rock! Indianapolis. I am a tireless promoter, advocate, and marketer.

Everywhere I’ve been, and more importantly, everywhere I’m going, I rely on my network of women, family, and friends to provide help, resources, and support marching in partnership with me toward a common goal.  At some point the “me” morphs into “we” and “we” becomes so much more powerful and produces greater results than just “me”.

This week has been an excellent example of this. We asked our families, friends, business alliances, Twitter followers, Facebook friends, Linked-In connections, and complete strangers to vote for Neon Love Life to win a contest to perform at Rolling Stone’s Super Bowl Tailgate Party. Winning this contest would give Neon Love Life the rare opportunity to open up for Jane’s Addiction and The Roots… two bands I didn’t live without when I was younger and they’ve been gig influences on the entire band. Our campaign has been insane; however, without the teamwork of everyone in my life, Neon Love Life would not have generated the (massive) amount of votes cast to date.  And by the way… the contest doesn’t end until Sunday at 8pm and we still need votes… so please, vote here and spread the word…and you can vote once a day until Sunday.

But if you think about it… running a business, running a band or nonprofit, running a family and life…all of these things take teamwork. Too often, we let pride or the thought of “I can do this myself,” get in the way of actually having peace of mind and things REALLY getting done.  If you’ve ever read the Tim Ferris book, “The Four Hour Work Week,” you’d understand that outsourcing and asking for help can be the difference between success and failure.

Each of us is only one person; we are simply more powerful as a team rather than individuals – strength in numbers.  Life should strike a balance of work and play; however, we would all agree that more play is always better!  Having more (quality) time doing what we love with those whom we love should be most important part of our lives.  The best way to achieve this “balance” is through teamwork and asking for help.

So ask yourself these questions:

• “What do I need help with?”
• “Who can I call on to help me achieve my goals and objectives?”
• “To whom can I be of assistance?”

The great Zig Ziglar* said “You can have everything you desire if you will just help others get what they desire”; stated another way: “teamwork makes the dream work”.

Follow Neon Love Life on Twitter.

*Special thanks to Muffy Davis for the encouraging words!

Also…if you need help with something or want to help someone else… check out Get Out Mom!

Hands in photo: Lindsay, Bella, Sharon, Tasha and Ashley

One thing I’ve been doing over the past few weeks (and my boyfriend has also joined me) is meditating.  But we’ve been doing an abundance meditation. There are many people doing this in Indy right now. Now, we’re not doing this to “get more stuff.” We’re doing this to be fully aware of our blessings…what we DO have, and to recognize where that comes from and figure out how we can give more, rather than focusing on our “1^st world problems.”

We live in a country of such opportunity that we sometimes forget that there are countries/people/human beings out there who have nothing and are oppressed, starving, sad, and yet we complain of our iPhones not pulling up Foursquare or Facebook fast enough. Trust me, I speak out of being 100% guilty.

We are blessed. We are blessed because we get to do what we love. At least many of the people in my life do. We have nice cars that get us from one place to another, we have a great community that for the most part, likes each other, and get to connect with people all over the world and then meet them once a year and sometimes more at blogging and social media conferences. We get to help businesses build. We get to write, encourage and love.

I just want to encourage you all to not take anything for granted. Not the laptops we get to work off of, not the free social networks we get to use, not our children or significant others. I know that personally, I wouldn’t like any of these taken away.  I hope you all have an amazing holiday season and love big!

As a social media controller, manager, person…whatever you want to call me, I have passwords and logins for all of my clients’ accounts, and this includes their Twitter accounts. Once a month, I take the time to go through and unfollow inactive accounts, people who are not following, people who aren’t a good fit for my clients, etc. In essence…I “clean house.”

What blows my mind as I am doing this are the number of accounts that just….drift off. There are tweets, tweets, than suddenly… no tweets.  3 months, 9 months, 11 months go by and businesses have given up.  It’s all just silly, in my opinion.

Every single person I’ve interacted with in real life that is on Twitter and using it to create relationships along with getting business stuff out there, has indeed GOTTEN business.  Even MUSICIANS.

Case and point: Cathy Hurt (@cathhurt) just joins twitter. She really doesn’t know why… she just does it.  Ashley Plummer (@ashleyplummer), guitarist for Neon Love Life and Butler University video and web producer extraordinaire, is tweeting that we’re looking for a female sax player. You see…we recently had the opportunity to play Indy’s Tonic Ball and one of the artists that was covered, was David Bowie. Since we have an all-female band, we wanted a female saxophone player for our version of Modern Love.

Ash tweets of our need. Someone responds with Cathy’s name and twitter handle. Cathy then gets to experience the Neon Love Life madness in 6 rehearsals and a killer performance that was tons of fun. ALL BECAUSE OF TWITTER. Let me also mention that Cathy has always wanted to play Tonic Ball and finally got to. ALL BECAUSE OF TWITTER. (Her experience was of course, the biggest factor. I mean, she was prepared and came into the first rehearsal nailing it. She was a joy to work with and was utmost professional.)

This may be a small example to you, but not to us, and not to Cathy because it was a perfect fit.

Sometimes it may take some time to find your individual perfect “fits.” But I urge you, DO NOT GIVE UP ON TWEETING because Twitter IS as Tweeters DO. Take the time to ‘do.’

Questions? Please ask.

Experience? Please share.

Let’s get down to basics. How many of you have a social media account? More importantly, how many of you have a LinkedIn account? What I notice about LinkedIn is that most business professionals on there not only have a stellar (most of the time) professional business photo, they also have a completed profile.

I’m not gonna lie, it took MONTHS for my profile to 100% complete. You know why? Because I was busy…maybe even a bit lazy. I mean, profiles take time to fill out. It’s like doing your resume, right? There are lots of questions about yourself, lots of thinking, a lot of articulation that needs to be done in a flattering-yet-not-cocky way, self-reflection, etc. You get the point.

Let’s carry that same model over to the online dating profile world, and you have a load of people out there, really hoping for love, but aren’t getting the attention they need because a) their photo sucks and doesn’t put them in the best light, or b) they have an incomplete profile and it inhibits them from having a strong presence. Not to mention if someone is shy, and really has no idea what to say about themselves.

That’s why Dating Headshots is such a cool concept. They help online daters look their best and really pull out that “umph” in people, so perhaps they can have more confidence, and reach their ultimate goal…find a companion to share life with. (I know I totally sound like I’m giving a sales pitch, but man, been there, done that. I get it.)

Look, if you know anyone who may find their service useful, check them out and have your friends check them out. They have a good success rate and I feel they’re just getting started. I’m pretty excited to be working with them. They also have a great blog with online dating tips, warning signs, and tons of other useful information for those who are embarking on online dating.

Follow them on Facebook and check out their Twitter.

So, what are your thoughts on online dating and this service in particular? Do you think it’s a helpful one?

This company happens to be an IT company trying to do social media marketing. This kills me. It pains my heart. I was ranting on Twitter the other day…yes, it happens when a) it’s close to shark week, b) I’ve been in front of my computer too long, or c) I see more idiot people who can’t run their own businesses successfully, decide they’re going to “get into” the “social media marketing” business because someone told them it’s a way they can make money.

BULLOCKS.

Back to the meeting: This individual shares that he’s having a hard time “selling” social media. (Honestly…at this point, I wanted to slap him.) ps…if you’re reading this, I’m sorry. I’m being honest.

Why did I want to slap him? Because IT companies SHOULD NOT BE doing the job of MARKETING COMPANIES!!! EVER!!! YO, do you know why you have a hard time “selling?” Are you on Twitter or Facebook? Are you making movements and gaining ground? Are you so passionate about something that people get you? I wouldn’t believe that this guy could do anything for my company. Of course there is a hard time selling.

As a matter of fact, half the new “social media” shits out there really can’t do what it takes, and I’m pretty fed up with the people who fail doing their own thing, suddenly decide to become marketers. It gives marketing a bad name. Say it with me: SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING IS ONLY ONE ASPECT OF MARKETING. An IMPERATIVE one, but NOT the ‘be all, end all.’

This isn’t an easy job. It’s taken years to gain the experience and knowledge I have. My response to his question, “Do I have a hard time “selling” social media?” No, I don’t sell it. When people call me, they’re ready to do business…write a check and get it done, because they know they have to incorporate change in today’s business world, and they know I love it and I’m passionate about it. Period.

What are your thoughts about the emerging social media businesses?

Even the greatest of writers and bloggers sometimes struggle with new ideas or concepts to share. What often inspires me when I’m going through the lull of idea birthing, is reading what other people are sharing. Another thing that helps inspire me is to get the heck out and DO something. Go to a networking event, go to a social media meeting or tweet up. Meet people and share. Sometimes the most trivial of conversations can strike up ideas.

As a ghost blogger and content creator, many of my clients want to know what the perfect solution is. And really, over and over I let them know that there is no perfect solution. It’s about creating content that people need. It’s about being real with your audience. It’s about talking about what your kids did that day and how it clicked with something you experienced. It’s about the jerk in the traffic that cut you off that made you think of a time you did that and what was going on at the time that caused you to do what you are now cussing about.

We all experience the same emotions, some more often than others. I don’t care who you are, what your station is in this life, or how much you’ve been praised as a child or adult. Sometimes the most personal experiences then sharing of those experiences have the most profound affect on your readers. Never be afraid to share. (note: use discretion here…not EVERYTHING is good for a business blog.)

The main point of this is that sure, we all get the contential blues sometimes. Don’t be afraid to go in a different direction in order to pick the momentum back up.

Happy writing.

Examples? “Content is King,” “You must be ‘engaging’ your customers,” blah, blah, blah. As a matter of fact, I’m sure I’ve used lines like this before in my presentation of new media marketing and search engine optimization.

But the reality is that content isn’t king, and who really writes the rules of engagement anyway?

Raidious is a content builder, strategy creator–all things online in one stop. But we’ll get to that in another post. For this one, I want to focus on making … creating.

What’s really so important about creating new stuff for your brand anyway? (Great question!)

There are hundreds of thousands of brands out there. I don’t have a percentage, but I think it’s safe to guess that probably ¾ of them have websites. I mean I’ve seen hundreds of websites…some good, some bad, and some downright ugly.

Just because you have a website, doesn’t mean it’s going to get you what you want (and what you want–or should want–is brand loyalty and sales … just in case you were wondering).

A static site is not going to get that for you. What I mean by static site is one that gives you a whole lot of information. One that sells, sells, sells! But most importantly, one that never changes. Like, “Here’s our site that we created two years ago. It’s had the exact same thing on it for two years!”

I’m not a huge SEO (search engine optimization) girl. I understand it enough to work with it, but I just don’t know the crazy google-ish science behind it.

What I do know, is that a strategy that prioritizes creating new, helpful, clear, and understandable content on a regular basis not only helps with SEO, but also helps your clients and customers.

So, yes, content creation is certainly important, but just as important as regularity. So, get out there and make, create, dominate.

(side note) I wrote this post for Raidious a couple of months ago. View the original here.

I’ve just boarded my plane to Indianapolis back from Austin, Texas. I was there for SXSW. I figured I’d take a break from my usual, dirty, cosmo magazine action to write a blog post and keep you updated on what’s been going on the past few weeks. Its been difficult for me to write for Linzstar lately out of pure craziness with finishing up the Neon Love Life album, writing new songs, client work, and taking on a digital content producer role with Raidious.

I also recently lost one of my favorite clients unexpectedly. He was killed in an automobile accident. The news was devastating. I cried a lot. I had just spent time with him and his staff on a two week break from Indianapolis and flown back three days before his death. Needless to say, I was in a bit of a lull.

I don’t think I’ll ever quite recover from that loss in the sense that he’s the first person I’ve been close with that had passed. He was someone who I spoke with at least twice a week, and I had the utmost respect for him. On top of the fact that he helped change a big part of my life. I think about him and his family on a daily basis.

So what now?

I’m still going to be blogging…probably a lot more actually. I’ve recently joined the Raidious team on a part time basis. I’ll be integrating my material with Raidious material. Raidious does what I do on a much larger scale. For those who have worked with me, you know how personal I like to keep business. Especially in this new media space. But because there is only one me, and there are clients I’d really like to work with on a bigger level, Raidious seemed like a perfect marriage. I’m thrilled to be a part of their team.

Yes, I’ll still be doing freelance work.

Girls Rock Indianapolis will be having our second rock camp August 1st-5th. Next week, the girls and I, along with Teri Page (T-page…as we call her, has been a major organizer for events for us and she is part of our team) will be heading off to Washington DC to be inducted into the Girls Rock Camp Alliance, which means we’re privy to more funding and such…plus, we’re “official.” Also, our 501(c)3 stuff is in, so that’s going on too!

Another insanely rad thing about this year and GRI is that I’ve been asked to present at TEDxBloomington. All the speakers are integrating the idea of “Wisdom of Play.” That presentation goes down on May 14th in Bloomington, IN, and I would love your support down there. Learn more about getting tickets and attending here.

Now, onto the band. Our album comes out in July on Roaring Colonel Records. The girls and I have worked our butts off for the past 19 months to create this record. We’ve had the privilege to work with Andrew Fry (engineering) and Vess Von Rutenberg (mixing) over at Queensize Studios in Indianapolis. And we’re equally as excited to be working with Roger Siebol over at Sae Mastering in Arizona.

Since we began tracking the album, Andrew has been a delight to work with. He is part producer of this project and gave us amazing ideas to make it even better. We were able to save all our monies from shows (you guys helped us do this!) to record this album. We are beyond excited to get it in your hands and take it on the road.

The excitement continues….but you’ll have to wait for it….

We have a couple of shows leading up to the big release. We have a good friend and fan who has Stage 3 Melanoma cancer and has been in and out of the hospital for surgery and treatment. We’re doing a benefit show for her at Bears Place in Bloomington, IN. on Friday, April 22. We’ll be playing with Vanity Theft (Columbus, OH) and Beta Male (Indianapolis). Both have killer new records out. All monies from this show will go to Tiff’s hospital bills. This is a non-smoking venue and show starts at 10:30pm. Please come show your support for our friend, Tiff.

We also have a show coming up in Lafayette, IN on April 9th at the Lafayette Brewpub and a huge Girls Rock Indy fundraiser at The Metro Rising in Indy on April 30th with one of my favorite bands, Slothpop. Check out our website for a complete list of dates through July.

Thank you to everyone who has consistently been a support in any of these passions of mine. Please also let me know if you have any questions at all concerning Raidious, Linzstar, Neon Love Life, or Girls Rock Indianapolis.

I’ve just been instructed to put turn off all electronic devices. Until next time…

Love a whole lot.

Fast-forward a year and a half. I’m now pretty situated and feel like I can share this. Or more so, feel I need to share it. Not sure why…but I am.

I, along with my family and my daughter’s father decided the best situation for her to have a stable routine was to be with her dad…as I was moving out of town… away from my family, starting a business from the ground up, as well as being in a rock band. I’ve been judged because of this. I’ve had people say mean and nasty things to me, call me a bad mother, mouth off some stuff about priorities…the list goes on.

On the flip side, I’ve had major supporters (my family included and constantly encouraging), people who completely understand, and people who believe what I did, was the best thing for my little girl in this particular situation. I definitely side with this crowd. It wasn’t an easy decision by any means, but ultimately, but allowing my self to not be in control of everything, I’ve seen an evolution of love. I’m with my daughter every week. I love her more than anything. She helps me be a better person and I hope she grows up understanding that she can be and do absolutely anything she wants.

Now, when you have a child with someone and it doesn’t work out, it can be nasty and devastating. I know. We were once there. Bella’s father is an amazing artist, tattooist, writer, and since we’ve had Bella, a devoted father and now husband to a wonderful woman. He has been in my life for 14 years. It was love/hate for most of it. But he’s changed into an incredible man. Not one for me, mind you…but a great one for his wife and my (our) baby girl.

Last week, I was hanging out with my good friend, Dave Quiesser. Dave owns Locals Only Art and Music Pub. I kinda love Dave because he’s pretty awesome. Anyway, we were spending some time talking about how lucky I am to be able to drop off my little girl, and never have to worry about anything. I don’t have to worry about a resentful ex talking smack about me and vice versa. We’ve been blessed to have grown into two adults who are so lucky to have this amazing little person with a great big personality. We get to show her that love can evolve into anything she wants, and that there is no such thing as normal…that we create whatever we want in our lives and make the best of whatever situation we face. My family didn’t stop. It only grew, as I now have his wife’s family as part of mine. That’s what happens when you choose for it to. No matter what you do today or this week, remember that people come into your life for a reason…and almost ALWAYS to teach us something that we can either pay attention to or choose to ignore. Here’s to evolution and more importantly, to love.

I’m an emotional being…sometimes too emotional. But as an artist/writer/creative type, I feed off emotion. It paves a way for me. That’s the first point.

Point number two: I’m an entrepreneur…a businesswoman. I help businesses blog and build relationships online. I help teach them how to be real with their audience and help build their audience. That being said, a question that often arises is, “What should my blog be about?”

My response? Everything.

Now, you may be thinking, “what about target audience?” or “what about business?”
Yes, all that too. The thing is, there really is no right or wrong way to write a blog. And there’s really no ‘this thing’ or ‘that thing’ that it should be about. Sure, if you’re a business, you definitely need a blog about that business, but it doesn’t have to be ONLY about business stuff. Sometimes I write about business, sometimes I write about passion. Sometimes I write about other people’s businesses, and sometimes I write about music…or my daughter.

The thing is, pretty much anything we write about can circle back around to what we’re passionate about. It’s more a matter of just doing it. Chris Brogan is brilliant at this. He can take some random thought or experience that happened in his life that exact day, and mold it into a couple paragraphs of relatable brilliance that typically circles back to business and the humanization of it.

My advice…don’t think too hard. Just do. And if you’re still not sure, have someone go over your blog post before you post. Write about your experiences and how they’ve made you learn about X lesson. Write about something your child did that made you think back to how you could relate to others in the workplace. Make business personal. That’s when people really relate to you.