UPDATE 10/29/30 – Google releases Sidewiki bookmarklet – “utilize Google Sidewiki on any browser, even if you don’t have the Google Toolbar installed.”

Tonight I came across Ed Lee’s post about Google Sidewiki, along with his recommendations. In it, he calls attention to Dave Jones, VP Digital Communications at Hill & Knowlton who doesn’t care much for Google Sidewiki. He says, “Sidewiki is like a bunch of people walking through that virtual front door and helping themselves to a boardroom to have a noisy chat about all the things they love and hate about the organization.”

To try to get people to leave comments on his blog rather than in Sidewiki, Dave Jones has posted his position and his request to the Sidewiki on his home page of DaveJones.ca.

Now, whether you like Sidewiki or not, I think it’s a good idea to post a welcome message there for your own site. Maybe you want to encourage people to comment right on your site, or, maybe you want to tell them why you don’t allow commenting and explain your position. Whatever you post, be aware that:

• you have no control over what people will post to the Sidewiki
• the comments are indexable by Google, including your own message
• comments are not physically contained on your site, but within Google
• commenters can highlight text on the page and comment upon it in Sidewiki
• every page of your site has its own Sidewiki

This last point is particularly important for implementing your welcome message. Be sure that you are posting the message to the home page of your site. But, also be aware that people may come to your site via a link to a blog post or may land on an interior page of your site. Where warranted, you may want to add a message to additional pages where comments may have been turned off for a specific reason. But, I would resist the urge to post to every page in your site as it might be viewed as company-generated spam.

As a site owner, Google Sidewiki will “pin” your post to the top of the Sidewiki and highlight it in green. After you’ve downloaded Google Toolbar and clicked open your Sidewiki, you’ll see this:

If you have not yet verified your site with Google’s Webmaster Tools and linked the site to your Google Account, you’ll need to go through those steps. The whole process is outlined here.

You can’t control what people will write on your pages’ Sidewikis, but perhaps you can help to set the tone and maybe even direct people to site resources where they are equally free to express themselves.

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Technically Women comprises a group of women from all walks of business. This blog presents our unique views on how technology is shifting our world. The women are business owners, marketers, evangelists and leaders. The idea for Technically Women stemmed from a “women and leadership” piece penned by Dennis Howlett, which brought several of these women together to share their unique views on the current state of business. We decided to keep the conversation going and bring in some additional voices.

The participating women are amazing and accomplished, and I’m humbled to be in their company:

Cathy Brooks (@CathyBrooks)
Laura Fitton (@Pistachio)
Maggie Fox (@MaggieFox)
Rachel Happe (@rhappe)
Jennifer Leggio (@mediaphyter)
Francine McKenna (@retheauditors)
Anne Kathrine Petterøe (@yojibee)
Marilyn Pratt (@MarilynPratt)
Susan Scrupski (@ITSinsider)

Here’s an excerpt from in my inaugural post entitled The Gender Card, which looks at my how I came to my approach toward the topic of  women in technology and business.

Let me state right from the start, I do not like playing the gender card. Sweeping generalizations about how men and women “are” make me bristle. I do not consciously frame myself in this world as a woman first. I am a person. I am unique. I happen to be female in gender. And in part, because of that, I often resist believing that there are any barriers to entry in positions or fields.

I encourage  you to explore the diverse viewpoints in Technically Women, offer up your feedback and, if you feel so inclined, follow @Tech_Women on Twitter to keep up to date.

Thanks.

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To be honest, when I first started this blog, it went live and started attracting comments before I was ready with all my widgets and sidebar components in place. A blogroll was way down on my list of priorities at the time. Then, with other commitments,  I never got around to doing it.

Lately, I’ve found more and more blogrolls are linking to this one. I’m grateful. And, I’m pleased that I’m offering something here that people feel is link-worthy.

But, this attention is has me re-evaluating blogrolls and how the blogging community, specifically in social media, view them. So, today I asked Twitter:

Q: Am I making a huge mistake by not having a blogroll? (My reasoning: it would be absolutely HUGE and I don’t want to offend by exclusion)

Twitter poll: Blog rolls: Yes or No?

Not surprisingly, there were arguments for and against them, and suggestions for how to implement a blogroll.

helenmosher:  well i have trouble keeping mine up to date, so I understand yr logic. but it does drive traffic around, so…
geechee_girl: you could always do it the brogan way and make a blog roll page
lil_gruntlings: Blog rolls are somewhat going the way of the dodo.
banannie: I’ve heard that google frowns on blogrolls, there’s no context for the links.
ChefMark:  yeah, what does it hurt? But not like the old days with 100 blogs listed, just a dozen or so
GadgetVirtuoso:  they’re good but should only link your tops links if anything.
starmike:  I peruse them once in a while
islandprincess2:  blog roll yes, polls not so much
Karoli: I use my Google reader shared items and list widget as the blogroll. no updating necessary.
vargasl: Company/Niche blog = yes; Personal = no
mikeneumann: blog rolls: no.
candicelee: I say yes. If you’re worried about it being too long, you can create a rotating blogroll to change the urls every day or so.
MRMaguire: I say yes. I find other interesting blogs from someone’s list. That is, if they have a list.
jamienotter:  Yes. You don’t have to include everyone. You can rotate people in. But effort is worth it. Link love is still important.
zoonini: Why not make it a Page instead of putting it in your sidebar? You could group the blogs by type, or in some other chunked way.
AdamSinger:  do what @ChrisBrogan does and make a page dedicated to them…I think it is a better solution.
rlangdon: I say add only those you are dedicated to reading. People won’t be offended. You are offering value to your readers.
rainesmaker:  I like how Renee Blodgett structures her blog roll on the left nav. Down the Avenue, one of my favs. http://bit.ly/INq8
Illig: Blog roll: Considered dropping it. Placed it in an AJAX reveal in lieu of doing so. See upper right hand column: http://is.gd/d0j3

Watching search.twitter.com (formerly Summize) in the minutes that followed the ABC report showed a flood of new Twitter users signing up with expectations of their customer service woes being heard. Here are some examples of first tweets, all of which used the tell-tale generic avatar of a newbie:

With expectations like those, it’s hard not to be disappointed. And if all of those concerns are not addressed, as Tracy Wilson Tracey Lee Wallace‘s were in the report, then in the eyes of those customers, the brands mentioned have failed them again.

I feel sorry for Comcast. Their ten “digital detectives” are going to be very busy keeping up with the new complaints channel. But, thankfully there is a (mostly) reliable search engine, because you can be almost certain these new Twitter users won’t know that they’ll be seen faster by using @comcastcares.

UPDATE 07/22/08: A manual search in search.twitter.com conducted 6 hours after the piece aired in the East, revealed more than 100 Tweets attributed to new users as a direct result of the ABC report. This does not account for new users who have signed up and not yet posted or have made their updates private (which, in itself presents a customer service issue for companies on Twitter who won’t see those tweets). In the search, I discovered a tweet from none other than Jack Dorsey, CEO of Twitter welcoming the new users. And to their credit, despite the reservations of users, Twitter did not go down as a result of the coverage.

UPDATE 07/23/08: There have been some interesting comments left on the ABC site about this story.

UPDATE 07/25/08: The New York Times ran a story today “Griping Online? Comcast Hears and Talks Back“, which also mentions Southwest Airlines, Whole Foods and Zappos using Twitter for customer outreach. As of 11 a.m. the story had received 60 comments. Hat tip Funny Business.

We all know it.

A band releases a stellar first album with hit singles and major sales only to return with a follow-up that doesn’t match up to first. The second album curse sees reviews that are harsher, sales that are lower and fans who are fewer. Sometimes the second album is so poorly received, the band will crash and burn, forever known as a one-hit wonder.

In sports, there are the vast majority of winners of baseball’s Rookie of the Year award who go on to have rather mediocre careers. Football sees this curse too.

And, students who face an exciting first year of university where they perform reasonably well, become discouraged in their second year by the difficulty and sheer volume of work ahead of them.

Brands have this trouble too. Just look at the success of Dove’s Evolution campaign. Ogilvy & Mather Toronto followed it with Onslaught, which from a viral perspective, didn’t perform nearly as well. Then Unilever was called to task over the mixed messages they were sending by promoting the Dove Self-Esteem Fund on one hand and the sexy girls of the Axe brand on the other.

The fear of the curse stopped me in my tracks. I didn’t want to be a one-hit wonder or mediocre. I was beginning to see the work that writing a blog on a regular schedule would take. And, after not posting for 3 weeks, I didn’t want to betray the faith of my early supporters with what appeared to be a lack of commitment to this blog.

And then, I got over myself.

Just like everyone who faces their second attempt at something new, I will make mistakes and may second-guess myself. I will have to learn new habits and be realistic about my own capabilities. And ultimately, like any successful band, athlete, student or brand I will have to learn from failures, chart a plan and keep at it. I’m in this for the long-haul.