The Creative Capitalist:

After six weeks, my unscientific yet decidedly “A”-for-effort LinkedIn experiment has fizzled to an ignominious and quiet ending. The reason is simple: Not only does LinkedIn not live up to its marketing hype (and seriously, how could any company promise users 5.5 times more job offers without first knowing how many offers the users were getting to begin with or, indeed, what industry the individual users are in?) and not fulfill its ostensible objective of creating an interactive Web 2.0 social networking site for professionals, it doesn’t even have the back-end functionality to support its most basic uses. As for LinkedIn customer support: What is it, five people working at a rent-a-cubicle in Des Moines? (Or Bangalore, more likely.) Boo.

Anyway. To recap. Phase 1 (uploading pre-existing contacts from Yahoo into LinkedIn): I was never able to complete it because some random programming bug started associating my YahooMail password with a Hotmail account, telling me that my Hotmail password wasn’t supported by its system. Well, duh. First of all, I don’t have a Hotmail account. Never have. Second, I was clicking the Yahoo radio button every time. Third, LinkedIn doesn’t support Hotmail. LinkedIn makes that very clear.

I e-mailed customer support twice about the matter. First, my CSR wanted screen shots. Apparently LinkedIn had never seen this phenomenon before. Then he helpfully told me that LinkedIn (drum roll) does not support Hotmail. He wound up this incredibly astute message by saying, “On your screen shot, you are selecting the Yahoo Mail button.” ”

Yes, that’s true,” I said. “Because I have Yahoo Mail.” To date, I have not received an answer.

Phase 2: Using LinkedIn functions to communicate with members of my current network. Well, I tried. I asked for referrals, I gave referrals, I passed on job requests, I sent messages…the whole kaboodle. Though about 50 percent of colleagues complied with my sudden LinkedIn frenzy, they mostly just seemed confused. “What’s the point?” seemed to be the overall response.

The other 50 percent refused to comply. One of my best professional references told me he’d happily give me a reference to anyone at any time, privately, but that he felt the LinkedIn public forum devalued the whole process.

One PR director did not respond to a media request I sent via LinkedIn for about three weeks. When she finally responded, she said “I am so sorry! Totally missed this. It went in my bulk file.” Meanwhile, the deadline for her to be included in a national feature story had come and gone.

Happily for both of us, I had gotten information from another source and included her brand. She and I moved our correspondence into regular e-mail. We’ve been communicating regularly via e-mail, Blackberry and even (gasp) in person ever since.

Phase 3: Pitching potential clients. I don’t know why, but a personal intro using any channel other than LinkedIn is, hm, 500 percent more effective than a LinkedIn intro. Again, not scientific. But.

Out of five LinkedIn intros made in Dec. and Jan., I got zero jobs. Zero meetings. Three responses to queries–two of whom were recruiters, one of whom wanted to charge me for a “consulting” service I didn’t need. And one job lead, for a job I have no interest in and for which I’m not qualified.

Out of five real-life referrals, two jobs already. For the second, I got the official offer this afternoon. The first I already finished, invoiced, visited the NYC office and was invited to bid on another projects. Additionally, I had two meetings in New York. Plus, out of the clear blue, a quasi-serious offer to take a consulting contract in Miami for a national luxury hotel brand. Someone at a conference introduced me to the founding partner, and things took off from there.

Out of five cold-calls, I received no jobs but two responses, one of which has turned into a fun back-and-forth correspondence. Who knows what will happen in time.

Final verdict: Nothing can come close to the personal referral. And no matter what the LinkedIn marketing materials say, the site can’t provide that extra personal touch.

Added to all of this personal research is my observation of the endless dialogue among MyLink500 members. I remind you, these are the LinkedIn uber-networkers. They more or less keep the whole system going with their zealotry and their dedication to maintaining LinkedIn networks. Yet. From everything I’ve seen, LinkedIn treats them as second-class citizens. All of their discussions center around how to overcome the various hurdles that the site has thrown in their path.

To me, it all seems like a tremendous waste of time. I am all for networking and always will be. I convention-hop, I save business cards obsessively, I have 1,800 contacts in my address book, and I benefit from the results every day. But if you want to network, go to a conference or a cocktail party. Scan the member list of a relevant organization, find e-mail addresses on Google and introduce yourself. Hell, start chatting up strangers in bars. Any of these methods is more effective.

When it comes to LinkedIn, it’s an understatement to say the emperor has no clothes. I don’t think the emperor is even in the house. Just like the Wizard of Oz, from the outside there’ an impressive presence, but try to peek behind the curtain and…nobody’s there.

I have, it’s true, been somewhat underwhelmed with my LinkedIn experience. For me, it has proved nothing more than an extra step in the day-to-day process of keeping in touch. But as the comments on my blog have shown, that is not the case for everyone. And my policy is always to open the field to as many opinions as people can shout out. So I sent out a message to the YahooGroup for TopLinkedIn users, asking what LinkedIn does for them. Below are the responses I got, together with a bit of professional background on each of the respondents.

In addition to my “9 to 5″ job I edit a daily e-mail publication, the Transportation Communications Newsletter. The newsletter has over 6,500 subscribers and most of my contacts are people who are readers of the newsletter.

While I don’t use LinkedIn daily, it is helpful if I’m trying to find a contact in a company that I report on in the newsletter or if I want more information about one of my readers. I also find LinkedIn to be helpful in terms of staying up-to-date on what my contacts are doing. By checking it daily I see who’s updated their profile and know about new jobs contacts have.

I also do freelance voice work. Again, LinkedIn has been helpful in identifying contacts in companies of potential customers.

I don’t use the forwarding feature of LinkedIn, but I do tap my own contacts directly to get leads.

Bernie
Positions: Operations manager, editor
Industry: Transportation

In the past week or so I’ve spent some time recruiting people for the Ex-Convex LinkedIn group that I manage, and clarifying our membership policy. Being in a leadership position here provides opportunities for me to stay in better touch with my former co-workers and keep my name fresh in their minds.

I’ve been helping a long-time colleague and new LinkedIn connection learn his way around LinkedIn. We’ve both been experimenting with improving our visibility by answering questions in LinkedIn Answers. Our continued discussions have led him to become a new advertising client of mine. It’s never as simple as getting an introduction request and then signing a new business deal.

Danny
Position: Owner/consultant
Industry: Software

The fact that your LinkedIn profile is reviewed by people from within and outside your immediate network is a benefit, but I have yet to dollarize the results to date, and I am now hovering around 920 active members in my network. I probably will not grow my network into the thousands, as I prefer to connect to people where we can mutually benefit one another. So the long and the short of it, IMHO, is that LinkedIn, like many social networks, is a way to garner visibility, and hopefully have people link to your homepage, blog, etc… where you can build a following, create interest, and ultimately gain a business opportunity.

Mark
Position: Managing director
Industry: Information technology & services

I’ve only recently become more active on LinkedIn so am probably not a good example, but I did have someone recently contact me about some possible work through someone who was in our joint network. We’ll see if anything comes out of it. Also I think your LinkedIn profile comes up on a Google search, and someone once contacted me for a quote after doing a search, but nothing came out of that one.

Yvette
Position: Virtual assistant
Industry: Information services

I use LinkedIn for my ventures in the Entertainment business. Mostly, I use it to connect to other creatives and production people with ideas for reality shows, scripts and other entertainment ventures.

Dylan
Position: Freelance television producer
Industry: Entertainment

I am a legal recruiter and have been trying to understand why lawyers have not adopted LinkedIn in the same number as other industries. The key complaint is based in the Q&A piece: Lawyers want to use the system by answering legal questions! But the system allows anyone to answer and incorrect answers to be marked “best answer” etc..

R. Raymond May
Position: Recruiter/managing partner
Industry: Legal services
Blog: www.zebriod1.blogspot.com

While the party line says that long-lasting, solid relationships are key to entrepreneurial success–put simply, your friends are the ones who’ll make sure you’re always working–sometimes the best and biggest opportunities come out of left field, fully formed and ready to fatten up your bank account. This week has seen a lot of that.

Example 1: Way back in July (seems like light years ago), I put together a proposal for Diageo. The person at the company who requested it had been a good friend of mine for a while, had had me on his Christmas card list for five years and had often told me how big of a fan of mine he was. After receiving the proposal, he passed me along to five other people who gave me approximately a zillion noncomittal answers. The prospect of something materializing dwindled away over several heartwrenching weeks–and I never heard from the erstwhile friend again. I sat on the proposal until last Thursday, when a major travel site contacted me on the strength of one mixed-up communication. After a five-minute conversation, the editorial head asked me if I’d be interested in devising an original content product for them. I dusted off my poor, forgotten proposal, tweaked it, sent it in, and… three days later, it looks like I have a buyer.

Example 2: I’ve been pitching an urban Hawaiian culture story to Hemispheres, to Islands–basically to every domestic travel pub that supposedly knows Honolulu well enough to veer away from the “Waikiki, beaches, hula dancers” claptrap. For six months, I got no traction. A week ago, a colleague I barely know sent my info to a British publisher, who offered me the exact assignment for a fantastic rate. Then I was recommended to someone else within the company, who also is giving me a gig. Never met either of ‘em–never spoken to them, in fact. And they know nothing about Honolulu. They just know they don’t want to write the same story about it that everyone else has.

There are many other examples, but the point is always the same: No matter how much you nurture longtime connections or trust your friends, the unknown factor is always going to account for 25 percet of your business. And it’s going to be the fun part. Instead of pitching, revamping and staying awake nights hoping, you’ll just blink one day and–bzzing!–open your eyes to discover a fat little opportunity sitting comfortably in your lap. It’s almost like the universe is delivering you a hit of preemptive gratification.

I know many people who, upon receiving a few of these little zingers, take them as a signal that they no longer have to work so hard. They just sit back and wait to see what lands in their lap. Unfortunately, this tactic tends to decrease the numbers rather than increase them. To borrow a moral lesson from Pilgrim’s Progress, the hire powers, just like other powers, usually help those that help themselves.

Wow. I’m 10 days into my LinkedIn experiment, and it’s already becoming much larger and more unwieldy than I would have expected. I thought I would have Phase 1 finished a few days ago, but instead it’s looking like it may…never finish!

Here’s the update:

The best way to transfer your contacts into LinkedIn is to upload your address book. However (rather embarrassingly), my address book was a mess. I hadn’t updated it in four years. Instead I just archived all my emails and found contacts via Yahoo mail search as needed (surprisingly effective, but not ultimately the best solution.) So my experiment started out with a massive address book cleaning–long overdue, total pain in the neck, but it feels great to have done it.

Here’s my first week of LinkedIn, by the numbers.

• 35: Approximate number of hours it took me to clean up my address book.
• 4000: Approximate number of emails deleted from my archives.
• 800: Approximate number of out-of-date contacts deleted from my address book.
• 1200: Approximate number of current contacts added to my address book. (Just finished last night. Phe-ew!)
• 400: Approximate number of Yahoo contacts who are already on LinkedIn.
• 271: Number of “join my network” invitations I’ve sent via Linked In since 12/06.
• 154: Number of members in my network currently
• 3: Number of people who’ve said they don’t know me

This last number is a bit sinister because, apparently, whereas in the real world if people don’t want to know you they can just ignore you, if they don’t know you on LinkedIn, you get penalized. I don’t know how this penalization works yet, but I’m trying to find out.

I think the most frustrating thing about that is, if it turns out the person actually does know you and just spaced out (as was the case w/one of mine), that individual can’t go back and change his or her answer. So one hair-trigger response can affect you negatively, and the person on the other end may not be aware of it, and there’s nothing either of you can do.

I may be wrong about this. As I said, I’m trying to get an answer from LinkedIn customer service.

In other news, I have not received any job offers out of LinkedIn yet. This is somewhat disappointing–you will recall that it promised me 3.5 times more than I had been getting. And upon a closer look, the language goes, “you’re 3.5 times more likely to receive a job offer for every 5 contacts you add.” Oh really! So where are my, um, I guess that’s 2 x 3.5 x 24 (120 contacts added / 5 ) = 168 new gigs!

Ah, well. Perhaps in time.

Anyway, I’m being facetious, because I didn’t start this experiment with the expectation of getting 168 job offers in a week. I did it to explore the potential benefits. And here’s what I’ve experienced to date:

• Reconnected with several old friends and colleagues–always a pleasure, especially in the cases where we’d been out of touch for years.
• Have “met” a couple new folks, who had been on the books for some reason, but whom I’d never spoken with previously. They responded to my LinkedIn invite with a personal note, I followed up, and now we’re truly on each other’s radar. This always feels warm and fuzzy; whether you call it “building a network” or “making a connection” or (my personal favorite) “making a friend.” It’s good to know somebody out there is interested in you.
• Several people have reached out to me, to see what projects I’m working on and whether we might help each other. In one case, my answer was a definite “Yes, please, immediately”– and as a result, I now have two amazing leads on potential female protagonists for a documentary treatment I’m developing. Absolutely no way could I have found them without the assistance of one Karen Cleary of Boundless Journeys, who made the introduction without gaining anything for herself…all on the strength of one previous conversation and a LinkedIn invite.

(Shout out: Thanks Karen. PR types like you make the world go round .)

• Finally…and this is the most important thing for anyone w/questions of his or her own about LinkedIn: On Friday, I made the acquaintance of Marc Freedman–aka My LinkDaddy.

With 20,000 connections in his files, Marc is what some people call an “uber-networker.” I would have probably called him a “zealot.” However. Marc agreed to do an interview with me about LinkedIn–which we completed an hour ago (no dilly-dallying in these parts!). And while he’s definitely an uber-networker, he’s definitely not a LinkedIn zealot. Which makes him much more valuable in terms of answering questions.

I’m going to post the Marc Freedman interview as soon as I can edit it down to a reasonable length, and I definitely encourage everyone to read it. Not only is he knowledgeable, but he is the epitome of the “pay-it-forward” player. It was very interesting to tap into that mindset–particularly coming from Los Angeles, where the standard question tends to be, “What can you do for me?”

In the meantime, check out Marc’s page at: http://MyLinkDaddy.com

And/or join the experiment at http://www.linkedin.com/in/lenakatz

Send me a note with your invite, please–otherwise I’ll have to check “I don’t know this person,” and then the LinkedIn police will put a black mark by your name….

Much ado has been made of LinkedIn lately, and I’m not sure it’s warranted. I’ve been on there for two years and never noticed any real benefits, monetary or otherwise. However, given all the buzz, I decided to explore the site a bit further and see whether its networking potential is truly worth $2 billion.

As everyone knows, I’m a networker extraordinaire–always going places and meeting people, and then keeping in touch with them forever and ever, amen. I have no qualms about asking for a referral, a recommendation, a leg up. And I’m very used to living in the cyber world. So if anyone’s qualified to test-drive an online networking tool, it’s me. To make things even more interesting, my virtual Rolodex is a colorful mishmash of PR reps and writers, editors and publishers, business execs and TV producers, athletes, fashionistas, mountaineers, surf bum and sundry. At the end of this experiment, I intend to have them all coexisting happily in my LinkedIn network.

But more importantly, at the end of this experiment (if things go as the LinkedIn advertising patter would lead me to believe), I will have 3.5 more job offers than I do currently. Being that I currently get about two job offers a week (contracts, article commissions and projects included), that adds up to…umm…seven job offers a week. A delightful amount. An overwhelming one, even.

But. We will see.

My experiment has three phases.

1. Link. This involves importing all my Yahoo address book contacts into LinkedIn and asking them to join my network.

2. Network. Use LinkedIn tools to get references from old clients, prospect for new ones and ask first-degree connections to connect me with second-degree connections.

3. Pitch. The true test of LinkedIn. I’m pitching five second-degree connections, made through LinkedIn channels. In the interests of science, I’ve decided to also pitch five connections made through normal channels (i.e. asking colleagues, “Do you know anyone at ___?”) and finally to pitch five random editors who don’t know me from Eve. I will rate all 15 based on promptness of followup, open-mindedness and (the most important) whether I get the assignment.

I’m still figuring out the exact point scale, but I will let you know. As of now, I’m midway through Phase 1 and already having some interesting results, which I will share with you later.

(On LinkedIn?) Look me up–full name’s Lena Katz–drop me a note, and join my network. Then you can become part of this experiment in modern social studies instead of just reading about it.

OK, I don’t really mean that literally. I just mean… well, maybe in-person communication isn’t such a bad thing sometimes. Or, failing that, I’ve heard wonderful things about this gadget called the telephone.

Context: I, like everyone else, have come to rely on automated systems and Digital 2.0 communication devices in my day-to-day working life. I absolutely adore CMS tools–always have, always will–and am perfectly happy to work for someone for years without ever meeting them. I prefer e-mail to phone conversations for the most part, and I always request e-mail over snail mail. (In fact, I have a deep and abiding hatred for the U.S. Postal Service. But that is not particularly relevant to this story.) I don’t use IM programs, but that’s only because I feel that IM chat is as big of a time-waster as regular conversation. Worse, because my godmother would never corner me by the water cooler (she’s in Honolulu; it’s physically impossible), but she definitely would if she saw me on Yahoo Messenger.

I know I’ve driven more than one person crazy with my reticence to attend networking events, “do lunch” or “take a meeting” when I feel it’s unnecessary. Why do lunch when you can figure everything out over the phone? Why take a meeting when the project is self-explanatory? These are my feelings. And they work for me. I’m a hired gun–I’m not supposed to be on the party circuit.

However. There are times when I feel like I’ve gone too deep into Digi 2.0 mode, and it’s not serving me or anyone else. And there are definitely also occasions when I feel that others have gone too far. Today, the juxtaposition of both situations has led me to make a rather unusual decision. I will let you know whether it works for me:

Part 1: Last week via e-mail, a colleague invited me to attend a three-day meeting. I went last year and got a lot out of it, so this time, I quickly sent her a response: “Sure, would love to.” Three days later, while in Jamaica, I get a crackly phone message from her telling me that she can’t sign me up for the event. I need to go online and register. She wants to know whether I’ve received her e-mail, stating the same.

Well, no, I haven’t. I’m in Jamaica, trekking around the Blue Mountains. I have neither time nor inclination to check my e-mail, much less mess around with online forms. So I wait a few days, return to civilization, and this p.m., I fill out the online form. When lo, it becomes clear that the hotel I need to stay at is not available, and the activities on the itinerary have very little to do with my needs. Hm.

I complete the form, get confirmation, e-mail back immediately asking if someone can help me with the hotel and itinerary issues. And immediately, I get bounced back to the same colleague who demanded that I online reg in the first place.

I am beginning to feel like a handball. And the colleague no doubt wishes I would stop being such a squeaky little handball. But. If I can’t get what I need out of this event, then there’s no reason for me to go. So. How ’bout a little human touch, people?

Part 2: I have a story due day after tomorrow. It won’t require much research, but I do need to speak with about a half-dozen different sources. Given that time is limited, I decided to send out an auto e-mail to all of them. I don’t know them all, but that is irrelevant. I’ll put in an eye-catching subject line. If they ignore it, that’ll be their loss, not mine.

But then I said… wait a minute. Yeah, these generic group e-mails work well when I’m dealing with 25 different sources. They’re great when I’m not sure who’s going to be able to help and who’s not. But when I’m dealing with five people who all know the subject matter intimately, and when every one of them could potentially improve the piece exponentially… why not take the time to send individual notes? It’s true, they need me more than I need them. But I do want them on my side. So… why not treat them like the precious jewels they are?

On a normal day, I might not have felt this way. But given the e-vite, e-mail, online reg, auto-response, e-mail cc shuffle that I just went through, I’m feeling like a little extra communication at the beginning goes a long way. At the very least, it saves you doing the exact same communication several days later.

…Or does it???

The whole subject of “getting press” seems to inspire a lot of questions, discussions and general bewilderment–not just on Entrepreneur.com, but everywhere in the business world.

Small business owners, in particular, see “press” as this mysterious, unapproachable, possibly malevolent entity. Which is soooo not true. If you’re a celebrity or a big business, press is dangerous. If you’re just a little guy, then they’re actually quite likely to be on your side. They’re just people, looking for good stories. And they’re more than willing to write about you–if you let them know you’re there.

Rather than write about the whole PR shuffle myself, I did a Q&A with Marcia Gagliardi of Tablehopper and got the journalist’s perspective on all things PR and marketing. I hope it’ll be helpful. (Note: yes, it’s from a restaurant-industry perspective, but a lot of the information can be applied to just about any retail business.)

How do you find restaurants to cover?
A combination of publicists, word of mouth, knowing people in the industry, reading food blogs. … Also, it’s a little unconventional, but I ride a bike to stay in shape, and I just look around a lot while I’m out and notice what’s going on. A lot of my column is finding out what’s new, so I’m always talking to people: restaurant owners, waiters, cooks, bartenders and so forth. I’ve lived in the city for 13 years, so I know folks from different walks of life, and that helps me keep up with what’s happening.

If someone doesn’t have a publicist, will it hurt them?

No, but I think they should familiarize themselves with local food writers. Write a press release, partner [or owner] bios and a fact sheet. That way if anyone inquires, you can send everything off to them so they have details. Enclose a menu, too. Or make the initial contact yourself. In a couple days you can figure out the writers of all your local magazines, newspapers and websites. I wouldn’t discount neighborhood papers either.

How can someone get all the writers’ contact information?

Usually on the company website, or on the masthead [for print publications]. A lot of magazine restaurant coverage is handled in-house. For freelance writers, run a search on their name.

How do you feel about receiving phone calls?

I feel it’s too pushy unless I’ve given someone my card, or unless it’s a friend of a friend. I prefer an email because I can answer it on my time. I’m a social person, but in this day and age writers get pitched so many things…

Is there anything you wouldn’t cover?

I don’t want to cover chains. There are nice restaurants that have multiple locations in multiple cities, but unless it’s something that stands out, I don’t feel a strong pull. I cover everything from taco trucks and small ethnic joints–even street food– all the way to high end dining. I think people love stories about family businesses. I love hearing stories about immigrant families who bring authentic food to a neighborhood. It’s something I seek all the time. Just ‘cause it’s not a big flashy restaurant with a full bar and valet doesn’t mean I don’t want it. I think most food writers feel the same way.

There are so many businesses. How/why would one stand out from the competition?

Writers are hungry for news. We’re looking all the time. But the restaurant business is really competitive—so yes, you have to do your part. Writers want stories. Is this an immigrant family? Are you making your own pasta? What is it about the ingredients that’s different? Really highlight your uniqueness. Or talk about how you’re providing something to a neighborhood that’s not being served. What makes you stand out?

I also think it’s smart to invite key media people in for dinner. Some press do accept comps. Offer to send a gift cert, or set them up. (Ed note: Even if they don’t accept, the gesture is always appreciated… and as any PR person will tell you, it’s standard procedure.)

Also—be nice to people in the industry. Sometimes, it’s something as small as calling back a writer who’s called your establishment. It drives me crazy when people don’t call me back. If I’m spending the time to hunt them down—especially if I stopped by—and they can’t call me back, I’m not going to be able to write about them. I know you’re busy, but I am too. Be respectful.

Pinpoint who the key communications person is. If your place is a mom-and-pop shop, just decide internally which person will answer questions. It keeps messaging consistent and gives the press a consistent contact.

When is the right time to talk to the press?

There are two phases. I think it’s good to have buzz before it’s finalized. People are hungry to know what’s moving in–it gets people talking. So even if you don’t have all the details ironed out yet, don’t be afraid to release prelim info. Pinpoint key people to release buzz to. Look at who writes buzz columns in newspapers, magazines and online

Start the second wave maybe a month before you open, to accommodate for print mags’ lead time. Make sure everyone knows when you’re opening. Let them know the concept, the chef, the hours, etc.

But if I promote things too soon, mightn’t it get me a negative review?

Reviews will start happening a month after you’ve been open—and that whole stage depends on whether you did your homework first. Do these publications even know you opened?

After the opening announcements, follow up with new info: menu changes, new features, staff changes, etc. Don’t inundate them every week, but I appreciate it when restaurants let me know they’ve changed things. Remind people you’re around, and give them reasons to write about you.

What can I do about bad press?

It’s a learning experience. The key thing is, the first month, get lots of feedback. Put your pride aside. Don’t just get friends who will say everything’s good. But maybe get them to write anonymous feedback. Your friends don’t want to say anything mean, but maybe it will save you from getting a negative magazine review that goes out to 250,000 people.

I think Yelp is a useful tool, though painful at times. There is some good info on there. Some people don’t have educated palates, and it’s easier to be negative than positive, but if you see consistent things in Yelp reviews, pay attention. Monitor constantly. The same goes for Citysearch, Zagat. etc. Also, I know some restaurateurs will contact posters from public forums directly. They’ll say, ‘Sorry you had a bad experience, come back and let us make up for it.’ It’s extra-mile stuff, but can go a long way in reversing negative feedback. People will sometimes revise what they’ve written online.

My brother-in-law asked for a marketing plan for Medici. I told him I’d write up a detailed email  outlining my PR plans, and CC the bar and kitchen managers.  A formal marketing plan would take too much time–plus everyone’s eyes would glaze over the minute they looked at it. They’re F & B (food and beverage) people, not cubicle drones.

 Here’s what I finally sent to everyone:

1.  First priority: Website. Crucial. Need it up and running ASP. Better if at least one page is CMS-maintained–we don’t want to depend on a Webmaster for updates. Maybe the news section? Probably I can get that as a feed on the homepage. Apart from that, we need an About Us/Bios page, a menu page, and a decor page w/pics. Since we won’t have pics for a while, we can just do a placeholder there. 
2.  I am okay to go forward with the color/graphics scheme Catherine has started. If you’d like her to play with it a bit more, that’s fine–and likewise, if you want her to begin by designing a logo or artwork, I can hold off on the Website for a week–but no more. It’s going to be the first place people go to learn more about you, and there needs to be something there.
3.  IF you have another designer in mind, please give me their contact info immediately so I can get proposals and initial ideas from all contenders. However, if you’re just kicking aorund the idea of considering other designers, I might caution you against it. Few of them are as efficient, reasonably priced and nice as Catherine is. I also think she has a good eye.
4. Once we’ve decided upon a designer, let me know whether you want them to elaborate on the existing design elements (my recommendation) or start from scratch.  Whatever your decision is, please let me know immediately, as I will need to manage the timeline and outline the deliverables.
5. Here’s my PR plan for the next few weeks:
6. Once you are *ready*, I can start feeding bits of info to the press. I am going to start by letting the restaurant industry trade pubs and the city blogs know that Medici is opening in the old Shadow Lounge space, and giving them Matty and Kevin’s names when/where applicable.
7. However. Before I do that, I’d like to at least get some temp signage in the window, and a tentative soft opening date.
8. I’ll write Matty and Kevin’s bios to coincide with the site buildout, since that’s the first place they’ll be posted. I also want to work with Kevin and Matty to come up with brief one-page backgrounders on the food and beverage menus.  Sample items, creative inspirations, spotlight products, etc. Greg, you can provide this for the wine.
9. Once we have a temp site, bios, backgrounders and menus in progress, it’ll be time to get Medici on the “Coming Soon” sections of various city sites and foodie newsletters. Probably this will be about 3 weeks to D-Day.
10. As Kevin and Matty solidify the basic menu parameters, I will start working with Kevin to reach out to liquor PRs, promo companies, etc.to see which liquors we will be featuring on the menu, and which products we want to align ourselves with at the outset.
11. Greg, I’m going to talk to people and find out what the process is for doing wine dinners, wine tastings, or any similar events. I’m not sure if you have to work through an importer/distributor or if you can go direct to winemakers. Do you know?
12. Based on what Matty comes up with, I’ll start coming up with different food-related angles. Signature items, signature samplers, organic/all natural product focus, food-and-wine pairings…all these things are potential hooks.
13. Once we have a solid opening date set, I’m going to reach out to journalists I know in the SF bay, and start the works in motion to get profiles of Matty and Kevin in the local papers, mags, etc.

It has been 10 days since I sent that email, and I haven’t heard a single word back from any of the boys, which pretty much confirms my suspicions about the futility of corporate communication tactics in the restaurant/bar business. At this point, I’m asking myself a variation on a classic question:

If a PR plan is outlined in the concrete jungle, and none of the management staff comment, has it really been outlined at all?

Have I mentioned that I’m helping to open a restaurant/lounge in the heart of San Francisco? I have not. A rather major oversight, you might say, but within the round-the-clock multi-tasking juggernaut that is my life, it’s really only one more ball to keep in the air.

 My brother-in-law owns the place–it’s a great space South of Market, nearby clubs, galleries, offices, studios… The previous owner under-utilized it for years, and still made a profit. Now we get to see whether a complete revamp, organic Mediterranean menu, super-premium bar and different demographic target will improve upon the old concept, or stagger under the weight of its own ambitions. I hope it’s not the latter, since a lot of the new ideas are mine.

We did a pre-opening party a couple weeks ago, and I was pleased to discover that the locals are definitely the Ketel One and Patron Silver crowd. They drank us out of top-shelf liquor within hours. Excellent. I began calling my contacts within the super-premium liquor niche almost immediately. “Tastings? Theme nights? Food pairings? Use your imagination,” I told them.

Now–with about a month to go until the soft opening and the construction workers representing in full force–it’s time to start setting meetings, I think. Except. Our bar manager has professed a sudden aversion to specialty cocktails: “I’m a meat-and-potatoes bartender…I don’t know how to do this stuff.”

This is a 180 degree reversal from his position three weeks ago–at that time, he told me that everything on the specialty cocktail menu would be made with real fruit and fresh-squeezed juices, and that he was putting a permanent ban on Cuervo Gold and Jaegermeister.

 I’m chalking it up to nerves. Tonight, we’re taking baby steps toward a cocktail menu. “Nothing needs to be set in stone right now,” I told him. We just need to have a basic concept. NOT one that has anything to do with potatoes. Leave potatoes to the chef. He’s a James Beard nominee, a Culinary Institute instructor and a diva, and though he can make me tear my hair out sometimes, his instincts with spuds are right on the money.

I can’t believe I haven’t mentioned this before, but my primary goal this year is to get a publishing deal. Not just any publishing deal, but one with a healthy advance and a major publisher. Every day, while I go about my normal business of wooing clients and pitching ideas and submitting copy, The Book (as I think of it) is in the back of my mind. And every week, I try to make some forward progress on it.

Just to bring you up to speed on The Book’s vital stats:

• It is non-fiction. Basically everything I write is non-fiction.
• It is a travel/lifestyles concept geared toward 25- to 40-something upwardly mobile professionals.
• I have an agent.
• I have completed a proposal.
• I have not yet written the book itself.
• This is not my first foray into book publishing. I have contributed to anthologies, edited two guides, turned down one deal because there wasn’t enough money in it, and had four previous book proposals rejected by countless publishers.
• No, my ultimate goal is not to land a television show. Why does everyone always assume that?

A former Sony boss of mine we’ll call EL is now in charge of international digital programming at a major media corporation. I’ve been after him to let me pitch a web/mobile content package, and finally last week, he requested a proposal. He also informed me that he intended to include it in a departmental strategy meeting—in two days’ time.

The good news: He likes my work.

The bad: The stopwatch is ticking.

This is definitely a pressure situation, but it’s not unusual. The client sets the pace; you follow. Especially if it’s “new business�—and especially if it’s a desirable client.

When I got off the phone with EL, I really didn’t know what I wanted to pitch him—which is par for the course. Most creatives have lots of little half-baked ideas on “simmer� at all times. The key to successful pitching is to match the idea to the client. Identify the brand, the target audience, the delivery mode, and the competition (who are they, what are they doing that’s similar). Once you know all these things, you come up with your ‘angle.’

Here’s where I started:

The Client: International. Corporate, but edgy. Sexy. Lifestyle-focused. Looking to grow digital division.

The Hiring Guy: Highly opinionated. Low BS tolerance. Extremely tech savvy. Expects all proposals to be brand-driven, and to be adaptable to multiple media platforms.

The Target Audience: Mostly male, 20- 40-something

Delivery Mode: Web. Mobile. (Potential for print, TV, radio)

The Geographic Focus: International

The Competition: Men’s lifestyle sites, geo-coded event newsletters, online city guides like metromix.com

Based on this information, I decided to pitch a weekly roundup with a rotating geographic focus—800 words online, with video and photo features. Also a condensed low-graphic version to be delivered to mobile devices.

Writing the Pitch:

Typically, I use one of two different pitch formats.

Query – For single-serving editorial pieces. Always short – ranging from two sentences to half a page. We’ll talk about queries later, because I decided to use the other format for this.

Proposal—This is a long-form breakdown of a major media or marketing project: a book, a PR campaign, a request for sponsorship, grant money, etc. There’s no one right way to write a proposal—but typically, every client or publisher has a preferred format. Find out what that format is. Or, in the cases where the information’s not available, come up with your own format, based on what you know of the client.

I have written proposals ranging from 1 page (a gift book idea) to 32 (a nonfiction book). In this case, since the client is corporate and the concept is simple, I decided to use a format very similar to a marketing brief.

(A marketing brief is something you see a lot in corporate creative departments. It briefly outlines pertinent information on a new marketing initiative: what’s the idea, what’s the point, who’s working on it, what’s the timeline. It usually only circulates to people who are directly involved in the project.)

It took me a while to decide how to break down topics, and in what order to address them. I think this is not only acceptable when you’re coming up with your own format, but necessary. Every situation is going to require a slightly different approach. The worst thing you can do is send a potential client a generic proposal. Seriously, it’ll go straight in the trash.

This is the format I eventually decided to use:

The Concept: A two-line overview. Not even complete sentences. Mention of the target demo.

The Hook: The piece de resistance. If anything were to make these guys go, “WOW,� this would be it. It’s the thing that sets this idea apart from all the rest.

The Focus: What do I want to do here? What are my basic tenets? Bullet pointed.

The Format: What is the weekly content offering going to include? What are the sections? What will it look like?

Editorial Angle: Where is the story, and how are we getting our information?

(Note: This is not normally included in a proposal. However, I felt it might be important to the editors (who are different from the production staff, but have some control over what’s published).

The Tone: How will this read?

The Point: Why here? Why now?

(Note: I take some liberty with naming, in case you haven’t noticed. Only follow my example if you’re a risk-taker or you just feel inspired.)

Delivery Strategy: How will we get the content to the reader? How will we bring in new readers?

I left out sections on existing competitors, potential advertising and promotional opportunities for the following reasons. First, there’s a lot of general competition, but not much direct, and I decided to send it in a separate message, with links for my contact to research. As far as the other two—well, this is a big corporation, with internal advertising and marketing departments who may not like being told how to do their job. Until I’m asked, I’ll keep my opinions to myself.

One final thing, the title (always the last addition, for me). And done. A full day ahead of time.

It’s one of life’s great ironies, isn’t it? “Creative” types are legendarily bad at business—or maybe just loathe to get involved. We (yes, I’m one of them) would much rather focus on our art, be it writing or music or pot-throwing or creative cake icing. Yet the minute that art starts turning a profit, the artist lands smack-dab in the business world—do not pass “GO;â€? do not receive $200 unless you negotiate ahead of time, invoice for it, and have a contract on file.

If you take a corporate job, your muse is on loan from 9-5, Monday through Friday. And if you decide to take the plunge and go freelance, or start your own company…well, that’s when you end up on a site like this. Because like it or not, building a successful creative business is 20% about the �creative,� and 80% about that thing we love to hate.

We’ve all heard that before. However, perhaps some of you haven’t seen it in the practical, day-to-day sense. University courses don’t teach it, and I’m sorry to say, neither do those “special seminars� that charge you $1500 and promise that you’ll soon be living on a tropical island.

That’s where I come in: As a columnist, corporate creative consultant and digital content maven, I’m constantly working on cool projects for Disney, Sony, MGM and various other big names. I do not live on a tropical island; I live in LA. And I do not work while lounging under a palm tree on a white sand beach. Sun on the monitor + white sand in the keyboard = BAD.

Maybe you’ve already guessed this, but I am here to deliver a mechanical, unromantic and decidedly un-creative account of my so-called glamorous job, from the proposal writing to the cold calls to the health insurance questions to the ongoing search for the perfect CMS tool. Sections are outlined below.

Strategery – Yes, I’m borrowing from an SNL skit. But this topic is serious. Pitching, follow-ups, networking, promotion, packaging, branding, the whole nine.

The Client Speaks – Interviews with decision-makers. These are the people who can give you the contracts. Contrary to what you think, they do not reside in ivory towers.

Laptop Meditations – I am opinionated. Sometimes I like to rant. Sometimes I like to lecture. This is the section where I get to do it. (My blog, my prerogative.)

Nuts & Bolts – The stuff we all hate, but have to deal with anyway. Health insurance, taxes, telecom, filing software, Web site management, money matters.

Meet My Network – They say you can judge a woman by the company she keeps. That’s why I’m so proud to know, and work with, amazing people all over the world. Here’s where I get to brag on their behalf.

Resources – We live in an age of information overload. Happily, I’ve spent roughly one zillion hours sifting through it, and am happy to pass the good stuff (and the “danger zone� warnings) along to you. ‘Cause I’m nice. And I enjoy making lists.