The gift of the magi

Part I
Years ago I sorted through my godmother's effects.  I found one sheet of manuscript written in Russian.  The only word I could comprehend was "prayer."  The next time I visited my grandmother I showed her the prayer.  Her eyes rolled to heaven.

"My mother wrote this!"  She explained that Prababushka had written out prayers for people going through difficult times.  She had evidently written this one for my godmother, her daughter-in-law.

My grandmother was grateful to have this new memento of her mother, now dead thirty years.


Part II
Yesterday I sorted through the coat closet, including the old fur coat.  With its seams splitting it's unwearable, but the fur is so fine to stroke!  My sister and I used to sneak into the closet just to rub our palms on it.

I tried offering the coat to my sister but for some reason she didn't want it.  Maybe because she lives in Texas.

Then I remembered that one of my mother's dear friends had given the coat to my mother.  The friend had died.  So I called her daughter, my own friend with whom I had been out of touch for years.

"You may not want your mother's old coat, but perhaps your daughter would, for the memory of her grandmother."

I couldn't understand my friend's joy until she explained to me that all her mother's possessions had been caught up in probate,  My friend had nothing except a few pieces of jewelry.

I wasted no time in shipping the coat to her.  I only wish I had called her earlier so that the coat would be there by Christmas.

Who would ever dream that possessions one respects and appreciates could be, to the right person, treasures?  Being able to send that coat was the best Christmas present possible--to me.

Merry Christmas and best wishes for a healthy and peaceful new year.

Contains historical facts and conjectures!

This is why you should avoid committee meetings:

I showed up at a committee meeting for my church last spring.  “Gee,” said the chair, “it would be great if we published a cookbook.  Katharine, would you be interested in taking it on?”

Actually, I was and am interested.  I assembled a formidable committee; we’re making great strides.  The problem is that we know that most people who want recipes look on the internet.  Who needs another cookbook?

So we decided to intersperse lots of commentary among the recipes.  We also decided that focusing on the community might make the book appeal to more buyers than those within our church.

I started assembling the commentary, a decade-by-decade retrospective of cooking in Summit, New Jersey, over the last hundred years.  Now I find that because I’ve begun the task, no one else is inclined to take it over.

Historical research is more difficult than I thought.  You find snippets here and there.  You try to knit them together, even if the connection is tenuous.  Then you find another nubbin that throws off your entire storyline.  Or you find that you have far too much information about one era, so much that it makes the other sections look scant.

Clearly, you then have to discard some of the information.  But what?

I’ve always wanted to write a book, but I never dreamed that it would be one so far out of my field.  Wish me luck, please.

That's so much better!

Please visit the new and improved KatharineHadow.com

What was so hard about that?

My Cringeworthy Website

Please don’t visit KatharineHadow.com. 

Whenever I visit it I tell myself that it looks disorganized and unprofessional.  Then I do what anyone else would do.  I close the tab.

I started my site for two reasons:

1. as a portfolio for my print work, so I could send URLs instead of attachments
2. to show that I could produce and maintain a website

 It serves those purposes, but it’s unwieldy now.

It needs to portray a bold, confident marketer who can size up customers and bang out compelling copy on tight deadlines.  It, well, doesn’t.

But, ugh, the thought of rewriting all that copy from scratch, finding the perfect USP and call to action feels so overwhelming.

And yet, I do it daily in my pitch letters.  Pitch letters are easier, probably because I can tell myself that no one reads them anyway.

My project for today is to cull the best lines from my pitch letters and refashion them into exciting web copy for KatharineHadow.com.

About perfection—It’s actually good if the web copy isn’t perfect.  If the site were perfect, I’d never change it.  Then the search engines would assume that I’d abandoned the site, and eventually my rankings would slip.

So, in web copy, as in life, the goal is

Progress, not perfection.

Writing tightly

I had problem meeting word requirements for college essays.  I didn’t like writing bloated prose, though I did it when I had to.

Fortunately, tight writing is a virtue when preparing ads and direct mail.  If a few more words bump you up from a postcard stamp (.28) to a large postcard stamp (.44), you ruthlessly slash a few words from somewhere.

Newspaper experience teaches you a) to make your words fit in the allotted space and b) to get it in on time.

But before you write for the newsletterpaper, you’ve probably written poetry.  And, boy, is that good practice!  Not only do you have to keep down the word count, the words also have to scan and rhyme. 

I only write poetry occasionally now, but it’s a good exercise in forcing yourself to write economically.  Even writing a few couplets for a Burma-Shave style ad disciplines you to justify the use of every word.

I recommend poetry to every budding writer, especially those with no intention of publishing.  Just as musicians play scales but don’t perform them, writing poetry strengthens all your other writing.

PS Don’t forget that postage rates go up on January 1.

Another office supply I can't show you a picture of

I try many office products because I'm always looking for ways to organize my work better.  Some are great, like the Post-It Weekly Planner.  Some work well but they're too cute--as if the designer would rather make the page pretty than present a more logical way for me to store my information.

I recently bought an Organizher budget planner from Mead Westvaco, mostly because I like Flex binders and because who doesn't feel that they could have a better handle on their expenses?

The pages are attractive, all right, but they didn't seem to fit my needs.  The packaging said I could visit the Mead website for more downloadable pages. 

When I went online, the extra pages weren't available, so I shot them a little email.  I was surprised and pleased today when they sent me back their templates.

I can't show them to you here, because I can't figure out how to display PDFs.  Let me describe the expense sheet to you.  It has five charming columns headed in lovely feminine scripts:

expense/amount/date paid/check no./confirmation no 

It's a handwritten log of expenses sorted by date, like my check register.

Darn!  I was hoping for something that would help me organize my finances.  The appealing page design was just supposed to help me get in the mood.

So I sent them these helpful suggestions:

 

The templates you sent are pretty, but I assume that an Organizher customer is buying the book to put her budget in order.  These templates seem to assume that the customer already has a budget and is merely tracking expenses. 

Selling a beginner a pretty book doesn’t help her.  She throws up her hands and says, “I spent $15 on this book and it looks like so much work.  I knew I couldn’t do this budget thing.”

What you want her to say is “Gosh, this book is really helping me get my budget on track.  I should tell all my friends about it.”

And it does look like a lot of work.  I assume that the buyer isn’t paying cash, but is using a credit card at Target—the only place you sell it.   That’s where I got my planner, and on the same trip I bought gifts and laundry detergent.  This makes it more work to track expenses by category.  If she’s paying by check, why would she want to record the purchase both on your budget sheets and in the check register?

Suggestions:

I suggest one or two pages at the beginning of the book explaining how to draw up a budget, the way the Franklin Covey planners do.  If she doesn’t need them, she’ll throw them out.  Be encouraging so the beginner will feel that she can do it.

“Congratulations on buying this book to put your budget in order. Don’t be intimidated by planning a budget.  It doesn’t have to be perfect, although you’ll get better with practice.  Use rough numbers.  All you need is an idea of how much money you have, so you’ll be better prepared for unexpected things that may affect your spending.”

Use the next page to plan your overall expenses for the year. 

The budget plan should have a large and inviting space at the top for the buyer to record her financial goals, i.e., pay off MasterCard balance, take family to Disneyland, buy a new car.  Asking her to dream first is an invitation to step into the budget process.

Then she records her expenses.  Fixed expenses (mortgage/rent, commuting, utilities) are usually easy, but variable expenses are rougher.

“Don’t know how much you spend on gas, utilities, groceries?  Carry this book with you for one month and write down every purchase.”  Carrying the book around for the whole year sounds like a lot of work.  A month sounds doable.

After getting a rough idea of expenses, and multiplying by 12, the customer can go back to trying to make a budget plan for the year.

“Subtract expenses from income to get an idea of where your budget is heading.  Now figure out roughly how much your financial goals will cost and divide by the number of months until you want to achieve them.”

When the budget goals are set, the purpose of the receipt folders becomes clearer.  Stuff all the receipts in the folder and figure out where the money went at the end of the week or the end of the month.  After lugging the book around for a month, this’ll seem like a huge time saver. 

The folders could also have spaces for writing in purchases without receipts, i.e., tolls, vending machine purchases, etc.  Note that if she writes on the folders she can’t reuse them next year.  She has to buy a new budget planner or at least new folders.

Every year at tax time at my house, we scramble to figure out our deductible expenses.  A sheet to track these (there usually aren’t that many)—and maybe an extra folder for those receipts--would probably be a big help.  I would certainly use it.

The websites sheet is just plain silly.  Who wants to keep a written list and then retype URLs into their browser every time except people on public computers?  It would be better to write two lines about learning how to bookmark, and then send her online to find budget templates that fit her situation.   

Don’t assume that everyone has internet access, of course; tell her that there are perfectly fine books at the library.  The basics of budgeting don’t change.

Internet users might want to see Microsoft’s budget templates at

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/templates/CL102207099.aspx (must use IE to download) and I’m sure there are other good ones as well.

See also http://www.iseek.org/iseek/static/Budgeting_10.pdf

# # #

I'm sure Mead will appreciate my help just as much as all the other consumer products manufacturers I  send suggestions to...  But, really, just because I'm a woman doesn't mean I want to sacrifice function for form.

Do Internships Extend Student Visas?

As I've said before, on internships young people do for free jobs that would otherwise go to paid workers, in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act.  Casually perusing Craigslist will prove that this is truest in the creative professions, including marketing.

 I felt sorry for the young college students and grads so desperate for jobs that they would work for free as “interns”.  And for their parents, paying for an education during which their kids toil like slaves for college credit.

Maybe, though, not all those laboring unpaid are penniless students.  I recently found an internship position that stated, “Must be authorized to work in this country, we will not endorse F-Status.”

Perhaps some of those interns are extending their US student visas by taking nominal “jobs.”  If so, those students and their “employers” are jumping through a loophole called Optional Practical Training (OPT).  The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) permits graduate students and undergraduates who have completed or who have been pursuing their degrees for more than nine months with F-1 status to work in the US for at most one year on their student visas without needing to acquire a work H-1B visa.

A year’s a long time—time enough to gain work experience, to acquire an H1-B visa, to get married, and to keep the paycheck away from skilled native workers.

In that case I feel less sorry for those students and their parents.  Keeping American jobs out of American hands is both shameful and short-sighted.  Of course, I have a dog in this race.  I want those jobs--but I don't want to work for free.

(To be fair, don't blame Craigslist for this problem.  Craigslist is based in California, where positions that violate the FLSA are illegal.  Craigslist's official policy is that they are not allowed in its classified ads.  Officially, it requests all users to flag off the bad ads.)

LinkedIn Expertise

I’m now an “internet marketing expert” on LinkedIn. 

Here’s what happened:  I visited LinkedIn Answers. I answered another user’s question: how she could get her team to promote her email newsletter? That was easy; I rattled off a few ways that I would have promoted my own newsletter in a perfect world. 

The asker chose mine as “best answer.”   That means I now have an “expert” badge on my profile.

Annoyingly, some people who ask LinkedIn questions never close the loop by choosing the “best answer.”

One fellow asked where he could get print copies of Miss Clairol ads from the 1960s.  Several people sent him to URLs where he could have printed low-res copies.  I actually spent dozens of minutes on eBay tracking down actual ads and even packaging.  I enjoyed it, and I fully expected that he would acknowledge my work by awarding me the “best answer.”  Two months later, he still hasn’t chosen a best answer.

In fact, about 80% of the askers whose questions I’ve answered never select a “best answer.”  Some generous LinkedIn members answer questions because they want to share their knowledge.  Or because they want the links back to their own websites.  But many people like me answer questions because they want that “expert” badge and the ego gratification that goes with it.

So I emailed LinkedIn.  They don’t follow up with askers who don’t close their questions, and they don’t plan to.

If I really, really wanted the badge, and strangers really, really didn’t want to select best answers, there would be a dishonest solution: a “best answer exchange.” 

1. My friend Jimmy Doakes asks a question; I answer it.  Jimmy picks my answer as “best.” 
2.  I ask a question.  Jimmy’s friend Shruti answers it.  I pick Shruti’s answer.
3.  Shruti poses a question.  Jimmy answers.  Shruti picks Jimmy.

Note that I pose this scenario in the subjunctive.  I wouldn’t actually set up an exchange, of course.  It would degrade the value of my precious “best answer” badge.

One thing’s for sure: if I’ve thought of it, someone else is already doing it.  Just sayin’.

Copywriting Prostitutes

My favorite clients are the ones whose writing skills are undistinguished, whose writing doesn't reflect their other accomplishments.  They appreciate good writers.  They may ask for minor rewrites, but on the whole we get along well.  They’re pleased, and they say so.  They pay on time.  We both walk away happy.

Then there are the ones who write decently.  They believe that they could do the work themselves.  Some of them could.  As a result, they don’t really value my services.

And there are the ones who patronize the furtive writers who stand on the corners in mini skirts and fishnet stockings.  These pros shame themselves by writing academic essays for lazy students who’ve probably spent too much time playing beer pong or otherwise disporting themselves.

For example

Just ask the Doc…

If you are looking for help with your academic work, you have come to the right place. I have helped hundreds of students just like you. My high quality work is always on time.

I am a Phd and a Harvard Graduate. Outside of running my own business, I freelance in academic writing and take on about 3 new clients each week. Many of my clients are repeat customers who know they can rely on me to get the job done. 

• I am an expert in APA, MLA and Chicago formatting.
• I have written dissertations, theses, capstones, literature reviews and research papers.
• I can take on rush assignments with a turn-around time of less than 24 hours.
• My rates are reasonable and include unlimited revisions.

There is no project too big or too small. Please give me a call today: (phone number) or email me at (email address)

No exaggeration.  I copy/pasted "Doc's" ad.  “Doc” is too lazy to type an apostrophe ("If you are looking"), or to capitalize properly ("PhD," and "Harvard Graduate").  Is the "shift" key so hard to reach with that left little finger?

Yet his or her work is probably better than his or her clients’. The clients are probably grateful.  The problem is that "Doc's" writing penalizes students who attend college to learn, who turn in less-than-perfect papers, and who seek honest feedback from professors.  “Doc’s” clients graduate and find that they can’t write worth a bucket of warm spit.  They become my grateful clients.

In the meantime, “Doc” cheats students and educators simultaneously.  Hope they're wearing protection.  “Doc” is a prostitute among copywriters, degrading us all. 

Advertising: Good, Bad, Creepy

When I went out leafleting last weekend, I saw three kinds of outdoor advertising: good, bad, and creepy.

When it comes to elections and Hallowe’en, it pays to advertise.  Hence, many lawns were decorated with pumpkins, skeletons, tombstones and political yard signs.

As to the election, “my” side, opposing selling New Providence’s largest park to Union County for $1, got the yard signs and the votes out early.  Somehow a “vote yes” sign appeared next to my “no county park” sign the day after the elections.  I suppose that was from someone sore that New Providence rejected the sale 2:1.

As to Hallowe’en, our house failed to advertise this year.  Advertising is very important.  Even though trick or treat day fell on a Sunday, only two children showed up to claim their treats.  This was not entirely bad; we got to eat all the chocolate ourselves.

The creepy advertisement was the house with the newspapers in the driveway, three FedEx stickers on the door and the door hanger from the week before on the knob.

If the owners had merely moved away, they must have been so sinister and unfriendly they couldn’t convince anyone to take care of their entrance.  As it was, the entire front of their house was an invitation to burglars to swoop in off the highway, break a window and help themselves.

On the other hand, maybe the owners were dead and mouldering inside.  That would have been appropriate for Hallowe’en. 

I decided not to leave my bright green brochure at the door to further advertise the vacancy within.  In fact, I picked up the newspapers in the driveway, too.  But, come on, neighbor.  If you advertise the fact that your house is ripe for a break-in, you put mine at risk, too.

Hallowe’en advertising, great.  Political advertising, great, even if you don’t agree with me.  “Nobody home” advertising, reprehensible and creepy.

Darn weatherstripping

Nothing says "Your neighbors hope you'll vote on this issue" like a hand-folded leaflet delivered to your door by a neighbor.

The problem is the darn weatherstripping.

Most of us know that it's illegal to put anything that's not US mail into a mailbox. So there I stand at your stoop, trying to figure out how to leave the leaflet so that it won't blow away.

The problem is that your weatherstripping is so tight that I can't wedge my important flyer between your jamb and your door. I'm all in favor of energy conservation, but I wish I could leave my message for you, confident that it won't take off in the next gust of wind.

Norfolk latches, attached to the door at two points, allow me to fold the flyer and leave it under the latch. Unfortunately, I only found a couple of those.

To the people with the jalousie storm door: I hope it's okay that I wedged the flyer between two of your louvers.

After delivering to 4 1/2 streets yesterday, I have new respect for letter carriers.

Thoughts for election day

I don't usually pass along those chain emails, but I liked this one so much I sent it on to my friends and family.

My 20 People

You're part of my 20 people, hoping you will send this on to your 20 so we get this out before election day.

If each person contacts a minimum of twenty people then it will only take three days for most people (in the U.S. ) to receive the message.

It is time.

FIX CONGRESS!!!!!
**********************************

Congressional Reform Act of 2010

1. Term Limits.

12 years only, one of the possible options below.
A. Two Six-year Senate terms
B. Six Two-year House terms
C. One Six-year Senate term and three Two-Year House terms

2. No Tenure / No Pension.

A Congressional rep collects a salary while in office and receives no pay when
out of office.

3. Congress (past, present and future) participates in Social Security.

All funds in the Congressional retirement fund move to the Social Security system immediately. All future funds flow into the Social Security system, and Congress participates with the American people.

4. Congressional reps can purchase their own retirement plans, just as all Americans do.

5. Congress will no longer vote themselves a pay raise. Congressional pay will rise by the lower of Consumer Price Index or 3%.

6. Congress loses its current health care system and participates in the same health care system as the American people.

7. Congress must equally abide by all laws they impose on the American people.

8. All contracts with past and present Congressional reps are void effective
1/1/11:
The American people did not negotiate these contracts with their representatives.
The representatives made all these contracts for themselves.

Serving in Congress is an honor, not a career. The Founding Fathers envisioned citizen legislators who would serve their term(s), then go home and back to work.

Please feel free to cut and paste this message into your own emails. And please vote on November 2.

Web search contest

Despite my smoking' hot search technique, I can't seem to draw a bead on a seemingly simple piece of information:

How much has snowfall in Summit, NJ, changed over the past few decades?

I'd like to go back to before 1970, because I know how the mean overall precipitation has changed since then. But, except for a few record-breaking years, the only snowfall information I can find is averaged.

This information might as well be classified. Just to be sure I wasn't missing something basic, I called in the big guns. I contacted a reference librarian at QandANJ.org. Believe it or not, she couldn't find it either.

I'm pretty sure that the Snow & Ice Management Association has the information. I bet they give it out to members only, given how hard it is to find.

So here's the contest:

Be the first to find me changes in snowfall since, say, 1960. It doesn't have to be just Summit. It can be Union County. Or it can be all New Jersey. I don't need individual year info. It can be decade-over-decade averages.

If you can find that information, you get your choice of delicacy from pastryparadise.com* and my profuse thanks. Good luck.

* Offer valid in continental US and Canada only.

Site Owners: Win an iPod or a day of consulting

 

I went to alexa.com this morning to tinker with my site listing, and saw a banner that said “Take the 2010 State of Online Marketing Survey.” Anyone reading this blog knows that share my opinions freely. So I did. I like (well-designed) surveys; they make me think.

The survey is sponsored by Linkdex. But when you try to learn more about Linkdex, you end up at http://blog.influencefinder.com/

 

If you scroll down to the very bottom of the blog page you'll see in a 30% screen that Linkdex owns its copyright. To learn more, you have to strike out on your own: Linkdex is a search intelligence firm based in the UK.

Now, if you take the survey, your name goes into a drawing for one of two iPods, or for a free day of website marketing consulting. That’s not enough to induce me to give Linkdex my email address. But if you take the survey and give them your email address and you win, I’ll be happy for you.

Find the survey here: http://www.alexa.com/siteowners

A Modest Proposal for Preventing Passengers Boarding Air Carriers from Being a Burden to Their Fellow Passengers

Whenever I fly, I wonder why the airlines board passengers from the front of the plane to the back. Premier and business class travelers, whose seats are so much more comfortable than mine, may prefer to stow their carry-ons and take their ease. That makes sense.

Economy flyers, though, need a better system. When I travel economy, if my seating area is at the back of the plane, I have to wait until last to board. That means I step around or on all those other people who are either still trying to cram their luggage in the overhead compartments, sprawling in their seats or arguing about who has which seat.

Likewise, I don’t understand why people are in such a hurry to get off the plane the minute it lands. If they have tight connections, sure. But many of those people have to pick up their checked baggage at the carousel. It won’t arrive there before they do.

I now modestly propose a more rational system for boarding large aircraft passengers:

First, admit first class and upgraded passengers, passengers with children, and those who need special assistance.

Second, admit everyone sitting in window seats. Then, once the window passengers are seated and out of the aisles, fill the middle seats. When they're out of the way, finally, let in the people with aisle seats.

If people need to make tight connections, they can be sure to reserve aisle seats. Their luggage will be the last stowed, so it should be easily to hand. They can grab it and go.

(Granted, the storage space for carry-on luggage may be used up before the aisle sitters arrive on the plane, but that happens anyway with the current system.)

In a perfect world, the cabin crew would ask other passengers to wait for people on a deadline. They would remind us that instead of a frantic race to the jetway, we could enjoy a serene and leisurely departure.

Think about this the next time you fly, please, and tell me if you don’t think this would make much more sense.

Oakwood Park Youtube Video

Thanks to Maria Ludwig for keeping New Providence residents informed about the upcoming referendum over whether the borough should sell Oakwood Park to Union County for $1.

Today she forwarded the link to this video about the potential sale.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFp9C55h8Gs

Our own Brian Flanagan is running for Union County freeholder. I encourage Union County residents to vote for him.

PS Have you noticed the brick outside the New Providence Library inscribed "No County Park 2009"? I wonder where that came from... kh

Jury Duty

Last time I served jury duty I noticed that some attorneys had efficient voir dires, but some, not so much.

The ones I liked were the attorneys who asked all potential jurors to stand up. They then asked questions such as “Have you ever been arrested for a speeding violation?” or “Has anyone in your family ever served time in a prison?” The people with “yes” answers sat down. This continued until the attorney had an acceptable number of potential jurors to question more closely.

The slowpokes asked each potential juror each question one by one. Once I’d seen the brisk approach, the laborious one struck me as a waste of time. Worse, I wondered if the poky attorneys purposely lengthened the jury selection process in order to rack up more billable hours.

Luckily for me, when I had jury duty yesterday, I sat next to the best-dressed gentleman in the room. He wore a suit and tie, and I’m pretty sure he carried (but did not wear, as we were indoors) a Panama hat.

Once he identified himself as an attorney, I asked him what he thought of my billable hours theory. He made the very good point that many of the prosecution attorneys worked on a contingency basis, meaning that they wanted to spend as little time as possible on each case.

I asked him why he didn’t hang a placard around his neck announcing that he was an attorney, ensuring that he wouldn’t be impaneled. He responded that in many cases, his profession would not affect his selection or decision. I disagreed with my fellow juror, on that point, but who was I to argue with him?

I still maintain that attorneys don’t want to admit any potential juror whose reaction to evidence they could not predict in advance. A rival attorney, with his or her own background in the law, would be a ripe target for a peremptory challenge. Nonetheless, I admired this attorney’s trust in an even-handed jury system. It was an honor to serve with him.

Fortunately or unfortunately for us both, the jury manager dismissed us all that afternoon. I’ve never yet sat on a jury. I hope that at one point I will, as long as the trial doesn’t last too long.

Attn Direct Mailers: US Postage Rates Increasing

If you like to mail things as much as I do, you'll be dismayed to learn that US postage rates will go up on January 2. Better get those promotional mailings out now.

My favorite direct mail piece is the postcard. Besides the fact that the postage is cheaper, postcards cut through the clutter. The recipient doesn't even have to open the envelope. Just flip it over and read the message.

Like E.B. White, postcards challenge us to write tight. If space permits only 50 words but you have 60, something has to go.

Most of all, postcards are physical. They have an eye appeal and heft that email can never rival.

And they're so darned cheap. I just ordered 500 4-color cards for $33 from printsmadeeasy.com. That's only 15 cents each--half the cost of a postcard stamp on January 2. Better get those mailings out now.

Postcards--when you care enough to send something better than email.

Das Kapital

A young friend of mine has taken a bold stand: even though she studies at a prestigious art school, she does not plan to do an internship. She’s as dismayed as I am at the number of companies swelling their rolls with free workers.

I’ve found some interesting work on CraigsList. If I hadn’t, I would abandon it altogether, thanks to the number of companies “hiring” interns, bringing students in to do real jobs. In lieu of pay, they offer no more than to work with colleges to arrange credit. Generous ones also pay for lunch. (What was I saying about “Will work for food”?)

Even if the “hiring” managers, who think they’re getting free workers, don’t know, their HR departments should: these “internships” violate the Fair Labor Standards Act.

The US Department of Labor offers the following definition of an internship

1. The training, even though it includes actual operation of the facilities of the employer, is similar to that which would be given in a vocational school;
2. The training is for the benefit of the trainee;
3. The trainees do not displace regular employees, but work under close observation;
4. The employer that provides the training derives no immediate advantage from the activities of the trainees and on occasion the employer’s operations may actually be impeded;
5. The trainees are not necessarily entitled to a job at the completion of the training period; and
6. The employer and the trainee understand that the trainees are not entitled to wages for the time spent in training.

In short, if companies look for free labor to supplant paid workers, if they want students to perform like skilled employees, they’re in violation.

If they allow an unpaid student into their shop for experience, maybe even to mess up a project or two, cheers to both the company and the student.

Most of the many, many internship postings I’ve read claim to be from startups short on staff and money. Most of them look for students in the “glamour” professions like art, marketing and writing. Nobody posts for interns in positions like bookkeeping or maintenance. I guess those kids are too smart to give away the milk for nothing.

I assume that in the startups' business plans they budget for office space, taxes and their own salaries. They omit funding for glamour jobs, counting on students to perform that work for free.

Instead of student labor, these people should be tapping their social capital.

Goodwill is most important at the beginning and end of a business. At the end of the business, when you try to sell, it’s an intangible asset. But also at the beginning, when you don’t have enough money, you need goodwill. You need that goodwill to raise enough money to convince lenders you deserve more money.

You also need the skills to promote your business. Congratulations to you if you have the skills to do it yourself. If you haven’t, you should have the enough goodwill to convince your friends to help you out. I help my own friends all the time. If you have neither skills nor goodwill, maybe you should rethink your plans.

Most kids in school today are training to be knowledge workers. Their art, writing and marketing skills are their capital; their creative output is their work product. You wouldn’t steal a cobbler’s last or new shoes or a chandler’s wax or candles. You shouldn’t use kids’ knowledge for free, either, even if everybody else is doing it.

Here’s how to “flag” postings for unpaid interns on Craigslist. Open the posting. If it offers no money, click on “prohibited” in the upper right corner. The posting won’t disappear right away, but if enough people flag, it will. When that happens enough, companies will get the message.

On behalf of everyone who likes to be paid for their work, thank you.

No Mulligans for Slater

Customer service workers the world round have cheered Steven Slater since Monday.

Slater was the JetBlue flight attendant who'd grinned and borne passenger rudeness one time too many. After a passenger dropped the f-bomb on him on Monday, he delivered a maledictory speech on the plane's PA system, grabbed a beer and deployed the emergency chute.

On Thursday, though, he asked for his job back.

No mulligans, Steven. A last stand is a last stand. That's why we honor and remember them.

What if Chief Joseph had said, "I will fight no more...unless I can round up more warriors."?

Asking for your job back says that you value the job more than you do your pride. That customers can heap indignity upon you, knowing that even if you lose your cool, you'll crawl back and ask for more.

You say you love flying. Wouldn't you love it just as much jetting from speaking engagement to speaking engagement plugging your new book Emergency Exit: Mollifying Your Customer-Facing Staff?

That strategy didn't work well for Chief Joseph, but Chief Joseph didn't have the internet and YouTube to promote himself. Nor did he have Craiglist, which apparently abounds in unpaid ghostwriters. Judging by all the Craigslist postings in New York and New Jersey, all you have to do is call the honor of writing your book an "internship" to find free scriveners. So stand your ground.

(My posting 80/20 Rule was just a little ahead its time, apparently.)

Follow Me (apologies to Phil Collins and Genesis)

Stay with me
My friend, I hope you’ll always be
Right here on my list if ever I read you
Oh, my friend

With long lists
We look trendy, 2.0
And every day is such a perfect day to tweet
In cyberspace

I will follow you. Will you follow me
All the days and nights that we know will be?
I will stay with you. Will you stay with me?
Just one single tweet in a single week.

Twitter counts
Every follower, so long lists
Imply we’re so popular
Not out of it, fading away.

I can say
Our time is short, but I don’t tweet
Very much, so we’re better with traffic shared
Infrequently

I will follow you. Will you follow me
All the days and nights that we know will be?
I will stay with you. Will you stay with me?
Just one single tweet in a single week.

Facebook: Finally

I got tired of saying "No, but I'm sure I could learn it," when prospective employers asked me if I used Facebook for social networking.

Lo, I could. I signed on yesterday and I already have 66 friends, mostly thanks to the fact that my friends already had plenty of mutual friends. Had I joined two years ago, I would have had to make a lot of those connections myself.

May I say that it took me all morning? I'm sure it won't take so much time in the future, but even so, that's a lot of time.

What I found spooky was that, as a first-time user, Facebook seemed to know a lot about me. I did not upload all my email contacts, and yet Facebook suggested half a dozen "People You May Know." It was right.

Uncanny.

I Like This Calendar, Too

At the beginning of every academic year I usually buy a new calendar so that I can note all the important dates through the following June. Younger members of the family, whom one would hope could do this for themselves, swear that they aren’t allowed to write anything but homework assignments in their daily planners.

The handiest format to manage multiple schedules is a grid with space for each family member. I’ve complained in the past that most of these calendars feature dancing hippos, as though someone managing three or more schedules was in fact childlike.

I’m pleased to announce that yesterday I found a dignified new calendar with spaces for five people’s schedules. The Day Runner Mom’s LifeTracker™ is blotter-size, with 3 1/3 x ½ inches to each person’s daily appointments.

Instead of balloon and candy corn decorations, it sports a tasteful abstract chocolate brown and sage design. In other words, if I had to manage multiple schedules at work as well, I wouldn’t be ashamed to put this calendar on my desk.

Also, it has an absorbent finish instead of a glossy one. Glossy paper looks prettier, but only until I forget how slowly it absorbs ink. Then I turn over the page before the appointments have dried, and I smudge the entire month.

My sole quibble with the LifeTracker is that it only runs through June, 2011. Usually academic calendars run through the end of the following year. If I end up loving it, I won’t mind going back to the store next summer, but I would have appreciated the flexibility to procrastinate a month or two.

Like the Post It Weekly Planner pictures and product information about the LifeTracker are hard to find online. I like to think that’s because it’s such a hot new product that Mead’s web designers haven’t caught up with the product designers.

A word from the calendar aficionada: if this sounds good to you, I advise you to get your Mom’s LifeTracker early. Last year another Mead product, the five-star flex hybrid notebinder sold out in August and wasn’t available anywhere until October.

Resources for People Who Hate Networking

Maybe this is why I quit real estate: I hate networking.

Don’t get me wrong. I do it. My business card is attractive; I hand it out proudly. I send out lots of holiday cards. I go out of my way to get together with people. I forward interesting articles. I lend out my books (note: a few of them I do want back, okay? You know who you are.) But networking itself, getting on the phone and asking for favors, is so darned uncomfortable.

So I typed “hate networking” in my search engine. Here are some interesting results in case you hate it, too.

Networking for People Who Hate Networking by Penelope Trunk. You may especially enjoy point #5, “You don’t have to get off the sofa.”

How to not hate networking on Gravity Blog. I liked this one because it reminded me of the advice I often give out-of-shape people: people are not really going to look down on you at the gym. 80% is just showing up. And going back.

Crazy Networking at MeetUp.com. This looks like fun. I want to try it next time I’m in Toronto.

7 Networking Tips for Generation Y. Rebecca Thorman gives a good justification for that expensive haircut you wanted anyway.

Networking for the Networking-Phobic by Susan P. Joyce. Joyce offers several practicable and novel networking ideas. This is my favorite, “Take your lucky charm(s) with you. Scientific research shows that they do help you feel more confident!”

Ladies, only read this one when you’re exhausted. Why Men Have Stronger Professional Networks than Women by Kevin Fogarty. I like an excuse to say, “So that’s why it’s not working out.”

And here’s a tip: I met a woman at a cocktail party. Her first question to me was, “What can I do for you?” It was a little contrived, sure, but I liked it better than if she had set me on guard by immediately delivering her elevator pitch. I’ll try it someday soon.

Trust Me

"Bob said that in the old days, a handshake was good enough to seal a deal," said a relative over dinner, talking about Bob's experience growing up in textile country, back when Americans still made clothes in North Carolina. "They didn't need any lawyers."

I remembered old home ec books, with instructions for turning old dresses into jumpers, and making dad's old shirts into pinafores for little girls.

"Clothes were expensive in those days," I said. "Things were cozy. Manufacturers all knew one another. They could agree on a handshake."

"It's only when outsiders got into the industry that not everybody knew one another. Then they needed contracts to spell out their expectations. Those outsiders shook things up, and they drove prices down."

The relative did not appreciate my opinion, but her husband, an attorney, did.

I've been thinking about trust lately. As I said, I have a great idea. To submit a patent application, I need an engineer to think it through. But how do you find the right engineer, somebody you can trust not to steal your idea? You don't look them up in the Yellow Pages. You ask around. And when you find what you hope is the right person, you draw up a paper agreement, just in case.

Which is Poorly Made in China, a new book by Paul Midler, fascinated me. Midler lives in southern China. He negotiates and performs quality control on behalf of US importers of Chinese manufactured goods.

He describes how, after a couple of shipments, Chinese producers begin a process Midler calls "quality fade," subtly and gradually substituting less expensive materials or processes. Or when the importer gets a big order from an American customer, the producer announces a price hike. Or increases production runs and exports to another country.

Is it that the Chinese producers have no respect for the paper contracts they sign? Or is it that they view Americans as capitalist running dogs who deserve to be swindled?

Minutes after I closed Poorly Made in China, I picked up the Star Ledger and read Kelly Heyboer's article about Centenary College's closing its Chinese and Taiwanese satellite campuses. Cheating there was so widespread that administrators declared that they could not confer the MBAs the students had enrolled for.

Until it's violated, we don't realize how much we rely on trust, nor how expensive it would be to have to police every transaction.

Midler says that the Chinese are only able to copy Western products, but Heyboer describes wristwatches that allow people taking competitive entrance exams to share answers. I doubt Americans are making or using those. Not yet.

How do you guard against Dick Tracy watches in exams? Make everybody test naked?

Anyway, you can be sure I won't outsource my patent application to China. Keep your fingers crossed for me, ok?

Who's David Foster Wallace?

I heard a piece on Weekend Edition about a site called IWriteLike.com. You put in a sample of your writing. The site parses it and tells you which writer your writing style resembles.

I submitted this entry and IWriteLike told me I write like David Foster Wallace.

Who's he? Hee hee.

I write like
David Foster Wallace

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

SCORE!

I have a great idea for a patent...at least my family thinks so. I need an engineer to work with me on the design. I think I know how to proceed, but what if I overlook a problem or an opportunity?

I called SCORE, the Service Corps of Retired Executives.

How SCORE Works

SCORE "Counselors to America's Small Business" is a nonprofit association dedicated to educating entrepreneurs and helping small business start, grow and succeed nationwide. SCORE is a resource partner with the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA).

SCORE has 364 chapters and 12,400 volunteers throughout the United States and its territories. Both working and retired executives and business owners donate time and expertise as business counselors.

My appointment is next week. Even if my idea is not the huge success we all hope for, it's fun to dream. Please keep your fingers crossed.

Here's how to find SCORE Offices near you.

Comparison Shopping: Permission-Based Email

I've been thinking for a while about getting a Constant Contact account, especially now that I've taken on a big volunteer project (but that's a posting to itself.)

Constant Contact is a permission-based email service. You can use it to send emails to people who have agreed to received your emails (no spamming). You get good reports back as to how many people received and opened your emails. For small organizations that send out limited numbers of emails, the charge is $15 a month, which seems pretty reasonable.

But as I mentioned before, today is the last day to renew website domains before the price goes up. As long as I was at GoDaddy I thought I would update my profile. Under the "Support and Community" tab they had an Express Email forum for permission-based marketers.

I spent at least 10 minutes flipping around on the site trying to figure out if they charged for Express Email. Finally I had to resort to Google, whereupon I learned that Express Email offers all the features I wanted from Constant Contact for half the price or less. (One month is $7.99/mo; thirty six months is $6.39/mo.)

The main difference is that with Constant Contact I can send unlimited emails. GoDaddy would limit me to 500/mo. If you start receiving oodles of professionally-formatted emails from me, you'll know why.

Reminder: renew your domains today to avoid the 7% price increase.

Organic SEO in a Nutshell

The quote below about search engine optimization appeared in Mentor Solutions LLC's newsletter for plastic surgeons. The article gives some concrete ideas for attracting internet visitors by focusing the search engines on your website.

(I)f you are not appearing on a SERP for the keywords related to your business, you are missing out on a huge opportunity. You are doing business on a street that isn’t on the map and that might as well have road blocks at all of its entrances.

80/20 Rule

Lloyd and I put together a fish and chips stand.

This weekend, our neighbor organized a block-long yard sale. We set up under a tree and soon people queued up for astonishingly delicious deep fried striped bass and potatoes.

The 80/20 rule says that 80% of your business comes from 20% of your customers, and that you'll never please the bottom 20% of your customers.

I'd say it was more like the 95/5 rule, but we did have one woman who was so annoying I finally told her off. She wanted bigger fillets. So for her second order I gave her the biggest fish chunks we had, fresh out of the wok. She insisted over and over that she wanted more fish on her first plate as well.

"Ma'am, this costs two dollars. Two dollars. You can barely get an order of fries at McDonalds for that," I snapped. She took her plates and wandered away, grumbling.

We hardly "netted" the cost of supplies, and if you count the labor, we actually came out behind. That was not the point of the exercise; it was to have fun being neighborly and show off Lloyd's tremendous catch (120 pounds) and his 60,000 BTU camp stove.

The customer is not always right. Two dollars a plate was a steal and still this woman wanted more. I bet fast-food workers around the world only wish they could tell off their unreasonable customers the way I did.

PS The food processor does a better job than I ever could at slicing potatoes. Is it a coincidence that Americans started growing fatter at the same time that the Cuisinart arrived at US department stores?

You Don't Own Me: 1099 Work

It amuses me that one of my freelance jobs at the moment is writing blog entries for a law firm, from scratch. So far they haven't complained.

With that dubious legal imprimatur, permit me to comment on independent contracting. Having been the VP of Finance of a very small independent contracting firm (one contractor, full-time, and me, putting in a few hours when the quarterly taxes were due) I do know a little about this.

Independent contractors are supposed to deliver contracted work products, period. A construction contractor delivers a building, within specs. A 1099 programmer delivers a completed computer program. A realtor delivers a signed real estate contract.

Theoretically, employers should provide benefits to employees according to the Fair Labor Standards Act. They cannot exert the same control over 1099 workers, to whom they do not provide benefits.

The employer does not tell the independent contractor when, where or how to work. The Department of Labor supposedly looks askance at an employer who says, "You'll work in our office from 8:30 to 5 on these days," or otherwise dictates how the work is completed.

In other words, you can't bring in someone who would otherwise be an employee and say, "We declare you an independent contractor, so we're not going to pay you benefits."

But in fact the Department of Labor is a little mushy on this topic. The DOL is unlikely to enforce the distinction unless the employer deprives workers of benefits on a massive scale.

And if independent contractors protest, independently, that it's inappropriate for clients or customers to attempt to control how we work, we're unlikely to find more work with those customers again.

Yet it behooves freelancers all, collectively, to understand how the law works, and to be able to protest its violation if necessary. The Fair Labor Standards Act exists for our benefit, too.

Harlan Ellison Blasts Amateur Writers

Ann Brenoff at WalletPop.com reports that increasing numbers of employers expect people to work for free to get their feet in the door. She also reports on a backlash, not only from the Department of Labor, but also from professionals such as author Harlan Ellison.

Ellison "calls writers who work for nothing "amateurs" and says they make it tough for the professionals," according to Brenoff's paraphrase.

I'm honored to be quoted in the same article as Ellison. If you scroll down to the very bottom, there I am, recommending a Craigslist posting that I found hilarious.

As I look for more of my own freelance work, you will probably see a few more pieces here about "internship" violating the Fair Labor Standards Act.

10 Reasons to Visit njcommuniques.blogspot.com

10. either Katharine or Lloyd is a friend of yours
9. you plan to leave a comment with a link to your own blog
8. you want ideas for promoting your own product, business or nonprofit
7. it's raining and you're bored today
6. you want to recommend Katharine for a job and you'd like to see what she's up to
5. you want to learn more about the Flag Code, Four Letter Functionals or Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt
4. you're thinking of starting a blog of your own and you'd like to see how someone you know does it
3. you've been meaning to for a while, but...
2. Katharine knows how to do things on the cheap so maybe you'll get some ideas
1. it's witty (or at least it has its moments)

Flag on That Play

I don't pledge my allegiance to the flag, but to the republic for which it stands.

The US flag symbolizes the men and women who have followed it into battle. Because of their sacrifice, our flag requires respect.

This is not respect. This is somebody saying, "Wow, won't we look patriotic if we put American flags on our fleet?"

Umm...no. You would look more respectful if you looked up the guidelines for displaying the flag, known as the "flag code."

You can find an explanation of the flag code at
http://www.senate.gov/reference/resources/pdf/RL30243.pdf.

I'm as guilty as anyone else. I used to wear those American flag shirts from Old Navy. Now I understand that "No part of the flag should ever be used as a costume or athletic uniform. However, a flag patch may be affixed to the uniform of military personnel, firemen, policemen, and members of patriotic organizations."

Now I leave the display of the flag to those who have earned that honor.

And, in honor of Flag Day, today, I remind you not to decorate your truck, or your trunk, or your table, with the flag.

Learn more about the flag code at
http://www.senate.gov/reference/resources/pdf/RL30243.pdf.

Marketing Works

In 2010, four years after I gave up my residential real estate practice, people still ask me if I'm in real estate.

The message stuck. Something about my marketing worked--albeit a little slower than I hoped for.

Two Suggestions for IFF and Schering-Plough

I sniffed the latest Coppertone on the shelves at the drugstore, but came up without the signature jasmine scent. I would have bought it if it had smelled like Coppertone.

Instead I bought another SPF 70 brand.

Down Lloyd and I drove to Sandy Hook, right past the International Flavors & Fragrances (IFF) plant in Hazlet. He refused to put on sunscreen before we launched (too early.) HOURS later when the sun was strong he refused to put on sunscreen because its scent would get on his line and lures and scare away the fish.

So, Schering-Plough, here are my suggestions:
1) let Coppertone smell like Coppertone
2) make a special scent for fisherfolk. I'm sure IFF can help you. Something that smells tasty to fluke. You can call it something manly like "Bait" or "Lure" or just "Men-haden," ha ha. He has to shower and throw his clothes in the washer after a day of fishing anyway. What does it matter what he smells like as long as he wears the sunscreen?

Just for fun

I took on an advertising project just for fun this morning. The challenge was to come up with catchy slogans for safe sex.

There's some good competition already.

After I hit "send" I realized what I had done: I had written Burma Shave ads for the 21st century. Boy, did I enjoy it.

If the advertiser doesn't want them, you'll be seeing them here.

Want to suggest more? Please leave a comment.

Get 'em now before the price goes up

I'm embarrassed to mention this idea because it's so basic, but I'm surprised how many website owners don't do it: put the keywords your potential visitors will be using into domain names. Buy those domain names and link them back to your website.

For example, if you sell material handling systems in New Jersey, buy "NewJerseyConveyor.com"

One of the things the search engines look at is the names of websites. Sites with those names usually have useful information for people looking for those topics. Plus, it helps to have other websites linking back to your website. So people looking for material handling systems are likelier to find your website, just when they're researching, and, I hope, buying.

Compared to keyword ads, buying domain names is remarkably inexpensive, about $10 a year. But prices are poised to rise 7% on July 1, so if you plan to do this, you might want to do it now, especially if you want to buy a lot of domain names.

And if yours is a personal business, buy your name as well, for example, katharinehadow.com. Someone may not remember what you call your business, but they may recall your name. Make it easier for them to find you.

Boomers, Brace Yourselves for the Brash

When I was interviewing at a law firm, I called an attorney friend of mine.

"How would you market a law firm?" I asked. I heard him stiffen over the phone.

"I wouldn't," he said through clenched teeth. He went on to tell me that when he worked at The Great White Shoe Law Firm, his business card didn't even include his telephone number.

Silent Generation, meet the Class of 2010. Maybe the law firm's understated campaign was a reaction to the breadlines of the Depression. It was probably a relief not to have to scrounge for the next client or customer, and a source of pride to stay aloof from sordid promotion.

Check out the picture of the woman with a sandwich board in Something's not working The Economist's story about the current US labor market. Her sign reads "Jennifernyc@earthlink.net/LAID-OFF/TODAY/9:45 A.M./HIRE ME."

Can "Will Work for Food" be far behind?

As The Economist points out, "about as many Americans are working as in the autumn of 1999-in a population that is larger by 28m." Competition is stiff, especially among those with no job experience. I predict that we will see self-promotion in this cohort that will horrify older generations.

500 LinkedIn contacts. Business cards at church. Realtor-style name badges. Email blasts. Skywriting, if they can afford it. Effrontery and chutzpah, because the ones who fail to market themselves will be left behind, even with their expensive college educations.

"How...tacky," I can already hear people sniff. "I didn't push myself on people like that. They look so desperate."

Actually, they are desperate. Wall Street Journal humorist Joe Queenan writes in A Lament for the Class of 2010, "Baby Boomers conveniently forget that it didn't set anyone back a year's salary to go to college in the 1960s and 1970s, and that college graduates back then were not entering a work force filled with other college grads."

These youngsters are competing for a limited number of jobs. They're competing against people with a lot more experience. Get ready now for a lot of young people who want your job, or any job. The smart ones are going to figure out how to promote themselves just the way Oscar-Mayer pushes processed meat.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I think I'll go look for a name badge.

Edit: you may also be interested in this comment on job prospects in the UK.

Is 3M Ashamed of the Post-it Weekly Planner?

You can’t get there from here.

I wish I had the kind of life where I made lists of tasks and delegated them to someone else. I do make the lists. And then I end up delegating the tasks back to myself.

Sometimes when there are too many, the tasks grow hard to prioritize. That’s why this week I went out and bought myself a new Post-It® Weekly Planner.

Instead of either
a) feeling sure that this task was so important that I would remember it—no need to write it down (oops!) or
b) writing it down in my daily planner--and then reproaching myself at the end of the day when it was not done (oops!)
the Post-It Weekly Planner lets me jot down every task on a “Super Sticky” Post-it. Once they’re written out, I can shuffle them around.

The Planner comes with a weekly grid for me to lay out the chores; I put the most urgent or the most important ones first. But if those jobs don’t get done, well, I just move them to the next day on the grid and try again.

The Planner does wonders for my peace of mind. But even after my description, you may be wondering what it looks like. So I thought I would provide you with a link to a description and a picture on 3-M’s website.

I can’t find it, and I’m a good Googler. You try it. Type Post-It Weekly Planner in your search engine. By the end of the second “e,” your auto-complete will fill in the entire name for you. “What’s so hard about this?” you’ll say.

At the top of the search you’ll find 3M’s Specialty Notes page. “It must be here,” you’ll say, “probably near the easel notes or the bulletin boards.”

But it’s not. You can’t get there from here.

3M just does not want you to find their Weekly Planner on their website. You can’t even search for it by part number (46-0001-4108-8).

I’m sure glad I know where to find them offline. Otherwise I might still be saying to myself, "Oh, yeah...I needed one of those Post-it Calendar thingies..."

"You'll get a laugh out of the hairstyles," my husband said, handing me the March, 1966 edition of the National Geographic. He wanted me to read an article about the Soviet Union.

Here's what really struck me: the unsophisticated advertising. One 4" 1-column ad bore a cartoon of a man in a beret with a palette and easel.

Design your different vacation in GALA MISSOURI
Free booklet shows you the variety and value that has made Missouri the "Vacation Capital of the Midwest."

Once Burma-Shave ended its iconic rhyming signs campaign in 1963, apparently there wasn't much advertising clutter to compete with back then. Madison Avenue types could whip out ads like this even after 3-martini lunches--no unique selling propositions necessary.

The ads in the 1966 National Geographic reminded me of the ones I see in trade journals now, earnest and informative. In an expanding economy, I guess you didn't need to be witty. All you had to do was lay out the product benefits. Mom and Pop would write away for your travel brochure and load up the station wagon. Apparently, it worked. Branson, MO's website now announces.

"And in 2010, Branson is celebrating 50 years of family entertainment!"

By contrast, the ads in the January, 2009, National Geographic are arch (a stomach-turning shot of a man in too-short gym shorts, knee-high tube socks, Converse high-tops, headband and wooden tennis racket: SURVIVE THE '70s? YOU DESERVE SPECIAL TREATMENT) or suggestive (Buck Naked Blue Beauties: Feast your eyes on a colossal 350 carats of raw sapphire). Advertisers are fighting much harder now to pry those dollars away from consumers.

I may not want to turn back the clock to simpler advertising, but I'd like to turn back to the thriving economy that allowed it to succeed.

Mystery Shopping

It's a mystery to me why, when I visit a local business, I find posters in the front window advertising the firefighter's barbecue that took place two months before. Why doesn't the proprietor simply hang out a poster instead that reads,

I don't care what my business looks like to my customers.
I never walk in the front door, anyway.
In fact, that's why I never flip over the "open" sign,
even when my business is clearly shut for the night.

Often what I don't find is some indication of when the business is open. I'm a real, live customer with money in her wallet, but I don't know if I have to wait 15 minutes or an hour and 15 minutes until I can get inside and buy something. Meh. I have other things to do than wait around.

I understand that freehand painting store hours on the window is expensive--and what if you decide to change your hours? But last time I checked, Staples sold lighted signs for $129.99, and if you really don't want to make a commitment, there's the flimsy plastic sign for $5.49.

While you're putting up signs, can you somehow mark your street number? I know it seems like no big deal to you, but if I'm walking down the block in high heels, I really do want to know if 350 Main Street is close at hand. This issue has been raised in New York City. Let's spread our concern all around the country, at least where I shop.

Finally, nothing says "the heck with my customers" like snow treatment. As a pedestrian, believe me, I remember which businesses barely clear one shovel width of snow, and which ones think that sprinkling a little salt suffices.

You have sidewalks. They're good for walk-in traffic. You have snow. Sorry, but them's the breaks.

I wish I'd written that ad

I could not take my eyes off the ad last night, and I watched the commercials hoping it would play again. It featured a racially-ambiguous woman boasting about her white pants and fabulous hair, and I had to wait till the very end to find out which feminine hygiene product she was selling.

Kotex. Kotex? My grandmother used Kotex.

I'm having computer problems this morning or I would research this further, but I believe Kotex was the first commercially-available feminine hygiene product. Kimberly-Clark or their predecessors introduced it after the success of disposable bandages during World War I.

Apparently the brand has reinvented itself. Whoever wrote that ad must have had a lot of fun with it. I envy them. I am actually looking forward to trying it out.

No April Fool joke here.

Oh, Right, a BRANDING Ad

I have blogged before about how I feel when ad salespeople ask me if I want my ads for "branding" or if I want the person seeing it to take a specific action.

I have felt irritated. Of course I want the "ad spend" to pay off in real benefits.

Those of you with professional advertising experience chuckled, I'm sure. After all, most of my experience with advertising has been for non-profits. The nice thing about doing marketing and PR for non-profits is that publishers understand that there is little or no budget for advertising. A non-profit is not going to buy a random "branding" ad, and a publisher will still grant the non-profit coverage space. Thank you, publishers.

But publishers are like any other businesses. They have expenses, which they can meet either through ad revenue or subscription revenue. Both are in free-fall now thanks to the Internet.

Although publishers would like to maintain that wall between advertising and editorial departments, they have to keep the lights on, too. I'm sure readers would like to believe that coverage springs purely from a disinterested editor pointing out what's new and noteworthy in the market. But if it were your publication, wouldn't you want to devote space and attention to an organization that proved that it had your publication's interests at heart?

Maybe once or twice, you might allocate a little space to a new product or contact, and hope that the contact would turn into an advertiser. But over and over? Not likely.

An editor made that clear to me in an email:

TO GET COVERAGE -- PLEASE NOTE THE FOLLOWING

We get literally hundreds of incoming e-mails DAILY from people and organizations seeking coverage.

The sad fact is, most of these submissions, no matter how good, important or legitimate, won't make it into our magazines or onto our website.

Space and time and staff are limited and we simply can't do all these submissions proper justice.

If you want to GUARANTEE coverage of your event/story, please read on.

LET'S ALL TRY A NEW, "WIN-WIN" APPROACH

If you or your clients are willing to buy ads in our magazines, we are willing to work with you to get your story properly covered. You scratch our backs, we scratch yours. The more you are willing to advertise, the more we're willing to do for you.

It's not what we want to think happens in the media, but of course it makes sense. He has bills to pay, and his readers are not paying them. Someone has to. (This particular publication was rather small and specialized, but if he came right out and said it, don't you think other publishers are thinking it?)

So I have redefined branding ads for my own purposes. A branding ad is an ad that I have no hope will ever pay off in measurable results. I take out the ad to support the publication, hoping that one day, down the line, the editor will return the favor. And because I like the fact that there are still real publications written by real journalists.

Branding ads, by the way, are more fun. I can be fanciful, without having to hammer home those pesky calls to action.

Helpful Suggestions for LinkedIn

1) Add an algorithm
Sorry, Julie Shaw. When you lived in town we were fast friends and saw one another all the time. But you moved. When I tried to reconnect to you on LinkedIn I learned that there are 212 of you. I'm not sure of the name of the company where you work anymore. I'm not going to sift through hundreds of names to see if you have signed up on LinkedIn. So, unfortunately, you and I are not going to connect on LinkedIn until I see that one of our mutual acquaintances has already done the legwork.

Or, there may be three people with a more distinctive name, but I still can't recognize them. Maybe I know Elois as a writer for Widget Gazette, but he lists his employer as United Media Publishers.

With Elois I may take a chance (if I'm pretty sure he'll recognize my name) and send him a message saying, "Is this the Elois who wrote the fascinating roundup of the widget industry last fall? If so, would you like to network on LinkedIn?"

There is a penalty for being wrong, however. Did you ever click on the

Only invite people you know well and who know you. Find out why.

link? You'll learn that

"recipients can indicate that they don’t know you.
If they do, you’ll be asked to enter an email address with each future invitation."

This is a good thing. If you and I exchanged two emails (or you paid me a sales call) two years ago, and you import all your contacts, but I do not remember you, no, I don't want to link up with you. Thanks anyway. I'm going to indicate that I don't know you and LinkedIn will eventually penalize you.

LinkedIn's privacy policy says

"Any other use of LinkedIn (such as seeking to connect to someone a User does not know or to use LinkedIn as a means of generating revenue through the sale of contacts or information to others) is strictly prohibited and is a violation of this Agreement.....LinkedIn may limit the number of connections you may have to other Users and prohibit you from contacting other Users through use of the Services."

But what if I'm just unlucky, and with all the genuine goodwill in the world I send too many invitations to the wrong people? Will LinkedIn limit the number of my connections? Unfair. I think LinkedIn needs an algorithm based on how common a name is. If there are 800 Barbara Andersons, then my reaching out to the wrong Barbara should count a lot less than if I mistakenly contact, say, Katharine Hadow.

2) Change your default invitation
Also, (I have already suggested this to LinkedIn) their default invitation needs to change. If I invite Patrick to connect, the default message that LinkedIn offers me is "I'd like to add you to my professional network on LinkedIn."

Apparently not everyone has learned by now that people tune in to WIFM--"What's in it for me?" So now when I send invitations, I change the default text to something more focused on the other person: "Would you like to network on LinkedIn?"

It's the difference between an official telling you, "I need you to fill out this form," which makes me want to respond, "I don't really care what you need," and that same official saying, "Would you please fill out this form?" Same basic message, but focused on the other person.

Oh, and by the way, if you want to write me a recommendation on LinkedIn but you don't know what to say, please let me know. I have some helpful suggestions for you, too.

Oakwood Park Decision Goes to Referendum

New Providence residents are relieved, annoyed or as yet entirely unaware that the borough council has tabled the question of deeding Oakwood Park to Union County. I wish I could say that it would be decided by a referendum in November, but in fact the council has made the referendum non-binding, which means that afterward they can say, "Ha ha! Only kidding! We'll do it our way after all!"

Whose Snow Is It, Anyway?

Here in New Jersey's suburbs, where we get about 50" of precipitation a year, we don't think much about riparian rights. We leave it to people west of the Rockies to rival each other in taking more water out of the Colorado River.

After a large blizzard, though, we do think about who owns the snow. At least I do.

The government clears the snow off the public roadways with large and powerful snow plows. The private citizen, on the other hand, removes snow from his or her driveway and walkways by shovel, blower or plow.

Here's what goes through the mind of the private citizen: "I have just shoveled/blown/plowed my driveway and along comes the public snow plow, depositing an enormous berm at the end of my driveway. Phooey!

"Also, removing snow from my car and driveway is a lot of work. If I remove it from my car, it falls in my driveway, where I have to remove it again. On the other hand, if I leave it atop my car I can drive out into the public roadway. Then it blows off and the next snow plow pushes it into a ditch, or makes a berm at someone else's driveway. That is so much easier. Besides, I can't reach the top of my SUV to push off the snow anyway."

The state of New Jersey is two steps ahead of that average driver, outlawing driving around with a snow cover on the vehicle. Clearly, this is a safety measure to prevent sheets of ice from flying off flatbed trucks and breaking someone's windshield. But the net effect is that the government is telling people to keep snow on their private property, not on the public roads.

When the government then pushes more (public roadway) snow onto (private) driveways, you can see how the citizenry might be irritated. Citizenry with clout fight back by engaging snow plows. The plows shove the snow out of the private driveways and into the public roadways, neatly destroying berms and making the private snow the responsibility of the public plows.

The rest of us sigh and throw our backs out.

If you're thinking that the answer is to close up your house and fly to Arizona for the winter and fret about how to supplement your 11" of annual rainfall with water from the Colorado, check your insurance policy. Does it require you to plow your driveway, even if you're not there, in case emergency vehicles need to get to your house? Gotcha.

Finally, aren't sidewalks a good example of the tension between public and private snow?

Once I had a blind roommate. I know how vital clear walkways are to independent living.

And many times I have been the muscle behind the snow shovel. I know I would rather remain inside on a snowy day than trudge outside and clear a pathway for other people's benefit.

Shoveling my driveway benefits me, in that it allows me to move my car. Shoveling the sidewalk really doesn't, and yet, if I have one, the government obliges me to clear it--under threat of a fine.

That's part of the protest against adding sidewalks along Woodland Avenue in Summit.

If there were an easy answer, I would include it here. I don't think there is.

Google Wouldn't Do This for Me

Neither would the New York Times

In fact, I'm pretty sure the Star-Ledger doesn't want me to tell you this, but-

My husband brought me a sausage recipe from the newspaper. "Gee," he said, "this looks tasty." Not only that, it would use up some of that cabbage in the refrigerator.

I wrote down the missing ingredients on the shopping list and clipped the recipe. Several days later, when I had all the ingredients, I looked for the recipe but could not find it anywhere.

"No problem!" I said. "I'll find it on their website." I'm a pretty good Googler, but I never did find it. I had to improvise, throwing ingredients in the pan and crossing my fingers. Naturally, I wrote a peevish email to the Star-Ledger, saying that I expected their website to mirror and archive their print content.

I had a very kind email back. Someone named Kim offered to US mail me the only sausage recipes that the Star Ledger had printed within the last month. I felt bad putting her to that trouble; all I had wanted was to express my annoyance. She insisted that she had already pulled the section and the envelope was right in front of her.

The envelope arrived today. "Kim" turned out to be Kimberly Jackson, the Lifestyle editor. And to my delight, it was the right recipe. I'm looking forward to trying it, right after I go shopping again.

Thanks, Ms. Jackson. Thanks, Star Ledger. I'm glad I'm a print subscriber.

We're All Journalists Now, Aren't We?

I'm getting ready for The Big and Influential Trade Show.

As an exhibitor, my company received a list of the registered media planning to attend. Last year I just sent everybody some press releases. This year I'm being more selective, so I looked up each company. And, you know, some of them may have blogs, but I wouldn't call them "media," any more than I would call myself a medium. In fact, a couple of them were PR firms, maybe looking for free admission to the show.

If there were an emoticon for an eye roll, I would use it here.