Starting Fires

Two weeks ago, I posted a call to arms for anyone who wanted to be a regular blogger here at Social Media Explorer. It was a call-to-arms for, “smart thinkers, status-quo challengers, tool reviewers and people who understand social media marketing better be about business or you’ll be flipping burgers soon.” I put an exclamation point on the post by saying, “I want to share this platform with thought fire-starters.”

Today, I have my fire-starters. Twelve new authors join Social Media Explorer now, each with a unique perspective, experiences, insights and attitude. (Yeah, I dig attitude.) I’ve asked them to challenge themselves, me and each of you, too. It’s a challenge to raise the level of conversation and discourse here, to make Social Media Explorer an intellectual stimulus for conversations around social media marketing, public relations, digital marketing, online communications, advertising and branding and more.

My challenge to you is to hold us accountable. Sure, there will be posts or topics that don’t stir the pot or challenge our thinking as well as the day before, but what I think we all want is content that doesn’t follow the crowd a chow time but still delivers smart insights to running your business or serving your clients or organization. We want to be helpful, but thought-provoking. Insightful but pot-stirrers. I think that’s what I’ve delivered in the last three years and what you expect of me. My new colleagues will have to be held to that standard.

And those colleagues are stellar. Each was chosen carefully. There are no social media gurus here. They’re all experienced and proven in business, not just blogging. They’ve served their companies, clients or passions with great thinking, smart doing and even smarter questioning over the years. We have category expertise in everything from strategic planning to humor writing, from design to coding. But more importantly, we have 13 people with a passion for learning as well as teaching. More on how they were identified in a moment.

First, and in no particular order other than ladies first (because that’s how my mother raised me) and without me, here are your new contributing authors for Social Media Explorer:

Angela Maiers @AngelaMaiers Angela Maiers	Heather Rast @heatherrast Insights and Ingenuity	Stephanie Schwab @socialologist Socialologist	Eric Brown @Eric_Urbane The Urbane Way	Jordan Cooper @notaproblog Not A Pro Blog	Mark Dykeman @MarkDykeman Thought Wrestling Broadcasting Brain
Andrew Hanelly @hanelly Engage (TMG Custom Media) Really Bad Parenting Advice	Adam Helweh @secretsushi Secret Sushi	Jeff Larche @TheLarch Digital Solid	Ike Pigott @ikepigott Occam’s Razr	Mark Smiciklas @intersection1 Intersection Consulting	Tom Webster @webby2001 Brand Savant

And Helweh has already compiled an SME Author Twitter list for those interested: http://twitter.com/secretsushi/socialmediaexplorer-team

The authors were chosen carefully. I published the call-for-authors because I wanted people who read SME and authors who wanted to write for me. I didn’t want to go begging people to contribute. I established some expectations in the post and reviewed each applicant (I wound up with over 50) for those qualities. Some of the ones I chose I was familiar with (and thrilled they raised their hands). A couple of them I didn’t know well but quickly discovered they had the qualities and experience I was hoping for. I would humbly submit that I will push them to be better than they are. They, in turn, will push me. Each of you, however, will push all of us.

And as an aside, I am not going to stop blogging. No, I won’t write every day in addition to these fine folks. My blogging will be more sporadic, but I’m not going to stop or even slow down. Having more authors means I can focus on diving deeper into some subjects and not worry that missing 2-3 days of posting will affect your expectations. What I’m doing is finding a way to provide you with more excellent content from smart people.

Thank you for continuing to count on Social Media Explorer. Hopefully these new colleagues will further your confidence in us and help you continue to learn and grow as a communicator.