Pemaquid Communications

There’s a lot of twittering going on about social media lately (pun intended). I’m going to be weighing in on the subject April 7 with a presentation I’ll be giving at the Harrasekett Inn, co-sponsored by the Freeport Merchants Association and the Maine Merchants Association.

Here are the particulars:

We’ll talk about a few Web sites you may have heard of – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube – as well as a few others, with an eye towards harnessing them to develop a sensible strategy for extending your organization’s brand or mission online.

Why me?

Good question indeed. I’ve built my business not on social media, but on the smart Web site design, usability, accessibility and content management, and that’s what I do best.

On the other hand, I also feel passionately about taking a no-nonsense approach to whatever it is you’re doing online, and that includes social media. I also know as much about social stuff as anyone in Maine.

I first bumped into Twitter in March 2007 while attending the South by Southwest interactive conference in Austin, Texas (which I call the Superbowl of Web Design). I twitter up a storm as @portlandhead and maintain @pemaquid (for the biz) and @Bluezberry_Jam (for my band; I play bass in my “spare time”).

I’m also the first (and to my knowledge, still the only) Maine Web designer to have developed Facebook apps. Pemaquid has done four: Bluezberry Jam, Portland Diner, Jenny’s Cards and Lost on Liftoff.

Editor’s note, 3/28/09: since creating this post, I’ve learned of another Mainer who’s created Facebook apps.

Fun Facts

Here are a couple fun facts about social media, to help you understand why it’s so important to use them effectively:

• 5 of the 10 most popular Web sites are social networks
• 3 billion minutes are spent on Facebook each day
• 13 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute

All that and more coming up April 7. See you there!

In the meantime, there’s a comment box below. You can use it. So give me your questions. What would you like to learn?

…but this is a true story. I swear on a stack of Facebooks.

The other day, Sarah Hines, Our Creative Services Coordinator, after much prodding, linked to me. No big deal, right? Well, when browsing her contacts I came across Glenn Skutt. Glenn is someone I used to know more than a decade ago when I worked at Virginia Tech. His wife and mine were in the local community band together; that was the (very slender) thread that linked us.

I linked to Glenn, telling him I was now in Maine and was building Web sites with Sarah. He replied saying he went to school w/Sarah’s mother, and was starting a new startup company called VPT Energy Systems which, by the way, needed a new Web site. Kudos, to you, LinkedIn, I guess your system really works!

But wait, this is where it starts to get really weird.

Glenn mentioned that his partner, Jack Lesko, was vacationing in Maine that very day. To make a long story short, we found out he was old college buddies with the neighbor RIGHT ACROSS THE STREET!!

Sarah and I rushed over to the neighbor’s and asked for the guy from Virginia Tech. I thought they were going to choke on their coffee.

A truly amazing day, a truly small world, and a truly unbelievable set of coincidences. Timing is everything, but this is incredible.

Sincerely,

Rob Landry
Pemaquid Communications, LLC

p.s. Yes, we’ve launched a modest new site for VPT Energy Systems – more on that soon.