That Instafamous Guy

Your friendly neighborhood IG Supehero

Aug
6

By

Funny Story, I used to blog before Instagram came out on Android

Category: So Genius Tags: , , , , 50 Comments

Give me a few seconds to dust off my keyboard.  My last post was over 60 days ago… back in May… can this possibly be true?  Yeah, time stamps don’t lie(usually).  You MIGHT have thought I gave up on blogging, but no. Let’s face it, this isn’t a top 10 social media blog or anything.  It’s not like you’re depending on this site to get your social media fix.  At least I hope not, because you’d be a desperate junky at this point, it’s been 60 days for crying out loud.

The fact of the matter is that I’ve been busy catering to my most engaging audience.  It’s almost as if the people I’ve met on Instagram REALLY do depend on me for their daily dose of skycandy, vintage landscapes, and pretty butterflies.  I only have so much time to devote to social media and I’m no fool, I am drawn to the network where I’m most in demand.  Conversely, it’s been SO rewarding to see something that you created be applauded and praised by hundreds, sometimes thousands, of people daily.  Look at the real-life reactions that I’m getting and tell me this isn’t what I was born to do.

As for the future of this blog, it’s still up in the air.  Maybe we switch gears to a photo blog, not entirely sure.  The purpose of this post is two-fold – 1.) To thank those who have fueled my passion over the last 3-4 months and 2.) Give a sample of my work so others not on Instagram can see it… After all, I do have a website, I might as well use it for something, right?

A brief history lesson… I come from a line of immensely talented artists, on my Mom’s side, pre-dating the 1900′s in Italy. From my Great Grandpa, whom I never met, and my late Grandpa Gino whom I adored, to my Aunt Marie – I’ve always been surrounded by sculptures and oil paintings.  Truth is, I always thought this beautiful gift had skipped a generation.  Oh, but it didn’t skip over me after all. It just laid dormant for my whole life up until Instagram drug it out of me!  It’s furthering the notion that this is meant to be.

Now, it’s one thing to snap a great picture.  Many people are competent with that skill.  However, during this short journey, I’ve been able to exercise my vivid imagination through editing photos.  These two before and after snapshots demonstrate how the mind really is a canvas.


That’s why this isn’t just photography for me, and many others, it’s art.  It’s a way to express oneself and connect with others. As one of my friends said “Images go beyond art, it’s a way of communication that knows no language barrier.”  This is so true, and I’ve embraced my interpretive style.  Take a look at these sunsets – some are edited with my trademarked “Van Gogh effect,” while others are just naturally beautiful.  Either way, these are generally my biggest hits.

 

       

        

      

Here are some other samples of cityscapes, landscapes, and wildlife shots as well.

    

     

     

Well, there you have it, almost.  I’ve been working in financial services for the better part of the last decade.  My sales skills will always be with me but, quite frankly, my talents are being wasted in this current line of work.  30 is a little young to go through a mid-life crisis, I definitely intend to live past 100, so I’m only a 1/3rd of a way through this gig.  Maybe I’m just a lil crazy – but all the great ones are, right?  What do you think, am I delusional or is this something I should pursue?

Thanks for visiting!

 

Apr
11

By

Stay Thirsty Friends – Be the Most Influential Man in the World

Category: So Genius Tags: , , , , , , , 44 Comments

No one in Social Media cares if you are the most interesting man in the world like the Dos Equis Guy… We want to see the most influential man(or woman) in the world! A few names come to mind for that title; but it’s not like Ann Handley, Scott Stratten, & Gary Vaynerchuk need any more accolades. This term influence has become quite the buzzword lately. Who do you influence? How many people do you influence? What is influence? If you’re anything like me, you’ve become nauseous due to influenza from the influence epidemic. Did we break a record for saying influence 7 times in the opening paragraph? Let’s call Klout,since they’re the “standard” of influence( that’s #8!). But before we do that, here are a few ways that you can immediately increase your authority in Social Media

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INFLUENCE FOR $200, ALEX.

Alex Trebek “The number of Timothy Snow’s Klout Score”

You “What is 82”

Alex Trebek “That is correct”

It’s like a game show sometimes, isn’t it? As much as we hate to be poked & prodded, or don’t want big brother watching our every move online, it’s what the people want to know. Like it or not, the measurement apps aren’t going away and you’re always being rated by someone, somewhere. There’s never going to be a perfect assessment of one’s influence, they all have flaws. They often measure your superficial influence, not real influence. You’re not more influential because the cute puppy picture you posted gets shared 30 times or 10 people retweet your retweet of a Mashable story. Real Influence goes beyond an action… beyond the shares and retweets. Influence is the power to persuade, the ability to change people’s thoughts, and sway their pre-conceived beliefs. It’s tricky to measure, but you’ll know the feeling when you’re doing it right.

PERCEPTION IS REALITY

It’s not necessarily how successful you are, it’s how successful others think you are…and I’m not talking about your mom. When you convey a sense of importance, you instantly become more significant. Successful people don’t ask other people to like their fanpage or retweet their blog post. In other words, there’s a fine line between self-promotion and being labeled as a spammer. When you utilize tools like Empire Avenue and Triberr where people promote your content, it makes you appear in-demand. It’s far more effective when others are doing the promotion for you. Also, winners in social media do not clutter their feeds with negative commentary. Remember, winners find ways –losers find excuses. If you’re not getting the desired results, change your tactics.

NETWORK: QUALITY > QUANTITY

While it’s possible to have a marriage of both quality and quality, only a small percentage of influencers will achieve this. Not to say that can’t be you, but I highly recommend building your network through known commodities rather than going for the quick score. There are services that will get you a bunch of twitter followers. You can send friend requests to everyone with a pulse and maxout your 5000 connections in a jiffy. That’s all fine and dandy, but what good are thousands of people who ignore you? Or, what if you don’t relate to what their most talked about topics are? Bottom line, when expanding your network, it’s ok to be picky about who you chum with. It will pay dividends to bring value to those who are more influential than you are. Start supporting them, and you might be surprised how many will start supporting you.

PARTING SHOTS

Before I ask for your thoughts, I didn’t an interesting Twitter experiment that plays into this topic. For the first time, I was approaching a symmetrical number between those I was following and those who followed me right around 1867 last week. Although a bit shallow, one of my own “metrics” when I observed other people was that same follower to following ratio. It’s just human nature, it gives the perception of importance when someone has more followers than they tweeps they follow. So I decided to trim the fat and unfollowed 40 or 50 not-so-active accounts that weren’t following me. In the last few days, I’ve gained 125+ additional followers without doing anything else different. Might be worth considering if you’re in a similar spot with less than 10,000 followers.

Here’s what I’m interested in hearing about – What’s your definition of Influence? Who Influences you most and why do you think that is?