Inspired

I am not going to start off by telling you who inspired this blog, what fun would that be?

I’d rather tell you the story and have you guessing.  The thing is if you’ve read a few of my previous blogs you might be able to figure it out fairly quickly. Or if you’ve seen my latest screw up in hitting publish, instead of save…yeah.

I did that. Again.

But if you haven’t read them all, grab a bag of popcorn and settle in. Because I’ve got a story to tell on how this blog was inspired. And maybe you will be inspired too!

The Prologue

It was a beautiful summer sunset, with the wind was blowing gently as the kids were playing in the yard… just kidding. I’m not that type of inspired writer.

But I do want to start this off by prefacing the fact I somewhat despise blogs. Hate maybe be a more accurate term. I know, it’s bizarre. But there are a lot of blogs that will make you want to gouge out your eyes with a rusty fork.

Either they are too technical (i.e. boring as hell) or they tend to run on for days. And days. And, now some blogs are just a linkfest to other articles and are so short they don’t really provide much insight.

So maybe that’s why I tend to be a bit of a smart ass in most of mine. Keep it entertaining but still insightful and useful, as I like to think of my blog as a mini-personal newspaper. Right under the comic section seems appropriate.

So how was I Inspired? Who is she?

I know, we all want someone to blame for this. So let’s get to it. I’ll give you her phone number and email address later.

To this day, I’m still impressed by how she did it. They always tell you to ‘plant a seed’ with someone, an idea and watch it grow. Let it take its own course into something you have guided them too.

And that’s exactly what happened.  Although, I may have gone slightly overboard on the request.

So originally the concept was that she needed a single article to help build her social feed. These articles would showcase best practices for category managers/sourcing professionals and also support suppliers in reaching out to us.

If you aren’t from the digital marketing world, you wouldn’t know by doing this, can help boost some websites SEO/SEM. I don’t think that was the main intention for the ask, but it definitely wouldn’t hurt.

What it really was geared towards was being shared on other sites like LinkedIn to drive people to the website/tool. And therefore – you guessed it, hopefully, an increase in interest in her tool.

And that was the original intent. So what was I going to get out of it? Self-promotion and putting my name out as a thought leader seemed like a fair cause. Especially after she gave me the opportunity to speak with her regarding her tool at a few conferences. But somewhere along the line, my brain picked it up, bent it and twisted it into something entirely else.

You see, I couldn’t figure out for the life of me where I was going to store these blogs or articles.  Do I publish on LinkedIn? Do I publish on the website she requested? What if someone wants to reach out to me? What if I want to write something completely different?

Because I couldn’t figure out the right approach, I decided to create this website and start my blog. I was inspired and it seemed like the best idea. Despite knowing absolutely nothing about how to create a website, let alone a blog.

But what other solution could there be?! I mean, if it was only once a quarter or whatever cadence she originally asked me to write for her, how was that useful? Why would I half-ass this opportunity?

I had to take the bull by the horns and twist it to something that could really benefit me.  And that was the beauty behind it all. I’m pretty sure she had that planned out from the start. Maybe not.

Either way, when you have someone is a similar type A personality, you know how they think (for the most part). She knew I would realize the potential. I just don’t think she realized the monster it would ultimately create!

If you don’t know her – check out her LinkedIn Profile Here.

She’s inspiration on her own. I mean tealbook was the second company she started!

And if you haven’t heard of tealbook – check out my blogs

• Tealbook  – Groundbreaking launch
• Tealbook –  Lessons Learned from the Global Rollout 

Don’t forget our Webinar next week! Sign Up Here

And then her website – tealbook.com

Thank You

So Stephanie, thanks for the inspiration. Intentional or not.

I never thought in my wildest dreams all the opportunities that one little blog would lead me to. Or the awesome people I would meet along the way. And it’s not even been a full year I’ve been writing!

So Cheers again to one of my favorite Canadians.

Ms. Category Management