Moving on Over to daveostory.com
Ahoy visitor! This site/blog/library has moved to a fresh new home at DaveoStory.com – come on along why don’t ya.
I’m speaking at noted, long-time personal expression/blogging conference: Northern Voice, this time held at Museum of Vancouver. I’m bringing old-timey suitcase and possible costume changes.
Details and tickets are at northernvoice.ca but basics are: June 14-15 (my gig is last on Saturday, 15th 3:30-4:30) at Museum of Vancouver (same building as the Planetarium with the crazy metal crab out front).
My blurb follows, perhaps we’ll see ya there? Oh, a load of my pals are spieling too.
For the record, my previous talks were:
- Blogging your Passion (with Rachel Ashe, Andre Charland and …)
- Three Ps of Podcasting (intro’ed by Roland Tanglao)
- Crazy Canucks panel (with John and Rebecca Bollwitt, JJ Guerrero, Alanah McGinley)
- Fuck Stats, Make Art (dedicated to Derek K Miller)
- Story of a Story (Letters from Russia)
- Rock n Roll Photo (with Kris Krug and Bev Davies)
- Japan photo project (with John Biehler’s photo camp)
- Storymaking (delivered via video due to hospitalization)
- Vancouver: The Untold Stories (with you, i hope)
Vancouver: The Untold Stories
The core of personal expression is in the stories we create. Indeed, we humans are defined by the stories we tell and the people we tell them to. No matter what form your stories take – digital or analog – they come alive when shared with an audience.
By exploring an oft-forgotten and eclectic variety of Vancouver stories, Northern Voice veteran (this is his 9th talk) Dave Olson @uncleweed, will send you on personal quests to discover new heroes, sort out conundrums, and collaborate with other storymakers to and remix artifacts from our local life. Along the way, you’ll explore forms your mixed media stories might take, and ways to share with audiences you’ve yet to meet.
Dave at Northern Voice 2009 by Megan Mallen
Start your journey by finding inspiration and interestingness in the history of our own Vancouver, perhaps: forgotten breweries and legendary blues venues, wealthy recluse at the Bayshore, intrepid punk rock photographer, bohemian group of seven painters, storytellers past and future, true heavyweight champ in an unmarked grave, a dead Hollywood star and his grisly autopsy, stoner comedians’ first meeting, Jimi/Janis/Jerry, summer of love shakedown #nofun, Sammy Sr. at the Cave, Jello at the York, everyone at the Buddha, and a host of our distant forebears and peers.
Your speaker Dave grew up in Guildford > Whalley > Newton and now lives in Lynn Valley and works in Mt. Pleasant – while he’s spent time in 29 other countries – he takes distinct interest in getting lost in neighbourhoods seeking craft ales, chill gardens and curious tales. You may have caught him sharing at Pecha Kucha, SXSW, TedX or local community clubs.
DaveO Talking HootSuite Culture on @TheRushTV show
Amidst a barrage of HootSuite-related media coverage, I appeared on The Rush TV show (Note: I appeared representing Happy Frog in 2008 when the show was “Urban Rush”).
In the segment with host Fiona Forbes, and guest host Tiffany Gurden, about the new East Van office, our unwitting role in the Egyptian revolution, what makes us special and a few notes about the tools.
The show also broadcasts a livestream which includes all the in between banter and offside comments and anecdotes from the Twitter stream.
“Art and Tech are Old Pals” at Social Media House SXSW 2011
I shared a spiel called “Art and Tech are Old Pals” at Wordcamp Vancouver in a full verison but shared a spontaneous and shorter version while at Social Media Clubhouse at SXSW 2011.
In this spiel, i discuss a “people’s history” of media creation and my tactics and thoughts about how to foster creativity by viewing the past and participating in the creation of the future.
Art & Technology are Old Pals with Dave Olson – 3.12.11 from Social Media Club on Vimeo.
You can catch a longer version of the similar deal at “Art and Tech are Old Pals at Wordcamp Vancouver” and you might also enjoy “Greeks to Geeks at Wordcamp Whistler.”
HootPress ~ Global BC Morning Show at HootSuite
On April 4, 2013, HootSuite hosted Vancouver’s media folk at our headquarters in Mount Pleasant. Among them, Grace Ke from Global BC stopped by for some live hits and a tour of our state-of-the-art offices. As you can see in this video, we caught up and discussed how HootSuite builds community through our HootUps and how the company played an important role in the Egyptian Revolution, among other things. Here are Grace Ke’s live hits from Hoot tour.
DaveO Share HootStories on Dotto Tech Show
I recently appeared on Steve Dotto’s radio show – Dotto Tech – to talk all things HootSuite.
We riffed about many different topics including: HootSuite’s App Directory; Social Media on an international scale; my experiences at SXSW; and, uses for Google+.
Check out this week’s episode: Dotto Tech 102 – HootSuite and Ebooks.
Back in January, my fellow community managers at HootSuite and I came together with mycmgr.com to produce a series of info videos called ‘Community Nuggets.’ Below is the one I appeared in, and surprise surprise! I used my good friend Tom Sawyer as an example of how to effectively crowdsource from your community. Checkout the video below:
Crowdsource from your Community the Tom Sawyer Way – Community Nuggets Vol.1 from HootSuite on Vimeo.
“Navigating New Territory” ~ #SoMeT12
November’s #SoMeT12 – a symposium about Social Media in the Tourism industry – held in El Paso, Texas does seem like ages ago now. But every so often – like now, just getting back into the swing of things in Vancouver and dealing with the unenviable task of sorting through hundreds of emails in my inbox – something pops up from the past. I had a rad time speaking to delegates representing many countries, regions, cities and so on at #SoMeT12 and it was great to find myself quoted in a story about all things SoMeT.
Here’s a particularly impressive excerpt:
Dave Olson, vice president of community at HootSuite, ended his presentation about building an impassioned and actively supportive community around a brand or destination by asking the question, “How do you measure happiness?” On the surface, it seems a flip remark for a serious business to consider, but most businesses know that a happy customer is a returning customer. Just as most meeting planners know that a happy conference community keeps attendees coming back.
For the full post, checkout Rob Hodge’s article Navigating New Territories in Connect magazine.
“Don’t Judge an Investor by His Track Suit”
With another action-packed #SXSW come and gone, I’m now back in Vancouver, enjoying a plate of pancakes and an overflowing inbox staring me straight in the eyes.
Upon my arrival, I found myself quoted in the Wall Street Journal, and felt pretty cool.
Here’s an excerpt and one of my top tips year-after-year for SX goers:
One way you may be able to tell apart investors and other bigwigs from the masses at South By Southwest is by zeroing on people’s feet, suggests Dave Olson, vice president of community for HootSuite, a social-media-management platform. While almost everyone wears hoodies, jeans and other casual attire, high fliers tend be the only ones sporting “rare vintage Puma sneakers” or other fancy footwear, he says.
For more tips checkout WSJ Reporter, Sarah E. Needleman’s full article, “Don’t Judge an Investor by His Track Suit.”
Building A Global Community Around Your Brand
Recently HootSuite CEO Ryan Holmes shared an article on Linkedin, which shared much of the community building work I’ve headed up during my time at HootSuite. In this, he shared the basic tactics and nuggets of wisdom gleaned from using commuity building methods for growing from 100K to 5.7 million users in a short period of time. Keep in mind, we use these same techniques all around the world.
Checkout the 4 ways to Build a World Community Around Your Brand.
Here are the 4 tips in a nutshell:
- Be humble; get local. Launch international markets by taking a grassroots approach.
The key to successful international (and cost-efficient) expansion is reinventing your brand and product for each unique culture and market you enter. This is done through engaging with the local community and really getting to know it. It boils down to flexibility and focusing on the details.
- Tell stories. A powerful brand is more than just a useful product.
“I like it when people tell us stories about how HootSuite has impacted their livelihood and their success….what the tool actually did for them. That’s what’s exciting to me.” – Dave Olson, VP Community
- Cherish all relationships. Be authentic. Listen, listen, listen…then act.
Building a successful brand isn’t just about ROI; it’s also about building authentic relationships with people. The key to this is to really listen. Even if it’s one enthusiastic fan in Iceland or Siberia standing outside the crowd (This really happens!) who reaches out to us via a tweet or Facebook update, we need to pay attention and engage or respond accordingly. Everybody counts.
- Enjoy the ride. Drink the Kool Aid. Eat the company dog food.
People get excited about social media because all of a sudden they can get more customers for their shop. Or raise money for the causes they care about most. Or make more friends, learn about other cultures…the list goes on. Our tool can facilitate dreams, and dreams aren’t just about destinations—the journeys along the way are just as important. People want to volunteer for our company because they believe in this, and we’re ecstatic to have them along for the ride.
Ephemeral Feasthouse ~ Observations by Storymaker Dave Olson AKA Uncle Weed 