Jan 13, 2010

Kaiser meet social media

My medical provider Kaiser Permanente just sent an email update on their H1N1 flu vaccine availability with the helpful sounding subject line: H1N1 vaccine now available to all Kaiser Permanente members. Previously, they would only give vaccines to the most high risk groups, mainly based on age. Inside this email was a link to their website and a phone number (1-800-KP-FLU-11) to call to find out where the next flu clinic would be. Let's put aside for a minute that Kaiser has my zip code and could have sent along the location and schedule. However, clicking the link just gave the same phone number. Kaiser it's 2010, you have my location and a website - you could really stand to use your website to disseminate relevant information.

Moving on, I gave up and called the flu clinic hotline number. After using the voice prompt system (it got my local facility on the second try), it played recorded information from December 7, 2009 that all vaccinations have been centralized at another location and that I would need to call another number! This is getting silly Kaiser. I suggest getting a blog or Twitter account so you could really get information out there. Here's an example of what life looks like in the future:

Kaiser members in the Walnut Creek area

If you are looking for the Kaiser flu clinic in Walnut Creek, California - you can call the Kaiser Martinez Campus flu hotline at (925.372.1615) however, last night the recording stated:

As of Monday, January 4th - Seasonal & H1N1 vaccinations are available for all members.

• No appointment is needed, just drop in at the Martinez campus
• Available on the 1st floor of the Ensenada Building
• Shots are available Tues, Wed and Thursdays
• between 9 - Noon & between 1:30 until 4:30 pm (or when supplies are depleted)
• Bring your member ID
• Wear a short sleeve shirt

There you go Kaiser and that took me 5 minutes and I don't work for you. You can't swing a stethoscope without hitting a social media consultant who can help, I bet you could start doing this in no time. I'll be waiting, patiently.

"It only hurts when I breathe in...or out."

Labels: blogging, customerservice, health, socialmedia

at 2:23 PM | 0 Comments

Dec 31, 2009

More something or other in 2010

Counting this post, I blogged 11 times this year. I couldn't even manage a measly post a month. It wasn't for lack of things going on. I mostly hated the format of my blog and my whole media workflow. Photos on Flickr (and now Brizzly), status and jokes on Twitter (synced to Facebook), videos on YouTube, everything on Friendfeed, Reader and Tumblr. It's a mess. It's a mess I hope to sort out in 2010 but it's neither here nor there. I did give shellen.com a little makeover so maybe I'll stop hating it so much. A big help along the way, I'm using Typekit to give it a fresh new feel. Instead of an empty promise to blog more in 2010 maybe I should just plan to sort out this mess for you, me and everyone. Happy New Year and happy new media!

Labels: blogging, brizzly

at 10:21 PM | 0 Comments

Sep 30, 2008

Sad excuse for a blog

Recently at a cocktail party I met someone who said, "Didn't you used to keep a blog?". Ouch. That hurt. All I can say is, I have a few tricks up my sleeve to keep this baby going. More on that soon.

Labels: blogging

at 11:55 PM | 3 Comments

Nov 7, 2007

A footnote in blogging history

A long time ago (2002), Dave McClure told me 'Just think, one of these days there will be so many Blogger users you'll have to have a blogging conference!' This weeks Blog World Expo and Conference in Las Vegas isn't the first conference on blogging but it just might be the largest dedicated solely to blogging. I will be moderating the keynote panel on Thursday where I will be speaking with: Roger L. Simon CEO and founder of Pajamas Media, Jeremy Wright CEO and founder of b5 media, Brad Hill Director of Weblogs Inc. at AOL and Richard Jalichandra the new CEO of Technorati. If you have any interesting questions you would like for me to ask any of these folks, please leave them in the comments below.

This is particularly fun for me since about this time seven years ago I had started doing business development for Blogger and was in Las Vegas at Comdex trying to explain to huge consumer electronics and software companies exactly what a blog was and why it would be interesting to work together. It took a few years to wear them down. Tomorrow, I'll be in the same convention hall in front of thousands of bloggers there to talk about... blogging. I know it's not earth shattering but certainly a lot of fun to see it's growth. I've also been reflecting over the past few months on my 10 years of working on the web and specifically on blogging and other social media products. A couple of things are beginning to stand out that I would like to share, but I'm going to get to bed here in Las Vegas and save that for another day.

Labels: blogging

at 11:15 PM | 2 Comments

Dec 15, 2006

Tofu Redux

If things look weird on this site it's because I just switched my blog over to using the new (and excellent) Blogger beta. In testing it out I went through some older posts like my Tofu Rant and made some tweaks. It's one of the oldest posts on this blog and it's originally from July 31, 2000 (over six and a half years ago) - however, some aggregators have picked it up as new, resulting in new comments, confusing re-syndication, and a general feeling of un-ease on my part since I haven't looked at that post in ages. I was just getting comfortable with a blog writing style back then. I always tell people that I started my blog for five friends from back home and the tone has changed over the course of the years as a few more people have started reading my humble little site. Funny thing about blogs, they tell you more about yourself the longer you keep them going.

A side note, if I could find contact information anywhere over at Googlersblogs, I would tell them a few things:

• I don't mind folks aggregating my posts, especially if it's a non-profit site. However, don't change the default linking behavior. At least make the headlines link back to the source site. Bloglines and Google Reader do the right thing here.
• You have many non-Googlers listed as Googlers. That's a little odd.
• Login to post comments? Why not just pull in comment feeds and link to the post for further commenting.
• If you ever add advertising to your site and you are still syndicating full posts, I want out or a fair way to participate in the revenue.
• Please add contact info for yourself. It's generally creepy to have someone how is so interested in the lives of Googlers stay in the shadows.

Labels: blogging, food, google, personal, retro

at 10:04 AM | 3 Comments