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The Gospel According to Scoble and Israel

By: Marijean Jaggers | 09/26/2007

I've just finished reading Naked Conversations: How Blogs are Changing the Way Businesses Talk with Customers, in preparation for (life, and) Shel Israel's keynote address at Friday's BlogOrlando unconference.

I was very jazzed by the book -- it provides great thinking behind corporate blogging; who should, who shouldn't, cautionary words and great, big arguments for why blogging for business can be wildly successful, backed up by numerous case studies. It was also an extremely validating experience, backing up what we've been sharing with clients with specific examples from interviews conducted by the authors.

Mr. Israel, I will be the geek clutching the book and asking for an autograph.

There are times, outside of the blogosphere and in my in-person life that I feel a bit like a a second-rate prophet, repeating the gospel those such as Robert Scoble and Shel Israel have been preaching for years. There was, however, this moment: On my recent flight from St. Louis back to Charlottesville, (readers of my personal blog know I lead the Charlottesville Standing office and travel often) I "won" the coveted front row seat, 1F.

During all the seating shuffle, I needed to get up and stand at the entrance of the plane to allow my rowmate to get situated. The flight attendant invited me to greet the passengers, which I did with gusto, thanking them for choosing the airline, etc. It was fun. As I was in full flight attendant mode, one of the passengers glanced at the book clutched in my hand. "How far are you?" he asked. I was shocked to find another follower of Scoble and Israel, right there on my tiny commuter plane, traveling to my town. "It's a great book," he said, and wandered off to find his seat.

I'll be sharing more about my thoughts on Naked Conversations and Israel's keynote on Friday. And those human connections? They just keep happening all the time.

Tags: BlogOrlando07

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