I’m a big fan of Meetup.com. It’s the Justin Bieber to my inner 12-year-old girl, without the incredibly bad hair. There aren’t too many websites and/or online services I appreciate more. Gmail is one. Facebook is an another. And Fred’s Potato Chip and Plumbing Supply Emporium is still another. Where else can you get Old Bay crab chips and the Waste King Legend 8000TC 1 horsepower disposer in one online shopping cart, besides Amazon? That’s right, nowhere. And the site’s emoticons are second to none. Long live Fred!

Meetup is a worldwide network of local groups organized around a wide variety of topics. The site helps individuals set up these groups, and helps others join them. The groups then get together to discuss their topic of choice, whether it be sewing or shuffleboard or Canadian teen idols. Meetup is an online vehicle for person-to-person meetings, pushing people away from their computers and toward each other. It connects people in a meaningful way, unlike many social networking tools.

I started using the site to connect with other online marketing types about three years ago. I attended various meetups in an official capacity, representing my previous employer. The meetings kept me abreast of all the happenings in the industry and put me in touch with a few of the movers and shakers. I kept at it after the layoff. The people in these groups have ins at good companies and the potential to help me find gainful employment. And they knew things… lots and lots of things. And not just things, but stuff… and whatnot, the grand poobah of all vague descriptive terms. As any two-bit unemployment site that isn’t Jobless and Less will tell you, networking is key to finding a job. My participation led to some interviews and freelance projects. Whereas, online job boards just gave me a raging case of carpal tunnel syndrome.

I still belong to multiple Meetup groups and attend events every so often. Here’s a selection of my favorites…

• Internet Marketers of New York
• SEMPO New York
• NYC Brandhackers Happy Hour Speaker Series
• WordPress NYC Meetup Group

The SEMPO and WordPress meetups are particularly productive. The SEMPO group, an offshoot of the Search Engine Marketing Professionals Organization, brings in experts to discuss the fast-moving field of Search Engine Marketing. The group for WordPress, the popular content management system I use for Jobless and Less, covers issues related to the software. Maybe you sense a theme here… a geeky, nerdy, online marketing-focused, career-related theme. And wouldn’t you know it, the settings in my Meetup account follow suit.

I don’t spend much time on the Meetup site each day. Trolling for new groups isn’t terribly helpful or informative. And the limited online social functions aren’t among the site’s strengths. Besides, the site is set to notify me of any new group that fits my location and interests. Far be it from me to do work I don’t have to. Here’s a sampling of the kinds of groups I’ve asked Meetup to ping me about…

• Weblogger
• WordPress
• Search Engine Optimization
• Website Marketing
• Social Media Marketing

Alas, though the Meetup concept is slick, the execution is often clumsy. I receive five or more notifications for new groups each day. Maybe 20% of these groups are remotely relevant, or even within the parameters I set up. The rest are either ridiculous or hilarious or both. I began saving my favorites a couple months ago to share with the world. The folder now contains 121 emails. Many more were deleted. Here are the best of the worst, as I received them…

• Bronx Ladies Who Lunch: This group is a social network for ladies 25 to 35 to get together and create lasting friendships. The point of the group is to support and uplift each other. There will be many events that will make this mission possible. Our outings will center on the Bronx but there will be events city-wide.
  [Don't be fooled by the lunch that I got, I'm still Normy from the block. So it needs a little work. J-Lo has been too busy crying to return my calls.]
• Flexyn: Flexyn stands for Fly, Sexy and Fun. And that’s just what our group is about. Being Fly, Living Sexy enjoying life to the fullest and having Fun. Whether single, dating or married, our get togethers will encourage all to live life to the fullest. Responsible and safe fun is what we’re all about. Networking, parties, events and trips are our focus. We will constantly have something fun planned. Some type of wonderful activity for people to come together and have a blast.
  [Well, I am fly, sexy and fun. They got that right. And I do enjoy making up words out of other words to describe myself. Unguatam, for example, stands for Unemployed Guy Hates Spam. It's also the name of the tiny banana republic I plan to start when I become the next George Clooney.]
• Drum Circle International House: International House is a residential facility in Morningside Heights/Harlem NY for over 700 graduate students from all over the world studying in a very diverse array of fields. The facility has a modern gymnasium where we conduct a drum circle every Friday 8pm-10pm. We have just started the endeavor with two drums and any additional drums/instruments would be great.
  [Shooting hippies is indeed one of my favorite activities. So maybe Meetup got this one right too.]
• Women 24 and Over and Colored Men: I decided to start this group as a result of being involved with an interracial meetup that was, ironically, too exclusive. Realizing that changing the mentality and make up of the group would be too time consuming, and probably even unrealistic, I’ve started my own group. This network has been designed for women who are interested in Colored Men. When I say colored, I’m referring to a broad spectrum of individuals from dark-skinned to light-skinned, Black, African, Asian, Latino, Middle Eastern, Indian, bi-racial and multiracial men. We value and would like to develop a network of open minded, respectful, and sociable members who welcome and are interested in interracial dating.
  [This group managed to include everyone except me. It's so nice to be discriminated against in my own inbox.]
• Daddyhunt NYC: Daddyhunt is a community of over 200,ooo hot gay men of all ages. We bring together older men, masculine guys and the guys who love them in a dating and socializing environment that is supportive and attitude-free. We welcome Dads, Older Bros, Bears and hunters of all ages. NYC/Metropolitan members are welcome to attend our premiere Meetup event on December 15th.
  [And to think I first thought this was a group that got together to play cruel tricks on orphans. Boy was I embarrassed at that first meeting.]
• Argentine Tango Beginners: FREE for 4 men only!! We have the women already!
  [All this time I thought it only took two to tango. Who knew?]

How can a site that touts its personalization, in an age of hyper-social media, be so misguided? I expect this from the the big job sites, which continue to insist that I become a nursing assistant in New Jersey. But I thought Justin, I mean Meetup, knew me better than that. The site just spams the crap out of me, over and over, day after day. It was funny at first… look at all those cute, funny, totally irrelevant emails from that site that doesn’t really know what it’s doing. Now it’s just annoying. So this once-satisfied user is blocking all new groups until Meetup gets its floppy hair out of its eyes and fixes this problem.

Where's Kool-Aid Man? I didn't pay all this money to meet a mustard bottle and a bald guy. (courtesy of www.realtimeadvertisingweek.com)

Many of the daily emails I receive are useless. They may even be less than useless, costing me two seconds to delete, two seconds I could have spent scratching myself or staring off into space. The nextNY newsletter is actually worth the time. The first of the week gives a huge list of technology events happening in and around New York. I always peruse it in search of the solution to all my problems;  “How To Grow and Care For Your Own Money Tree,” for example, would be ideal. Last week I found something not nearly that good, but maybe worth $25 and a few hours of my time.

“Advertising Week is North America’s premier gathering of cutting edge communications leaders,” according to their marketers and copywriters. Is that vague (and, therefore, ironic) enough for you? The event could just as easily be a gathering of teenagers with really fast thumbs on the latest Sidekick, or maybe knife owners who talk a lot. The wordsmiths go on to describe the event as, “…a hybrid of thought leadership and special event programming, uniting clients, creatives, media and inspiring figures…” They didn’t work in “next generation” or “turnkey,” so I only sort of understand what they’re getting at. I’ll try to summarize Ad Week myself, having attended and all. Media people sit in auditoriums, listening to more important media people talk in platitudes on stage, and plan out their networking strategies. Near constant lip service is paid to social causes, though networking and open bar parties are the main draw.

I attended last year as an employee of my previous company and managed to learn a few things and meet a few people. My schedule is a little more open this year, so I bought a $25 student pass with a borrowed .edu email address and filled my days with sessions. Some of the programming included…

• The New Media Mix: Connecting the Dots in a Multi-Screen Environment
• The Future in 4D: Brands, Communities, Content & Technology
• The New Mad Men: How Familiar Agencies Are Writing a New Business Model for a New Ad World
• Social Networking 2.0: Brands Get in the Game

The sessions took place at The Times Center in the heart of Times Square (read, on a side street within eyeshot of the Port Authority Bus Station) and the Paley Center for Media a little further uptown. The Times Center – part of the new New York Times building – is a state-of-the-art auditorium where performances, lectures, readings and fancy parties are held. They may use it as a meat locker on off days, given how cold they keep it; the New York Times needs to make money any way they can. The Paley Center is more like a movie theater, before anybody spills soda and buttery popcorn on the floor. It’s comfortable in a padded, high-use, industrial sort of way. The two venues aren’t close enough together to make it from one to the other between sessions. So I stopped trying. As it turned out, no one gave a crap what I’d registered for and what I attended. I came and went as I pleased.

Despite the grand names of the sessions – complete with colons and qualifying descriptions, as if working titles for nonfiction hardback rejects – not much substance was offered. I’m media savvy, though not expert, even with my much-celebrated, prize-worthy blog to end all blogs. But I didn’t take away much more than a few free magazines and some pilfered cookies. Presenters tended to generalize and not back up their ideas. Everybody was friends; no one really disagreed with anybody. The real goal was to get a little publicity for their company, while using up as many plastic water bottles as possible. I did learn that AOL still exists, or at least an entity by that name still sponsors conferences. And the ten-year-old trend of oddly capitalizing a company’s name is alive and well, as is the shunning of spaces. What were once cutting-edge ideas, even bleeding-edge, are now childproof-scissors edge. Okay, class, today we’re going to brand our startup. Everyone cut your construction paper. Be sure to follow the lines… exactly, so nobody can tell them apart.

I found myself drifting off during sessions; cool air and a comfortable seat will do that. How might I re-brand myself, were I a company? Maybe I could go by normelrod, or normElrod, or even nOrmelrOd. The third one has potential. It’s like my name is looking at you, making eye contact, so you know I’m serious about doing business. Stare into my eyes… you’re getting sleepy. I’m going to count to three. And when I snap my fingers, you will give me a job. If I were a conference session rather than a company, what would I be called? A couple of the finalists were…

• Norm Elrod: Connecting the Dots Between Education and Unemployment
• The New Mad Man: How an Employable Person Goes Postal in a Jobless Recovery

Some company ran a contest that preoccupied me for the better part of an afternoon. Entrants filled in words for “(blank) moves (blank) forward” on a sign and were photographed holding it up. The pictures ran in a long slide-show loop on the wall as advertising. One randomly chosen entrant won $3.27 or a gift certificate to Chipotle or something else not worth the price of their dignity. Entries tended to be along the lines of “hard work moves my company forward.” I didn’t enter, but kept coming up with possible responses. “Bran moves my bowels forward,” was one of my favorites. “Bad corporate management moves my last day forward,” was another. But the winner was, “stupid advertising moves the competition forward.”

I eventually started wondering why the people on stage were there and I was in the audience and, more generally, why some people have jobs and some don’t. There are many possible reasons… skill, luck, timing, hard work, fate. All of them and many others probably figure in somehow. No one reason can fully capture it. My daydreams didn’t provide an answer, nor did most of the people talking at me in generalities. A few of them were indeed very impressive people. But all of them could’ve been me, later on in life or after a sex change. I suppose if I had the answers, I wouldn’t be asking the questions. I’d be up on a stage talking, or writing a book. Or maybe I’d be picking large, ripe bills off my money tree.

Does this make anyone else think of McDonalds? (courtesy of www.highlands-ortho.com)

Looking for a job is sort of an all-or-nothing deal. Either you find one, or you don’t. I haven’t, for seven months. There’s some comfort to be had in knowing that the job market stinks. Companies continue to layoff employees, and those hiring receive millions of resumes, even for that freelance position scraping burnt gunk off of boiler room walls with a screwdriver. Knowing may be half the battle, but it doesn’t pay the bills. There’s also some satisfaction in getting the occasional callback or interview. Validation that I’m doing something right does give me the warm fuzzies. But it too doesn’t pay the bills.

Job boards are a giant waste of time (though I did find my last job through one). At best they give a decent sense of the current job market and skills needed for a particular type of job. At worst, they help companies gather our personal information and sell it off to marketers who then spam the crap out of us. And where would I be without those more-than-obvious, less-than-useful job search tip emails? Step #1… figure out the type of job you want; step #2… apply for those jobs. I only ever respond to listings for which I’m qualified. My resume is optimized for keywords that appear in these listings. My cover letter describes why I’m the ideal candidate for the job. In my oh so humble opinion, my inquiries kick some major ass. They’re practically lethal. If you come across one in a dark alley, keep your hands in plain sight and back away slowly. And call me as soon as you can, as we will have just discovered where they all go when I hit the send button.

Still I try and try and try, or at least I did. The countless hours slaving over my (and wifey’s) laptop have given me an on again/off again case of carpal tunnel syndrome, or as I call it, “Ouch, My F**king Hand, err, Syndrome” (OMFHeS). The pain is mostly along the back of my right hand and up into the knuckles. It also sneaks around the side beneath the pinkie and up along it on bad days. OMFHeS is brought on by repetitive motion – like scrolling with the mouse track pad through endless, useless job listings and clicking on possibly interesting listings that never turn out to be. Typing doesn’t help. Using a mouse is better, but my hand still aches. The pain disappears when I’m off the computer, but it’s never far from the surface.

A few months ago, I switched up my approach to the job search. Whereas I once devoted serious time to trolling the online listings, now I barely skim the automated searches that appear to my inbox. Sorry, CareerBuilder, none of those 17 Avon positions served up in my last email actually applied, but thanks anyway. My job search is all about networking lately. Starbucks’ second quarter numbers will probably show a spike; I’m keeping half of their NYC locations in business with my informational meetings. I have the third-degree burns on my tongue and the pictures taken of me from a neighboring Starbucks to prove it.

Lucky for me employed types are willing to chat these days. Maybe they want good job search karma, should they get bounced. Maybe they like free coffee, though many don’t even let me pay. Maybe they’re attracted to my winning resume and charming personality like metal to a magnet. Alright, so it’s probably the coffee and karma. But people have been really generous with their time. I’m getting way more informational meetings than I thought I would, and learning a ton of stuff. And I’m meeting many friendly and interesting individuals. Who knew it was just a matter of asking?

There’s one serious drawback. You guessed it… OMFHeS. Shaking hands is really painful, yet unavoidable when networking. It’s how one greets another when they meet. “Hello, my name is…” [shake, shake] “I’m a marketing professional with blah, blah, blah.” In a networking environment, refusing to shake someone’s hand is akin to kicking them in the shin and cursing their mother.  It’s just not the best way to start things off. Explaining that I have OMFHeS makes me look like a weirdo. And no one likes talking to a weirdo, except when drunk in Penn Station at 3:00 a.m., waiting for the train back to Long Island. They definitely don’t want to hire a weirdo and be forced to talk with them everyday, sober, for the foreseeable future.

OMFHeS is bearable in one-on-one meetings. There’s one handshake as a greeting and another as a farewell, with 30 minutes to an hour of interesting conversation in between. Networking events – already painful for other reasons – are the worst. The two requisite handshakes are only separated by a couple minutes of conversation. And everyone there is trying to seem strong and confident (read employable), so they squeeze and shake harder. It’s all about eye contact and a firm grip. After a little while, I have to consciously try not to grimace. As mentioned before, no one wants to work with a weirdo, or for that matter, a wuss.

I’m not a wuss. Let me repeat that, for anyone who nodded off around the 800-word mark and is rejoining us now. I’m not a wuss. These, of course, are the words uttered by someone who is a wuss when faced with their wussiness. But I’m not. I played tackle football. I’ve been beaned with an 80 mph fastball. I can do a lot of pushups and crunches. But OMFHeS really hurts sometimes. And it tends to zap my confidence at the moments I need it most – first impressions. Thanks for the additional obstacle in the job search, unemployment. Next time just send the polar bear, or maybe the black smoke, out of the jungle to get me.

Where working out meets rocking out.

Unemployment took away my last excuse not to go to the gym… work. And for that I will never forgive it. If you’re reading this, unemployment, consider yourself out of the will. The cats now get my ever-shrinking pile of assets. (Wifey will have to take it up with the furry ones.) My gym membership is cheap and paid through some time next year. All that prevents me from going these days is laziness and achiness (by which I mean laziness).

My gym has three reasonably convenient locations and many more totally inconvenient locations. One is in midtown, across the street from a previous employer and a short subway ride from home. Working out was so convenient until layoff #2. I still go there sometimes in the late morning to avoid the lunch-time and after-work crowds. Another location a few stops further downtown in Chelsea is bigger and better, but also more crowded. Working out during off-peak times is still perfectly pleasant. And then there’s the Elmhurst location within walking distance of my apartment, where I go if I’m pressed for time or – like today – just don’t feel like riding (or paying $4 to ride) the subway. That place is a madhouse.

I left for the gym at about 9:30 this morning. It was drizzling and sunny, and the sky threatened thunderstorms, portending another day of confusing weather. There was also a 30% chance of snow, a 20% chance of tsunami and 10% chance that the atmosphere would solidify into some sort of jello-like substance making it impossible to do anything. I crossed underneath the subway tracks as the 7 train rumbled overhead, and wound through Elmhurst past the hospital and the park. I turned down through a neighborhood of houses, most of which have been converted into apartments, judging by all the doorbells and Direct TV dishes. A few have been remodeled or torn down and rebuilt into some blocky, tasteless monstrosity. Many more are just kind of drab. At Queens Blvd., I crossed over to the gym.

The one-story box of a building sits right on the boulevard of death next to an LIRR overpass, some used car dealerships and a few hotels that probably rent rooms by the hour. One dealership I’ve watched shrink over the last year from two lots and 60+ cars for sale to half of one lot and about ten cars. And one motel I’ve watched go up right next to it; all they forgot was a sign big enough for passersby to actually see. A huge billboard on the overpass advertises Big Macs at McDonalds with the words, “Sobrang masala may kasamang extra bun.” Who knew that “two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions” could be boiled down to four words? A huge public intermediate school sits behind the gym, and buses line up next to it. If I go around 8:00 or leave around 3:00, I inevitably end up following a group of 13-year-olds and looking like a total perv.

The gym was packed, because it’s always packed. Every person in Elmhurst is required to hang out at this gym for two hours each day; working out is optional. I signed up for a couple aerobic machines at the front desk. The earliest available was in an hour. Every machine looked to be occupied when I got inside. Some people were working out, some were talking on cell phones, and some were trying to do both. I jumped on a recumbent bike when one opened up.

As if the crowds weren’t bad enough, the noise levels were just ungodly. Pumping club music covers of 80s songs blared from the aerobics room, as the instructor yelled instructions into her headset microphone. Some of the TVs played corporate music videos of beautiful, disaffected white guys rocking out in construction sites and on the tops of buildings. The accompanying audio came through the club’s speakers. Other TVs tuned to CNN played the news. People yelled into their cell phones over all of this and to their friends across the gym. I hoped my head wouldn’t explode.

I moved from the bike to a cross-trainer when my turn came up, kicking off the woman who tried to take my spot and putting my towel in the drink holder not lined with hardened bubblegum. The air conditioning wasn’t really on, and I was sweating profusely. Soon after, a 40-something-year-old woman busting out of her stretchy black and white gym outfit took the machine next to me. She was all silicon and botox, and damn proud of it. I glanced over, and she flashed me a smile through her lipstick, at least what amounts to a smile for someone who can’t move her face. Distracted from a New York Times Magazine article about aesthetically unpleasing construction, I looked over again a minute later. The Williamsburg Bridge may be ugly, but who could possibly ignore a living, breathing disaster two feet away? She smiled again. I cringed.

When construction lady was done, one of the two people I know at the gym – an unemployed engineer – took over the machine. We chatted about what would happen once unemployment insurance ran out. He has his eyes on a job at McDonalds. I’m thinking Starbucks. My reasons are simple… I don’t want to get fat, and I’d much rather be scalded by coffee than grease. The conversation moved on to the situation in Iran and places to play ping-pong in Flushing. I finished up on the cross-trainer and went for some water.

By the water fountain in the locker room, I ran into the one other person I know at the gym – a heavyset retired guy who enjoys science fiction and Broadway shows. We met many months ago when he commented about The New Yorker magazine I was reading. He was surprised to see it in a gym where no one even speaks English. We chatted briefly about the drag cabaret show I saw over the weekend and what movies we wanted to see.

My time on the elliptical trainer was uneventful, except for the OK Go’s brilliant orchestrated treadmill dance routine video, which came on. Someone programming the music videos for Big Gym TV has a sense of humor, or not. It seemed appropriate either way. The old Jewish guy who works out like he’s on a mission was nowhere to be found. Nor were his right-wing buddies, whom he greets by yelling political nonsense across the room. The Tourette Syndrome guy who spouts off randomly in Italian wasn’t there around either; I think he comes in evenings. The stretching area was unusually quiet. The crew of old ladies who sit around telling dirty jokes was noticeably absent. I finished up my workout in relative peace.

Leaving the gym, I passed an employee returning from her smoke break and waited at the corner for the traffic light. I was tired and had the beginnings of a headache. It had been a relatively quiet workout, but I was still less relaxed than when I arrived. Tomorrow I’ll spend the four bucks and go workout in peace.

Hello, my name is...

I’m not big on networking events, never have been. But a talented blogger I met out there in Blog-land and in person at a career networking event recommended I use Meetup.com. The site lets people find others with similar interests and then organize meetings with them in the real world. (The MTV group, for example, lets beautiful but vapid and annoying 20-somethings gather in a lavish house in a hip locale to talk about themselves.)  It’s like platonic group dating for hobbyists, and the idea has caught on.

It turns out I was already a lapsed Meetup member, having joined SEMPO New York – a search marketing group – months before. I tried once to sign up for an event, failed, got frustrated and stopped trying. My computer probably just timed out processing some rote task. I was employed then (ah, memories), so personal bandwidth was at a premium. The thought of following another website seemed akin to an earwig burrowing into my brain at the behest of Carlos Montalban. But just as death by Khan has its upside – getting to yell “Khaaaaaaaan!!!” with good reason – so too does Meetup.

Based on my contact’s recommendation I decided to give Meetup another chance. A few weeks ago I signed up for the following groups…

• Gainfully Unemployed
• NYC Brandhackers Speaker Series
• New York City WordPress Meetup Group
• New York Unemployed Meetup Group
• NY Bloggers Meetup Group

Then nothing happened. To be precise, events were organized and then canceled, netting out to nothing.

Yesterday evening was my first actual event – Brandhacker’s “Twitter for Business.” Twitter, for those of you who call under a rock home, is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that lets users send and read other users’ short updates. The gathering took place in a bar located in the shadow of the Empire State Building, home of my former employer. I went stag, partly because I have no friends, and partly because I expected to run into ex-coworkers… this being a social networking gathering and them being online marketing people.

The event started off with a networking period. I knew no one and wasn’t much in the mood to mingle. People sat in little groups chatting and tweeting about chatting on their PDAs, which is really ignoring and being rude rather than chatting. I held up a large pillar and sipped a four-dollar soda. The presentation portion of the evening started mercifully soon after I arrived.

David Berkowitz, director of emerging media at 360i, started things off. He walked us through his vacation in Texas and his in-laws’ new-found affinity for Twitter. Greg Galant, podcaster and creator of the Shorty Report, talked through some business cases for companies using Twitter as a PR and customer service tool. Sprint and Comcast apparently monitor Twitter for mentions and respond accordingly. Whole Foods even has an account to promote itself and answers questions.  The key takeaway is this: tweet about any problem you’re having with a major company and name names. Make a real stink about it. Corporate America is paying attention, and you may get the results you’re after.

The two presenters then rattled off some of their favorite Twitter tools. MrTweet, which recommends users to follow based on current followees, is one. Hootsuite, which helps manage multiple accounts, is another. Then they dove into attendee questions. These revealed more about the questioners’ lack of knowledge than anything else. I was pretty surprised that a room full of professional marketers contained so many people so ignorant of Twitter. The service isn’t new, and it gets more press than the naked popstar du jour. Marketers should be up on these things. I am, and I don’t even have a job. To their credit, the ill-informed were there to get a handle on things.

I didn’t learn much about Twitter from this meetup, aside from the names of a few tools and resources. Maybe my knowledge is already too advanced, me being a superior life form and all. I also didn’t make any decent contacts. But the power of Meetup became abundantly clear. Like-minded people gathered around a common interest should provide some good learning and networking opportunities. And who knows, maybe there’s a job to be found somewhere in all this.

Who to talk to and who to avoid? This question has plagued humans since one caveman rolled his eyes at another grunting and pointing at a rock, and then tried to extricate himself from the conversation. “Look, dumb ass,” he was probably thinking, “I know what a rock is for. And when you shut up, I’ll go kill me some tasty woolly mammoth with it.”

Some people are funny and interesting, and some people are unfunny and uninteresting. It’s just a fact of life; don’t hate me for being special. Then there are those conversationalists – good and bad – who just can’t take a hint and shut up. I used to pride myself on knowing just when to end a conversation. Having a low tolerance for idiots (and sometimes people), I am usually the one to remove myself or subtly excuse the other person. My signature move is the slight shoulder turn combined with the cell phone time check and a vague grimace. When done right, even the most oblivious of talkers winds up their thoughts. These days, I never get to use it.

I’ve become the guy who traps people in conversations. Maybe it’s my imagination, the visions have been fairly vivid of late, and the voices loud. Maybe my grip on reality has slipped ever so slightly. Maybe my skills at interpreting people’s subtle verbal and non-verbal communications have withered from all the days shut away with two vocal and neurotic cats. Whatever the cause, I’m now the guy who keeps talking when other people have had enough. Unemployment… I blame you!

Wifey and I got together with some friends and their friends at a downtown bar early one Sunday evening a few weeks ago. One couple – good friends whom we’d not seen in awhile – was in town for an event of some sort. The group totaled eight, and people soon divided up into smaller conversations. I started chatting with the guy next to me whom I’d just met.

The conversation quickly moved to sports – us being guys and all – and then drifted into education. Before too long we were examining the current state of our country’s university system as compared to the German system (if I had a nickel…). He knew from experience, and I was curious, asking questions to draw out more information. I understand the American system on certain levels, having gone to (and paid for) college and grad school, and find European systems intriguing, if (ahem) foreign. The conversation continued on another ten minutes, maybe longer, and then waned. I was gearing up to change the topic – I may have even started my next sentence – when he, rather abruptly, said, “I’m going to talk to my wife now.” He turned away.

I was  taken aback and a tad embarrassed. This is how one ends a conversation that they have tried and failed to end more tactfully. That we were done hadn’t occurred to me. Was I too busy listening and asking questions to notice he was growing bored? Did I steamroll right over gentler brush off attempts, leading to this blunt and final brush off ? I went to find the bathroom and my pride.

This experience was new to me. But I realized after some thought that I may have become the guy who doesn’t know when to shut up; I do spend a lot less time these days socializing with other people. Since then, I’ve payed close attention to the dynamics of my conversations with strangers. The goal has been to gauge my natural inclination to talk or not talk. And sure enough…

I ran into an acquaintance at the gym last week. He’s an older, retired guy who tends to be there at the same time I am. We usually exchange pleasantries and move along with our respective workouts. On this day, he was pedaling a recumbent bike and reading a book; I approached on one side and made a comment about it. We went back and forth for a minute. He suggested another interesting book. I tried and failed to remember the title (stupid brain!). In the middle of my next thought, he turned to face forward, signaling that he was done. The conversation was clearly over. But I finished my thought and moved on to another one. This never used to happen.

There have been other instances since that initial realization. The scenario is disturbingly frequent. I could just be starved for human interaction and anxious to get what I can get. The social aspect of the office environment is missing from my life. I could also just be realizing that I’m that guy – the guy who won’t shut up. Either way, unemployment has revealed this less than appealing trait. And I don’t know how to fix it. So until further notice… avoid me at parties.

You be the pharoah, and I'll be the slave. (image courtesy of http://friemoney.com)

How did I become such a target for pyramid schemes? Is it the unemployment? It’s like I have a giant sign on my forehead that reads, “yes, I would love to partner with you to sell the latest space-age product that could save my life, and in the process receive triple-digit returns on my money and never work again, except for all the selling.” In the last few weeks, multiple organizations have contacted me with promises of success and riches if I join up. All I have to do is take my place at the bottom, sell a lot of stuff and then get some people to sell it for me. The offers always seem a little suspect.

To be fair, the business models of the companies contacting me suggest a Multi-Level Marketing (MLM) rather than a pyramid structure. The line between the two can be fuzzy. My good friend Wiki P. Edia – knower of all things… kind of – explained the difference over coffee earlier today. People make money in pyramid schemes by enrolling others, who then enroll still others; no good or service is sold. The business model is non-sustainable and illegal. MLM organizations have a similar structure, in that members create networks of people below them from whom they may earn commissions. The difference is that members of MLM companies sell a real good or service, and the companies are legal.

Those who approach me seem to like what they’re doing, or they’re mainlining caffeine and happy pills. Either way, enthusiasm can be infectious. It always makes me interested in what they’re saying and why. Within about two minutes of meeting, they hit me with the vague notions of financial freedom and personal satisfaction – common selling points of most pyramid/MLM schemes. Those who have honed their craft might turn it into a question like, “would you like to make lots of money and set your own hours?” Approximately 1.7 seconds later (0.8 if I’m also mainlining caffeine) I realize that I am being recruited. A project for a former employer involving a popular pyramid/MLM-structured company gave me a keen eye for this sort of thing. If I were as quick and clever as wifey, I might reply, “I prefer the desperate life of a corporate peon, slaving away in the firey pits, thank you very much” or “f**k off, weirdo.” But I’m not. The rest of the conversation becomes a desperate search for a way out. I usually don’t find one.

I was approached at a networking event awhile back by someone selling products from a company called Isagenix. Here’s a blurb from their website…

This company can be your vehicle for financial freedom and a lifetime of satisfaction by helping others. In addition to using and sharing the “no-compromise” high-quality cleansing, nutrition and skin care products, the Isagenix Team Compensation Plan provides a logical and rewarding pathway to a better financial future. It rewards your personal efforts and allows you to leverage your time while helping others achieve their success. The plan is generous and provides a substantial income earning potential.

The products may work, or they may not. I have no idea. But the system set up to sell them is definitely MLM. And the guy at the event was pretty relentless. He had my business card before I knew not to give it to him. It was a networking event after all, I was throwing my business card at everyone within 1000 feet of the place. He tried to persuade me to join his team, become part of his family as it were. I even watched at his insistence some of a crazy video of the founder talking at me in front of a while background. After multiple phone conversations and some talk about a freelance project, he stopped calling.

A story about me and my unemployment blog Jobless and Less ran this past Monday on NY1. I received the following email that morning, before I even saw the clip…

yes hello how are you doing today? i saw you on new york 1 this morning i have a great site for you too look at this morning     www.TNI.com/2733376 when you get there go click on “the opportunity”  if you have any qustions feel free to call me at XXX-XXX-XXX my name is XX XXXXX or i can be e-mail at XXXXXXXXXXX@yahoo.com you can IM me there or just e-mail me ok have a great day thank you

Given the professional nature of the correspondence – never mind the grammatical nuance, punctuational mastery and convincing calls to action – I immediately sold my apartment at the market rate ($24) and joined. The company is called Tahitian Noni International, and they appear to also sell various dietary supplements. Again, who knows if the products actually work?

I was contacted today with yet another intriguing business opportunity, this one so vague I actually forgot (and had to reteach myself) English halfway through. Here it is…

Peace and Blessings

Ms.XXXXXX

I saw your interveiw on NY1 News.I also visted your blog. I’m currently working with a group of professional people.We are introducing a new business concept in the tri -state area making multi streams of income. I would like to set up an appointment with you today.

Your first question is probably, “did she actually type the message after her signature?” Yes, she did. Please take all the time you need to grasp the genius in our midst… I’ll wait. Her response to my followup email revealed the time and place of her group’s next meeting but no actual information about the business opportunity. So I did a little internet super-sleuthing and discovered Ur Residual Ncome. The name suggests the company offers residual income, or something far dirtier. I’m assuming the former, given the content on the award-winning site. Here’s a description of their services, in their words…

(Residual income is income you continue to receive long after you’ve done the work that generated it; it’s like the royalties that songwriters receive)

This website will help you discover how to generate a significant LIFETIME residual income from the comfort of your home.

You don’t have to leave your house to get this information; there are many different ways to get the information.  There are phone calls, live and recorded webinars and live meetings.

That copy is way more convincing than all those late-night infomercials I record and run on a loop all day to test my tolerance for pain. And the nature of the business opportunity seems promising. I immediately bought back my apartment and sold it again (this time for $17) to raise the membership fee. Watch out world, here I come!

To answer the questions I posed at the outset of this post, unemployment has to be the reason I’m targeted. An MLM recruiter assumes that I’m looking for a money-making opportunity, and rightfully so. Depending on the length of unemployment, one may even feel desperate and a little down on their luck. A recruiter might also assume that unemployment has left the job seeker disillusioned with their job prospects and career in general… still another reasonable conclusion. People in this frame of mind are willing to give an opportunity the benefit of the doubt. We want something – anything – to work out. And we’re really trying to find it. But we’re not blind, and we’re not stupid. Ridiculous products and ridiculous promises may pay your bills, but they won’t pay mine. Find someone else to bother with this nonsense.

Share your job search experiences in the Unemployment Forum…

Don't hate the playa, hate the game.

I started the unemployment blog Jobless and Less to get back in the habit of writing everyday, improve my marketing skills and stay off the streets. My thinking was (and is) that beefing up the resume with relevant skills could only help in the job search. Months later I’m still unemployed and finding companies to be a tad unreceptive – hopefully a product of the local job market and not my resume. Otherwise, things are moving along quite swimmingly. I’ve gone from semi-illiterate neighborhood tough to erudite man about town. I even managed to understand my first New Yorker cartoon, though it still wasn’t funny. And I’m fast learning the ins and outs of the crazy world of online marketing.

Last week was Search Engine Strategies New York (SESNY), one of the major search marketing conferences and an important learning and networking opportunity. I attended with open ears and an open mind and walked away with a notebook full of helpful information. This week I launched a nationwide search for someone to implement all my notes while I watch South Park DVDs.

The conference started with notable industry expert and personality Guy Kawasaki‘s keynote presentation about the social media tool Twitter. For those not familiar, Twitter is essentially the status field from Facebook, divorced from all the addictive games and inane questionnaires. Users “follow” (Twitter-ese for a one-way connection between users) and attract followers with whom they communicate through short messages (limited to 140 characters) called tweets. Some of the exchanged info is useful, and some of it’s just babble… kind of like everything else in life. Here’s the Jobless and Less Twitter page for you curious types.

Being a Twitter newbie, I learned tons from Guy. Apparently – and this shouldn’t be surprising – there are many tools to automate (abuse?) elements of Twitter. SocialToo, for example, will automatically follow anyone who follows you. (If only the police had a real-life version they could use on stalkers and paparazzi…) Power users and aspirants no longer have to click through countless “Joe Schmo is now following your updates…” emails to return the favor. They just set up this service and let it run. Other sites provide similarly useful functionality, though Twitter purists see such gaming of the system as detrimental to the micro-blogging community. They have a valid point.

Perhaps the most meta moment of my life to date occurred during this presentation. As Guy presented juicy tidbits on how to game Twitter, people in the audience tweeted about it. He pulled up those tweets on Twitter a few moments later and highlighted them for the audience on the big screen. His new comments were tweeted again. A great vortex then formed and actually sucked a third of the audience into the Internet, where they now live a Tron-like existence. For your reading pleasure, I will attempt to condense the whole occurrence into one sentence, without getting sucked in myself. Please don’t try this at home; I am a trained professional. (If I don’t survive, please tell wifey I love her.) Here we go…

In a session about Twitter, audience members tweeted Guy Kawasaki’s comments about Twitter with their own comments, which he then found on Twitter and commented on to the audience, leading some to tweet about those.

Wow, I think I just tore a hole in my cerebral cortex with that stunt. What’s my name again? Where do I work?

SESNY covered a wide breadth of other search marketing topics. A panel called “Meaningful SEO Metrics: Going Beyond the Numbers” immediately followed the keynote and featured the crazy-looking Ray “Catfish” Comstock of Business OnLine. This guy really knew his stuff, and seemed to bubble over with useful tips from the Search trenches. I couldn’t take notes fast enough. Site Logic‘s Matthew Bailey was also quite enlightening in his presentation “Advanced SEO Strategies: Integrating Analytics, Usability, Persuasion, & Journalism,” though after my last stunt I lack the brainpower to explain exactly how. Just take my word for it; he was good. Other sessions were generally useful, though some more than others.

The exhibition floor was very hit or miss, as they tend to be at conferences. A lot of small companies advertised and offered services that were indistinguishable from each other. They may have been different, I just couldn’t tell from the booths. One thing is for sure, many companies at SESNY don’t know much about graphic design; some of the signage was just brutal. I guess expertise in one area of marketing doesn’t guarantee expertise, or even a working knowledge, in another. Still, I managed to have a few meaningful conversations – the folks at Google were very helpful – and leave behind a few business cards. Quality is always better than quantity in these situations. We’ll see if anything surfaces.

One pleasant surprise from SESNY was just how much I knew already – that progress I mentioned at the outset. Months of reading and slaving over Jobless and Less are starting to pay off. Whether this elevates my unemployment blog into the Search stratosphere or leads to gainful employment remains to be seen. For now a little progress is reward enough. Tomorrow I may not be so positive about my situation.

What networking looks like for kids at Wal-mart.

I hate networking events. Let me rephrase that. I despise networking events as the unholy creations they are. They fall somewhere below gefilte fish and riding the 7 express train during rush hour on a rainy day after a service delay. I’d rather perform an emergency tracheotomy on myself with a Bic pen. The what-I-despise-most scale is of course slightly less than scientific. But networking events are a proven tactic in the job search, and can lead to valuable contacts and even those job thingumajigs people keep talking about. I take part whenever I can bring myself to.

Good intentions always lead me to sign up; this will be the one with all the job openings and recruiters offering six-digit salaries. But I often manage to talk myself out of going the day of. Pouring over job postings for wavers on Craigslist suddenly becomes way more urgent than hobnobbing with people who might get me work. This time I convinced myself to go. Event organizer, The 405 Club, is a quality unemployment site that deserves my support. The Search Engine Strategies conference, which has kept me from jobsearching and blogging all week, was only three stops away, killing the travel excuse. And most of all, I am unemployed.

Success at a networking event is largely about selling yourself, face-to-face, in a few minutes and a few sentences, while wearing nicer clothes. It’s important to come prepared with an elevator pitch or talking points and then be strategic and forthright in starting conversations… and ending them. Experts recommend keeping conversations short and on topic, engaging and purposeful. The goal is to find those few who can help you by having meaningful conversations with lots of people.

The talking points have been in my back pocket for years. They’re so ingrained that I mutter them when my mind drifts off to its happy place. The strategy is fairly intuitive – talk to the people who can help, whether they are recruiters or contemporaries. You never know who the right person might be. Even conversations, once started, come naturally. I just turn on that Norm charm and bend people to my will. And then I hit them with the Jedi Mind Trick… “You will hire me.” The force is weak in me, so that only gets me a job for about 20 seconds, not long enough to make any money.

Starting and ending conversations is the hard part. I suck at this, always have. Walking up to strangers and trying to get something feels awkward and disingenuous in any environment – reason #142 why I avoid Sales jobs. Then there’s always that irrational yet looming fear of rejection, never mind that everyone else is there to chat too. Naturally cutting off a conversation also seems rude. I feel slighted when it happens to me and mean when I do it to someone else. Why does it have to be like that?

The organizers made it easier to target people, marking job seeker nametags with red stickers and recruiter nametags with green. Colored dots on stickers are a lot easier to distinguish in bar lighting than scrawled names. I spent a good part of the evening trying to decipher names as people had conversations. Aside from a strip club, a networking event may be the only setting where it’s okay to openly concentrate on women’s chests.

I was in the mood to socialize about job-related things, and so was everyone else, it seemed. Desperation brings out the best in people. I met a couple of recruiters, who lamented the dearth of available marketing jobs, killing me a little more inside. I connected with interesting people, including one woman who runs another good unemployment blog called The Art of Out of Work. I tried to convince her to switch to WordPress as a blogging platform. She tried to convince me to attend Meet Ups for bloggers. We each wondered how to make a little money doing something enjoyable. But after working the room and nursing a Diet Coke for a few hours, I’d had enough. My voice and patience for crowds were waning fast. The night was productive, as far as networking goes. The next event will be a little harder to blow off, though my powers of procrastination and avoidance should never be underestimated.

My chance to learn more about search marketing.

This upcoming week may turn out to be the busiest of unemployment so far. In addition to lunch meetings, networking events and the usual job search activities, I will be attending Search Engine Strategies (SES) in midtown. This event is the leading international conference series for webmasters, digital agencies, online marketers and corporate decision makers. And this year we can add to the list at least one unemployed but excited and enthusiastic blogger who’s looking to learn and network.

I’ve been to SES before, as a representative of a previous employer. It was up to me to organize and set up the company’s conference booth and check out the competition. My responsibilities, though educational in their own right, didn’t leave much time for attending seminars and events. This time around I’m free to come and go as I please. Learning from experts and networking with industry people can only help my job search. And I intend to take full advantage.

Marketing is my chosen field, but much of the work seems to have disappeared lately. The economy decided to throw itself a nice big recession, and invite everyone. Companies always cut back on marketing jobs when money goes away. The approach seems almost counter-intuitive, given the opportunity to reach your consumer with less chatter to distract them.

The few job openings I’ve encountered often have something to do with search engine marketing (SEM). SEM, for those who don’t know, is a type of internet marketing that aims to improve a website’s visibility in search engine results. This includes search engine optimization, paid placement, contextual advertising and paid inclusion. Running Jobless and Less has taught me quite a bit, and business contacts have been extremely generous in explaining things further. I still don’t know as much as I’d like to though. Do we ever? And the more I learn, the more I realize how much is left to learn.

A conference is a great opportunity to network in your chosen industry. Everybody is there at least partly for that purpose. Finding a job may be rough going in this market, especially given my still somewhat limited knowledge, but connecting with people possibly in a position to help can’t hurt. We’ll see what happens.