Today, I am on the cover of the local publication, The Rural Virginian (sorry, no link). You can download the article, though.
The article was written, very well I might add, by local freelance writer Wendy Edwards. You can follow Wendy on Twitter, too (@WendyTime). The interview itself was a lesson in how social media can have a profound effect on the way we communicate and form relationships. I talked with Wendy a few months ago, in October, I think. The Rural Virginian wanted to do a profile story on me and the things I have been doing with social media and real estate. We did the traditional phone interview. During the course of the interview, though, we started talking all about social media. Wendy told me that one of her good friends heads up an organization called Social Media for Social Change. We talked about Facebook (and became friends there), we talked about Twitter, and I showed her the AIM chat widget here at the Zebra. Wendy talked to me about some of the things she has planned (exciting stuff, to be sure). All in all, it was much less of an interview, and much more of a great conversation about social media.
Well, the conversation was great for Wendy and me, but probably not quite as interesting for readers of the Rural Virginian. As a result, nothing ever really came of it. That was fine by me, since I doubt that many local residents really care all that much about a Realtor using social media.
That does not mean, however, that they wouldn’t care about social media.
After NAR Orlando, and Inman Connect NYC, I started to think about how the skills and knowledge that I have acquired might be able to benefit people outside of real estate, and even business in general. I started to do a little research on my own, and I discovered that many local residents were participating in social media. This research also showed me that there were a lot of folks and organizations who could benefit from social media, but they just hadn’t been exposed to it– yet.
I decided that if I wanted to make a difference in my community, one way that I could do that would be to share my knowledge of social media with my community. I also knew, however, that doing that here at the Zebra probably wasn’t the best way to go about it. First of all, what I talk about here is real estate related, meaning that I was either going to alienate one audience or the other every time I wrote a post.
The solution– DanielRothamel.com
At DanielRothamel.com, I have a way of talking about social media outside the context of real estate and business. I can reach an audience that is slightly different from the folks that I love who read the Zebra.
The first thing that I did on DanielRothamel.com was announce a free presentation that I am going to give to local residents about the ways in which social media can benefit them, and the tools they can use to take advantage of those benefits. Once I decided that I wanted to do the presentation, and concentrate on the local community, I approached Wendy again and asked her if this was something that might be better for readers of the Rural Virginian. Sure enough, she agreed, and the article was born. Score! 
It should be fun, so if you are reading this, and you are local to the Charlottesville area, please come on out on the 25th. If you aren’t local, but you know someone who is who could benefit, then please, let them know. The more people that I can reach with this message, the better.
Thanks to Wendy for writing the article, I know that it will help me spread the word and change our community. Wendy and I now communicate regularly, mostly through Facebook and AIM, and she became my very first RSVP for the event. Yet another very cool person that I can look forward to meeting IRL! 
