Reflections on the Past Few Months
June 3rd, 2007 | Published in Misc. | 6 Comments
One of the things that I strongly believe is - success is just showing up and following up. This means showing up to meetings, attending conferences, attending lectures, or at the most basic level showing up to the gym, to lunch with friends, or just “showing up” ready to work on your latest project.
Recently Chris Heuer gave a talk at the Web 2.0 Open — unfortunately due to a strange set of circumstances - and some bad room advice - only about 4 people showed up. But Chris wasn’t even the least bit bummed by this turn out. In a Direct Twitter he told me: “Success is showing up - whether there are 4 people or 400.”
This is why I think it’s important to attend conferences, meetups, and workshops. To become a part of your community, and to help local, regional, and national organizations to gain exposure. And to be perfectly frank, this is something that I excel at.
But the other half of Success - is in the follow-up. And that’s an area where I have definitely been failing lately.
So, I’d like to take this opportunity to follow-up with some really amazing people who have helped me over the last few months.
First - to our recent guests on The Business Makers - Jeremiah Owyang, John Moore, Lee & Sachi LeFevre, Jimmy Wales, Silona Bonewald, Giovanni Gallucci, Matt Mullenweg, & Derek Hatchard.
Next, I’d like to thank Nick Finck & Chris Bernard - without whom I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to attend WebVisions & MIX07. To Nick - Kelsey will be in Seattle soon — and I’d love it if he could interview you for the show. To Chris - Thanks again for everything — and I look forward to seeing you here in Houston in a couple of weeks — and would love to interview you for The Business Makers.
I’d also like to thank my friends - for always having my back - and for all their words of wisdom and encouragement. So a big thank you to: Kelsey, Kinan, whurley, Bryan, Zach, Connie, Greg, Ludwig, Adrian, Cody, Jim, Melissa, Katie & the rest of the Refresh Houston and CSS Meetup Gang. I’d also like to thank everyone who has been helping me on the path to becoming the #1 Erica in Google. Thanks for the link juice 
And if you guys ever need anything — just let me know.
And finally, to my mentor Ed Schipul, who is one of the coolest guys I know.
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Erica O'Grady is a New Media and Loyalty Marketing Specialist based in Houston Texas. Her turn ons are: Community Building, Design, BarCamp, and Twitter. Her turn offs are: Trolls, Spammers, and Folks who "Just Don't Get It". 
June 3rd, 2007 at 3:35 pm (#)
Erica,
I completely agree that showing up is the first half of being successful and I know for a fact that you make the time to be present. The follow up part is hard just because saying “no” is difficult when there is so much action happening all the time.
As I’ve told you before - soon all of your community will be name-dropping ‘Erica’ instead of the other way around.
Keep it up and see you soon.
Marc
June 3rd, 2007 at 5:45 pm (#)
Erica,
Thank *you* for being such a great conduit for meeting others in tech, design and marketing/advertising in Texas. You have an amazing ability connecting people with similar interests who would have never otherwise corssed paths. Keep up the good work!
-giovanni
June 3rd, 2007 at 6:55 pm (#)
Thank you Erica! You are awesome and I cannot wait to come visit you when (well if) I come in Jan 08
Rock on!
June 3rd, 2007 at 8:13 pm (#)
Erica, it’s been a pleasure getting to know you. I love your passion for community-building and the knowledge you so freely share.
When I saw your tweet earlier that you were actually blog-writing, I said, “It’s about time!”
Connie #847 (or some such number LOL)
June 5th, 2007 at 11:44 am (#)
You’re an incredible networker, an awesome organizer and just a really cool person. Erica, you’re the best. Thank you for all you do for this community.
June 8th, 2007 at 4:08 am (#)
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