Link Roundup

Quintesocial works hard to stay on top of news and information that we believe is meaningful and useful. Here's the news we've shared on Twitter over the last week:

• Baby Boomers Opting For Less Drastic Facelift [News Channel 8]
  
  
• The Baby Boomer housing market [The Orange County Register]
  
  
• Pepsi over Coke? Boomers balk at list [thestar.com]
  
  
• Taking political stock of the millennials [Kyle Wingfield]
  
  
• Will Boomers Be Any Different? [NYTimes.com]
  
  
• Sandwich generation feels squeezed for space at home [chicagotribune.com]
  
  
• Boomers Slowly Warm to Mobile Web [eMarketer]
  
  
• Baby Boomers win gold for Olympics viewing [examiner.com]
  
  
• The trials of baby boomer job hunt [The Daily Breeze]

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How Do You Educate Yourself on Health Issues?

Hoke and I have been exploring adding health affinity groups as a feature on Quintesocial.

Hoke has terrific experience assisting with the development of a public site that boasts the largest health affinity group for diabetes called dLife. There’s a lot of info on this site from members of the diabetes community sharing comments and recipes, a blog, expert Q&A, info on diabetic equipment, etc.

The top more prevalent, chronic health conditions in the U.S. are pretty consistent on a nationwide basis: Diabetes, hypertension, asthma, and heart failure.

Due to their prevalence, there are myriad places to get lots of information, but some of the data is conflicting from site to site, some is of better quality than others, and many sites do not offer the participation of the health community.

There doesn’t seem to be a “community” like dlife.com for other health conditions as yet.

When a health condition is less prevalent, where are the best resources?

For example, right now I am trying to assist my Dad with a flair-up of gout, which I didn’t even know he had until he mentioned today that he missed work because he couldn’t be on his feet for his shift.

My Dad is 75 years old, goes it the YMCA 363 days a year, and rarely do I remember from childhood forward him missing a day of work.

So it’s a red flag for me when he mentions having missed a day of work, not to mention pain. Dad is one of these “take two aspirin and deal with it” kind of stoic men many in his generation may be.

When a doctor at the VA tried to prescribe cholesterol medication, Dad declined, he said he wanted to try to control it with diet first and he has done so successfully for well over a decade. That’s his philosophy. And it’s mine too, so I’m supportive.

So tonight my job is to educate myself on gout and whether there are dietary or other lifestyle changes Dad can make to help prevent future flair-ups.

My primary go-to source for helping Dad research his health concerns has become Wikipedia.

Their search engine is very easy to use, they reference common names for the same condition well, plus data is peer reviewed and foot noted. It is also written for the lay person. And unlike some medical reference sites, Wikipedia often includes information on lifestyle factors instead of medical jargon and pharmaceutical references.

Tonight I readily found what I was looking for pertaining to gout and lifestyle issues so I can cut and paste to pass it along to my dear old Dad.

But for chronic issues, Hoke & I are still thinking Quintesocial users may find health affinity groups helpful for peer review and support in addition to general information.

Let us know what you think! We value your opinions.

Birth Announcement: Our business sprung to life

Hoke, Scott & I (plus our fantastic Camp Q team) just birthed a business on Monday. We are now the proud parents of Quintesocial live in Portland, Oregon!

We have spent the last year in R&D so longer than a human gestational period, but this was a unique undertaking so it required longer incubation. The scientific sociology and the sophisticated algorithms that we use to match Quintesocial members with events and activities in their local communities is not only unique and proprietary, but it the "first impression" of the service so it underwent a beautiful metamorphosis from cute fuzzy caterpillar to beautiful butterfly this past year.

Our Portland licensee, Sarah, has experienced some of our growing pains first-hand as she helped tweak the tools and resources available to Social Directors on her online "metrics panel" over the past months.

And it all came together for us live and in-person at the cool renovated, LEED certified, EcoTrust building in Portland Monday night at Sarah's launch party.

Already today, Sarah has successfully signed up 31 Quintesocial members in less than 24 hours. And has gained approval from two businesses (one with 400+ employees and one with 16) to offer Quintesocial at a group discount.

Next we will be offering affinity discounts via LinkedIn and Facebook.

After all, we social networking companies fully utilize the power of social media. Q is not a competitor. That's a stale, old business model. The NEW business model is that we interweave and utilize each outlet's distinct strengths to co-promote with other social media outlets as separate marketing campaigns.

We even blend new media with traditional media to build strong marketing. Here’s a fun example. Sarah sent out a postcard announcing her launch party in addition to Tweeting about her event, posting it to LinkedIn events, posting on our Facebook fan page, etc.

A contemporary she had worked with on a Portland special event six years ago, received her postcard and contacted to her about featuring her post card in an employee newsletter for over 100,000 postal service employees. What a terrific blending of traditional and social media tools! Special shout-out to Ron – thank you for coming to the party and looking forward to seeing your photos.

We are all excited, exhilarated, and energized (I think I used all the relevant descriptors that start with the alliterative letter "e" – ha), but are also a tad exhausted from the birthing process. But just like birthing a baby, the joys will quickly overshadow the labor pains and we look forward to watching Quintesocial grow.

We’ll be in Denver next and are in talks with Savannah, Birmingham, Charlotte, and Napa Valley as we post this.

Exciting! Tell us where you’d like to see Quintesocial next.

Business Travel: Experiencing Portland, Oregon

I make a concerted effort to experience the cities where I conduct business versus the airport, the rental car outlet, my hotel accommodations, and the interiors of various office buildings.

I had the distinct pleasure of visiting Portland, Oregon on business recently. We are launching our first Quintesocial market there March 1. By the time you read this, we will be “LIVE in PDX.” (I will be writing about this exciting adventure for Thursday’s blog.)

Upon checking into my hotel despite being about 9 pm, I wandering down a wide sidewalk from my hotel near the Lloyd Center, down ML King Street to Burgerville.

Yep, fast food. Far from ordinary fast food. Burgerville’s brand. Burgerville locally sources their foodstuffs. They recycle or reuse everything – including food waste/compost. And the burger baskets are delectable. I had the double Tillamook cheeseburger. Having grown up in Wisconsin, I know good cheese when I taste it and Tillamook was heaven. Devine cheddar that makes your mouth sing like Aretha Franklin. I also had the Burgerville northwest cherry chocolate milk shake. I sucked down the last of it as I strolled back to my hotel. Great intro to Portland and it’s uber local, uber pedestrian, uber environmental focus within the first hour.

Next came breakfast; a little corner restaurant called Bridges where I had thick multigrain freshly baked artisan bread toasted and served with homemade jam along side my roasted garlic, blue cheese and broccoli omelet with farm fresh eggs. My kind of eating! How can I not love Portland when my day starts out so gloriously?

On day two we had a brief 20 minutes between appointments on our Portland Social Director, Sarah, zipped me through Powell's Books – an amazingly humongous maze of a bookstore that feels small and intimate. I managed to buy two books for the airplane and still get to our luncheon engagement. Yep, more fabulous food.

Friday night after a full day, Sarah had procured tickets from friends who produce Live Wire!, a live radio broadcast on the local NPR station. Two back-to-back show tapings in a local theatre with cash bar and pub food. Total local flavor and a lot of fun.

As I wrap this up, I will finish packing for my return trip to Portland for the launch festivities at the fantastic Art Deco Ecotrust Building. And Sarah has hand-selected Oregon brews and Oregon wines for the party. I am truly looking forward to a first-class affair.

Special shout-out to Judy Peppler at Qwest for approving Quintesocial as part of their employer discount program. Looking forward to seeing her and a few other heavy hitters for a glass of vino at the launch party before they go on to their monthly “diva night out”.