Imagine you are sitting at lunch with a group of friends chatting and the topic of decor comes up. You make a joke about how glad you are that you got all of that crappy country blue and pink stuff out of your house because it looked like 1985. You continue with the thread and say that couldn’t even sell the stuff at a rummage sale because no one uses those colors anymore unless they are color blind.

Fast forward to a few weeks later when one of the ladies at the table is hosting a Pampered Chef party at her house. You walk in and immediately notice that everything is country blue and pink. You flash back to the conversation at the table. Had you ever been in her house before? Did you know her house looks like 1985? Do you think she was offended? Do you need to say anything to apologize? Do you even care what she thinks?

That situation happens on Facebook pretty much every day. I am amazed at what I see people posting. Whether it is political or religious or just about taste in general, I see things posted all the time that I know for a fact offend people in my social circle. Sometimes people respond in a good natured way–”Hey! I like my country blue and pink!.” Sometimes they fight back– “I guess my house isn’t good enough for you then? Not everyone has enough money to redecorate every year.” Sometimes they just stay silent and either hide their hurt feelings or even “unfriend” the person.

I wonder what it is about Facebook that makes us all feel like we can say whatever we want, however we want, without any regard to how it makes those around us feel. I know people will say that I care too much what everyone else thinks, but since when is it a bad thing to be considerate of the feelings of your friends and colleagues? It’s one thing to post a comment to start a genuine discussion (and I question how well you can really even do that over Facebook with topics as heavy as health care, the economy, and raising kids). It’s something else entirely to post random musings just because you can, often at the expense of others.

If you made it this far in my rant, please let me know your feelings on the topic. Has Facebook changed the way that we all express ourselves by making it so easy to confront or ridicule others without dealing with them face to face? Or am I being too soft and just need to lighten up?

I spend a lot of time on Facebook for both business and personal reasons. I like that I can interact with my customers and my friends in the same place in different ways. I’m also just a social person that wants to be involved in conversations and see what is going on with everyone. Through the time that I have spent on Facebook I have come to characterize people into 6 different groups. Groups are not mutually exclusive. I know some people who actually fit into a few of them (scary!).

1) Business Blah: These are the people that only post on Facebook for business purposes, for better or for worse. If they are only friends with business associates, it works great. If they are friends with family and neighbors, those people are probably hiding their status updates because they are so tired of reading nothing but business updates. Mix it up a little, people. Tell us your company is having a great month but then show us a picture of your kid or something.

2) Attention Addicts/Sympathy Seekers: All of us follow at least a couple of these people on Facebook. I’m lumping them into the same category because their means are different but their goal is the same. Attention Addicts post seemingly innocent questions (often full of innuendo) that are calculated to get responses. “I’m feeling like such a naughty girl but am too embarrassed to say why.” Sympathy Seekers are constantly whining about their latest problems and when you share your good news, they can only top it with more bad news of their own. You consider hiding their updates but it’s like a train wreck–you have to keep watching.

3) Serial Posters: “Just woke up.” “Getting ready for breakfast.” “Easting breakfast at my desk.” “Breakfast today was great!” And on, and on, and on. Eventually you do hide their status updates because you don’t want your life to be as boring as theirs. The irony of the Serial Poster is that they also often post about how busy they are and how much work they have to get done. Chances are good that they would get more done if they didn’t post everything they were doing while they were doing it.

4) Lost in Timers. Catching up with old friends on Facebook is great until you realize that the Lost in Timer is still stuck in high school or college. Every day they are posting their favorite memory of you on your page or tagging you in pictures from 1987 that they have scanned in and uploaded. Every other post of theirs is an 80s movie trivia score or a link to a hair band video on Youtube. Memories are great but the failure to move on just isn’t healthy.

5) Players. I don’t mean in the “Playa” sense where they are dating and seeing a lot of action. I mean the game “Player.” The ones who are constantly asking you to send them chickens or kill a mob boss. We all get pulled into the games at some point. But if your status updates are 80% game notifications, you need to spend more time playing the game of life.

6) You: Clearly, you are none of the people above. They are annoying and you are not. You do your best to only post pertinent information and never to the point of overkill. You are sensitive to others and politically correct. Your posts are an equal mix of wit, social commentary, and family life. Everyone loves to read your updates and look at your pictures. Wouldn’t it be great if everyone on Facebook were like you?

(Thanks to my Lunch Friends for their thoughts on this post as I was drafting!)

Let me start out by saying that I didn’t even know that there was such a thing as a Social Media Butterfly until this morning. I was thinking about what I wanted to blog about and it kept coming back to me that I seem to be spending half of my time these days social networking on different sites. In my head I kept equating it to being a “social butterfly” and I decided to title my post “social media butterfly.” I did a quick Google search only to discover that lots of other people thought of this term long before me.

In essence, the Social Media Butterfly is the technical equivalent of the traditional Social Butterfly. You move from group to group networking and socializing. You may do it for fun or to futher your business. You know a lot of different people in different circles and enjoy making friends.

I wouldn’t say I’m exactly a social butterfly in my real life, but a big part of that is working in a home office and spending a lot of time and energy raising two kids. But lately I have absolutely become a Social Media Butterfly. In addition to my time on the Sunshine Rewards forum with those members (and the corresponding Twitter account and videoblog), I spend a good deal of time on Disney sites talking about both friends and business. I keep my Facebook page open constantly (partaking in a little Farkle, Mafia Wars, and even Farmville). I couldn’t get into Twitter much until I installed TweetDeck, and now I am addicted. Add to that my Ning sites (like TwitterMoms and Smaller Indiana). Oh! And my actual job…networking on various affiliate marketing sites and commenting on blogs. I even got a new phone that I could better text on because my other one was too hard.

It remains to be seen whether all of my time as a Social Media Butterfly is going to be profitable. It’s hard to figure out an ROI on the time that you spend Twittering. I guess I’ll give it a go for the rest of the summer and see where it takes me!

Of all of the sites that I have, why is the one that I give the least attention to the one that is about ME? Part of it is probably the profit factor (this blog is truly a labor of love and doesn’t really make any money). But the other part is that I feel like I am already putting so much about ME out into the world that there doesn’t seem to be much left to say.

On any given day, I post at least a few Facebook updates as well as a few Twitter updates. Add to that a couple of forum posts in each of the different groups that I belong to. Then some emails back and forth with employees and family. With all that, I’ve pretty much told all that there is to tell about me in a given day. There just isn’t anything interesting left.

I promise to do a better job of updating this site about the news that has me interested. I need to install a fancy twitter feeder of some kind (any suggestions?) that will import my tweets into this blog. Plugin, anyone? Then I will at least feel like it’s worth it for you to visit.

What am I working on so much that keeps me off of here? A lot of blogging on my Twilight site (Twilight fans…I think they come out with something new every single day). Also Sunshine Rewards is taking a lot of time these days to retool and keep up with offer and shopping trends. Plus, the kids are home for the summer. Which means time flies by so fast I don’t even know what month it is.

I’ll be blogging soon about a couple of great conferences coming up this summer, Affiliate Summit and Blog Indiana. Until then, you’ll have to check me out on Facebook and Twitter to see what I’m up to.

Once upon a time when I was in the corporate world, I loved reading “Who Moved My Cheese?” with my teams. I loved when things changed because I saw opportunities. But I didn’t think that the book applied to me now that I am an affiliate and own my own business. I couldn’t have been more wrong!

As it turns out, the cheese gets moved more in affiliate marketing than when I worked for Lexis. I have to remember that every move means a new challenge that can take me down a different path. Look around. Isn’t the new Shareasale toolbar policy really just someone moving my cheese? It means not only evaluating my own company’s non-use (or use) of toolbars but to what extent we need to educate our visitors better about them. It means looking at where we are in industry and where we want to be.

But toolbars aren’t the only thing. I was reading Scott Jangro’s post about affiliate links in Twitter. Extending it out to other conversations now going on is the use of affiliate links on Facebook. These are new opportunities for us. We can choose to follow the path of monetizing our Twitter and Facebook accounts or continue along the road of viewing them only as pure social networking.

Each twist and turn in affiliate marketing can be scary because it’s my livelihood. On the flip side, it keeps my business fresh because I always have to be on the lookout for the next big thing. So go ahead and move my cheese. I’m up to the challenge and, in fact, looking forward to it!

I was in Facebook tonight creating an ad for Sunshine Rewards when I saw the “coupon” button under Funding Sources. So of course I Googled “facebook ad coupon.” Much to my surprise, there were quite a few out there. However, most were for people brand new to Facebook ads. Because I have created a Facebook ad before, I could not use them.

Then I came across people talking about getting a $100 Facebook ad credit for signing up for the Visa Business Network on Facebook. Sure enough, after I added the application and completed my profile with them (which took about 5 minutes), I received an email with a coupon code for a $100 Facebook ad credit. I entered it into my account and it is showing up.

I can’t speak to whether or not the ads will actually work, but I liked that I was able to use the “Social Actions” check box to tie my advertisement to people who are “Sunshine Rewards Fans” or part of the “Sunshine Rewards Group.” From my own use of Facebook, I know that seeing my friends’ names and pictures over the ads on the right does make me look at them more closely.

So if you are looking for some free advertising, give the Visa Business offer on Facebook a shot. I’ll be anxious to hear what you think about the effectiveness of the Facebook ads. And let me know if you come across mine!

Last month at Affiliate Summit West, I had the pleasure of leading a round table discussion about affiliate created video. At first I worried that I didn’t possibly have enough to say to fill a whole hour. But as I began putting together my notes, I realized that I could have talked for hours!

Because this wasn’t a formal ASW09 presentation, it was not recorded for their site. However, Angie did take some video with her Flip and has been formatting it for me a piece at a time. Here is the first 10 minutes of the round table discussion. In it, we talk about different types of videos that affiliates might want to create including product and merchant reviews, how-to-videos, weekly updates, and viral videos. In addition, we started talking about how we can tell how many people are watching our whole videos and the Shareasale video technology. Lastly, we talked briefly about the use of videos on Facebook.

Thanks to some of my friends for attending and helping keep the discussion interesting.