Written by Virginia on December 13th, 2009
Grant and I just got stopped on the street by a lovely woman named Isabel, who spotted my Card Caddie business card holder. We got started chatting about Lovebug — she was particularly fascinated and almost disbelieving that we had met on Craigslist. All in all, it was a fun little conversation, in which we both got spontaneous stranger hugs!
There are worse ways to spend a Saturday night. After having been out of the country for two weeks, and off the radar for waaaay longer, it sure was nice to get a bit of positive business interaction!
Hopefully it’ll spur me on to bigger and better things come the new year. As it is, I’m busily working on a Lovebug book, and trying to get through all the holiday travels and parties without getting too frazzled or going broke!
Happy holidays and hugs to everyone… I hope to be back to consulting more often come January!
Posted in misc. | No Responses »
Written by Virginia on October 5th, 2009
Man, I get a little rush of relief and joy when I see that people are still posting ads like this one and this one on Craigslist. I love being reminded that, despite the bad press and whatnot, Craiglsist continues to serve as a great source of somewhat “alternate” personal ads — and free ones at that. Keep the creativity coming, folks!
Posted in Craigslist, Online Dating, Our Terrible Economy, Personal Ads | No Responses »
Written by Virginia on September 18th, 2009
Man, I have been MIA! Wanna know why? A: Because EVERYONE is getting married this year. Seriously, I think my fiancé and I are headed to my seventh (his eighth) wedding of the season next week. Yowza! We’ve barely had a second to do any planning of our own wedding, let alone consulting or blogging or other fun stuff!
But this story was so cute and heartwarming that it dragged me out of my blogging sabbatical. To every single client who has expressed the feeling that they are “too old” to have any success with online dating: NUH-UH!
If a pair of 83-year-olds can boldly jump into the online scene and *get married*, no less, I think it’s safe to say you’re never too old. Good hunting, daters!
Posted in Online Dating | No Responses »
Written by Virginia on July 4th, 2009
This day had to come eventually, I suppose… now my lovely $40 magnets are all gone.
Well, two out of three of them. I got one for each side of my car (so that the arrow pointing to the Card Caddie would go backwards on each side for optimal placement). They were a pretty good deal, but they still cost a pretty penny!
The very first day I applied them to my vehicle, the driver’s side one went flying off my door in the 520 wind. Oops!
So Grant ordered me a replacement. Which just got stolen (I think last night when I was parked in Pioneer Square for my high school reunion.)So, uh, classmates/drunks/hooligans of Pioneer Square, can I pretty please have my magnet back? It does me a lot more good than you!
I mean, c’mon… the card thing in the parking lot was at least amusing. Sort of. But answer me this: what the heck are you really gonna do with a magnet advertising someone else’s company? I’d like to think you could at least make your vandalism useful, like the hacked McDonald’s sign Grant spotted today. You can do better, vandals! Show me your A game!
Posted in misc. | No Responses »
Written by Virginia on June 27th, 2009
…And their altruistic/mischevious guerrilla marketing. I was parked at the Southcenter Mall for a couple hours this afternoon, and when I got to my car, look what I discovered! Some kids had taken it upon themselves to remove most of the cards in my Card Caddies, and stick them under the wipers of other cars in the parking lot.
At least, I assume it was kids. That’s exactly the sort of generous yet snarky thing my friends and I would do in our bored, antsy, mildly rebellious teen years. Heh.
Click to continue »
Posted in misc. | 1 Response »
Written by Virginia on May 29th, 2009
Hey Seattle singles! I’ve joined up with some other dating-minded entrepreneurs from Biznik to help plan a singles mixer sometime this summer. Please check out our survey, even if mixers aren’t your thing — hopefully we can learn how to change that. :) I’ll keep you posted with details as they come together. Thank you!
Posted in Events | No Responses »
Written by Virginia on May 22nd, 2009
In the next few weeks, a really neat movie is going to start to come together. Biznik put together a film called SHINE, which is all about how small businesses are going to be what lifts us out of this recession/depression era.
Personally, I think half the battle is approaching things in a new light — not constantly muttering how terrible things are and how bad our economy is. But there’s definitely more to it than that.
My own bit at SHINE was mostly about how I’m seeing business boom lately, despite the recession — my theory is that people are no longer willing to sit back and allow their lives to be unsatisfactory. Once they wind up laid off from their job, they’re taking the initiative to search for something more meaningful and soul-fulfilling — in this case, finding love!
I love being a part of that search, and I hope this economic crisis has provided the opportunity for some people to re-examine their priorities and move their emotional happiness up a bit on the list! I’ll post a full clip of my interview once it’s done being edited.
Posted in Our Terrible Economy | No Responses »
Written by Virginia on May 21st, 2009
Craig Newmark of Craiglist rarely goes über-public — sure, he’s been known to speak up on behalf of his company, but he (like his chosen user interface) is fairly no-frills. So I found this WSJ article kind of interesting, in light of the recent decision to close the erotic services category.
Craig states that participating in social media and reviewing sites is an act of patriotism and compassion to other consumers. I tend to agree — I’m one of the most review-happy people I know, possibly because I’m overly critical, but I like to think of it as simply having high standards.
Especially when something is very pricey or when there is a lot at stake, I’m known to be VERY vocal about it later on. Usually just a so-so experience warrants no comment, but if I have an experience that’s either extremely positive or extremely negative, you can bet I’ll be mentioning it on Google Reviews, Citysearch, Judy’s Book, Yelp… you name it.
I’m glad to see Craig encouraging consumers to get involved, especially when it comes to dating-related sites. I like to think of myself as one of the few positive reviews out there, since I don’t think many people are convinced by the models and actors in eHarmony commercials and Yahoo banner ads. Here’s hoping that we can start to balance out the often overwhelming negativity surrounding online dating!
Posted in Craigslist, social networking | No Responses »
Written by Virginia on May 12th, 2009
Social networking sites have morphed a lot over the past couple of years. Back when Friendster was all there was, I know a LOT of people who found love (and lust) on that site, as well as friends, business networking contacts, etc. etc. But now that the social networking stratosphere is significantly fuller, things get a bit more complicated.
The era of Myspace was a favorite for lots of people I know. It was so easy — if you had a unique Myspace URL, it was a great way to send a potential online date a simple link that included some photos and snippets about you, but didn’t disclose your most personal information (like your last name, place of work, etc.). While Myspace allowed for lots of disclosue, the culture wasn’t wild about putting too many details in, so it was a pretty safe and secure way to show someone a snapshot of your personality without disclosing too much sensitive stuff.
And it had another great application — as an online dating network. I know TONS of singles who used to use Myspace as a way to search for and contact other compatible singles. Now that Myspace’s heyday is over, those singles are lamenting all the changes to the online social scene — private profiles mean you can’t search for cool matches as easily, and Facebook’s dominance means it’s not a good dating platform.
Did you catch that, readers? Facebook is NOT a good dating platform! First and last names, places of work, detailed geographical and employment info, and no unique URLs means bad news for online dating. Facebook is a great tool in many ways, but this is just not an area where it shines.
So for now, stick to hand-picking which details your potential bachelor(ette)s receive, and happy (and safe) dating!
Posted in Online Dating | No Responses »
Written by Virginia on May 11th, 2009
Man, I just hate it when an ad I post for a client winds up getting flagged and removed on Craigslist. Sure, sometimes it’ll happen for some minor Terms of Service violation, and I realize that that’s valid.
But MOST of the time, when one of my creations gets flagged and removed, it’s because someone out there is bitter and unhappy. In chatting with other daters who’ve seen this phenomenon, we’ve determined that it comes from a certain sub-section of Craigslist users — those who are so unhappy with their own romantic lives (or lack thereof) that their only satisfaction comes from raining a little misery onto the dating lives of other users.
To them, I say: give me a call! We CAN help lift you out of that misery and find you a match made in heaven — perhaps someone with whom you can eat ice cream in front of the treadmill window at the gym. :)
Posted in Craigslist | No Responses »
