Case in point, a man asks “what is club soda?” in a comment one of my cocktail shows. The response was one that I’ve seen before and will no doubt see again, “what is club soda????????? How did you log onto a computer and use finger muscles to type that question? … In another episode he uses cream for a white Russian let me know if you want to know what that is and I’ll explain…” Obviously the comment was left with a sarcastic tone but the point was made clear, someone doesn’t understand my international audience.

There are no stupid questions, only ignorant responders and I don’t mean this in a bad way. Some folks do not understand the idea of an international world where not everyone speaks English or the same English as we do in the United States. What is “Club Soda?” That’s actually a very good question but to answer it you first must do some investigation. Turns out the first commenter is from the United Kingdom while the responder was from the United States and these separate regions define carbonated products differently from one another.

Club Soda isn’t a global term, it’s not like “Coca Cola,” a product heavily marketed across many countries with a symbol, trademark and billion dollar namesake. The same can be said for the origin of Lemonade which may be entirely different from one country to another as may be the cocktail garnish we know here in the United States as a “Maraschino Cherry.”

We’re trying to create excellent video and audio content that streams the globe from time zone to time zone. However, we’re only human, we cannot understand every culture on earth and we cannot predict what people may or may not understand within our content. But, we can keep an open mind when the “stupid question” arises and rather than be condescending in our response, ask for the persons origin and a bit about their culture.

By opening a line of communication with your international audience it’s important to respect their efforts to speak your native tongue (no matter how bad) and understand that not all forms of English have the same meaning in all countries. After you’ve opened communications with your international audience you’re bound to not only answer their question in more detail but learn a bit about another culture in the process.

Creating content is a two-way road and while you may be teaching someone something, there is no limit to your own knowledge absorbed by those around you and abroad.

While old school media is a one-way conversation, you’ve got a tough job to do when it comes to answering all those e-mails and blog post comments. You may want to establish a dialog with each user independently to really add focus to their existence and be more direct on answering their questions. This can be time consuming and, frankly, hard work but you owe it to them to make the effort as it will strengthen their bonded relationship to your show.

Your viewers are probably used to old school media where they really become fans with the host(s) of the show but can never contact the person directly. In the new world way of doing media, the minute you shoot them back an e-mail, they’ll respect you more and identify more with you as an individual.

It’s important to remember that folks contacting you directly via e-mail, web contact forums or by posting on your website have taken time out of their day to say hello. The least you owe them is a little time to do the same, no?

Twitter is like a home to many individuals in the Internet. Folks visit to socialize, some visit to market themselves and their brands while yet others come to find people with like interests. I have nothing wrong with people pimping their websites, dropping in a link on their 140-character post or otherwise conversing with the work that is social media. Hell, I do it all the time.

But, please, at least try to be somewhat human when socializing on Twitter. Some key turn-offs for me, things that usually get me to NOT follow you on Twitter is filling in the Real Name field with your domain name. You know what? If I want to know your domain I’ll ask. Or, better yet, be subtle and hand me your domain equipped with useful information, pictures or a funny video once you get to know me a bit. I enjoy a direct message saying “hi” and explaining why you started following me so that we can open a dialog and talk.

I socialize on Twitter as I would as an individual at the worlds biggest Internet conference. There are thousands of potential friends, leads, colleagues and associates – how would you handle yourself at a conference? Would you lead off by saying “Hi, I’m Derrick Schommer from EverydayDrinkers.TV, I have a great website that can help you out!” and run off to yet another person and repeat the same promotion?

No. You’d introduce yourself, you’d open a dialog and a line of questioning and, eventually, you may drop your website and a bit about your job. You may even lead off with a business card and then sit down and socialize to see what you and the recipient(s) have in common. You may find you have a lot in common and could work with each other to some common goal. Observe how you handled yourself, you were personal and friendly all while treating the other person as an individual sentient being.

For instance, I’ve followed and “friended” many folks that run drinking websites, reviews and wine blogs. Why? I love wine, I like to read, I like to drink and I’ve got something in common with them. If I’m nice enough they may even tolerate when I tweet my latest video podcast episodes on a weekly basis because they know I’m a human with a life, problems and have gotten to know me over a few “tweets.”

If you simply want to follow me in hopes I’ll follow you back so you can spam me with diet pills, SEO benefits, lines of haircare products and everything else under the sun you’ll probably notice you’ve got very few followers. Nine times out of ten, if a twitter user is following 5,000 people and only 25 have followed them back there is a reason.

Some helpful tips I’ve learned from observing and growing my own small social network of friends:

• Be friendly and helpful. If a follower asks you to check something out, give them a few minutes and do it then send them back your thoughts.
• Be a good Internet citizen and be approachable and friendly as you would in real life. Twitter can be a tool but so can you.
• Post daily updates that can be useful or silly. Ponder a thought and send out a tweet with no other agenda.
• Post links to other people’s sites, perhaps those that are following you to share the love. It’s a back and forth relationship – it’s not all about you.
• Follow people you find have interesting things to say, don’t follow every single person just because the Twitter allows it.
• Pimp your site on occasion but be modest, ask for comments/suggestions on how you could make it better.
• Don’t be annoying, if you post every five minutes all day you’re going to lose followers (or at least me). Just because you don’t have anything to do doesn’t mean I don’t.
• Use your real name or at least something that people think is your real name. We want to interact with people, not domains. Put your domain in the “more info URL” because, if I want more info I’ll go there, don’t force it on me.
• PR people can be cool too. Lot’s of great PR folks are using twitter as a useful resource, such as Flying Dog Brewery, Comcast and Popcap Games. Many of them understand how to use the product the right way. Sometimes you can get to exclusive or less well known social events, parties and, if you’re lucky, free beer.

And, remember, you don’t have to have 20,000 followers to be a nice person. You probably have more useful information than some of the top-tier internet personalities anyway. Telling 20,000 people you had a steak and cheese for lunch is just darn silly.

Lastly, it wouldn’t be a good post if I didn’t ask for you to follow me on twitter: http://twitter.com/everydaydrinker

That’s my shameless plug, but at least I gave you about 830 words before I pimped myself.

But, how do you get noticed with your own art?

Unless you’ve been on a TV show or have a bundle of money to start your brand in overdrive, you’re going to end up like the other 90% of us: wishing we were popular. We can’t buy friends like some bloggers and podcasters, we don’t work for a huge media site and we’ve not been in the spotlight before. All we have to market ourself is a good personality, patience and a will to be the best. I’m not sure about you, but personality doesn’t make you a star overnight.

I’ve often laughed when I looked back at some of my old friends and said “you probably didn’t like me at first, but then you got to know me.” As a kid, I probably made some really bad first impressions but my personality was tolerable and grew on you. I’m sure not much has really changed, but I’ve learned a few concepts from watching others socialize in awkward environments.

First, being a friendly approachable person makes you a person worth meeting. Hold yourself with confidence (even if you have very little at the moment) and strike up casual conversations. Avoid being annoying and pushing your personality to the extreme. In moments of fear some folks start to chat a little too much or just go way overboard and you can tell, this isn’t how they act when in one-on-one situations. You can smell the fear and awkwardness and just want to get away from them. Don’t be “that guy.”

I’ve found the best remedy for situations where I’m nervous is to ask the people around me questions about what they do for a living, hobbies and anything else to get them talking. Once they start talking my nerves calm and I can derive new lines of questions to help get to know them. They’ll like feeling special with the inquires and perhaps open their own line of questioning to you.

If you’re trying to social network with people in a higher tier of fame than yourself, don’t fawn and giggle. The person you’re talking to is actually human. However, you can learn a lot from an Internet personality in how they handle themselves in public, how they pay attention and compliment their fan base even if they would rather be at home with their own kids. You can learn a lot from how they deal with situations.

Although you don’t have to act like a school girl meeting New Kids on The Block for the first time, you can indulge their personality a little. Famous Internet personalities, in general, like to have their ego stroked and to be told how awesome they are. It’s not really because they’re conceited (in all cases) but they’re used to little kids sitting in IRC chat rooms talking about how much they adore all the things the person does. Let’s face it, wouldn’t you like to be told repeatively how awesome you are? You’re saying “no” but you’re thinking “yes.”

Unfortunately, you’ll sometimes find it’s not what you do but who you know. For most, you want to know a few people with a large base of fans but also do good work yourself. Even a big Internet personality can tell awesome work from a half-assed attempt to be in the same league.

What I’ve noticed, from listening to some high profile podcasts, is that those that get the most mention are those that do things for the Internet personality in question. You pat their back, they’ll tell you how awesome they are by pimping your website, tool or gimic you made for them. That could be your spring board to success, or at least give you 15-minutes of fame. But, nothing is more annoying than spamming your blogs URL over and over in a chat window, comment field or voice-call-in on a show.

If you are friendly and approachable you’ll realize others will be drawn to listening to you and answering your questions. If you are simply annoying they’ll be nice to you but forget you existed after you leave their sight. It’s probably best to leave a good impression than leave nothing at all.

You’ve probably seen sites on the web that try to trick you to click on ad’s by making a blog post that is one big ad with absolutely no text of usefulness on it. Normally, these seem to be track-back attacks, sites that link to your blog hoping you’ll put the track-back in the comments of your blog so they get clickers who accidentally click on their ads. These are obviously breaking the terms of service google set up, but it’s also possible to make an equally ugly legit website.

I’m a firm believer in making a bit less money through click-thru ads by making a site that’s about content as it’s primary objective and about advertising as its second objective. I don’t think a site needs to be overloaded with crazy animated advertising on all sides of the site with huge banners outlining the content.

Having a site that focuses on content will keep users entertained for longer but may stop a mass from clicking on your ads because they’re less obtrusive. In the end, if you have rich content that’s useful you’ll have more returning guests to your website and returning guests offer a constant source of page views. Page views becomes a secondary weapon when you start getting advertisers coming directly to you to pay you for advertising space on your site because it has a growing community… not just a few flash crowds of traffic.

Perhaps I’m alone in thinking quality content is more important than an extra few clicks per day. It works for me and at the end of the day I feel good about what I wrote and any money I made supporting the writing. Respect your reader, keep the ads out of their face and let them focus on your skills and creativity.

Let us call it Ad Etiquette .