I was 27D. She was E and the snorer was F. As is my tradition when I get on a plane, I had started reading this week's PEOPLE in the hopes that the battle between Nick and Jessica and that the news that Vili Fualaau, husband of Mary Kay Letourneau, could face a year in prison for drunk driving,would carry me through lift off and to the comfortable cruising altitude of 30 thousand feet.
I really didn't intent to chat with the lady in E ,I had work to do, a knitting project, and a book club book to read. But, when F let out a particularly thunderous snore, she asked, " Should I nudge him?"
"Is he yours?" I asked.
Since he wasn't, we let him be. But we bonded,and talked our way to Seattle amidst the intermittent bursts of stertor from our aisle partner.
It was early on in the conversation that I learned she was headed to Vancouver to attend a conference on Commencements.
Commencements are something I know absolutely nothing about. I've never attended one--choosing to skip my own. So until that very second, it never occurred to me that that there could be trends,styles, and news that could take up a 3 day conference on a college graduation.
She has agreed to share what she learns at the conference.
As a preview, I did learn that the University of Texas has fireworks, that Columbia and Harvard have over 100,000 people attending their ceremonies, and that the mom's at Pepperdine are expected to wear a straw hat.
However, it was probably 2 hours into the flight when we learned that we had business associates in common. First there was her PR firm, Kohnstamm Communications-- Kohnstamm's president Josh serves as the head of a marketing committee for the St.Paul JCC, nonprofit agency that hired me to help with their branding. Josh and I see each other on a monthly basis.
If that wasn't curious enough, she pulled out a copy of Northwest Airlines Magazine and showed me the ad for her institution. That's when I found out a former co-worker, Chas Porter,who I haven't seen for 10 years, is handling her branding/advertising. He is now blogging and sharing his views on branding,
"While anyone can build brand buzz if they know how to leverage the Internet's mercurial network dynamics, building brand loyalty is not so easy: the never-off Internet requires that you must continually share your value with the market. In the words of Neil Young, rust never sleeps.
But there is a solution: create content that shares your expertise and knowledge with consumers and you'll build both brand buzz and brand loyalty.
Sharing your expertise is direct selling. It's an inexpensive and very effective link back to your product or service."
Two connections with just one degree of separation.Not bad for a 3hr 40 minute plane ride.
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