Dopp Juice Archive

I get this question a lot. It’s the “hipper” way of asking, “Why do you have your hair like that?” (which I also get a lot), and the masked way of saying, “Your hair confuses me and makes me uncomfortable. Explain yourself.”

I don’t mind talking about my hair. I do mind having to respond to spoken judgment from strangers. Preferred variations of this conversations starter include, “That haircut looks easy to take care of,” “I bet your head is cold,” or (my personal favorite), “I love your hair!”

The other really common one I get is, “You have a really nicely shaped head. I could never have that haircut because my head is too lumpy and dented.” Don’t laugh–this is serious! I get this more often than any other comment, hands down, even from strangers passing me on the street. Sometimes it’s sounds generous and sometimes it sounds like they’re uncomfortably grasping for something to say. Completely depends on the tone of voice.

But back to “So… what’s up with the haircut?” I’ve accumulated quite a few answers to this question over my last two years of relative baldness, and I’d like to share a few of them with you. Most of these are true:

“It’s a great conversation piece.”

“I don’t like hair.”

“I was really angry one day while giving myself a haircut, and I accidentally cut too close to the scalp — so the only way to even it out was to shave it. I wasn’t working in an office at the time, so I figured it didn’t matter much. But then I got so many compliments on it that I just had to keep it.” [note: this is actually how it all started.]

“The shorter my hair is, the more free I feel.”

[dumb look] “What do you mean?”

“It helps people remember me.”

“I like to spend my time and money on things that matter more to me than my hair.”

“Rubbing it brings me good luck.”

“I look terrible with hair.”

“I got tired of people hitting on me.” [note: the haircut does not actually fix this problem]

“It’s a social experiment. I like to see which kinds of people feel the need to comment on it.”

“Ooh, I love this game! I’m a militant nazi skinhead man-hating lesbian buddhist monk with cancer! Now you tell me about your haircut!”

“It shows people I have nothing to hide.”

“Oh I’m from San Francisco.”

“It changes the assumptions people make about me as a consultant in the tech industry. I’m more likely to be seen as brazen and cutting-edge and less likely to be talked down to as a young woman.”

“Oh, thank you for noticing! I paid $300 to have this done by a famous hairdresser in LA. Do you like it?”

“It’s a great haircut. I’d been listening to men brag about it for years. They were absolutely right.”

“Does it make you uncomfortable?”

“Wigs are a hassle.”

“It’s part of my personal brand.”

“I like it.”

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In my last post I talked about nonprofits using social media to reach their audiences — it’s inexpensive and effective. Unfortunately, I also know from personal experience that many people — especially in the nonprofit sector — don’t have time to sit down and learn the best strategies to leverage new technology. So let me lay out a few Cliffs Notes.

One of the cooler features of social media is that it allows you to keep an eye on what people are saying about you. If someone across the planet blogs about your organization, you can know about this almost instantaneously. If that blog post was favorable, you can jump right into the comments and thank them. If that blog post was unfavorable, you leap right into ‘damage control’ mode and address the complaint. If fact, you can do whatever you want with this feed of information once you’re receiving it. It’s kind of like a secret ninja move.

These are sometimes called “vanity feeds.” Here’s how to get them:

Technorati Feeds
Watch the blogs.

1. Go to Technorati.com
2. In the search box, type in your name or the name of your organization. If it’s more than one word, use quotation marks.
3. The results that come up are what all of the publicly-indexed the blogs on the web are saying about you. Just above the search results, you should find a link that says “Subscribe.” Click it!
4. What you’re looking at now is an RSS feed. You need to take the URL for this page and put it into an RSS reader, so you can be alerted when new things are added to it. If you’re not already using an RSS reader, go get an account with Google Reader and follow their instructions (it’s super easy).

Google Alerts
Watch the web.

1. Go to Google.com/Alerts
2. In the search box, type in your name or the name of your organization. If it’s more than one word, use quotation marks.
3. Leave the search type drop-down at “Comprehensive,” unless you want to ignore some things and just focus on one area.
4. Leave the “how often” at “once a day,” unless you really prefer otherwise.
5. Type in your email address and hit “Create Alert.” You’ll get notifications of your presence on the web whenever it comes up.

Note: There’s some overlap between Google Alerts and Technorati — try both and see if you only feel like you need one of them after a few weeks. In my experience, Google Alerts will sometimes repeat the same alert over and over again, which can get annoying (and which is why I don’t recommend receiving Google Alerts “as it happens”). Technorati is a cleaner, more meaningful, and less invasive feed, but it also doesn’t cover the entire web.

Knowing about your reputation on the web is a key step in gaining control of it. But be careful not to get too addicted to watching these feeds… you still have other work to do.