Four Days with My People

I recently returned from a trip “home” to Minneapolis.

I put the word home in quotes because although I no longer live there, Minneapolis is where I grew up and it will always feel like home to me because a big part of my community is still there.

Community is what I want to talk about today, it its many forms. Because I keep going back to Minneapolis to reconnect with that community.

Relaxing and Reconnecting with My Community

If you’ve been part of my community for a while, you know that I go home every year to participate in and help run a science fiction/fantasy convention called CONvergence. It’s a 4-day event where pretty much everyone who is interested in science fiction or fantasy can find something that interests them.

CONvergence is a place I find community, among my fellow geeks and nerds. We spend 4 days reveling in the things we love. Books, television shows, movies, games, art, costuming, performing, music, writing, all of it.

This year a friend of mine and I cosplayed (dressed up as) Aziraphale and Crowley, the two main characters from the television show Good Omens. This costume set is from a flashback scene in the first season, when they met at the Globe Theater in Elizabethan London.

I am part of the Guests of Honor department at this convention. We’re the people who take care of the special guests we bring in every year.

My Guest of Honor this year was John Kovalic, a cartoonist and illustrator from Wisconsin. If you’ve ever played the card games Munchkin or Apples to Apples, or read the cartoon Dork Tower, you’ve seen his work.

One of the panels he participated in was called Art Impossible, where the panel moderators present a prompt and the artists are given a limited time to create something from that prompt.

The artists, most of whom were illustrators, got very creative.

A couple of them decided to use balloon art as their medium.

And, to get even more geeky, I help lead an activity called Birding with Nerds, where a group of us go for a guided bird walk in the park close to the hotel.

Yes, talking about this stuff is an excuse to share fun pictures with you. But it’s also a chance to talk about why community is so important for all of us.

Community Support Matters for All of Us

Community support is essential in so many ways. Communities are a constant flow of giving and receiving that we all need in different times of our lives.

This wonderful geeky community of mine gets together once a year and throws what is essentially a big party with a lot of fun activities. But it is also a support system, made up of smaller communities, that meet throughout the year.

When community members need help, we all do whatever we can to assist. The organization that runs the convention is a non-profit, so we all contribute with our money and volunteer time. And the smaller organizations and groups host events to keep our community connected thriving.

While I was home, I also got together with friends from my Renaissance Festival and high school days. We’ve known each other for over 30 years.

We’ve been there for each other for weddings, anniversaries, births, deaths, surgeries, illnesses, exciting celebrations, major tragedies, all of the “normal” life events, and then some.

I try to see this friend group every time I’m home, and many of them have visited me out here in California.

You probably also have that group of friends that you’ve known forever. The ones you went to school with, worked with, or attended the same events with every year.

Regardless of whether this group is 5 people or 500, this community is there to support you when you need help and you support them in turn.

This is all part of being human.

We need each other. Especially in these bizarre times when technology, politics, and world events keep trying to divide us.

I have said many times in this newsletter that we are all interconnected. We’re part of the same huge ecosystem and when we work together and support each other, we all thrive.

We all need our communities and our communities need us.

Why Does This Matter to Your Business?

Your customers and email subscribers are your community.

Some of them may be those friends you’ve known forever, who just want to support you in this crazy endeavor you do. But many of them came to you because they have a problem that only you can solve, or a dream that you can help them fulfill.

This is where my whole “serving first, selling second” philosophy comes into play.

You serve them by helping them solve this problem or fulfill this dream. They support you and your business by being your customers.

This is the “natural” course of business but it’s all in the attitude you take toward it.

Are you putting your community first, making sure they have what they need to thrive? Or are you putting yourself and your business first, taking whatever you can get from your customers and subscribers?

If you look at the businesses of all sizes that have genuinely thrived over many years, the ones that have supported their communities tend to stand out. I’m talking about major corporations, like Patagonia, and Dr. Bronner’s down to local Mom & Pop businesses like my favorite Thai restaurant here in Ventura.

And in return, those communities continue to support these businesses by buying their products and services, helping them out when tragedy strikes, and recommending them to friends and family.

That is the power of community.

And that is why building, supporting, and maintaining your community matters.

Whether you do it in person, through regular nurture emails, on social media, supporting local events, or all of the above, do it.

Knowing that you’ve got your community’s back, and they have yours, is one of the most precious relationships we all have.

Thank you for being part of my community. I love having you here and getting to serve and support you every week.

And I appreciate your support, reading this newsletter every week, and being (or considering becoming) a customer.

I hope these newsletters inspire you to serve your community by writing to them on a regular basis, whether you write long-form articles like I do, or just a short email that nurtures and connects you, so you can support them and they can support you in turn.

Finally, this week’s picture is my friend and her family, sporting their “Rescue Dragons.” These are incredible puppets they each built themselves.

Also, this is the 42nd issue of the Email Marketing Ecosystem newsletter. 42 is the most appropriate number for this particular issue, talking about all things geeky and community. (For my fellow Douglas Adams Fans.)

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