Serious answer time...

About eight months after I started my blog for EVE Online my father's small business began to struggle. Downturns in the economy, you know the story. He lost a major client, as in the original reason he had formed a company in the first place, and it threatened the entire future of his business. He knew he needed to get his company's name out there, knew he needed to expand his client list, but with the local economy still in major recession mode, finding people that were willing to spend more money on his services was proving to be a hard sell. I knew I wanted to do something to help, but thought I didn't know anything about the areas of business that he needed help in. That's when EVE proved me wrong.

My father and I ended up having a conversation one day discussing advertising strategies on a shoe-string budget. That's when I suggested the idea that he start aggressively building a social media brand for the company. Of course, he knew nothing about any of it, and I thought I knew nothing about it. All I knew was that I ran a blog and that for some reason Google seemed to really enjoy sending traffic to me for the things I'd write there. So the first thing I did was start my dad a new page for a blog on his company website. It turns out, I had been taking a crash course in search engine optimization over the last eight months and just never knew it.

So from the ground up, I designed a second blog for my father's business, started a twitter account and facebook page in the company name, and just started putting the name out there as much as I could constantly pimping the blog anytime there was a new article. The articles that were written, usually as some collaborative effort between my writing skills and my father's knowledge on the topic, were always written with an eye on what the news of the day was. Eventually, that timely writing paid off.

Over a period of the next six months we had accumulated followers on a new twitter account, some of whom were reporters in the local media. My dad got a call asking if he'd be interested in appearing in an interview to provide a voice as an expert on a topic that was in the national news at the time. That piece aired on a local news channel that broadcasts to millions and was easily the single biggest break the company has ever had.

Calls started coming in overnight. The business was saved, my dad was able to keep his dream alive, everyone lived happily ever after, cue the music, etc, etc. Well, maybe not quite that far, but it was definitely a turning point. My father's business would have definitely closed its doors had everything kept going the way it was, and I for one will always credit the experience I had gained through writing a blog in the EVE Blog Pack for making sure that didn't happen.

I'm an attention *****. I love being a proud member of the blog pack (even if I feel like a barnacle clinging to the hull.) It's endlessly entertaining to see the random comments, mails, convos, and waves in local I get from friend and foe alike. I also get a huge kick out of the fact that possibly the most consistently enjoyable part of my EvE experience is related almost entirely to a blog that isn't even in the game.

not sure if serious..

My sarcasm sense is tingling.