The “Community First” program initiative.
Community First On Amelia Island - Click to enlarge
Community First On Amelia Island - Click to enlarge
What is “Community First”
Community First is an initiative to “brand” Amelia Island and Fernandina Beach. By combining the strength of leading professionals, social organizations, tourism and travel professionals and many other contributors we can inform others (Feed) through social media networks and reach out to tell the world what our island paradise is all about.
Community First uses a twitter feed that is connected through RSS, Facebook and LinkedIn to spread relevant information about Amelia Island, Fernandina Beach and Northeast Florida.
This initiative, spearheaded by SearchAmelia as a community news and information service will use public and proprietary resources. Our hopes are to reach thousands, if not millions, of people through professional and personal experiences of those living and working on Amelia Island. Who better than us to provide an insight as to why our island is so unique and worth visiting? We founded Community First on the principle of “United we stand, divided we fall”.
The world is changing around us. Economic security and ethical values are disappearing at a rapid rate, but if we work together as a community, as a family, we will succeed. Businesses in our backyard are competing for the same dollar; some will survive, some will not. Your neighbors that don’t survive will move away looking for sustainability somewhere else. Instead of competing for that same dollar we can work together to bring five new dollars to the community, a committed effort could bring ten or more new dollars into town giving us the basis to survive. We can strengthen our community infrastructure and even flourish when other communities are falling apart.
Principle of “trusted” Communication
Why did we choose to use the social networks? The answers are simple.
First, the success of social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkenIn and many others is based on the need for human interaction. Community First is no different. By working together we will create a noise about our community that is louder in decibel levels than any one person could ever reach alone. We will not only attract attention, we can pinpoint exactly WHERE we want to attract attention!
Secondly, 600 million people are in some way connected and this is growing more powerful than any marketing campaign could ever trigger in trustworthiness of information. These social networking avenues display staggering numbers that give us trusted information and recommend the whom, what, where, when, why and how. People throughout the world that are seeking to visit places other than their own hometown are now gathering and communicating with each other on the World Wide Web.
How Does it Work and How Do You Benefit?
By using one Twitter account (AmeliaPromotion) and 20 different categories (or lists) that are shared by hundreds or even thousands of account holders funneled into one massive yet organized constant stream of “Community First” updates using available technology (Hootsuite and Co-Tweet) and some SearchAmelia internet code magic. Your contribution would be to provide on a daily (if possible) some 5 to 10 min. of your time to act, interact or write your personalized views based on your professional experiences, background and interests and share them on AmeliaPromotion.
You can elect to share your AmeliaPromotion Tweets on your own twitter account.
But first you need to Follow AmeliaPromotion on Twitter even if you’re not going to actively support “Community First”. While you’re at it you may also want to follow SearchAmelia on twitter to get maximum exposure on your “Community First” efforts.
No Personal or business Twitter Account? Why not set-up one Here!
Will You Personally Benefit from “Community First”?
We are certain you and your business will, if you opt to use your FaceBook and LinkedIn Accounts (No we don’t need any passwords) and for those of you who have RSS (Real Simple Syndication) on their website, we have even built the possibility to feed your Daily Tweets on AmeliaPromotion to your website.
How much will you personally benefit?
Well, that is something you determine yourself. The more active participation, the more “social interaction” and the more Category Streams go out to your followers, friends and professional colleagues, the higher you will score in building a relevant following.
Let us stress this again: We don’t need any username, password or other identification, nor any financial contribution from you. This is a community effort to get Amelia Island into a highly profiled online presence with the objective to attract.
To participate you only need an e-Mail and one twitter account.
There are Some Rules to Abide By!
To avoid becoming a massive screaming billboard of advertising, the rules of engagement are based on the principle of being invited to a party. Would you whip out a business card and go from one guest to the next and tell them that you sell dishwashers and stoves without even introducing yourself? Of course not, you would never be invited to that party again. To avoid this behavior which would weaken our message to the world, we introduce peer reviews and a monitoring system as part of the “Community First” structure to which each and every participant will have their say.
Community First is about personal, professional and responsible information dissemination. We are sharing, day-by-day, what it is like in our wonderful hometown; this is a place where visitors can feel at home. Together, we are an orchestra playing the symphonies written by our community!
We are convinced you want to contribute to a thriving community and we invite you to complete the form below so together we can tell “our” story to the rest of the world.
Here is what we would like you to do!
Step 1: Follow AmeliaPromotion on Twitter even if you’re not going to actively support “Community First”. If you don’t have a Twitter Account, you have to set-up one before you can follow and participate in the “Community First” initiative.
Step 2: Also follow SearchAmelia on twitter to get maximum exposure on your “Community First” efforts.
Step 3: Provide the following information and upon completion you will be re-directed to the “Community First” Instruction page where you will receive additional information on how to set-up your “Community First” account and when your account will be active.
