Nomadic Texan

That is the $64 million dollar question. Why on earth should this little old man “Deserve to Win” this leg of the Marketing Globetrotters trips to South America? First of all it is the only leg I can actually take, as I have a prior obligation with a trip to Japan beginning November 28, 2014 to see my oldest son. Why should a travel and food blogger who basically been at it for around 18 months deserve this trip before what I am guessing will be tons of experienced bloggers, who have been doing this for many years longer than me? The good news is I have made “The Shortlist” and will hopefully continue to make the various cuts in the next two weeks. The decision for the November 3, 2014 through November 16, 2014 leg will be decided on October 25, 2014. #Video is coming!!!

Ladies Looking at Goods at The New Cathedral

Well for 1) I actually started writing at the age of eight, when I helped my father, Carter Hinshaw put out a weekly small town newspaper in Texas and ran a Linotype for him. I edited and proofread columns and was allowed to write a few stories. We usually worked all night long and I would always fall asleep in class the next day. The school finally called and told my Mother, Juanda Hinshaw that I should either get a little sleep or stay home from now on. Obviously I started going to bed at midnight from then on and our paper was distributed a little later the next day, but it was tremendous experience. So in effect, I have been writing for 56 years! And I actually have met and talked with Walter Cronkite, who was a true authentic journalist with the highest integrity! #Video is coming!!!

Indigenous Man

2) One of the qualifications has to do with Marketing and for many years in my former life as a retail executive in convenience stores, I oversaw and directed the entire processes associated with the department. This included contact negotiations with all vendors and suppliers, sales by SKU reviews, annual marketing plans broken down by category, with projected GP%’s, GP$’s and share of overall sales. Not to mention attaining total budgeted sales year after year which at the end, ran into over a billion dollars worth . #Video is coming!!!

Bicycle Mode of Transportation

3) I was identified by “Holidaze“ in the first ever, “The Best New Travel Blogs You Haven’t Heard of Yet” awards, one of eight blogs awarded this award in the first ever nominations. I was literally dumbfounded that after only about nine months I was identified as a blogger on the rise and to watch. This was done on January 31, 2014. #Video is coming!!!

Don Colon and the Nomadic Texan

This was the verbiage written on my behalf: “Mike Hinshaw is one of the most kindhearted travel bloggers I’ve ever met in the course of my travels and it shows in his writing – although if you do something stupid then he’ll be the first one to let you know Whether inspiring others to visit Texas (we’re both from Austin) or sharing the excitement from his most recent trek through southeast Asia, Mike’s posts are always a joy to read. This guy has more energy and life inside of him than other travelers half his age!” #Video is coming!!!

Perfect Pitch from the Harp

Additionally Bully Travel named me as their first ever Travel Blogger of the week. I was blown away again and this happened right at a year of actual blogging, on April 14, 2014.

Finally in August 16, 2014 I was identified as #76 on the list of Top Travel Tweeters of 2014, as identified by TrueNomads Here was the tweet that caught me again completely off guard “Top 90 Travel Tweeters of 2014: Wanderlust in 140 Characters or Less http://truenomads.com/2014/08/top-travel-tweeters-2014/ … via @truenomads“. I was very honored and have significantly grown my followers on Twitter since this award and am nearing that magic 10,000 number. Fairly decent, given I have only been doing this for around 18 months and have never “Bought” any followers. I detest this avenue of growing your numbers. #Video is coming!!!

Nomadic Texan Grinding the Cacao Beans

4) I have good numbers on other social media platforms and am amazed at how quickly some of these numbers have climbed and the fact that a few are responsible for additional followers and helping grow my audience. As an example I just looked at my Pinterest platform recently and found that I have 2,464 followers and represents about 1.5% of my referrals. On Google+ I have 3,141 followers and it accounts for 8% of my referrals. On Linkedin I have 6,146 followers and it represents about 2% of my referrals. I think we sometimes concentrate strictly on Twitter and Facebook and do not comprehend the value the additional social media platforms. These three additional platforms represent approximately 11.5 % of my referrals for my blog! Please feel free to connect on any platforms identified! Thanks. #Video is coming!!!

Interior Cacao Beans with Fruit

5) Despite my best efforts to read and make sense of things like this https://victoriousseo.com/blog/referring-domains/ post on the Victorious blog, I have absolutely no knowledge of SEO and how to use it to my advantage. I really could use a couple of weeks with Mike King and maybe even some one on one time to really get my numbers growing! How much more fortunate could a blogger get? #Video is coming!!!

A Meal Made for an Incan King, Cuy! With Chef Patricio from Restaurante Corvel, in Paute Ecuador

Mike King is a Digital Marketing genius and a very good rapper!

Yngrid Arnold is the CMO of Viventura of Berlin and co-founder of Trip.me

As most of my friends who truly know me are aware, I wear my emotions on my sleeve and can become very irate over stupid people who perform or state stupid things. I am also a member of several groups that share blog posts and generally help each other out with exposure, as we all have varied traffic levels. I was going through my process today and a post showed up that totally infuriated me. This young man, who I am sure possesses a degree and has a position with a large company, wrote about “Managing Older People”, as if we are a different species. It must be the third eye I am sporting these days.

Old But Still Employed, at a Jimmy Buffett Concert in Vegas

In the past year I have had friends that have lost their jobs strictly as a result of their age and salary. There is a huge tendency to push  the more mature crowd out the door and hire young individuals with a degree, that supposedly have as much acumen as the veterans. In one such case a dear friend had been with a company for over 40 years and had about two years left before retirement. It was a case of second generation inheriting the responsibilities of running the day to day operations and the descendant made the decision to release my friend, after the person had dedicated his life to building the business with the father. I wanted to throw up it made me so sick.

Another friend worked over 25 years for a company that I was employed with for 10 years and had a Bachelors and Masters degree. He was a very intelligent individual who moved his family many times, always at the request of “the company”. He finally received a nice promotion and salary and was considered an astute business manager by all vendors and peers. He walked in one day last year and discovered he was no longer needed. His salary and tenure had worked against him, just like many my age.

What Do I Do Now?

Today’s writer stated many factors that needed to be used in managing the older generations. He stated that one shouldn’t come across “too strongly”.  He is basically saying we need to be coddled and handled vastly differently than younger workers? I guess its okay to be strong with younger generations. When I was in management, age was not an issue and I managed all generations equally.

He states that a manager needs to work around the more mature workers schedule and definitely not plan social gatherings when its inconvenient for the older workers. I guess that mean no parties after 7:00 PM, since we all go to bed at 8:00 PM apparently. He talks about the (fact?) that older workers are not familiar with social media and we probably don’t have Facebook profiles, etc. Huh? I have a Twitter, Google+, Facebook. Linkedin, Pinterest page and I have my own web site. I am 63. I must be the exception.

Lover of Ecuador and Travel Blogger

He states that a younger manager needs to pay attention as older workers need “more benefits”. This baffles me as I would think all workers need the same benefits. He finishes by stating managing older workers is a tricky task. I sincerely hope that this “writer” never ages or faces the discrimination that is rampant in the business world for the more “Mature” population in this day and time.

Carter Vance Hinshaw

My father was a night city editor at a large newspaper in the DFW area and was allowed to work up until he hit 70. I am amazed at how substantially our world has changed in regard to this philosophy. Funny how this phenomena parallels our economy landslide. Maybe we really do have something to contribute if given a chance!

In my younger days we were taught to respect our elders. In Japan they still have strong regard for their elders and actually endeavor to take care of them. They insure they are taken care of right up to the end. I have generally found this to be true all over the world, with the US being the only glaring exception. In the US there is a race to push my generation out to pasture as quickly as possible. Consequently I say, “Why Don’t You Just Take Me Out Behind the Barn and Shoot Me”? It might just be an easier end!

Recently a friend in the travel blogger industry had the misfortune of  having a large corporation pilfer his theme. Turner Barr has been on a Round The World quest, to sustain himself, by working at various unusual jobs. His blog aroundtheworldin80jobs.com as been very successful and he has devoted over two years of his life to establish a following and share his inner feelings and thoughts about each of the jobs. He has made many personal sacrifices and wanted to show the world if you really want to work, there are a myriad of “odd” jobs that one can hold.

On June 20, 2013 Turner went public as Adecco, the large corporation that appropriated Turner’s theme, wanted no part of admitting their fault or even negotiating at any level. How I Got Fired From The Job I Invented  was written seeking the large corporation’s admission of fault and a fair and legitimate compensation for actually and outright plagiarizing his theme and creation. Over the weekend Turner sat idly, as friends and fellow bloggers try to escalate Adecco’s blunder into a ground swirl, which could not be ignored. Adecco’s Twitter handle was shut down from too many tweets. Various social media platforms were closed to additional comments, as the response was overwhelmingly in Turner’s favor and Adecco had no supporter’s for their swindle.

The blogging community and especially the travel blogging community is a large and vibrant family eager to express themselves and broadcast the misdeeds of Adecco’s theft of Turner’s campaign. All weekend long Adecco was silent with no answer except to state they were in negotiations. This was another untruth, but what should one suspect from a company that advertise’s a stolen campaign and presents a purloined agenda to young people who are desperate to find a job.

Turner all through this ordeal has taken the high road and had tried in vain to maintain a open and positive dialogue. Just a few minutes ago Turner released this post Even Multi-Billion Dollar Corporations Should Apologize When They Are Wrong: An Open Letter to Adecco to #makeitright stating what he desired to settle the issue. Adecco apparently wanted him to keep quiet and not continue use of the “AroundTheWorldIn80Jobs campaign”.

I think that in this “David vs Goliath” battle David (Turner) is completely in the right. Please read and completely digest Turner’s story, especially if you are a small business owner. As I discovered with a simple Google search, there are predators willing to steal even my theme and domain name. Beware you might be next! I would appreciate it if you would share this among all your friends and family and let the world know we are tired of large corporations running rampant over the little guy! Turner I sincerely wish you well my friend! #MakeItRight Adecco!.