Some nice things people have written about me!
(Because calling them ‘testimonials’ would have been just that bit too cringeworthy.)
Last year, I offhandedly mentioned in an email to Jackie Danicki that I missed writing in my old blog, which I’d taken offline the year before. Ten minutes later, a return email came; embedded in it was a link, as well as the message, “I’ve built you a new blog, in case you feel like writing.” It was gorgeous, with photos and links, more than I would ever have thought to build for myself, and done before I had the impetus to do it.
In late 2005, my husband opened Ristretto Roasters, a coffee roastery and café in Portland, Oregon, a business that (as all businesses do) required thousands of unanticipated tasks. As one of the major goals is to sell coffee online, we needed a site, and yet it kept being put off until next week… Again, an email came from Jackie, saying she’d built us a little something and now we could do business and get the word and the coffee out. [Hillary Johnson built the website and online shopping engine; Jackie started the blog, which Hillary then tweaked as well.]
In the bestseller The Tipping Point, author Malcolm Gladwell posits that three personality types drive business, trends and ideas: Connectors, Mavens and Salesmen. I was initially going to write that Jackie is an exemplar of the first, one of “these people who link us up with the world… who introduce us to our social circles—these people on whom we rely more heavily than we realize… people with a special gift for bringing the world together.” And she certainly is this, and yet she is also a Maven, always looking for new ideas and passing them on, via the many blogs she spearheads and/or contributes to, and which address her foci: Jack & Hill (beauty); Engagement Alliance (how [and how not] new business should be conducted); Samizdata (politics and social justice), and the ecumenical Jackie Danicki. And I suspect—no, I know—that if tomorrow she were to take up yodeling or higher mathematics, she would create corresponding blogs, because she knows that to give away the experience will only amplify it, and move us all to the next square. The natures of the blogosphere and of Jackie are, in this way, identical.
And yet, Jackie is also a Salesman, creating these sites because she understands they are the new currency, the way ideas and real goods are moving and will move and why not do it better, sooner and faster? Where so many businesses, and especially media, struggle to navigate the blogosphere, Jackie is always looking for dynamism, to streamline, and if this means she must pronounce the latest bells-and-whistlers technology a hackneyed piece of crap, she’ll do it. But she’ll also be the first to stoke a good idea.
In the past year Jackie has accomplished extraordinary things, and continues to do so each and every week. On a personal note, she is also the most generous person I know. Her combination of tenacity and tenderness makes the world a fairer, brighter place.”
-Nancy Rommelman, journalist
“I established Seraphic Press, an independent publisher devoted to fine literature for children, with a great deal of enthusiasm. But we had no idea how we were going to publicize our small company and sell enough books to justify our existence.
And then, along came Jackie Danicki and the Big Blog Company. In no time at all, a vision was born and clarified. Seraphic Press is now a very well known publisher in our niche, with many awards to our credit. I have a loyal community of readers and our first novel is now in its second printing. The Big Blog Company brings many revelations about how networked audiences can help a brand. Everything has changed, and they know exactly how to make the changes work for your company. Without them, Seraphic Press is nothing.”
-Robert Avrech, Founder, Seraphic Press
“I was on the verge of packing everything in when I noticed a tiny mention in the Times Online Business Section. Jackie had written an article about business blogging and fleetingly mentioned The Tinbasher for some unbeknown reason…In a nutshell, but for Jackie, you wouldn’t be reading The Tinbasher as it is now.”
-Paul Woodhouse, Butler Sheetmetal
“[Jackie] is just as ferociously smart and energetic in person as she is on her blog…”