Our Monmouth Blog

As a Howell resident, mountain biker, aspiring triathlete, and most importantly daddy I can say I love our park system. We are really fortunate to have such great parks that support a lifestyle and makes our community special. I am so looking forward to the warmer days ahead.

Howard:
Thanks for offering your time to speak with me Davide. I was introduced to Davide though his township emails informing Howell residents about upcoming events. For the readers of my blog that may not know you would you mind sharing with us a little bit about yourself and your role as Director of Parks and Recreation?

Davide:
My name is Davide Fuoco and I am the Director of Parks & Recreation for Howell Township. My job responsibilities include: the oversight of the Department and staff; the organizing and implementing of several youth and adult programs as well as community events; to maintain the township’s existing parks and facilities while seek opportunities for future development; to preserve open space and natural resources; establish the Department’s operating budget; serve as the liaison to all sport organizations and much more!

I received my B.A. in Recreation Administration from Kean University in 2003. Currently, I am pursuing an M.P.A. in Public Administration at Kean University. I am married and reside in Brick, NJ. I am an active volunteer with Big Brother/Big Sisters of America. I enjoy spending quality time with my wife, family and friends. I also enjoy the outdoors, camping, working out, practicing mixed martial arts and traveling around the world.

Howard:
Davide BBBS is one of my favorite charities I have been working closely with them for the last several months and will be attending their Annual Gourmet Food & Wine Tasting tasting in May. Can you highlight some of the upcoming programs and where we can find out details about them?

Davide:
Some of our upcoming programs include our Summer Day Camp Program, our Teen Adventures and Teen Expedition program. Our next special event is “Howell Day at Blue Claws” which is going to be on Monday, June 15th. The game will take place at the Blue Claws stadium and will start at 7:05 p.m. Tickets are sold at the Recreation Building only at $10.00 for children and $15.00 for adults. Tickets include admission to the game, a baseball cap and a food voucher for adults. All children under the age of 12 eats for free.

For a list of our all our programs, residents are encouraged to visit the Howell Parks & Recreation Department website. Once at our home page, click on “Activities and Forms Page” to view all of our current and future programs and events.

Howard:
That is awesome. I got to tell you that I am constantly impressed with the BlueClaws as an organization. What a classy group who understand what good affordable family entertainment is. One thing that has been on my mind was the threat of park closure due to budgeting issues. Do you foresee any issues this year?

Davide:
I don’t foresee any park closures in the near future but I do foresee problems with the maintenance/upkeep of these parks due to budget issues and the township furloughs. However, it is my job to assure all Township parks are kept up to code and are safe to all who utilize these facilities. There has been a delay of the opening of Easy Street Dog Park due to the tough economic times. This project has been put on hold until further notice.

Howard:
Do you run any volunteer programs for community members that want to help out?

Davide:
We don’t have any specific programs. However, the Parks & Recreation Department conducts several community events throughout the year and volunteers are always welcome. If anyone is interested in volunteering their services, we ask that they complete a Volunteer Form and when called upon to donate their time. Please note, Clean Communities (contact Laurie Dunwoody at DPW for more info) and the PAL (contact Chris Hill at HPD) have several programs throughout the year that focus on projects, activities and events that benefit the Howell community.

Howard:
If you had to pick out one place in your park system as a crown jewel. What would it be?

Davide:
Currently, our crown jewel has to be our purple playground which is located at Deerwood Park. Anytime after 3:00 in the afternoon during the weekdays, all day on the weekends or anytime during the summer months the playground is overwhelmed with children and their parents. It’s a great facility and gets a great deal of use which is everything you want to see at a Township park. Adjacent to this playground is our refurbished skate park which also draws a great crowd.
One of our hidden secrets that not many people are aware of is our Regional Playground named Pride Park which is located on Seton Hall Drive. This too is a great playground. More crown jewels are to come like the refurbished Oak Glen Park Basketball courts which is to be completed by the end of May. In the near future we will opening up Bonim park which will be our new premiere facility that will consist of 8 soccer fields, 2 all purpose fields and 5 softball fields. In addition to, it will consist of several picnic and playground areas.

For a complete list of our parks and amenities with pictures of the site as well as an address, visit the Howell Township’s website and click on “Departments”, then follow to “Parks & Recreation” and lastly click on “Recreational Facilities & Parks.”

Howard:
Thank you for sharing that with us. You must get tremendous personal satisfaction from your job knowing what an impact these parks have on the community.

Davide:
My pleasure! It’s why I embarked on a career in Parks & Recreation. There are not many careers out there where you can make such an impact on so many people’s lives. I consider all Park & Recreation professionals unsung heroes which is why I take pride in being part of such a wonderful profession.

Howard:
Davide on behalf of all Howell residents I want to thank you for the tremendous job you do. You do a precious service for all of us. Thanks again for taking the time out of your schedule to talk with me. I really enjoyed it and am really looking forward to spending time outdoors. You can catch me (if you can) in Allaire on the mountain bike!

Davide:
Thanks Howard – enjoy this beautiful day and the weekend!

Davide Fuoco is the Director of Parks & Recreation for Howell Township

Visit the OurMonmouth.com Monmouth Recreation & Sports listings.

Original story appeared in the Internet Marketing NJ blog.

Being a baseball fan and a family man I really have enjoyed our Lakewood BlueClaws. I went to a number of games last year with my family and we had an absolutely great time every time. I personally don’t think there is a better value in sports. My daughter attended a birthday party at the stadium and it really opened my eyes to what a class operation they have put together.

Howard: I think the BlueClaws have done a tremendous job marketing themselves on the internet. As a small business owner I think there is a lot to learn from. How important is the Internet to your over-all marketing plan?

Greg: It’s critical and we’ve put a larger emphasis on that in recent months. Beyond our website and email newsletter, we keep a blog, have a significant presence on Facebook and have recently joined the
Twitter revolution too. It’s all about reaching your clients in different ways.

Howard: I absolutely agree. Many business both large and small are struggling to benefit or see the value of social media. The BlueClaws seem to have embraced the internet and are comfortable communicating with it. What I found uplifting was the genuine love for the sport of baseball which is interwoven into all of the content on the website, especially in your PodCasts. This is not evident in most larger businesses websites because it cannot be manufactured, but then again you’re a baseball team which makes it a bit easier! We are talking about America’s Pastime.

How have you been able to transfer the excitement on the field into excitement on the Internet?

Greg: We try to interact as much as possible with the fans. One thing we’ve done with some success is trivia contests. We even posted on our Twitter page an offer where if someone printed out the page and brought it in we would give them a free hat. We want to give people a reason to head over to these sites without confusing it with BlueClaws.com. They’re different sites and they serve different purposes.

Howard: What is your most popular section of the website?

Greg: Beyond the basic stuff, like the schedule and the promotions, everyone seems to love the fan photos section. We put up pictures not just from games but from events and community appearances. Everyone wants to find Buster and see if they can find themselves.

Howard: Pictures tell the story, especially for a family event like baseball. I can way the fans would really enjoy that. Tools like flickr make it nice any easy for anybody to incorporate pictures into their online presence.

One of my favorite websites out there right now is Pandora which is fantastic Internet Radio. When you are not working on BlueClaws.com what other websites stand out when surfing the web?

Greg:I don’t listen to that much internet radio. I do read a bunch of blogs on subjects I’m interested in. Besides BlueClaws Blog of course, the site that I will definitely go to is Neil Best’s Media Watchdog blog on Newsday.com. I think he does a great job.

Howard: Are you planning any special internet programs for this season?

Greg: We had a BlueClaws desktop wallpapers, the winners received four tickets to a game and have their wallpaper on our website. Don’t have the details yet on the new stuff, though.

Howard: You’ll have to keep me posted on those when finalized. What special events do you have planned for the April 9th Opening Day?

Greg: The biggest part of Opening Day is the Phillies World Series trophy will be in attendance. Fans can bring a camera and take their picture with the trophy on the concourse. It’s the only time the trophy will be here this year. Also, everyone will get a BlueClaws magnet schedule for their refrigerators.

Pre-game, we’ll bring the trophy out on the field and we’ll also have a flag drag over the field before the game. It’s going to be a fun night.

Howard: My whole family is really excited about coming down opening day. We had a lot of fun at the stadium last year and are really looking forward to a new season. Thanks for spending some time with me Greg, I really appreciate it. If you want to get tickets to see the Lakewood BlueClaws you get them online on their website .

Greg: Anytime Howard.

Greg Giombarrese is the Media & Public Relations Manager for the Lakewood BlueClaws (A-Phillies)

Last week I had the pleasure of interviewing Wendy Johnson. Wendy is the Top Plurker (by Karma which is Plurks popularity metric) and has been for quite some time. Prior to this interview I did not know much about Wendy nor did I understand how and why Plurk and knitting worked so well together. That’s right Wendy is a knitting blogger and author of a books!

As I interviewed Wendy the reason why she has such a following became obvious. Wendy is not only a very interesting and dynamic person but she is extremely personable. As I dug a little bit deeper into Wendy’s Plurks and her blog it was amazing to see the responsiveness of her audience. There is no doubt the level of commitment on both sides.

There is no doubt that any business can capitalize from successful social networking. Wendy has a wonderful perspective and we could all learn a few pointers from her success on Plurk.

Howard: I think there are many small business owners that can benefit from your experience and success with social media. Can you tell us a little bit about the impact to you blog and business from the use of Plurk and other social media platforms.

Wendy: Actually, using social media has no impact on my blogging, or my business — I consider it just a fun extra. I have no agenda on Plurk, I’m not really trying to push anything — just having fun chatting with friends.

My success on Plurk is a result of my success with my blog. My blog is quite popular and I have a lot of followers. When I got on Plurk, a huge number of my blog readers followed. Those are the people with whom I interact on Plurk every day.
So my experience is actually the opposite of what you are interested in, I think. The success of my blog impacted my success on Plurk, not the other way around.

Howard: You don’t use Plurk to share new blog posts and to promote? My assumption was that you would be growing your subscription to your blog based on your tremendous success on Plurk. After all you are the current karma champ surpassing the world’s top bloggers that have significant followings and influence. Does top Plurk karma status must create additional opportunities you would not have been exposed to otherwise?

Wendy: Well, I admit that I do a Plurk announcement when I’ve done a new blog post, but that is more as a courtesy to my Plurk friends who read my blog than promotion.

As some background:

I average 3 – 5 million views of my blog per month, and have done so for several years now.

Because of my blog’s popularity, a well-known and well-respected literary agent contacted me a few years ago and talked me into writing a book (a sort of knitting autobiography), which he sold for me. I’m currently working on my second book (a how-to and collection of sock patterns), to be published April 2009 by Potter Craft (a division of Random House).

I have a day job in the federal government and do the blog and knitting designs on the side. Started as a hobby, but has become somewhat lucrative.

What has top Plurk Karma gained me? Well, a lot of followers on Plurk who are probably wondering why the heck I am the top user, considering that I talk about knitting, my cat, and other ordinary topics. I can’t say that it has created any opportunities for me, but then, I haven’t actively sought any.

Howard: That is a tremendous accomplishment. According to Technorati and Alexa data I would never had guessed that your blog generates so much traffic. What a interesting success story.

How do you manage your time? I know the effort it takes to work a full time job, blog, Plurk, write a Book, and take care of Lucy (the cat). How do you pull it all together and keep your loyal audience engaged?

Wendy: Yup, Alexa is not a reliable source. In fact, a friend of mine did a blog entry about that a while back comparing her blog to mine.

How do I manage my time? I never sleep.

Seriously though, I am always thinking, and writing in my head, which probably contributes to my insomnia. When I get home from work I write my blog post pretty quickly, as I usually have it composed in my head. At the moment I’m not doing much on the book, as it is at the publisher and I’m just waiting to see and proof the final galleys before it is printed. But I spend evenings working up new designs, playing with Lucy, Plurking, and watching old movies. My agent is working on getting me a commitment from my publisher to do another book, so no doubt I’ll have to step up the pace a bit if and when that happens.

Howard: Alexa is often criticized as a metric and with good reason. What is the secret to your success?

Wendy: Beats me, I find it hard to understand why so many people want to hang on my every word. But as far as knitting is concerned, I am very good at what I do.

Howard: You don’t build such a loyal following over night. I would say you are not only a great knitter but a fantastic blogger and social media expert. What was the tipping point of your success?

Wendy: Well, thanks. The blog success comes from being able to express oneself and maintaining a humorous positive outlet. I think that’s a key on Plurk, too. There are some people who do nothing but whine and complain and offer TMI (Too Much Information) — these are people I unfollow very quickly.

The tipping point? I’m not sure — it’s all been very gradual. I’ve been writing the blog for over 6 years now. I did get a definite boost a few years ago when there was an article about me, my knitting, and my blog in the Washington Post. August or September 2004, I think it was?

Howard :Google works wonders for finding that Sept. 2004 article titled “Knitting Together a Web Community“.

What is it about blogging and knitting that work so well together?

Wendy: Heh. Clearly your Google skills are better than mine — I searched and failed. I think knitters just love to talk about their craft and show other knitters what they are working on. Blogs are a great way to do that!

Howard: Thanks so much Wendy this was fun. I look forward to getting to know you even better on Plurk!

Wendy Johnson is a mild-mannered civil servant by day and a maniacal knitter by night. She is the author of the upcoming book “Socks From the Toe Up: Essential Techniques and Patterns from Wendy Knits”

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