Wednesday, May 22, 2013

NZ Twitter Secret Santa Update - Who is taking over

So a little while ago I mentioned that I was looking for someone to take over the reins of the NZ Twitter Secret Santa and I am happy to announce I have someone (actually a team of people) all keen and excited to take it over.

You do really need to be a certan kind of person to want to do this sort of thing, where the joy of running the event is the motivator and just spreading the Christmas cheer is all you need as a reward.

The people taking over NZ Twitter Secret Santa from me is......................


The really great team at NZ Post @nzpost

We've had quite a few discussions around the whole Secret Santa thing and not once have I had a bad feeling about it, actually quite the opposite. They already run the letters for Santa every year for the kids and kids at heart and really want to carry on the awesome NZ Twitter Secret Santa vibe that happens every year without changing a winning formula.

Sure there will be tweaks and new ways of doing things, and the team at NZ Post are very capable of using their skills to do this.

I hope all you great Twitter people out there give them as much support as you have to me over the years, you can find them at @nzpost and can check out their blog at http://postmodern.nzpost.co.nz

As for me I am concentrating on giant pumpkins over at www.giantpumpkins.co.nz Op Shops over at www.opshopdirectory.co.nz and working on any other crazy ideas I might come up with.

Cheers

Sam

Monday, April 15, 2013

NZ Twitter Secret Santa - Why I have to pass it on


Hi there

I'm Sam, also known on Twitter as @websam.

Over 3 years ago I had the brainwave of taking the simple concept of a secret Santa, and making it work for people on Twitter in NZ.

Doing it for the last 3 years I have interacted with a great bunch of people on Twitter, almost all of whom have been based in NZ.

I wouldn’t have been able to do any of this without the help of many people, from people helping me make the process easier, to people listening to me occasionally rant about the amount of emails and questions I get while doing the whole secret Santa thing.  So a big massive thanks to everyone that has helped me.

I've been doing a lot of personal development stuff at work lately, and I know what my strengths and weaknesses are.  And it has made me think a lot about the stuff I do.

If you didn't know I grow giant pumpkins and I run the website www.giantpumpkins.co.nz, our season for pumpkin growing is the end of October through until the middle of March usually.  Which makes it a busy period, tied in with secret Santa makes it extremely busy.

I've made the decision to focus on the giant pumpkins more this year, and I wouldn't be able to do the secret Santa justice.

This is where you come in, I want the whole NZ Twitter Secret Santa to carry on, I think it is a great idea, and I am happy to pass it onto someone else but you need to be a certain type of person.

You need to be:

Able to deal with a lot of people all at once and answer questions right into February/March
Be trustworthy with peoples information
Be awesome
There are probably other things you should probably be.  But for now that is a start.

If you are interested in taking over this mammoth task, and want to run the NZ Twitter secret Santa feel free to get in touch with me at sam@nzsecretsanta.co.nz

I am sorting this all out now, so if the right person wants to run it, they can have it all up and running by Christmas this year.

I'll still be around on Twitter, just being myself.  And any other important notices or announcements about the whole thing I will communicate with you.

Thanks for everything Twitter, you have been awesome.

Sam