But not for the weather, women or the weed. (Although some sunshine should thaw my Boston winter blues.) I’m catching a plane to California this afternoon for a week-long editorial summit with the online media department of one of the largest retailers in the world. We’ll be discussing the 2010 editorial calendar, as well as how to make articles more interactive to nurture a community following. This brings me to a great article I read in the New York Times called “Be It Twittering or Blogging, It’s All About Marketing.” The content we create for this online retailer’s website is engaging and offers value to readers, but let’s be real: it’s exists for one purpose only and that’s to drive online and in-store sales.

The Times story features Gary Vaynerchuk, an online social media wonderboy who increased sales exponentially at his dad’s wine store with internet-based social media marketing. Blogging, Tweeter, Facebook, LinkedIn are all his free yet time-sapping resources to get his product out to the masses. While I’m fascinated at where Gary’s going, and I’d love to do more of the same for LifeTips, ideaLaunch and our other sites, I’d be challenged to find all the time to do so and keep up with my editorial and managerial tasks at the office and still retain some shred of a “live” social life outside the office. I’m a sucker for the old-fashioned kind of social networking (and it gives me an excuse to drink wine too).

Luckily for us, we are welcoming to the staff John Cass, online media superhero and more attractive adult Harry Potter lookalike (British accent and all). John is going to rock our Facebook world, tweet the tutus out of Twitter and bring this pet project blog to the next level. I can’t wait to work with John and learn from his many years of blogging, consulting and his time as the president of the Boston Chapter of the American Marketing Association. I think our staff, writer & Guru community and clients will all have plenty to learn from him.