Do YOU Have a Dream? MLK to Google -- Join our Search and March for Change in Health Care Information on the Internet!

Today's I'm hoping to have YOU find out how you can be part of a successful 'march on Washington (and around the world!) which Lumigrate is asking you to join if you're interested in health.  And you can do it right from your computer!  If you don't want to read all the 'why' and get to the 'how', skip to the bottom of this blog!  If you want the 'story' of my thoughts today and the history of Lumigrate since 2007/8 and Internet correlations, I thank you for reading this today.  (Time for a beverage?  A deep breath?  Please get in a good gear!)

I got up today wanting my first thing to be writing a blog post about Martin Luther King, as today is a holiday in the US to honor him and the changes and progress he brought with him to our country and the world.  I think of the change related to racial equality in the 1960's correlating to health care with the new White House administration, ironically headed by our first African-American President. I know that Lumigrate's 'integrative medicine' concept is part of health care change, and feel that on our first Martin Luther King Holiday since our launch in March of 2009, we 'have a dream' and have a small but formidable group that could 'march on Washington' via the Internet.  60% of Americans say they want 'complimentary' medicine, and basically 'integrative medicine' is a philosophy of weaving/'integrating' medical concepts, just as 'integration' of the 1960s was about weaving people with different skin colors into the same buses, schools, bathrooms and religions. 

I turned to A&E and presumed Biography would be a resource for a history review and inspiration about what to write about, but it was about Bill Gates of MicroSoft.  The morning shows were about the Golden Globes, and so I went over to CNBC and there was a show about Google.  I stayed to watch, since Lumigrate is a progressive medical information business with much of our product accessible by download on the Internet (Videos -- which was a hurdle with users for us in 2009), Blog posts, and our growing Forums, and current decisions related to interest by other businesses in our Products area.)  And I'm glad I did! For one, the Internet and computers is just 'where it is at' if A&E and CNBC both are running shows on a national holiday about these topics.  Always good to be reminded of this when I start the day thinking of how to get more people onto the concept of Lumigrate, which is Lighting the Path to Health and Well-Being.

I was inspired to seeing the similarities between Google and Lumigrate, which was started in 1998 by two graduate students (I started Lumigrate ten years later in 2008).  Google started as a graduate school project, and I got the idea for Lumigrate in late 2007 when I saw how many people wanted to attend the health education forum I co-lead related to fibromyalgia in the new, lovely medical building my occupational therapy practice was in.  We had a wonderfully 'tight' and 'integrative' group of seminars presented by people who were coming together to form an integrative medicine center which I was invited to be part of (though to provide therapy services, something I wasn't wanting nor able to finance), and two years ago right now I was picking the pain colors for my office in that center.  

Google had a valid idea at the foundation, and I've been sure to keep our blog, video, product and forum areas focused on validity through my resources with the experts I utilize for information.  The Forums are for anyone to write in, but I work to invite sources to the area which will keep the quality in the quantity up to my standards.  Their idea was progressive as well.  Their hallmark is 'simplicity' and being as 'unthreatening as a box of crayons'.  When they initially had students look at their search engine prototype, all 16 sat there 'waiting for the rest to load' because the current search engines (AOL, Yahoo, etc.) were cluttered with ads and links, and theirs was free of that.  You might know that I say all the time, our premises for our information and marketing are 'valid, progressive, streamlined, and FUN!  So Google also was doing the 'streamlined' thing ten years before I was developing Lumigrate.  GRATE!  Hopefully someday it will be as utilized and hence profitable.  Because only if it is profitable can it be in existence.  Lumigrate's 'difference' from other sites has raised suspicions, I am told, that I'm not really who I say I am, with fibromyalgia and getting better, and am paid for by the pharmaceutical industry with some devious plot up our sleeves.  That is simply not the case.  WYSIWYG!  I'm very transparent and available, so please send a message if you have any questions! (There is that capacity to registered users of the website -- the come to me!)

You will notice that the top of the Lumigrate pages have no 'banner ad' -- it's just the Lumigrate logo on the left?   There initially was a Google Ad in the big blank white space to the right when we tested the website in March and I asked for it to be taken away.  I wanted it to be clear to a potential advertiser that there's a space for them!  I am an OT and know that websites can be overwhelming visually to older people or those with any kind of neurological issue that affects the brain and cognition.  I would have preferred to have no ads and to make our money completely from people purchasing products and information (again, a progressive idea), but in order to have a backup plan if that didn't work and to know in reality how people were going to utilize the website, there are Google ads and the Products tab takes people to Amazon so that we know how those aspects are utilized.  

I wanted the users of Lumigrate to not have to wonder if there was anyone controlling what information was put on Lumigrate, because in the medical industry that is a huge issue, and I have found out in our first 3 seasons that the public is aware and very scrutinous of websites and why the information is there that is there.  I'm glad to see that I was right about that!  And in reality, people weren't wildly wanting to spend $20 to download full hour-long videos of seminars by integrative medicine center providers, but for the number of people aware of the website, we have impressive results. Particularly considering the technology learning curve of the public.  It's foreseen that the 'tubes' that are allowing people to download movies and TV shows in full are currently breaking that barrier for us.  (Hulu I believe it is called.  I've never done it because I'm dedicated with my time to working on Lumigrate 'stuff' -- product development, funding, marketing). 

The show went on to say that Google makes things whimsical and FUN!  They encourage their employees to be at work 'all the time' so have much recreation inside and out.  They are easy on their dress codes and appearance requirements, and showed the Queen of England talking with an unshaven Google founder!  (You'll notice Scott Rollins, MD filmed his seminars after starting to grow his beard in the fall, which was something I'd not thought about and figured in the moment that we ARE who and what we ARE and that will show as realistic groundedness and our 'difference' would mean something favorable to those who mattered.)  They believe in good nutrition so incredible meals are free, and they have on-site massage therapists.  In our own little way, Lumigrate encouraged similar things in 2008 and 2009 with our upstart employees -- 'green goo' (green fruit, wheat grass drink), horchata and organic coffee, and immersion in a think-tank of progressive medical providers which was wonderful!  And we had FUN -- after open houses and blessing ceremonies, we'd pull up lyrics on the very monitors I'm looking at right now composing this blog post, and with our families, sing away the evenings.

The Google show then turned to Google's search and how it works, and I transcribed it and am going to leave it for you at the bottom of this post.  Because what I am asking people to do today, as Whoopie on the View just stated, our President has reminded us that today can be a day in service and not a day 'off'.   By getting on the "March for Progressive, Valid, Streamlined, FUN Health Care Information with Lumigrate" by reading this blog post, doing what you think makes sense to YOU to help progress our ability to help you and others.  In order to have Lumigrate get high enough in Google searches for people who type in their 'search bar' health related words (and the show later showed 'pain medication addiction' being typed! -- I kid you not!), the number of links from other places to Lumigrate.com influences how high we come up in the 'organic search'.  So if you have a blog, if you have a website, if you go out and post on discussion boards, please put a link to Lumigrate there for us.  I am asking each of you to become Lumigrate volunteers!  

So please join Yenta (a volunteer), Cutee-cle Lady (also volunteering), Deirdre Rawlings, ND, PhD (nutrition expert), Emma-Kate Lamb (OTR and college instructor in New Zealand with a new blog who I worked with last night on her new fibromyalgia piece), Adam Cochran (IT adviser here in Grand Junction), Abby Landmeier (facebook/marketing and graphics volunteer adviser) and ALL The others who write in Lumigrate's Forum area and give some of your time for a cause which you believe in -- progressive, quality health care information.  It is an impressive collection and MORE are coming --  Cinda Crawford, April Schulte-Barclay, DAOM (acupuncture and Oriental medicine), dance, pets, avocational / hobby experts!  And they're health care providers by training, generally.  ANYONE can write in the Forum area!  So invite experts and people YOU know and help it grow with quality that YOU know of!  It then becomes everyone's Lumigrate!

If you don't have a mechanism for linking, even typing 'Lumigrate' with health words that YOU think of as topics with information we have that the world's public and medical professionals would want to find us for.  "Fibromyalgia", "chronic pain", "bioidentical hormones", "chronic fatigue", FMS, CFS, etc.... What do YOU think of when you think of Lumigrate?  And just spend some time on that if you'd be so generous with your time and energy.

If you're on facebook and Twitter, please suggest new friends, message out to your groups and ask them to read this blog and to join the march for better health with Lumigrate!  We have such a WONDERFUL following of supporters and know that if YOU invite YOUR people our way, it will bring MORE GRATE PEOPLE to our website and then we can do what I set out to do two years ago now ... get progressive, valid, streamlined and FUN health care information to as many people as want it!

Below is what the show said, word for word, about how Google's search engine works -- to help you understand what I'm asking for here:

"A basic search engine crawls the Internet, bouncing from link to link, indexing as many web pages as it can.  When you do a 'Search', it stacks your results based on the number of times your search term appears on each site.  Google's master stroke was to rank every website's importance by counting the number of website's linking back to it.  Google figures the number of links to the website, the more important it must be, and the higher it should show up in your search results.  They call this approach  'Page Rank', after Larry Page, and it worked brilliantly.  (They show footage of the young, unshaven, smiley co-founder)"

So please find areas of Lumigrate that you like and think others would want to know about, and cut and paste that link where YOU think it will reach people, and in doing so, we'll be up a big higher in the 'big O' (my new joke), the 'organic search'.   Comment below, and for your ease AND link copying, become active with us on facebook and those links are below.  THANK YOU IMMENSELY ~~ Mardy Ross, OTR, Founder, Lumigrate

WATCH OUR FACEBOOK FANS GROW!

facebook Lumigrate fan page (for anyone interested in integrative medicine concepts generally):

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Grand-Junction-CO/Lumigrate/55... [1] (436 fans today)

facebook Lumigrate fan page related to chronic pain and fibromyalgia: (currently 318 fans)

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Lumigrate-Fibromyalgia/1718615... [2]

Follow us and 'retweet' and tell your friends... Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/lumigrate [3]