Getting other people to toot your horn

While I'm not exactly a shy, retiring wallflower, I've also never been one to toot my own horn. Not, at least, without encouragement and/or provocation, which is one of the reasons I starting working with and still like hanging around Ilise and Peleg.

But at a great conference recently, I discovered an amazing thing: you don't need to toot your own horn if other people will do it for you. Not only that—it's far, far more effective that way.

Here's the thing: I"m forever praising other people to the rooftops. Not to get something from it (although the warm, fuzzy feeling is nice) but because it feels great to introduce other people to something or someone I'm seriously digging on. And while my friends are wonderful and say nice things about me, this was the first experience I've had where someone not only said nice things, but nice things that were dead on target with my personal brand and the message I'm trying to put out there.

In this case, it was a good friend whom I've known online for a while but who I met in person for the first time that weekend. And while I couldn't say for sure, I'm guessing it was just that same kind of excitement over meeting in person that triggered the exuberant blathering: we couldn't shut up about how great the other was.

I saw it again recently on the blog of another new online friend whom I truly hope will become an offline one. Pam Slim wrote a fantastic article about asking for help: how to do it specifically and well. And in it, she also describes the kind of person you want to help: someone who's doing kickass work, trying to change the world, and busy working, not running around with a hand out, asking for favors.

So who have you talked up recently? What have you done that's worthy of being talked up? And how are you making it easy for people to do it?