May 2009 - Posts

• Twitter - An Annual or Perennial in Your Social Media Garden?

  Inspirational Place My family is very fortunate that our home has been blessed with a beautiful garden in spite of having nary a green thumb in sight. When my wife and I first saw this property two-and-a-half years ago, it looked like something out of a magazine - the inside was pristine and the outside looked like a snapshot from the local botanical gardens. Our three active kids have ensured that the inside is now far from pristine, and we haven't put nearly as much time into the garden as we might have liked, but it's still an inspirational place. For example, I was so inspired while sitting out here working on a Facebook fan page the other week that I got an idea and decided to record a video of myself out in the garden, just because it seemed like the right thing to do on a beautiful day. A Legacy of Love and Labour The main reason that the garden is still presentable is that, from late April to mid-October, there is always something blooming each week. My wife and I do some work in the garden, but nothing compared to the work that was obviously done by our predecessor. Clearly, a lot of love and labour went into creating and maintaining the garden. That lesson, that preparation and planning can produce wonderful long-term results, has again given me inspiration, this time for a post on Twitter. Twitter Basics Before we get into how gardening can possibly teach anyone a lesson about Twitter, let's get through the general Twitter stuff, that most of you probably know by now if you watch Oprah or are fans of Ashton Kutcher. Twitter is a "microblogging" service, where you can stand on your soapbox and say whatever you like, as long as it's 140 characters or less. Each message is called a "tweet". The message goes out to the Internet in general, but particularly to your "followers" - people who have expressed interest in hearing what you have to say. If you're not the soapbox type, you can just be in the audience, by following whomever you think it is who has something worthy to impart. You don't need to use your real information as your username, so you don't have to worry about people finding out your personal information. Legions of Followers To the uninitiated, the whole having followers thing sounds like a bit of an ego stroke, which of course it is, but no more so than being a follower is a bit of a humility stroke. Therein likely lies part of the genius of Twitter. It's great both for the soapbox shouters and those who like to listen to them. Those who are neither may be a little less excited about its possibilities, but could certainly find at least enough usefulness out of it to understand why it's this year's social media darling. How Can Twitter Help Me? I've certainly been getting a lot of questions from these types of "in between" people, both as individuals and representing businesses, about what they should do on Twitter. If Oprah is doing it, it must be worth checking out, right? Well, it can have many useful functions, depending on what you're looking for. It can act as a "breaking news" service, from which you can get news as it happens. Twitter is the first place you will normally hear about pretty much anything of relevance that is happening in the world. It can also be a very current search engine, which will return results about the state of something at this particular moment in time. For example, do a search for gardening and you'll get a real-time stream of what people are doing out in their gardens. You can also share videos, share pictures and now even post voice notes over Twitter. Best of all, you can measure your Twitter stats to learn how many people are clicking on and reading your tweets. I use a URL shortener called bit.ly because I use my Twitter account mainly for posting links to stories you won't find on the six o'clock news, and I love the fact that bit.ly gives a simple 2-click process to post relevant links to Twitter with the added benefit of traffic stats. To Plant or Not to Plant Of course, anything this popular gets the attention of businesses and marketers. The tendency among people or organizations who want to sell things is to want to make everything, from marketing and sales copy to the sales cycle itself, shorter, so that it can offer quicker returns. There are no shortage of examples of this on Twitter. My view is that you should indeed be ready to be able to jump on some of these new opportunities, but you need also need to consider longer-term consequences. What this meant for me with Twitter is a decision to hold off jumping onto the Twitter bandwagon until I understood it and knew exactly how I wanted it to fit into my overall Internet presence. In other words, to further cultivate the garden metaphor, I knew that to get the balance right between perennials and annuals, a gardener needs to plan, so I needed to figure out where in my garden to put the Twitter space, what to plant in it, and when I wanted it to bloom. My Social Media Garden In my social media garden, I use different social networks and services to manage different types of information, because if I scattered it all across everything, I wouldn't be able to keep track of it, and it also wouldn't look very good. So, I use iGoogle to bring in and organize information, I use Digg to keep track of the social value of that information, I use Twitter to re-publish interesting information, I use a Facebook fan page to distribute premium (ie. sellable) information, and I use different blogs (like this one) to create and publish original material to a target audience. Giving each service a specific place in the garden allows me to keep the garden organized so that I can measure the effectiveness of each particular patch and know which areas need work if they aren't adding to the overall health and appearance of the garden. Only the Good Stuff Like any social network, Twitter does have certain etiquette points you should understand before you roll up your sleeves and get your hands dirty. There are lots of ways to increase your amount of followers, but the golden rule of social media is that people will choose to follow you based on the quality of the content that you post. I have tested this out. Using the traffic measurement tools that I mentioned, I have cross-referenced links that were clicked more often with the number of new people choosing to follow me. In other words, when I posted something that was interesting, I picked up new followers. Twittiquette The "Twittiquette" question I hear most often is whether you should follow someone who is following you. My answer is that you shouldn't feel obliged to do so. I only follow someone who has chosen to follow me if that person is posting content relevant to the reason I am on Twitter. For instance, if you're on to learn about gardening, and one of your followers posts a lot of gardening tips, then follow that person back. You will lose some followers by choosing not to follow everyone who follows you, as some people expect a reciprocal follow and will "unfollow" you if you don't reciprocate, but it will keep your Twitter presence less cluttered if you are disciplined about it. Irrelevant Personal Details? Critics of Twitter often cite examples of people tweeting irrelevant personal details ("I'm out in my backyard gardening") to argue that there is no relevance to this type of information, and so it's essentially a useless waste of time. I agree in part, but if for example you're about to plant something and learn from another gardener in your area that it's a bit too early, that has relevance to you, so it's news. There is a great video of a Wall Street Journal interview with Twitter's two founders discussing this and several other issues. Of course, this theory only works if you and your followers (presuming you have any) are tech-enabled, so there is an argument to be made that it's great for the techies and their opportunities, but doesn't do much to help the "ordinary" person. What do you think? Tweet Me! To tell me what you think, or if you have questions about using Twitter, you can leave a comment here at the bottom of this post, or, if you're feeling ambitious, you can use Twitter and tweet me what you think. If you're a Twitter newbie, you can give it a try without worrying about breaking someone's account or saying something you shouldn't. Just go to Twitter and set up an account. Once you've set up your account (or if you already have one), you'll see a 'What are you doing?' box at the top on your main Twitter page. This is where you type your tweets. In order to address a tweet to a specific person, just begin your message by typing the @ symbol before the person's username (so I am @oryx_orange), type your tweet, and I will see it in my Twitter profile. So go ahead and mess with it - I promise I won't get upset if you do something wrong! If you want to receive "always up-to-date" news on technology and all kinds of other stuff you won't see on the 6 o'clock news, you can click 'Follow' on my account page and you'll be a tech expert in no time! Plan Your Garden Whether or not Twitter belongs in your social media garden is something you'll have to decide on your own, but the most important thing to remember is that the easiest way is not always the best way and, like anything, any patch in that garden will require planning and care for it to yield what you want it to. So roll up your sleeves and get your hands a little dirty with Twitter, but before you get them really dirty, take a step back and figure out what you want to plant and when to plant it.   P.S. A great big thanks to all of you who supported me by purchasing my "How To Promote Your Business on Facebook" Guide and/or becoming a Fan of my Facebook Page. P.P.S. If you are already on Twitter and you like this article, feel free to tweet it. You can use the following text as your tweet: Twitter - An Annual or Perennial in Your Social Media Garden? - Magic Bookshelf http://bit.ly/18Vs4K   Posted May 29 2009, 12:00 PM by beamishboy with 2 comment(s) Filed under: social media, tweet, twitter, gardening, Oprah, social network

• A Social Media Star is Born - The Many Facets of Facebook

  Celebrity Gossip The prevailing wisdom of our celebritized culture seems to tell us that, when everyone has an opinion about you, you know you've done something right. Facebook is a celebrity, a big star. It's a cultural phenomenon. Everyone has an opinion on Facebook. And just as the tabloids love to talk about celebrities, the Internet loves to talk about Facebook. The chatter about Facebook usually comes from one of two camps, admittedly with some inhabiting the territory in between. Those Not on Facebook If this is you, you probably have friends and family telling you daily that you should be, and other friends and family who think you're just fine in holding back the tide. What you should know is that there isn't even a typical Facebook user. Some are on just to be on and see what's all the fuss is about, and don't do anything with it - I actually count these among the "Not on Facebook" camp. Those aren't the ones telling you to get on it. If that is you, I understand your point of view. You're just like my wife, who thinks Facebook is a big waste of time. Offline or online, some people are more social than others, and will regulate their amount of interaction accordingly.   Those on Facebook The ones telling you to get on Facebook are the social ones, regaling you with stories of finding that old school friend, or chuckling to themselves about that great video of the grandchildren that you never saw. I'm sure that if you're not a particularly social person, that can be mighty annoying. Unfortunately, I plead guilty to being one of those people. We all know that life these days can get very busy, and there are always people in your life that you wish you could spend more time with. I am on Facebook because I know it as a great online way to replicate my offline personality, and therefore spend more "almost-quality-time" with people I care about but often don't have the time to meet. Isn't Facebook Information Public? However, I'm going to try not to take sides here, and, in the spirit of trying to write an objective article on something it's very hard to be objective about, I will start by addressing a few common misconceptions, so that we can at least all get on the same page. Many non-users of Facebook, or even beginner users who are on but not active, are under the impression that by registering for a Facebook account, all a person’s information will be immediately “made public”. In fact, Facebook only shares the information that you tell it to share, which in the case of some personal profiles is nothing other than name. Even among those who share more information, most people on Facebook choose to share that information only within their own network of friends. In other words, anyone who you don’t know well can only see your information if they request to and you give them explicit permission. Security and Privacy on Facebook That said, the Facebook naysayers are certainly right about one thing - you should always consider very carefully what you choose to show to the world. It's always a great idea to take a very close look at privacy and application settings of any Internet service before you do too much on that network. The good ones (like AnnTheGran!) are very respectful of that, know how to store your information, and won't do anything with it without your permission. The sneakier ones are the ones you have to watch. If you are thinking of dabbling in Facebook but aren't sure where to start, or even if you're on it but are concered about your privacy, my recommendation is that you set up an account and go immediately to the Settings, so that you can review and choose which information you'd like to share. If you have questions, they have an extensive and searchable Help section. If you're still stuck, you can always ask me using the Comments field below. A Talented Matchmaker So, now that we've established that, what is it about Facebook specifically that makes it a mandatory part of the daily routine of over 200 million people? Aren't there other social networks on which you can "replicate" your offline self online"? I think the key to Facebook's current success is that it started with a very simple and very strong value proposition to potential users - to rekindle long-dormant relationships - and made an interface in which it was very easy to do so. As its userbase grew through this simple functionality, it became very good at recognizing relationships between its existing users, that they might not have known even existed. For example, if I live in Mississauga, my friend Pedro lives in Guadalajara, and my friend Kenji lives in Osaka, and I am connected to Pedro through Facebook but I haven't spoken to Kenji in ten years, Facebook looks at my relationship with Pedro and understands that I may very well know Kenji, and so it tries to put us together. If Facebook makes a mistake and I don't know Kenji, I ignore the attempt to connect and Kenji is none the wiser. But if Facebook is right, and I end up re-connecting with an old friend, Facebook looks like a genius, and has earned my gratitude. Making You a Better Friend Now that Facebook has grown by leaps and bounds, this little trick applies now not only to connecting people but to connecting the important moments in people's lives. The Facebook algorithms (programs that analyze information and figure out what is relevant to you) have now evolved to monitor not only which relationships are the most important to you but even to speculate as to which kinds of interactions within those valued relationships (wanting to see photos, attending similar events, supporting the same organizations, etc.) might interest you. Facebook doesn't always get it right, but you sure end up knowing a lot more about those in your world than you did before you found them on Facebook. It could even be argued that, with its ability to help you remember important birthdays and share in important milestones, Facebook makes you a better friend. Lurking in the Shadows In one sense, this is all rather elementary, and is no different from what happens when one person facilitates a personal connection between two other people in any social situation, but when it is done digitally and automatically, it dramatically expands your network of people. Now, of course, there are thousands of applications added to the mix that allow you to do everything from send gifts and play online games to share favourite movies and have caricature sketches done of yourself, and this is where it all starts to drift back a little towards being more cautious. There are quite a few unscrupulous application builders on Facebook, whose applications are designed to be fun and to spread quickly for one primary purpose - to get your contact information so they can sell you stuff, or sell your information to someone who wants to sell you stuff. The good news is that Facebook has recently undergone a major overhaul that now allows legitimate organizations a way to connect easily and safely with legitimate users. Facebook For Business So, even if you are not the slightest bit interested in the new Facebook on a personal level, if you own a business or are involved with an educational or charitable organization, you owe it to yourself and your employees or volunteers to be aware of the incredible promotional opportunities that exist on it. Many of the recent changes to Facebook revolved around its Pages, which exist for the purpose of promoting organizations like yours. Pages are great because they are viewable by non-users of Facebook and get found by search engines like Google, sometimes above the organization's own web site. The business buzz around Facebook Pages right now reminds me of the early days of the Internet when Google first got into pay-per-click advertising, the system that still allows them to make most of their money. At that time, the possibilities of search weren't well understood by businesses, and so the businesses who did understand it could spend almost no money yet still make a huge impact. I know that's what my company did. If you have a business, Facebook can do for you now what Google did for me then. How To Promote Your Organization on Facebook If you're interested in knowing how, I've created a guide that I'm selling through the AnnTheGran store. For those of you with a business or organization to promote, it will be the best $40 you've ever spent. The whole system is based on using the FREE tools already available on the new Facebook. For non-users of Facebook, the good news is that you don't have to be personally active on Facebook to make it work for your business. In fact, you don't even need to be on Facebook to see what a Facebook Page looks like. To give you an example, I've created an actual Facebook Page (click on the link to view it) as a tutorial for the kit, from which I took screenshots I used to make the kit. The best thing about this new opportunity on Facebook is that it works for pretty much any kind or size of business. So, whether you have a small home-based embroidery business or a ball-bearing factory with hundreds of employees, you can reap huge promotional benefits for just a bit of effort and no cost (except the cost of the Guide!). You can view the product page for the Guide here, including some sample pages. The Bottom Line Whatever you use it for, the right amount of Facebook time, like anything, is all about how it affects your relationship to those with whom you are connected. I've overheard some people say that they think it's ridiculous that their friends spend a couple hours a day on Facebook and yet they think nothing of spending those same couple hours in front of the television. Like television, Facebook, and the Internet for that matter, can be used for education and enlightment just as it can be used for mindless entertainment and trash. In fact, with the added social element of Facebook, I don't see it as much different than getting a group of guys together to eat nachos, drink beer and watch the big game. Either way, whether it's in front of a screen or not, it's the quality of the time that counts. Posted May 01 2009, 03:00 PM by beamishboy with 10 comment(s) Filed under: magic bookshelf, facebook, promoting your business, promote your business on facebook, social media