BlogWorld Presentation: Social Media Marketing for Small Business
Yesterday, I presented at BlogWorld Expo ‘09 on Social Media Marketing for Small Business. I talked about keys elements to social media success for businesses and brands and some practical steps to achieve the success that you are after.
You can download my power point presentation below (click on menu in the bottom left corner and select Download Presentation option).
| Did you enjoy this post? subscribe now to get all of the posts | Comments (0) |
Too Much Information on the Internet
We all know someone or at least have heard about people who put too much of their personal information on the Internet. There have been numerous reports of people who are fired or refused jobs because potential employers find objectionable images or other details about them on their FaceBook or MySpace pages. I have always been conscious of keeping my personal information to a minimum in the public view. For example, when someone searches my name on the Internet, they only find some articles I have written and some of the social networking sites I have accounts with. My address is no where to be found; if I am required to identify my location, the information is as general as I can make it.
Many of the following tips are common sense, but I think they are worth mentioning.
· In addition to your address, try not to put your phone number out there too. This obviously doesn’t apply to small business owners who want to promote their businesses. Still, e-mail addresses are ideal because you can always adjust your spam filter and block addresses if needed.
· Setting your relationship status on FaceBook or MySpace to anything you want isn’t a problem, unless this information is something you don’t want other people in your life to find out about. If you are in an “open relationship” and one of the people in it are not aware of this, you may not want to publicize this. If you have the option to set your social networking sites to a private setting (accessible to friends only or completely private) then do so.
· As mentioned earlier, any objectionable images of you (or those which can be construed as objectionable) should be taken down from public view, or placed on more private pages. Remember, even if you think your grandmother will never see the crazy vacation pictures you posted a year ago, I wouldn’t take the risk. After all, someone else could always print out them out or show them to her on their computer or cell phone.
Just be careful when you are on the Internet. The virtual space may seem imaginary because we cannot stand in it or experience it on a tangible level, but it is very real…and it can backfire on us if we are not cautious.
| Did you enjoy this post? subscribe now to get all of the posts | Comments (0) |
Online Journalism: It’s All Been Said Before
It isn’t news that most of us get our news via the Internet these days. If you have a computer with online access, it is much easier to find the latest news on national and other news sites that are far too numerous to mention. My father still gets the Wall Street Journal seven days a week, but when I am home I hardly (if ever) look at it. It is just easier to go online and find the latest news. What makes it so much more popular is that news is constantly being posted and updated every hour, if not every minute. Just refresh the Google News page and you can often see new stories listed ahead of the one you were just looking at.
But the idea that there is “too much of a good thing” does apply to the bounty of free, online journalism. The constant need to put the latest news on the Internet can affect the quality of the writing or ignore the credibility of the sources used. Many news sites (alternative, national, and international) have reputable journalists providing content, but there are those other sites that have questionable contributors with dubious writing and editing skills. I have seen a quite a few spelling, grammatical and even factual errors when reading articles online, but these can easily be corrected; once an article is published in a traditional newspaper or magazine, any errors are there to stay.
Last year I attended a conference on the future of micro-blogging and online news sites as a whole and was surprised to find that many of the attendees where in the advertising industry. Obviously, the tensions in the room were high; I almost expected a screaming match between one of the panelists and an advertising executive in the audience. The general consensus of the panelists was that a new advertising model must be developed to adapt to the rapidly growing online journalism industry. Journalists, editors, graphic designers, photographers, and all others that contribute to online content should be paid, and I also believe that traditional advertising methods must change. When one disgruntled audience member suggested charging visitors to online news sites a small fee, many others balked at the notion. I just don’t see it happening; what I do know is that the “powers that be” have to think of something. Online journalism is here to stay; and no one wants to pay for it.
What are your thoughts on the online journalism and its future?
| Did you enjoy this post? subscribe now to get all of the posts | Comments (1) |
5 Tips to help you manage your time on the social web
I was recently interviewed by Gwen Bell for the Unconventional Guide to the Social Web and one of the questions Gwen asked me was how I manage to get all the many things done that I have on my plate!
My answer….you have to develop great time management skills and stay disciplined about them…and you have to manage technology instead of it managing you.
One of the biggest problems of the social web is the ease with which one can lose track of time. We are having so much fun connecting with friends & colleagues on Twitter, Facebook, and other social networks that we end up not getting any work done during the work hours and end up working ALL THE TIME.
Another problem is multi-tasking and interruptions. Research shows that it takes an average of 23 minutes and 15 seconds to get back to the task when interrupted on an unrelated topic.
Here are some tips on managing your time on the social web:
- Schedule Everything and stick to the schedule
I use the Entourage calendar to schedule EVERYTHING…meetings, responding to email, social network presence, day-to day tasks. But it’s not enough to schedule things..you have to stick to the schedule!
- Schedule your most important tasks when you feel like you are most productive
The most productive time is different for each person…some people are sharpest in the morning, some are later in the day. Figure out what your magic time slot is and schedule your most important task during that time. Sprinkle your social interactions & email management throughout the day but make sure it’s not during your most productive time. - Use a timer
Using a timer will allow you to set an alarm to notify you when your current scheduled task/activity is supposed to end. Let’s say you are alotting 20 minutes for social media interaction at 1pm…before you begin the task at 1pm, set your alarm to let you know when the 20 minutes has passed.The application that I use to achieve this is Apimac Timer (mac). You can also use Xnote StopWatch if you are on Windows (there are many more you can choose from).
- Close down the applications that you are not using
Human nature is to respond to stimuli…so if you hear a notice that you have a new email or a new response from a friend, you have to go see what it is. That is why if it’s not time to check and respond to email, I close down the email application…if it’s not time to interact on Twitter, I close down the Twitter application…the point is…only have the application that you are currently working in open. - Set and manage expectations
Managing everyone’s expectations is the key to time management. I think a lot of the time, the immediacy to respond is in our own head. Training your clients, colleagues, friends, and online connections that you are not available 24×7 will allow you to respond on your own time. And because we are all going through this information and task overload…they will more than undertand!
Did I miss anything? Share your time management tips in the comments!
| Did you enjoy this post? subscribe now to get all of the posts | Comments (0) |
The Power of the ReTweet on Twitter
A few weeks ago, I conducted a workshop for NYC Webgrrls on How to use Twitter for Business. The room was packed, the learning was fast paced, and we were able to cover a lot of Twitter ground.
One of the topics that we talked about is the Power of the ReTweet, which is a way of republishing someone else’s tweet to your users. ReTweeted posts are generally indicated by adding ‘RT @username’ in front of the original tweet. Although as seen in the example below, there is no hard rule…as long as you give the attribution to the author of the Tweet.
The Re-tweet is the viral marketing component of Twitter. I used the following slide to illustrate the point (click on image below for larger view):
My post “Reading: PC Mag’s Top 100 Web Sites of 2009 http://bit.ly/GgoF8″ was posted on Twitter to my 2077 followers, which got ReTweeted by 4 other people, potentially reaching 19,973 people!
Here are some tips on how to get ReTweeted (RT)
- Publish Engaging & Interesting content so it can spark discussions & get ReTweeted
- Make sure to leave at least 20 characters free so people can just ReTweet you without doing additional work. This will increase your ReTweet probability.
- Use words and phrases that will get you the most ReTweets
- Ask to be ReTweeted: include “please ReTweet” or “please RT” in your Twitter post. I generally don’t do this but have seen it work for other people.
| Did you enjoy this post? subscribe now to get all of the posts | Comments (0) |
Next Page »
