Embracing Social Media: Using It to Our Advantage

Editor's Notes

• #2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhPgUcjGQAw&feature=relatedhttp://tv.winelibrary.com
• #4: Emphasis on social.Not replacing face2face – enhancing it. Sharing is encouraged.
• #5: Socionomicsvideo - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhPgUcjGQAw&feature=related
• #6: Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project (11/09)http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2010/Social-Media-and-Young-Adults.aspx74% of all adults ages 18 and older are online.47% of online adults (ages 18 and up) use social networking sites, up from 37% in November 2008.40% of adults 30 and older use social sites73% of adult profile owners use Facebook, 48% have a profile on MySpace, 19% use Twitter and 14% use LinkedIn
• #7: Noise– games, spam, babble? Solution: Hide feature on Facebook, being particular about whom you follow. Free tools? Tools are free; time is not free. Need time commitment to listen, respond and create content. Relationships? Real relationships can be started on social media. Many have experienced this – my example. Quantity means nothing, it’s quality and frequency of interaction that matters. Don’t be a “collector.” If you have crappy product/service and customer service – social media can’t help that.
• #8: Lilly’s experience with SM - http://www.linkedin.com/in/lillyferrickUses LIgroup discussions, LI Q&A and blog commenting. Results: Networking - professional relationships with other sales strategists - mutual respect, share advice. Professional branding/recognition – establishes her expertise via LI Group discussions, LI Answers & blog comments. Business development – leads via her SM activity.
• #9: My experience with SM – blog comments, LI group dicussions & Answers, Twitter: Professional networking – association and social media industries. Personal networking – Raleigh, food and craft brew. Professional development:Twitter #1 source of knowledge for me – links, #assnchat, conversation.Other sources for professional development - FB fan pages, LI groups.Results – guest blogging, articles, speaking, client referrals, scholarships to 2 conferences, rewarding professional & personal networks, new friends.Image – Tweetdeck in background.
• #10: New professional development resources via SM – webinars, podcasts, virtual & hybrid conferencesASAE’s Technology Conference cancelled. Members organized an “unconference” in 46 hours. First day – 75 people attended in person, 500 people attended via livestream of conference. Second day – full schedule of webinars and webcasts.
• #11: Before tools, need to understand behavior,culture of SM space – determines your success.Gary Vaynerchuk - http://tv.winelibrary.comStarted working in parents’ liquor store at 16. Began his study of wine (reading, developing his palate, but no tasting). Started Wine Library TV 4 years ago. Now best-selling author (with huge book deal), on TV all the time (see graphic), keynote speaker. Leveraged social media (primarily videos & Twitter) to be a success.
• #12: Gary – not the typical reviewer -- language, passion, personal interests.Knows his stuff – content expert.Responds to comments, tweets, Facebook fan page comments. Relationships are important to him.It’s social media. People prefer having relationships with people, not brands, logos or institutions. Be a real person, have conversations. Mix in a little personal now, makes you real, differentiates you, create bonds.Chris Brogan – Trust Agents (book)
• #13: Breaking down of personal/professional walls:Challenge - comfort level, exposing personal life.Privacy issues – industryregulations (FDA), confidentiality (legal, medical)We’re ambassadors of our brand now 24/7Google search reveals all, personal and professional. Used by recruiters, potential clients and customers.Your views on your personal privacy may evolve as you get deeper into using social media. Everyone has a different comfort level, and that’s okay.
• #14: Laurie Ruettimann - http://punkrockhr.com/HR professional (worked at Pfizer too). Moved here. HR consultant and blogger keynote speaker, writer, CNN/CareerBuilder listed, thought leader in industry.Provides valuable content. Collaborates and shares – guest posts on her blog, team blogs, referrals to others – social media karma. Responsive – listens – comments and tweets. Personality – personal interests, spunky. 2 twitter accounts – one more industry focused than the other.
• #15: Treat others as you want to be treated – golden ruleLI – business reception, Twitter – after work happy hour, Facebook – backyard barbecue
• #16: 1st steps: read blogs, subscribe to blogs, maybe comment on blogs.Commoncraftvideo on RSS reader - http://www.commoncraft.com/rss_plain_english RSS brings blog posts to you. You can read them when you have time and you won’t miss anything.
• #17: Click on orange RSS icon to subscribe to a blog (or subscribe by email). Commenting – brings you social mojo, link exposure.
• #18: SM is like sex. You can’t just read the manual, you have to experience it. Reserve your Twitter username so no one else takes it. Complete your profile.
• #19: Fish where your fish are – upload contacts and find your tribe. Start where your target audience (friends, fellow professionals, clients, prospective clients or members) is hanging out.
• #20: 80% of companies use or plan to use LI in their recruiting/hiring process. When LI launched, it took 477 days to reach 1 million users, the last million took only 12 days. Follow LI’s profile completeness suggestions. Use the same photo you use on other SM platforms – your Facebook profile on your personal page may be different. LI Search function will look for keywords so keep that in mind as you complete your Headline, Summary, Specialties and job descriptions.Your Headline can be edited if you wish to describe yourself other than the default – current position.Add web sites – blog, web site, company web site – and Twitter username. Customize your LI URL so it shows your name and not a mix of numbers and name.Add past jobs so former colleagues can find you.
• #21: Applications can be added to your profile – Slideshare, Tripit (travel plans – good for meeting connections in other cities), Amazon reading list, blog import, Events. Be wary of adding the Twitter application if you tweet a lot – can be obnoxious. Get recommendations. Differentiate yourself by adding Interests – may create bond with someone. Join groups and add credentials.
• #22: Review your Settings. Go through all options. Visible to everyone. Check name – full name, not first name/last name initial. Connectionsbrowse – allow. Profile & status updates – turn off Profile Updates when doing a lot of editing, but turn it on before completing last edit. Turn Status Updates on.
• #23: Search Directory/Groups by keyword. Join groups. Display logo on your profile. Sign up for daily or weekly email digest of group activity.
• #24: Personalize invitations to connect – don’t use LI default. Connectingphilosophy – everyone has a different connection philosophy. Choose Connect or Ignore. If you choose “I don’t know this person,” it’s possible that their account will be suspended if that happens to them several times. Their connection philosophy is different, that’s all, don’t punish them.
• #25: 3rd largest country – China & India (in Nov, #4 behind US). 40% increase in active users (use FB monthly) in last 6 months.
• #26: Fastestgrowing group is age 45-54. Average user – 130 friends, spends 7 hrs/month (other top sites – 2 hrs)
• #27: Friending philosophy – everyone has a different approach. My approach – if I would have a beer with you in real life, I’ll be your friend. I do include online friends that way. Fb is great for sharing links, photos, videos, status and interacting with others. Go to Accounts/Privacy Settings. Check all your settings. Fb recently made changes to the default that may have changed your settings to a more public view. You can customize your settings for each type of Fb activity. Most individuals limit their activity to Friends. You can also customize your Notifications so that you don’t receive too many emails from Fb about others’ activities.
• #28: News Feed – 2 options – Top News and Most Recent. Top News is based on a Fbalgorithim, they will select news for you based on that. I use Most Recent. Hiding applications (games, quizzes, snowball fights etc.) and people – place cursor over upper right corner and Hide button will appear. Click on that and you’ll have the options of hiding the person or the application.Edit Options at bottom of page – shows whom you have hidden (in case you want to bring them back). Also, shows # of friends that Fb will display in your News Feed. Increase this number if it’s too low – I think the default is 200 so if you more friends, you’ll want to increase it.
• #29: New HBA-RTP fan page – great place to share resources with fellow members. Don’t spam it, don’t self-promote, not cool. When HBA has 25 fans, they can sign up for a Vanity URL – instead of an URL address with lots of numbers in it, can request something like www.facebook.com/hba-rtp.Fan page updates go to the fans’ News feed so it’s a great way to keep fans in the loop.
• #30: Professional fan page – great idea for a professional who wants to share resources, tips, etc. Need to invest time so that page doesn’t become stagnant.
• #31: Twitter – public texting – www.twitter.com You will see the tweets only of people you follow (click Follow on their page). If they choose to follow you back, they’ll see your tweets too. You don’t need to follow back those that follow you. Be selective. You will receive an email when someone decides to follow you. Tweet – message to your followers. @ - used in front of a username when you are talking to or replying to that person, or mentioning them in a tweet. Your @ tweet to that person will only be seen by him/her and any followers you have in common. RT – retweet – a way to share someone’s tweet with your followers – great way to share good links or messages/tweets. Good twitter karma. DM – direct message – private tweet to a person who follows you. No one else can see it. Will also go to that person’s email. You can’t DM someone who does not follow you.
• #32: Complete your profile – photo, full name, web site (blog, web site, LI profile), location (city, state) and bio. Bio is limited to 160 characters. Because I use Twitter for professional and personal reasons, mine is a mix. People will not follow you back if you don’t have a complete profile. Key to Twitter success – a mix of tweets, @’s and RTs. Do not self-promote more than 20% of the time. Mix it up. Give value. Sharing and giving credit is highly encouraged.
• #33: Whom to follow? Find out who’s using a hashtag (like #biotech10) – often used for conferences. People will add a hashtag to their tweets from or about a conference and its content. Great way to find people and get soundbites/info from conference sessions. Use the Search function to find the twitterstream for a hashtagged conference. You can even subscribe to the search’s RSS feed.
• #34: Whom to follow? Twitter lists – new feature – some people have created Lists by topic to group the people they follow. Good way to find people. Do the authors of the blogs you read have a Twitter account? A link to their Twitter account may be displayed on their blog. Linkedin profiles now list Twitter usernames. http://search.twitter.com/ - Advanced Search – can search by keyword and filter it by location.
• #35: First, lurk and learn. How are others using the tools? Find those you want to interact with. Which tools are they using? How are they using them? Goals - there’s SM for fun and SM for a purpose – can do one or both. Have some ideas about what you want to accomplish. These ideas may change over time as you learn about the tools’ potential.
• #36: You can lose a lot of time in the SM space if you don’t have a plan and a schedule. It’s easy to rationalize the time because you are learning or developing relationships – beware. Tweetdeck and Hootsuite are great applications for Twitter. Can create columns categorized by topic of those you follow, so that you can prioritize your time and only review certain columns (groups, lists) if you need to save time. Set a timer in the other room if you want to also give your hips a stretch. Cell phone applications are very useful when waiting in line. I use Ubertwitter for my Blackberry and the Facebook for Blackberry application.