Social media, social web, marketing and Twitter hints, tips & advice – Liz Hover's Diary of a Web Gal

First, I’ll admit that this is pretty much a duplicate of a post I made today over on the National Screen Institute’s website.

But not entirely.

I don’t think much of Google Buzz, ok?

I love Google, for the record.

The basic premise: Google wants in on the social media thang. Google Buzz is their trump card.

Or something.

This is my comment on the proposition, not the product.

According to Google’s official blog:

Google Buzz is a new way to start conversations about the things you find interesting. It’s built right into Gmail, so you don’t have to peck out an entirely new set of friends from scratch.

If you think about it, there’s always been a big social network underlying Gmail. Buzz brings this network to the surface by automatically setting you up to follow the people you email and chat with the most. We focused on building an easy-to-use sharing experience that richly integrates photos, videos and links, and makes it easy to share publicly or privately (so you don’t have to use different tools to share with different audiences). Plus, Buzz integrates tightly with your existing Gmail inbox, so you’re sure to see the stuff that matters most as it happens in real time.

So far I’m not that impressed with it – largely because I only use my Gmail accounts to log in to Feedburner, YouTube and a bunch of other Google-operated sites.

I’m also a prolific Twitter and Facebook user and don’t see the sense in adding yet another network to the list.

Sure, I can add my Twitter account so my tweets appear on Buzz but I’d rather folks just follow me on Twitter.

I can see the benefit for regular users of Gmail. Send mail and chat with your pals all in one place. Which makes sense.

Are you using Google Buzz? Let me know what you think.

Thanks to my friend, the wonderful Erica Glasier, for the illustration at the top of this page available under a Creative Commons License.

Apologies to those of you who read this link via my Twitter stream. This seemed like such a great article with so much food for thought I had to post it here too.

Noupe – a website I regularly read – posted an article about how the web might look five years from now.

The Future of the Web: Where Will We Be in Five Years? is an insightful look at emerging trends and some that are already sticking.

Some highlights include:

• There are a few unsurprising predictions such as the growing influence and use of social media (a term, some of you will know, I think is silly). What this means is social interaction on the internet will be an even bigger feature of the web spaces we visit.

• Our never-ending fight against spam and fraudulent internet behaviour may well increase but I don’t think we’ll ever really be totally safe from this stuff.

• As a chick who spends a large (some might say, excessive) amount of time online I heartily look forward to better and more online film and TV content.

• And Microsoft’s world domination of our PCs may be over sooner than you think. With Google set to launch a Chrome operating system we’re looking at a virtual online office as our operating systems move online.

This is all very exciting stuff. But as Noupe points out, predictions fly around the internet at the speed of tweets so there’s no telling what the future really holds.

“Fear and risk are vital components for personal and business development.”

I don’t usually tackle something this heavily emotional but today I read a post by Jacob Morgan on fear and risk which totally struck a chord with me.

And before you think I’m going off topic, this is absolutely tied to social media.

Talking about his own risks, Jacob says he one day he threw all his clothes in his car and moved from Los Angeles to San Francisco.

While I didn’t make an impulse decision, I made a big upheaval in my life in 2003 and emmigrated from the UK to Canada at the tender age of 29.

It was and remains my single most life changing event.

I fantasized about it at first telling myself there’s absolutely no way it would ever happen. But it did. I was more excited and scared than I’ve ever been. And it was by no means easy. In fact it was probably the hardest thing I’ve ever done for so many reasons. Yes, there were times when I nearly gave up and headed back to Europe where I’d had a successful marketing and communications career and fabulous friends.

But I stayed. I knew I had to make this new life work because it’s not something you get a second chance at.

Thankfully things eventually fell into place.

I found meaningful work, a wonderful relationship (and my baby Sadie Shih Tzu).

This experience taught me many things which were put into words by Jacob Morgan’s post about the importance of fear and risk.

My dad always told me that the darkest part was just before the dawn. So I’ve tried to live my life knowing that when things are super hard, they can only get better.

Which brings me to social media.

About two years ago I ventured into a new job – I sort of morphed into the job and along with that came myriad new responsibilities and emotions. That job was web manager for the National Screen Institute – Canada (NSI). At the time I was discovering a whole new way of working in the form of Facebook, Twitter and blogging. Each required an element of risk on my part.

And, it seems, I wasn’t alone in my apprehension about being thrust into the online world. To manage social media effectively requires a lot of ’self.’

There are folks I know who still struggle with the idea of a Facebook account (my mother: all this internet stuff is so anti-social.) Their fear comes from different places and sometimes has to do with feeling exposed or simply a lack of understanding.

So I’ve been ‘putting myself out there’ for a couple of years now and it’s become easier and easier.

Then in May 2009 my personal blog was hacked. You can’t get much more of scare than that – I felt violated and wondered who had access to my personal information.

After a couple of days I stopped feeling attacked and found the process of rebuilding my blog to be rather cathartic.

All this to say that for personal and business development you must take risks, put yourself out there, face your fears and even create your own challenges. It’s vital to your growth.

My favourite excerpt from Jacob Morgan’s post is a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt which every marketer should heed:

“You must do the things you think you cannot do.”

Photo courtesy of ittybittiesforyou via a Creative Commons Licence

I dunno how many times I utter this phrase but here we go again…

As a web manager your work is never done. A website is never complete. It’s a constantly growing, developing thing.

It’s been over a year since we launched my employer’s website.

And part of my job is to improve that website.

Today we finally had the official ‘launch’ of our shiny new home page and the integration of Facebook Connect, courtesy of our friends at Tactica.

We designed a magazine-style home to show off our content and make our site more accessible.

To streamline our site login, we’ve added Facebook Connect which allows you to log in to our website using your Facebook account. No more creating yet another account.

Of course the success or otherwise of these changes will only be known in time but it’s great feeling to continue to develop our website for the benefit of its users.

Remember my new internet superhero Gerry McGovern?

Well he made my heart go pitter patter when I read his latest post Great websites are boring to manage.

That isn’t to say I agree with everything he says. But I adore his sock-it-to-em style.

I manage a website and my job is never boring. Or rarely so.

Over the last few months I’ve realised something about my working style and what makes me tick: I love a good challenge. I enjoy troubleshooting. I like to fix the problem. Or at least try.

In his article, Gerry says he hates doing website reviews, checking the accuracy of older information. Well I’m lucky. I like ongoing review. I usually find it’s a good excuse to tighten up website copy.

Gerry says that “… doing interesting and challenging work is often what makes problems for websites, making them technically complicated, graphically overwrought and content heavy.”

In redeveloping the National Screen Institute website we worked hard to avoid these pitfalls. But I do think it’s an ongoing challenge for web managers to keep things simple, go easy on the graphics and always use less words than you think you need.

Gerry goes on to say “Day-to-day web management is about rolling up your sleeves and getting your hands dirty with the nitty gritty stuff. But remember: You get paid to be bored.”

That’s me – I’m there rolling up my sleeves every day getting my hands covered in grease. And rarely is it boring work. I’m sourcing free Flash slide generators, editing audio interviews, uploading video to YouTube, keeping an eye on our Twitter account, creating online ads, testing our film festival content, scouring the latest news for stuff I can post to our website and always, always thinking about how to improve things without being technically complicated and or spending much money.

That isn’t to say everything I do is on a shoestring – in one of my ‘improvement’ moments I had an idea for a major change on our website (which will roll out in June sometime). And I’m very excited about it. It’s a basic feature (yeah, Gerry might think it was boring) but it came about because of ongoing website review.

Gerry McGovern will continue to write things that make my heart go pitter patter. And I will continue to be excited about the simple stuff.

Photo courtesy of ittybittiesforyou via a Creative Commons Licence

R.D. Gavel, avowed Flashaholic and travel agent, is the owner of Whimsical World Travel, specializing in vacations to Disney destinations. She is currently at work on a new website with a focus on experiential, luxury travel, and is taking web design classes as part of a twelve-step program to overcome her Flash-dependent behavior.

Hello. My name is R.D. and I am a Flashaholic.

My addiction began slowly as I navigated through the web running up against a lot that was boring or just plain bad and a few wondrous places that drew me in and made my smile.

Yes, in the days of dial-up I would sometimes move away rather than watch the agonizingly slow page load but, today, there are few flash sites which don’t reward us for just a couple of seconds’ patience.

When it came time to start on my own website the issue became much more complicated.

How do I get the look I want and still allow people to find us? I learned that even professional web designers are sometimes not really knowledgeable about Flash. I sometimes get negative feedback about my decision to utilize Flash on our site but, right now, it’s the right choice for us.

So, how do you decide what’s best for you?

I believe the objectives of the site itself should drive the decisions. This seems straightforward enough but if you poke around a bit you’ll find that site design often has very little to do with site goals. Taking the time to consider carefully and prioritize your requirements will help clarify your design directions. While this doesn’t begin to distill all the issues you’ll confront, here are a few things to think about:

What is the purpose of the site?

While all sites might do a number of different things, each generally has a basic purpose. Decide if your site’s primary focus is business or personal. If it’s a personal site or blog, is it monetized or primarily an outlet for your own creativity? If it’s commercial, is it the main portal to conduct your business or an extension of another sales model?

Who is the target audience?

Who are you trying to reach? The demographics of your preferred visitor should play a big part in the design. This can be as simple as hip graphics for a young crowd or larger text for an older generation.

How will visitors be directed to the site?

There are so many ways to draw traffic to a site: search engines, adwords, social media connections, affiliate programs, print media, and advertising, to name just a few. What methods do you plan to incorporate?

Personal preferences

Don’t underestimate the power of preference. Your site is ultimately a reflection of you and/or your business. You should be proud of it. Liz Hover recently posted an interview here with Britt Reints which commented on the importance of doing what’s right for you. You will find far too much advice, a lot of it conflicting – go with your gut.

So, how did this process work for me?

The purpose of our site is business, and it is one of the major portals we rely on for securing new business.

I looked at many, many websites in our category and, incredibly, could find only one that I liked.

In the travel industry many suppliers offer cookie-cutter websites as a “perk” for doing business with them. In a field so crowded, where differentiation is key, it’s hard to imagine that anyone would voluntarily choose a site that was exactly like thousands of others, but most do.

Unlike many other businesses, the product that we represent doesn’t need to be sold; a decision to buy, either sooner or later, has already been made by the visitor. What we needed to do was sell ourselves; try to convey why that visitor should buy from us rather than someone else.

Our client tends to be upscale but retains an appreciation for whimsy and fun. We used Flash for a one-of-a-kind look to set us apart and make our brand unique and, hopefully, memorable. We were looking for a little bit of the “magic” that is inherent in our product and Flash achieved that for us.

I find Flash effects entrancing and was determined to use Flash for its beauty while trying to maintain site visibility for searches.

We have placed most of the informational component on non-Flash pages so that it will be accessed by search engines, and have been careful to word page headings, image titles, etc. to maximize our presence.

Rather than using promotional methods to vie for the same homogenous group of potential clients as our competitors, we decided to move into more non-traditional areas, such as photography, which are still aligned with our product but provide an added focus on the site.

The interest, buzz, and links this strategy generates allow us to reach out to a different segment of the population who might never run a search for our core product, but may well be interested if informed.  Our blog, still in its infancy, features nothing but unique content rather than a rehash of industry press releases and special deals generally found on similar blogs.

If search engine optimization is the number one consideration, then Flash might not be the best choice. While some web professionals still cling to the notion that a Flash site is completely transparent to search engines, this is no longer true. Nonetheless, a Flash site cannot currently be optimized with anywhere near the success that can be achieved with html pages.

If, however, you want to stand out in the crowd of millions, use or plan to use multiple strategies for pulling traffic, and the visual aspect of your site is important to you, give Flash a chance. Try to keep in mind that you can never be all things to all people; be true to your own vision.

I’m currently working on a new website which will feature other products in our market niche. It will require different approaches because the target customer is somewhat different and the products need to be showcased in a compelling fashion, rather than the company.  Is there going to be Flash on this site, too? Absolutely. No rehab for me.

Diary of a Web Gal is proudly powered by Flash. The theme was originally released by Roy Tanck and requires Flash and Javascript (although it doesn’t break completely if these are missing). Thanks to Geoff Stearns, the use of Flash does not affect search engine ranking. The Flash titles contain complex algorithms that change things like line breaks and font size in order to best accommodate the post titles.

Learn more about Flash.

Months ago when the new National Screen Institute website was a mere twinkle in my eye (I’m its web manager) I got asked lots of questions about how the new website would function.

How would the navigation work?

How would the content be organised?

So I settled into my favourite spot in front of a computer and began to create my vision based on meetings with colleagues and our design folks.

I used Word. I added text boxes with menu items. I broke down the navigation and content. It was rudimentary.

I’ve used SmartDraw and would use Word again in a heartbeat. If you know how to draw a text box and move it around in Word then don’t bother with anything fancier.

I essentially built what I now know was a wireframe.

Some time later I sat for several hours with our website developer and sketched out our new website based largely on my initial Word diagrams. Another stage in the wireframe process.

Why am I writing about this now?

Randa Clay published a post today about wireframing and I was reminded how important that process was for me and my colleagues in bringing this mythical new website to life. Suddenly ideas had a structure.

It’s one of the most basic steps in planning a new website.

Oh, and PS – developing a website is one job you’ll never finish. There is no end. I’ll write more on this in coming weeks. But eight months after launching our shiny new site, I’m about to redevelop one of its – if not THE – major parts.