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

I’m a huge fan of Adam Singer who runs a wonderful blog called The Future Buzz.

He recently put together a useful post about the future marketer’s skill set. I really love what he includes and wanted to share this with you.

Below I have only abbreviated Adam’s post. Please read the full post here: Tomorrow’s marketing skill set

1.  Writing skills are critical

2.  Meaningful insight into analytics/interpretation of data

3.  Nexus of marketing specializations

4.  Digital strategy development

5.  Leadership

6.  Not afraid to fail

7.  Always experimenting

8.  Understanding of tools/technologies/applications/programming languages

9.  Fresh thinking with content

10.  An understanding of how to orchestrate buzz

11.  They’ll be members of the media

12.  Content marketing will be second nature

13.  They will champion niche media over mass

14.  Understanding of the rules that govern groups

15.  Ability to tap power users and influencers

I’m about to deliver my final social media seminar in a series that I’ve designed for the National Screen Institute.

We’ve looked at Twitter and Facebook and this Wednesday I’ll tackle some of the other stuff that makes up a social media toolkit including blogging, RSS, FriendFeed, StumbleUpon and LinkedIn.

One message I’ve carried through these seminars is that social media is hard work. Bloody hard work.

I’ve been asked by seminar participants, ‘How much time should I devote to this stuff?’

And I’ve not been able to put a number on it. All I can say is work hard at it, be patient, consistent and you will eventually see results.

I think there is still a perception that having Twitter and Facebook accounts along with a handful of others is enough to tick the social media marketing box.

It isn’t.

You can’t do the social media thing half-heartedly.

You almost have to live it which means making it an intrinsic part of your everyday life.

This reminds me of something I recently heard …

Once upon a time we all had radio and TV came along. We had tapes and vinyl and CDs came along. We had VHS and Beta cassettes and DVD came along. People derided the new way. Soon the new way was the way. I think the same is true of the social web. It takes time for these behaviours to weave themselves into your life.

But I’m quite serious when I say social media is hard freakin’ work.

Making connections on the web is hard work.

Writing regular blog posts is hard work.

Keeping up three Twitter accounts is hard work.

Maintaining two Facebook accounts is hard work.

Delivering social media seminars is hard work.

But wait.

For me, hard work doesn’t mean ‘unenjoyable.’ It means I have to put my heart and soul into all that I do (and consequently sleep a lot at weekends!)

The social web and many of its parts are my passions.

Which is why I think social media isn’t necessarily for everyone.

If you don’t care enough, you’ll do a poor job of representing your company online.

If you’re gonna dive into this social media thing, do it with both feet and prepare for deep water.

Photo courtesy of ittybittiesforyou via a Creative Commons Licence

At the end of 2009 I committed to Project52 – a year long challenge to post new content to your blog every week.

As part of that I asked what you’d like to read about in 2010.

This post is a direct response to one of the suggested topics I received from my online pal and fellow Canadian blogger, Heather whose blog The Unexpected Twists and Turns we worked on together to revamp during ProBlogger’s 31 Days to Build a Better Blog Challenge.

Heather wanted to learn more about using Facebook and StumbleUpon to increase traffic to her own blog.

Using Facebook

My number one rule for using Facebook to promote your blog or business is that you must provide added value.

Merely repeating what readers would find if they visited to your blog or website, and nothing more, is a turn off.

First you have choices to make. Will you be using a Facebook group, fan page or your own profile to promote your blog?

Networked Blogs

To ensure your blog posts are promoted on Facebook you should look at an application called Networked Blogs which will push new content from your blog to your Facebook profile.

This means your new blog posts will automatically appear in your Facebook stream. Although Networked Blogs is an excellent tool, using it is not. You may have to fiddle around a lot before figuring out it works.

So, let’s assume you’ve done this and your blog posts are being added to your Facebook account. Now what?

Establish your Facebook page as a go-to destination

You must establish yourself (your Facebook account/fan page or group) as a go-to place for information about a specific topic. If, like Heather, you are writing about your local neighbourhood then you should subscribe to other blogs and websites which provide information about where you live and what is happening there.

Then you can decide what it is you wish to publish as status updates on Facebook.

As well as reading the stuff about your local neighbourhood (and replace the word ‘neighbourhood’ with whatever your chosen industry is) you should establish a relationship with those sites. Leave comments, follow those folks on Twitter and Facebook. Create links with them. Build and nuture a relationship.

This works to benefit everyone:

• You help promote and share information created by others
• You demonstrate to the author of those sites and its readers that you have a shared interest
• You begin to build credibility

Nuturing relationships

Eventually some wonderful things will happen.

You will receive new Facebook friend requests from folks that have discovered you because you grew your presence online. These are new eyeballs for your blog.

The authors of those sites begin to see you as a genuine force and will begin to promote you by commenting on your blog or by sharing your posts on their Facebook.

As this network grows, others that you have friended on Facebook will ‘like’ your updates and leave Facebook comments thus drawing attention to you and your blog.

Do you see a common theme emerging here? The one that’s central to all ’social media’ activity?

Relationships.

Building a following online, anywhere, is about give and take. You cannot expect to launch a blog and for hundreds or thousands of folks to flock to you overnight.

That recognition will only occur once you demonstrate to your peers that you a) exist; b) make yourself known; c) engage with like-minded folks online.

It’s hard work. It takes time.

Providing added value

At the start of this post I talked about ‘added value.’ This means publishing information on Facebook that your readers will not find you publishing elsewhere.

This is how I generally use the National Screen Institute Facebook fan page.

Of course, some information is repeated but I try to include links to cool stuff I’ve read and have not mentioned elsewhere.

Networking with others on Facebook

Connect with other like-minded folks on Facebook.

Find and join groups that cover similar topics to you. Contribute to those group pages by responding to their content and posting links to your own.

Ditto for fan pages.

Are there gurus and popular spokespeople in your industry? Find them on Facebook and establish a relationship.

Organising events, advertising

Heather, who is writing about a location, could use Facebook’s event feature to organise a get together in Montreal and have Facebook manage the RSVPs.

She could also use Facebook’s very targetted advertising feature to spread the word about her blog. You can build your ad on Facebook (thereby saving you the cost of hiring a designer) and set your own budget.

You can pinpoint your target audience down to the minutest detail.

These are just some of the ways Facebook can help create interest in you and your blog.

Now let’s look at StumbleUpon.

Using StumbleUpon

StumbleUpon is a website that recommends other sites for you to check out based on personal preferences you provide

I discovered Miss Britt through StumbleUpon.

While there are a number of different features on StumbleUpon, I primarily use it to do two things:

1) Click the ‘Stumble!’ button installed in my web browser in the hopes of discovering fabulous new sites to visit (see Miss Britt above).

2) Add my own recommended sites for others to ‘Stumble!’

The second action here has sent lots of traffic to my blog and the National Screen Institute’s website. The traffic comes in short bursts but it’s still significant. By adding my recommendations those sites then show up when others ‘Stumble!’

To do all this you must set up a StumbleUpon account.

Like Networked Blogs I didn’t find StumbleUpon particularly intuitive to use so it may take you a while to figure it all out.

Like most things on the internet, these strategies can take time to show results.

Be patient, sensible and give as well as take and you will soon see the benefits.

I love a good list.

Well I’ll be damned if the wonderful Tamar Weinberg hasn’t saved me an awful lot of work by curating the most delicious list of internet marketing posts from the past 12 months.

Apparently she makes this list every year.

It’s almost art.

If you’re looking for a diverse range of reading material (and one of my top tips for folks wishing to learn more about the social web is to READ A LOT) then this is an amazing place to start. In fact it may take you until 2011 to finish them all.

Prepare to be dazzled: The best internet marketing posts of 2009 by Tamar Weinberg

Oh God.

I was worried this might happen.

According to Jerry Bowles writing over at Social Media Today there is a war on social media.

Just look at the restrictions put upon employees at ESPN, the NFL and the US Marines.

Is the end of freedom really coming because organisations are uncomfortable about all these conversations?

Bowles says:

… social media will become one more tool in the marketing /pr / communications toolbox. An important tool, but basically one more channel to be “managed.” Official Twitterers will be designated and scripted.

There will be no Scobles starting unapproved blogs under the radar. A lot of the spontaneity and diversity will disappear.

The unfortunate thing is that the humanised content generated by brands on sites such as Facebook and Twitter are a big part of the appeal. But as Bowles writes, many organisations just aren’t ready for all that transparency.

But many folks are missing the point – all this chatter has been happening online for ages.

The difference now is that there are a number of popular websites where a lot of that chatter is sort of aggregated.

I’ve never understood this reluctance to be open and honest. Why do big brands feel the need to micro-manage everything they say? That’s a rhetorical question readers.

Paranoia is the culprit.

Micro-controlling messages only becomes essential when there’s bad news to manage. The fact is nothing is really what it appears to be. And brands can manage messages all they like but the truth will out – the salacious British tabloids are a case in point.

Celebrities far and wide try to control what we read about them but the gutter press (I use that term with affection) usually leak the gossip before an official statement is released.

So while some companies may gag their employees, word will always get around. That’s the beauty of the social web peoples.

Before I was a web manager I was a publicist and a media officer (in the UK).

Ooh, do you know how many times jargon slips its naughty way into press releases? I tried hard to keep it away. Honest.

But almost as bad as jargon are those redundant little adjectives that seem to worm their way into press releases the world over. Sometimes it’s hard to avoid.

I read a great post today by Robin Wauters writing on TechCrunch: 10 words I would love to see banned from press releases.

My personal favourite is ’strategic partnership.’

Ouch.

I love email. And so I religiously read everything that arrives in my inbox. This includes over 20 email subscriptions from technology, web design, blogging, social media and marketing websites.

I couldn’t do my job without a lot of the information that comes my way.

One of the requirements of website management is the need to continuously nuture your knowledge base. I find these email updates are one of the best ways to stay in the loop.

So I get some of these sent to my personal email address and others go to my work account. If you’re trying to absorb this much information you’ll need to be pretty organised about how and when you read the updates.

Of course email alerts don’t work for everyone. And most if not all of the sites I list below also offer other ways to subscribe. Or you could just regularly visit these sites. But that’s a heck of a job.

Here are my picks in no particular order:

• One Degree – the inside scoop on digital marketing and social media for Canadian marketers.
• ProBlogger – created by uber blogger Darren Rowse, the site is dedicated to helping other bloggers learn the skills of blogging, share their own experiences and promote the blogging medium. Includes well over 3,500 articles, tips, tutorials and case studies.
• TwiTip – also from Darren Rowse, a tips site for Twitter users who want to improve their use of Twitter.
• Skidzopedia – a blog offering updates about the latests gadgets, softwares, news and reviews.
• MediaShift - tracks how new media – from weblogs to podcasts to citizen journalism – are changing society and culture.
• VentureBeat – Silicon Valley news about tech money and innovation.
• Mashable – the world’s largest blog focused exclusively on web 2.0 and social networking news.
• MediaPost – resources for media, marketing and advertising professionals offering news coverage, event information, a social network, and industry jobs, directories and research. Folks can subscribe to updates from over 20 blogs.
• Media in Canada – the latest news keeping media and marketing execs up to speed on the Canadian media scene.
• Micro Persuasion – a blog exploring how emerging technologies are revolutionizing marketing and communications.
• Silicon Alley Insider – news, commentary, and discussion about digital publishing, entertainment, news, music, social networking, mobile, and gaming.
• All Facebook – the unofficial Facebook blog.
• Seth Godin – Seth has several sites. I currently subscribe to Seth Godin’s Blog which offers riffs on marketing, respect, and the ways ideas spread.
• John Battelle’s Searchblog – thoughs on the intersection of search, media, technology and more.
• MakeUseOf – news about cool websites, software, and how-to articles.
• NETTUTS – a site aimed at web developers and designers offering tutorials and articles on technologies, skills and techniques to improve how you design and build websites.
• Six Revisions – a blog that shares useful information about web development and design, dedicated to people who build websites.
• ZDNet – technology news and reviews.
• Blogging Me, Blogging You – marketing, blogging, social media, PR and technology news.
• TechCrunch – a weblog dedicated to obsessively profiling and reviewing new Internet products and companies.
• Daily Blog Tips – erm, I think the title speaks for itself.
• Web Design Ledger – written by web designers for web designers. Web design related knowledge and resources. Topics range from design inspiration to tips and tutorials.
• ReadWriteWeb – a blog that provides web technology news, reviews and analysis.
• Smashing Magazine – trends and techniques in web development. They don’t provide email updates so I follow them on Twitter.
• The Web Squeeze – web design articles on business and computers to web development tutorials on topics such as CSS, PHP and Javascript.
• PR 2.0 – Brian Solis’ blog covering marketing and technology.
• Blogsessive – blogging tips for bloggers.
• Six Pixels of Separation – fellow Canadian Mitch Joel blogs about marketing and communications. No email updates so I check this site manually when I remember.