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Why we should love Social Media

Israel García Rodríguez — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 18:44:26 +0000

It’s 1:32 am, I’m sitting in front of my laptop trying to figure out why we’re so

Social Media with Ease

Israel García Rodríguez — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 11:33:26 +0000

I’m here to talk plain and frankly from my approach about Social Media with ease, so everybody

Starting Your Small Business

effie_tsi — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 18:37:46 +0000

Starting a small business is always difficult, the hard part is where do I find information. You need to think about registering your company name, if you are going to be a Sole proprietor, LLC, or a corporation. Most people become LLC you are more legally shielded than a sole proprietor.

First step go to your local state hall and register your small business. Next make sure to go to something like godaddy.com and register your dot com there as well. I have heard stories of people registering their business name and someone else taking ownership of that name online. With the emergence of social media even if you do not have plans to establish anything online register your business name on Twitter, LinkedIn, and FaceBook.

Funds: Two ways about going about this one. First use a $1000 of money that you have, or go through a small business loan admin place. Either way for each one you needs a Business Plan no way around that. Make sure to find an established book-keeper, and check there references.

Step 2 Location Location Location

Social Media Success Stories

effie_tsi — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 15:46:16 +0000

Gary Vaynerchuk grew his family business from $4 million to $50 million using social media. Gary’s eccentric personality and offbeat oenophile knowledge have proven a natural path to success with his Wine TV Library.

Vaynerchuk found first hand: $15,000 in direct mail = 200 new customers; $7,500 billboard = 300 new customers; $0 Twitter = 1,800 new customers.

A Wetpaint/Altimeter Study found companies that are both deeply and widely engaged in social media significantly surpass their peers in both revenue and profit. The study also found the company sales with the highest levels of social media activity grew on average by +18 percent, while those companies with the least amount of social activity saw their sales decline -6 percent.

BlendTec increased its sales 5x by running the often humorous “Will it Blend” Videos on YouTube, blending everything from an iPhone to a sneaker.

“You can’t just say it. You have to get the people to say it to each other,” says James Farley, CMO Ford. Ford seems to know what they are doing, especially with Scott Monty leading the social media charge. By giving away 100 Ford Fiestas to influential bloggers, 37 percent of Generation Y were aware of the Ford Fiesta before its launch in the United States. Is it any wonder why 25 percent of Ford’s marketing spend has been shifted to digital/social media initiatives? Ford is the only U.S. auto company that didn’t take a government loan.

Intuit introduced “Live Community” into its TurboTax products two years ago. Due in part to the resulting word-of-mouth, it has seen unit sales increase +30 percent each year and has now integrated “Live Community” into its other products like QuickBooks, Quicken, etc. “Live Community” allows customers to ask other customers questions, which has proved both beneficial to the customer and to Intuit. In some instances, the customer can answer questions that Intuit isn’t allowed to answer because of regulatory restrictions.

Naked Pizza, a New Orleans pizzeria that specializes in healthy pies, set a one day sales record using social media. In fact, 68 percent of its sales came from people “calling in from Twitter.” On top of that (no pun intended), 85 percent of their new customers were from Twitter. So, yes, social media does work for small businesses.

Also, social media works for B2B, non-profit, and more. Consider these examples. “Tweets for a Cause” sent out a tweet from Atlanta to encourage support of Susan G. Komen for the Cure. As a result of retweets from such notables as @mashable, @G_man, @zaibatsu, and others, the Atlanta Chapter site received 11,000 visitors in 24 hours as a result of this initiative by ResponseMine Interactive.

Software company Genius.com reports that 24 percent of its social media leads convert to sales opportunities.

During Barack Obama’s rise to the White House, he garnered 5 million fans on social media and 5.4 million clicked on an “I voted for Obama” Facebook button. Most importantly this resulted in three million online donors contributing $500 million in fundraising. An astounding 92 percent of the donations were in increments of less than $100.

The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center witnessed a 9.5 percent increase in registrations by using social media.

Web host provider Moonfruit more than recouped its $15,000 social media investment as its Web site traffic soared +300 percent while correspondingly sales increased +20 percent. They also saw a huge lift in their organic search engine rankings getting on the first page for the term “free website builder.”

“Our head of Social Media is the customer.” — McDonald’s.

Case-mate “Recession Case” drives record sales. Andrew Knight, VP of e-commerce, readily admits he was skeptical when a 22 year old on the marketing staff brought him the idea of selling a cardboard case for the iPhone (see image, above). Appropriately dubbed the recession case, this would retail for 99 cents.

DevLearn 2009 - Day 3 Recap

B.J. Schone — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 04:35:32 +0000

Ah, the final day of DevLearn 2009. It’s been so much fun! But all good things must come to an end…

If you haven’t caught up yet, be sure to read recaps of Day 1 and Day 2. And don’t forget: You can view photos from DevLearn, too!

Keynote: Why New Media Matters – Leo Laporte

Leo gave a great keynote without using any slides at all. How refreshing is that?! His stories were engaging, and it’s clear why he’s been so successful as a radio/technology personality for so many years. Cammy Bean did an awesome job (again) of live-blogging this morning’s keynote. You can see her notes here. Thanks again, Cammy!

I was only able to attend one session Friday morning, but it was a really good one:

Session 706: Sharing Knowledge for Training: Social Networking in Action at Toyota

Rodolfo Rosales presented his story of introducing a social network within Toyota to help encourage employees to share subject matter expertise (ex. product information, car comparisons). Rodolfo and his team used Ning as their social network and it flourished in the first 3 months….until their internal IT department found out about it. As I’ve seen in many cases, IT isn’t always comfortable with rogue installations of software, and they shut down the initiative (booo!). However, there was a happy ending: IT began to see the value of the social network and the resulting data, so they are now working to create an enterprise-wide social network that will be supported at Toyota. Rodolfo’s slides will be available on the DevLearn Resources page. Be sure to take a look.

Side note: Has anybody else noticed that many of the Learning 2.0 / Enterprise 2.0 tools seem to cause disruptions (ex. politically and technically) within the enterprise? I’ve seen it several times. There’s a research project in there somewhere…

Nice to meet you!

I had the pleasure of meeting all kinds of new people at DevLearn. I was also able to catch up with old friends, which is always great. I will attempt to list a bunch of them here, but I know I will forget several. (I’m sorry if I left you off the list!)

Thank you!!

A big Thank You to the eLearning Guild for doing such a great job with DevLearn!! I look forward to attending another Guild event soon.

Myspace the New Social Media Under Dog?

effie_tsi — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 20:08:17 +0000

Myspace was first created in 2003, probably the first social media platform to really take off. In 2005 it was purchased by Rupert Murdoch, the media giant behind Fox and other forums. Myspace was the leader of the pack when it came to social media, but then in 2007- 20++ it has lost its edge.

Myspace has a bout 110 million views world-wide. The have restructured their company business plan to be more media specific rather than competing with the likes of FaceBook and Twitter. Good or Bad? The company recently laid off 480 workers, and hired 5 new executive positions to help it regain market control, or better yet from keeping the ship from sinking. Good idea or Bad? Myspace is also paying for unused leased space in California in the tune of 1 million a year, unused space remember.

With the success of Twitter and the growth of Facebook executives at Myspace were backed into a unfamilar wall. They were no longer the innovators, leaders, cool kids on the block. Instead they were just the “other” social media platform and their market value has dropped to being work $0 from the 580 million that Mr.Murdoch spent to purchase Myspace.

Time to restructure. What helped build your company? Young, fresh, and innovative ideas. What did Myspace bring to the table instead? Newly created executives to help slow the creative process. Let me change gears for a second. What I love about Google? Google loves, breathes, drinks, sleeps, new fresh ideas. Google lets its people create, its a beuatiful thing. Okay back to Myspace. cial media. They lost their edge.

I continue to try to understand where Myspace made there ill-advised mis-step. From a social media giant to an under dog now fighting to regain what it once had. I will continue to monitor Myspace hoping it can get its groove back, it will be interesting to see it will or can.

DevLearn 2009 - Day 2 Recap

B.J. Schone — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 17:48:06 +0000

Day 2 of DevLearn kicked off with a keynote from Eric Zimmerman on Serious Game Design. Cammy Bean did a fantastic job of taking notes during the keynote, so I’ll defer to her on this. You can see her notes here. (Thank you, Cammy!)

Session 401: Overview of Latest Learning Trends: What’s Hot, What’s Not, and Why

This session was presented by Lance Dublin. In Lance’s typical style, it was full of interesting discussion and TONS of open (and often uncomfortable) questions. He covered everything from eLearning basics to all of the new “2.0″ technologies. Some of the questions include: “Why would we use this? Does it really help? What really motivates us to use this tool? Are we over-complicating things?” When covering each iteration of technology, Lance broke items down to their core functionality to reveal their true advantages/disadvantages. Interesting stuff.

Session 506: Exploring the Benefits of Using WordPress for Learning

I presented this session along with my colleague, John Polaschek. We covered all things related to WordPress.com and WordPress.org. Our slides will be available on the DevLearn Resources page next week.

Session 613: Mobile Gaming Models – A Google Case Study and More!

This session was presented by David Metcalf. Julie Clow (from Google) was unable to co-present. (Feel better, Julie!)

Some quick gaming statistics:

65% of households play games
Average player is 35, 40% female
Teens: 99% of boys, 94% of girls play games

73% on desktop/laptop PCs
60% on portable gaming devices
48% on cellphones or PDAs

David showed several phone-based mobile learning games running on Java, BREW, and Flash. Next, he showed a few hybrid games, which integrate mobile with a full experience that includes full video, a web site, etc. Good examples, including one called MySportsPulse.

Google Leadership Game
Google worked with David Metcalf to create a leadership training program that was a mash-up with 7-8 Google tools: Gmail, YouTube, Google Docs, Google Talk, etc. They called it gLearning. Google used David’s MovingKnowledge engine, which provided a game engine, leader boards, curriculum tracking, and reporting. The MovingKnowledge engine bridged the gap between Google apps to provide a cohesive learning experience. The game element of a leaderboard led to higher retention and completion rates (and added the element of competition). What a cool case study… I would love to learn more about this.

One more day…

Notes from the final day of DevLearn will be online soon!

LinkedIn and Twitter Form Relationship

effie_tsi — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 13:58:32 +0000

The idea is simple: When you set your status on LinkedIn you can now tweet it as well, amplifying it to your followers and real-time search services like Twitter Search and Bing. And when you tweet, you can send that message to your LinkedIn connections as well, from any Twitter service or tool.

Why? Because when you’re trying to get something done, you want Twitter and LinkedIn. Its like having a peanute butter sandwich with fluff.

To there are two settings when setting up your Twitter account on LinkedIn. You can either allow all Tweets or just tweets with the hash tag #lin. I for one chose to only allow tweets with the hash tag #lin, personal preference thats all.

In the end using LinkedIn with Twitter has made a lot of us “geeks” happy

Don't Forget About LinkedIn

effie_tsi — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 14:50:57 +0000

In the world of Social Media sites we have FaceBook, Twitter, and the one that seems to be forgotten is LinkedIn. LinkedIn is more of a professional site, you connect to fellow colleges and professional recruiters to help maximize your job opportunities. Unfortunately many professionals do not use ot know how to use LinkedIn. Colleagues will create a LinkedIn profile, barely add any information and never update it. Now why is that?

Many people hear about LinkedIn think it’s a good idea, create a profile, then be done with it. Never reaching out to other groups (College, University, IT groups, Health Groups..etc) all these forums are a way to reach out and make connections. Connecting with potential recruiters, company recruiters, all of these connections will help you out in the long run.

You and Your LinkedIn Profile. Part 1 – In the “Summary” think of it has your cover letter. Make sure to make key relevant points, highlights, awards, anything that you feel is an accomplishment to who you are.

In the “Specialties” section provide keywords, words that search engine will be able to crawl for.. For Example Web Design, Web Programmer, key points.

In the “Experience” section put in you relevant work experience. You don’t have to go into key points, just relevant accomplishments.

Make your LinkedIn profile You!

Maximize Your Search Engine Optimization

effie_tsi — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 15:22:19 +0000

Maximize Your Search Engine Optimization

In order to maximize your search engine optimization you first need to understand how to build it. For example having the correct meta tags in your website is the first step. Also if you use a WordPress blog for your site, make sure you find the correct plugin that will help maximize your search engine optimization performance.

You have a new site and when you Google for it you can’t find it or it is 3-4 pages away from the first page correct? In order to get to that first page you need to learn about meta tags and how to effectively use them within your site. Since Google and Yahoo no longer crawl for meta keywords, I would still have it in your list of meta tags because other search engines still may crawl for them. So what meta tags should you add.

<meta http-equiv=”Content-Type” content=”text/html; charset=windows-1250″>
<meta name=”copyright” content=”2009″>
<meta name=”title” content=”Title of Your Site”/>
<meta name=”description” content=” description of your site”>
<META NAME=”KEYWORDS” CONTENT=”Use about 20 or some words”>
<meta name=”Content” content=”What are you providing.”>
<META NAME=”Robots” CONTENT=”INDEX,FOLLOW”>
<meta name=”revisit-after” content=”30 days”>

Also make sure to go to Google Analytics and sign up for an account and add the code for the within the body of your text as well. Google Analytics will be a gauge for you to see when and where your traffic is coming from.

Look out for Part 2 coming next…..

Facebook? Facelift more like.

Brendan — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 14:34:18 +0000

Another Facebook Facelift. Grrr.

Why oh why oh why oh why oh why does Facebook keep changing?

I recently had call to get back into Facebook for a new business pitch (post-edit: we won). I knew it had changed and needed to clue up on the differences. It was broadly similar but, well, different. And on looking back at work I’d done in the past, I could see that the changes materially affected those Facebook pages too.

This was an annoyance for me, but I could imagine plenty of people out there trying to do the same thing as me pulling out their hair with frustration. You get a strategy together, you figure it all out, you build a beautiful page – and then it changes. So you have to adapt it all.

So it’s with further annoyance I just came across Techtree’s announcement that Facebook has changed yet again. As it says: “Facebook has tweaked its Live News feed to display only those posts that Facebook thinks would be useful for you and your network of friends.”

I’ve only just read this so I don’t know what implications this will have. But I do wish Facebook would get a grip. It imposes the Beacon advertising system. Then Facebook drops Beacon after howls of protest. Then Facebook says it owns everything on the site. Then Facebook changes its mind again, and takes the exact opposite tack of letting its users decide its terms.

Then decides to hell with that and changes anyway.

My life! When will this stop? The permanent beta’s annoying enough, and human beings don’t work that way. No matter how much we’re told we should embrace change, we find it annoying, stressful even. Just ask Alvin Tofler.

But I see something more fundamentally wrong here. Which is: Facebook don’t have a plan. They don’t know where they’re going or what they’re doing. So they make changes here and there to make the service ‘better’. It’s not ‘better’, it’s just ‘different’, and people don’t like ‘different’. How can we build ‘different’ into our strategies? Put in milestones every month or so entitled “Check whether Facebook has changed again”?

Honestly Mr Zuckerberg. Have a heart. Leave well alone. 300 million active users can’t be wrong can they?

Why Myspace Will Crumble

effie_tsi — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 15:20:16 +0000

For some reason I have been trying to understand what happened to Myspace. You had a social media giant who had gotten of our attention with social media, then it seems as though they fell off a fairly large cliff. Think about it in Dec 2008 Myspace had 125 million users (Competitorbiz), Facebook at the time only had 100 million users (Competitorbiz). Doesn’t sound bad right? But Facebook has know out grown Myspace 2-1.

Myspace originally was a fantastic idea, connecting social media platforms, adding music, cool backgrounds, you name it they had it. Facebook is just a wall you can write on, nothing fancy, but more businesses are turning to Facebook instead of Myspace. Myspace is seen more as a media’s outlet for bands, but it was never meant for that. Once media mogul Rupert Murdoch purchased the company the air came out of the balloon. Instead of continuing to be on the edge, they are now standing around scratching their heads wondering what happened.

What Myspace decided to do? What every large company does when something goes wrong, panic and lay off your worker bees, 480 to be exact. They then hired in 4 or 5 newly created “executive” positions to help them lead the way. Now if you just cut out that “executive” management you just created, you could be focusing on ideas and creativity. The guys that started Myspace thinked outside the box and made Myspace what it was. Insert executives and it all goes down like dominos.

What I would do to bring back Myspace? Foster creativity! Sounds simple but these large companies don’t get it. Remove middle management, too much is no good and helps no one. Treat your employees like you would like to be treated. So if Mr.Murdoch himself or his assistant is reading this give me a call, I can and will get Myspace back to where it should, oh yes did I mention with a profit!

barcampCLT 2

Malik — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 01:15:00 +0000

I was very fortunate to be in the attendance of BarcampCLT2 at Area 15. It was great being around people that are so much more geeky than me. And to think that I was once on the path of coding righteousness. I don’t regret being an educator but I do miss the joy of debugging code and troubleshooting network/server issues.

I learned few off the wall things, such as Blackberry users felt the shameful of their devices. Also, Oprah seems to be the benchmark of your Twitter Coolness. (Anyone joined after her is to be considered unoffically lame.) Oh, almost forgot to mention that men that knit are way cool.

I will share a few takeaways from the sessions that I attended.

1. iPhone App Dev Roundtable

I received some inspiriation to get on board in creating iPhone
apps for education, however an Apple laptizzle is required. It was mentioned the iPhone for Dummies book was a good read. The process of getting an app approved for the App Store was communicated as being very difficult. Pushing apps via ad hoc for clients was mentioned as a work around.

Web Resources referenced:
http://appceletator.com
http://www.stanford.edu/class/cs193p/cgi-bin/index.php
http://www.iphonedevsdk.com/

2. Making $$$ Online

This session was a little similar to last year. Here’s a sample from YouTube…

3. 45 Questions in 45 Minutes

Some good info popped up here. Some discussions on Google Wave, FireFox, and Android took the show.

4. Managing Your Social Networks

Long story short, use an RSS new reader aggregator to gather all your Web2.0 sites. Outlook was mention as a good RSS reader becuase it allow you assess RSS feeds behind secure logins. Also it was discussed the importance of adding value to tweets by linking your social networks.

Web resources mentioned:
http://ping.fm
http://igoogle.com
http://netvibes.com
http://pipes.yahoo.com
http://dizzysoft.com/rss/manage-your-social-networks
http://feedtwit.com
http://websitebiz.com

5. Simple Content Management

The presenter actually went through the stage of registering a site domain, hosting, and dumping CMsimple in a directory to making it live. Very nice… especially since CMsimple does not require having to deal with databases where CM packages such as WordPress and Drupal require.

Web resources mentioned:
http://dreamhost.com
http://www.aweber.com/
http://www.e-junkie.com/
http://www.myemma.com/
http://www.mailchimp.com/
http://dotcomwebdesign.com/

Sessions that I wish I could have attended:

How to create webcasts that don’t suck
The Rabbit Hole
Google Page Ranking

Overall, this was another successful unconference. I highly recommend you to check one out that’s near you.

Branding in Open Waters of Social Media

effie_tsi — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 15:06:57 +0000

By now you have probably gone a lone and tried to sort through all the information about branding your business in a social media platform. Problem is you don’t know where the heck to start? Am I right? Must be you are still reading. Okay back to branding in social media world, you have Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. I did not mention myspace because it more of a music site, so if you are a musician go for it, if you are a coffee show, just say no.

Create a Facebook business page. Take the time to create go images, post pictures of your staff, your logo and why the world should know you. Follow some people in the industry that are your vendors, wholesale company, editors in magazines, and anyone else that you feel would be interested in knowing about your company. Also make sure to check out your competitors, see who they are friends with, and if they are doing anything at all.

Engage the people who are following you. By this I mean sent out special promotions, let them know about new products in stock, to funny interviews with your staff, let your followers feel like they are a part of your business. Now I know this might sound like a lot of time goes into it, but so doesn’t building your business. This is no different from putting ads in the paper, or doing radio ad, you are driving customers to your business via the internet. The one thing to remember is that this all takes time, it’s not in a week you get over 50,000 followers it takes time to build. Once it does you will see your return on investment!

Social Media and Your Business

effie_tsi — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 12:26:02 +0000

Utilizing social media for your business lets customers know you are aware of new marketing channels. If you were a fortune 500 company and did not have an active social media strategy plan I don’t think I would do business with you. Why you ask? Well if you can’t get it together enough to build social media plan then how can I believe that you have it together to run your business? I went and some with some clients who thought that social media equaled $$ for them. What they failed to see is the larger spectrum of what social media branding can do for their complete business model. Your ROI is your customers now engaging in information with you on a variety of levels, giving you insight that you never had before. Your ROI is your customers!

A social media platform always you to reach out to people, editors, and other businesses that before you would have never been able to reach. If your boss is still a little hesitant about social media, show him some case studies. I find that the Dell, GM, and Gap social media plans are an eye opener for a lot of bosses. However, I also get the “we can’t do that”? Oh really why? Be the big picture person show the world and how you plan to capture it and make your business bigger and better. Do this by planning, building, and executing your plan. Love it and enjoy it because that is the number one key.

3 Steps to Twitter

effie_tsi — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 13:33:25 +0000

Okay you decided to open a Twitter account for your business, congratulations! Now where do you start? So much information out there, do this do that, here I got 3 simple.

Rule 1 – Create you account, sounds simple enough, right. Next create a twitter name that is unique. Last tweet information about your business, tips, facts, who you are as a business.

Rule 2 – Follow people who are tweeting about your products and services. Get a feel of what everyone is saying. Next add yourself to wefollow.com, under the correct directories. If you have an IPhone or BlackBerry you can download cool apps to stay in touch like tweetdeck, or tweetberry. I would recommend staying away from programs that do a mass update on all social media sites.

Rule 3 – Engage your followers. You don’t want to get a following and then start to see your numbers fall off because you are not engaging your crowd. What do I mean about this? Post articles or links to your blog and ask for feedback, set up promotions or contests. Also make sure to respond to comments about your Brand in a professional manner. If someone writes something negative don’t get upset, wait a while to come up with a good comment.

Last remember to have fun!

Interesting Social Media Facts

effie_tsi — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 17:26:43 +0000

“93% of Americans believe a company should have a presence in social media, while an overwhelming 85% believe a company should not only be present but also interact with its consumers via social media. 56% of American consumers feel both a stronger connection with and better served by companies when they can interact with them in a social media environment.Americans believe that companies should use social networks to solve my problems (43%). Companies should solicit feedback on their products and services (41%). Companies should develop new ways for consumers to interact with their brand (37%).”(ifacts.biz)

Here Comes Google Wave

effie_tsi — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 15:12:53 +0000

Google Wave, what is it? It’s the next generation of social media connection in my opinion. It allows you to share documents and conversations in real time. Now that is awesome! Think about it? If you are in a large organization and need to run half way across the building to find someone or share a document, now you can do it in real time at your desk with the Wave. Google Wave also allows you to add others in your network so you all can share documents, or communicate in real time. Think of it as real time email. You can communicate with a person in real time and at any time that conversation can be changed into an instant messaging chat, with a click of a button. This way everyone is on the same page.

Google Wave is like a mash up of Facebook and Twitter in one. Now that is happy harmony to me. It does have some drawbacks though. The Google Wave technology is pretty intense so it will be interesting to see how server admins adjust to it. Also it will be interesting how it connects with other social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook. They will be some who will hail the Wave and others who will shun it. Either way I suggest you give it a try especially in a company setting to utilize the efficiency of your group.

Myspace, Where Did You Go?

effie_tsi — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 19:45:09 +0000

It seems like everyone was jumping on Myspace and creating an account, but as fast it came it just truly faded. Think about it, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn have all held tight to their social media followers. Many businesses don’t even have a social media strategy for Myspace. Why you ask? Well I feel Myspace has become more of a music site than one for connection with followers. In 2007 Myspace had over 125 million registered users (Myspace Stats), today Myspace has outpaced by Facebook which has taken over with the most registered users.

So today I was thinking what happened to Myspace since its big launch into the social media platform. A little background on Myspace, it was found in Aug 2003, in 4 years it was receiving more page views than Google. Not bad for a social media site. But where is Myspace today? Well it seems that Fox Interactive Media has purchased the company for 580 million dollars, def not bad for a days work. However since being purchased it has declined revenue, no real buzz about it anymore, and it is lagging way behind to Facebook.

It seems as though Myspace has lost its identity in the world of social media. It has come through lately with adding Tweets to your page, which def must have helped them out a lot. Leveraging your company with a giant like Twitter can only do you good. By Myspace needs something more. It needs to be Myspace. What do i mean by this? Go back to what you are good at. Cool themes, adding music, add tweets, maybe a blog, cater to large businesses, see what they would like, then make a run at it. Instead of trying to be Facebook, be better, where Facebook is lacking Myspace needs to capitalize on.

Myspace I am here if you need me, just be you.

Connecting Social Media With Your Business

effie_tsi — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 19:34:09 +0000

Walking downtown I could not help but notice how many small businesses don’t utilized social media. I bet maybe one out of the 15-20 shops downtown, don’t even know about social media. If they do know about it, it’s because they read about it, or saw it on the news, but they don’t really understand how to make the connection to their business.

How does a small business connect the social media dots? One at a time. First create a Facebook business page, and let your customers know about it. Put a notice by the cash register to let all of your customers know where they can find you. Take it one at a time, you don’t have to tackle them all at once. Social media is all about Branding and representing the best appearance possible that you can for your business. Take the time when creating your Facebook business page, a rush job will only make your business look unprofessional.

Reaching Out: Once you create your Facebook business page start reaching out to other people who would be interested in what your business has to offer. Create promotions, add coupons, slowly start to build your followers. Now remember this isn’t an overnight success, it takes time. You have to remember to update your page frequently, and give your followers a reason to follow you. How long should you sick with it? I would say at least a year or more to really see the feedback from your followers. Once it takes off its like a ball steam rolling down a hill.

Have Fun: Just like running your business, online social media is a passion as well. It is allowing you to reach out to millions of people to let them know who you are, and what your business represents.

Sissejuhatus Second Life'i

dotmrt — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 23:37:47 +0000

Sel nädalal uurin sellist suhtluskeskkonda ja fenomeni nagu Second Life. Igaüks võib sealt kliendi tasuta alla laadida ja virtuaalmaailma uurima tõtata.

Põhimõtteliselt Massively Multiplayer ja Online, kuid mitte päris mäng, vaid pigem virtuaalmaailmas asetsev jututuba, kuna otsest eesmärki tegevustel pole. Jaluta palmide all, lenda nagu Superman, telepordi teise virtuaalmaailma otsa nagu Star Trekis, osta ja müü nänni, modelleeri ise ümbritsevat maailma ja selles asetsevaid objekte või lihtsalt suhtle inimestega – see ongi Second Life. Aga mitte ainult. Mõne päevaga pole võimalik seal murdosagi näha. Nii püüangi anda pigem esmast muljet ja analüüsida seda algaja virtuaalseikleja vaatenurgast.

Second Life avas virtuaalsed uksed 23. juunil 2003 ning projekti eestvedajaks on algusest peale olnud USA ettevõte nimega Linden Labs. Tuhanded serverid jooksevad Debian Linuxi peal ning paiknevad laiali üle maailma. Virtuaalmaailma residendid ühenduvad serveritesse kasutades Windowsi, Mac OS Xi, Linuxi ja Solarise peal jooksvaid kliente, mis kasutavad 3D graafika jaoks OpenGLi võimalusi.

Analüüs

Lühikese analüüsi aluseks võtan Matt Webbi kriteeriumid, mida võib pidada universaalseteks sotsiaalveebi iseloomustusjoonteks.

Identiteet – esimene asi, mida Second Life’is pärast registreerimist tehakse, on endale avatari meisterdamine. Eesnime võid ise välja mõelda, kuid perenime pead valima etteantute hulgast. Taolise triki põhjuseks tuuakse veidrate numbritega nimede vältimine. Mõned näevad avatariga väga palju vaeva ning detaile on palju, mida võid paika panna. Alates lõua kujust ja kulmude kõrgusest kuni varba suuruseni ja riietuse materjalini (tekstuur). Ja see pole veel kõik – mängu jooksul võid osta/leida palju valmis olevaid avatare ja oma olemasoleva nende vastu vahetada. Näiteks draakoni raudrüü või tapjarobot. Ehk siis igaüks võib olla selline, kuidas tal vaid viitsimist ja tahtmist enda avatari mudida on.

Kohalolek – kasutajad teleporteeruvad oma eelmisesse asukohta või enda määratud “koju” ning avatar on nähtav ümbritsevatele inimestele. Juhul kui sõbrad pole ümbruses, siis nende SLis sees olemise jälgimiseks on “kontaktide nimekiri”. Sõbrad on need, kes on sinu sõbrakutse või sina nende kutse vastu võtnud ja kui nad sisse logivad, saad sa pisikese teavituse.

Vestlused – mõiste “local chat” tähendab võimalust rääkida “kuulmiskauguses” olevate avataridega. Aga suhelda saab ka kaugel asuvate sõpradega, kes on kontakti nimekirjas.

Rühmad – Sõpruse “taset” on võimalik suurendada nii, et lased kontaktil näha end kaardi peal. Samuti on võimalik SLis moodustada partnerlussuhteid ja siis neid jälle lahutada – seda võib võtta abieluna. Partnerlussuhe maksab 10L$ mõlemale osapoolele ja lahutamine 25L$ lahutamist nõudvale osapoolele. Kuid on olemas ka võimalus kuuluda suuremasse gruppi, mille peamiseks eesmärgiks on koondada avatare mingi ühise tunnuse alusel. Grupid võivad koos olla kinnisvara omanikud, keelata mitte-grupi liikmetel sellele maaalale juurdepääsu. Grupp omab ühist pangakontot, millele laekuvad summad jagatakse ühtlaselt grupi liikmete vahel. Kuid grupp on ka lihtsalt “veel üks moodus kuuluda kuhugile”; sinu gruppi kuuluvus on mainitud ära profiilis ja tihti iseloomustab gruppi ka avatari nime ees paiknev string.
Haidega vee all

Maine – lihtsaimaks reputatsiooni teenimise mooduseks on nagu tavalises maailmaski teiste inimeste abistamine. Sellest aga ei jää mingit märki maha peale jälje konkreetse inimese mälus. Natukene paremini annab materialistlikus maailmas mõõta asju rahas. SLs on rahaühikuna kasutusel Lindeni dollarid ehk L$ ning neid on võimalik osta ka reaalse raha, USA dollarite eest. Selle raha eest saab siis erinevatest poodidest osta igasugust rohkem ja vähem veidrat nänni. Näiteks esimesel päeval sain sõbraks ühe tüübiga, kes oli just ostnud kahe kohalise allveelaeva 800L$ eest ja tegi mulle sellega demo sõidu haide ja korallide vahel. Lootsin leida ka midagi “karma” laadset ehk siis mitte-rahalist reputatsiooni mõõdikut, kuid midagi sellist silma ei hakanud. Tüütud tegelased on võimalik vaigistada (mute), kuid tublisid ja abivalmid jäid paraku autasuta. Küsisin nõu nii mõneltki residendilt, kes seda ka lahkelt jagasid.

Jagamine – suheldes võid jagada äsja mainitud informatsiooni, sinu kaardi peal asuvaid huvitavaid sihtpunkte (landmarks), aga ka raha ja nänni, mida oled aja jooksul korjanud. Lisaks reaalelulistele komponentidele nagu värv, kuju, suurus, on SLi nännil ka omadus kopeeruda (või eksklusiivsemate asjade puhul jälle mitte). Minul jäi mulje, et vähemalt alguses saadaval olevaid tasuta asju sai anda teistele nagu arvuti faile – copy-paste. Ühes raamatus üks mees küll kusagil 33 AD copy-pastes rahvale leiba ja kala, kuid selle reaalelulisus jäägu igaühe enda otsustada. Oletan, et ülal mainitud allveelaeva-tüüp ei saa nii lihtsalt oma suurt investeeringut paljundada. Samas on aga täiesti aktiivselt toimivad turud, kus müüakse Second Life nänni ning mõned teenivad selle pealt täitsa korralikult.

Veel huvitavat Second Lifes

Raha kulutamine – Second Lifes kulutatakse raha päris korralikult. Näiteks 2009 augusti kohta käiv statistika näitas, et rohkem kui 1ML$ kulutavaid residente on 1126. Üldse raha kulutavaid kliente on 473553, seega täiesti aukartust äratav kogus. Samas võib Second Life’i ka täiesti tasuta mängida.

Raha teenimine – Lisaks raha kulutamisele on olemas ka täiesti ulmelistesse numbritesse ulatuvad raha teenijad. Kui sellest allikast nüüd õigesti aru saada, siis 1,7M$ käib kvartali kohta ning tegu on kingamüümisäriga. 1M$ kanti äriga tegelevad ka kinnisvara ja mööbli ärimehed. NB! Tegu on päris reaalsete USA dollaritega $!

Universaalne Translaator – Second Life on üleilmne multilinguaalne keskkond ning kui keegi hakkab rääkima prantsuse keeles, siis on võimalik hankida endale Google Translatori abiga töötav vidin, mis sulle teksti inglisekeelseks tõlgib. Olemas pidi olema ka teisi sarnaseid vidinaid. Kasutasin tasuta riista oma esimestes seiklustes üpris ohtralt ja olgugi, et tegu pole ideaalse riistaga, ajab see korrektse kirjutamise puhul asja täiesit ära, mõlemale osapoolele. Täiesti hämmastav.
Eesti virtuaalsaatkond

Eesti saatkond – Eesti lõi 100KEEKu eest saatkonna Second Life’i, mille peamiseks eesmärgiks on tutvustada meie pisikest riiki. Lisaboonusena on võimalik alustada ka Eesti viisa taotlemist otse SList. Virtuaalsaatkonna uudisteblogi. Välisministeeriumi infolehekülg virtuaalsaatkonna kohta.

Pariis aastal 1900 ja Eiffeli torn – Eiffeli torn, nähtavasti projekti raames, millega üritatakse taastada Pariisi aastal 1900.

Huvitavat on kindlasti veel päevadeks, nädalateks ja kuudeks ning kui aega saan, siis uurin seda vinget virtuaalollust kindlasti edasi.

Linke

Kiire lugemine alustajale – http://secondlife.com/support/quickstart/
Wikipedia ülevaade Second Lifest – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life

Reach Out and Touch 18 Million People

effie_tsi — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 14:52:26 +0000

The hardest part of being a small business and connecting with new customers. How do I reach them? Print Media? Radio? In today’s world you can reach out and touch 18 million + using Twitter users alone. (emarketer 2009) Crazy isn’t it? Now let’s think about how you can get your business brand out to all of these people.

First I would poke around and see if any of your competitors are on Twitter trying to brand their company image. Second I would go a head and create your Twitter account. Okay so now you checked around for competitors, started your own Twitter account, how do you reach out? Very easily. With a simple message and information that is all about what your business does. For example, if you are a coffee shop and only sell “free trade” coffee then let your customers know about it.

Reach Out! Really don’t be shy. Once you create your Twitter account find other people with the same interests that your business encompasses. Update your Twitter often. With over 18 million + users people are not just going to be trying to become your follower, you have to give them a reason to want to. People will follow you when you “tweet” information that they think is important to them. Don’t just “tweet” about useless information every 30 mins, keep it clean and simple.

Start Walking! Now that you have reached out to followers who have similar interests as you do now you can start walking. Tell people all about your business, why you started it, and why you are the place they should be at. Also take in input from customers. Ask them what they think you need to add or remove. This way you followers feel a connection with you and your business.

Remember it takes time to build a following. Nothing happens over night. Hard work and keeping your Twitter account up to date will always add more followers.

Got Your Tweet Grade?

effie_tsi — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 12:49:20 +0000

Find out where you stand with over 4 million people on Twitter. We just got our Grade of 91!!

http://twitter.grader.com/wersocialmedia