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Archive for the ‘Social Media’ Category

An introduction to Blogging PT1

Wednesday, May 12th, 2010

There are tons of reasons that blogging is taken up by business owners, and there are just as many blogging subjects as there are reasons to do it. Traditionally, online communities were built to bring people together, so each community would usually feature a different subject, such examples might be talking small business strategies or coming together to discuss interests in finance.

The first weblog was penned around 1994 and the shorter version of the word ‘blog’ was later used as the technology improved. Later, it was able to support basic images and now design firms build blogs into websites of owners that want to move on or expand the business from their basic shop or info site to something much bigger.

Blogs get people involved.
Online discussion groups absolutely thrive nowadays; you could find a blog about any kind of subject or interest, so just how does blogging affect your business? We wrote this to bring you some info and to clear up some grey areas concerned with blogging.

So, not everyone likes the idea. Blogging is often seen as a fairly informal way to build online communities, to create an interest with like minded people. It’s also a way to announce to people exactly what might be going on within your business, how it is progressing and expanding perhaps.

How does it work?
A blog uses a simple user interface so that anyone can easily update it. You can add and amend articles and format them as you please with rich text functionality so you can bold and underline text. Adding images is easy too.

What’s really exciting and important about blogs is that they are open for comment which can keep a blog looking lively and up to date. This means you as the blog owner can engage with those who leave comments. You remain in control as you can edit and delete the comments as appropriate.

In the next part we’ll look at what to blog about in more detail giving you some ideas.

Posted in Blogging, Internet, Social Media, communication | No Comments »

The Language of Liking – Facebook Pages

Thursday, April 22nd, 2010

There’s been a major change on Facebook this week. Well actually it’s quite minor but the shift it represents is quite major.

If you’re not aware then brands and personalities can set up something called a page on Facebook and then people can become ‘fans’ by simply clicking a button to confirm they are a fan. The action is simple but what is the behaviour behind the action when someone says ‘yes I’m a fan’?

Behaviour of becoming a fan
Are you a fan of something or someone? How long did it take you to become a fan? How much do you have to like something to become a fan of it? On a scale how far up it do you need to be to really really like it so much you’re willing to say ‘yes I’m a fan’?

Becoming a fan requires you to decide how much you like something not the fact you simply like it.

You see becoming a fan of something takes time. It requires you to decide how much you like something not the fact you simply like it. Generally speaking it’s not an overnight thing that happens much like ‘falling in love’. You know when you’re a fan but what are you up till that point? You’re wither a fan or a nothing, you’re in or you’re out!

The problem is it puts up an unseen barrier to people making a connection with the things they feel they have a connection to but are not willing to call themselves a fan. In this world of connections and ownership we all like to belong to something and connect with it and own it so a barrier to doing this is bad.

The barriers are up! So what’s changed?
This week Facebook have changed the word ‘fan‘ to ‘like‘ and this changes everything. No longer does someone have to wait to decide if they are a fan or not they simply need to say ‘hey yeah I like this’. They might of only seen, tried, tasted, visited or whatever once and they can say they like it. This is a very subtle change but a genius one!

It’s so much easier for someone to say they like something than to say they are a fan of it. There’s no real scale any more, you either like it or you don’t, it needs a much lower trip over level for someone to know if they like it or not and be willing to click that button and digitally say ‘I like’.

How is this good for page owners?
People, in a word! You see the name of the game for page owners is to get people to commit and connect to them so that they can interact with them and ultimately build there brand profile much more easily.

Being a fan was a barrier and with people only needing to process whether they like something or not we should see many many more people acknowledging their likes and so brands have a bigger connected audience.

What are your thoughts on this? We love to interact with our readers so please leave a comment.

Posted in Branding, Internet, Social Media, Social Networking, communication | 8 Comments »

Have you got any social equity?

Monday, April 19th, 2010

What is social equity and and why do I need it?

Well Social Equity (closely linked to brand equity) covers many different things but in this article it’s the value of your online reputation as dictated by your followers, readers and fans etc. That is to say do people like you, trust you and generally think you have credibility?

This value of your equity ie your worth increases or decreases based on the on-line engagement between yourself and others on various social media outlets. It’s not very tangible but it’s evident quickly if you have positive or negative social equity and ultimately this moves to the off-line world, maybe in the form of a business transaction.

How do I work out my equity value?

If you look at the diagram below you can easily see how different aspects of engagement determine your equity value.

Now there’s no definitive scale or points system and there’s no website to sign up to to get your equity value score although I no doubt someone will try! This diagram is theoretical at best but I know that when people know, like and trust you then things happen. My suggestion is that everyone starts at 0 if you’re unknown and it’s up to you which way you travel, up or down the scale.

How do I travel up the scale?

You will be part of a community that is your followers, fans, readers and those that come across you. You maybe part of multiple communities which is where it gets a little complicated so I’ll come back to that later. Within your community you have to build trust and credibility – kudos is the name of the game.

This is done in a number of ways and if you’re already actively involved in social media you’ll of read a number of articles saying how you need to be real, authentic, transparent, trustworthy, engaging, helpful etc (if you haven’t read anything then you need to be all those).

Also if you want to be seen as the guru in your chosen field then you also need to be seen as knowledgeable, the person who should be asked and of course you must respond to and answer those questions that are posed to you.

Is it a numbers game? If I have lots of readers or followers I’m doing good right?
Well not necessarily. There’s no real direct correlation between your social equity and the number of followers or readers. For example you might have a 1000 readers of your blog but they might not trust you.

How will I go down the scale?
Posting one way salesy marketing messages about your business is a good start. Not responding to any comments, tweets or messages aimed at you. Posting inconsistently, infrequently and without any substance will also send it plummeting. And of course as in life if you’re being a general douche bag that wont help.

Can I survive an equity fall out?
A tricky one. It really depends on what happened but people are people and some will forgive and some wont. Most people like to hear the word sorry as it’s the hardest word to say. That out of the way you must then rebuild what you’ve lost or indeed never had following the advice in this article.

We love to engage with our readers so please do leave a comment.

Posted in Internet, Social Media, Social Networking, Twitter, Web Marketing, communication | 2 Comments »

Social Media Explored Seminar in Cromer

Monday, March 8th, 2010

Fazed by Facebook? Troubled by Twitter? Unsettled by social media generally?

Whether you’re a business owner, representing an organisation in the private or public sector or just a concerned individual the explosion in use of social media can easily leave you feeling left behind and uninformed. Maybe it seems everybody is getting involved except you?

Come to this completely free seminar and listen to experienced social media user, speaker and trainer Gary Dickenson explore, explain and unravel the mysteries behind social media. Anyone is welcome to attend the talk but it is primarily targeted towards business owners, management & staff and organisations & their staff.

The evening will be split into 2 parts with the first part giving a general introduction and the second optional part giving a specific brief twitter teach in.

Pt 1: Social Media Explored:

Where has the social media explosion come from?
What are the good/bad things about it?
Is social media right for you, if so what type?
How do you keep privacy and boundaries?
Should you be letting your employees use it?
Get tips on how to gain new business & exposure.
Learn what do to when it all goes wrong.
Learn how to use social media responsibly & effectively.
A time for questions and answers.

Break for refreshments

Pt 2: Twitter Teach In
This is the social media channel that everyone seems to dismiss as pointless but is it and why is so popular?

Why do I need to be using Twitter?
How to use Twitter, the basics?
Learn how to avoid bad behavioural traits and succeed with best practices

Where & When?
Cromer Parish Hall, Cromer.
Tuesday 30th of March
7pm for 7:30pm start

Please book your place in advance by calling Gary on 01263 579422 or email gary@creospace.co.uk so that we can make sure there are enough seats and refreshments.

People are talking about your business, brand or organisation right now,
…. are you listening?

Posted in Company Information, Internet, Social Media, Social Networking, Twitter, Web Marketing, communication | No Comments »

Why you can’t base twitter success and expertise on stats

Wednesday, December 16th, 2009

Have you noticed recently the prolific increase in twitter based stats and reporting type websites ?

Have you noticed lots of people boasting about their position and status amongst their peers?

Have you noticed ’some’ social media experts using these sites as proof of their so called expertise?

Remember the saying ‘all that glitters is not gold’?

I’ll let you into a secret: On the whole these sites mean jack, zilch, zero, nout. And I say that being in the top 5 of one! But does that make them useless for everything or am I simply throwing the baby out with the bathwater?

Well no it doesn’t and no I’m not. Like many things in life it’s a case of ‘right tool for the job’ something that I believe in greatly. Now coming back to the issue at hand, that of folk using them to justify expert status.

The thing that actually counts is the thing that is almost impossible to measure

The trouble with this social media stuff is the thing that actually counts is the thing that is almost impossible to measure and gauge and that is engagement, interaction, meaningful relationships, true followers. lets face it numbers can be crunched and twisted to make anything look good, politicians do it every day!

For example: The number of people that follow someone (taken in isolation) is no real hard and fast gauge of how well you or anyone else for that matter doing because of several factors:

It’s easy to gain 1000’s of followers by simply following 1000’s and hope they follow you back
Your followers could be made of of a load of spam followers, bots and porn type followers. All of them meaningless
It doesn’t take into account the level of interaction with your followers
It doesn’t take into account the quality of your tweets
It doesn’t take into account the value that your followers place on your tweets (if people are re-tweeting you)
There’s no way to gauge what your followers truly think about you (unless you mind read)

Now some of these things are absolutely impossible to ascertain unless you interview every follower and review every single tweet and try and rate its value using some sort of predefined scale.

Useful for what?
So having established that these sites that rank lists of people into order actually mean nothing what can they be of use for? Well in the case of twiterholic.com you can find tweeters in your local area. You can see how active they are and use your own judgement as to whether they are worth following.

Some sites you can pick up stats about yourself that might give you an idea of how effective your tweets are by looking at the audience saturation level. In other words how many potential eyes has your tweet reached by others re-tweeting what you’ve said. Also a good indicator as to whether what you’re saying is of value.

Twitter based statistical websites include: www.twitterholic.com, www.tweetstats.com, www.twittercounter.com, www.twitteranalyzer.com to name but a few. There’s even one that pertains to gauge whether someone has more positive comments than negative said about them ( I tried it, it’s fun but essentially rubbish)!

The general rule is take it all with a pinch of salt and have a bit of fun. Learn to learn what is good and what is not and when a tool is useful and when it’s just a gimmick. Hopefully in 2010 we’ll start to see some more powerful analytical type tools that go some way towards being meaningful.

And remember; 56.8% of all statistics are made up!

As ever your comments are really welcome, please leave them below.

Posted in Social Media, Twitter | 2 Comments »