Showing posts with label Social Networking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Social Networking. Show all posts
Saturday, July 26, 2008
Stumble Upon
For a really useful guide to using Stumble Upon to drive traffic to your website sign up for a series of F.R.E.E. lessons put out by Caroline Middlebrook. They can be found at www.stumblerush.com. Caroline is on Facebook and also has a very useful blog packed full of helpful suggstions and advice and refreshingly honest.
Friday, July 25, 2008
Social Media Espionage
I was taking the opportunity presented by a stomach bug to catch up on reading posts on my favourite blogs. This one from Rohit Bhargava entitled How to Avoid Social Media Espionage is worth reading. Your Facebook and Twitter friends and complete strangers could end up knowing enough to know what they should not know.I have copied the following verbatim:
Nearly 1500 people have a window inside my daily actions and thoughts by subscribing to my feed and following me on Twitter. Over a thousand can see updates on what I do through Facebook. There are Flickr photos from the events that I head to and I publish the cities that I will be travelling to on Dopplr. In a social media universe, living your life a bit in the open seems a bit unavoidable if you are really going to take advantage of all the social media tools you are signed up for.
Along with this openness, however, comes the danger of publishing too much information too publicly and unwittingly leading to the rise of social media espionage ... the act of obtaining information published on social networks or online presumed to be secret or confidential and using it for personal or business gain. Here's a step by step fictional example:
Entrepreneur and business owner tweets about heading to a meeting on the west coast from his home in Orlando with a friend (known to be his lawyer)
The lawyer updates Facebook independently about heading to a client meeting in Redmond, Washington
A business executive at Microsoft recently quoted in the media about having some "serious talks" with several companies in a certain type of business similar to what the entrepreneur does.
An engineer at Microsoft blogs about his efforts and cites a really innovative company out of Orlando
In four small updates from unrelated people, a smart social media surfer could get a very direct sense of a deal about to happen and some inside information unintended to be shared. It is only a matter of time before Social Media Espionage becomes a concern that some businesses will need to have a preemptive strategy to fight against. thinking
Posted at 12:18 AM June 30th 2008
Nearly 1500 people have a window inside my daily actions and thoughts by subscribing to my feed and following me on Twitter. Over a thousand can see updates on what I do through Facebook. There are Flickr photos from the events that I head to and I publish the cities that I will be travelling to on Dopplr. In a social media universe, living your life a bit in the open seems a bit unavoidable if you are really going to take advantage of all the social media tools you are signed up for.
Along with this openness, however, comes the danger of publishing too much information too publicly and unwittingly leading to the rise of social media espionage ... the act of obtaining information published on social networks or online presumed to be secret or confidential and using it for personal or business gain. Here's a step by step fictional example:
Entrepreneur and business owner tweets about heading to a meeting on the west coast from his home in Orlando with a friend (known to be his lawyer)
The lawyer updates Facebook independently about heading to a client meeting in Redmond, Washington
A business executive at Microsoft recently quoted in the media about having some "serious talks" with several companies in a certain type of business similar to what the entrepreneur does.
An engineer at Microsoft blogs about his efforts and cites a really innovative company out of Orlando
In four small updates from unrelated people, a smart social media surfer could get a very direct sense of a deal about to happen and some inside information unintended to be shared. It is only a matter of time before Social Media Espionage becomes a concern that some businesses will need to have a preemptive strategy to fight against. thinking
Posted at 12:18 AM June 30th 2008
Sunday, July 20, 2008
TweetBeep
TweetBeep: Like Google Alerts for Twitter!
Be the first to know who's twittering about you, your products, your company, or your website! TweetBeep.com gives you twitter alerts by email when a tweet matches your search! You can even check for mentions of your site, even if the link is shortened (like through TinyURL). And it's free!
TweetBeep is not affiliated with Twitter, but is a helpful tool for Twitter users. You can spend hours watching conversations or keeping up on RSS feeds so much simpler and time efficient to get an email with TweetBeep?
Click here to sign up !
Be the first to know who's twittering about you, your products, your company, or your website! TweetBeep.com gives you twitter alerts by email when a tweet matches your search! You can even check for mentions of your site, even if the link is shortened (like through TinyURL). And it's free!
TweetBeep is not affiliated with Twitter, but is a helpful tool for Twitter users. You can spend hours watching conversations or keeping up on RSS feeds so much simpler and time efficient to get an email with TweetBeep?
Click here to sign up !
Thursday, June 5, 2008
Facebook - you have been warned !
Yesterday I was merrily growing my little list of Facebook friends and then BANG - I start to get the nasty warnings that my account will be de-activated because I am allegedly a spammer. I could not even open my messages. I had heard of this happening to people but I assumed (naively) that it was the people who were adding friends at the rate of hundreds a day. NO.
Here's what I have been able to piece together. It seems that you start to get warnings about being a spammer and threats of being bounced off of Facebook if you cut and paste and/or if you include a URL. The cut and paste is a definite and it can be as innocuous as writing a personalised message and then pasting your name and some information underneath it (which is what I was doing).
It is essential to always type each message and cut and paste nothing. Some people are telling me not to include my URL which I was doing when I wrote on new friend's walls to thank them for joining my circle of friends.
For me, the pain with Facebook is that there are no clearly set out rules. I would pay to be on it as I find it heads and shoulders above LinkedIn and Ecademy however the owners seem to prefer free membership but operate with unwritten rules.
I would direct anyone and everyone to the teachings of Brian Campbell and Travis Greenlee who are both 'friends' of mine on Facebook.
Here's what I have been able to piece together. It seems that you start to get warnings about being a spammer and threats of being bounced off of Facebook if you cut and paste and/or if you include a URL. The cut and paste is a definite and it can be as innocuous as writing a personalised message and then pasting your name and some information underneath it (which is what I was doing).
It is essential to always type each message and cut and paste nothing. Some people are telling me not to include my URL which I was doing when I wrote on new friend's walls to thank them for joining my circle of friends.
For me, the pain with Facebook is that there are no clearly set out rules. I would pay to be on it as I find it heads and shoulders above LinkedIn and Ecademy however the owners seem to prefer free membership but operate with unwritten rules.
I would direct anyone and everyone to the teachings of Brian Campbell and Travis Greenlee who are both 'friends' of mine on Facebook.
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Why listening to Twitter is good..
Here's the scoop - Facebook and Twitter are the best social networking sites for small businesses. As far as Facebook is concerned I am currently writing a paper on this which will soon be available to download from my website. But meanwhile, here's the deal on Twitter. Twitter enables you to observe your potential clients and associates - almost a legitimised eavesdropping - and we all know from our marketing courses that the more we can learn about our target clients then the easier it is to reach them and communicate with them in an appropriate way. Twitter enables trust to be built up - not overnight but over a period of time. And don't forget, Twitter is opt-in marketing.
Friday, April 18, 2008
Facebook Group
I've started a new group on Facebook - Starting out in business. My plan is to put useful information there for people thinking about or starting up a business. Membership is open so feel free to join !
Using Ecademy to drive business to your website
Here are some ideas for driving visiters from your Ecademy profile to your website.
Update your status whenever you have the opportunity and include your web address. Click this link to see what I mean. Why is this a good idea ? Because Google spiders the status page and follows the link to your site.
In your profile, use your keyphrases to link to your website. Click this link to see the links I have set up at the beginning of my profile.Google spiders profiles so if your keyphrases point to relevant pages on your site this helps in your Google rankings.
If you post an ad in Marketplace use a keyword in your ad title and then repeat it in the test with a link to your website. Not only will this be picked up by Google but non-Ecademy members can find you.
These suggestions came from Nikki Pilkingtons Blog - 299 Steps to Website Heaven.
Update your status whenever you have the opportunity and include your web address. Click this link to see what I mean. Why is this a good idea ? Because Google spiders the status page and follows the link to your site.
In your profile, use your keyphrases to link to your website. Click this link to see the links I have set up at the beginning of my profile.Google spiders profiles so if your keyphrases point to relevant pages on your site this helps in your Google rankings.
If you post an ad in Marketplace use a keyword in your ad title and then repeat it in the test with a link to your website. Not only will this be picked up by Google but non-Ecademy members can find you.
These suggestions came from Nikki Pilkingtons Blog - 299 Steps to Website Heaven.
Sunday, April 6, 2008
Friday, April 4, 2008
Twittering for bloggers
I just have to share this with you. Out there in the ether is a guy named Darren Rowse who generously shares on his blog (ProBlogger) how to make good use of Twitter to drive traffic to your blog.Click on link to go read this for yourself.
Happy twittering !
Happy twittering !
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
