Posts Tagged ‘Social Media’

This year, I am finally getting to attend two conferences I have wanted to attend for a very long time – Blogworld in October and PubCon in November.

Even more exciting? I will be speaking at PubCon on a panel – November 10th – Navigating The Complex Social Media Marketing World. I will be discussing the different key social media tools and the best ways to get the most from them – and which tools to use depending on your industry. I will be on a panel with some brilliant minds and am very excited to be a part of this event! If you’re coming to the event – I really hope to see you at my panel!

I am still waiting to hear if I will be speaking at Blogworld…but should know soon. *Update: I will not be speaking but will still be there…*

Either way, since I’m very Type A -  even 3 months out, I am already putting together my “must do, must see and must meet” list for both events!

1. For Blogworld, I am attending with @Vetlovingpetshb and staying at THEhotel, flying in the day before and leaving the day after. Have you been to this hotel before? Recommendations of places to eat/shop visit?
2. For Pubcon, I am not sure where I will be staying – that one is left to be determined. So if you have connections for this one, let me know
3. If you have been before to either event – what are the must see and do’s? I want to know what events are the best, which areas of the expo I can’t miss and if there are any other secrets I should know!
4. Are you going this year? If so, let me know so that I can plan time to meet as many people as possible. My readers are on the top of my list. Just add a comment and let me know which event you are attending

Finally, I am still looking for a sponsor for the hotel/flight for each event – so if you are interested in talking with me about what that means, send me an email and we can chat

snapping pictures at the Sanyo & Social Rewards event last week

Social media has made parties and party planning so much easier…which means there has been an explosion of events that are planned, promoted and talked about just through these channels. Almost everytime I turn around, I see a new twtvite shooting by, or am getting a facebook invitation.

For consumer businesses, being part of one of these events can really help you to get your name out there. But, a business doesn’t just have to host an event to get heir name out there – sometimes all it takes is participating and helping in an event. Even if you can’t participate in a donation or the planning – you still should try and go to as many events as possible. There is no downside to meeting lots of new people.

For restaurants, nightclubs and hotels, offering your venue to host an event can often help fill you up on busy nights and help spread the word about what amazing things you can offer. Small events allow you to feature new recipes, drinks and your venue and have a fun event that people will be talking about for a long time.

This year, I have attended more than my fair share of tweetups, launch parties and networking events. Some have been awesome, others have been okay, and some have been seriously disappointing. The good news is there are a few ways to help make sure that your next event is as good as it can be:

1. Pick a venue that is easy to get to.
2. Plan it at least two weeks in advance for a small tweetup.
3. Plan at least a month in advance for large events.
4. Get a few big name people on board.
5. Ask for help promoting the event from your friends.
6. Provide food and drinks either free or at a discount.
7. Make sure there are plenty of places to sit down.
8. Have an awesome speaker or giveaway.
9. Make it easy for people to tweet while there.
10. Have a photographer (or a few) to share the awesomeness.
11. Make it easy for people to exchange their information after the event.
12. Have a list of all attendees so you can send them thank you notes.
13. Share the twitter and facebook name of the venue so people can share it.
14. Set up an easy to remember hashtag for the event.

What other tips can you share about hosting a great event? Have you been to one that did something really spectacular or awful? Share it!

Image from Failbook.com

Despite the multi millions on twitter, there is a huge percentage of that number who have no idea what they are doing – add in those who have never tried twitter, and there is a large chunk of the population that has never sent a tweet, typed the @ symbol before a twitter handle, used a hashtag or RT’ed something.

Twitter is still in its infancy, and has a lot of room to grow, change and develop. Businesses are still trying to discover why (or if) it is beneficial for them to use, and how to use it if it is. Unfortunately, many of them feel that social media can be a solve all – that adding in facebook, twitter and a blog will skyrocket sales and change the face of their business. Reality: it won’t. It may open new doors, create conversation and down the road, increase sales, but it is not something that works over night. Or even over a couple weeks.

Most of you reading this probably have a twitter account, may have came here through a tweet and follow me on twitter. You know everything I said above to be true. You may use twitter for your business, yourself or a combination of the two. You have gotten involved with the community and have learned to appreciate what twitter can and can’t do. You understand its value but also understand that it is not a super power. You are the ones that are doing it right. But, at one point, you were the person in red in this situation. You had no idea what you were doing, how to start the conversation, or how to benefit from using social media.  You struggled to think of things to tweet, who to follow and what links to share. Twitter was a wild jungle and you were ill-prepared to take it on. Luckily, you had help from other friends in the twitter world who gave you advice and helped you along the way. Maybe you even hired someone to come in and talk with you about how to set up lists, what to talk about and how to use tweetdeck and twellow. Either way, you had support and you learned how to survive in the jungle. Because of your struggles and accomplishments, you are part of the twitter “we”.

“We” are of the group that is active in the web world – connected in many ways to our audience and are on the forefront of the newest technology. “We” lead the way, sharing conversations, having tweetups and building yet another way to create more conversation. “We” know the news before anyone else and “we” are the proud who share it, brag about it and love it. “We” are unique in the fact that “we” have serious contacts and friends spanning the globe, all created through a simple tool and a lot of work and effort. “We” are the people that the news talks about when social media is a trend, and “we” are the victims of the social media scammers.

And now, “we” need to take a moment and think about what we are involved in – and how what “we” know can help the rest.

So now…yes, right now…I want you to share something about twitter – anything you think a first time user needs to know. Let’s make this list awesome, and then let’s share it.

Let’s open the “we” to everyone else…

This morning, at 11:33, my wordpress dashboard went from this:

To this:

And I went from having a normal day to the ledge of a cliff in 2 seconds flat. I screamed. I freaked out.  And I tweeted. Luckily, I have some amazing twitter followers and tech friends, and @thevixy, @ikepigott, @jonmrich & @lorennason …you are my twitter heroes. You 4 kept me *relatively* sane when the world came crashing down…and my entire blog went kaput. You told me to breathe, found me articles on what might have happened, reminded me that you read my blog, and have many posts in your RSS readers and suggested solutions, including calling my hosting company and asking them if they could restore my database. Which is where Lunarpages came in – and was incredible. They were able to restore my database and recover every post (even my drafts!) and all my pages.

This near catastrophe taught me three things:

1. Twitter is awesome, especially when you make the effort to make real friends out of your followers. When you need them, they will be there. And, they will help you calm down, figure out the right solutions and talk you off the edge of insanity. Anyone who says social media and virtual relationships are silly just isn’t doing it right.
2. Backup your blog more often!! Luckily, even if Lunarpages hadn’t been able to save my database, I do backup my blog. But, I only back it up once a week…which meant I would have lost 5 posts that had been published plus the 15 I have scheduled for this month when I am on vacation (yikes!). So I need to backup more often – especially during times that I put a lot of new content onto my site.
3. My blog really means a lot to me! I have always enjoyed my blog – it is fun to write and I share great advice that some people read. But, I hadn’t ever thought about how much it meant to me until it was completely gone. The pages didn’t worry me as much – as I knew what was in them and could have re-written them. It would have taken time, but not that big of an issue. However, the thought of losing 2 years worth of thoughts, emotions, ideas and creativity nearly sent me into shock and made me realize how much I appreciate this blog!

So again, thank you to my amazing supporters and for talking me through this – I couldn’t have managed without you!

We’ve all been here…

Created by Alberto Montt

Last night, I was craving CPK…but had zero desire to go out to dinner. So I jumped online and ordered food for my husband to pick up at their (awesome) curbside delivery. But then I remembered…if I don’t go in for dinner, I can’t get the foursquare benefits, and CPK does a good job with theirs. For example, if you check in anywhere near a CPK, you get a “special nearby” for a free appetizer when you spend $20. And I would have loved a free appetizer! But, if you are picking up food to-go, you don’t want to wait for the appetizer. And there is no way to “check-in” through the web so that you can order it… Which I think is unbelievably silly because there are a huge number of people who shop online – and not just for food. So I did what any normal person would do and tweeted about it – and @Admore responded with an idea I liked, and wanted to expand upon.

(read from the bottom up)

So here’s how I think it should work…

Step 1. You login to foursquare from your computer, type in the retailers name that you want to shop online with, or you can search by categories.

Step 2. Follow them on Foursquare, then click on their web link within their profile – this will have a tracking code that determines what you are doing.

Step 3. Each retailer can determine the level of participation required on the site for the checkin points, however I suggest that the visitor should have to buy something if you are checking in online. This would stop the issues of tons of people checking in online, because they have to buy something to make it count.

Step 4: Stores could offer the same types of specials through the web that they can online. Or, another way to do it would be to have “web mayors” in addition to actual “mayors”, so there is one for the brick and mortar facility, and there is one for the website.

I just know how little I like going to real stores, but how much I shop online – and I think that we are such a web driven world that it needs to be recognized. This makes foursquare more accessible too for people who live far from their favorite stores, or don’t have the ability to go out as much as they would like. This opens up foursquare to a larger demographic – and as long as the checkins online have strict rules so that you can’t abuse it, I think this could be a really successful new part!

So Foursquare…what do you think?

Readers…how can we improve on this idea?

Foursquare and I have had a tough relationship…which has been chronicled on the Motor Creative blog, one of the blogs I on which I cover social media strategy. First, I started on foursquare. And then I decided it wasn’t for me. Finally, I decided (after a lot of convincing) to go back. While each of these posts has a lot of explanation behind each of my decisions it really came down to one thing:

Foursquare is learning, growing and expanding. It is going to change and possibly change how businesses market themselves…why would I want to miss the changes?

What are your thoughts on foursquare?

A month ago, this post would have been entitled Facbook Fan Pages, but since Facebook has nothing better to do than change around functions, terminology and their TOS…anyway, I digress.

I have a fan page for Kirsten Wright. I meant to set it up for Wright Creativity, but apparently wasn’t paying attention, and whoops! That was months and months ago. I figured it would be no big deal to change it later, so I didn’t worry about it. Much to my chagrin, it is a big deal…as in you can’t change page names. So now, I don’t really use it, and it sits there with pretty much the same content that is on my normal profile or this blog.

I understand the value of “Like” pages, in fact I have suggested them to many of the companies I have worked with. And, when it is used right, a fan page can be very successful. Unfortunately for me, I am not really using my fan page the way I actually recommend. Partially because it isn’t named right, partially because I share all my thoughts and content through my main facebook stream, twitter and linkedin already, and partially because I just don’t like the facebook pages that much.

So, I am considering removing my facebook “like” page and just telling everyone to subscribe via rss or email…or to follow me on twitter. It is all the same content, and these are tools I already maintain.

Do you have a “like” page? Any opinions on me removing mine (for or against?)?

This past Saturday, 15 of the top women in Orange County on twitter took a trip to Temecula for a phenomenal wine tasting trip. It included a limo ride out, stops at three wineries, over 200 tweets, pics and FB updates and finally, a whole lot of wonderful pictures and memories. It was also entirely planned through the use of social media, with companies who wanted social media exposure, and were willing to work with our group to make it happen.

The planning of the event started almost 5 months ago, as a tweet between a few of the women who attended, mentioning that it would be fun to do a wine tasting trip out to Temecula. I loved that idea, and started doing some research on how to make it happen. There are over 15 wineries in Temecula, most of which were on twitter. Unfortunately, most of the accounts weren’t managed well. Of those that were, I started sending tweets, talking about our idea of a wine tasting trip. A few of them immediately brushed it off, worried about what we might tweet or how their winery would ‘look’. But, three wineries did pay attention, and were willing to take the risk, @leonessecellars, @robertrenzoni & @oakmountainwine. They all offered half price wine tastings, and Joel Reese of @winehostTV who works with Leonesse Cellars gave us a behind the scenes, amazing tour, of the winery.

In addition to recruiting the wineries through twitter and later, through facebook, the rest of the event was also planned through social media.

The limo (ULC Limos) was recommended through twitter and has now been convinced to start an account soon.

All the messages to organize the trip were sent via facebook or twitter. This made it simple to track, and easy to follow

Almost everyone who attended originally met through twitter, social media networking events or blogging events.

Everything that happened on Saturday was sent via tweets, status updates, whrrl stories and twitpic.

Anyone who didn’t attend could track our tweets, photos and conversations via the hashtag #twwt.

The minute we all got home, we uploaded photos to facebook, became fans of the wineries on facebook, promoted them to our friends, and made sure we were following them all on twitter.

So, how can our wine tasting help your business? Because this type of event will happen again! And next time, your business could take advantage of it. Small twitter networking events are popping up all over the place, and it doesn’t take a big hoopla to make them happen. This event was only 15 women, but the hashtag was followed online, and the conversation spread to over 100 in just short moments. Your business can plan the next small event with just a few simple steps:

1. Pick a date that works well for your audience. Our group was a lot of mom’s and small business owners, so we needed a weekend event.

2. Find an easy way for the attendees to get there. We chose a limo because 15 women + 3 wineries = bad idea for driving. It also kept us all together, so we tweeted more and shared more pictures.

3. Make it fun! We were not met with sales pitches and business strategy, we just enjoyed the wineries and had a blast with each other. This meant we were much happier to tweet about our experiences and were actually having fun!

4. Remember you can’t control the conversation. There was no way for the wineries to know what we would tweet, so they made sure to show us a great time so that our tweets would be positive.

So the big question is…will your business take advantage of an event like this?

Or will you be like @scwinery, who told us we couldn’t visit because they were concerned what we would tweet?

With all of the tweets and news stories going on around the newest web tool, Chat Roulette, I have to admit, I was curious. Although most of the conversation about the tool touted how awful it was, that every other person was behaving obscenely and it was a bored teenagers strange idea…I still wondered about it (darn that curiosity!). But, I hadn’t checked it out, I just simply didn’t have the time. I pushed it to the back of my mind, and kind of forgot about it.

Yesterday, me, my hubby, @vetlovingpetshb and @elecsecurityguy had brunch at Memphis in Santa Ana, and over unlimited mimosas and french toast, we got on the topic of weird tools and unique websites. Which of course, brought up Chat Roulette. We started talking about what we’d heard about it and what it was really like. None of us new more than the basic principal – go to the site, click play and wait to see who (or what) shows up. It was basically a video chat room, where you just clicked next to move onto another person/conversation. We had all heard that it was definitely nsfw, and that the majority of people on there were men, showing body parts that we had zero desire to see…but of course, after those mimosas, the curiosity came back and so we decided we just had to check it out (curiosity will getcha every time!).

The first tries to get the site to work completely failed…apparently Chat Roulette does not like Firefox. So, we switched over to Internet Explorer, got the ‘play’ button and took the chance. We clicked play, and waited. Three things we realized right away:

1. It auto turns on your own webcam which means the other person can see you laughing.
2. It auto turns on your microphone which means the other person can hear you laughing.
3. No one can prepare you for it, but you’ll definitely be laughing!

As all the news stories and tweets had told us, it was a strong mix of obscenity, with a few normal (albeit bored) people. We lasted about an hour on the site, clicking through about 15-20 different people, and had only one normal conversation, with a college kid in the UK who couldn’t sleep.

My final verdict? This site is a wreck, will end up the late night game at many sleepovers or drunken fraternity parties, and I doubt it will have any real staying power. That is unless they can figure out how to clean it up, segregate the types of conversations and turn it into a safer site for viewing…either way, I wouldn’t venture back.

Have you been to ChatRoulette? What did you discover?