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Posts Tagged ‘micro-blogging’

10 Pithy Social Media Tips in 140 Characters or Less

31
July
2009

High wisdom density. True micro-blogging for Friday’s short attention spans.

Blake Bowyer
Media Program Analyst
  1. As always, start with a purpose and set objectives. Build systems around social media as you would other marketing initiatives.
  2. Implement and measure against yourself. Fewer benchmarks exist in social media, so you might have to create your own.
  3. Get buy-in. Make sure others take social media efforts as seriously as you do or long-term outlooks won’t hold up. They’ll fail.
  4. Observe best practices but don’t mimic. Social media levels the playing field and its agility gives even the little guys room to innovate.
  5. Using social media means writing in headlines and for eternity.  Be cautious, but more importantly make sure you can stand by what you say.
  6. Give stuff away, worthwhile and upfront. Make sure the value you offer is clear and understandable, no matter how great it is.
  7. Type from an office, but loosen your tie. Social media is serious, but best used with a colloquial voice. Stuffy travels nowhere.
  8. If you make mistakes, correct them. A social media apology goes a long way toward rectifying what you’ll have to anyway.
  9. Keep up. Don’t get stuck on the next Friendster while your audience retreats. It’s environmental scanning on a global, real-time scale.
  10. Be social. It sounds obvious, but organizations and employees often forget to connect. Reach out, listen, and toss your ideas into the mix.

- BONUS -

Be succinct. When everyone has a voice, you can’t afford to waste people’s time and pixels.

Now it’s your turn. Fit these 140-character tips into your social media strategy and create some of your own.

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Week 3: Curing the Twitter Hangover

29
June
2009

Finding the e-H2O to rehydrate and navigate Twitter’s multiplying flock.

Blake Bowyer
Media Program Analyst

Every morning I wake up to an inbox full of unread messages. If I sorted them by sender, 95% of them would fall under “T” and 100% of those would be from Twitter. I am greeted by the faces and logos of new followers and their generic welcome messages. Many come bearing gifts, others videos, and a few even make promises: “I will improve your experience on the Internet”, one proclaimed this morning. It’s possible, but how? Like any good marketing consultancy, EyeTraffic Media got started on Twitter a while ago, but has since built a tolerance for that initial giddiness a new follower brings. 

Sigh. After so many tweets, the honeymoon period is over.

But that doesn’t mean the value is gone. In fact, with more experience, Twitter ages like a fine wine in the hands of the right tweeter. Most organizations experience the micro-blogging disenchantment after the initial Twitter-passion subsides. It’s natural. At first, Twitter is a shiny new toy and you ostensibly have access to the eyes, ears, and minds of everyone on the Internet. It’s free, it’s voyeuristic, and suddenly your audience has grown tenfold in two weeks. 400 followers?! That’s more than the number of MySpace friends, Facebook fans, and blog comments you’ve gotten in the last five years COMBINED! 

It’s a shot of social media adrenaline that is addictive, inspiring, and fascinating. Suddenly you’re caught up in the whirlwind tweeting about things you never would have dared to put on your blog. A post about buying new pens for the office? Sure, why not. These people follow you because they want to follow you, right? Your organization’s most mundane activity fascinates them.

Probably not. It’s unlikely that you’re blowing people away with 140 characters about buying pens – unless they’re soy-based and you’re @algore. That’s when users hit a wall. The Twitter pen-talk isn’t increasing sales or driving users to a Web site. Twitter isn’t producing any results, but every morning you sit down to an inbox full of new faces eager to “learn more about you” and totally “looking forward to your tweets!” Suddenly, you feel like you’re being lied to. You’ll discover it’s mutual. You never asked two crucial questions: 

  1. How do I use Twitter? 
  2. What do I want out of Twitter?

But that’s fine. There is still unmined value, but it’s necessary to reciprocate with your own. Your organization might have to give out a few pearls of wisdom for free, but that will attract the eyes of people who actually want to read what you have to say. Best of all, you can benefit by the millions of others who are playing the Twitter karma game. You can’t decide who follows you, but, if you tweet it, they will come.

The number one rule: follow value and lead with value.

Get value from @eyetraffic and we’ll help you shake the Twitter hangover.

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Twitter Summons Its First “Fail Whale?

26
May
2009

Twitter partnerships offend “no one…and everyone?”

Stefanie Berliant
Media Coordinator

My feelings for Twitter are summed up in an entertaining four and a half minute video from Current: “Twouble with Twitters” (see link below).

While the content of this blog may seem ironic and slightly hypocritical, I find that the social network/micro-blogging service, Twitter, is just a bit extreme.  I don’t really understand why people feel the need to share that they are watching TV with their cat.  In instant message speak, we call that TMI (too much information).  So while checking out the news on CNN.com, to my surprise and delight I stumbled upon an article headlined “Kutcher Threatens to Stop Twittering.”  The article shares how Twitter has partnered with TV producers Reveille and Brillstein Entertainment on an unscripted show that would be "putting ordinary people on the trail of celebrities in a revolutionary competitive format"- aka: a show centered on stalking celebrities.  When finding out about this, actor Ashton Kutcher Tweeted “its all fun and games until somebody gets stalked” and warns that he might take a break from Twittering if this show goes through.  

I find this to be quite ironic. Kutcher and wife Demi Moore are some of the worst "Twit" offenders, constantly Tweeting meaningless details about their lives. Kutcher also had a high-profile race with CNN to be the first with 1 million Twitter followers. While celebrities and Average Joes alike get stalked every day, I agree that creating a TV show about stalking is probably not the healthiest behavior to endorse. However in my opinion, exploiting oneself is pretty tacky, especially through Twitter.  At least when a third party exploits you, people take pity and feel sorry for you.  

Twitter has definitely drawn some criticism on this partnership from celebs and regular people. We’ll see if this TV show goes through.  While Twitter does allow people to share ground breaking news, give expert advice, give feedback on certain products or services, Twitter should not be used for everyone to “randomly brag about their unexceptional life” nor for harassing individuals.

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Twitter Not Interested in Ad-Revenue Model

20
May
2009

By year-end, Twitter plans to introduce new revenue-generating ad tools.

Christine Pepin
Media Coordinator

It’s becoming one of the most asked questions among marketers: How and when will Twitter develop a viable business model? 

According to Twitter’s co-founder, Biz Stone, they are not considering introducing advertisements on their fast-growing micro-blogging site. For many start-ups, this model poses a way in which money can be made without having to tack on a fee to its users. It’s the trade-off us consumers of free online services have accepted. There are not many free portals left out there that are surviving without it, so we’ve come to expect that animated ad at the corner of our screens. 

Twitter, however, hopes to become different.

Stone and his fellow founders are dismissing the ad-model for a variety of reasons. For one, “it’s just not quite as interesting to us,” he tells the Reuters Global Technology Summit in New York. He furthers his reasoning that ads may become terribly annoying for the user. A big limitation that they note is the lack of knowledgeable staff members to help develop an advertising-sustained business. Another easy problem to fix, yet they have no desire to seek these individuals. Then ironically, the 40 employee San Francisco based company plans to double in size by the end of 2009. What kind of talent are they pursuing?

In lieu of ads, Twitter plans to generate revenue by way of ad-on tools for businesses and professional users.  The company will still be assuring a free service but prepares to roll out additional features for commercial use, including “lightweight analytics” and a directory of commercial accounts to verify a business’ legitimacy. Twitter is also in talks for a partner agreement with cell carriers so that the service can be available through a subscriber’s text messaging network. With no pressures from investors to return profits and their recent $35 million round of financing, delivering a public offering is certainly not on Twitter’s radar.

Again, we stay tuned as the company continues to figure out how it could be possible in the future as its popularity compounds rapidly. Listen here as Biz Stone discusses the company’s direction.

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