A big thank you to Laura Gainor (@LauraGainor) who came to speak to our class last week about the social media strategy she used to land a great job and tips for how to develop a personal brand through social media. In terms of developing your personal brand, some of her best advice includes: - Be consistent across social media channels. This includes the name you choose and your personal photo.
- Know your message and know your audience. Why should people follow you? What have you learned that can benefit others? (I love this!)
- Set goals. What do you want to accomplish? Track your results when you can.
- Engage in conversations. Reach out and connect with people, especially on Twitter.
- Play with social media. New tools are popping up every day. Try them out and see what they can do for you.
Check out more of her great insights on social media and personal branding via the SlideShare presentation below.
Every year for the past 11 years, Beloit College in Wisconsin has issued a list of cultural truths that the current class of students entering college today know to be true. The Beloit College Mindset List serves as "a reminder of the rapidly changing frame of reference for this new generation." Here are some of the technology-related highlights for students of the class of 2012 (approximating those born in 1990) that I find astounding. For these students:- GPS satellite navigation systems have always been available.
- Electronic filing of tax returns has always been an option.
- IBM has never made typewriters.
- They may have been given a Nintendo Game Boy to play with in the crib.
- Employers have always been able to do credit checks on employees.
- Caller ID has always been available on phones.
- Windows 3.0 operating system made IBM PCs user-friendly the year they were born.
- The Hubble Space Telescope has always been eavesdropping on the heavens.
Caller ID has always been available. Growing up, we had phones with cords that were attached to walls. You had to answer the phone to find out who was calling... And if someone was already on the phone when you tried to call them, you got a busy signal. Some people used pagers. In fact, I didn't have a cell phone until I went to college. Most people had PCs, not MacBooks. Clearly, things are much different today. College students are equipped with a whole new set of technologies that are commonplace: smart phones, iPads and e-book readers among them. Does this mean their lives are easier because of the technologies available to them? Not necessarily. However, it's important to keep in mind how the tools are changing from year to year.The Beloit College Mindset Lists can be found here for the graduating classes of 2002 through 2014.
In the past six months, I've been asked to watch the Social Media Revolution video below several times. If you haven't seen it yet, it's worth the watch. I also came across its sister video, Social Media ROI, also below. Both videos were created by Erik Qualman, author of Socialnomics: How Social Media Transforms the Way We Live and Do Business and its corresponding blog at Socialnomics. When I first saw this video, I questioned some of the stats. If interested in checking the sources, Erik has outlined them on his blog here.
Last week we had the opportunity to hear socialpreneur Philip Nowak discuss how some big brands are diving head first into social media without a solid business strategy or revenue model. At first, this sounds shocking, but it's strikingly simple: finding success with social media is about trial and error. Eventually, you will find what works best for your brand. Philip also talked about some of the reasons why brands use social media. Here are some of the reasons (and my commentary).- Fishing where the fish are. People (consumers) are using social media tools. Brands can too.
- Avoiding brand jacking and other potential PR crises. Get involved before your brand has to.
- Matching the competition. Your competitors are there. Do you want consumers to connect with them and not your brand?
- Getting instant feedback. Only from those who want to provide it.
- Building loyalty and brand ambassadors. Certainly.
- It's more affordable than traditional marketing. Sometimes. I would argue that finding success with social media as a marketing tool takes time and resources.
- There's potential for a viral explosion. This is not something that can be controlled and could have positive or negative results.
All of these reasons are relevant, but what wasn't stated directly is that the goal behind all of these reasons is to make money. Brands are using social media tools to make a profit, by using platforms to reach new consumers, maintain visibility, drive marketing campaigns, gather information, manage reputations, or build customer relationships. There may not be a silver bullet approach (think: Facebook page), but the tools are worth exploring.
Crain's Chicago Business recently posted an article about a local business owner who put his everything into social media to successfully market his bar. In the end, he decided to back off and delegate the management of social media activity to another staff member. As he put it, "I was looking down more than I was looking forward." Social media was helping him build his customer relationships online, but it wasn't helping foster his offline relationships. Engaging in social media takes time, and it's easy to let the scales tip. At times, social media can feel like a hungry beast that constantly needs to be fed. Internet pioneer and writer Jaron Lanier felt the same way. So he quit social media. Now he reports that he feels more innovative. In addition to eating up our time, does engaging in social media stifle creativity? This article on Neon Tommy sums up his sentiment: "If everyone collaborates on everything, then nothing is original." How can we find balance with social media before we all throw in the towel? Lots of folks have suggestions for how to maximize social media tools for efficiency and tips for how to manage time online. Here are some of the reoccurring themes that can be helpful: - Determine what you want to accomplish online using social media tools.
- Evaluate which tools will help get the job done and exactly how you will use them.
- Set limits on the amount of time that you spend on social media sites.
- Recognize when you are being distracted.
- Get outside and get some fresh air (and don't bring your iPhone).
Finally, I think this quote from a 2009 BusinessWeek article still applies: "If the productivity best practice is to target your social media very precisely to attain your goals, then the productivity worst practice would be to indiscriminately hook into multiple sources of poorly defined static. To use social media effectively, just be sure that you aren't putting more effort in than the result you're getting. "
Here are two mind maps I began for two different class projects. One is around the topic of "Emerging Media" and the other is around a local health care organization. Both are works in progress.
In the past month, I've encountered several people using an old technique that has become a new trend: mind mapping. What I couldn't figure out is why. Hello, welcome to fourth grade brainstorming. Write a word in a bubble in the middle of your page and draw branches coming off of it with other concepts, words and phrases. Nothing new to see here, folks. This visual way of taking notes has been around for a long time. So I tried it today using an online tool called MindMeister. Other popular online mind mapping tools include Mindomo and Bubbl.us, but MindMeister seems to be able to create most visually appealing map of these three options. As it turns out, there are dozens of other mapping tools available, either free or for sale. Was I blown away? No, not really. It's exactly what I thought it would be. In fact, I found it annoying that you could only see portions, not the whole map, at any given time. But here are some pluses about online mind mapping tools that I did identify: - You can drag and drop words and phrases to reorganize your map, which you can't do the old-fashioned way.
- You can add images and icons to your map, making things more visually interesting.
- If you have an iPad or iPhone you can make maps with the MindMeister application. I'm thinking this is one of the main reasons why this technique is trending.
- Perhaps the coolest feature and what makes mind mapping relevant again: You can work on collaborative mind maps with other people and track the changes. You can also check out other people's public mind maps and see what people are working on.
Do I foresee a need to ever collaborate on an online group mind map? Not really. But you never know. That's what's great about being aware of new emerging media tools and trying them out. They could come in handy for a project down the road. There are also some really beautiful mind maps out there that make lovely infographics, such as those I came across by Paul Foreman on Mind Map Inspiration. Paul's site says that he offers mind maps for inspiration, mindmapping and drawing tips, as well as techniques for enhancing creativity and idea generation. These mind maps are little works of art!
Undoubtedly. Tomorrow, the graduate students in our emerging media class will be watching the Frontline documentary titled "Digital Nation" which first aired in February 2010. One point which struck me while watching the trailer was this statement: "Every hour of a life on the screen is an hour not spent in the rest of life. If we're there, where aren't we?" I've often pondered the same sentiment. What could we be missing while we are spending more and more time online? How does our time online affect our relationships and how we interact with one another? What is the proportion of our time online and offline is necessary to achieve balance personally, professionally, and socially? The other concept in the back of my head is the reality of digital divide between those that have the means to access technology and those that do not. Does technology bring people closer together or pull them further apart? Whose point of view is not being represented online? Do we have a responsibility to represent these viewpoints online? I'm looking forward to thinking about these topics and more throughout the semester. You can see the trailer for the Digital Nation documentary here.
Having used WordPress previously for other blogs, it was difficult to decide whether to use Weebly or WordPress for this site. After only 10 minutes, I think I made the best choice for this project by using Weebly. The drag and drop function alone is fun and easy to use, and the designs are just as good as WordPress. I also spent some time checking out these videos comparing WordPress, Weebly and Tumblr on this Ames Creative blog found here.
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