My Digital Media Secret Sauce...or How Do I Keep Up?

Recently there has been a plethora (yep a bunch) of blog posts highlighting the "Top [insert no. here] People to Follow" on Twitter. Here's a few of them:

@PRsarahevans "Top 50 Tweeples to Follow"
@InkFoundry "20 Social Media Marketing Leaders on Twitter"
@iancapstick "20 Leading Women in Social Media" (this one is a response list to the InkFoundry list which had only TWO women in the list).
@jasonhiner "Techies: The Top 10 People You should Follow on Twitter"

And then, of course there are several lists by @kenthuffman:

Top Marketing Professors to Follow on Twitter (I'm currently #8 'cause I don't have 2,000 followers yet)
Top Marketing Authors on Twitter

In my Internet Marketing class in addition to the required reading for the course I include both blogs and twitter id's on a "must read for current events" list. All students in the class must have an RSS feed reader set up by tomorrow (Friday) and have subscribed to a certain list of blogs/twitter accounts. Many of my recommendations below are on the list for students.

So, not to be outdone by the above lists and warning of some overlap, here is Elaine's Recommended List of People to READ (both blogs AND tweets) for Students:

This list is based on overall VALUE to me as an educator. Where do I learn the most and who keeps me up to date the most so I can pass that information on to my students. So folks, these people make up my Digital Marketing Secret Sauce (for all the people out there wondering how I keep up on it all):

Oh, and this is in no particular order just a mashup of greatness if you will.

Beth Harte via Twitter and #pr20chat: She works at Marketing Profs, is an adjunct faculty and an all around smart, strategic thinker. Must follow for anyone in communication.

Marketing Profs (Ann Handley) via Twitter: All around good info - knows her stuff, great RT of others. Value, Value, Value!

Conversation Agent (Valeria Maltoni) via Blog AND Twitter: Excellent point of view about all things MarComm. Makes you think, makes me think.

Brian Solis via Blog and Twitter: Talk about critical thinker! Looks at PR and what makes it tick, rips it apart, builds it back up. Visuals describe it all.

Avinash Kaushik via Blog and Twitter: Web Analytics Evangelist at Google. If you are NOT following him you miss out on the keys to Data Driven Decision-Making.

Danny Brown via Blog and Twitter: The nicest Marketing person on the web hands down -- great point of view, relevant info and all about social media for good with his 12for12k Challenge.

Sarah Evans via Twitter and #journchat: Twitter stream of value and fun, great retweets, good links and runs Journchat. Always thinking about intersection of journalism, blogging and online communication tools.

Danny Sullivan via Twitter. Edits Search Engine Land. Been following Danny via his search work since before I was teaching. Solid gold info on all things Search. Must. Follow.

Andrew Keen via Blog and Twitter: The anti-social media person on my list (although he uses social media). Makes you think about all the social media hype and frenzy and questions the value. Cult of the Amatuer is a must read.

dana boyd via Blog: Academic. Researcher. All over online communication tools and environments. 'nuff said. Really.

Diedre Breckenridge via Blog and Twitter and the new #prstudchat: PR2.0 Strategist, writes books, connects PR/Marketing and Communication. Excellent info grounded in experience.

Rohit Bhargava via Blog and Facebook and Twitter: You want personality? Author of Personality Not Included (a required text in my MKT111 class), his book is great and his blog RAWKS. Really. Great insight, important point of view and experience beyond all reason.

Ambercadabra (Amber Nasland) via Twitter and Blog: She's with Radian6 (Community Manager) and her Tweets...well....they be good. Really, really, good. And then there's those e-Books. Just might end up as required readings in some classes of mine.

SkyDiver (Peter Shankman) via Twitter and Blog: Brains behind HARO (Help a Report Out) and all around interesting PR person. Lot's of energy and one of the few people I have Poken'd (now that's another story). Fun tweets and important social media perspective.

Barbara Nixon via Twitter: Aside from the occasional NASCAR tweet (grin), Barbara, a PR Prof from Georgia Southern University, provides great info on teaching PR, using different tools in the classroom and current issues.

Robert Scoble via FriendFeed. Yes, the world follows him and so do I. I friend feed because of him and I learn about all sorts of nifty things from his Tweets and FF. Follow, Listen, Learn.

and now...a special shout out to #BTV:

Joe Mescher via Twitter: The Social Media Commando is a prolific vlogger and provides great tips. Works at Dealer.com.

Nicole Ravlin via Twitter: Local PR Maven with emphasis on FOOD. Great clients, great energy, good info and retweets. Works at People Making Good, great PR firm in BTV and one of the founders of the Social Media Breakfast.

Ryan Mercer via Twitter: Part of our local news media at the BFP -- Photo Journalist. Pushing the edge. Always trying new things.

Rich Nadworny via Twitter: Owns local shop Digalicious, big part of the BTV social media scene and one of the founders of the Social Media Breakfast.

So there you have it. Another list.

Lessons from the Classroom: Facebook Business Pages, Blogging and Twitter

It began simply enough. The goal was to be able to show my Internet-based Marketing students how the new FB Business Profile Pages, Blogging and Twitter all serve different purposes to further the brand. Oh, and while doing that work in how to develop the content for each in order to achieve that mission. And...um...how to know when to use which and when not to...and do it in less than an hour.

So, here it is:

• Facebook Business Profile = Engagement
• Blogging = Expertise
• Twitter = Value

I know. That's not quite enough info is it?

Facebook Business Profile
The facebook redesign which seemed to be the bane of my students' existence has become a golden opportunity for businesses. In today's social media landscape, a brand that wants to fully engage with their customers now has a way in which to do that -- through Facebook. How? By doing the same things I can do as a person -- connect with my friends, comment on their walls, send messages, posting photos, joining groups...and my friends can comment on my posts and engage in discussions. Many others can see and take part in these discussions hence my emphasis on engagement.

Take a look at how Magic Hat is ENGAGING with their customers on their Facebook Profile Page



When you first go to the Magic Hat FB page, you come to this tab (Did I mention above that businesses can control the "landing page"?) Lot's of great pics and videos that show an exciting and interesting brand (which is what Magic Hat is all about).





So they caught my attention above. And now on the Wall I, as a consumer can comment on their status posts along with other fans and Magic Hat can respond to me directly. (Which they've done)





Is Magic Hat fully there yet? No. But as a local Vermont-based Company they are really taking advantage of a great opportunity to provide a space where they can engage with their customers and their customers can engage with the brand.

Should Magic Hat have a FB page at all? YES. Their target market is there. Their brand image fits with the FB landscape.

How should they measure their ROI? Number of fans is one simple way, but the true test is engagement. How many people are engaging on the page? How many in discussions? On events? Just like ANY site, Magic Hat should set clear objectives that are measurable so they can determine the ROI for their use of FB.

Blogging to build Expertise

My point of view on blogging is that it is not about selling. A blog is about showing your customers and potential customers who you are and what you are about. It boils down to creating a sense of expertise. Why would I, as a customer, trust YOU? Some great examples (also from Vermont, of course) include Seventh Generation's Blog: The Inspired Protagonist. I LOVE this blog. It really highlights why I have built a trust for Seventh Generation.

Here's another by local Web Development and Marketing Firm Union Street Media. If you don't have them bookmarked and aren't grabbing this firms FREE expertise (in the form of a well written, team blog with timely, important information) you are missing a great opportunity. So, why would they give this information away for FREE? Simple. Their blog shows their expertise. As a reader you learn to trust them and when it comes time to do something with your website, or enhance your Internet marketing strategy or focus in on blogging, who are you going to remember? Yep. They got you because they have shown, more than titles and puffy language, that they know their stuff.

Building Value with Twitter
Perhaps the biggest challenge right now is to address how something like Twitter can help in a brands marketing strategy. There are many words of advice out there so I'll add to the chaos (grin) with my thoughts.


There is NO VALUE in engaging in what I call "Follow Fever". You know what that is. It's a sickness that has struck many a Tweeter -- how many people can I get to follow me and how fast can I do it? Like a race. Mass follow tools are sprouting up like so many weeds. At the end of the day if 5,000 people are following you and you mass follow them back, how has that helped to increase your brand image? How does that help you reach your target market? At the end of the day you have a bunch of useless Twits (yeah, not a typo) following you for no good reason other than they might have follow fever too.


So, STOP with the follow fever. Start by assessing your brand image and how you will use Twitter to ADD VALUE for your customers, because at the end of the day, that is what it is all about.

Why would I follow anyone? I follow the people I do for specific reasons:

1. They provide valuable information for the work I do. People including (but not limited to) @rohitbhargava, @prsarahevans, @bethharte and @dannybrown and locals @gahlord, @cresmer and @rnadworny all help me do the work I do every day.
2. They expand my business and local network. Do they share my professional interests? are they in my local geographic region?
3. Are they my students or students at Champlain College?

Who don't I follow?

1. Anyone who is a "self-proclaimed" expert/wizard/maven/guru...etc.
2. Anyone who doesn't tell me who they are.

For a business, the value of Twitter is that you can reach out to customers who are passionate (either really really happy...or really really unhappy) in a way that brings value to the relationship. ComcastCares is a great example. Customer Service via Twitter. Provides VALUE for the customer. JetBlue is another example that provides the customer service access via Twitter. Locally we have some great examples of value creation through our Print News Media from Seven Days and the Burlington Free Press who are both utilizing Twitter in interesting ways. This was clearly evident today in Vermont during the veto override of the same sex marriage bill. Historic day in VT and Twitter is how I followed the process thanks to @shaytotten.

Another great local example of a company that is adding customer value through Twitter? Magic Hat! Their recent "Twitter Taste Live" event where they had several of their brewers available along with a Beer critic Tweeting Live responses to customers questions as they all sampled beers from the Spring Fever Pack. Um WOW! Great way to provide extra special value. Not only do I get my beer, but I get to Tweet about it with other people and learn great information.

How do you measure the ROI on something like that? How many people participated? Was there a spike in sales prior to the event? How many people blogged about it? What kind of "buzz" (yeah, I had too) did it create?

So there you have it. Why I think FB is for customer engagement, Blogging is for building expertise and Twitter is for creating customer value.

One final point that I made to my students was that if your brand is using any combination of these then they should all be linked to each other.

A stew of possibilities

Here it is. Finally. That promised blog post.

The pressure to write this has been overwhelming and yet, I seem to keep finding other things to do like grade and prep classes and sleep and play WoW and ... well you get the picture I think.

I've had a bunch of social media swirling around me lately. The discovery of Ping.FM, having multiple classes create blogs for different purposes, Twittering and realizing that there is a way to save your Tweets (I'll get to that in a few), and having people send me requests to "social media" pass their info on...and then there's that internal clearspace thing...and the new Champlain Portal workforce group...

It makes me think about all the possibilities that social media is bringing. Things that I couldn't do a few short years ago, I can do now. So let's get to it shall we?

Social Media for GOOD
It's the giving season and it would seem that some people don't get that. For whatever reason a local Non-Profit dedicated to collecting toys for children was vandalized a little while ago. Someone or someones got their jollies by bust'n up toys. Great. Makes you wonder what the heck is going on in the world today for real. Enter NEW BREED MARKETING. Devin and the gang over there clearly felt that it wasn't good enough to talk about this one, they have taken action. They've created a donation widget that you can use to give money to the cause. You can also share this widget on Facebook and with tons of others...in my case I'm putting it right HERE:



Now that is the way to use Social Media. By the way, you can follow Devin on Twitter by going here: http://twitter.com/devin1682. They've raised over $3,000 so far to help out our local Vermont children. Spread the word, will ya?

Why I need more time to read Twitter
So here are the things I've learned recently because of the people I follow at Twitter:

1. Twitter Grader: A site that helps track your "popularity" on Twitter. Note that you can also grade your website and your press release -- it's from HubSpot. Why is this important? Because this is a business that is trying to get your business so they've created a way to drive traffic and get more people talking about them. If they can do this for themselves...what could they do for your business? Great marketing!
2. Chris Brogan: @Lizschlegel Tweeted about this guy and a recent blog post he had about how to get started in Social Media -- his scenario approach is readable and interesting. I'll be saving this one for my class next semester!
3. FTW: Learned from @agahran with a link to the urban dictionary that FTW means "For the Win" which is often snarky and ends a post.
4. Gender Inequity in Africa: @DaveTaylor linked to a news article from the UN News Centre. This is getting forwarded to my students who are working on the UNFPA Project for sure!
5. Help a Reporter: I've known about this one...but it was because of Twitter. So PR People, you should be following @skydiver on Twitter and you should register at the HARO website for sure.
6. TwitterTake: Another from @agahran. A website that will back up your twitters and export them to an excel file. Why would I want this? Well so I can keep all of this great info of course!
7. OneTeam: I learned that folks from @OneTeam have ordered my recommended books! (Ok, I know, personal gratification listing!)
8. How Businesses can get Started with Twitter: This one is an ongoing gem from @gahlord at Union Street Media.
9. Branding of College Students: This article came to my attention from former student @gracekboyle. Not only is the article cool, but I'm watching a former student ROCK the social media.

This is but a sample. Yes, it's in between the personal stories of people that I may or may not know, but look at all the things I have learned because I've been on Twitter?

Another Cause...and How Students are Learning the Social Media
There's a prof on campus (not me, believe it or not) who is asking their students to get the most "views" of some cause-related vidoes over at YouTube. One entrepreneurial student has reached out and asked me to post her "Vid" so she can get "peeps". So...here it is! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QfnGOiFJUoo. The cause is 1% for the Planet.

This bring me to the point that will be another post that is swirling around in my brain -- that students aren't coming to college with the knowledge of how to connect beyond their friends with social media -- and that our job at the college level is becoming even more complex so that we can help them sort out the best practices on a moving target that doesn't have clear best practices yet.

Social Media and the Presidency: Has social media changed our voting engagement?

As our country celebrates it's democracy today -- where we can vote without fear of taking our lives into our hands -- I thought it would be appropriate to consider how social media may be changing our voting engagement.

Not only have the politicians jumped on the social media bandwagon with social networking and twitters and blogs and community sites, but we've seen the conventions and the candidate debates turn into social media events through sites like Twitter and the mash-up of Twitter and CurrentTV.

Today, I Twittered while waiting in line to vote. I included #vtelxn so that my tweets would go into a "local" twitter meme for all Vermont voters.

Today, I'm seeing my Facebook friends "donate their status" to remind people to vote.

Throughout the day I'll probably watch http://election.twitter.com/ to get a flavor of what is happening around the country through people's tweets.

I'll check in at #votereport to see information about polling places -- is anyone having issues? What are the lines like?

Tonight, will I watch TV? Maybe. More likely I'll be online checking the different sites and streaming live commentary from various places.

There are a growing number of ways in which I can feel more plugged in to the election process. It's not about being fed information from the candidates, but rather seeing what others in my social media sphere are doing and thinking has allowed me to feel even more connected.

So as the media talks about unprecedented voter turnout. As we all get engaged this year because of so many issues, I'm left wondering if the social media so many are using is having an impact on the voter turnout. As you see your friends writing about voting and you follow others who write about the lines and what they are doing as they wait to vote, does that pressure you into going to vote? Does it make you feel like part of a bigger movement knowing that you also voted and you can actually see others engaged the way you are? Others all over the country?

It's a known fact in marketing that word of mouth and viral marketing has more power then direct messages from a brand. Social media is the biggest WoM out there right now and part of the voter turnout may, indeed, be because of this phenomenon.

So, get engaged and plug in. Be in the know. And above all exercise your right to Vote.

You can lead a student to Twitter...but can you make them Tweet?

Tonight is the Vice Presidential Debate.

Last week was the first Presidential Debate.

I "hacked the debate" last week using CurrentTV and Twitter and posted my thoughts to #current. It was both really cool and absolutely overwhelming at the same time.

I talked to my students about it and they thought I was nuts. I could tell. If they were twittering during class they would have tweeted: "She's nuts"

But none of them seemed moved to take action to better understand the implications of mashing together TV and Social Media.

So this week, I have done what only a college professor can. I am DRAGGING my students to Twitter through an assignment. I have asked two of my classes to watch the VP Debate tonight and sign up for Twitter and tweet several times during the debate using #current or making sure they use one of the key terms (palin, biden) in their tweet so it gets captured by election.twitter.com.

Then, they have to write about their experiences in a discussion forum I've set up.

The classes are Internet-based Marketing and Technology: A Disruptive Force.

For the marketing students this is about learning how to play with new technologies, putting them in context and being able to assess how they work and if they are applicable to other marketing situations. As I told my students, if you don't play, you won't ever know if something like this could be useful elsewhere.

For the Tech as a D-Force class this is about disruptive technologies and exploring how technology has influenced discourse -- and is influencing how we can engage with the debates...sort of.

Most of my students have been resistant to Twitter. They "don't get it" and don't want to get it.

Tonight I'm making them try it.

We will see what happens.

Sick and Blogging, but not sick of blogging

It's a record. Really. Less than ONE FULL WEEK OF CLASSES and I'm already sick. Really really really sick. Been down for the count for five days so far and it's getting old. Really really really old (see, I'm so sick I'm channeling my 11 year old daugher...Really!).

So why blog today?

Convergent forces.

Great NYTimes Magazine article about "Ambient Awareness" and Facebook and Twitter. I can't say anything that really makes sense at the moment about it other than it's really really really good ... and stuff.

Secondly, our own local Burlington Free Press which has been playing with the Twitter thing has made a welcome change to their process! Woot!

Here's the Tweet I received today: @dliloia @PMGCreative @ejyoung67 Made changes to BFP's twitter channels. Now separated by topic. This is to reduce the major tweet dumps. about 3 hours ago from web

So now there is actually a "news" feed that has already alerted me to a moose on the loose and ballots missing at a local poling station. Not just the articles that are in the paper. Yeah BABY! That's the way to use the Twitter! But wait...it looks like I can also subscribe to:

• bfp_local
• bfp_biz
• bfp_living
• bfp_opinion
• bfp_sports
• bfp_politics
• bfp_alert
• bfp_news

So I'll be sending bfp_alert directly to my mobile phone because I'm going to assume that it will alert me to the critical news like major catastrophies and shootings etc. and the others I'll just add to my twitter stream.

Good conversations going on out there folks. Join the "ambient awareness" and the local news alerts, stay informed and...stay well. *cough* I'm off to bed.

Social Media Comes to the Olympics and Twitter might just win the Gold!

It's Friday morning here in Vermont. It's soggy and grey but there is an excitement in the air. It's anticipation, it's the knowledge that the one sporting mega event in history that I actually enjoy watching on TV is coming. Yep...it's the Olympics! In Beijing. Wow!

Would you like to know what the opening ceremonies are like? Right now? Live? Before we get them here locally (cause they don't happen until Friday NIGHT).

Just go to http://search.twitter.com/ and search for #080808 (get it? It's the date!).

Right now I know that the opening ceremony celebrates Chinese history, inventions (gunpowder, paper, compass and tea), that the commentators are terrible, the fireworks are amazing and that those of us who are NOT Chinese will have a hard time getting the story behind the full production. I also know,thanks to Blogger and Tweeter Rohit Bhargava that the first non-Chinese person to appear is Sarah Brightman who sings (according to the other tweets it's quite um...piercing). And I also know that the athletes will be marching in alpha order according to the local language which is Mandarin...so it's not what you'll expect.

It's a global Twitter with many languages BUT...they've got that covered too over at the Twitter Search -- there's a great little option to "translate" into English.

So we have this Twitter stream where people from all over the world are commenting on everything about the ceremony from the production itself to the commentators to the technical difficulties of being able to load the website of cctvolympics.com and cctvolympics.cn.

During the actual competition I can only imagine how this will work. I wonder how many news organizations are paying attention?

I wonder if NBC is paying attention?

I checked out their website at http://www.nbcolympics.com/index.html and they've got all sorts of things going on -- they've got mobile so I can get mobile alerts (hmmm...my twitter can come in on my phone and it's MUCH more interesting), and there seems to be a blog going on but the only way to find THAT is to watch the intro videos and look for the tiny print "blog" -- or do a search or look through the site to find SOMETHING. The one nice feature is the localization feature.

Why no social media links? Because they can't control it I bet. Tsk. Tsk. Tsk. Way to innovate there NBC! Thank goodness I have access to CBC out of Canada. They aren't rock'n the social media either, BUT at least I can find their blogs by clicking on the tab at the top!

If you look closely at the image below NBC is on top and CBC is on the bottom you can see that there is actually a "blog" link on the CBC banner. Not so for NBC.

Meanwhile our own Burlington Free Press is running a blog by Essex, Vt., native Carissa Gump who is a weightlifter. Those local ties to the games are always cool. I wonder if they'll set up a Twitter stream for during her competition?

So because of the preview, I'll watch tonight and see if I agree with the tweets in my commentary!

By the way, this is but one piece of some of the amazing social media that is going on. There's a whole different level from SPONSORS. Check out this blog post from ReadWriteWeb that shows examples of what McDonalds, Lenovo, Coke and Pepsi are doing with consumer generated content and social media to engage with athletes, customers and their brands. I'll be using this one in my classes for sure.

Finally, check out this "mashup" of the different social media from photos to tweets to blogs etc. at http://tag080808.appspot.com/. If you include tag080808 in any of YOUR posts, you'll be part of the timeline of connection during these games.

The socially redeeming value of "Twitter" and teaching social media

Whew! Note to self: Don't take a "fast trip" to the West Coast!

I returned from the Internet Strategy Forum in Portland, OR on Saturday morning and promptly slept until Sunday morning. Jet lag, lack of sleep and information processing all took their toll for sure.

Biggest wins at the conference?

1. Meeting, sitting with and "friending" Geoff Ramsey the CEO of e-Marketer
2. Meeting and chatting with Mike Moran who writes an SEO blog I follow
3. Not only watching, but participating in a full conference Twitter stream via my crackberry
4. Several new case studies from speakers from Forester and Intel
5. A free book: Groundswell by Charlene Li

The biggest disappointments?

1. Nothing really new from a content perspective
2. Lack of conference organizers focus on the use of Twitter
3. Poor choices for several of speakers -- this was a high expectation crowd so the speakers had to be "spot on" to be successful
4. No educators

Would I go again? Probably not unless they really push out the envelope on what's coming next.

So overall Twitter was the big winner for me. To actually take what I've read about and put it into practice and follow the Tweets to see the thoughts behind the scenes was great. It really emphasizes that post from Rohit Bhargava on Twitter and conferences. Nice to live the experience.

It certainly helps having had this experience now that I'm in the process of teaching social media tools and techniques to K12 educators from several Vermont school districts today and tomorrow. I'll be bringing Twitter into the classroom to play with it so hopefully this time it will work!

Finally in the same focus about connection and social media, my colleague Peter Straube who is program director for our Hospitality and our Event Planning programs sent me an email today with some great links to some things that are being used in the conference arena:

Hi Elaine,

Thought you might find this interesting: http://www.crowdvine.com/conferences and a specific example from the MPI conference I got this from in Houston last winter: http://mpi.crowdvine.com/

Oh, and while I’m at it, you might enjoy seeing some sample work that a team of our e-Gaming students produced in real time during the conference: http://www.mpiweb.org/cms/mpiweb/pec2008/peccommon.aspx?id=13996

- P

P.S. Does this get me somewhere on your blog today?

Yes, Peter...it does!

Wrap-up and Reflection from Summer Educator's Institute Presentation

Well I just wrapped up the presentation from the Summer Educator's Institute on Web 2.0 Technologies You Should Know About. I think it went well save for the complete bust on the TWEME.

Can't for the life of me figure out what happened -- especially when I thought for sure it would show all the comments...in one place.

Bummer.

I'll try again to figure it out. I think it might have had to do with the fact that so many people were hitting the server at the same time from the same IP Address. But, that's just a guess.

Going into the individual Twitter messages provides some great reactions to what we did today:

1. Lots of new stuff to learn, not sure how to use it yet.
2. What I thought about this exercise....it was frustrating getting in at first and I don't know if I want to be a "twit".
3. i have way too many tabs open, facebook, netvibes, twitter, gmail, blogger..so many cool new tools so little time..
4. I've signed up for Twitter and I am learning how to use it. I think this is really cool.
5. Very enlightening exercise. Each of these tools seem to be hybrids of the other.
6. I am trying to follow this twitter thing but it can be a little confusing...
7. a bit scary, yet interesting,trying to think of ways I can use this in the classroom or communication between students, parents etc
8. I am feeling completely overwhelmed and need time to play wiht these applications before thinking about educational uses.
9. I am a little freaked out about this whole twitter thing - can I pick who follows me...no cell phone texting so how will it work

I was able to find all the reference to edconf using SUMMIZE and that link is http://tinyurl.com/5oetfl

So as I thought, two hours wasn't really enough -- and yet, it was enough to get people thinking and playing. Hopefully the sandbox metaphor worked! Now on to tomorrow and the presentation for the St. Mike's School and Community Course (GED 684) on Social Networking and creating community!

OM Marketing Bootcamp Day One Wrap-up

Whew! It's been a GREAT day at OM Marketing Bootcamp. My personal highlights:

1. I not only MET Avinash Kaushik, but I got his autograph for my Web Analytics Book. Great speaker, very relaxed and seriously into analytics, data and very customer-centric. Really liked him in person. Thanks Avinash! Yes, Trinity Rocks and So do you!!
   
2. Cathy Resmer "live blogged" all day -- was way cool to read the re-cap and figure out this new journalistic endeavor. Down-side is the application she used was not Blackberry friendly so I had to wait until the end of the day to read it all, so couldn't participate.
   
3. Networking, networking, networking! Chatted with former students, other business people including folks from Epik, Propeller, MyWebGrocer, and the Publisher of the Burlington Free Press.

My biggest take away is that overall, I'm on it. There weren't any surprises that made me feel like I wasn't on top of the space I'm teaching. Whew -- that's always my concern and I'm glad to see that I've been able to stay on top of the trends and issues in Analytics, Advertising and Social Media. And actually, I might be a bit ahead on the mobile use and Twitter...but that, of course remains to be seen.

Best Advice and overall great themes that came from today:

1. The CUSTOMER should drive your decision-making (in other words, know your target market, where they go online and what they are doing online). Use analytics data, surveys and A/B and Multivariate testing to help get clear on what customers want from your online presence.
   
2. Give up control Marketing VPs and CEOs! Your brand is no longer your own -- now you need to MANAGE the brand using other tools, but you have to be willing to let consumer generated content run its course.
   
3. Be open and flexible and ready to try out the new tools to see how they will work and if they will work for your target market.
   
4. Data driven decision making ROCKS or...as Avinash would say, "It's crazysexycool". Even better, is data visualizations of the right information. Data by itself is often crap -- but with the right visualizations it can actually tell you what you need to do and better yet can help you convince the HIPPO to let you do it!

For the nitty gritty check out http://twemes.com/om -- which are all the Tweets that came through today about the OM bootcamp -- of course most of them are me! I think my thumbs will fall off. Also the live blog from Blurt provides some great things too.

I'll be back on tomorrow for the second day -- the focus will be Analytics. Yippee!

Micro-blogging from Online Marketing Bootcamp

I'll be attending my third Online Marketing Bootcamp this week (Tuesday - Friday). As a matter of fact, I'm getting ready to head over to registration right now.

I'll be posting evening wrap-ups of the event here, but micro-blogging with Twitter, via my Blackberry throughout the day. Check out the "Tweme" in the sidebar -- it's all the Twitters from people who are are using Twitter during the conference and include the conference code #OM in their posts.

If you want more in-depth, then check out Blurt. Cathy Resmer will be live blogging today's sessions.

More later.

Micro-blogging with Twitter at the e-State Symposium with my BlackBerry

As I posted earlier today, I attended the e-State Symposium at Champlain and decided to take my new Blackberry for a spin and really use Twitter as a micro-blogging tool.

My results I think were good. At least from my perspective. I was able to text about many of the main themes, a former student twittered back to see if he could use the quotes in a social networking session he was conducting today and I picked up three more followers, got picked on by Bill Simmon at CandleBlog (yes, Bill, that "woman" behind you was me!), and had a great chat with Cathy Resmer which ended up on Blurt.

Neat results.

By the way, you can see all my "Twits" or is it "Tweets" in the sidebar here in my blog. You be the judge...useful or just annoying?

Ask my sister about it and she will say that when she got to her phone this afternoon, it was a bit crazy -- 30+ twitter alerts would make anyone lose their minds. Her text to me that stated "ENOUGH ALREADY" clearly pointed out that I must consider the importance of "Twitiquette". Netiquette is just not enough anymore.

Perhaps I should have sent out a warning last night via Twitter: "Warning, I will be using Twitter to live micro-blog at a conference tomorrow. If you do not want 30+alerts, you might want to turn notifications off!" Hmmm...lesson learned.

As to my take aways from the symposium?

Well it was an interesting group of people -- diverse in age and background, but I don't really think enough was done to pull in a larger group of people who would really add to the discussion. I would have liked to see representation from other stakeholders to add depth. Where were the community activists, the African American community members, refugee groups, rural advocates, etc? At the end of the day I'm not sure we had good enough cross cultural and diverse socio-economic points of view to really get at the opportunities and challenges. It felt very "Chittenden County" and "Montpelier" to me. Not really representative of the state as a whole.

It was also too much, too fast. But I won't write more than that. Bill Simmon summed that part up quite nicely.

What I did like was the passion that everyone brought -- people really care about creating community -- and see the opportunity that technology can have to help enhance and support community building efforts. And, the Snelling Center has created a WIKI where they will provide updates.

My final thought on this was the continuing challenge to EDUCATE. It's not just about educating high school students and college students. It's about each of us embracing the fact that learning never ends, that our jobs are to learn and help others learn -- especially when it comes to integrating different forms of technology into any type of process. Case in point was the fact that there were people who didn't know what Twitter was. Not surprising. Many people don't know what it is -- perhaps more know now because of what I did today (and for those of you who are unsure -- check out this video from my favorite "how-to" site, CommonCraft):

http://www.commoncraft.com/Twitter

In my small way I have provided a learning opportunity for myself AND for other conference attendees.

But that does beg the question -- do all of the people who really need to be involved in the process of helping Vermont to become an "e-State" (in other words a community that is connected through many means, including technology) even know what a WIKI is? AND...do they understand how to use one?

CommonCraft to the rescue!

Conference Posting: Vermont's e-State Potential -- Building Community in a Connected Age

I'm about ready to head into the Welcome session for the e-State Conference sponsored by the Snelling Center for Government and my own Champlain College.

Check out the agenda!

I won't be "live blogging" since my computer (in it's current state of ready to explode at any time) can't handle it, but I might be using my new "crackberry" to micro-blog via twitter -- certainly a fun time to give it a try!

However, several others WILL be blogging.

Bill Simmon has already started with this first posting from last night. Cathy Resmer from SevenDays will also be live blogging at Blurt -- here's her first post from this morning.

The twitters have already begun...everything kicks off in about 10 minutes...I'm off!

Welcome to the "New" Academy -- Prof's who use online tools

So I'm not alone. Ok...I knew that really, but more and more I'm reading about College professors in disciplines other than Business (and there are not many of those either) who are using tools like Twitter and blogging and social networking to connect with their students and to write about their own experiences.

Yes, there are many who are playing around with podcasting at iTunes U, but recent items from the Chronicle of Higher Education have provided some other tidbits.

Like the emergent media Prof. who is now posting video on how he uses Twitter, and then there is today's article from the Chronicle where theologist Dr. Brandon Withrow writes about the pitfalls of faculty writing their own blogs -- who knew? Certainly not I!

It would seem that those of us who are utilizing these new tools may be running into some type of "hiring bias" ... hmmm.... better not tell Prof. John Rogate from here at Champlain -- he's created a whole virtual Champlain College in Second Life.

Bottom line, we are out there and we are experimenting and using these tools for ourselves, to connect with students, and to provide insight in the classroom. We have to. We are educators and we not only need to know about these tools, we need to help our students understand the ramifications of using these tools as well.

Twittering about Twitter and Rock'n with Ginger: Come follow me!

So the other day, I was Twittering about Ginger and my sister called me. She's been "following" me for a bit through Twitter, but hasn't really done much with it. My Twit, "Rock'n the Ginger Widgets. OMG!" proved too much for her and she called me almost immediately. "What the HELL are you doing and WHAT is GINGER?" she asked. And so it began. Too bad I didn't have the folks at Common Craft to help me out (grin).


Call it social presence or micro-blogging or something else (some might call it crazy!), Twitter allows you to stay in contact with "friends" and others in short little bitess. Of course, Common Craft has just come out with their "Twitter" how-to...



In my Twitter world, as you know, I'm "friends" with politicians -- although right now I'm just getting Twits from Obama and Clinton. I'm also friends with other people too (check out my Twitter feed on the sidebar). What's the redeeming value...really? Here's what I think:

1. Conferences. Conference organizers could set up Twitter accounts that all attendees can "follow" -- the organizers send out one note and all the attendees get it...on their cellphones...in real time.
   
2. Groups. Keeping the group (no matter what the group) informed. Helping complete a project, working on a scavenger hunt, whatever. One text reaches all in the group, quick and easy.
   
3. Family. Just like the folks at CommonCraft point out...keep your family and friends in the know and learn more.
   
4. Classes. Here's an interesting one. David Parry a prof at the University of Texas talks about Twitter and his students. Me, not doing that now, but I'm on the Facebook and working the NetVibes Ginger, so perhaps Twitter comes next. I've thought about creating a Twitter for a class to send out important announcements...hmmm...perhaps.

The general concept however is connection. And following. And that leads me to ...

GINGER!

Imagine you had a way to get to your students all the important things they need to read without printing them out, or assigning the readings. And you could provide a brief context for WHY something was important. A roadmap. A model to teach and show students not what they must read as an assignment, but rather what you are reading and why you think it is important. And you can do that at any time...from any place. And you get them ready for what is to come when they are in the work world.

Well...

It's here!

NetVibes (my FAV RSS feed reader) has released (just a few days ago) their newest version "Ginger". It came off of beta mode just a few days ago. I signed up for it a few weeks ago and have just begun to realize its full potential. Rather than a regular private RSS feed reader, it now allows you to create a public "universe" where others can follow you. You can post blogs and information you read to your "public universe" and even send favorites to your public universe with a note.

So if you follow me you would see that I've shared the Common Craft video, a research article about Web 2.0 and information about the Social Media Release.

Students can also access my Public Universe (http://www.netvibes.com/ejyoung67) and see the feeds that I have that I think they should be paying attention to.

As I talk about RSS in the classroom and show students the potential we are having some great conversations about the use of the RSS for marketing. Well, I do know right now that the power of this version of NetVibes is going to be the power of teaching.

Why not sign up and follow me?

Making Connections

Today I've been experimenting more with Facebook Applications and Digg. My big discovery today is how I can interconnect different parts of my social network -- and it actually works!

So I've Dugg some stories and then from Digg, posted them directly to my Blog (see the stories below), which I can then post on Facebook. Oh...and I read an article at another Blog site which allowed me to "Twit" it...so a link was posted on my Twitter!

Lov'n the social connected world!

Wow!