Managing Your Accounts

Looking for an easy way to manage all of your social media accounts in one dashboard?  Read about both of these internal and public managing tools.

For Your Eyes Only

• TweetDeck- Your personal real-time browser, connecting you with your contacts from all social media outlets including Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and more. 
• HootSuite- Plan your social media strategy all in one place.  HootSuite makes it easy to manage multiple users of various accounts, and track statistics with easy to understand visualization links and graphs. 

For the Public

Make a homepage for you or your company in minutes with both of these splash page websites.  Both pages allow you to link all of your social networking sites. 

• About.Me
• Flavors.Me

Flavors.me from Rob Morris on Vimeo.

Discovering User Generated Content

Discovering news, information and customer reviews has never been simpler with the help of several social media advancements.  From push to pull communication, getting the inside scoop as fast as you want is possible, and can be vital to tracking and monitoring your public relations and marketing efforts.  Use any and all of these tools below to follow what others are saying about you, your brand and your client.  Read more about each of these tools on the Mashable and Wikipedia links below.  

• RSS Feeds: RSS stands for Real Simple Syndication and according to Mashable's online article, "Do You Use an RSS Reader," they aren't as new as we think.  While they have been around since 1999, the social media hype has increased awareness of this clever tool. They are a quick and popular way to read numerous blogs, news stories and information in general all on one web page.  Utilize an RSS feed by keeping track of any and all publications you may be reaching out to, and see what consumers have to say about you or your client.

• Digg: This easy to use website helps users to share and find interesting or relevant content from anywhere online.  According to Wikipedia, users can submit links and stories and vote or comment on submissions.  You can look at it as a democratic way of rating online information, and it also allows you to see what consumers are discussing.  One of the neat things about Digg is that it stores the most popular or commented on stories on the front page every day.  This top ranking spot is a great goal for public relations and marketing professionals to shoot for.  

• StumbleUpon: Also a fairly old tool, StumbleUpon was created in 2001 and allows users to see a random website, anytime and anywhere with the click of the mouse.  According to Mashable's online article, "How To: Get the Most Out of StumbleUpon," the creative website "stumble's upon" a new website each time you click, and tailors what it "stumble's upon" according to your interests and preferences.  If you're looking to utilize this tool for your small firm, try using “StumbleUpon Tag Toplist.” According to Mashable, "This little puppy adds a button to each StumbleUpon profile which allows you to see some advanced statistics about each user’s tags. It will also display a list of the most used tags, and allow you to sort them alphabetically or by tag count."

• Reddit: Mashable explains this as a "social news website" which allows users to post links to content they found on the web to other users.  Once posted, much like digg, others can vote on links and put their input into the submission.  This gives interest to another possible goal for public relations or marketing strategies as the more positive votes are given to a link, the higher the link moves up on the discussion areas.  

Want to know more?

Check out some of my classmates blogs linked below.  While both have similar information about utilizing social media for your small business, notice the difference in themes and context the two authors share with readers.  While one prefers video additions to their post the other prefers getting the information out quickly and efficiently with no frills or strings attached. 

Which version of the blog topic do you prefer? Post a comment here or visit their blogs and give them some feedback!

NateBlizzy Social Media Blog

Dan C Social Media Blog

Display all of your social media profiles in one place online!

Want to create a custom profile and personal analytics dashboard? Check out aboutme.com and give employeers, readers and fans a place to check out all of your profiles from one location.

Below is an example of an AboutMe page.  Notice the links at the bottom of the bio to their online profiles including theirTwitter account.

Wikipedia and Social Media Statistics

Wikipedia may not seem like the most obvious piece of social media available for marketing use out there, however if you take a look at the facts behind this dynamic networking tool you will realize it may benefit your small business after all.

While Wikipedia is the number five most visited site on the web, over 50% of Wikipedia’s traffic is search-driven.  Creating and maintaining a Wikipedia page is an easy and efficient way for you to show your clients you are tuned in.  Using your Wikipedia page also has tactical benefits when starting strategic discussion around your topic of choice for your business.

Check out the number of ways you can use Wikipedia for your marketing efforts from the online article written by Minda Zetlin for Inc.com.

I find that one of the most interesting ways to get involved is to volunteer to write for many different subject pages on Wikipedia.  While, you will not always be writing about what you’re promoting, it shows you are proactive and unselfish to take time to write about other areas of interest that you are an expert in.  As Zetlin explained in her online article, “Use Wikipedia as a Marketing Tool,” spending a little time on adding other information besides what you are trying to promote, can only enhance your knowledge of how Wikipedia works.

Check out some more statistics about using social media for marketing purposes in this YouTube video below posted by the blog Six Pixels of Separation, a blog on digital marketing.