social media

3 Simple Ways to Be Cleverly Quiet in Social Media

We’re told by those that know that we should be in social media. Not just in it, though, but participating.

Jumping in; joining conversations; leading the way; growing our audiences while talking with them at the same time.

And of course, in an ideal world, we should and would follow the above and more.

Problem is, we don’t live in an ideal world.

Time or budget restrictions. Fear of the big scary world that is social media. Lack of buy-in from decision-makers in our workplace, and so on.

All decent points, all valid arguments.

But even if you can’t justify participating actively in social media, there are a ton of ways you can be cleverly quiet in social media and know all you need to know too.

Here are just three. Best of all, they’re all free too.

Use the Search, Luke

A vastly under-used yet hugely effective source of silent participation are the various search options in social media. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, Slideshare and virtually every other social media platform you can think of has a search function.

Just like Google’s search box, all you need do is type in the keywords relevant to you and see what’s being talked about when it comes to you and the customers you’re after.

It doesn’t stop there. You can save searches on Twitter, for example, and then jump back in any time and see what’s new in your industry – it’s basically an ever-growing resource centre.

Search is your friend – look after it.

Real-Time or Your Time

So we know search is your friend. But one of the arguments against social participation is the time involved, and that same argument can also be used against searches – you have to always be there. Which is why alerts are also your friend.

By plugging your keywords into real-time search and monitoring platforms, then setting up alerts for them, you can get the information you need to know at your convenience.

Tools like Google Alerts, Social Mention, Surchur and others allow you to set up search parameters and then choose when you want to receive that information. Hourly, daily, weekly, as it happens – you choose. There might be some words less important to you than others, so choose the important ones for more frequent updates, then the others as you see fit.

Alerts are also your friend, since they let us decide when (and if) we need to jump in on something.

Subscribe to Knowledge

According to Technorati’s last State of the Blogosphere, there are more than 133 million blogs out there (probably more since that report came out a year ago). That’s a heck of a lot of blogs – and many of them cover business. Which covers social media.

By combining social and “normal” searches, tags like Technorati’s own social media tags and reading blogs that offer excellent research and information, you can soon build up a great knowledge base on the topics you need to know about to help your business.

Then, to make sure you don’t miss out on that information, make sure you subscribe either by that blog’s RSS feed, or by email subscription so you get all the latest news as soon as it’s published.

Your Turn

Like I said at the start of this post, you don’t need to participate actively in social media to benefit from it. Obviously the more active you are, the more beneficial it’ll be. But if time and resources are currently against you, then silent participation can still benefit you immensely.

How about you – what ways are you using social media silently to benefit you and/or your business?

photo credit: buddygirlgreetings

Using Social Media Right – For You

Chris Brogan wrote a post the other day about connecting your Twitter profile to LinkedIn. His take was that it’s annoying, and you should only be sharing some of your Twitter stuff.

There are a ton of folks that say you shouldn’t be tweeting about what you had for breakfast, or how silly your cat is. Doing that means you’re not using Twitter right.

Then you have folks that say you shouldn’t connect Foursquare to your Twitter account, because no-one wants to know that you’re sitting on a patio having a cold one somewhere, or you’re in Best Buy getting a game for your Xbox 360.

Again, it’s “not the right way” to use the service.

Here’s a little heads up – there’s no right or wrong way to use social media.

There is a right way to use it for you and your needs, though, and that’s different.

To take Chris’s point about Twitter and LinkedIn, I worked with a client in the service industry. They used Twitter to help resolve issues and technical queries. We fed their Twitter feed into LinkedIn and Facebook.

Because of this, they won three big clients who were impressed at how quickly they resolved issues, and how concerned they were for their customers. Where did these clients come from? Two from LinkedIn and one from Facebook. The three new clients equated to six figure contracts – something that would have been missed had the Twitter account of my client not been linked up elsewhere.

As for not using Twitter to share personal stuff? Look at Twitter’s own description of the service – “Twitter is a rich source of instant information. Stay updated. Keep others updated. It’s a whole thing.” Nowhere does it say, “Please keep this business related.”

And sharing what you’re up to on Foursquare allows others to see your tastes. We keep complaining about ineffective advertising – by sharing what we like, we’re allowing marketers and advertisers insights into what we’d like to see from them. Seems like a win-win (as long as they don’t abuse our trust, obviously).

This whole “doing social media right” mindset seems to miss the mark. Who said that using Twitter or LinkedIn should be one way and one way only? Where did these “social media rules” come from? I don’t recall seeing a Social Media Ten Commandments movie. You?

Social media is just like anything else – people will either like what you’re doing or not. They’ll either agree with your viewpoint or they won’t. The ones that agree will be your customers; the ones that don’t probably weren’t a good fit anyways.

And isn’t that the way business and personal relationships have always been anyway?

photo credit: QualityFrog

Gen Y Isn’t Leaving Social Media – Are You Ready For Them?

A new study from the Pew Internet and American Life Project makes for interesting reading on Gen Y and their presence in social media/social networking.

Using the responses from a cross-section of 895 technology stakeholders and experts, including the likes of?Clay Shirky and?Jeff Jarvis, the survey shows their belief that Gen Y won’t be leaving social media anytime soon. This is in contrast to various opinions on why Gen Y isn’t using social media.

According to the Pewter survey, 67% of respondents agreed that Gen Y will still be using social media and be active on networks by 2020. Not only that, but their connectivity will have grown and, even in parenthood, they’ll be active and open members of various social networks.

29% disagreed, saying Gen Y will have outgrown their current online use (including gaming) as new commitments take up their time.

The reasoning for those 67% believing Gen Y will continue to grow their connectivity is the very reason many detractors use against social networking – its openness and ability to share information. Couple that with the benefits of growing brand reputation and it makes sense for Gen Y to continue being active users in the space (and continuing to grow in uptake).

So what does this mean for you, as a business owner?

The obvious answer is that you need to take a look at your current approach and see if you’re ready for this huge potential audience (for example, half of YouTube’s users are under 20).

Does your company have Gen Y employees on your social media team?
Can you employ a Gen Y community manager to communicate your message?
Are you social mapping to find out where your Gen Y customers are?
Is your sales message adapting to also include Gen Y tastes and needs?
Are you taking part in dedicated chats like?#u30pro to understand what Gen Y feels about business, careers and more?
Are you reading blogs from the likes of Matt Chevy, Lauren Fernandez, David Spinks and Teresa Basich (amongst others) to understand this audience better?

While you might not be targeting Gen Y at the minute, they will be your customers of the future. Maybe it’s time to make sure you’re ready for that future now.

You can download the full Pew Internet report here.