what is social media

Discussing Social Media with… Tara Joyce

A little while back, I sent out a request via Twitter asking if anyone would be interested in being interviewed for a discussion on social media. With the medium meaning so many different things to so many people, as well as how it can be used, I was interested to hear the views of the people I connect with.

My original plan was to run a “round table” style of blog post – raise the questions and then have a mix of views as the responses. However, the answers I received back were all excellent, and showed why social media is the mix of interesting people and views that it is. So, I decided individual posts would be far more effective in an on-going series of interviews.

Sharing her views today is Tara Joyce, founder of Elastic Mind Content Solutions, offering small businesses help with building and improving their websites. My sincere thanks to Tara for taking the time to reply and share her views. To connect with Tara, or find out more about her, please visit her blog Rise of the Innerpreneur.

If someone was to ask you for your definition of social media, what would it be?

Using the web to share and gain knowledge.

What is your reason for using social media?

A desire to communicate with a group of people I could not as easily connect with using traditional media.

Do you feel that social media is being used to its maximum effect?

No, not yet. But give it time. The idea is still in its infancy, in both it’s acceptance and use globally and in its evolution as a communication platform. This is only the beginning. But a big criticism I have in its efficiency today is that it is too disjointed. Too many different applications.

What social media tools or applications do you use? Why these ones in particular?

To be honest, I’ve signed up for more than I know. But the ones where I see value are: weblog (wordpress), microblog (twitter), social networks (biznik – prefered, linkedin – obligatory, micromagnate, Behance), Wikis (wikipedia, greenwiki), social bookmarking (delicious, stumbleupon), Music sharing (Last.fm). I belong to Reddit and Digg too but I still haven’t found value.

Where do you see the future of social media, both in general and for you?

More mass collaboration for the betterment of the environment and society. A further funneling and aggregating of the too-many-to-count and easy-to-forget applications that currently exist and are floundering. A new social trend replacing the old social trend called ‘FaceBook’…

Are businesses effectively using social media? If not, what can they do to improve?

Depends on the business. Some don’t even know what it is or simply dismiss it. Others are more adaptive and have embraced it. My advice for a business in regards to thriving in social media is ‘be helpful’ and ‘be authentic’.

What do you feel are the best and worst features/uses of social media?

Best – the ability to quickly and easily connect with like-minded people. Worst – the fact that you have to join and use an application before you can determine that it has no value; couple this with the fact that there are far too many applications and not all are created equal.

You can find more “Discussing Social Media with…” interviews here.

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Discussing Social Media with… Eric Guerin

First up is Eric Guerin, co-founder of SmartMarket Movie, offering marketing tools via the medium of online video. My sincere thanks to Eric for taking the time to reply and share his views. To connect with Eric, or find out more about him, please visit his profile at SmartMarket Movie.

If someone was to ask you for your definition of social media, what would it be?

Social media for me are tools, interfaces & websites where you as an individual can seek to achieve branding and marketing communication goals through the participation in various social media networks.

What is your reason for using social media?

I own a small virtual business creating online marketing videos. Participation in various social media communities allows me:

a.? The ability to promote my business through social media community engagement

b.? Extend the reach of my business outside of my local region to compete on a national level

c.? The ability to promote my customers products or services to people who trust my opinion

Do you feel that social media is being used to its maximum effect?

No, I feel that there are a select few people who understand the opportunities for engagement by using social media and how to go about utilizing it correctly. I think with time more and more businesses will begin to see what prospects are available by taking part in social media.

What social media tools or applications do you use? Why these ones in particular?

I have tried many different social media tools. The ones I have settled on were largely because they were the ones I was the most comfortable with and the tools where I saw the majority of my potential customers engaging. I utilize Delicious, Digg, StumbleUpon, Furl and Reddit for social bookmarking but am really only active and engaging with people on Digg. As a video producer I am active and launching videos weekly on almost all of the video sharing sites including YouTube, Google Video, Yahoo! Video, Revver, Viddler, Metacafe, AOL Video and Dailymotion. For everyday tools I blog, comment on other blogs and I use LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter.

Where do you see the future of social media, both in general and for you?

I think as more and more people start to utilize social media in their daily lives it will become more and more effective and accepted by the main stream masses.

Right now there are a select group who are utilizing what it has to offer but as that group starts spreading the word the acceptance of social media will grow. As for me, my usage of social media will definitely grow and refine as I see more and more applications for what I do and opportunities to engage in communities.

Are businesses effectively using social media? If not, what can they do to improve?

As I mentioned earlier, I don’t feel most businesses are effectively using social media. Most jump in like they would with an advertising plug and without looking to connect with the community first. Then they assume that social media doesn’t work so they abandon it.

What do you feel are the best and worst features/uses of social media?

The best features of social media are the opportunities for engagement in various ways across all of the different social media websites/applications. People feel like they get to know you on a somewhat more personal level by reading your updates, watching your videos, etc. So, as a business, they are more apt to remember what you do, particularly when you allow your personality to shine through in your social media involvement.

My pet peeves with social media are when I get direct message sales pitches through Twitter or get invited to some online game that gets passed around on Facebook because “if you invite 5 friends you get a new ____” so people just choose 5 friends, or all their friends, and just forward it on.

People need to know and understand who they are communicating with first before they start sending invitations to games some of their Friends are probably not interested in or sending direct sales pitches to people they don’t even know. One thing I know for sure is that cold-calling DOES NOT work in social media.

You can find more “Discussing Social Media with…” interviews here.

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Is Social Media Already Over?

In a nutshell, no – social media is not already over. It is, however, most definitely over-saturated.

Look at the bottom of this post – you’ll see the nice little Share/Save icon, as well as footer options to share this post with your friends on Digg, Reddit, Mixx, Stumbleupon and Delicious (and please do feel free to forward this on – always appreciated!) 🙂

Hover your mouse over the Share/Save icon and it opens up a whole host of other social media sites where you can submit this post to, should you so desire. Go one step further and click on the small downward arrow near the bottom of the Share/Save list. This offers even more social media sites to share this post with – well over 100, in fact.

This is too much (and a reminder to myself to edit the amount of Share This options). Who in their right mind would join 100+ social media sites? I think I may be on about 10 or so and even that feels a little too much, although I do use each end every one of the sites I’m on.

Mention social media and it’s pretty much guaranteed that these names will come out: Facebook, MySpace, Digg, Twitter, Stumbleupon, Technorati, Mixx and Reddit. Yahoo Buzz is becoming more popular while newcomers to the scene like BackType and MeeID are starting to build up a nice head of steam.

But what about the others that make up this 100+ list? Have you heard of Pusha, or Gravee, or Yoolink? How about Twiddla or Taggly? Apart from having names that George Lucas might use in his next movie, the abundance of these social media sites are what’s causing people to be wary about stepping into the social media pool in the first place.

Look back through the ages and it’s clear that the most successful products or services were the ones with the fewest choices – VHS or Betamax video tape, Sega Genesis or Super Nintendo, cable or satellite TV and so on.

While there’s no doubting that social media offers a wonderful opportunity to truly open up the world to everyone for the first time ever, it’s also apparent that there needs to be a reining in of the services available. Yes, choice is great but not at the expense of scaring everybody away through confusion.

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The True Meaning of Social Media

So, social media. It can be pretty confusing, right? After all, one person tells you one thing about it while another person tells you the complete opposite not 5 minutes later. And then the day after, you have someone else telling you it’s something in-between the previous two explanations! No wonder social media is so confusing. So what does it mean?

To be honest, social media is exactly what you want it to be. You want it to be a way of finding cool and interesting websites that you would never have found before? Sign up to Stumbleupon. You want to know what blogs are popular? Get yourself a Technorati account. History of all the comments you’ve ever left? Backtype. And the list goes on.

For me, however, the true meaning of social media can be found in the way that people who would normally be business competitors offer support, knowledge and different expertise to those who need it.

I’ll give you an example. On my Twitter account, I’m probably connected to around 40 or so people from the PR and copywriting industry, whether it’s through me following them or them following me (or both, even). Now, in the “normal” business world, they would be competitors so you’d think the last thing we would want to do is help the other out.

Yet instead, Twitter sees any request for help or advice answered almost immediately, and often with information that would offer a distinct advantage if kept private. Now to me, that’s social media at its finest.

Yes, we’re all in business and we all want to succeed, but gone is the “at all costs” attitude of the last decade and beyond. With the Internet opening up a whole new world of commerce and potential customers, there really is enough to go round for everyone. And people are realizing that.

Not only that, but people are also encouraging others to succeed and offering up the tools with which to push for that success. You can’t get much more of a truer meaning of social than that, media or otherwise. Perhaps we should get the leaders of the world into social media? After all, they could use all the help they can get.