Are you an event manager or promoter looking to use new tools to more effectively get the word out on your next event?  The Social Media Club of Madison recently played host to Chris Brogan who, in the social media channel at least, is a guru and

thought leader.  We had several components of the total event to promote and looked to social media channels and tools to do the promotion and word of mouth extension.  I had a vested interest in making this work both as a social media consultant and  personally because Chris Brogan is my go to thought leader and has provide significant guidance for me on the path to being a trust agent.

Creating an event with a twist

For the benefit of anyone thinking of some type of social media campaign integrated with traditional efforts, I thought I would relate the activities that the Social Media Club Board Members,  the Madison social media community, and a few individuals did to promote this event.  Over all we engaged the community, shared user generated content, and created dialogue. We had a relatively short period of time to work with – just 6 weeks.  I would certainly recommend more planning and more time to promote such an event. More time would also allow the media distribution across various channels move a little more than it did.  That being said, we accomplished a lot in the time we had-using primarily social media tools and word of mouth.

The kernel of thought

Chris Brogan was brought to Madison by American Family Insurance to present an internal social media related training. The date was slightly in flux from last October, as to when American Family would be able to have Chris Brogan speak.  Part of their contract negotiated a separate presentation to the public. The decision was made to offer this program to Accelerate Madison, as one of the leading technology focused professional groups in Madison, to promote. Accelerate Madison in turn coordinated activities with the Social Media Club of Madison who planned and executed the free Brogan After Dark After Party (with Chris Brogan) in attendance.

Create a game plan

Some time in the first week of May, with a finalized date confirmed, the first contacts were made between Accelerate Madison and the leadership team of the Social Media Club of Madison.  The SMC, which usually has Skype conference calls before events,  quickly scheduled a face to face  board meeting on May 15th to finalize the action plan for promoting the Chris Brogan Event. We implemented BaseCamp to provide a better resource for managing this project and the future events the club intends to sponsor. The main Social Media Club site also provides access to PBworks for consolidating notes, information, calendars etc and its has an RSS feed to allow updates to get to the right individuals.

Step 1:  Planning

TIMELINE: Saturday, May 15th SM Club Board Meeting – Monday, June 21, 2010 Brogan Presentation. 6 weeks.

• OBJECTIVES – Fill the 300 person auditorium reserved for this event.

• STRATEGY – Develop a campaign aimed at getting a broad category of individuals, large business, Small Midsized Business and education representatives to attend this event. Ensure that Accelerate Madison members, for whom the event was free, and Social Media affectionatos in the greater Madison area, knew about and had access to either event. Decide where “home” is and have all links send back to that location

• KEY MESSAGES – Focus on Madison being a technology savy community (think Google Fiber RFP) and ready to get a thought leader to speak. Active social media community – Social Media Club, Social Media Breakfast, Meetups and Tweetups ongoing, copious technology hardware and software groups. Share that this is thought leader  presentation, social media author, special event and fun.

• TOOLS – Email lists, Blogs, word of mouth, local calendar /event board postings, Pitchengine.com, local media resources, Twitter, Youtube, WordPress, IMBY.info, Slideshare, Event Brite, LinkedIn, Facebook, Foursquare, and yes picking up the good old phone.

• MEASUREMENT – #1 – total seats filled at presentation. #2 – total attendees at After party.  Planned to measure indirect and direct indicators of impact, including: Web site hits, calls and e-mails, comments, posts, pictures, video, and media coverage.

• COMMUNICATIONS PLAN – We involved board members of the Social Media Club of Madison, Social Media Breakfast, American Family, and Accelerate Madison.  Many of the team members were public relations professionals with  social media skill.   They provided ideas that were then assembled into a quick action plan.Members of all organizations were asked to pass along, RT, share links, digg news stories, stumble, and bookmark posts and images.

1. Registration landing page created – Accelerate
2. Eventbrite event page created with all details for After Party
3. LinkedIn Event setup (Presentation and After Party)
4. Facebook Event setup (Presentation and After Party)
5. Use a socialcrm tool like Xeesm.com to target key invitees, sponsors or promoters of the event
6. Plan Blog Posts ( at least 1 per week)
7. Plan Twitter Activity (use MadisonSMC account for event)
8. Post to all local digital and print calendars
9. Solicit After Party event SWAG sponsors
10. Collect questions and video interviews to drive awareness and excitement of event
11. Create Social Media Press Release for presentation and after party
12. Pursue interview at TV stations
13. Pursue print interviews/stories with newspapers
14. Create videos for Youtube promotion
15. Use and suggest  status updates out each week for connections
16. Get regular updates out on Twitter and ask for RT
17. Traditional word of mouth
18. Encourage people to bookmark, Digg, Delicious, and buzz any and all efforts.
19. Calls to Media outlets for story lines and press conference
20. Setup Press conference
21. Capture the event in pictures and video
22. Make arrangements for online streaming and recording
23. Get sign copies of Trust agent books and give away
24. Create followup blog posts to recap event (include link to recorded presentation)
25. Upload pictures from event  – tag madisonsmc
26. Upload video from event

STEP 2: PUT PLAN INTO ACTION

(TIMELINE: May 24 – June 21st)

1. Branding – make sure #MadisonSMC is mentioned in tweets and is used else where on events
2. WEB SITE (May 25)– the SMC site was updated for the event and two people committed to blog and post each week prior to the event.
3. Sponsors – if expecting 300 attendees, we needed 10-20 SWAG sponsors or limit bags
4. Event Calendars (By June 1)- IMBY, YourHomeTownbiz, Isthmus, InBusiness, Accelerate Madison Website, AmericanTowns, Personal websites,  Plancast, EventBrite, Facebook, LinkedIn, Personal but public calendars
5. Social updates on sites (ongoing) – LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, Slideshare (select the ones that are most appropriate to your audience.
6. Social Media Press Release (2 weeks out) – Pitchengine
7. Blogs – Social Media Club, Examiner.com, WISocialMedia, MadisonSMC.  If necessary to capture buzz and community after your event, consider creating an event blog (ie Ning or similar site)
8. Groups/Pages: LinkedIn group posting, Facebook pages
8. Involve third party stakeholders – standup at your professional business meetings and mention the event. Winning the support of  other groups and community organizations can mean the difference between success and failure as they have valuable tools in the form of newsletters, e-mail lists and Web sites that can help carry messages further. For example, Disney Institute promotes their local events with non profits trade and professional associations and Chamber of Commerce groups to get the word out quickly to business owners.
9. Materials – Determined what materials would be needed to help spread event messages. List included: key messages for internal use, program, FAQs, newsletter, membership info, Web site copy for stakeholders, and media materials such as press releases
10. Call TV station NBC 15 for interview

Step 3. Execution Day of Event

Chris Brogan Presenting at Accelerate Madison/Social Media Club of Madison Event

KICKOFF – An event can be an easy way to generate news coverage and buzz. A press conference to officially announce the campaign could make an impact. We got a press release out on Pitchengine.  We secured a news interview on Channel 15 the week prior to the event.

LOCATION & TIMING –  The press conference on June 21 was a little last minute as we did not get final authorization until late on Friday before the event. Due to the speaking program that Chris Brogan was contracted for, the time slot of 3PM did not allow for TV stations to attend, nor did it allow for newspapers to get any details for stories for morning papers.

SPEAKERS & GUESTS – Accelerate Madison personally called key journalists and representatives in the Madison and greater Dane county area about the press conference.

LOGISTICS – Needs such as A/V, seating, parking and catering need to be determined well in advance. This was well handled by American Family who did a wonderful job with the food preparations prior to the event.

MEDIA RELATIONS – To ensure media attention throughout the campaign, we solicited attendance at event, and on-site, interview and photo opportunities.

BEST UNEXPECTED EVENT – Getting Oscar Mayer/Kraft Foods to arrange for  a couple of Wienermobile Hotdoggers to take Chris Brogan to the

Chris Brogan goes first class to airport in Wienermobile compliments of Oscar Mayer

airport instead of a car.

Step 4 Assess the Campaign

MEASUREMENT – After all the hard work of planning and executing the campaign, we took stock of results to determine success:

• web site visits –  We did not do a pre campaign benchmark which I would suggest to anyone else.  total traffic since January 2010 start up is 8,173 views.  The highest day was 290 and during the Brogan effort we had a high of 179 views.
• We had  300 people attend the event at American Family Training Center

Chart showing view build up on Madison SMC blog/website for Chris Brogan Event

• Blog posts – A total of fourteen posts (that I counted) were made between 7 blogs.

1. Social Media Club of Madison (host site)
2. Accelerate Madison (host site)
3. Wendy Soucie Consulting (board member)
4. Networkmindshare blog (boardmember)
5. Examiner/Madison Edition (national online news)
6. Blog site for the Wienermobile Hotdoggers
7. Miri Mcdonald blog (attendee)
8. Miscellaneous  pickups from blogs event pages  (At least 4 posts were made as followup stories to the event.)

• Presentations with photo collection – 1 posted on Slideshare.net

• Videos – 13 total, posted and tagged Madisonsmc on Youtube.

Final thoughts

I am not sure we used our member network as well as we could have. By breaking up the board members into groups focused on event setup and logistics, event promotion, member outreach, and followup, I think we could have used our members of both Accelerate Madison and Social Media Club more effectively. One thing I have found when I have been asked to buzz an event is that when I am given a list of 10 things to do, with concrete suggestions on places, wording to use and with deadlines to meet,  I do at least half of what is suggested – maybe in my own way, but I do it. Just asking to help out a bit is like asking someone to write a recommendation for you.  It usually happens quicker if you write a suggested framework first and let them (your recommender)  edit the document.

I also don’t think we effectively used Twitter. Next time I would define a stronger plan, created scheduled tweets to drive conversations mixed with promotion for the event.

You can see by the views of the website, the blog postings did generate traffic.  Next time I might do more outreach to members who have blogs and encourage them to post and link back at some frequency that they are comfortable with and one that would compliment the efforts of the main “home” blog.

There are certainly mistakes we made, but definitely a learning experience.  What have you done to promote an event using social media?  Please share your success stories and ideas in the comments.

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Xeesm gets all your social links in one place for better management

Best practices for managing and choosing your  social media profile name is not discussed but should be. Your name, is of course, your ultimate personal brand. Gone are the days of cute but anonymous profile names. In the age of authenticity and network building, people find you by keywords, real names and your email. Managing your online reputation can be best done if your profile name is claimed across all the social media channels you intend to use now or in the future. Finding the right tools to help you manage all these social sites is the next challenge and solved by a social business application like Xeesm.

What’s in a name

Consider first your reasons and goals for being on social media sites.  Just as a business should answer the question of ‘Why’, you should also define your goals and objectives for any particular site.  Whether you are managing your online reputation, a budding entrepreneur, connecting with alumni friends, looking for a job, changing careers, or  looking for venture capital be clear about what you are doing here to define what you need to accomplish.

• LinkedIn – A place for you to find people you know – use your full name, maiden name and middle initials. Don’t use a nickname, your company or product brand name when you customize the URL.
• Facebook – A place for you to find people you used to know – use your full name, maiden name or nickname most commonly used in the past. Facebook lets you customize the URL for your profile. With over 400M users on Facebook, don’t wait to see if your name is available for your personal profile and your business page if you have one.
• Twitter – A place for you to find people you want to know – With some character limitations in Twitter for the displayed profile name its important for you to enter the data in several ways. Use your full name on the account and abbreviate your name only if you have to for the username. You can always setup another account with the clever username as a second profile.
• Slideshare – A place to share your expertise in a visual presentation format
• Youtube – A place for you to share video and the third largest search engine.

Steps to take

You should first make a list of the different variations of your name that are acceptable. If you have a more common name, your middle initial is a must.  Use nicknames only if you are also known in business by that name. My brother is a third generation Donald with his son also called Donald (IV).  He has been know by the name “Skip” since he was 3 years old. I don’t even think his business associates even know his real name. In that case he would use his nick name incorporated into his profile.

There are several sites that can save you some time to find out if your name is available across several social sites at one time. Knowem and Namechk are two of the more popular ones. Both are continually adding new social sites.  Knowem has monetized the service nicely by adding the paid feature of creating your profiles on any selected sites for you. They even have an ongoing service

Claim your name

If you have an understanding of your goals and have created a strategy about your activity you should know the type of social media sites that will best serve you.  You can choose to signup for those sites one at a time or claim them all at one time (its just time and money after all).  Just as we would recommend using the same profile picture across all your social profiles, especially if you are new to social media, use the same profile name across all your sites if you can.

As a business owner, author  or even a celebrity, its important to reserve your name.  There is some squatting going on for user names, so don’t regret waiting around to claim your name.

Customizing your profile URL

If you haven’t done it yet, several of the top social sites provide ways to customize your personal profile. If you are on Facebook go to www.facebook.com/username.  If you can’t get your first choice it will suggest other variations for you. If you are building a business page on Facebook, you can’t actually name your page with a custom URL until you have 25 or more people following your page (or liking as the terms go these days).

Twitter does let you change your profile name in midstream from the settings page of your profile, but you will have to let your followers know about it so they can find you in a search. One of the key points in Twitter is to make sure your name in the account settings is your full name, and then if you have to shorten it for the username, its possible to find you under either variation.

LinkedIn is the one place to customize your profile URL to your complete name.  Although you can change it, you do want to promote your LinkedIn profile link, and making changes just doesn’t help your presence. You can edit the URL under Edit My Profile tab and click on the edit link beside the URL link in the boxed profile section of your profile.  Remember no spaces or hypens as the characters are limited.

I have found that on Youtube and Slideshare that I have taken a slightly different approach. On Slideshare, a social site for sharing presentations and documents, I have classified my account name under my business name (Wendy Soucie Consulting) as opposed to my personal name, even though my personal name is the actual URL Slideshare.net/wsoucie.  On Youtube I have created a Business channel under Youtube/wendysoucie  and then created a separate personal video channel for miscellaneous videos that don’t fit with my business focus directly but which I still want to share.

Solving the problem of changing names

One tool that I have used to minimize the problem of managing social media site links is Xeesm.com.  It has a free social address link page and it lets me add as many links here as I need while only using one link on my emails or my business card. This is one site that you definitely need to create with your fixed name as you can’t change it later.

Take your time before you decide, but the default will be the name you enter into the first name and last name fields. If there are multiple users with similar names, but default it will auto generate numbers to add to the end. I don’t think this looks professional at all – so before you save it, try to find another acceptable combination with your middle initial etc.

Your name is your personal brand. Don’t let someone else be the first to abscond with your identity. Consider your strategy, your goals, check what’s available, claim it and then manage it with Xeesm.

Did you get your name?

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I am sharing my experiences with the SocialCRM tool Xeesm over the course of the next few months. I have made a strategic decision to use a Social CRM tool instead of a contact management tool like ACT! (which I actually deleted from my computer).  Perhaps my experience as a BETA tester and a new Business Partner with the Xeesm product will be helpful to other innovative sales professional looking for tools that help with their social business relationships.

This week has been full of success and failures with data entry.  In my over zealous attempts to get all my contacts as quickly into Xeesm, I relearned several lessons my mother taught me that clearly apply to getting started with Xeesm Edge.

Patience is a virtue

Although I could enter contacts one at a time into Xeesm, doing that for over 6,000 contacts seemed monumental. I wanted to use the upload feature so I didn’t have to do as much work.  In my efforts to quickly get  all of my contacts in as quickly as possible, I exported my Gmail contacts and uploaded them into the import tool.

First I was impatient and hit the button twice for submit.  Instead of uploading 6,000 contacts, I duplicated them and had 12,000. Unlike Google Gmail contacts or Outlook, there is no “you have duplicates” so you have to delete things.  Or start over.

My data was not entirely accurate before I started.  I should have at least sorted for those with email addresses and only uploaded those. The data, once you get it into the Contact Manager, is somewhat cumbersome.  It would be much easier to manipulate, delete, correct, etc. in a spreadsheet than online.

Tip 1: Export your contacts into a spread sheet prior to uploading into Xeesm. Only upload those contacts associated with an email address, eliminate duplicates, and edit out extraneous titles and certification abbreviations attached to the contact name.

Something worth doing is worth doing right.

If you have the business version of Xeesm you have the ability to setup Categories and Flights (Groups) of contacts prior to uploading. This is something worth doing before you just upload contacts. Doing a little strategic thinking about how to group contacts, partners, prospects, and clients will be important to spend less time identifying them once in Xeesm.

The categories I set up were: professional association contacts (broken down by group name), clients, partners, teams, manufacturing prospects, professional service firm prospects, Wisconsin prospects, national prospects, Social Media Academy Alumni, Integrated Alliances Certified Trainers, and Xeesm Business Partners.  The flights I created were more granular and focused on my short and midterm business efforts.

Tip 2: By having the categories and flights created, I can now add a column in the spread sheet prior to uploading the contacts.  Now they will go directly into the flight and the category that is appropriate. Definitely a time saver.

Have you created your Xeesm yet? If you are one of my contacts on LinkedIn, search and find your profile, claim it, and add your social links.

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Radio interviews are social media too!

Text, video, pictures, and audio podcasts are all pieces of information that can be shared on social media sites. If you get a chance to be interviewed in print, TV or radio, be sure to say yes!  Afterward grab the file to embed in your web page, blog or social networking site. I have been on the radio several times in January and February and intend to post on my blog, share on Facebook, post to Examiner.com, and transcribe for a future blog post.

How do you get on a radio show?

It helps to be in the right place at the right time. Dr. Kathleen Paris asked me to work with a group of her clients on the subject of LinkedIn and improving their online profiles. One of the attendees was Carol Koby, radio show host of All About Living on WTDY.

Carol is the producer and host of All About Living and Living Minutes, is one of the most experienced broadcasters in our market. A former women’s director and reporter for WITI-TV in Milwaukee and consumer advocate for WKOW-TV in Madison, she also moderated the Picture of Health cable television series for University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics.

Carol had a last minute cancellation and I had some time, so I headed over to Clear Channel to record what turned out to be a great time talking with Carol about social media. In the hour, we covered what it is, how to use it, what to be careful of and various personal stories about each of us using our favorite sites.

Do it yourself radio or TV

Find out who the local talk show hosts (TV and Radio) are in your area and supply them a one page sheet on specific topics you are available to speak on. Follow HARO (Help a reporter out site) for postings of journalists needing subject matter experts. If they don’t call you right away, consider recording your own.

With a audio recording device, make it into a mp3 and post it. Itunes is full of podcasts that you can download or upload for little to no cost. Or use a flip video camera or better to capture yourself or others in video and post anywhere you would like.  I have been doing this on my blogs, incorporating my Youtube channel at the same time.

If you want to get a little more sophisticated, get the help of a local Toastmaster International group. This is a public speaking organization that I have belonged to since 1979.  Not only did my self-paced training and practice prepare me for being interviewed by Carol, many Toastmaster participants are preparing themselves for interviewing others and would love to help you record your session.

Listen to the interview here or head to Open Source Audio

Start practicing today for your day in the spotlight! How are you going to more visible this year?

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Image via Wikipedia

In Part 1 of this series, I suggested you look at your existing marketing content to see how you might re purpose this for social media.  We created 5 new pieces of content from your company’s Frequently Asked Questions. For Part 2, let’s work on what you can do with this new material.

Creating social media accounts  – its about people

Next, let assume that you aren’t currently on any social media site – you will have to create a couple of accounts at some social media sites.  Remember these are not anonymous business accounts.  Decide what staff person is interested and willing to participate on social media sites and is ready with your support to do this long term. Allocate a set amount of time each day or each week, create guidelines and policies for this individual that support your business goals.

1. Create accounts at Youtube.com, pitchengine.com, Ezine or doc.com, Slideshare.net, and Itunes.

2. Write and edit your article

3. Edit your video clip with free, simple video editing software. Windows Movie Maker and Flip Video editing software are both free products.

4. Build a PowerPoint presentation of less that 10 slides. use only 1 intro slide with contact info on it and repeat as first and last slide.

5. Create an audio file from the separate digital recording of the Q&A interview (should be done at the same time as the flip video recording.

Tips: Brand your video or slide set with a title, your website and contact info to the beginning and end of clip/presentation. Also make sure you introduce each person in the audio recording prior to the interview so you capture that in sound.

Add appropriate content to social media sites

1. Post article on enews sites, pitchengine.com, event on your website, trade website, online news site and local news paper.

2. Post video on Youtube.com and your website/blog.  Share the link with your connections.

3. Upload audio to Itunes.com in the podcast category. Share with your connections.

4. Add the PowerPoint slides to Slideshare.net.  Share with your connections.

Tip:  Make sure you use the tag features for each social media site.  This is especially important for the video, audio and slide content.

Then make sure your customers know about this free information by

• Send email out to your mailing list giving them the links to wherever you posted content.
• Update your status on any active social media sites.
• Ask every employee at the company (and yes, they are on social media) to do the same.

For traditional marketing efforts, add the link into your next print newsletter, add as note in your invoices, add as signature in your emails and on any letters.

Next month, pick another piece of marketing material, previous article or interview and start the process over again.

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This is a good question and one that I have been asked at every meeting I have with a business.  You are not

alone in asking. As business owners, we are concerned with the return of investment of our time, any costs involved and we want to see change and sales revenue increase right away.  If this is a hard question for you to answer even to yourself, perhaps, you are asking the wrong question.

The start of customer engagement

If you are interested in true customer engagement, I believe your question should change to “How can I use social media to help others?”

I define social media this way: It is a two-way conversation via the Internet (from many to many) bringing shared knowledge that benefits and brings value to the people involved.

What value can the knowledge you have of your business, products, personal passions, or favorite activities have to others?

What if you freely shared that information?

Social media works by sharing your content via text, images, slides, video or audio. Businesses win by solving problems.  Customers win by educating themselves using the media that best suits their lifestyle, time availability and depth of knowledge. All this is done in the space/place that each individual spends his available time.

So then, what should I do?

First, its OK to take baby steps with social media. You have my permission to do little things.

Second, don’t make a sales pitch and this is not just free advertising.

So, lets get started.

It helps to take marketing materials already created and just re purpose them.  For example, most every business has a list of frequently asked questions or could come up with this pretty quickly.

Using this material as our knowledge base, here are some ideas:

1. Collect frequently asked questions used in your business
2. Write it up as an article between 300 and 500 words.
3. Video yourself or others answering each question (video each question separately and make answers between 60 secs and 1 1/2 minutes max).
4. Have someone else record, separately, the audio for the interview /answer questions video, with digital recorder( mp3) Length should be the same as the video.
5. Create a slide show of the Q & A with good product pictures. Answer the questions using product pictures or step by step pictures and limited text.

You have just created 5 pieces of original content that can be placed on no less than 5 different types of social media sites as well as being added to your very own website.

Stay tuned for Part 2 where we will talk about what to do with this new content in the social web.

Do you have content you can already use?

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Wendy Soucie Twitter Following

• Nurture marketing & social media combine to form End Result Marketing, Madison WI.www.endresultmarketing.com http://pitch.pe/31739 #
• #FF1 @rondavies one cool dude in a suit, capable of video blogging while crossing Canada , Twitter genius and coach. #
• #FF1 @loriruff this lady knows linkedin and can get more done while sick than some people in a lifetime. Go to gal for social media 4sure #
• Q&A #Linkedin What do you do if you get an invitation from someone you don’t want to link to? If not comfortable just archive invite. #
• Q&A #Linkedin How are they making money? Only Linkedin is making money – not twitter or facebook. Advertising, upgrades, corp contracts. #
• Q&A #Linkedin Whats comming on Linedin? Advanced search, for people and companies. Learn how to use existing relationships better . #
• Q&A #Linkedin Whats is the point of groups? connection from fun area. Better to be active and fewer groups. #
• Q&A #Linkedin How do you get an introduction? You should write targeted message which works better. #
• Q&A #Linkedin What and How do you better manage time? Set linkedin apts for time management. #
• Q&A #Linkedin What and How do you better manage the email generation and traffic created.? Use junk email address to manage communication. #
• Q&A #linkedin How can you share private documents? Not best use of Linkedin Groups for fewer than 5. Groups better for open conv. #
• Q&A #Linkedin How difficult it is to showcase two separate business? You can create multi current positions . You can have mult email. #
• Q&A #Linkedin do you see younger people turning to Linkedin versus Facebook? any place where 350M people gather there is business #
• Q & A on #Linkedin – why aren’t more people in Wisconsin using this tool. 48M across the world. Get more training #
• #Linkedin Tips – safe choice, but policy and internal dialogue between departments need to happen. #
• RT @Steve1derland: Rules of Engagement survey #Webtrends: Young people abandon if brands get too pushy http://bit.ly/2SRNPE #fuflu #
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• #Linkedin Tips – Check out the #rocktheworld contest winners. Learn what a good profile really looks like #
• LinkedIn tips – use aps to enhance your profile and make more interactive. #
• Linkedin Tips – company profile will eventually be created by Linkedin, but best to brand and do your own #
• RT @CREATEWisconsin: Wed Resource: Cultural Horizons of WI Wisconsin Public Television – Great for the classroom! http://bit.ly/2KD8FK #
• tips on Linkedin company profiles – underused #
• tips on Linkedin use – set your connect settings. Recruiters are supposed to respect requests for no contact on jobs #
• Linkedin all business for C-level executives – fortune 500 on linkedin #
• Obama in Madison today at school . #
• 11/4 presentation on Linkedin over subscribed today (over 250) . Great need for understanding and training. #
• First business bank had over subscribed nonprofit social media presentation last month October – #
• At First business bank presentation at monona terrace. Michael Phelps speaking on linkedin #
• finishing up presentation to private group of job seekers on Linkedin. So many senior exec looking. Best practices for high visibility. #
• RT: @endresultmarketing Nurture marketing: a strategically superior alternative to drip marketing http://bit.ly/103br7 #
• RT: @wendysoucie Blogs, websites and integration | Social Media Breakfast Madison http://bit.ly/13fYWL Free event just rsvp #

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Related posts:

1. Twitter Weekly Updates for 2009-09-27
2. Twitter Weekly Updates for 2009-10-18
3. Twitter Weekly Updates for 2009-09-13

Social Media Profiles – Tips on Photos and Headshots

When was the last time you really looked at the picture you are using on your social media profiles?  Does it give the perception you hope for?

Wendy Soucie 1987

I had been using a photo taken for a press release that was twenty years old.  It was good in its time and I looked younger, but it was in black and white and by others standards, a bit dated. After putting up with digs by friends when I used it for a quarterly community voice column I was writing, I started to think maybe I should redo.  When I started to get very engaged in social media I knew it was time.

Pictures on social media profiles are very important.

1.  It builds on consistency across profiles and messages

2.  People can see exactly what you look like

3.  If you have a common name, you can be better identified

4.   It feels more trustworthy

Are you using an old picture or another type of avatar?

Getting the picture done right is worth a little extra time, attention to detail and in many some cases may be worth having a professional get a series for catching you in various poses and attire.  Amy Lynn Schereck recently presented at the Social Media Breakfast – Madison and talked about copyright, attire, makeup, jewelry, and posing.    I am a firm believer in using a plain, old, real picture of you.  Others feel there is more flexibility in using transformed pictures or cartoons.  Specific tips on what to wear and how to take your own pictures for social media profiles is covered well at Lisa Stewart – Creative Goddess.

Do I use casual or professional photo?

Wendy Running on the Ice Age Trail - Bill Beers Photo Credit

Early on when I started using social media sites, I tried to keep some strictly personal and others professional.  I tried using a few of my own outdoor pictures as profiles on the personal sites. I thought I should have a different look on different social  media sites.  So I tried a few casual shots for profiles.

It ended up being a mashup of looks across all my sites.  As I started to grow my network, I connected with professional contacts more deeply and they wanted to connect with me on sites they were more active on, such as Facebook, Slideshare and even Youtube. The separation between business and social began to blur.

None of us can afford to be perceived as just business or just social.  If your potential clients only connect with you on Facebook and non of your professional and business interest are evident then they will only think of you from a social perspective.  The same occurs on places like LinkedIn – your connection may only see and experience you as a serious business person only talking about the latest award, closed deal, business related activity.  You need to mix up these spaces with your personality.

I am both social and professional

I found it difficult to only be social / casual on some sites while trying to maintain strict professional comments and business related ideas on others.  I also realized that I not singularly one or the other.  If I am being authentic and showing people who I am, I have a lot of fun in life, take the work I do seriously and with great passion but I try not to take myself too seriously and love to find the humor in what I do. Laughing is not an option in life – it’s a requirement.  So I decided to move to one picture for all my profiles.  The benefit of this was
•    Consistency across profiles
•    People will recognize me (those in my network see me much more often in business attire)
Besides, I can add other pictures to Facebook, Flicker and Picassa to show other sides of what I do.

Quick but Professional

Wendy Soucie - Amy Lynn Schereck Photo Credit

The next photo was done quickly, no special lighting, no real time to prepare or think about what I was wearing and perception. I happened to be at the same restaurant for a meeting as my friend Amy Lynn Schereck and she was kind enough to take a current shot, doing an outstanding job in the lobby with window light.

The negatives to this picture were the dark back ground and my dark hair, but I had a blazer on and simple jewelry so it was useful for my immediate needs.

Headshot done right

The most recent update was also done by Amy Lynn Schereck in a studio with controlled lighting, non seasonal attire, simple and limited jewelry and a dark (black) suit coat. It is simple, professional and works across all my profiles and business needs.  This matches the way I dress every day for business so I feel it reflects me.

Wendy Soucie 10-09 Amy Lynn Schereck Photo Credit

Since LinkedIn doesn’t let you add multiple pictures my network can see the other facets of my life by the various applications and writing I do there.  Examples are my volunteer activities, comments I write, my NetworkedMindshare blog link, and I usually talk about a week end activity to see who else has a smilar interest.

What do you do if you are not a suit and tie person?

If you have jobs, occupations or business that you would never wear a suite for -  don’t.  Amy was nice enough to give me permission to use a few examples of people in other occupations.

A chef and restaurant owner

Amy Lynn Schereck Photo Credit

Gary Nski, Photographer with tools of his trade.

Gary Nski - Photographer

Before and After

For someone interested in doing a complete redo with a professional sitting and selected attire, consider Dabney Porte . She has used several pictures on her social media sites that tie in nicely with her facebook and twitter pages.  Dabney lives in Baltimore, but I have met her in person and she is as lively and vivacious as her pictures convey.  She has a sassy but professional concern about her clients and they absolutely love her attitude and the help she provides. I have connected with her on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook.

New Dabney Porte picture

Old Dabney Porte Picture -

I think her pictures reflect her style and her personality!

Take a look at your profile pictures.  Do yours do the same?

Related posts:

1. Madison Social Media Breakfast|Profiles and Copyright
2. Profile Names on Social Media Sites | Tips and Techniques
3. Social media for the rest of us | Radio Interview | Tips and Techniques

Managing your time wisely and effectively to allow yourself to write a blog, a column, a newsletter and a book review, may be easy for a seasoned journalist, but a technically focused, word-challenged, social networker needs to have other strategies in place. Fellow marketing consultant and friend Steve Gasser and wife Beth recently had a good post on their blog about 5 tips to writing regular blog posts .  It provided some good tips to generate ideas on blog topics.  Some I plan to implement.  What I really need help with is a bigger topic – that of overall content generation management, before time management gets the best of me.

Is it a problem because I am an engineer?

Here is my problem.  I am an engineer.  I never really liked to write much or thought I was very good at it. I did take an interesting college writing class and it explored some new areas for me, but I stayed an engineer and really liked lab reports.  I actually believe that my identical twin sister has the real creative writing talents.
As in everything I do for my clients, I am trying to build an authority blog strategy and learn about my social media at a deeper thought level. What’s hard it figuring out how best to integrate writing for these commitments into my work and everyday life without living on the computer, attached to it like an umbilical cord.

Content is king and gets you found

The Internet and search is about content.  Google loves user generated content.  Social Media sites are the search engine’s darlings at this point in time with new fresh content being generated in 140 character bites or more every second.
Writing should help people find me in the clutter of consultants, websites and people on the Internet.  I write for my blogs – Network Mindshare and Wisconsin Social Media, a column for an online magazine – MadisonSocialMediaExaminer.com (bi-monthly), a book review – BookReview.com (monthly), a column for an online newsletter – financial services newsletter (monthly), local news sources – LodiValleyNews.com and Lodi Enterprise (occasional), as well as two other blogs that ask me to be a contributing author – Social Media Academy and Black Diamonds (occasional).  They are all important for me to be recognized as an expert and authority resource in my area of expertise. I also try to comment at least once each day on other blogs that I find interesting, stimulating, controversial, or in my hobby area.
All this takes time and I am finding that I must manage my time better and be as creative as I can with what I do write.  I took a time management quiz with a friend and was just shy of the category for “immediate intervention help” with my current schedule and hectic management style.

How do you make it all work?

It would be great if I could write one post, twist it and reword it, then place it everywhere.  But each writing assignment has a slightly different emphasis.
No one says that blog posts or articles have to be a particular size to be of value.  Chris Brogan and Seth Godin often have very short (200-400 word) posts that are very direct, focused and incite full.  Brian Solis has some very long ones that I set aside to read with more time.  Axel Schultze of the Social Media Academy, recently had a bunch of short small thoughts.  It was like getting a handful of M&Ms that left you still wanting more. If you have an inspirational moment and write a tome, stop before you post it and see if you can’t post pieces throughout the week that have a soap opera effect and draw your readers to click through each update to see where the story goes.

Preparation is key

Here are some quick thoughts on organizing ideas and material for blogs and articles.  Let’s assume this is all online, but it could easily be folders on your desk.  I plan to create computer files to access this data

• To Do – spread sheet with items organized by date and also placed on my daily calendar.
• Blog Ideas –thoughts and pages found in magazines, books and Internet (bookmarked on delicious, digg, stumbleupon).
• Blogging Tips – suggestions found on the Internet (bookmarked on delicious.com).
• Interviews – I carry a flip video and digital camera with me all the time. Perfect for impromptu interviews that can be video posts or transcribed. (bookmarked also on Youtube).
• Articles – Ideas for articles, scans of other articles that impressed me, research, white papers, ebooks (bookmarked on delicious, digg, reddit).
• Book Reviews – ones you do yourself and ones by others (posted on Squidoo, Amazon, website, blog, online newspaper).

Can anyone help by adding your own ideas?  If you have a blog, what strategies do you use? Comment back and perhaps we can all help each other. I hope to make some progress and actually sleep some nights instead of writing.

Related posts:

1. Thoughts on blogs|Week of October 4, 2009
2. Blogs, websites and integration | Social Media Breakfast Madison
3. Social Injustice | Thoughts on Blogs | Wk Oct 16, 2009

Has your social media link list been growing as you become more engaged in social media of all types and sizes? How do you choose which ones to put on your email, list on your website, attach to your blog, or link on Twitter?

New software is available and making these decisions easier every day. Recently I have had the opportunity to be part of a group using a BETA software called www.xeesm.com which is providing me a place to consolidate my growing number of social media links.

What to do about business cards

I was just beginning to sweat about my new business cards and how to read everything I wanted to put on them.  Somehow a 5×7 card to hand out just doesn’t fit as well in a  pocket.

The email links in my signature line was growing from just a website and LinkedIn profile, to 5 or 6 I thought were important. My glasses weren’t helping either.

I now have a new option from www.xeesm.com. They even seem to listen to suggestions because already 2 or 3 of the sticky points I pointed out have already been taken care of.  One of my suggestions was prefilling the social media configuration for each common social media link.  I can’t always remember how each URL is setup and the change made it easier to fill in just my profile name.

Social Media Link Consolidation

So far I have just ten links added here. The effort actually made me review all my social media profiles and begin to clean up a few so they were consistent.  I also had to decide if I do want every one located there.  I guess some are ones that people just don’t need to find.  Easy enough to add over time when I have time.

Reporting

I like the reporting, although basic,  because it allows me to see my changes over time.

Wendy Soucie www.xeesm.com report

Since I started the test, they have added more networking functions but I am just beginning to explore those.

Another review of this software on Talent Zoo by Jeff Cotrupe (www.xeesm.com/Jeff) highlighted the fact that you can’t reorganize the social media sites in the list.  I also found that I couldn’t add my own that weren’t already in the list.  I am sure they are working on some of that but we will see.

In the meantime, my contacts have been giving me good feedback on my links and thoughts on the site.  Many have chosen to sign up as well.

I will update my report once a month to check out my visits.

Related posts:

1. Want a social media education? Five reasons you should!
2. Citrix/Webex Social Media Assessment by Social Media Academy Alumni
3. How can social media help my business? Part 2