websense

With Twitter has come a whole new language, beyond the LOLs and MHOs and so on. The “Tweetup” is a somewhat new phenomenon, and an old one. The new part being that you let folks know about it via Twitter, and the old part is that it is any kind of get-together, whether it be friends meeting for drinks, or a networking event. If you’d like to hold a Tweetup of your own, TKG has some great pointers on the “dos” and “don’ts” of the Tweetup!

Tweetups can be just for fun, or friends, or fans, too. Celebrities have been known to cause accidental tweetups when tweeting about where they are headed for dinner. Tweetups happen in every city, just Google your city’s name and “tweetup” and choose your tweetup!

TKG has hosted several Tweetups, and it has been a great way to get a little “face time” with folks you Tweet with, but have not met, or don’t see often. As always, with anything Web related, be careful about where you are going, just watch out for yourself, and always Tweetup with strangers in a public place.

When it comes to the web, there are always new terms being tossed around. A fairly interesting one I have come across several times that seems rather pertinent to the discussion of SEO/SEM and all things social is something called a “Digital Sociologist”. What is a digital sociologist, you ask? Great question – one I would like answered myself.

A digital sociologist is a person who studies the behavior of people when using digital technology, with it’s main focus on social media usage. This new study of people will probably remind you of the discussion we have had here many times on the topic of tribalization. Tribalization, if you recall, is the phenomena of people banding together on the web around a particular blogger, forum, brand, idea, belief, or what have you. Part of digital sociology would be to study this phenomena, and perhaps figure out how to make it work for your brand.

So many things are happening on the web. It’s only natural that some formal study of the behavior of people on the web take place. We (and most SEOs) have been doing it for years in the form of analytics. But, analytics alone can only tell us so much. They tell us what channel a user comes from, what pages they visited, what they bought, or where they spent most of their time on a particular site. From these analytics we can make educated guesses to help us tweak our strategies, but taking all of this a step further, to actually understand the feeling and beliefs of the user may help define a strategy to a greater extent. For some, it will help define why people behave they do about a particular blogger, brand, belief, etc.

Below is a very brief presentation on Digital Sociology by Ali Hadi. I would like to take the discussion much deeper, as I think this will ultimately have an impact on the way we do our jobs, especially as they pertain to social media and SEO/SEM.

Small businesses have a great opportunity with social media. It presents a “word of mouth” type of advertising that is sadly lacking in traditional marketing. People, oddly enough, are now looking to the web, and the people they ‘meet’ there, to help them make sound decisions on many major issues, including just about any purchase you can imagine. Brian Solis has an interesting article about small business utilizing digital sociology and social media if you’d like to read further and join the discussion.

Always on the lookout for my small business clients and friends, I have happened across and interesting offer from RatePoint, Inc. RatePoint provides copy in the form of testimonials, customer feedback, that sort of thing, for use on it’s clients’ web sites. This is a free offer for small business owners who are trying to maintain their online reputation. The services includes:

•Unlimited collection of reviews and testimonials from customers
•Unlimited automatic posting of content, such as newsletters, coupons and offers to Facebook and Twitter by simply checking a box
•Unlimited use of online surveys to collect customer insights
•Unlimited e-mail campaigns to a list of up to 125 contacts

This might work for some of you who need a hand in this department, but aren’t looking to spend money on it. I’ve mentioned here numerous times how important it is to build your brand and maintain your reputation online. This service may be helpful to you. It’ll probably be a bit cookie cutter, after all, it is a free service, but I’d wager that it has some very good points to it. There is a catch, each of the services offered have limitations. Such as only 125 email contacts for each email, you can’t post a review after 30 days, etc. These carry extra fees, thought they are minimal.
Overall, it is for sure better than nothing. If you have tried it or are using it, let me know what you think of it, I’d be interested to hear.

If you got our Spring Newsletter (way back in March), or read this blog very often, you know I use LinkedIn and feel that it has some real potential to be more relevant in the business world, in some cases than other forms of social media. In my mind, it just makes sense. It has great potential for driving traffic to your site, especially with some of the new features.

LinkedIn has in recent months added a number of new features to enable users to spread their brand over a number of applications. You can now “follow” other companies and thus, users can “follow” you. You can link your blog to LinkedIn pull your posts into your profile. It also will find all blogposts by those in your network, making it easy to keep up with the business blogs that are important to you. You can also have your LinkedIn status feed your Twitter account to get your business some additional exposure, as well as traffic.

LinkedIn has a video stream called InTips, with lots of pointers on ways to make the most of your profile. One of the really cool aspects of this is that they have developed a series of six videos for students or people graduating from college. Best ways to find a job, beef up your profile and resume, and so on. If you belong to one of those two groups, I highly recommend you check out these very helpful videos and create or work on your profile, it could really help you find the best position for you.

LinkedIn has also developed an integration with Microsoft to make networking with your contacts in Outlook that much easier. I’m all for making this stuff easier, and when it comes to using social media to make connections or drive traffic to your business or e-commerce site, I think LinkedIn should be your first stop.
Chris Crum has a great post on LinkedIn over at WebProNews. Definitely worth a look.

So, do you use LinkedIn? What are your favorite aspects of it? Are you getting traffic from LinkedIn?

There’s a study out that says something like a third of all online adults have quit using some facet of social media because of other people’s rude comments or behavior on a blog or other social media outlet. About half say they have blocked or defriended someone because of rude behavior. Great article about it over at WebProNews.

This goes back to a topic I’ve discussed on here a time or two in the past. Being respectful online, not bashing others, not making illegitimate claims against a company just because you have a voice on the web. You might think this does not apply to a business blog, but I assure you, some very interesting discussions go down on blogs of every variety. There was a lot of heated discussion on the Chrysler blog when the car manufacturer took government funds to keep it’s doors open. Manufacturers of every type get comments and discussions on their company blogs, especially when there has been a recall or other failure.

If you are using social media to discuss some hot button topics, or simply need to reply to a less than flattering comment on your blog, there are a couple of things you need to keep in mind, so you don’t end up driving away readers.

1. When posting about a controversial topic, whether it be politics or what have you, it’s a good idea to ask that any follow discussion be kept respectful. It just reminds folks to remember that the other people reading the discussion are people, not anonymous drones without feeling.
2. Always be respectful yourself. No problem with disagreement, we have to have the ability to openly discuss, just keep it clean, keep it kind. No need to be hurtful or use profanity.
3. When commenting, it’s great to leave your name and url, especially if you have a dissenting argument. It lends credibility. It also leaves a trackback, in most cases, to your own blog or website.
4. Know that whatever you say, you can’t please everyone, so stay true to your company’s mission statement, and do your best to remedy any complaint with a product or service. Knowing what folks are saying about you can go a long way toward maintaining your online reputation and allows you the opportunity to make things right, if possible. Some people are just going to be negative – just do your best to keep the discussion on topic.
5. Deleting comments can be tricky. I don’t recommend you do it unless the comment contains profanity, or is intentionally and personally hurtful (to you or another commenter). Try to keep the discussion open, and if things get dicey, try introducing some levity.
6. When commenting on a blog, or replying, try to react as you would if the person were standing right in front of you. Undoubtedly, this will lead you to be a bit kinder, a bit more reasonable, than you would be with total anonymity.

I recently had a couple of commenters take issue with a post I wrote about the oil leak in the Gulf. Both were very respectful, and I really appreciated the ability to dialogue in a rational manner. This is what is so great about the web. The ability to instantly share ideas makes the web what it is. Unfortunately, this experience is not always the case.