The Real Power of Social Media-4

Instead of focusing on one individual today, I have three more that came to mind as I was writing this series. While there are numerous others that I am sure are also making a difference, here are 3 that I have met that are not national celebs but are using Social Media to have an impact in real life in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

These include:

Andrew Hoffman. Andrew's background in the marketing world connected him to an organization called NeighborLink. Andrew is now the executive director and has used social media to promote the faith based volunteer organization that connects local people with needs with neighbors who can help. Check out their website.

Andrew also has been using his social media experience and connections with his alma mater, Huntington University. In January 2010 and 2011, he taught a class that introduced students to the power of Social Media and the impact they can have. This fall he has expanded that to a fall semester class.

Craig Crook. Among the notable things Craig has done recently was organize a TedX event which was an out growth of being a Linchpin. This isn't any easy accomplishment but it took someone like Craig to step forward and start the ball rolling.

Heather Schoegler also comes to my mind as someone who is highly involved in using Social Media as a tool to have an impact on real life. When you visit her twitter profile and see the multitude of ways she is connecting, you'll see why she was on my short list today.

I encourage you to connect with these folks yourself.

Tomorrow, an announcement of a big change.

ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS.

You can contact him here:

The Real Power of Social Media-2

Continuing my focus on the Real Power of Social Media, today I am going to introduce you to Randy Clark, another friend of mine who has had a tremendous impact on my life as well as many, many others.

In January of this year I was asked to be one of the panelists for the Social Media Breakfast in Fort Wayne and one of the other panelists was Randy.

Randy made the drive in the middle of a January snowstorm the night before from Indianapolis and that face to face connection has led to multiple life changing events.

I knew Randy somewhat via Twitter, and was invited to join him for an event he started called a Friend-Up in Indianapolis.

Randy's Friend-Up has become a monthly event that I started attending in April. Randy has mixed the Face to Face with Social by using a web service Posterous where notes are posted so those who were not able to attend in person can still see what's going on.

22 of Randy's friends are in this group and there are others not in the social media group who also attend the monthly gathering when they can.

It was my first visit to this group in April with just 5 of us that lead to my career move due to the sharing both in-person and on-line. And this summer I invited my brother in law who lives in Indy to join us and as a result, he ended up with some additional contacts and paying projects.

Randy Clark is under the radar of Twitter and Social Media Celebrities, but he is certainly demonstrating the Real Power of Social Media.

Okay, time for a confession. That last line was a not so subtle play on words that friends only friends of Randy would catch. Along with everything else that Randy does, he is also a member of the band Under The Radar. Check out their videos.

ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS.

You can contact him here:

The Real Power of Social Media-1

On Friday, I used Seth Godin as an example of the danger elevating individuals beyond the level of their expertise.

This week, I am going to shine the spotlight a few people that I know that are using Social Media as a tool to accomplish a greater good, other than elevating themselves.

Quite frankly there are dozens of others, but when I was contemplating this subject, 6 friends whom I have met via Twitter came to mind.

Kevin Mullett. I either first met Kevin face to face at a Social Media Breakfast in Fort Wayne or at a Tweet-Up. I was a web amateur with a few blogs and was just starting to earn some residual income from some of the pay-per-click ads that the Forbes Network placed on one of my sites.

Kevin is dynamic, knowledgeable, outspoken, gracious, and humble at the same time. He is a professional in the web world. He works for Cirrus ABS as their Director of Product Development and was the one who actively recruited me to join the Cirrus team this year. This picture of Kevin was snapped as we were having lunch in May talking about the opportunity.

One example of what Kevin does to keep social media "social" is what is going on tomorrow.

The Social Media Breakfast in Fort Wayne that I previously mentioned was launched locally by people who where not actively using social media and within a few months last year, it died due to lack of interest, lack of promotion and a lack of understanding.

Kevin was then asked to revive it and he has done so with a gusto that it really needed.
But Kevin has been careful to make it an "open event".
That means it is not sponsored by Cirrus ABS.

Tomorrow is our September Social Media Breakfast Fort Wayne. It is always the last Tuesday of the month with signups for tickets via EventBrite. We have sold out of the 70 free tickets every month for the last several months.

Kevin has lined up speakers, panels, and drawn together people in the Fort Wayne area of various levels of knowledge and this face to face interaction is one example of the Real Power of Social Media.

Friday, I'll be sharing something that Kevin has challenged me to do.



ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS.

You can contact him here:

Create Your Own Twitter Background

Yesterday I was asked if it was worth the money to buy a custom Twitter background.

I said no. Why spend money on something you can create yourself?

First off, let's look at what you need to do to load a custom background.

On your Twitter settings, click on Design.


Now you will see Theme options which include the background image.

But what if you want to be unique?

At the bottom of the page you'll see the option to change background image. When you click here you'll be given the option to upload your own image.


Which brings us back to thew question of how do I create that background image?


During the 8 years I worked for a group of radio stations, I used and abused Powerpoint.

Rarely did I use Powerpoint for on screen presentations.

I used it mostly to create proposals that included images and with the ability to move items around without the stricter formatting that Microsoft Word imposes on you, you can be pretty creative.

With Powerpoint you can save your finished product in a variety of formats including picture formats which is what you will need for your Twitter background.

There you go, use Microsoft Powerpoint as your canvas and you too can create a custom twitter background.

Here's mine: http://twitter.com/ScLoHo


ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS.

You can contact him here:

12 Twitter Tips on the 12th

Welcome to the 12th of September.

It's a hard to imagine I started this site over 9 months ago with updates 5 days a week.

And another surprise is coming next month.

In the meantime I have a dozen Twitter Tips and thought starters:

1. Make sure you fill out your Twitter Profile completely including a link to a site that tells us more about you. Yes, we are going to judge you, we want to see who you are and why we would want to follow you on Twitter.
2. Include a picture. Of you, not your cat or your car, unless you are a cat or car. The exception is if you are a business, but even there, I prefer to talk to persons, not impersonal businesses.
3. It's okay to send the same tweet more than once. Those of us that follow more than 200 people don't see all the tweets you send out. When you have more than 2000 like I do, I will likely miss your message due to the volume of tweets I get. And because I have a real job and life offline too.
   
4. More on tip 3. Vary that "same tweet". Change a word or two. Send it at different times of the day.
5. Include an @ScLoHo in your tweet if you want to be sure I get it.
6. Use the Direct Message feature to talk privately to someone. Works like text messaging.
7. Include a link if you want me to read or see something.
8. Don't set up an autofeed of all your tweets to Facebook or LinkedIn. I will update my Facebook page at least once a day with the same message I place on Twitter and i will do the same with LinkedIn. But I select which tweet I want on those other social media channels. And I do it with a strategy in place.
9. Communicate and converse. I try really hard to respond to everyone that reaches out to me. I also reach out to others and join in their conversations at times. Be Friendly!
10. Use hashtags. The pound sign # is a way to follow a theme or conversation.
11. Don't spam me. Twitter has become victim to the same spammers who now send out more than 75% of the emails. I don't fall for those and I will block and report you.
12. Your universe shouldn't revolve around Twitter. Or any social media channel for that matter. Use it as a tool, but also get face to face. Twitter has changed my life. It wasn't really Twitter that helped me land a new job or created dozens and dozens of new friends the past 3 years. It was me going beyond Twitter. My wife doesn't Tweet. One of my best friends isn't on any social media channel.
    

What tips would you add to this list?

ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS.

You can contact him here:

A little Respect for my Tweeps

Is Twitter the ugly stepchild of the social media world?

No, it's just an acquired taste.

But when you are on Twitter, and really use it as a communication tool, it can create a revolution, large and small.

For a world wide perspective check out this recent story.

In my own world, I have connected to folks across town, 150 miles away, half a country away, and even around the world that I talk to on a regular basis.

And it's not just silly stuff, like cat videos.

But I have helped people connect who were looking for work, looking for a job, looking for an answer, even looking for their lost phone!

My simple take on Twitter is it's a group text messaging platform.

Want to join me? I'm here: http://twitter.com/ScLoHo/



ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS.

You can contact him here:

The Worry Free Social Media Life

Pardon the bit of rambling as I gather my thoughts...

Last week was a whirlwind and so will this week in my life but for different reasons.

I had 2 1/2 days to do my usual work for Cirrus ABS, which included an excellent Manufacturers Symposium that we co-hosted on Wednesday.

Thursday started with a 4am alarm to spend the day in Fishers, Indiana, just outside of Indianapolis as Cirrus ABS was one of the sponsors of the two day event Blog Indiana 2011.

I was only able to personally attend the first day, due to devoting Friday, Saturday and Sunday to the weekend wedding of my daughter Abby.

In the days and weeks ahead, I'll share some of the lessons learned both at Blog Indiana, and from the weekend, but one thing that I wanted to share today is the power of living a worry free social media life.

Granted, my job is not dependent on being connected 24/7, but there are plenty of folks who are taken back by the amount of social media activity I produce.

40+ blog posts every week, has been my habit for the past few years including weekends, holidays, and days that I don't turn on the computer.

Daily updates on Facebook and LinkedIn. And a few updates on Google+ each week.

Twitter however is my main social media communication tool. Even when I'm not online, I have 6 tweets a day that are automatic since they are links to blog posts as they appear online.

"Normal days" I tweet 25 to 40 times a day from my laptop due to conversations that I'm having.

Confession time: I used to be a little worried that if I did less blog updates or Twitter updates that it would matter. I don't worry about that anymore.

Everyday I get an update from TwUnfollow.com in my email which shows me who has unfollowed me in the past 24 hours. Today there were 16, some days there are 4 or 5.

It doesn't matter.

Most of those are people who I don't follow, or spammers.

Every once in awhile there may be a person who stops following that make me wonder why, but each of us have our own interests and the key is not to take it personally.

Besides, despite the number of Twitter followers I lose each day, if I wanted to keep score, I would see that the net number of followers is growing, recently surpassing the 2500 mark.

And at the heart of it all, is why I am doing it in the first place, to build relationships, not to keep score.

What part of social media do you worry about?

ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS.

You can contact him here:

Does Big Business Understand Twitter?

Or small & medium sized businesses for that matter?

One of the contributing factors to my leaving my last job was they didn't get Social Media.

They certainly didn't believe in the power of Twitter, and the overall problem was their mindset was stuck in money mode.

Believe me, there is nothing wrong with money, and my job there and here is to bring in money.

But we also understand the value of relationships first and that is where social media channels such as Twitter can excel.

AdAge.com had a story on this recently that started with:

Over the last three years, the No. 1 question I've gotten from brand marketers is: "What should I tweet about?" These are not small brands, either, and not junior marketers. The industry seems to be confounded with its new-found power to speak directly to audiences. Marketers know it's worth collecting fans and followers, but once they have them, they're left with little to say. They've been creating content in the form of advertising for years, but something about the flow of new media isn't jibing with the old methods.

So they give away coupons or they apologize for not having given away any coupons since last week. This is sort of a joke … but not really. I've heard from many marketers that Facebook is out there telling them this is what people want. My reply is, invariably, "Of course that's what people want. Has anyone ever responded to the question, 'What do you want from a brand?' with anything other than, 'More stuff, cheaper'?"

Continue reading here: http://adage.com/article/digitalnext/tweet-teach-brand-speak/229045/

ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS.

You can contact him here:

A Fort Wayne Twitter Story

Over the weekend I checked out a site that seems to be reasonably accurate at tracking your Twitter stats: http://twopcharts.com/index.php and after looking back at some of the numbers, it inspired me to share with you a few observations from the Twitterverse.

(Fort Wayne, Indiana is the 2nd largest city in Indiana, behind our state capitol, Indianapolis.)


I don't recall what prompted me, or who prompted me to join Twitter, but I did in October 2008.

In early 2009, I was one of 4 folks who attended a Tweet-up at Club Soda. One of the 4 of us was a client of mine and I invited him to join us that evening.


We had a few more that year, but Twitter was not a mainstream social media channel in Fort Wayne, yet.

In 2010, a few people organized and began hosting a Social Media Breakfast which started out with a decent turn out, but at the last one, which I didn't attend, there was one person who showed up.

The problem wasn't that social media was failing, it was that people using social media were failing to use social media.

Big difference.

At the end of 2010, the Social Media Breakfast baton was handed to Kevin Mullett who is active on Twitter and dozens of other Social Media Channels.

The growth has been phenomenal for the Social Media Breakfast Fort Wayne and Tweet-Up style events.

I don't have all the numbers handy but in January 2011, it was over 40 who attended, it has been growing. Even during the summer months we have had over 70 pre-register and nearly the same number attend the monthly breakfast.

I've attended a few social media events in Indianapolis and our attendance figures now beats theirs.

I hesitate to use the Tweet-Up term, only because in reality, many of the events that are occurring now are attended primarily by Tweeps, but it's not exclusively Twitter folks.

And Twitter has become mainstream as a way of life. No, there is no secret handshake, but it is the preferred social media tool for a lot of us for short form communication.

Along with the Social Media Breakfast Fort Wayne event, free, last Tuesday of the month, every month, Amber Recker of Cancer Services of Northeast Indiana has launched a monthly Social Media lunch which was just going to be a summer series and now will continue as long as there is interest.

Amber's event costs $10 and is used as a fundraiser for the organization. Details = http://www.eventbrite.com/event/1816524273/eorg

The last Tweet-Up I attended was organized by a couple of ladies in town who are also active on Twitter, and there are many other specialized Tweet-Ups going on around town.

That's what happens when you treat Twitter as a part of your life, you form relationships that lead to face to face relationships with common bonds.

And with that in mind...

Here's an invitation for you to join a couple of my co-workers and several of my Twitter friends for the first ever Fort Wayne Karaoke Tweet-Up Saturday evening. I won't be there as it is the wedding day for my daughter Abby but you are welcome to show up.

Details are right here: http://fwkaraoketweetup.eventbrite.com/



ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS.

You can contact him here:

What is #FF?

Twitter Time:

What's this #FF thing I see on Fridays?

#FF is short for Follow Friday. The concept behind Follow Friday is to:

• Recognize those that you enjoy Following on Twitter by mentioning them.
• Discover who your friends are following, because you may want to follow them too

#FF can be used as a list of random people you follow, or to make it more valuable you can:

• Group similar people together. Like #FortWayne #FF @kmullett @TechSavyLender @awelfle
• Do Individual #FF with a reason. Like #FF @TheAFWBlog to stay on top of #FortWayne news and info

Try doing a few #FF this Friday!

And if you see some #FF tweets from people you follow, check out some of the recomendations and you may find some new friends to follow.

ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS. You can contact him here:

Twitter History

Embed the above image on your site

Direct Link

by visually via

ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS. You can contact him here:

You Gotta Find Them

I was looking at some of the brands I follow on Twitter and discovered that most have a small number of followers compared to, well, me.

Just because you are a brand and you have a Twitter account, you are not going to automatically get followers.

Oh sure, there are some of your Real-Life fans that would like to be in contact with you, but they aren't going to always seek you out.

You Gotta Find Them.

Pat McGraw wrote about this recently:

The Importance of Clear Communications

Posted: 05 Jul 2011 09:15 AM PDT

I was reading Twitter Users Want Businesses to Answer Them, and the research is strongly indicating the importance of monitoring social media – especially Twitter. (And I think it also makes a really strong argument for clearly communicating to your audience the most effective ways for them to get the answers they need in a timely, accurate manner. In other words, never assume they will remember to call your toll-free hotline…)

According to May 2011 research from InboxQ, a service to feed businesses questions from Twitter, Twitter users—especially ones with more followers and thus, presumably, more experience—tend to ask questions with tweets directed at all followers rather than using @ replies or direct messages. This means questions are often not directed at a relevant brand, but many users want brands to answer them anyway.

I put that last sentence in bold because it’s the sentence that made me stop, reread, stop again and reread again.

So it would appear that, based on this research, experienced Twitter users will fire off specific questions for a brand, into the Twitterverse rather than go direct to the source! And if your company doesn’t happen to just stumble across that Tweet to Infinity and Beyond, you lose!

(For those of you thinking that every business should have resources dedicated to monitoring social media for ‘Mentions’, please turn to the left and the right so you can introduce yourself to representatives from companies that don’t invest in those resources because they haven’t been able to justify the expense.)

Users indicated that more responsive brands would benefit from greater loyalty and purchasing. Almost 60% of respondents said they would be more likely to follow a brand that answered them, and 64% said they would be more likely to make a purchase from that brand.

Those numbers shouldn’t be too surprising – responsiveness is good for business. But I include it as a reminder that your customer’s expectations might be a little out of whack (firing off tweets and expecting timely responses) but it impacts your business. So what are your going to do?

The solution? Don’t assume your customers know the best way to get accurate information from you. Be a lot more proactive in your own communications with the customer. Ask them if they have any questions whenever you get the opportunity. Remind them of the best, easiest, fastest way to get answers from you.

If you happen to have a large contingent of Twitterheads in your customer database, and you have dedicated the resources to monitor the Interwebs for ‘Mentions’, remind them of the importance of ‘@’ – and give them plenty of examples of how targeting their own communications makes it easier for you to help them quickly and efficiently.

And if you don’t have the resources – tell them. Let them know that you don’t monitor everything and if they need to talk to someone, the best way to get a fast, accurate answer is .

Yes, you still will have a handful of “Twit-iots” firing off tweets into the Twitterverse (did I get all the possible “Tweet” related words in?) But at that point, shouldn’t you be asking yourself if these are really you ‘best customers’?

Social Media is one of the many elements of Net-Centered Marketing that we provide for our clients at Cirrus ABS. Email me at : SHoward@CirrusABS.com or give me a call to see if we can help.

ScLoHo is Scott Howard, a Solutions Consultant with Cirrus ABS. You can contact him here:

Social Media is Mainstream

Friday I posted a story about the Online Revolution extends beyond Social Media. Click here to read more.

But Social Media continues to explode as I'm sure you'll agree after watching this 4 minute video:

Deep into the Bowels of the Twitterverse

Okay, I admit that I did not read the following article from Brian Solis in depth.

I skimmed over it.

Brian is more analytical than I am, and while we need those people, this was a bit much for me.

Still, it's worth reading it your want to dig deep into the world of Twitter:

The Twitter Paradox

Posted: 10 Jun 2011 10:03 AM PDT

There’s an old saying, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Twitter is a paradox that redefines that old saying to, “If it’s broke, don’t fix it, because it works.”

For all intents and purposes, Twitter shouldn’t work, yet 200 million people (and bots) have created accounts in this thriving information egosystem. Now, news no longer break, it Tweets. Celebrities use it daily to connect directly with fans and also augment their income streams. Politicians and governments use Twitter to communicate with constituents and one another. Everyday people rely on Twitter to find information and share experiences. And for those more “influential” Twitter users, connectedness pays off in the form rewards, recognition, and compensation.

Twitter has evolved into a human seismograph that channels the pulse of business, politics, entertainment, news, and culture into the mobile phones and PCs and defines of our connected society. Twitter is a public confessional where screens become the window to self-expression, validation, recognition, with each contributing to a digital form of self confidence. And it is this new assurance that guides our actions in the real world. I Tweet therefore I am…whatever I want to become.

Indeed, Twitter shouldn’t work, but it does. What started as a hybrid public messaging service meets social network, is now a flourishing information network where people connect and disconnect based on interests and fleeting moments of intellectual, sophomoric and parallel intimacy. As such, Twitter forces the evolution of social networking from social graphs to interest graphs, where people are not only connected to those they know, but also those who share their interests.

While it’s often chided for its ability to assemble and syndicate irrelevant, irresponsible, and questionable activity, Twitter excels in aligning relevance with those who understand how to filter streams to their advantage. And this is where things start to get interesting, as I don’t believe we’ve seen Twitter’s true impact on our digital and IRL culture.

Twitter’s Awareness vs. Adoption

The state of the Twitterverse is in flux. Capturing its shape, genetic makeup and direction is akin to measuring the development of a baby in a womb. It’s growing, quickly, and even though we know that a baby will arrive and grow into a human being, we never know exactly who this person will ultimately become nor can we be certain of its personality through each of the development stages.

Twitter’s challenge with awareness versus adoption has plagued the fledgling company since the beginning. One of the top Google searches for Twitter after all is “I don’t get Twitter.”

The Pew Internet & American Life Project announced in June 2011 that Twitter usage rose from 8% of US Internet users in Fall 2010 to 13% in May 2011. Representing an impressive 62% spike in adoption, many question the significance of the bump in its migration toward mainstream adoption. As eMarketer recently wrote, Twitter has a problem with Awareness vs. Usage.

Twitter’s awareness has greatly benefited from the nonstop media attention it receives due to controversial and high profile users. Citing Arbitron and Edison research, we see that 92% of consumers ages 12 and up are familiar with Twitter, but only 8% actually use it. According to this graph, Twitter has an adoption problem. In contrast, Facebook adoption ranks at 57.1% of internet users as stated by eMarketer.

As we know, numbers don’t lie. eMarketer also projects that Twitter advertising revenues will soar from $140 million in 2011 to $225 million in 2012. In contrast, the once bursting place for friends, MySpace, will generate $184 million in ad revenue this year. As such, Twitter is focusing on improving (and defining) the user experience with Jack Dorsey rejoining the fold. And the company is building a sizable sales force. But even at this moment, Twitter has a model it can sell against. Since the launch of its Promoted products line, Twitter has worked with 600 advertisers on 6,000 campaigns. Twitter’s director of revenue Adam Bain puts things into perspective for optimists and skeptics alike, “Eighty percent of those marketers come back and buy from us again.”

Now, the cost of a Promoted Trends on Twitter has jumped from $100,000 to $120,000 per day. Promoted Accounts and Promoted Tweets are auction-based and a self-service model is due to arrive before the end of the year. Bain suggests that Twitter provides higher engagement levels that outperform not only traditional digital advertising products, but also Facebook ads.

In an interview with ClickZ, Bain reinforced the value of Promoted Products, “Paying $4 for a follower is a pittance because the ROI is insane. Because again once they have a follower, they can keep marketing to that guy as many times as they want without worrying about where they are across the web or what kind of mindframe they’re in.”

Certainly this is no mistake, but it is something that again, wasn’t anticipated. Attention has migrated to the stream and as we’re learning, that while money doesn’t grow on trees, it does in fact grow on Tweets.

Recently Mark Suster wrote about how the future of advertising will be integrated. In his post, Suster shared work by usability guru Jakob Nielsen that shows through heat maps where our eyes are focused. Attention zeroes in on text and not the banners around it, thus introducing an era of banner blindness.

And in social media, banner blindness is equally prevalent. Facebook Ads sell against interests and people you know. Twitter sells products that appear within your line of sight – the stream, your new attention dashboard.

The Twitter Paradox is fascinating to study. I don’t believe mainstream adoption is a metric that matters to Twitter or to those who understand its benefits. Surely mass adoption is important to investors. But as a human network, we make the world a much smaller place, creating a global culture that connects people to information and events as they happen. And, through a stroke of fate or democratized serendipity, people effect how information travels and how events unfold. But at a minimum, Twitter has become an infinite well of incredible insight and intelligence and for that, it is already an indispensable service to businesses, governments, educators, and anyone who is impacted by the words and impressions of others.

Connect with Brian Solis on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook

5 Twitter Tools

One of the marketing guys I follow online and feature on ScLoHo's Collective Wisdom regularly is Drew McLellan.

Last week he wrote about 5 Twitter Tools he uses:

Essential Twitter Tools

Posted: 10 Jun 2011 03:49 AM PDT

Twitter is an important part of my daily communications and community. I use it to:

• Share great resources
• Chat with friends and peers
• Share my own writing/posts
• Access resources, articles, and keep current
• Test ideas, vent, laugh and connect
• Give myself a mental floss — you never know what you’ll see, read or jump into

But…I have a day job so I can’t spend all day, glued to the Twitter screen, waiting for someone to say something relevant. So, I rely on a handful of Twitter tools that make it much easier for me to accomplish my goals and cover my day job as well.

Let me preface my tool talk with this statement: Twitter is not about automated conversations between your bot and mine. It’s about real interactions between real people. But that does not mean all automation is bad. It’s about finding the balance.

Twitter Tool #1: HootSuite.

Re-arrange tweets into conversations

Much has been written about this software. It allows you to manage your Twitter activity (follow the main stream, when someone directs an update to you or sends you a direct message) but what I appreciate the most about Hootsuite is that it allows me to schedule updates (on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.) so I can be sharing resources, blog posts etc. throughout the day, even if I’m in a meeting or asleep.

It also lets me “re-arrange” tweets into conversations, as you can see in the screen shot to the right.

Twitter Tool #2: Boxcar

Keep me in live conversations 24/7

Boxcar is an app on my iPhone and iPad. It streams any message sent directly to me (I have it set just for Facebook or Twitter but you could set up Google Voice, e-mail and much more) right to my device and pops up with a portion of the message so I can decide if I want to read it, respond to it etc. It’s very elegant and simple and very easy to set up and use.

This allows to to respond in real time — no matter where I am or what I’m doing.

Pre-set a handful of blogs to autopost

Twitter tool #3: Twitterfeed

This is a tool I use very sparingly. You create an account and then add URLs that post new content (typically blogs). Then, anytime one of those sites has new content, it automatically tweets it out on your account. (You can set it up to do Twitter, FB and others).

I would only add blogs that stick to their core content faithfully and consistently deliver A+ content. In my Twitterfeed account, there are only about 10 blogs loaded up. I can regulate how often it updates my status with someone’s new content and it tells me what my Twitter friends are clicking on. I don’t want to bombard my Twitter followers, but I also don’t want to make them wait until I get to my feed reader to share the best stuff.

Manage your followers with a click!

Twitter Tool #4: ManageFlitter

Oh how I love this tool! With a couple clicks, I can see what tweeps I follow that have gone dormant, who are the super talkers (might be bots) and who has stopped following me, etc. Then, I can unfollow or add people very quickly.

This used to be one of my most laborious tasks… cleaning up my Twitter followers. But now I can do it in minutes and it keeps me connected to the people I want to follow and disconnected from those who got bored and haven’t tweeted in 6 months.

What the set up screen looks like

Twitter tool #5: Tweet Old Post

This WordPress plugin allows me to tweet out some of my older posts from my blog. I’ve been blogging for over 5 years, so in theory, there’s some good stuff in there. This plugin randomly grabs an old post (I can identify categories I do/don’t want included) and tweets it out. I can add a prefix like A golden oldie… or a hashtag like #GreatestHits so my followers will know what’s up.

This is a great way to breath new life into old but still relevant content.

So there you have it….these five tools (along with some RSS feeds for listening by topics and Twitter lists for listening to my favorite people) are how I manage my life on Twitter. They let me connect in real time, share my favorite writers, schedule some of my tweets and manage my followers.

I hope that at least one of these tools is a new find for you and that a mix of them can make your Twitter experience even better!

What tools are your favs?

Should Teens Tweet?

There are a lot of stereotypes and misconceptions about Twitter.

One that I've heard include that it's just a "teen fad."

When Larry King was doing his nightly broadcast, he (or his peeps) were using Twitter!

Larry is not a teenager.

And so the question remains, should teens tweet?

Mediapost had a story about this recently:

Making Twitter More Relevant For Teens

We know that teens are mobile. They're always on their phones and expect most of their favorite online experiences to transition into mobile. Teens love to text, and Twitter is more like texting than Facebook is. They prefer short-form content and they like to share social experiences with each other. Teens like to keep it simple while also expressing themselves.

Even with all this, study after study has shown that teens just don't like Twitter that much, and many teens express no intention of using the platform. They're not as interested in sharing links or expressing their personality in 140 characters or less. Teens aren't trying to self promote, and most of them use it to follow celebrities (which may also become a vehicle for teen audience growth via the new "Follow" button).

So, how can Twitter make sure they don't lose that market potential as the teen audience grows up? The answer is starting to show up with Twitter's latest evolution as it becomes more of a content library than just a content-sharing platform.

Twitter isn't directly targeting teens with this new addition, but it is certainly tapping into a need state of that demographic. Teens are heavy adopters of photo-sharing sites like Flickr and Photobucket. They share pictures on Facebook, but typically stick to photo sites for their more creative and personal photo sharing, whereas Facebook is more about pictures from a party or driving in the car to the mall.

Teens also tend to have accounts on video sites like YouTube to share with their closest friends. We know that teens watch a lot of online video. YouTube is the go-to place for video search, but Twitter has the opportunity to become a resource for socially shared video among teens if the user base grows because, as we all know, teens trust peers as sources of information.

With the addition of photo and video hosting, as well as integration into the overall platform experience, Twitter could be the go-to place for teens who want to share photos and videos with select groups of friends and even connect with other teens doing similar things.

Twitter has a big opportunity to grow its teen audience if it finds ways to make these new features relevant to their needs -- especially now that teens are starting to experience social media fatigue with other platforms that are becoming more complicated and less personal. For now we'll have to wait and see the new features are rolled out and what's coming next.

David Trahan is a strategist at social marketing agency Mr Youth in New York, which was named one of the Top 10 Most Innovative Marketing Companies in the World by "Fast Company" magazine.

Linking With Twitter

At the very moment this article is scheduled to appear on ScLoHo's Social Media Adventure, I am sitting in a presentation on LinkedIn.

Here's how it came to be, from Anthony Juliano:

What collaboration looks like on Twitter ajjuliano | URL: http://wp.me/p10gsk-rv

June 14th, I'm making a presentation at Cancer Services of Northeast Indiana*. While I'll be speaking about LinkedIn, there's an interesting subtext: the event might have never happened if not for Twitter. Here's how it came about:

On April 27, I was part of an Asher Agency seminar at the Greater Fort Wayne Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber's Jon Swerens got things rolling by Tweeting before the seminar. Then, when I was discussing LinkedIn, Asher's Lauren Zuber jumped in:

Shortly thereafter, others joined in the conversation as part of the backchannel that was going on while I presented. I didn't realize it was happening at the time.

After the seminar, I thanked Amber, Joe, Kristin and Lauren for their comments:

And then an idea--would anyone want to get together to talk a little more about LinkedIn?

The group was receptive, and then something cool happened: Jennifer (@23skidooooo) and asked if she could participate:

Which led to another idea: why not open it up to others?

And why not ask for a nominal admission fee, with the proceeds to benefit the organization Amber works for, Cancer Services of Northeast Indiana?

Jennifer said yes...

So Amber and I started to talk details via direct message...

And then something else really cool happened: Kevin Mullett offered to present another topic to benefit Cancer Services:

And the next day, less than 24 hours after it was first proposed, Cancer Services was Tweeting the details:

I think this example shows the true power of Twitter: a group of people with a similar interest quickly creating something out of nothing. Everyone had a role:

• Jon got it started. The first Tweet sets the table for others to join in.
• Lauren mentioned her need to do more with LinkedIn.
• Joe, Amber and Kirstin, all of whom I trust, revealed the opportunity for a conversation about LinkedIn.
• Jennifer showed that the interest may be broader than just a few people.
• Kevin proposed that it didn't have to be a one-time thing.
• Cancer Services presented an outlet and made it all come together.

All of this goes to show that while you can certainly waste a lot of time on Twitter, you can be pretty productive, too. All it takes is some good connections and the desire to listen and engage.

Making the World a Little Smaller & Better

Last Monday I shared with you the story of how my humble experiment with social media became a passion and a career changer.

Click here if you missed it = http://www.sclohosocialmediaadventure.com/2011/06/power-of-social-media-in-my-life.html

Today, a story of how I saved at least $1200 Friday due to this thing called Social Media.

If you click on the names mentioned you will connect to each persons Twitter Profile. All Good People you should follow.

It was just after 11am and I was getting ready to meet a friend for lunch. I hoped in my car, drove out of the parking lot and stepped on the gas and heard a pop.

My car came to a coasting stop on the road. I turned on my flashers and had a sinking feeling in my gut.

I had some type of transmission problem. I tested all the options from Park to Reverse, Drive to the individual gears and nothing would engage. I got out, looked under the car, on the road and saw nothing out of the ordinary.

With the help of a police officer who stopped to help, we pushed my car into a driveway and he gave me a ride back to the radio stations where I still work, for about 5 more days.

I call my friend, he decides to come pick me up for lunch and I also call a well known transmission shop Russ Moore because I have met the owner at a social media breakfast.

Bad news. They don't work on Mercedes.

My car is nothing fancy, it's a 16 year old Benz that I paid cash for 6 years ago, so it is paid for, except for the repairs which are extremely expensive and sometimes it's hard to find someone who has the knowledge to do the work.

I'm not a mechanic by any stretch of the imagination, but I can make an educated guess that this is not the entire transmission taking a crap, but something minor. First guess is the transmission linkage snapped, which would be an easy fix. Minor fixes still equal Major dollars on this car.

I've been unhappy with the "Dreaded Dealership place" I've been taking my car so I decide to ask my friends on Twitter:

#FortWayne transmission repair for a 95 Mercedes? Recommendation? you have 5 min before I start calling around

I get a few responses but after 5 minutes I call the "Dreaded Dealership place".

By the way, the "Dreaded Dealership place" is a local VW dealer that I used to like, but they lost some of my trusted mechanics and service has gone downhill.

The "Dreaded Dealership place" tells me if I can get my car towed to their shop, they might be able to look at it...Tuesday...or Wednesday. And if it is a major repair they would have to ship it to another town 90 miles away.

Now this is Friday, and I need a car to drive every single day. "Dreaded Dealership place" has no loaners available, so I'm looking at several days of rental car bills before knowing if the car can be fixed locally or not.

Thoughts are running thru my head, like maybe I need to work my old job and my new job to be able to afford this nightmare. I call the towing company and wait for 30 minutes and check twitter again.

Friends on Twitter are offering suggestions, warnings, and talking between themselves.

A few of the selected Tweets:

from Rick:

@ScLoHo Co worker with Mercedes says only 2 places are Mercedes Benz FW and Vorderman. He likes Vorderman much better.

from Amber:

@scloho How about Mercedes Benz Fort Wayne?

@ScLoHo u could also try import docs. My former boss took his Acura there for everything and highly recommends.

My answer back to Amber:

@amrecker Import Docs only do Asian imports

Amber again replying to me and Rick:

@longsre @scloho I have had TERRIBLE experiences with Vorderman.

And I was waiting to see if either the "Dreaded Dealership place" or the local Mercedes dealer would join in the conversation.

Sure enough, they did.
@ScLoHo Yes Mercedes-Benz of Fort Wayne !! 260-432-7200 :) came from @mbfortwayne

I get on the phone and call. They can look at my car and tell my what's wrong if I can get it to them soon. I tell them I should be there within an hour or less.

My thought process is that what ever the problem is, they will be able to fix it and I'll know something, (what the problem is & cost) today, even if I don't get my car back right away.

There were many others on Twitter joining the conversation including: Joe, Carrie, Kit, Jim, & Tyler.

One of the comments from Jim who works for another dealership recommended the service manager I was working with!

I met the woman behind the @mbfortwayne tweets who said, "You tweet a lot!"

And along the way, I was given some inside information about how I could trim the $1700 estimate down by $1200. I can't say how publicly, but it pays to have friends who can direct you to legitimate ways to save and if you ask me privately, I can share the website that I was directed to for parts.

Before I wrap up this long story, there is a side story to share.

As I was standing in the parking lot when the tow truck arrived, the driver, Steve Hire said to me, "I know you, you're Scott Howard and you used to live across from Klug Park."

It turns out, this was someone I went to Elementary School with in the late 60's- early 70's who recently connected with me on Facebook but I have not seen face to face in 35 years.

And now, let me ask you... What has your Social Media Adventure been like?

Mixing Personal with Business on Twitter

Last Thursday I laid out the case for having more than one website if you have more than one focus or product line.

And a few weeks ago I had a discussion with a couple of friends about the pros and cons of separate Twitter Profiles.

Let me begin with a quote from Seth Godin:

Marketing to nobody

Nobody wears a watch any more.

Nobody wears a tie either.

Nobody shops at a bookstore, at least nobody I know.

The market of nobody is big indeed. You can do really well selling to nobody if you do your homework. In fact, most companies selling to nobody outperform those that are trying to sell to everyone.

I believe the Twitter debate is not as simple as what Seth says.

Your Twitter voice should reflect the Twitter profile you have created for that Twitter account.

I have a friend who is a photographer and I believe that due to the intimate and personal experience you form with a professional photographer, people want to know her beyond her finished work. So when she tweets about her personal life, she is inviting her clients and potential clients to form a stronger bond with her which is better than a cold and impersonal relationship.

On the other hand, I follow CBS News on Twitter and don't care about the personal life of whoever is tweeting on behalf of CBS News.

The CBS News Twitter account is focused on News, which is why I follow it.

What are your thoughts?

The Power of Social Media in My Life

Storytime.

This is a story about starting a blog or two a few years ago then hopping on Twitter in 2008 without knowing for sure what the outcome would be.

I'm going to refer to some folks by their Twitter handle because Twitter was instrumental in this story.

2003, I started a blog after watching my kids Rachael @greenglasshero , Josh @gandhizero and Tiffany @phanniejay start blogs.

All four of us stopped blogging but the next year I launched two blogs, one a personal site, and the other a work related site.

ScLoHo's Really? http://www.sclohoreally.com/, the personal site now features a Fort Wayne area website of the day every morning at 6am to promote the city I live in, and then an update at 4:08pm every afternoon, with what ever I want to feature. Saturday nights I feature a Classic Music Video.

ScLoHo's Collective Wisdom http://www.sclohocollectivewisdom.com/ information on Marketing, Media, Advertising and Sales; is updated 3 times a day, 7 days a week, which sounds pretty industrious, but the concept is that every article features Wisdom from others (that's where the Collective comes from), with a few words of introduction or commentary from me.

My wife suggested I write a book on Marketing, but instead I simply started another site, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo http://www.scloho.info/ . The self-imposed rule here is that the words are all mine, which separates it from Collective Wisdom. I update it Tuesday mornings at 7am.

Then at the end of 2010, I contemplated, planned and launched this website, ScLoHo's Social Media Adventure http://www.sclohosocialmediaadventure.com/ which is updated 5 days a week at noon.

During all of this time, I never received any significant financial reward for all of this activity. My paying gig has been working for a group of local radio stations as a sales person and manager.

The past few years I have been invited to give presentations, seminars, been interviewed and have written articles about marketing and even spoke to a college class a few times about Social Media & Branding.

All of this was simply a creative outlet for me. There was no master plan except I needed a way to share ideas that I felt passionate about.

At the end of 2008 I started a Twitter account and after playing around with it, made some connections both locally and worldwide which have now opened doors.

Chad Pollitt @CPollittIU and Amy Stark @AmyStark who both have ties/roots to Fort Wayne were there in my beginning Twitter Days and then Kevin Mullett @KMullett became a friend who I grew to respect.

In January 2011, Kevin revived the Fort Wayne Social Media Breakfast @SMBFW and asked me to be one of the panelist along with Heather Schoegler @HSchoegler; Lee Hershberger @LeePings; and Randy Clark @RandyClarkTKO .

I had known Heather for a couple years and Lee & Randy for a few months, but this was the first time I met Lee & Randy face to face.

Fast forward to April 21, 2011.

Randy Clark, who is in Indianapolis, invited various social media friends to a monthly gathering in Indy for the past couple of months and I planned my regular radio station sales rep life to be in Indy for business during the day and meet with Randy and friends that evening for what is now called a FriendUp.

At the meeting at the downtown Scotty's Brewhouse @BrewHouse we are eating fried pickles and other goodies and the 5 of us are all answering the question Randy asks, "What do you need/want & how can we help each other?"

I decided to go last and listen to what the others were saying. My answer was that I would like to explore leaving the radio world and earn my living in the social media or web world, but I was not willing to leave Fort Wayne. That evening was my 8th anniversary at the radio stations, and with the exception of a couple of the air staff, I have been there longer than anyone else.

Everyone's "wish list" was complied in an email, then posted on a private website, so others who had attended Randy's previous FriendUps could join in.

Kevin Mullett saw what I said and contacted me with the message, "We need to talk".

Kevin has done multiple things over the years and his current title is Director of Product Development for Cirrus ABS @CirrusABS . And so we had lunch.

Which lead to more questions on my part so we had lunch again.

It was after this second lunch where I learned more precisely what Kevin had in mind and I went from curious to excited about the possibility of changing employers and direction with my career.

A week later, I met with Matt Nickols, the founder of Cirrus ABS over lunch and was offered a position with his company.

June 1st, another meeting, (this time without food!) to discuss details, review a formal offer and accept with a start date of June 20, 2011.

What struck me was, there was no formal application process, no resume I gave them, no job posting that I saw anywhere, this was all due to the cumulation of my 7+ years of social media involvement, and the connections that I made via Twitter.

But it wasn't just the connections, it was the relationships that were built.

My returning to the world of radio advertising in 2003 was sort of a default.

My real passion is to help businesses (and people) connect and be successful with what I know about marketing, advertising, sales and a bit of psychology.

In other words, build meaningful, profitable relationships.

Since radio was my chosen "fall back career" since I was a teenager, that's why I've worked in that arena the past 8 years.

Now I'll get to use my passions with a new, growing media with a strong leader in all things web related and continue to help businesses (and people) connect and be successful.

My thanks to all that I've mentioned and many others too.

You can continue to contact me at Scott@ScLoHo.net as the transition begins.

(All of my own websites will continue too.)