Nathan Rupert via Compfight

First let’s talk about consuming content. Personally I use a single application to read my RSS feeds. It is an awesome little program call Reeder. It has an OSX app, iPad app and an iPhone app that all work the same for the most part and offer me a ton of options for sharing and saving the information. I love the versatility of the app but it originally was solely reliable on using Google Reader as its backend to feed the articles. When Google made the announcement that Google Reader was being killed my thoughts turned to favorite app and what would happen to it. I started hearing about other reader apps and their plans for moving forward. Needless to say I didn’t have to wait long before Reeder came out with their statement of direction. It also occurred to me how my world had changed. I no longer was worried about the service itself that was going away I was worried about how I would read my content. I wasn’t even worried about my curations workflows since those are just connecting processes behind the scenes but how I sit and read is matter of opinion. Reeder is the app I launch sitting at Starbucks on my iPad, Reeder on Mac during my lunch hour and Reeder on my iPhone when I’m randomly waiting anywhere for anything. There are a lot of tools out there for reading content and everyone has their favorite. I’m not here to start the “my tool is better” war but the way we consume our content is going to affect the direction we have to go after Reader is shut down. Our reading apps are personal, there are so many of them out there to choose from that our decisions to use certain ones are based around our feel for the tool in our hand. Maybe the worst thing was all these tools used the same back end to feed them making them equally throw away if we didn’t like them. Now though our decisions maybe more final and less able to pickup and move without some additional work. We will see Reader users scatter to multiple services but it will be less about the service and more about how we want to consume our content. Some may find an RSS service that has some similar functions to the base Google Reader product while others will go with what ever service their apps support.

As for me I signed for the paid service known as Feedbin.me It seems pretty nice so far and I’m OK paying for a service that works. We get so use to these services being free that maybe paying for it will potentially keep it around longer. I know I would have started paying for Google Reader to keep it going but why ask them to keep a product they obviously didn’t care about maintaining for their user base. Sorry if that statement sounded bitter, that was not the intent. Part of me is actually looking forward to this since after my information is moved I will delete all apps that no longer work with Feedbin.me. Maybe I should thank Google for removing apps from my sometimes cluttered iProducts

Let me also point out here that there are many tools that use your social feeds to produce a list of articles to read and those are great. Tools like Zite and Flipboard are a couple that include your social feeds as well. This is also a direction that many will go to find their content. So we may see some Reader people just leave the world of RSS readers all together.

OK let me take a second to talk about Google decisions to kill Reader. Companies change no big deal and when you look at Google as of lately they are trying to change their products from a tools company to a content based company. Obviously Google+ is their direction and they seem to be aligning all resources in that direction. I wish them luck but I am suddenly cautioned by their willingness to cut off what seems to be successful products. Let me be honest there are several services I pay for happily because I see their value. Evernote’s hundred year company direction makes it an easy decision to pay for their service. Dropbox has a lot of integration and works very well across a lot of platforms that makes it easy to use and see the value in. I also always paid for iTools for my mac.com email address and I’ve had it for over a dozen years. In fact I was almost a little sad when it became a free service. For all the issues Apple has had with creation of services like these they keep those tools alive for a long time so it feels safer. So when I see Google Kill Reader after they already started removing functionality it worried me a bit. Google has Google Drive and Keep but I can’t use them because I suddenly can’t trust Google keeping the service around in the long term. In fact I have even started pulling away from Gmail in favor of my iCloud account because now feel like I need to worry about it. Tools will forever evolve change and displace one another that is the nature of tech world but when the company making the tools seems to be their worst enemy it makes me think twice about it. So while I’m not thrilled about Google’s decision it has occurred to me that they did create an eco-system of content consumption that now has to learn to fly on it’s own.

Me? I’m going to take a day and reorganize my curation feeds and update all my tools to my new RSS service. Hey Feedbin.me I’m looking forward to a long relationship with you.

I agree that the social Internet can be a time suck, however there are many benefits to allowing access by employees during the work day.  If there is a question that someone asks me and I am unsure of the answer or where to begin looking for the answer, Twitter is usually the first place I start.  Someone in my mass of followers might know or know someone who can help.  This is not only a quick way to get a question answered sometimes, but a huge benefit to the organization.  Tweets do not cost money.  Therefore answers given via tweet are usually free too and might just be the right solution.

I am a firm believer in social media when it is used as a tool to improve oneself or accomplish a task. Trolling social media as though you will cease to function without it is another problem altogether.  If a company has a social media presence, then the employees of that company should not be punished for interacting with Social Media.  This doesn’t mean sit on Facebook all day, and not work.  It means peek at Facebook at lunch if you want or use twitter to further something you are working on.  You may find that some things that are causing you headaches can be easily handled by asking someone else their opinion of the issue.

 What is your company’s policy on social media?  Have you used one of the social networks to solve a problem you’ve been faced with?

Derek Schauland

» Zitona « via Compfight

So what happens when you throw a social media breakfast and no one shows up? I’ll tell you what happens. You end up remembering one of the best thing about social media, friendships.

Our Fox Cities Social media community has an ongoing networking breakfast that happens every other week. One Friday every two weeks we take over a large table at one of our local breakfast places, Blueberry Hill to enjoy a good breakfast and conversation. The hashtag #BBhill is usually the place to hear about what is happening. This is a simply a breakfast of people with shared social media interest and place for newcomers to social media to meet some people willing to help in the area. Our about page on Facebook sums it up best:

“Bi-weekly meetup with Fox Cities social media fanatics (and sometimes out of state peeps) 

The Idea 

Blueberry Hill started in February 2009 as an opportunity to meet people face to face from social networks. The idea is to be comfortable interacting with people from the internet. 

It is not a place to push your product or try to hard sell those attending. We do talk about what we do casually but we want this to be an open environment away from spam bots and pushy internet sales people. 

The Casual Approach 

We meet every other week. It doesn’t matter if you have Twitter, Facebook, and any other accounts. You probably will after you leave

Be Yourself 

We don’t bite, unless there’s bacon involved.”

Now this group is completely casual and there is no expectation to show up every time and the group is very dynamic and there are times when there are 20 or more people and other times when there is less than 6. Either way we enjoy meeting new people that show up or just enjoy sharing a meal with people I consider friends. Now this post isn’t about Blueberry Hill but what happens because of it.

A couple Fridays ago was our Blueberry Hill Friday and since I missed the last one due to be out of town I was looking forward to this one. I showed up at my usual early time slot. See the Blueberry Hill mornings are not bound by time. We roll in anywhere between 6:00 to 9:00 so really show up when you feel like it. For me I’m part of the cool kids in the early group, actually I just need to drive to work at a reasonable time so I show up earlier. Anyways I got there right at 6:00AM and had a seat. I was hungry so I got my usual Don Garcia Mexican Skillet and devoured it. Around 6:30 Derek strolled in. Derek a contributor here and founding partner of Tech On Tap sat down and ordered his usual breakfast. We got to talking as we normally do and after a while we realized that no one had shown up. Now this isn’t a big deal since Blueberry Hill is an open event and let’s face it, life happens. People are out of town, sick, busy or just can’t make it and that’s OK. We talked for about an hour and then left on our separate ways to work.

While driving to work it occurred to me that while it was a slight bummer to not see more people that morning it was really nice to spend time with a friend just sitting and chatting, one-on-one. Sometimes we get so caught up in the networking and community building that we forget how many genuine friends we have had the opportunity to meet through social media. Don’t let those friendships get lost in the sea of followers.

Thanks to all who attended #EarlyBirdSMB!

Twitter 101 with the #EarlyBirdSMB

Storified by Carrie Keenan · Wed, Oct 31 2012 12:45:24

@tvorse Tim you are my hero! #EarlyBirdSMBCarrie Keenan

Time to tweet! It’s #earlybirdsmb time Kim Stobb

Good morning @tvorse! Wish you were here in Fondy #earlybirdsmbKim Stobb

#earlybirdsmb Who’s that handsome devil in the Yellow #SoMeFox shirt… oh right that’s me.. My best side, back of my head.Tim Florek

RT @kickinupdust: Good morning @tvorse! Wish you were here in Fondy #earlybirdsmb http://bit.ly/XZrvsrFond du Lac

@tvorse I’m a fan myself It warns you right in the bio "Star Wars Geek" #earlybirdsmbCarrie Keenan

Here are the slides & recommended reading:

Carrie Keenan

Reto Fetz via Compfight

This isn’t a post about those business owners that look at Facebook or Twitter as an opportunity for a written radio or TV spot. We all know that a twitter stream full of commercials is not an effective policy. No this post is about those owners that think social media users are there to just promote for them. They’ve watched to many Kevin Costner movies and they actually think if I tweet it, they will come. Well they’re in for a rude awakening.

I don’t remember the business owner’s name, lucky them but what I do remember is how they acted. We were having a social media happy hour that we are prone to have in our area. These are always open events that anyone is allowed to show up and we try to invite people we know and those we don’t. We invite them from every social site we’re on and we love meeting new people. Anyways while at this event the business owner walked up and introduced themselves to us. Some small talk trying to get to know the person and their business when they did something I couldn’t believe.

“say you guys need to promote this thing for me on social media since you guys have more followers than me” they said.

“scuse me?” I thought.

“Did you just do that to us?” I thought.

With a nod and a chuckle we continued the conversation trying to ignore what had just happened.

I don’t care who you are but asking for a favor from people who you just met doesn’t work. As users of social media we’re not some two-bit whore who’ll jump at the chance to promote whatever walks in the room. In fact those with larger followers are probably more particular about promoting anything since they understand they are putting their name on it.

The problem is some don’t understand that social media is about building relationships. I mean actual work at building these relationships. Once those relationships exist then businesses don’t need to ask for recommendations because their genuine fans will do it on their own. For business owners it is really not that difficult just follow a few steps.

• Take the time.

• Build the relationships

• Be real, be known

Once you build your relationships with your customers and your fans then you can ask for their assistance in passing the word. Don’t ask them to recite a commercial, ask them to tell the truth about you and your company.

If a celebrity falls and no one on twitters notices do they make a sound? Maybe, maybe not.

 ZeroOne via Compfight

So it is election season and one of my favorite things to do is to search and follow supporters and the candidates on social media. I do it just to get a feel to how each is using social media and how their followers are interacting with their “alignment”. Now I’m not going into some tirade about who to vote for or anything like that but watch a debate from both sides of the fence while on social media and you can gain perspective on how each side is interpreting what is being said by the candidate. It can be quite interesting or quite aggravating depending on how political you are in nature. Of course you will also find the seedy underbelly of each party and find yourself listening to people talk from their fallout shelters and wearing their tin foil hats. Remember social media is equal opportunity when it comes to crazy. However this idea of perspective can be important  for a lot of different realms not just politics. In fact its use for businesses can help gain understanding into your competition, your consumer and yourself.

So let’s talk about gaining business perspective using social media. There are always a couple of things that businesses are looking for. We want to know how our products are doing(Feedback), what our customers are thinking and wanting(Market Research) and we always like to keep a pulse on how our competition is doing(Competitive Advantage). So the first two are pretty easy if you are harnessing the potential for social media and building a well-rounded community then you should be getting great feedback from your customers about how your products are doing and what your customers are saying about you. Built right the community may also be generating ideas for product improvements or extensions to your product line.

What about your competition? What are their clients saying about them? What are their clients asking for?

Well here is where finding perspective comes in.  Why not pay attention to your competitions biggest fans? Are you a stand-alone restaurant, then why not follow food trucks to see if there is something that you can pick up on that is working for them. You never know what you might find. I’m a firm believer in not trying to play follow the competition when it comes to product improvement and that is not what I am talking about here. You are doing this to mimic what your competition is already doing well. However what if you see your competitions fans asking for a product or feature that you have, maybe you’re not promoting that product or touting that feature properly to the right people. You can find gaps in your existing marketing that might be falling short. You might hear your fans talking about wanting a product that does “X” but never thought there was enough interest until you noticed that your competitors’ fans are asking for the same thing.

So you see finding the other perspective isn’t always about finding people who believe in the opposite sometimes it is about gaining insight into your competition and their fans. Or finding businesses that run parallel to yours and gaining insights into things that may you can do that will help differentiate yourself from your competition in the market place. You can’t differentiate from the competition if you don’t know where or how your competition operates. So get out there and start paying attention to them and their fans. You might be surprised what you will find out.

Entertaining – When creating content, make sure you find yourself entertained. If you don’t want to read what you just wrote, who else will? It will also help the flow of your writing. Often this type of post is the best remembered.

Educational – If you have knowledge or expertise in an nice or learned a new way of dealing with a common problem, share it. Do a webinar or slideshare demonstrating that thing you do so well.

Visual – With Instagram and Pinterest leading the way – visuals are the “hot new shiny” in social media. Sites like Facebook show more engagement from page fans for video & photo posts than any other kind.

click here for full infographic 

Promotional – Do this, but do this sparingly. Feel free to talk about your new and exciting widget or your upcoming event, but remember to pepper it in sparingly with all your other content. Social media is not your billboard.

Informational – This type of content could also be called “personality” content. Share some behind the scenes info. Do bios on employees or share photos of a day in the life in your office. People like to see what is going on behind the scene and what makes businesses tick.

“Quick Bite” – Most often this is seen on Twitter with it’s low character count. This could be a quick tip or fact you want to share with your community. Remember to keep your Tweets to around 120 characters to allow for other people to share.

Shared – This one is easy. Share the awesome things of others that you think will be of benefit to your community.

Do you ever have days you feel like Johnny Number 5 when your every thought is about content? How do you determine what kinds of content you produce and what you curate?

Carrie Keenan

The Social Media Club of Milwaukee (#smcmke) meets the first Tuesday of every month at various places across the city. The August meeting was called “Tool Time” and the night was dedicated to learning at social media tools. The event was held at Great Lakes Distillery and also included a tour and tasting. I was happy to be one of two Fox Cities members of the club who were asked to speak. Cedar Brown joined me along with the local speakers to talk tools.

Here is the recap from Storify:

Carrie Keenan

Tuna Guacamole

My second stop on my Tour de’ Case Study is an award winning Fox Valley  favorite. Nakashima of Japan. Unlike Kangaroostaurant who I spoke to last time, Nakashima uses an outsourced social media agency for all three of it’s restaurants. (Nakashima in Appleton and Green Bay as well as Katsu-Ya in downtown Appleton.) I sat down with Tim Nakashima and Brad Cebulski to talk social media and sushi.

When did you get decide to get started in social media and what made the decision for you to outsource it? 

“We have been seriously using social for the last 6 months. I kinda knew we needed to do it all along. It was just a matter of knowing how to do it right. Basically it was needed since everyone came in with smartphones and were using Facebook. I didn’t want it to look like a poorly made or home made. I wanted to keep the consistency of the brand across all 3 restaurants” Tim had actually purchased a copy of “Social Media for Dummies” but it was never used

What social media channels do you use?

Facebook: Nakashima, Katsu-Ya and Twitter: both  They are planning some ways to get involved more with photo and video coming in the future.

What are your thoughts of location based social media like Foursquare ?

We do not want to be known as a “coupon restaurant”. We will be using Foursquare as a way to reward customer loyalty. It will serve to celebrate customers.

Is social media integrated with the rest of your marketing plan?

The content is the same as the rest of the marketing plan. The photos used are the same across all branches of marketing. Social media took the lead role for marketing, that is where the most impact comes from. Response time is better in social and more immediate. The social branding is a match to the rest.

Do you have a social media listening plan? How do you implement it?

We use Sprout Social for listening . The goal was to be on social ,when the customers are on, usually in the evening “after work” hours. There is not set response time they allow a reasonable response time to reply. This is also why they outsource. Most of the (Twitter) conversation happens at meal times when people check in at arrival and also  after the meal.

Tuna Tataki with Mango Salsa

Have you had any issues with an outside company responding to comments/questions?

Brad knows the voice of the company and is able to answer appropriately.  If there is an issue, he will contact Tim for the correct response. If that issue does arise, he will let the person know he is going to get back with an answer. That being said, they don’t often have concerns come up on social and that can be attributed to the way the restaurant is run. It is doing it right from the ground up. Good service and good social go hand in hand.

Do you have a social media content calendar? Or do you post randomly?

The content calendar is based on restaurant promotions and set up about a month or so ahead. Day to day postings ar not scheduled, they brainstorm what kind of conversation will be had for the week at a weekly update meetings to keep things fresh and timely.

Do you have a written social media policy?

There is no “crisis plan” per se. It is mostly a plan of action. Being there and reaching out and responding to questions and comments as they arise has all that has been needed at this time. There is one hard and fast rule about what can NOT be said on the social media channels “No religion. No politics. No Brett Favre” 

What are the benefits to your business do you see from social media? 

Social has been a great way to get to try more items. Sushi can be intimidating. Sharing photos on the Facebook page has been a way to familiarize people with the different types of sushi and made it easier for people to try new things. It is a great way to promote variety.

Do you use social media to crowd source information?

We use social media as market research and promotions.  It is a way to find out what people prefer and a source of new ideas. *Author Note, I asked what the most popular sushi item was. It is cream cheese.

And folks – I tried… I asked if I could have any scoop on this cryptic Facebook post – sorry. We all just have to stay tuned!

Carrie Keenan

Posted with Blogsy

Derek Schauland