Below are some tips for optimizing your Google+ page for search engine results:

#1: Set up a page! It’s quite simple and should be on your business’s check list of social   media to-dos.  Our blog provides step-by-step instructions to get your Google+ page up and running.

#2:  Get in Circles: The more followers a page has (the more circles you are in), the better it will perform in search results.  The best way to increase followers on Google+ is to provide a link to your Google+ page anywhere you can.  This can include your existing social media platforms, your company website, e-newsletters and email signature.  Another great way to get your page known on Google+ is by adding people to your circle and hope they add you to theirs.

#3: Add Keywords: Just like you would optimize your website with keywords, it is important to do this with your Google+ page.  The best places to incorporate your keywords are in the introduction and tagline sections of the page.  Make sure when you are incorporating your keywords, they come across as organically placed. This is Google, after all, and they will pick up on pages that overdo it with the keywords.

#4:  Google+ Badge Your Website: Adding a Google+ badge to your company website will connect your Google+ page directly to your website.  This is a great way to up your followers on Google+ and potentially rule search results for your keywords.  A company that is doing a great job of this is Toyota. By connecting their Google+ page to their website, their Google+ activity is shown directly below their traditional search results.  This will effectively push down anyone else who was showing up in results below Toyota.

#5: Rack up the +1s: More effective than its Facebook counterpart the “Like,” the +1 shows up in search results.  The more +1s your site has, the more credible it looks to Google and people potentially clicking through.  Companies can add a +1 button to their website or articles they have written by clicking here.

Have you set up a Google+ page for your business?  Will you take advantage of these tips to help boost your company’s SEO?

Photo by: jscreationzs

Last month we learned about the tweet that postponed one man’s death row sentence. With this and other social media blunders in mind, it’s worth a second thought to consider the effect a post will have – on your friends, your followers, even your job – before broadcasting a status or tweet to your networks. And for healthcare professionals, even posts with the best intentions can have career damaging effects.

The National Council of State Boards of Nursing recently released a white paper to encourage appropriate use of social media by nursing professionals – without compromising patient privacy and confidentiality. The social media guideline is an extensive document and includes suggestions for healthcare practitioners, such as:

• Refrain from sending patient images by any electronic media device.

• Maintain professional boundaries in the use of electronic media. Use caution when

engaging in online social contact with patients or former patients.

• Do not share, post or otherwise disseminate any information, including images, about a patient, or information gained in the nurse-patient relationship, with anyone unless there is a patient care related need to disclose the information or other legal obligation to do so.

In one scenario, a licensed practical/vocational nurse used his personal cell phone to take pictures of a group home resident. He later showed these photos to a former hospital employee outside of work and discussed the patient’s condition. Although the nurse had permission from the resident’s family member to take the photos, the patient was physically unable to respond herself. Further, the nurse later acknowledged he had no legitimate (or patient care related) purpose for taking the photos or discussing the patient’s medical history. It was purely a social discussion.

The Board of Nursing (BON) determined the nurse’s actions to be a breach of patient confidentiality and imposed disciplinary action, requiring the nurse to take a course on patient privacy and ethics. Fortunately, this incident did not result in harm to the patient or damage to the group home.  Many similar scenarios, particularly those that involve social media, end in a negative publicity for an organization, loss of licensure for caregivers, even jail time.

Many issues with online communication begin when the lines are blurred between professional and personal relationships. As a medical professional, the nurse has an obligation to maintain professional boundaries in the digital environment.

So what can hospitals and healthcare organizations do to ensure employees and medical staff members appropriately engage in social media?

• Have a strong social media policy that corresponds to your organization’s code of conduct.  Make sure employees, physicians and even volunteers understand the policy – and the consequences of violating it. And as part of your hospital’s annual compliance training, make sure employees know how to keep professional and personal boundaries clear.

• Monitor your organization’s presence on social media at least daily. SocialMention and Technorati can help a hospital monitor its presence or “buzz” in social media, and TweetDeck or HootSuite can help you manage your organization’s social media accounts. Radian6, Cision and Meltwater, among others, are paid services that provide real-time social media monitoring and allow companies to measure and track a variety of social media metrics.

• Consider in advance how to respond in the event of a social media HIPAA violation. Have a consistent method for dealing with social media violations and act accordingly.

• Advise clinicians never to give out person-specific medical advice through social media. Offer only general information – and use disclaimers! When responding to forums or other online outlets, always state that readers/followers should consult with their physician first.

You can find the rest of the NCSBN’s social media guidelines here. For more healthcare examples, visit Ed Bennett’s blog, the leading resource on hospital use of social media. From best practice techniques to crisis communication in the digital era, Found in Cache can be a valuable resource for healthcare marketers looking to stay informed of the latest social media strategies and statistics.

Does your organization have and enforce social media guidelines? Let us know which methods are successful at your company in the comments below.

1. Social media is different than mass marketing. It is important to remember that individuals are behind the technology you’re using. When using social media, remember to speak to an “audience of one” and focus on the individual.

2. It is dangerously easy to make noise via social media, but difficult to listen. To utilize social media successfully, it is vital you listen and respond to what your audience is saying, both the positive and negative.

3. Each social media channel serves a different purpose, so use them to achieve different objectives. For example, LinkedIn is a great tool for recruiting new employees; Facebook can be used to update organizational news; Yammer is used for collaboration between employees; and, as Christi McNeil pointed out, Twitter is a great way to quickly respond to customer service concerns. Be aware that your company may not need to use each of these social media channels to achieve its objectives.

What social media services does your company use? Do you have any other tips to share?

For the past few years, stories have appeared in publications like The New York Times and The Washington Post speculating on why most teens are so unimpressed with the power of the tweet. Their general disregard for the social media tool stems from the fact that they don’t like the restrictions inherent in being able to type only 140 characters and the fact that their message has to be so condensed.  Also, they would rather text than tweet; they are more interested in communicating with their “friends” than the whole world; and, to them, Facebook seems more secure than Twitter.

So, why the change of heart?

Well, it seems the perceived privacy issue that once made teens shun Twitter is not what they thought; they can in fact be more private. They can set up more than one account, they don’t have to use their real identity and the accounts can be locked and private. Teens are slowly adopting Twitter because their Facebook circles are too large and Twitter allows them to communicate with a smaller group of friends. The number of teen Twitter users has doubled in the two years according to a Pew Internet and American Life Project study. The total number is still small when compared to Facebook but it is definitely a trend worth noting.

Teens are such an influential group when it comes to technology and social media. So, much so that Google + just announced they are going to add teens to their audience.

Will teens slowly abandon Facebook and become the largest group of tweeters in the country? Only time will tell.

Email and text messaging have left many of us accustomed to instant gratification when it comes to communication, though impulsive tweets and status updates often lead to regret. Our methods of communication have evolved so rapidly, many of us can now tweet about anything (or nothing) within a few seconds.

In the era of 140-character updates, when the lingo has become so foreign that you may need a translator to follow Twitter conversations, have our messages lost their depth?

Jonathan Harris thinks so – and says his new project, Cowbird, houses personal, searchable storytelling – and may someday be the one-stop shop for an inclusive public library of human experience.

In an interview with Fast Company, Harris said, “It wasn’t clear to me how there was going to be another level of compression after tweets, unless we reverted to monosyllabic grunts. I thought we would hit some kind of wall, bounce back in the other direction, and people would start craving a little more depth.”

The project is comprised of three parts: stories, diaries, and sagas. Cowbird is presently in beta mode – and storytellers are hand selected by Harris after filling out a brief bio. Once you have been accepted, you’re free to create your story.

The more stories you add, the more your page begins to resemble a personal diary – in fact, that’s how Cowbird began – with Harris photo-documenting each day for a year, prior to the project’s launch. The layout of a Cowbird story page is intentionally uncluttered – and emphasis is placed upon the single photo. In some instances, the photo tells the author’s story more concisely than his words. The Kitchen, by National Geographic photojournalist, Aaron Huey, is a magnificent example of this.

The one-photo post illustrates two women, surrounded by friends and family, dancing – and if the black and white image with the accompanying tale is not enough to capture your attention, the audio track that begins soon after opening the page surely will.

The Washington Post references this photo and its ballad in a summary of Harris’ new project:

“Amid the clamor of most social media sites, on Cowbird everything slows down. It asks its viewers to linger over the single image of the women dancing and listen to their songs. There’s no rush. With that kind of beauty, why should there be?”

I’m a fan of “following” authors, such as Huey, to receive updates when new posts are published. As an author, you can flip-flop between public and private story-telling modes until you’re ready to share your tale.

What really makes Cowbird stand out from other forms of blogging or sharing, such as Tumblr, WordPress, or Flickr, is its method of cataloging personal experiences to make the stories searchable. If you’ve got a particular topic or location in mind, Cowbird’s search feature makes it easy to find what you’re looking for. All of the stories are interconnected through a series of tags, timelines, maps, and dedications.

Explore the site’s first saga, the Occupy movement, and you’ll find hundreds of personal stories from the nationwide event. Sagas are designated by the site as monumental events affecting the population on a national – or global – level, and authors are encouraged to contribute their perspectives.

“These types of rapidly changing events are hard for the mainstream media to write about because they tend to take a 10,000-foot view and summarize it, rather than getting in any real depth,” Harris said.

Unlike sagas, stories can be about any topic or comprised of any tag – such as birthday parties, first cars, or wedding days, to name a few.

Today, a new saga debuts – fittingly titled First Loves.

“A lot of the self-expression that happens online today feels more like self-promotion, and we didn’t want Cowbird to feel like that,” Harris said. “We want to tell the kind of stories that will still resonate in 100 years.”

Our messages are continually shortened through limited-character posts – does Cowbird have what it takes to bring back the depth? And is anyone willing to give a new social network the chance? Let us know what you think.

A blog post back in November had some wonderful tips for the recent college graduate on how to land a job in PR.  While the five tips listed are extremely important and a vital part to landing a first job, there are a few additional things I wish I had known when I was on the job hunt.  These not only apply to PR and marketing job seekers but to anyone who will soon embark on the journey of their first job search.

1. Patience.  As lucky as I was to get a job at a time when many were struggling to even get an interview, it did not come without a wait – seven months to be exact.  I spent the first few months out of college frustrated that no one was hiring.  I felt that after years of schooling I should at least have been able to find one place that would open its doors to me!  Every company that was hiring required at least three years of experience: three years that I did not have.  I became so frustrated that some days I felt like giving up and leaving the country.  While I did eventually realize that patience was essential during the search process, it is something I wish I had been warned about and told over and over again BEFORE I started the process.

2. Network, network, network!  I knew that networking was an important part of finding a job, but I did not actually realize the massive importance of it until right before I landed my job.  Networking means getting yourself out there and meeting new people in your prospective field; it can also mean becoming reacquainted with people you already know.  It’s as easy as calling up a professional organization and asking for a schedule of their open events, or calling up a parent of a friend or neighbor to find out more about what they do.  I eventually landed my job because a friend of mine’s father had multiple connections in the PR and communications field in Nashville. He was gracious enough to personally send out my resume to several agencies and let them know that I was actively seeking a job.

3. Don’t be afraid to start at the bottom (or in a position you would not expect.)  This tip is the absolute best lesson I have learned.  I spent much of my time directly after college searching and hoping for a job that would place PR work in my hands the second I walked in the door.  After realizing that many of these job positions require several years of experience, I wondered how I could get my foot in the door not having had that experience.  When I was offered the job at Lovell Communications as administrative assistant, I knew I would be given tasks that don’t necessarily require a degree.  While answering phones and filing invoices had not previously been on my radar as something I would be doing at my first post-college job, I was extremely excited and fortunate to have landed a job at a PR agency.  Over time I was able to work on tasks that the AEs and VPs were working on, and after six months in the position as administrative assistant I was promoted to assistant account executive.  Starting at the bottom and being promoted six months later was a wonderful feeling and something that I knew I had earned and worked hard for.  It is important to not pass something up just because you think you are overqualified for the job, because you never know where it will lead you.

To those of you who are beginning the job search process, I hope that these three tidbits of advice will help you along the way.  Remember, your first job can set the tone for your entire career, even if in unexpected ways!

So while many millions of television viewers are exposed to what may have been recently tweeted about Newt #Gingrich or from the New York @Giants, many do not actually understand what is being said.

Twitter has its own language – and an etymology that evolves on a daily basis. Like an extreme case study in the mechanics of the Web 2.0, Twitter is constantly being formed and reformed – by its users.  Many folks use Twitter like some of us use eye contact or polite conversation; they are on Twitter 24/7 and are slick with the lexicon of the medium.  Others, like my Dad, just want to listen in on the conversation and have a better understanding of what’s being said.

If you’re looking to eavesdrop on whatever is being discussed in the Twittersphere, below is the brief primer I gave my Dad.

The @ symbol is used as part of a person’s Twitter name (also called a “handle” for those of us that remember the hay day of the Citizen’s Band radio).  When a person opens a Twitter account, she creates a unique name so that others can find her in the Twittersphere (I’m @plorin – follow me!) Many people create Twitter handles that are reflective of their regular name, such as @MichelleObama or @WaltDisneyWorld.  Others may try to make an advertising statement with their handle, such as @bestpizza or @ilovebradpitt.  If you see a Twitter handle in a tweet, it is likely the name of the tweeter, or the name of the intended recipient or subject of the tweet.

Placing a hashtag (#) before a word in a tweet marks a key word or topic in the message. Words that follow a hashtag are more readily found in a search on Twitter. So if you want others to know what you think about #TheVoice or #SilentMovie, be sure to include the hashtag in your tweet.

RT in a tweet simply means the message has been copied, or ReTweeted, from another source.  It’s a form a flattery, and an appropriate attribution to the creator of a tweeted message.

Strange strings of letters, dots and slashes, such as bit.ly/8ZrV9S or tinyurl.com/7xmzcqn , are likely website addresses that have been shortened (so as to not take too much space in a tweet’s 140-character maximum).  Click on them if you want to learn more about the tweet’s topic.

While there are many other odd little tweaks and secret handshakes on Twitter, understanding these four common terms and shortcuts can help you decipher the dialogue – and better understand what’s being discussed on the nightly news.

Once you get comfortable with the language, jump in and send us a message @LovellCom!

Photo By: Master Isolated Images

So I’m fascinated and mildly amused by the newest cyber-contagion spreading through communities: cyberchrondria.  The word probably doesn’t require definition.  It’s a term coined to describe people’s obsession with self-diagnosis based on reading online healthcare info.

According to American Medical News, which cites a Pew Research study, 80% of internet users search for health information online.  Since about 75% of Americans go online, that’s almost 60% of the US population who are ferreting out online information about illnesses or diseases related to themselves or someone they care about.  Some of that information is quite reliable; some not so much so.

Physicians are now reporting an increased number of patients who are needlessly worried about diseases they think they have as a result of internet reading.  The docs say they require significantly more time and counsel or, even worse, they sometimes demand costly screenings and tests just to prove they DON’T have a certain disease.

Recently I got an unusual diagnosis which will probably have little or no impact on my life or long term health.   The physician (not the best communicator, by the way) said, “And don’t go out and read about it online; it’ll just scare you.” You can imagine the first thing I did when I got back to the office. (And it did scare me to death.)  Suddenly I just knew I was having a reaction to the medicine (I wasn’t) and I was diving into “chat rooms” populated by people with the same “disease.” (I’ve never heard so many old wives tales.)

At a time when government, physicians, patients, and insurers are looking for ways to reduce healthcare costs, this can’t be good.  By the same token, patients are being encouraged to play a more intimate role in their own healthcare.  What’s an intelligent person to do?

Even before this development, which should feed satirists and late night comedians for days, I was underwhelmed by the company’s response. Nowhere on the Carnival Cruise website will you find reference to the incident, and only by digging into the Carnival Corporation Investor Relations page will you do so. The Costa Cruise website, in contrast, does feature YouTube video excerpts from a press conference with its CEO that took place three days after the incident. However, the CEO’s delivery of remarks read in English, obviously not his first language as he pronounces lawsuit “law-sweet,” does not impart the level of personal warmth, engagement and concern that such situations demand. Still, it was a real person – at last – as for the first day and a half, Costa and Carnival communicated only through news releases. In contrast, Carnival received substantial praise for its handling of a November 2010 fire on the Carnival Splendor that left 4,500 passengers and crew stranded adrift for days. I doubt similar praise will follow this incident, despite the nifty 30 percent discount offer.

As for the industry, the Cruise Lines International Association expressed its condolences in the second-to-last sentence of a three-paragraph statement issued three days after the incident. The sentence before that statement reads: “Accidents such as this one are an extremely rare occurrence in the cruise industry, and cruising continues to be one of the safest means of travel among all types of vacationing.” I do think they might have managed to get to the condolences a bit quicker.

In Italy, Gianni Scerni, president of RINA, which is a classification organization that issues certificates of seaworthiness for vessels, including the Concordia, resigned surprisingly within hours of publication of an article in which he criticized Costa management. Scerni reportedly expressed doubt that Costa was unaware of the routine and very dangerous practice of “saluting” the island of Giglio by passing close to it, despite such incidents having been captured on YouTube and statements made by the ship’s second officer that the salute occurred “fairly often.” This dismissal could certainly be perceived, correctly or incorrectly, as the industry closing ranks to protect its own at the expense of a clear airing of the facts in this tragic story.

In the end, the cruise industry – including Costa and Carnival – are not likely to suffer much from this incident, despite the pictures that will remain in file footage and our mind’s eyes for years to come. It’s reported that just days after the accident, cruise bookings actually increased as savvy cruise regulars began seizing the opportunity to take advantage of discounts and specials being offered by nervous cruise lines.

What are your perceptions of the handling of this crisis by the cruise lines and the industry? Do you feel their crisis communication response to the Costa Concordia incident has been adequate?

An unfortunate side effect of that policy is that posts often contain outdated or incorrect information that PR pros cannot correct. Basically, they can recommend to Wikipedia that the page be edited and then cross their fingers.

Frustrated with that often dead-end process for removing erroneous Wikipedia information, Edelman Senior Vice President Phil Gomes has launched a Facebook group called “Corporate Representatives for Ethical Wikipedia Engagement” or CREWE. According to a Forbes story earlier this month, the group is looking to engage Wikipedia in a discussion about “how communications professionals and the Wikipedia community can/must work together.”

At the time of the Forbes piece, CREWE had 72 members. A week later, it was tracking above 110 members – including industry scribe Jack O’Dwyer, a smattering of Edelman employees, and even Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales.

Although joining the group requires an invite or approval from an administrator, any Facebook member can get a taste of the group’s work by browsing its Facebook wall, where posts are frequent. For example, at the time this post was written, the CREWE wall prominently featured a working document titled “Examples of unpublished COI Suggested Edits that followed Wikipedia Guidelines”.  Listed among the examples is this one by Gregory Kohs:

“Comcast:  Ever since July 2011, the Wikipedia article has stated that Comcast is the fourth-largest residential telephone provider in the country.  The fact is, though, since March 2009, Comcast passed Qwest and became the third-largest provider.  This was documented in DSL Reports, Reuters, and other news sources.  Because I am purportedly “banned” from editing Wikipedia, I could not even make a mention of this on the WP Comcast Talk page, however, 16 days ago, I did the next-best thing — mentioned it on WikipediaReview.com, where dozens of Wikipedians (including admins) read the postings.  I even provided a handy link to a Reuters source for the fact” … “It’s still being ignored by the Wikipedians.”

Among CREWE’s documents you can also find a working copy of the CREWE PR Plan and a proposal for a pilot project that would allow PR pros to edit Wikipedia pages.

Of course, at this early stage, it’s unclear whether these or other moves by CREWE will have an impact on Wikipedia’s perceptions and policies toward PR pros. But as the group undoubtedly grows in size, it will be interesting to watch and listen.

What do you think? Will CREWE be able to influence Wikipedia’s editing rules? Have you ever run into issues with incorrect Wikipedia postings? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.