Don’t know the full story yet, but on multiple Facebook pages our team has visited today we’ve noticed that you cannot comment on the wall postings.

An example from Social Media Examiner:

Older post made to wall, you can comment on it

Versus the recent comments:

Recent Wall Posts with no ability to Comment

For reference here’s more of the page in context:

Older posts (9 hours ago) can be commented on

Update: This does not affect walls of personal profiles. Just Pages, no word yet if this affects community pages yet.

Update 10:09 am Target’s Wall: http://www.facebook.com/target?v=wall documents this quite well

Note the comment on Target's wall about Facebook comments being broken, and then comments on a later post

Target users desiring it to be fixed.

Update 10pm: Known issue, Social Media Examiner has a thread explaining that its the posts made by fans to the walls of business pages. However fans can still comment on posts by the page admins. AllFacebook.com is also covering it.

This is a tip or a technique I use everyday to monitor keywords about me and my clients. There are tools which do actual sentiment analysis and all kinds of other listening, but I just want to be reminded to read the conversations.

I also like to keep my inbox small. So I trick myself and have content by keywords delivered to my inbox, that way I’m forced to read it or make a conscious effort to ignore it. Not signing into a listening application can cause problems… unless it delivers emails of conversations.

This technique will focus on listening to twitter, however there are plenty of RSS feeds out there to use this method of “subscribing”

Gathering your RSS Feed

Simply head over to twitter search and type in a query, I’ll use “elephants” as mine… however I recommend you visit the Advanced Search page to develop a better query like “elephants -peanuts -from:Elleph” This will give you this page as a result http://search.twitter.com/search?q=elephants (or http://search.twitter.com/search?q=elephants+-peanuts+-from:Elleph) And in reality you can use these URLs in most RSS to Email tools, however I recommend going one step further and locating the actual RSS feed.

In the Twitter Search Results page you should see a link saying “Feed for this query” (as seen in the image below) right click on this link and choose copy link address or link URL. This is the actual RSS feed url that we’ll use in the next step.

Finding an RSS to Email tool

There are a few options, and some have come and gone over the years, so I’ll recommend two searches, and two currently functioning tools. First off, searches:

• http://www.google.com/search?q=rss+to+email
• http://www.google.com/search?q=rss+to+inbox

One of the current tools I use shows up in spot number one for both of those searches… Feed my Inbox. The next sections will explain what to do with each of these tools

Feed My Inbox

Arguably the best tool out there for taking an RSS feed and dumping the results to email, Feed my Inbox makes it quite simple, when you arrive it asks for a feed url (which we got from step one) and your email address, that’s all it needs to start emailing you the tweets you care about. (or blog postings youtube videos etc). You can also login to customize more settings, but the basics are here for you.

Notify.me

Taking the RSS to inbox one step further Notify.me allows you to have it send an SMS, IM or Email. Which is very handy for the more important keywords you want to pay attention to. Once signed in you can turn on and off notifications with a simple click and add feeds by pasting the URL (from above) to add new feeds.

Simple

These are two tools, and one technique that I use on a daily basis to keep me informed of conversations around my keywords… this is how I can appear to be online all day long while actually enjoying a life offline.

Remember, Automate the simple stuff, do the conversations and relationship manually.

The following are the 60 or so tweets I had as my presentation material for a recent talk at GRSM on Twitter Strategy for Business. I would love to post the slideshare of this presentation however it was designed as a presentation via twitter. Many of you have asked how I did it. I could not have done it with out the help of two staff members of ddm marketing & communications who posted each point as I hit it. These tweets are my content, I prewrote them and my staff only filled in 3 or so tweets where I strayed from my pre written notes.  I’ve also embedded the video for your viewing pleasure.

GRSM – Aug. 26th 2010 Paul Kortman Twitter Strategy from Grand Rapids Social Marketing on Vimeo.

Were you there? What did you think? Discuss your thoughts in the comments section below

Presentation Notes as Tweets

Getting setup for #GRSM, follow along at home or from your own laptop at @grcommfound by going here: http://bit.ly/dbXy3K Link to Tweet

Just a couple more minutes until we start the Twitter talk at #grsm, we will be Ustreaming this for those at home, follow @grsm for link Link to Tweet

If you don’t care about live tweeting events, or learning about #twitter use a tool to mute me: http://bit.ly/ahN902 #grsm Link to Tweet

- @joelleo and @imaclurg from @grsm should be thanked (or bought a few beers) for creating #grsm and giving back to the community Link to Tweet

The house is packed! Great Turnout. #grsm Link to Tweet

For those who didn’t get the link earlier, what you see on the big screen can be seen on your screen here: http://bit.ly/dbXy3K #grsm Link to Tweet

Paul Kortman @namtrok is starting an non-traditional presentation, using #twitter as the presentation tool #grsm http://bit.ly/dbXy3K Link to Tweet

This is an experiment in action, we’ve taken the proper safety precautions, but this whole presentation could blow up :) #grsm Link to Tweet

Tweet Grid Link: http://bit.ly/dbXy3K Link to Tweet

I work for @teamddm as dir of Search & Social: We help companies navigate twitter & more on a daily basis #grsm Link to Tweet

Gratuitous plug for @teamddm, did you know we’re hiring? http://bit.ly/1q7JX Search & Social, CSS, Proj Mgmt & more #grsm (plz RT) Link to Tweet

I believe that #twitter is an infrastructure like the power grid. You can use it for whatever purpose. Thus, twitter as a preso tool #grsm Link to Tweet

Pyramid of Strategy: top= Marketing Strategy, second tier includes Advertising Strategy, PR, Sales, Trad Media, Web Strategy #grsm Link to Tweet

Everything you do should be driven by objectives which come from a strategy, this includes all SocMed, but especially Twitter #grsm Link to Tweet

Pyramid of Strategy: Whiteboard pic, Marketing Strategy http://twitpic.com/2i1cls #grsm Link to Tweet

Under Web strategy (Tier 3 of Pyramid of Strategy) is Conversion Strategy, Content Strategy, and Social Media Strategy #grsm Link to Tweet

Ever thought about a conversion strategy for your website? What are you trying to get your users to do? How does it help your biz? #grsm Link to Tweet

Pyramid of Strategy: Tier 4 under SocMed Strat: Blog, Facebook, Twitter, 4Sq, Tumblr, Flickr, YouTube, <–All are Strategies #grsm Link to Tweet

Question for you to ponder: What are you doing with your web presence? #GRSM Link to Tweet

Pyramid of Strategy: Whiteboard pic, Web/Social Strategy http://twitpic.com/2i1co3 #grsm Link to Tweet

And finally Tier 5 under Twitter Strategy – Listen, Objectives, Voice, Content Strat, Follower Strategy, Integration Strat, & Tools #grsm Link to Tweet

Pyramid of Strategy: Whiteboard pic, Twitter Strategy http://twitpic.com/2i1cql #grsm Link to Tweet

Pyramid of Strategy: Whiteboard pic, Whole Pyramid: http://twitpic.com/2i1cjm #grsm Link to Tweet

I’m going to skip over Listen as a strategy, all I’ll say is you’ve got to listen first. I’m assuming you are or have done this. #grsm Link to Tweet

Objectives flow from Marketing Strategy all the way down to Twitter Strategy, are you selling hammers? or pimping a non-profit #grsm Link to Tweet

Example Objectives for Twitter Strategy: Sell Tickets, brand awareness, buzz generation, Publicity prep, customer support and more #grsm Link to Tweet

Example Objective: Product Awareness, focus around a topic like better eyesight, this drives content and follower strategy too. #grsm Link to Tweet

Easter Egg: http://bit.ly/bCHsxF #grsm Link to Tweet

Voice was covered last year http://bit.ly/936nOi Personal/Person, Person behind the brand, & the brand #grsm What is your voice on Twitter? Link to Tweet

New thoughts or ideas on voice for twitter strategy? #grsm Are you going to be hip, stale, conversational, self-focused or what? Link to Tweet

How many retweets, original content, replies, and marketing are you going to post? #grsm Link to Tweet

I recommend: 40% original content, 40% other’s content and 20% (or less) ads/marketing speak #grsm Link to Tweet

Social Media is a multidirectional platform. DO NOT be 100% marketing, or 100% one-way. Dialog, Dialog, Dialog. #grsm Link to Tweet
Want to know how to create content that will “go viral” or at a minimum get retweeted? checkout @danzarrella now working for @hubspot #grsm Link to Tweet

Questions to ask in a content strategy: ratios, do you RT? Content scheduled? Editorial Calendar? What value are you offering? #grsm Link to Tweet

So many brands get it so wrong with 90% marketing speak 10% “hey i’m going to talk to someone” #grsm Link to Tweet

Editorial calendars help plan what you’re going to say on Twitter… it’s not bad to plan #grsm Link to Tweet

We all want Followers, but you’ve got to have the right followers, total numbers mean nothing if they are not in your target market #grsm Link to Tweet

Tools to help in building follower base: @followerwonk, @socialoomph, @tweepsearch, @PeopleBrowsr, @twittersearch, & more #grsm Link to Tweet

Automation can only do so much, the old school methods still work the best, hand following, @ replying and unfollowing non followers #grsm Link to Tweet

It is really hard to follow 100 people manually…. use tools #grsm Link to Tweet

Some clients have taken > year to break the 1,000 follower mark, others have broken 2,000 in 6 months. Depends on target Audience #grsm Link to Tweet

Easter Egg: http://bit.ly/crDDGm #grsm Link to Tweet

It’s not about the follower number, it’s about reach, dialog, and engagement of followers. Success is not measured in follower count #grsm Link to Tweet
If success were measured by follower count @ladygaga should be today’s speaker, > 5 Million followers and less than 500 tweets #grsm Link to Tweet

Key in Follower Strategy: find the right accounts to follow through keyword/topic/geo-based searches, like “Venture Capitalist” #grsm Link to Tweet

Also possible to do a contest, give-aways based on hashtag, dialog, or following. <– These are more difficult to gain adoption #grsm Link to Tweet

Contests to gain followers work well if you have a large base of engaged followers already or can engage influencers #grsm Link to Tweet
Short and Simple what other social networks are you going to integrate to your twitter presence? #grsm – this is your integration strategy Link to Tweet

Example integrations: YouTube, Blog, RSS feed, Delicious, Feed Reader, Facebook, Tumblr, Posterous, 4sq, flickr, linkedin, etc #grsm Link to Tweet

Choose your integration wisely #grsm Link to Tweet

Be careful with Integration of other SocMed content as they can be annoying, and they can mess up, automation is not always best #grsm Link to Tweet

You have to have a strategy with what tools you are going to use. Don’t use a tool just cause the twitterati use it. #grsm Link to Tweet
Too many tools to mention, but @oneforty from @pistachio has the best collection and review, I often find new tools there. #grsm Link to Tweet

I use @tweetgrid @tweetdeck @tweetie @twitter (iPhone) @echophone @cotweet @hootsuite @friendorfollow @klout @twitterfeed & others #grsm Link to Tweet

Don’t forget listening tools: @scoutlabs @radian6, @AlterianSM2, @socialmention Automate the easy stuff, spend your time on dialog #grsm Link to Tweet
New Features: Followed by http://twitpic.com/2i0qm9 U both Follow http://twitpic.com/2i0qri Suggestions 4U http://twitpic.com/2i0qws #grsm Link to Tweet

For important topics, create an RSS feed and drop it in your email so you’re notified when your topic comes up #grsm Link to Tweet

Take an afternoon once a quarter and evaluate your strategy #grsm Link to Tweet

Can you remember twitter without replies?? #grsm Link to Tweet
Freebie: Twitter Lists: http://bit.ly/bXY76B #grsm Link to Tweet
Because of Twitter and sms people’s lives were saved in last years Chilean earthquake. ISPs/web access down but sms was up #grsm Link to Tweet
Thanks for listening, reading, tweeting, asking questions and all, please feel free to ask questions here #grsm or on #twitter! Link to Tweet

Thanks to @danielbkimball and @imeghanp from @teamddm for being the wizards behind the curtain! #grsm Link to Tweet

And thanks to @GRCommFound for making space for #grsm and other learning/non-profit events. Link to Tweet

Sorry there will be no slidedeck to download :) but you can search for #grsm and find all of these tweets (for a week) http://bit.ly/dldNxU Link to Tweet
Thanks for participating!! Did you enjoy the experiment? Lets carry on the conversation on #twitter #grsm Link to Tweet

Wow that’s a long outline

There is a lot to say about twitter and business!

Were you there? What did you think? Discuss your thoughts in the comments section below

Skittles.com

Social Media sharing icons are becoming ubiquitious, Clients ask for better social media integration on their website and they generally mean they would like these social media icons on their page/site/content. In my oponion there are two types of social media icons by function. The first, which I’m not going to spend too much time on in this post, is the “We have a presence here” Icons

Presence Icons

levi.com

These Icons are in a consistant place on a website, typically in a header or a footer, and simply communicate to the user that we have a presence on these social networks. These icons used to say Find us on Facebook, or Follow us on Twitter, or Fan us on Facebook, or even Like us on Facebook. (There is so much wrong with the last one, but thats for another day!)

techcrunch.com

I have no problem with these Icons, they do what Icons do best, effectively communicate a larger concept, and frankly the larger concept (we have a presence on this network or that network) belongs on these sites.

getonboard.com - Transit blog

These Icons have their place and are not for debate in this post, however the other Social Media Icons are.

Content Sharing Icons

mashable.com

These are the icons you most often see at the bottom or top of a blog post, an individual piece of content that can be shared on one of these social networks. sometimes they are labeled “Share and Enjoy” othertimes they are not labeled. And even in this category there could be two different sub-categories, but for today’s arguments I’m going to lump them into one. It is my attempt in this post to show how these social media icons are over used, unnecessary, and an old concept rehashed.

Social Media Icons are Over Used

getonboard.org - Transit Blog

We are starting to see these Icons everywhere, and I’m not referring to the Facebook “Like” button that will grow to ubiquity as well. Any site that is current is or has already applied these to their content. The ones that make me laugh the most are contact us pages with the sharing icons. Who would want to have a discussion about your contact page? Do you really think that’ll go viral? I mean your phone number is sexy and all but I doubt I want to share that with my grandma on Facebook ;)

Social Media Icons are Unnecessary

nytimes.com

And why have these Icons? Anyone who is savvy enough to use these networks, who would really make something spread/go viral is going to know how to copy/paste the URL in the network they want to and with the options/content/context that they want to set.

techcrunch.com

Most of my target audience with this blog is similar in skill set as I am, I rarely find a need to use these, I much prefer to put my own title, my own bit.ly account information and my own privacy settings on something I share, why then wouldn’t I just copy/paste the URL?

Sharing Icons are the same as tell a friend from the 90s

lifehacker.com

Yeah you remember those… where it had a little email envelope, may have used the word share, but most often said tell a friend. You could then type in their email addy, and yours, a subject and a message. Ironically Email is still the best social network to make content go viral. But we can’t access the analytics on that. (Note the lifehacker image to the right, still has an “Email this” link.)

Wordpress plugin, sexy bookmarks

Email and Tell a Friend also prove the previous point of being unnecessary, most people copy and paste urls into emails, they don’t use tell a friend, why do we think they will use the sharing icons?

cnn.com

The long and short of it: If you create good (remarkable) content people will discuss and share it, no matter what tool set you provide, or don’t provide for them. So if you are adding these icons to then label your site as integrated with social media you are missing the boat. It’s about the substance of your content, not the icons.

Before you get all crazy on me in the comments for slamming icons you love, realize that some of what is written here may be from me playing devil’s advocate. I’m trying to argue for the oponent’s side to see if they are right. With that said, what parts of this article do I agree with? Good luck.

Google recently released an update to its display of content called Real-Time Search. At first I thought this would be a better experience than twitter search or facebook search, because its from the king of Search, Google. Unfortunately it has become apparent that this was more of a knee-jerk reaction to Bing’s Twitter Search announcement less than 50 days earlier.

We knew that Google and others were indexing the tweet stream earlier this year, but this is a game changer in how they have integrated their display of tweets with standard results. 

Real Time, the Achilles Search Heel

So what’s the big deal? This content from twitter, this real-time search content that Google is now displaying in it’s Search Engine Results Page (SERP) is all available elsewhere, so this is just another evolution in the concept of universal search. Right?

True, but as any SEO will tell you, those positions on page one, from 1-10 on the first SERP are highly coveted and can garner significant respect and authority. Be it right or wrong a searcher will more quickly refine their search query then click to page two. A searcher will also consider items on page one of a SERP to have authority or credibility.

Tweeple have credibility and deserve SERP right?

Perhaps some of the accounts on twitter deserve respect and authority, but Google has not indexed it accordingly. Some quick tests have gone on to prove that any (non-private) account gets indexed and can show up on page one of a Google SERP.  Bing keeps the twitter search separate in http://bing.com/twitter. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for Google and Bing indexing tweets, I’d love to see them improve on twitter search, but I like Bing’s approach better than Google. It allows me to say, I’m looking for real-time information that could be unqualified.

How to abuse Google’s Real-Time Search

It’s fairly simple actually, find a search that returns a real-time result in the SERP, namtrok, davenaylor, tiger woods, or Copenhagen Climate, and tweet with those keywords in it. You will see your tweet show up. Now envision this search for sesame street, and a pedophile tweeting something to the tune of “Hey kids want to see more sesame street? Call me at 555-111-2222, I’ll show you how.”

I like every parent of small children suddenly got totally creeped out.

Do you see the possibilities? Do you see the problems? Do you see the spam and liable issues?

Granted the search for Sesame Street does not currently display Google’s Real-Time feature, but who gets to choose which search does and which doesn’t? It’s only a matter of time before this weakness in Google’s SERPs is exploited. (I assume that anything trending or popular gets Real-Time function added, how long till we make Sesame Street trend on Twitter?)

Bing poised, Google Cracked?

I am a Google fan, from day one when they took down Altavista. However, The giants always fall, remember MySpace? or Lotus? How about Windows? (too early?)

No matter how much I love Google and dispise Microsoft, I have to admit, Bing is the best thing Microsoft has put out in years. The only thing Bing needs to improve it’s results set is more traffic. Yup, the crowd when it shifts to the next search platform will help that platform improve it’s relevance and results. If Google were to make a false step now and 10%, or 20% of it’s traffic move to Bing, plus the Micro-hoo deal. Bing could be poised to actually challenge the search giant.

Will Google let that happen? I don’t think so. But if they don’t see the failure of leaving Real-Time Search results in page one of the SERP then perhaps they are too high on their own ego?

Besides I think the usability and pure function of the Real-Time updates are flawed. I much prefer Bing or Twitter Search itself. But thats just me right?

Do you agree?

Do you see the flaws in Google’s Real-Time search? Share examples of searches you’d like to spam or be concerned about being spammed.

Today is an American holiday known as Thanksgiving, and while the foundations of this holiday are different, the current culture dictates that there be a large family gathering with overeating and a turkey involved. There is another more subtle tradition of listing the things a person is thankful for. This is my venue of choice for listing my 2009 thanksgiving “I’m thankful for…” list.

God’s grace, mercy, and forgiveness.

Frankly I rarely have my act together and yet God loves me. When I dwell on these two concepts I often am dumbfounded as to why He chooses me/us.

My wife.

She has had numerous struggles in the past two years, major let downs, major health issues, and through it all she has perservered. She is an encouragement to me in how no matter what happens she gets out of bed each day and makes it through the day. I love you babe.

My two kids (plus the third on the way).

In the last 3 years since having kids I have laughed, cried, sleptless, and played more than ever before. My life and heart would be empty with out them.

Google.

Yeah here is where I earn my nerd credentials. I’m a search engine marketing specalist. Without google I wouldn’t A. Have access to a tenth of the information that I do know. B. Have a cool job like I do now. And C. Have access to free tools like Gmail, google analytics, google docs, and many others. I’m a nerd and I’m thankful for Google

My team at work.

There have been tough times and they will cone again. But no where else have I worked where I am valued as much as with my current team. Also I’ve never been more proud of my coworkers as I am now. I love my job.

Twitter.

By far it it my network of choice. It has extended my reach, helped my clients improve their numbers and taught me many many new things.

My iPhone.

No other device has so radically changed every aspect of my life and how I communicate. I write, plan, research, socialize, and connect more now thanks to it.

Centos and Linux in general.

(I told you this is a nerds thankful list) no other OS combines security, stability, and openess quite like Cent does.

Living on a farm in the woods.

Farming has it’s many challenges, but with as much tech I have in my life it is still amazing to connect with Gods creation and see how plants grow and animals provide for us.

My socio-economic status.

We’re a one income middle class family. I love being able to afford family vacations while saving money by being a one car family and carpooling. There are many joys and humbling experiences that come with middle class life.

The ability to help people.

Everyday I find myself training/instructing/helping others from clients to friends to the local mechanic. I am so thankful to be able to give to others what has been given to me.

Happy Thanksgiving to you all. May you express thankfullness in things small and large everyday.

(I owe a thank you to my wife for the suggestion of a non-traditional thankful list.)

What is On Page SEO?

On Page SEO is a term used to describe the work done to change Page content (Titles, Headings, Alt text, internal link text, keyword density, etc) in order to affect position (page rank) in the SERP (Search Engine Results Page). We’ve been working with quite a few of our clients and copywriters training them to have an eye for optimizing on-page content in light of SEO and keyword positioning.

It brings good success. But we have learned not to stop there.

Website Promotion

To boil it all down, Website promotion is efforts at garnering links, either through increased exposure, through the blogosphere, through social networks, or through standard linkbuilding.

No matter how you look at it Website Promotion can be a more powerful tool than on page SEO.

Link building case study

To prove a point, I took a domain that had only one published page, and on that page had 6 words and two images. There were no keywords, no alternate text on the images, no headings and the page title was very similar to the domain name.

To say that this page had no on page SEO is an understatement.

I choose a keyword for which this page did not rank, The domain, page title, the 6 words on the page nothing contained this keyword.

I created 8 brand new blogs, one post each, with different content on each post, but all linking to that page with the link text of my keyword. And it worked

Within one month The keyword-less (the none on-page SEO optimised page) ranked on page one, a couple of days later it was up to position 5 on page one.

Quoting Search Engine Watch’s Eric Enge: “Unlike on-page SEO, Web site promotion nearly always continues to offer good returns.” and “Every minute you spend tweaking (and re-tweaking) on-page factors is a minute you don’t spend on promoting the Web site” He says more in his post on Website promotion

We all know our normal latin characters. We know them world-wide because English is the primary trade language.

We also know that the Internet has been based on the latin character set. There has been a shift away from this to UTF-8 encoding. But there is now a larger shift. We’re approaching the 20th birthday of the Web, and for the first twenty years the web has been based on Latin-1 for domain names. This is about to change.

English is still the predominant language on the web but, this will not last for long. The Chinese are quickly becoming the dominant player online despite the Great Firewall of China.

And so I want you to read a post by Andy, which does great justice to the background of this change and the moumental affects if will have on the web as we know it today:

Even though, in the foreground, this change will make the Web seem much more universal to all people, in the background ICANN has implemented a huge translation workaround that needed to be tested for absolute safety. And when you’re taking on well over 100,000 potential characters that appear in URLs as opposed to the 30 or so which were in use before, you really need to take care.

“This is only the first step, but it is an incredibly big one and a historic move toward the internationalization of the Internet,” said ICANN Chairman Peter Dengate Thrush in Seoul. “The first countries that participate will not only be providing valuable information of the operation of IDNs in the domain name system, they are also going to help to bring the first of billions more people online — people who never use Roman characters in their daily lives.”

In two weeks, all countries will be able to apply for Internet extensions reflecting their name and using their own characters. It will be interesting to see what impact this has on domains, trademark specialists, and on the domains we know and love. It will also have an impact on search engines.

The expression “keywords in the URL” will now have a truly global meaning and affect the way we manage global sites. Clearly, someone just put their foot on the global gas pedal.

Read more of Andy’s post on the SEO impact of double-byte characters in domain names

The SEO impact for local searches outside of latin character regions will be huge. But Search Engines will have to change their index algorithms to keep up with this. I’m waiting and watching, this could be fun!

I implore you to investigate Twitter lists. A New feature rolled out by twitter last week. A quote from twitter’s own non-micro-blog:

“We believe Lists will be a new discovery mechanism for great tweets and accounts.”

I have to underscore that. There are great list strategies and great twitter lists being created and curated everyday. I’ve tried to list some lists and catoroize them to give some inspiration. There is no way to include the thousands of lists, nor the many different list making strategies, I’ve tried to cover the basics with links to more information.

From lists that geographically tie people:

• http://twitter.com/SleepoverRover/local-las-vegas
• http://twitter.com/SuperDu/grand-rapids
• http://twitter.com/bcbeatty/chicago
• http://twitter.com/BillHR/grandrapids
• http://twitter.com/keithprivette/minnesota-twitheads

To lists that focus on people’s content

• http://twitter.com/PRsarahevans/social-groups-tech-app
• http://twitter.com/SashaWolff/socialmediaawesomesauce
• http://twitter.com/mashable/social-media-links
• http://twitter.com/chucksense/comedy
• http://twitter.com/glossolaliac/musicality

To Lists that are employment focused

• http://twitter.com/muckrack/chicago-tribune
• http://twitter.com/namtrok/team-ddm
• http://twitter.com/imaclurg/pomegranate-studios
• http://twitter.com/VarejoVerdeWM/walmart
• http://twitter.com/blackfridayweb/major-retailers

Or the lists that could only fall into the category of Too Much Information?

• http://twitter.com/jimconnolly/jims-inner-circle
• http://twitter.com/califmom/nutz-n-slutz
• http://twitter.com/damselesque/people-i-don-t-sleep-with
• http://twitter.com/lafix/guns-for-hire

Could The geographically focused lists fall into the category of TMI if a person doesn’t give their location away in their twitter account? Therein lies a significant problem with the list functionality: You are defined by what people list you as. Could someone add your account to a liars-cheats-conartists list? Could they be sued for defamation?

Possible Twitter List Strategies

No matter how you develop your lists, There are Etiquette and Strategies that are already emerging. As well as third party app support and integration for twitter lists.  But to me the most benefit of this new feature is the metrics this will enable.

Before twitter lists, one had to look at three numbers and 10 tweets to determine if an account was real and or worth their follow. Now we have a 4th number, listed.

For example, look at a famous twitteratti: Sarah Evans, She follows > 9,000 people and has 31,000 followers. She has posted 14,000 tweets. On these three numbers I am able to draw a few conclusions

• She either stopped following people in return, or she only follows a select few
• She is somehow famous in twitter, or ran a competition to get followers
• She posts a lot of content.

Now we add the list number; She has been listed over 500 times. This means that not only do people follow her for unknown reasons but now they specifically list her and essentially tell you why they list her. By glancing through the lists she is on a person can know what kind of content they will receive from her.

• marketing
• blogging
• social media
• chicago
• publicrelations
• must follow

Looking through these lists it also tells me what she is not

• photographer
• funny/humor
• west coast
• self promoter
• MLM entrepreneur

Twitter lists are a very powerful tool. It is your choice to use this power for good or for evil. I predict good will triumph in the long run but there will be evil shortly.

So what’s your Twitter List Strategy? Do you desire to be listed 100 times? Do you desire to gain respect and following by creating the most beneficial lists? A new fame could come from curating the best lists.

Thank you Flickr user xjy

Are you kidding me? He’s going to be just like one of those other SEO guys who blog about blogging or about blog content?

Yes, and No.

I have been struggling lately with this concept and so I’m going write my struggles and invite you into a process/growth/learning/development I’m going through.

Content is King

If you haven’t heard it before, please search on the terms content and king. You will find a wealth of bloggers discussing how it’s about the content you put out there.

It’s true: A Twitter profile, a YouTube channel, a Facebook fan page, a blog, these are all methods of putting content out there. So to be social, to take advantage of the new marketing style, one has to have content.

I thought it was about Listening or Listenomics

If content is king, then perhaps listening is queen? Or is it Duke? I never did understand royalty.

The long abused metaphor of the social web as a cocktail party helps us understand this relationship. Even the most popular person at a cocktail party will lose people’s attention if they only talk and do not listen. No matter what topic they talk about. This is not a speech, a monologue or a diatribe. This is being social.

So yes, spend time listening –a lot of time. But the converse is true. A wallflower at the cocktail party is not going to be interesting nor will he sell anyone on his next business idea. Not until he opens his mouth and begins to talk, aka provides content.

Produce Content and Listen

It’s a two way street, dialogue, etc. These all point to the fact that we were given ears and mouths. So please when approaching social media consider it a two-way media. You will be producing content and consuming content (also called listening).

What Content to Produce?

This is where I struggle.

Ad agencies in the past have created ads about their products, like a car driving on some nice street around a corner – with a tight shot of the wheel while talking about control. And this is the content they and the car companies produced. Focused on them, on their product, on its benefits.

That doesn’t work anymore. Granted these are targeted to a segment of the buying population, but the costs and the ROI on traditional messaging is not effective or beneficial anymore.

Take any statistic you want, people trust recommendations and referrals (Word of Mouth) over any advertisement.

Most of marketing is about selling a product or service. That’s the ultimate goal. So we use advertisements (traditional and non-traditional) to get the product or service sold.

Yet hearing from your company about your product is not going to make me talk about it. I’m not going to rave at how well you presented me with the fact that you think you are better than your competition.

What will get me talking about you?

So if it’s not product or service-focused content, is it industry focused?

Take the car example: If Ford were to talk to me about the process of launching a new product or the process of designing batteries or the process of choosing how to gear their new Fiesta for the American market, would I care? Would I care enough to talk about it?

What if they gave me a free car? Would I, an average-joe-american, rave about the car? Or about having a free car?

Is Word of Mouth Marketing all about Gimmicks?

Some call it viral marketing, others call it guerilla marketing. But, is that the only way to produce content that will attract attention?

Is it about being Edgy?

Mashable recently covered a law firm who tried an edgy marketing piece. Is that the only way to get attention in the 21st century, borderline lying?

I don’t know.

So what do I tell my client? How do they use the social web to sell more of their products or services?

In my opinion, my client needs to:

• Listen
• Provide a great product
• Provide great customer service
• Answer potential customer’s needs with content
• Produce remarkable content
• Produce highly relevant, specifically targeted content

It’s just that simple. :)