This presentation serves as a broad overview of popular social media technology and was presented by the Capital Area District Library's Online Content/PR Coordinator and Technology Librarian on April 29, 2010.
The Capital Area District Library (CADL) is a mid-Michigan destination for exciting programs, quality materials and services, and access to technology, all free to the residents in our district. CADL serves communities throughout Ingham County (with the exception of East Lansing) with 13 libraries and a Bookmobile.
16. So what DO these mean? Twitter Me on Facebook An Overview of Social Media Tools
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Social media is everywhere, both literally and figuratively. For a lot of people, taking the first step into the social media arena can be really intimidating. I was talking to a friend of mine last week who said, “I don’t want to get on Twitter. It’s like having to learn a whole new language.” I think that he’s not alone in this sentiment.
The biggest challenge facing public relations in this day and age is getting people’s attention. Social media is a great way to engage users where they already exist. Proper implementation of social media is the answer. Among all of the social networking options, the key is determining where to focus your energy. You can’t be everywhere at the same time.
Social media is all about the conversation. Social media can’t be used successfully if you’re just talking about yourself or your product all the time. You need to engage the users in their online community and make a tangible connection with them. Making that connection increases the likelihood that they will, of their own accord, talk about you or your service. You go to them; they respond.
Two things always confuse social media newbies. Number 1: Vocabulary. A lot of social media sites have different names that mean essentially the same thing. For instance, what are known as your friends on MySpace are called your followers on Twitter. As we go through this presentation, key vocabulary words for each site discussed will appear in the upper right corner in a green box, like you can see here. The other thing social media newbies often struggle with are these little square icons representing the various popular social media sites. For the newbies in the audience, we’re going to have a quiz at the end of this presentation, at which time you should ALL be able to name them. The winner gets a free library card.
On Facebook, the people you connect with are known as your friends or fans. In just the past couple weeks, Facebook has added the “like” feature, enabling users to more easily connect with businesses and organizations they appreciate. Icon-wise, remember: F is for Facebook, a site known for its blue and white layout. Facebook allows organizations to establish a presence through developing a fan page that Facebook users can “like.” On that page, organizations can import a weblog, promote events through an online listing that can be featured on anyone’s personal or organizational Facebook page. Pages can also be used to share photos or links to other sites of interest. Your page itself can even be featured on other Facebook profiles.
Flickr is recognized by its pink and blue dots. Your Flickr friends are known as your Flickr contacts. Flickr is a site where users can share photos they’ve taken, from the personal to the amateur professional. You have a profile and can “contact” other Flickr users to see each others’ photos more easily. At the library, we share photos from the events we have. We also use Flickr groups to allow our patrons to show us why they love the library.
These icons represent the two most commonly used blogging services, WordPress and Blogger. The people who read your blog are known as your readers or subscribers. As there are multiple blogging services competing for users, there is no one standardized term for blog followers. A lot of people have suggested that blogging is over and done with, which couldn’t be further from the truth! Blogs provide a forum through which one can prove themselves an expert in their field. There is no character limit to a blog post.
LinkedIn is all about the people IN your network (hence the “in” icon). The people you are linked to are known as your connections. You set up a profile, get connections and can add applications to share things like a reading list. You can also use LinkedIn to list and find open positions, and you can use it to keep in touch with former co-workers and colleagues at other organizations.
Twitter is huge, especially in Greater Lansing these days. Just like F is for Facebook, T is for Twitter. Your friends on Twitter are known as your Followers. Twitter consists of posts limited to 140 characters and is known as “microblogging.” It can be used, again, for promotions and to promote events. You can also share links to your blog, website or other relevant & interesting articles. If you’re familiar with Facebook’s status update feature, Twitter is a social network that, essentially, consists of just status updates. No pages or groups, just updates. Remember, it’s about creating valuable conversation with your customers/users.
Many of us, even those who aren’t otherwise on social networks, use or at least know of YouTube. YouTube’s icon is the easiest to remember because, go figure, they include their name on it! Additionally, users may subscribe to your videos or befriend you on YouTube. YouTube is consistently the second and third-most searched site on the Internet. One of our YouTube subscribers even lives in Portugal and sends our librarians fan mail. YouTube is a site to which users can upload videos under ten minutes in length or 2 GB in size. We at CADL share content library users want and can use. We upload videos that include job and computer training videos, book reviews and our own PSAs. YouTube also enables rich PR communication. Having a video option available is much more appealing to the media than a plain old, letter-headed press release. Branching off from that, including videos in your Tweets makes them that much richer. YouTube is a tool that enables you to share your videos across platforms… for free.
RSS arguably has the most well-known icon of all the social technologies. RSS, most commonly known as “Really Simple Syndication,” is a tool that allows users to avoid having to “check back” at their favorite websites multiple times a day. RSS does the checking for you. As a social media manager, RSS is a fantastic tool that can be exploited to help syndicate your content to a variety of social media sites. Most commonly, people send the RSS feed from their blog to their Twitter account, they include a module at their website of recent Tweets, or they use RSS to share their latest YouTube uploads.
(left to right) Facebook, Flickr, Twitter, Blogging site: Wordpress & Blogger, LinkedIn, YouTube, RSS Congratulations, you just won a free library card!