Blog

Facebook's plan to take over the internet.

Cyber PR Books — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 12:37:49 +0000

In my last entry, I talked about Facebook and how they were phasing out "Become a fan" and changing it to "Like". At the time, no one was really sure how this was going to change the experience of Facebook. That is until later in the week at the F8 conference.

Facebook is rolling out a plan that will essentially put their footprint all over the web. This plan is called "One Graph". What is "One Graph"? In a nutshell, it's connecting Facebook to many other areas of the web and having those websites come back to Facebook. Mark Zuckerberg said "Yelp is mapping out the part of the graph that relates to small businesses. Pandora is mapping out the part of the graph that relates to music. If we can take these separate maps of the graph and pull them all together, then we can create a Web that's smarter, more social, more personalized, and more semantically aware."

Websites will have the opportunity to have like buttons on their websites. If a user clicks "Like" on the website, that information is fed back to Facebook and has potential to drive a lot of traffic from websites back to Facebook.

Many people are concerned about privacy. Privacy will become the responsibility of the user. Public doesn't mean "public on Facebook", public now has potential to mean public on the entire Facebook graph, which could potentially encompass almost everything. Facebook says they are dedicated to the users' privacy, but in the past they have gotten burned by things like "Beacon". A new privacy setting in Facebook was launched today called "instant personalization" that shares data with non-facebook websites and it is automatically set to "Allow." Doesn't sound like Facebook really cares about privacy when you see something like that.

What does all this mean? No one really knows. I don't think that Facebook even knows. Only time will tell.

Facebook: Welcome the "Like" button.

Cyber PR Books — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 02:10:11 +0000

Today, Facebook started rolling out the "Like" button. This button will replace "Become a Fan". I noticed the change was being rolled out when I went to a fan page and saw this...
But what does this mean? Facebook says “When you click “Like” on a Page, you are making a connection to that Page. The Page will be displayed in your profile, and in turn, you will be displayed on the Page as a person who likes that Page. The Page will also be able to post content into your News Feed.” This makes it seem like pages might be slightly more interactive than they were before and that's a good thing.
What do you think about this? Will being a "connection" rather than a "fan" be different?

Engage.

Cyber PR Books — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 02:06:09 +0000

One thing I always preach to clients is that they need to use social media to engage. But what does that mean?

1) Use Twitter. Many people say that they "don't get it", so just jump in. Tweet at least twice a day, respond to people who @ you and thank those that RT you.
2) Blog. Many of my clients get overwhelmed with this one, but a blog is a great central location for people to interact with you.
3) Thank people who comment on your blog. When someone takes the time to comment on your blog, thank them. I personally would email them to thank them, but at the very least comment a thank you. This helps build community and building community leads to building readership.
4) Find other blogs to follow. Pick at least 4 or 5 blogs that are relevant to your mission. If you are an author, follow book bloggers or other authors. If you are a musician, follow music bloggers. Then comment. People who follow those blogs may start following you.
5) Use LinkedIn. Create a profile and begin to find people you are connected to. You would be surprised by who you are connected to through your contacts.
6) Use Facebook. If you create a fan page, pay attention to it. Post new content on it. Respond to comments people leave on your fan page. Engage!
7) Pick your social sites carefully. It's easy to become overwhelmed with the multitude of social sites out there. Pick no more than five sites. This allows you to communicate on a deeper level than if you are trying to keep up with 25 sites.
8) Forget about the hard sell. Nobody cares. If all you're doing is trying to sell something, a book, a CD etc, people will get bored and bail. Build a community and the community will take care of you. It's ok to mention different projects from time to time, but don't make that your focus.

With these tips, you can begin to engage and build a community.

Spring cleaning

Cyber PR Books — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 12:52:16 +0000

Spring has sprung and for many of us that means cleaning out out our closets, desk drawers but what about our "digital closets"?

Every spring, I clean up my computer and delete files and bookmarks, file things away and archive. This year, I decided to take that a step further and do some social media spring cleaning. I want to get more value out of my social media experience. I want to reconnect with people, get rid of the things that aren't adding value to my experience and just generally tidying things up.

I started with Twitter.

1) I used Untweeps to unfollow people who have not posted in 90 days. "Untweeps" lets you determine this length of time. This cleared about 200 people off my list.
2) Then I used "Your Twitter Karma" to unfollow anyone who was not following me back that I was not interested in.
3) Then I went through and made lists. I have lists for people I know in real life, social media types, music types, regional people, bloggers and authors. This helps me keep track of people I follow.

I cut my list in Twitter in half and tidied things up a bit.

Then I moved to Facebook.
1) I unfriended people that I wasn't getting anything from. This was mostly people I knew from high school who most likely wanted to add me to poke around and see what I had been up to since graduation.
2) I 10 people I knew who could be valuable connections in my professional life.

This cleaned up my newsfeed quite a bit.

In LinkedIn, I reconnected with 20 connections who might have some value to me professionally, either because of what they have to offer or because of what their connections have to offer. While I was in there, I also joined a few groups so things aren't stagnant.

When I was done with all of that, I unsubscribed to any newsletters and blogs I don't read anymore.

Clearing out the cobwebs from my "digital closet" has helped me focus on what matters and now I'm able to spend a little less time on "noise" and get real value from my digital life. Maybe you could do the same?

Twitter turns four.

Cyber PR Books — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 12:52:33 +0000

On March 21st, Twitter celebrated it's fourth birthday. In that time, it's gone from 5,000 tweets a day to 50 million tweets a day. Lately, many people have been wondering if Twitter has reached it's plateau. The number of active users has decreased, but the number of tweets posted has increased. It seems that Twitter is still a relevant platform. Personally, I go through stages where I use it more than other times. Currently, I am in a stage where I am using it throughout the day. Is the future still bright for Twitter or will they end up being like other social media platforms that fall out of favor such as Myspace?

What are your thoughts about the future of Twitter?

Is Twitter still relevant?

Are you using Twitter more/less/at all?

Advanced Twitter searches

Cyber PR Books — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 15:28:02 +0000

Twitter is a very useful tool to find information. I've used it to keep up on current events, find new music, new books, meet new people, make business contacts and the list goes on and on. Within Twitter is a search function that is really basic that allows you to search the body of the tweets. Sometimes I want it to do more so below are three advanced searches and how to do them.

Location
If you want to find people in Chicago, you can go to the advanced Twitter search and type in br>near:"Chicago, IL" within:50mi
but what if you want to search authors who may live in Chicago. For that, you need to use Google. To look up authors in Chicago, you would type in
intext:"bio * author" intext:"location * Chicago" site:twitter.com
You can use this to find the location of anything or anyone in Twitter.

Bios
You can find a lot of information out about people from what they put in their bios. But how do you find that information? To find someone who is a musician, you would put in
intext:"bio * musician" site:twitter.com
You can of course put anything you want in the search.

Google Alerts I am a big fan of Google Alerts. I have them set up for things such as clients, my personal podcast, bands I like, authors I like etc. You can use Google Alerts with the above search strings. Every time an author from Chicago signs up, you will know about it. Of course you can change the search fields, but it is a great way to find people to follow on Twitter.

Happy Tweeting (and googling)!

Tips to avoid damaging your personal brand

Cyber PR Books — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 15:13:48 +0000

When most people think of brands, they think of big companies such as Apple, Starbucks, Levi's etc. But if you are an author or a musician, your personal brand is also your "company" brand and you need to take steps to protect it.

1) Setup a Google Alert.
A Google alert is an email update sent to you with a comprehensive list of Google results based on the search string you put in. You should have alerts setup for your name and the names of any projects such as books or CDs you have out. This helps you see what people are saying about you and also helps you engage with the people who are talking about your projects. I have Google alerts setup for my personal projects as well as alerts setup for my clients and their projects. To create a google alert go to www.google.com/alerts and follow the prompts.

2) Don't over promote yourself
While promoting yourself is an important part of building a brand, if you over promote yourself, people won't listen. In fact, they may unfollow, unfriend and even block you from their networks. You need to engage with people in forums such Twitter and Facebook. If you have a relationship with people, they will be more likely to pay attention to your promotion if the other 90% of your time is not spent self promoting.
I dealt with a musician client who asked me why they were losing followers in Twitter. I explained to them that the only things they were tweeting about were where to buy their CD and other merch, where to go see them live and where to watch their videos. They didn't have any real meat and were just promoting themselves 100% of the time and the number of followers suffered because of it. I gave them other ideas on what to tweet about such as funny things that happen on the road trips between gigs and even talking about lightening hitting their house and after a couple of weeks, the number of followers in Twitter grew and kept growing a steady pace. The moral of the story...you can self promote, but just do so in moderation.

3) Be consistent
Be consistent with your branding. Try to have your various vanity URLs be the same, i.e. twitter.com/cyberprbooks, facebook.com/cyberprbooks etc. It makes it easier to be found. Also, be consisent with fonts, logos, backgrounds, colors across your website, your blog and your social media networks. It will help you build brand recognition.

Try these tips and you will be well on your way to helping your brand.

Tips to promote yourself using social media

Cyber PR Books — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 14:47:40 +0000

Social media is a great vehicle to promote yourself or a project but some people go about it all wrong. This isn't the age of traditional PR where you need to blast the masses. The methodology with social media is about engaging with them. Here are a few tips to keep in mind when you have something to promote.

1) Network before you need to
Don't create a Twitter account or a Facebook page right when a book or CD is about to get released. Social media promotion is a marathon, not a 100 yard dash. You will not be able to make the kind of connections you need in a short period of time. It's about building relationships. This is particularly true of Twitter. Start building relationships before you need them. Then when it comes time to launch a new project, your base is already there.
2) Jump in
Jump in conversations that aren't about you. If you are constantly talking about yourself, people will lose interest quickly. Try making relationships by getting in on conversations that are about other topics of interest and build a community with other like minded people. Overall, this will help you achieve your goals.
3) Keep it up
Social media is something you need to be actively engaged in. You can't be engaged if you aren't communicating with other people on a regular basis. Try to tweet at least twice a day. Keep doing this even when you don't have something to promote because when you do have something to promote, you will already have a base of people to promote your project to.

If you use these tips, it will help any promotion you need to do go more smoothly.

Why Twitter is important

Cyber PR Books — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 13:17:00 +0000

I was talking to someone the other day about why Twitter is important and why authors and musicians should utilize it. The purpose of Twitter and other social media outlets such as Facebook is to engage in a two way conversation, to foster relationships and to build community. The old methods of marketing were very much one sided and those methods don't seem to be working very well in the world of web 2.0. Everyone gets inundated with hundreds of marketing messages each day, messages that many people ignore, but if you have a relationship with a follower via Twitter, they are going to pay attention to what you have to say. That's a good thing.

Some people don't understand how to even get started. I've said it once and I'll say it again...just jump in. Start retweeting. Start replaying to people. Start posting things going on with you or things you think are interesting. Follow people who are relevant or seem interesting. Once you do these things, it will be second nature and you will see your fan base grow.

The Importance of Consistency

Cyber PR Books — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 16:39:03 +0000

Yesterday, I was a having a conversation with someone about branding and how important consistency is.

If you are an author, a musician or a business of some sort, there should be a consistency throughout your web presence. Your websites and profiles across all sites where you can have custom profiles and backgrounds should be similar. They should also be similar to your main website, like color scheme for example.

Part of the branding also includes what the URL is. If a site offers a vanity URL, you should use it and you should make it the same across the board. If your Facebook URL is /johndoe then you should make your Twitter account be @johndoe. You should make whatever social media website you are using have the same naming convention. This makes it easier for people to find you. If I know someone's Twitter account is @johndoe, then if I want to find them on another site, sometimes, I might try /johndoe there as well. Consistency. It's important.

Since consistency is so important, and since no one knows what the next big social media website is going to be, it might not be a bad idea to use a website like knowem.com and see what names are available. They have a paid version where they actually register you at all the various websites. I have used this for myself as well as a couple of clients to try and figure out what the best naming convention would be. Why? Consistency.

Just some food for thought.