A few weeks ago a friend of mine suggested that I check out the KIN (new Microsoft phone) Webisodes on Facebook. So I took 5 minutes out of my day to take a look at the adventures of a girl named Rosa, as she traveles with her new KIN to visit her social network face-to-face and find out if her “friends”, are really her Friends.
Now, for a social media geek like myself, this is an extremely intriguing idea, because I’ve made friends and built relationships with people I don’t know personally. We are able to have a relationship online, in the “fake” world, but the question is could we be friends in the “real” world. This is exactly the question Rosa is looking to find out. The KIN is Microsoft’s latest phone living only on Verizon.
Its biggest pull is that it you can tweet, talk and post in real life. According to its website, the KIN was designed to communicate as naturally as you, as Microsoft put it, “KIN is everything you love, everyone you want, all together in one place.” More than the idea of the phone being so connected with your social networks, I love these webisodes. I have an Iphone, and it connects me enough to my social networks, that I don’t feel the urge to go out and buy a new phone, but I do LOVE every time a new webisode is posted. Rosa is such a curious grounded person that she is incredibly relateable. The concept behind these webisodes is so brilliant I wish I would have thought of it first!
For example, the episode that go me hooked, Rosa asks the questions, “should we be friends with our parents on Facebook?” Now I AM friends with my parents on Facebook, and I think I’ve learned enough about posting private things on the internet that it’s doesn’t bother me to be friends with my parents. Unlike many of my friends who wouldn’t dare friend their parents on Facebook, I mean I’m even friends with my Grandma! Plus, I’m pretty close with my parentals so that’s not really the issues. But some of the things Rosa brings up is that her mother embarrasses her online, all the time. You can check out the video yourself here, it’s actually quite funny. But her mother said, “You should be comfortable enough with yourself that it doesn’t matter what I say to you online!” Which is so true.
My mother is slowly grasping the concept of Facebook, but still, nonetheless she weekly has a question trying to decipher the difference between her Wall and her Newsfeed! (Don’t worry mom, you’ll get it soon!).
Online Marketing tactics like this are great. I truly appreciate something that connects my social networks with my cell phone. Rosa asks legitimate questions that you find yourself say, “OMG I think about that all the time.” Although I may not be running out to buy a KIN, Microsoft has done a good job of hooking me into their webisodes.
Disclaimer: I have NOT been provided compensation for this blog post. It is truly a topic of interests.
A little bird sent me a direct message on twitter the other day that I should weigh in on a conversation I am most certainly passionate about.
I mosied on over to PROpenMic and weighed in on a conversation about requiring students to participate in social media in their college courses. Now, this conversation was coming from students not professors or practitioners.
I was pretty frustrated with the post and a majority of the replies from other students who agreed they felt like it was a chore. Social media has changed my life as cheesy as that sounds, and shaped my career. My first reaction was “Do you ever complain openly about writing a paper for your Writing class?” because that is what I would compare participating in social media for your PR class to. Your professors give you an assignment for a reason, you can fight it all you want, but in the end you can:
A.) Do the assignment
B.) Not do the assignment and fail
-Or-
C.) Drop the class and potentially the Major
It’s your choice, you’re a big girl or boy at this point in your college career and your professors are not here to baby you because you don’t like an assignment.
Okay, that is my rant.
What really frustrates me is what these students do NOT SEE! What I would give to go back and be a part of the social media courses they are teaching now! I Think I ask my old professor just about every week if she would video her classes and send them to me. I’m very impressed with the high level of conversation her students get into on their Twitter chats. It makes me proud to say I am a product of the same professors and School of Journalism and Communication (*cough University of Oregon cough*).
Here is my Note to those students who feel they should not be required to participate in Social media.
Dear SM Student,
I’m sorry you feel as though you are being “Forced” to learn about social media. My first question for you is, “what do you want to do with your life?” or “what is your dream job?” Is it being a sports journalist, CEO of a fortune500 company or Manager at McDonalds? Whatever your dream job is social media can help you achieve your goal or assist you in advancing within your company. But you don’t know this yet, because you are resistant to participating in social media as a useful business tool.
Your professors are trying to teach you a skill that will put you miles ahead of your peers applying for that same job. They are trying to teach you a skill that senior level managers and account directors, VP’s and Presidents in so many companies don’t understand—Social Media. Hiring managers at these companies you want to work at so bad are looking for the next great Social Media talent who can teach the organization about the wonders of Twitter and Facebook and how they can help their company reach its consumers. Your professors are trying to provide you with the tools to be that next great employee with the social media skills.
We are in a Recession and it is going to take years, not Months to get our job market back to an expectable level. I guarantee you will graduate and have a panic attack that you have no idea how you’re going to land a job–I did. But you know what I did, I used the skills I learned in my Social Media class and I put it to use. I pitched myself to hiring managers on twitter—Beat that Elevator pitch! Try selling yourself in 140 characters—it ain’t easy. But it worked. I found a creative way to sell myself and my skills that caught the eye of quite a few hiring managers. I got the job.
I continue to use my twitter account and blog that I created for my SM class to advance my professional career. I interact and network with key opinion leaders in my industry and they know who I am! This wouldn’t have been possible if I didn’t TRUST my professors when they said, “leap- And the net will appear!” The net did appear and now I have a huge network of professional, professors and mentors who I can bounce ideas off of.
Social media is not a fad. It is the future. It is the future of every business and every organization. If you’re not looking for a job in public relations you can use these skills in any job whether it be to promote yourself and your services or to help promote your brand message and build relationships and two-way communication with your consumers.
Take advantage of the advice your professors are giving you, be a sponge and soak it up. It’s harder to continue learning when you’re working at a full-time job. You begin to yearn for the days you sat in class. My Blog and Twitter account have acted as wonderful supplements to my resume. I no longer have to send along writing samples, I just direct potential employers to my blog. It is not only highlighting my ability to write, but it is also highlighting my social media skills.
I will bet money that no matter what your career may be, that your future employer is either already in the social media sphere or is looking to dive in. That means they are looking for someone with ideas and knowledge about how it works…. You could be that person.
Clean up your act online. Your employers WILL Google your name— that is not a myth. Stop complaining about the work, and start caring about your future. Social media is the future. You’re paying to go to college, start caring about where that money is going toward.
I apologize for being harsh, but this is a reality and it seems as though, you need a reality check.
The ability for our world to integrate technology and philanthropy amazes me. How
Corporate Social Responsibility is at the forefront of development and implementation among large corporations. It’s wonderful to see Pepsi, Starbucks and Trader Joes care about our world and what is happening outside of their state-of-the-art buildings.
Today, I was introduced to CauseWorld, a wonderful phone application modeled slightly after Foursquare. Instead of simple checking in for points to one-up your friends to become the mayer, you earn Karma points to donate to an organization or
cause of your choice.
CauseWorld is sponsored by Kraft Foods and Citi and donate to the organization of your
choice when you gain Karma points and designate them, it is Kraft and Citi that is donating to the organizations you choose.
What a great way to donate while shoping or having dinner with your friends. Open up the free application, check-in and donate within minutes. You can donate to anything from offsetting carbon,
helping students in need, preventing child abuse, help fight cancer, bring art to schools, help at-risk girls, Provide relief to Haiti or Chile, give clean water, treat autism, plant a tree or care for abused animals. So many options of ways to give sponsors money to great causes.
What are you waiting for. Go download the app and start giving Karma points out!
Like many of you, I am becoming more and more obsessed with iphone apps and fun sites that interact with my friends, family, colleagues and neighbors. I’m on every social networking site you could imagine, twitter, facebook, myspace, Google BUZZ, linkedIN, Loopt and FourSquare.
Virtually, you could probably figure out where I am at all times. Which means, is my house empty? Am I a target? Could all of my tweets, updates and notifications be aggrigated into one site that informs the world I’m not home?
Pleaserobme.com is a site that is bringing awareness to those naive internet goers who are caught up in the excitement of new applications and are constantly letting the world know, “Hey, I’m not home, Please Rob Me!”
The site was created by three individuals who aren’t really out to get you robbed. Here’s how they describe the problem created by check-ins and the purpose of the site:
“The danger is publicly telling people where you are. This is because it leaves one place you’re definitely not… home. So here we are; on one end we’re leaving lights on when we’re going on a holiday, and on the other we’re telling everybody on the Internet we’re not home. It gets even worse if you have ‘friends’ who want to colonize your house. That means they have to enter your address, to tell everyone where they are. Your address.. on the Internet.. Now you know what to do when people reach for their phone as soon as they enter your home. That’s right, slap them across the face.”
There are a few things you can do to protect yourself:
Don’t list your address ANYWHERE on the internet. If you even have your Resume posted somewhere online, make sure you blur out your address or remove it.
Don’t connect your FourSquare or Loopt to your twitter or Facebook status. By keeping these social media tools separate you avoid your exact location being broadcasted to 10x as many people.
Avoid including your phone number. This is also a search that is easy to conduct and find where you are and where you live, leaving your vulnerable.
So are Foursquare, Loopt, Google Buzz and all the others just sites that make us all easier targets? Location-sharing is becoming such a popular trend this year that it doesn’t seem likely that the site will do much to curb the behavior. If there is such a thing as safe location-sharing, however, I hope you practice it.
As stages of internet development are being deemed the 2.0 and 3.0 era, the state of online healthcare has jumped in head first with Healthcare2.0.
What does this look like? And what will Healthcare 3.0 look like?
As a student of the internet and a healthcare professional I have been intrigued by how the internet can help patients bring care into their own hands. Let me first define what I think Web 1.0 is to set the foundation.
Web 1.0 – information that is communicated from company to individuals (i.e. your basic web site). The web becomes one big encyclopedia of sorts.
Web 2.0 – information is communicated between company and individuals & between individuals. This is the Facebook, myspace, twitter, message board youtube web. If web 1.0 is a book, web 2.0 is a discussion.
Web 3.0- it’s not information anymore, it’s intelligence, artificial intelligence. You’d interact with it almost like another person. The web won’t just blindly do what we tell it do to, it’ll think for you.
As for Healthcare…
Healthcare 2.0- brings your healthcare questions and answers online. Do you remember all those medical books your parents used to have and they would look up your symptoms as a kid to make sure you didn’t have Rubella or some crazy illness. Well now they can look it up on sites like WebMD and Medipedia. You can join online advocacy organizations such as Patients Like Me, and ask questions to people on message boards. Healthcare has become interactive.
With Web 3.0 on the distant horizon what does this mean for healthcare 3.0?
It could mean a ton of different things. Such as online database where you can choose your Physician based on specialty, number of years practicing, number of malpractice suits, if they accept your insuarnce provider. I imagine Healthcare3.0 making it easier for the patient to find exactly the right dr. Web 3.0 will be more interactive, where your computer can diagnose you based on your symptoms. Healthcare 3.0 can help patients be more educated about their health and diseases.
There are so many possibilities as to where we can go from here. I’m excited to see what’s next for Healthcare-something-point-something.
Recently, I’ve been asked to put my social media passion into action. This is exciting for someone who has been blinded by my daily routine and the grind of the working world.
Since graduation, I’ve had minimal time to focus on my blog, tweeting valuable information, and exploring the social media sphere. One thing I’ve noticed over the past seven months is that I stopped actively learning, and for a topic I am so passionate about I am extremely excited to begin exploring again!
Now I’m working on a social media strategy for a company that you wouldn’t quite expect to use social media as a valuable tool. I feel limitless, which is basically like handing me the world on a silver platter.
But, this doesn’t mean I am going to dream up some crazy ideas of how to “jump in” that is unreachable for this company. I need to get back to the basics and deliver a strategy that they understand and doesn’t make them want to run in the other direction.
It is never to late to continually learning, and that is what I love about Public Relations- is that there is always knowledge to grasp, you can learn something new everyday.
As the social media landscape expands, more organizations are taking advantage of the online tools available. There are thousands, and they are expanding as we speak. Anything from fundraiser support sites, to picture and video sharing to niche social networks that can expand your reach as an organization. One tool that I find very helpful is go2web20.net. This site provides an overview and ratings of thousands of Web 2.0 sites.
By taking the time to assess the social landscape in which your organization wishes to immerse in, you can identify key opinion leaders, the audience, and important topics in the conversation. Through assessing the conversation happening in different forms of social media you have the ability to pick and choose the right forum to your conversation. You must be picky when finding the right forum. There is no use having a conversation with people who don’t want to listen.
There are a few ways to find out what social media tools would be right for your organization to utilize in creating a presence online:
Research where your organization stands in all forms of mediums look on Facebook for support groups, on Youtube for videos, on twitter for organizations, competitors and supporters.
Listen to the Conversation Now that you’ve found forums with which your organization could fit into the conversation. Listen. See what others are saying about your product or service and assess the tone. If there is a negative tone, begin to strategist on how you can make negatives into a positive.
Narrow the Field Social media takes time. Don’t be too ambitious because if you begin to have a presence in a specific network and then become lazy and cannot keep up with it, you lose listeners and the point of getting involved in the social media sphere was to gain followers. Take a look at the possible tools you can utilize and assess their relativity to your goal. Then narrow the field.
Participate the hardest thing organizations will find is keeping up with all the forms of social media that are at its fingertips. Just because you are a part of Facebook or twitter doesn’t mean you’re actively participating in it. Make the effort, comment on blogs and message boards, tweet and reply to tweets participate in the social media and show a new audience that you’re doing everything in your means to make them a believer in your product or service.
Today marked my first day in the working world! I began my new position as the Assistant Account Executive at Doyle Dane & Bernbach (DDB) in the Issues and Advocacy department.
I spent most of today in the typical HR orientation, touring the agency and getting to know the background of my client. There was definitely a lot of reading, which I had expected.
Job searching is usually a grueling task for most recent grads (or anyone for that matter), but with our economy, its even rougher. Most of the time I barley had a sliver of hope finding a job in this market, but Brian Solis, PR 2.0 blogger, gave me (and I’m sure many more in my position) that sip of water that will get you through that desert of a job market.
Solis wrote a guest post on Culpwrit about “Tomorrow’s PR Leaders?” Solis says, “As a student, recent graduate, or newly hired communications professional, Social Media and the tools that define social landscape, will quickly become pervasive as you research and observe the markets that are important to the business you represent.” I couldn’t agree more, as a new hire (though it has only been about 8 hours) Social Media has been the tool I turned to the most when researching material on my client.
The first thing I did was sit down and search for blogs pertaining to my client. It helps to understand where your audience is coming from, and the information they are providing. Listening is key. Solis drives the message that when you take the time to listen you truly find the best channels to relay your message. And that is something all young PRos should know!
There is more to understanding RSS feeds, blogs, Facebook, twitter and podcasts. People are listening, we as young professionals need to realize our “Facebooking stalking” skills come in handy more than you may think!
When you’re preparing for a job (or internship) search, it’s time to be sure that you don’t have any “digital dirt” that a potential employer may uncover.
Currently, this is the topic of discussion on PROpenMic. I’m intrigued by this issue, because it has to deal with personal PR. You never know when an employer may look you up on Facebook or MySpace and find out a little more about their potential employee.
One member, a professor, said that in order for him to get his point across he searches for his students on Facebook before his first class and when he calls role he pulls up interesting photos of his students. He says, “If I can find it, your potential future internships and employers can find it, too.” This sticks with students, because it embarrasses the student.
I’ve attended leadership conferences where speakers have found photos of the participants, enlarged them and projected these photographs on a big screen in front of thousands of college leaders. The other thing students, need to clean up, is their email accounts. Employers don’t want to communicate with HOTCHIK69@hotmail.com or BEERPONGKINGXXX@aol.com, these are simply inappropriate email addresses. Sign up for a gmail account and use your name. Make it simple and professional.
Just ask yourself, would I like to put this email address on a business card to Bill Gates?
Also, think twice before you post inappropriate photographs of yourself on Facebook. We all know how powerful social media is, You cannot ignore the fact that the industry we are trying to dive into is constantly working with social media, you can’t hide.
Rule of Thumb: The Internet is an open venue. Clean up your act. Don’t let your digital dirt get out of hand.
A few weeks ago a friend of mine suggested that I check out the KIN (new Microsoft phone) Webisodes on Facebook. So I took 5 minutes out of my day to take a look at the adventures of a girl named Rosa, as she traveles with her new KIN to visit her social network face-to-face and find out if her “friends”, are really her Friends.
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