Home | Archives for Janet Gershen-Siegel | Page 31

Author: Janet Gershen-Siegel

I'm not much bigger than a breadbox.

Feeding the Content Monster

Content Strategy, Halvorson, Hip-Hop Content Strategy, Content Monster

Feeding the Content Monster

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on February 23, 2021

Feeding the Content Monster

Is there such a thing as a content monster?

I don’t mean the happy, contented monster. Because that one wouldn’t need any feeding.

I mean the concept of adding content regularly.

I enjoy writing about as much as, perhaps, any blogger. But sometimes the words just don’t come. And, in the meantime, you need to be pumping out content!

C’mon, chop chop! What the devil is wrong with you? Why aren’t you yammering, 24/7, like you’re supposed to?

Egad, it’s enough to put you off your feed. Or, at least, put you off blogging.

Case in Point

I used to write for the Examiner.

So I was supposed to post every month. And I did. I liked having an active status there, even if it was fairly marginal by the end. It’s not like I was buying groceries with my big earnings from there. And, truthfully, they did pay me one time. It thrilled me at the time. These days, I get an actual salary for my musings. Hence a pittance from the Examiner, while considerably better than a kick in the teeth, stopped cutting it.

And it was not enough for them, anyway. Instead, they would send me a reminder every two weeks.

The Whining Content Monster

This being constantly reminded never gave me content ideas. Going to their content idea bank never gave me ideas, either, although I knew they tried and did not fault them for that. I tend to zig when I should be zagging (or perhaps it’s the other way around). And, in the meantime, being prodded every fortnight never made me a happy blogger.

Instead, it made me feel like I was listening to a spoiled, petulant child who was dissatisfied with what I had provided, and only wanted more, more, more!

I gave you a Honda. And now you want a BMW? Cripes. Leave me alone, content monster.

Today

I still have to feed a content monster with a shovel. But at least I have other people to feed me ideas. Thank God.

Solutions

So far as I’m concerned, there are three real solutions for feeding the content monster.

Make a list, brainstorming, of everything that could possibly, ever, be associated with your topic

This list will change as time goes by, as you evolve, as the sun sinks slowly in the west, etc. etc. Refer to the list often, and record when you’ve written about a particular subtopic.

Let’s take my old weight loss column from back in the day. The list included things like carbs, aerobic exercise, running 5K races, shopping for clothes, etc. If I last wrote about clothes shopping in 2010, I could write about that activity again.

But if I last wrote about it last week, though, then forget it. So I would need to cast about for something else. Keep updating the last, even splitting out larger topics if appropriate. The subject of clothes shopping could divide by season. Or write one post just devoted to buying a swimsuit.

Strike while the iron is hot

That is, if you’re feeling inspired, don’t just write the current blog entry. If you’ve got the time, write the next five. Just go until you run out of gas. Any blogging software worth its salt provides the ability to schedule posts in advance. Take advantage of this.

Repurpose, repackage, reply, rethink

Go online. Look at others’ takes on your topic. There are few new topics under the sun. Someone has written about your topic. I can practically guarantee that. And that’s fine. Just don’t out and out plagiarize. But I don’t see any laws against referencing someone else’s blog or article on a topic and then expanding on it.

The Content Monster is a Cannibal

At a certain point, if your content is too similar, it harms your SEO efforts. It can compete against itself and cannibalize itself. You really, really don’t want that.

Takeaways

Nourish the content monster when you can, for there will be fallow times, and you must prepare for them. And, when it works for you, even silence can be golden. After all, if you’ve got absolutely nothing to say, who needs to hear that?

3 Comments

Online Personas and Cyber Infidelity, Oh My!

Legal, Creative Commons, fanfiction, crash course, copyright law, exceptions, Practice Law, Avoiding Common Legal Mistakes, Transitioning, cyber infidelity,

Online Personas and Cyber Infidelity, Oh My!

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on February 18, 2021

A Look at Online Personas and Cyber Infidelity—Oh My!

Cyber Infidelity? Yep, it sure exists.

Years ago, author Sophie Hannah did some research for a book she was writing. And so, she conducted a survey of Twitter, OKCupid and other sites, in conjunction with just plain out and out asking people – is online infidelity worse than in-person infidelity?

Results

Her results were mixed.

Some of the respondents saw less harm in a relationship where the parties never actually, physically, meet. Others saw it as being more or less the same as a physical affair, or at least an emotional one.

Hannah did this research for her book, The Telling Error. She says,

“The thing about Twitter is that everything is on there, so whatever you’re interested in is there.But it is capable of being incredibly nasty. I noticed that whenever somebody either does something wrong or offends somebody, Twitter will form a kind of aggressive, vindictive mob and start slagging off that person. Almost always, the punishment is worse than the crime.”

Cyber Infidelity: Some Takeaways

For bored and isolated people, social media can often serve as a godsend. Yet with worries such as this, spouses might do well to be cautious. Not necessary jealous, but at least to be wondering a bit, if someone spends seemingly forever online. It does not help that a lot of online behaviors encourage an almost addictive obsession. Because we crave the latest tweets.

We can’t wait to read the next gem from the Huffington Post, or take the latest meaningless quiz from Buzz Feed, or try to prank our friends with the most recent fake news from The Onion. And do not get me started on Candy Crush.

In fact, many of these algorithms and reward systems are designed for, you guessed it, keeping us on the edge of our seats and fully engaged.

Hence the opportunities are all too ample for vulnerable, lonely people to end up typing a little too much with someone else, and for it to turn into sexting and worse.

Where Do We Go From Here?

Making friends online is truly fun and, for a lot of people, the only thing that truly keeps them sane. Consider the shut-in, the 24/7 caregiver, or the spouse of someone on deployment. Or the person crippled by anxiety. They probably aren’t getting a lot of opportunities to talk to people within spitting distance of their age group.

And of course there are people who have a significant other who does not share their fandom. Or just plain bored people.

Every single one of these folks is vulnerable, in some way, to this kind of cheating.

I wonder who will tweet The Scarlet Letter now.

Cyber infidelity? It’s here to stay.

3 Comments

… And Facebook for All

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on February 16, 2021

For Liberty, Justice (?), … And Facebook for All

Facebook matters.

At least, that’s what Mark Zuckerberg would want us all to think, wish and feel. I can understand that, a desire to make a website about as universal as possible. Once the site stopped being exclusive to collegians, the inevitable business model was to universalize it. And the site, today (although that will probably change), has about the best chance to become a truly universal web experience as any site.

Universality

So, are you on the biggest social media site on the planet? About 2.93 billion monthly active users are, as of 2022. But, wait, not so fast. Is that number truly accurate? Absolutely not. After all (and for different reasons), my husband and I each have more than one account. Do you? Even if you don’t, I bet you’ve got at least one friend who does, and probably lots more.

And that is perfectly all right, and is absolutely permitted by the site (although they’d like to change that). And they are trying to….

Real Names

Facebook also pushes for users to go with their correct names. Why? Because if you can hide behind a username, you might flame people more than if you can’t. Real names also (in theory) help to eliminate duplicates. But in all honesty, how many guys named Mike Brown do you know? I can think of two I’ve known in my life and that figure is probably more like four or five.

Even middle names might not fix such a duplication issue. There are probably several men with the name of Michael David Brown in the world.

Also, though, another use for real names is better marketing. If you Anglicize your name, then an advertiser might miss that you’re Hispanic, and incorrectly market to you.

Not So Fast On Those Real Names

We have all seen names which are not quite so perfectly right, though. How many of us have seen married women using a middle name of something like Was(whatever their maiden name was)? Hence Susan Davis might call herself Susan WasSmith Davis. It’s not a perfect solution, and you don’t really have to do that, anyway. Still, there are plenty of people who do.

Others might place a nickname within the middle name field. Robert Bob Brady, or Richard Dick Daily. But again, they might not have to. The more common nicknames are already going to come up in a search, even though, in both of these examples, the nickname starts with a letter different from the full name.

Still others may try to use stage names, but Facebook would rather you just created a fan page or had someone do so for you. This is not just to nicely help you keep your personal and professional lives separate. It’s also to market to your fan base better.

No Real Name, No, I Mean it, Facebook!

Then there are people who have damned good reasons for never using their real names, such as people escaping domestic violence. Facebook has gotten better and more sensitive when it comes to such needs.

Why Facebook?

The site’s main purpose (in case you’re just coming into the light after a few years on a desert island), is to sell advertising. Its offshoot purpose is to connect people, of all stripes, for free. But it’s those connections which sell the advertising.

There’s a lot else to it, at least on a general basis. But it’s still a valuable business tool for any Social Media Marketing Campaign.

But never forget: you’re the product that Facebook is selling.

The Best Parts of the Site for Social Media Marketing

Facebook’s main virtues, when it comes to your business, can currently be divided into three basic areas:

• Personal pages and peripheral connections to same
† Company pages and groups and peripheral connections thereto, and,
• Offsite connections back to the site

By “peripherals”, I mean all the extra stuff that goes along with the site experience, and not computer hardware peripherals.

The Concept of Universalish Reach at Facebook

Beyond just the sheer numbers, Facebook is extremely good at putting people together who are similar. You always get friend suggestions, yes? Those people tend to either have friends in common with you, or they have some other characteristic in common with you. That ‘in common’ bit might be home town. Or it might be favorite sports team. Another possible connection could be where you work.

Now, let’s face it: if you work in a huge Fortune 50 company, then you’ll have tons of coworkers. And the chances are beyond good that you won’t know everyone. You may not even know everyone in your office building or even on your floor.

So sometimes when a friend request arises, it may feel like a mystery. Hence – look for a commonality.

Clutches of People

But let’s get back to the people you do connect with. It’s perfectly natural to hang out with the people you went to high school with, or who love the same sports team you do. You might feel more comfortable with fellow cancer survivors. Or you might want to set up a political echo chamber. Another thing you might want to do is spend time with people in the same profession as you.

But no matter what, we people tend to group together. It’s a natural tendency. We’ve been gathering together since before there was a Homo sapiens species.

Facebook just exploits that. Really, really well.

And if antitrust cases go one way, they might not in the future. But we don’t know that yet.

Want More About Facebook?

If my experiences with Facebook resonate with you, then check out my other articles about the largest social network on the planet, by far.

… And Facebook for All

• Demystifying
† Creating a Page
• Working with a Page
† … Your Profile Page, Part I
• … Your Profile Page, Part II
† Home Page
• … Company Pages
† Offsite Sharing
• All Your Account Settings
† … And Facebook for All
• All the Rest of It
† Advertising
• FB versus Forums

4 Comments

The Conquest of LinkedIn – Your Resume

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on February 11, 2021

he Conquest of LinkedIn – Your Resume

LinkedIn is almost a corporate version of Facebook, a serious social networking site, a place to plonk your resume amidst all the chatter. If you are looking for a job, you need to be on LinkedIn. In case you might be looking for work again some time in your lifetime, you need to be on LinkedIn.

If you might ever be called upon to professionally recommend someone, or professionally network together people from disparate times of your life (such as a college classmate and a person you know from your last job), you need to be on LinkedIn. And if you ever need to showcase your credentials to a mass audience, for any reason whatsoever, you need to be on LinkedIn. And the cornerstone of it all is your resume.

Who Should Be on LinkedIn?

And if there’s anyone else over the age of eighteen left in the United States, or potentially on the planet, chances are pretty good that they need to be on LinkedIn as well.

Why?

All of the aforementioned are perfectly good reasons to be on LinkedIn, but there’s one more. It puts together all of your professional data into one safe, trusted and uniform online package. Hence LinkedIn, like your resume itself, gives Hiring Managers a well-presented collection of information about you as a worker.

But that is if you take the time to make a complete, compelling and well thought out profile. If not, well, then LinkedIn can become a fast ticket to oblivion.

Hence, you need to put together a cogent profile, and the first place to start is with your resume. It will be similar, but not identical, to the resume you provide directly to Hiring Managers.

Improving Your LinkedIn Resume

So here are some tips for making your LinkedIn resume as good as it can be:

† List only your major, recent jobs, so long as the company (or a successor) is still in business. On LinkedIn, don’t list as many companies as possible to make linking easier with a greater number of people. Save those for the projects section. This way, your resume can look clean and not go back more than maybe 10 years, 15 on the outside
• Place key words and phrases in your job descriptions. People hunting through LinkedIn are most likely using the search feature. So you need to use words and phrases that people will be using to search for someone like you. E. g. if you’re looking for work as a Business Analyst, don’t just include the title – also include the fact that you did (assuming this is accurate) requirements gathering, which is a main Business Analyst task across multiple disciplines

More Tips for Your Resume

† List the different types of software you’ve used, with versions. This is, again, to make your profile come up in searches. E. g. if you used Excel 2003 and Excel 2007, make sure they are listed that way.
• Just like with a standard resume, use action words and well-defined metrics to show what you did in your career. “Worked on the Smith project” is nowhere near as impressive as “Performed quantitative analysis; these recommendations saved the company 20% of the estimated costs on the Smith project”. Numbers are impressive. Use them.

† Make sure your company listings jibe with what’s already on LinkedIn. That is, let the software give you choices (if any) for the company name. If you worked for a very large company (say, Fidelity Investments), the company name is already on LinkedIn. Don’t type it in yourself. This automatically makes it easier to link to everyone listing Fidelity Investments as a current or past employer.
• Feel free to add more than one current employer. This includes any volunteer work you may be doing. Again, this will add to the ease with which you can link to others.

Want More About the Conquest of LinkedIn?

If my experiences with LinkedIn resonate with you, then check out my other articles about the largest networking site on the planet.

What LinkedIn Has to Offer

• Your Profile Page
† Your Resume
• Meeting Offline
† Your Network
• Giving Your LinkedIn Profile A Facelift
† Last Little Bits
• InMaps – Visualize Your Network on LinkedIn

The Numerati by Stephen Baker, a Book Review

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on February 9, 2021

Time to Look at The Numerati by Stephen Baker

Who are the Numerati?

The Numerati by Stephen Baker remains a fascinating work about sensors, technology, data mining and where it’s all going when it comes to our privacy.

And it ends up all about data, about collecting, refining and interpreting it. People are, well, a bunch of fish in a bowl. Or, if you prefer, hamsters on a wheel. We are lab rats, we are subjects, we are collections of bit streams. We are … information.

And the kicker is that, put together enough things about us, and conclusions can suddenly be drawn.

Conclusions from The Numerati

Let’s say I go to the same grocery store every week (not a stretch – I really do). And I buy fish every single week. What if I buy, say, tuna steaks 70% of the time, and swordfish the other 30%? Am I automatically a tuna lover? Or am I simply scared to try something new?

Or am I getting to the fishmonger when everything else is sold out?

And what happens if a coupon is introduced into the mix? Does my tuna consumption go up to 80% if you give me $1 off per pound? However, that’s not too much of a victory, seeing as I normally buy it anyway. Will a $1 off coupon entice me to buy the more pricey salmon instead?

Ideas But Not Gospel

The data gives its interpreters (Baker refers to them as the Numerati, which sounds a tad like Illuminati and perhaps he means that) ideas. However, it’s not really a slam-dunk. Or, at least, not yet. Hence essentially the Numerati bucket you.

So I am a tuna buyer. And I am a sometime swordfish buyer. And I am also a Caucasian woman, in her (ahem) sixties, married, no children, living in Boston.

So far, so good. And when we herd all the data together, when we aggregate the bits and bytes of our lives, this may very well have a lot to say about us. Because it might be a predictor of how I’ll vote in the next election.

Or perhaps it will show how I’d use a dating site if I should ever need one in the future. Or it may even tell whether I’m likely to become a terrorist.

Border Collies and Data Goats

The data matters, but, to my mind (and to Baker’s as well, it seems), there are not only herds of data but there are also nagging outliers. And these constitute the Border Collies amidst all the data goats.

Perhaps I am buying tuna to feed to a cat. Or maybe I buy it with the intention of eating it to improve my health but, alas, never get to it and it goes to waste every single week.

So consider this case: a health professional places a sensor into a senior citizen’s bed, to determine whether that person is getting up in the morning. And, let’s say we also collect weight data.

Because a sudden dramatic rise in weight would indicate the possible onset of congestive heart failure. And let’s say the senior in question is a woman who weighs 150 pounds. Your own mother, maybe.

Day one: 150 pounds. Day two: 158 pounds. And then day three: 346 pounds. Day four: 410 pounds. Golly, is Mom really that sick?

Maybe Mom’s dog is 8 pounds. Okay, that explains day two. But what about days three and four? Maybe Mom’s got a boyfriend.

Or maybe she’s got two.

Messy Feelings

When I had the occasion to meet Stephen Baker at the 2010 Enzee Conference, we had the opportunity to talk a bit about these squishy, messy feelings.

Sure, our hearts are in the right place. And we want Mom to be safe and healthy, and we can’t be there. She might live in a warmer climate, and we cannot (or won’t) leave our cooler climes.

Or the job opportunities may be no good there for us. For whatever reason, we are here and she is there. So we want to be aware, and caring and all, but in our desire to gather information and protect her, what else are we learning?

If Mom is competent, and single, and protecting herself from STDs, we truly have no business knowing who she spends her evening hours with. Yet this technology makes this possible.

And if we have any sense of the future at all, we have to think to ourselves: what happens when I become Mom’s age? Will my bedroom and toileting habits potentially become a part of this huge bit/byte hamster wheel lab rat canary in a coal mine data stream? You betcha.

Are the Numerati Worrisome?

So, it is often said that only people who have something to worry about in their private lives are the ones who have worries. Everyone else should be fine, blithely giving up their warts and preferences, their virtues and secrets, to all who ask.

I say bull. I like my secrets. And I like my hidden life. And I’ll be damned if I give it up, even in the name of health, diet, voting, national security or even love.

A terrific read. I highly recommend this book.

Rating

Review: 5/5 stars.

Want More Book Reviews?

If my experiences with book reviews for social media resonate with you, then check out my other book review articles.

Check Out Book Reviews on Social Media, SEO, Analytics, Design, and Strategy

• Avinash Kaushik’s Web Analytics 2.0, a Book Review
† The Cluetrain Manifesto: 10th Anniversary Edition, a Book Review
• Cognitive Surplus by Clay Shirky, A Book Review
† Content Nation by John Blossom, A Book Review
• Content Strategy for the Web by Kristina Halvorson, a Book Review
† Google Advertising Tools by Harold Davis, a Book Review
• Groundswell by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff, An Updated Book Review
† Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook by Gary Vaynerchuk

• Likeable Social Media by Dave Kerpen
† Michael Fleischner’s SEO Made Simple, a Book Review
• The New Rules of Marketing & PR by David Meerman Scott, A Book Review
† The Numerati by Stephen Baker, a Book Review
• Optimize by Lee Odden, A Book Review
† Social Media Marketing by Liana Evans, A Book Review
• Trust Agents by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith, a Book Review
† White Space is not your Enemy by Kim Golombisky and Rebecca Hagen, a Book Review
• The Zen of Social Media Marketing by Shama Hyder Kabani, a Book Review

Social Media Continues its Relentless Pace

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on February 2, 2021

Ever feel like you’re on an online treadmill? Well, you just might be falling victim to social media’s relentless pace.

Social Media Continues its Relentless Pace to Try to Make You Stay Put

It’s a relentless pace out there. And much like the holidays accelerate the end of the year, and we suddenly look up on January 7th or so and wonder exactly what the hell just happened, social media is continuing to not so much reap the whirlwind as to be the whirlwind. But at the same time, there’s an effort afoot to slow down and control the whirlwind.

Twitter’s Relentless Pace

Case in point: Twitter has implemented changes, over the course of its history, that are designed to keep people on as long as possible.

They do this by embedding media more directly and making it so that you don’t have to leave Twitter’s embrace in order to enjoy a clip or a photograph. Often, this means shortening a URL.

So far, so good. But shortened URLs can allow for more malware exploits. It’s like one step forward, a step back and another one to the side.

Facebook’s Relentless Pace

Facebook, yet again, looks to change its layout. In fact, it changes it every single day. They are the biggest A/B testing site on the planet, bar none! So, what’s changing? What isn’t?

The profile is going to become richer and provide more information. This may or may not be useful to users but it will certainly keep them on longer. At least, that will happen in the beginning, when it’s a novel concept.

As time has passed, we have all seen how Facebook has attempted to become more things to more people. Is that good? Well, it can be.

But it also means that people have to take it more seriously. Somewhat ridiculously rigid rules on verbiage force people into typing silly stuff like ‘unalive’.

LinkedIn’s Relentless Pace

Long ago, LinkedIn tried adding Signal to make it easier to track even more of the social media avalanche – and, of course, to try to keep people on LinkedIn as long as possible.

Currently, they are using status types of communications. Sounds a lot like Facebook, eh?

LinkedIn also pushes articles, and tries to get you to follow thought leadership. Not a bad idea over all. Except anyone can, conceivably, become a thought leader. Kinda. Just post enough, and get a big enough follow. This is not a bad gig if you can get it, but it can also be a dandy way to spread misinformation, sports fans.

The Common Thread

What these changes have had in common, other than, perhaps, novelty for the sake of novelty, is the desire to keep people on site as long as possible. Put some tar down, and have us all stick, at least for a while.

So while the internet spins ever faster, and social media sites attempt to keep up, their overall strategies seem to try to slow us all down. Will it work? Is it a foolish dream to think you can keep people around with such tricks, such slick bells and whistles?

The Lack of Meaningful Content

What disturbs me is that there’s not a lot of content happening. And it would, could, should make me want to hang around. Instead of hiring writers to improve things, or rewarding good current content providers, each of the big three sites is instead pursuing a software solution.

But what’s the sense in hanging around a site if the content isn’t compelling? Or are we, instead, merely getting the sites that we, perhaps, deserve?

Hence here’s what happens if my Facebook friends list is dominated by people I went to High School with over thirty years ago. Their status updates and my wall have a lot of news of their birthdays, their children (and grandchildren these days), and their careers. But isn’t that what we would expect?

And if I instead tip my list in a different direction, and it’s suddenly dominated by the people I work with or diet with or do artwork with, the news is going to be different.

In particular, politically, you can see very different versions of each site, depending on your bubble. After all, a lot of us prefer to see people we like and agree with. … and that’s how we get ideological bubbles.

Comparison to Reality TV

One thing about Reality TV is that it’s anything but real if it’s at all successful. Because people just, generally, don’t lead terribly interesting lives (yes, you too, gentle reader). We pick up the dry cleaning. Or we bicker over the remote. We forget to buy sausages and make do with hot dogs. And around and around and around we go.

And all three of these really big social media sites, when we are not following celebrities and businesses, are really just a big agglomeration of Post-It Notes whereby we tell each other to grab milk on the way home. For “Reality” to be compelling at all, it’s got to be unreal, and scripted. It must become this fight or that rose ceremony or this other weird pancake-making challenge.

The big three older social media sites, when you strip away the celebrities and the companies, can be a boatload of errands or a standard-form holiday letter. You know the kind, where you learn little Suzie has taken up the clarinet. Over and over ad infinitum.

No wonder we need software solutions to keep us there. The relentless pace continues.

Whither TikTok and the Rest?

TikTok shackles you to it by way of its algorithm (sound familiar)? Like one video and you get sucked into the next one, and the next, and then the next one after that. The videos are short, so it doesn’t feel like a relentless pace.

Until you look up and realize that four hours have gone by.

It’s a lot like eating a bag of potato chips. You stick your hand in, grab a few or a big handful, and go to town. It doesn’t feel like a lot, until suddenly the bag is empty and you’re thirsty from all the salt.

In the world of dieting, the conventional wisdom is to portion out your chips. Fill a smaller bag and put a clip on the bigger one, and stick it back in the cabinet. In short, have some discipline and a smidgen of self-control.

With TikTok or anything else, unless we put a timer on our sessions or have external pressures getting us off the virtual hamster wheel, our lives pass us by as we succumb to the relentless pace.

Dang, I am a ray of sunshine sometimes, eh?

Want More About Social Media?

If my experiences with non-platform-specific social media resonate with you, then check out my other articles about navigating our social media obsessed world.

Trust Agents by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith, a Book Review

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on January 26, 2021

Trust Agents by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith

Trust Agents by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith seems to be one of those books that everyone tells you to read when you want to go into social media marketing. And it’s that sort of a wholesale recommendation that sometimes, frankly, makes me nervous.

After all, how many people have read it? Are they happy with what they’ve learned? Or is the work somehow coasting on its reputation?

Usefulness

But it doesn’t seem to be. Instead, I think there’s useful information in there – and it’s information that doesn’t seem to be found in the other social media books I’ve been reading lately, in particularly Cluetrain Manifesto and Groundswell.

There’s more practical nuggets in here, more like in The Zen of Social Media Marketing. No great shock there – Chris Brogan is the coauthor there as well.

How so?

Too Many Delays

One of the issues with books (you know, pulp and paper books, not electronic ones) is that they take so long to be produced, and then they can become obsolete or at least out of date rather quickly.

It can almost seem like buying a new car – once you get it out of the dealership, it’s depreciated a good thousand dollars. And, once many books are published, they’re suddenly obsolete.

But Trust Agents doesn’t care. Instead, it forges ahead with practical, specific tips. If they go out of fashion or become obsolete, head to the website for an update. Or, if you prefer pulp and paper, there’s always a later edition.

Basic Principles

The gist of the book consists of six basic principles:

1. Make Your Own Game – e. g., break the mold and experiment with new methods. This means you’re going to occasionally – gasp! – fail. So you do. Get over it. Pick yourself up and try something else. Safety and sameness aren’t really going to get you anywhere. At least, nowhere good.
2. One of Us – be one of the people. Be humble and be accessible. This means blogging. It means letting your hair down every now and then when you tweet. Of course it doesn’t mean foolish oversharing or putting out things that are going to really harm you (“Had fun at the Crack House last night!” – uh, no)
3. The Archimedes Effect – use leverage. That is, got something that’s working? Then use it to push and promote the next thing. Think of it like the spinoff to a sitcom. Laverne and Shirley was originally a spinoff of Happy Days. The first success was, absolutely, used to generate the second.

More Ideas

4. Agent Zero – be the person in the center of the connections. This does not necessarily mean that you have to be the center of every conversation. It’s just – everyone seems to know someone (or know of someone) who is like this. Oh, talk to Gwen. She knows everyone.
5.Human Artist – be polite and gracious to people. This may seem to be like a no-brainer to most, but, sadly, it’s not. Thank people. Tell them how much you enjoyed meeting them. Follow up. If this means creating a tickler file to remind you to contact people, then do that.

True story – the first time I heard the term “tickler file” was in 1984 when I was working on Joe Biden’s Senate Campaign. And it made sense –you followed up with voters (in those days, it was via phone call or postcard or letter, and sometimes via an in-person visit) because you knew that, even if their support was unwavering, that they had busy lives pulling them in a million different directions. This continues to be true if not far truer these days.
6. Build an Army – e. g., as you become the person in the middle of all of the connections, and the one who does the followups, your time will start to fill up. You’re going to need help, so link up with other people who can be social hubs and follow-uppers. This does not relieve you from thanking people, but it does help you to continue to keep in touch.

Details

There are, of course, a thousand little details that go along with these. The specifics include things like using Google Alerts to check on how often your name shows up online and looking at AllTop and Technorati for blogs to follow. Grab an RSS feed so that you can get through more blogs with more speed.

But be patient. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither were trust agents. You cannot take a shortcut and metaphorically substitute canned vegetables for fresh ones here. Cultivate this and pay attention to it. Much like a garden, your hard groundwork will pay off beyond your wildest expectations.

And you can even leave your extra lettuce on my front porch.

Rating

Review: 5/5 stars.

Want More Book Reviews?

If my experiences with book reviews for social media resonate with you, then check out my other book review articles.

Check Out Book Reviews on Social Media, SEO, Analytics, Design, and Strategy

Community Management – Look at Me!

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on January 21, 2021

C’mon and Look at Me! Look at Me!

C’mon and look!

Look at Me!

Ah, marketing.

We’ve all seen it done well, and we’ve all seen it done not so well, and even downright poorly. Now let’s look at applying it to your extant community.

A poorly executed marketing strategy cannot only turn off your preexisting users; it can also get your site marked as a Spammer. And the scarlet S can get your site unceremoniously dumped from Google. And that means, essentially, the equivalent of the death of the site.

Long Story Short: Don’t Spam

In order to effectively market your community, you need to cover three kinds of SEO/Marketing. Those are onsite, offsite and offline. Onsite will be covered later in this series, and that information will not be repeated herein.

Plus, it may seem a tad counter-intuitive, but onsite SEO is not that big of a deal.**

Yes, you need good keywords and you need good content. But after that, your optimization and marketing efforts need to move offsite.

Offsite Marketing

Offsite can be (mainly) divided into two areas:

1. Search Engines
2. Social Media

Let’s Look at Search Engines

You must submit your site to Google. However, don’t submit to any other search engines. Why? Because others’ share of the market is virtually nonexistent. Hence this is a waste of your time, and they will likely pick up your site from Google anyway.

So don’t use a blasting service. Heavens, no. You don’t need it and it is absolutely not worth it.

There are still some directories you can submit to (depending upon your site’s overall purpose). So, these include places like Google My Business, CitySearch and Yelp.

It can be best to do well locally and rise to the top of the search engine rankings for specific search terms like, say, Indiana Relationship Forums, than to attempt to break into the top rankings for a more general terms, such as Relationship Forums.

Consider directories and even search engines in other languages, too!

Look at Social Media

Social media implies interactivity, and not just voting links up or down, perhaps laced with the occasional comment.

While there are international ones (and if you’ve got a perfect match between your content and their focus, then by all means establish a presence thereat), you really only care about the following:

• Facebook – an official fan page helps for any number of reasons. First of all, it can make your site known to friends, family members, business colleagues and any other connections to your site’s currently existing users.

And you can use it to post photographs and links directly back to your site. Furthermore, you can use it as a rallying point during both expected (and unexpected) site outages.

† Twitter/X – even if your users are not, generally, on Twitter, it is still a useful marketing tool. Try feeding in a slice of the site via RSS. Just like with Facebook, this can expand the network of persons who know about your site.

• LinkedIn (if applicable) – if your site is attached to a going concern, then at minimum make sure the company listing on LinkedIn is correct. And make sure all of the company’s employees directly linking their profiles to it.

Furthermore, make sure your site’s blog and social media streams are configured to feed and accept updates.

A Look at More Social Media

† Pinterest – demographics tend to skew heavily female and over thirty-five. Got a restaurant? A shoe store? Wedding products or services? A women’s health collective? A feminist bookstore? Go to Pinterest – but only if you’ve got excellent images.

• Got great images but less of a female-centric slant? Consider Instagram instead.

† Tumblr – demographics skew heavily under thirty-five and even under twenty-five. Got a video game? An indie film? Go to Tumblr.

• Snapchat – demographics skew toward teens and tweens? Consider this fast-moving site for everything from soft drinks to acne cream to fashion.

† YouTube – longer form video content is a great way to get a message across.

• TikTok – 100% content-centric. Show this slice of the world what you’re made of.

BackLinking

Backlinking is where you get others to add your site link to their own websites. Back-links help a great deal as Google gives them weight when determining your site’s importance. And that is directly linked to search placement.

You always do better when more trusted sites link back to you. Don’t get spammers to link to you.

Blogs

For your blog, you can add a blogroll of other sites you admire. Just as importantly, post comments on those sites. This provides value to those other people, so they are more likely to spontaneously wish to link back to you.

In addition, don’t leave it all to happenstance. Put a link on your site and approach the webmaster of that site and politely ask for a back link.

Some people are happy to oblige. Others are not, so remove their links from your site after a reasonable amount of time. Some may simply think about it, so give them a little time.

And be reasonable, but also be reasonable with yourself. If you’re not getting link backs, try to figure out why. Are your requests too aggressive? Or do you ask people with wholly unrelated sites?

Do you, perhaps, have no content (or no meaningful content) for them to associate with? Look at your site with a critical eye before throwing in the towel.

Offline Marketing and Optimization

Offline marketing and optimization can mean going back to techniques used before – shudder – there even was an Internet. Before computers even existed.

Depending upon your budget and your site’s overall purpose, offline marketing can range from something as simple as business cards or baseball caps or tee shirts with the site’s logo to a 30-second spot during the Super Bowl.

It can even be completely free. After all, any time you mention your site to someone else, didn’t you just market it?

Look, sitting back and waiting for your site to take off will almost never work. You need to market it, particularly in the beginning. Get your name out there!

**Of course, onsite SEO is vital for a blog like this one. But for a forums site? Er, not quite so much…

Want More About Community Management?

If my experiences with community management resonate with you, then check out my other articles about how online communities work.

Community Management Tidbits

• A Day in the Life of a Community Manager
† Analytics
• From Small Things
† Get Together
• Going From a Collection of Users to a True Community
† Handling Yourself as a Good Netizen
• Let’s Get this Party Started
† Look at Me!
• Risks of a Community Without Management
† Snakes in the Garden
• Superstar Users
† The Circle Game
• Wandering off Topic

3 Comments

The Conquest of LinkedIn – Your Profile Page

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on January 19, 2021

To Continue the Conquest of LinkedIn, Let’s Look at Your Profile Page

What’s up with your profile page?

You’re doing it. And you’ve got your resume up. You’re answering questions. And you’re joining groups. You’re even meeting people offline. But you aren’t getting an enormous number of invitations to connect.

Or, perhaps, you’re blogging and tweeting. But you’re not getting a lot of readers in either medium. And you’d love to get some of your LinkedIn buddies to read some of your stuff. Maybe you want to use your writing and social media skills as a part of your overall job search strategy.

So the most obvious place to look, and to fix, is your Profile page.

Just like with a resume, a news story, or even if you were trying to sell your home, it pays to spruce up the first thing people see. Hence special care should be taken, as this is your first (and it may very well be your only) chance to make an impression.

There are any number of things you can do to assure that this impression is a positive one.

Driving Traffic

And, you can even use it to help you drive a little traffic to your own website and/or blog. Here’s how:

• Make sure that you make use of all available fields, and customize these as you are able.
† Next, list your blog.
• and I also recommend adding X or Bluesky.

If another social media platform will fit better, then add your details there as well, such as YouTube for videographers.

More You Can Do With Your Profile Page

So assuming that your resume has been integrated in its entirety, your next task should be to update the summary and specialties sections in your profile page. First of all, the specialties section is essentially just for keywords, so load them up.

However, the summary section should be more grammatical. So don’t make it an old-fashioned and generic personal statement. Instead, highlight your main differences here.

Pix, Pictures, Images, You Get the Idea

Include a current, clear, professional image of yourself. And once that image becomes, say, about five, eight, ten or so years old, replace it with a newer one.

URL City, Baby!

LinkedIn won’t give you a nice URL unless you essentially make your own. But they offer instructions for customization. After all, it is absolutely in LinkedIn’s best interests for you to put your LinkedIn URL on, say, your resume, your business cards, etc.

And most people won’t do that if the URL is breathtakingly ugly.

It’s a very, very easy thing to do, and there is truly no excuse not to polish your URL.

Posts and Takeaways

Yes, you can add posts to your profile page (a feature which seems to come and go). But you don’t have to. This isn’t Facebook, so a continual stream of statuses (statii?) is not expected.

Finally, with a little polish, your front door (profile page) can look mighty inviting to all.

Want More About the Conquest of LinkedIn?

If my experiences with LinkedIn resonate with you, then check out my other articles about the largest networking site on the planet.

What LinkedIn Has to Offer

• Your Profile Page
† Your Resume
• Meeting Offline
† Your Network
• Giving Your LinkedIn Profile A Facelift
† Last Little Bits
• InMaps – Visualize Your Network on LinkedIn

5 Comments

Community Management — The Circle Game

Community Management, Scale. Freshening, Get Together, Love, Small Things, Without Management, True Community, Party Started, Terrible Netizen, Snakes, Circle Game, Look, Netizen, Corralling, Wandering off Topic, Facebook versus Forums, Superstar Users, Analytics, Community Roundtable, Community Management Haikus, Life of a Community Manager, Social Media Job Descriptions, Superstar Users, Community Roundtable 2010

Community Management — The Circle Game

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on January 14, 2021

Community Management Tidbits – The Circle Game

What the heck is the Circle Game? Er, I don’t mean this one.

Forums have cycles, and so do users.

Community Phases are the Backbone of This Circle Game

There isn’t a lot that you can do about this. You can, however, stretch out the individual phases.

Discovery

The first phase is discovery. It all starts with excitement. The user has found your forum! It seems huge! The user can’t possibly read everything. It’s all too much.

It’s heady, and the user may very well tell everyone he or she knows about you. Or, the user might want you all to him or herself. Either can happen.

Nesting

The next phase is nesting. The user makes friends and starts to get into an enclave or two. Enclaves are little groups within your forum, whether formal or informal. Even if your forum does not have actual designated groups, per se, this still happens.

In a single fathers’ community, for example, a user might hang around with other users who became first-time fathers after the age of forty. In a folk music forum, a user might spend time with (and follow around) other users from Ohio.

This is perfectly normal – a carving of familiarity in an alien sea. But it does set up the next phase.

Boredom

The next phase is boredom. The community has too much sameness and does not seem to be changing quickly or thoroughly enough for a user’s taste. But the user sticks around, however, grudgingly.

Departure

The final phase is departure. Whether that comes with a bang (a user suspension) or a whimper (the user simply fails to sign in any more), is immaterial.

Or, there is a third type of endgame, where the user posts a topic about their departure. This topic can be fond, hostile or even a ploy to get other users to beg that person to stay. Or to get other users to join them in exiting—or going elsewhere.

Don’t put it past people to use their departure as a means of gathering friends or fans or followers in some new pasture. They want to start their own, new circle game. But they don’t feel like putting in the time or effort to build an audience.

Fighting Back and Reversing the Circle Game

Does it always have to be this way? Well, this kind of a cycle is more or less inevitable. The trick is to stretch out the first two phases, discovery and nesting, as much as possible, or to have the user cycle back from boredom to nesting again (e. g. to find a different group to hang with).

Or, a positive situation would be if the boredom phase were at least short (and put off) so that the departure phase would not be a suspension. And it would be less fraught with meaning.

Because a user taking leave, no matter how popular that user is, will leave behind less of a hole if they are a part of a 100,000-person forum versus a 100-user community.

How do you do this? By phases, of course!

Discovery, Reimagined

The Discovery phase of the circle game has two essential elements: new users and new topics. Increase both with good SEO and with encouraging as much user participation as possible.

Nesting, Transformed

The Nesting phase can be encouraged and promoted by keeping your community a safe, warm and welcoming place. Having formal specific groups is not strictly necessary for this, but it can be of help if your users are struggling in this area.

And, if you do go with formal groups, ask your users which groups they would like. They might surprise you. And it (almost) doesn’t matter whether a group is terribly active. It will still serve its purpose, to continue to afford your users with a friendly place within the forum, even if it is small. This is a place they can call their own.

Boredom, Shortened

The Boredom phase of the circle game can be delayed and/or truncated by keeping the twin flows of new users and new topics going. This means more and better SEO, offering new features and encouraging your users to continue adding new, interesting and diverse topics.

Can’t think of new topic fodder? So try taking a stand on a controversial subject, or ask for comments on a related news article. Or look in your archives, and see if an older subject might benefit from a fresh, new take.

Circle Game Departure, Delayed

Finally, the Departure phase of the circle game can, of course, be put off if the first two phases stretch out. When departure happens, don’t ask most users to stay. Unless you have a very tiny forum, this kind of behavior will be impossible to scale.

And it generally doesn’t put off the inevitable for too terribly long. Instead, try to find out from the user just why they are leaving. Except for purely personal, internal circumstances (e. g. the user just started a new job and has no time for your community any more), there may be something you can learn from and improve on.

And asking why will also give you an opportunity, not to entreat the user to stay, but to let the user know that he or she is welcome to return at any time.

The Circle Game: Takeaways

Your users’ interest in your community will wax and wane. You cannot always do anything about it, but if an effort is made, your users are generally going to appreciate that. And your circle game will go on.

Want More About Community Management?

If my experiences with community management resonate with you, then check out my other articles about how online communities work.

Community Management Tidbits

2 Comments

Author: Janet Gershen-Siegel

Feeding the Content Monster

Feeding the Content Monster

Case in Point

The Whining Content Monster

Today

Solutions

Make a list, brainstorming, of everything that could possibly, ever, be associated with your topic

Strike while the iron is hot

Repurpose, repackage, reply, rethink

The Content Monster is a Cannibal

Takeaways

Like this:

The Numerati by Stephen Baker, a Book Review

Time to Look at The Numerati by Stephen Baker

Conclusions from The Numerati

Ideas But Not Gospel

Border Collies and Data Goats

Messy Feelings

Are the Numerati Worrisome?

Rating

Want More Book Reviews?

Check Out Book Reviews on Social Media, SEO, Analytics, Design, and Strategy

Like this:

Trust Agents by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith, a Book Review

Trust Agents by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith

Usefulness

Too Many Delays

Basic Principles

More Ideas

Details

Rating

Want More Book Reviews?

Check Out Book Reviews on Social Media, SEO, Analytics, Design, and Strategy

Like this:

Author: Janet Gershen-Siegel

Feeding the Content Monster

Case in Point

The Whining Content Monster

Today

Solutions

Make a list, brainstorming, of everything that could possibly, ever, be associated with your topic

Strike while the iron is hot

Repurpose, repackage, reply, rethink

The Content Monster is a Cannibal

Takeaways

Like this:

A Look at Online Personas and Cyber Infidelity—Oh My!

Results

Cyber Infidelity: Some Takeaways

Where Do We Go From Here?

Like this:

For Liberty, Justice (?), … And Facebook for All

Universality

Real Names

Not So Fast On Those Real Names

No Real Name, No, I Mean it, Facebook!

Why Facebook?

The Best Parts of the Site for Social Media Marketing

The Concept of Universalish Reach at Facebook

Clutches of People

Want More About Facebook?

… And Facebook for All

Like this:

he Conquest of LinkedIn – Your Resume

Who Should Be on LinkedIn?

Why?

Improving Your LinkedIn Resume

More Tips for Your Resume

Want More About the Conquest of LinkedIn?

What LinkedIn Has to Offer

Like this:

Time to Look at The Numerati by Stephen Baker

Conclusions from The Numerati

Ideas But Not Gospel

Border Collies and Data Goats

Messy Feelings

Are the Numerati Worrisome?

Rating

Want More Book Reviews?

Check Out Book Reviews on Social Media, SEO, Analytics, Design, and Strategy

Like this:

Social Media Continues its Relentless Pace to Try to Make You Stay Put

Twitter’s Relentless Pace

Facebook’s Relentless Pace

LinkedIn’s Relentless Pace

The Common Thread

The Lack of Meaningful Content

Comparison to Reality TV

Whither TikTok and the Rest?

Want More About Social Media?

Social Media in Our Society

Reviews of Books on Social Media

Working with Social Media

Social Media for Writers

Like this:

Trust Agents by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith

Usefulness

Too Many Delays

Basic Principles

More Ideas

Details

Rating

Want More Book Reviews?

Check Out Book Reviews on Social Media, SEO, Analytics, Design, and Strategy

Like this:

C’mon and Look at Me! Look at Me!

Look at Me!

Long Story Short: Don’t Spam

Offsite Marketing

Let’s Look at Search Engines

Look at Social Media

A Look at More Social Media

BackLinking

Blogs