I recently changed my main Twitter client (more information on that below) and decided to create a new LinkedIn Poll for Groups in my Social Media Strategies for Business LinkedIn Group to find out what others use. I asked my 2,500 group members: What Twitter client do you use for business? Statistically speaking, the results can not represent the entire user base for those who tweet, and I only gave the poll readers a choice between 5 popular clients: Twitter.com, HootSuite, TweetDeck, CoTweet, and SproutSocial. The leading client in the poll as I write this blog? SproutSocial. Cibo, a digital agency based …
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It’s been several months since the incredible misfortune and tragic events that have struck my beloved 2nd home of Japan. Although you don’t read about it on the news anymore, Japan is still in crisis in both trying to contain a nuclear power plant which might require years of work while also trying to keep radiation-tainted food away from the dinner table of 125 million Japanese who are understandably nervous. #PrayforJapan still needs you, so please do not forget to include the Japanese nation in your prayers. Thank you. Twitter has always had more uptake in Japan when compared to …
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Social media is fascinating in that businesses and professionals are often using all of these websites for things they were never intended for. Although it feels as if Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and the rest have been around forever, believe it or not quite a few of these sites came from humble beginnings with very different intents. From dorm rooms to couches, let’s look back to the history as to how the most popular social networks began – and perhaps learn some trivial knowledge that can help deepen our appreciation for these platforms.
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The secret to success in utilizing Twitter for social media marketing in 2011 is in taking advantage of all of the 3rd party apps that exist for the platform. If you go to a Twitter application directory site you will literally find hundreds if not thousands of these apps available for you to use for free. The problem in 2011 is that many of these applications are old or just plain old don’t work as advertised. I’ve already blogged about the most popular Twitter applications that exist according to their Alexa rank, and some of the apps on this list …
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Every person or business has probably had that “Aha!” moment when they see their tweet show up in a Google Alert. Of course, with Google Realtime Search probably relaunching with Google+ data to replace tweets, your tweets may not appear on Google but are still being indexed by all of the other search engines. Every time you tweet, there is a chance that your message will be retweeted or even linked to, but a majority of the time your tweet becomes a fleeting piece of data that is lost in time and buried together with the billion other tweets that …
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It was only a matter of time before it happened, but overwhelmed with the sudden and sometimes overwhelming impact that their tweets had on society, some Japanese celebrities are now calling on other celebrities to stop using Twitter. As social networking websites penetrate every society around the world, every country will at some point be dealing with a variety of issues regarding invasion of privacy, employees getting fired because of their use (or perceived misuse) of social media, and even defamation lawsuits from a tweet. In Japan, Twitter has become the rage and even Facebook is still challenged in its …
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One of the problems about Twitter is that it was never meant to be used for data mining. It displayed conversations of those you followed, and you could see whenever someone mentioned your username or sent your a private message. In fact, Twitter didn’t even have an integrated search engine until it bought one from Summize in July, 2008, 2 years after they had launched their service. Fast forward to today, where the most recent stats last year hint at Twitter being one of the largest search engines that exist and you get a sense of how important searching for …
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When I taught my first Twitter workshops back in 2009, I mentioned one of the many reasons why I was bullish from the start about using HootSuite as a Twitter client: It gave you the ability to seamlessly import RSS feeds. At that time, I mentioned that this was efficient for your blog content, although now I would say since you spent 2 hours (at least I do!) to create a blog post, you might as well spend a minute or two to customize your tweet to promote it. However, I also told those in the workshop that, should they …
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Twitter is now 5 years old – Long Live Twitter! With an estimated user base that is now double that of LinkedIn at more than 200 million users, Twitter is less about what we are doing now and more about becoming a channel for customer service, consumer campaigns, and big brands to engage with their present and potential customers. Needless to say, with the mass usage and attention to tweeting on the Internet, many businesses have taken advantage of the site for its marketing potential. This has become such a popular and fruitful business tactic that Twitter have included an …
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As I continue to speak to corporations, professional associations, as well as social media workshop attendees on the strategic value of Twitter for both B2C as well as B2B companies, I am finding many businesses starting to take the plunge and explore tweeting as a business tool. As you can imagine, becoming comfortable with a Twitter presence, especially for a business, can be confusing, especially if you’re just starting out and getting your feet wet. There are many different objectives that businesses have in embarking on using Twitter, but a common goal for many companies is to build brand loyalty …
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