In Web 2.0, no matter what anyone tells you – you can’t simply put up a shiny blog and expect that milions of people will suddenly arrive to gaze at its beauty.
Just grabbing a Twitter account, polishing up your Linkedin.com account and reading one or two other bloggers is not enough either.
In that same vein, your procession (postings) on the Web using all these tools, should never be a series of over-hyped marketing messaging with little or no real insight.
Instead of looking for the quickest way to have the biggest float in the parade, why not strive instead for slowly making your way – respectfully, truthfully, and creatively.
Don’t let people fool you into thinking that just because you’re here it means you don’t have to do anything else.
Don’t be beguiled by folks who tell you there’s a quicker way of using all these tools that don’t involve work on your part.
If you really want to reap the benefits of Web 2.0, you have to be willing to march with the masses. Let them see who you really are and contribute what you can to benefit everyone.
Don’t view this work as drudgery – view it as a way to find your peeps. Find the tools that work best for you and join in!
And always remember to simply be yourself.
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Here are a few links to some of the finalists for this year’s Online News Association Awards – please check the links out.
Journalists and journalism is still alive and thriving and we’re all better off for it.
Online Video Journalism Large Site -
Student Journalism Small Team -
Lisa Pickoff-White, UCBerkeley – “It Happens at Midnight”
- hit play.
Multimedia Feature Presentation, Medium Site
Lane DeGregory, Melissa Lyttle, Desiree Perry, Jack Rowland & Ted McLaren, Tampabay.com, The Girl in the Window
Online video Journalism Large Site:
ESPN – “YouTube Baby”
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I’ve had some folks recently email me about where they might hear my take “virtually” on PR and social media – and so once in awhile I will put a link to some of my faves.
This top one focuses on community, Web 2.0, building synergy across the world using 2.0 platform.
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- Image by Getty Images via Daylife
As the modes of monetizing social media continue to expand, it’s very important to keep in mind that each person can be a mighty social media force for all things good.
When we just think about social media in terms of how much money it can make us, how many books it can sell, how many CDs are bought – we can lose the very important piece of how social media can change the world for better.
Here are 5 Tips for Being a Mighty Social Media Force:
1. Don’t be a back to me social media poster child. Always think of how you can mightily expand everyone’s endeavors, not just your own.
2. Focus more on how your social media can empower, instead of the increase it might bring to your bottom line. (Secret - If you do good, you will do well.)
3. Don’t be stingy – share your ideas freely.
4. Power abundant link-love – link to other folks who are brilliant and share their posts as well with your readers.
5. Be real – be the same offline as you are online. Don’t be incongruent.
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Here are my ten favorite things about writing a blog:
1. Instantaneous gratification after you’ve finished a post.
2. No writers’ block allowed or “blog block.” If you don’t have something to blog about – then take time out to thank or link to all those other peer blogs who inspire you.
3. Freedom from an editor or story slant – although note, this never means your blog should be sloppy and not congruent.
4. E-meeting tons of other bloggers who are supportive and active in the blogosphere
5. Reaching out to potential readers and establishing a rapport.
6. Interviewing other bloggers
7. Writing anything keeps you creative and focused. It’s too easy as a writer, to get lazy and not challenge yourself. Writing blogs keeps you challenged!
8. Hoping someone will comment on your blog. (Someone…anyone…Mom?)
9. Getting feedback that you’re on the right track and you’re helping folks view the world at a better vantage point.
10. Link Love – it’s fun and festive and you get to meet other link-minded folks!
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- Image via Wikipedia
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Very interesting story of how one author got a book deal and now a published book through her use of Twitter. Check it out and keep in mind – no matter what Web 2.0 tools you are using – each one of them raises your visibility and brings new opportunities!
1. It takes time to grow your social media presence, it doesn’t happen overnight.
2. Make certain your expectations are in line with what is really happening in social media. Don’t expect 10,000 friends on Facebook the first month out.
3. Twitter count – quality is more important than quantity.
4. Establish a regular editorial calendar for all your social media content and assign one or two people on your team to make sure it gets done.
5. Bloggers are much easier to connect with if you actually read their blogs instead of just asking them to do something for YOU.
6. Don’t make your social media circle exclusive – always make room for more people to join in and participate.
7. Be engaging, tell stories and be honest.
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1. Be a competitive thought influencer. Don’t wait to chime into other conversations about your product or vertical – start new future-focused ones.
2. Always focus on the end-user never on YOU.
3. Use 2.0 tools to heighten your visiblity on the Web. Tie these tools in with offline traditional marketing/pr efforts.
4. Make sure your messaging and storytelling empowers viral word of buzz.
5. Think perennial platform, not short-term gain.
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This is a very interesting piece on Richard Russo and one of his booksignings. Also great in terms of the Brewster Bookstore and what community really means.
Read it and learn.
1. Bring enough drinks for everyone. Don’t be cheap. (Give away your books for free to bloggers, and online reviewers who are so kind to cover them.)
2. Don’t be chintzy on the decor for the party: Don’t try to get the cheapest website or blog design you can and then hope that people won’t notice they’ve arrived to a dump.
3. Serve fresh, snappy, enticing snacks: Make sure witticisms abound and you’re not grumpy with folks who come to your site or your blog.
4. Don’t stalk your partygoers: If a blogger or reviewer picked up your book at the party, don’t email them incessantly for months afterward asking them when they’re going to post about it.
5. Don’t be the smartest one in the room (even if indeed you are – the only person this rule would not apply to is Stephen Hawking – because he cannot but help be the smartest one in the room. ) If someone is talking about your book and they have a different take on it, unless it’s completely and utterly inaccurate let them have their own opinions. D’OH!
6. Don’t close the party just when it gets going: The only way to successfully work a virtual party is to be in it for the long haul. To that end, don’t just grab a blog, post for three months and then stop after you “feel you’ve done enough.”
7. Don’t be ridiculous: You and your publicist have never done enough, you can always do more. Pick up another tray of your books and start walking the blogosphere party again.
8. Search out the folks in the corners of the room (Web): Don’t just try to pitch to the biggest blogs or online sites, let others be included too. They will feel all the more valued by it. (Plus, the people who are prone to being more shy are always the more interesting ones! Or at least that’s what my husband said when we met and I was the one in the corner.)
9. If you can’t find something nice to say… ok, you know the rest. Just insert the word “post” for the word “say.”
10. Revel in other people, not in front of the mirror, by the door, whilst holding up your book and ignoring your partygoers. Unless there is a fatwa on your head, get over yourself and circulate.
Check out this NYTimes article on the Google Books settlement – it’s not over!
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