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Beware of the Twitter Monster

I was fortunate enough (litterally lucky) to attend a social media confrence last week focused on business, customer and employee communications. I met some excellent practitioners and learned a ton about how social media tools are being folded into enterprise communication strategies.

As with many confrences if this sort, there was a healthy amount of questioning and speculation around exactly which tools will emerge as game-changers and which are nothing more than a flavor of the week. If I had the answer, I would have posted it in the very first line of this blog (sent to Posterius through my iPhone, by the way).

I'm as guilty as the next social media strategist... on buying in to new social applications - because they are brilliant, coceptually sound or just plain cool. And laggard adoption rates have proven me wrong more than once. But here's what keeps me coming back: social tools have fundamentally changed how we communicate and relate to each other and it's the community who is - in many cases - defining use. Some of these so-called social tool monstrosities have turned into applications that make money, connect people and change lives.

Beware of the Twitter monster. He's so ugly, he just might melt your heart.

What tools and platforms are you currently evaluating? I'm checking out Google Wave this month. Please drop a comment and share your discoveries.

Sent from my iPhone

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Just a Social Media Tool

“Communication leads to community, that is, to understanding, intimacy and mutual valuing.” ~ Rollo May

I have had the privilege of working for two very different educational organizations. Each organization has offered a unique and diverse group of employees, multiple stakeholders, challenges to overcome, and rewards. Each has also provided me with the opportunity to create and implement communication efforts as broad as the organization required or as specific as a situation demanded.

The communication game has changed. It is now necessary to have a working knowledge in social media. However, the Social Web is more valuable to PR than Social Media Tools

Concept vs. Tools
To me there is an important difference between Social Media as a concept and Social Media tools.  The tools are just that, tools that can be leveraged for purposes that PR people can and should be using to effectively communicate with various publics.

That Social Media is a concept - people having online conversations - is why I believe we as PR people need to be better at understanding and planning for to address business needs. The point being the social web should be approached as the mindset of sharing, openness and authenticity needed to successfully engage your communities and ultimately benefiting the bottom-line. That is much more important and valuable than any of the tools.

That is what I believe.

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Weapons of Mass Communication

Along with being able to create Office Nunchucks,

I have mad skills in the following Social Media tools and programs:

• TweetDeck
• Google Analytics
• Vocus
• Adobe Creative Suite (Photoshop, InDesign, Bridge, Dreamweaver)
• Blogging platforms including Blogger and WordPress (oh, and now Posterous)
• Although my current employer does not utilize the program right now, I've taken Radian6 for a test-drive and found it to provide a wealth of insight and efficient opportunities for engagement.

Because social media is a continually evolving arena, I am a voracious reader of books, blogs, and presentations. I also spend a great deal of time participating in the space. (Just ask my wife.)

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Got Social?

Here's the latest in social media tools that you should be using:

Box.net - save files online and access them wherever you go.  The Lite version is free and provides you with 1 GB of storage with max file size at 25 MB.  There are other options with greater functionality for a monthly fee (starting at $9.95/month)

Widgetbox - use one of their pre-defined widgets or create your own!

Backtype - follow your comments on your social networks and share them.

Picknik - free quick and easy online editing of your photos - and there's no registration required!

Bit.ly - make your favorite link into a shortened url perfect for microblogging (Twitter).  Many of you know about this, but some of you (like me) may be new to tweeting on a regular basis and can use all the help you can get!

I could give you a long list of other tools floating around the Web, but I'm trying to stick to only listing sites that I've tried, used and like.

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Barack Obama Social Media Tips

Social Pulpit - Barack Obamas Social Media Toolkit

Social Media 2009

Twitter Power: How to Dominate Your Market One Tweet at a Time

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Social Media Case Study: The Barack Obama Strategy

Twitter Power: How to Dominate Your Market One Tweet at a Time

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Social Media for Businesses

Twitter Power: How to Dominate Your Market One Tweet at a Time

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Free Online Reputation Monitoring

Check your online brand 24-7

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The VIEW - A quest for the "evolved web browsing experience"

"The evolution of social media depends on the evolution of the browsing experience."

Open Source Collaboration is about Virtual Teams using web tools to manage and communicate asynchronously while still maintaining priorities and quality of communication. The first step on any new project (open or closed) is to define the goal. This post is only part of the challenge, but the goal of FFoFF has morphed into a process I refer to as The Cloud >> The View >> The App. And that process or workflow is the basis for a conversation I am intending to have with other simliar minded seekers.

The goal is not to create the next killer app, or uber browser, the goal is to define what that evolved web experience might look like. And then, using free plugins, apps and browsers (0riginally FFoFF or FriendFeed on FireFox) to get as close to the goal as possible. Through this discussion [preferably not a monologue] the intention is to articulate the needs and challenged of the next generation web experience.

The evolution of social media depends on the evolution of the browsing experience. Things like secure transactions anywhere, on-the-fly translated content, consolidated profile management (across all of your networked sites) and public and private personas are all part of the puzzle that will drive the next generation of social media connections and networks.

THE VIEW (an invitation to dialogue and collaborate to build the requirements and demo of the UBER UI for the "social web.")

1. The project
2. The tools
3. The rationale
4. The solutions
5. The view
6. The team
7. The genesis

1. The project

Defining the Evolved Browser or Uber App for Social Media

2. The tools

• FireFox 3 is the development platform and interface.
• The tools are widgets, social media sites, online apps, clouds of data and on and on.
• And FriendFeed is my current choice for uber aggregator of social content.

3. Rationale

• I believe we can iterate an Uber Interface (a VIEW) that will have amazing flexibility and require a ZERO DOLLAR dev budget.
• My Firefox bookmark bar is already a sort of streamlined UI. It is not good enough, and constantly changing and evolving. But it is FREE.

4. The Solution - Usage models for the solution.

• The uber social master VIEW
• BrainTraining and Teaching VIEW
• The newbie VIEW

5. The VIEW

A view is a design and grouping of FFoFF elements. A view is an iteration. A view is a proof and hypothesis.

6. The team

John McElhenney

7. The genesis

• First I posted a Question on LinkedIN. http://tinyurl.com/firefox-plugin-question
• Read a post by Steve Woodruff on his StickyFigure blog. And posted my comment to his One Interface to Rule Them All post. http://tinyurl.com/uber-search
• Next as I was contemplating Steve's question I was inspired to put together a PPT slide of what I imagined the uber app to be.
• Next, I created a room on FriendFeed http://tinyurl.com/globalsocialmedia
• Next, I built a feed of the GSMC room and invited most of my smart friends to join the room.
• Somewhere along the way, I read someone's post containing a reference to FFoFF as a joke. But in my mind it stuck.

Note: I am searching for that initial FFoFF person and will post the link here poste haste. And if it's you, please jump in and put yourself on the TEAM.

Also please see Socialwiki and Wikisocial for an evolution of this process to an open source directory project.

[Initial wiki page created 7-15-08]

@jmacofearth
permalink: http://bit.ly/theview-exploded

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