best wishes
peter waldren

Why that? Because she has rationalized how to manage her various identities (her personal one, her professional one, her brand ) leveraging the various social medias with a distinct purpose for each of them (You Tube, Facebook, Twitter, Four Square, etc.). The thinking was pragmatic and she demonstrated through examples how each channel tangibly contributes to her business. She owns a coffee shop in Sydney CBD.

I filmed an extract of her speech. Check it on the wall of the Facebook page of ASE Australia (posted on June 1st).

Hmm – Prezi is flash based so bit of a bummer for all those techie geeks trying to access something via Ipod / phone / pad… and your own slides do advise that the content should be smartphone friendly, the majority of which are iphones, hmmm
& Prezi doesn’t give slide numbers so I can’t leave specific slide based comments here without counting (which I’m too lazy to do – esp when there’s three hundred plus of the blighters!)

But – loving how the design feeds into the information & the way it transitions (although cumulative effect might leave some feeling a little dizzy = steadicam sickness!)

And – finding the content interesting and thought provoking

But – can it spellcheck (Accessability NO, Accessibility YES)

And finally – I wish for there to be more stroking and truffling, that is all.

Nosing, feedback and commentary are all encouraged:

http://prezi.com/evhlgvjcphg8/what-does-it-mean-to-be-adept-at-social-media/
http://prezi.com/xcitkidw43oa/what-does-it-mean-to-be-adept-at-social-media/
http://prezi.com/xgraq_astbwx/what-does-it-mean-to-be-adept-at-social-media/

Bear in mind that it’s still a work in progress: the flow is as I would like it, and so (pretty much) is the grouping of key ideas. I’ll be adding some more salient content here and there, and cutting back some of the fluff. Oh, and there’ll be illustrations. Lots of them

Thank you all for your invaluable contributions

An interesting point of view on the subject : if you want to be good at something, you should start by learning what you don’t know…

http://hbr.org/web/slideshows/social-media-what-most-companies-dont-know/1-slide?cm_sp=most_widget-_-default-_-Social%20Media%3A%20What%20Most%20Companies%20Don%27t%20Know

Cheers
Seb

http://www.ted.com/talks/eli_pariser_beware_online_filter_bubbles.html

and this

http://ascii.textfiles.com/archives/3086

(I love b3ta!)

I have a number of networks to which I can reach out using various kinds of Social Media: current and former work colleagues, chiefly in the two arenas of IT and Collaboration Design, who are on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIN, etc., as well as Ye Olde Emaile Distributionne Lyste.

I also have networks of neighbours, friends, family etc., who are also reachable through all of the above networks.

I was hopeful of rich results from the former group: this kind of thing is generally well within their sphere of interest. Indeed I have had some excellent stuff – but the trickle so far has been quite thin.

A surprisingly powerful torrent of stuff, however, has come from Wifey’s literary network. Surprising because this is a network of second-degree separation, built around my wife’s career as a literary author. These are people who don’t really know me, are not directly engaged in what I do, and are a network that is built around a core topic that would seem wholly seperate from this discussion. Despite all of this, theirs has been a contribution which has included excellent insights, direct subject expertise, and thoughtful consideration of the topic.

So. The lesson to be drawn here is that there is gold in them there hills – even the ones you don’t suspect to be gold-bearing.

Often, and particularly in the corporate world, we build our networks around what we deem to be ‘likely candidates’ for contribution. This is a mistake, clearly, and it would seem that the wider we cast our nets, the more opportunity we afford ourselves for truly valuable dialogue.

I think that’s enough mixed metaphor for now. Thank you to Claire, and to her friends from Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, her blog, and the various bars and pubs that she frequents.

I think Social Media is highly useful for people but only if they approach it carefully. “Being good at social media” is basically getting it right. You wouldn’t, for example, write a rambling post on LinkedIn about taking your dog to the vet, because that isn’t what LinkedIn is about.

As a writer, Twitter is my favourite Social Media platform, mostly because of the incredible amount of writers and publishers on there. As others have said though, with social media you have to pay attention to the “social” part of it and come across as a person. I have no interest at all in connecting with people who only tweet links to their products and I regularly unfollow anyone who has unfollowed me, as I am not on there to ‘observe’ but to share ideas.

When I joined Twitter I couldn’t see the point in it, so I think it takes a while to work out whether you slot in. My husband told me about Twitter but he went off it very quickly but I have used it ever since, and can honestly say it’s helped me to start my writing career. I find Facebook helpful as a supplement as you can say a bit more on FB and also with FB I connect with more people that I know from the ‘real world’ so for me the dynamic is different and I like having that variation.

In summary, IMHO, “Being good at social media” is about connecting with people, being appropriate to that particular site, and “giving” as well as “taking” if that makes sense.

The people I consider ‘good’ at social media don’t over-promote themselves and give a lot – advice, encouragement, ideas. Just saying ‘I have a new XXXX out’ on each tweet / status update without being part of the conversation turns people off. There needs to be some personality behind it otherwise it’s just another advertising channel and in turn social media must respond to questions, queries and criticisms. This gets difficult and costly as companies grow or people get busy. The other problem I think is starting to materialise is guruhood. I despair of the number of ’5 ways to improve your xxxx; articles which merely recycle perceived wisdom without any original thought. The straight recycling of news without comment is also a big turnoff. I can still read a newspaper/website! Soon someone will start looking at the numbers and considering whether this is good value for money.

Social media enables people to keep in touch with others in a ‘soft’ way beyond the 7 close friends. I keep in touch via Facebook with my skiing buddies with who I shared a house in Whistler, old school and Uni friends and some old work friends. It’s a loose kind of conversation, a few words here and there but we’re still in touch and I couldn’t do it otherwise – they live in Australia, US, the Pyrenees etc etc. It adds to my life. However looking at it from a business point of view, I’m not convinced that Facebook is encouraging me to spend a lot of money with companies. I have a different use for Twitter and LinkedIn but again, I’m not spending money. If you charge to use these media, then the service loses a critical mass of users. LinkedIn is the darling at the moment but it’s primary role is recruitment and there’s a limit to the number of times people move jobs. The networking aspect is very fragmented to date and has a contrived feel about it.

In a rambling kind of way, I’ve come round to the view that in society, there is a limit to the amount that we can ‘promote’ ourselves in a social setting and we’re exploring that limit in a virtual world. I think we will find countless ways to enrich our lives but the monetary value will turn out to be less than many believe. Like the dot.coms, they are just another channel to market for business and whilst there might be some growth, there tends to be a substitution of spend in one channel vs another.

Look forward to seeing the discussion develop.