Category Archives: Twitter

What Part of the Word Publishing Don’t You Understand?

February 5, 2013Current Affairs, Twitterinvestigative journalism, Techdirt, TwitterTim Berry

Warning: this is probably just a waste of time, but still, I was curious, then fascinated, as I read Investigative Journalist Claims Her Public Tweets Aren’t ‘Publishable;’ Threatens To Sue Blogger Who Does Exactly That on Techdirt.

My first reaction:

It’s publishing. Look up the definition. Published and not publishable are opposites.

It’s an interesting story, though, followed by some lively comments.

One note that might be relevant: I visited the Twitter account in question. It’s locked. Does locking the account make it not published? I don’t know.

Still, can I say something in public and sue you for quoting me? Seems oddly illogical.

Q&A: Who Do I Follow For Business Twitter

December 11, 2012Q&A, Social media, Twittersmbplans.com, timberry.com, Twitter, twitter business, twitter strategyTim Berry

(Note: This is my post from smbplans.com, where I posted it yesterday. I was asked to repost it here.)

Here’s another good question I received from my Ask-me form on my Timberry.com website:

If I’m trying to build my Twitter presence to support my [omitted] business, who should I follow? How do I find them? How to decide?

I’m happy to answer that one because I think it could be useful to a lot of people starting to look at real-world business use of Twitter. Following in Twitter is important for several reasons:

Who you follow determines what you see. Your Twitter stream is the collection of tweets from the accounts you follow.
Who you follow is who you are. Other people can see how you follow. That means they see what you like, believe in, care about, listen to, and so forth. c
Who you follow is who’s likely to follow you back. For most businesses, following is the best way to be followed. About a third of your follows will follow you back — more if your tweets are interesting, less if they aren’t.

So, with that as background, here’s who I think you should follow for your business twitter account, in order of strategy value:

Leaders. The influencers you respect, want, and need. The people, businesses, and organizations you’d like to have knowing and liking and trusting you. It’s hard to generalize so think strategically for your specific business. For example, a restaurant would want local media, local organizations, hotels, food blogs, night out blogs, restaurant guides, travel guides, reviewers, and local people who comment on restaurants and have followings. The chamber of commerce, restaurant association, chefs’ schools, local university groups might be good targets too.
Media, writers, bloggers, and experts in your field. Authors whose work you like and respect. People who you’d like to see writing about you. Our sample restaurant would look for food, dining, restaurant, travel media.
Social media stars who turn up in keyword searches. Search the web, search Twitter, using important keywords. The restaurant example might search for #dining, #gourmet, #organic, #vegetarian, #chefs, #fastfood, #slowfood, #meals, for example. And if it is located in Eugene, OR then it would search for #eugene and #oregon too. See who tweets with those hashtags. See what content they tweet. Decide whether you are compatible with them.
Local organizations, groups, and institutions. The schools, universities, community colleges, public theater, development groups.
Some general news and bloggers and information sources on idea, places, topics, and people that interest you. This is just because you want to see what they’re offering. They’re not strategic.
Friends, family, and compatible business associates.

25 Ways to Look Dumb on Twitter

June 4, 2012TwitterConstant Contact, TwitterTim Berry

There was an interesting post on the Constant Contact blog over the weekend: 25 Things That Make You Look Dumb on Twitter. Some of my favorites:

Too much self promotion
Automatic direct messages
Spelling errors

Special mention for “tweeting without a strategy:”

Never tweet just for the sake of tweeting. Take some time to decide why you’re on Twitter and what you want to get from it. Let that guide your content.

My thanks to Constant Contact. Nice list. Of course I still like my 18-point twitter etiquette very much, but this is pretty good and a couple of years newer.

New Game: Social Media Snooping vs. Social Media Cleansing

July 13, 2011Business Ethics, Current Affairs, Social media, Twitterbackground check, Facebook, Social media, TwitterTim Berry

The other shoe dropping: Business Insider posted This Company Will Expose All Your Most Embarrassing Online Moments a few days ago. It’s about a service company that helps employers by doing a social-media online background check on a potential employee.

It was more than two years ago that I first saw a business plan for a social media cleaning service, meaning a company that would clean up all those dumb and embarrassing things college kids posted on Facebook, when they wake up to the job market and the implications. (Aside: that one was done by Kai Davis, who is now doing marketing for Palo Alto Software).

My favorite comment in this context:

What part of the word publishing don’t you understand?

I’m traveling as I write this, waiting for my car to get new brakes while on a driving trip to California. While I was driving this morning I heard a major radio station commercial for a social media cleaning service. Sorry, I forget its name, I’d like to mention it.

So the contest is on: the social media scraping service, telling your next employer every dumb comment and picture you posted online; vs. the social media cleaning service, helping you get all of that off of the web.

Shall we take bets? Who wins?

(Image: heal the bay/Flickr CC)

My Recommendation About Your Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn

March 7, 2011Advice, Social media, TwitterFacebook, LinkedIn, MBA students, Social media, TweetDeck, TwitterTim Berry

A couple of weeks ago I was in a classroom full of entrepreneurial MBA students, as a guest speaker, answering their questions about me and Palo Alto Software and bplans.com, this blog, and so forth.

When they asked me how I managed my online self in social media, my response went something like this:

I don’t do social media clutter. I think of social media as publishing and I try to offer nothing that isn’t useful to a reader. When I’m on Twitter I tweet only what interests me and might interest somebody else. I highlight blog posts I wrote and posts I read that seem worthwhile. I ask questions. I sometimes share something useful about business planning, or small business. I use TweetDeck to manage my Twitter self, and I set TweetDeck up to share that with my Facebook and LinkedIn pages.

Several of the students seemed troubled. One of them asked: “So you never post anything personal? What about who you really are?”

And I realized, with that question, that maybe I was lucky. I got into social media late in life. The topics I care about are business related, and my friends are business related. I was already a published author and business owner. I wasn’t ever tempted to post the kind of personal stuff that gets younger generations in trouble. I was always aware of it as publishing, not just gossip. Most of the students, on the other hand, started on Facebook as high-school or university students. Facebook was fun first, business, if at all, only as an afterthought, later.

So here’s my advice: your social media presence is public. It’s publishing. Never clutter it up with personal trivia, much less drinking parties, embarrassing pictures, inappropriate comments, or anything your adult self might not be proud of. Use phone, sms, and instant messages for playing around with friends. Build a social media presence you’ll be proud of when your next prospective employer, boss, or client looks into it.

Oh, and by the way: you don’t have to call it personal branding. You can just call it taking care of your reputation.

5 Rules for Kindergarten Friends and Twitter

February 21, 2011Advice, Social media, Twittergrandfather, grandson, kindergarten, kindergarten advice, social media advice, Twitter, Twitter adviceTim Berry

Not long ago I was driving a five-year-old grandson to kindergarten when he asked me how to make friends. That’s ironic because networking is hardly my strong suit, but he doesn’t know that. And I guess that’s what kids expect grandfathers to know, so I really wanted to help him. I tried. It sounded like a lot of clichés to me, but then I’m not five years old.

I think it’s about Empathy. That’s too big a word for a kid, so I called it feeling what the other kids feel. You have to be a friend to have a friend; the golden rule; kindness. etc. My mother would have said “put yourself in the other kid’s place.” My mother-in-law called it “see yourself through the other kids’ eyes.”

Just a few hours later, in a group of mostly-baby-boomer types drawn together by interest in entrepreneurship and possible angel investment, Twitter came up. I like it and I said so. Somebody asked me for supposed secrets of success in Twitter.

Without actually thinking of that moment with my grandson earlier that day, I gave them these five tips for success with Twitter. And as I did so, it struck me that it’s mostly the same thing: empathy.

Offer something other people want. In Twitter specifically, nobody cares what you’re watching on television or eating for lunch. It’s publishing, not babbling. Use twitter to offer people quotes, humor, ideas, and – my favorite by far – useful links they can follow up on.
When in doubt, treat others like you want them to treat you. Teasing, mocking, insulting, shouting (all caps) are not appreciated.
When you don’t have anything to say, don’t say anything.
When you’re angry, wait. Breathe. Think about it before you do it. Public arguments are ugly. And (when published on Twitter, at least) they live forever. Angry words are not biodegradable.
Return favors. When somebody does you a favor, remember it, and do them a favor back. Thank you is nice but a favor in return is more effective. In twitter at least, too much thanking becomes clutter. Twitter involves a lot of passing other people’s tweets (posts) along, called re-tweeting, so when somebody likes what you’ve published (tweeted) there and passes it to others, find something of theirs to pass along (re-tweet).

The next time I was with my grandson, I gave him almost this same list, revised only slightly, for kindergarten use. And while I’d like to report that he took it to heart and he’s now the life of the proverbial kindergarten party… well, at least we’re both still trying.