Really Chicken Little? The sky is falling?

Okay…first of all don’t freak out!  There’s no issue here with personal privacy! Your personal information is NOT being strewn all about the web like your dirty laundry on wash day.

Google+ cannot litter the Internet with that…only we can.  (Okay, [...]]]>

Really Chicken Little? The sky is falling?

It’s Not The Sky – Honest!

Okay…first of all don’t freak out!  There’s no issue here with personal privacy! Your personal information is NOT being strewn all about the web like your dirty laundry on wash day.

Google+ cannot litter the Internet with that…only we can.  (Okay, well they could…but that’s a post for another day…let’s stay focused here)

For the last two days I’ve had conversations with folks who’ve decided that Google is the new Evil Empire out to trap the unsuspecting web citizen.

This is not the case.

Google’s strategy has always been first and foremost focused on speed of information.  The speed at which,  relevant information results  are delivered to our fingertips.

‘Fast is better than slow’ has been a Google mantra since our early days, and it’s more important now than ever. The Internet is the engine of growth and innovation, so we’re doing everything we can to make sure that it’s more Formula 1 than Soap Box Derby. Speed isn’t just a feature, it’s the feature.

The Google Gospel of Speed, WORDS BY Urs Hoelzle

How Do I Look?

I know you noticed the emphasis I placed on the word relevant.  Search + Your World is about the information that matters to YOU and your circles of influence.  What’s really important to note here is you get the option to choose.

Let’s take a quick look at how the terrifying new search affects my results.  My keyword is simply photos.

1. I can CHOOSE to have the results delivered reflect my preferences, circles of influence, my presence.  It’s important to note here that I MUST be logged into G+ to select this feature.  You’ll note that in the upper right hand corner, the user icon is highlighted.  I can easily just switch back to worldwide results.  Not quite vanilla, but definitely a far less personalized experience.
2. My connections to other talented professionals, artists, thought-leaders and the world at large are positively impacted.  You’ll see that I follow Trey Ratcliff.  He’s an amazing photo journalist…artist!  BTW You have to check out his site www.stuckincustoms.com.  Now I’m introduced to +Lisa Bentanny.  I have an opportunity to review her work…see if I find value in that potential connection.  This is very simliar feature to what Facebook does to me all day.
3. Relevant photos are not just photos of me.  Although I look AMAZING in the SFIMA Photobooth pic with my buddy +Jeff Cohen.  The images delivered are from my friends and  family, my circles. I was delivered a gorgeous virtual photo album of family and friends.

Don’t Be Evil!

Do I think maybe there’s a self-serving motive here?

You Decide.

I invite folks to join the G+ community, do your research, check out the links I ‘ve provided below.  Understand that you have the power to control the privacy settings on any of these communities.  You can be as “out-there” as you like – or not.  It’s important to note that participating on line will bring with it risks, it’s not a mindless endeavor, it actually requires cultivation.  Let’s all take responsibility for our online presence…build one or don’t.  Please make you own informed decisions.

Official Google Blog:http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2012/01/search-plus-your-world.html

Extra Extra Read All About It!

In 2005 I jumped into the Social Media sphere with both feet, pinching my nose and just having a blast.  Those of us who were “getting-it” early were like members of a secret club, decoder rings and all.  Each day we would blog [...]]]>

Extra Extra Read All About It!

Hey Check This Out…

In 2005 I jumped into the Social Media sphere with both feet, pinching my nose and just having a blast.  Those of us who were “getting-it” early were like members of a secret club, decoder rings and all.  Each day we would blog our thoughts, opinions or just plain rambling rants.  There were days where, I was linking back to other Blogs to share with my community the excellent tips/tricks or just plain Thought Leadership.  On a really slow or uninspired day, I’d pull together a quick summary of the content I found important with appropriate pics, links, etc.   My summary sharing as well as those of other bloggers was Content Aggregation in it’s simplest form.

In 2006,  Twitter started to gain momentum and I saw the dedication to the Blog decline.  The summary aggregation of content moved to the 140 character “News Flash”.  I wondered if “micro-blogging”  would kill traditional blogging. I became irritated at what appeared to be a “lazy” habit of just “re-tweeting” information.  Now don’t get me wrong here…I am a big believer in Citizen Journalism - when practiced with responsibility.  But to just become a mountainous echo chamber for other people’s thoughts bugs me.

Now there’s a debate over Content Creation vs. Content Curation.  I’m even seeing requirements for this “skill” in Online Community Manager job descriptions.  What I would have referred to as a…”Hey…Check this out” tweet a “micro-blogging” staple is now considered by some a bona fide “skill”.

So as not to appear out of touch with the scene, I’m taking a little time to define Creation, Aggregation and Curation.  All three bring value to the Digital Brand Strategy.

Content Creation

Digital Brand Strategies includes; creation of web based content to include:  

1. Text (Articles, Blog Posts)
2. Video
3. Audio (Podcasts)
4. Animations

Content Aggregation

Have you "Reddit"?

You’ll see Content Aggregation in various forms.  I’ve listed a few below that I participate in or have used.  I recommend searching News Aggregators to pull more examples.

1. Google News Google sees their news aggregator differently than most.  I’m quoting Google Directly here;“Traditionally, news readers first pick a publication and then look for headlines that interest them. We do things a little differently, with the goal of offering our readers more personalized options and a wider variety of perspectives from which to choose. On Google News we offer links to several articles on every story, so you can first decide what subject interests you and then select which publishers’ accounts of each story you’d like to read. Click on the headline that interests you and you’ll go directly to the site which published that story.”
2. Yahoo News/Bing News  both are traditional news aggregators -Search Engine Style – allowing user control over the content delivered.
3. Reddit is unique in that it relies on user contribution as opposed to pulling directly from the Search Engines themselves.  The content shared is either in the form of a link or text.  The Reddit community determines the popularity  or value of the content by rating it “Up” of “Down”.  This is IMO community driven or curated content.
4. Individurls is a fairly new RSS aggre­ga­tion tool that allows you to build a cus­tom col­lec­tion of your favorite sites for uncluttered brows­ing. The site fea­tures a very sim­ple and clean inter­face as well as an iPhone ver­sion.

Content Curation

Mashable’s recent post “Why Content Curation Is Here To Stay” quotes Clay Shirky, author and NYU Professor when definging Content Curation.  I happen to really dig his take on this and Mashable’s post is a great read.

Here Comes Everybody

“Curation comes up when search stops working,” says author and NYU Professor Clay Shirky. But it’s more than a human-powered filter. “Curation comes up when people realize that it isn’t just about information seeking, it’s also about synchronizing a community.”

In my opinion this is the KEY to successful online presence management!  Here’s where we take the creation of all that interesting “stuff” and expand exponentially across the web.  We’re no longer communicating in a vacuum, we’re building community with content.

In a Digital Brand Strategy the biggest mistake made is to expect that great content will “pull” the community.  It does not.  Communities curating content, sharing knowledge, gossip, trivia, jokes, puzzles, trials, tribulations, all of it – that pulls in community.  Content Curation is what sustains and feeds the communities and keeps them engaged.  You know, like “Tell Me More, Tell Me More”!

Here’s a touchy subject…I’m a firm believer that you can’t be afraid to share content that could be perceived as competitive.  Brands that are secure in their product have to be open to feedback, constructive criticism, able to receive the direction needed from those that that own the brand…the customers.  Curating transparently is important for Brand identity.  Don’t be afraid to improve or change based on direction from outside of your fortress.

Final Thoughts

There are those that feel that Content Curation is just plain stealing, or minimizing the efforts of those that create the “original” content.  I personally strive for others to pull my input, contributions to add value in other’s respective communities.   I want my original content to be curated.  I don’t want to be mindlessly chattering into the emptiness.  If you can bring value to your relationships through knowledge sharing, you’re a curator and should be glad you are.

Don’t build out your Digital Brand Strategy leaving out this vital piece of the landscape.  With curation be sure to accurately attribute the content to the original creators.  If your’re uncertain partner with a Strategist.  Map out the appropriate experiences, not just at first launch but on a regular basis.  Bring value to your community and empower them to bring you into theirs.

How Do You Rank - Do You Care?

For me the debate over Influence Measurement simply comes down to Social Capital and what’s the importance of your online presence, or Personal Brand?”  Does this presence bring value to your work and/or personal life?  There’s [...]]]>

How Do You Rank - Do You Care?

For me the debate over Influence Measurement simply comes down to Social Capital and what’s the importance of your online presence, or Personal Brand?”  Does this presence bring value to your work and/or personal life?  There’s no doubt for my “geek” family and I that time invested online has value.

However, as many have said already, the measurement of that worth has been elusive at best.  I’ve vehemently  ranted IRL (In Real Life) that ranking sites, like Klout demean Social Community Citizenship.  I’m not out here to be popular, I may very well offend, sharing my objective opinion is not in the hope that I’ll receive a “freebie” or be given backstage access to your club.  However, like it or not, human beings will rank one another and the potential benefits of our connections.  This is especially true since we have expectations of these relationships, whether online or IRL.

 Social capital is a sociological concept, which refers to connections within and between social networks. The concept of social capital highlights the value of social relations and the role of cooperation and confidence to get collective or economic results. The term social capital is frequently used by different social sciences. It is a wide term, and that is why it can be defined accentuating different aspects depending on the perspective. In general terms, it could be said that social capital is the fruit of social relations, and consists of the expectative benefits derived from the preferential treatment and cooperation between individuals and groups.

Source: Wikipedia 2011

BUT!  When it comes to marketing and connecting with audiences, I tend to return to the  original 95 Theses of the Cluetrain Manifesto.  As a purist, Thesis 73 comes to mind.

“You’re invited, but it’s our world. Take your shoes off at the door. If you want to barter with us, get down off that camel!”  

Wouldn’t it be safe to say that the measurement of “influence” is an attempt to persuade Social Community Citizens to “hitch a ride” on that camel?  You can tell I worry about this, and at the same time I’ve acquiesced.  I can’t deny the power of the rankings for no other reason than I’m a Digital Brand Strategist entrusted with building Social Presence for clients.

A genuine authentic brand voice requires Brand Evangelists, those that bring their tribes with them.  Successful Social Presence Strategies must rely on the community in order to measure any activity effectively.  And of course the question then becomes, how do you quickly identify these very powerful voices, the Influencers.

I prefer to connect with these communities the “old-fashioned way”, participate, cultivate and reciprocate.  It concerns me intensely that we may well be handing over our power to cold algorithms.  I’ve always said tools are important, but we HAVE to bring the humanity into the analysis.  The charts and graphs bear the stench of traditional old school “marketing speak.”

Okay…enough of the rant…below I’ve shared a quick comparison of how I rank on these sites.  Keeping in mind I’m a Digital Pioneer from way back in the Gopher protocol days.  With my history and strong online participation, one would think my “Web Cred” would be equally ranked.  But not so much, in fact I’m either a Rock Star or irrelevant to point of non-existence.  It’s all based on how each site slices and dices your data.  But I found it a fascinating exercise.

My Web Career

They Like Me...They REALLY Like Me!

Okay, this one’s is my favorite since “My Career Score” is 807 out of a possible 850!

This site focuses purely on your Personal Brand from an employment perspective.  So since I’ve spent the last five years primarily focused on Employer Branding this score does not surprise me.  I’m fairly pleased that my professional career web cred has such a high score.  But again, I’m not sure that recruiters will be easily persuaded to spend dollars to access the aggregation of my data.  Where “My Web Career” gets the interesting recruitment/online reputation data, I’m not sure.  But briefly:

What Does Your Online Presence Tell Potential Employers About You?:

• 70% have rejected candidates based on reputational data found online
• 75% have hiring policies that require the review of online reputational data.
• 84% believe the use of online reputational data will increase in the next 5 years.

Kred

I'm Not Kred Worthy

I’m not “popular” enough to be “invited” to this party.  No offense it’s in BETA and they’re definitely looking for uber influencers.   I did “Tweet” my request for invite and hope that I’ll be able to set up my profile for further analysis.  Here’s a quick screen shot of my Kred from simple search on their site.  I can’t have an opinion here till I get more time to play so for now…let’s just say I’m not Kred worthy .

All Quiet On The Peer Index Front

Peer Index 

This is a site that clearly focuses on Social Capital, it’s in their tag line.  ”Understand Your Social Capital”.  You can search for others on the web to determine their social capital as well as gauge your own.

Peer Index explains that you have an “Authority Score”.  They measure your overall Activity, Audience, and Authority.  My total ranking as you can see is a whopping 13 out of a possible 100.

My Authority Score

Breaking Down the Components:

Authority:

Authority is the measure of trust; calculating how much others rely on your recommendations and opinion in general and on particular topics.

We calculate the authority in our eight benchmark topics for every profile. These are used to generate the overall Authority Score as well as produce the PeerIndex Footprint diagram.

The Authority Score is a relative positioning against everyone else in each benchmark topic. The rank is a normalised measure against all the other authorities in the topic area.

Audience

Your Audience Score is a normalized indication of your reach taking into account the relative size of your audience to the size of the audiences of others. In calculating your Audience Score, we do not simply use the number of people who follow you, but instead generate from the number of people who are impacted by your actions and are receptive to what you are saying.

If you are a person who has an “audience” consisting of a large number of spam accounts, bots, or inactive accounts, your Audience Score will reflect this.

Activity

Your Activity Score is the measure of how much you do that is related to the topic communities you are part of. By being too active, your topic community members tend to get fatigued and may stop engaging with you; by taking a long hiatus on a particular topic, community members may not engage with a long absent member. Your Activity Score takes into account this behaviour.

Like the other scores, Activity Score is calculated relative to your communities. If you are part of a community that has a large amount of activity, your level of activity and engagement will need to be higher to achieve the same relative score as in a topic that has less activity.

Source:  PeerIndex

I'm Great At Dinner Parties!

Klout

Last but not least the heavily debated Klout.  Here my score is 27 out of 100.  And just so you know…I’m great at dinner parties because Klout has decided I’m a conversationalist. I sadly have a long long way to go to be considered an “influencer”.  What really get’s me about this site is it’s reminiscent of the “karma” we had to earn when we were playing with PLURK back in 2008/2009.  Our individual karma was ranked based on how much we “plurked” and replurked, etc. With each increase in rank we were gifted the ability to use dancing emoticons.  Don’t get me wrong…it was an epic day when I got my dancing banana.

I’m not belittling the power here of encouraging influencers to raise their scores.  Genuinely if you’re considered a mover and shaker say in the “classic car” world, there may well be some AWESOME opps coming your way to receive tickets to shows, sample products, speak, and so on.  We social marketing professionals will be looking for easy ways to find you and enlist you in our strategies.  But!  Online Influencers are a unique tribe…they protect the village with diligent watchful eyes. They won’t be reduced to a demographic.   I highly recommend that you read Pam Moore’s analysis.  She goes into stellar detail in “Why I Deleted My Klout Profile”  focusing on privacy concerns, algorithm inconsistencies and more.  Her review and assessment is outstanding.

NOTE:  It’s important to mention that each of these sites REQUIRE  we grant them access to our Social Networks. We have to open the back gate of our walled communities so they can virtually rummage through our online cupboards to produce a validating score.  Now, It doesn’t matter if you’ve decided to opt-out by ignoring them.  All of these sites will generate a profile for you based on your existing online presence.  The amount of information they pull back to verify how important you are is based on your individual community security settings, is your profile public?   I’m not saying one way or another these sites are good or bad…they just are.  Do some research and assessment of your own online presence and decide for yourself what value these services/sites bring.  From a Digital Brand Strategy perspective, I caution clients to remain agnostic and approach their influencers through, participation, cultivation, reciprocity and most of all –  with respect.

The Conversation Prism

Hard to believe it used to be fairly simple when developing a Social Media Marketing Strategy.  We had one or two social communities that “really” mattered.  Today however, there are over 300 social networking sites excluding those focused purely on dating.  Now [...]]]>

The Conversation Prism

Hard to believe it used to be fairly simple when developing a Social Media Marketing Strategy.  We had one or two social communities that “really” mattered.  Today however, there are over 300 social networking sites excluding those focused purely on dating.  Now not all of these social networking sites are relevant to a Digital Brand Presence…but it does stop and make you think.

Step One – Audit the noise to determine the tone and sentiment of existing brand conversations.  If you’re not prepared for potential Public Relations nightmares, don’t execute the strategy.

Where do you want to be is the first question that comes into my mind.  Most clients tell me they want the basics, Facebook, Twitter, and maybe LinkedIn for their sales force and oh yeah, the talent acquisition folks (recruiters).   It used to be we had mountainous obstacles to overcome with the ROI challenge.  Now…not so much, because you know…everybody’s doing it.

In the end though…someone in the organization will want to know why you’ve spent $1000s on Social Media Strategies.  What makes the Fans/Followers/Likes/Tweeps so important.  How do you place a value on this?  Well that’s where the Digital Strategist comes into the picture.

A competent Digital Brand Strategist will be prepared to first perform an online reputation audit.  With the completed audit they should present the findings, provide baseline metrics for future measurement strategy as well as a Destination (participation) Roadmap.

Don’t go building out your Social Brand Strategy alone…connect with a trusted Digital Brand Strategist, one that’s competent in both digital marketing and social marketing.

Trey Ratcliff - www.stuckincustoms.com

When is the last time you went with your gut?  You know…that strong knowing in the center of yourself crying out “Do It – SAY Something” while the account team drones on with empty noise.  Or worse there’s the fear that Negative Nora who always “poo-poos” your idea,  will somehow [...]]]>

Trey Ratcliff - www.stuckincustoms.com

When is the last time you went with your gut?  You know…that strong knowing in the center of yourself crying out “Do It – SAY Something” while the account team drones on with empty noise.  Or worse there’s the fear that Negative Nora who always “poo-poos” your idea,  will somehow present it as her own.  It’s just better to keep that spark hidden.  Just be quiet so the aggravation won’t rear it’s ugly head from another hi-jacked great idea.

It’s hard to believe that there are folks in our world who would actually be comfortable with snagging ideas and claiming them as their own.  I’ve found that when you hear a someone in your org say, “this is about team think” beware.  For me I’ve found that means you’re about to regret sharing your epiphany with that trusted colleague.  And it’s not because I’ve ever required recognition and a strong pat on the back.  It’s because somehow I feel an injustice being done to the concept or the idea as a whole.

And you’re wondering what in the world am I alluding to?  Well I’m not alluding to anything, I’ll be very plain.  That spark that comes from within you, was meant for you.  It’s like that cold day where you’re just waking up from a deep delicious sleep to see the light coming up over the horizon.  This moment was meant for you.  It’s meant to be plotted out and a course charted by the bearer of the message.  When someone else takes the very tip of the idea iceberg and tries to run with it, it’s usually nowhere near the brilliance it was meant for.

Letting your intuition come into the light and out of the darkness – removing the fear and embracing courageously the whole inspired moment requires hard work.  It’s so easy to run down the hall and blurt out something with passion.  I know because I get so excited by the clear vision of one thing or another.  I feel as though I will burst and must tell someone.  The challenge is to take that excitement, the energy that’s gifted with the light bulb and put it down on paper.  Or put it into a mind map, but get the whole thing put somewhere with your name on it.  

There is nothing wrong with being proud of your work or taking credit for the gift of illuminated intuitive thinking, especially in marketing and brand strategy.  In fact as I’ve already stated, we have a responsibility to get the idea right.  Others will certainly contribute their perception and bring opinions that have value.  If the team is brining great insight to the idea – HELLO collaboration. Now we’re talking about “team think”.

Trust that strong knowing…don’t ignore it.  Embrace, nurture and encourage your spark.