Really? Did you HAVE to Tweet that?

I don’t get shocked easily & I am not a prude by any stretch of the word.  I can swear like a sailor, scratch like a dog, but I look damn good in 3 inch heels and  a smoking hot little black dress.  But why do you feel the need to swear IN CAPS due to issues you are having w/technology…dude, it’s not like you are in a plane that is crashing!

But I just saw this Tweet come through by @ScotteVest who lives in our great state of Idaho, but is not representing it well as a business owner at the moment.

 

Scott Jordan, CEOSCOTTEVESTFUCK! WEBSITE WENT DOWN- TOO MANY PEOPLE ON IT.half a minute ago from web

A few people have told me about this guy and what a hard worker he is.  He does EVERYTHING on his own & doesn’t really like to hand things off.  No worries, we are all controll freaks here and there – but now he needs help.

I wish him luck.

UPDATE 4/16/09: Scott’s comment is below, thank you.  I also received 2 other comments from Scott fans, but only posted one – I was actually thinking they were employees, but it looks like they are just fans.  I Want to post the Tweets that came through to get your .02…is he sorry? Was I off base? Is that really his handle?

SCOTTEVEST Got scolded for inappropriate language on twitter yesterday very sorry http://tinyurl.com/ce5x9d

phuc_head @SCOTTEVEST i don’t think you owe an apology for “inappropriate” language because some people cannot handle reading “grown up words”

SCOTTEVEST @phuc_head i agree but saying i am sorry for the few people that were offended is very easy

Twitter “Followers” Should Be WAY More Than Following

I am having pain now! Please Fix
I am having pain now! Please Fix

The general consensious of the people writing the Twitter manuals on “how to” and “what is” appropriate in TwitterLand, might need to reconsider their follower/following number guidelines.  Those guidelines currently recommend that you should have about an equal portion of follower to following or else you are considered a spammer (following more than are following you) or a celebrity (have more followers than following).

Well, I think we can all be celebrities!

Corporations & brands that want to really be a part of the social media uprise, need to LISTEN & ENGAGE!  But, not in a spammy way.  Be there for us when we cry out & have a need.  Be there for us when we are talking about certain subjects.  Be there when we have a request or question about YOUR PRODUCT (or a competitors!-but be nice).

Because I have been on both the consumer side of Twitter & the represenative of a company listening for those cries, I give you my following examples: 

Me as the Consumer: Tuesday of this week @digitalvision tweeted out the following:

digitalvision: Webex, you and your non-sharable proprietary formats give me headaches

I responded that it was valuable info since I am in the hunt for an efficient webinar service.  We pinged back & forth a few times, and then-it happened.  @ooVooMarty chimed in and @’d me the following.

@JenHarris09 saw comment on webex, give oovoo a look, www.oovoo.co….

He was either searching for key words and or competitors and found our conversation.  He was not spammy, but very kind & gentle on suggesting that I check out oovoo.  

My Results: THAT my friends,is how you engage.  I pinged him back, said thank you for the OOVOO suggestion (which I have since checked out) and that I appreciated his engagement & am considering using!  (cost to Co? 2 min of his time to find & tweet me…ROI? Much better than a click through rate!)

When/If the ball is in the COMPANIES court (or is it, when the Twal is in the companies Twort?)

Me as the Company: For three months I was the Social Media Sales & Marketing Specialist for @TSheets.  I was all over Twitter searching for mentions, recommendations & critiques of @Tsheets.  I also searched keywords such as “time tracking”, “time tracker”, “time card” etc.  Since 60% of the current customer base was tech, it was a good place to look.

My results? Conversations with potential customers and engagement with those looking for help…in a NON-Spammy way of course.  Our Twitter follower numbers never dropped because I was human & respected peoples time.  I would read our customers blogs when they Tweeted them out and respond if I had something relevant to add (this is a WHOLE other blog on how a Social Media Marketer should engage in all platforms – stay tuned).

My Tip of The Day?  Use Search & Learn how to use “operators” well.  Don’t be spammy, be human, be helpful.  And Consumers, it is ok to have a skewed number of followers, if the man a caring company is listening in TwitterLand, it is better for all of us as consumers in the end.

Personalize Your FaceBook URL

How to get a personalized FaceBook URL when they don’t offer one.

Thank You to Sascha Majcenic

There is no need to install a 3rd party application.
Facebook is not yet enabling “vanity” URL for your profiles but they “hope to make these URLs available (…) in the future.”
Until then you can do this:
1. Click on “home” then click on “profile”, you should see a URL like this in your address field:
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/profile.php?id=123456789&ref=profile

2. Now copy that number, in this example 123456789.

3. The public URL for your Facebook page is then:
http://www.facebook.com/people/FirstName-LastName/123456789

Put in your real first and last name in the above link and keep the hyphen as separator. Voila!
However, in order to be found by people who are not on Facebook yet, you would have to first make your profile publicly searchable by going to Privacy Settings -> Search. 

When you have your personal URL, make it trackable baby!  
Hint: Case Sensitive, took me 10 minutes to figure that out!
http://bit.ly/JenHarris09FaceBook

I use bit.ly & I can’t tell you how it has made my online life justifiable!  You can customize a shortened URL, place it ANYWHERE you want (wordpress, FaceBook, Twitter (duh), LinkedIn, Communities etc) for optimal tracking.  So if you are using anything BUT bit.ly, re-think & think how smart you will look when you can say “and then we received 80% of our hits from ONE post, which led to an increase in sales that day for a 45% conversion rate “.  
Just saying, makes you look cool!

-jen

Facebook speak is not Twitter Speak

A local friend, GenY’r and Twitter newbie, Tweeted out the following this morning:

is so thankful for her wonderfully supportive friends and family.

She speaks Facebook.

If she were to speak in Twitter it would have sounded like this:

I am so thankful for my wonderful supportive friends and family.

There has been a flood of Twitter newbies (all WELCOME!) lately from Facebook & they speak in FB which starts a sentence by saying: “Joe Schmo is” instead of Twitter’s question: “what are you doing?”  
I don’t know about you, but when I speak in 3rd person, I feel my DBQ # rise.  Sort of like Jimmy on Sienfield.

For those of us that speak to ourselves a lot (yes, A LOT) my guess is that we don’t say “Jen is bouncing a basketball”, “Jen is schoolin’ George…ah, look at Jen snap the towel at George.”  rather we would speak to ourselves as if writing in a journal.  “George is such a loveable dork. I think he likes the whole towel snapping thing.”  My advice?  Just write in a journal that just happens to be public on a mass (or as mass as you want it) scale.

What language do you feel more comforatable speaking in?  Is the learning curve shorter for the Facebook to Twitter crowd or vice versa?

Facebookers, welcome to this new medium, a new language & a new set of friends.  We want you here, we know you have something more important to say to & something more important to pass along than snowballs.

Twitter & WordPress are in LOVE!

 

Tweet!
Tweet!

It’s about time!

 

WordPress FINALLY has a Twitter widget that you don’t have to re-code someone elses tool & give up your 2nd child to do!

Whoo HOOO!

Love you WordPress, but this should have happened at least a year ago and should not have been so combursome for us non-uber geeks…but, thank you!  FYI: can you make it prettier? I bit 1.0 if you ask me…but I don’t want to look a gift bird in the mouth – again, thanks…but keep working on it.  😉

Check out Social Media Marketing Industry Report

For ANY business that has ever-ever-ever hesitated or is contemplating why they need social media…please take 6 minutes of your life & watch this video of a report that you can also download for free.  Your CEO/VC will thank you in the end.

And if you still balk at the thought of having someone inside your company dedicated to social media…see you in the dust my friend!

I want you to take a look at: Social Media Marketing Industry Report 

How to be Visually Stimulating on Twitter

Thank you Rochelle DeLong for the inspiration for this post.  Little Tid-bits here & there can make all the difference…IMHO that is.  🙂

Your Name

Or should I say: “YourName” and not “yourname”
I think you get the drift.  When picking out your Twitter handle, make it visualy stimulating to your brain…don’t make that poor little engine up above do any more work than it has to.  Capitalize like you usually would any other name so that when people are searching for you, they don’t see a gobbledegook of info.  Here is a quick funny from a forum of how web addresses should double check their capitalization wtih the same logic:

All of these are legitimate companies that didn’t spend quite enough
time considering how their online names might appear … and be misread.
These are not made up. Check them out yourself!1. “Who Represents” is where you can find the name of the agent that
represents any celebrity. Their Web site is http://www.whorepresents.com

2. “Experts Exchange” is a knowledge base where programmers can exchange
advice and views at http://www.expertsexchange.com

3. Looking for a pen? Look no further than “Pen Island” at http://www.penisland.net

4. Need a therapist? Try “Therapist Finder” at http://www.therapistfinder.com

5 There’s the “Italian Power Generator” company, http://www.powergenitalia.com

6. And don’t forget the “Mole Station Native Nursery” in New South
Wales, http://www.molestationnursery.com

7. If you’re looking for IP computer software, there’s always http://www.ipanywhere.com

8. The “First Cumming Methodist Church” Web site is http://www.cummingfirst.com

9. And the designers at “Speed of Art” await you at their wacky Web
site, http://www.speedofart.com

Let me start by saying that I am NOT a brain guru  by ANY stretch of the word, but I do understand how my brain sees things, therefore I am going to assume yours works the same way.  lucky you!

Happy Monday!

A Hands-On Twitter Workshop

Tweet!
Tweet!

I am thrilled to announc our first Hands-On Twitter Workshop here at Consilio (my new stomping grounds)!

This will be a class for those that say “I know I should be on Twitter, but I just don’t get how to use it” or “I want to use it better.”

WHO IS THIS? – SHOULD THIS BE YOU?
I met a guy Friday night at Red Sky PR’s one year anniversary party (Congrats Jess & Crue’ by the way!) who said he had 600+ followers & he doesn’t know what to do with them or how to communicate with them – this class is for you!

There are also a ton of people in Boise that I have started following lately that have less than 10 tweets out & very few followers…don’t be scared – once you get the how to’s & why’s down, you will see the light…aka: have that Ah Ha moment that I love so much! – this class is for you!

WHO THE HECK ARE YOU, JEN HARRIS, AND WHAT QUALIFIES YOU TO TEACH TWITTER?
Great question, thanks for asking!

Really hope to see you Wednesday or if that fills up another one in the coming weeks!
Facebook Invite: You can see the details here & link to the online sign up on EventBrite from here.

See you soon!
-jen

My New Working Venture

I have landed!

With out breaking into song & dance, I now have The Best of Both Worlds.

Being a rock star mom and wife is number one in my life while work allows me to express myself with the a path that I have found a pretty good niche in. I have found a job (or did they find me?) where I am able to be a mom and help a company communicate & market themselves to the right client.

I am now with Consilio and it’s sister company Perfect Order as their Communication Manager. I will be communicating about classes, services as well as assisting in internal marketing efforts.

This “Best of Both Worlds” opportunity is part of the revolution with the way working moms decide whether or not they should stay at home with their kids or fulfill their need to work and contribute to something that they are great at. All the while, being a rock star mom & wife.

I will also be out and about picking up new clients to give them my nurturing, hands on approach to social media all the while doing other “things” with my new working family.

#FollowFriday in +140 Characters

In the spirit of #FollowFriday on Twitter, I would like to introduce you to five Tweeple that always catch my eye and why I think you might enjoy following them.  #FollowFriday is nice & all, but I like to hear from people why they think they are so great…here are my Tweeps!

@TacAnderson Tac introduced me to Twitter.  He is also the first person, outside of my husband, that I told I was pregnant with the twins.  He jumped up and gave me a great big hug—if you can hug, you can be my friend.  Oh, and he’s frickin’ brilliant.  He knows every new product, every cool kid knows him, follows him & wants to be him.  The thing is – he isn’t arrogant about his notority in the world of social media.  He is cool as a cucumber & genuine to the core.  And he doens’t owe me a coffee at all for this.  🙂

@MikeBoss Disclaimer: I set up Mike’s original Twitter account while we were at MPC Computers together.  Mike took the love of telling stories about food, his Middle East travels & his cats and turned that into relationships with computer and education publications that got MPC Computers off the “black ball list” (btw: that is not my quote, it is someone that was higher up the MPC food chain than me).  He didn’t have to buy the inside front cover to get a story or a quote from the publisher, he gave them content & value through stories, insights and heart felt comrodery with people.

@SaulColt  Saul is the Head of Magic (and self proclaimed Mayor or Twitter) at FreshBooks and he holds that position close to his heart & does it damn well!  My favorite part of following Saul on Twitter is that he is FUNNY!  His little insights about the cabbies he encounters, the food he is eating & the house he just lost make me laugh…and he responds back – kudos!  

@DirecTV  If you have DirecTV you MUST follow them.  They don’t tweet out that much but when they do it is valuable info…like when they offer free HBO!  Quick story: Our signal went out one night and my husband was on hold wiht them for 45 minutes (on that thing-a-ma-jiggy called a “phone”).  I had just started following them & gave it a crack – with in 8 minutes our signal was back!  

@SteveAMiller  My favorite part of his bio is his first line: Kelly’s Dad.  Won my heart right there.  Steve has given me advice during my most recent lay off & we have actually had a REAL phone call.  He has many years behind him in consulting in the marketing world and shares his knowledge & tidbits well….and he has a great band (jk-not THAT Steve Miller).