On the OPEN Forum
This Conversation is Making Me Dizzy
Anita Campbell of Small Business Trends | July 21st, 2008 - 03:50 PM
(14) found this useful. Do you? 
I don’t know about you, but all these social networking sites are making me dizzy. 
The reason? I don’t know where the conversation is anymore.
It used to be that you didn’t have to worry about conversing online anywhere, except maybe at the occasional message board or perhaps email.
Then came blogs, and suddenly you had conversation on your blog, with readers leaving comments. Or readers might extend the conversation to their own blogs, by discussing your company, you, or even a blog post you wrote. So you had to track the conversation on other blogs as it related to you.
But that’s not what’s making me dizzy. No, what’s making me dizzy are all the social media sites that now encourage sharing, comments and/or voting.
The conversation now is taking place at multiple places … potentially thousands of sites if you are a large company and thankfully fewer if you work in a small business or are a solo entrepreneur.
The past two years have seen an astonishing range of “social” sites or sites with a social component enter the picture. In my case I only pay attention to perhaps a dozen sites (aside from individual blogs), but those keep me busy: Facebook, MyBlogLog, Twitter, Stumbleupon … to name a few.
Others that encourage sharing and commenting include YouTube, Amazon.com, iTunes, Yelp, Google Local, DocStoc. And the list goes on.
You have to pay attention to trends, too, as the popularity of these sites changes. New social sites can enter the scene with amazing rapidity. The trend I’ve noticed in the past 60 days is that while Twitter is still red hot, FriendFeed is picking up followers at an accelerated pace, especially among the entrepreneurial crowd.
So how do you manage to monitor and participate in the conversation about your business or anything that interests you, if the conversation is distributed across the Web? Without it becoming a full time job?
I don’t purport to have all the answers. But I can share a list of 4 tips that have helped me manage:
(1) Quickly Decide Which Sites to Participate In. As soon as you start hearing about a new group social site, make a quick initial assessment of it. Is it likely to impact your world? If no, then put it out of your mind and avoid the mental clutter. If yes, then you or your staff need to get up to speed. Unless you manage a mega-multinational brand, you probably are not going to have to participate in or track 100 or 1000 different social media sites — you may only need to pay regular attention to a handful. Example: if you are a management consultant and have published no books and do not manufacture any products, then you can quickly rule out a site like Amazon as a site to monitor — the conversation there just won’t apply to you.
(2) Bookmark the Sites You Track. You can’t track or manage your profiles or your activity on social sites from memory or haphazardly. Lack of organization leads to unnecessary distraction and anxiety because you are worried about forgetting or missing something. This is where one of the new breed of start pages comes in handy: iGoogle, Netvibes, PageFlakes. Also, use an RSS reader to subscribe to RSS feeds of influential blogs covering your industry.
(3) Hire Social Media Savvy People. Hire people around you who have one foot in the technical world, even if it is for what has traditionally been a “non-technical” position: marketing, administrative assistant, writer. Steve Rubel wrote last year about the need for marketers to combine both traditional marketing and technology in The Geek Marketer. The same goes for a variety of roles within small businesses. Surround yourself with people who understand this online world, and who also have enough skills to navigate it. For instance, an “old school” writer thinks the job is done as soon as an online article is written. The “new media” writer understands that publishing a blog article is just the start, and a conversational element then begins — that person is a hands-on user of social media and knows where to look for that conversation and how to participate in it.
(4) Use Monitoring Tools. Sign up for Google Alerts. These email alerts will notify you when the discussion touches on you, your business or your products in Google’s Web search, Google News, Blogs, Videos and so on. Get familiar with other monitoring tools that show links to your site(s), such as Technorati and Google Blogsearch. You’ll need to use several tools, as most of these monitoring tools can be hit or miss — not everything will immediately show up. Get used to checking your traffic stats, too, to identify where traffic is being referred from — often you can spot conversations through traffic analytics.
Phew! I feel less dizzy already.
![[ Digg it ]](http://blogs.openforum.com/wp-content/themes/amex/images/icon_digg.gif){kind=icon}
![[ Facebook share ]](http://blogs.openforum.com/wp-content/themes/amex/images/icon_facebook.gif){kind=icon}
Discussion Boards
Tamar Weinberg | July 21st, 2008 at 4:30 pm
You’re absolutely right, Anita. It’s confusing. The best thing you can do is make sure you subscribe to Google Alerts about your name and your brand (and even link:http://blogs.openforum.com to see the conversation, especially if you miss something). There are some plugins that also work well, but plugin management only seems like it’s getting tougher. Plus, with comments migrating to video, you can’t even track the conversation there since there’s no contextual element to video.
It’s difficult to follow, but there are a few tools that can keep you on top of it. I think it really does come down to receiving “as-it-happens” notifications from Google Alerts especially if you want to be kept abreast of the latest.
Brian Moran | July 21st, 2008 at 9:47 pm
Hi Anita -
It’s been too long since we last spoke–probably because we are both too busy running around in different social networks!
Interesting note–isn’t Amex OPEN Community a social network? I always thought their idea was to create a community which allowed business owners to share ideas, collaborate, ask questions and get information. I belong to this Community as well as Bank of America, AT&T, Intuit, LinkedIn, Facebook and a few others.
I think we’ll see a big shakeout in 2009. People don’t have the time to invest in 6-8 different communities. It will be 1-2 per entrepreneur.
So who wins the battle? The companies that make the big push NOW in offering robust products and services that address the needs and concerns of business owners. They also have an easy to navigate Web Site and great content for people to start, manage and grow their businesses while strategically connecting with fellow entrepreneurs and industry experts.
In my opinion, LinkedIn has the early lead, but they don’t offer enough services to keep people coming back–there’s an educational void with LinkedIn. So, it’s anyone’s ballgame.
Enjoy!
Brian Moran
Jen | July 22nd, 2008 at 8:40 am
I think you are completely right about the need in having the ability to sort through relevant information quickly and efficiently, but just because it doesn’t come to you second nature or you have minimal experience doesn’t mean and “old-school” writer couldn’t learn the ‘rules of the new road.’
Thank you for the tips though. My internship has a large focus on following blogs, articles and various social networking conversations. Enjoyed the reading!
Jennifer
Anita Campbell of Small Business Trends | July 22nd, 2008 at 9:10 am
@Tamar, yes, I agree, Google Alerts are probably the single best tool for staying up to date, especially for blog postings (since no one can possibly track all the blogs out there that may be discussing you or your brand). You can set up alerts for keywords, your brand name(s), your personal name, your site(s) — just about anything searchable.
I also like your tip about checking in Google using the link search parameter: link:http://blogs.openforum.com
– Anita
Anita Campbell of Small Business Trends | July 22nd, 2008 at 9:27 am
@Brian, yes, this OPEN Forum site is indeed a social network and community — and one of my personal favorites.
I agree, there is a growing glut of social networks. But as I point out in Tip #1, many of them you can rule out immediately as not being networks you wish to or need to monitor on a regular basis.
I used to have a feeling of mental weight about all these new social networking sites. Then one day I had an epiphany. I realized that much of my “overwhelmed” feeling came from this vague sense that I needed to be joining dozens of new social networking sites every month. But aside from sites like the OPEN Forum and maybe a dozen or so others that specifically attract small business owners and entrepreneurs, most of the sites I just didn’t need to set up a profile on or follow regularly.
Google Alerts helps keep me informed about key conversations on the rest, and that’s sufficient.
Once I “freed” myself from this feeling of must-join obligation for every new social networking site, I became much calmer and more productive about social networking. Now my philosophy is: Just join in the big sites where I am more likely to find like-minded souls and resources that apply to my situation.
sean percival | July 22nd, 2008 at 11:54 am
Sean here from docstoc, thanks for the mention. How about making our name an active link?
Anita Campbell of Small Business Trends | July 22nd, 2008 at 12:24 pm
@Jen, yes of course, “old school” writers can learn the new rules. Definitely!
75% of it is a mindset issue, IMHO. Some freelance writers and mainstream media journalists are fabulous with blogs and developing conversation around what they write. Some are not.
If you are hiring someone, I suggest having a discussion with the writer to see how he or she feels about responding to comments on blogs and the willingness to engage with the public. If the writer expresses distaste or resistance or even lack of interest, that might be a red flag.
Anita
Amanda | July 22nd, 2008 at 12:54 pm
The thing I am most concerned with is time. I do want to participate at some sites but it needs to be quick. I find myself getting sucked in and the next thing you know, I’ve spent an hour in one site. I learned to narrow it down to maybe 2 or 3 sites only.
Brent Leary | July 22nd, 2008 at 2:42 pm
I like your list Anita. One thing that may help is to take a quick poll of your company’s best customers to find out what social networks they belong to. Then possibly create a presence on the ones they frequent to deepen the relationship.
The other thing is to identify the influential/expert bloggers in your industry and begin following them. Bloggers your customers and prospects read can help you keep up with what’s of interest to them.
Paul Woodhouse | July 23rd, 2008 at 7:23 am
You’re absolutely spot on, Anita. I’ve held off and held off various thoughts of joining various networks even though I lurk. But, like you, the pressure is there to get involved to try and keep abreast of what’s going on and down.
But, the thing is, for the vast majority of small business owners not in the twitter tech bubble it’s mostly an irrelevance for them.
I think it’s harder looking at it from your perspective than it is from your average tech geek.
I still get folks who can’t read a blog post in context. Plurk? Not likely.
Chris | July 23rd, 2008 at 12:28 pm
Time is an issue with me as far as participation goes. It’s hard not to get sucked in and find that you’re spending much more time than you should be in these sites. Pick two or three and master them. That’s the best strategy. Because if you’re participating in many, you spread yourself too thin and your participation really doesn’t make an impression then. But you provided some really good tips and I’m going to put a few to use for myself.
Ivana Taylor | July 23rd, 2008 at 4:05 pm
What a fantastic conversation this is! I found myself exactly where you were (and I still do sometimes). I follow your recommendations - but still have that nagging feeling when I see people twittering or sending brightkite updates or Plurking - but I just don’t have the time to do them.
My favorite coping mechanism is to remind myself of what my goals are, where my ideal customers are hanging out, and which sites provide the greatest value to me and/or my customers. The rest are just temptation.
Anita Campbell | July 23rd, 2008 at 10:44 pm
@Amanda, I agree, it’s got to be quick. That’s why I think the current crop of virtual worlds hasn’t caught on, despite all the hype, because they require an order-of-magnitude greater time commitment.
@Brent, that’s an excellent suggestion about finding out where your customers (or target market) hang out and participating in those communities.
@Paul, wonderful to see you here. How is wild and wonderful verdant West Virginia treating you? You’ve hit on a “gotcha” we all have to remember: that not everyone is on these social networks. In a way, it’s becoming a bit of the haves and the have-nots when it comes to social media.
– Anita
Paul Woodhouse | July 24th, 2008 at 6:31 am
It’s not treating me too badly, thanks, although I’m a couple of weeks off moving back up Cleveland way. Still working with Justin at DOM, but he’s been kind enough to arrange a telecommute. So, that’s me and Steph rather happy bunnies.
Who really cares what the digital cognescenti are doing with whom for lunch. (Which reminds me, let me know when you’re free, it’d be great to catch up ;-))
Give me social media that isn’t about A-lists or number of followers and that type of thing and then we might be getting somewhere.
Louis Gray makes plenty of sense about a lot of it.
nmw | August 7th, 2008 at 1:44 am
As time goes on, the “Wisdom of the Language” will be a very good guide for finding reliable information, and specifically targeted information around which online communities will congregate (see also http://gaggle.info/miscellaneous/articles/wisdom-of-the-language
Some terms which are somewhat ambiguous (for example: does “open” mean “open for business” or “open minded”? or both? …?) may not be as *EFFECTIVE* as something which is more “straightforward” (such as “news” or “weather” — or “pizza”), but at any rate people will not generally “subscribe” to a brand name (don’t think I ever heard of the Ford Motor Company promoting “Ford Magazine” — though perhaps it might work for an “off road” community interested in making it to the other side ;).
Good article — and it accentuates that the web 2.0 alphabet soup is perhaps “standing on shaky ground”! :O