Matrix Group International

Category: Content Marketing and Social Media

  • Tweeting While On Vacation

    Tweeting While On Vacation

    Phone at the BeachI’m headed out for a short vacation today. Before I left the office, several co-workers asked me if I will be tweeting while I’m out. I had to pause for a second before responding with a “no, yes, maybe.” Hmmm….. Just what are the expectations these days about being on vacation and tweeting or maintaining your status on the various social networks?

    When I’m on vacation, I like to really unplug, which is why my husband and I go to places like Japan, Cambodia, Vietnam, Prague, Costa Rica. We go to places where we’re not tempted to go online and work because there is so much to see and do; often, the time difference makes it difficult to stay in touch. (more…)

  • How I Became a Cool Kid and Why It’s All About the Platform

    How I Became a Cool Kid and Why It’s All About the Platform

    PlatformWhat do the iPhone, Facebook, Twitter and Google have in common?  They have great platforms that have contributed greatly to their success!  What’s a platform and why does it matter?

    Wikipedia defines a platform as “a place to launch software. It is an agreement that the platform provider gave to the software developer that logic code will interpret consistently as long as the platform is running on top of other platforms.”

    I’m convinced that Facebook zoomed past MySpace because it launched a developer platform earlier.  The developer-friendly platform lets developers create zillions of cool apps and suck more of our time, energy and loyalty.  How many quizzes have you filled out on Facebook?

    The iPhone is no different.  Apple opened up its platform, hosted a user-friendly store and nine months later, iPhone users had downloaded 1 billion applications, most of them free or under $5.  My husband says he can purchase or download apps for his Blackberry but it’s not easy and the apps are on multiple sites.  No fun at all.

    Twitter’s platform lets developers capture streams of data from the millions of tweets posted every day.  Born from these streams are apps that let us visualize tweets, manage tweets, search tweets, map tweets.
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  • Don’t Like Facebook? Try Another Social Network!

    If Google and Twitter seem to be getting all the press, but they’re not your cup of tea, don’t despair!  There is a social network out there for nearly every interest group and demographic.  Here are some I’ve tried out recently:

    • FoodBuzz is a social network for people who like food.  You can create a profile and share your recipes, restaurant reviews and photos. In addition, FoodBuzz aggregates content from food blogs and allows food brands to create a presence and interact with users.  Here’s a link to my jmpineda profile, although I’m new so it’s still sparse.
    • TeeBeeDee is a social network for “grown-ups” aka mostly the 40+ crowd.  You can invite your friends, join and create groups, and participate in discussions. As expected, the top topics are: Work, Sex Over 40, Relationships, and Health.
    • Bebo is AOL’s social network.  It allows you to aggregate streams from other social networks, including Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, etc. I really like how you can create an interactive timeline of your life through LifeStory.
    • If you want to create your own social network, there’s Ning.  Ning lets you create your own social space, invite people, and customize what people can do through the hundreds of applications.  Associations might use Ning to create a closed network just for members where you control the brand experience and ways that members can interact.

    How about you?  What social networks are you on?  Which best suits you and your interests?  Which one is your favorite?

    • What We’ve Learned About the New Facebook Pages

      What We’ve Learned About the New Facebook Pages

      FacebookThe dust is finally settling on the Facebook pages for companies and organizations.  The new pages were supposed to go live March 11, but the transition seemed to take a few weeks.  Here’s what we’ve learned so far about the new Facebook pages:

      • Status updates (aka What’s on your mind?) are definitely posting to the organization’s Wall and showing up on fans’ streams. Fans can indicate if they like a post, they can comment, and they can share the update.
      • Only native Facebook applications are showing up on fan’s streams. In the past, we brought in photos and videos from Flickr and YouTube via RSS.  You can still do this today, but these updates do NOT show up in fan’s streams.  For example, if you want your fans to know that you posted a new photo album, you have to use the native Facebook application.
      • Sending an update to fans does NOT trigger an e-mail. Instead, these updates show up in fan’s Inboxes, in the Updates tab.  These updates also exist in View Updates in the left navigation of the company pages, but only if you click More.  It took us forever to figure this out and I’m convinced that nobody is reading our updates because they have no idea these updates exist.

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    • Getting Started with Twitter For Your Organization

      Getting Started with Twitter For Your Organization

      Follow me on TwitterMany clients ask me how to get started with social networking.  Should they blog, be on Facebook or LinkedIn, or should they start tweeting?  For many organizations, I recommend Twitter.   The concept is simple:  Twitter lets you broadcast short updates (140 characters or less) to the people who “follow” or subscribe to your updates. These updates are called “tweets.”  Twitter is also called micro-blogging because people tweet about what they’re doing, thinking, eating, reading, yada, yada.  So how do you get started?

      • First, you need to set-up an account on Twitter.com. Unlike Facebook or LinkedIn, you don’t connect your organization’s Twitter account to a personal account.  And both people and organizations have equal status on Twitter.  Not sure if you’re ready to start tweeting?  I recommend setting up an account anyway so that somebody else doesn’t grab your name.  And be sure to record the username and password on the account so that if the person in charge of tweeting for your company leaves or goes on vacation, someone else can do the tweeting.
      • Next, you need to personalize your account. I recommend uploading a logo or image, and entering a short description of your organization plus your Web address.  This is critical to helping others find your company, and to encouraging others to follow you.  For example , I generally don’t follow people or organizations that don’t have a description or URL.   You can also get fancy and customize your background image.  Check out how Business Insider customized their Twitter account with images from their Web site and job fairs.  I also like the backround image for Pocket.

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    • Creating a Content Strategy for your Web Site, Blog, Social Networks

      Creating a Content Strategy for your Web Site, Blog, Social Networks

      Pieces of the Marketing PizzleIn my last blog post, I referenced the content strategy that the marketing team at Matrix Group has developed to keep our Web site and social networking pages fresh and interesting.  Several folks asked for more details on our content strategy, so here you go.

      Our communication/conversation strategy has several elements:

      • Communication vehicles. We created an inventory of all the ways that we use to communicate with clients and prospects.  Our inventory includes: the Web site, e-mail newsletter list, blog, Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, and e-mail discussion lists.
      • Communication schedule. We have mapped out a schedule that delineates what we will post or send out every day, week, month, and quarter.  For example, we strive to tweet every day, update our Facebook page twice a week, and post new blog entries twice a week.
      • Content strategy. We believe that it’s important to NOT post the same stuff across all channels.  For example, on the Matrix Group Twitter account, we tweet about association/non-profit news, how companies and organizations are using the Web and social networking in interesting ways, cool sites, Web standards, site and application launches, job openings, Matrix Group events, and fun stuff going on around the office.  My personal Twitter account (@jmpineda) is different; I will post personal updates, sites I love, business news and trends, cool gadgets, blog posts and Matrix Group events.  You’ll notice that there is overlap in what we tweet when it comes to Matrix Group; otherwise, what we tweet between the two accounts is very different.  That’s intentional; we want our followers to have a different experience on each Twitter account.
      • Tone and voice. Our Creative Director, Alex, says tone and voice are very important, no matter what the vehicle, so we have guidelines for the writing across our sites and pages.  Our updates are always professional, not formal but not too casual either, friendly and warm.

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    • Time Management and Social Networking: How to NOT make social networking a huge time suck

      Time Management and Social Networking: How to NOT make social networking a huge time suck

      Time ManagementOver the past couple of weeks, I’ve met with clients about their social networking (SN) strategy. A common refrain is this: “Social networking takes too much time. I don’t have extra time in the day. And I don’t want my staff wasting huge amounts of time on social networking.”

      There’s no question that we can fritter away hours reading Twitter posts, watching random videos on YouTube, updating our Facebook status, yada, yada.

      But for organizations that have made the decision to incorporate social networking into their communication, conversation or marketing strategies, how can we be sure that social networking sites aren’t just a sinkhole of time?

      As someone who is fairly active on different SN platforms (I tweet and update my profile on Facebook regularly, I browse sites on StumbleUpon, and I certainly watch my share of YouTube videos), here are my top time management tips:

      • I set aside time during the day to read blogs, tweets, Facebook status updates, etc.  Typically, I set aside a half hour in the morning and a half hour at night.
      • I may update my status on Twitter and Facebook during the day, but I don’t do a lot of reading.
      • I don’t read everything.  I’m really good at skimming.
      • I use Tweetdeck to manage the tweets from people I follow.  I set up groups for the people whose tweets I really want to see:  family, friends, clients, CEOs, thought leaders, research orgs. Love Tweetdeck!
      • If I find something I like, I either read it right then, or I save it to my Delicious account (social bookmarking) site for later consumption.

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    • The Campaign is Over, but President Obama Still Committed to Social Networking

      The Campaign is Over, but President Obama Still Committed to Social Networking

      the_white_houseCandidate Obama ran a great campaign and made amazing use of social networking services to get the word out about his campaign, mobilize supporters, create viral messages, and raise money.  When the campaign ended, I wondered if President Obama would continue to use social networking tools or if the constraints of the White House or security would put an end all that open communication and engagement.

      I’ve been so happy to see that President Obama is being just as innovative and engaging online.

      • Google Moderator gives participants a way to submit questions and vote for the ones they want answered.  The White House launched Open for Questions and used Google Moderator to field questions for the President during in online town hall meeting tonight.  92,934 people submitted 104,049 questions and cast 3,604,964 votes.
      • The White House maintains a blog.  Imagine that, a White House blog.  The President himself is not blogging, but the blog does a terrific job of making visitors feel like a White House insider.  Here’s tonight’s post on Open for Questions.
      • The White House has a YouTube channel that features press conferences, the President’s weekly address, briefings and other events.  Some of the videos are available in HD; check out this beautiful HD video of President Obama’s March 21, 2009 address.  If you don’t see the video in HD, click the HD link in the bottom right corner of the video.

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    • The Power of the Relationship

      I tell my staff (especially Project Managers) to jump at any chance to share a meal with a client, vendor or partner. Why? Because I’m convinced that once you’ve shared a meal with someone, it’s a lot harder for them to demonize you, blow you off, ignore your calls and e-mails, or fire you for a small mistake.

      A meal, however, is simply a metaphor for creating, nurturing and maintaining a relationship. The relationship is what matters. A meal is one really great, fun way to establish or further a relationship. Face to face meetings and social events are others. Can social networking help you nurture your relationships?  Here’s how.

      • A really great blog lets you connect with your staff, customers, members. A blog lets you share your perspectives, talk about what’s important to you or your field, speak more conversationally about a highly technical or complicated topic.
      • An authentic social networking strategy lets you share aspects of your organization’s culture and values. So don’t just tweet about your press releases!  Share tips and tricks through a video, tweet about Web sites that move you, and upload photos of your staff in action.

      How about you?  How are you using social networking to support your relationship goals?

    • iStockphoto Uses Twitter for Customer Service

      iStockphoto Uses Twitter for Customer Service

      Twitter search for iStockphotoClick on the image to see a larger version of a screen shot of the Twitter search I used to get info about the iStockphoto site being down.

      I get nearly all of the photos for my blog from iStockphoto, an online photo service. There’s a good selection and pricing is great. A couple of weeks ago, I was dismayed to find that the iStockphoto Web site was completely down; all I got was a Service Unavailable message.

      So what did I do?  I tweeted about the iStockphoto site being down, of course. Then I had a brainwave.  Surely other people were tweeting about the site being down; what were they experiencing and what did they know?

      So I went to the Twitter search, which is a real-time search of all tweets, not just the people you follow.  I typed “istockphoto” and got a stream of tweets about the site being down.  Okay, so I knew I wasn’t alone and it wasn’t me.  But then I started seeing tweets from @istock.  Aha, perhaps I could get some answers there.  Sure enough, @istock reported that their site was under attack and they were down as a result.  I direct tweeted and got a reply back, apologizing for the downtime.

      A few hours later, the iStockphoto site was back up.  I was still monitoring the tweets on the Twitter search and someone recommended changing your iStockphoto password.  I tweeted @istock and got a personal response back, agreeing that I should change my password. (more…)