Social media has taken us by storm in the last few years. I talked about the "popularity contest" in my post about Klout and how we are all vying for attention. Well, now that companies are starting to really see how much Social Media can be used as a tool to drive traffic to their sites and products, it seems we are inundated with companies and startups encouraging us to "like" them on Facebook, or to "follow" them on Twitter. (Of course, I'm not any different! I love the spot light as much as the next gal.)
So we know these sites are huge. They are everywhere. Mom-and-Pop-type-shops use them, big-box companies are using them, and credit card companies are using them. Have you noticed when you check into certain places on Four-Square that you can get a discount if you use an American Express card? It's a marketing tool. And a pretty darn good one, if you ask me.
Content marketing works.
If you think about it, it's pretty obvious as to why. We are always online. And this is not to say we are always at a computer. How many people do you know that don't have a smart phone these days? I know I don't know many. I work in an AT&T store, and I can honestly say about 85-90% of my customer base (depending on the time of year in relation to how close we are to an iPhone launch) is using a smartphone of some sort. Hell, I have TWO smartphones, an iPhone and the new Nokia Lumia. (Never thought I'd see the day that I liked a windows product.)
If you have a smartphone, think about the different apps you have. Facebook? Check. Twitter? Check? YouTube and LinkedIn? Check and check. And now there's Pinterest. (My newest obsession) And this is why content marketing works so well. You have access virtually 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Have a really important thought that you want to share with your friends? Share it on Facebook and Twitter. Want your friends to know that you are at a really cool restaurant and that you'd love them to join you? Check in on Foursquare and have it cross-post to your Facebook and Twitter.
Now think about it from a business perspective. While you're busy Tweeting about your favorite new Mojito spot, you're probably also checking your feed. Any number of the folks you follow retweet content you likely to check out all the time. For example, that link I posted up there to the Nokia Lumia. Did you click it? You may not be interested in getting a new phone, but it is a new gadget and new gadgets are fun and exciting, right?
Most people who are on any of these social sites are on them to be social. As a general rule of thumb, these folks like to share. So why not get them sharing your content?
Case in point: I'm in the process right now of building a site for a colleague of mine who is a painter/mixed-media artist. Once her site is up and running, our plan is to start pinning images from her site on Pinterest. She's going to be doing the monthly First Thursday in Portland's Pearl district which features some of Portland's best and newest artists; and at these events, plans to promote her site as well as her Pinterest to get her name out there.
There are countless ways to use your social media accounts to spread your content and get your name out there. What is your strategy and what has been your outcome?
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Popularity, Klout and How YOU Set Yourself Apart
Remember when Myspace was huge? The number of friends you had seemed to reflect to people how popular you were. People spent hours trying to get their profile page to look spiffy and sparkly, choosing songs for your playlist was one of your top priorities.
With the rise of Facebook, social media and networking world have changed their face and quickly found their way into our everyday life. Myspace died out, Facebook started taking over. People, for a time, were more selective about who they added as friends. Some cracked down on permissions so that they could control who was able to see content on their page and who was blocked from certain areas. As the popularity of Facebook grew, the face of the internet and how people were connecting started changing as well. Facebook was no longer for college students; this phenomenon was spreading like wildfire and making its way into the business world for networking and so much more.
Then came Twitter. At first, Twitter was a hard sell. A friend of mine tweeted a few months ago something that made me giggle, but also really got me thinking. They said, "What's harder: Trying to convince a kid that Twitter is a complete waste of time? Or trying to convince an older person that Twitter isn't a complete waste of time?"
Twitter, for me started out as a fun way to have silly interactions with friends, let friends know of events that were happening at the moment and to keep up on some people that I don't otherwise get to keep up with. As I started to really pay attention to the possibilities of Twitter, I saw the growth happening and the networking world that was available to me.
As a young designer, just starting to build my business and just starting to build my brand, networking is my bread and butter. A couple of years ago, when I first started in the design program here at Portland State University, an opportunity to create a logo for a local start-up fell into my lap. I felt like I had just stumbled upon a pot of gold. Over the last two years, I have created a relationship with the women of Seniors Homing Together (my first logo gig) who also run APN, a service that helps the elderly and their families find appropriate facilities and care for their loved ones. Right now I am in the process of helping them re-brand APN, and it has been a pretty amazing experience.
But I digress. Networking, yeah, that's what we were talking about. So I read an article yesterday about Klout, its +K feature and how it mirrors the idea of the once popular #followfriday. I just started on Klout 4 days ago, but it has been an amazing tool to be able to watch how I interact with social media, the effect I have on my followers, the effect they have on me, and to be able to adjust my social-networking-skills to be more successful. Needless to say, I have learned a lot in the last 4 days.
So how, you are probably asking by now, does Klout and +K relate to the almost antiquated #followfriday? Well, I will tell you. Yesterday, I read an article by Troy Janisch on SocialMeteor.com about this very concept. When Twitter first started gaining popularity, a common meme was #followFriday. This was a way for people to recommend Tweeps to follow. As people became follower-hungry, it starting getting to a point that was careening toward on spam-tweets. The once helpful hashtag became more about trying to hoard new followers than really being able to discover interesting people you might not have been exposed to otherwise.
With Klout, the new +K awards are a way to do something very similar. The last couple of days I've seen some of the people I follow tweeting about "I just gave @thatonefriend +K about a topic that they know a lot about and talked about." You can let your friend know that you appreciate them for influencing you, and you can let others know that they are a reputable source in that area.
So last night, as I rode the 35 toward North Portland, I was flipping through my RSS on my phone (goodness, technology is amazing). I came across this article and started to think about the way this resonates with me. I thought about how this effects me, my business, people I know, people I want to know, and how we all see one another as a commodity. Capitalism at its best, yes, but also the way we, as a culture and society, operate and think. In a way, we're all in this huge popularity contest. The internet, being our stage, has also made this world a very small one. What was once '6 degrees of Kevin Bacon', is now 3 degrees of Facebook.
How do I fit into this popularity contest? I mean, the rules have changed since middle school, but its essentially the same thing right? So I am faced with the challenge of trying to set myself apart from every other designer out there. I think this will always be the case, I will constantly have to redefine my mission, reestablish myself in this market, and reconnect with people. How do you set yourself apart and how often do you think about this question? I'm guessing you're like me, and you probably don't ask yourself that enough. So I say, how 'bout we start now!
With the rise of Facebook, social media and networking world have changed their face and quickly found their way into our everyday life. Myspace died out, Facebook started taking over. People, for a time, were more selective about who they added as friends. Some cracked down on permissions so that they could control who was able to see content on their page and who was blocked from certain areas. As the popularity of Facebook grew, the face of the internet and how people were connecting started changing as well. Facebook was no longer for college students; this phenomenon was spreading like wildfire and making its way into the business world for networking and so much more.
Then came Twitter. At first, Twitter was a hard sell. A friend of mine tweeted a few months ago something that made me giggle, but also really got me thinking. They said, "What's harder: Trying to convince a kid that Twitter is a complete waste of time? Or trying to convince an older person that Twitter isn't a complete waste of time?"
Twitter, for me started out as a fun way to have silly interactions with friends, let friends know of events that were happening at the moment and to keep up on some people that I don't otherwise get to keep up with. As I started to really pay attention to the possibilities of Twitter, I saw the growth happening and the networking world that was available to me.
As a young designer, just starting to build my business and just starting to build my brand, networking is my bread and butter. A couple of years ago, when I first started in the design program here at Portland State University, an opportunity to create a logo for a local start-up fell into my lap. I felt like I had just stumbled upon a pot of gold. Over the last two years, I have created a relationship with the women of Seniors Homing Together (my first logo gig) who also run APN, a service that helps the elderly and their families find appropriate facilities and care for their loved ones. Right now I am in the process of helping them re-brand APN, and it has been a pretty amazing experience.
But I digress. Networking, yeah, that's what we were talking about. So I read an article yesterday about Klout, its +K feature and how it mirrors the idea of the once popular #followfriday. I just started on Klout 4 days ago, but it has been an amazing tool to be able to watch how I interact with social media, the effect I have on my followers, the effect they have on me, and to be able to adjust my social-networking-skills to be more successful. Needless to say, I have learned a lot in the last 4 days.
So how, you are probably asking by now, does Klout and +K relate to the almost antiquated #followfriday? Well, I will tell you. Yesterday, I read an article by Troy Janisch on SocialMeteor.com about this very concept. When Twitter first started gaining popularity, a common meme was #followFriday. This was a way for people to recommend Tweeps to follow. As people became follower-hungry, it starting getting to a point that was careening toward on spam-tweets. The once helpful hashtag became more about trying to hoard new followers than really being able to discover interesting people you might not have been exposed to otherwise.
With Klout, the new +K awards are a way to do something very similar. The last couple of days I've seen some of the people I follow tweeting about "I just gave @thatonefriend +K about a topic that they know a lot about and talked about." You can let your friend know that you appreciate them for influencing you, and you can let others know that they are a reputable source in that area.
So last night, as I rode the 35 toward North Portland, I was flipping through my RSS on my phone (goodness, technology is amazing). I came across this article and started to think about the way this resonates with me. I thought about how this effects me, my business, people I know, people I want to know, and how we all see one another as a commodity. Capitalism at its best, yes, but also the way we, as a culture and society, operate and think. In a way, we're all in this huge popularity contest. The internet, being our stage, has also made this world a very small one. What was once '6 degrees of Kevin Bacon', is now 3 degrees of Facebook.
How do I fit into this popularity contest? I mean, the rules have changed since middle school, but its essentially the same thing right? So I am faced with the challenge of trying to set myself apart from every other designer out there. I think this will always be the case, I will constantly have to redefine my mission, reestablish myself in this market, and reconnect with people. How do you set yourself apart and how often do you think about this question? I'm guessing you're like me, and you probably don't ask yourself that enough. So I say, how 'bout we start now!
Friday, July 8, 2011
ack!
It has been quite awhile since I've logged on and blogged on. Maybe this is the time to start doing so on a regular basis. I've been working hard on trying to expand my knowledge, perfect my resume, build my portfolio (as well as client base), finish college and, most importantly, STAY SANE. Its possible, I swear.
One of the biggest worries I have in this field is the fact that I have very very little coding experience. I can do basic html tags, but that is about it. I don't know CSS at all. And I worry that this fact will make me a less desirable candidate for design positions. I have been doing a little research and I am planning on learning these elusive languages. Well, maybe they aren't elusive, but as of now, they are to me.
Building my resume and my portfolio have been on the top of my list of priorities. As of now, I have a job working at Portland State University. Its a student job and allows flexibility so I can finish out my last term without losing my mind completely. But I also don't have much down time to be able to work on my own stuff because I am here.
However, I am starting to create an online presence. At least I hope I am. I've created a Twitter account for my business self. I've got my website up and running, although it needs A LOT of work. I've got my photography up on a SmugMug site, and adding to it all the time. I started a FaceBook page, although that too needs a little attention and love. Bringing it all together and seeing things starting to flourish and really come together has been exciting. I have so much work to do still, but I'm working on giving myself the tools to do it.
Oh, yeah, follow me on Twitter, y'all!
One of the biggest worries I have in this field is the fact that I have very very little coding experience. I can do basic html tags, but that is about it. I don't know CSS at all. And I worry that this fact will make me a less desirable candidate for design positions. I have been doing a little research and I am planning on learning these elusive languages. Well, maybe they aren't elusive, but as of now, they are to me.
Building my resume and my portfolio have been on the top of my list of priorities. As of now, I have a job working at Portland State University. Its a student job and allows flexibility so I can finish out my last term without losing my mind completely. But I also don't have much down time to be able to work on my own stuff because I am here.
However, I am starting to create an online presence. At least I hope I am. I've created a Twitter account for my business self. I've got my website up and running, although it needs A LOT of work. I've got my photography up on a SmugMug site, and adding to it all the time. I started a FaceBook page, although that too needs a little attention and love. Bringing it all together and seeing things starting to flourish and really come together has been exciting. I have so much work to do still, but I'm working on giving myself the tools to do it.
Oh, yeah, follow me on Twitter, y'all!
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Monday, November 1, 2010
Linky-bits
One of the hardest things for me to figure out is billing. I'm still fairly new. I'm nervous about asking too much, for fear of scaring away clients. But I also don't want to under bill. I know my time is worth more than just a few bucks bein thrown my way. Anyway, this site is a good resource for billing.
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Just looking around for some awesome inspiration. This site is incredible. It is a portfolio, but the way that it is set up is just amazing.
I am in the process of kind of building my business, my brand, my portfolio, all of it. And while I know that I am still pretty new to all of it, I am feeling a bit overwhelmed by all that I wish I knew or create. Anyway, I found some really amazing portfolios that were featured on GraphicDesignBlog.org.
As of now, I have some pretty simple business cards. I really just wanted to have something that I could have on hand until I came up with something really eye-catching, something fun, and something that I felt I wouldn't misrepresent myself or I didn't like. I like them ok, but, even though I just got them a couple weeks ago, I'm already ready for something new. These are really cool, so hopefully I can find some inspirations from them and come up with something I love.
I am in the process of kind of building my business, my brand, my portfolio, all of it. And while I know that I am still pretty new to all of it, I am feeling a bit overwhelmed by all that I wish I knew or create. Anyway, I found some really amazing portfolios that were featured on GraphicDesignBlog.org.
As of now, I have some pretty simple business cards. I really just wanted to have something that I could have on hand until I came up with something really eye-catching, something fun, and something that I felt I wouldn't misrepresent myself or I didn't like. I like them ok, but, even though I just got them a couple weeks ago, I'm already ready for something new. These are really cool, so hopefully I can find some inspirations from them and come up with something I love.
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