Friday Social Tips!
Social tips that I found in my work and personal wanderings that I found this week!
- "Top Terms make a difference". Looking through why certain YouTube videos there were the normal "content" "Music" "funny" but I found that one interesting analysis was the use of "most searched words". So I am testing this in my title. According to YouTube: "the weekly spikes are even more pronounced for the word "Friday," which is a term that's seeing more searches now than it ever has on YouTube." And I quote....
"The video, which has been seen approximately 90 million times, will likely have another bump today as our data shows that -- just like searches for the song -- views of the video also increase every Friday. Interesting aside: even though "Friday" blew up the week of the 13th," - Focus for your target audience. My daughers and all her friends are watching this video. Harry Potter in 99 Seconds. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y57sYHIDP_Y] The lesson is to target your focused Social work toward your specific group by age, likes, location, etc
- Have a POV (Point of View): People like comments, postings, community comments that have a perspective. They may or may note agree with you but they like to debate the points. Develop your expertise and your POV to add value to the conversation!
Is Bigger better? Small / Medium Businesses see what Social can do for you! #ibmpartner #socbiz #ibmsocialbiz #ls12
Yesterday a very small tree shed a very big leaf! Take a look! My biggest tree has the smallest leaves and my little tree produced this HUGE leave!
This leaf caused me to think about small and medium businesses and the value of social to them. (Does everything remind me of Social? Well, kind of!!)
Social is the great equalizer. Social can be the great equalizer. If used appropriately, a small company can produce the biggest leaf!
How do you do that?
- Share your expertise using Twitter. A small dry cleaner is active on twitter sharing their expertise on geting stains out. They are attracting the most new clients in their local area by their updates and value.
- Reach new audiences with Facebook or LinkedIn. My local salon no longer does advertising to drive new clients. They only use social means to drive new word of mouth clients through Facebook, Foursquare and other tools. Richard Scott Salon and Day Spa is even doing social polling to understand better what is required to be even better.
- Grow your brand. Russell Convenience Stores uses social tools in the cloud to collaborate in their growth. They use IBM connections to collaborate with their builders, architects, etc while crafting their new store expansion!
Social is a great equalizer! Just like my little tree!
Christmas Cookie Coma! (Same true for Social?!) Including Sandy's Fav Recipes! #socbiz #ibmsocialbiz #ibm
I baked tons of cookies this weekend and ended up in a Cookie Coma!
What does a cookie coma look like?
- Over indulging on sweets by eating more than needed
- Obsessing to try each and every type of cookie
- Focusing on making the cookie look great, not as much on taste great
So why did I raise this in a Social Business Blog?
Well, as I see companies, I think they are in a Social Coma!
- Over indulging on social. I see a lot of companies that seem to think that more is more. They tweet and blog on everything and anything and broadcast too much! Advice: Think through your strategy on how you communicate in the market. While you cannot plan everything, you can ensure you are sharp and clear in our you communicate. I advise companies to lay out their strategy by week. For instance, each Monday post a video. Each Tuesday respond on the following top 3 blogs. Every Wed, Tweet the following, etc. This strategy provides a way to be consistent and to let your "fans" know what to expect! Surprising them also is good too but not everyday!
- Obsessing to try each and every type of social tool. I see a lot of companies that cannot decide the tools that they need to use. So each new tool they adopt immediately without thinking about the goal, or how it fits. Advice: Carefully select the tools based on the goals. For instance, if you are already using Twitter, Foursquare, and LinkedIn, do you need Google Plus or Gowalla? You'd be surprised at how many companies try too many tools.
- Focusing on making it look great, not as much on content! Social is about content. Not just cool gadgets, and gizmos. Many companies spend too much time on making their facebook page look great, but don't focus on the content. Content is king or queen. Make sure you have a content activation strategy or curation strategy is more important than the icing!
Here's one of my fav cookie recipe !! It is from my grandmother who was from Lithuania.
A cool ball shape and has nuts and powered sugar....yes, some people call this a Russian or Greek Wedding Cake. But not us! It is the Lithuania Ball!
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
3/4 cup finely chopped walnuts
additional powdered sugar
In a large bowl combine first 6 ingredients on low speed of mixer about 1 minute. Blend well. Gradually add flour at low speed until just combined; stir in nuts. Roll dough into 1 inch balls; place about 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake at 350 F for 8-10 minutes until firm to the touch but not brown. Do not overbake. While warm, roll in additional powdered sugar. Cool; re-roll in powdered sugar before serving.
And one more for good measure! Not cookies, but we are on the sweet roll!
Pumpkin Gingerbread Pie
Great way to jazz up classic pumpkin pie, yet keep it simple!
- Nonstick cooking spray
- 1 cup canned pumpkin
- ½ cup sugar or splenda for baking
- 1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice or (1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, ¼ teaspoon ground ginger, ¼ teaspoon ground allspice, and 1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg.)
- 1 egg, slightly beaten
- ½ cup half-and-half or light whipping cream
- 1 14.5 oz package gingerbread mix
- Sugar free cool whip
Preheat over to 350 degrees. Coat a 10-inch deep-dish pie plate or an 8x8x2-inch baking dish with cooking spray. In a small bowl combine pumpkin, sugar, and pumpkin pie spice. Add egg, beat lightly with fork just until combined, and gradually stir in half-and-half, mix well. Set aside.
Prepare gingerbread mix according to package directions. Pour batter into prepared pie plate. Lightly spoon pumpkin mixture over gingerbread batter; swirl gently using a table knife. Bake about 50 minutes for a pie plate or about 60 minutes for a baking dish. Cool slightly on wire rack. Serve warm or at room temperature with cool whip or whipped cream.
I always make this over the Holidays for my family and friends and they loved it. This was the first dessert that was empty in minutes.
Social Business Coffee Break: Social helps you with Recruiting, Retention and more! See it live at #IBM #Connect12 #socbiz #ibmsocialbiz
Embedding social into the HR process is a critical way to drive ROI. In fact, in a recent study, embedding social into HR can help cut costs up to 15% by helping you recruit the best talent, and to retain the very best!
Learn more here or at our upcoming IBM Connect 2012 event where IBM - Analytics and workforce reporting for human resources (HR) and Chief HR leaders will talk directly about their experiences!
And there is a WHOLE track dedicated to Optimizing the workforce. Social businesses improve the effectiveness of their people by unlocking talent and skills that otherwise might have gone unnoticed. Now more than ever, leaders need to focus on rapidly developing workforce skills and capabilities, fostering collaboration and knowledge sharing, and developing future leaders.
Learn from experts leading the way in workforce transformation who share their successes in developing and bringing together the right talent at the right times to support better, faster solutions to business problems.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2tXLsO8eFQc&feature=youtu.be]
Social Business "who's who" Speaking at IBM Connect 2012! #socbiz #ibmsocialbiz #ls12
I am so impressed with the "Who's Who of Social" that is speaking at IBM Connect 2012! Major and successful organizations are showcasing their ROI of going Social!
IBM Connect 2012 is January 17-18 2012 in Orlando! Please join me there! http://www-01.ibm.com/software/collaboration/events/connect/
- TD Bank's Wendy Arnott, VP Social Media and Digital Communications and Glenda Crisp, CIO, as well as Tim Hockey, the Group Head, President, and CEO will speak on transforming financial services to a true Social Business!
- Gilberto García, VP of Innovation, CEMEX, and leader of Shift. Shift is a Business
social networking platform that empowers employees in all CEMEX operations worldwide to interact, share best
practices and promote innovation through collaboration. Gilberto's Innovation efforts have been recognized by
Computer World, MIT Technology Review, Forbes, and IBM. -
CheeChin Lew of BASF, will be disucssing how BASF leverages Social for Social Collaboration.
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Scott Schrader, Director, Information Systems, SXC Health Solutions, will talk Gilberto García, VP of Innovation, CEMEX, and leader of Shift.is transforming Healthcare.
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Raymond Huff, President, HJB Convenience Corp/Russell’s Convenience has a great story on Social Expansion! He is using Social to grow his stores -- online collarating with architects,construction, and marketing. Wow!
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Dr Burns, Children Hospital Boston, who has a way to train other doctors Socially. You won't want to miss this one.
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Denise Hatzidakis, Chief Technology Officer for the Premier healthcare alliance. Premier serves morethan 2,400 U.S. hospitals and 70,000-plus other healthcare sites, the Premier healthcare alliance and itsmembers are transforming healthcare together. technology field as a decisive leader of operational
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Ray Wang, Constellation Consulting, will be talking about Gamification. As you guys know, I am a big believer in this and started some of the first work in IBM on gaming.
- Kevin O’Shaughnessy, Group Digital Director,Standard Life will lay out his new Digital Strategy at Standard Life.
- Michael Lynch, Manager IT Advance Personal & Workgroup Solutions, 3M will discuss how 3M Gets Social with Product Development!
- Harish Lade, GM Systems & Information Technology,Asian Paints Ltd., will speak on how Asian Paints Develops a Culture of Innovation Through Social Collaboration.
- Rachel Happe, Principal Co-founder, The Community Roundtable, and a dear colleague! She will go into how important People are in Community Building!
- Mark Heid - IBM, showcasing the Social Intelligence that IBM is driving in the market to make it an even better client value based company!
Wow! Please join me there!!!
The Social 10: Big Thoughts from Tweets Over This week! #socbiz #e20conf #ibmsocialbiz
I am trying to learn as much as I can and I thought I'd summarize some of my favorite tweets of the week from Events/Client meetings/Virtual events of this Social Business Week!
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Transparency defies authority. Businesses must understand the re-architecture required by open social business. Culture must change
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Awareness translates into business, so online conversations have value
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Social has to be embedded into the way we work and that involves changing the culture of the company
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Social business is not about technology, its about changing the way people work
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You know the world has changed when you hear IBM executive Sandy Carter discussing Gaming! Who'd have thought?
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Social is a requirement for enterprises to impact the war on talent.
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Socialize me means going Mobile with Social. 68% of the social networking use is from a mobile.
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Being an effective Social Media leader has less to do with knowing the answers & more to do w/ asking the right questions
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Children's Hospital of Dallas goes live with IBM Social Software
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SoLoMo is it. Mobile numbers are most important in digitalmarketing. It is not just about Social, but Social Local Mobile.
New Social Business Coffee Break: Hire a Social Reputation Manager! #ibm #ls12 #ibmconnect12
Our coffee break this year is on reputation management in a Social Business! Reputation management is the business value of who you are and who your company is.
I believe that "Reputation Share" will become increasingly important.
For instance:
- More companies will measure their employees social savy for bonuses
- Word of mouth value will be measure like market share -- it will be reputation share
- The financial value of your online reputation will become part of your brand value balance sheet
Here more in this Coffee break video!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7KJOKL3kPo&feature=youtu.be]
‘Tis the season for work apps on my tablet. HoHoHo - no SoLoMo! #IBMSocialBiz #socbiz #getsocial11
I love my iPad. How did I survive without it? And I am not alone. The use of tablets in business is on the rise. Increasingly, employees require enterprise connectivity from their personal smartphones and tablet devices, also known as the "Bring Your Own Device" to work trend.... not BYOB but BYOD!
According to IDC France, the tablet market is forecast to reach over 4.1 million in 2012, representing a 48% growth compared to 2011. The study reveals that 73% of business leaders surveyed currently allowed mobile devices to connect to their corporate networks!
IBM will make your holiday dreams come true with:
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Social networking for iPad: Available from the Apple app store at no charge for existing IBM Connections users. I use this everyday in my marketing and sales.
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Attend Online Meetings: I can attend online meeting from any tablet anytime and any where.
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Instant messaging: I was in the pilot for Sametime. Wow! This is extremely powerful. Anywhere I can instant message anyone anywhereAccess business documents
- Easier access to mail and calendar: I use this everyday
Lots of clients are using these SoLoMo functions today! ConMed Linvatec, other global organizations including Bekins Van Lines, Cincinnati Zoo, Cummins, VCC Construction, and schools like Virginia Commonwealth University.
Lower Internal Social Business Deployment Risk -- Get your employees onboard in 5 Steps!
Love this from the recent InformationWeek article! It was the topic of 3 of my Canadian discussions today with clients !
Businesses see the value of social networks, but not every employee does. Here are some tips for getting people on board.
1. Perform A Social Assessment. What do your employees know right now? A client today told me that his team was at a Kindergarten level. So start there!
2. Set Clear Expectations. Can employees speak on behalf of their company? Can they set up an internal community on fun stuff like soccer? Make sure all know the rules!
3. Put Expectations In Writing. We at IBM have a set of guidelines. It helps to guide and set expectations!
4. Provide Training. At IBM we provide intense training for our BPs and employees. Skills are very important to success.
5. Culture Eats Strategy For Lunch -- so get buyin from the top!
Heading to LeWeb in Paris - is it the #SXSW of Europe! Focus on #SoLoMo! #ibmleweb
I am heading over to LeWeb, a conference that promises to be the South by Southwest style conference in Europe! You don't know South By Southwest? You should. It is a HUGE conference on Social and the latest trends. Check it out at http://sxsw.com/interactive
Some cool things I see about LeWeb so far!
- It is in Paris -- enough said
- The theme is SoLoMo --> Check out my last presentation on this one: SoLoMo
- They set up a community for all attendees with different groups -- eating their cooking before talking about it
- Lots of European Case Studies there. For instance, Danone will be speaking![youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5djlZFNEAP0]
I'll blog and tweet live from the event!
Bon Jour!