Publications
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
New resources to help entrepreneurs get started with social media
The SHOP Symposium that CRAVE put on today was bursting with fantastic women entrepreneurs whom I’ve long admired as a customer, member, or as a drooling window shopper. I offered some suggestions on the tools and tactics that can help their companies make the most of social media.
6 essential social media tools for your business or organization
If you’re itching to get a handle on this social media thing, and want to open your eyes and ears, there are a few tools we recommend as assets to virtually any organization. I’ve listed these in the order I’d recommend adopting each one.
4 questions to answer before you get started (or move forward) with social media
To make good choices about where to spend your social media dollars, you need to be clear about what you want to get out out of social media, and how you’re going to do it in compelling way. These four questions can help to frame your planning and decision-making.
Forrester, Social Signal on finding online passion for your brand
Comparing Forrester’s notion of “borrowed relevance” with Social Signal’s approach to “reflected glory marketing”.
17 tips for using Twitter to grow your business
Just like black-and-white photography can reveal depths you’ll never see in colour, the short length of a Twitter message encourages new levels of creativity and effectiveness in marketing. Don’t believe me? Here are my top tips on getting started with Twitter…and each is 140 characters or less.
How the social web can nourish your most personal relationship
The process of strengthening a relationship by working hard together; by facing, nurturing and celebrating your successes and challenges together — that’s an experience that’s open to any couple, or indeed any relationship, that integrates the creative and communicative possibilities of the social web. Here are some of the ways you can use the social web to bring the energy of creative collaboration into your relationship.
Inviting positive customer feedback
If your web site has a customer feedback form, you can learn from Apple’s mistakes.
Building your social media team
Developing an effective social media team requires more than finding the right box on the org chart or figuring out where that community moderator should sit. Here are the kinds of capabilities you need on your team.
Today in the Globe & Mail: Alex on the business of social media
Today’s Globe & Mail included a special supplement about MBA programs, with a feature story on why and how schools are incorporating social media into the curriculum. “Within minutes or even seconds, online chatter can span continents, conveying positive spin or the kiss of death for a product or company,” reporter Diana McLaren writes. “Business schools are adapting to the rapidly shifting relationship between companies and consumers.”
Diana spoke to me about Social Signal’s experience integrating social media into today’s businesses. (And the Globe ran my favourite, uncredited headshot — by the remarkable Kris Krug.)
Here’s what Diana included in today’s story:
Social media consultant Alexandra Samuel, co-founder of Social Signal in Vancouver, says that social media is “not just a marketing technique. It also allows a business or organization a way of monitoring for customer care.
“Social media can’t just be out there isolated in some little marketing department. You need someone to monitor and respond to what people are saying.”
The challenge for MBA schools, she says, is to “get people to think about a dramatic shift in organizations needed for social media marketing. They need less hierarchy and more communication across teams. Generally speaking, one of the first concerns for business is risk management. The reality of social media is far greater than risk. It’s about throwing a party and no one comes, there’s no response.”
…
As someone who consults with organizations on social network marketing, but also a business owner herself who hires staff, Ms. Samuel agrees about the need for more MBA graduates to offer a combination of traditional skills, such as financial management and business strategy, with an understanding of social media that makes them “billable” to clients.
“My dream hire is for an MBA with social media expertise,” she says. “Someone who comes with the whole package.”
Using online contests as a marketing tool
If you’re running online contests to promote your work, you want to encourage people to participate as widely as possible. Here’s how to create a compelling and fun contest.
The Harvard Business Review
New resources to help entrepreneurs get started with social media
The SHOP Symposium that CRAVE put on today was bursting with fantastic women entrepreneurs whom I’ve long admired as a customer, member, or as a drooling window shopper. I offered some suggestions on the tools and tactics that can help their companies make the most of social media.
6 essential social media tools for your business or organization
If you’re itching to get a handle on this social media thing, and want to open your eyes and ears, there are a few tools we recommend as assets to virtually any organization. I’ve listed these in the order I’d recommend adopting each one.
4 questions to answer before you get started (or move forward) with social media
To make good choices about where to spend your social media dollars, you need to be clear about what you want to get out out of social media, and how you’re going to do it in compelling way. These four questions can help to frame your planning and decision-making.
Forrester, Social Signal on finding online passion for your brand
Comparing Forrester’s notion of “borrowed relevance” with Social Signal’s approach to “reflected glory marketing”.
17 tips for using Twitter to grow your business
Just like black-and-white photography can reveal depths you’ll never see in colour, the short length of a Twitter message encourages new levels of creativity and effectiveness in marketing. Don’t believe me? Here are my top tips on getting started with Twitter…and each is 140 characters or less.
How the social web can nourish your most personal relationship
The process of strengthening a relationship by working hard together; by facing, nurturing and celebrating your successes and challenges together — that’s an experience that’s open to any couple, or indeed any relationship, that integrates the creative and communicative possibilities of the social web. Here are some of the ways you can use the social web to bring the energy of creative collaboration into your relationship.
Inviting positive customer feedback
If your web site has a customer feedback form, you can learn from Apple’s mistakes.
Building your social media team
Developing an effective social media team requires more than finding the right box on the org chart or figuring out where that community moderator should sit. Here are the kinds of capabilities you need on your team.
Today in the Globe & Mail: Alex on the business of social media
Today’s Globe & Mail included a special supplement about MBA programs, with a feature story on why and how schools are incorporating social media into the curriculum. “Within minutes or even seconds, online chatter can span continents, conveying positive spin or the kiss of death for a product or company,” reporter Diana McLaren writes. “Business schools are adapting to the rapidly shifting relationship between companies and consumers.”
Diana spoke to me about Social Signal’s experience integrating social media into today’s businesses. (And the Globe ran my favourite, uncredited headshot — by the remarkable Kris Krug.)
Here’s what Diana included in today’s story:
Social media consultant Alexandra Samuel, co-founder of Social Signal in Vancouver, says that social media is “not just a marketing technique. It also allows a business or organization a way of monitoring for customer care.
“Social media can’t just be out there isolated in some little marketing department. You need someone to monitor and respond to what people are saying.”
The challenge for MBA schools, she says, is to “get people to think about a dramatic shift in organizations needed for social media marketing. They need less hierarchy and more communication across teams. Generally speaking, one of the first concerns for business is risk management. The reality of social media is far greater than risk. It’s about throwing a party and no one comes, there’s no response.”
…
As someone who consults with organizations on social network marketing, but also a business owner herself who hires staff, Ms. Samuel agrees about the need for more MBA graduates to offer a combination of traditional skills, such as financial management and business strategy, with an understanding of social media that makes them “billable” to clients.
“My dream hire is for an MBA with social media expertise,” she says. “Someone who comes with the whole package.”
Using online contests as a marketing tool
If you’re running online contests to promote your work, you want to encourage people to participate as widely as possible. Here’s how to create a compelling and fun contest.
OneZero
4 ways online communication can build relationships
Dear Alex: The Internet can be good for relationships. No, it's not an affirmation. It's the argument I'd like to make to Alex Lickerman, who recently wrote a post about the Effect of Technology on Relationships for his blog on Psychology Today. While I applaud his...
Using ecosystems to model the abundance of the Internet
John Naughton had a remarkably thoughtful and useful piece in the Observer this weekend, Everything you need to know about the internet. He covers what he deems the nine essential truths you have to understand about life online, and while that may be overreaching, he...
Putting a price on friendship
I'll give you $2 for the guy you talked to at an office party last week. The friend you play hockey with every weekend, on the other hand, is worth $75. Your college roommate? She'll net you a cool $1,000. If the idea of assigning a price tag to each of your friends...
How to find support online during life’s big passages (for Oprah.com)
Friends are there to share your celebrations, support you through difficult transitions, and mourn your losses. Social media enable that sharing and support in new ways, across distances that would formerly exclude people who are far away but dear to your heart. Find out how to get the support you need online.
A practice to make your online friendships more meaningful
I wonder if technology and social media has compressed our relationships into a process that we can barely recognize? That question is at the heart of Rhett Smith's thoughtful blog post, Technology: Connected, Yet Lonelier Than Ever. He argues that by making it so...
Techsperiment days 3 & 4: going out without Twitter
Our effort at keeping devices off during family time -- roughly three hours a night -- continues. The biggest challenge of day 4 came when I realized it was 5 pm, and I'd yet to log day 3. Would I grant myself an exception, and blog for a few minutes so that day 3...
Popplet brings mind mapping to the iPad
"It's only for content consumers, not content creators." That charge was leveled at the iPad even before it hit the stores. Now that it's in all our grubby little hands, there seems to be some truth to the argument. My husband has gotten great mileage out of his iPad...
5 questions that will change how your grown (or little) kid thinks about technology
If you want to affect your kids’ relationship to technology, you need to do it through conversation, and not by handing down edicts or advice. Here are five questions you can ask your kids to start a meaningful conversation about technology, whatever their age.
JSTOR DAILY
4 ways online communication can build relationships
Dear Alex: The Internet can be good for relationships. No, it's not an affirmation. It's the argument I'd like to make to Alex Lickerman, who recently wrote a post about the Effect of Technology on Relationships for his blog on Psychology Today. While I applaud his...
Using ecosystems to model the abundance of the Internet
John Naughton had a remarkably thoughtful and useful piece in the Observer this weekend, Everything you need to know about the internet. He covers what he deems the nine essential truths you have to understand about life online, and while that may be overreaching, he...
Putting a price on friendship
I'll give you $2 for the guy you talked to at an office party last week. The friend you play hockey with every weekend, on the other hand, is worth $75. Your college roommate? She'll net you a cool $1,000. If the idea of assigning a price tag to each of your friends...
How to find support online during life’s big passages (for Oprah.com)
Friends are there to share your celebrations, support you through difficult transitions, and mourn your losses. Social media enable that sharing and support in new ways, across distances that would formerly exclude people who are far away but dear to your heart. Find out how to get the support you need online.
A practice to make your online friendships more meaningful
I wonder if technology and social media has compressed our relationships into a process that we can barely recognize? That question is at the heart of Rhett Smith's thoughtful blog post, Technology: Connected, Yet Lonelier Than Ever. He argues that by making it so...
Techsperiment days 3 & 4: going out without Twitter
Our effort at keeping devices off during family time -- roughly three hours a night -- continues. The biggest challenge of day 4 came when I realized it was 5 pm, and I'd yet to log day 3. Would I grant myself an exception, and blog for a few minutes so that day 3...
Popplet brings mind mapping to the iPad
"It's only for content consumers, not content creators." That charge was leveled at the iPad even before it hit the stores. Now that it's in all our grubby little hands, there seems to be some truth to the argument. My husband has gotten great mileage out of his iPad...
5 questions that will change how your grown (or little) kid thinks about technology
If you want to affect your kids’ relationship to technology, you need to do it through conversation, and not by handing down edicts or advice. Here are five questions you can ask your kids to start a meaningful conversation about technology, whatever their age.
THE VERGE
Social Media Strategy: Make Your Own Romania
"Create a social media presence that highlights your expertise," I told a room full of entrepreneurs. "And that will do…
Trust, disclosure and social media
Two of the most frequent criticisms of social media hinge on the quality and quantity of information people disclosure through blogs, Twitter, Facebook and other social tools: Why does s/he think anyone cares? Asked about people who blog their latest meal, tweet their...
TedX Victoria: Stop apologizing for your online life
I'm delighted to be participating in TedX Victoria this November 19th. I'll be speaking about the 10 Reasons to Stop Apologizing for Your Online Life, and look forward to helping TedX participants give up the notion of IRL ("In Real Life"), and learn to embrace RLT....
Bored by your boyfriend? Try having sex.
This is my best effort at scrupulous transcription of a conversation I was fortunate to overhear in the locker room today, between two young women I initially assumed were roommates. I wasn't sure whether the locker room was covered by a cone of silence, so I checked...