2008 June | Social Desire

Archive for June, 2008

The ABCs of Social Media

Social Desire will be featuring Guest Posts for the next few weeks. Today’s Featured Guest Post is by Mark Dykeman.

Image by Steve & Jemma Copley

Everyone’s got a Top Ten list, an 8 step guide, or some other how-to post to succeeding in social media.

This isn’t one of those posts. Not exactly. Not really.

OK, maybe a little bit.

What I’ve done is to take each letter of the alphabet and try to find one or two words that can be used to describe social media. I’ve tried to cover many of the important points and aspects of social media that I’ve picked up through my own activities. I hope you enjoy and find it useful.

The A – Z listing for social media

Ask/Acquire – social media is a place where we can ask questions and acquire knowledge; there are tons of great resources out there.

Bold – push yourself and test your limits. Try things that might have scared you in the past, either due to lack of confidence or experience. Be bold!

Communicate – it’s all about the conversations.

Demonstrate – show people what you know; help educate them. (note: I was very tempted to use the word "desire" here… )

Evaluate – absorb everything you can, but keep a critical eye open. As you meet different people you’ll gradually get a sense of who knows their stuff and who doesn’t. Don’t accept advice blindly – think it over and make up your own mind.

Friend – "friend" has become a verb in social media, where you give or are given permission to share stuff with other people. It’s a key component of social media, hence the word "social".

Give – contribute to the body of knowledge with your own thoughts, ideas, tips, tricks, critiques, and others. It’s not valuable if you keep it to yourself.

Help – as per give, take the time to do favors for other people. Answer their questions; show examples. You get a lot back from this, even if it doesn’t happen immediately.

Ideas – social media contains some of the coolest parts of higher education – the discussion and refinement of ideas.

Join – if you’re going to be social, join groups that interest you. It’s all about relationships.

Knowledge/Learn – this K and L go together like peanut butter and jelly; learn stuff, increase your knowledge.

Mentor – help a beginner and you could have a good friend for life.

Name – names are important, doubly so in social media. Meet people, remember their names. They’ll do the same for you!

Open – be as transparent as you can. Consider different points of view, as well. Speak respectfully, but freely.

Passion – that burning sensation isn’t an, um, infection, it’s the power of love and desire when you discover something that you love to do.

Question – questions drive social media. Why? Because we all want to find answers!

Reveal – tell the world about yourself to the extent that you feel comfortable to do so. People want to know something about their follow social mediaites!

Share – as with giving, sharing means doing things that don’t just benefit yourself, they benefit other people as well. Give credit where credit is due and share the rewards!

Teach – again, show people what you know and we all benefit.

Understand – this is critical, because language is an imperfect means of communication. It can be very easy to misinterpret someone else’s writing, especially if it hits an emotional hot button. Make sure your reactions are tempered by understanding so that you know what was really meant within a communication.

Vigor – show some life there, sparky!

World – it’s a big world out there and social media will expose you to places that you never knew existed.

X-Ray – look inside and see what’s really happening. Don’t be fooled by exteriors or pretenses. Get the real story.

Yearn – satisfy those self- actual cravings, at least temporarily, through social media participation. But stay hungry – there’s always more.

Zen – practice, be mindful, and learn constantly as a path to enlightenment (of sorts). You might not become a spiritual master, but these principles can still lead to fulfillment in social media.

Social media from A – Z – there it is. I hope you were paying attention because there’s a test coming up!

(Of course, the test never ends… )

If you enjoyed this post check out more of Mark Dykeman’s work at Broadcasting Brain, his blog about communication and social media.

Posted in Blogging, Guest Posts, Humor, Social Bookmarking, Social Media, Social Media Marketing, Social Networking, Tips and Tutorials, Uncategorized, Web 2.0, Web 2.0 Basics | 12 Comments »

Social Media Karma – What Goes Around Comes Around

Wednesday, June 4th, 2008

This Featured Guest Post is by James Duthie of Online Marketing Banter

Image by dmax3270

Do onto others as you would do to yourself. It’s a fine philosophy to live by. The laws of karma state that our personal actions & behaviour influence future experiences. In other words, we’re responsible for our own destinies and the ultimate happiness & success we achieve. I can’t think of any other environment in which karma is more relevant than social media…

Free is the new currency of the Internet. Social media is a perfect example. How many people make real money from blogging? Very few. Yet every day millions of bloggers produce content for free distribution. Why? Because they believe in karma. They believe that giving their content away will lead to positive future outcomes, whether they be business or personal.

Social news communities such as Digg and Sphinn are even better examples of karma in action. A selfless attitude is expected within social news communities. Good karma can only be earned by dedicating free time to positive community activities such as:

Submitting content that the community values
Creating relationships with other community members
Contributing to blogs of community members via comments & guest posts
Reading and voting for your friends’ content
Adding meaningful insights to conversations within the community
Asking for nothing in turn for your positive contributions

People who succeed in social media embrace the principles of good karma. They don’t ask for support from the community, but they receive it anyway because of the positive contribution they make.

Newbies in particular need to display the strongest faith in social media karma, because the karmic circle takes time to turn. In my case it has taken months of participation within Sphinn before the good karma returned some personal rewards. But good things come to those who wait…

Social media karma in action

About a month ago I crossed paths with a blogger named Robin Cannon. Robin manages Fog of Eternity, a blog dedicated to web design, social media and online marketing. Like me Robin is fairly new to the game, and is still establishing his blog and audience. I liked Robin’s work and quickly subscribed to his blog. I also began to submit his work to Sphinn and StumbleUpon because his stuff was well written and deserved a broader audience.

According to Robin, it was my social media support that helped give his blog the kick start it needed. A number of my Stumbles helped him generated thousands of visitors a day (who ever knew my Stumbles were so powerful…?). Before long that momentum grew and he was averaging over a thousand visits a week. In fact, in just a couple of weeks he had far surpassed my own traffic levels.

Robin has thanked me a number of times for the social media love I gave him. He didn’t need to. After all, social media submission also shines the limelight on the submitter if it goes hot… But despite that, Robin made me a special offer recently. Noticing that my own blog design was a little uninspired, Robin offered his design skills to help give it a little spark. As someone without an iota of design experience or skill, this offer was like gold to me!

And that, my friends, is the circle of social media karma in action.

Robin never asked me for social media support, but I gave it anyway because his work was great quality. I would never have dreamed of asking Robin to redesign my blog, but he offered anyway out of goodwill.

If you’re not succeeding in social media, perhaps you should take a look at your own behaviour… Are you exuding an aura of good karma…?

Author Bio:

James Duthie is an Australian digital marketing expert. He writes on all things social media, blogging, SEO & digital marketing at his blog - Online Marketing Banter. Subscribe to hear more of his ramblings here.

Posted in Blogging, Guest Posts, Social Media, Social Networking, Sphinn | 16 Comments »