platforms Archives | Ian M Rountree

Notes From #tweetdiner – Social Media Fatigue

March 26, 2011 by Ian 4 Comments

Tonight, Nic Wirtz and I cohosted #tweetdiner (it was my second run at this – last time, @MyAgenda and I took the reins) – thanks to Earth Hour crossing the continent just as we began, it was a small, tightly-knit crowd in the chat. Made for a lot of depth which, ironically, was a bonus to the subject.

As with any twitter chat, I’ve missed things – that’s what the transcript is for (read it all, no tl;dr allowed)

The questions were fairly simple;

What are the signs that you’re suffering from social media fatigue?

Some diversity in answers here; I mentioned an increase in effort, Nic feels he gets crabby when he’s fatigued with something.

Also, finding that the time it takes to realize that arguments you’re making are pointless, or finding that more often what you say is not advancing the conversation can be a clear sign of fatigue. When we have high energy, natural optimism often helps us continue to persevere in difficult discussions.

@MyAgenda – “For me is knowing that I’m spreading myself thin and not being productive up to my standards (is a sign of fatigue)”

What steps can we take to overcome or avoid social media fatigue?

Some suggestions include;

Take regular breaks, and schedule time for yourself.
Set goals – have a purpose behind your work.
Vary your activities. Spending all your time on one platform is tiring.
Set expectations, and let people know when you’re not available.

From a comment by Daniel Hewitt came: Taking a break can work in the short-term but what if that is not enough?

Daniel mentioned he goes into “Airplane Mode” – a reference to turning off his connections. Occasionally this does mean missing some things – big events, scheduled things. However, the corollary for this is that perceived consistency (in broadcast) is often just as good as real consistency.

For example; one could schedule a number of blog posts, tweets, and other push messages for the sake of taking a few hours – or even a few days – away from the keyboard.

Do you have a long-term plan for your social media usage?

SMSJoe – What’s long term in socmed, 6 months?

Joe’s point is that so many goals set in social media are blinds. They appear to be long-term, but can’t be sustained; they’re “build a house” tasks, not “run a household” jobs. So how do we set goals? Joe mentioned that some metrics-based goals are useful for building upon, but relying exclusively on statistical goals is weakening.

Personal note; having been working with online communities for twelve years, this is the first year I set myself any goals as far as actual involvement and activities go. Oddly, having the goals (even if some of them have already proved wrong) has led to less struggling and grasping for ideas.

final note; watching the numbers is a zombifying experience, and an incredibly easy trap to fall into regarding goal setting.

What one thing would improve your social media experience?

This one got crickets. I think it’s hard for people to nail down “that one thing” with social media. which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

Quick-fire round!

We ran out of time, so I tossed these out at the end – if you have any comments about the last two questions, please leave them here.

Do you find it’s difficult to promote yourself consistently, rather than just puttering?

(and)

Which app do you find you spend the most time on? Is it a web version of a platform, or a mgmt app?

Blog-only Bonus Round!

For those reading here: How often do you take what you’ve learned in chats and create an action plan because of them?

Top 6 Best Ways How To Write Awful Headlines

March 22, 2011 by Ian Leave a Comment

Writing great headlines is one of the key elements of good blogging practices – everyone says so, right?

There are dozens of tutorials out there explaining what makes a good headline; numbered lists, using the words How to in the title, addressing a key fear a large group of people have…

That’s fine, but what happens when you write what you think is a great headline and it doesn’t seem to be doing it’s job? Feels like a complex problem. Feeling like you need to do some analysis, get some feedback?

This is one of those things where I know – I know – you’ll be mad at me for how simple this is.

It turns out there are some really simple ways to tell if you’ve written a bad headline, no matter how good you think it is.

If you;

make a joke your post doesn’t follow-up on
make it the wrong length (too long or too short)
don’t check the title to see if it fits once the post is written
include an inaccuracy in the headline as relates to the post, but not on purpose
imply something is new/old when it’s not (Even if it may be so for your intended audience)
give away the entire post in the headline

… You might have written an awful headline. And when you have a bad headline, it doesn’t matter how good the post is. No one will read it.

Just like when you have a great headline, if the post sucks, you’ve jumped the shark. No one cares about the great headline, unless it’s tweetbait, in which case if they have share remorse, they’ll be even more ticked.

Law Seven – There is no more obvious way to kill your blog than inconsistency of form.

It could be consistency of message, consistency of schedule, or any number of other things, but when you break consistency, you’re making people think for the wrong reasons and making a withdrawal from the bank of social capital.

Unless you’re writing research papers or case studies, you want people to expend their energy considering that you publish, not examining it for lumpy bits like titles that don’t fit, or bad grammar.

Reducing the emotional overhead on your work helps keep the investment people make in your work valid.

Writing better headlines – as relate to the writing they represent – is a good start.

3 Steps to Mastering Any Social Network

February 7, 2011 by Ian Leave a Comment

Great news! There’s a new social network, and the word is, it’s awesome!

Oh. But it’s fundamentally different than anything you’re using right now, and the first reports are that just about everyone is, as usual, doing it wrong.

Pop quiz, tough guy. Do you join the new network?

One of the biggest challenges when approaching a given platform is feeling like you’re actually getting your head around it. Are you publishing the right material? Are you making the right friends? Are you ticking anyone off?

Getting over the fear of diving in is difficult – but it doesn’t have to be.

Whenever I start making use of a new platform – whether it’s digging into Twitter, or changing my approach to Facebook or LinkedIn – there are three simple things I do before solidifying my strategy: Listen, Observe, Catalog. You might think these are similar activities, but they’re really quite different – and essential to do before actually taking any action on a new plan.

How does it work? Simple:

1) Listen to what other people are saying about locales, individuals, or artifacts on the new platform.

Granted, this is easier with open networks than closed ones – it’s easier to do sentiment research on what’s going on within Twitter, for example, than it is on LinkedIn. However, if you have any kind of network to start with, you probably have a buffer – a back channel – to help you navigate the initial onslaught of information.

Chances are there are some movers and shakers, no matter how early the days of the new network are. Who are they? Are they making splashes? Are people you follow mentioning the same things consistently? Listening, especially on purpose, can be a powerful first indication of what people are doing, why they’re doing it, and how they’re managing to get results. Listening will also let you in on what kinds of results people are actually looking for.

Now, I’m not saying this should be done before filling out that tempting, well-designed sign up form. Not a bit. But it is easy enough, with some tools like Google Blog Search, Google Alerts and (gasp) asking your friends, to get a sense of where to go next, where the movers are actually doing their shaking.

Listening should give you your first indication of whether or not a space is worth further investment of time and energy.

2) Observe what others are actually doing with their networks in the new space.

I know, radical isn’t it? Once you’ve found out what you should be looking for by listening to the noise surrounding a new space – and, bonus points, this is actually easier as the space ages; anyone listening for Facebook news would find a wealth of information these days – you’ll know what kinds of people to actually spend time watching.

Pay attention to what’s getting done. Take note of how it’s being done as well. Is auto-publishing of blog posts or Twitter feeds welcomed? Are there opportunities for leadership? Are the leaders in the space actively investing in others, or promoting themselves?

Where listening is generally outside-the-wall activity, observation is being a fly on the wall in the same room where the party is.

3) Catalog what you’ve learned and start breaking out your plan of action.

What did you learn during your listening and observation? By now, you should have an accurate sense of:

What gets done in this new space
How people are doing this work effectively
What kinds of behaviors are encouraged or accepted
What kinds of behaviors are expected, whether encouraged or invisible
How to get ahead easily
What tools are available to reduce emotional overhead and administration effort

This preemptive insider knowledge will help remove a lot of the thrash from starting out on a new network, and make even your first days there easier. When you have a sense of what’s accepted, expected and anticipated, you can live up to expectations – and manage them – far better than going in blind.

Don’t have that sense yet? Repeat steps one and two until you can hammer out at least a 14 day revolving plan.

It’s really that simple. Everything else is over-complication.

Yes, there’s detail involved. there always is. And sometimes, the new network may not be for you – or you may go for years using it in a certain way, based on your initial perception of where the value is. Above all; don’t be afraid to course-correct and make a new plan of action. But, if you’re making changes in your network navigation intentionally, I’d strongly suggest spending at least a day on each of the above activities.

Going in to any network with more information, and using aware observer skills in building your knowledge, is always a good idea.

Have you been in any situations where more information could have been helpful? Where later observation put a new spin on your initial perception? I’d love to hear about it – please do share in the comments.

How To Start a Global Business in 2 Simple Steps

January 16, 2011 by Ian 1 Comment

1. Set up a website. You are now global.

2. Make money. You are now a business.

What? It’s simple, right? The trouble with simple is that it often fails to be anything that human endeavour is; simple is rarely interesting, attention-getting, or successful. I’m not saying it’s impossible to be any of these things with simplicity – but it is rare, and it’s never easy.

It’s not just about getting clients, securing contracts, or delivering… well, deliverables.

It can’t just be about doing the business for a while, developing a professional speaking career, and retiring into consultancy.

It should never be about the money – insofar as we always need money, anyway.

It should never, ever, be centered around the transaction and nothing else.

A global business needs to be about communication; anything with that kind of intended reach has to be. And if it’s about communication, it’s also about community – and by extension people, socialization, and relationships.

If you can figure out how to build global relationships that make money, you can figure out a global business. There’s just no other way.

Go ahead. Tell me I’m wrong.

My Three Words for 2011

January 1, 2011 by Ian 4 Comments

While my exposure to this idea begins with Chris Brogan, a number of people I respect have been marking the new year with three words – succinctly expressing the core themes that they intend to use to drive the coming twelve months.

Last year, I didn’t plan at all. I drove through everything I encountered, trying to do the best work I could – well, guess what; I missed opportunities, failed a number of times to do things that mattered to me, and overall had a “not to plan” year.

I intend 2011 to be very different. In the past few days, I’ve been planning what’s going to happen in my world over the next year. I have a number of things on the go, and a few milestones to hit – I’ll be talking about them throughout the year.

I’ve been struggling, however, with how to express these plans in a succinct manner – so, here are my three words for 2011.

Themes, Platforms and Seekers

Themes – Much of the non-reflexive writing I’ll be doing in 2011 revolved around a set of themes I’ve already decided on. Everything from posts here, to planned guest posts elsewhere, and other projects. I plan to tie everything together, use every venue and opportunity I have to tell a story based on the plan I’ve outlined. I’ve already been asked if this will make my writing rigid – and I don’t think it will. I think it will prevent me from being reflexive (which is even further down the scale from ‘proactive’ than ‘reactive’ is).

Platforms – Part of my work this year is examining how to build platforms – for personal work, and in other circumstances. The difference between a home base (such as a blog), and a platform is vast, and complicated. Part of this year will look at the work of building platforms online.

Seekers – We’re all looking for something. Some of us find what we’re seeking by building it – some of us join in the work of others and derive value as we deliver value to them. All communities work with common destinations in mind, but how do we discover that our destinations are common after all? I’ll be looking at Seekers for a long portion of this year – covering almost half of the themes I’ve decided on.

There you have it. You may have made some resolutions, or made a plan. But have you chosen how to express that plan yet?