Tag Archives: audience engagement

Facebook, An Introduction

Posted on by
Reply

Today we begin our exploration of some of the key social media platforms that can help you communicate with others and grow your online visibility. First up, Facebook. Today, we’ll cover some basics without discussing whether you should or shouldn’t use Facebook for your business. Let’s just get a feel for Facebook first before we rush to the decision-making.

What is Facebook?

Facebook is a social networking site where the emphasis is on building community through social interactions. Facebook connects friends, families, classmates, colleagues, and people who share similar interests. Users communicate with their contacts, called friends, via short posts, called updates. These updates are typed into a box that asks, “what’s on your mind?” and can be found on a user’s home page or their timeline (profile page). Users can upload photos and videos, and share links to articles and other interesting stuff around the web. They can also play social games, take polls and quizzes, and interact in other ways, too. These interactions are fed into the news feed—a collection of events and updates from a user’s friends—and are visible on a user’s home page.

Facebook currently has over 900 million users worldwide. That represents about 1 in 12 people on the planet. If it were a country, it would be the third largest after China and India. Out of those, 500 million people use Facebook every day. This makes Facebook the largest of the social networks by far.

Among the reasons for Facebook’s enormous popularity is how easy it is to use. The ability to check Facebook from mobile devices while on the go makes sharing updates, links, and photos that much more immediate and engaging. Another reason for its popularity is its addictive quality. According to this article on Mashable, the average American Facebook user spends about 15 minutes a day on the site.

It’s hard to avoid the fact that Facebook has become a major way people communicate. Of course, size alone isn’t reason to jump on the Facebook bandwagon. It’s just as important to know who is using Facebook, and how.

Who Uses Facebook?

Facebook was started in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg in a Harvard dorm room. It was originally a closed network connecting Harvard students, but soon it allowed students at other universities to join. Facebook eventually opened up to anyone with an email address. Key to this bit of history is the fact that from its inception, Facebook has been about social interactions.

Considering Facebook’s start in a college dorm room, you might be tempted to believe that Facebook is only popular among young people. That would be a big mistake. The averageage of Facebook users is about 38 and seems to be rising, not dropping. People 45 and older make up 46% of Facebook users.  More women (57%) use Facebook than men.

How Do People Use Facebook?

All communities develop a culture, and Facebook is no different. On Facebook, the emphasis is on the personal. We use Facebook to reconnect with people we’ve lost touch with, to interact with friends, or to keep up with family members who live far away. It’s all about our relationships.

Facebook comes down to people sharing and responding to the events and stories of their lives. Just like posts in a blog add up to a story over time, so do updates and “likes” on Facebook. Our timelines become a record of who we are, who we know, what we like, what we think is entertaining, and what we believe in and support. Like digital scrapbooks, timelines create a portrait of our lives for the world to see.

Scary? Absolutely. In fact, Facebook privacy issues are a real concern. Before you join Facebook, learn how to control your privacy settings.  Personally, I prefer to assume that anything I post online is potentially visible to the entire world. That way, I minimize the risk of posting anything that I’m not comfortable with strangers seeing.

But despite the privacy risks, this ability to interact with others and share our stories is also exciting. It’s what makes Facebook so appealing and compelling.

Now, just so there’s no mistake about it, Facebook itself is a commercial enterprise. They make money by placing advertising on their site, which is essentially driven by user-generated content. That’s the content WE generate. In other words, our stories, our lives.

Is Facebook using us? Um…yes!

But we’re also using Facebook. Let’s not forget that. And if we’re going to continue using Facebook, we can at least try to be smart about how we go about it.

What Facebook Means For You and Your Business

Facebook gives businesses the opportunity to tell their stories via Facebook business pages. We’ll get into business pages in more detail next week. For now, it’s important to  understand that even on business pages, the emphasis is on genuine sharing.

People gather on Facebook in much the same way they’d gather in a town square, at a garden party, or around a relaxing game of golf. They want to interact, not be sold to. But we all know a lot of business gets done on a golf course precisely because of a magical mix between social, personal, and business interactions.

To get the balance right, keep the focus on your audience rather than on yourself. Share useful information, such as content you create on your blog or articles that you come across. Engage your fans in conversation and respond to their comments. Be helpful, and be yourself. In short, follow the same basic guidelines for interacting and sharing you follow on your blog. 

Then, if you occasionally toot your own horn about an award you won, your 500th Facebook follower, or being invited to speak at a prestigious event, no one will hold it against you. In fact, they’ll cheer you on! Why? Because they’ve come to trust you and think of you as a person or business who cares. Yes, you can let your page fans know about your services or special offers you may be running. Just make sure the balance is right.

Facebook Summary & Further Resources

Here’s a quick summary of the key points in today’s post:

And some more Facebook resources below:

Next week, we’ll take a more in-depth look at Facebook business pages. How do you feel about Facebook so far? Are you intrigued? Or turned off? Let us know!

Adding Video To Your Blog

Posted on by
Reply

Last week we discussed why adding multimedia to your blogging mix is a good idea, and we looked at three relatively low-tech methods for doing so. This week we’ll explore two more advanced methods, the screencast post and the video post.

The Screencast Post is technically a video post. However, instead of using a camera to record a person or an event, the screencast uses software to record what is showing on your computer’s desktop. Similarly, you can create an audio track for your screencast using the same tools that you’d use for a podcast. Remember our slide deck post from last week? Well, a screencast would allow you to capture video as you scroll through your slide deck. If you couple that with an audio track, the result is an animated slide deck presentation.

A screencast can record anything that’s visible on your desktop, not just slide decks. When I created this Good Writing screencast for my website, I recorded myself typing the words you see appearing in the video. Then I added a typing sound effect, which I downloaded from the Internet.

More examples are the educational screencasts put out by Khan Academy.  Conceived as 10-minute classroom lectures, the screencasts reproduce a blackboard. We can see the teacher “writing” information on the board—all through the technology of screencasts.

The great thing about screencasts is that you can have the advantages of video  without any of the headaches. You don’t have to worry about buying equipment, learning how to operate a camera, recording audio, setting up lights, or editing. There are many simple and affordable tools for creating screencasts. The one I used to create Good Writing is Jing. The Internet is also full of tutorials. Seek and ye shall find a convenient way to produce your screencasts!

The Video Post Now we finally come to the most technically advanced of all of our methods, the video post. Nothing beats a video post for letting your personality come through and creating connection with your viewers. But to do the job well, you’ll need to consider production values.

The casual approach: Depending on your goals or the circumstances, a quick, casual video shot with a cell phone might be just the ticket. Maybe you’re at an event or traveling and you want to share an experience with your readers. Go ahead and grab your cell phone and shoot a short 2-minute video. There’s something to be said for the immediacy of being in the thick of things, and an impromptu video can do a great job capturing that. Just make sure to keep it visual. Any important audio information that you want to deliver over video should be kept to a bare minimum.

Below is an example of a casual video that I shot during the online launch party for my web series My Bitchy Witchy Paris Vacation. On the day of the launch, cast, crew, and fans gathered in a Parisian café to help us celebrate, and we streamed the launch live over the Internet. While the live party was going on in the background, I was playing hostess to our online fans. If you were a fan who couldn’t be at the launch, these videos would make you feel like you were right there with us.

Note that I’m wearing headphones to better capture the audio, and I made up for technical glitches with the video recording in post-production by adding title cards to help viewers follow along. This video was filmed with the webcam in my MacBook laptop, so really nothing fancy. But the low-tech quality was nevertheless fitting for the situation and engaging for our target audience!

The more polished look: Let’s say however that you’re aiming for a different vibe—less artsy and in-the-moment and more polished and timeless. Well, then you need to increase your production values. But this doesn’t have to be very complicated. You can still use your webcam and either your computer’s internal microphone or a head set if that’s all you have, but make sure to set your video in a quiet, well-lighted room to cut down on any visual distractions or noise. Think through your presentation and practice a few times. Take your time shooting, and repeat as often as necessary. As you get better at video posts, you can increase your technical skills and add effects if you want.

Below are two different videos discussing…you guessed it…why you should use video. The first one is a simple presentation by Derek Halpern of SocialTriggers.com. It’s just Derek and a whiteboard:

The other is a fancier integration of video layers and some special effects by the company Hunting With Pixels:

Both work. They each have a consistent and deliberate style, and they get their information across in an effective way. Again, depending on your needs, your personal taste, and your goals, you can opt for the simple, clean, do-it-yourself approach, or you can hire someone to either help you or teach you how to produce a slicker, more polished look.

Tips For Successful Video Posts

In conclusion, here’s a short list of tips to help you create better videos:

  • If you’re a beginner, remember that your first videos don’t have to be very sophisticated at all. Your webcam, a basic audio capture tool, and a basic editing program are all that you need to get started.
  • If you’re still nervous or if you want to up your game, consider working with someone who knows how to create engaging video content, at least until you get the hang of it.
  • Keep your videos simple. Limit them to one idea per video. Break down complex processes into shorter tutorials, and cover just one step per video.
  • Keep your videos short. Remember, text can be skimmed, but video and audio are  harder to fast forward.
  • Think through your text and your talking points, and make sure to rehearse.
  • But don’t rehearse so much that you take all the life out of your video! People want to see the real you.
  • Pay attention to production values, even in the simplest of videos. Make sure the production values you’re using match the image you want to project.
  • Give proper credit to anyone who helped you create the video. This includes properly quoting and acknowledging your sources.

That completes our series on the types of blog posts available to you. As you can see, there’s lots to choose from. Some you’ll take to right away, others won’t make any sense for your blog. That’s perfectly normal! Use what works for you and ignore the rest. And let us know how you’re faring, OK?

Next week, we’ll cover how to manage the comments section of your blog.

3 Posts to Get Readers Talking

Posted on by
3

To me, engaging an audience in a give-and-take exchange is much like the game of Tug of War. For those who have never played the game, Tug of War involves two opposing teams in a test of strength. Using a rope, each team tries to pull the other over a center line marked on the ground in chalk.

I know what you’re probably thinking: conversations aren’t meant to be competitive. Nobody’s trying to take the other side down. And you’re right. But I’m a competitive athlete. I’m actually editing this post on a plane as I head to Lisbon to take part in a half marathon. I enjoy competition, even if it’s only against my own best time. Competition gets my creative juices flowing and helps me set goals. And I like my analogies to have a little muscle on them, so hang in there with me as I try to find commonality between civilized conversation and dragging each other through the mud.

In Tug of War, once you get into the game, the momentum becomes so powerful that you find yourself doing your all to help the cause. Everyone is focused on the task at hand, ready to pull and to give every ounce of their energy. The rope is the common bond among all players. Everyone is in physical contact with the rope, taking information from it and responding to that information in real time. Each change of pressure on the rope elicits a response from each and every player. They react by digging in their heels, leaning back, refreshing their grip on the rope, or by groaning or laughing. It’s a conversation of sorts, even though no words are being used. Or at least no words longer than four letters. Nevertheless, the teams are “talking” to each other, engaging through the common bond of the rope.

This brings us to our discussion of unconventional posts. Much like the rope in a game of Tug-of-War, an unconventional post coaxes interaction. So far all the posts we’ve looked at generated information for readers. But the three posts we’re looking at today exist to create immediate engagement and conversation. Key to using these posts successfully is to wait until you’ve grown a small following and you feel confident moderating.

The Questions Post

If you’re having a hard time coming up with ideas, or if you have so many ideas but don’t know which ones would interest your readers most, consider a questions post. Select a subject in your niche that you’d like to explore further and ask your readers to post their most burning questions about it. It’s a great way to find out what your readers need, and it guarantees that you’ll be spending your time writing something your readers care about! You can also use questions to involve your readers in a live event that you’re attending but they’re not, such as a conference or a seminar. As an expert in your field, you have access to other professionals, and you can help open up that access to your readers by gathering their questions and asking on their behalf. Here’s a great example from the U-T San Diego that gathered reader questions for a mayoral candidate debate on education. They chose to collect questions by email, but you can ask readers to leave their questions in the comment section. (We’ll talk more about comments and how to manage them soon.)

The Survey, Poll, or Quiz Post

Surveys, polls, and quizzes are a fun and easy way to get to know your audience. Unlike a questions post that requires your taking time to answer, surveys, polls, and quizzes can give you and your readers quick insight on a certain topic. Do a survey or a poll if you want to gather information on a topic from many people and then publish or comment on the results. Opt for a quiz to help your readers learn something about themselves or test their understanding of a particular topic. Check out this useful quiz designed to help readers decide if they should start a blog.

One quick poll I recently ran on another blog was to help me select the logo for that business. Why not let your readers or clients participate in some of the more fun decisions that go into running your business? They’ll be happy to help and it will make them feel more invested in what you’re doing.

Surveys can go deeper than the simple poll described above. They might include more questions and use a variety of tools, such as ratings on a scale of one to ten, drop-down menus, or text fields where people can respond in their own words. A great tool for running surveys is Surveymonkey.com. The basic survey is free, but is limited to 10 questions and 100 responses.

The Contest Post

Just like a game of Tug of War, contests provide a playful way to connect with your audience. The key to running a good contest is to offer a good prize. The prize doesn’t have to be expensive, but it does need to provide value to your audience. For example, you might want to offer the winner a copy of your book if you’ve written one, or a free consultation or other equally valuable perk. Be sure to spell out the details, deadline, and entry rules of your contest. Make it as simple as possible for people to enter. Entries can be via a comment on your blog, or through an email, or the social networks. Here’s an excellent contest post by Darren Rowse of ProBlogger. The prize? A five-day, all-expenses-paid trip to Australia!

Next week we’ll finish our roundup of blog post types by taking a look at how you can use audio, video, presentations, and slideshares to enhance your blog.