In the last post we talked about some of the problems people have with using Twitter. A major concern that I run into a lot is the idea of how to organize tweets to create or follow conversation. By far, the first thing that needs to happen is to select the tools for organizing your tweets. Twitter has heard this concern too and recently they changed the Twitter home page by adding features to help us utilize advanced functions. It works great. But what about Facebook, Fan Pages, and LinkedIn. Is there a way to have everything thing in one convenient place you may ask. My answer to you is a resounding yes! Here’s how. Use a tool such as Hootsuite, TweetDeck, or Seesmic . I have used all three and in my humble opinion, Hootsuite is the winner. However, I would suggest that you try out all three or whatever tool you like as long as it does the same as these. Now let’s take a look at Hootsuite as a social media organizational system.

Hootsuite gives you very powerful tools that bring everything you need to stay abreast of what is happening in your social media world. When selecting a tool such as this look for speed first. You don’t want to be sitting around all day just waiting for the thing to load or refresh. Also, consider ease of use. How much information can you see right on the dashboard. Is it easy to make comments or follow conversations. Take a moment to view this short video created by Chris Voss, of the Chris Voss Show, (that’s the Chris Voss Show, he always says it twice) as he talks about his first impression of Hootsuite.

Which one you select is not as important as knowing that it is easy to use so you will, well, use it.  Here’s another short video from Melissa who blogs at Adverturoo.  She’s a new find for me but I already love what I just saw of her mommy plus marketing blog.  In this video you’ll get a basic overview of a few of the major functions of Hootsuite.

Now that we’ve comvered the basic of organizing your tweets and other social media sites, let’s pick up again next week with a talk about strategy for building followers, dialogue, and relationships that help you meet your desired goals.

What are your questions about Hootsuite?  Go ahead to the comment box and ask away!

1. Content is king.  People have questions and you have answers.  Plus, the search engines love variety.  When you post frequently, your SEPR (search engine page results) will continue to rise.
2. Blogs are interactive.  When you have interesting, educational, entertaining, or inspiring posts, people will respond at length.  This creates conversation of a caliber that doesn’t happen anywhere else other than eye to eye networking.
3. As a blogger, you become an author. There’s no need to get a publishing house involved.  You publish your own material and your reach is just as far as any established author.  As people get to know you through what you write about, you’ll gain a fan base.
4. Blogging helps you to develop your reputation as an expert in the industry.  Why should your friends and family be the only ones to benefit from your deep knowledge of your trade? Share it with the world. We used to say that everyone is only separated by 6 degrees, now it’s 2 or 3.
5. Links are love.  Linking is when another site actually puts your URL on their site in some way.  Maybe another blogger links to something you wrote in their blog post or perhaps your blog shows up on another blog’s roll.  Also, whenever you comment on someone else’s blog that links you to them.  So, getting linked to high traffic, high quality sites improves your chances of being found too.

I hope this helps you make the decision to start blogging today.  What are your questions about getting started and developing strategy for blogging?

Social media may be on the top of everyone’s mind these days but email is definitely not dead.  In fact, I believe that the deeper a person is involved with using social media tools to communicate the more email that person will eventually receive. 

The resource I want to share with you today is called Xobni (that’s inbox spelled backwards).  I’ve been using it for about a year with great results.  This plugin helps me keep my email conversations and their attachments in one place, a sidebar next to my outlook inbox.  Whenever I click on an email, I see a picture of the person, their contact information, whatever social media links they have and the email conversations and attachments.  All of this information comes from where ever that person is plugged in to the web liked LinkedIn or Facebook.   This outlook plugin also gives a graph of what time of the day this person normally emails me and a list of the other people involved in that particular conversation.   All of that and it can be searched too.

It’s better than sliced bread if you ask me so go on over to the Xobni site and view a video about the service.  Then don’t be afraid to download it and simplify your life.

(This is not a paid content post.)

Well boys and girls, the summer is over and it’s time for me to reflect on my efforts to be earth mother again this year.  Yes, you see somewhere deep inside I have this urge to plow the land and make it produce food and such that will be healthy for my family and others who cross my doorstep. (Halo appears over my head now) I know, I know!  I really don’t have time!  Nonetheless, this year I decided to try to plant tomatoes using the Topsy Turvy Tomato Planter.  Guess what, it worked.  I still had to invest a lot of time with watering because tomatoes are about 85% water and my balcony is about 100 degrees or more all summer.  In the end, though, I grew about 50 good-sized tomatoes enjoyed by all.  We just ate the last ones today!

So, what does this have to do with social media marketing?  Well, while I was standing out there on the balcony in the sweltering heat, I began to think about how marketing is a lot like gardening and that social media marketing is not different.  You still have to do the same things to figure out where to start and how to make it grow.  Below is my side-by-side comparison of the ways that growing something, no matter what it is, takes a planned, consistent effort.

Gardening                                    Social Media

1.      Plan                                  

 2.      Prepare                

 3.      Exposure

 4.      Monitor

So, you see, I didn’t waste my time dealing with that tomato growing plastic bag all summer.  LOL!  It helped me to stay on track with my marketing efforts after all.