Last Tuesday, I participated in a workshop at Temple University’s Center City campus that focused specifically on Twitter and LinkedIn. I presented the Twitter portion, while Ed Callahan spoke of LinkedIn.  We had about 35 people attend the workshop. I found that to be a very comfortable number of attendees.  With a show of hands, we asked the audience who was currently participating on Twitter and LinkedIn.  Far more people were on LinkedIn than Twitter. Most of the people who said they were on Twitter were relative newbies.

My presentation was geared for the small business owner who is just getting started. I focused on the basics of setting up a good profile, Twitter search, etiquette, and viable reasons for using Twitter for business. There were many questions from “Should I put my email address in my profile?” to “How do I get more followers?” It’s clearly evident that small and medium-sized business owners and executives know they need to leverage Twitter as a business tool, and there is still a lot of confusion on how to use it effectively.

I’ll tell you what I tell everyone before they embark on a marketing strategy: know your goals. Develop obtainable objectives around those goals. Then brainstorm and experiment on the tactics and actionable items that may accomplish those goals.

Let’s face it, the major goal of any business or company is to increase revenue, right? But increasing revenue can only take place if you have qualified sales leads. So, an example of a sales-driven objective and some action items could be:

Objective:
Increase prospective client & qualifed lead pipeline

Venue:
Twitter

Tactics:

• Create search-friendly profile and tweets
• Download/use desktop or mobile phone-friendly Twitter client
• Use Twitter search for specified and relevant keywords
• Manually follow and monitor appropriate Twitter users
• Follow thought leaders in your industry or area of expertise
• Review daily Twitter stream
• Tweet daily
  • Share relevant links and information about your industry or area of expertise
  • Join relevant conversations
  • Engage Twitter followers: ask questions! give answers!
  • Respond to replies or direct messages
• Promote your product or service moderately
• Monitor and analyze traffic to website

Your social media mileage is going to vary. What works for someone else, may not work for you. Test often, but always keep your objectives in mind. Revise & refine as you need to. Twitter, or any social media for that matter, is not a sales & marketing cure all, nor should it replace other, successful methods you’re currently using. They are one of many tools you may use in your business-building efforts.

Click Here for more information about the Twitter-LinkedIn Workshop. Contact info@teamandadream.com if you wish to discuss setting up a social media consult or social media coaching session with me.

TONIGHT!

Getting Back to Basics: Measurable Objectives in Social Media and Public Relations w/ Ken Jacobs

Location:
Science Leadership Academy
55 N. 22nd St

Time:
6:30pm

Register at: http://smcphillyfeb.eventbrite.com/

Why social media and PR this month? Because in today’s world, nearly every “public” with whom you’re trying to build a relationship is online!

In the current economic environment all of us—whether business owners, freelancers, or those who execute communications for non-profits, government agencies, or corporations—need to be on defense when it comes to our work.

The best protection against the budget cutter’s sword is a rock-solid plan—one with measurable objectives, strategies that overcome roadblocks and tactics that ultimately help achieve marketing goals.

So let’s get back to the basics of planning and discuss some best practices!

Ken Jacobs of Jacobs Communications Consulting, a PR consulting, training and coaching company, will present and facilitate a discussion on the basics of plan writing. You’ll learn, among other topics, how to:

• Create objectives that are objectives; neither strategies nor tactics
• Make sure your objectives are measurable
• Understand the Three Kinds of Objectives: Output, Outtake, and Outcome

The Philly Social Media Club has partnered with the local PRSA (Public Relation Society of America) chapter and its new social media committee. Please welcome them to the Social Media Club!

See you tonight!

Philadelphia Twestival - Thursday, February 12th

On February 12th, 100+ cities around the world will be hosting Twestivals which bring together Twitter communities for an evening of fun and to raise money and awareness for charity: water.

According to the Philly Social Media Club wiki, the December meet up is SOLD OUT!  Space was limited, so it sold out quickly.  The topic is a hot one, too:  journalism and blogging.  Notables from Philly.com will be on hand to discuss social media and its impact on the future of journalism.

But never fear social media lovers, after the discussion with Philly.com, the group will be converging at the Irish Bar & Restaurant Tír na nÓg (located at 1600 Arch Street) for socializing.  Come on out!

bloblive is back!

Monday, November 24th
at McGillin’s Olde Ale House
1310 Drury Street, Philadelphia
(between Chestnut & Sansom Streets / 13th & Juniper Streets)
Doors open at 6:00 PM
Idea sharing and collaboration begins at 7:00 PM
Space is limited – Only 75 seats available!

Myself and Gloria Bell will be “Guest Advisors”. In other words, we will be available for brief 1-on-1 advice giving sessions with those who present ideas!  Naturally I will be giving marketing and/or public relations advice. Gloria will be giving advice on how to take that seed (idea) and grow it!

See you there!

As I noted the last time I posted about Philly Standards, I have a “thing” for web design, programming, and development.  A “clean” site not only plays a crucial role in ensuring search engine friendliness, but in user experience as well.  Ask my roommate, I have a pet-peeve for poorly designed and flashy websites that are hard to navigate and read.  But I digress.

This past Tuesday at Ly Michael’s, Philly Standards hosted a presentation by Kel Smith who explained what Section 508 is and why it is important for anybody with a web presence, or marketing a website, get up to speed on what he calls “inclusive design”.  More on that later.

He started the lecture by boldly declaring there are no standards.  He prefaced the remark by saying he knew he’d get a lot of flack for that.  Naturally the World Wide Web Consortium exists to develop specifications, guidelines and tools to ensure web accessibility.  While some of these guidelines seem like no-brainers, there are still millions (billions?) of web sites that don’t adhere to them.  His point is that unless builders and people who fund websites adopt these standards, they may as well not exist. The importance and existence of WCAG shouldn’t be understated.

He went on to explain the 4 design principles (POUR) from the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0:

P – Perceivable
O – Operable
U – Understandable
R – Robust

From there he plowed into the importance of Section 508 – a statutory section in the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, whose primary purpose is to provide access (”reasonable accommodation”) to electronic and information technology (EIT) for individuals with disabilities.

EIT includes:

• telecommunication products, such as telephones;
• information kiosks;
• transaction machines;
• World Wide Web sites;
• multimedia (including videotapes); and
• office equipment, such as copiers and fax machines.

He went on to cite the landmark class action lawsuit against Target by the National Federation of the Blind. A blind user was awarded a $6m settlement because Target’s website was not accessible to him.  Amazing, huh?  Drop in the bucket for Target, of course.  But this lawsuit brought the issue to light.  Some companies began to worry about it in fear they would get sued, too.

The fact is, in an ever increasingly technical world, we need to develop new standards for ease of use for everybody (”inclusive design”).  There are between 40 million and 50 million Americans with disabilities.  Not to mention, a large aging population with various special needs as well.  A growing proportion of these disabled and aging people are connected online and spending online.  These people often use screen readers (such as JAWS®) and braille keyboards to access the Internet.

Some good practices in accessible web design include:

• include a Table of Contents if possible
• specify language
• use understandable semantic rich elements (such as header tags)
• include accurate, succinct alt attributes to all images – for example: “Picture of…”
• write anchor text (on links) so that it makes sense when read out of context
• separate words so that when spelled out it makes sent – for example: homepage -> home page
• increase letting on website for people who are color-blind or dyslexic
• if you install a captcha, ensure it includes audio

These are just some of the things you can do to create a barrier-free user experience for everybody.

Testing software and tools are available that can help make sure the websites you create are accessible.

Cynthia Says Portal
Wave 4.0
FAE (Functional Accessibility Evaluator)
Firefox Accessibility tools

To learn more about barrier-free user experience, web accessibility, and user-centered design, read more at Kel’s blog.  Thanks Kel!

There’s always something great and exciting happening.  Whether it’s casual meetings of creative people socializing, monthly lectures by groups such as PANMA or Philly Standards, or bigger all-day events like PodCamp and BarCamp Philly.  Then there are resources like the Philly New Media Hub that track all of this exciting creative activity.  There’s literally so much going on, it could make your head spin.

Just this past Saturday, BarCamp Philly took place at the University of the Arts. I was unable to attend due to not feeling well.  This pained me as I knew it was going to be a day filled with learning and networking.  From the sounds of it, it was a resounding success. I still don’t feel well, but according to attendee David Konopka, BarCamp Philly was mind-blowing. After reading that, I am quite sad I was not able to attend.

However there are talks on the BarCamp Philly Google Group about holding monthly BarCamp-related meetups.  At first I was worried because there are a lot of other similar groups that hold meetings, and there is certainly overlap – but then it dawned on me – why should these meetings of creative folks be tied to just organized groups?  Why not hold impromptu meetings according to subject matter and whoever is interested in attending just show up?

The pro is that there is no toe-stepping, everybody is welcome no matter where you come from.  The con of it is it could get too disorganized resulting in chaos.  But, like David says, “Do First, Worry Later”.  I like that mentality and that’s what is so great about this town.  People not only TALK about things, they ACT!  In big numbers, too.

I’m proud to be a part of this vibrant, smart, and enthusiastic community of doers.

This is one reason why I am so thrilled to be living back in Philadelphia again.

bloblive Philadelphia Idea Event

Today’s topic is: Search Engine Optimization and Social Media Marketing: Can’t We Just Get Along?

Recently, on Twitter, I noticed some talk from Search Engine Optimization experts actually downplaying the importance of Social Media Marketers.  It was inferred that SEO is superior and social media marketing is simply for those who failed at SEO.

So… this got me thinking: Why would search marketers say that? Wouldn’t any additional form of online exposure be GOOD for internet marketing efforts?

Could it be that search engine optimizers are threatened by Social Media Marketers? Are they afraid they’ll lose customers?

Well, if that’s the case, naturally, they would frown upon social media marketing.

What are your thoughts on this?

Can SEO’s and SMM’s get along in an increasingly competitive online marketing world? Is one better than the other? Should they complement each other?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Listen to the “podcast”: SEO vs. SMM: FIGHT!

FWIW: Personally I think you can’t have effective SMM without a good SEO foundation.  Naturally I love me some search engine optimization; it’s the bomb-diggity of internet marketing. I happen to advocate both, though, depending on what the objective is. YMMV.

I’m just curious to see what people really think about Twitter.