Sep
10
Another great resource (while I am on a Twitter-roll): 8 Twitter Networking Tips: From Online to In-the-Flesh is an excellent post on how to use Twitter for networking, shameless self-promotion, and doing good things. Combine this with what you just learned from Lowrider Librarian – and you will be a Twitter star.
Sep
10
I recently stumbled upon the blog Lowrider Librarian (you gotta love that name) while doing some research about Twitter use within organizations. In a recent post, Twitter for Organizations, he provides a very simple, clear tutorial about what Twitter is and how to use it.
It is by far the best Twitter explanation I have found. Check it out.
Sep
3
My 17 year old son sent over 4,000 text messages last month. Call me old skool, but I cannot even fathom communicating that much via texts (I have trouble sending one in under 20 minutes). After a lengthy “talking to” it dawned on me that he doesn’t really ever actually talk on the phone anymore (except to me). In fact I realized that I was scolding him for what has become second nature (of course I feel guilty over it), and it is the preferred method of communication and information sharing amongst his peers – and apparently many others.
Kevin Dugan’s recent post on his Strategic Public Relations blog on Text vs. E-mail or Digital Natives vs. Digital Immigrants describes a recent experience he had where he encouraged to provide his cell phone number rather than email address to receive coupons and updates from a local coffee shop. I can see why it is attractive – marketers would no longer have to deal with email deliverability issues and recipients can begin reducing the amount of SPAM in their inboxes. Not only that, I can have my coupons on my cell phone, so when I go to that coffee shop or bookstore I can get my discount (I am forever forgetting to print out my borders rewards coupons).
Texting is becoming so commonplace that we are now seeing it used in schools. In fact, educators are beginning to understand that ‘digital natives‘ actually process information differently – and the use of text messaging in education is quickly becoming a hot topic.
Some educators are going as far to say using SMS in the classroom to summarize complex topics helps to increase understanding – (as discussed in “Messaging Shakespeare” from the Northwest Educational Technology Consortium – NETC).
Cell phones offer new potential for learning, if well-managed. They can send short text messages (SMS), images, and browse the Web. Users can also send files from their phone to be published on a Web page. Imagine students gathering survey data outside class – now instead of purchasing new tools students’ cell phones may enable efficient data transfer and analysis. –NETC
This all sounds really crazy – and foreign to me. Thoughts?
Sep
2
Strategic content tagging is one the most overlooked practices online today. Using them strategically not only helps others find your stuff, but it helps you repackage and repurpose content easily and in very targeted ways.
If the basic concept of tagging confuses you – check out this “Tagging 101″ tutorial from ZDnet:
Many people associate tagging with Social Bookmarking – which is a very powerful (and useful) concept worthy of a conversation on its own – Jason Falls provides a great explanation about this on Social Media Explorer.
Most organizations are overwhelmed by the fact that their content and resources live in different places (especially in a web 2.0 world). My organization has content on Flickr, YouTube, Slideshare, Delicious, and have several blogs and podcasts. I also use google news and blog alert feeds from time-to-time as well. We are also having conversations on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Meetup and Ning.
On top of this, we are implementing an enterprise-wide content management system (cms) to manage and publish our core content as well.
The question was, how can I strategically combine and repurpose content from these different online properties efficiently and effectively? How can I repackage them around topics, issues, events, etc., when they come from different places? Even with enough resources – this can be very overwhelming.
This is fairly easy to do if you consistently use tags. Here is what I do:
Using tags this way allows me (and users) to easily combine, repackage and repurpose content in many different ways. It also allows us to manage content in a distributed environment, as long as we are all working off of the same list of tags “keywords” – we are able to quickly combine and organize our content and links – and deliver it accordingly.
I am still experimenting with alternative ways of using tags – so let me know if you have any thoughts or ideas.
Sep
1
I just came across a nifty site called fivesecondtest.com. The site is primarily for web designers/developers who need feedback and input on overall design and information architecture. According to them it is a “simple online usability test that helps you identify the most prominent elements of your user interfaces.”
I was on the site earlier and tested out a few sites loaded by others. Take a look and let me know what you think.
