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Gevril and Haurex Italia dinner during Baselworld in March 2011 with Larry Brauner standing in the background.
Baselworld 2012 March 8-15.
Nov
11
Top 10 Reasons Why the Twitter LinkedIn Partnership is Big News
Filed Under Facebook, LinkedIn, News, Ning Sites, Social Media and Social Networking Sites, Twitter | 19 Comments
We learn nearly every day of developments in the social media world which have the potential for far reaching impact.Take for example the recent integration of LinkedIn with Twitter. You can now tweet your LinkedIn status to your Twitter followers and automatically post your tweets to your LinkedIn status.
It is easy to see that this Twitter-LinkedIn partnership has many practical implications. Based on my research, these are my top 10 takeaways from the new Twitter-LinkedIn hookup:
- Microblogging has gone mainstream. Facebook has its own microblogging platform, and Twitter tweets can now show up on MySpace, LinkedIn and lots of other places on the web.
- Twitter is the de facto king (queen?) of microblogging.
- Twitter is a medium for real business conversation. You can still tweet about breakfast, diapers or the light turning green. Small talk and chit-chat are the norm on Twitter. However, increasingly, people and companies are branding themselves and exchanging ideas on Twitter, 140 characters or one link at a time.
- The Twitter-LinkedIn integration helps LinkedIn by adding new life and meaning to its neglected status-update function and by adding much more dynamic content to the site as a whole. As a result, LinkedIn can be more competitive. Hopefully Ning will take notice and react!
- The Twitter-LinkedIn integration helps Twitter by attracting new professional users from LinkedIn who were previously too skeptical to join.
- The Twitter-LinkedIn integration enables members of both Twitter and LinkedIn to cross-post with ease, providing users with greater social marketing leverage.
- LinkedIn can help to reduce an enormous amount of content, functioning almost as would a Twitter list containing only members of your LinkedIn network.
- The hashtags #in and #li allow for selective cross-posting from Twitter to LinkedIn. This wasn’t possible when cross-posting with Ping.fm.
- The use of hashtags to selectively cross-post from Twitter to LinkedIn suggests the possibility of using hashtags similarly with other apps.
- Aggregation and syndication (using the semantic web or tools like Ping.fm and FriendFeed) have been touted as the next major trend in social media. However, the integration of Twitter and LinkedIn, although still at an early stage, demonstrates that collaboration too (when achievable) has much to offer. I suppose that the absence of conflict between Twitter’s business model (whatever that is) and the ad-based models of competitors helps to create a favorable climate for collaboration.
What are your thoughts on the Twitter-LinkedIn integration, and what are some of your takeaways?
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Tags: LinkedIn, MySpace, Ning, Social Media, Twitter
Aug
2
Targeting and Connecting on the Top Business Networking Sites
Filed Under Best of 2009, Facebook, LinkedIn, Networking and Marketing Strategy, Ning Sites, SPAM, Social Media and Social Networking Sites, Targeting, Twitter, Web Marketing | 26 Comments
I am about to discuss targeting and connecting as they apply to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Ning networks, the most popular social networking sites for business networking.I could have broken the material into four separate blog posts, but decided instead to deliver it to you as four articles wrapped up into one long one.
For simplicity, I am assuming that your target market uses each of the sites. Since that may not be true in your case, feel free to adapt these business networking techniques to all other social networking sites as needed.
Facebook
Targeting and connecting on Facebook are pretty straightforward with one caveat. You are limited to 5,000 connections on Facebook, so you can’t afford to cast too wide a net. Be fussy about whom you connect with and remove from your friends anybody who spams you.
To identify people in your target market, search for groups and Facebook networked blogs that would likely interest them. Join the groups and follow the blogs yourself. Then browse the members of those groups and followers of those blogs to find potential connections.
I believe that blog followers as a whole are more active on Facebook than mere group members. However, consider selecting only members with some minimum number of friends such as 100 to weed out people who don’t really engage with the site.
If you’re not sure which groups and blogs to select, try connecting with others in your niche. You’ll be able to see which groups they lead or belong to and which blogs they publish or follow. You can also examine their Facebook walls to find additional potential connections.
Connecting isn’t difficult. When you invite another member, include a short note such as, “You and I are both members of the Social Networking Haters group.”
Please, promise me that you won’t write anything nerdy like, “I’m looking to connect with like minded people.” Don’t use a line like that with anybody anywhere ever. I mean it.
Twitter
The Twitter learning curve is steep. If you’re not well versed with Twitter, try the advice and resources in my Twitter articles. I’m going to assume that you pretty much know what you’re doing.
Since Twitter is bloated with spammers’ phony profiles, targeting on Twitter is difficult and getting more difficult all the time. It’s going to be a messy job, so be prepared. Don’t say that I didn’t warn you.
Do not connect with anybody who has:
- no profile information or inappropriate profile information
- no picture, avatar or business logo
- a lopsided relationship between following and followers
- almost no tweets or spammy looking tweets
Do follow back anybody else who follows you. Unfollow anybody who spams you.
To identify Twitter members in your target market, start your search by using Find People to look for other people in your niche. Avoid the biggies, since they are magnets for spam, and a large percentage of their followers are spammers.
Look for the ones who have a few hundred to a few thousand followers.
Follow them and follow their followers — unless of course a particular follower looks suspicious based on the criteria I just listed above. A portion of their followers will hopefully belong to your target market.
Unfollow the people who don’t follow back after a few days and repeat the process.
Consider using a tool to manage your account.
LinkedIn
On LinkedIn, targeting is fairly straightforward, but connecting can be a challenge.
If you’re a job hunter or a headhunter in the recruiting industry, you should probably connect with as many people as you can. Since the limit is reportedly 30,000, you can afford to cast a very wide net.
In any case you should accept all invitations. Remove any connection who who spams you:
- Click on “Connections” which is on the left side bar.
- Click on “Remove Connections” which is currently near the upper right corner
- Then follow the instructions.
The main difficulty with LinkedIn is that if you invite someone who then indicates that they don’t know you, you get a strike against you. If this happens often, LinkedIn restricts your inviting privileges.
People who are open to invitations and implicitly agree not to indicate that they don’t know you are call LinkedIn Open Networkers, abbreviated LION.
There are at least two groups for LinkedIn Open Networkers:
You can join and browse these groups to find people to link to. They of course have an option to accept you or to archive you, i.e. ignore you. Usually they accept.
If you are not a job hunter or headhunter, you’re probably better off targeting than trying to connect to thousands of people. That’s your judgment call.
You can do both, just as I do. But I admit that I started as a job hunter years ago and built a large base at that time. If I were starting today, I think I would stick to targeting.
To make the best connections, join the groups that people in your target market would join, and participate in the groups’ discussions. You’ll naturally make connections and get some traffic to your blog or website along the way.
Ning Network
Targeting on Ning is a little tricky. Cast a wide net on Ning, since I’m not aware of any upper limit on the number of Ning friends.
Here are the challenges that you face when adding Ning friends:
- You can only have 100 outstanding friend requests. You’ll have to dis-invite people who don’t respond. Do this from the “Friends” tab of your Ning dashboard at Ning.com.
- Most of the people you invite won’t respond. Either they don’t know how or they’ve already abandoned the site.
You improve your results by posting a friendly, non-spammy and non-nerdy comment to their profile at the time you invite them.
You also improve your results by inviting people who have recently joined the site, the ones at the beginning of the member list, or people who are obviously engaging with the site.
Find people in your target market by joining Ning networks and groups that are likely to attract these people. Invite a hundred people, and wait a day. Some will accept, so you can invite more.
When you get stuck, trim your invite list starting from the end. While this can be a slow process, it has worked for me and for others.
Be careful not to spam your friends. Don’t invite them directly to join new Ning sites.
The best way to communicate with your Ning friends is to write informative blog posts on a Ning site about something that would interest people in your target audience. Then use the share feature on Ning to let them know about your post.
Read Introduction to Using Ning Sites and other Ning articles.
Now It’s Your Turn
I don’t have a monopoly on online business networking techniques. Why not share some of your own targeting and connecting ideas?
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Tags: Business Networking, business networking techniques, Facebook, LinkedIn, Ning, social networking, SPAM, target, Targeting, TwitterSharing is Caring!
Jul
19
Most Popular Social Networking and Business Networking Sites
Filed Under Best of 2009, Best of 2010, Facebook, LinkedIn, Ning Sites, Social Media and Social Networking Sites, Twitter | 64 Comments
My list of social and business networking sites is updated when online social networking changes occur. If I omitted sites you feel should be included, please leave a comment.This article about top social and business networking sites is sponsored by the Small Business Network, a new social website for open business networking and lifetime business learning.
Social Networking Sites Becoming the Internet
The rapid growth of Facebook and Twitter the past several years has fueled much excitement and speculation among the public and within the business world.
Alexa ranks the world’s most popular websites. Eight social networking and business networking sites, Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, LinkedIn, Orkut, hi5, Ning and Xing are ranked very highly overall among the world’s websites.
Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Ning networks are the most popular social networks with wide business appeal. From a business point of view, MySpace has become a niche site for the music industry.
Each social networking site is different. Choose a social network according to your individual or business networking objectives, as well as your personal style. Don’t base your choice solely upon site popularity, for each social networking site has a style and features that differentiate it from other social networking sites and contribute to its success.
Facebook
Read the Great Wall of Facebook: The Social Network’s Plan to Dominate the Internet — and Keep Google Out, and you’ll begin to appreciate ambitious scope of Facebook’s controversial plans, plans that have already started unfolding before our eyes.
The Facebook article has several important implications:
- If Facebook succeeds, even partially, our influence and the content we post on Facebook will affect Facebook search results. In other words, we can to some extent impact the outcome of Facebook searches.
- Facebook will evolve to compete both with Google and with other social networking sites. Facebook will implement powerful new features that enhance our networking experience.
- To profit from an evolving Facebook, we must master Facebook now and start building our influence on the site.
I like the realness of Facebook. Most members use their actual names, provide factual information about themselves, and share interesting pictures, videos, and other content.
I also like the ease with which I can connect with my Facebook friends with a private message or a comment on their wall.
We’ve been discussing spam a lot lately. There’s a 5,000 friend limit on Facebook, so friend slots are precious. If a “friend” spams me, I remove him or her, unless of course it’s somebody I know from outside Facebook, in which case he or she gets an earful about spamming.
Twitter
Some people believe that Twitter is merely a fad. Not I. However, I’m not as confident in the future of Twitter as I am in the future of Facebook or LinkedIn.
For now, Twitter is growing, and it’s very useful if it’s used properly. I have created more traffic using Twitter than with all my other social networking sites and social media sites combined.
The ability to connect with and reach large groups of people makes Twitter attractive from a marketing perspective. I use a simple yet powerful tool that helps me connect with people and manage my profiles and those of my clients.
If you can reach your target market on Twitter and keep their interest, you will benefit enormously.
LinkedIn
LinkedIn is a great business social networking site that is under new management.
LinkedIn’s potential lies in it’s many diverse and successful groups and their ongoing discussions. What better way to network than to participate in the discussions of groups that attract the types of people you want to meet?
You can also build up a very large network on LinkedIn which will enable you to communicate directly with the people you want without having to get past the usual gatekeepers. Members will also be able to search for and find you.
Ning Networks
I’ve written much recently about Ning networks. Many Ning social networking sites appeal to narrow niches, but others have broader appeal. Small Business Network is a new Ning network with a wide appeal.
I appreciate most a Ning network feature that is very controversial, the ability to share content with all Ning friends on a particular Ning network. I can write a blog post and share it easily with hundreds of friends.
Popularity of Social Networking Sites Isn’t Everything
While these are the most popular social networking sites, popularity isn’t everything. Less popular sites may offer you precisely the audience or the features you want. See also my list of social networking sites article from 2008 and my recent review of an excellent business networking book, The Skinny on Networking by Jim Randel.
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Most Popular Social and Business Networking Sites was most recently updated 28-Sep-2010 by Larry Brauner.
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Tags: Alexa, Business Networking, business networking sites, Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, MySpace, Ning, social networking sites, Twitter
Jul
27
Small vs. Large Social Networking Sites
Filed Under Best of 2008, LinkedIn, Networking and Marketing Strategy, Outside the Box, SPAM, Social Media and Social Networking Sites | 15 Comments
Even people who don’t go online and don’t understand social networking have heard of MySpace or Facebook, names that might conjure up fears of predators or identity theft.However, that’s not my point.
My point is that MySpace and Facebook are so much talked about that they have pretty much become household names, and serious business networkers have or ought to have a presence at MySpace, Facebook and Linked In — and at other major social networking sites.
Many of the important online networking sites are listed for your convenience:
- Mashable’s Catalog of 350+ Social Networking Sites
- 50 Social Sites That Every Business Needs a Presence On
- Wikipedia’s List of Social Networking Websites
There are also industry specific sites. For example if your business is real estate related, consider joining ActiveRain Real Estate Network and Wanna Network, if you don’t already belong.
To find business networking sites specific to any industry, try plugging the industry name and the words “networking sites” into your favorite search engine.
But wait, the story doesn’t end here.
Smaller and newer business networking sites also deserve to be included in your online portfolio. After all, less can be more.
When Diane Hochman Zigs, I Zag
Diane Hochman, the founder and director of My Private Classroom for Marketers, often instructs, “Don’t Follow the Flock”. When others are zigging, you zag.Diane is a Web 2.0 social media rock star. Many people follow her every move. They go where she goes. They do what she does. They zig when she zigs, and they zag when she zags.
People like Diane Hochman and Mike Dillard have their own flocks. Since I don’t want to follow the flock, nor live in somebody’s shadow, when Diane and Mike zig, I zag.
When they’re hanging at Facebook and Twitter, I’m chillin’ at one of the newer smaller sites such as Sta.rtUp.biz, a site that caters to small business entrepreneurs, or Natural Networkers, a social networking site for proponents of attraction marketing.
I might also be list building at Direct Matches or schmoozing at Yuwie, since they are not.
I think you get the general idea. It fits in with my online social networking strategy and my personal branding strategy. It’s common sense. I have plenty of room to maneuver.
You too might be best off charting a different course than your competition or industry leaders.
Choosing Business Networking Sites
There are many possible criteria for choosing business sites. However, at the end of the day it’s largely a matter of trial and error.
Nevertheless, let me share a few of my considerations with you. Perhaps I’ll share more in a future blog post.
Some social networking sites are funded by membership fees, some by advertising, and some by a combination of the two. I mainly prefer advertising supported sites. I’m not typically reaching out to a very elite crowd.
I do admit, I was a paid Executive Member at Direct Matches for three years. I highly valued the package of services they provided, and I appreciated Bill Weber’s personal touch. You can join Direct Matches for free.
I don’t pay to use any social networking sites at the present time. All the networking sites I use are either ad supported or offer free memberships that I find suitable.
Some networking sites make it easier to connect than others. I like to reach out to a large audience and prefer sites that make it easy for me to do that.
I like to be able to browse and add friends or contacts by demographic characteristics or by geographic location. When sites offer that option, it’s great. When they don’t, I look to a site’s groups or clubs to find people in my target market.
I recommend that you explore Ning social networking sites. While they do not support demographic browsing, but they are nevetheless very useful for business networking.
Short Lived Networking Feature
Some new social networking sites let me send mail to all my contacts or to all members of groups to which I belong. I love this capability and use it effectively without abusing or spamming.
I like to let lots of people know about my new blog posts. If I didn’t have a blog, I’d send links to useful information and thereby build my relationship with fellow members.
Unfortunately, as a networking site grows, spammers inevitably move in and ruin it for everybody. It’s impossible to keep a step ahead of them, so all sites eventually limit or eliminate this wonderful feature.
Don’t Let Spammers Ruin Your Day
I don’t like spammers and wish they’d stick with safelists or classified ads, but I don’t let them ruin my day, nor do I let them dissuade me from using any particular social networking site.
If I can cope with tailgaters and drivers who cut me off on the highway, I can surely cope with spammers.
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Tags: advertising, Bill Weber, Blogging, branding, Business Networking, Diane Hochman, Direct Matches, Facebook, LinkedIn, Marketing, Mike Dillard, My Private Classroom, MySpace, networker, networkers, online social networking, personal branding strategy, relationships, social networking, social networking sites, Strategies, target, Twitter, Web 2.0, yuwieSharing is Caring!
Jul
20
Business Week Regrets Missing Web 2.0 Social Media Trend
Filed Under Blogging, LinkedIn, News, Social Media and Social Networking Sites | 3 Comments
Business Week in their June 2, 2008 cover story, Beyond Blogs, confessed that three years earlier when they wrote, Blogs Will Change Your Business, they completely missed the larger Web 2.0 social media trend that was emerging.Business Networking Sites
While blogs have indeed transformed business, politics and publishing, online social networking at social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook, and Linked In have impacted an even greater cross-section of businesses and people.
Many businesses have created their own in-house social networking sites to encourage and support staff collaboration.
Social Media Sites
YouTube, a site where regular people post their videos, has challenged the dominance of television in the entertainment and news industries.
Wikipedia, an encyclopedia developed and maintained by users, and wikis in general, have revolutionized the way people work together and share information.
Twitter, a micro-blogging site, lets people and businesses communicate in 140-character chunks called “tweets”.
Read the full article to better understand social media’s impact on marketing, management and collaboration in business today.
Time’s 2006 Person of the Year
One footnote: Time Magazine in their December 2006 cover story, Time’s Person of the Year: You, communicates the full impact and significance of our collective online collaboration called Web 2.0.
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Tags: Blogging, Business Networking, Facebook, LinkedIn, Marketing, MySpace, online social networking, Social Media, social networking sites, Twitter, video, Web 2.0, YouTubeSharing is Caring!
May
19
Business Networking Sites
Filed Under Best of 2008, LinkedIn, Search Engines, Social Media and Social Networking Sites | 6 Comments
Online social networking sites such as MySpace or Facebook have become considerably heterogeneous over time. They support diverse agendas and activities.
One the other hand, social networking sites such as myYearbook or Linked In have retained their strictly social or business networking character.
Social Sites for Every Business
Business is embracing social networking, and most new social networking websites seem to lean more towards doing business than towards socializing.
I came across an excellent list of business networking sites and social media sites that will help you create a strong web presence for yourself or for your organization.
Inside CRM published a collection of 50 Social Sites That Every Business Needs a Presence On. The entries are listed in five categories:
- Social Bookmarking Sites – such as reddit and Digg
- Business Networking Sites — like Ryze
- Niche Social Media Sites – including Sphinn and Tweako
- General Social Media Sites — such as Wikipedia
- Job Sites – like Yahoo! Hot Jobs
I don’t know whether their list will be updated periodically, but it is certainly an excellent jumping off point.
You can also consult Mashable’s Catalog of 350+ Social Networking Sites, Seth Godin’s Web 2.0 Traffic Watch List and Ning Social Networking Sites for additional ideas.
You Need a Strong Web Presence
Are you an established entrepreneur or manager?
Are you opening a small business, a network marketing business or a consulting practice?
Even if you’re an employee in a corporation, you need a solid web presence to comptete in today’s Internet-based world.
When somebody Google’s YOU or your niche, what will the search engine return?
More on search engines and search engine optimization coming in future articles.
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Tags: Business Networking, business networking sites, consulting practice, Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, network marketing business, online social networking, opening a small business, search engine marketing, social networking sites, social networking websitesSharing is Caring!
Apr
15
Online Social Networking: Quantity vs. Quality
Filed Under Best of 2008, LinkedIn, List Building, Networking and Marketing Strategy, Social Media and Social Networking Sites | 5 Comments
On April 4 in Building a List with Online Social Networking I discussed the role of online social networking in permission-based marketing.
When you add a friend at one of the social networking sites, you are adding that person to your list, and at the same time you’re adding yourself to his or her list. It’s reciprocal list building.
You’ll readily agree that a tiny list is not likely to get you far. Right?
You must build a large list. But how large? And do you focus on quantity or quality?
Whether you have 100 or 500 or 5,000 people on your friends list, you aren’t going to be able to have a regular intimate dialog with all of them. So why opt for smaller rather than larger?
In Stan Relihan’s interview with Ron Bates, the most connected networker on LinkedIn with around 40,000 direct connections, Ron answers the question quite succinctly. He says that “there is quality in quantity”.In other words, the larger your list, the more people there will be who are just the ones you’re looking to meet. Some relationships will remain superficial while others will become strong friendships.
Ron also discusses the importance in business today of what he refers to as an “additive online presence”. Before somebody does business with you they’re likely to Google you to see what comes up. That’s your online presence. Each place you network, post an article or bookmark a site adds to that presence. This you may recall is a subject we touched on last month in Social Networking Sites: Your Web Presence and is frequently discussed at My Private Classroom for Marketers.
I encourage you to listen to Stan’s interview with Ron Bates and Stan’s other online social networking podcasts. You’ll find loads of gems.
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Tags: building a list, business today, direct connections, Google, LinkedIn, List Building, online social networking, permission based marketing, Ron Bates, social networking sites, web presence
Feb
22
Personal Development: Consistency
Filed Under Best of 2008, LinkedIn, Networking and Marketing Strategy, Personal Development and Success, Social Media and Social Networking Sites | 10 Comments
We both know that consistency is important. We’ve heard it over and over since we were kids. But just how important is it?
Obviously if we take no action we go nowhere.
But what if we have a bias for action? How much do we benefit?
We benefit in two ways:
- Multiplication of Effort. Can you learn a foreign language or a difficult subject in 30 minutes? You can if it’s 30 minutes per day. That’s 15 hours per month or 180 hours per year. Over the course of the year you gradually master the language or the concepts that you’re studying.
- Compounding of Results. If you’re a social networker, here’s where you get a big payoff. Every person you meet knows other people. The bigger your network grows, the more people who you don’t know will reach out to you to connect. You apply the same constant effort, yet your results increase exponentially.
When I first joined the LinkedIn community, I spent time each day seeking out and adding new contacts. Today I have more than 2,000 direct contacts and a LinkedIn network of nearly eight million people. Do you think I still need to look for people to invite?
Perhaps I should, but I get a half a dozen requests per day sitting back and doing nothing. People are easily finding me through my existing contacts, because I took the time to build a large network.
No matter what you’re looking to accomplish, why not break it down into small daily actions as I suggest in Critical Success Factors?
Establish daily benchmarks for yourself. Meet one person per day. Walk a mile or two. Save a few dollars. Give something to charity. You get the idea.
Multiply your daily effort by the number of days in a month or in a year, and you’ll be astonished at your potential for achievement. Add compounding of results or compounding of interest, and your consistent effort will have a profound effect on your life, as well as the lives of the people who matter the most to you.
Get started now, and please remember, as Mike Litman says, “You don’t have to get it right. You just have to get it going!”
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Tags: benchmarks, bias for action, consistency, critical success factors, LinkedIn, mike litman, overcoming procrastination, productivity, success secrets, Success Strategies, You don’t have to get it right
