Twitter is still a scary, untamed frontier for many businesses. They know that they should be engaging with the Twitter community, but aren’t sure how to do it.
I’ve collected up some of the most common questions asked by Twitter-for-business newbies and answered them below.
Is it bad to have a lopsided following/followers ratio?
Balance is better. Following 150 people with only 75 following is OK. If you have more lopsided figures of, say, 300 following to 75 followers, that might give tweeters pause before they consider following you. Focus on quality over quantity. Read the rest of this entry »
Yikes! I participated in two Twitter chats last night and lost a follower as a result of overwhelming his stream with my tweets.
Here are eight simple ways to avoid driving your followers crazy by dominating their streams, and perhaps losing them in the process:
- Use a second ID for chats: One brilliant user has a second ID that was identical to his main ID, except with “Chat” added at the end.
- Avoid responding to everything: Some well-meaning users respond to almost every individual question or comment with a tweet rather than summing up and holding back. If you want to thank someone, then send a direct message (DM) instead.
- Ease up on #followfriday: Oh my gosh, some people have nothing but “@name @name @name (x 10) #followfriday” in their stream on Fridays. Their whole Twitter page is full of names. Make your #followfriday more meaningful by recommending less people and explaining those recommendations.
- Watch those links and quotes: Sure, we all appreciate a good quote and links to great articles. Just take care not to fill up your stream with quotes, links or both.
- Schedule tweets: Typically, I don’t recommend automating anything in Twitter as it will likely lower your rep. However, if you’re like me and only check Twitter a couple of times a day, then you may want to spread out your tweets, replies, etc., using an automated service. This avoids cluttering a person’s stream with bursts of tweets.
- Dump the short tweets: Some people’s Twitter page show lots of meaningless tweets, such as “Cool!” “I agree,” “LOL” and “Thank you for RT.” DM those messages instead, or expand your responses to add meaning.
- Share your own links sparingly: Just now, one user has three tweets to his own blog in my stream. It’s OK to share your stuff, but certainly not one link after the other. Spread ‘em out. A good rule of thumb is to tweet your stuff no more than once a day..
- Drop the play-by-play: Lots of us love sports, but not when you give us every play at the event you’re attending. This applies to conferences and events, too. Instead of “live tweeting,” give one or two summaries of what’s happening.
Every rule has exceptions. Some folks tweet from conferences and share great insights. The point is to tweet carefully and wisely. Follow us on Twitter @webworkerdaily.
How do you tweet without irritating your followers?
Image created at twitlogo
For those of us who earn our living working online, the always-connected lifestyle can have its benefits and its drawbacks. I spend most of my day at my computer, whether I am in my office or working from other locations. When I step away from the laptop, I rely heavily on my phone as a way to check email, Twitter and RSS feeds, and I use it to look up information or get a map to the location for my next meeting. However, it isn’t always clear when using these devices violates the social rules defining acceptable behavior. In the New York Times, Alex Williams shares his views on the topic of smartphone usage and manners, so I thought that I would try to outline my take on appropriate use of devices in various social situations.
Photo by scriptingnews
Conferences and events: For most events, using a laptop or phone falls within the boundaries of acceptable behavior. We use our devices to take notes, blog or tweet about the event, and keep up with our email and other work during these events. Possible exceptions to this rule could be where the event is small and intimate, or where most of the attendees are not computer-savvy and so someone typing on a laptop might seem out of place. Read the rest of this entry »
One of my favorite blogs recently has been The Art of Manliness. It’s not a boneheaded celebration of dumb machismo, rather a thoughtful exploration of what being a man can and should mean in a post-feminist world. With values anchored in equality, the writers explore everything from employment and relationships to parenting, grooming and etiquette.
Last month, in response to the deepening recession, one contributor wrote “How To Network Like A Man.” It’s a great essay on networking, oriented around the story of a man losing his job and immediately putting to work his network of professional relationships to find new work. The advice in the essay isn’t gender-specific, and applies pretty broadly to almost anyone in a professional context — for web workers, good networking skills are even more valuable than understanding CSS or Photoshop inside out.
Here are some of the key points to take away from the piece: Read the rest of this entry »
We’ve all learned that good news travels fast online, but bad news travels faster. Now, with social networks, blogs and microblogs, the speed with which bad news can travel online is staggering, as everyone can get in on the conversation almost instantly. What can any of us — individuals, organizations and companies — do to handle a social media communications crisis?
After publishing my 10 Golden Rules of Social Media, I’ve been asked by a number of people what to do when things go wrong in the social mediasphere. Anyone who is putting themselves out there using social media tools is bound to encounter moments of crisis — some as large as the Domino’s fiasco, others as small as an old-fashioned person-to-person flame war.
My advice is to plan now. Don’t wait for that communications crisis to take place before planning for how you’ll handle the fallout when something bad (inevitably) happens. Here’s a blueprint you can use for your own plan.
1. Pay attention. Whether you are using Google Alerts or Twilert or any other monitoring service to see when your name or brand name is mentioned, setting up “digital listening posts” is essential to help learn about not just the good things people are saying about you, but the bad things as well. Getting an early “heads up” can make all the difference in the world between crisis and total disaster.
2. Review context. Before you panic and jump the gun to respond to what might appear to be a crisis, dig a little deeper to make sure you understand what is being said and why. You don’t want to enter the conversation until you have a firm grasp on the issues being raised.
3. Address promptly. Timeliness is everything when dealing with and defusing the crisis. Every day, every hour, every minute you agonize over what to do — or ignore the situation altogether — is time wasted.
4. Acknowledge first. Once you figure out what has happened and what some of the emotions are behind it, make sure to address these issues or emotions in your responses. Like any good interpersonal communications, start with statements like “I understand you’re frustrated” or “We realize this is a confusing situation.” Give credence to the other party’s feelings and perceptions. They may not be correct, but they are valid in that they’re what they believe and feel.
5. Don’t overthink. Running through committees, endless drafts and approval processes to get a response out there can cause far more damage than good. As long as you have taken the time to assess the situation and can take a rational, respectful tone in your response, even an awkward response is OK to start with, and buys you time to continue to respond to the problem.
6. Be open. If you’re upset, nervous, worried, shocked — don’t be afraid to express that as well. People want to see a human response to a crisis, not an overproduced, formulaic or canned reply. When there is a crisis, there are people involved. Pretending there are no emotions mixed in the mess is a surefire way to lose credibility with others. Domino’s CEO responded pretty quickly and openly. However, check out his response to the crisis. The CEO never once looks at the camera. If you are going to be open and forthcoming in your response, at least look straight at the camera at some point. Even when reading from a teleprompter, you can set it up so your eyes are directed at the camera. Otherwise, you’ll look shifty and untrustworthy.
7. Fix the problem. If the crisis is bringing a problem to your attention, admit it, address it and fix it. If something is wrong and you can make it right, do it. If something isn’t really wrong but someone perceives that it is wrong, don’t dismiss their concerns. Take every exchange seriously, and do your best. That is all anyone can really expect. If you make sincere efforts and consistently take the high road, you stand to gain some goodwill, even if the problem is not entirely resolved.
8. Tell your story. Telling your own story throughout the “fixing” process is another good way of helping defuse the issue. Giving updates such as “We’re still looking into that bug that caused your data loss,” and “Please contact us privately so we can make amends to this situation” lets anyone paying attention to the situation see something is being done, even some of it has to happen “behind-the-scenes.”
What other things should we think about when it comes to crisis communications in a social media-powered world?
I spend a significant amount of time, more than I probably realize, naming things both online and offline. We have usernames, Twitter handles, blogs, training classes, books, events, and so much more. Each one needs to have a name, and many of us probably don’t spend as much time as we should when picking a name. Personally, I hate coming up with names: the brainstorming to come up with something unique, the paralysis of choosing, the uncertainty about choosing something that won’t work as well as you thought it would, having to change the name later, and more. I prefer being poked with a sharp stick.
I started thinking more about naming this week when I went to my fitness tracking web site, Gyminee, and found myself on a new web site, DailyBurn. After poking around on the blog to find out more about the change, I found this: Read the rest of this entry »
Working on the web is great, but you miss out on some great business-building opportunities if you’re far removed from the majority of your clients. Business lunches and dinners are a fantastic tool for greasing the wheels of profitable partnerships, but if you’re in Taipei and your client is in Reno, it can be a little hard to coordinate. What web workers should not do, and what we too often do, is just shrug our shoulders and leave it at that.
Even across great distances, we can still schmooze and butter up with the best of ‘em. The key is good CRM, which applies regardless of distance. Here are some examples of how you might go about bridging that geographic gap to form a solid client-contractor bond. Read the rest of this entry »
Much as we wish it wasn’t true, on occasion we take on a contract that gets us in over our heads. Especially when we’re just starting, out or are unfamiliar with the field or industry in which we’re working. Obviously realizing that you can’t deliver what the client is expecting, and what you originally agreed to produce, can be a very stressful experience. It may even seem like it’s the end of your professional life.
It most likely isn’t, so don’t panic. There are steps you can take to mitigate the damage and come out as clean as possible on the other side.
I’ve run into this situation on two previous occasions. Once, I brought it on myself; the other time, the firm I was working for passed me a project due to staff transitions that had already been handed off so many times there was no clear record of who began it. The following tips come from what I learned from both experiences. Read the rest of this entry »
Web Work 101: How To Escape The Cubicle
