Maximising your investment in social media/networks

Presentation with compliments of Bryce Biggs ©

Brief Bio of Bryce Biggs• Change agent, facilitator, fundraiser, futurist, storyteller,

strategist• A principal/owner of several small businesses• A graduate of UKZN (SA) and of Cranfield in the UK• Facilitates & develops training materials for various

government training bodies as well as for the private sector in South Africa

• Consults in the field of fundraising• Researches & studies a wide range of fields and personal

and organisational effectiveness in particular• Can be found on many/most social networks• Interested in development: HR; LED; Small Business• Contact him at biggs@associates.co.za

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

Which social network?

Why are you networking?• Everyone else is doing it (2 833 860 South

Africans were members of Facebook the last time I checked)

• To be visible (to who and why?)• To stay in touch with family and friends• To generate business (16% of people in SA)• To achieve expert status (there’s money here)• To network generally (serendipity)• To access (and provide) expertise in a particular

network• To find a date (1 in 5?)• Other ??

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

Achieving expert status

Why other (US) people joined a network

Which network?

• The obvious• The specialist• The less conventional• The undiscovered treasures

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

The obviousTwo million plus South African members and growing. SA is fourth fastest growing country at present.Every man and his dog belongs.Best (?) social network for paid advertising.

Good if you want to generate a following or follow a particular expert. Easy to use on the run. Nice if you are doing something that warrants frequent updates. Was formerly a more mature group but the teenyboppers are flocking there at present.

Home of the teenyboppers. Starting to focus around games and music.

Twitter

The specialistMore mature, more educated, higher incomes

More mature, more educated, higher incomes.Relatively popular in South Africa.

LinkedIn

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

The less conventionalChinese for peace. Do it yourself. The way to go if you want to build your own network. Was free – now charging a modest amount

Another do-it-yourself. Not as popular as Ning but worth watching. Free

Ning

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

SocialGo

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

The undiscovered treasures?

• www.opennetworkers.info• www.kickapps.com• www.bestthinking.com (need to

prove who you are – this is an expert network)

opennetworkers.info (a ning site with lots of add-ons & a Firefox toolbar)

kickapps.com (a useful add-on to an existing website)

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

bestthinking.com

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

Optimising your use

• Selecting a network• Profiles• Advertising• Integrating• Reputation management

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

Selecting a network• Suggest that you broadly follow the

Jewish saying of “dancing at all the weddings”

• Facebook for family and friends (one size fits all?)

• Twitter to get your name and expertise out there (choose a particular focus)

• LinkedIn as a professional site• Your own ning/SocialGo site to see if

you can create a community around your area of knowledge/ expertise

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

Profiles

Suggest that you have a base profile and vary it to take account of the particular audience you are going for e.g. with the use of attached documents and videos and links

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

Maximise your use of MS OutlookA number of options:

• LinkedIn add-in• Gist• Xobni

These are free or freemium products that index all your emails and find linksFor example let’s look at Xobni

Xobni

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

Advertising

• This is a big area all on its own• Try advertising on Facebook to cut your

teeth if you haven’t already done so• Facebook has some useful demographic

selection criteria which means you can target your audience/ads

• In the longer terms get to grips with Google Adwords and use them to pull people to your blog/website

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

My Facebook advertising page

Integrating

There are now websites that pull all your profiles together e.g. www.lookuppage.com

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

lookuppage.com

Reputation management• This is becoming a significant issue on the

Internet with a number of monitoring and management services

• Monitor your name by setting up Google Alerts on your name, the name of your business, companies or topics you are interested in

• Think of registering your name on as many social networks as possible – free if you do it the hard way or for a fee if you pay someone

• Google your name on a regular (monthly?) basis

Google Alerts

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

Is your name available?

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

Google your name

Presentation by Bryce Biggs

Thank you for your time – hopefully you found the session useful

Presentation by Bryce Biggs