jasonyormark.com

Social Media Friendly Blogging

Over the past year I’ve learned quite a bit about building traffic and driving awareness of my personal blog.  I haven’t done very well from a search perspective.  There are certainly some improvements I could make that would make my blog a little more search friendly, but I just haven’t made it a priority. 

What I have done well however is utilizing social media.  It’s pretty much the sole source of all my blog traffic, and in my opinion, much more fun to manage.  The following are the steps I’ve taken that I use and have found success in using social media to drive traffic to my blog.

Enable your readers. Make it as easy as possible for your readers to share your content.  Utilize above the fold share buttons like Tweetmeme & Facebook Share.  Also add more robust sharing options below the fold.  My personal fav is the Sexy Bookmarks plugin for Wordpress.

Write effectively. Most people are not interested in reading long winded blog posts.  Getting to the point quickly and concisely is the way to go.  Even better is using lists.  Anything that allows people to scan and move through your blog posts effectively makes for a better read.

Titles are everything. When you share your blog posts on social media channels, in most cases you have one chance to entice someone to actually click through.  Your title is the key.  Be clever and descriptive, and once again, lists have a much higher click thru rate.

Share Share Share! It goes without saying that after you post, to share your content everywhere.  Don’t just stop with Twitter or Facebook.  Linked In Groups are a great way to drive additional traffic, and don’t forget secondary channels like Reddit, Digg and Stumbleupon.  It only takes a few extra clicks on your part for the extra eyeballs.

Be vain. It’s OK to toot your own horn on your blog, within reason of course.  If you begin to build a nice following on Twitter or with your RSS subscribers, let your readers know.  By displaying your following, you build instant credibility, and your new visitors will be more likely to want to stick around and come back for more.

Eye catching image. While it may not seem very important, I’ve found that associating a relevant, eye catching image to my blog posts go a long way towards driving more people to my posts.  Not all channels use a preview image, but ones such as Facebook and Digg do, and if you choose smart, they can contribute to higher click-thrus.

I’ve found all of the above to help contribute to growing my blog’s readership and traffic.  I’d love to hear what has worked for you.

Related posts:

1. My 9 Favorite Wordpress Social Media Plugins
2. How To Use LinkedIn Groups To Drive Website Traffic
3. The Office For Mac Social Media Extravaganza!
4. My 9 Favorite iPhone Social Media Apps
5. You Are Not A Social Media Guru, Ninja, Expert, Master, (Enter Title Here)

My 9 Favorite iPhone Social Media Apps

As if spending countless hours on the computer with social media wasn’t enough, there’s a quite a few excellent apps out there that help you manage, monitor and communicate through your social media channels on the go. While some of these are quite obvious, perhaps a few in here are new to you. Regardless, here are my 9 favorite social media iPhone apps.

1. Facebook – Really if you don’t have this one on your phone, you really aren’t interested in this article to begin with right?

2. LinkedIn – Their first version was pretty lame, but the most recent update brings the app into usable form.

3. Tweetie 2 – In my opinion, the crown jewel of Twitter iPhone apps. Slick interface, easy to use, and a front pager for me.

4. Meebo – Recently launched, a free IM client that is terrific. Works like a charm, and practically supports every IM client there is including Facebook.

5. Yelp – Perhaps a social media reach, but the fact is, Yelp has many social media aspects to their site, and I use this app quite a bit. My fav app to find everything on the go, and read reviews from the community.

6. Wordpress – Again, another example of the 2nd version of the app breaking through.  I don’t really blog with the app, but monitoring comments is very useful on the fly.

7. Mashable – Recently just launched, a slick little app to stay on top of social media and technology stories quickly and easily.

8. Byline – There are quite a few RSS iPhone apps, but I’ve found Byline to fill my needs quite nicely.  Synchs with Google Reader seamlessly, and I can easily stay up to date on my fav blogs.

9. Ustream Live Broadcaster – Maybe not for everyone, but it’s still pretty amazing to be able to stream live video straight from your phone…for free!

Related posts:

1. My 9 Favorite Wordpress Social Media Plugins
2. The Office For Mac Social Media Extravaganza!
3. 9 Great Social Media, Digital Marketing & Productivity Tools
4. iPhone 101: How To Sync Gmail Contacts Without Using Exchange
5. You Are Not A Social Media Guru, Ninja, Expert, Master, (Enter Title Here)

Office For Mac Macworld 2010 Recap

This year’s Macworld 2010 was my first Macworld and it was definitely a different tradeshow experience then I am used to.  For years, I’ve attended the Search Engine Strategies and SMX events and the biggest difference by far is in the audience.  The search shows I’ve attended are much more B2B, with Macworld having a much more consumer feel.  This was very evident in my attempts at doing video recaps like I had done in the past.  At the search shows, EVERYONE wants to be on camera.  At Macworld, not so much.  It was like pulling teeth actually.  We did the best we could, and I’ve embedded our two daily recaps below.  The Day 2 video is a bit more interesting as you actually get some insight into some cool apps and software that were at the show.

What’s been most interesting is seeing the social media plan that I’ve been working on for quite a while go into action.  As of this blog post, the Office for Mac twitter account is closing in on 8,000 followers after a few weeks of going live.  My hope is that they would hit 10,000 by the end of the Mac Office Loves You campaign which wraps up 2/25.  I think they’ll get there.

What suprised me the most though was the Facebook adoption.  Well over 3,300 fans after just a few weeks.  I wasn’t expecting that many that quickly.  Obviously a good thing, and part of that success is certainly the group’s ability to be in the conversations.  So many companies have good intentions and launch, but never back it up with real people and responses.  As long as they keep it up, I anticipate they will continue to build momentum and be able to drive real value through their social media efforts.

It’s been a great run, and I’m wrapping up my time with the group.  I’ve got big news to share in terms of my next move that I hope to share in the next few days.  In the meantime, enjoy the Macworld video goodness below.

And don’t forget you can still enter to win one of two fancy Macbook Pros just by following Office for Mac.

Related posts:

1. The Office For Mac Social Media Extravaganza!

The Office For Mac Social Media Extravaganza!

Three months ago I accepted a contract position that would have me help build the social media and community plan for Mac Office.  Now, after 3 months of discussing, planning, revising, and who knows how many meetings, the curtain has been pulled away and the excitement begins.  It’s been an amazing experience getting to experience building and executing on a plan for a large brand, and certainly challenging to say the least.  The group is very unique in that it’s a Mac product within the halls of Microsoft.  I’ve grown to love the platform (don’t fret, I enjoy both), and I look forward to now getting to interact with the Mac community a bit more now that we are launched.

I’ll be attending Macworld next week which I’m pretty excited about.  We have a fairly large booth presence, and I’ll be spearheading some daily video recaps that I will post here in addition to the Mactopia blog.

In addition a custom website was built to celebrate the social media launch and Macworld experience.  Be sure to check out all the fun at www.macofficelovesyou.com.

In addition to all the hoopla, Mac Office is also giving away 2 sweet Macbook Pros as part of the social media launch.  All you have to do to be eligible is to follow the officeformac twitter account and you are entered to win.  You can earn a second entry by tweeting anything (preferably something clever of course) using the #officeformac hashtag.  The contest is open through 2/25.

I can’t take all the credit.  Tons of thanks to some great agencies and individuals I’ve gotten to work with throughout the project.  Zaaz is a tremendous group of smart, talented people that I’ve had a blast working with.  And don’t even get me started about how cool it was to work with Wexley School For Girls.  I never thought I’d get the opportunity to work with them on a project, and I’m glad I did.  Super creative folks, and the craziest offices you’ve ever seen.

So now I ask all my friends, family, readers and visitors to spread the love!  Follow Office for Mac on twitter, fan ‘em on Facebook, and win yourself a cool new Mac in the process.

More to come!

Related posts:

1. Office For Mac Macworld 2010 Recap
2. My 9 Favorite Wordpress Social Media Plugins
3. My 9 Favorite iPhone Social Media Apps

9 Great Social Media, Digital Marketing & Productivity Tools

I absolutely love it when I find incredible tools online that help enable your productivity, efficiency & marketability.  They can often be hard to come by, but there are some great ones out there and the following list are the ones that come to mind recently that you may or may not have heard of or used.

1. Search Status Firefox Extension – This is my new favorite plug in.  So simple and unobtrusive, yet highly addicting and very informative.  Quite simply, this plug-in shows you any website is performing in the far right bottom of the Firefox web browser.  Quickly and easily you can see Google Pagerank, Alexa, Compete, and a variety of other data points.  If you are a serious blogger or a digital marketer, it’s a must have.

2. Xmarks – Managing bookmarks can be tedious, but Xmarks is a great little piece of software.  You create an account, and install the software on all your machines, and whalla, you can ensure that your browser bookmarks are synced up across all your computers.  You can also access your bookmarks on their site if you are ever on a public computer.

3. bit.ly Sidebar – URL shortening is all the rave, and bit.ly has certainly put their stake in the ground as the industry leader.  What makes their offering so great is the statistical analysis and easy of use.  Sign up for an account, and make sure you use their bit.ly Sidebar bookmarklet.  It makes sharing extremely easy, and will automatically track all your URL shortening so you can see how much activity results from what you share.

4. SocialMention.com – What a great free tool.  It’s one of the few resources that is free that allows you to monitor keywords across the web.  A great way to test it out is to simply search your name and you can a nice little dashboard of information including measurements of sentiment, passion, reach and a variety of other data points.  It’s certainly not professional grade, but for a free tool, it’s a great starting point for social media/digital marketers.

5. Dropbox – I heart Dropbox.  So easy to use, great UI, and of course free (they do have paid upgrades).  Who can’t use 2GB of cloud storage at there disposal.  There are countless times where I find the perfect situation to be able to drop a file on a desktop folder, and know that I can get to it on one of my other machines.  So good.  The iPhone app is the icing on the cake.

6. Tweetdeck – I know most of those reading will know of Tweetdeck, but I have to add this to my list as I’ve tried practically all of the different Twitter apps, and in my opinion Tweetdeck just seems to work out the best.  Logically everything is laid out well, and it fulfills my needs perfectly.  However when it comes to a mobile Twitter app see #7.

7. Tweetie – Best iPhone Twitter app hands down.  Clean, easy to use, and just works.  I don’t use it for anything heavy, but it’s a perfect mobile Twitter experience anytime I need to post, read or just check in.

8. Tweetadder – I’ve written about Tweetadder before, but it bears repeating.  It’s a great piece of software if you are serious about managing your Twitter account and want to build a strong, relevant following.  I started at 500, and I’m closing in on 30,000 in just 6 months or so of casual use.

9. FriendFeed – Most people of heard of FriendFeed, but not as many use it.  Here’s my #1 reason for you to consider; increasing your blog subscribers.  Of course this only really works if you use Feedburner (which many bloggers do), but my blog subscribers skyrocketed once I started using FriendFeed.

Related posts:

1. My 9 Favorite Wordpress Social Media Plugins
2. Making Dough(nuts): A Real World Example of Using Social Media Effectively

You Are Not A Social Media Guru, Ninja, Expert, Master, (Enter Title Here)

Let me preface this blog post with saying that nor am I, nor have I ever claimed to be, however I do know enough to be able to implement workable, results driven social media plans and have had some success doing so.  However there are thousands of individuals across the interweb claiming they are.  From old school marketers simply updating their titles to stay with the times, to recent graduates who know how to use Twitter or Facebook.  Just take a look at how many Twitter users “claim” their authority on the subject.

I’m not saying that there aren’t any very knowledgeable people on the subject, but this has gotten so out of hand, that it’s hurting the credibility of those that can actually provide real value with social media consulting and marketing services.  I’ve talked with many small businesses that are so out of the loop, that I could easily see them being “wowed” by anyone armed with just basic knowledge of how to get around the major social network channels.

So how can we filter out all the pretenders?  Social media marketing certainly could use some certification to start with.  But really, it falls on those that really want to make a career out of social media marketing through learning the craft, and getting familiar with as many tools as possible.  Dive deep into each channel and understand their differences so that you can make informed decisions about what makes the most sense for a particular business or cause.

I’ve found getting familiar with reporting tools such as Radian 6 and Social Radar a good start.  However those can be expensive tools to get access to.  An alternative to start with is simply using free tools like SocialMention.com or Google Analytics.  Dig in and try to really understand social media metrics and how that data can be leveraged to help businesses understand the value of a strong social media plan.

Social Media is not a new concept.  People have been connecting, sharing, and communicating since the beginning of time.  What’s changed is HOW we do these things.  The Facebooks and Twitters of the world are simply giving us new technologies to do these things more easily then ever and at enormous scale.

Quite frankly, I would steer clear of anyone that ever uses words like “guru” or “ninja” when describing themselves.  Chances are they are quite the opposite.

What do you think?  Too many unqualified cooks in the kitchen?

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9 Twitter Directories You Should Be Listed On

There are a variety of ways that you can build a strong following on Twitter, and one of those ways that is to take advantage of a few key Twitter directories that have established themselves quite well. For a few minutes of your time, you can have yourself listed on these directories, and while in many cases it may not drive droves of users to your Twitter profile, there’s no reason not to list yourself. By listing yourself on these directories, other users can find you if they are looking for like minded individuals. As I’ve always said in my consulting, it’s not important what you personally think of a channel. You may think certain sites are poorly designed, under featured, or unreliable, but if the audience exists there, it’s important that you are there as well if you truly care about reach.

Here’s my top 9 Twitter Directories to make sure you are listed on:

1. 1. Twellow – Right now the crown jewel of Twitter directories.  If you only bother with one on this list, choose Twellow.
2. 2. Wefollow – My personal favorite for the simple design and usability.  Built by Digg co-founder Kevin Rose.
3. 3. Twittercounter – My 2nd favorite as it acts as a statistical tool as well.
4. 4. Twitterholic – Another one of those directories that ranks users by followers.  Kind of fun to see where you rank based on filters.
5. 5. JustTweetIt – A directory of Twitter users sorted by categories. Nothing groundbreaking here, but just another large directory to list yourself to be found.
6. 6. Geofollow – GeoFollow allows you to list yourself geographically and categorically.
7. 7. Tweetfind – Free Twitter yellow and white pages directory.  Not the best looking directory, but front page on Google for “twitter directories”, so worth the listing.
8. 8. Twibs – Only really applicable to businesses, but everyone is selling something right?
9. 9. Hashtags – This is simply a directory of hashtag users on Twitter.

Related posts:

1. How I Increased My Twitter Following by 45% In One Week

Booked: Facebook Disabled My Account

I feel so alone.  I didn’t quite realize how much I used Facebook until it was taken away from me.  Between Twitter and Facebook, I had built a nice little social network.  Twitter has turned into a nice, strong following that I leverage for professional and social sharing, while Facebook really had become my way to stay connected to the people I actually have or had relationships with.  I’d spent a good 3 years building a nice little corner of the ‘net and the Facebook gods have spoken.  Why I have no idea.

And there lies my problem.  Facebook just shut me down for no reason what so ever.  They simply slapped me with a “your account is disabled” and threw me a nice little generic FAQ.  No warning, no nothing.  Sure, they have an email address where you can submit your argument, but based on what I’ve found online, it will be quite some time before I get a response, if I even get one ever.

Sure, I get it.  Facebook has 300+ million users, and it’s a free service.  I don’t expect to get the same level of customer service that I would for something I pay for.  But I have a real problem with a company that thinks so little of their users to make broad sweeping account shut downs like this.  I’ve spent countless hours over the past few years using the service, investing my time and providing my trust to Facebook with a lot of contact and content.  I’ve evangelized and certainly contributed to bringing users to the platform.  And all of that does not matter one bit.

It’s a good learning experience for me to realize that using social networks like this can be a risky proposition.  Especially if you are a business.  Imagine investing the same kind of time into building your fan page only to have Facebook give you the smack down with no explanation, or little to no resolution paths.  A few months ago I wrote about how a local donut shop has used Facebook to tremendous success.  They are up to over 2500 followers and have made Facebook a critical part of their marketing plan.  So much so that they haven’t even bothered to create their own website yet.  They don’t have to.  Can you imagine if Facebook decided to just shut them down?  Perhaps they should rethink that whole website thing.

I don’t know if I’ll ever get my account back, which means I’d probably have to start over.  I’m not so sure I’d even bother.  Regardless, it’s an eye-opener, and if you are a business owner thinking about using social media channels such as Facebook and Twitter, always ensure that you combine those efforts with your own home grown web presence.  It’s important to have some level of control when the gods decide to wreck havoc.

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Google Wave Invites: Grab Your Board

I’ve been playing around with Google Wave for a month or so, and while I think it’s definitely a cool way to manage your communication, the fact is, I don’t know many people that are actually using it yet.  Lucky for me, I’ve got some invites to give out.

As of now, I have 16 to give out.  Want one?  Leave a comment on this blog post with your email address and either a guilty pleasure or pet peeve.  First 16 comments get the invites.  If I happen to score more, I’ll send them in order of comments left.

And once you’re in, be sure to track me down at jasonyormark@googlewave.com.

Enjoy!

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My 9 Favorite Wordpress Social Media Plugins

The Wordpress platform never ceases to amaze me. It’s by far one of the greatest pieces of software ever built, and to think that it is free is the icing on the cake. What really makes the platform as successful as it is, are the thousands of themes and plugins that the Wordpress community contributes. These add ons turn what essentially is a blogging platform, into just about any type of site you want from community to content management systems to storefronts. It truly is amazing.

Over the years I’ve found some very useful plugins, and lately there have been some great developments with social media plugins as well.  Below are my 9 favorite Wordpress social media plugins.  If you are running a hosted Wordpress blog you should definitely check these out.

1. Sexy Bookmarks – I had been using Sociable and Add To Any for awhile, but stumbled across the Sexy Bookmarks plugin and just think this one looks better.  A unique design, simple to use, and…well sexy.

2. Tweetmeme – Certainly you’ve seen plenty of blogs with retweet buttons on the top left of postings.  Chances are they are using the Tweetmeme plugin.  Easy to use, does what it’s supposed to do.  Retweet.com has recently launched offering a similar service, but I like that Tweetmeme has established themselves already with a proven service.

3. Fbshare.me – This just recently launched and mimics the functionality of Tweetmeme but for Facebook.  The facts are Twitter and Facebook are the kings of social media so having both prominently on your blog posts increases the chances that your readers will use them and spread the love.

4. Disqus Comment System – The Disqus plugin transforms your Wordpress comments into a true social media friendly experience.  The plugin integrates social media mentions in addition to your blog comments which helps consolidate all the “chatter” about your blog articles into one place.  Comments load in real time, and users have multiple options regarding how to log in using any of there social media profiles.  Very cool stuff.  Oh, and did I mention it’s free?

5. Twitter Tools – The Twitter Tools plugin simply helps you be more efficient by automatically tweeting your blog posts once you publish.  It also allows you to pull your tweets into your blog posts and offers a ton of customization features to fit your needs.

6. WP Greet Box – Anytime you can give your readers the impression of a custom or personalized experience, that’s a good thing.  The WP Greet Box plugin uses Ajax to automatically identify how your users found your blog articles, and displays the appropriate referrer message at the top welcoming them and suggesting they share accordingly.

7. Fotobook -While Flickr still offers a more robust photo hosting experience, the reality is, most people are consolidating their sharing, and post the majority of their photos on Facebook.  This nifty plugin allows you to easily “import” your Facebook photos and albums into your blog seamlessly.

8. Smart YouTube – This plugin is all about making it quicker and easier for you to embed YouTube videos into your blog posts.  I’m personally more of a fan of Vimeo (check out a plugin here for them), but the fact is, most of the free world is using You Tube.  Regardless, these plugins speed things up considerably.

9. Yet Another Related Posts – While this plugin may not directly be categorized as a “social media” plugin, it’s a must have.  Social Media is all about sharing information, and when you get users to your blog, you should do all you can to share relevant information to them.  This plugin automatically identifies similar articles in your blog, and displays them as related posts.  It’s a great way to keep your readers engaged on your site and to drive down bounce rates.

Those are my favs.  What are yours?

Related posts:

1. Social Media Friendly Blogging
2. My 9 Favorite iPhone Social Media Apps
3. Mobilize Your Wordpress Blog!
4. The Office For Mac Social Media Extravaganza!
5. Making Dough(nuts): A Real World Example of Using Social Media Effectively