ImPREZI Your Audience

Recently, a friend of mine introduced me to a new way to present slide shows, minus the slides. PowerPoint and SlideShare were great...in 1990. Now that we're approaching 2010, perhaps it's time to reinvent the wheel.

Prezi.com is a "canvas" approach to keeping the attention of your audience compared to the monotony of flipping through slides that all look identical. Instead of "sliding" from one slide to the next, Prezi is a "zooming" approach from one concept to the next. With Prezi, the audience has no idea what is coming. Eager anticipation can be the magic words when creating a successful presentation. All you need is the right tools to deliver that result:



The Prezi Blog discusses further techniques that can be learned for this program. Everything from wordles, to imbedded links, to video, Prezi has all the capability of Powerpoint plus the "wow" factor we are missing with the slide show. (Don't worry-if you're too nervous to completely let go of the slide show world, you can upload it into Prezi. No more excuses)And, whether you're giving that presentation to students or a boardroom, keeping your audience engaged is the most chanellenging part. The ripple affects of this program can also extend to a buisness. The last thing customers want is to wade through endless web pages. Why not give them something they can actually learn from? This concept that be applied in many areas of business and education alike.

So, who do you need to imPREZI? Give it a shot. You have nothing to lose but those boring slides!

Are You in the "Loopt?"

How connected are you to your mobile device? One important characteristic that separates our computer from our cell phone is the intelligence factor: your phone knows where you at any given time. What happens when social media utilizes this intelligence function? It invades your privacy.

Does your cell phone have the capability of telling your friends where you are at any given time? Some might find this type of application a turn-off, but programs such as Loopt are interactive programs on mobile phones that help people connect to other people, places, and events.

Often I will see a "tweet" on Twitter with a link from Loopt, showing me exactly where they are, what they might be doing, and any deals or information I can get from the event they may be attending. This is a revolutionary social mapping service. Through Loopt, people can discover the best places and events in town and how your friends rate them. Uploading this feature to Facebook, Twitter, or other social media sites could be the next "big thing" in social media and its platforms.

If you don't like the idea of your friends or your public followers on Twitter knowing where you are, chances are, any location platform may be a turn off to you. Foursquare, for example, gives you and your friends a new way to explore the city in which you live. Much like Loopt, Foursquare works best on your mobile device and lets the user "check in" to places around the city. Through this application, you can recommend places to your friends and get recommendations from them. Foursquare describes this as an "urban mix tape". The site helps make the list and you can in turn share them with friends. The catch? Every check-in earns points. Before you know it, you just knocked your friend out of position and took over as Mayor of Banana Republic.

Before we know it, this technology might become the next Twitter or Facebook. Better get in the Loopt!

Become More "Linked"

Linked In is probably the most comprehensive social networking site for professionals. Free of the public photos that could present embaressing circumstances on sites such as Facebook, Linked In brings a professionalism to social media that is despretely needed.

I recently read an article on Mashable that listed some efficent ways to stay connected on Linked In and utilize the site to its fullest potential. I'm sure most of us feel we could always network better, but don't have the time or may be overwhelmed with the surge of new social media tactics. The truth is, we can always become better at networking, no matter what the technology. It should not be something we run from, but instead, learn more about.

Sharlyn Lauby, President of Internal Talent Management, gives some great advice on creating a Linked In profile that gives the job seekers an advantage over someone who ignores the networking possibilities of the Internet. Linked In is not just another social media site; it's a potential market.

For example, utilizing the status update lets other people know what you are potentially involved in, outside of what the resume explains. If someone has 20-50+ connections, we can guess they probably check their Linked-In profile about once a week. If someone has less than 19 connections, we can probably guess they haven't passed the network of friends and family. These connections will say a lot about how agressive and interested someone is in building their network.

Lauby also speaks about the importance of content on a Linked In profile. Providing a simple online version of your resume is something anyone can do. Go above and beyond what is typical and post portfolio items, links to your blog, or other initiatives you may be involved in. Something this simple could make your profile stand out among your collegues or in a search on your profile. You never know how a connection may help you in the future.

Read Lauby's full article here.

The Online Sticky Note

Nothing can ever replace it. The age-old yellow sticky pad that faithfully sits on our desks-ready to be used at any moment. Nothing could ever replace that cute, endearing notepad. And its matching pen. But, something can come dangerously close. So close, it can take the "post-it" name.

Posterous is an online vehicle where we can post anything. No account needed. Just like the paper sticky pad-just write it down and go.

This inventive site uploads documents, MP3 files, audio, photos, and more. By emailing posterous whatever you need to upload, posterous emails you back with your own site to use in the future. So-need to share a photo, but don't want to show Mom your Facebook? Send it to posterous-and they'll send you a link back that is safe to share.

Posterous even has its own blog, where new ideas of how to use posterous are posted (no pun intended). Maybe I'm getting a little carried away. But this is the type of tool to keep in your back pocket when you need to upload something in a new, safe place.

Your sticky pad might feel threatened. So, pick it up and write this website down.

Have You Caught The Wave?

It seems Google has finally caught on to the social networking phenomenon.

Google Wave, Google's new online community site, is a collaboration of email, social networking, and instant messaging. It may be surprising that the giant search engine has not caught the social media "wave" sooner, however, now that it has, the question is what will it over-take with it's potentially giant tide.

The hope for Google is that this site will replace sites such as Twitter and Facebook, since all of those tools will be located in one place. Wave is Google's attempt at an "app store", which would give outside programmers a share in Wave's success. While Apple sells "apps" for Apple products, Google's apps would have the potential to work on all devices. Could this take over the iPhone specific apps that Apple prides itself from? Could PC users suddenly have the same, if not better, applications that Mac users currently enjoy?

This site certainly has the power to create another "wave" in social media, and with competitors such as Yahoo, this might just be the beginning of new media tools for the online community.

Yahoo! Pipes

Let's say you wanted information about a specific sports team from a specific newspaper, but didn't have the time to go searching for articles every day via the web or the physical newspaper. All you need is a medium that will filter all the newspaper's information every day to a separate account instead of going through the hundreds of articles on your RSS reader, or the thousands that may appear in a web search.

Enter:Yahoo! Pipes.

I recently learned of this new medium and its capabilities in my social media class. For me, this tool is absolutely brilliant. Yahoo! Pipes is a powerful tool that has the capability to collect information from around the web, filter it into a specific topic or word you have requested, and deliver the customized information directly to you, free of an extra stuff you may not want. Unlike the regular reader accounts, Yahoo! Pipes customizes everything so I don't have filter through all of my readers to find one article about the one thing I may be looking for.

By using a filter system, Pipes understand different commands through an output system that delivers all specialized content directly to you. It's like reading a personalized magazine every morning, except every article is actually something you really want to read. By filtering out information we don't want, Yahoo! Pipes had reached a new level of RSS customization and news reading.

Imagine what we could actually do with this. How much easier does this make researching the web for different content, or scanning the web for news about your business or organization? This introduces a new way for us to understand, receive, and filter web content every day. And what's better: it's all free.

Watch this tutorial below and get started with your own pipe. Once you understand its benefits, you'll be saying Yahoo!

Social Media Out of Control?

In this new media phenomenon, one question many businesses may have about using the social mediums is whether or not they will continue to have control of it, like they may have in other marketing areas. Admittedly, yes, diving into Twitter, Facebook, and other social networks can be a risk. But let's not blow the risk out of proportion.

Businesses do have control. Individuals do have control. But we don't have control of everything, and never have. Social media did not suddenly make us feel as though perception is out of our hands. The only thing we've always had that has been constant, and will remain so even with changing technologies is influence.

Take a look at this blog to read more about how to address these issues of control and social media:

http://altitudebranding.com/2009/09/social-media-and-the-reality-of-control/

Is Search the New Homepage?

It is no secret that most web visits begin with search. Think about it.

Do you have the tendency to paste a URL into the search bar, or go straight to Google or another search engine instead?

Because of the fact that most of us go to directly to a search engine when looking for reliable information, it could be argued that search engines are indeed the new homepage of the web. As a result, sites such as Google and Yahoo! have developed aggressive visibility strategies that ensure the company or link you might be looking for comes up on the first page of your search engine, the first time you search for it.

An article Edleman Public Relations has published explores this new phenomena that has developed over the last 10 that "search, without question, is the most dominant online activity". The article speaks to two types of primary visibility tactics: paid search and optimized search. Both of these types of search tactics are a more widely known type of search engine marketing, where the process of buying keywords is an expensive and technical process.

More recently, however, two other types of search tactics have emerged: reputational search and social search. Both of these tactics sit in the hands of public relations practices, utilizing social networks such as Twitter and Facebook to create links to their sites and set up the world wide web for the next upcoming phenomena: search and social networking. What happens when we begin to find all our information from social sites? Could another medium replace the power of Google?

As a result of these new search tactics and the increasing importance of search visibility, how we write has drastically changed. Not only do we continue to write for our audience, we must write for the searchers, and more importantly, the search engines. Learning how to incorporate key words into the text and strategizing where these words are placed on the page suddenly takes precedence over how much content we provide. The dangerous pitfall that can result from this, however, is bad writing. It is important to remember that the English and grammar rules aren't breaking just because the way we search the web is changing. The challenge becomes how to incorporate good, clear writing with the strategic ability to have your article or webpage found.

The power of search has quickly linked with the even more powerful social networking sites. Social search, as the Edleman article outlines, is quickly rising to the top of all search tactics. More search queries are rising from inside communities than directly from Google or other search engines. Understanding this convergence could be one of the best tactics to master.

The Power of 150

In my search to understand internet marketing and this current "groundswell", as Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff call this social technologies transformation (http://www.forrester.com/Groundswell), I recently came across the top 150 "power blogs" in marketing. Advertising Age, one of the prominent authorities in the marketing business, has complied this list at http://adage.com/power150/. In my enthusiasm to keep up with these social media gurus, I added several RSS feeds from their personal blogs to my Google Reader account; a new love I have also recently discovered.

Since last week when I set up these RSS feeds, I have received hundreds of articles, many of which I have not had time to read. But, the ones I have managed to stay current with have been fascinating. I have learned in this week that not only are these blogs sometimes more informative than my textbooks, but the feeds I receive them through have made researching and keeping up with the incoming news incredibly easy.

One blog I found particularly interesting, and from whom I have re-posted articles to my Twitter and Facebook accounts, is http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/. Jeremiah Owyang, a web strategist, has jumped into the conversation about social media, how it affects buisness, and what we can do to make it work for us. For example, his latest post, "The Three Spheres of Web Strategy" (http://tinyurl.com/qkph9m ) resembles something like a presentation you might hear at a buisness conference, sharing information for free with us about how to make your buisness better in this "groundswell" of information we find ourselves in every day. This is important to me as a student because I am engaged in it as a social medium, but also as a business tool. What are the affects of this for the business world? In some ways having a social media device that is open to the public is a glorified thing, but the fact that business can't control it, also makes it an incredibly scary thing. Learning how to successfully ride this fine line every day is an art. And, understanding how to perfect it is essential.

Another power blog I found helpful was by Matt McGee, who comments on search engines and social marketing at http://www.smallbusinesssem.com/. Understanding the collision between the search world and social media is powerful knowledge, especially when you understand how you can be found in black hole we casually call the Internet. Three magic words can turn any search around on this world wide web: Search Engine Optimization. Matt McGee writes good and useful information on these topics and more, originally intended for the small business owner, but useful for anyone attempting to understand how one's personal blog can be found world wide.

I have only named two blogs here that I follow in a list of close to thirty than I try to check daily. But perhaps the attitude we should all be taking is not quantity, but the quality of the information. After all, to be found on the web, you have to keep bringing the people back. This little, neglected blog is surely no example...but maybe someday it will be. Understanding social media in business and in personal life takes time, effort, and patience. But once you can master these social connections like Jeremiah Owyang and Matt McGee have, who at one time I'm sure knew just as much as I do, the possibilities are endless. Find a niche, gain your audience, and bingo. You have become an authority on your topic. So, keep powering those blogs, friends. You never know who is reading.

Social Trumps All

I recently visited a new site I had never been to before, www.alexa.com. This site ranks the top sites in the world according to specific data. Combing through the massive amounts of information I scrolled through the top vistited sites online in the United States. I am not sure what was more surprising: the fact that most of the sites I saw were mostly social networking sites, or that Wal-Mart, the number one retailer in the United States, came in at a pathetic 44.

The top ten sites were probably what you and I would both expect. Google ranked number one, reaching a far higher popularity than any other site. But Yahoo! came in above Facebook with Youtube following closely behind. Of course, it should come as no surprise that sites like Facebook and Youtube are among the top visited sites in the United States, but it is somewhat of an awakening that we prefer to read-up on what our friends from high school are doing or watch an amateur video online than visit a news site. CNN did not even make the top ten sites; instead it came in 17, not exactly a close fourth after Youtube.

I find it fascinating to visit a site and look up the statistics of what the rest of the world frequents on the internet. But why has social media and social sites become so popular? Is it really that appealing to "tweet" or "facebook" people whom you may have never met, or follow celebrity updates, as boring as they may be? Could the 140 character status bar Twitter has developed really become a source of news for some people?

As a college student in the middle of all of this buzz and hype surrounding social media, these numbers on www.alexa.com aren't a shock to me. But evolution of where we get our information on a daily basis, however, is. As a nation, and a world, we will visit Google or Twitter or Facebook hours before we will open a news story.

A search through India and England's top sites showed similar results to the United States. We are becoming a globalized world, connected by the touch of a keyboard to anyone in the world. The only thing I have to wonder is how impersonal we have become and where we could be headed. What matters to us shows in how we search the internet and what sites we frequent. Whether all this hype and popularity with social media can be a good thing in the long run has yet to be seen. I certainly can relate to the billions visiting these sites every day.

Take a look at www.alexa.com and explore for yourself the fascinating trend social media has taken in our world.

The Sociology of Social Networking and Its Success

In the course of the past several weeks as I have been researching all the available tools social networking can actually provide, it occurred to me that the general marketing networks like Twitter and Ning.com provide has the potential to not only expand business; it has the potential to create it.

In a world where communication hinges on success, those of us who have entrepreneurial spirits, and those of us who don't, have a niche we can capitalize on. Social networking has become a phenomenon because of its individuality. Anyone can be social on the internet. Anyone can create business through social networking if the right tools are utilized. The question thus becomes, does your network actually work?

As a college student studying how these networks function and feed off one another, I have realized that there is a way to capitalize on social media if we understand human psychology and the sociology behind doing business with people we have never met, and may never meet in person. Social networking is a sociological phenomenon. Why? Because it disobeys the rules we typically adhere to on a day to day basis, and its growing exponentially. It's curious to me that many are attempting to discover how to break into this networking market. The rules to this game are very basic, but they are also very calculated. Networking is all about human interaction and relationship building. If you're good at this, who's to say you can't create a niche market? The variable in this equation simply results in how you develop those relationship and understand their needs.

If we can follow this trend in business, we can create other trends, and the glass ceiling disappears. The question thus becomes, what's the next trend and how do we find it? How do we create the next business? Largely, what I have discovered is that relationships become a key component, and are sometimes the only component to the next revolution in communication. If we can truly understand our network, and connect with it, I believe our chances of success will suddenly suddenly increase.

Truly Contagious Tweeting of Twitter

I recently signed up for a Twitter account. At first it was simply a tool I was required to use for research at my internship, but then I became addicted to its simple, 140-character, single-sentence updates. It quickly became a source of entertainment, followed by a source for news, followed by source for...well, just about everything.

It seems to me that as we continue to develop our technology into better, faster, and more efficient mediums, the information we seek at our fingertips becomes more and more concise. We no longer require lengthy news stories or sixty-minute interviews. All we need is 140 characters or less to tell us what is going on with who, where, how, when that fascinating one-sentence event happened, and why it so important that I log on to view it, via this thing we call a "tweet." Since when did life become so simple that we are satisfied with a question in 140 characters...or less?

I started to realize the importance of this phenomenon when I recently saw a news article reporting on George Stephanopoulos' "twitterview" with Senator John McCain. An interview completed conducted in, you guessed it, 140 characters or less via the internet. Single sentence questions followed by single sentence answers. To the point. Concise. Beautiful.

A few weeks prior I discovered the popularity of "tweeting" when I found out such things called "tweet-ups" existed. We are not tempted to meet up with those on our LinkedIn network, even if we don't know them. I'm not even tempted to meet up with those I have on my Facebook account, whether I know them personally or not. I have generally found the idea of meeting up with a complete and total stranger...well, strange. Yet, the idea of meeting those in person whom I "follow" via my twitter account is engaging. Why? What is it about this status-update tool that effectively breaks these social rules we once held about, "do not talk to strangers?" Instead, we want to talk to them. In fact, the more "tweets" that follow mine, the merrier!

I don't have an answer to this question yet, but I think it is an important one to ask. Is this thing we call "tweeting" indiciative of the direction communication seems to be going? It is curious to me how this fun, little tool has begun to change the way we communicate, nearly overnight.

I have come to realize that it is not so much the concise material these "tweets" are made up of that is so engaging, but rather the timing. Twittering is instant. You can upload your responses, get replies, or post from wherever you are in seconds. As a result, this instant gratification has become the new normal for society. And, communication, is moving more quickly than ever before. It begs the question what will follow Twitter. What will the next phenomenon in communication be?

Interesting. For now, I'm content with my "tweets." I know I can follow that.