Persuasive Picks for the week of 08/25/08

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The Best Practices In Social Media Marketing Writing Project
Mitch Joel from Twist Image has launched a writing project that encourages marketers to share their best tips for Social Media Marketing, and hopes to build contributions to the project into an ongoing organic resource for marketers to reference in the future. Mitch’s own best practice contribution revolves around consistency.

Before Consistency in Social Media Marketing
Bryan Eisenberg from the FutureNow blog contributes his Social Media Marketing best practices to Mitch Joel’s writing project – in the form of transparency, being social and communicating values. Make the jump to read more!

Three tips for “company blogging”
Google’s Matt Cutts shares three tips for those who blog for their company. Be sure to read through the 60+ comments for additional tips and points of view.

Community Manager Salary Report
Community Strategist Connie Bensen has touched on the subject of Community Manager salaries for almost a year now. This post is her latest entry on the subject and is a great starting point for companies looking to fill such a role in their organization.

Use Ning to Build a Community Around Your Personal Brand
Personal Branding expert Dan Schawbel expands on the power of using Ning to build an online community around your personal brand – and backs it up by highlighting two “big name personal brands” who are doing it successfully.

Persuasive Picks for the week of 08/18/08

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Tiger Wood Walks on WaterTo Reach Prolific Content Sharers, Lay Off the Humor
Dan Zarrella recently completed a very informative viral content sharing report. A portion of the report was featured on the CenterNetworks blog and focuses on how “funny” doesn’t always equal viral.

Don’t be that guy
If you’re new to social media/networks and haven’t done your homework on the do’s and don’ts of online community engagement, then you might be “that guy.” Shannon Paul helps readers identify the traits of “that guy” and provides tips to get them back on the road to recovery.

50 Ideas on Using Twitter for Business
Chris Brogan pumps out another great mega-list to help businesses wrap their heads around using Twitter

Why the Embargo Process Is Broken and Why We Still Need It
Louis Gray expands on the topic of press release embargoes, their importance to businesses and why they need to be honored by blogger and journalists alike.

Don’t Tell, Show Them!
A lot of bloggers have picked up on the Electronic Arts/Tiger Woods YouTube video response this week, but Valeria Maltoni kicks it up a notch by sharing a few techniques that center around whey execution matters. Watch the video, absorb the tips and have a great weekend!

Persuasive Picks for the week of 08/04/08

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Lego Time TrackerAre Social Media Jobs Here to Stay?
Ben Parr from Mashable.com touches upon the future of social media oriented jobs. Are they a flash in the pan or here to stay?

An Anthropological Introduction to YouTube
Be sure to set aside an hour to watch this one. Its well worth it and gives a very detailed and interesting look at the birth and success of the YouTube phenomena.

Marketing 103: Jeff Pulver’s e-mail Marketing Tips
Jeff Pulver shares a plethora of practical e-mail marketing tips based on 13 years of personal experience as a parallel/serial entrepreneur. Extend your e-mail marketing knowledge with additional tips directly from Constant Contact (PerkettPR client).

Twitter Brand Index
A tremendous number of brands are finding their way onto Twitter and there are a wide variety of opinions on how brand activity on Twitter should be approached. While the topic will continue to be up for debate, Jonathan Kash shares his extensive list of brands that are currently on Twitter. By the way, PerkettPR is one of those brands. How are we doing?

Track Your Time with LEGO Bricks
I’ll finish up this week’s picks with something a little light and somewhat humorous. Gina Trapani from LifeHacker.com shares one developer’s take on keeping track of the time spent of various project using Legos instead of more traditional time tracking methods!

Persuasive Picks for the week of 07/21/08

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AOL is MeltingFull Text Of AOL Email: XDrive, AOL Pictures, MyMobile And Bluestring To Shut Down
Assets at AOL continue to crumble with the announcement of four product cuts following the recent coverage of cuts across cuts with their blogging properties their blogging properties. Mike Arrington shares the full text of the official email from AOL EVP Kevin Conroy in this post.

Facebook Connect: OpenID Without the Email
Nick O’Neill from the SocialTimes.com blog shares his view on Facebook’s recently announced “Facebook Connect” initiative that was announced at this week’s F8 Facebook Developer’s Conference. Audio of the Mark Zuckerburg Keynote is also available in a separate post.

What ‘Facebook Connect’ Means for Corporate Websites
The topic of Facebook Connect continues with this great post from Jeremiah Owyang that discusses what this new offering from Facebook might mean to corporations.

What are the five strengths of a Community Manager?
Many of last week’s picks centered around the topic of community. Here’s another good one to add to the bunch written by Mario Sundar, Community Evangelist & Chief Blogger at LinkedIn.

A Guy Walks Into a Bar…
Scott Monty reaches out to the Twitter community in search of answers (punch lines) to the question “How many social media experts does it take to change a lightbulb?” The humorous replies are featured in this post.

Persuasive Picks for the week of 07/14/08

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Twitter Acquires Summize. Confirmed.
Just like chocolate and peanut butter, the two great web apps that go great together make the pairing official.

iPhone vs. BlackberryWhat You Should Know Before you Switch from BlackBerry to iPhone
Unless you’ve been living under a rock without any form of mainstream media coverage for the last few months, you’ve already heard plenty of things about the new Apple iPhone 3G. If you’re a Blackberry user and have been thinking about making the switch, Judi Sohn of WebWorkerDaily.com lists some pros and cons to help you out with the decision. While I’m writing this week’s picks, there are over 400 comments on Judi’s post for you to digest!

Why Most Online Communities Fail
Ben Worthen from the Wall Street Journal blog addresses some of the challenges and hurdles that businesses are facing when creating online communities to support their brand(s).

Why Should I Join Your Network?
While on the topic of building communities, Bill Rice of the BetterCloser.com blog gives tips for businesses to consider when trying to build a successful online community.

Do Startups Need Community Managers?
This past week Marshall Kirkpatrick asked the Twitter and Friendfeed communities if start-ups need community managers. He got a plethora of responses that covered a variety of opinions. Several people who participated provided links to supporting blog posts, so get ready to settle down for a good amount of reading!

Persuasive Picks for the week of 07/07/08

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Is teaching older workers a productivity drain?
Stephen Baker from BusinessWeek.com touches on the topic of training and employee age. The post makes this week’s list of picks since he engaged the community on Twitter for responses on the topic – bravo! Some the sources he included where @mosleyppr and @missup from @PerkettPR and @astrout from client @mzinga.

What Traits Define a Social Media Marketer?
Tamar Weinberg gathers responses from some of the top names in social media, blogging, marketing and SEO to help define the essential skills required for todays social media consultants.

Social Media is not Community
Rachel Happe, of The Social Organization blog and new employee at Mzinga (PerkettPR client) helps clear up the confusion with the differences between “social media” and “community.”

Personal Brand Equity for Rent
Valeria Maltoni discusses how companies will need to adapt to handle employees who are continuing to grow powerful personal brands.

Nine Signs of an Effective Blog Post
Problogger.net guest writer, Dustin M. Wax offers up nine tips to to help maximize the success of every blog post you write.

Google Analytics Help: Questions, Answers, Tips, Ideas, Suggestions
Google Analytics guru, Avinash Kaushik answers analytics questions and give tons of tips and help in the monster blog post.

Persuasive Picks for the week of 06/23/08

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Jared FogelSmart People, Stupid Tweets. Fake News Spreads Fast on Twitter.
Yet another argument to not believe everything you read, and be sure to check your facts. A lot of people fell for this one earlier this week, and Louis Gray lays it all out on the table in this post.

Microwhatting in the enterprise?
Laura Fitton contributes this guest post to Jennifer Leggio’s ZDNet blog and discusses the adoption of “microblogging” as a communication tool in the enterprise.

Using Facebook Pages to Promote Your Blog
Guest blogger, Mike Henry takes a brief look at how Facebook Pages can be a valuable tool in your arsenal when trying to promote your blog.

Twellow!
Bub.blicio.us guest blogger, Michelle Lentz introduces readers to a new “people search” tool for Twitter. Since using the tool myself, I would imagine that Twitter users will finally start paying more attention to the keywords they use in their profiles.

Applying Personal Social Media Techniques to Corporate EMC
EMC Social Media Specialist (and personal branding authority), Dan Schawbel takes readers through an overview of the extensive social media programs he has been involved with at EMC during that past year.

Persuasive Picks for the week of 06/16/08

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O'reilly's Graphing Social Patterns ConferenceGSP East moves Social Media forward
Shiv Singh from the Going Social Now blog shares 5 takeaways from the “Advertising versus Appvertising” panel at O’Reilly’s recent Graphing Social Patterns East Conference. Each takeaway presents an interesting twist on today’s typical social media engagement philosophy and potentially points to the next evolution in Social Media Marketing. Thoughtful perspectives like this make me agree with Shiv on attending the next Graphing Social Patterns conference!

Dave Balter on Word-of-Mouth
John Moore from the Brand Autopsy blog shares his thoughts on Dave Balter’s (of BzzAgent) new manifesto entitled “The Word of Mouth Manual.” While a hard-bound version is available on Amazon, John links readers over to the PDF version for a free read.

How the Red Cross is using Twitter, YouTube, Flickr, RSS and WordPress.com in their disaster response efforts
RexBlog.com shares how the Red Cross is utilizing new media to aid in times of disaster. They’ve been using a wide variety of online tools for a while now and this list is good starting point for building the full picture of the Red Cross’s social and new media efforts.

Now You Can Have a Great Facebook Profile and Have Fun Too!
Ok…you caught me. Technically this post came out last week, but questions about mixing personal and business networking with a single Facebook account continue to be at the top of the list with clients and employees alike. Phil Rosenberg from the reCareered blog lends another perspective on how to reach that happy medium.

Large Firm Getting into Facebook Apps – Many Eyes from IBM
Bill Ives shares some incite and links about IBM’s “Many Eyes” project in the social media software space. Registered members of SocialMediaToday.com might also find IBM’s social media case study white paper useful. A link to it is located on the right column of the SMT.com home page after signing in.

Bonus Pick!

Why I’m Blue
Boston’s own Scott Monty recently announced that he’ll be leaving us here in the east to head up social media for the Ford Motor Company out in Dearborn, Michigan! Obviously, this is an amazing opportunity for Scott and his presence in the Boston social media circle will truly be missed! Congratulations Scott, and we’ll be looking forward to using your future accomplishments at Ford as case studies for how social media in the enterprise is done right! Cheers!

Persuasive Picks for the week of 06/09/08

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Talking About Competitors
John Cass, the newly appointed Online Community Manager for Forrester touches on how to talk about your competitors and shares 5 tips from Dharmesh Shah at OnStartups.com.

Ongoing List of Social Media Examples in the Auto and Car Industy
Jeremiah Owyang provides an excellent list of social media case studied revolving around the automobile industry.

Blog Topics for Business to Business Customers
Coming up with a steady stream of topics for your corporate blog is sometimes not an easy task. This can be especially challenging in the B2B space where topics can be rather, well…dull. Chris Brogan help ease the process with several good suggestions.

H&R Block Social Media Programs Success
Jennifer Jones from PodTech interviews Paula Drum, VP of Marketing for H&R Block on their use of social media tools and the success that they’ve had. Be sure to check out all of Jennifer’s other excellent interview podcasts as well.

Must-Read Books for the Social Media Marketing Newcomer
This post on the Ignite Social Media blog touches on 9 “must read” books for those diving into the social media space.

Persuasive Picks for the week of 06/02/2008

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This week features a shorter set of picks that center around notable videos I’ve spotted. The last even features my appearance on a MyRaganTV.com segment talking about LinkedIn.

Video: Social Media in Plain English
Lee Lefever and his Common Craft videos continue to educate and entertain while breaking down topics in a way that anyone can understand.

Authors@Google: Garr Reynolds
Garr Reynolds, author of the excellent book Presentation Zen, recently spoke at the Google campus. The session has been posted on YouTube for all to enjoy.

Are you LinkedIn?
This week I had the opportunity to contribute some content to MyRaganTV.com. In this segment, I talk about how PR Pros can utilize LinkedIn as a valuable tool for both internal and client work.