Social Media book for absolute beginners

By Tim Priebe on July 26, 2010 at 10:13 am in Reviews, Social Networking

The Social Media Marketing BookFrom time to time, people ask me where to find a good absolute beginner’s guide to social media and social networking. As you might imagine, those aren’t books I read, so it’s somewhat difficult for me to find one I can really recommend.

Recently Jerry Pournelle, a famous sci-fi author, wrote a succinct review about The Social Media Marketing Book (affiliate link warning), by Dan Zarrella. Although Pournelle’s review here (scroll down a bit after clicking) is fairly succinct, here’s his comment on who this book is good for:

That should give you an idea of who this book is meant for: people who want to promote products by using the new social media like Facebook and Twitter, but who don’t know the game: either because they’re just getting started, or they are old fogeys who haven’t kept up with the enormous explosions on the Internet. Incidentally, you may count me in the latter group.

Sounds like it’s probably good if you haven’t used social media at all and really need a primer.

Learn from Half Price Books’ Social Network Marketing

By Tim Priebe on July 7, 2009 at 7:00 am in Reviews, Social Networking

Twitter bird hiding behind Facebook LogoA new Half Price books opened up recently here in Oklahoma City, and this past weekend my dad and I went to check it out. Great store. I grew up in Dallas and frequently visited the original Half Price Books while there.

$50 later and back at home, I decided to look up Half Price books on all the social networks. They’re doing a great job with their Facebook page, and I became a fan of them there. Then, after some searching, I found their Twitter account. Wow. Did they set it up with the intention of failing?

Edit: While the tips in this blog entry still apply, Half Price Books has contacted me directly to let me know that they did not set up the Twitter account and have already had Twitter suspend the account. They may not be responding on Twitter, but they replied to my blog with a blog comment, then with an email, all in less than 36 hours after the blog went online!

Let’s take a look at both the great things they’ve done with the Facebook page, and the terrible job they’ve done with the Twitter account.

Twitter

Half Price Books' Twitter page1. They’re not promoting it on their website.

In the spirit of full disclosure, we at T&S are not yet promoting our Twitter account on our website. But we should be. And so should Half Price Books.

2. They haven’t entered in a name.

Companies need to enter in their company name, not just their username. Initially, I searched for “Half Price Books.” That got me nowhere. I tried a few variations, before finally just typing in http://twitter.com/halfpricebooks. So they need to make their account easier to find. This will also help in search engines, as currently the Twitter account does not show up in searches for “Half Price Books.” (Note: I only checked the first 15 pages of results.)

3. They aren’t using it.

Here’s a blindingly obvious one. Twitter is a great method for communication. Half Price Books’ news page on their website has plenty of available content they could be reusing on their Twitter account. But I’m not visiting their website on a daily basis, and neither are you. The average consumer is much more likely to visit Twitter on a daily basis than they are the Half Price Books website. That’s not conjecture, it’s based on hard data.

4. People are talking about them on Twitter, and they aren’t responding.

At the time of this blog entry’s writing, a Twitter search for “Half Price Books” revealed 34 mentions of them within the past 24 hours. And only two results for @halfpricebooks, because people don’t know it’s there. (One of those two is a tweet I wrote.) Most of the tweets are praise, which they should be thanking those customers for. And what kind of statement is it making when they’re not responding to criticism?

Facebook

Half Price Books' Facebook page1. They’re letting people know it’s out there.

They’ve linked to the page on their main website. What a concept! It’s on the front page, it’s prominent, and people are obviously clicking on it, because they have over 14,000 fans. And I’ll tell you a secret: They didn’t have to get a Facebook ad, they just used a website they already had. (I have no clue if they’ve also purchased Facebook advertising.)

2. They have a username.

They’re keeping up to date on Facebook developments, and have obtained a username for their page. This definitely hasn’t hurt their search engine placement in Google, as their Facebook page is on the first page of Google results for “Half Price Books.”

3. They’re actually using it to communicate.

At the time of this blog entry’s writing, they had five entries over the last month or so. They could probably use it slightly more often, but they’re definitely making use of it while not spamming fans. As with Twitter, more people are visiting Facebook than Half Price Books’ website, so this is a great communication tool for them.

So what’s the overall lesson we can take back to the social network marketing our businesses do? Simply put, utilize what’s out there. Remember, these tools are free, aside from time spent, and are even better than your own website at keeping in contact with current and potential customers. You still need your own website to provide in depth details about your business to those who are interested, but making use of the social networking tools that are out there is a no-brainer.

Review of LittleSnapper (as a designer)

By Dave Roach on April 27, 2009 at 6:00 am in Design, Mac, Reviews

Recently I purchased LittleSnapper through Macheist, a super amazing bundle of mac applications (plus the proceeds go to charity). Sorry PC users, this application is for Macs only =( Anyways, LittleSnapper basically takes screenshots of entire webpages…no matter how tall the page is and puts it in a library of screenshots:

LittleSnapper Gallery

This is very handy for many applications. If you have a need to display a screenshot an entire webpage for a portfolio or gallery, LittleSnapper makes this easy. Furthermore, if you are a designer, you can bookmark screenshots of a tutorial and go back to it later, and even make a colleciton of tutorials to view whenever you need them.

Another cool feature about LittleSnapper is that it allows you to snap specific elements within a site. This makes things much more accurate than trying to make a screenshot yourself:

Element screenshot

Screenshots can be taken straight from your browser  and are automatically imported into LittleSnapper, or you can use LittleSnapper’s built in browser, which is especially handy when taking images of specific elements.

What makes LittleSnapper so cool though is what you can do with your screenshots after they have been taken. You can easily annotate your screenshots and upload them to share with others! Check out my website dnroach.com in edit mode:

Annotating

As a designer, LittleSnapper is a handy little tool that I have used daily since I got it. It makes things much easier and streamlined on my part, and it’s a simple application that doesn’t get in the way either. Check out http://www.realmacsoftware.com/littlesnapper/ to read about more features and check it out for yourself.

LittleSnapper is on Twitter!

Pikchur: Good for uploading pictures to social networks, or good for nothing?

By Tim Priebe on April 14, 2009 at 8:54 pm in Reviews, Social Networking

Piktchur homepageHere at T&S, we love tools that let us update multiple social networking and social media websites in one fell swoop. We’re big fans of ping.fm, a website that updates your statuses across multiple sites. So when we heard about Pikchur, a website that would allow you to update multiple websites with your pictures at once, we were eager to try it out. I was the willing volunteer.

Pikchur currently supports Twitter, Tumblr, Jaiku, Facebook, FriendFeed, Identi.ca, Plurk, Brightkite, Totspot Rejaw, Koornk and Flickr. I was immediately disappointed that it didn’t have MySpace in the list. I’m not a huge MySpace fan, but I try to keep my pictures there as up to date as my Facebook page.

I went ahead and signed up for Twitter, Facebook, FriendFeed and Flickr, and started uploading pictures. The first major drawback I found was that I could only upload one image file at a time. What a pain! I had 15 pictures to upload, and if I was a more casual social networking user, I probably would have bailed at that point.

pikchur_logoThe upload process did let me put in the location, although it turns out it didn’t share that information with the other websites. By default, Pikchur stores your pictures themselves, with a gallery and pages you can view them on. So here’s how it interacted with each of the social networks:

Twitter

Tim's Twitter homepage after using PikchurPikchur posted a tweet for every single picture I uploaded, with a link back to Pikchur’s website to view. A batch upload option with just one tweet would have been nice here. I’m sure this was annoying for those following me on Twitter.

Facebook

Here, Pikchur created its own Pikchur album. I did not put a description in when I uploaded the pictures, so Pikchur posted some annoying message for other people to visit Pikchur and use them. I had to go in, delete all the descriptions for each picture, then rename the album.

FriendFeed

FriendFeed got the same treatment Twitter did, with a status update with a link for every single picture. Annoying.

Flickr

picture-3Flickr had the same results as Facebook, down to the annoying “Send pics 2 Flickr from your mobile device, and view full size @  pikchur.com/wp7″ for the description. I had to delete the descriptions and put the pictures in a set.

So there’s two gripes I have with Pikchur right now. First, they need to not automatically put their plug in where my description goes. Second, and more importantly, they need to allow for multiple files to be uploaded at once. This would create a set on Pikchur, Facebook, Flickr and similar sites. On FriendFeed, Twitter and other related sites, it would result in only one link sent out, not one per picture.

Until they at least add multi-file upload support, I won’t be using Pikchur any more.

The Fireworks Advantage

By Dave Roach on January 22, 2009 at 4:14 pm in Design, Development, Reviews

Adobe Fireworks CS4 BoxFireworks is often overlooked. Many (most) web designers today use Photoshop to design their websites, and a lot of them have never considered or (*gasp) even heard of Fireworks. Adobe Fireworks is made for creating websites. That is what it was built for, and it does it well. Fireworks enables you to rapidly prototype and design for the web. With it you can create a clickable PDF that will act as a prototype. Also, you can quickly create export and optimize slices (Fireworks is better at optimizing images than Photoshop).

Now don’t get me wrong, Photoshop is an extremely powerful tool and is amazing; it has way more features than Fireworks, but if all you are doing is designing websites, then you should use software that was specifically made for doing just that. Another excellent feature to note about Fireworks is that it is compatible with Photoshop. For the most part, you can open a psd in Fireworks, and it will recognize all of your layers and styles, and with CS4, compatability between Adobe’s programs have been further improved.

If you are a web designer and have not looked into using Fireworks, you should at least try it out and see for yourself how efficient it really is. There are hundreds of other excellent features Fireworks has to offer, read more about them at Adobe’s site.

For all your listening needs…

By Dave Roach on January 5, 2009 at 1:22 pm in Hardware, Reviews

Sometimes I find the best way to concentrate on my work and get a lot done is to just put on some headphones and work in my own little world. This (hopefully) will decrease outside distractions and allow me to not only get work done, but get it done well. I find that music is is one of (if not the best) way to get some creative juices flowing. These are the main reasons I have decided to buy some new headphones!Sennheiser HD-280 Pro

All this being said, I first wanted to find some headphones that were comfy. If I’m going to be wearing them all day, I don’t want my ears to hurt. Also, I want them to be easily removable in case I need to take them off and put them back on a lot. For these reasons, I decided that over the ear headphones would be best. Currently, I have a pair of Sony MDR-V150 which are decent, but after a couple hours they kind of hurt because they are a tight fit. In looking for a new pair, I know Bose makes nice headphones, so that’s where I started. I actually listened to a pair of Bose around-ear headphones at Target, and they sounded awesome, but after some research, I found out that Sennheiser makes some of the best headphones out there.

After some more reasearch on Amazon.com and Headphone.com (which by the way has excellent reviews) I decided to go with a pair of Sennheiser HD 280 Pro headphones. I have to say that these are the best headphones I have ever used. They sound even better than the Bose around-ear headphones and are extremely comfortable. I got these $200 headphones off Amazon.com for about $75.

If you are in the market for some headphones of any type, I would recommend starting your search at Headphone.com, they know their stuff. I actually used this article that recommended the best headphones to use with an iPod, which is how I ultimately made my decision.

The Logitech V200 Cordless Mouse

By Tim Priebe on August 27, 2008 at 6:30 am in Hardware, Reviews

Since Dave reviewed his mouse he’s only had for a week or two, I thought I’d go ahead and comment on my no-frills red Logitech V200 cordless mouse I’ve had for about six months now.

This is my third mouse in about two years, and it’s finally the one I think I’ll be sticking with. It’s simple and usable, and goes fantastic with my other red desk accessories. I use it on my desktop, and it’s only a hair smaller than some of the desktop mice I’ve used.

As you can see, the USB receiver isn’t nearly as small as Dave, but if you’re using it on a desktop instead of a laptop, it’s not a big deal at all. And if you do use it on a laptop, the receiver snaps on the bottom with no problem.

Unlike some of the other mice I have, this one will go a couple months before I have to swap out the batteries. I’ve literally had zero problems in the six months I’ve owned it.

The Logitech VX Nano

By Dave Roach on August 20, 2008 at 6:30 am in Hardware, Reviews

Recently I decided to buy myself a new mouse, since my old one was getting, well, old. After some research, I found that the Logitech VX Nano got really good reviews, so I ordered one. I eneded up getting it in the mail about two weeks ago, and I have to say that this mouse is awesome!

The features of this mouse are awesome, a scroll wheel that you can change between hyper fast scrolling and precise scrolling, side scrolling, forward and back buttons (programmable), another button for switching programs (also programmable), low battery indicator, side grips, and best of all, the nano receiver. You know that usb receiver you use to get signal for your wireless mouse? If you’re lucky, then it might be the size of a thumb drive. How about the size of a nickel? The nano reciever is so small, you can stick it in your laptop and never take it out, since it can fit in the bag just as well with it in as with it out.

It can also be stored inside of the mouse and can be ejected with a little button which I thought was cool.

When I first got it, I tried scrolling it noticed how the scroll wheel spun all by itself which is awesome. I didn’t realize until later that it could be changed to the standard clicky scroll wheel until I pushed it down and it changed. At first I though I broke it! Pretty cool feature. It also came with Duracell batteries (always good), a USB extender dock thing for easy access to a desktop usb port and a nice mesh protective case. The only very small issue I have with this mouse is its size. While it’s not a tiny mouse, it still is not a full size mouse either. For someone with smaller hands it would be perfect, but I prefer larger mice. When I ordered it I knew that it was going to be smaller, so I don’t want to say that this mouse isn’t good because it’s small, it’s meant to be that way. If I want a bigger mouse for my desktop I would probably go with a Logitech MX or Logitech G5. Anyways, that’s my two cents. If you are considering getting a portable mouse, I would definitely recommend this mouse first.