Automated list generated by your mentions

So if you've been on twitter at all in the last few months you will by now be familiar with the lists function.  Lists are great in that they allow you to create a list of people (who you don't need to be following) with like interests.  Then more recently I found a great service called listwatcher.  If you follow @listwatcher you will be alerted by DM (Direct Message) of any changes to lists that have you as a member - rename of the list, drop from the list, if you are added to any list.

I have found listwatcher to be helpful in that it monitors the lists I'm on or put on for me.  Hence when I was informed that I had been put on a list called "hotnsassy" I immediately checked it out and found to my relief that it was a list that consisted of social media types.

More recently, I was informed that I had been removed from a list called "conversationlist" (the misspelling is on purpose) maintained by a tweep I frequently converse with @yonitdm.  So I checked it out and found that the list was auto generated by something called conversationlist.com.  The list is regenerated depending on your settings and interactions everyday.  Here is what they say on their website:

To be a little more specific, a "conversationlist" is a Twitter list of the people that you talk to (and about) on Twitter. The list is automatically updated daily, so that it always reflects the people that you are paying attention to right now. If you @reply (or @mention) someone, they're added to your list. If you stop talking to that person, they drop off your list.

I created one of these myself, or actually the website did it for me, based on the settings I am still tweaking.  So if you are anything like me and have a toolbox of twitter related stuff, here's another tool to add.

Twitter - Startup #11 - Other resources

There are many other twitter resources users should be aware of. Many of these I have used in putting together the previous 10 blog entries on twitter. Here are just a few of them:

MakeUseOf Guide to Twitter
My Delicious.com Twittertools bookmarks
Twitter for Business, Twitter for Friends , by Mark Murnahan (@murnahan)
Presentation on Starting to use twitter
Just about anything on Bitrebels.com about twitter

Thanks to Ahad Bokhari (@featureblend) for suggesting this series to me.

Friendfeed and the Tweecious plugin - users beware

I was pointed to a great tool for twitter. It is called tweecious. Tweecious combines twitter and delicious by searching your tweets and saving all the links you have tweeted to your delicious account. This seemed like a really good idea to me, but there was a catch. It works very well and when you first set it up it searches your last 1000 tweets. The problem was that I have friendfeed set up to autotweet anything I bookmark using delicious. This is usually a handy thing to do, but in this case, it was a disaster.

I finished setting everything up and suddenly my twitter stream was deluged with posts from my friendfeed account! Anyone who was following me must have been baffled as to what was going on. I tweeted the problem and stopped it after 30 or 40 tweets.

Here is what you need to do if you have friendfeed set up to autotweet and would like to use tweecious.

1. go to your friendfeed account
2. click on the settings link right next to your avatar
3. click on "Twitter publishing preferences"
4. You should be on a screen that says "Advanced Twitter Settings"
5. Under "Post Entries From:" UNCHECK delicious
6. Click "Save Changes"
   

Now you can set up tweecious. Follow the instructions on the tweecious site and you should be fine. For good measure you should probably leave that setting unchecked for 24 hours, then go back and recheck the delicious setting in friendfeed.

CORRECTION: I thought this was how it worked, but when I rechecked the delicious box in friendfeed after a long delay my twitter stream was once again bombarded with posts I had already made - only the posts with links. So if you use tweecious, you can't in all good conscience check the delicious box in friendfeeds twitter prefs.

The take away: You'll need to tweet the bookmarks you tag with delicious manually.

How "social" is social media?

The question occurred to me while I was on vacation. I hadn't brought a laptop, after all it was my vacation. I looked up from my reading to see the three other people I was with all typing on laptops and could only wonder 'Is that how I look?' Are we being anti-social when participating in social media online?

I guess when I am at the office and the only one there any way, I'm being more social when fraternizing online, but when there is more than one person in the room one must remember to not only be social online, but to remember the social niceties of society. This is not always easy, especially in this electronically tethered world.

We must keep in mind the people around us as well as our online family. I know from personal experience that it is all too easy to get caught up in something like twitter, facebook, or even email and suddenly realize that you've been at it for a few hours without relief. Sometimes I'll see someone in my family sit down to "just check email", or "just check my wall" and I know that extricating them will be a herculean task.

So, remember to take the actual people around you into account.

Social Media - What to say (4 in a series of 5)

To recap: in the first in this series we addressed how to listen. We then went on to talk about getting involved in the second part. In the third part I spoke about the need to give up control. These posts are meant to be read in sequence.

In the fourth part of the series I'll address what you say. It is fairly easy, no matter what platform you are using (twitter, facebook, myspace, ning, blog, etc) be completely honest.

The reason is that in the end the truth will out. If you have not been honest it will come back to haunt you. Remember that unlike the vegas axiom that "what happens in vegas stays in vegas" what happens in social media networks will haunt you forever. A twitter example may be appropriate here. You may spend a significant amount of time and energy building your brand on twitter and acquiring the right kind of followers. One wrong tweet may sully your reputation for quite a long time and lose many of those followers.

Also don't try to sell something to a new follower, get to know them first. You'll get a feel for who would be open to a link to your site and who won't. In the second part in this series I talked about giving more than you get. This means yes you can post a link to your blog or website, but make sure you share 3x more information that isn't about you.

For instance, deciding to set up an auto DM (direct message) for new followers with a plug for your product in it. This is a definite no-no. Although a DM is only seen by you and the person you sent it to, there is a very good chance that the receiver will unfollow you.

Series of 5: Parts 1, 2, 3, 5

Social Media - Giving up control (3 in a series of 5)

In the first of this series I described how to start your social media experience by learning how to listen. If you have read that post, you can catch it here. It is truly important to take that first step seriously.

The second blog post in the series spoke about getting involved. Again, this is a sequential "how-to" so it would be good to read that before this post.

In this post we will move on to the next step in your growth in the social media milieu, giving up control. Social media is all about conversation and community. The old school way of using PR to spread your message by telling people what you are about and presenting your brand must be modified to work in the social media world. If you want people to spread your message in the viral way it can be spread you need to trust them.

Once your message leaves your computer, you will no longer have control over it and if you attempt to control it, there is a good chance that you will counteract any chance you had of getting that message out to a wider audience.

So listen to what people are saying, write copy that is inspiring, truly engage others in your communications and let go.

Series of 5: Parts 1, 2, 4, 5

Retaggr all your social media sites in one place

Retaggr is a service that lets you put all (more than friendfeed offers) your social media sites or logins in one place and it creates an embedded card you can place on your blog (see the bottom of this page). The card is clickable and updates like the friendfeed embedded piece on the side of this blog.

First let's check out the site. Retaggr.com does, of course, have a pay version. The pay version let's you do a lot more customizing. When you first go to the site you are greeted by this screen:



Once you create an account, the site walks you through set up. You can even start by importing all your friendfeed info. The edit profile page is your starting area. Fill in the information to start your profile:



The next tab is the profile photo tab. You can upload a profile photo or use your gravatar.

The tab after that is the heart of retaggr. Here you enter all your sites. They are listed in categories



or you can click on the link to list them alphabetically.



There are more than you can imagine. And if the site you want is not there, which happened to me with a forum site, there is another place to enter that. Remember, you can import your friendfeed sites first then add more.

On the next tab you can add those profiles that weren't listed in the previous tab. Note that retaggr will even check out the site for you and try to capture an icon.



In the Blog tab you can add any blogs you have by entering the blog name, blog URL and Feed URL (this automatically puts a subscribe button next to the blog listing).



You can then add more widgets, professional information, and any affiliations.





When you are done, you can preview the retaggr card



And the retaggr profile page

Wakoopa the social software site

I recently started using another aspect of social media, a social software site called wakoopa. As with so many of the other social media sites I use, I was introduced to this by my son @chronotope on twitter. This site analyzes and tracks the software you are using on the computer you run it on. It tracks both the active application and the background applications. Not only can you review the applications you use, but you can also see other reviews and find other software. One of the options lets you set the site to alert you of software updates.



When you log in and start tracking your profile will look something like this. The top half shows your favorite applications and what you say about each one (you can mark anything as a favorite app), below that are the top ten pieces of software, according to your usage, divided into categories of the past week, past month, and newly used apps. Next to that is some basic info about your software usage and your level of usage according to how much you contribute, how many different apps you use, reviews you write, screenshots and icons you upload, etc.


The next part of the screen shows a usage history graph and some recently used apps (note that most stats are 1-2 days old). You will also see a message section, which can be used to communicate with people you have friended, and some of the point awards you have received to change your level. Below the Awards section is a section showing the most recent reviews you have submitted.



You can see what new software is being used and what people think about it. When you check out a piece of software on wakoopa, it lists other software that does the same thing. this can be real handy if you know a piece of commercial software but want a similar free version. Or if you are having trouble with a certain piece of software another app may do the same thing without giving you problems.

Other users reviews can be quite instructive and helpful in finding the appropriate app to use in any circumstance.

Social Media - Getting involved (2 in series of 5)

In an earlier post, I suggested that the first and most important rule of Social media was to Listen. But it does not become Social until you interact. So the second rule of Social media is to interact with those you have been listening to and learning from. Or simply, engage.

This is not as easy as it may sound. But it is extremely important to remember that all social media is about building communities. Remember that your audience is interested in being involved in the conversation. If you shut them out by expounding too much and you may no longer have an audience.

During the listening portion of your indoctrination into social media you learned how people interact. One of the most quoted axioms is the rule of three or for every one tweet or blog about your interests there should be 3 more tweets/blogs/posts about what most interests your intended audience. In other words, give a lot more than you get.

Social Media is about conversations and building relationships. It takes effort. Don’t just talk about yourself. Ask questions, engage people and link, Most of all be inspiring.

Series of 5: Parts 1, 3, 4, 5