The document provides an overview of social media best practices based on the author's experience. It recommends starting by participating in social media communities to learn, then thinking through goals and policies before picking appropriate tools. Key steps include measuring metrics before and after campaigns, listening and engaging during campaigns, and identifying lessons learned to improve future efforts. The overall message is that social media is about building relationships and having conversations, not just broadcasting messages.

1. Practicing Social Mediain the Real World Mack D. Male January 2010

2. Software developer for Questionmark Social Media Guy! Entrepreneur! Started my company in 2000 Started blogging in 2003 Joined Twitter in 2006 (#985) Launched Podcast Spot in 2006 Launched ShareEdmonton in 2009 Organized dozens of events in the last couple of years, started writing more about Edmonton. Passionate Edmontonian. Who am I?

3. Name Where you’re from What you do How are you feeling about social media today? Excited? Scared? Who are you?

4. Let’s make this interactive! Ask lots of questions! Social Media Overview (quick) A Campaign in Action Walk through the various steps Look at some examples Identify strategies Test out some tools Agenda

5. Social Media Overview Are we all on the same page?

6. Less than 200 pages, still relevant to read today! Contains 95 theses: Markets are conversations. Conversations among human beings sound human. Join the conversation. The Cluetrain Manifesto

7. I believe we crave connection with others. Social media is about people, and the relationships between people. Social Media is about people.

8. There’s no such thing. Has anyone spent 10,000 hours on social media?  http://www.gladwell.com/outliers/ One study in December 2009 found that there were 15,740 Social Media Experts on Twitter. http://mashable.com/2009/12/27/social-media-experts-twitter/ How hard could it be if there are so many? Social Media Experts

9. A Campaign in Action Where do we start?

10. Start participating! Think. Plan. Create a list of goals. Get the right people involved. Pick the right tools. Measure before your campaign. Launch your campaign! Listen, participate, engage. Deal with the good and the bad. Track things as you go. Measure after your campaign. Identify lessons for the future. Overview

11. Become familiar with the communities, the tools, and the etiquette. Listen, listen, listen. Try a variety of different social media services, to learn the pros and cons. Be patient (think: Twitter). Don’t be afraid to ask for help! Start participating!

12. Don’t reinvent the wheel! Can be difficult to join an existing community, but it’s totally worth it. Twitter: http://www.twellow.com http://wefollow.com Strategy: Find existing communities.

14. Okay I’m on Twitter. Now what?

15. Do some housecleaning. Pick a good username. Change your profile pic. Keep your tweets public.

16. Enter your website URL. Set your location. Post a few updates. Resist the temptation to follow everyone.

17. Learn the lingo. Tweets, Replies, Retweets, Hashtags, Twooshes, Direct Messages, Tweetups

18. Twitter is like sex. You can read all the stuff (or look at it) about sex all you want, but if you’ve never had it, you simply have no idea what it’s like. http://michaelmartine.com/2008/04/11/twitter-is-like-sex/

19. There are entire blogs devoted to writing about Twitter applications: http://everythingtwitter.com

20. There are so many great blogs out there! Start reading a few, and you’ll be amazed at what you can learn. A few that I enjoy: http://www.mashable.com http://www.readwriteweb.com http://www.chrisbrogan.com Remember that there are no experts, only those who have taken the time to learn! Read and learn.

21. Before you do anything, stop and think: is social media right for me, for this campaign? Think. Plan.

22. Edmonton is bidding to host EXPO 2017. Report recommending that the City move forward was release in October 2008. January-March 2009, volunteer committees were formed for theme, site, and community engagement. The Bid Booster Club launched in July 2009. Submission to province and feds was November 2009. Running out of time to demonstrate strong community support for the national bid! Case Study: EXPO 2017

23. Established a presence on many social media sites: http://www.twitter.com/edmontonexpo17 http://www.facebook.com/edmontonexpo17 http://www.youtube.com/EdmontonEXPO2017 http://www.flickr.com/photos/edmontonexpo2017/ 470 fans on Facebook, 493 followers on Twitter Haven’t updated since January 20, infrequent updates prior to that Case Study: EXPO 2017

24. What’s the problem? They have nothing to share, and they’re not interested in a conversation. Like the Olympics, bid organizers didn’t want to give away too many details to the competition Culture of secrecy and lack of information sharing It got worse when Calgary announced it was also bidding Convinced they need to focus on the politicians, and not the average citizen! Case Study: EXPO 2017

25. Before you do anything, stop and think: is social media right for me, for this campaign? Be prepared. Have a plan of attack ready. Create your policies up-front (where possible). Think. Plan.

26. Internal and external, but be open about them. Don’t forget about the policies you already have: Employee Procedures External Relations Crisis Management Comment Policy (external) http://www.transformingedmonton.ca Friend/Fan Policy (internal, maybe external) Ex. Teachers! Privacy Policy When to ignore, when to respond, when to notify others. What policies?

27. What do you want to accomplish with your campaign? Think of it as your mission statement. Just want a presence Sell more widgets More visits to your existing websites More downloads of key information Increased community engagement Reduce costs, increase satisfaction Etc. Create a list of goals.

28. Who will take ownership of the plan & goals? Who in your organization is already involved in the project? What untapped expertise do you have? Get the right people involved.

29. Depends on what you learned when you started participating, on what your goals are, on who you have on your team. TIP: Consider breaking them up into four categories: Text Photos Audio Video Don’t forget: RSS Pick the right tools.

30. Short updates? http://www.twitter.com Documents? http://www.scribd.com Presentations? http://www.slideshare.net Bookmarks? http://delicious.com Blog? http://www.wordpress.com Others: http://docs.google.comhttp://www.blogger.com http://www.reddit.comhttp://www.yammer.com http://www.digg.comhttp://www.facebook.com Pick the right tools: Text

31. http://www.flickr.com http://www.smugmug.com http://www.facebook.com Pick the right tools: Photos

32. http://www.libsyn.com http://www.blubrry.com http://www.podbean.com Pick the right tools: Audio

33. http://www.youtube.com http://www.vimeo.com Pick the right tools: Video

34. You’re using Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr, Digg, delicious, etc. How can you tie them all together? Use a blog. Make it your social media hub. Ex. http://blog.mastermaq.ca The importance of blogs: http://blog.mastermaq.ca/2009/07/13/social-media-and-the-city-centre-airport-debate/ Strategy: Use a blog for cohesion.

35. This is important! You need to establish a baseline. Again, it depends on your goals. If your goal is increased customer satisfaction, you might need to do a survey. If your goal is to establish a presence, you can use a variety of online tools. Measure before your campaign.

36. Surveys, questionnaires, etc. http://www.surveymonkey.com Web presence http://www.compete.com http://www.alexa.com http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com http://www.woorank.com Social media presence: http://socialmention.com https://analytics.postrank.com http://grader.com Tools for measurement before!

37. Keep your goals and policies in mind. Be patient, but not too patient. TIP: Remember what each service is good at! On Twitter, frequent updates On YouTube, short, engaging videos On a blog, longer, regular posts Launch your campaign!

38. Listen Monitoring of the conversations, multimedia, ratings, threads/forums Reactive & Proactive Participate Establish presence, offer information, answer questions, respond to comments, establish relationships Engage Go where people are connecting, stimulate, compile Range of engagement: receive suggestions and comments, compile input for decisions Listen, Participate, Engage. http://tinyurl.com/EdmSM

39. Capture positive comments, posts, and other stories to share with your team, your managers, etc. When something goes wrong, remember your policies: When to ignore When to respond When to notify others Deal with the  and .

40. What are you tracking? Depends on your goals, but also wise to just track what people are saying about you. How much time should you spend? It’s a good idea to have a budget. Who should do the tracking? Good opportunity to split the work amongst your team. Track things as you go.

41. Wide spectrum of tools, from free to expensive. From the Journal of Interactive Advertising: Track things as you go. http://www.jiad.org/article127

42. Free tools: http://www.tweetdeck.com http://search.twitter.com http://reader.google.com (feeds) http://www.google.com/alerts (keywords) http://www.google.com/analytics (web stats) http://www.youtube.com/my_videos_insight (video stats) Tools for tracking!

43. Some feeds are just really busy and you parsing it is tough, time consuming work. In other words, there’s a high signal-to-noise ratio! Filter the content of those feeds to zero in on the stuff you’re interested in. http://pipes.yahoo.com Strategy: Use Yahoo Pipes to filter.

44. Social media is not advertising. Remember, it’s about people. Common sense always applies! http://blog.mastermaq.ca/2009/12/15/social-media-and-ask-premier-ed/ Case Study: Ask Premier Ed

45. Tell the truth! People don’t want to be lied to. Use the tools for what they are good at. Talk with the community, not to the community. Learn from your mistakes. Lessons from Ask Premier Ed

46. Use the same tools you used when measuring before your campaign started. Augment the metrics with information gathered during your regular campaign tracking. Measure after your campaign.

47. Consider holding a debrief with your team. Focus on pluses and deltas. Pluses – things you did really well! Deltas – things you would do differently next time. Write it all down, and share it with others. You learn more by teaching! Consider an Advisory Committee: http://blog.mastermaq.ca/2009/11/09/the-city-of-edmontons-social-media-advisory-committee/ Identify lessons for the future.

48. Start participating! Think. Plan. Create a list of goals. Get the right people involved. Pick the right tools. Measure before your campaign. Launch your campaign! Listen, participate, engage. Deal with the good and the bad. Track things as you go. Measure after your campaign. Identify lessons for the future. Overview – revisited!

49. Mack D. Male mack@paramagnus.com 780.619.3864 http://www.mastermaq.ca http://blog.mastermaq.ca http://twitter.com/mastermaq Basically, I’m mastermaq at your favorite service  Contact