Top 10 Things I Learned About Social Media re: Perspectives On Social Media Marketing

1. “How would you define social media?” (2)

To me, social media is the way or ways in which people can communicate with an audience via communities on the internet. Being a frequent user of social media for a long while, that’s not quite what I learned from this class. I learned about companies use social media to reach their potential consumers via various platforms and methods.

2. “Often, companies make the mistake of thinking that creating a Twitter account or Facebook page is “doing social media” (25)

Initially, I thought the whole marketing via social media thing would be fast and easy. I soon learned just how time-consuming it is. There’s a lot of work that goes into creating and managing content on different channels.

3. “You want to identify the platforms where people talk about your industry, about topics that align with your brand’s values, about situations where your brand might have some relevance” (236)

I learned about brands following the crowd, so to speak. On Disney’s Tumblr blog, disney.tumblr.com, there are a lot of posts like these. Disney has a huge fan following on Tumblr, so the decision to appeal to those people via the one-two punch combo of gifs and Disney was wise. They knew of their relevance on the blogging platform, and adapted to what the community likes to see.

4. “Setting goals for social media success is vital” (242)

This turned out to be a good strategy for expanding my brand. By deciding “I’ll post this to this blog, then that to Twitter, and wait a bit before my next post”, I always knew what it was that I had to do. It’s easier to remember to put out more information relevant to your product (if you have one), if you can set goals in a sort of schedule-like fashion.

5. “What it all points to is the fact that you need to have a multi-channel strategy and then underlining all of that an in-depth, global strategy.” (116)

I had not thought of the need for a multi-channel strategy before, but I am glad to have implemented it. On my Twitter, for example, I have the urls of the other platforms I use for my Boarding the Bandwagon project listed in one place in the description. I also tweeted a link to my Youtube video talking about my idea. By expanding your horizons by spreading your brand to other websites, you can garner more interest and attention.

6. “Personal branding plays a critical role in self-promotion” (17)

On my own blog, I chose to stick with a friendly, casual way of speaking and presenting my information. I felt like that would resonate better with people, since the purpose of my social media 4 social change project was to ease people into social media. I think my typing style would help to promote what I’m doing, because it comes across as approachable and therefore the information on my various social media platforms are more accessible and marketable.

7. “In short, when building a blog, strategy, moderation, promotion, and measurement are key considerations that all marketers should think about.” (118)

Before this class, I’ve only ever blogged casually. There’s no real need to have a strategy or to promote blog posts that are just about your personal life, unless your personal life is essentially what you’re selling. I learned that if you’re blogging as a way of reaching people for a specific purpose, though, you need to have an idea of what you’re doing and you need to promote it. I did just that by posting links to my Blogger posts on Twitter and Facebook, and sometimes Instagram.

8. “In terms of specific tools, I think listening and measurement tools are fairly essential” (84)

I did not realize that Blogger allowed you to view your stats. Knowing your pageview count and where your traffic is coming from can really help you. If one post has significantly more pageviews than another, it may be a good idea to do another post similar to that one.

9. “Widgets can be used for entertainment or for a specific function, adding features such as maps, weather charts, calculators, content sharing, polls—if you have a specific need, chances are there’s a widget for it.” (134-135)

Honestly, I did not know that widgets still existed. Nor did I know the extent to which they can do. A social media campaign could definitely make use of one widget or another.

10. “Now, people have always shared information—that activity wasn’t invented with social media. But what social media does is allow us to understand the ins and outs of that sharing.” (226)

Prior to this class, I had not realized just how important sharing information between platforms was. It helps to spread your message and reinforce it. It can also show you, with use of things like pageview statistics, which platforms are getting the most traffic, and where they’re getting it from (for example: my Blogger site, the corresponding Twitter account in which I share links to my posts whenever I update).

Post a selfie on social media and join in the new revolution...

Now here's a good example of social media for social change. The second annual Fashion Revolution Day is coming up this April 24th. It's a holiday in memory of the 1,133 dead and over 2,500 injured during the collapse of a building composed of multiple clothing factories in Bangladesh. For this occasion, people will post selfies showing the tags on their clothing, then tweet the companies behind them and ask who made the garment. The intention is to bring awareness to the dehumanizing conditions so many garment-makers in poorer nations are subjected to. The hashtag #whomademyclothes will be used. Keep an eye out on Twitter, or maybe participate yourself!

http://www.halifaxcourier.co.uk/what-s-on/arts-entertainment/post-a-selfie-on-social-media-and-join-in-the-new-revolution-1-7213769

My pitch!

"What is Instagram?"

Recently my mother asked me this question. To put it simply, it's just a platform for photoblogging.

"Okay, but what's photoblogging?" she asked, as may you. A Photoblog is basically "sharing various photos with the world".

How do you use Instagram? Simple!

First, find the app on your cell phone's app store (Google Play or iTunes).
1. Download the app and create your account.
2. Then you can do one of two things:
A: Click the camera button in the middle of your bottom toolbar OR
B: Exit the app and go to your phone's camera.
Take a picture using either of these methods.

Instagram tutorial #shusocialmedia http://boardingthebandwagon.blogspot.com/2015/04/what-is-instagram.html?m=1

A photo posted by boarding the bandwagon (@boardingthebandwagon) on Apr 19, 2015 at 5:50am PDT

If you went with option A, then simply choose a filter for your photo from the selection provided for you. and hit "NEXT". Write a caption if you'd like (may also include hashtags), share on your other platforms if you want to as well. When you're done with this, tap the blue and white checkmark button up top and you're done! Welcome to Instagram.

If you chose option B, then the first sentence of the previous paragraph doesn't apply to you. Instead, click the camera button on the toolbar and then go into your phone's photo gallery. Select the photo you want and then proceed with choosing a filter and with the rest of the steps.

People use Instagram for various purposes. Some like to promote themselves with it, some use it as a very casual social thing, some just like to take pictures...or any combination of these. If any of that appeals to you, try it out!

Something a bit different

No tutorial or anything this time. Rather, I'd just like to bring an aspect of social media to your attention. There are people who condemn social media for various reasons--the vast majority of those reasons being ridiculous and untrue--but one thing that cannot be debated on is its ability to aid when there is a dangerous situation afoot.

Missing Person and Missing Pet posters cannot reach as many people as tweets and blog posts, and the same can be said for alerts about criminal activity. Check out this news item about a family using social media in hopes of someone being able to identify the two burglars who robbed their home. 

Not to tweet my own horn...

Now that we've gotten an introduction on how to convey tone through text, let's use that knowledge on Twitter. Don't know how to use Twitter? That's alright, I will walk you through it.

Upon putting www.twitter.com  into your url bar, you will see this box

You can input your full name if you want to, but it's not mandatory. You will need to fill in the email and password sections properly, though.

After clicking the yellow button, you will be brought to this page:

Pretend I put in a valid email while signing up, rather than leaving it blank. As you can see, the username I chose is already taken-- by me. Choose a username that makes you recognizable, and that fits you and/or your brand. Try to avoid an overly-complicated name, but that can sometimes be unavoidable due to how many usernames are already taken on twitter.

After you complete this step, twitter will give you the option of following various people. It's up to you whether you want to do that or not.

To upload a profile picture, change your banner, your name, and your description, go to your profile (www.twitter.com/yourusername) and click Edit profile.


Once you've personalized your twitter, go to the Home tab up top and tweet away! Being a social platform, it helps if you've already got friends or family to converse with. You can address someone in a tweet by typing @theirusername at the beginning of your tweet. They will get a notification of this mention. If your reason for using twitter is to promote your brand, it's good to use hashtags pertaining to you/your products in order to best reach your audience. For an explanation of hashtags, click here.

Alright! That's it for a basic introduction to creating a twitter account. I hope it helped even a little bit.

I don't like your tone

Let's talk about conveying tone through text.

Sometimes it can be difficult to gauge a person's feelings or intent from just reading words they've typed. Here is an example: Dennis just posted on Facebook about how beautiful his garden has become. You reply "that's great, dennis". Dennis may not know how to take your comment; was it sincere or sarcastic? Now, if you were being sarcastic then you've done a fairly good job of conveying that. If you were being serious, though, a better reply would have been "that's great, dennis!". A smiling emoticon at the end is optional.

Exclamation points are helpful tools because they prevent comments/sentences from reading as flat! Sometimes you will want a more deadpan sentence, but if you're trying to communicate in a friendly, cheerful way then exclamation marks can help! Adding a question mark to the end of a question (that sounds a bit redundant, I know), also helps to convey genuine curiosity. For example, "why would he do that" vs "why would he do that?".

Excess punctuation is something many people use (I sure do, multiple times a day) when communicating. Sometimes ! is just not enough, and you need !!!!!!!!!. Likewise for ?/?????? and ./.......". Excess punctuation marks convey intensity/urgency/confusion/hesitation, depending on the type used. In the same vein, CAPSLOCK is also used for intensity, SOMETIMES IN COMBINATION WITH EXCESS PUNCTUATION!!!! Of course, do not use anything I've been talking about in this paragraph in situations in which you are trying to put forth a professional image.

People have their own typing styles. Do you know yours, and do you know how to effectively use it?

For more on this subject, check out this website.