Posts Tagged twitter
Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010
Twitter’s Promoted Tweets
Twitter’s Promoted Tweets have been around since April 2010. At first, these were available only to a select number of advertising partners, but over the past few months they have expanded their network of advertisers and in the past few days Twitter started syndicating promoted tweets in some user’s timelines. Now, all you need to do is fill out this form (scroll waaaay down to the bottom to access the form link) to apply to become an advertiser.
cvent’s Promo
It was yesterday that I began seeing cvent’s sponsored tweets in the #eventprofs timeline. At the present time cvent is the first and only advertiser in the community. If you monitor the #eventprofs conversation you’ll see how their tweets hold the #1 position in the timeline – even if I tweet after them, my tweet will fall below theirs.
Naturally, cvent is garnering a lot of attention – positive, negative and indifferent. But I struggle with how this concept will scale successfully for Twitter and for those who use it. It remains to be seen how Twitter will roll out this program – their lips are pretty tight on their plans – and it sounds as if they’re doing a lot of experimentation to ensure users don’t become disengaged with their site.
More info on promoted tweets
How do you feel?
So, how do you feel about Sponsored Tweets – a necessary evil or an annoyance?
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The RT (or, if you’re not on Twitter, retweet) function started with good intentions. It was a way of spreading a compelling thought, idea or a concept that struck a chord with you to your followers. But over time, it’s lost its impact. Quite frankly, it’s overused. In the past couple of hours, 35 out of the 100 updates in the #eventprofs group alone were retweets. That’s more than 1 in 3 tweets.
The act of retweeting can be very powerful when done effectively:
- When you RT an update that also has a hashtag extension, it duplicates a message to the same community. If the intent is to share the tweet with your followers, consider removing the hashtag.
- Read the tweet before you RT it. Ensure you really value what’s being said.
- There are a number of reasons why people choose to follow others on Twitter. Probably the most common is to get ideas, insights and perspectives on a particular topic from an authority. Everything you tweet is a reflection on you. Before you RT consider whether it’s relevant to your voice and valuable to your followers.
- I always appreciate when someone adds their thoughts to a retweet to tell me why they’re retweeting something. It can be as simple as telling me that a link is interesting or informative:
Think before you retweet…but feel free to RT this post.
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I have thousands of connections on Twitter, almost a thousand connections on Facebook, hundreds on LinkedIn, hundreds of blog subscribers, thousands of contacts in my address book and hundreds that blog that I follow in my reader. I get dizzy just thinking about the number of connections I have. Many overlap connection points – I have contacts that I’m connected to on LinkedIn that I also am friends with on Facebook, I have others that subscribe to my blog and are in my address book, and others that I tweet with and email from time to time. It’s confusing to track all of these connections. In fact, there are many people that I email and have no idea we’re actually connected on social media sites. This is where many get social media overload. But your contacts are gold…when you know how to manage them.
This is why I love Gist. It’s been in Beta for about a year and as a result it is 100% free…not to mention one of the most useful tools I have in my social media arsenal. In a nutshell, Gist helps you build stronger relationships with your connections by providing critical information about all of them. Let me give you an example. Let’s say you’re connected with John Doe on Facebook and LinkedIn. By simply inputting John’s email (which he uses for both social media sites), it will pull John’s phone number, address, his social media account names, website, rss feeds, shared connections, the last time you connected with him, etc. You can also sync with your emails so that your latest correspondence is stored with the contact! Essentially it’s a social CRM service.
Here’s a video overview by The Social Networker to give you more in-depth info (please note that the video was created when Gist was released so some of the content has evolved, but it’s a great overview):
Top 6 reasons to love Gist:
1. All of your contacts and all of their details in one place. Enough said.
2. It has a built in Google search feature. This allows you to get the latest news on your contacts and their companies.
3. You can tag your contacts. For example, tag them with ‘prospect’ and you can sort your contacts by tag.
4. You can read your contact’s tweets, facebook status updates and blog posts without leaving Gist. You can also customize what you want to see and what you don’t. Don’t want to see Twitter updates? Uncheck the Twitter box. This feature has virtually replaced my need for my reader since I’m connected to most of the people whose blogs I follow.
5. You can easily share your contact’s rss content by email, facebook or twitter. You can also favorite items that you really enjoyed.
6. If you sync Gist with Google Calendar, you can hone in on the updates from the contacts you plan to meet with.
PS – The iPhone app is available for download. An updated version has been released to fix some bugs. It’s obviously not as easy to navigate as the desktop application, but it’s still a really useful application.
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Ahh Twitter. Everyone has heard about it, yet it still sends ripples of fear and frustration through many. It remains seen as a tool for people to blast others with useless information about what they ate, what they’re doing and where they’re going. Since February of 2009 I’ve been trying to convince people about the power of Twitter and how it’s been used to build a community of thousands of Meetings & Event Professionals from around the world who share useful and timely information about our industry (aka #eventprofs). But alas, still many scoff because of that darned 7 letter word…Twitter.
Recently I saw a tweet from Michael McCurry about Paper.li. Paper.li basically takes links shared on twitter and organizes them by popularity and tags into a newspaper format. In a matter of seconds, Michael input the #eventprofs hashtag and out popped a real-time industry rag all about Meetings & Events. How exciting is that?! This should be a great solution for those people who want to stay up to date on the latest & greatest in our industry without having to go over to Twitter.
Click here to read the Eventprofs Newspaper.
Now, if you don’t want to have to remember to go over to this website all the time, simply click on the ‘notify me’ link and they’ll email you when the next paper is available. (Just keep in mind that this function will not work in Safari)
Happy reading!
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There’s no doubt that conferences as we know them are being re-imagined. Organizers have recognized that attendees are looking to be engaged, they want to be heard and they’re expecting conference organizers to be using the same social tools they’re living and breathing every day. If you are a presenter, conference organizer or event sponsor, you need to check out EventHive. It is a web application that smashes chatrooms, Twitter, Facebook and polls together to create a tool that can help build better engagement with attendees.
Presenters
- Engage your audience
- Learn about them via real-time polling
Organizers
- Build a better experience for your attendees
- Create additional value for sponsors
- Learn what people really thought about your event
Sponsors
- Select relevant sponsorship based on session content
- Get comprehensive analytics
If you’re interested, you can contact EventHive to request a demo for your event.
Have you used EventHive at an event? What were your experiences?
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(from left to right) Myself, Tracey Kumar-Moore of LV Wedding Concierge, Debra Roth of PinkInc
A lot of people ask me, “What’s the deal with tweetups?”. First, let’s define what one is. A tweetup is basically a scheduled meetup between Twitter friends. Tweetups allow you to take the relationships you’ve built online and extend them in person. The beauty with tweetups, which is hard to describe to someone who doesn’t use social media, is that all of the awkward “um, hi, errr…I’m Lara” is replaced with “Oh my Gosh!!! You look nothing like your picture! How are your daughters? You mentioned they’re moving to California for University, right?…”. They’re fun, they’re unpretentious, they’re meaningful.
The Queen of tweetups (aka Debra Roth of PinkInc) planned this one at The Event Solutions / Catersource 2010 Conference. We met at Bally’s Indigo Lounge before the big Anthology party later that night. It saw a mix of girly drinks (yes, even the men had a few pink, fruity concoctions), a lot of smart phone comparisons and a tonne of business card trading. A perfect combination.
Next time you attend an event, follow the event’s hashtag on Twitter and you too may just be lucky enough to find yourself at a tweetup!
(left) Liese Gardner of Mecca Communications, (right) Debra Roth of PinkInc
Eddie Diaz (right) hams it up for the camera
What happens at a tweetup? Everyone compares smart phones. (middle) Eddie Diaz, (right) Alan Jones.
(left) Robert Sivek of The Meetinghouse, (right) Jeff Hurt of Velvet Chainsaw
(left) Laura Schwartz of White House Strategies, (right) Howard Givner of Heathcote Advisory Group
(left) Liese Gardner of Mecca Communications, (right - back to camera) Lindsay Fultz of Grosh Backdrops
(left) Liene Stevens of Think Splendid, (right) Carolyn Baragona
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If you’re looking to amp up your event’s Twitter feed and are bored with conventional aggregators, this event is a beautiful example of art, drama and technology combined.
With high-powered video projectors and their patented video mapping technology, Klip Collective transformed the Art Deco façade of the Edison Hotel in Miami Beach into an eye-catching 3D illusion for the Super Bowl in February 2010. Using light and shadows, the front wall flies away revealing the building’s interior where room-like vignettes transpire. Twitter feeds about fan excitement and Super Bowl predictions appear in word bubbles around the building occupants.
Hired by Anomaly in New York City, Klip shot all content, edited and site-mapped the video projections. Permitting, site selection and custom equipment installation was coordinated and executed by Klip Collective. The site-specific video installation was sponsored by Motorola and the NFL.
If you’ve never heard of Klip Collective or Anomaly NY, well I’m pleased to introduce you. Both agencies shake down the walls of convention. Check out their sites.
Video: Motoblur Hotel from klipcollective on Vimeo.
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