Collective Thoughts

The Art of Social Media War

As a known Social Media enthusiast, I’m privy to a ton of information. I stand on the sidelines of various Social Media realms and watch as drama unfolds. I find that it’s usually the best thing to do when two opposing forces in Social Media go head to head. It’s not that I’m disloyal, don’t get me wrong, but rather that I prefer to not get involved.  “Jay not get involved? Since when is Jay a pacifist? I thought Jay was a Marine!” Well, yeah, I choose which battles to fight, especially when it comes to elite Diggers throwing down on each other.

I refuse to name names, that wouldn’t be classy of me. I am, however, going to give a run down on how the battle has been fought; it’s actually been quite interesting.

It all started with Google. Yeah, you heard right, Google. Google has been posting Sesame Street / Google Logos all week to celebrate Sesame Street’s 40th anniversary. As anyone who is an internet junkie knows, Google tends to do this sort of thing to celebrate milestones or holidays.

One Digger, with a good ratio I might add, had been placing these images on his site, and submitting the new image each day to Digg from his site.  Another Digger saw it but had also submitted the image directly from Google. The first Digger (Digger A) cried Dupe! In doing so he went after the other Digger (Digger B) and reported the image to Digg. Well, things got real nasty.

Name calling ensued in a chat and before you know it Digger A got Digger B banned. A fine line was crossed in the whole ordeal.  Digger A was posting the images on his site, some people calling him out for “Blogspam,” but he considered the images a place holder as Google would change them everyday. Digger B, being an old school Digger, had linked to the original source.  Digger A did not care, he was mad over the whole dupe ordeal. Things escalated sverely after that.

With the banning of Digger B, being an old school Digger, things did not look well for the upstart. I even shot a friendly warning to Digger A. “Hey man, he is old school, watch your step, his loyalties run deep.” I guess my warning fell on deaf ears. The name calling and threats continued. Digger A then lashed out at other people in the chat who were making lighthearted jokes about the situation. With a line in the sand already drawn, my advice would have been not to upset everyone else.

Elsewhere, other old-school Diggers heard of Digger B’s banning at the hands of Digger A. Things do not look well for Digger A. Yesterday his account was banned from Digg, his site is under DDOS attack, a satire blog has been erected to forever mock him and a lot of people in the Social Media Community are upset with him.

You guys still with me on the whole A/B thing?

Many mistakes were made during this dis-agreement.

1. If you do have an issue with someone’s submission, especially a dupe, approach the individual who duped you. If the individual will not take down his submission, make a friendly game out of. (Okay, first one to the FP wins, loser buys a beer at next meet up.)

2. Social Media or Social News Sites are just that, Social! Play well with others. Do not soil your name and give yourself a bad reputation.

3. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.  Sound familiar? It should. Same rules apply to any war if you expect to win. If you do have a rival, find out his mistakes and exploit them if need be, but it must be done in a way that keeps you squeaky clean. Name calling and bashing only makes you look bad.

4. KNOW YOUR ENEMY! Good Intel is always key to winning any war. Know who is loyal to them and their amount of influence. Crossing one person could mean crossing more people than you realize.You must also know the level of your rivals technical skill — there are a lot of good hackers out there. Do your homework!

5. Be prepared to defend yourself and your brand. A good defense is also a great offense.

6. Never, Never, Ever, write a check your butt can’t cash. If you have to resort to threats, make sure you can carry them out. Empty threats make you lose credibility.

Hopefully you should never have to deploy any of these tactics. Just like real life, most small conflicts can be settled using a good attitude, and a little respect.

Then again, The Internet is serious business.

Posted in Rants | 13 Comments »

Social Media: Expertise? Not Required. Sanity is Optional.

In the grand scheme of things I am but a babe when it comes to social media. A rookie. A noob, if you will, though to spare my fragile feelings I’d just as soon you didn’t, really. Nope, no expert opinions here folks, just me stumbling along, trying to learn what I can. Like some great person of yore once said, “I’m just a worm crawling through the dirt of life.”(Actually that was me, I used it as a tag line on one of the many social media outlets I’ve tried, and may perhaps still use, I’m not really sure, but feel free to use it for your own purposes if you like.)  But this is a good thing actually. In Zen Buddhism there is a concept known as beginner’s mind, and it means, basically, that the mind of someone who is new to something (a beginner), is free of the rigidity and ‘old-hat’ mentality of the expert who has seen and knows much. They are open to new things and new ways, and the ever-changing sea of social media is inherently new. Isn’t it?

The metaphor of the sea is particularly fitting because not only is social media, and with it the Internet, constantly changing and growing, it also implies a flow. A constant flow of information: emails, images, blurbs, and yes… tweets. We often find ourselves buried beneath a relentless tide of information. Will it ever stop, or do we even want it to really? More importantly, how do you handle it all?

If you’re anything like me, the Internet has reduced your attention span to that of a gnat; there’s just so much to look at. Sometimes I feel like a cat in a room full of laser pointers. No, really! Even when I sit down at the keyboard with a plan, fully intent of looking up one thing –  just one thing! — if I’m not careful, I end up clicking 57 links, only snapping out of the trance once done digesting  the Evolution of Toilets (via lovetoknow.com).

This isn’t a new idea though, is it? The Internet has been driving us mad with choice from day one. But now we have social media thrown into the mix; Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace just some of the names which come to mind. Naming all of them would be another post altogether (actually that would be another venture-funded web project and a lifetime of work—venture capitalists, feel free to email me, we’ll talk). It’s a wonder we get any work done today at all.

It can be done, and trust me, there are greater minds than this one working on it. David Allen, bestselling author of Getting Things Done, advises that one must be judicious in choosing who and what we interact with online, and even he acknowledges that it’s a slippery slope.

The most obvious issue about social media: Is this a useful way to spend your time, or is it a sinkhole of attractive distraction? It could very easily be one of those one minute, and the other the next! It all depends on why you’re doing it, and this must be evaluated moment to moment. It’s an important distinction to make for yourself, because focus is probably your greatest asset that you can control. You must be judicious about where you place it and what you let grab it, thus reducing your effectiveness.

Posted in Social Media | 4 Comments »

Collective Thoughts is Back!

credit: AFP

I’d like to thank you all for your patience through the times that this site has been quiet. Many of the original authors have gone on and are quite busy, but I didn’t see why that had to be the end of our community.

After about 2 years of reflection, we’ve seen where our strengths and weaknesses were, and wanted to give you a list of what the new Collective Thoughts will be about:

1 – Updates. Things slowed to the point where we were updating only monthly. Look for many more frequent posts in our new organization.

2 – Focus. While the post focus is still going to be revolving around social media, what’s meant by focus is the authors and their perspectives. I feel that we had the SEO / Social contingent, but this time around, we have a more rounded model across the realm of social – including more that are new to the game, PR types and the like.

3 – Bells and Whistles. We’ll be making some changes and tweaks to the overall UI as well as adding in some of the latest new fangled fun gadgets.

4 – Authors. In the past, we have not had guest posts. We’re changing things up a bit adding more regular and guest authors, though at this point it is by invite only. If you’re interested in contributing, contact us.

Looking forward to coming back into the fold with you!

Posted in Social Media | 2 Comments »

Social Media is Not Dead. It’s Run by Cats.

Humans think they’re such hot stuff.  Them and their opposable thumbs.  I’ll have you know that us felines are really the strength behind Twitter.  Don’t believe me? Apparently the San Diego News Network does:

Brians_cat and PETCO haz a conversation

That’s right folks.  PETCO pays Natalie Davis, Director of E-commerce to talk to pets.  We even convinced her to get her cat Leo to start getting up and running on Twitter.

We cats are better equipped than you humans for taking over the social media sphere anyway.  Here’s just a few signs of our prowess:

1. The expression is LOLCats.  Ever see a LOLhuman? Pssh.
2. Cats sleep 18 hours a day, so we’re better rested.  Besides, humans are always too busy “working” to mess with Twitter as we cat professionals are.
3. We outrank you.  @Sockington has 3/4 of a million users following him on Twitter.  Ashton Kutcher and CNN are clearly fronts for the feline empire.
4. Twitter is a bird.  Cats catch birds.  We’ve caught you.

Image credit: Twitkitteh

This has been an informal update by Brian’s Cat – if you want more informal thoughts, follow me on Twitter.

Posted in Rants | 10 Comments »

Is Being Social Online Enough?

Although I have had these thoughts about this many times before, I never placed pen to paper to convey my thoughts. I began this version of this post while sitting outside of Laidoffcamp/Freelancecamp in Miami. I was watching the afternoon monsoons about to come down on me. I was sitting alone in a garden of hedges and walkways watching the passersby. Everyone seemed to be busy buzzing by. The cool breeze just washed in from the approaching rain. I can feel the electricity in the air. The energy created by everyone that attends social gathering of large magnitude is incredible. The energy feels like the change in the air as a storm rolls in. I also have a sad disturbing feeling of what is about to happen.

photo credit miamisunpost.com

Unfortunately in the past once the excitement of the event dissipated the attendees often fall back into their daily grind and lose their zeal. The positive drive is taken away by the dream stealers and opposing elements. The mega builders in the MLM industry have spoke of this for as long as I can remember. They were always looking for a paradigm shift. Looking forward from where I am at, has technology brought this downward spiral to an end? Can the mix of an online presence keep the energy going?

Let’s look at online social networking; we have so many places to congregate. Every day I am approached by someone new with an idea or thought on how to make communication online one step easier. Although most of the concepts are spun over and over, often there is a spark of true imagination that pops into view. The main downfall of so many ideas is the lack of true open communication. It is difficult to pass the same feelings over phone, let alone a keyboard. If you lack communicative skills you may feel that your voice may never be heard. Video and webcams do help to transfer the visual imagery to a point. If there was a way to capture the intimate relation of one on one conversation like that of being in person, online long distance communications would also see a parabolic leap in growth.

I am one of the biggest supporters of both online and offline congregative tools. Conferences and Barcamps are great for connecting with your online social graph, but only occur over large periods of time. Refresh Miami and Social Media Club of South Florida hold monthly meetings that I have attended for close to a year now. (Both organizations are opening events, some may be near you.) Before that I was also very active in the local Meetups that are held here in South Florida. Now there has been a great surge in Tweetups popping up all around me. Some are even specializing these Tweetup events. Craig of Worst Pizza has taken this idea even further with starting Pizza Tweetups. These events are great sources of support for your online endeavors. They help you to cement your online bonds with the brick and mortar world that many of us are quickly leaving behind. Plus they are a great source to build your social graph with users that would ordinarily not friend you till a physical connection has been made.

I wrote this post to quite some thoughts on what needs to be addressed about online and offline social networking. Do we really need that physical connection to build our networks or is a virtual world something that we are all going to embrace in the future? Tell me, do we really need to attend offline events to grow? Are these events something that will advance the online world? Are these offline events dragging back the innovations that we need to make the next leap forward to a truly virtual world?

What is your view?

Posted in Rants | 10 Comments »

Gender Differences In Social Media Participation

“I think women put more emphasis, focus and time into their social media browsing than men. Men seem to be very ADHD with social media, jumping from news story to story, whereas I’ve noticed women take slow time and incorporate what they read more into their daily life and lifestyle planning.”

Loren Baker, Search Engine Journal

A great thing about social media marketing is that you literally get a first-rate, hands-on education in human anthropology. You learn what moves people. You learn what people want. You learn how to tug at heartstrings and drive emotions to their limit. You learn how different groups of people respond to different types of content. It’s simultaneously liberating and disillusioning to discover how predictable groups of people behave.

[Note: for the rest of this article, I err on the side of gross generalization. This is necessary to make a general point. There are definitely exceptions to the rules and it's your duty to identify them;-)]

One of the more interesting observations I’ve made over the years as a participant in social media is how differently males and females participate. It is easy to see a strong analogy between the playing field of social media and the playground from elementary school. On the one hand, you have the males who are driven by aggressive competition, accomplishment and the highs of “victory” (football at recess/24 hour digg voting marathon). Sure, there are some females who join in, but for the most part, the aggressive side of social media is dominated by men. Just like how dodgeball games during gym class were usually dominated by the boys. Females, on the other hand, tend towards activities that are cooperative, non-aggressive and friendship building. As I recall, during recess in elementary school, the girls would teach other things like hand-clapping rhymes or sit around in a circle making bracelets (or each others hair). Not all the girls, but most of them. I think the same holds true in social media. Women are looking for like minded people to learn from, to share with, and to build lasting friendships.

Men use social media as a means to some other end. Men want success. Men want traffic. Men want money. Men want to be the best. Men compete to be the best at social media like athletes compete to be the best at their sport. Just like there are superstars in sports, social media sites like Digg and Reddit also have clearly identifiable superstars (and their fanboys).

Now, it would be silly to say that women don’t want things like traffic, money, success, etc. But the point is just that most men are using social media for something other than the social interaction. Women seem to actually use social media as an end in itself: they use it for socializing.

So whereas men use social media to accomplish things and gain status, women seem to use it for “deeper” stuff like building genuine relationships, solidarity and discussions about life (which men might call gossip;-) In my experience, women are much less likely to hit you with a dozen social media vote requests in a single day. I have half a dozen guys bombard me everyday via AIM with non-stop vote requests without even stopping to say hi. Women, in my experience, like to drive real conversation. They actually take the time to read stories and then tell me what they thought rather than just skimming headlines and voting blindly. Women are energized by compliments and pats on the back and affirmation. In other words, women are more social with their social media because in reality, women are more fundamentally social beings.

Women also tend to be more principled in their social media voting. This can be good and bad. The good is that if I send a story to a woman and ask for a thumbs up on StumbleUpon, if she actually likes the story she is more inclined to take the initiative and submit it to other social media sites she is active on (Twitter, Kirsty, etc.) The bad is that women are much, much, much more likely to secretly downvote a request if they don’t like the story (or the person who wrote it). As an example, I’ve stopped sending any “Hot Women” articles to my female social media friends because I have strong empirical evidence that the majority of them end up downvoting. This is not surprising at all and I should have figured it out much earlier given what I know about my wife;-)

Observations

So before getting to a list of some observations and a handful of insightful quotes from my social media friends, let’s draw a conclusion. I believe that the social media professional will be much more successful at his or her craft when taking gender differences seriously. The key, really, is to understand the needs of each person you interact with. Offer them something in return. But don’t assume that everyone wants the same thing. Take the time to understand what motivates each of your social media friends and go above and beyond the call of duty to interact with them so that when it comes time that you need something, they are eager to help. And remember that it’s very easy to wear out a social relationship of any kind (marriage, friendship, business) if one party is not having his or her needs met or if one person is carrying too much of the burden.

Before ending this article I’ve included a few more general observations that come from various social media friends who chose to be anonymous. We’d love for you to add your thoughts in the comments.

• Men often make accounts that look like attractive females for pragmatic purposes (to motivate more action by other social media participants)
• Women tend to use Twitter more for chatting and real conversations
• Men tend to use Twitter more for marketing
• Women are more likely to forward chain emails
• Men are more comfortable with manipulative behavior so long as it helps them acheive their goals
• Women like sites that facilitate discussions about life and offer a peek into others’ lives
• With men, social cooperation comes down to swapping favors
• With women, you have to earn social cooperation through relationship

Quotes from Social Media Users

More men are using it for networking and establishing authority/credibility. More women are using it to share their lives and to connect with other women who share the same values or similar experiences. Women are using it more for solidarity. They’re social beings, and social media has given them the amazing capability to find like-minded women instead of feeling judged and misunderstood by the women in their immediate families/geographic regions.

- Daniel Dessinger

Social media is a lot like relationships in real life – men tend to want information and to give out info if it will help them get ahead or achieve a goal. Women tend to take it a step further and are more willing to connect on a deeper level.

- Charlene Polanosky, Essential Keystrokes

Men seem to promote more, it’s more “about me,” whereas women are natural networkers and seek cooperation and participation. Don’t throw tomatoes at me, I’m just making a generalization in what I’ve obserrved.

- Brian Wallace, NowSourcing

I think women socialize more, but they both use it too boost careers and brands.

- Deb Ng, Freelance Writing Jobs

Women want to be popular or communicate, men want to make money or be considered cool.

- David Peralty, BrandingDavid.com

The biggest difference is that women are actually more naturally atuned to the whole social aspect, and tend to spend more time interacting and consuming the content, whereas men tend to be more fly by visitors and less interactive.

- Elise from Cell Phones .org

I’d say women are more drawn to social services like facebook and twitter, where communication is the feature as opposed to something like digg where there’s a competition like atmosphere.

- JD Arney

I think men want success from their participation on the social media. I think women mostly want to be social and have fun.

- HART, http://twitter.com/PetLvr

Posted in Social Media | 19 Comments »

Social Media Housekeeping for 2009

You may have noticed a few small social changes that we’ve instituted for 2009:

Twitter.  We’ve been quiet on this front for far too long.

While it won’t be all of us running the account, expect some solid updates from @nowsourcing and @thegypsy.  Why follow? Well, we have some interesting things to say and will also be sharing great links collectively.

Google Friend Connect. You might call us Collective Forgetfulness if we didn’t have the latest and greatest blog widget from our friends at Google.  So we’ve added Google Friend Connect.  It’s an interesting concept, and will be fun to see what people make of it beyond the simple “here are the friends that like my site.”

MyBlogLog.  You might say that this is old news, but we updated the MBL widget to the more sleek, iPhone looking UI.  What’s really interesting about MBL is the community/site itself beyond the widget.  Personally, I’ve liked the service for a long time because it allows you to visually see who your recent visitors are – a different crack at the data vs. a more 1′s and 0′s Google Analytics approach.

What about you – what have you done to make your blog more social for 2009?

Posted in Social Media | 5 Comments »

Using Social Media as a Support Group

Image by gem fountain

It seems that now-a-days we can do most things online… clothes shopping, looking for Colleges, buying Holiday gifts, doing our banking… pretty much anything.

But there is something else we can do online….. something much more personal and sacred. We can even work on mending our inside pain and turmoil.

Before I get deeper into this topic I want to show why finding support groups online can make a lot of sense.

The Definition of a Support Group

Support Group – A support Group is a group of people who support each other over a problem they all share.

The Definition of an Online Community

Online Community – A group of people online who share a common interest.

Wow, both of those definitions sound very similar, don’t they?

An online community and support group are on the same type of idea. They have a common ground…. a common interest. And, the group builds from there. Because of this it makes sense that support groups would work online…. that they not only work, but they thrive.

A support group is usually a group centered around a very specific issue. This group of people usually come together to give and receive both emotional and practical support. When people come to a support group it is because they need to be with people…. to surround themselves with people that understand, have been through or are going through the same thing and can offer help, suggestions or just a shoulder to cry on. Most people aren’t looking for anything to be solved, but just to be with others in a similar situation can offer a sense of belonging and get them through the difficult time they are going through. Knowing that everyone who is part of this support group share the same problem and that they are not alone can be extremely helpful.

Social Media and online communities can be so helpful when it comes to support. I have shared issues of mine on my blog and the community has lent their support. I have on many occasions mentioned an issue I was having while communicating on Twitter and my friends their didn’t let me down.

But, what if you needed more? What if you need more specific help?

I love that my friends and colleagues want to lend their support. They want me to know that they care. But, what if i wanted to communicate with someone with my same problem…. a non-judgmental person that I can freely say what’s on my mind about our shared problem? Could that happen?

Sure, that’s where online support groups come in. Your friends and family are wonderful support, but when you need more specific help such as support on a specific topic…. support groups offer a safe environment for mutual support and encouragement. In order for a support group to work, online or in reality, you must feel safe.

What to look for in an Online Support Group / Community

• Needs to be User Friendly
• Easy Navigation – No confusion
• Clean and bright

  This Online Support Group / Community is The Virtual Wellness Community. It is a great website that provides free support,
  education and hope to people with cancer and their loved ones. It is beautiful, easy to navigate, completely user-friendly even for the casual computer users. Their Online Community has plenty of articles to educate yourself on Cancer as well as inspiration and hope. It is a great place to meet other people with Cancer as well as loved ones who are dealing with the pain of someone they love having Cancer. People coming to this community are looking for support, friendship and strength. It truly looks like a safe place to be….. exactly how a support group / community should.
  
  
  

• Clear Guidelines on how to use the support group.
• Easy to follow as well as easy to find online support group rules.

  This Online Lupus Support Group is a perfect example of how to make sure make sure the online support group guidelines are right out in the open so that there is no question as to what the rules are. This way all support group community members are following the rules and not making any members feel unwelcome or unsafe.
  
  

• Message Boards / Forums and Chats – This is a very important part of support groups. Forums and message boards are where community members can ask questions, get advice and others can offer suggestions and help. Even though the conversation is not real time, forums and message boards can be extremely beneficial. And, for many Online Communities the only conversation that can happen on the website are via message boards and forums. Chats are real time and also a great benefit. Make sure there is some kind of moderator in the chat…. sometimes sensitive and difficult conversations can get out of hand. It is helpful (and safer) to have a non-judgmental third-party moderator on hand.

  
  
  Look for a message board that have plenty of activity….. like this Eating Disorder Forum above. The more activity there is then you know it is an established forum and that the community enjoys it.

• Links to important information and Websites. Forums and discussions are wonderful. But, you also need to understand the issues you are having…. why you are having them, what are the symptoms, when will they go away, etc. Good Support Groups and Communities should have plenty of information for you at your fingertips. Or, at least point you in the right direction.
• Find a Doctor - These online support groups should also offer you the resources you need to help you find a Support Group in your area and a Doctor if need be. Online Support Groups are great, but sometimes you need a real person, real hug, real conversation…. reality.

  

These are just three examples of great Online Support Groups. But, there are so many more. And, most that I have found are doing an awesome job at combining Social Media and Community Support.

Twitter as a Support Group

Twitter has yet to add a group function to their Microblogging site. It’s coming…. at least that is what we are promised. But, as of yet…. nothing. There are an amazing amount of people on Twitter….. many with issues. This would be a great place to have groups. And, with Twitter the groups can have conversations real-time. As close to reality conversation with many people as it gets.

People use 3rd-party Twitter tools to create groups…. such as TwittGroups, GroupTweet, Hashtags (Hashtags website wasn’t working during the time of this post), TweetParty, Twitter Groups, TwittBot . Nothing that looked like it would be worthy of a support group….. except TwittGroups. Not spectacular, but it is as close as it gets as far as Support Group worthy on Twitter.

Searching for support groups on Twitter was not easy. I assume it will get much easier once Twitter finally adds group capability to the Twitter website. But, until then it is going to continue to be a struggle. I understand that these 3rd party Twitter Groups that I mentioned above have the ability to create Twitter groups, but why can’t I search the groups to find one that will match with my needs? Maybe I was doing something wrong or it wasn’t clearly visible on their sites, but I couldn’t find it. However, TwittGroups was the only place I could search the Twitter Groups easily. You can choose to either look through all their Twitter Groups , look through all the popular Twitter Groups, or do a search of Twitter Groups to see what is a good fit.

Once you find a group that you find interesting…. click on the link. You will find something that looks like this:

This is the Homeschool Twitter Group. They have a nice group going on, I must say. If you scroll down on this page you will see all the members. I’m not going to put an image of that here….. they have a lot of members. But, if you click on the link that says, "Show Members" it shows you all the members of this Homeschool Twitter Group.

Now go back to the main page again that looks like the above screen…. the main page of the Twitter Group you picked. Click on "TweetGrid"
and you will get the tweets having to do with your support group. Here is what the TweetGrid of what the homeschool support group looks like….

This is where you can see all the conversations having to do with your support group and the tweets done by the members of the support group.

Now, go back to the home Support Group page again and click on "Post Tweet" This is where you will post a tweet to the group. Doing it this way will label your tweet perfectly so that it appears in the TweetGrid.

Well, there ya go. Support groups can be a wonderful and helpful thing. I’ve used them several times to help with issues…. I totally agree with support groups. With Social Media it opens up the mediums that you can get support from… take advantage of that. It can be a wonderful thing.

Note: Please keep in mind that online support should not take the place of medical attention that you should receive from a doctor or professional.

Posted in Social Media | 9 Comments »

Pay Attention to the Man Behind the Curtain: an Interview with Colonel Tribune

With us today is the Daniel Honigman, part of the social media team that’s responsible for Colonel Tribune, a persona formed for the Chicago Tribune. Thanks for joining us.

1- Give us some background about yourself.

My background is in reporting and traditional journalism. Right now, I work as a social media strategist for Tribune Interactive (Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Baltimore Sun, etc.), where I work on ways to build local and national communities around our content. I also help evangelize the use of Web 2.0 tools in the newsroom.

2 – What was the aha moment at Tribune that lead to the establishment of the Colonel? Is the team full-time dedicated to social media, or is it incorporated with other duties?

When I started with the Chicago Tribune, I looked at people’s touchpoints with the digital brand, and I saw that while there were some traditional ways people could reach the paper, including via e-mail, there was nothing to inspire the local digerati, really.

I thought about Facebook pages, YouTube pages and Twitter, and seeing that someone had already reserved @ChicagoTribune on there — it was an RSS feed — Bill Adee and I decided to create something, and we settled on Robert McCormick, an historic figure in Tribune lore. We built out a persona for the ChicagoTribune.com and, all of a sudden, we had our Colonel.

3 – Is this a fad? Surely there’s a beginning and end to things, but as web ambassadors, does social media seem like a worthy investment for the Chicago Tribune with long-term benefits?

From what we’ve seen, just from a traffic perspective, social media is worth the effort. But I believe that for local news organizations, it’s essential to create one-on-one connections with people in your market. But social media is something that all mainstream media should embrace, because it’s only going to get tougher and more cluttered out there.

4 – How does The Tribune use social media, and do you see it as a threat to your business? Many fear that blogging killed the journalist. Your thoughts?

It’s not a threat to the business. Traditional media has sold on a CPM model, but for mainstream media to survive, it has to think outside the box. As an industry, look for more aggregation.

But for newspapers to survive, they need to ratchet things down for a bit. If anything, blogging has been a shock to the journalism system. But journalists still have skills that many bloggers just don’t have: access and accuracy. They just need to embrace the 24-hour news cycle and, I believe, be format-agnostic.

5 – You’ve had some successes through social media, such as being able to report a bomb threat. Care to elaborate on the experience or share some others?

Just having a line to the social space can bring you all sorts of information that you may not have had before through traditional channels. As reporters cultivate their beats in real life, social media can help them tap into sources and audiences they never knew existed for their work.

The reason the Colonel got the tip, however, is that he has the reputation of a man who knows what’s going on. And if he doesn’t, he can try to find out. Not many people have that sort of connection with their hometown newspapers.

6 – What has the Chicago Tribune’s social media team found to be the best ROI sites for it’s efforts? What sort of strategies seem to work the best/least?

When we find them, we’ll tell you. The great thing about social media is that there’s no one right way to do it. Everyone’s feeling their way around the space right now, and it’ll probably continue to be that way for a while.

7 – Do you use any tools to monitor people submitting their articles to social media? How do you attempt to monitor your brand in social media?

Metrics are the Holy Grail of social media. Right now, I look at referrals, number of friends in different networks, number of brand mentions in different spaces, some direct feedback and the amount of conversation going on — both about the Chicago Tribune and about Colonel Tribune.

8 – Have you had any negative backlash from the self promotion? Example – when looking at the Colonel on Digg, 9 of the last 10 submissions were Chicago Tribune articles. We’ve seen in many cases that if a Digg user only submitted stories from a single source to which they are clearly connected, they would be flagged as a spammer, even if it was Techcrunch, Cracked or Ars Technica. In fact about the only person who can get away with submitting all his own content is Kevin Rose. Comments?

The thing about anything in social bookmarking sites is that if your content is good, it has a good chance get popular. Period.

But it’s not just about the content; you have to find other ways to contribute to these online communities, whether it’s submitting outside content, commenting on other stories or sharing other stories. It’s important to bring something else to the table and to show you’re willing to be a part of the group.

9  – Ok, so who would win in a fight – Colonel Tribune or Colonel Sanders?

Funny story: My girlfriend Mollie’s grandfather opened the first KFCs here in Chicago, so he and Colonel Sanders were good friends, actually. But I still think Colonel Tribune would win.  Colonel Tribune has a pretty big posse, you see.

Thanks again for speaking with us, Daniel!

Posted in Interviews | 1 Comment »

Don’t Be a Mamma Bird – Be an Inspiration!

All too often, I come across blog posts that are simply a regurgitation of some breaking news or someone else’s earlier thoughts.

Shouldn’t a blog be more? I sure think so.

Sure, sure…content is king. But shouldn’t it be original content? As we are nearing the 1 year anniversary of Collective Thoughts, I wanted to share with you a peek into very selective process in finding great bloggers to head it up.  The single most important factor was that each contributor was totally original and the real thing.  You know it when you see it.  That said, here are the aha moment that I had in when reading the work of my esteemed colleagues:

Andy Beard – For me, Andy has had more thought provoking posts than any of the contributors here, so it was really special for me that he’s part of the team. If I had to pick one post there, it would be the WordPress Masterclass post.  An oldie but goodie, and may show many of you how little you know about WordPress after all

Brendan Picha – Brendan is also a newcomer, and showed his stuff with a Digg submission that made it to Diggnation!

Dave Harry – While Dave is a relative newcomer to Collective Thoughts, I’ve been a fan of his writing for quite some time.  The Sphinn awards got my attention – great way to get a community buzzing!

Mark Laymon – Mark is quite a character.  For those of you that don’t know him, you probably know of him as the guy that relentlessly throws sheep and pokes you in Facebook.  This post on getting a PDF to the front page will live on forever in my memory.  I’ll bet every commenter on Digg had their jaw to the floor when it happened

Shana Albert – As we all know, everyone loves Shana.  Shana is a rare talent that has an outstanding writing ability to capture the human spirit.  She actually started writing on Collective Thoughts prior to the almost immediate debut of Social Desire.  Would have to say that my favorite post of hers has been how social media is like high school.

Tim Nash – I believe that his name will forever be associated with StumbleUpon. Who can forget the Stumbleupon Algorithm post? No doubt that this was a different thought than the crowd.

What post has been the aha moment for you? We’d love to hear from you.

Posted in Social Media | 3 Comments »