I tackled Google reader today, and I want to share with you some of the gems I found and a few ideas they triggered.

• Rohit Bhaargava’s posts about the 12 types of social media experts. This was written a few months back and has that quality of timelessness that will make it suitable for printing in a book. Thanks to Rohit for posting this to his Facebook today. This blog post is powerful not only for social media folks, but also for businesses trying to plan for social media. Many busineses want a social media strategy without understanding how many options exist and the nuisances of each. Hiring a community manager yields different results than a professional speaker; hiring a trainer is different from hiring a builder. Businesses would be well served to use this when interviewing social media marketing agencies and prospective employees. Ask them to rank the competencies listed here in order—the exercise will absolutely uncover strengthens and weaknesses.

• Watch this video with LinkedIn’s CEO Jeff Weiner. Much respect to Mr. Weiner for consistently correcting his interviewer’s attempts to call LinkedIn something that it isn’t. This is an excellent example of how to stay on message in an interview. It’s also an effective example of a company that knows what business they’re in. My favorite lines:
• Interviewer: You’ve said that your goal is to be a public company at some point.
• Jeff W: Actually our goal is to connect the world’s professionals.
• Jeff W: “People’s personas change despite the fact that they’re the same person depending on the context that they’re in. So the way in which you’re going to carry on with your friends and your family is at times different from the ways you are conducting yourselves in a meeting or within the boardroom.

• Here’s yet another presentation from social media’s dynamic duo, Steve Rubel and Dave Armano. Its beauty comes from its simplicity.



Six Digital Trends To Watch by Steve Rubel and David Armano
View more presentations from Edelman Digital.
• Here are a few points to which I was saying, “amen.”
  • Equip employees to become ambassadors.
  • Quality content and social connections drive digital visibility
  • “Where are you is the new what are you doing?”
• A few of my thoughts:  I’m interested in the idea of whether we are in control of what we share. My interest is with our awareness around sharing—do we realize what sharing reveals about us, and if we did, would we continue to share anyways? Just for fun, pick someone you  admire on Twitter and read their tweet stream, a week of it, in one sitting. What you learn is very different than if you were following along in real-time.

Have a great week.

-Zachary

I recently read testimony from the Government Accountability Office released 7/22. In it, Gregory C. Wilshusen, Director Information Security Issues outlines challenges and opportunities that the federal government faces with web 2.0. I discovered this testimony through Alex Howard and found it relevant not only to those working with the government, but also to experts working in highly regulated industries.

Since these documents are a matter of public record, I’m going to quote a few passages directly I found interesting:

“As of July 2010, we identified that 22 of 24 major federal agencies had a presence on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.

·       The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) uses
Facebook to inform the public about the developmental and humanitarian assistance that it is providing to different countries in the world. It also posts links to other USAID resources, including
blogs, videos, and relevant news articles.

·     The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
uses Twitter to notify the public about the status of its missions as
well as to respond to questions regarding space exploration. For
example, NASA recently posted entries about its Mars Phoenix
Lander mission on Twitter, which included answers to questions by
individuals who followed its updates on the site.

·      The State Department uses YouTube and other video technology
in supporting its public diplomacy efforts. The department posts
YouTube videos of remarks by Secretary Clinton, daily press
briefings, interviews of U.S. diplomats, and testimonies by
ambassadors. It also conducted a global video contest that
encouraged public participation. The department then posted the
videos submitted to it on its America.gov Web site to prompt further
online discussion and participation.

·      The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) developed a
blog to facilitate an ongoing dialogue on security enhancements to
the passenger screening process. The blog provides a forum for TSA
to provide explanations about issues that can arise during the
passenger screening process and describe the rationale for the
agency’s policies and practices. TSA also uses Twitter to alert
subscribers to new blog posts. A program analyst in TSA’s Office of
Strategic Communications and Public Affairs stated that blogging
encourages conversation, and provides direct and timely clarification regarding issues of public concern.”

While this research addresses opportunities and examples for “web 2.o technologies,” it also highlights its challenges, especially as it pertains the privacy. I believe that the challenges associated with managing sensitive information, records and personal information will drive innovation for new tools, which will introduce new applications for social media. Often in debates about social media, we arrive at the concept of “who owns the message.” It’s a conversation about brand and brand management. I am excited that similar conversations are occurring with the federal government debating how to participate in an environment in which the message is not easy to control.

Franz Fanon said it best. “I ascribe a basic importance to the phenomenon of language. To speak means to be in a position to use a certain syntax, to grasp the morphology of this or that language, but it means above all to assume a culture, to support the weight of a civilization.”

And so when you tweet, you tweet revealing your world. The words you chose, the order in which you write them, their tone, their syntax, whether you use a hashtag, your decision to RT the new way or the authentic way–all reveal you.

How skilled are you at understanding the world of those you follow on Twitter? Try this, it takes :30 seconds. Ready?
Go to your tweet stream.
Highlight a tweet from someone you do not know well.
Analyze the tweet for age, gender,  attitude, profession of the speaker.
Now click on their bio. How’d you do?
If you want to improve, consider reading chapter 4 of Jim Sterne’s helpful book, “Social Media Metrics.”
It’s a plain English guide to social media metrics that makes an important, complex field easy to understand.

Innovation can happen anywhere. Even at big, established, blue-chip companies there’s always a way to communicate better with your customers. Just ask Charlie Treadwell, Cisco’s Online Community Strategist.

Charlie has single-handedly cultivated a vibrant Facebook community of more than 70,000 fans of Cisco’s Networking Academy. And in an innovative twist, people who have no direct connection with the company are allowed to manage the page’s content: with administrative access, these Cisco fans can update the Academy’s page and keep people posted on the community’s doings.

Charlie’s there too. Treadwell, aka CharlieAtCisco, reports detailed analytics — including quarter-by-quarter comparisons of page views, unique views, photoviews, video plays and fan activity — to all who care to see. With such information at his fingertips, Charlie has a solid command of the page’s cultural zeitgeist. He knows when to let it be, when to interject, and when to remove objectionable content. (Ever mindful of Cisco’s fans, he even notifies users before removing their content, carefully explaining his rationale.)

Check out Cisco Networking Academy’s Facebook page to learn from Charlie’s best practices. You’ll notice:

* A significant number of comments from fans unprompted by a moderator
* Fans answering each other’s questions with thoughtful feedback
* Detailed and thorough answers from the Cisco Networking Academy team (employees and community ambassadors)
* Fan video submissions in the video tab
* More than 450 discussion topics ranging from VLAN configuration to job posts

The most remarkable aspect of the page is that it has a life of its own.
The conversations are initiated and sustained by the community with thoughtful moderation.

To learn more about Charlie, follow him on twitter – @CharlieatCisco

Millions of people today are experiencing Twitter for the first time. On June 5 I appeared on a radio show in Los Angeles to share my thoughts on how Baby Boomers can get the most from their Twitter experience. Here’s what I shared:

Understanding what you hope to gain from Twitter will help you have a rewarding experience. My favorite benefits are using Twitter in the following way:

1. As a personal classroom. Follow people who teach you. Place them into lists and use TweetDeck to keep track of them. These are there lists I created and an example of someone I am following in each list.

• Poetswriterslifelovers (@MargaretAtwood)

• WorldChangers (@NickKristof)

• BusinessHeavyHitter (@Tom_Peters)

Everyone on the list teaches me something every day through the articles, quotes and commentary they share.

2. As a search engine on steroids. Run your Google search on search.twitter.com for real-time results. Use the advanced search to specify tweets based on location, whether they contain links, and more.

3. As a behind way to get behind the scenes access to personalities. (@alyssa_milano, @andersoncooper)

4. As a way to get shopping benefits. Get coupons, discounts and special access from your favorite brands (@bestbuy, @nordstrom)

5. As a way to make new friends and business contacts. Demonstrate you care by paying attention to your followers, respond with comments and over time, you’ll create meaningful relationships.

6. Getting closer to existing friends. Follow your friends for the every day details of their lives. You’ll feel closer to them – or decide to unfollow them! (@slarkpope)

The purpose of Twitter is yours to find. These points may make it easier to see why so many people love it.

Happy Tweeting

- @ZachBraiker