This is the second in our series of blog posts answering your twitter questions from the recent contest.
Our first question comes from Jenny from @jattconsulting more info on them here. (site still under construction)
@Spiderworking How do you run a contest or a poll on facebook?
There are a number of ways of running a poll on Facebook. Which method you use is determined by what sort of results you want. If you are running the poll for research purposes and you want definite answers to your questions I would recommend using one of the applications that has been designed to run on Facebook Pages. Probably the best application currently is “Polls” which is not only the best looking application but it also makes it easy for your fans to see the options.
If however your Poll is just for fun, or designed to create more interaction on your page, using phtographs or the Notes Application can attract more users. One of my favorite Irish Facebook pages Hairy Baby runs polls using Photos on a regular basis. They load a picture or a series of pictures and use the description box to ask the question.
We recently ran a poll on our own page using the notes application and again found it a good way to encourage interaction. Because we weren’t limiting our responses to specific answers we discovered options we hadn’t considered in the original poll.
If you know the username of the twitter user you want to unfollow go to http://www.twitter.com/useryouwanttounfollow – Make sure you are logged into twitter.
On the right hand side of their page you will see a cog symbol:
Choose “unfollow” from the drop down menu.
We’ll be answering more of your Twitter questions next week.
If you like cool social media tools don’t forget to become a fan of Spiderworking.com on Facebook where every Monday we showcase one of our favourite apps.
We’ll be answering more of your Twitter questions next week.
If you like cool social media tools don’t forget to become a fan of Spiderworking.com on Facebook where every Monday we showcase one of our favourite apps.
This week Amanda from Spiderworking.com demonstrates a cool web app for videobloggers. Trying to remember what it is you wanted to say can be a challenge when you are a video blogger. Easypromptor is a autocue / telepromptor device that you can use on your own computer.
If you like cool social media tools become a fan of Spiderworking.com on Facebookwhere we help blow the Monday Blues away with a weekly “Monday Morning Cool Tool”.
At Spiderworking.com we work closely with Partners in order to offer you the best skills from the best businesses in Ireland. Although we manage all the Social Media work in house there are some jobs that our expert team of associates are better equipped to handle. Last year we were delighted to welcome Sole CV on board offering clients the opportunity to ‘Pimp Their Profile’.
We asked Justine from Sole CV to tell us more:
‘’LinkedIn exists to help you make better use of your professional network and help the people you trust in return.’’
Likewise, we exist to help make sure you use your professional network optimally and therefore help the people you trust in return.
Sole CV provides a service to help maximise the power of your profile by pimping your digital CV on LinkedIn. Users on LinkedIn set up their profiles in stages to ultimately build a summary of your academic and work history to merit your professional credentials. Profiles consist of location, education, current and past work history, skills, website links, specialties, personal information and contacts to name a few.
Employers are using LinkedIn to help find suitable employees. Candidates are using LinkedIn to search for suitable jobs. Networking groups are growing on a daily basis so you can now find that contact, and rate their ability, by word of mouse.
If you are uncertain of how to complete this significant profile section, struggling to get content rich profile, want to know how to maximise the keywords in your profile for search engine optimisation or simply do not have the time, then please contact us at www.solecv.com. We’d be happy to pimp your profile!
@Spiderworking How do you know if an event has a twittertag and what that twittertag is?
Twitter tags or hashtags are very organic, some spring up spontaneously, some are created with a specific purpose in mind. Some take off, some trend then die quickly and some never get beyond a few tweets.
Twitter users watching the recent BBC documentary series ‘The Virtual Revolution’ were delighted to see the hashtag for the series appearing at the opening of the show, it was the talk of twitter for most of the programme. Sadly twitter tags are not always as easy to identify. Some events can attract more than one #tag as the recent battle to establish a tag for ‘BBC Question Time’. Both #bbcquestiontime and #bbcqt were being adopted by viewers with most finally settling on #bbcqt, probably because it’s shortness allowed more comment. Although, as far as I can see, the BBC did not create this tag, they have actively adopted it even advertising it on the ‘Qustion Time’ site.
Conferences and events tend to invent their own tags and will often list them on their websites. Some display a twitterfeed screen at the event including the tag. Obviously if you aren’t at the event and they haven’t indicated the tag on their website, it is harder to discover what it is. In this case, searching the twitterfeeds of tweeps you know are attending could help.
There are a few #tag directories, Hashtags.org being perhaps the best, it allows you to either view current trending hashtags or search one of your choice. The result is a list of tweets containing the tag and a graph, showing the tag’s popularity over time. Another directory; TagDef defines #tags, again you can choose from trending tags or input your own. The site offers you a definition of that tag and a list of tweets using it. The definitions are, like Wikipedia, user generated so it is worth comparing them with the twitter stream to confirm the meaning.
Our second question comes from our winner @OscarBearGrylls who asked:
@spiderworking how many companies have used your services to launch them on twitter?
This is a hard question for me to answer as we offer training to groups as well as setting up accounts for individual users so for now that number will have to remain a pretty vague up to 50. We most recently trained a group of Journalists from ‘The Nationalist’ and are looking forward to reading their tweets in the future.
We’ll be answering more of your Twitter questions next week.
If you like cool social media tools don’t forget to become a fan of Spiderworking.com on Facebook where every Monday we showcase one of our favourite apps.
If you’re a blogger did you know that you can feed your blog automatically into Facebook. In this weeks video blog we show you two ways to do this:
1. Using the existing “Notes” application
2. Using Networked Blogs:
If you want to know more about some of the coolest social meida applications join our Facebook page, where every Monday we feature a “Monday Morning Cool Tool” last weeks tool turned text uʍop ǝpısdn.
Each week we are featuring one of the Work The Web workshops here on our blog.
This weeks featured workshop is ‘Owning Your Own Website’
Who is this workshop for?
This is not a course for nerds or technophiles – it is a course for the common or garden business person who wants to understand and appreciate the technology behind one of their greatest sales tools – their website.
This is a course for people who know nothing about owning a website but wish to know everything.
This is not a course for nerds or technophiles – it is a course for the common or garden business person who wants to understand and appreciate the technology behind one of their greatest sales tools – their website.
This is a course for people who know nothing about owning a website but wish to know everything.
What you will learn:
Common types of website
Guide to hosting your website
Guide to domain names
What are IP addresses & domain name servers?
Uploading and accessing your website
Email and your website
Primer on search engine optimisation
Website technologies explained
The future of the WWW – HTML 5.0 revealed
Common website mistakes
Where & When:
We are running this one day workshop on:
Thursday 20th Mayat The Maudlins House Hotel, Naas, Co. Kildare
and
Friday 4th June at Jury’s Inn, Custom House Quay, Dublin 1
A limited number of Early Bird tickets are available for €95
Full price tickets cost €145
Payment Details
If you wish to pay by Visa or Mastercard please simple pay online when booking your tickets. If you wish to pay by Laser or if you prefer to pay by Visa/Mastercard over the phone please call 091 399 939 and tell the receptionist that you wish to pay by credit card. To pay by cheque or EFT please contact Ruairi on 091 399 939 for details.
Running a competition or draw can be a great way to attract new followers.
You can offer a prize draw for those who retweet a particular phrase, for tweeps who uses a particular #tag or a simple have a draw from new followers. It not only helps raise your twitter profile but it also adds a bit of fun and interaction to your tweets.
You can of course run the contest manually but there are some tools that can make it easier:
Twitrand.com allows you to either choose one follower randomly from all of your followers or choose a winner from those who have ReTweeted a particular phrase.
Tweetaways.com has a free service and a very reasonably priced paid service. The free service allows you to pick a winner from those who Retweet a phrase. The biggest difference between this and Twitrand is that Tweetaways requires you to verify your twitter account. When you sign up it sends you a unique key that you can use in all your contests. The paid service allows you to run the entire competition through the application, giving you more stats etc.
If you want to draw from a group of followers, for example you may want to choose a winner from every 100 followers, I have found two applications that work well in conjunction with each other.
Random.org allows you to pick a number randomly from a set that you specify. For example 101-200. To save the hassle of counting back through your twitter followers you can use MyTweeple.com which lists your followers numerically.
If you like playing with cool social media tools join our Facebook page where we have introduced “Monday Morning Cool Tools”. Designed to blow away the Monday morning blues each week we will be featuring one of our favorite social media apps.
Flock is fast becoming my favorite browser. With lots of added features that enable you to keep up with all your social networking, video and photo sharing and email accounts, it means you no longer have to have multiple tabs open. It also means you no longer have to log in and out of accounts.
Flock is a one stop interface for all your social media activities.
Download Flock at: http://www.flock.com/
Flock is fast becoming my favorite browser. With lots of added features that enable you to keep up with all your social networking, video and photo sharing and email accounts, it means you no longer have to have multiple tabs open. It also means you no longer have to log in and out of accounts.
Flock is a one stop interface for all your social media activities.
Each week we are featuring one of the Work The Web workshops here on our blog.
This weeks featured workshop is ‘Blogging For Business’
Who is this workshop for?
Small to medium sized business owners who own a website but feel that they are not maximising it to it’s full potential. Paricipants should already have a basic knowledge of Social Media.
Each week we are featuring one of the Work The Web workshops here on our blog.
This weeks featured workshop is ‘E-Commerce & Selling Online’
Who is this workshop for?
This workshop helps participants understand what e-commerce is, the benefits of using the Internet to sell products and services and how to implement e-commerce. This workshop is for both existing online retailers and those who are in the planning stage.
What you will learn:
What is e-commerce?
How it works
How it could benefit you
What could you sell online and to whom?
What type of e-commerce is right for you?
How might e-commerce change your business?
Setting up e-commerce on your website
Setting up the facility with your bank
Security and reliability issues
What price to charge for products
Pricing models
Payment methods
Fulfillment and distribution
Purchasing policies
How to let users select items to purchase (the shopping cart options)
How to promote your e-commerce facility
Maintaining the e-commerce facility
Google analytics and e-commerce
Case studies
Where & When:
We are running this one day workshop on:
Friday 14th May at Jury’s Inn, Custom House Quay, Dublin 1
and
Thursday 3rd June at The Maudlins House Hotel, Naas, Co. Kildare
A limited number of Early Bird tickets are available for €95
Full price tickets cost €145
Payment Details
If you wish to pay by Visa or Mastercard please simple pay online when booking your tickets. If you wish to pay by Laser or if you prefer to pay by Visa/Mastercard over the phone please call 091 399 939 and tell the receptionist that you wish to pay by credit card. To pay by cheque or EFT please contact Ruairi on 091 399 939 for details.
I was asked by a customer during the week if you could post pictures to twitter. Twitter is text based but it is possible to link to a picture externally. By using a link shortener you can post a link to the photograph on Flickr, Pix.ie, Photobucket etc.
Even simpler are the web based applications that synchronise with your twitter account allowing you to tweet a picture and caption for you. These services also give you an email address that automatically tweets photographs to your twitter stream.
I trialed two of the many applications available for doing this are Twitpic and Twitflog. Both work well. Twitpic is probaby the most common twitter photo service, it’s easy to use, the upload time is short and it is simple to view comments on your photos.
On Twitflog the interface is nicer, once you have synced your accounts the home page mimics your twitter page. I found the upload time to be slower.
Both services are very user friendly and easy to use. On upload time alone I think I prefer Twitpic so here’s a quick rundown of how it works:
Log into Twitpic using your Twitter username and password.
Click ‘Upload Photo’ on the top right hand side.
Click ‘Choose File’ and find the photo you wish to upload on your computer.
Add the tweet that you would like to accompany your picture.
Click ‘upload’ and your message will be tweeted.
Here’s one I made earlier:
To email a picture from your phone or email app you will need to make a note of your unique email address. Click the ‘settings’ menu on the top right hand side of your screen to find out what it is. Attach the photograph to your email and add your tweet into the subject line.
Remember to let us know your social media questions no matter how big or small. Leave a comment below with your question.
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