Conversational Media Marketing

After spending a good deal of time on Steve Rubel's blog I got to noticing that he had a bunch of cool social media stuff in the footer of each post... Technorati links, Digg, delicious, etc.

Using Typepad for my blog, as does Steve, of course I wanted to have all that as well. So, I searched under the hood of his blog to view the source code and found that he was using Feedburner's FeedFlare component to add the functionality.

If you're using Typepad and would like to do the same, it's really very easy.  Just follow the steps outlined in the two following videos:

Video #1: Setting up FeedFlare in Feedburner (4 MB; 3:13)

Video #2: Activating FeedFlare in Typepad (1 MB; 47 sec)

Disregarding the fact that I need to polish up my video presentation/narration skills, I hope you found this helpful. In all honesty, I'd like to do more of this sort of thing to add some instructional value. I've been reluctant to do so in the past because I'm not a technical writer and doing "how-to" posts has never been my strong suit. But, with video screen capture (I'm using Jing btw), it's much easier.

I know Steve Rubel well enough to know he didn't write his recent SEO Shenanigans post solely for the purpose of linkbaiting. In fact, I'm betting he probably didn't have using the post for linkbait as a motive at all.

Nonetheless, the post he wrote decrying the use of social media for the sole purpose of influencing search engines is ironic when you consider just how "sticky" it became as a result.

Consider these numbers... 340 Diggs, 60 saves to del.icio.us, 69 blog reactions listed in Technorati, and nearly 6,000 links according to Google for the keyphrase "seo shenanigans." I went through several pages worth of returns and they all linked to the post directly or to another referencing it.

Me and the Internet go way back, at least to 1995, and probably before. I can't exactly remember. What I do recall though is that the browser I used to surf the net via my 1200 baud modem (or whatever speed it was) was Netscape Navigator. That's why I'm a bit sad to learn that AOL is about to kill the browser once and for all.

On Saturday, March 1st, AOL will pull the plug on any support related to Netscape. It's already dead for all intents and purposes. What happens March 1st will be the final nail in the coffin.

Despite this move, considering Firefox and Flock are built on the same codebase as the original, Netscape does live on in a sense.

So, why don't we all take a moment to fondly remember the old browser.  Rest in peace Netscape. I knew thee well.

Just for grins, I downloaded Netscape 9. Though I have no plans to actually use it, I thought once more just for old time sake wouldn't hurt.

I'm in the throes of preparing for a speaking engagement later today with the Public Relations Association of Louisiana, Baton Rouge chapter, at their monthly luncheon. I'll be talking about the marketing benefits of blogs.

Actually, this feels a bit like deja vu all over again. A couple of years ago I spoke to the Mississippi version of the same group at one of their monthly luncheons.

Well-known PR blogger Steve Rubel incited quite a bit of debate recently with a post he wrote that accused SEO experts of exploiting social media for the sole purpose of scamming search engines. One such expert, Marketing Pilgrim's Andy Beal, took him to task over the matter saying that the proverbial pot is calling the kettle black and that PR pros should get the log out of their own eye before trying to get the speck out of another's.

Steve seems to think there's a fire and all of us need to run to it with a bucket of water. He's certainly raising the alarm calling these "shenanigans" a "clear and present danger."   

In response, I left a lengthy comment on his blog, but am reprinting it here because the chances of you finding it among the many there are slim to none.

I agree that using blogs and social media solely for the purpose of influencing search results is disingenuous and not the best and highest use of the medium. However, I can "feel their pain." Clients place great emphasis on the need to rank higher in SERPs and the burden of that falls in the lap of the SEO specialist.

Having the spent the last couple of years introducing blogs to the real estate industry I can tell you the one thing I heard over and over again was, "Will it help me rank higher in Google?" That was the only benefit many were interested in.

Truth is, blogs especially are great SEO tools. Writing frequently-updated, keyword-optimized, thematically-relevant posts will very likely vault one to the top of the rankings. I've experienced that on numerous occasions.

From what you're saying, the desire to exploit that benefit has become as tempting to SEOs as "Turkish Delight" was to Edmund in the Chronicles of Narnia. If that is indeed the case, let me encourage a return to a healthy balance of value-added conversation combined with an emphasis on and awareness of the SEO benefit of blogs and other forms of social media. It needed need not be one or the other when it can just as easily be both/and.

I don't pretend to be an SEO specialist. One thing I do know is that Google and blogs play together very well. Here's one example...(click for larger image)

Recently, I made a social media boo-boo on Facebook, admitted it and moved on. Most everyone was gracious to accept my apologies.

There is one social media faux pas that marketers are making over and over again, with no apology whatsoever. It's the "friend-me-for-the-sole-purpose-of-pitching-me" tactic, and I'm darned tired of it.

Just a couple of days ago I get a Facebook friend request from someone. Before accepting, I click the link on their name to check them out. They seem legit, so I agree to let them join my network.

The Word of Mouth Marketing Association is holding its annual WOMMA University, a two-day event designed to help educate marketers about how to carry out WOM marketing campaigns... and, they're looking for faculty members.

So, if you're an expert on business blogging, social media guru or WOMM savant, here's your chance to strut your stuff! Plus, the event is being held in Miami in May, so it can't get much better than that so far as location is concerned. (Unless you consider the upcoming Aloha Summit being held in Hawaii.)

And, yes, I've already sent in my application.

Forrester analyst Jeremiah Owyang has started a new series called Social Media Frequently Asked Questions. The second in the series asks, "What does it mean to be authentic, transparent, or human?" That's within the context of social media, of course.

It's a good question, and not unlike questions Pete Blackshaw is friends. The group has reached the 500 mark and Pete wants to know  if he's reached the "tipping point" and is he's making a "mockery of relationships." (He's asking the question on his blog as well.)

The two questions are not that disparate. In fact, they're both looking at the same elephant, but from different vantage points.

I want to posit an hypothesis. (Not sure what that means, but it sounds good.) There is a biblical epithet that says, "A cord of three strands is not easily broken."

In constructing my social graph, I'm finding that I tend to build relationships around three sites: Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. In some cases, I have connections with a given individual in all three.

My hypothesis is this...

The more connections you have with a particular person, the stronger your relationship to them. Is that fallacious?

Further, it seems to me that there are varying degrees of personalbeness depending on which site you're connected, LinkedIn being the least personal and Twitter being the most. Or, perhaps "personal" is not the best term... maybe "casual" or "informal" is.

What do you think? Does my conjecture hold water? What's been your experience?