9 Easy Ways To Improve Your Online Life Today

Check out threadsy, the coolest new social media platform I've seen in a while. It combines the interface for e-mail, Facebook and Twitter. I have 10 more invites to the beta. Help yourself by going here:

http://bit.ly/cP5pBv

Set up Facebook friends lists. They help you create different channels so you can see your close friends, work friends, high school friends -- however you'd like to see people -- one group of the time. This blog post will walk you through how:

http://bit.ly/5SRjaQ

Explore Twitter. If you're not a Twitter user, and you wonder what all the buzz is about, here's an easy way to just sort of listen in. Google the phrase "Twitter advanced search," or click here. Type into the search field any phrase you're interested in. You could try "snow" or "Saints" or "Tar Heels." Then set the parameters for "place" to within 15 miles of where you live. Now you can see what the people right around you are saying about the topic that you are interested in. Some of the posts will be a little inane. (Welcome to Twitter.) But you might discover that you occasionally like to do this search, to listen in on the conversation in your area on a certain topic.

Explore Foursquare, the most successful geo-based social media platform. Is it still in a silly, somewhat irrelevant form? Yes. But everything is heading toward mobile, GPS-based smart search, and you need to understand this stuff. Start an account, and play around with it on your phone. Be careful about friending people you don't trust. You don't really want frenemies knowing where you are, do you?

Polish up your LinkedIn profile. In this economy, everyone should have a sparkling public, living resume. If you have a halfhearted LinkedIn profile, you may be doing your career more harm than good. This is a methodical process, and has none of the voyeuristic fun of checking out your high school sweetheart on Facebook. But it could help you get your dream job. Go through and make sure all your jobs, your educational information, any awards, and any professional group affiliations are represented. Join the group Charlotte Business Professionals, the city's best face-to-face networking organization. And write a few recommendations for people you've worked with. Chances are, a few will return the favor.

Check out Evernote, everyone's favorite app for improving productivity. This helps you save all kinds of information from the Web, syncs it to your phone, and makes it all searchable. Within a day you will be raving about it.

Explore voice-related dictation programs. Give your wrists and hands a break. They really were not made to type on keyboards and phones all day. If you're a Mac user, get MacSpeech. (I'm writing this with it right now.) there are many different recorder and dictation programs for your phone, as well, including the free Dragon Dictation.

Create a folder on your computer of "head shots," closeup photos of yourself that you like, including casual pictures and more formal, work-related shots. It's surprising how often we need head shots today. You should have at your disposal a variety that you like, cropped and ready to go. You should also have these on your phone. Otherwise, you will end up with pictures that you don't like of yourself being circulated for work and other purposes.

Create a personalized business card you love. If you let face-to-face meetings go during the recession, get back out there. Zazzle lets you create your own, prints and ships within a week or so, for cheap. Remember to inlcude your photo on your card, so people remember who you are.

Why many business's Facebook fan pages don't work

Has this ever happened to you? Someone sends you a friend request on Facebook, and you think, "Oh yeah, I like that person," and you accept. Immediately you're bonked with a request to fan their Facebook business page. And you feel a little used. You haven't even had a personal interaction with your new "friend." And they're already selling you.

This is one reason I don't like how many business owners use their Facebook fan pages.

Fans are naturally enthusiastic about someone or something. I know who and what I'm a "fan" of. I don't need someone to urge me to remember that I'm a fan of Ella Fitzgerald, fresh fish and the McGlohon Theater. And if they did, I'd be suspicious.

What often happens is that we fan a business because we're real-life friends of the business owner, and we're showing our support. There's nothing wrong with that. But, notice that we're coming back to the human connection. The bond is with our friend, not with a logo and a storefront.

There are businesses that use their fan pages well. The shoe store Step By Sloan uses its fan page to showcase new shoe styles, posting photos on the page's wall. That window-shopping approach makes sense for that business. For your restaurant, it might make sense to post dinner specials or events. But when a brand new Facebook friend immediately asked me -- a content renter -- to fan her real-estate agency, I thought, "why would I do that?"

I've had several business owners tell me how many fans they have on their business pages, and I suspect some of this is tied up in the unfortunate popularity contest on Facebook -- The Numbers Game. Are you trying to boost the number of fans on your page just to indicate that your business is thriving? That's understandable, but what if it gets in the way of your actual relationships with real customers and friends?

The content of your fan page needs to be interesting; you need to invest yourself in that business page. If it's simply wallpapered with promotional posts and the company logo, fans won't really be fans. They'll tolerate the page because they're friends.

Ask yourself: How would you greet customers in your brick-and-mortar or at a networking event? You'd be as personable as possible. If you're going to the trouble to maintain a business page, go to the trouble of being present and sociable there.

On the other hand, if you're at a cookout and someone asks you about work, you don't dash into another room and re-emerge in a suit, business card in hand. You talk about work because it's a part of your life.

Just because you have two pages doesn't mean you can't be a friend on your business page and can't mention work on your personal page. Too stringently separating our personal and work lives on Facebook often results in a one-sided personal page, and a very drab business page.

Reward a friend for being a fan of your business page by showing up there personally yourself and investing in that relationship.

Reach the peeps!

Wondering how to reach the folks from Saturday's social media conference at Queens University of Charlotte? This Twitter list is a great way to get them all in one fell swoop:

http://twitter.com/QueensDiana/cltsoc-attendees

Where's social media going? GPS shows us

Where's social media headed? Whip out your smartphone's GPS to find out. Location-based social media apps on mobile devices, such as Foursquare, are changing the games. Right here in Charlotte, startup Stash Games is mapping a new direction.

I recently sat down with two of Stash's leaders, Matt Wackerhagen and Kristi Stanfill, to talk about their company, which blends mobile, gaming, and a fun, story-related role-playing aspect. Here's what they told me about social media in motion:

"As more smartphones include robust mobile technologies, we're seeing social media become more physical and tangible," says Stanfill. "No longer are people just networking remotely over the internet. This becomes very real when you know where your friends are, and you can go connect with them in person."

One of the big knocks on social media has been that it's a time suck. Stanfill says that's changing, thanks to geo-based apps. "In many ways, it is more relevant. It gets you up off your butt from in front of your home computer. And it communicates what you're doing in the real world."

Foursquare has been the first big breakthrough in geo-based social media. That smartphone app lets you tag the locations where you are and communicate those spots to friends. You can leave tips for other users about the place where you are, unlock information about the places you visit, win virtual badges, and get ranked as "the mayor" of a locale.

What kind of impacts will geo-based social media have on us? Several important ones:

1. Privacy becomes a huge issue, because people can see where you are, what you're doing, and what your preferences are. So you won't want as many "friends."
2. The nostalgic aspect of Facebook will be left in the dust. Facebook has been a great deal about gathering, cataloging and sharing the past. You don't do that on the go. Facebook is about who we were. Web 3.0 is about where we're going.
   
3. Relevance becomes a priority for people on the move. Look for virtual contacts and signatures to become a bigger part of business, and for Farm Town and other dopey apps to fall away.
   
4. And gaming goes mobile in a fun, social way.
   

That mobile gaming is where Stash Games comes in. The company is taking role-playing, treasure hunts and mystery stories into mobile social media with a new kind of interactivity. The company builds games with a plotline, so companies can build morale, friends can bop around a city, and tourists can explore a new location.

"This is the stuff that really gets me excited," Stanfill says. "I love seeing the evolution of this augmented entertainment. It's "The Da Vinci Code" meets "Amazing Race."

Where'd Stanfill get her love of treasure hunts and mystery? She's the daughter of a former federal agent, and she moved around a lot as a kid.

So she could've GPS'd this destination long ago.

Walk through Facebook privacy settings

In December, Facebook sent out a message to all users about a change in privacy settings. There was some controversy about this because while Facebook claimed to be giving users more control over their privacy, they also seem to be suggesting that we reveal more personal information to marketers. The best way to control your privacy information on Facebook is to methodically go through your privacy settings. It's not as fun as looking at photos of your old high school sweetheart, but it does mean you can rest a little easier. I jokingly call Facebook "the giant peephole," because it gives a glimpse into its users lives. You just want to make sure people can only see as much as you want them to see.

Keep this post up in one window, and open a new window in your browser. Call up Facebook. Now you can read these instructions while making changes to your Facebook profile.

OK, first let's go up to the top of the Facebook page, and click on "settings." Let's go to "privacy settings," probably the least fun and most important category. Let's start with "profile information." Click on this category, and you'll see a list of information about you. You should be in control of who can see these things. The first topic, "about me," refers to the little box on the left of your profile page. This includes my birthday, networks, relationship status and other private details. I only want my friends to see this, so I toggle this to say "only friends." But I have one friend who I don't want to see any of my information. (Don't ask.) So after I've chosen "only friends," I also click "custom." Then I type in the name of the friend I don't want to see this information. Now only my friends, with the exception of this one friend, can see my "about me" box.

I can now do the same operation on each of the things on this list. For almost all of them, I want only my friends to be able to see my profile information.

There's a little category here you might want to tweak. See the category "birthday"? Besides making this so only friends can see the information, I also want to hide my birth year from everyone. (Vanity.) So I can go to my profile, click on "info," click on "edit," and toggle my birthday options to say "show only a month and day in my profile."

Now lets go back to privacy settings, and continue to choose who can see the categories of your profile information. On this list is something I want to shut down: the photos and videos that other people tag me in. I don't want anyone to see these. I want people to see the photos of me that I post, not the photo of me that some friend posts, probably without my approval. Otherwise, the photos "of me" taken by other people are the first photos anyone sees of me on Facebook. They see other people's photos of me, not the photos that I choose to post. So I toggle this category "photos and videos of me" to the option "only me." So no one can see the photos other people post of me, except me.

Below this is the category "photo albums." I choose to "edit the options" here, to edit who can see the photos I post to my profile. You want these photos grouped in albums, rather than all thrown in together. Here's why: I don't mind if friends of friends see my profile photos, but I don't want them to see the photos of my kids. And I want everyone to see the pictures I've posted of me with famous people, because I'm proud of those. So I can adjust the privacy settings for all these albums.

Now let's go back to privacy settings, where we can control who can post to our profiles. I have a few pesky friends who have been overly opinionated on my wall. I need to shut them down. So on the four categories of who can see and comment on my posts, I customize the settings to say only friends can do this, with the exception of the pesky friends.

That's all for the profile information of privacy settings. Let's move on to the next category, contact information. At the top of the page click settings, privacy settings, contact information. I don't want everyone or even all of my friends to see my mobile phone number or my address, or my e-mail. So I toggle those switches to include a friends list I've made of "close friends." Contact information might be the category or friends list comes in most handy. If you don't know how to make a friends list, see this post for instructions. This allows you to share your personal contact information with a small group of people who you want to see it. I do want everyone to see my website, so I toggle that switch to "everyone." I also want everyone to be able to send me a message, so I click that to "everyone."

Now let's take a look and see how a friend can see our profile. See the box "preview my profile" at the top of the "contact information" page? Click on that, and it will take you to your profile. You can type in a friend's name and see how they see their contact info.

Let's go back to our privacy settings and click on "applications and websites." This has been a controversial area, and might be the most important one for you to understand. See the category of what your friends can share about you? This is a red flag.

When friends enable applications, those applications and outside developers can see information about you, even if you don't use that application.

If that makes you feel uncomfortable, it should. Why should some outside developer be able to access your information when you're not even using their application? Let's shut this down right now. Click "edit settings." Now we can control what information our friends can share about us when they dabble in outside applications. (Again: creepy.) The only thing that I want these applications to be able to see is my website, because I want that to be publicized. (I'm marketing to the marketers, heh heh.) But I don't want these applications to have access to anything else here, because they're not even my applications, so I just want to shut them down. So the only box I check is "website." The fine print above the boxes reminds you that everyone can see your publicly available information. That's why we controlled it in the previous section. Save this information and let's go back to applications and websites.

I've chosen to block applications that popped up on my wall too often as friends engaged in Mafia wars and other games. On the block applications tab I can see what I've chosen to block. The next tab, "ignore application invites," lists the friends that I've shut down from inviting me to do certain applications. (I have a few who've gone overboard.)

Let's go back to our privacy settings page, and click on "search." I don't mind if everyone on Facebook can search for me, because that allows real-life friends to find me, and friend me on Facebook. (But again, I did shut down what information people can see about me in the previous section. Aren't you glad we did?)

I've also chosen to allow public search results, from search engines like Google. That's because I work in social media, and I want potential clients to be able to see what I do. But if you don't want people to be able to Google your Facebook page, say no here.

Let's go back to the privacy settings page and click on our last category, "block people." There are two strange robot profiles who bugged me some on Facebook. I've blocked them here. You might have more serious stalker problems. If there's someone out there who you don't want to be able to find you on Facebook, put their name and/or e-mail in here.

We're done! This is like going to the dentist: It's unpleasant, but it's a lot better than the repercussions if you don't do it. Aren't you glad to know that not everyone out there (including marketers) can see all that information about you? That friends can't post unflattering pictures of you? That third-party developers can't harvest your info simply because a friend is using their app?

I know I do. Thanks for going through this with me.

Threadsy the next big thing? Get an invite.

Who would play you in the movies? Send me your Hollywood double, or the perfect star to portray a friend.


Are you a combiner, or a divider? That might be one of the big questions in social media right now. For while 2008's mantra was "All aboard!" And 2009's was "Here's how to do it right." The social media approach for 2010 is:

Have it your way.

(Sorry, I was always a BK guy instead of a Mickey D's guy.) One of the big complaints I hear about social media is: "I don't have time for this stuff. Who wants to be on the computer for hours every day?" But configuring social media -- including email and chat -- to work for you cuts down on the time you put into it every day. You just have to put in the time up front. That's where the block is for many people -- and businesses. They don't know how to configure things to work for them. That's the most valuable thing I can provide.

Pulling together a custom-made social media and email interface for you that feels comfortable is an individualized process. But let me throw out two approaches that go opposite directions.

If you're a combiner, you might dislike hopping back and forth between email, Facebook and Twitter. Do you have to hit all three when you hop on the computer or pick up your phone? You can reroute Twitter DMs and Facebook messages to your email, but what about @replies on Twitter and other Facebook interactions? Threadsy is a new social media site that combines social media platforms so you get them all in one place. In September Threadsy placed second in the Techcrunch 50 competition for startups. Thready is currently in private Beta, but you can snag an invite here. I feared I might be overwhelmed by it -- facing all my social media and email at once. But actually, it's very handy. I don't have to hop back and forth as much. And there are two dandy features: The smoothest bit.ly link shortener I've ever seen; and a profiler that shows you all your friends' public social media accounts when you click on one of their messages. So I found flickr photos I'd never seen from a friend. You might want to at least experiment with Threadsy. Combining these accounts is one philosophical direction all this is going.

But what about another direction? That's where the dividers come in. If your idea of social media sanity is sorting all your messages into manageable folders, try Facebook friends lists, Twitter lists and Gmail folders. Some believe Twitter and Facebook can save us from email overload, as this Guardian blog post suggests. I can see that argument. And many of my friends send personal greetings via Facebook, rather than on email. The quick messages come through Twitter. I do file my Gmail emails into different categories. (You can double-categorize them by adding an "important" label to a "work" label, or a "needs long reply" label to a "personal" label.) Then I don't just stare at a massive inbox. Or several massive inboxes: I'm stunned by how many people have separate email accounts they must access one at a time. Combining those into a Gmail account can make your life much simpler, and you can route those emails into separate folders. But, some folks are dividers by nature.

Whether you're a combiner or divider, it's worth putting in the time to configure your online communications. Three hours going in can save you an hour every day, and untold frustration.


Moses was a very talented divider.

Panthers, "Avatar" and your social media

Who would play you in the movies? Hollywood meets Charlotte in this game pairing lookalike stars and their Charlottean counterparts. Got a casting inspiration? Let me know.

The Panthers' promising play at the end of the season shows the players' talent -- especially with the running game and defense -- and proves there are problems at the top. Yes, the Saints sat starters today, but the Panthers are now showing potential that was nowhere to be found earlier in the season because a talented team was not ready to play. That's a coaching problem. ... Charlotte is too passive and patient a sports town. Observer readers are voting to keep Coach John Fox and GM Marty Hurney 54%-46% in 4,300 votes. I disagree. Jake should've been out earlier in the year, Matt Moore should get the starting spot, and Fox and Hurney should be out now. ... Does Fox even try on third-and-long? The Brad Hoover handoff is not the exciting play we need to see. ... I'm listening to former Ravens coach Brian Billick (pictured, right) do the color announcing for Fox and thinking, "He'd look good on the Panthers sidelines..."

The video below is a hilarious look at what a Christmas album would be like from the intentionally weird pop diva Lady Gaga.



The Harvard study showing men who drink six or more cups of coffee a day are safer from deadly prostate cancer just seems wrong to me. That much coffee is good for the prostate? I'm resisting objecting to a prostate study led by a woman researcher. OK, I'm not: I just want the lead researcher to have the part of the body being studied, that's all. And I don't blame women for feeling the same way about men leading studies about female plumbing parts.

The whole "social media is narcissism" argument is B.S. Smartphones and social media connect people; narcissism is self-centered isolation. And the fact that nearly 300 pundits have written this in the past month shows only that this is the flavor of the month for opinion writers who don't understand the platforms. What we need to do is organize our social media.

I loved "Avatar." But special effects aren't everything. (I don't go to a Sherlock Holmes movie to see special effects and kung fu.) If you want to see acting, rent "I've Loved You So Long" with Kristin Scott Thomas (pictured, right), or this year's "Juno," "An Education." Speaking of "Avatar," did you know the first 3-D movie hit American screens in 1923?

Questions to ask about your business on social media: We're now on question 6 in this series. Previously we've asked What does our business hope to accomplish? and What social media accounts do we now have, how active are they, and what problems do they have? and Who's going to maintain, feed and grow these accounts? and What are the communications skills and weaknesses of the social media leaders in our company? and How will we integrate social media into the overall communications strategy of our company?

Today we move on to our next question:

How will we measure the success of this objective?

Return on investment has been one of the big social media questions for businesses. But you can't evaluate whether Facebook and Twitter are "worth it." You've got to be specific to your business and your campaign. Will you measure it by how much traffic you drive to your Web site? To the number of new requests for business? Many businesses go those directions. But I'm going to suggest a different approach, especially as the economic downturn lingers. Why not ask if social media is connecting you better, generating more contact and dialogue and improving your online brand? Or, even better, would those areas be suffering without these new efforts while your competitors pull away from you?