Spreading my wings

Hi Nadine: I think it is very important to transmit the history & heritage of a company as part of telling its story via social media. Mining a company’s DNA is very important for customers and employees. This can be cone in a variety of ways which are NOT musty and dusty!!!

It is particularly important at the time of an anniversary of a company, brand or non-profit.

And it is particularly important at a time of economic difficulties as a part of “comfort” marketing. This year a lot of companies are telling their storeis as they celebrate anniverssities such as Orea and Starkist which has brought back Charlie the Tuna of whom I have fond memories.

Nadine: You are so right. One canread about social media all they wish, but there is no way to truly understand its impact without diving into yourself. The real currency is shared thoughts, ideas and exchange. Each new media entrant of size has its own value. Twitter is a real time barometer of the chatter that is occurring as each person joins in. Facebaook is a closed network for most to share more personal information with friends and acquaintances, Linked In is a vibrant network among business people, a giant collective contact database threaded through degrees of separation. The only way to know their power is to use them. Glad you’ve joined the conversation. Kay

I think I do know quite a lot about this Nadine – 26 000 blog reads in less than 9 months, over 50% of my business comes through people I have never met etc.

I just posted something on employee engagement more generally – see http://www.humandynamics.wordpress.com Might that be of interest.

Best regards

Peter

Engagement I have found to be the key to maintaining social media relationships – I wrote a piece a few years back on the topic –
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/christopher-burgess/a-common-sense-approach-t_b_391963.html

There is great utility in social media, but it, like so much else is also about the hype it generates, or even self-generates. These various “tools” demand time to be useful, or even dedicated staff to maintain them effectively. For most of us, not all, they are not useful in getting work, but certainly make more work…as work and social become more entwined, making demands of both ever so much greater. Overall, I remember the summers as a youth, thinking they lasted forever and what a wonderful feeling that was. Today’s young people, my children included, believe the summer flies by and there is no time for anything…social media, Internet and the constant stream of info-tainment has a great deal to do with this. We seem willing to give up a little of our humanity for all this “surface” connectedness, while many are far less connected where it matters most. Relationships are aplenty in this new age of “friends,” but depth leaves all too much at the table, where many of us eat alone.

Debbie, Kay, David, Peter, Marita, Christopher, Liliana and Robert – thank you for your comments. I am not certain about the settings here and whether you will be alerted when I write this reply but I appreciate that each of you have shared your insights. I’ve also checked your websites and left comments where I can.

Well, here is an interesting take on this, compared to most of you I guess.

I’m in the “younger” generation where social media became part of our childhood early on. It has always been like 2nd nature to me, to connect to other people and make new friends online.

One of my biggest hobbies is playing video games, especially online. No, I’m not one of those kids who sits around for half a day and plays World of Warcraft till he falls asleep at his desk. But I do play quite a lot when I get the chance, aside from married life and just taking care of myself in general. Since I’ve started playing games online, I have met some really amazing and wonderful people. If you look a popular game long enough, you will find out that there are “communities” that people become a part of and join. This way, they can play with the same people usually, get to know each other, and make friends.

I’ve been a part of a gaming community since 2007, and it has been fantastic. I’ve met people from all over the world, and some of them I consider close friends. Some of us have even reached out to each other on Facebook. When you’re playing a game, with a great community, people not only talk about the game. In case you’re wondering, we use headsets with mics on them. This way we can just talk while playing, instead of typing in chat. Another form of communication we use for the community is a voice client called, Ventrilo. It’s basically a voice chat program, where the server you are on, can create different rooms and people can join and just talk to each other. It’s actually the first thing I do before I start up my game. Just to catch up with friends, talk about our days and see how people are doing. Its also a nice way to talk more privately, so you don’t talk too much in the game itself.

Of course, it takes a physical server and money to run this whole community. So the owner of the server puts in a lot of money to run it. But the nice thing is that many people donate money to him. For myself, I even do a monthly donation though Paypal. Since this is an important place of friendship and lots of fun, people are glad to donate to the server/community.

Finally, we also have a website, where we use to post announcements, have a birthday calendar and even have a place for people to post fun stuff to share with everyone (videos, pictures, websites, etc.). Once in while, we even have fun events that the admins will setup. We’ll do fun things in the game, that you normally wouldn’t do for holidays, or something other special day. When its someone’s birthday we turn on “party mode”. This changes the characters in the game to wear party hats. Instead of things exploding or breaking into their usual forms, they explode into gift boxes, confetti, and other party related things. One particular event, that was very special and personal to me and our community happened a couple months ago…

One of our main admins, who went by the name of “Moofie”, was an Australian, amazing and hilarious man. He was one of the most generous and thoughtful people many of us knew. He was so welcoming to anyone new, and always made funny and cheesy jokes that make everyone laugh. One of his signature jokes was like so; “This team is worse than George’s meatloaf!” He contributed a lot to the community, and in donations as well. One day, he started to not show up as much as he used to. He was in contact with some other admins in real life every now and then, and word got out that he became very sick with something. He eventually came back on the server to play for a little while, but couldn’t speak. He would only type in chat. He told us he was getting treatments for something, but no one knew exactly what. It sounded serious… Eventually some of us got word that he was diagnosed with something very serious… some terminal illness that was life threatening. No one knew if he would make it or not.

Then, one day, his wife or sister (not sure really) posted on our website. It was a message from Moofie, to the community. It was his last farewell to all of us. By the time we had gotten the message, he was gone… He expressed a lot of love for everyone in the community and how he didn’t want anyone to be sad. Of course, he had to throw in his silly and cheesy jokes in there. That post, eventually became a MASSIVE thread where everyone wrote back their goodbyes and last messages to him. The woman that was related to him, and posted initially, sent all the message back to the family and was greatly appreciative of them. A little later that week, we planned a date for as many people as possible to show up (in game) for a memorial ceremony. Some people recorded it from their desktop, for those who were unfortunate to miss it. There was a moment of silence and everything… In case you are curious about how this whole thing looks and happened, you can watch the youtube video that was posted here: http://youtu.be/QuV6FOWV-MA

Writing and reliving this moment, makes me a bit emotional, but he was an important part of my life. He will be greatly missed… So, coming back to Social Networking, you can see how it has been a part of my life. There are so many different form factors of it. This is just one way that it’s enriched my life.

(Sorry for the long post, but I couldn’t help myself :) )

Hi Nadine,

Some of us are novices to exploiting the social media and we by so doing cannot get exposure to great supporters,,,,,nevertheless, I believe through beCause we can get linked to people who support our causes,,,,

I wish through this forum I can get connected to followers who can share their expertise, resources, etc I need to learn what it takes to be successful in development endeavors, who to seek and at what time,,,,,,

Thank you

Hi Nadine,
Very Interesting and lovely article,and very Informative

Many thanks
Reza