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Within the next two years 70% of all Dutch organisations will be using social media. More reason to put extra attention and effort in making your own tools effective! In this blog I will focus on a question of which answer may interest you…

How to get more interaction and traffic to your social media tools?

Keep your private pictures in your pocket!

This blog is not about media use IN organisations, but media use BY organisations. In 2 years approximately 70% of all Dutch organisations will be making use of social media, they will be all over the social networking websites creating work opportunities and screening potential employees.

An article I read online today on AD made me think about something I was told a few weeks earlier: everything people are displaying on their personal profiles creates their internet identity. This identity can work for you or against you… The article I read referred to a chat conversation of Facebook-founder Mark Zuckerberg which took place when he had just established the popular social networking website Facebook. Facebook did not deny the authenticity of the following conversation:

Join My Party

This morning I read the morning newspaper on my way to school when I bumped into an article regarding social media use among the Dutch politicians of today. The article started with some information about our very own prime minister who ate a piece of cake yesterday with a few of his 200.000 hyvesfriends. I laughed out loud when I read that these friends shared their birthday, May 15^th, with Jan Peter Balkenende.

I decided that I wanted some more insight in this happening.. I couldn’t find anything on Prime Ministers’ hyves, me not being one of his 196.430 friends (a request is pending). When I searched some more I found out he had invited 15 of his hyvesfriend who shared the birthday and to launch CDA-radio. Balkenende received some nice presents such as decorated soup cans, self made collages and some books.

I have to admit he makes it count.. ‘As a politician you need to know what is happening in the society, Hyves helps me with that. This is a nice opportunity to meet each other for real.’ he tells in an interview. My birthday is on September 24^th, unfortunately all celebrities who share that same birthday died. Nevertheless, when you celebrate your birthday on the following date, make sure you will send a friendrequest...

May 27^th – Jamie Oliver
July 6^th- the 14^th Dalai Lama
August 4^th – Barack Obama
October 13^th – Margaret Thatcher
December 18^th – Brad Pitt

Observing, listening and participating in Social Media, The Conversation Prism

A few weeks ago I visited an alumni gathering from my old college where I attended a social media workshop by Joris Kleinveld. In the first few slides he showed the crowd some media graphics of which one kept on crossing my mind later that week, The Conversation Prism. In this blog I would like to introduce you to this brilliant attempt of visualizing the rapidly involving landscape for social tools, services and networks.

(Source)

The prism, which is developed by Brain Solis, represents the world of Social Media and the conversations floating around in it. According to Brian[1]; online conversations take place all the time, with or without you. The prism will help you to visualize the potential extent of the online conversations that can impact and influence your business and brand.

As a professional you will be standing at the center of the prism. From out this position you can observe or listen to the conversations floating around in the Social Media or you can participate in them. According to Solis, everything starts with listening and observing in order to identify where relevant discussions take place, as well as their scale and frequency.

I agree, patiently observing and listening can reveal information, groups and discussions that would never be yours to find in the fist place. Last week, someone asked me how I thought about the overkill of Social Media NGO’s got to choose from in order to communicate with each other. My thoughts, which definitely did no go out to the fact that many options are overkill; thought of NGO’s assembling a well considered media mix. The Conversation Prism can help NGO’s to identify where other NGO’s are active and where they should link in. In this way, they can put their valuable time some specific communication channels to create optimal and cheap communication.

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[1] http://www.briansolis.com/2008/08/introducing-conversation-prism/