Thanks to the generosity and kindness of Janessa (of the Epicurious Vegan) and the other lovely organizers of Vida Vegan Con, I won a ticket to attend the Vida Vegan Con Tech Seminar. This seminar was all day on Saturday here in Seattle and I learned a ton! From basics of website design and coding to podcasting on a budget and integrating video into your blog to the ins and outs of social media. I brought home a ton of great information and ideas about moving forward with the old blogaroo. One thing I learned a bit about at the seminar was maximizing the potential of social media. I’ve been somewhat resistant to social media and only recently started posting on Facebook (though I’ve been a Facebook voyeur for years) and Twitter (it still goes against my writer’s sensibility to condense communication to 140 characters (or whatever it is)…I do actually really like complete sentences and punctuation and proper grammar. Nonetheless, I’m making an attempt. A few take-home tips I learned this weekend about social media were as follows:
- Choose just a few social media networks that work for your purpose and get good at using those, rather than doing all of them half-assedly (speaking of language–is that even a word?!)
- Be clear about your goals. What is the goal of your blog? When you identify what your goal is, you can choose to use social media to advance that goal. Also, think about your audience and what networks they are most likely to use.
- Be responsive and share others’ content. In addition to sharing your own content, share interesting stuff from other people. These networks are best used as an exchange of information and as a way of networking in both directions. Rule: for every share you make, you should share 7 items from others.
- Share different content in different spaces. Don’t duplicate the same content across all social media sites (I’m really bad about this and want to work on this).
This workshop especially gave me the chance to reflect on what social media I use, how I use them and how I might improve. On that note, I’ve noticed recently that a fair amount of traffic has been coming to my blog from Pinterest. I haven’t been on Pinterest, but last week I finally signed up for an account and started adding some stuff. I had a lot of school work to do this week and I can already tell that I could spend A LOT of time on Pinterest pinning other people’s photos, etc. What I came away with from the social media workshop is a commitment to using three social media sites and trying to use them more effectively. I would love it if you would follow me on:
I will do my very best to offer unique content on each of these networks and be a responsive member of each of these social media communities. I also want to do more research on how to best utilize these tools because I have A LOT to learn.
What social media sites do you use most often and why?
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awesome notes! glad you could make it.
Thanks, Jess! You guys did an awesome job!
Sounds great – when should I expect to be downloading serenityinthestorm’s first podcast?
Soooon! I hope!
Great coverage. Glad you could join us.
I’ve had to work so hard at twitter — Jess and Janessa basically forced me to get on there. I think I’ve seen it done sooooo poorly, like reposting the same thing five times a day, just a ton of transparent self-promotion. It’s so much more fun when you’ve got real people up there, even if they’re brands. (Also, I super love words.)
See you at VVC2013!
Thanks, Michele! Yes, the Twitter thing is foreign territory for me, but I’m going to give it a whirl and hope for the best… It seems like all of these things are a constant learning/evolving process. Here goes! 🙂 Can’t wait for VVC2013!