Friday, May 22, 2009

Your Social Networks Have Different Audiences!

I bet you $100 that your Facebook friends don't care what you are talking about on Twitter. They don't know what @username is and they don't know what #hashtag is.

I also bet that half of them have opted out of receiving your FB updates because you spam their Facebook lifestream with Twitter updates.

You have different audiences on your social networks - and your normal friends are not on the 15 different social networks that you are on! Play it safe and only post things on the social networking platform that fits that audience.

Sure sometimes you come across a great article or funny video that you want to share with everyone; it is probably suitable across all your audiences too. But once start using characters that are unfamiliar with non-Twitter folk, you become irrelevant to that viewer.

I am not a big advocate for posting the same msg I do on Twitter to go to my FB account. Half the time, I'm taking the time to find the @username that is associated to the artist or author to give kudos to the individual OR I'm using a #hashtag term to add my post category/conversation.

To me, that is a smart way to use Twitter - You engage more in conversation with individuals at such a small level (140 characters or less) that your followers can scan what you are saying and choose to engage or choose to ignore. Within 10 seconds, your posts will have dropped below the screen and out of their view.

This has been posted on twitter a few times over the past week (or at least this data flow concept). give credit to Louis Gray for this slide deck:



Fortunatley for me, I don't have too many friends that spam my Facebook lifestream with twitter feeds. I haven't blocked their posts out of respect :) But I'm not everyone, and I'm sure others may hide you eventually!

You MUST be aware of your audience within your social networks. If not, your message is diluted and ignored. Take advantage of your other networks by sharing or pitching information to them in a slightly different way.

Do you agree or disagree?

Sunday, February 1, 2009

Twitter Newbies: "They are on there, but don't know where to start"

I see why many people just don't get Twitter.  
  1. They don't care, and don't know where start
  2. They want to care, but don't know where to start
  3. They are on there, but don't know where to start
Just got asked a question about Twitter on Facebook.  See Question and Answer below:
Question
Answer


He also is testing out TwitterFon and Tweetie.

So really, its education of Twitter that needs to be put in place.  

How many professors out there are using Twitter?  Or High School Teacher for that matter!

What are your thoughts?


Saturday, January 10, 2009

My 101 Goals to complete in 1001 Days

Today, I start my 101 tasks to complete in 1001 days (2.75 years). Thats 143 weeks (31 months). My BIG DAY is October 8th, 2011.

I have a ton on my plate right now with working full-time at Global Crossing as a Business Analyst, working nights and weekends with the MyMinderz team to launch their next wave of applications, and in my spare time, when I'm not having a social life, working on creating a national awareness campaign called TextSmart.

I love every minute of it, but I also have a list of things that I have been wanting to do over the past 5 years that I have yet to do.

Today, I start on my list of 101 unique tasks that I've always wanted to complete, but always gave excuses for not completing.

This is Matthew Ray's "No More Excuses" List:
  1. Take Guitar Lessons (I've had one for 5 yrs)
  2. Learn 10 songs to play on the guitar (0/10)
  3. Learn to speak Spanish Fluently/improve what I know (LiveMocha and/or SpanishPod)
  4. Buy a house or rent out a Classy Loft Apartment with a spiral staircase and balcony
  5. Complete my U.S. Lincoln Head Penny Collection that my grandfather from Mom's side and grandmother from Dad's side started and handed down to me when I was younger (year 1909-present)
  6. Take Yoga Lessons and apply them
  7. Finish decorating and painting my current apt
  8. Cook 1 brand new meal a week at home (3/143)
  9. Go try out a "Singles Mingle"
  10. Go an art exhibit at the Rochester Memorial Art Gallery 3 times a year (0/9)
  11. Go to two RMSC exhibits each year (0/6)
  12. Learn all current countries and their capitals in the world (195 currently; 192 in UN)
  13. Print out and Frame 12 of my best photographs taken from my road trips
  14. Take a professioal photo shoot with my brother and send to all our family members that are still around
  15. Travel to Hawai'i (2nd to last state I have yet to visit; North Dakota is the other)
  16. Buy a MAC laptop
  17. Buy an Amazon Kindle (one more step to going green and paperless)
  18. Travel to the Galapagos Islands
  19. Pay off my debt
  20. Pay off my car (Honda Civic '00)
  21. Donate a garbage bag or more of my old clothes
  22. Buy a new bike and actually use it during the summer months
  23. In a round of 18 holes of Golf, get a under a 100 strokes
  24. Go to a new restaurant once a month (1/31)
  25. Enter 3+ photo contests (0/3)
  26. Win a prize or honorable mention in at least one photo contest that I enter
  27. Organize and catalog ALL my past Uncles belongings (antiques, paintings, statues, etc) from around the world
  28. Find a way to hack into my old harddrive to grab my old music (5,000+ songs)
  29. Launch my blog site to consoledate all my social sites, etc.
  30. Double my annual income at least one more time
  31. Launch my three other content-driven sites I have plans for (0/3)
  32. Have more low key nights in with a movie, boardgame, dinner, coffee, converstation (non-out-till-2am-bar nights)
  33. Go on a date (maybe from the singles mingle I'm going to attend..its been a while since I've been in the dating scene)
  34. Get 1000 people to follow me on Twitter @MatthewRay
  35. Read the 1st Harry Potter Book; read the rest if I like it (0/1)
  36. Get a pedicure - I hear its worth it
  37. Travel to Montreal for a long weekend
  38. Donate all my clothes and start fresh buying a whole new waredrobe
  39. Use the dry cleaners regularly
  40. Volunteer at a soup kitchen
  41. Run a 5K
  42. Go to a U2, Muse, ColdPlay, or Spearhead concert (travel if neccessary and make a long weekend out of it)
  43. Take my Business Law CLEP test and Graduate with an MIS from RIT
  44. Get Lasik Surgery...unless talked out of it
  45. Visit a Psycic (tarot and palm reading)
  46. Visit a nice zoo and aquarium - Not the Rochester zoo
  47. Go to a new Cirque de Soleil
  48. Help 5 people complete an item on their 101 in 1001 (0/5)
  49. Learn to play a full song on my grampas "Blues Harp" Marine Band Harmonica circa late 1800s (Key of G)
  50. Put $20.00 into a savings account with every goal completed (2/101)
  51. Learn to Dance (be it Salsa, Tango, Waltz or Ball Room)
  52. Go on at least 3 spur of the moment day/weekend trips each year (0/9)
  53. ReDesign/Restructure my "Our Drive To Alaska" site
  54. Have a cookout party on the rooftop patio at my apt building on the first beautiful weekend this spring 2009
  55. Revise my Facebook Page and get rid of the dumb applications I've collected and never used.
  56. Revise my LinkedIn Profile at least every quarter as needed (0/11)
  57. Complete Tim Ferriss' "Ideal Lifestyle Costing": http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/lifestyle-costing/
  58. Help someone on the side of the road change their tire when no one else will stop to help
  59. Travel somewhere to go skiing (besides Bristol Mt.)
  60. Read Guy Kawasaki's, "Reality Check" (in progress)
  61. Read Malcolm Gladwell's, "Outliers"
  62. Find 2 more favorite red wines besides Ménage à Trois (0/2)
  63. Go Scuba Diving
  64. Go cross-country skiing at Mendon Ponds
  65. Go see 2 movies at Charlotte Beach over the summer (0/2)
  66. Go to the Little Theatre at least once a month (0/31)
  67. Take time-off work to go volunteer my time and build a house/school/church overseas
  68. Go on a camping and whitewater trip in summer of 2009
  69. Visit Austin, Texas to see a Bob Schneider Concert
  70. Visit family in South Carolina
  71. Go the the Public Market in Rochester (never been)
  72. Read 5 books that someone else suggests (0/5)
  73. Watch 10 movies that someone suggests (0/10)
  74. Get new responsibilities OR change position at Global Crossing
  75. Successfully get 5 new people to monetize their company/sites/themselves on Twitter (2/5)
  76. Help someone get a Facebook Page up for their company or band
  77. Help get WorkAlertz into 100 markets (1/100)
  78. Go to another Rochester Social Media Club Event
  79. Spend a day at Darien Lake
  80. Go rock-climbing (indoor)
  81. Invest in a Wii
  82. Test drive a car I'd want to buy but can't afford today
  83. Learn to smoothly drive stick shift
  84. Take a digital photography workshop
  85. Create a frame by frame picture video and post it to YouTube/Vimeo
  86. Spend the day on a beach (not Charlotte Beach)
  87. Successfully run the national TextSmart campaign
  88. Listen to Pink Floyd's, "Dark Side of the Moon" and watch Wizard of Oz
  89. Find 9 more things to do (6/9)
  90. Make a YouTube/Vimeo Music Video Playlist (Possibly MixTube...)
  91. Join a HotShots Volleyball Team for a season
  92. Contact Guy Kawasaki and explain to him who MyMinderz is and how he will love to talk about them (with success or no success, I'll still reachout)
  93. Go to a Roller Derby somewhere
  94. Take my Mom to a Destruction Derby - Can't believe she wants to go to one (shes never been and neither have I)
  95. Successfully run @RocTwestival
  96.  
  97.  
  98.  
  99.  
  100.