7 Informative Social Media Books Worth Reading
The social media business is a very dynamic one. It’s developing and growing fast, and there are always opportunities to learn how to do things right and grow your business more effectively using the social media. There are plenty of books out there that promise you unreasonable things without providing you with the tips and theory you need to truly “get” social media. Whether you are new to this world or just want to hone your skills, you want to pick up books that are worth your while and provide you with tips you can implement in your business. Here are 7 very informative social media books that do just that:
The Social Media Bible: if you are new to the social media or just don’t know whether you have been using it to your full advantage, this book is a must read. Provides you with a good overview of what may work for your business.
The New Community Rules – Marketing on the Social Web: if you have been taking advantage of the social media without getting any results, you may want to take a look at this book. It may have the solutions for you.
The Social Media Marketing Book: an easy to understand guide that will show you how your business can take advantage of blogs, social networking sites, and beyond. Great for beginners.
Socialnomics: a very good book on theory. It shows you how the idea of “social” has changed the way companies do business. Shows you how successful businesses are taking advantage of those top social media services.
Twitter Retweet Feature Draws Praise, Criticism
Those of you who have been on Twitter for a while have probably realized the need for a retweet button under each tweet. It’s not too inconvenient to copy and past tweets and add RT information to them. But it’d be much fun if you had that ability on Twitter. In truth, you are going to get that ability on Twitter soon. The company has been testing the “retweet” feature for a while now, and if you happen to be one of the lucky ones to have the feature activated on your account, you can test the feature by yourself.
So here is how the feature works. You see a story that you want to retweet, you click on the retweet button, and Twitter asks you whether you want to retweet the story. Twitter does the rest for you.
The Retweet feature is certainly convenient and fun to play with. Keep in mind that it’s a new feature so it will take some time for Twitter to get everything right. But while many are excited about the introduction of the new feature, there are people who are upset about the way Twitter has implemented the feature and for a good reason. Twitter does not allow you to add your own take on these stories when you retweet a post. So essentially, you post a piece of article with all the attributions but without your take on it. It’s also regrettable that you can only see RTs from the people you follow. So if you are not following the top dogs in your niche, you are not going to see the stories that they like.
The first issue is not something that can’t be fixed. The way Twitter has implemented it can certainly make things get done faster. I do believe that Twitter needs to add another option to the above pop-up to allow us to add our own take to stories. Maybe we will see that when the feature is released to everyone. The 2nd feature and the way it’s been implemented are actually something I do agree with. If you are not following someone on Twitter, you probably don’t want to hear from them. Besides, you don’t have to be following everyone to get those top stories on your timeline. If you are following people who truly provide value in your niche, there is a good chance they’ll catch the top stories and tweets from other top people around the world. So you don’t have to follow everyone in the world to see those top retweets. If those who you follow catch them, you will as well. That’s why you should only follow people who provide real value. There are just too many folks who follow a lot of people in hope of getting followed back. That’s not what Twitter was designed for. So I wouldn’t put any blame on Twitter for how it has implemented the second feature.
The good news is that we are finally going to get the retweet button on Twitter. It may need some work and not everyone is going to agree with everything, but it’s a nice step forward.
What’s your take: do you have an issue with how Twitter has implemented the retweet feature?
5 Cool Wavebots That Help You Get More Out of Google Wave
Google Wave is one of the most exciting pieces of technologies that I have personally have had the privilege of testing. Playing with Google Wave reminds of the early days of e-mail. It all must have looked like magic to those who used the e-mail technology at the start. Google Wave goes beyond e-mail and makes collaboration and social interaction much easier. With Twitter and Facebook so popular these days, it’s not out of the realm of possibility to see Wave become a very popular form of communication in the near future.
There aren’t too many robots around for Google Wave at this point. The platform is new, so it is going to take time for folks to build up extensions for Google Wave. But if you have just gotten your Google Wave invitation and want to enhance your experience with it, here are 5 robots you should try:
Amazon Wavebot: it allows you to access Amazon.com right on Google Wave. You can also share product ideas with your contact lists and engage in social shopping.
Bit.ly Wavebot: brings Bit.ly to your Google Wave. An easy way to shorten your URLs and share them with your contacts.
Posterous: if you happen to be on Posterous, you are going to enjoy this robot. It makes it easy to publish your posts right from your Wave.
Bloggy: It’s a cool robot that lets you publish your Google Wavelets to a blog. Certainly makes things easier.
Skimmy: a very simple robot that will convert your smiley text to real smiley images. It makes for a more dynamic discussions online.
Not earth shattering wave bots by any means, but they do let you get simple tasks done on Google Wave more easily. What’s your favorite Wave bot?
TwitterPeek To Debut for Twitter Junkies
The iPhone may be a killer smartphone, but I personally use it to manage my Twitter and Facebook accounts when I am traveling or where I don’t have access to the Internet. There is no question that iPhone is one of the most social media friendly smartphones on the market. At the same time, not everyone can afford paying thousands of dollars for a 2 year AT&T contract. And unlocked iPhone can cost you a good amount of money as well. That’s where TwitterPeek comes in. It’s a device designed for those who can’t get enough of Twitter, but don’t want to pay for a hefty wireless/data plan from AT&T.
TwitterPeek is not a device that will ever go mainstream. It’s a niche device made for Twitter junkies. If you happen to pick up the model with a life-time of service, you can use your gadget on the road (as long as you are in the coverage area) to tweet, respond to your followers, and track their activities as well.
