Web 2.What?

When I embarked on the exploration of social media monitoring tools, I surveyed my Twitter friends, I posted about it on this blog, I even wrote about it in my LinkedIn and Facebook statuses. Throughout all that, one name that came up again and again was Radian6.

So I was delighted when they offered to give me a demo. One distinct difference between the first tool I looked at, social radar, is that Radian6 is targeted specifically to PR firms (or large multi-unit company). Which is good, because now I don’t feel I have to compare the two.

So if you happen to be a good size PR firm or a large company searching for a social media monitoring tools, than I urge you to check out Radian6. Somehow it’s complex and detailed, yet manages to stay very user friendly. One of its strength lies in the ease and simplicity of managing multiple profiles–something that can be tricky to pull off, but a necessity when you have multiple clients or business units.

Also I love how it’s layout is based on widget style functionality. So essentially you “build” the tool how you’d like to use it. Very Web 2.0 friendly!

I can go on, but a picture says a lot more, so let’s take a look (click for larger):

The middle boxes top and bottom (behind) are examples of a “river of news” which is essentially the search results for whichever terms you’ve chosen, the river also includes media like microblogging (Twitter, etc), video and podcasts. Very cool!

As well, you can build a tag cloud around your search terms, as viewable in the bottom left corner. Aside from the fact that everyone loves a tag cloud, it visually gives you an idea of what else people are talking about along with your search terms. Very handy!

But wait– how do you know how influencial these people talking about you are? Well they’ve got a widget for that too, which is best explained in this shot:

The middle box shows a list of blogs/web sites that mentioned your search terms, and when you click on one, the dashboard below pops up and tells you all about its links.

So essentially, the dashboard is completely customizable via the widget icons (pictured on the left) you can set it all up the way you like it and leave it as is, or you can switch it up at will. It’s clear these guys understand social media and the specific needs of their target audience. Being a PR gal myself I can easily see how well this could work in an agency as well as how it can also help educate users who may not be totally up to speed with all this social media stuff. (hey it is still pretty new!)

And the final kicker why I really love Radian6–they’re Canadian! Yup, based out of New Brunswick, these guys are taking the social media monitoring world by storm. Keep up the great work!

Every used Radian6 before? Or another social media monitoring tools. Please leave a comment!

**UPDATE**

One really cool thing about Radian6 I forgot to mention is its “Twebinars” which obviously is a webinar that’s discussed in tandem on Twitter! Each one features leading experts in social media. Unfortunately I had to miss the first (silly work getting in the way!) but fortunately more are on the way. As far as I know this they are the first to initiate something like this, so major points for that.

If you pay attention to some of the social media buzz out there, surely you’ve already heard of Plurk. Plurk is like twitter, but takes it a step further by laying out posts on a visual time line and when you want to reply to someone’s post, instead of the @username, you can actually drop down someone’s message into what can best be described as an IM chat box and keep the conversation going. Anyone–fans or friends–can jump in as well. It’s hyper-interactive, and a lot of fun.

Why will it stick?

Now I’m certainly not ready to give up Twitter–I worked hard to build up my followers–but I could definitely keep coming back to plurk, and that’s because on top of it all it they build another dimension of fun in with your Plurk Karma. The more you post, the more karma you earn, and when you invite people into plurk you earn more karma–this point is key because any type of social site’s success depends on it’s ability to continuously expand. And we all know friend referral is the best way to do that. Anyway, what does plurk karma do? Earns you cool stuff of course! The more karma you get, the more you can customize your profile. As well you earn new and cool smileys. These obviously become “Cool” status symbols and those of us who don’t have them yet are just dying to get them!

So, if you dare, give plurk a try, and don’t forget to add me as your friend!

PS-Are you on Plurk? What do you think about it? Have you not tried it yet? Why not? Keep the conversation going below…

Ok this video has already been making the rounds, but I just *had* to post it here as well… Common Craft has been making these adorable paper-cut out videos to explain all the crazy new internet stuff in plain English. Love it!

Ok, I realllly should have a smart phone, but I’ve been putting it off in hopes of the iPhone *finally* making it’s way to Canada… Well now Canadian company Research in Motion has announced its new BlackBerry Bold — likely a worthy rival to the iPhone. Unfortunately it will only be available on the GSM network, which means I’ll have to get back with the certain wireless provider I despise, but I think it’ll be worth it. (Same deal with the iPhone anyway) If anyone has heard anything about the Bold yet, please drop a comment and let me know, I’m very interested!

Here’s a full story about the Blackberry Bold…

PS- Sorry for the hiatus, I took a week’s vacation in Cali, and much to my dismay I had to pay daily for a WIFI connection! While I did cave (three times) I was so overwhelmed with my inbox and feeding my twitter addiction, I didn’t make time to post. However, I’m back and hoping to contribute here and over at Be Relevant! more often!

Depending how well you know me, you probably know one or the other of the following statements (or possibly both) about me:

1. I LOVE shoes. Both my shoe racks are full, along with a closet and a half. When I see a great pair of shoes, I can’t resist. I may have a problem.
2. I LOVE Twitter. I’m on it more and more every day, tweeting more, following more. I’m a huge advocate of brands using Twitter to connect with customers. In fact it’s likely you came here through Twitter. I may have a problem…

In my opinion, the one thing Twitter has been missing is a really great example of how a brand can use it to its advantage. Well finally I found it!

Zappos, an amazing online shoe store (actually, a “service company that happens to sell” shoes & other accessories), whose been featured on Seth Godin’s blog for a pretty amazing customer service experience, has officially impressed the heck out of me with its use of Twitter.

Twitter CEO, Tony Hsieh created an account on Twitter and announced he would give away a free pair of shoes to one of his followers (at random) that evening, as well as free shoes for up to 10 of that’s person’s Twitter friends, provided they were all following @zappos as well. Not sure how many followers they started out with but currently (a day later) they have 1,152, the account has only been around for three days, so I’d say that’s crazy-impressive! But it gets even better, Zappos also set up a page to monitor everyone’s tweets. (You may even notice some people exclaiming that they are heading to Zappos.com to make purchases, how’s that for proof?)

A pretty amazing Twitter story, even if I didn’t win the free shoes. Oh, and for those of you who came here expecting it to be about shoes, here’s some eye candy:

To the left, Betsy Johnson ‘Foster’ and to the right, very hot new pumps from Alexander McQueen.

With so many social media tools out there, how do you find the right one for you?

The answer–and I’m sorry to say–is I don’t know… Or let’s go with the famous ‘marketing’ answer: It depends. However, I’ll document a few I use and why I chose to use them:

Micro-blogging
I’m a Twitteraholic. No doubt about that. However, I will admit I have yet to try out the competitors (Namely, Pownce and Jaiku, as well as Utterz I believe). Usually I like to try out a few before I commit, but I’m so in love with Twitter (aka addicted), I just don’t have time for the others! I’ll admit–I also love how the name lends itself to cute wordplays like twitterverse and twitterati etc., but that’s just one of the many reasons.

*Update*

• Pretty much everyone agrees, Twitter rocks!

Blogging Platform
First I started out my blogging life using Blogger, because it seemed the easiest for beginners. I wasn’t completely thrilled and contemplated switching, right until Google bought it out and re-vamped it. I fell in love, but when the company I worked for was acquired, Blogger wasn’t flexible enough. So I learned Wordpress and I have never looked back. Recently, however, I began blogging over at Ottawa.Cityguide.ca, which uses Moveable Type. I’m no expert yet, but so far I’m liking it a lot. However I’m only a contributor on Moveable Type, so I can’t say for sure how they templates, set up, etc. work.

Therefore my favourite would have to be Wordpress. It’s easy-to-use and I was able to set it up on my own domain quickly and easily. Though I have yet to use Typepad, which I know many swear by.

*Update*

• Johann Burkard recommends a service called blojsom, I’ve never heard of it, but apparently Apple uses it for one of its web servers.

RSS Readers
I started out using Newsgator, not even sure why, but I noticed that a large majority of my subscribers were using Google Reader–I was intrigued–so I checked it out and sure enough, fell in love. I’ve also tried managing some feeds through my iGoogle page, but I think I consume too much for that to be a viable option. What I would love is a reader built into an app that could sit on my desktop and scroll through new headlines for all my feeds. I’m not even sure if it exists-but I would love it.

*Update*

• Dave Barger recommends Outlook 2007’s built in reader. I’ve never used it, but I’ve heard lots of good things from others. So if you have ‘07, it’s worth checking out!
• @heatherforce says she loves Attensa, which I’ve never heard of before. According to the web site it looks like an enterprise RSS reader. Heather particularly likes the plug in for Outlook. (Come on now, who’s really surprised we want to read our feeds with our email?!)
• Johann Burkard uses Bloglines, which is another popular choice, but has also used Rojo & found it to be great, but unreliable.

Social News/Sharing Sites
Ok, this is probably a vague area, as it could cover a lot, but I’m thinking of Digg, Mixx, Reddit, and even del.icio.us and StumbleUpon might fall into this category. However there’s tons of niche sites that could be included like Sphinn and PlugIM, for example.

Out of all of them, I’d say Stumble is my favourite. Actually, by far. It is a killer tool for driving traffic to your blog, AND it’s hours of fun hitting the “Stumble” button. My Stumble is also integrated with my Facebook, so all my friends can see the sites I like. It’s a fantastic tool

(Fun fact: I actually heard about Stumble over two years ago from my hair stylist, she was complaining that her husband stayed up all night ’stumbling’ and I was intrigued to learn more)

I know I could probably go on for days, but I’d love your input: What tools do you use? Why do you use them? What else have you tried?

I’ll update this post with your comments.

*Update*

• Colin brings to my attention that I missed a very obvious category: social networking. (duh!)

Social Networking
I’m still hooked on Facebook, because it’s my primary means of communication with some of my good friends. However, like Colin says in the comments, LinkedIn is a rocking place to be. I’ve pretty much abandoned MySpace. I’ve also joined and played around in a few niche sites like Chapter’s Book Lover’s Community as well as Group Recipes, but they just don’t have the ’stickiness’ of the big guys.

*Update*

• Linda Bustos points out some great niche sites for marketers: Gooruze, Sphinn, and SEOmoz. I’ve been involved a little in all three, so I’ll second the great choices.

Whether you’re interested in social media for professional or personal reasons (or both!) it can get overwhelming. There’s so much information out there, and now even more tools to consume information. If you’re into what’s new and hot in the social media world, you likely know how daunting it can be to stay up to date with everything. At times I feel like if I don’t spend a couple hours each day browsing blogs in my reader, doing some Stumbling or checking out Twitter, I feel like I’m back at square one in the social media game.

However, I have figured out a few shortcuts which can help you stay up to date without giving up sleep time.

1. Bestofyoutube.com - As fun as it is to browse You Tube every day for the funniest or most interesting videos, it can take a lot of time. But how embarassing is it when everyone starts talking about that crazy popular video and you haven’t seen it yet? Well Bestofyoutube.com takes the most popular videos from youtube each day and aggregates it in a podcast. I love downloading these babies to my new Nano and watching ‘em at the gym. (I admit, I’ve burst out laughing once or twice!)
2. Twitter - Get the right people on your Twitter feed and you’ll be amazed how much great info you can digest in a small amount of time (and 140 characters at a time!). Honestly since I got hooked on Twitter, I’ve been opening Google Reader less and less.
3. Web Strategy by Jeremiah Owyang - Jeremiah is easily one of the most influential and knowledgeable web strategists out there. In fact, Twitter is taking off big time and I think a particular post by Jeremiah on what is now dubbed ‘Twitter Tuesday’ has a lot to do with it.
4. Google Alerts - These handy little suckers help you monitor issues you are interested in. I use it for several keywords that are important to what I do, as well as for monitoring mentions of the company I work for on the web. You could also set up an alert for your own name, to monitor your personal brand reputation. Whatever you use it for GA are super useful, quick and convenient.
5. Alltop - Are you still wondering what an RSS reader is? Or how you subscribe to blogs? Or maybe you get all that but just don’t have the time to seek out all the best resources. Well Alltop is probably the place for you.  It is a collection of blogs on a wide variety of topics. Each topic includes “All the top” blogs on that subject. Check out socialmedia.alltop.com for all the top stories on social media. (Though web2dotwhat.com is not there…yet!)

So there you go, consider it your ‘Coles notes’ to being a social media geek. There’s probably tons more, so drop a comment if you know of something good.

Have you checked out all the browser bling Firefox has lately?

There’s always new stuff going up, and very cool stuff too. Today when loading up my new computer, I threw on the StumbleUpon, del.icio.us, Facebook, Twitter tool bars you know… All the usual.

However, then I searched around, just to see what’s out there. Now what I think will likely become my favourite and most useful tool is BlogRovr. You can individually add blog feeds you like, or upload your OPML file from your reader (might sound complicated-but it’s dead easy. In GoogleReader I just clicked ‘manage subscriptions’ and then ‘Import/Export’ and then BAM! Good to go…)

So anyway, BlogRovr ‘fetches’ your feeds and pops up relevant blog activity when you visit a new page. For example I went on to Twitter, and the tray appears in the bottom corner of the screen with three blog posts talking about Twitter. If you’re a information junkie, distraction-loving multi-tasker like me, it’s pure genius!

It’s only been a day, so I’m still in the honeymoon phase, but I’ll give you an update in a few weeks or so.