Somethings are just easier to do yourself than to try and explain.  I ended up writing the directions down and sending them via email, but by 3pm, I had two other people asking me this same question on our Gettin’ Geeky Page so I figured I’d better get this out!

Since you put a lot of effort into a blog, you want to get all the exposure you can.  You can import your blog into your personal profile on Facebook as well as your PAGES.  Here are the steps to follow (it may sound a bit confusing but hang in there!)

1. Go to your PAGE and click on EDIT PAGE on the left.

2. Go down to APPLICATIONS (sometimes you have to click on BROWSE MORE .  The search box is in the upper left- type in BLOG and you will see several options including NETWORKED BLOGS (SOCIAL RSS is another good one).

3. When you click on the Blog app you will then need to click the link ADD TO MY PAGE (under the picture on the upper left).  If you have multiple pages, it will ask you to choose which page to add it to.

4. Now you go BACK to your PAGE and select the Blog tab that should now be showing.  You will  have to now pull the blog into the tab from here.  You are almost finished.

5. There are a few boxes to check and then you must SAVE your settings and then TEST the publishing to make sure everything took.

There … that wasn’t so hard now was it?

Share your blog address here for all of us to check out too!

@GinaSchreck

The challenge was, I was conducting a Webinar the day after we got home and then speaking at a conference two days after that and I was concerned that I may need to sneak in a bit of early morning work on these while away and didn’t feel completely confident it could be done on my iPad.  I saw it as an opportunity though; One that would help me finally find a place in my heart for this lovely iPad, which up until now has just been an oversized iTouch or expensive iPod.  Sure I had a few fun apps on it and the Schrecklet loved playing games on it, but I had not moved it into a business tool category yet.

So I mustered up the courage to kiss my laptop good-bye, just for the week, and pack my iPad.

Here are some of my observations and benefits of traveling with my iPad:

1. Checking in and going through security at Denver’s International Airport was much smoother than when traveling with a laptop.  Not only did I not have my big red laptop case, but TSA didn’t even require that I take the iPad out of my purse. Smooth sailing through security …except for that bottle of nail polish at the bottom of my purse! Curses–I usually catch those small items and stick them in my pocket!  (NOTE: The TSA folks in Honolulu did not have the same smooth-sailing policy and required me to remove the iPad from my purse and lay it in a bin by itself.)

2. When sitting on the plane and the antsy 9-year-old boy in front of me slammed his seat into the reclined position, the iPad did not get lodged into the tray or seat back like my big laptop usually does!  SWEET benefit I had not anticipated!

3. Obviously the small size made it great for throwing in my bag and heading down stairs to grab coffee and do a wee bit of work before the Captain woke up and the added benefit was that I didn’t look like a total idiot bringing my laptop poolside when I should have been relaxing.  The new cool-factor served as kind of a disguise for any workaholic! (Which I’m not!  I know, denial is one of the signs, but really…I’m not!)

4. Aside from music in my iTunes library, I had a collection of great magazines, podcasts and audio books that I had downloaded before we left, and before we even landed in Honolulu, I had read an issue of Wired Magazine, listened to half of Tony Hsieh‘s book “Delivering Happiness,” and one TWIG (this week in Google) podcast! Nothing says geeky vacation like laying on the beach with a few good episodes of This Week in Google with Leo LaPorte, Jeff Jarvis and Gina Trapani!  (Can’t you hear the ukuleles in the background now?)

I do have to admit that the iPad connectivity was sketchy and I could not get online many times to even check email, so I ended up at the end of the week loving my (HTC) Nexus One phone all the more!  That baby doubled as a great camera, email reader, Facebook app for posting content, a GPS navigator for getting us around the island, and of course a phone occasionally for making a call here and there! (NOTE: I do not have the 3G service on my iPad so I could connect, or try to connect, to the Marriott’s wifi service, a few others I met there were trying with 3G service and could not get a strong enough signal)

There were a two apps I had loaded onto my iPad that helped get me through the week though.

1. Thanks to the prompting of my tech-savvy and Mac enthusiast assistant, Marci Dahms, I signed up for LOG ME IN, which allows you to access a desktop (previously set up) so that in an emergency I could pull documents or files off of my PC at home and work on them and send them to a client in need, which did happen.

2. Because I had Docs To Go loaded on my iPad, I could open and edit a Word doc with no problem.  This is also what you would use if you wanted to show a PowerPoint presentation from your iPad. (You would need to add a $69 adapter that connects to the projector.)

So all in all, can you survive on your next business trip with only your iPad? I say of course you can…as long as you bring your smart phone!

Let me know if you have successfully traveled with your iPad sans the laptop.  I still feel that with a little more time, I CAN make another attempt at it.

@GinaSchreck

Take a look at the company, Zappos. For those of you who are not familiar with this company (shame on you!) it started as an online shoe retailer but now sells clothing as well.  I believe Zappos is a customer service company that happens to help you look great!  The CEO, Tony Hsieh, says they deliver HAPPINESS…and when shoes are delivered…it is indeed HAPPINESS!  But if you do a search on Twitter for Zappos, you will find over 40 individual accounts that have Zappos and then the person’s name within the company that is using Twitter to reach and engage her own community, including Tony Hsieh. People want to connect to brands that they love and if there is a real person behind the brand, it is a bonus!

Remember, social media is about the conversations, not the pushing of your goods and services.  Once I like you, I will be more likely to buy from you.  If all you do is talk without asking my opinions or listening to what I am talking about, you might as well keep wasting your money on those slick postcards that I love throwing away!

Now on Facebook it is a little different.  You may want to allow individuals within an organization to send or post content on behalf of your company from their personal profile pages, but I would use extreme caution (OK I would really ask you “ARE YOU NUTS?”).  If you are a small company and you want your team members to help you get the word out on certain company campaigns or messages, have and communicate clear policies around what type of content should and should not be shared from a personal Facebook profile.  ”Company picnic today at Synapse” is fine but “Boss man getting married AGAIN…this time to our marketing VP” may not be the message you want getting out to all of Facebook Land!  Facebook has PAGES that serve the business world and provide a great place for you to engage with your community. (See episode #35 on Gettin’ Geeky for the HOW TO CREATE A PAGE)  I suggest that companies create a PAGE that does not have an individuals name, but the company or the service you provide (SPEAKEASY uses the company name while WOMEN WHO WALK THE WALK is not a company named PAGE, but a community of people drawn by common interests).

Twitter and Facebook profiles are more about the personal conversations, while PAGES (formerly FAN PAGES) are about great content and engaging your community -whether around a brand name or common interest group.

So who’s face do you use?  I will leave that up to you…but unless your logo has a shoe somewhere in there, you may not get me to engage!  Share your thoughts with us~ What PAGES do you engage with most and is it a person’s name or an organization?  Come on…take off that mask and talk to us!

@GinaSchreck

You can connect with me on Facebook on my personal page or join the fun at our GettinGeeky Page

There are regular info-dump posts with tips or links to his site with information about where he is speaking next, but you never see comments on the Facebook PAGE or replies in the Twitter feed.  There is no conversations going on. Why bother?  Your website is already playing the role of stagnant information dumping ground (assuming there is no blog).  There’s nobody home.

Social engagement tools like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube and your blog are about conversations and building relationships.  Part of a good conversation is listening and responding to the people you are wanting the relationship with.  If you don’t believe me, try maintaining a healthy relationship with someone (significant other, children, co-worker, etc) without responding when they speak to you.  That relationship won’t last long.

Here are 3 tips for making sure the lights are on and people know you are home:

1. Mix in questions with your tips and information that get posted.  Asking questions shows you care about what your community thinks. For example, your Twitter profile and Facebook PAGE should be sprinkled with great content and conversations.

2. NOW LISTEN and respond to the answers your community posts.  Yes this means replying to every single comment.  You can bundle your reply to several people at a time but show you heard them.

3. Look at what your community is saying (this is made easier by using a tool like Hootsuite or TweetDeck to filter the flow of information) and jump in on the conversation occasionally with a comment, a LIKE, a ReTweet, or a reply (shoot for 5 times a day to start).

Be sure you are applying these tips to all of the places you have hung your SOCIAL sign out–your blog, Facebook Fan Page, Twitter, LinkedIn, MySpace, YouTube, Flickr, etc.  Remember, don’t leave your lights on if no one is home!

Like Tom Bodett, I’m @GinaSchreck and I’ll leave the light on for you~

Join me on our Facebook PAGE (someone’s alway home there)

After two years using Twitter, and spending 6 months writing my Gettin’ Geeky with Twitter book, I have pulled together my top Do’s and Don’ts for using this powerful social engagement tool. There are so many tips and techniques for Twitter success, but these will be a good foundation for anyone wanting to build their business and manage their brand using this simple social engagement tool.  You may not agree with all of them (and I encourage you to add your tips to this list in the comments), but I have found these the best way to build an authentic Twitter feed with minimal spam and maximum conversation that leads to new friendships, new learning and yes, new sales!

1. DO start by writing down your goals for being on Twitter.  Is it a PR tool for you?  Will you just be a Twatcher (someone who reads tweets but never posts anything)?  Is your goal to connect with potential customers, or send readers to your blog?  Write this goal down and keep it near by.  Without a goal you can easily get sucked into that Twitter trap of sitting for hours and reading everyone’s posts and adding useless content to the already polluted stream. Having 1,000 followers is NOT a good goal.  I can show you 1,000 naked spammers if that is your only goal.

2. DO take time to build your nest before starting to fly.  Fill in your profile, giving people some information about you, a link to your website, blog or even LinkedIn profile, so they can see you are a REAL person and learn more if they want.  Show your personality in that 160 character bio-HA!  Most importantly is to be sure to load a good headshot of …YOUR HEAD!  Don’t load a picture of your cat or truck or baby picture.  People want to connect with a person, and more importantly, they want to conenct with YOU!

3. DO follow SMART people. Start by following writers and thought leaders you enjoy as well as those in your industry that you can share information with.  Don’t get caught up in following the “Recommended” twits that Twitter suggests or celebrities, unless this is your industry.  You can sprinkle those in later, but it can derail your focus as you read hundreds of possibly useless posts.

4. DO use a Twitter tool to manage the information flow.  If you start feeling like it is information overload, realize that it is “filter failure.”  Tools like TweetDeck and Hootsuite will help you manage the information flow.  You do not need to read every tweet that comes raging by like a fast moving river.  These tools will help you “pool” the tweets from your favorites into different columns or lists that you set up until you have time to read them. (More info on this in episode #55 of Gettin’ Geeky)

5. DO ReTweet good stuff.  If you are following smart people, you will be getting smart info in your stream.  When you retweet, you let others know you appreciate their information as you provide good content to those following you! (Be sure to use the RT etiquette which is to always give credit to the originator of the content)

6. DO jump in and reply to tweets that you have something to say on.  Show people you are here for the conversations and not just to dump your information.  If you look at your Twitter stream (look at your profile page) you should see a good mix of @replies, RT’s and great content from you.

7. DO think before you tweet!  Before hitting send on that nugget of information, ask yourself if it is interesting or helpful. Many of you know my motto is “Be Interesting, Be Helpful, or Be Quiet!”  Sharing personal information about watching television or what you are eating is neither helpful nor interesting.  If you are telling me what movie you’re watching, perhaps you can give us a great line from the movie and have people guess, or you can tell us a lesson learned from the movie.

8. DO anticipate people ReTweeting your great nuggets.  If you are posting something that you feel is helpful or interesting enough, then help people ReTweet it by making it short enough for them to fit a short comment and their Twitter name.  To do this you want to aim for 120 character tweets–I know, it’s not easy!

9. DO make your links “clickable.” When posting a link to a blog or website, on Twitter, you must start with http:// instead of www.  The http:// makes the link clickable.  The only person who will go through the trouble to copy and paste your link into a browser is your mom, and even she will wait until later to do it.  Bottom line, make it easy for folks!

10. DO add pictures, videos and other fun add-ins to your Twitter stream to allow us to SEE into your world.  Most mobile devices can snap a pic and upload it to Twitter either via MMS messaging (text) or by using an app.  Write a short tweet with the pic and share!

11. DON’T send people an auto Direct Message that tells them you are a cheesy spammer right off the bat.  If you ARE a cheesy spammer, you may not want to tell us to unfollow you so quickly.  When I get a direct message (DM) from a new person I follow and it reads “Thank you for following me, I can help you make thousands of dollars from your Twitter stream. Here is my gift to you: http://ImAnIdiot.com”  I click UNFOLLOW and depending on what the spammer said, I may UNFOLLOW and BLOCK!  Direct messages should be real messages from you to the other person that are not intended for anyone else to see.  Here’s more information on how to use the DM feature.

12. Don’t protect your tweets.  Go back to your goal-why are you on Twitter?  Unless you are using Twitter for an internal communication tool (in which case, most of these tips will become useless to you), you really shouldn’t care about who reads your helpful nuggets.  You do not have to follow them all back.  Remember people who are following your posts will only see what you decide to send out.  Make it easy for people to get your information.  Protecting your tweets is a hassel for others.

13. Don’t use the verification services that make followers authenticate themselves to prove they are not spammers.  YOU do the work.  Remember, you don’t have to follow everyone back, but don’t punish those you were trying to attract in the beginning.

14. Don’t send every tweet to Facebook and LinkedIn.  Be selective on what posts go where.  Each of these sites reaches a different audience (for the most part) and requires different information.  There are some nuggets that will go everywhere and some only to one or two of the sites.  Using a tool like TweetDeck or Hootsuite will allow you to pick and choose which sites will receive your post.

15. Don’t listen to every so called “expert” telling you her Do’s and Don’ts on how to use your Twitter account.  If you jump in and explore you will find the tools you like and a way that works for you.

Add your favorite Do’s and Don’ts~

@GinaSchreck

Here is my “comedy routine” I titled “Becoming Mayor of Tipsy’s Liquor World & Other Technology Dangers”

If you’d like to see more of the entertaining presentations from last night’s IGNITE Fort Collins event, check them out HERE.

Happy Friday and REMEMBER DONT TEXT and WALK without your iHELMET.

@GinaSchreck

Growing your social community is a lot like a garden.  It takes a daily commitment to do the work each day.  You will need to check on your relationships, nurture a few that are wilting and even pull a few weeds each day.  Too many people want the beautiful garden without doing the work.  Those are the people who end up buying fake plants or paying someone to come each week to do the work for them.  Let’s take a peek into both of those Social Media Gardens:

Buying fake plants is the same as those who jump into the social media arena and connect with thousands of people that they have nothing in common with or that they really have no interest in conversing with.  They just want the appearance of a big garden.  Take a look at the “FOLLOWER” list of some people and you will see it filled with spammers, porn accounts and the default Twitter bird picture that shows it is most likely a spam account.  Now look at the profile page of that gardener and you will find one way conversations that are most likely automated.  Little if any @replies to people because this gardener is simply focused on sticking more fake flowers in the dirt.

While there is nothing wrong with paying for a little help, and who wouldn’t want a gardener to come and help make your garden look its best each week, BUT you have to be careful that the gardener doesn’t take over your vision or your garden might end up looking like Disneyland with sculpted Mini and Mickey in the front yard!  There are tools that can help you automate SOME of your social media chores, but you still have to get out in the garden to nurture the relationships each day.  An example of a problem that can arise when you replace your presence in the garden with automation, is posting Facebook PAGE updates using fabulous tools like TweetDeck, Hootsuite or any other third-party tool and not paying attention to comments or questions that might be posted.  You will not always see comments or questions unless you walk through the Facebook Page garden.

If you are going to hire someone to help you, be sure you don’t abandon the garden.  There’s just no way around the fact that SOCIAL media tools are still about the SOCIAL!  Without the daily work, all of the time and effort you put in to start your garden will return nothing but weeds.

Here are 4 tips to simplify your work in the garden.

1. Start with a plan. What kind of content will you be providing? Who is the community that you will be connecting with?

2. Log in to each of your sites each morning. Welcome newcomers, provide value to your community, respond to questions or comments. Be social.

3. Use automated tools (TweetDeck, Hootsuite, etc) to schedule posts for regular events or tips that you provide.

4. Take time to enjoy your garden- post fun content – recognize loyal followers- show your personality!

What are your tips to keeping a beautiful social media garden?  Share them here with other gardeners!

@GinaSchreck

The title of my session was, “Using Today’s Technology for the Game of Learning!”

If our goal is to engage learners and make learning fun again, it may be time to look for ways to take learning OUT of the classroom and put it into the hands (and devices) of the learners.  Let’s get them involved in the process, from telling us what they need, to co-creating content for BIG FUN learning.  In order to involve our learners, we have to be willing to step off of our thrown …or podium and remember that WE are smarter than ME!

These are the folks “FORMERLY KNOWN AS YOUR AUDIENCE”

Repeat after me, “I will not stand in front and read BORING powerpoint slides to my audience as if they were mindless idiots!”  That mantra, repeated daily, will help you shift from standing up and dumping information to truly engaging the brains of the people in your audience.  There are technology tools that can help engage, teach and even thrill your teams as they are learning …even outside the classroom walls BEFORE and AFTER a learning event!

WHY should you worry about changing the way training is delivered in your organization?  Well part of it has to do with the fact that our learners have changed!  We have 1-yr olds trading stock on e*trade for goodness sake.  They are tech-savvy, impatient, have ADHD, and they have a lot to contribute!  Here are some statistics:

We need to use some of the tools that are already in the pockets, purses and backpacks of our learners (and I’m not talking about bandaids, chewing gum or tweezers here!).

One of my favorite tools is the fabulous FLIP camera. Get creative and get others in the driver’s seat creating content!  Involve customers, vendors, and of course employees!  Some of the ideas shared included giving sales teams cameras and having them create a 5 minute learning video to teach the other teams about a new product roll-out.  Have a few of your best customers create a short video showing a “Day in the life” of that customer to show your customer service teams what it is like in your customer’s world.  Have executive teams or senior members of the organization share 3 things they know now that they wish they would have known when they first started in the industry or at your company.  These learning videos can be loaded on your own website or on sites such as YouTube (set to private) or Blip, which allows you to load videos longer than 10 minutes.

Create podcasts within your organization (simple audio recordings saved as MP3 files).  Interview team members and capture their knowledge to share with others.  Download audio books and have them available on MP3 player for people to check out.  And for those of you concerned about the risks and hazards of having these tech tools available to employees, LET IT GO! Reading your training manuals can give people paper cuts and looking at boring Powerpoint can cause brain damage so this is much safer and less expensive than those worker’s comp claims.

Here is a fun video that can provide SOME protection for Tech-Hazards (I showed an edited version of this in my program–this version is RATED PG-13) )

Remember, these are just a few ideas of how to get your learners involved using video and audio files, so be sure to post any of your great ideas in the comment section here so we can continue to share knowledge.

We discussed ways to take geo-tagging apps used for marketing or games such as FourSquare or GoWalla and create learning treasure hunt games.  You could leave envelopes at different locations with blog posts or articles in them for learners to find using a geo-location list you give and their mobile devices.  By adding the element of competition you will turn learning into a fun and fast-paced race to learn!  This is very much like the popular geocaching game for treasure hunters, only the real treasure in your hunt is big nuggets of learning!

For another dimension of fun, you can use augmented reality tools such as LAYER or TAGWHAT to embed pieces of information or content from your learning programs into specific locations.  By tagging the content to the location, you can send participants out on a hunt for information using mobile devices.

With barcode scanner apps on many of today’s mobile devices, look for ways to add 2-dimentional bar codes on objects that will provide more information to learners.  You can place barcodes on walls within a building that bring the company’s story to life, or provide safety tips to learners.  This picture shows a barcode placed on a tombstone that brings up information on the deceased.  You can create your own content-loaded QR tag at http://QRtag.net – go ahead and try it–it’s FREE!  I think I will be making a t-shirt with a tag on it that takes people to my website )  How can you use this?

With iPads, ipods, smart phones, Kindle readers, and more gadgets popping up daily, make a commitment to learn more about these new mobile learning tools, and do share your ideas here for the rest of us because WE are smarter than ME!

Be sure and check out the Gettin’ Geeky page on Facebook where I always share tech tips for BIG learning and building BIG biz.  I encourage folks to post questions there or their own GREAT tech tips!

It was great meeting so many wonderful people this week at ASTD and I look forward to more BIG learning and BIG success stories!

@GinaSchreck
President & Digital Immigration Officer
Synapse 3Di

1.  Log into YouTube or sign up if you have never done so. Click on the CREATE an ACCOUNT.  If you have a Google account, you can use that same log in information without having to start over (Google owns YouTube).

Uploaded with plasq‘s Skitch!

2. Take some time to fill out your profile and tell folks about your business.  You can add links back to your website, blog, Facebook page or anywhere else you’d like to point them.  You can customize the colors and choose how you want your videos displayed.

Uploaded with plasq‘s Skitch!

3. The next step is to decide if you want everything shown to the world or if you will keep a playlist designated for family or private videos.  Not only are YOUR videos highlighted here, but anytime you see a great video on YouTube you can save it in your playlists or mark it as FAVORITE which will be displayed on your channel.

Uploaded with plasq‘s Skitch!

4. The last step is to tell the world about your channel.  Like Facebook or Twitter, your URL is the website with your username following:  http://www.youtube.com/GinaSchreck From here you can link your videos to your website, your blog, your Facebook page and more!  So what are you waiting for, get that camera rolling!

@GinaSchreck

1. If there is no photo.  Do not let the DEFAULT BIRD of laziness kill your Twitter efforts. Don’t be like those folks who drive to work while they shave or put on make up- Get dressed before you leave the house.  Loading a picture can be tricky for some folks but if you don’t have a digital photo on your computer to load, try using the camera that is built into your laptop to snap a photo or better yet have your teenaged son or daughter do it for you!  They can even go to http://PicNik.com and do some teeth whitening or blemish remover before loading it.

2. If there is a photo but it looks like something out of a Playboy or Playgirl magazine you will not only NOT be followed but you will probably be BLOCKED!  I don’t want to see a picture that is cropped from your chin to your hips and I CERTAINLY don’t want to see your sculpted 6-pack abs (that would only irritate me every time I saw your tweets!).  Save those Glamour Girl poses for your boyfriend, and get dressed before you take that headshot!

3. If you have no bio written.  Take a moment (it’s only 160 characters for goodness sake) and tell us who you are or better yet why you are here in Twitter Town.  Are you a photographer, a trainer, a stamp collector?  Put something that gives your followers an idea of the type of information you will be sending out and don’t forget to show some personality.  Play around with your bio and feel free to change it up often to see which one you like the best.  You can take a look at my Twitter Bio for one idea.

4. If there is no link allowing me to find out more about you.  Add the URL to your website, your blog, your Facebook profile or even your LinkedIn page.  Show me you are legit.  If you are entering Twitter Town to network or showcase your business, don’t forget this important step!

5.  Post a few tweets before you head out to follow folks or clean up your trash-talking tweet stream if you already have tweets posted.  I tend to look at one page of someone’s tweets to see what kind of information they are sending out. This is a good exercise of all of us to do – look one one page of your Twitter profile and see it from the perspective of a new follower.  Would YOU follow YOU if you saw that?  Nothing is a bigger Twitter turn off than a page filled with profanity or raunchy talk that belongs …well that belongs in the TRASH CAN.  Remember that your tweets are out there for the world to see, and unless you are trying to attract that kind of trashy business, keep a bar of soap handy and clean that Twitter beak!

Remember, everyone has different standards but these are a few that are shared by many business folks here in Twitter Town.  If you want more tips on creating a successful Twitter nest check out Gettin’ Geeky with Twitter: Build Your Business and Manage Your Brand with Today’s Hottest Social Media Tool – available in eBook (for the impatient) or paperback!

What are some of the standards that you have when it comes to folks you will follow, unfollow or block?

@GinaSchreck