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Posts Tagged: Social Networking

Facebook Depression Hits Teens! Don’t They Know It’s like Disneyland and Mickey Isn’t Real?

According to the official Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics, more and more teens are suffering from what they are calling FACEBOOK DEPRESSION. This is a condition caused by teens comparing their lives to those of their “friends” on Facebook. I am fascinated by this and wonder how many adults suffer from these same feelings.

Facebook, and any other social site, is a place for people to post all of the wonderful things about themselves and their lives (of course there are those few friends who post so much of their dirty laundry that we wonder what they were thinking!). They are places where people put their best foot forward. What we need to remember is they have ANOTHER FOOT!

When you go to Disneyland, everyone is smiling. The janitor cheerfully points you in the direction of the bathrooms, even though he has been asked “Where are the restrooms?” 5,000 times in the past hour. Even the ground is clean enough to eat off of…well okay that is a stretch, but after all, it’s called the MAGIC KINGDOM! A place where pumpkins deliver princesses to balls and mice bake cupcakes in little pink houses. Of course it seems grand…IT’S NOT REAL!

Facebook for Business, Facebook Depression

My Perfect Child & Husband Ready to Eat off of Streets

Just like Disneyland, Facebook Land is filled with ultra-white smiling faces (created using PicNik, a photo editing app) and beautiful children who sit quietly studying advanced calculus (probably a fake family picture found on Flickr), as all of your Facebook friends count their millions from online sales of their latest book… all acquired from that beautiful Facebook Business Page.

Instead of comparing our REAL lives to those vacation snapshots we read each day on Facebook, we should take a step back and look at all we have to be grateful for. We have REAL friends who love taking pictures of us that we can NEVER share on Facebook. We have a perfectly imperfect family that gets mad if we talk about them or tag them in any pictures, and we have lived a life filled with wonderful experiences, hurts, and successes, that now enables us to be BRILLIANT and GENEROUSLY share our knowledge and encouraging comments with others on the walls of their lives!

Now go use that airbrush and teeth whitening feature on PicNik, you want your photo to look good when Oprah calls for you to be on her show…broadcasting LIVE from Disneyland!

How to use Facebook for business, Social media for business, Gina Schreck

Head Mousekateer

Gina and her MAGICAL team of Mousekateers help individuals and organizations use today’s technology and social media tools to build that PERFECT business and manage a MAGICAL brand. You can reach Gina on Twitter @GinaSchreck or her glass slipper phone 303-978-0887

Gina Schreck
President & Chief Hooligan at Synapse 3Di

@GinaSchreck

March 30, 2011 | Filed Under Brand Management, Facebook, Facebook for Business, Facebook PAGES, Social Marketing, Social Media, Social Media for Business, SOCIAL SHARING | Leave a Comment

4 Social Marketing Tips Learned From Shopping with Teenaged Girls

Shopping with the Schrecklet (my 14-year-old daughter) can be torture sometimes. She has to try on 1,700 pairs of jeans from 350 different stores in 5 or 6 malls and still isn’t sure if she likes anything. Of course if I say, “Oooh, I like the way those look on you” she will correct me, pointing out 17 things that I should have known such as “The stitching is not bold enough” or “The zipper shouldn’t stick out 2 millimeters like this.” I have no credibility when it comes to teen clothing.

Social Shopping!

Now if I drop her off at a mall with four of her friends, she will come home with several bags filled with treasures as if she had been shopping for weeks. The difference? Social shopping with peer feedback. Social shopping will begin to take off this year with sites like Fashism (Ashton Kutcher is one of the main investors in this company) and GoTryItOn, both providing customers the opportunity to try on clothes, take a picture with their cell phones and upload it to these sites for immediate feedback. If you can’t decide which outfit to wear for that special date or first interview, you can send a photo of yourself wearing each and ask the crowd!

Some of you may be wondering why anyone would want the opinion of total strangers online, but if you sit for 10 minutes outside a women’s dressing room, you will see that it happens all the time. If people shop in groups (or packs as in the case of teenaged girls…scary packs) they will buy more and make decisions faster.

So what can you learn from this wild pack animal behavior? If you can create social environments where people talk about you and your brand, the pack will sell more for you than you and your slick brochures ever will. Here are 4 tips to get your social pack working for you:

Build the community. Just like budding teen relationships, this takes a bit of time and nudging, but if you encourage your current customers to engage with you on your Facebook and Twitter accounts, many will join in. Don’t forget to talk about these connection tools in your email signature lines, marketing materials, websites, billing inserts, receipts and newsletters.
Identify your champions. Watch a pack of teens (there are probably mall safaris you can find in your city). There is usually one or two who will tell the others what looks good and what doesn’t. The others are easily convinced. Every brand has those cheerleaders and champions who love to share their experiences online. Encourage them to post photos, videos or stories of themselves interacting with your brand.
Use contests and promotions whether through Facebook Deals, Foursquare, Gowalla or something unique that you can offer. If one teen sees that there is a “Buy-One-Get-One” sale, watch how fast they will convince the pack to pool money and get matching tops! People will rally their troops when there is money to be saved or prizes to be won. Never underestimate the power of healthy competition! (Even I have been known to take out little grannies to win sample packs of eye-make up!)
Appreciate participation. Always be listening to the social-vine… and not just for trouble. When someone gives your brand a shout out, be sure to thank them and let them know they ROCK! Remember, behavior that is recognized and rewarded gets repeated…and occasionally it works when the dishwasher gets unloaded!

How can you use SOCIAL SHARING and SOCIAL SHOPPING to build your business this year? Share your ideas with us… the pack is waiting for your opinions!

Gina Schreck

Gina and her team at SynapseConnecting can help you engage your community with strategic programs. Let us connect you to your world!

Check out the GEEKY tips on our Facebook Page or follow Gina on Twitter!

Gina Schreck
President & Chief Hooligan at Synapse 3Di

@GinaSchreck

January 9, 2011 | Filed Under Brand Management, Facebook, Facebook PAGES, Social Marketing, Social Media, SOCIAL SHARING | 1 Comment

Why Oprah Can Sell Anything and 5 Things You Can Learn From Her for Successful Social Media

Oprah’s network, OWN, launched yesterday (1-1-11) with high expectations. After all, anything Oprah touches turns to gold. Best selling books are made when she mentions them. Makeup and shoes fly off shelves if she shows them in her “Favorite things.” I think people would buy vats of lard if Oprah said eating it would be good for us. She can sell anything.

Oprah Winfrey, OWN, Oprah's network, Social Media for business, social marketing, Gina Schreck

Oprah- The Queen of Social

How does she do it, and more importantly, what can we learn from her and apply to our social marketing strategy?

Oprah is a CONVERSATIONALIST. The Oprah show is all about conversations with her guests and the audience. Are you having conversations on your social sites or are you just throwing out cold facts and pieces of your content hoping people will buy more from you? Invite people to sit on your virtual couch for conversations about THEM. Even though her show is named after her and every issue of her magazine features a picture of ….her, she does make her shows all about her guests.
Oprah LISTENS. There are many shows out today that are almost humorous, because of the way the host asks questions and then, without listening, either throws out another question or worse, interrupts the guest with a counter-point. In the social media arena, listening and responding to what is being said, is more important than flapping your lips all the time, assuming everyone will find your every word fascinating (although I’m sure you are!). If you are not interested in listening to those in your community, why should they be interested in what you have to say?
Oprah is LIKABLE. This one is a little harder to put your finger on, except to say when you listen and show interest in others, they will like you more. Being likable in social media circles first starts with being in the right circles. Obviously not everyone LIKES Oprah (I’m sure there are one or two out there), but those who are her target demographic (99.7% of the world) find her very likable. Find “your peeps” and then be yourself (unless you are a jerk…then perhaps be someone else until you learn how to be likable). Being likable has to do with being comfortable being yourself, all while you are making others feel important. Mary Kay Ash (of Mary Kay Cosmetics) once said that she pictures a sign above everyone’s head as she talks to them that reads, “Make me feel important.” This is a great philosophy to live by.
Oprah doesn’t SELL. I know this one is hard for any marketer to swallow, but if people know you and like you they will more likely buy from you without you really having to sell. After all, people hate to be SOLD, but they LOVE TO BUY! Does Oprah get kick-backs or free “stuff” for pimping them on her show? Most likely. But all she has to do is talk about the product or service and the world rushes out to try it. In social media, if you are providing interesting conversation, helpful tips and loads of value, when you do mention your product or service, people will rush out to try it. Well, they are more likely to rush out and try it. And the good news is, if they like it, they come back to the community and tell others…more sales without selling!
Oprah is VULNERABLE. Let’s admit it, anyone who can work in the public and have photos of themselves bulging out of bathing suits, showing up in the grocery store without make up, and having horrors of your childhood atrocities discussed in detail, is VULNERABLE! Now I am not saying you have to allow this type of publicness, but if you only allow people to see the perfect side of you, they cannot relate. When you try to appear perfect, people want to see you fail–I know, we are a sick people! Share your struggles and how you overcome them. Share your failures and what you are doing to improve. Oprah’s weight has been a public joke for years, and yet “her peeps” identify with her struggle and they love her more for sharing it! There are many people who enter the social media scene but want to keep every aspect of their life private. They might do better by finding a career path that does not require social interaction.

So whether your goal for 2011 includes building your business by 20% using social media or building an Oprah-sized empire, these tips will get you on your way. I’d love to hear what other qualities you feel make Oprah and her empire so successful…especially if we can all use the tips to be more successful this year! Happy New Year and as always if we can help you connect to your community (or help you not be a jerk) just hollar!

Gina and her team at SynapseConnecting help organizations use today’s technology tools to build their business and manage their brand. Follow Gina on Twitter, connect on Facebook, or jump into our GEEKY community on our Facebook Page.

Gina Schreck

Gina Schreck
President & Chief Hooligan at Synapse 3Di

@GinaSchreck

January 2, 2011 | Filed Under Brand Management, Facebook, Facebook PAGES, Gettin Geeky, Marketing, Social Media | 6 Comments

SPINNING SOCIAL PLATES: Using Facebook LISTS to manage personal & professional connections

Gina Schreck, Social Media for Business, Technology expert, technology speaker

Spinning Social Plates

We want to stay in touch with family and friends, but is it wise to use one social site to manage all of our connections? We have our professional contacts sharing business tips and our best friend from junior high school posting photos of herself on her boat. This can’t be good for our professional image. Many people create two accounts on Facebook to try and separate the two groups but find it starts getting confusing when they have friends that become business contacts or or vice versa. What’s a person to do?

Relax. Although you do have one life to live, social sites like Facebook allow you to segment that life into LISTS for easy brand management as well as time management. Aside from the fact that creating two accounts goes against Facebook’s terms of Agreement, this is just too hard to manage.

You can take all of your contacts on Facebook and place them into LISTS like FAMILY, SCHOOL FRIENDS, BIZ CONTACTS, CHURCH. You can get even more segmented by breaking your professional contacts into LISTS such as, ASSOCIATION CONTACTS, WORK CONTACTS, perhaps even TOPICAL EXPERTS. This allows you to then go in and customize your privacy settings to ensure everyone does NOT see everything.

I can place photos into albums and have some albums set to only be seen by FAMILY list members. I can customize my settings to ensure anything that gets written on my public wall (Your main profile page on Facebook) on my wall is only seen by ME. It’s also good to remember that the newsfeed or status updates you receive are only seen by those who are connected to the person sending the update. So if my business client is NOT friends with my daughter, the post I read about her homecoming dance is not seen by my client.

Lists will also help you save time when checking in and reading the updates. You can log into Facebook and choose to only read the updates of those in a particular list.

To place your Facebook contacts into lists, simply go up to the ACCOUNT link at the top right, select EDIT FRIENDS and then you will see a CREATE A LIST button at the top. Setting up the lists and adding friends to them does take some time, especially if you have lots of connections already. The key to maintaining this, is to add people to a list right when you connect.

Before long, your plates will be spinning smoothly…at least until Facebook changes the setting again )

Share how you keep your lists organized or how you have set your privacy settings to manage this double life we all live–Me, Myself & I are all interested in hearing your ideas!

Gina Schreck

@GinaSchreck

Let us help you connect to your community! Our team is AMAZING & TALENTED.

Gina Schreck
President & Chief Hooligan at Synapse 3Di

@GinaSchreck

September 27, 2010 | Filed Under Brand Management, Facebook, Facebook PAGES, Gettin Geeky, Social Media | 2 Comments