Lessons on Social Networking and Blogging from Traditional Media - Eric Rhoads - MediaBizBloggers

Bashing traditional media as quotold schoolquot is popular these days and with the declining revenues and audiences of newspapers television and consumer magazines it39s easy to take shots In fact not all old media is crashing Radio for instance has not seen declining audience numbers like other media So bloggers and others using social media have a lot they can learn from traditional mediaSummertime BluesIn a recent blog Internet Guru Leo Laporte reported that several weeks of his blogs had not been published due to a glitch in Google Buzz According to Laporte quotno one noticedquot so he was going to discontinue blogging I pointed out to him that perhaps there is more to the story For instance these blogs supposedly went unnoticed during the summer Traditional media companies will tell you that audiences shift into a passive mode in the summer because they are occupied with vacations cookouts boating fishing hiking and other recreational activities For that same reason television networks place their toptier fresh programming when school is in session and repeat a lot of their old programming during the summer months when viewership declines Perhaps Laporte39s absent audience was just outside instead of in front of the computer I blog and post on Twitter and Facebook consistently most of the year but I barely spent any time posting or checking social networking sites this summer I usually do my posting late at night after the kids are in bed but in the summertime it39s light outside later the kids are up later and family demands keep me off the computer in the evenings I also found less connectivity in the mountains where we spent much of the summerAdvice for Posting Things slow down in the summer so either take a break and resume when audiences return or increase your frequency so you39ll get noticed more Note The constant din of bloggers can sometimes be annoying anyway and a break might give people a fresh outlookIncreased ClutterAs I gain more quotfriendsquot on Facebook and Twitter I39m actually reading fewer posts because of the overwhelming volume Unless I39m willing to dig deep and read back over several pages of posts there is a strong chance I won39t see the majority of messages my friends have posted I can tolerate three or four pages back but some days my quotfriendsquot will post hundreds of times and I simply can39t see them all In the advertising world this would be referred to as increased clutter To get noticed advertisers have to run more ads to overcome clutterAdvice for Posting Clutter is increasing so you need to increase the frequency of your posting in order to get noticed In the ad world it takes hundreds of impressions to reach every consumer seven to ten times in a week Keep this in mind when postingRotate Like RadioThe radio business understands a basic principle that can also apply to social networking and blogging Radio knows how to play the hits In the 1960s a radio programmer who spent a lot of time in a bar noticed that the waitresses kept playing the same songs over and over on the jukebox Radio discovered that people love certain songs and want to hear them as much as possible so some stations put the hits into high rotation playing the top 10 songs every two or three hours Though some people complain because those songs may not be their favorites they want radio to play their favorite song even more A wellprogrammed radio station will always be playing a hit record when you tune in no matter what time of day What does this have to do with social networking Ask uberblogger Guy KawasakiWhen I check Facebook even with all the posts I have to wade through I almost always see a post from Guy Kawasaki every time I sign on At one of my recent conferences Kawasaki told the audience that he has a team of people who search smart articles of interest and then post them for him He even uses a software program that automatically repeats those same posts several times a day in different time slots As much as I check Facebook I39ve never seen one of his posts repeated yet I always see something fresh and interesting from Guy He is following the principle of repetitionAdvice for Posting Repeat your best posts in different parts of the day to increase chances that people will see what you39ve writtenThree Important PrinciplesMedia companies understand three very important principles 1 It39s all about the content 2 stories sell and 3 big brands sell It39s no wonder that the highestpaid people in Hollywood are the writers and the actors Great writing makes for interesting content and great stories Great execution acting keeps people engaged and big brands great wellknown actors will attract people more than lesserknown brandsAdvice for Posting If you39re a professional blogger trying to build your image or brand start with great content No one cares if your cat had a hairball Not being promotional is imperative in the social media environment so you need to post some personal things of interest amp8212 but make your content interesting well written and full of great stories people will want to pass on which is how you grow People remember stories Edit everything you post your writing and your photos Less is more Brand yourself like actors who understand that people love knowing a little about their personal life and the exciting life they supposedly live Create some mystique and remember that controversy gets attention Also remember that when you39re posting on Twitter or Facebook you39re on stage and all eyes are on you Make it your very best performanceIt39s a natural tendency to want to shed all links to the past when something new has been invented but the lessons we39ve all learned in the traditional media world can be powerful lessons in the social media world as wellB Eric Rhoads is CEO of Streamline Publishing Inc Rhoads writes regular columns for his publications and is an active blogger in the radio and art industries including Radio Ink Tank Artist Marketing and Blue Chip Gallery Marketing He is an active speaker consultant and advocate in the radio art and technology industries and he sits on a number of advisory boards Eric can be reached at ericRadioInkcomRead all Ericamp8217s MediaBizBloggers commentaries at Ink Tank with B Eric Rhoads MediaBizBloggersCheck us out on Facebook at MediaBizBloggerscomFollow our Twitter updates MediaBizBlogger

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Lessons on Social Networking and Blogging from Traditional Media - Eric Rhoads - MediaBizBloggers

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