Two days ago Slideshare sent me an email about my Case Study for using Twitter for Lead Gen:

Your presentation is currently being featured on the SlideShare homepage by our editorial team.

Today I received another email that said:

"Twitter: a Case for Lead Generation" is being tweeted more than any other document on SlideShare right now. So we’ve put it on the homepage of SlideShare.net (in the "Hot on Twitter" section).

It was odd because I had tweeted a link, but Twitter was quiet (or so I thought…). In looking at the stat’s on Slideshare I saw that SocialMediaToday and it’s sister site, MyVenturePad had published my blog post and were receiving a LOT of traffic. There were almost 1500 views between them. Next question, what was driving the traffic? A quick search for the phrase, “Twitter Engagement”, that’s a part of my blog title showed that there was some serious retweeting happening on Twitter!

Slideshare is an active community with great shareable features

For the past three years I’ve been studying why things happen in social networks. Then I unravel them and share the steps so that you can apply them to your situations. And this one is easy to replicate. It will work for YouTube as much as Slideshare too!

First, a quick explanation of Slideshare. Skip this if you’re familiar with it.

Slideshare is a free site where you can host your powerpoint decks. It’s a really active community. They totally understand the concept of ‘shareable’ which is so imperative for word of mouth (some call it viral). (This is one of the main principles that Andy Sernovitz asserts and I highly recommend that you read his book, Word of Mouth Marketing.)

The secret sauce is that it allows you to embed your presentation in your post and others can download it and also embed it. They also offer a nice widget that I’ve put on the side of my blog AND are integrated into Facebook and LinkedIn so my friends there can see my newest decks.  It can grow legs! and Slideshare keeps track of the number of views. The community in Slideshare can favorite presentations and comment on them. So Slideshare has done a great job of helping their users connect!

How can you make Slideshare + SocialMediaToday + Twitter = Viral

I’ll list the steps. You provide the ideas

1. Create your content and post on a shareable site such as Slideshare or YouTube
2. Write a blog post and embed the content
3. Syndicate your blog to great communities like SocialMediaToday.com, MyVenturePad.com, etc
4. They and many others tweeted the link x 180 + times!
5. Engage with the communities on Slideshare, Socialmediatoday & Twitter. Here’s an article I wrote on syndicating your blog. (That post is how I got my job at Techrigy)
6. Watch the ripple effect afterwards and thank those that blog about it and further share my content.

Here’s the stat’s on this adventure 24 hours after publishing my blog post:

On Slideshare.net (note that it’s been downloaded 48 times)

SocialMediaToday.com – 1529 views

MyVenturePad.com – 1147 views

Tonite I was asked a question. Will this work for a company and their brand? Of course! I realized yesterday that Dell had followed me on Slideshare. And their decks are quite interesting! Check out the So So Social Media Strategy. (Note that my deck is also branded & has my contact info.)

Another point is that you don’t need the reason of speaking at events to create and post slide decks. There are also people in Slideshare community that have never posted a deck (but what fun is that?!)

So what are you waiting for? Get busy, and make a slide deck. Link it up here. Need ideas? Go explore the decks in Slideshare.

Special thanks go to Beth Harte & Ann Handley for inviting us to share Techrigy’s story in Marketing Prof’s Twitter Success Case Studies and again at their virtual event! (It forced me to make the slide deck!)

And thanks to Adam Helweh @SecretSushi for his thumbs down on my first draft. You can thank him for his honesty & for pushing me to be more creative!

Now I want to see your work!

Start here if Twitter is completely new to you

And this is part 3.5 in his series.

Follow me @cbensen & I’ll follow you back

Enjoy & don’t be shy about asking for help.

Twitter has become a valuable tool for business use. There are so many opportunities to leverage it’s capabilities in a  way that is relevant & provides value.

• Customer Relations
  • @netsolcares   @comcastcares
• Crisis Communications
  • opportunity to respond immediately before it escalates to blogs & other channels
• Crowd Sourcing
  • product development,
  • survey customer satisfaction
• Build Brand & Communications
  • offer assistance – How can we help you? @ChrisBrogan style
  • brand presence
• Lead Generation
  • new markets
• Customer references – star items – refer people to the URL of favorites
  • I made one for Techrigy SM2
  • how to create it
    • use search.twitter.com to search for pertinent tweets
    • open tweet & star them which will propogate the favorites
• Announce new services, coupons & information
  • @digitalscrap
  • no push marketing please
• Professional Networking

Laura Fitton @pistachio has a comparison chart for the various microblogging platforms.

• For searching past twitter conversations: search.twitter.com
• For monitoring twitter: tweetbeep.com (there is also tweetscan, but it’s not as good)

This has replaced my Google Reader for RSS feeds. By monitoring the tweets in my topic area (ex: social media monitoring and my own name including misspellings) they gather the latest URL’s pertinent to my area of interest

If you’re just getting started with Twitter I have a post, Twitter 101, with links to resources for getting started. I also provide consulting in the areas of social networking & branding. Feel free to email me at conniebensen @ gmail.com

And definitely follow me on Twitter!  @cbensen

What business value does Twitter provide you with? And what are your success stories?

Here’s  a book that’s soon to be published that has my endorsement – I’ve read parts of it. (It’s written by a Minnesotan, so it has to be good! @jojeda )

Twitter Means Business: How Microblogging can Help or Hurt Your Company

Ogilvy PR has two good posts on corporate use of Twitter:

• Why Twitter should matter to you
• Twitter Best practices
• Why Twitter Should Matter To You: Twustomer Service Edition

There are many resources for getting started. Here are some of the best:

• Caroline Middlebrook has a great guide
• Twitter in Plain English (a clever and fun two-minute video)
• How to use Twitter (a blogger’s solid step-by-step)
• 10 Ways to use Twitter
• List of Twitter101 posts on Delicious thanks to Warren Sukernek

Have patience with Twitter. Until you have some follow people & they follow you it will seem meaningless. Who you follow depends on your interests. Make sure that you keep adding new people because that will give you the opportunity to expand your horizons. Some must follows in my opinion:

• Follow me & I will follow you back
• @chrisbrogan @jowyang @mackcollier @conniereece @kanter
• Community Managers & Social Media 
  • to add your twitter link – password is build
• List of Brands on Twitter
• Enterprise use of Twitter
  • @pistachio – Laura Fitton is creating a business
  • Dell has a hierarchy set up
• Subject Areas in Twitter
  • @fgossieaux – Marketing 2.0 & Community Expert
  • @LeeOdden – SEO expert
  • @AlbertMaruggi @PhilBaumann – health field

Ideas to find more interesting people:

If you see an interesting conversation click on the @person & see if they will add value to your Twitter stream. Follow them if they look interesting.

Twellow.com is a tool that allows you to search twitter bio’s. What is your area of interest? Mashable has an article on more uses for Twellow.

And Twitter may seem odd & disjointed. Here are two tools to see the messages in a threaded format:

• Quotably.com puts the conversations into perspective (it’s not perfect though).
• Tweeder.com thanks to my sister for that

Searching Twitter

• Search.Twitter.com. This is a great tool & you can subscribe to the RSS for the search & monitor it. It’s a great tool for building brand.
• Ways to Search Twitter thanks to @webword

How my use of Twitter has evolved as my number of followers increased

• And I have a number of articles on Twitter.

What are your favorite resources for getting started with Twitter? What advice would you give someone just dipping their toes in? Feel free to leave your Twitter must follows in the comments.

Subscribe to my blog by email (over my photo) or by RSS. My focus is community building, branding & social networking.

Well Jonathan Kash has a similar project. He has a list of brands on Twitter. This includes non-profits so there’s something for everyone there. Between the two sources you can pretty much find who you need.

The most amazing brand presence on Twitter has to be Dell’s. Jonathan has built out a page showing their usage. It almost reads like an organizational chart! And note that it’s international in scope.

Have you seen any great examples of brands on Twitter? Do you have your brand on Twitter? should you?

That’s where I update to. Before you schedule help though – I really only interact on half of them. I’m really finding ping.fm to be an excellent timesaver. (use pingscompany to sign up – they keep changing it)

Ping.fm efficiently updates 10 services for me with one click. Here are the advantages:

• I think twice before I type those 140 characters!
• I try to add a question that elicits a response from friends
• It keeps me active everywhere.
• I don’t have to choose one service.
• Different people respond at different services.

Then awhile later I will pop into my services of choice. Usually Twitter, Identi.ca & Plurk. Doing it this way I’m finding that:

• I don’t stay as long in each one.
• I don’t ponder all the noise when I pop in (there is more of a purpose)
• I’m updating less, but it’s far more meaningful (and probably appreciated by my friends!)

One could argue that I’m not gaining the same value that I was before in getting to know people there. In regard to that I can always spend time wherever I’d like when I choose too. In many respects I feel like I’m offering more value by not contributing as much to the noise. I feel like I’ve shifted to a new level of use again (it’s like #3 or 4 – I should review them again here).

What do you think about updating often?

So in my librarian style – I feel the need to do the following:

• simplify it – leave it to a bunch of guys to fragment this!
• inclusion – you can include yourself!
• automate it – let all of you contribute

There is a great collaborative wiki called ‘Twitterpacks‘. I just added a section for Community Managers. (Something happened to this wiki & list – I moved them over to my wiki – password is build ) .  I think that there are enough of us to fill it up quick & others can use it to follow us in order to get excellent customer service!

So pop over & add your Twitter link, your name, title, company etc. Let’s connect!

• the password is ‘build’

About the wiki – I was introduced to it was because they also have it set up by Geographic Location. That’s cool! Minnesota is here. Password is ‘project’

And please abide by the guidelines of the wiki.

When I had only 120-150 followers I checked in 3-4 times per day. And I would page back through everyone’s tweets & open links that I would read later.

But the twitterstorm that @jowyang created disrupted that & my number started growing. It took me a bit to readjust & I started using some new tools.

Now at 750 followers here is how I use Twitter:

• pop in only on breaks (It’s too disruptive to stream)
• chat with my network that is online at the moment
• if I see an interesting comment I may
  • click on the @username for context
  • follow that person
  • put their name into quotably.com to see the thread of the conversation (it works pretty well albeit it’s not perfect)
• use quotably.com to check my favorite tweeters & follow their links
• check replies & respond

My Twitter tips:

If you tweet about a broad variety of topics you’ll get followers of varied interests

Ask questions – crowdsource your followers – they love to help! (today I asked if I should get a kayak or canoe; on another day it was what to do in Paris) It’s also a great place to get tech help (my following is very geeky).

Business related tips:

• Tweetscan.com delivers an email every morning to me with a standing search for:
  • cbensen – for DM’s that are missed – Twitter is prone to hiccups)
  • cbenson (people misspelling my name)
  • acdsee – brand monitoring
  • community manager – I’m connecting with like minded people & I like reading the news as people announce their positions or talk about their work
  • take your tweetscan search & share it with others
    • Here’s an example that I saw Radian6 using
    • *update* Look at what Zappos is doing
      • Public mentions
      • Employee tweets
      • List of employees that Tweet
      • Link to follow the CEO

• • • If you use that – make sure you monitor it so there aren’t negative tweets on it
    • Get creative with it! It’s offered in an RSS feed – where can you embed it? website? blog?

Benefits:

• Networking – I’ve met a large number of people from Minnesota. After getting to know them I’m ready to attend the Twin Cities Social Media Breakfast next week & meet them in person!
• Branding -
  • repetitive – Use your photo as your avatar
  • memorable – Use a representative photo for your home page & people will see it when they check out your profile or go to DM you. This space offers the opportunity to display your brand logo multiple times. If you have questions on how to do it, let me know – I know of some software that makes it easy!

Follow me @cbensen & I’ll follow you back!

Resources

• for the beginner – Beginner’s Guide to Twitter
• more in-depth – Caroline Middlebrook has a great guide
• And there are tons of Twitter app’s out there – Lee Odden lists 5 newer ones & @jowyang has a good list too.
• Ellen has a good resource
• all things Twitter – a wiki with many, many resources!

Update – an interesting article on Twitter

As a customer this means that I have direct contact with the company. It’s very powerful! And the personal touch means a lot to me.

Who are actively using Twitter?

• @MarketingProfs,@BulldogSolut (Bulldog marketing), @evernote
• people representing indeed.com, radian6 and many more!

The other part of this is monitoring what people are saying on Twitter about your brand. I use tweetscan.com in the same way that I have GoogleAlerts set up: a daily report on @cbenson, @cbensen, acdsee and ‘community manager’

@jowyang recently listed a number of helpful Twitter app’s.

And if you’re wondering what Twitter is – Lee LeFever of CommonCraft has a video on it:

If you’re not on Twitter yet, sign up & follow me @cbensen

Connect with me on Facebook (link under my photo on left – works for Twitter too!) & I’ll be glad to help you with Twitter.

*update* 2 more corporations found me today: @HRBlock & @carnivalcruises

And I shouldn’t have forgotten my friends at @batchblue & also @perkettpr

*update* here’s an excellent article on why Companies Should Use Twitter

• Job vacancies are posted that I doubt ever hit traditional boards
• requests for sightseeing & restaurant recommendations
• tweet-ups (people meet at a certain place when attending an event)

Recently I had won an iPhone. AT&T doesn’t offer service in my area so I blogged about it & posted a link on Twitter. My readers came up with a number of ideas & offered empathy. It seems that the iTouch better suited my needs . I really didn’t want to test AT&T to see if they would notice an out of range account & disconnect me.

I called Apple & they were willing to return it, but the credit would go to the original purchaser which was the Wetpaint Wiki company. Then they would have had to order a new one & it just seemed like an unfair hassle for them. Apple had free shipping on Friday, so I posted my Twitter ad.

need an iPhone? at $299? I won one, I can’t get service & an iTouch is better – Apple has free shipping today… DM me if you’re interested

In 5 minutes I had 2 responses. In an hour the third one came in that actually purchased it. We used Paypal to transfer the funds. Ebay has taught me how easy Paypal is to use.

My iPhone has a home where it can be used for more than a paperweight! YAY! And my iTouch will be delivered by Friday. (I won’t be home so it’ll be a week before I can play with my new toy.). My sister-in-law is taking delivery.

What creative ways do you see Twitter being used?