Panel discussion on Measurement and Monitoring

Measurement by Sterlic

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Summary

Listen to the panel discussion with Shonali Burke of Shonali Burke Consulting and Gini Dietrich of Arment Dietrich . These two intelligent, fun, humorous and dedicated professionals represent years of experience. Listen in and learn about measurement and some misconceptions. Our conversation also eventually strays to an interesting discussion about Klout and both panelists give their candid opinions on the service.

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Monitor any Facebook Page for Posts, Comments and Content

As someone who manages and participates on a number of Facebook Pages, I have always wondered why Facebook does not give us the means to monitor user activity on pages such as posts and comments. Until recently I used a Google Reader entry that uses Feed My Inbox to deliver this content from other pages, but I’ve been stuck with manual visits for user comments and posts. Earlier this week I saw a wall post from my Friend Shonali that pointed to the Facebook Page Alert App SmackDown. The authors statement really sums up which app was worth even trying:

All I’ll say about Hyper Alerts is this: it is THE BEST THING EVER. It’s free and sends you real-time updates when people post AND comment on your posts. I’ve been managing Facebook Pages for two and a half years and I’m telling you right now, the past week since I’ve started using Hyper Alerts, have been a freakin’ cake walk. – Maggie at Mizzinformation.com

That was the kind of reference that I can appreciate, so I tried the app out. Since using it I have been anxiously awaiting the opportunity to share how much butt it kicks to anyone who does not want to constantly “spot check” pages for updated content, comments and posts. You all know who you are, you are the ones who are getting excited right now.

How to use Hyperalerts

Using Hyperalerts is extremely simple, you navigate to their site and setup an account. Once your account is created you are able to add alerts. I started by adding what was the most critical page for me to monitor, my businesses Facebook page. While creating the alert you are able to choose how frequently you will receive alerts and what type of content you will receive alerts about. The user interface is very simple, but I will of course be happy to provide a video tutorial for anyone who’d like a little extra help. For demonstration purposes I setup a second alert for my Rotary Club’s Facebook page, because unless I am posting something there I don’t want to visit it unless I know there is something to comment on (or delete if someone has spammed the wall, though this is becoming less common). My alerts are now setup, this is what the page looks like where I can edit them or add more:

hyperalerts edit screen

Now that the alerts are in place I receive notices when the criteria I have setup are met. This saves me from those periodic “spot checks” that I was doing previously. Now that it is setup there is nothing else required. Here is an example of an alert:

Hyperalerts Email Notice

Fresh from the idea farm

Since this program uses Email and you can monitor essentially any Facebook page, it could easily be used in to achieve some heavy lifting. In conjunction with an Email list you could distribute content notices to a number of users. For example, with a club you might be a part of you could with a little tinkering allow the entire club to receive notices when a particular page had been updated. Or you could even have alerts from your businesses (or a customers, competitors?) page go to a team of people who are at the ready to respond. You could also feed the notices into a system that creates tickets for a team to assign and respond. These are little hacks that might make this already powerful and useful application even more so. Do you have any other suggestions?

Update: 2/5/2011 – Hyper Alerts just got easier!

I was pleased when I logged in to Hyper Alerts today to notice a new button “Add alert from your Facebook user” this makes adding alerts so much easier. Nice to see great changes so soon!

Add alert from Facebook user

Update: 2/11/2012 – Facebook Pages now do alerts but they stink

Facebook included an alerting function with their big changes to Pages but it is not very user friendly. I still strongly recommend Hyper Alerts.

Episode summary of the first Ampalooza (Podcast)

This week I had the opportunity to chat with some very cool people about my favorite social networking site Amplify.com. I have done several podcasts and lots of posts about Amplify, but after kicking the idea around with my friend Shonali Burke,  the panel began to take shape. The panelists were:

Shonali Burke – my main co-conspirator in this effort, past podcast guest and all around awesome Marketing and PR genius. Also blogging at Waxingunlyrical.com and shonali.amplify.com or @shonali.

Tinu Abayomi-Paul – a new media veteran regularly sharing her traffic tips at freetraffictip.com and asktinu.amplify.com or @tinu.

Alex Schleber – my biggest influencer of #curation efforts, also savvy and prolific. Definite power user of #amplify. Also find him at businessmindhacks.com or Curation FTW his amplog or @alexschleber.

Eric Goldstein – the discussion would not be complete without the CEO of Amplify. Eric joined us for the last 20 minutes or so answering questions and sharing his insights. He’s participated in several interviews. You can find Eric on egoldstein.amplify.com or @egoldstein.

The community at large – there were tons of great Amplify users present in the chat, many of them are listed here. I regret that I could not have managed more people on the panel. This could have been a panel of 30-40 people that are great trusted sources on Amplify. Many (but not nearly all of them) are listed at “Why sources are more valuable than followers“.

What's on your Mind? An Amapalooza!

Highlights

What can you expect by listening to this podcast?:

  • Insights from several different users with unique approaches
  • That Shonali has a wonderful speaking voice and accent (Thanks @zn_moment and @flapic)
  • How discussion and meeting people creates a lot of value for the site users
  • Ideas about how Amplify could scale and remain “intimate”
  • The power of the @mentions on Amplify (Originally suggested to Eric by Shonali)
  • Lots of great suggestions for new features
  • A conversation between the panel and Eric

Listen to the Ampalooza:

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Quotables:

Amplify is what Google Buzz should have been.” – Tinu Abayomi-Paul

The structure of Amplify does create some of that intimacy, it’s not just happenstance and it’s not just that the community is still relatively small.” – Alex Schleber

“(On Amplify being a great time saver) - The clipping function which is to me is the core of it and is so beautiful about it and the way that it clips and presents the posts particularly when you post them to Facebook is remarkable.” – Shonali Burke

“(On being willing to change priorities) - The internet is incredibly fluid and one thing we try to do as a company is try to remain as fluid as possible.” – Eric Goldstein

Self quote (I know, strange quoting myself):

“(On the Amplify team) - When you deal with people that treat you right and give a crap, it makes it really easy to be an advocate.” – Joe Hackman

Listeners, how would you have responded to the questions? Are there any features that you would have suggested to the Amplify team?

Episode Summary of the PRapalooza on Blogtalkradio (Podcast)

I had the great opportunity to interview some veteran’s of PR and new media on my PRapalooza episode on Blogtalkradio. If you’re looking for a primer on new media and PR this is a great opportunity to learn more from the pros. Here are some highlights that were addressed:

  • The differences between PR and Marketing
  • The biggest changes in and the future of PR
  • Effective use of (limited) time in social media
  • PR / Blogger relations
  • How much all of the panelists love Twitter
  • Spin Sucks
  • Learn why these panelists blog

Listen to the episode while you read on:

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Quotables (don’t worry these are just a few of many):

I don’t know how Danny does it, he is a blogging machine.” – Shonali Burke

PR people don’t pay attention to bloggers unless they are the a-listers.” – Gini Dietrich

“You’re always as influential as your audience allows you to be.” – Danny Brown

Worthy mention:

Danny Brown suggested that Robert Scoble probably would not be a good candidate for promoting cow manure. He made his point and we all got a good laugh out of it. This was not the only comic relief by our friend Danny Brown.

Best Question and Answer:

Question from Ike in the blogtalkradio chat: (Hey Ike, if you’re reading this send me your Twitter handle so I can cite you properly)

“What is the biggest business world misconception about PR that you’d like vanquished?”:

The idea that PR Professionals are spindoctors, that they lie to stories placed for their our clients makes me absolutely insane” – Gini Dietrich

PRapalooza

Where to find my distinguished guests:

Gini Dietrich @ginidietrich or http://spinsucks.com
Danny Brown @dannybrown or http://dannybrown.me
Shonali Burke @shonali or http://waxingunlyrical.com

Recommendations:

I like to ask my guests who some of the “lesser known” people are that they follow that we should watch. Here are the lists by panelist:

Shonali Burke’s Recommendations:

Herwin Icasiano @iherwin
“Wedge” @wedge
Steve Crescenzo @crescenzo

Gini Dietrich’s Recommendations:

Jason Verhoosky @jasonverhoosky and http://streamingcreative.com
Scott Hepburn @scotthepburn and http://mediaemerging.com
Joe Thornley @thornley and http://propr.ca
Jon Buscall @jonbuscall and http://jontusmedia.com
Becky Johns @beckyjohns and http://becky-johns.com
Marijean Jaggers @marijean and http://marijeanjaggers.com
John Heaney @johnheaney and http://orange-envelopes.com/blog
Craig Jarrow @tmninja and http://timemanagementninja.com

Danny Brown’s Recommendations:

Tim Jahn @timjahn and http://beyondthepedway.com
Antonia Harler @antwizzel and http://socialglitz.com
Shannon Boudjema @shannonboudjema and http://shannonboudjema.com
Troy Claus @troyclaus and http://troyclaus.com

If you’re listed here and have a blog you’d like me to link to, please leave it in the comments below.

Listeners, what was the highlight of the program for you? Any key take aways?

Join the PRapalooza on Blogtalkradio November 3rd

Ok so maybe PRapalooza is going a bit overboard but I am really excited about an upcoming panel I have arranged for my Podcast on Blogtalkradio. Thanks to a very interesting #SBT10 chat on Twitter and a subsequent awesome blog post on Spinsucks, several great people in PR and Social Media have graciously agreed to form a panel and discuss the topic of technology PR on my podcast live on blogtalkradio November 3rd at noon UTC – 8.

So who are these distinguished guests?

None other than:

  1. Gini Dietrich @ginidietrich founder and CEO of Arment Dietrich, Inc., author of Spinsucks.com and recently ranked the #1 PR person by Klout and Techcrunch
  2. Shonali Burke @shonali of Shonali Burke Consulting, based out of Washington DC, one of PRWeeks “top 40 under 40″, one of the top 25 women that rock social media and adjunct faculty at John Hopkins University’s M.A. in Communications
  3. Danny Brown @dannybrown co-founder of Bonsai Interactive Marketing, AdAge Power 150 Blogger, and Hive award for Best Social Media Blog in the 2010 South by South West festival.
Gini Dietrich Shonali Burke Danny Brown

Do you have any questions for this panel?

The best question will be featured in the post, come on PR people, surely you can challenge this panel with some excellent questions?

Save the date:

  1. On Blogtalkradio
  2. On Plancast