N9ne Group gets Twitter training
July 27, 2010 by Tim Miner · View Comments
Last week I had the pleasure of leading a training session for a group of about 80 N9ne Group employees. As the owner and operator of most of the clubs, restaurants, and venues at The Palms Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, the N9ne Group views Twitter as a very powerful tool for their employees on the front line.
Vestor Logic led a 90 minute Twitter training session held in the Rain nightclub for the 80+ attendees covering everything from an overview of Twitter, the anatomy of a tweet, the etiquette of the social platform, and best practices for success.
The hosts and promoters that serve a critical function for the N9ne Group venues like Ghostbar or Rain use Twitter every day to engage with their visitors. They keep their customers updated in real time on the celebrity sightings at each venue and provide a pulse on the activities each night.
The restaurants under the N9ne Group umbrella like N9ne Steakhouse and NOVE Italiano also have big plans for Twitter to better engage with their dining guests. Look for big things from them in the near future as well.
You can follow N9ne Group on Twitter @N9neGroup or following any of there venues specifically at the following handles:
You can also follow the blogs for each venue:
- N9NE Steakhouse
- Playboy Club Celebs
- Rain Nightclub Celebs
- Moon Nightclub
- Palms Pool
- NOVE Italiano
- Ghostbar
If you would like to discuss training for your organization on any social media topic or platform, just shoot us the details. We tailor each training sessions to the needs of the client. We can cover any of the topics that are relevant to your business.
If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to our RSS feed. You can also become a fan of Vestor Logic on Facebook and follow us on Twitter. Thanks for visiting!
Backpacker Magazine gets even more social
April 21, 2010 by Tim Miner · View Comments
Anyone close to me knows how much I love to hike, camp, and go fly fishing. One of my favorite sources of information and inspiration is Backpacker Magazine. I recently renewed my subscription and received the current issue packed full of maps on the National Parks, local hikes, and life list trips.
I’ve never really adopted the use of GPS devices as most of my trips have been day hikes in areas that I am very familiar with, namely Red Rock and Mt. Charleston. But lately, I have begun to expand my horizons. I have been forced to gear up for a three day backpacking trip to Havasu Falls in June and I am planning a few overnight trips in the Mt. Charleston wilderness this summer. These types of trips allow you to cover more ground and the need for navigational help is more pressing.
So like I usually do, I turn to Backpacker Magazine and their website to start my research. Do I want a watch with the basic functions? Should I suck it up and buy a handheld GPS? Is there anything I can use on my Blackberry that would do the job equally well?
Page 9 of the current issue (May 2010) of Backpacker Magazine seems to hold an answer…if I owned an iPhone or Android!
The magazine has released an Android app (iPhone version to release May 1) called Backpacker’s GPS Trails, which allows users to do a number of cool things including:
- Locate trips
- Research trips
- Plan trips
- Save and share trips
- Geotag photos, videos, and sound clips
- Turn your phone into a GPS
- Save maps
- View stats
This leaves me with a simple choice: either switch phones or buy a handheld GPS. I have been a devoted Blackberry user for too long to switch for this one app. Maybe Backpacker Magazine will build something for us someday too.
The other thing I noticed on this page is that they are promoting the app with a Facebook Contest starting May 15th. They plan to give away one app a day for an entire month to the first person that can answer the daily map trivia question which will be posted at backpacker.com/facebook which currently redirects to their Facebook Page.
Our Take
Backpacker seems to be getting more social. The May issue included three instances of social marketing. The app contest on the Facebook Page (page 9), a one page write up of “Yosemite’s Buzz” covering social media and the park, and an ad by the State of Arkansas which included a QR code that directs the user to this page.
It’s great to see my favorite magazine getting out there and trying something new, like social media mentions in the magazine. Of course, the entire culture of their magazine and its readership is dedicated to trying something new. Exploring new territory. Testing gear. That’s the exact reason that I read it! I guess, it doesn’t surprise me that Backpacker Magazine would be one of the first magazines (at least of the ones that make my short list of those worth reading) that would try these new marketing tactics. Good for you! And good for the readers.
I’m not sure who is steering the social media adoption at Backpacker Magazine, but I hope to see more of this interactive nature in the pages of the future issues. The website already plays host to a very active forum on all things outdoors and the community that participates in the conversations there are most willing to share their experiences. Backpacker Magazine has much to gain from doing social media well, and by our account is off to a great start.
You can follow Backpacker Magazine on Twitter and join the conversation on their Facebook Page.
Social 60 – Promoted Tweets on Twitter
April 13, 2010 by Tim Miner · View Comments
So Twitter has finally launched their bid for revenue in the form of Promoted Tweets. For now, these ads will be seen in the search results, but by year end Twitter promises to roll them out in more areas based on the feedback from this initial roll-out.
Of course, we all know that Twitter has to monetize their platform in some way or another and this appears to be a pretty conservative step in that direction. But the implications are huge. If users respond to the ads and Twitter is able to effective gauge the viability of each ad then we could see a shift in the way brands market on social platforms across the board.
Here a post from Mashable – The Multi-Billion Dollar Question: Will Users Click on Twitter Ads?
And a more detailed look from John Battelle – Twitter To Roll Out “Promoted Tweets”: Initial Thoughts (Developing)
And finally, from Steve Rubel (one of my favorites) – Twitter Sponsored Tweets: The Impact for Marketers
So what do you think? Will ads in the search results be effective for big brands? Will users be turned off? Where might the ads be placed next? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
Social :60 – Facebook Community Pages
April 2, 2010 by Tim Miner · View Comments
Facebook recently announced the addition of the Facebook Community Page type. What? Exactly. We don’t get it either. We have discussed the topic with our larger brand clients and the collective minds were unable to make sense of the move either.
We also included links to two other posts below from two of our favorite sources below to help you wrap your head around this recent change.Take a look at this video and weigh in with your opinions in the comments section below.
Lisa Barone at Outspoken Media covered the topic in a blog post this morning and shares our sense of confusion. Read her post here. It’s a more detailed look at the issue and she is always a good read.
AllFacebook.com, the popular website covering all things Facebook, published this post yesterday on the subject.
What do you think? Will the addition of Community pages help to curb brand jacking for those brands that have yet to engage on Facebook with a Fan page? Will it empower consumers in a better way to show advocacy for the brands they love? Or will it just muddy the water even more? Use the comments section below to share your thoughts.
Getting Started: World Series of Barbecue & Charity Poker Tournament
March 31, 2010 by Tim Miner · View Comments
It is often the first step that is the most difficult. Whether you’re an individual or a large organization trying to define your social media footprint, taking the first step can seem a bit overwhelming.
There are a seemingly endless list of elements to consider in the formulation of a viable social strategy: objectives, measurable goals, ROI, messaging strategy, content strategy, delegation of responsibilities, identification of participants, means for measurement, monitoring, and analysis. The list goes on and on.
But perhaps one of the most important considerations is the design and deployment of social assets like a website, Facebook Fan Page, or Twitter account. It should reflect the image and message that you are trying to convey in your content strategy. You want your visitors, fans, and followers to get a real sense of what your brand and message are all about.
Here is how we helped our clients, Howard & Suzie Lederer, express their message in the design of their social assets for their annual charity event.
World Series of Barbecue & Charity Poker Tournament
Howard & Suzie Lederer began this annual charity event in their backyard several years ago. Each year it grew, both in terms of the number of attendees and the amount it raised for the Boys & Girls Club of Las Vegas. In the past, the marketing effort focused primarily on the enormous reach that Howard & Suzie have in their network of friends. This year, Suzie decided to raise the bar yet again and find ways to utilize social media to expand her reach in hopes of raising more money for the BGCLV.
We had been working with Suzie on another project and eventually the conversation about social media shifted to the WSOB Charity Poker event. We began discussing the possibilities for charities and non-profit organizations and ultimately decided to give it a go. Because the event had no social footprint, we basically had to start from scratch.
Defined Objectives
Though it may seem obvious, we wanted to utilize social marketing to raise more money for the BGCLV. But as we drilled deeper during the initial brainstorming session we realized that we had more than just that one objective. Here is the list of objectives that we developed:
- Use social marketing to raise more money for the BGCLV than in previous years
- Build a centralized database of donors to serve as a base for future events
- Offer supporters a way to officially register for the event in advance
- Provide a secure way to accept donations online from supporters that cannot attend the event
- Share the experience with videos and photos from past events
Here are the social assets that we decided to create to support our defined objectives.
Facebook Fan Page
For now, the Facebook Fan Page for the World Series of Barbecue & Charity Poker Tournament is the central hub for all of the activity around the event. Visitors to the page can become a Fan of the event, make a donation, and even register in advance for Karaoke, a highlight of years past.
We created a Charity Registry on JustGive.org that allows us to embed a link on the Fan Page that opens the registry in a new window and allows visitors and Fans to make secure online donations with a credit card. Those donations are then disbursed to the BGCLV each month minus the minimal administrative fees that are assessed by JustGive.org on each transaction.
Visitors can also register for the event on the Fan Page. The registration function is simply a form that opens in a new window and integrates with VerticalResponse, an email management system. We created an account for our client with VerticalResponse that provides us with the ability to dump all registrants into a dedicated list so that we can communicate with them as the event nears and provide them with specific instructions on how to make their donations the day of the event.
Nevada Gaming Law prohibits us from collecting the buy-in for the poker event. That function must be provided by the Golden Nugget, the licensed gaming venue for the poker event and will be done the day of the event. For that reason, we decided to simply accept registrations using the Vertical Response form integration with a dedicated list.
Twitter Account
The Twitter account for the event was created to serve as both a marketing tool and an information channel. We were able to identify other Twitter members that have an interest in poker and follow them. Many follow us back creating an opportunity to share the vision for the event as well as educate them about the role that the Boys & Girls Club plays in the Las Vegas community.
The addition of a Twitter account to the marketing mix also gives us a very efficient way to put out event updates as it draws closer and reach more possible donors that may not be able to attend in person. Twitter will play a critical role in the fund raising effort made possible by the Donate button on the Fan Page.
Additional Outposts
There are a few other social outposts that we have leveraged for the marketing effort. We have uploaded hundreds of images from past events to a Flickr Stream dedicated to the annual event. Our hope is that attendees will turn to this stream to reminisce about past events and even contribute to the stream this year.
What’s coming next for the WSOB Charity Poker event?
Vestor Logic began work on this project about 30 days ago many of the moving parts are just now falling into place. This year’s event is on July 2, 2010 at the Golden Nugget Las Vegas. Our marketing effort is beginning in earnest at the time of this post and we expect to exceed all expectations for both the effectiveness of the social media initiatives and the fundraising results that will benefit the BGCLV.
We have begun the initial web design process on a website dedicated to this annual charity event and should be able to launch in the next few months. This website will serve as the content hub for the event and will provide a base for donors and supporters moving forward. The site will host the photos and videos for all past events and will offer a mechanism for anyone to participate in the ongoing conversation about the involvement that the BGCLV has in the Las Vegas community.
Introducing our newest video series: Social 60
March 25, 2010 by Tim Miner · View Comments
Social 60 is our newest video series created to explore the hot topics in social media in less than 60 seconds! Our goal is to provide frequent video updates on the topics that are garnering the most discussion in social media circles. We hope that you will use the comments section following each post to help us reach an understanding for each topic. Most of the videos will cover topics that will play out in the social media landscape over time and it should be fun to see how much we get right in the beginning. We look forward to your comments.
Discovery Workshop – Sheetz Inc
March 15, 2010 by Tim Miner · View Comments
Click here for the full .pdf presentation notes and sources with links
How To: Setup a “Listening Channel” for your brand
February 23, 2010 by Tim Miner · View Comments
Want to know what people are saying about your company online? There is an easy way to create a “Listening Channel” to monitor the online chatter about your brand, your name, your keywords or phrases or any of the discussions that you find interesting. This screencast will show you how to get started.
If you would like a little help setting up your listening channel for brand monitoring, just contact us. We are happy to help!
Yammer is a powerful link manager
February 22, 2010 by Tim Miner · View Comments
Yammer is one of our most used social tools at Vestor Logic. We use it as an internal Twitter platform to aggregate links, share ideas, and communicate on active client campaigns. It has become indispensable for us and is used by our team every single day. Think of Yammer as a private Twitter platform for your organization.
You can setup your own Yammer network in minutes here.
Integration with Google Reader
We have integrated Yammer with our Google Reader to share interesting blog posts and articles from the numerous feeds that we subscribe to and review each day. Sometimes we find blog posts from our favorite blogs that prompt internal discussion. A member of our team will Yam It! using the bookmarklet and apply a hashtag to make it easy to follow the conversation in the future.
Yammer provides a step-by-step tutorial on how to integrate with Google Reader here.
Yammer as a link manager
Recently, we began using Yammer to manage articles, blog posts, links, and web pages that apply to an active client campaign that we are working on.
For example, we are leading a one-day workshop for a large corporate client in early March and we have begun collecting relevant stories and resources in Yammer to help build the presentation that we will give at the event. We submit the link to the relevant content, hashtag it with the designated client tag, and then discuss it internally using Yammer. We can go back at any point and view all of the submissions we have under that tag to begin crafting the slides for the presentation.
For this project, we now have 30 posts under that client tag and we should have more than 50 posts by the time we begin building the presentation. This is by far the easiest way for us to aggregate all of this information. This is a very powerful way for us to manage all of these links in one place and easily recall them when we are ready to review.
Our take on Yammer
Yammer provides us with an easy way to aggregate information from other sites and blogs in one place. We can discuss each post independent of all the others in our stream. It has become one of our most used social tools and I cannot imagine not having it as part of our arsenal. All of our posts are preserved forever and the platform offers a free account.
How can you go wrong with that! If you are storing links somewhere else, get on the Yammer platform and make your life easier. You will find that it provides more efficiency to your research process and will certainly allow you to perform better for your clients and the projects that you are working on.
For companies that are accustomed to discussing topics regularly with the entire team, Yammer provides a perfect platform to do so. Team members can subscribe to hashtags, discuss the content using comments, and the entire discussion is preserved for future reference.
Yammer’s new release is coming
Today, we discovered that Yammer will be reviewing its newest release on Thursday. It’s certainly worth a listen. You can register for the upcoming event here.
Are you using Yammer?
What are your thoughts? How are you promoting discussions in your organization? Are the discussions taking place on an internal system or out in the open? Tell us how you are doing this? We want to know. Share your thoughts in the comments below.
How We Use Social Media
February 19, 2010 by Tim Miner · View Comments
At Vestor Logic, we use social media apps and platforms in a number of different ways. Some create efficiencies for us in the daily work flow. Many help us accelerate our learning curve about new technologies and tactics. Others give us insights into trends and breaking news that we would be hard pressed to discover without the help of social apps. And some of the things we do/use are for pure enjoyment.
The following is an inventory or sorts. It is a list of the tools that we use everyday and a description of how we use them. We are sharing this to give you a better idea of how we are embracing social media to make our business better but is not intended to be a blueprint for your business. Your needs and goals may require that you rework this mix of tools and maybe even how you use them.
Tell us how you are using social media to benefit your business by commenting below. We want to learn from you and your experiences as well.
The Vestor Logic Blog
Certainly the hub in our business model
The Vestor Logic blog serves up our original content and allows us to share our insights into the ever-developing social media landscape. We post weekly and will increase our frequency now that we have finished the development of a few other internal projects that have been huge time-sucks as of late. Our model is simple: create content on the VL blog and syndicate it through the various social outposts that we have created. Though our team has been at the forefront of social media for a number of years (we launched the first social network dedicated to real estate investors in Feb 2004: see The Investor Nexus), our Vestor Logic brand is relatively new having just launched in August 2009. We are still building out our foundation and further defining our marketing strategy just like many other companies.
The Vestor Logic site and blog are powered by a Content Management System (CMS) called WordPress. We host the site on our own servers and recognize the effort as one that will never truly be complete. We constantly tweak pages, add new widgets, and refine the message for our visitors. WordPress as a CMS makes this process easy. The learning curve is short and almost anyone can master the basics in a short time. The other big benefit of WordPress for us is the collection of plugins that offer social functions like Sociable, Tweetmeme and WWSGD. These plugins provide great functions to our site and cost nothing to use.
Facebook Profiles
We post to our personal profiles several times a day
Jessica (Jessica’s profile) and I (Tim’s profile) both have Facebook profiles that we use primarily to stay in touch with our friends. Of course, this counts for business too as many of our clients are friends or are referred to us by our friends. We post multiple times throughout the day on a variety of topics but try to keep the business talk to a minimum. Of course, we do share cool tips and tricks with our friends for some of the more popular social platforms like Facebook and Twitter. Both of us are passionate about other things. For me it’s hiking and I share pics and accounts of my trips on my profile page. Jessica has artistic roots. Her posts cover the spectrum of cool and unusual topics. She is a great follow for anyone looking for a laugh or smile during your workday!
Facebook Fan Page
We update the Fan Page a few times each day
The Vestor Logic Fan Page is a testing ground for us. We test different tactics relating to design and functionality in an ongoing effort to stay ahead of the curve and provide the best advice for our clients. We regularly post links to interesting articles from our favorite blogs, thought leaders and news aggregators. We post links to our new blog entries and maintain an active stream from www.TimMiner.com covering my ramblings on everything from social media to hiking to kids and family.
I use Seesmic on my desktop and my Blackberry to check the Twitter stream multiple times each day
Our Twitter account is used primarily to research the current trends in social media and uncover the news sources (i.e. blog posts) that are covering those trends. We use Twitter to test drive concepts with other social media pros and to syndicate our own content from the Vestor Logic blog. We see Twitter as a news source and a testing ground for ideas. Our experience suggests that the value is far greater for those activities than it is for generating sales. But to be fair, we mostly follow social media people and do not focus on building a following for potential customers. Your experiences may bear more fruit from sales initiatives if you target more individuals that could be potential customers. Our Facebook page also posts to our Twitter stream.
I visit the site several times a day and try to post at least one update each day
We have a company listing on LinkedIn for Vestor Logic and I also maintain my own profile. We connect with other social media folks, each of our clients and prospects, the members of our past projects like Investment Riches and all of our referral sources. I participate in various groups and maintain close ties to many of my classmates from college on LinkedIn. We have had a fair number of referrals come from our relationships on LinkedIn, most coming from connections made years ago that now see what we are doing in social media thanks to the updates that we publish regularly.
YouTube
Our YouTube activity is just beginning – look for our new video series “Social 60″
There really isn’t any excuse for not posting video on a regular basis. I wish had some great reason for not doing it. But I don’t! We have been busy building our Vestor Logic outposts and YouTube fell to the bottom half of the list. But we are working on it now. We are launching a video series called “Social 60″ which is a video format that will allow me to rant on the top social media issues for 60 second clips and encourage responses and feedback. I don’t expect these videos to provide clearly defined answers up front but rather to create a place for us to discuss the hot topics of the day and encourage others to share their opinions. Together we will reach more of a consensus and perhaps all learn something. Look for a few new videos each week.
Micro-blog: www.TimMiner.com
This is my safe place to test ideas
It usually takes Jessica and I a few days to work through a new idea or concept or to reach an opinion on a new platform (like Google Buzz) that just launched. The micro-blog allows us to do two things: explore the value of Posterous (which is the backbone of the micro-blog) and test ideas that are not yet ready for the Vestor Logic blog. I also post pics from my hikes and backpacking trips, share interesting links to stories I find, and share my joy as a father of a 19 month old little boy.
Yammer
Yammer is our own private Twitter platform
I jumped on Yammer the middle of 2009 and have found that its value to Vestor Logic is really that of a link repository. I use a bookmarklet labeled “Yam It!” to archive links to interesting blog posts or articles or web pages and then check back later to review them in more detail. The most effective practice however is to use hashtags to organize my link submissions by topic and most importantly by client. I am working on the structure of a one day Discovery Workshop for a client right now. I have more than 25 archived links that point to blog posts and articles that are relevant to their event. I will go back about a week before the event and revisit each one turning many into slides for the event. I have found this practice to be very effective and it allows me to share all of it with my team.
Picasa + Flickr
I love photos!
I have nearly 15,000 images on my laptop (and a backup copy on Google using web albums in Picasa for just $20 a year!). I take pictures at each event we are part of, all presentations, every hike I embark on, all family events, and just about anything else I can think of. Up to this point, I have been storing all the personal stuff on my laptop install of Picasa. But recently, I changed my strategy to incorporate Flickr. Moving forward, I will use Picasa for personal images mostly and Flickr for the business stuff. Of course, there will be some spill over as I find it very difficult to delineate between work and personal.
Google Docs
A great way to share and collaborate on documents
Jessica and I have been using Google Docs for a long time. We collaborate on project specs, new page content for the website, new blog posts, just about anything you can do in Word or Excel. We use the Form tool to create presentation evaluations. Now that Google Docs allows you to upload ANY file to Docs and the storage is so cheap it makes it very easy to aggregate most of our docs on the Google platform.
Google Analytics
The best free tool for website owners in my opinion
We have a Google Analytics account that monitors all three of our web properties which provides priceless insights into visitor behavior. This application allows us to make changes and modifications to our websites to improve on the experience for all of our visitors. It also provides feedback on which social platforms (Facebook, Twitter, Email Campaigns, AdWords) are referring the most traffic. We look at Analytics every week.
Google Reader
RSS feeds are our lifeline!
I currently have 138 subscriptions in my reader. They produce somewhere between 400-500 new articles a day and cover social media, real estate, general interest, business, hiking, and even our ECHO. Our ECHO folder is a collection of RSS feeds that monitor platforms like Google Blog Search, Google keyword alerts, Twitter Search, Icerocket Blog Search, and each of our own RSS feeds for mentions of our brand. This is a great way to establish a basic listening channel for monitoring the chatter about your company. I spend about 90 minutes a day scanning the feeds, starring items, and reading about the topics that matter to me. This may be one of the most important functions I perform each day.
SlideRocket
SlideRocket is PowerPoint on steroids!
We use SlideRocket for all of our presentations and also for the image galleries on our site like the Portfolio page. They just recently released some social plugins including a live Twitter stream that can be integrated into live presentations. The best feature for us is the portability of the presentations and the fact that they are housed online accessible from any web browser. Of course, there is also the choice of linking to your presentations online using a link or simply embedding it into any blog post or web page. Very cool application!
Seesmic
Our desktop and mobile Twitter and Facebook interface
We have used many of the popular Twitter clients including HootSuite and Tweetdeck but have found Seesmic to be the most comfortable. They all do most of the same things and there are tons of reviews out there already for each, but I think it is a personal preference. Bottom line – I like Seesmic!
Feedburner
RSS management and promotion made easy
Each of our three web properties is armed with a Feedburner feed to manage the subscriptions and promotion of the site RSS feeds for posts and comments. If you want to step up the value of your feeds you need to take a close look at Feedburner which is another Google product.
Mobile Apps on the Blackberry
I use mobile a great deal but I expect that usage to increase
I find that I am using my Blackberry Bold more and more to connect to my social outposts. There are apps for almost everything. It will only get better (for Blackberry users specifically) as the development of apps continue to provide a functional experience similar to what we get on our laptops or desktops. Currently, I use mobile apps for Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Google (which includes Picasa, Docs, Maps) and WordPress. I access a least half of these everyday if not more.
bit.ly
Keep it short!
Bit.ly is a URL shortening service that allows you to take those really long URLs and shorten them into something manageable. The service also tracks the metrics for each of your links showing you which content has the best reach or was most effective at reaching an audience. We see this as a nice compliment to the data we track using Google Analytics. I don’t visit our Bit.ly account as much as I should but will certainly do so more often now that we are running at full steam.
In testing…
Both of us are constantly testing new apps and programs. Currently, I have a list of about 25 that I am getting to know better and the following three have excited me the most in recent days. Feel free to check these out too and see if they fit for your business strategy.
- Swix – a social metrics dashboard of sorts
- Social Network Integration in Outlook – a cool way to connect Outlook to LinkedIn (and Facebook soon!)
- SpredFast – a cradle to grave social marketing platform created by friend Scott with robust management and analysis capabilities
So what are you doing?
How are you managing your social marketing efforts? Are you doing the same things we are? What are you doing differently? We want to know…besides, I showed you mine so now you need to show me yours!