Slides from internal social media training webinar at Novell.

1. Joining the Conversation: Strategies for
Sharing and Commenting in Social Media
Frank Days
Director, New and Social Media
@tangyslice

2. Agenda
• Why participate
• Community members
• Content and sharing
• 7 ways to join
• 7 things before you hit send
• Resources
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3. Benefits of social media participation
• Because they are “social” media
• Meet new people with common interests
• Build your personal brand
• Opportunity to share
• Learn from others
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4. Types of social media participants
Forrester's social technographics ladder
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5. Building a community:
Forrester Groundswell model
Social media is about:
• Listening
• Talking
• Energizing
• Supporting
• Embracing
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6. Start by “listening”
• Blogs
• Facebook and LinkedIn groups
• Twitter
• Google Alerts
• Podcasts
• Trade press
• GroupWise or Google reader for
aggregation
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7. Then “talking”
• When sharing consider
– Will anyone care?
– Will anyone read this?
– Is this interesting?
– Is this original?
– Does this add value?
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8. Advice when leaving comments
• Stay on topic
• Contribute new information to the discussion
• Don’t comment for the sake of commenting
• Make the tone of your message clear
• Be succinct
• Cite your sources with links or inline quoting
• Be courteous
• Don’t post when you’re angry, upset, or emotional
• Do not feed or tease the trolls
> Source: Steve Rubel, Micro Persuasion blog via the Lifehacker blog
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9. Don't feed the trolls...
“A troll is someone who posts inflammatory, extraneous, or
off-topic messages in an online community ... with the
primary intent of provoking other users into a desired
emotional response or of otherwise disrupting normal on-
topic discussion.”
> Wikipedia via PCMagazine.com
9 © Novell, Inc. All rights reserved. Image source: Wikipedia

10. Seven ways to join the
conversation...
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11. 1. Connect with people you know
• Talk with people you know
– Prospects
– Customers
– Vendors
– Peers
– Neighbors
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12. 2. Start a conversation
• Questions work better than statements
– What do you think about … ?
– Does anyone know ... ?
– How do you ... ?
• These are two way media
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13. 3. Leave a comment
• Find some place you feel confident
• Novell properties/blogs
• People you know
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14. 4. Share Novell stuff
• Marketing is creating new content
• “Like” on Facebook
• Retweet on Twitter
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15. 5. Ask or answer questions
• Join groups
• Answer questions
• Demonstrate your
knowledge
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16. 6. Post content to bookmarking sites
• Help spread the word
• Make it easier for people to find
• Amplify our messages
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17. 7. Write a guest blog post
• Blogs are looking for content
• We have experts
• Often you just have to ask
• Targets:
– Syndicated blogs
– Partner blogs
– Novell blogs
Example blog: Cloud Computing Journal
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18. 7 things to consider before
hitting send...
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19. 1. Is it consistent with
our Internet usage policy?
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20. 2. Does it represent
our company values?
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21. 3. How do people behave
in the specific community?
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22. 4. Does it add value
to the conversation?
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23. 5. Is it authentic and credible?
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24. 6. Is it appropriate
for general consumption?
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25. 7. Will anyone care
about what you have to say?
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26. When in doubt...
• Don't
• Pause
• Ask for advice
– Your manager
– Corporate communications
– Social media (me)
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27. Novell social media guidelines
• Review Code of Business Ethics
• Attend training
• Get familiar with Novell policies
• Protect your own privacy
• Treat others with respect
• Use common sense with controversial topics
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28. NOISE
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29. Think Value
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30. Where to learn more...
• Online resources
– Mashable.com
– Techcrunch.com
– Marketingprofs.com
– MPDailyfix.com
– Copyblogger.com
• Articles
– http://www.delicious.com/novell_novl/socialmedia
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