Today’s guest post is from Evan Thrailkill. Evan is an upcoming senior at The University of Alabama at Birmingham. He is majoring in psychology and hopes to pursue a career in student affairs either working in student housing or with student organizations. In his free time Evan enjoys playing around with new technology and gadgets. Follow him on Twitter @Evanbt. It is crazy to me just how much Facebook, Twitter and OrgSync have revolutionized the way we handle life.  I am amazed how much social media has come into play during the recent natural disaster, the tornados that hit Alabama. Ten years ago, during a tornado, I can remember being found in the basement of my house tirelessly watching to see when the storm would pass. However, for the recent storms, I was listening to Internet radio on my phone and looking at pictures that people were tweeting from across campus and across the state. The most intriguing part of this whole experience is that all this information was being shared in real-time. The following is how Twitter, Facebook and OrgSync were utilized during this disaster to share information and for continued relief efforts. Twitter  Many people were tweeting breathtaking videos and images during the disaster, including this video from @ryanvaughan of a tornado in Jonesboro. Numerous reporters, including The Weather Channel, were tweeting pictures constantly during and after the storm. A couple of examples are below:

The following tweet was sent my James Spann, a TV meteorologist for ABC 33/40 based in Birmingham, Alabama: At least 40 deaths in Alabama today #alwx Additionally, Mr. Spann noted on Twitter, “My stream has evolved into one that is matching groups or people with tornado relief needs with those who can meet those needs. The strength of social media has proven to be remarkable in the past week as I have watched it work.” Facebook  Facebook was a huge factor in the disaster relief effort. Facebook groups such as “Pictures and Documents found after the April 27, 2011 Tornadoes” were used to help reunite family and friends. Currently the page has over 100K likes and is still active.

  Also groups such as “Pets lost or found after April 27, 2011 Alabama Tornadoes” helped reunite lost pets with their owners, including Bear (pictured below), who was reunited with his family.

Facebook groups were also created to allow students to spring into action.  Katelyn Armstrong, Student Advocate for the UAB Student Government Association, created the Facebook group Blazers for Birmingham.  This was created to secure volunteers to spring into action when the cleanup began.  Armstrong wanted to secure around 100 volunteers.  Within the first hour it was created, the page had 75 “likes” and by the end of the week more than 600 students had joined the group. OrgSync  Finally, shortly after the disaster, the USGA Student Advocate and I worked on an OrgSync news post, which went out to every student at UAB. This news post explained ways for students to get involved and help in the Birmingham Community. We included a link to the “Blazers for Birmingham” Facebook group as well as links to the “Hands on Birmingham” specific sites that students could volunteer at. The morning after we also send out community wide text messages to the Fraternities and Sororities, Student Government, and the Residence Hall Association explaining how to spring into action and help. OrgSync proved to be a major communications tool when combined with our other social media outlets. Since all student organizations are required to register through OrgSync this was a very efficient way to contact many students and keep them updated on opportunities to help their community and the disaster relief. Do you have any interesting stories to share about social media being utilized during the recent tornadoes in Alabama? Leave your comments below.

A few weeks ago we encountered our first social media crisis via Twitter and #sachat, a vibrant and active community of student affairs professionals on Twitter. The tweet, which was sent out from OrgSync’s main account and then retweeted by our employees, included the #sachat hashtag and linked to our testimonial video from Tom Murray. A total of 5 tweets were discovered in the #sachat community’s social stream, which caused many of its passionate and vocal members to acknowledge us and indicate a violation of the community’s guidelines (See tweet here). A feeling of intrusion cast over the community members as they repeatedly expressed their dislike of our “Twitter bombing.” The over step was an honest mistake and we sincerely apologize for our actions. However, we are glad #sachat members were quick to catch our attention and address the issue. The reason for such a reaction was because the community felt our tweet was product orientated rather than something that adds value to the community and its members. We chose to write this post to share with you the lessons learned from our actions in Twitter and share ways for you to prevent making a similar mistake in the future. Difference between bombing and sharing

As many of us know, social media is about sharing and engaging in conversation with people that make up your target market and those relevant to your brand. When starting to share information and spark conversations with relevant communities you shouldn’t bombard them with continuous tweets about your product. Although our intentions are to share and spark a dialogue, we sometimes lose track and can’t seem to help ourselves. Know the difference between “Twitter bombing” (a blatant intrusion into a social community) and sharing relevant information.

Employees shouldn’t retweet everything

After this incident, we started to analyze some of our employees Twitter accounts and soon realized that many of them created an account only to retweet everything from OrgSync’s Twitter stream. This method added clutter and noise to Twitter, instead of actually adding value. Allowing employees to use Twitter has its risk, however, having a clearly defined policy and guideline for how to contribute and act on social media, helps employees get a better understanding about how to effectively use these new mediums.

Research and lurk before you implement

Maybe the biggest mistake and pitfall during this event, was not doing enough research to understand how #sachat operates and what the guidelines of their community are. A mistake that I made was discovering these relevant communities without thoroughly examining each of their rules, community behaviors and objectives. When you first get started pursing relevant communities, do your homework and lurk before you start doing anything else.

Develop a social media policy

Policies for all different parts of a company are created, which means a social media one should be present. Proper methods of conduct online, response to mistakes and/or strategies for how to respond during a crisis need to be discussed by not only the marketing department but management as well. Thankfully we had a procedure for handling this incident and are working to develop a structured policy that everyone in the company can follow and refer to.

We obviously haven’t been the only company that has gone through a social media crisis, nor will we be the last. The best part about this experience is the fact that we were able to learn from this mistake, examine the situation, implement new processes and begin developing a better understanding of OrgSync’s social media strategy. Unfortunately, our excitement and passion for OrgSync was presented the wrong way to a community of student affairs professionals we absolutely admire. We hope you will take away some of the lessons we learned and become more prepared than we were. Again, we’d like to send out our deepest apologizes to the entire #sachat community.

There’s a new issue of the Law Spotlight: the biweekly email newsletter highlighting the best law stories from around the web, found automatically by OneSpot from over 500,000 different sources.

This issue’s stories include:

Top Lawyers Behaving Badly of 2009

High Court to Review Text-Messaging Privacy Case

Exam Stress Makes University of Maryland Law Students Catty

No “Friends” For Judges

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It’s that time of year again, when bloggers reflect on the past year and experts make predictions for the year to come. This issue of In The Spotlight contains top content marketing and social media posts from 2009, as well as 2010 forecasts for social media, digital marketing, B2B marketing, interactive marketing and more.

Reflections on 2009:

What Matters Now

Top 12 most popular posts of 2009

10 Most Popular Content Marketing Posts of 2009

Predictions for 2010:

eMarketer: 12 Digital Marketing Predictions for 2010

10 BtoB Marketers Predictions for 2010

Trends that will influence 2010 and beyond

The Future of Interactive Marketing

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There’s a new issue of the Law Spotlight: the biweekly email newsletter highlighting the best law stories from around the web, found automatically by OneSpot from over 500,000 different sources.

This issue’s stories include:

Ariz. Supreme Court Sees the Metadata

Justice Scalia comes clean on Brown v. Board of Education?

Can a Lawyer Really Use Twitter to Market a Law Practice?

Dialing in on Trademark Abandonment?

To read these stories and more, check out our newsletter: Law Spotlight

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There’s a new issue of In the Spotlight: the biweekly email newsletter highlighting the best content marketing and social media stories from around the web, found automatically by OneSpot from over 500,000 different sources.

This week’s stories include:

Put Down Your Twitter Toys & Get Back to Work!

The Quentin Tarantino Guide to Creating Killer Content

Your Company May Own Your Tweets, Pokes, and YouTube Videos

Google’s Eric Schmidt on What the Web Will Look Like in 5 Years

To read these stories and more, check out our newsletter: In the Spotlight

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There’s a new issue of In the Spotlight: the biweekly email newsletter highlighting the best content marketing and social media stories from around the web, found automatically by OneSpot from over 500,000 different sources.

This week’s stories include:

How Speakers Should Integrate Social Into Their Presentation

Proctor and Gamble’s ‘technopologist’: social networks enrich my job

How to Be the Cool Kid (Even if You Weren’t One in High School)

The Great Social Divide: Twitter, Facebook Traffic Surges, Myspace Fades

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There’s a new issue of In the Spotlight: the biweekly email newsletter highlighting the best content marketing and social media stories from around the web, found automatically by OneSpot from over 500,000 different sources.

This week, there has been a big focus on the new “endorsement” disclosure laws the FTC is going to apply to bloggers. Read about this issue and more this week:

Bloggers to be Subject to FTC Endorsement Disclosure Laws

What Does the FTC’s New Ruling Mean for Bloggers?

FTC Values Sponsored Posts at $11,000 Apiece

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I have a bold prediction about facebook (or “the facebook” for us old-timers). I am making this prediction based on keen observation, scientific analysis and guessing…..mostly guessing. I have had a love-hate with facebook from the start, and from the start I mean 2004. Ever since they started with the vanity URLs I have become a bigger fan, and I do not see the facebook momentum in any area slowing down anytime soon with one exception.  My prediction is: within 5 years, college students will start to leave facebook, or at least it will not be their primary social hub.  I know you think I might be crazy, but hear me out. Facebook is big. If there is a word that embodies a more descriptive meaning than big, then that is the word I need. Perhaps, huge, massive, or gargantuan is a more appropriate term to use when describing facebook.  Yet, according to a recent article on Mashable “…Facebook is valued higher than CBS, Discovery Communications, and Macy’s.” Facebook, which started as a tool for college students to connect, now has over 250 million make that 300 million users worldwide with over 150 million unique logins in everyday.  And I think they are just getting started. The 2 reasons I am making this prediction:  1) Parents. 2) Corporations. Facebook’s fastest growing demographic is no longer first-year college students, it is people ages 35 years and up. That means parents, uncles, aunts, or other authority figures that may (depending on your privacy settings) have access to view your activities or photos. You should ask your students the start of every year how many of them have parents on facebook to see if the number increases over the years.  My Aunt that joined facebook last week and she just turned 69.  I think it is cool so I can keep up with her, but her soon to be college grandkids may think differently.  And when my parents joined last week I did not know what to think. Facebook has had a few major development changes that I think are interesting, but the one that affect this issue is the creation of fan pages. Pages we create for corporations and organizations easily have a presence and advertise on facebook. They were given the first opportunity to create vanity URLs such as facebook.com/vitaminwater before people had the opportunity to create their custom URL. In the current world of marketing, facebook is becoming an essential step in any marketing campaign that can quickly distribute information to a mass audience. When facebook hit the college campus it was their thing. You had to have a “.edu” email address, while everyone else could go join MySpace or Friendster. College students embraced thefacebook.com and Mark Zuzkerberg, but now it is starting to become a place of commerce. It is like showing up to the mall, or any personal hangout spot, and your parents are hanging out there.  So I ask: when was the last time college students wanted to socially interact in a corporate location with their parents?

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There’s a new issue of In the Spotlight: the biweekly email newsletter highlighting the best content marketing and social media stories from around the web, found automatically by OneSpot from over 500,000 different sources.

This issue’s stories include:

What Google Understands About the Future of News and Publishing That Publishers Do Not

21 Must-Follow Tips For Optimizing Time Spent In Social Media

Is it time for companies to hire a Social Media Administrator?

Lessons from a Business Website That Misunderstands Content Marketing

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A special thanks to all of our fans and followers who voted for our SXSW panels. Competition was tough this year with 2299 panels in interactive alone (quite a crowd to get lost in!). There were some high quality panels in the mix as well and we hope you thought our panels met that same high quality, interesting panel standard. Thank you so much for all your continued support!

While voting ended September 4th, we will not know which panels are selected until October at the earliest. Stay tuned to the blog and our twitter accounts for news on the results!

If our panel(s) do get selected, we will need experts as well! We will post what topic areas and expertise we need to our blog and twitter as well.

We hope to see you at SXSW 2010 and thanks again for all your support!

There is only two days left to vote on our SXSW panels (also known as #sxsw). Voting ends Friday, September 4th! Get those votes in to ensure SXSWi rocks this year!

Voting is super easy: start voting for and commenting on our panels!

We have panels ranging from Artificial Intelligence to Twitter Power to the great Newspapers vs. Content Aggregators Fight Night!

Vote now!

If you have a panel in contention, let us know! @ reply us on our twitter accounts and we’ll vote for you too! Our Twitter accounts are @onespot, @onespot_law, @onespot_health, and @onespot_fashion.

So get out (on your computer) and vote! Voting ends September 4th!

See you at SXSW 2010 and thanks for your support!

As voting for panels continue, we’ll focus on one of our panels every day. Today, it’s a content panel: Retailers = Publishers? Using Content To Connect To Customers.

Panel Description

Customers used to be loyal, buying from one store. In this online global economy, it has become harder to gain and retain customers. Content marketing is an avenue some retailers are exploring to add value to customers and drive sales. Come hear content strategies and how retailers participate online.

Possible Panelists

Matt Cohen, CEO of OneSpot

Al Gashi – VP, Strategic Marketing at OneSpot

Matt Corey – VP Marketing, Golfsmith

Justin Sewell - Founder/CEO, Despair, Inc.

    Senior Representative - JCPenneys

Senior Representative - Michael’s Crafts

Senior Representative - Martha Stewart

Questions this panel will answer

   1. What is “content marketing”? 
   2. How has retail changed from traditional to online? 
   3. How has retail changed online in the past 5 years?  
   4. How does social media play into a traditional marketing plan? 
   5. What is the benefit of providing content emails in addition to promotional emails for retailers? 
   6. How do you balance driving attention and adding value with spamming? 
   7. What retailers could use online content marketing?
   8. Who cannot benefit from online content marketing? 
   9. How has twitter changed the face of content marketing and retail strategies? 
  10. What does the new publisher-retailer relationship look like? 

VOTE FOR THIS PANEL

We are so excited to plan this panel and the other 6 we have submitted. We hope you like them enough to vote and attend! Voting ends September 4th!

See you at SXSW 2010 and thanks for your support!

There’s a new issue of In the Spotlight: the biweekly email newsletter highlighting the best content marketing and social media stories from around the web, found automatically by OneSpot from over 500,000 different sources.

This issue’s stories include:

Facebook Acquires FriendFeed

What Facebook Lite Actually Is. Hint: It’s Not Twitter Or FriendFeed

Women love their social networks more than their mothers in law

Beauty or the Beast: Which is your B2B Newsletter?

To read these stories and more, check out our newsletter: In the Spotlight

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As many of you have experienced, Twitter has been down on and off today since 6 AM PST. This has not been the first time Twitter has gone down for an extended period of time, but the growth in users and activity by those new users has made this outage seem more widespread than past occurrences. Many are tweeting about their lack of Twitter whenever there is a blip of uptime, while others are Facebooking about how they cannot post to Twitter (has anyone ever tweeted when they could not post to Facebook?)

It’s interesting to see how a down social network can cause social panic. Have we become so dependent on social networks that we feel socially cut off when we cannot connect virtually (even when we are surrounded by coworkers we can physically interact with)? Kevin O’Keefe posted a great commentary to his Real Lawyers Have Blogs earlier today titled “Twitter outage ongoing : Surviving in an unconnected world.” I recommend reading it (since you have some free time thanks to Twitter). In it he states:

“Interesting how something I didn’t use a year ago is now something I can’t live without. It’s like I’ve lost my connection with the outside world.”

We all will effectively survive this outage, but it does feel like a part of our daily routine is off with Twitter missing. For some, Twitter is part of their job (like me), while others use it as an intermittent escape from their job. Regardless of why you use Twitter, it has become ingrained in our daily lives.

Since many of us are trying to find some alternative escapes, here are some great videos about what to do when your network/email/twitter is down.

What to do when email goes down What will your people do when the network goes down?

Take it easy as we wait for Twitter to come back 100%!

There’s a new issue of In the Spotlight: the biweekly email newsletter highlighting the best content marketing and social media stories from around the web, found automatically by OneSpot from over 500,000 different sources.

This issue’s stories include:

Why Email Marketing is Dead (And How to Bring it Back to Life) Social Media Mavens - An Interview with PepsiCo’s Bonin Bough Best Practices for Journalists Curating the Web: New York Times Bits Blog “What We’re Reading” How to Motivate People to Buy

To read these stories and more, check out our newsletter: In the Spotlight

Not yet subscribed? Sign up now to Get the Spotlight for our Social Media Marketing, Health, Law, or Fashion Newsletters.

There’s a new issue of In the Spotlight: the biweekly email newsletter highlighting the best content marketing and social media stories from around the web, found automatically by OneSpot from over 500,000 different sources.

This issue’s stories include:

Facebook’s Own Estimates Show Declining Student Numbers; Now More Grandparents Than High School Users Why Teens Aren’t Using Twitter: It Doesn’t Feel Safe Introducing the Google Chrome OS How will you respond to a customer complaint in the age of Social Media?

To read these stories and more, check out our newsletter: In the Spotlight

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Michael Jackson’s death has been receiving a ton of coverage, both from media outlets and on social media sites. During his memorial, Facebook averaged 6,000 status updates per minute. Michael Jackson was truly an icon and will be missed.

I was tweeting during the memorial and one user mentioned that people are grieving more for Michael than they did when Diana died. I initially responded that it was because Michael was an American icon (arguably global), whereas Diana was fairly isolated to the UK. After thinking it over, I realized that all this grief and coverage of Michael’s death was amplified because of social networks: real time, minute-by-minute coverage and commentary. Twitter, much less any social network, did not exist when Diana died.

I also began to wonder if we would ever see this sort of world-wide pause for any modern celebrity. Do we have any icons today in a world of Twitterlebrities? Michael Jackson was in the limelight for over 3 decades, entertaining audiences world-wide. He contributed greatly not only to music, but to the entire entertainment industry: many actors and models gained popularity from appearing in Michael’s videos and those same videos helped to shape MTV. Few have received the mass grieving of Michael, Elvis, Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra, John Lennon, and Princess Diana.

There are a couple of icons still present today that may elicit world-wide news, but not many: Madonna (though, of late she has been more tabloid fodder than entertainment), Oprah, Sean Connery, Elizabeth Taylor, and a few may grieve for Britney. These stars have been entertaining for at least a decade. Can you think of any other major timeless entertainers?

The presence of social networks changed the interaction around Michael’s death, but they also have changed the way celebrities are perceived, popularized, and destroyed. Everyone has access to content production these days, thus everyone can truly get their Andy Warhol “15 minutes of fame.” But as soon as one thing hits big, something else comes along to replace it. Take, for instance, Susan Boyle. She became an internet sensation overnight after appearing on “Britain’s Got Talent.” All the talk shows wanted to interview her, people were tweeting and retweeting her video, and her performance became water cooler fodder. However, I was watching “America’s Got Talent” the other night and couldn’t even remember her name, much less the name of anyone who has won these talent competitions. “Celebrity” has become a fleeting concept.

Susan Boyle is an extreme case of here today, gone tomorrow. But many entertainers these days have abbreviated careers thanks to social media and mass quantities of content/noise to consume. We are no longer in the era of 4 TV channels to watch, 5 movie production studios, and a handfull of record labels. Anyone can produce content; individual audience members are their own gatekeeper. We are in an era where obtaining celebrity status is brief: just a blip on the radar.

“It all went by so fast, didn’t it? I wish I could do it all over again, I really do.”- Michael Jackson Michael Jackson will be remembered forever (or at least as long as my lifetime) because he came from an era of superstars, with only a handful received the money, promotion, and attention needed to rise above other artists. We need our global grieving period because it is nearly impossible to be in this world and not know who Michael Jackson was or not know his songs (unless you were born after 2000). While we may grieve like this when Madonna dies (if she ever does), do you think we would mourn the deaths of Paris Hilton, Megan Fox, or Kim Kardashian? What about Ashton Kutcher, Miley Cyrus, or Amy Winehouse (if she isn’t already dead)? In this era of “blip” celebrity, few entertainers are known world wide; few entertainers will be remembered a decade from now; few entertainers will have the impact Michael Jackson had on the world.

Related articles by Zemanta Throngs Of Fans Pay Tribute To Jackson (cbsnews.com) Michael Jackson may be ‘worth more dead than alive’ (blogforkiddies.blogspot.com) The Battle Over Michael Jackson’s Legacy (time.com)

Blog by: Cody Olsen, OrgSync Campus Liaison, Dixie State College Just like many others, I am fully aware of the recent uprising of the mega-internet platforms now known as social media. Their increase in popularity has brought a new level of communication and interaction to all groups and ages, especially on college and university campuses. As a full time student I know that social media has become just as effective as e-mail, text messaging, and phone calls because of the instant communication capability. Many times on campus I witness arguments between friends because someone failed to receive an invite to the latest social event. It’s clear that these students have already jumped on the social media train, but what about the rest of the campus population: the faculty and administration?

Untapped Resource for the Classroom Many educators tend to adhere to the tried and true teaching methods of the past. Unfortunately, students are changing, and those once effective teaching methods are becoming stale. Faculty, and campus administrators, can utilize social media as a tool for creating new ways to engage students by posting relevant articles, research and websites to these social media sites that students are frequenting on a very regular basis; hence, encouraging outside the classroom learning. Extend Learning Beyond the Classroom Using these social media tools educators are able to reach students through new communication mediums and provide students with exposure and experience to valuable tools.  Providing their students with the experience of blogging, developing podcasts and building professional networks, equips students with skills they will likely need after college due to the multiple mediums that all outlets are reaching out to with these social media tools. Allowing students to hone these skills inside the classroom, giving appropriate and constructive feedback, plays both into the traditional mode of teaching/learning as well as the know-how of the future tools. Teach People, Not Lectures Many of the postings and updates on social media sites are fully searchable and identifiable to a particular user or author. With the proper skills, educators can track and follow the indications of the comprehension and understanding of specific lectures, lessons, writings and assignments of their students over the duration of the class. Using social media posts, along with student interaction in the classroom, educators may now base their teaching on custom plans centered not only on the needs of their students, but the overall student participation level over these various social medium platforms. This bridge is easy to cross for the faculty member by indicating in the course syllabus the specific social media sites that they will be monitoring/tracking/participating in along with their students and then granting a certain percentage-point amount for participation, frequency, cogency, and relevance to the course materials. These perks are only a small taste of the fresh new style that social media can bring into the world of higher education. In addition, we will see the potential for higher productivity, better student accountability, and increased participation because when faculty members are reaching out to students where they currently are, the internet, it establishes credibility of both the student and the faculty member. With new technology breeds innovation, and with the best and brightest minds utilizing this new medium, the possibilities for overall effectiveness are near infinite. It’s clear that the use of social media can have a great effect on the lives of students and educators alike. It’s time to throw away the stale, and to embrace and create a fresh new environment where education can thrive.

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Blog by: Angel Quicksey, OrgSync Campus Liaison, Claremont McKenna College Today’s world is smaller, flatter, and more connected than ever before. Places and people that once seemed remote are now only a click away and virtually right next-door.  Neighbors that once chatted through a fence are now chatting online through a social network such as Facebook, Twitter or AIM. Young people – students, especially – use the internet to stay connected, as it’s easier than ever to reach out to the classmate across campus, parents back home, or even the friend made while studying abroad. Yet, students can use such technologies to reach out in a different way. Young people on campuses around the world already promote social justice and create change. Clubs raise money for relief actions in war-torn countries, they prod politicians and their fellows to take action on environmental issues, they support campaigns for AIDS relief, clean water, and health care. But if one club on one campus can raise a few thousand dollars for Darfur or Burma or the environment, imagine what could be accomplished if those students came together to accomplish something even greater. This is where social media comes in. Recall what students can do without our new technology: •    The Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in the 1960s – the group, begun at Shaw University, staged many of the sit-ins and freedom rides of the civil rights movement and had a leading role in the1963 march on Washington. •    The students of the 1970s and ‘80s who protested apartheid in South Africa – beginning with students of Stanford University in 1974, these young people divestment from companies involved in South Africa during apartheid. By 1988, 155 universities had partially or fully divested funds from the country. These students saw a need for change and combined their efforts across the nation to guarantee civil rights in America and abroad. Today, students have even more tools available to them to create social change. Through the internet, particularly social media sites, students can easily spread information by broadcasting videos, photos and headlining news. The power of these sites has become especially apparent in recent weeks as students and opposition leaders in Iran used Facebook and Twitter to spread their message and capture images, like the death of Neda Agha-Soltan. While perhaps not facing the same immediate strife as the people of Iran, many college and university students tackle other important issues at home and abroad. Yet, most campus organizations seem to work independently, though they may be working toward a similar goal.  Why not take advantage of this new age of social networking and connect with others at your college, in your area, or in a similar branch of your club? Then, once these connections are established using social media, you can create larger events, campaigns and movements that will greatly impact your campus, your nation and even the world.

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