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Social Media, Girls And Corporate America

07/17/2013 By Jayme Soulati

Look out corporate America, the girls are coming to a social media channel near you. Little girls, some as young as 9-years-old, have taken to activism with online petitions by Change.org against multi-national corporations the likes of McDonalds, PepsiCo, Coca Cola, Hasbro, Jamba Juice, and other unsuspecting entities.

This Crain’s Chicago Business story June 17, 2013, Girl Power; Big Business Faces A Formidable New Force: They’re under 18 and All Over Social Media, provides the scoop:

Pre-teens and teens with evolving female emotions (high-touch/high-care) about right and wrong, healthy eating, food toxicity, the Earth, animals, and more are taking issues to heart and attacking corporations via social media channels, online petitions, at corporate events, and in tandem with activist groups.

And, the floodgates are nearly breached. This generation (what label does it have as they are younger than Millennials?), was born with social media engagement. They watch their parents take snapshots on Instagram, tweet, Facebook, and basically live and breathe every social media channel.

When something goes awry in customer service, what’s the first thing an adult does? Complains on social media and takes images of the entire experience. Where are the kiddies? Watching, clicking buttons, hitting send, and reacting to their parents’ social media zeal.

Look at some of these young people and what they’ve done under 10 and 20 years of age:

Hannah, 9, of British Columbia attacked McDonalds in Oak Brook, Ill. In May 2013 at its annual meeting. She accused CEO in person of “trying to trick kids into wanting to eat your food all the time.” Hannah was backed by Boston activists Corporate Accountability International.
Sarah Kavanagh, 16, Hattiesburg, Miss. used Facebook and Twitter to get brominated vegetable oil out of Gatorade and Powerade sports beverages. (Hey, Pepsi and Coca Cola, she’s now of age; hire her!)
McKenna Pope, 13, Garfield, NJ lobbied Hasbro to make a gender neutral Easy-Bake Oven.

Yesterday’s Kids v. Today’s Kids

As said, the floodgates are nearly breached. How many pre-teens and teens are there watching people use social media to get what they want? Back in the day, my brother and his friends used to hit McDonalds, order cheeseburgers, eat half, take it the counter and tell them they found a hair or it was overcooked. They’d get another one and then turn around and ask for fresh fries because the ones they bought were dried out.

No more.

Teens are smarter than adults in the online world, and schools are teaching students to think differently, use online tools and take action sooner.

Corporate America is what the kids target; it is ripe for the pickins’.

What’s A Company To Do

Corporations need to listen!
Never attack a kid anywhere – in writing, in person, or via a third party.
Don’t use corporate speak, but don’t treat these kids as if they were adolescent.
Make the girls into ambassadors; invite them to company functions, ask opinions, hire them, give then a scholarship, recognize their maturity – especially the kids acting alone without help from the activist organizations.
Respond on social channels…graciously.
Social media teams who answer posts must be trained to be fully aware that children may be responding. There’s no way to determine age of a consumer especially if the avatar is an animal or shape.

No one said it was easy being on the frontline as a multi-national corporation. Smaller companies need to sit up and take notice from example, too.

One Chicago girl took on the municipality of Grayslake to ban single-use plastic bags. She is 13-years-old.

When any company believes they can ignore social media; think again. When you don’t engage, you cannot respond. When a pre-teen girl gets a brick wall in answer to a smart social media attack, look out…you’ll be on the defensive for years from not just one girl but all her friends across every single social channel.

That train? It left four years ago. If you are not taking social media seriously by now, then hop into your horse and cart and enjoy the ride.

The Happy Friday Series: Thriving Or Surviving?

06/28/2013 By Jayme Soulati

People often say your destiny is in your own hands but there are times when you can’t control what life has in store for you. Most of us have a desire for happiness, though how many of us actually achieve happiness? You may be perfectly content with your life or you may be struggling with the challenges facing you now. Sometimes all we can do is try to get through each day and be done with it. But to achieve true happiness, you need to thrive.

Often we have routines in life going through the motions of our daily chores, but how often do we reflect on what makes us happy?

What makes you happy in life?

What can you do to achieve that happiness? The changes you make to your life may be small changes, such as taking a daily walk with the dog or writing in a journal, or large changes, such as moving to a new home or starting a blog. Perhaps your changes aren’t attainable in the near future, but it’s important to have dreams.

Do you have a plan to thrive? Are you thriving now? Are you taking steps to achieve a goal?

When I moved to England the transition was tough for me and my family. We moved in the winter, at the darkest time of the year when the days were brief and glimpses of the sun behind the clouds were rare. My husband was traveling constantly for work while I was trying to adapt to a new culture and develop new driving skills (roundabouts anyone?). Fortunately, we had the support of the ex-pat community at the girls’ international school and at the local American Women’s Club.

People aren’t considered new for very long in the ex-pat world. Three months after I arrived, I was asked to head the Welcome Team for the school, welcoming new families and helping them with the transition living in England. By helping others to adapt to their new surroundings, I was helping myself as well. I realized how far I had come in a short time and by sharing my knowledge I was able to learn a lot from the newcomers.

A year later, I started presenting “Tech Is Your Friend” to the newcomers at the American Women’s Club. I showed them how tech such as smartphones, Skype, GPS devices (called “Sat Navs” in England) and other tech could help make their stay easier and communicating with loved ones back home less costly. People started showing me helpful apps such as Tube Exits that tell you which car to board on the London Tube to arrive closest to your exit, saving time and hassle in your Tube travel.

The Wonder of Tech

Sharing tech knowledge and helping others in England was very fulfilling but when I returned to the U.S., that opportunity seemed to disappear. Friends encouraged me to start a blog about tech, so I launched The Wonder of Tech in January 2011. I wanted to continue writing for everyday people to show them how tech can help them in their lives. My blog lets me share my tech knowledge while helping others.

The Wonder of Tech has helped people around the world embrace tech instead of fear it. I have heard from many readers about what a difference tech has made in their lives. By sharing tech, I feel as if I am thriving and helping others thrive, as well.

I didn’t have a plan to thrive in my life, I was struggling to make it through the days when I was asked to head the Welcome Team. By accepting that challenge, I was led on the path to my passion, allowing me to thrive by helping others.

What dreams do you have? What passions would you like to pursue? What steps can you take to bring those dreams closer to reality? Are you thriving? Did you have a plan or did life guide you there? How can you change your life to make your dreams come true? Let us know in the Comments section below!

About The Author

Carolyn Nicander Mohr is a lawyer, wife and mother of three teens including a set of twins. She is a polygadgetist entranced with personal technology for 20+ years. The Wonder of Tech is her professional blog designed for tech lovers, tech haters and anyone else who wants or needs to learn about the world of personal technology in plain English. The Wonder of Tech also has appeared at philly.com, the website for The Philadelphia Inquirer. All opinions expressed in this blog are mine and are tech, not legal, opinions.

LinkedIn Profile: Carolyn Nicander Mohr
Facebook Page: The Wonder of Tech
Twitter account: @wonderoftech
Google+ Page: The Wonder of Tech

Triberr Is Blogger Treasure

06/20/2013 By Jayme Soulati

Since the earliest days of Triberr, I have been on board. Triberr is one of the best and most-needed blog sharing tools around; in fact, there isn’t any other.

Bloggers can elect to join a tribe of nine bloggers or join multiples of tribes as I have. What happens to the tweet stream, though, when you’re in more than 25 tribes, like me, is chaos. Some of those tribes consist of 100+ members that connect me with 5 million folks? (Don’t think that’s really true, but OK.)

121217- Digging Into Triberr (Photo credit: Rogier Noort)

Sound stupid? I agree, of course, but there is a method to my madness and insatiable thirst for knowledge and curiosity.

I have received several direct communications via Twitter and someone even filled out my WuFoo contact form that my tweet stream is too full of retweets. It has become annoying because of the quantity of content loading into my stream. I was asked to set up another Twitter account for retweets of Triberr content (which is totally impossible due to the RSS feed, branding and outreach). Others have said how boring it is to see the same tweet from a variety of bloggers (they’re obviously in the same tribe).

I understand all of the concerns from the folks who are not professional bloggers and who don’t realize the merits of Triberr. I’m going to share why I continue to accept tribe invites and why I pay $10 monthly to Triberr so I can share more blog content faster. Besides, for any platform the likes of Triberr, they deserve my $120 annually to continue to innovate at the speed they have for the last three years.

Reasons Why Triberr Matters

Founders. As I’ve joked with Dino Dogan, founder and front man of Triberr, the fledgling company is like Two Men and a Truck. They fly by the seat of their pants, but anytime you speak with Dino or Dan Cristo, the energy to innovate is palpable. I’m including a link here for my Soulati Media On The Street chat with Dino Dogan at Social Slam in April. Energy? Uh-huh.

Innovation. In the three years since the launch of Triberr, back when Dino and Danny Brown were gaming Klout with sheep (yes, that really happened), Triberr has launched about a dozen new tools to help bloggers automate shares. And, that word “automate?” In this case it’s not cuss.

Tribes. Being in multiple tribes means you comb for the cream of the crop. You can mute bloggers not in your genre, and you can meet new bloggers publishing leading content. You can also launch and join an atomic tribe; one blogger with unlimited followers. I have learned so much from my peers on the ‘sphere, and the only way I can reasonably do that is via Triberr. I save productivity time being on one platform with ~500 bloggers at my fingertips on a given day.

Reader. Triberr has become my new reader. You see folks on the quest to find the next best Reader after the demise of Google’s and the migration to Feedly. Triberr works wonders for me; not sure I’m going to find any other blogger not already in a tribe I belong to. In fact, if I do, they get an invite to join my tribe.

Content. A newer feature called reblogging allows bloggers to republish content from another’s blog with the original author featured. This is one aspect of Triberr I don’t yet care for; when I read peoples’ blogs, I want to read their content primarily. If I see only reblogs happening 90% of the time, I’m discouraged visiting. For bloggers who want to post more frequently and don’t have time to post consistently, then re-blogging works; just not for me. I reserve the right to change my mind.

Reading. I love being able to read blogs from Triberr without going anywhere. I can quickly scan and see if the content is worthy of going to the blog and leaving deeper tracks. This has helped me be more share aware; there are so many who still say, “don’t share unless you read first.” That’s one issue for me being in so many tribes; I can’t read everything and have to trust the authors’ credibility which I’ve vetted already once they’re in my stream the first time.

Commenting. The new Triberr dashboard now allows easier reading of blog posts right on Triberr without having to go to a blog. What this means is not good for bloggers (because traffic isn’t recorded on the blog), but it is convenient for readers and tribe mates. An email comes alerting me that someone commented on my blog on Triberr. Comments are up 50% since the guys fixed all the glitches. I have seen some bloggers using the Triberr comment system along with another system like Google. Interesting.

Content Marketing. The best reason to use Triberr is to review the content and topics others are writing about and with what angle. It helps to know what’s new and trending and it also provides fodder for your own writing. Topics can get pretty boring quickly when you see all the bloggers writing on Facebook hashtags and photos in comments, for example. That’s when I have to select one only and ignore the rest. It becomes an echo chamber and I know my Twitter followers don’t want that.

Shares. Shares are down with Triberr. Even with the ridiculous numbers of tribes I’m in, I have fewer shares of my blog content. Regardless, without Triberr (when it was down for an extended period), traffic is nearly zilch.

When you add up all of the above, bloggers need Triberr. For those on the receiving end of the tweet stream for bloggers in massive numbers of tribes, patience is the virtue. It’s my responsibility to share my tribe mates content; in fact, if I don’t, they don’t share mine. So, I apologize to all of you not blogging and invite you into my tribe so you can experience what I’ve just shared.

12 Most Snappy Headline Writing Tips For Bloggers

06/11/2013 By Jayme Soulati

Do you know that many blog headlines suck? No, seriously, they do, and here’s why… the headline is the single-most important aspect of a blog and writers often stop short by featuring a less-than-pizzazzy headline.

In this era of time constraints, a headline has to describe the gist of the story, draw readers in, and be creative. With that said, here are 12 tips to get you thinkin’ on better headlines to attract and keep readers coming back:

1. Summarize the story in the title. Give readers the low down of the story right on top. A headline provides the gist of the news, content, story angle, etc. Be descriptive in a concise way. Spend the most time writing the headline FIRST; trust me, this is the best way to get it right.
2. Be creative! Can’t stress enough how critical it is to let the creative juices flow like hot lava. It’s your job to draw a reader in and make them click on that title to see what else is being featured. When the headline is the only chance you get… well, spend more time on it!
3. Say no to hashtags. If you think you’re killing two birds with one stone writing a headline for Twitter with a hashtag, think again. A headline with a hash tag is unappealing. Besides, Twitter is not the only channel for sharing; other channels don’t use hashtags to capture topics, so why do it?
4. Reconsider name dropping. You may be in love with that book author, client or peer in your tribe or feed, but guess what? Your readers have no clue who that person is. When you name drop with the @ sign in a headline it diminishes the headline and becomes very promotional.
5. Use more than one or two words! Amazingly, bloggers think a headline with one or two words is acceptable; rather, it’s an immediate signal to run for the hills. While the content may be decent, there’s no way to tell because one-word headlines say and do nothing to entice a reader to open the door.
6. Be tastefully raucous. Some writers never use raucous words in a headline and that’s up to the discretion of the writer; however, if you’re going to use the “sex sells” mantra, do be tasteful about it. Do a test on occasion — add a racier word than you’re used to and see if traffic boosts.
7. K.I.S.S. — Keep it simple! When a headline carries on for three lines, readers’ eyes completely gloss over. It’s so critical to keep a headline short, sweet, simple and to the point! Not satisfied with yours? Ask someone for help; people do like to help others.
8. Keep key words for SEO to a minimum. Never overdo key word littering in a headline. That’s one thing every reader picks up on and every reader then expects the content to be oriented to SEO juicing, too. All bloggers want to boost SERP, but it needs to be done in a minimalistic way.
9. Use action voice. Write a headline that is a “How To” or includes an action verb. Here’s an example, “How To Refinish a Spindle Chair In Half The Time.” Not only does that title tell me I’m going to learn how to do something, it also tells me I can do it more efficiently. (Anyone who has refinished spindle legs knows how challenging it is!)
10. Ignore first-person pronouns. Use of the word, “I” is verboten… that’s German for “forbidden.” Who’s making that rule? Moi, the author of this post. There are no hard or fast rules to blog headline writing, but this one should be set in stone.
11. No selling! Cannot stress enough how horrific it is to read a headline in which the author is sharing coupons, deals on products or dentistry (yes, I saw a woman doing that on Google+ and kindly told her this is not how Google+ is used with a suggestion on how to do it and then deleted her from my stream). There’s no easier way to alienate readers by putting such things in a headline.
12. Know your audience! Who is in your community? Do you have “mommy bloggers” who might like to know which brand of children’s clothing stands up to 10 washings? Are you an author trying to showcase your latest book? Do you write professionally for small businesses? No matter… when you write a post with your community in mind, the headline needs to orient to them and their takeaways.

Overwhelmed with these tips on how to perfect a blog headline? Please don’t be! Review the patterns in your own writing and note a few areas you might consider improving. Then, take a few of the aforementioned tips and change up your style a bit.

What do you think? Is anything missing?

This post originally appeared on 12Most.com January 1, 2013 by Jayme Soulati.

The Happy Friday Series: Amazing Online Friends

05/24/2013 By Jayme Soulati

When I started my social media marketing agency 5 years ago, I did it for a variety of reasons.

I didn’t have a job. I had just been laid off from the magazine that I worked for when a larger publishing company bought it out. They were in OH, I was in NC, we didn’t know each other, and I was easy to cut.
I have always been ahead of the curve when it comes to technology. In early 2000s, I made President’s Club when I was in sales because I was the first to do email blasts. A few years later, I started the concept of selling Webinars to my advertisers at the magazine.
I started my blog in 2003 – I was a “mom” blogger before most moms even had email. I was on LinkedIn the first year; I was on Facebook when there were less than 800,000 people and so on.
I’m BIG on customer service and helping people succeed.
I’m very social. I like to meet people.

One of the BEST parts of social media is getting to know people. I have met some amazing people that I would never have had the opportunity to meet were it not for social media. I met my friend and mentor, Mark Schaefer because of Twitter. I don’t know what tweet it was that he saw, but he reached out to me and offered a half hour of his time to “mentor” me. I was floored and giddy all at the same time. Whether he liked it or not, he had a follower for life. I wouldn’t meet him in real life for at least another year and that was when he came to be the keynote speaker for me at ConvergeSouth. He came to speak because of our relationship that we had built online.

Meet Whom You Tweet

You can build amazing relationships with people online but at some point, you REALLY want to meet them in person. To put a face to a Twitter handle or avatar is the best feeling in the world. That’s why I go to conferences.. it’s not to learn (added bonus if I do!) but rather to MEET WHO I TWEET!

I think it’s so important to find these opportunities to connect in person that I started a group affectionately called the #BWTs.. Broads Who Tweet. My point is getting to meet my online friends makes me happy for days. The energy I get from our BWT weekends will feed my soul for weeks. I just love taking those online relationships to the next level.

BWT is a group of tech-savvy women who I had gotten to know over the course of time and we had built such great online relationships that we wanted to get together in person. We have a hoot when we’re together.. we laugh, we support each other and we talk non-stop. After a few lunches, I thought…Hey! Why don’t we go on a retreat! We can get away from the family for a few days, drink copious amounts of coffee and wine and learn from each other.

And just like that, the #BWT Beach ReTweet was born.

We’ve done two of these retreats, and I’m in the process of planning the third. These relationships began on social media. We’ve carried them into real life and formed real friendships. I know that I can call on any one of these women to help me with something and they will be there in a flash. And they know that they can ask the same of me. It was because of this group that I joined forces with my friend Adrienne and together we created a new, bigger and better social media agency. It doesn’t get much better than that, friends.

You never know where you will find your next friend or your next tribe. Some last, some don’t. I’m grateful that I have them and all of you. Every chance I get to grow my social media circle, I do it because you never know where it may lead.

About The Author

Kristen Daukas is the Director of Social Media for Atlantic Webworks. When she’s not creating magic for clients, she’s busy trying to keep her sanity as she navigates the water of raising three teen and tween daughters. She also enjoys long walks on the beach in the moonlight with her husband. And she thinks she’s really funny. Come share a tweet and circle her at Google+!