I don’t get any of the above.
Dennis Howlett does and says Facebook is where it is at.
If so, how do I use it to best effect?
Answers on the back of a postcard please‚Ķ‚Ķ(knowing which phrase which really does show my age, I suspect)
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One of the best typos ever, Richard…
“how do I sue [sic] it to best effect?”
They’ll have you down as an ‘ambulance chaser’ if you’re not careful.
I agree with Dennis (no surprise as I’m not a teenager!) I find Twitter better than Facebook – Facebook’s such a huge mixture of stuff all on the same page that it’s hard to make sense of it a lot of the time. It’s like a weird mix of a social club, shopping mall and a soapbox. Potentially a huge timewaster for me.
But I like the twitter feed because it’s very quick to see where interesting stuff is coming from, if you’re following interesting people or organisations, and then you can click on their links if you want more. It’s quite a time-efficient way of browsing a lot of content quickly. Of course you can do much the same with an RSS aggregator, though.
LinkedIn is like Facebook for business. A few people seem to be very very into it, with everyone else along for the ride. I’ve got a token presence on there but I’ve never really gotten a lot of use out of it.
I was perturbed to read that you are intending to ‘sue’ FaceBook!
I often post your blogs on my FB account but it would be better if you ‘use’ it yourself. Never needed to do what you need to do, so sorry can’t help.
If so, how do I sue it to best effect?
May I suggest doing it in the US – I hear they’re all for that sort of thing. Don’t think the UK courts would entertain the case.
@Howard
Oh well, I’d better correct it!
In italics for those who want to spot where the original mistake was
Proof reading was never my thing…
Along with facebook…
Richard, you can use Twitter and Facebook at the same time, and there’s some sort of way of simultaneously tweeting and Facebooking your blog posts. Twitter is good for sharing information very publicly in a short and quick way, and people can re-tweet etc… so the tweet could go a long way.
I guess you could use Facebook as a sort of blog, i.e. status updates everyime you have a new post on your blog. Everyone’s on it, so it could help you with increased traffic to here…
Best,
Nizar
Dennis and I have disagreed on this subject before and will no doubt do so again. Here’s my take, based on what’s happening here and now, rather than what may take off in the future:
Key point: Who is your target audience and where can you reach them.
a) Where do they consume news, blog posts and the like?
b) Where are the people whose views you want to pick up on sharing them?
I’m assuming that these are the two issues of greatest import to you Richard. I’s be very surprised if the answer to either or both questions is ‘facebook’. And until it is – there’s your answer.
I’ve written about twitter on my blog – main target readership ‘accountants in practice’, although many of the points are just as relevant to you and to many non-accountants.
http://www.BookMarkLee.co.uk/twitter
My first piece around 2 years ago was Twitter is not for accountants. I explained why they could ignore the hype. It’s a popular marketing tool and is great for online networking. So, much like facebook and like telemarketing there are some people who will give it a go and may find it useful. I’ve since written a number of related posts for those who want to give it a try.
I’m also writing a short series of blog posts to help accountants ‘get’ LinkedIn. May be useful for you too Richard. http://www.BookMarkLee.co.uk/blog
If I were you though all I would do as regards these facilities is the following:
1 – register and post a suitable profile on all 3
2 – set up feedburner and/or other automated tools to post links to each of your blog posts against your profiles on all 3 sites. This will enable those people who do have a preference for one or the other to access your material through THEIR preferred media.
3 – On facebook you might also establish a company page for Tax Research UK and invite contacts to ‘like’ and or become fans. You MAY get a pleasant surprise. Or not. 😉
Hi Richard
Interesting post from Dennis, personally i think that “where it is at” for professionals is LinkedIn.
LinkedIn is a business networking website that has no entertainment value, unless you are entertained by your professional career. Facebook is for entertainment, in my view.
Twitter is informative and great for conversation, especially in real time.
I note that LinkedIN and Twitter have strong collaboration. The Tweets application on LinkedIn enables you to follow your LinkedIn connections and makes it easy to do so.
There is no such collaboration between Facebook and LinkedIn. Enough said perhaps ?
In a free online training course I show people the 8 foundations of networking and how to develop your LinkedIn profile, this gets you started with making LinkedIn work for you. > Maybe of some use to you Richard and your readers ?
Phil
@Mark Lee
Sound advice
I have done this on Twitter
I will see how to do it on the others
As for the Facebook page – there are young people who do say I should do that….
They are into campaigning after all
As for disagreeing with Dennis – we all do that sometimes – and he’s big enough to take it 🙂
I’ve heard some people disagree with me on occasion. But that’s hard to believe!
@Phil Richards
URLs please?
Thanks
@Mark Lee aaah Mark: here we are again. Remember the subtext to my blog: innovation. I’m not writing for the professionals that struggle to type anything on a machine but the upcoming generation and those who do get what’s going on in the digital media world. You know – the ones that are going to steam roller most of what we know of as the profession today.
As an aside – the real professional networking system has yet to emerge. FB and Twitter’s models are unsustainable except at massive volumes. LinkedIn? Not so sure. The UI is bloody awful.
@Dennis Howlett
You encapsulate my feelings entirely in the second para Dennis
And in the meantime we make do?
@Richard Murphy
That’s all any of us can do until the next shiny new toy comes along. One thing I recently did was kill all my Twitter followers and then rebuild from scratch. I no longer attempt to insanely follow X,000 people but the 2-300 with which I regularly interact. Concentrating more on accounting types these days.
I tend to keep away from FaceBook but I see merit in what Phil is suggesting.
One of the problems is that people who are into theis tend to be everywhere so there’s a kind of self defeating nature to connecting all sources up – talking to the same circle of people etc. But we do it because everyone else is. Hardly inventive.
I think the major point is being missed here. Ultimately this discussion all boils down to demographics. The professions are ageing. Their client bases are ageing – both mainly populated by 50 somethings.
Our future clients are going to come from the generation that are 15 – 30 now, and these youngsters literally live their social lives on Facebook. It’s the online environment they are familiar with and the communication medium they find most comfortable and convenient. When was the last time you received an email from a teenager? Exactly, they think email is for the government.
So, I argue that we need to think like McDonalds. They know where their future customers are and they spend a lot of time and money capturing their hearts with “Happy Meals” and free parties. The burger behemoth reaches out to its future customers now, on their terms.
Facebook is the Happy Meal, Twitter, LinkedIn and email are for grown ups, and what teenager wants to hang around with grown ups?
@Adrian Pearson Good point Adrian – but will they move? That’s the question to which I have no answer. I might ask Jeremiah Owyang – he’s an expert in this stuff.
@Dennis HowlettYep, I agree. The only question that’s relevant right now is whether the Facebook generation will “grow-out” of it, or find it no longer meets their needs (perhaps because status updates become swamped by advertising).
Now, “ad-blindness” – that’s another coming issue …
@Adrian Pearson
I am ad blind on G mail – my wife so much so she swore blind they were not there until I pointed them out…..
[…] migrated to Richard Murphy’s place. There we are seeing professionals batting back and forth wondering whether they should be on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn, what are the ramifications for client communication and acquisition. The researchers claim […]