How I'm Currently Using Social Media Sites

I was being interviewed by someone the yesterday on video. In the preamble they described me as a "Social media guru."

Rest assured, that won't appear in the final cut. I put them right.

Image: Gregory Szarkiewicz / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I'm still learning and still experimenting with social media, but I feel I'm beginning to understand it reasonably well, and I think now is a good time to share how I give and gain from the three key social media sites in which I invest time.

Twitter

I embraced Twitter whole heartedly when I discovered it back in 2008. It suits me very well. I'm kind of a "one liner" sort of person, and I enjoy the brevity of the medium.

On Twitter I'm able to stay in touch with the somewhat disparate group of friends I have there - old motor industry colleagues, other motoring writers, fellow bloggers and anyone else I find interesting.

I love that I can upload photos and share my lifestyle with people, and that I can share other people's good stuff around. But I also make sure to use Twitter as well to direct traffic where I want it, and it's the single biggest source of direct traffic to my sites.

I'm just getting into Foursquare and I'm looking forward to seeing how effective it can be when I'm in the US in a couple of months.

Twitter is 60% business, 30% fun and 10% staying in touch with mates. For me, Twitter is very United States biased.

How I use it

I had a brief flirtation with automation a year ago or so, and hated it! I don't auto tweet, I don't auto follow. What you see from me on Twitter is what I've typed in, in real time.

I'm actively unfollowing people at the moment, and I'm weeding out folk who are obviously simply sending their own links into the stream. You know the type - three links in a row from Twitterfeed or API. I'd much rather connect with people who want to talk or share stuff, and the more I can reduce the clutter, the better. I check my own new followers carefully every day, and if they appear to be "real" people, I follow them back.

Facebook

I nearly quit Facebook when Nathan did. Mainly because I never really understood how it worked (does anyone?) and also because I couldn't see how to either give or get benefit from it.

However, I had something of a Eureka moment a few months ago, and I began to finally understand how to make it work for me. And that, coupled with realising the huge number of people who use it, together with forcing myself to understand how it operates, has enabled me to begin to enjoy being there.

Facebook is 60% staying in touch with friends and family, 30% fun and 10% business. For me, Facebook is very Europe biased.

How I use it

I basically use Facebook to let people know what I'm doing. I'm fortunate in that I have an interesting and unusual lifestyle, and I live in a fascinating place and one which I really enjoy sharing with people. And Facebook is the perfect medium for that. I can write as much as I want, it's so easy to load albums of photos on there, and everyone, and I do mean everyone I know, is on Facebook.

For me, Facebook has begun to take the place of regular emails to family and friends. Instead of writing a long update email to individual people, I'm able to tell them what happening in my life all at once, in real time, and with photos. They can each comment and we can get some personal dialogue going. I'm starting to really enjoy it.

Linkedin

This is another area where I just wasn't doing anything. And then I came across Phil's fabulous Linkedin course (free!) which made me look at it in a whole new light. Linkedin is business focused and always has been.  Using Linkedin well has brought me a decent amount of tangible consultancy business, as well as two joint venture opportunities.

Linkedin is 70% business, 20% staying in touch with colleagues and 10% fun. For me, Linkedin is very UK biased.

How I use it

I share some of my writing, promote the books I've written and also stay in contact with former colleagues. But I spend most of my time there answering other people's questions, and participating actively in the groups I'm a member of.

So how does that compare with what you do? Different? Similar? Are you using other sites?

These are related:

1/ We need to talk about Linkedin

2/ How I use Twitter

3/ How to leverage Facebook for traffic