A very useful function of social media is to allow you to keep up to date easily. How? Well:
You can follow blogs via RSS
If you use the Google homepage method, then on your Google homepage will be blocks for each of the blogs you follow with a list of the most recent three blog posts. You can run your eye over them every day to see if there is anything you want to click through to and read. If you follow lots of blogs then you can have separate home pages for each which you naviagte by clicking tabs. Its fairly straightforward, but you need to register with Google first (worth doing as there are lots of other benefits). To follow blogs click the orange square with the white curvy lines on it. I have found it easiest to do using Firefox.
You can sign up to get blog posts by email
Not all blogs offer this, but if they do, and if it is a blog you are particularly interested in, it is worth doing. You will then get sent an email of all their posts, which you can read quickly and easily in your email in box. if you decide you don’t want them any more it is generally easy to unsubscribe. (Note, if you want to get posts of this blog by email, there is a link to do this at the top of the side bar).
You can become fans of facebook pages
You will then see their updates on your facebook wall. If you use facebook a lot this is a good way to keep up with what they are doing. Again it is easy to block them or stop being a fan if you get fed up with it.
You can follow people and do searches on twitter
Many lawyers think twitter is stupid solely because of the name. This is a mistake, twitter is a serious business application now. You can follow people and organisations you are interested in and keep tabs on what they are doing and thinking. There is also a very useful search function where you can search on words, to find out what people are saying about them. Try a search on your firm’s name!
You can sign up for Google alerts
This is another benefit you get from registering with Google. You give Google the relevant words and every day they will send you an email summarising search results. Use this for key words in your professional work niche, and also for your own name and the name of your business to find out what people are saying about you. I have found out loads of interesting things from Google alerts.
You can keep any eye on updates on your LinkedIn home page
The LinkedIn home page is similar to the facebook wall, and you can often pick up what people are doing and writing about by scanning this once a day.
Thats all I can think of just now. Do you know any other good ways of keeping in touch using social media?
All very good points. I use Hootsuite for keeping an eye on Twitter searches. You can create columns for the search terms/people you are interested in following. Those columns are then always there and constantly updated when you login to Hootsuite.
Thanks for your comment Brian. I also use Hootsuite and find it invaluable. It is also good for scheduling ‘tweets’.
To people who would say ‘What’s the point?’, surely they just haven’t realised that social media is another medium for advertising and reaching clients/customers.
they’re not taking advantage of some very simple tools that could help their business/website