Yes, We Meet in Second Life

Part of the challenge of a virtual team is finding ways to bring connections and cohesiveness to a group that spans the globe. We use web-based project management systems and collaborative apps such as Google Apps and 5pm. We’re testing out Socialtext as our internal “social network.” We use Skype video, voice and text as well as Gtalk.

And yes, we meet in Second Life.

While our “watercooler” gatherings (yes, we do have a virtual water cooler in our virtual office are optional at the moment, I’m going to argue that we need to have them as permanent “must-attend” meetings starting 1 Jan 2010. Why? Because I think there are several major things to be gained by making them mandatory for our team:

• we’re challenging our team members to “think out of the box” and outside their usual 2-D computer screen
• we’re helping our team members hone their 3-D skills in design, building, communicating, participating, and just moving around
• we’re getting something much closer to “face-to-face” than we can get with pretty much any other application out there for holding meetings between disparate parties
• we need to have regular weekly team meetings so the entire team has a sense of what others are working on – and conference calls just don’t cut it

I’m a firm believer in pushing our comfort zones to try new ways of communicating because technology is changing rapidly all around us. Yes, I know that other companies used to meet in Second Life (many still do) and gave it up as they moved on to new shiny objects and initiatives. But Second Life has not gone away despite their naysaying. And it is still one of the best environments for virtual meetings I’ve ever seen.

Visit our offices in Second Life: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Athena%20Isle/51/48/23

What are YOU doing in Second Life?

Conversify is hiring!

We have two contract positions (that we hope will go permanent in 2010) open — a Social Media Specialist and a Social Media Assistant.

Please see the descriptions below and contact us if you are interested.

Also, make sure to read through the entire post as there are important instructions about applying for these positions toward the bottom.

Thank you!

SOCIAL MEDIA SPECIALIST

We are looking for a person with a great attitude who is extremely organized and has a genuine passion for social media.

This position is a part/half time contracted position for the months of September and October. Our plan by the end of 2009 is to provide closer to full time contract work and possibly bring this position on as a permanent employee in 2010.

This position reports to Conversify Project Manager, Nik Hewitt.

RESPONSIBILITIES

• Must have superb organizational, prioritization and communication skills.
• Implementation: Setting up and maintaining Facebook Pages, Twitter accounts, blogs, and other social media tools and assets for clients. Familiarity with using RSS feeds for content integration and syndication a plus.
• Research: Carrying out consumer, marketing, and sales research assignments.
• Site Maintenance: HTML and CMS work for various client blogs. Familiarity with a variety of blog publishing tools and CMSs a must. Graphics skills a plus.
  
• Community Moderation: Monitoring and moderating client communities utilizing best practices.
  
• Outreach Communications: Carrying out one-to-one outreach to bloggers and within social networks adhering to detailed instructions and best practices as well as keeping track of results.
• Process: Communication with Conversify Project Manager, personal book-keeping, and following client briefs/requirements as specified.

====================================

SOCIAL MEDIA ASSISTANT

We are looking for a person with a great attitude who is extremely organized – perhaps a former administrative assistant – and someone who has a passion for social media. This position is a part/half time contracted position for the months of September and October. Our plan by the end of 2009 is to provide full time contract work and possibly bring this position on as a permanent employee in 2010.

This position reports to the co-owners of Conversify, Monique Elwell and Aliza Sherman.

RESPONSIBILITIES

• Must have superb organizational, prioritization and communication skills.
• Implementation: Managing company general email, Facebook Pages, Twitter accounts, blogs, and other social media tools and assets.
  
• Site Maintenance: Light HTML and CMS work to keep company external and internal sites updated.
• Community Moderation: Monitoring and moderating client communities.
• Research: Carrying out consumer, marketing, and sales research assignments.
  
• Measurement: Regularly monitoring, tracking and recording metrics for company and clients.
  
• Administrative: General administrative tasks including data entry, responding to or redirecting emails, managing calendars and appointments, light phone work, and related tasks.

THE CONVERSIFY CULTURE

Conversify is a 100% virtual Social Media Marketing agency. That means we all work from our homes, a coffee shop, our friend’s homes or even a hotel. Our team members are professionals, and our focus in on the deliverable. There is no micromanaging here. As such, anyone and everyone we hire will need to be a self-starter who is highly motivated to make deadlines and be hyper communicative. If you are the type that panics if the phone is not answered or goes into withdrawal if you have not checked your email and if you never, ever, ever miss a deadline, then welcome to our world.

We are growing into a fully global company with “offices” spanning from Derbyshire, United Kingdom to Anchorage, Alaska and everywhere in between. As such, the concept of a 9 to 5 work day is no longer valid. Depending on where you are, you might need to have a 6am conference call or a 7pm conference call. That said, there is virtually no face time. If you stayed up late the night before getting something done for a client and all of your work is done, go play the next day. Have fun (but take your mobile communications device with you just in case!)

Playing hooky on a Tuesday does not mean we are not productive. The expectation at Conversify is that you are available when the client or your Conversify team members need you. You are a team player who communicates well to teammates via email, phone, video, chat, Second Life, etc. You work well collaboratively, but you are also able to work independently and are motivated to get the job done. A professional attitude is a must. The technology you have (phone, computer, email, etc.) must work without fuss. When on the phone, you take care to eliminate all non-professional noise (traffic, babies, barking dogs, etc.). But we also encourage interaction with our internal Conversify team including weekly watercooler gatherings in Second Life.

OUR VALUES:

Happiness.

Treat people the way you want to be treated.

An open source ethos.

Flexibility leading to optimal productivity in work and in life.

Imagination and Creativity.

Empowerment.

PLEASE ANSWER THESE QUESTIONS WHEN YOU SEND US YOUR RESUME:

• Please share URLs of your own social media sites.
• If you have produced social media sites for others, please include a few examples and explain what they were trying to achieve and how you helped them achieve those goals.
• What is your philosophy on organization and getting things done?
• How do you specifically prioritize and manage the daily demands on your time?
• What are your favorite online tools to get things done?
• What qualities do you have that will be well suited for being part of a virtual team?
• What work have you done for others that has provided you with relevant skills to be part of our team?
• Why do you want to be a part of the Conversify team?
  

Please send your resume with answers to our questions above to Jobs [AT] Conversify [DOT] net. Please specify your fee for monthly contract work.

Fishing for Fans on Facebook

Image via Wikipedia

A recent promotion was brought to my attention where a services firm was holding a giveaway of some really desirable items to build their company’s Facebook fan base on their Facebook Page. I had never seen this type of promotion before, but I guess it isn’t surprising that people are starting to fish for fans on Facebook for their Pages. A lot of fans means that a lot of people like your company and what your company offers, right?

Wrong. I’d be hesitant to use the number of fans – large or small – on a professional services company’s Facebook Page to measure how good a company might be. Why? Because not all companies are the type of businesses that people would fan. Think about it. Why do people fan a company’s Facebook Page anyway?

1. Because they are customers and like the product(s) or service(s) - but what if they are a very small, rural company with a small customer base. Does that mean that if they only have 100 fans they aren’t successful?

2. Because they like the people who run the company - but not everyone who runs a company puts themselves out there in the public eye so does this mean a company with a more quietly productive, behind-the-scenes team isn’t a good one?

3. Because they know the people involved with the company - but how do you discern who of the fans are really real-life friends or family members of the company team?

4. Because they want to define who they are by the companies/products/services they like.

But how valuable is it when people are fanning your company’s Facebook Page because they want to win a prize? If I were to see a small consulting firm – like Conversify, for example – with 500+ fans on Facebook, I’d actually be pretty suspect.

Why? Because we can’t realistically service 500 customers at this stage in our company. I’d venture to guess that over the 20+ years I’ve been doing consulting, I’ve probably had over 100 clients, but in any given year, maybe 15-20 tops. This year to date, we’ve worked with about 15 clients and probably will work with another 10-15 before year’s end. I haven’t asked them to fan our Facebook Page, but maybe I should ask if they’d be willing to do so. Even with an invitation, I would consider those legit fans.

I think there are many companies that do lend themselves to many fans such as any of the Web apps companies developing great tools via the Web. That’s scalable. Products companies that are national or international can realistically have a large fan base. But small services companies just aren’t the type of company to organically get a huge number of fans, and I don’t think that is a bad thing.

If you want a lot of fans on your Facebook Page, create a page for something that people want to rally around, support or align themselves with but that doesn’t mean give away valuable gifts as an incentive. Once the gifts are given away, what do you have? A lot of disinterested people who have no more reason to follow you unless you run another contest. Or they will “un-fan” you toot sweet.

Sure, there could be the arguement that even though you are getting a lot of empty fan connections because people are only fanning you to try to win a prize, the very act of them connecting with your company Page means that their friends on Facebook will see that action and might – just might – link over to your Page out of curiosity. And then a few of those people might – just might – need your services and contact you.

I say that’s a lot of work and wasted effort to reach people indirectly. And when they get to your Page and see an announcement that you’ve built your fan base by offering prizes – what then?

Having 500 or 1000 fans on Facebook should not be any company’s goal. Having meaningful connections with happy and loyal customers, interested potential customers and people willing to be evangelists for your company even without your prompting is far more valuable – even if those numbers are in the double digits.

Quality fans matter far more than quantity.

What do you think of promotional tactics to build up a Facebook fan base? Is it authentic? Sustainable? Desirable?

Latest Posts Around the Blogosphere

In addition to being avid bloggers, Conversify offers problogging services to clients. Below are some of our latest posts on various sites.

10 Golden Rules of Social Media (Web Worker Daily) by Aliza Sherman

Second Life is Social Media (Web Worker Daily) by Aliza Sherman

Tooting Your Own Horn (WorkitMom) by Maia Nolan

How to be a Super Woman without Being a Superwoman (WorkitMom) by Gina Blitstein

Learning Through Podcasts (Anchorage Daily News) by Aliza Sherman

When You’ve Got Connectivity (Anchorage Daily News) by Aliza Sherman

Bad Blogger Outreach Techniques

One of the things we work hard at here at Conversify is our blogger outreach initiatives. As a longtime blogger, I’m often on the receiving end of emails from PR folks and anyone with something to market, and I have to admit I’m still floored by the messages I receive. So instead of complaining about it to anyone who will listen, I thought I’d be productive and provide some ideas about blogger outreach best practices.

Here are some of my thoughts. I welcome your input on these as we’re all still evolving the way we handle this more intimate and conversational outreach.

1. Don’t you know me? Today, I received an email from someone I know personally pitching an event that they’d like me to promote – or attend – that was totally impersonal. I understand the complexity of sending out a bulk email and have it list everyone’s name (that’s what third-party e-newsletter or email marketing services are for like Constant Contact and Mail Chimp), but if you have people you actually know on your list, the least you can do is personalize the message.

You’ve Got to Be Kidding Me Advertising Trends

I am flabbergasted by the new formats for online advertising. At first, I thought it was–literally–an error on the web site I was visiting, some erroneous programming that rendered the page virtually unreadable.

I even tweeted about the experience.

The Auto-Playing Commercial

That’s one of the new formats for online advertising. You arrive on a Web page, and the commercial starts playing. My reaction? Shut browser window immediately. Go to another site, usually a competitor to the site I just visited.

Somehow, the powers-that-be behind the offending site got it in their heads that auto-playing ads were a good thing. For those of us who go to their sites to read quality content (read: consumers, customers, clients, eyeballs), feel assaulted by the interruption on our bandwidth–both figuratively and literally–and offended so will seek good content elsewhere, thank you very much.

The Stuck Ad

The other new online advertising trend that is even more pervasive and irking me to no end as a reader is the pervasive banner that remains at the bottom of my browser window as I scroll down the page to read an article. To be fair, I don’t mind the one at the side that stays with me as I scroll down the page. That one knows its place.

I’m talking about the banner at the bottom that literally blocks the content. Continuously. It doesn’t have an X in the upper right hand corner to make it go away. I’m afraid to click on it because I don’t want to visit the advertiser’s site and don’t know what will happen if I try to move it away. And I’m frustrated because I can’t read the article I came to read!

As we all continue to go mobile, I can’t even imagine what surfing this site might look like. On my laptop, the content I came to read is contained within a small space, boxed in by navigation on the left and ads on the right. And covered up at the bottom by that pervasive ad.

I understand the desperate need to monetize web sites, particularly when anyone in the business of content–print content–is panicked as advertising dollars either dry up or are diverted. But take it from me, a voracious reader of online content (and a voracious online shopper): Covering up the content you deliver is going to be the death of you.

What do you think of these new pervasive and invasive online ads?

Who We Are

We’re a social media strategy group working with companies and nonprofits to develop and implement smart, compact and efficient social media campaigns.

We focus on your business objectives first, operational issues, your competitive landscape, and THEN we make strategy and implementation recommendations.