Fan Pages and Facebook

I feel so ambivalent about this whole Fan Page thing and so far have refused to become a fan of anyone.  This makes me feel a little guilty as a couple of requests have come from real “friends” who are trying to use Facebook for their business and keep their other Facebook profile for more personal purposes.  I also heard that if you get 25 fans – you can claim your name back.  Didn’t I say I didn’t care that someone else has my username: robertahill?

I read with interest this article yesterday – How to Get the Most Out Of Facebook Fan Pages:

Facebook Fan pages allow you to officially represent your business on Facebook. You get to give your “fans” and customers a unified place to hold conversations about you, to get updates on what you’re doing, interact with you, and connect with other people who are “just like them” and love your products.

Michael Jackson via last.fm

It is the term “Fans” that really bugs me the most. Maybe I would be more inclined to consider a Fan Page if is was called something else.  Don’t know exactly what but anything would be better.  They say in social media, it isn’t who you know but who knows you.  The whole paradigm has shifted.

Michael Jackson’s Facebook fan page grew from 80,000 to over 7.3 million members in under ten days following his death, unseating President Barack Obama as the most popular fan page. This huge following leaves the singer’s heirs (and his record label) with a massive network to communicate with fans and continue the massive resurgence of interest in Jackson’s music.

OK – maybe dying is a little over the top in order to get attention.

Tags: facebook

Policy

What Is My Personal Social Networking / Media Policy?

Disclaimer: Just because I may have an account with a social networking service like the ones listed to the right does NOT mean that I use or support or recommend them. I do use the networks  listed in the right tab – “My Key Social Networks” and have described by specific policy to each one below.  A good indication on how “public” I am on a service is to view the image I have chosen.  If I am using my avatar – then I am likely to be a little more suspicious or cautious.  (See avatar below.)

Definitely an ongoing work in progress

1. Connecting: My intentions

I am an amateur techie geek.  That means that I am reasonable savvy regarding the latest trends and while I may not be the first to jump on a bandwagon, I am an early adopter.  Then I like to take the time to “check it out” and see if it or how it might meet my interests and needs.  Consequently, I end up spending quite a bit of time online before I figure out how active I will be.

My name is important to me and it is my brand.  So I tend to register for almost everything with the username of robertahill.  For example, I have a MySpace account that I do not use. If you look to the right, you can see that I have well over 80 different types of Social Media accounts.

Over the years, I have been quite impressed how one can make meaningful connections with someone you have never met.  There are people that I consider friends even though I have not had a face to face interaction – there has even been a case or two with people I have never even spoken with.  That said, as some point I will initiate a conversation to take our relationship to a deeper level.

If you are interested in connecting with me, it helps if you:

tell me why you are asking to connect, if it is an option

have a picture on your profile (Avatars may or may not work for me – it depends)

use the url links for your web site or blog

describe your interests or expertise

2. Follow, add, friend: How I use these networks

LinkedIn – The Business Meeting

I consider myself an open networker on LinkedIn and I am always interested in connecting with new and different people.  While I prefer that we might have some mutual interests or experiences, I am much more flexible.  I appreciate introductions and I am usually willing to pass on requests.  In my opinion, LinkedIn has stringent rules and there is less likely that I would be spammed.  I am a member of about 30 forums and discussion groups and try to stay on top of about 10 of them with weekly digests.  I also subscribe to a dozen Yahoo Groups but only follow a couple.  I have accounts with Xing, Ecademy, Naymz and Ryze but have not found them to be as useful.  Again, I have a pretty open policy with business networks.

Facebook – The Family Picnic

If I don’t know you personally or through a longstanding on-going online connection, I will not add you as a friend in Facebook.   If you don’t have my phone number there is a good chance I won’t “friend” you. Sometimes, even if I do know you, I will not connect.

I use Facebook to maintain connections with people that I have met and liked and might otherwise loose contact. Perfect examples are:

• Young people who are interns at an NGO and stay with us for a week and then are gone
• Old school mates that I haven’t seen in over 20 years
• Past clients who have become friends over time
• Some people (I repeat some) that I have met at a Conference
• “Real” family and friends – but not their kids!

For me, Facebook is not for marketing or professional branding.  I also do not like all the cross postings from Twitter or Friend Feed to Facebook and I have been known to unfriend.  If I like you, I will tolerate it but you will get “on the list” of marketers and I keep a tab on your updates.  OK, this is my opinion only and not shared by many.  If you are into “serious” branding, get a Fan Page and keep your Facebook personal.

I am quite restrictive on who can see what on my profile and it is usually limited to my direct friends.  This is a place for family to see photos even if they are not on Facebook – so usually only a few get access to my albums.  So far I am not a fan of fan pages.  I limit applications and groups and usually avoid requests of this nature.

Twitter – The Cocktail Party

Think – short, quick, upbeat, phonetic, fun. Maybe I should call it: Speed Dating or 20 Questions.

First, Twitter is a learning vehicle for me and an opportunity to share resources that I have found.  (And using my own FriendFeed, it is a great way to have my own history of what interested me at a point in time.)  Second, over time,  it is a way for me to develop deeper relationships with individuals who share my personal pursuits or professional interests. So I may make a personal comment (1 for every 5 real tweets) so that those who follow me know that I am a real person with a real life. But I am not that personal and if I begin a short conversation I will move it to DM.  I find that DM with friends and colleagues sometimes better than other chat mechanisms.

I am trying to “control” the numbers. Sometimes I am less successful than at other times.  For this reason, I have a general policy of only following up to 100 people who do not follow me.  These might be services, “famous” twitterers or someone that I just find interesting even if they do not fell the same about me.

Every month or two, I am not on the public time line and my tweets are private.  This is a good time for my followers to drop off naturally or be removed by me.  I do searches and do find people that I am interested in following but it is not likely that they will find me. I do not automatically follow someone even if I approve that they can see my updates. I prefer to evaluate the value of the content over time. When I am public, I will check who is following me and may block followers.

I decline or remove anyone who:

is following almost 2000 and has very few tweets

only RT or writes personal dribble

does not have at least two of the following -  real name, location, URL or description

clearly is interested in marketing (especially online or MLM) or making the sale

is not open minded regardless of whether we share similar ideologies

uses foul language, poor taste, inflammatory remarks or spreads hatred

spams, harasses or pesters me – especially with DM’s

It is hard to follow a large number and I have decided that if you describe yourself as someone who is a social media “nut” or expert, branding coach, affiliate builer, SEO marketeer, internet entrepreneur, I will not follow back.  Don’t ask me why I get a lot of real estate and music geeks asking but I don’t follow those back either.  Probably the best list on why I might not follow you can be found on Snipe,net Blog.

I prefer to use Tweetdeck so that I can follow people that I find stimulating and interesting. I have my “favs” and I get to easily see the Facebook updates of friends.  I will skim other people’s tweets, but not as consistently.   I get annoyed at DM that are not necessary or not personal.  I appreciate RT’s and will usually acknowledge them.

FriendFeed - The ??

Where does FriendFeed come in?  I am still not sure.  The vote is still out on this one.  It seems to be the great aggregate for all  of these social networks and for the time being I have put it back on private and am not accepting any new connections.

Skype - The Telephone Conference

I include Skype here because I love it and use it extensively for business and calling home across the ocean.  It is great from conference calls and sharing desktops.  People often ask me for my username which – you guessed it – is robertahill.  However, I use SkypeOut more than anything.  I rarely connect directly through Skype and unless we have a call scheduled.  I will not accept any invitations and prefer to remain “invisible” when online. Sending a quick chat first is appreciated.

3. Privacy, boundaries and safety: What is important to me

“There is no such thing as privacy but that doesn’t mean you should go around advertising you personal business.”  The purpose of my Social Networks is different and and consequently I use them differently.   I have different privacy issues and boundaries for different Social Networks.  About 30 % of my connections are across platforms.  If I know you in one place, I may connect on another.

My mother told me years ago that if I wrote something, then I should consider it public domain.  I have followed that advice. That said, I would like to maintain some personal privacy so see point 5.

4. Signal to noise: Don’t be surprised if I unfollow you

I think that I have made it clear above that I don’t like marketing that is over the top.  Hopefully, I check you out before I follow but if I make a mistake and you consistently do something on my pet peeve list – I will unfollow you.  I also respect your rights to do the same.  I will not be offended.  I am interested in real connections based on my professional interests.

5. Personal data and sharing: What I won’t share

I do put up information about my family, such as pictures but I will not go into details.  Trips of a personal nature may be listed but I have a personal blog that is currently on hiatus for more intimate details of my life.  I share personal family data privately via email.  If I have a “real” relationship with you, I may mention certain things in DM on Twitter or a note on Facebook.

6. My networking needs and uses:

Learning, connecting and curiosity.  That curiosity causes me to sign up for accounts that I sometimes reconsider.  Deleting is often a pain and as I am committed to “owning” my name as my brand, I will leave it open.  If I am inactive on a network then it is highly probably that I will use my avatar picture to the right instead of the two main ones that I use elsewhere.

* I want to thank and give full credit to Melanie McBride for the use of her template and her position on why she protects her updates.

Tags: ecademy, facebook, friendfeed, linkedin, skype, social networks, twitter, xing