There are tons people in the social media scene who talk a lot about “community”… and there are a quiet few who work hard at building sustainable online communities. Joshua Dorkin is an independent online publisher and community manager in Denver, Colorado – who runs the real estate investing community BiggerPockets.com.

Josh shares tips for building an online community and tells how he grew the site to almost 50,000 members:

Please tell us about yourself and your online community?

“I’m an online publisher and real estate investor in Denver, CO. Five years ago I started out in real estate investing… I and was looking for a great resource to help me find the tools and info I needed to help me with my business. I couldn’t find any site that fit my needs, so I decided to start building my own.

Joshua Dorkin supports his family by running an online social community from home.

I began to build the site while working my full-time job as a teacher. Soon after launching our forum, people began to participate… I immediately realized then that the site could become more than just a hobby site for my own personal needs. I spent all my free time coding the site and expanding the directory of resources, and soon launched our blog. Eventually, I hired my first coder and began to really start building the site into what it is today – a full-featured social network, with tools and applications targeted to real estate investors, professionals, aficionados, and the every day homeowner / renter.”

Did you have experience running online community sites before? How did you learn?

“I learned how to run it though trial and error, and from watching what other forum sites did. There was a lot of experimentation in the early days as to how to run the site, and I made plenty of mistakes and pissed off more than my fair share of people while doing it. Overall, I learned by doing.”

How does your site make money?

“The revenues are primarily from advertising. While Google AdSense is a great driver of ad income, we also do direct sales of banners on our site and newsletter. Additionally, we participate in a select few affiliate programs. Partnerships with other businesses are also very important drivers of revenue, as are our paid membership upgrades, and a little bit of e-commerce.”

Presently your site has over 48,422 members. How did you get such a big crowd?

image: Steven crane

“The most exciting member was number two. It was very exciting to know that someone other than me was on the site . . . I felt a sense of success, and saw the potential for people to start pouring in. The first two years were very shaky. The community hadn’t reached any kind of tipping point, and it seemed that the site could either flourish or fail at any time.”

What were the most successful strategies that helped increase signups and strengthen the community?

“I believe that the strict administration of our site has helped it be so successful. I’ve spent time on other real estate and non-related communities, and I see that the sites that are strongest are those who clamp down and enforce some set of rules or guidelines. It is so easy to be lax, but in the end, that doesn’t work. People are always looking for some angle to exploit for the purpose of marketing, and if you allow a free-for-all, your community will result in chaos.

Other important reasons for our success in growth has been the passion of our core members. Any strong community will always have that core group, and they can easily make or break a site. This group usually consists of influencers, and often times, those influencers are quite powerful. Sadly, in many cases, this power can get to their heads; I’ve had to remove many of these people from the site over the years. Mostly, they always got the idea that they were above the rules and started to take advantage of the site. While the community respects them in general, by allowing these members to stick around, you undermine your entire system. All that said, we’ve learned to keep this type of behavior in check and have come to depend on the core group of members to help other, new members out and promote the site. Their passion is evident and catchy.

Throw all that together with lots of activity, tons of great content, and fantastic membership, and the community simply grows on its own now.

What are the biggest headaches?

“Spam is certainly a problem with any kind of community, but we’ve managed to develop some pretty good processes for identifying and removing it. Actually, one of the best moves we made on that front was to empower the members to report posts and other content on the site. I’ve found that the general membership does not want that crap around, and usually find it before we do. We have a zero tolerance policy when it comes to spam.

Spam and community disagreements can be a major headache. image: jk5854

The last major headache is disagreements between members. We allow members to disagree with one another – these often result in some of the best discussions, but when people begin to get personal and attack one another publicly, we put a stop to it. We try and bring these people together to resolve their issues in private, but you can’t always make that happen. In that case, we simply let these people know to avoid one another. We’ve got many members who were participants on other sites, but decided to leave and join BiggerPockets because they know that we won’t tolerate that public bad-mouthing that goes on elsewhere.”

A lot of times people will join a community and never even upload an avatar, let alone any content. What’s the best way to improve participation?

“I think the best way to improve participation is to have a team that is welcoming and friendly, and to always connect with new members. We make it a policy to welcome new members and to remind them of the benefits of completing their profile and participating. Often times, people just set up an account and plan on coming back later, but forget and move on. The welcome serves to let them know not to forget about us, and to get going for their benefit. Otherwise, having that strong core group of members, who also remind the newbies to get a picture and profile together, definitly helps.”

Say someone was starting an online community today – what are two or three things you’d advise them?

“The first thing I’d advise is to get an understanding of how online communities work before getting started. Jump on other sites and get a feel for them. While I did it through trial and error, you can learn by participating. I’ve seen dozens of sites come and go over the years for this reason alone. I’d also advise making sure you’ve got the time, or that you’ve got people who have the time, to manage and remain active in the community. Countless communities die because there is no one to actively manage them. Doing so is not easy – in any niche, there are only a handful of truly successful communities for this reason alone.

The last bit of advice I’d offer is to do good. When other upstart communities have done bad things to us (steal content/members/etc), in the end, they failed. Karma is a real bitch sometimes.”

What are your professional goals for the future? At what point will you know you’ve ‘made it’?

“Given that I’ve managed to build the site without a real, full-time team of employees or any kind of startup capital, I’d have to say that I’ve already made it. Does that mean that I’m satisfied with what I’ve built? Not even close! I’ll know that BiggerPockets has truly made it… when anyone and everyone who deals with real estate knows that we’re the place to be.”

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Love it or hate it, Facebook is currently the biggest and popular site on the web… except for Google. It’s ranked #2 by Alexa and it has over 1.5 billion inbound links. Because it’s such a powerful site, having a well-branded, SEO-optimized vanity username or Fan page URL on Facebook can be a big boost your business and online reputation.

Facebook Username Length & Guidelines

• Usernames must be 5 characters long and may be no longer than 50 characters.
• Usernames can only contain A-Z, a-z, 0-9, and periods (.)
• Your account must be e-mail and SMS (text message) verified before you are allowed to set or change usernames.
• Facebook says you cannot register usernames and try to resell them for money, or they will disable the username (or your account) if they find out.

How Do I Set My Facebook Username (Vanity URL)?

When you’re logged into your account, type the following URL into the browser bar:

http://www.facebook.com/username

Then follow the on-screen directions. They tend to show a lot of suggested usernames with periods in them, and you may have to click the “more” button to type in the one you really want. Check the availability, double-check your spelling (don’t type in “JohnSnith” instead of “JohnSmith“>), and then confirm the name to lock it in for good.

How Do I Change My Facebook Username?

1. Click on the “Account” dropdown menu at the far upper right of your screen. Then select “Account Settings” from the drop-down menu:

2.) Click on the button to change your username:

How Many Times Can I Change My Facebook Username?

You are only allowed to change your username once. If you have changed your name once already and want to do it again, you’ll have to register and SMS-verify a new Facebook account. (Maybe buy one of this disposable, prepaid cellular phones for $29.99?)

Someone already registered my choice of username. If they change it to something else, can I claim it? Can we trade Facebook usernames?

Yes. It is possible to trade and exchange Facebook usernames. From the tests that I personally conducted (on 2/19/10)… it seems that the second you change your Facebook username to something else, your old username immediately becomes “up for grabs.” If someone else registered as “JohnSmith” and you can talk them into changing to another name.. the moment they change and confirm it, you can grab “JohnSmith” for yourself.

Here is a video I found on YouTube that demonstrates how to transfer / trade Facebook usernames:
(warning! cheesy music)

How Do I Set A Vanity URL for a Facebook Fan Page?

Facebook Usernames URLs are best for individual people. Facebook Fan Page vanity URLs are better for collective interests like: companies, organization, bands and products. Once your fan page has 25 or more members, you are eligible to set a vanity URL for it. Here’s how:

1. Type “http://www.facebook.com/username” into your browser’s address bar:

2.) Click the blue link that says “Set a username for your pages”:

If I registered a personal Facebook username and now I want to change it to a fan page URL, is this possible?

Yes. As long as your fan page has more than 25 members, you can do this. First change your username to something else. Then immediately go set your the fan page name to the one you want, as your previous username will now be available.

Can I Change the Name of a Facebook Fan Page?

No. According to this thread, you cannot currently change the name of a Facebook Fan page. If your company is called “Extreme Print Design” and you have a Fan page for it, and you legally change your company name to “Extreme Web Design” – you still cannot change the name of your fan page. You have to make a new fan page and start over.

Can I Change the URL of a Facebook Fan Page?

No. Once the fan page URL has been set, there is no way to change it. Not that I know of.

Disclaimer: Facebook has complex, not-user-friendly, constantly evolving interface! The information in this post was true at the time of writing, but i is very likely to change in the coming months or years.

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“To learn about the most financially lucrative social media skill for 2010 and beyond – check out my new blog Online Reputation Edge and subscribe via RSS or e-mail updates. ”

If you enjoy the content and conversation here at Social Media Rockstar, I invite you to subscribe to my new blog about online reputation.

Why am I going to the effort of publishing a whole new blog?

Because I’m 100% convinced that managing and improving your ( clients’) online identity — or online reputation management – is the most important and financially lucrative skill a social media professional can have in this new decade.

Online reputation management (ORM) requires learning a combination of advanced SEO, PR and social media skills that are worth top dollar in today’s competitive market. And subscribing to my new blog will give you a powerful, inside edge on the best practices of this fascinating new industry.

Social media is fascinating and fun. But when it comes time to write the checks, most execs and companies still continue to see Twitter, Facebook and videos as expendable “creative luxuries.” In contrast… companies absolutely need a good online reputation to thrive & survive — and they know it. So they are willing to budget for online reputation consulting without skimping or flaking.

That’s why I plan on publishing so much informative and high-quality content about online reputation management (ORM) in 2010. If you’re a serious social media consultant, PR pro, or SEO… you can’t afford to be in the dark about about the vital topics and discussions that are happening over at Online Reputation Edge.

I’m still planning monthly updates, interviews and social media tips here at Social Media Rockstar. And because I’ve really enjoyed the fantastic connection and conversations with with my loyal readers here, I really want to keep in touch with you over at my new blog also.

So please take a quick second to pop on over to Online Reputation Edge – and subscribe via RSS or email – before you jump off onto a Firefox tab or get sucked down a Tweetdeck vortex.

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Social media is quietly forcing an integration of “work” vs. “play” into the mainstream business culture. Networking and socializing used to be quarantined into special times and locations – like conferences, power lunches, and parties. But now virtual cocktail hour and watching cool videos have been integrated into our desktop, inbox and phone with apps and constant reminders that keep us distracted connected.

Social media is forcing an integration of work and play, in business. image: Mike Oleveri & Rev. Xantos

Some companies, consultants and HR administrators are stubbornly resisting social media as an encroachment and liability. And others are guzzling the social kool aid until they’re blasted out of their mind… and then drowning after jumping headfirst into the deep end of it.

The Dangers of Too Much “Work”

Working hard doesn’t always mean working smart. Especially in the fickle, light-speed digital era. Grinding away on a product or project without being dialed into up-to-the-minute news — and without being closely in-touch with the people in your market (a.k.a. “community”) — can be less productive than smoking bong hits or making paper airplanes.

• You’ll miss connecting with ideal partners, employers and clients. If you’re too busy filling out T.P.S. reports and thinking of your bosses needs more than your own, you’re bound to miss out on some amazing people and opportunities that could have unfolded.
• Your professional brand will fade into obscurity. All that blogging, Twittering, commenting and networking does help you “stay afloat” in the noisy world and remind people you’re still alive and in business. Without enough social media pulse, people may forget about you.
• You won’t be able to predict the future.If your nose is always pointed at your inbox and it’s never sniffing about for interesting new trends, you risk becoming obsolete very quickly.
• You’ll burn out and suffer productivity loss.If you work too much and don’t integrate it with a little bit of fun and spontaneity, you’ll wear down your batteries and the work you complete will be dull and uninspired.
• You won’t get “big ideas” or see “the big picture.” Sometimes all those funny stories, random links and technological chit-chat can all add up and stimulate your mind towards a huge personal or professional epiphany.

The Dangers of too Much “Play”

The myth that enthusiastic social media use will — somehow, someday — lead to success + profits is quite pervasive. It’s kindled by a few highly-visible “rockstars” who appear to spend most of the day Twittering, partying and flying around to speak at conferences – and they make it seem so easy. But in reality, they’re just as rare as professional surfers whose day job involves riding waves on exotic islands while getting their picture taken. For 99.9% of people who surf, that’s just a pipe dream.

• You’ll get too consumed with doing favors for other people. The more people you have in your network, the more you get “sucked in” doing favors that will help them but don’t pay any direct dividends for you. You can easily spend all day scratching people’s backs and not watching your own.
• Your stress and anxiety will rise.Procrastinating your profit-producing work to take care of all your endlessly-time-consuming social media obligations can be very stressful. You can dig yourself in such a deep productivity “blackhole” that you’ll keep distracting yourself as an anesthetic, rather than climb out and get back to all the work you’re behind on.
• You’ll become jaded. Too much indulgence in social media chatter and events is like eating too many frosted chocolate doughnuts. You’ll become sluggish and clouded, and you’ll be too stuffed with “junk” to notice the few rare gems that pass right on by you.
• You’ll never make your “big idea” actually happen. Social media can give you great ideas, and it can also take away the time and focused attention you need to make them a reality.

Social Media Success = Vigilance, Self-Awareness and Balance

Social media unlocks both a multi-verse of new opportunities, and a minefield of new opportunity costs. The freedom and choices granted by social media tools come with demands for more responsibility: being accountable and self-aware about how you spend your time. And being clear about your goals and staying focused on the specific people and tasks that will help you achieve them.

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“If you enjoyed this post, leave quick comment below or subscribe via e-mail or RSS. Don’t miss out on new social media articles and interviews!” -Brett

This is a guest post by Chris Goddard from Affilorama.com – an affiliate marketing training site.

Technology has a habit of embedding itself in our lives – so much so that we start working by its schedule, rather than by our own.

Unfiltered, social media can be too much to handle! image: theVanCats

There isn’t a single application or service that, in my mind, does an excellent job of aggregating multiple social feeds into one manageable interface. (Sorry FriendFeed fans… but I’ve never been satisfied with you!). Hopefully one day there will be, but for now we have to rely on our own time management to navigate the insurmountable torrent of information that passes over our screen and mobile devices each day.

So how do you do it? How do you stay on top of social media without it being all you do?

I follow three basic processes:

1.) Segment

With so many sources, the trouble is knowing what to listen to and what to ignore. One option could certainly be to just block out some of those sources – follow less people, blogs, etc. But that kind of defeats the purpose! Instead, I segment sources by relevant topics and by my level of interest. Applications like Facebook, Twitter and Google Reader all allow you to create sub-lists or “groups” of people or sources.

There are people on my Facebook who I really don’t need to hear from all the time – or people that I’ve added, like old school friends who I’ve accepted mainly to be nice and not out of any real desire to keep in touch. By adding these people to common lists, it’s not only possible to remove them from the stream, but you can also set privacy settings across them so they can only see limited information about you – this is particularly good if you don’t want your boss or new business partner seeing those drunken photos of you in the Santa suit last Christmas.

Twitter is a little trickier. While a lists function has been added it still has a few limitations – mainly that many Twitter apps have yet to support Twitter’s lists – with the exception of Tweetdeck 0.32 and a few others. I rarely use Twitter’s web interface anymore, opting for the in-browser plugin EchoFon (great for receiving updates while you’re working). Once more apps like these incorporate lists, then sifting through Twitter feeds will become a lot easier.

2.) Prioritize

Some sources you want and need to hear from throughout the day, whereas for others once a day is enough. Things like breaking news, new releases, new trending topics, etc, are temporal and are “need to know now,” where as more in-depth analysis, commentary, entertaining and personal can be a once or twice a day thing. The hardest part is disciplining yourself to only look at the segments you should – however I find that by checking my top lists every hour or so, I feel sufficiently “plugged in” to satisfy my appetite for information while not taking too much time to do it. While if I try to go cold turkey and abstain completely – then I just get frustrated! A little moderation is easier.

3.) Follow Well-connected Influencers

Finally – find the people who make staying plugged in easier for you. These are the people who collect information from a variety of sources and republish it. In digital media some of the best examples would be some of the big ‘news services’ like @Mashable, @Techcrunch, as well as a few individuals like @copyblogger, @philipnowak and @rebbeccakelley. These 5 probably account for 80% of the important updates that I get – and therefore are the first 5 that I check. Follow these influencers and you are letting someone else do the work for you.

At the end of the day, the flow of information is too vast and overwhelming to catch it all – it’s like trying to divert a river with your hand. Instead, focus on grabbing the few important bits that are floating by and you’ll stay informed while still being able to achieve something else with your day!

How do YOU stay productive and manage information overflow?

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“If you enjoyed this post, leave quick comment below or subscribe via e-mail or RSS. Don’t miss out on new social media articles and interviews!” -Brett

One year ago, I started this blog with the goal of improving my writing skills and also my connections in the social media world. I also wanted to practice creating viral content. Out of 48 posts, 12 of them (25%) went viral and got over 200 retweets. Near the end of my first year I had about 2000 RSS subscribers – a modest number. There were an average of 9900 monthly unique visitors, with a peak in April of 16,894 unique visitors. While some people have figured out how to get blog subscribers much more quickly, I was more successful than with my other blog – which only got around 200 subscribers in the first year.

Here are some tips to get more RSS subscribers:

1. Spend Ample Time On Your Headlines

Killer headlines are what make Cosmopolitan and National Enquirer fly off the newstand and onto the checkout line scanner belt. And killer headlines separate the big dog blogs like Copyblogger, DoshDosh, Problogger from the amateurs. Check out Alltop’s social media section to improve your headline skills. Which blogs have the most arresting headlines? Which ones totally suck? Study how to write headlines and give them ample time; don’t just slap one on as an afterthought.

2. Include Alluring Images with Every Post

If you read book reviews on Amazon, you’ll discover people hate cookbooks with no pictures. They hate Keynote slide presentations with lots of words and with no pictures. And, guess what? They usually hate blog posts with too many words and no pictures, too. Adding images is relatively trivial and has a huge boost to the overall “look and feel” of your blog content, but many bloggers just don’t bother. And people just don’t bother subscribing. I find most of my images on Flickr Creative Commons, but there’s also hundreds of other places to find free images and stock photos.

3. Add Unique Insight and Value. Avoid “Me Too” Posts

There is a lot of echo on the web. Same tweets, same topics, same links. If you want subscribers and attention, it’s best to offer up a unique perspective and a “brand” of information that people can’t find anywhere else on the Web. Don’t waste time with just commenting on what others have done or said (“Today I read this cool post that said…”), invest in your own original ideas that will provoke others to share and others comment on them.

4. Prominently Display RSS and E-mail Subscription Buttons

A lot of people just can’t figure out RSS (“really simple syndication”) and prefer to get your content in e-mail. Give them that option. Make the buttons to subscribe eye-poppingly obvious and place them in a prominent position on your blog.

5. Personally Respond to All Blog Comments (Worth Responding To)

People are secretly craving warm digital fuzzies and personal feedback – so give it to them when they make the effort to comment on your blog. The first year, I spent anywhere from 2 to 20 hours a week responding to blog comments. People will begin to see your blog as a conversation, a friendly destination where they can get a little burst of personal attention and they’ll keep coming back. You don’t have to do this forever, but it sure helps kick things off. (Don’t worry about responding to “Great post” comments.)

6. Subscribe and Regularly Comment on Other People’s Blogs

The Golden Rule of blogging is “subscribe unto others, so that they may subscribe onto you.” Tune into others’ blog channels, and let them know it by making your name and icon a regular part of their comments section.

7. Make Other People Look Cool. Feature and Link to Them

Feature other people. Interview them. Talk about them. Link to them. Then those people will probably talk and tweet about your blog. Be strategic about who you feature — find people who have a lot of followers. You’ll help them, and they’ll be able to help you.

8. Remind People to Subscribe at the End of Each Post

People forget to subscribe. Personally remind them at the end of each post.

9. Install Social Media Sharing Links or Buttons

Install buttons or links that encourage people to share the post on Twitter or Facebook. You can use a Wordpress plugin or just put the customized links in HTML like I do.

10. Focus Equally on Both SEO and Viral Marketing

To get your blog in front of more eyeballs, it pays to focus on both viral marketing (good headlines, amazing pictures, solid resources people will naturally want to share) and on SEO (keyword research, competition analysis, building links). I focused almost exclusively on writing hot headlines and marketing the blog on Twitter. In the next year — if I decide to continue blogging here — I’m going to try and get more search engine traffic by writing more pragmatic, utilitarian posts I think Google searchers will find and appreciate.

11. Stick to a Posting Schedule

Don’t miss content updates if you’re serious about growing subscribers. As soon as you’re not posting, you’re not growing. If you can’t post yourself, get someone to guest post – or expect your subscribe numbers to stagnate or drop.

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You’re cranking out some solid blog posts for your company. And you’ve just convinced the boss to let you set up a Twitter account and a Facebook fan page, too. But the boss is worried it’ll take up too much time, and she asks: “Can you automatically update Twitter and Facebook with our new blog posts?” Yes, you can. Here’s how to do it reliably and for free.

Update: When I wrote this post, the method outlined in the post was the way to go – at that time. In the past several months, the social application HootSuite has evolved significantly and will take care of all this for you. I recommend trying Hootsuite first, and only messing with the following information if you have special needs.

This method will allow you to link out of Facebook’s walled garden and get maximum traffic for your publishing efforts.

Step 1: Getting RSS Updates Automatically Posted to Twitter

Twitterfeed is a handy, free website & application that will “feed your blog to Twitter.”

1. Go to Twitterfeed. Sign up for an account. Verify and login.
2. Click “Create New Feed” button

3. Click “Connect your feed to your Twitter account” button. Enter your (company) username and password on Twitter’s site and click “Allow.”
4. Enter in a name for your blog’s feed, and enter the RSS feed URL.
5. Click on “Advanced Settings” and you can choose the hourly update frequency, URL shorteners, titles, suffixes, etc.

It might take a couple of hours to get working. Once going, it’s fairly reliable unless Twitter goes down or has API issues. Check the stream every few days to make sure all is well.

Step 2: Getting Twitter Updates (‘tweets’) Automatically Posted to a FB Fan Page

Once you have your content automatically posted to Twitter, via Twitterfeed, you can then have it automatically piped to your Facebook fan page with a free (donation supported) application called “Selective Twitter Status.” Whenever you tweet with the hashtag #fb – (example: “666 Signs You’re NOT a Social Media Expert – http://bit.ly/poser #fb“) – Selective Twitter Status will selectively grab that tweet and post it onto your FB fan page. Here’s how to hook it up:

1. Go to “Selective Twitter Status” when you’re logged into FB.
2. Enter your (company) Twitter username and “allow” the pop-up permission to post updates.
3. Click on the “Your Fan Pages” tab and enter the (company) Twitter name next to the page you want updated. Click “save changes.”

4. Open up another browser tab and log back in to Twitterfeed.
5. On the main Feed Dashboard, click the oval “Edit Feed” button.
6. In the box marked “Post Suffix,” enter #fb.
   

   
   This tells Twitterfeed to put these characters at the end of each tweet, so that FB’s Selective Twitter Status will “selectively” post this new content to your FB fan page. This way you are free to chat with people and tweet random things, but only the actual blog posts marked with #fb will be rebroadcast on Facebook.

(Note #1: Facebook has a new built-in application that will allow you to update your Twitter feed from your FB page, which can be handy for some people. Check it out. But personally I don’t want to log into Facebook everyday and tinker around with the clunky interface and endless distractions – I want fully-automatic updates.)

(Note #2: Facebook has a popular, built-in application called “Notes” – that will easily import your blog content and/or pictures onto your fan page – and keep people stuck in Facebook’s walled garden. But as a marketer, I want to drive people out of Facebook and onto my clients’ pages – and I want to post external links.)

What If I Don’t Want the #FB Tag to Show Up On My Tweets?

The Selective Twitter Status app requires that you put the tag #FB on all tweets you want to show up on your Facebook Fan Page. This can look a little ugly, and it can slightly discourage people from sharing or retweeting the content. Here’s how I get around having a visible #FB tag on all my blog post tweets:

1. Make two Twitter accounts. Have your “main” one with the preferred username and nice background, and a secondary “dummy” account with a random username. (The purpose of the “dummy” account is just to update Facebook – it doesn’t matter who follows it.)
2. Make two Twitterfeed accounts. Have the first Twitterfeed account update your main account, and under “advanced settings” make sure it does not add any prefixes to the tweets for a nice, clean look. Have the second Twitterfeed account pipe your RSS feed to the “dummy” Twitter account and make sure the “#fb” prefix is added to every tweet.
3. Go into Facebook, click the “Application” option in the extreme bottom left bar of the screen – and find Selective Twitter Status or just click this link.
4. Set up the Selective Twitter Status application so that the dummy account, with all of the posts marked #fb by Twitterfeed, gets piped into the fan page of your choice.

Hooray! Now you’re pimpin’ the power of Web 2.0 – and you have one Twitterfeed account feeding beautiful links to your main Twitter account, and a secondary Twitterfeed account feeding #fb-tagged RSS updates to your dummy Twitter account… which all gets imported straight to your Facebook fan page – free of tags and noise!

If this sounds a little complex, it is, but for me it works well. I get an RSS feed turned into clean, clickable links that are broadcast out on Twitter and FB automagically. If you have a monthly budget, you might want to investigate Involver – which claims to offer premium features for FB page fan management – or explore other apps.

Good luck and let me know what you find or discover in the comments below!

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Every day, around 30 new people follow me on Twitter. Then around the exact same number of people usually unfollow me. They’re apparently upset that I haven’t blindly reciprocated their “friendship,” despite the fact that they’ve never even said “hi” or interacted with me. They’re so obsessed with numbers games… that they don’t seem to understand the most basic social networking principle, where you have to be sociable and personally interact with people before you win their trust and friendship.

Social Marketing = Constant, Conscious Personal Interaction

Social relationships evaporate quickly. Personal interaction is the “glue” that holds them together. image: imelda

Take a moment to think of the “people online you actually care about.” Usually, the important folks are those who have taken the time to personally interact with you or acknowledged you (recently). These are people you’re willing to help out and stand up for. When you’re under pressure or pressed for time, the people who haven’t interacted with you become second-class “nobodies” who are incredibly easy to ignore and forget. No matter how cool or famous they are.

Here are 6 tips for cultivating authentic, long-term, “sticky” personal connections – and maintaining them:

1. Send a quick personal note every time you follow / fan / friend someone.

Don’t just blindly add people without interacting with them – and don’t dare send Auto DMs or cookie-cutter messages. A quick, personalized friend request note that says “We met last week at the Social Media Meetup, enjoyed discussing design with you. Let’s keep in touch?” or an @reply saying “Cindy, you always find the hilarious side of mundane situations. It’s a pleasure to follow you! ” or “Just checked out your Flickr photos. Amazing mountain shots!” is enough to make a strong, personal impression. Then most people will take a moment to check you out or take your request seriously.

2. Leave a quick comment on friends’ blogs every time you stop by.

If you’re already wasting two minutes to check out a blog post, why not go all the way and take another 30 seconds to leave a quick comment? This will transform you from an anonymous nobody to a friend and supporter, who is a valuable and unforgettable part of their online social community. This isn’t just altruism, it quickly builds up your own reputation & social karma card. (Tech tip: easyComment plugin for Firefox makes entering your name and e-mail address quick and painless.)

3. Retweet, link to & talk about what other people have to say.

Don’t be totally self centered. Link out to what other people have to say about topics you’re interested in. Retweet content you feel is worth sharing or endorsing. Forgetting to do this is the online equivalent of going to a cocktail party and launching into an endless monologue about yourself.

4. Respond to everyone who reaches out. Don’t drop the ball.

The deeper you get into the social web, the more “requests” will start to show up in your inbox and in DMs and @replies. People are usually reaching out to ask for something, says Jemimah Owyang. Try to get back to everyone who sends you a heartfelt (non-copy-and-pasted) request… but don’t be afraid to say “no,” be very brief in your response, or propose payment if someone is asking you to embark on a non-trivial consulting project. If you accidentally ignore someone a couple of times, they’ll likely start to “forget about” you.

5. Never pitch someone without getting to know them.

An essential, but widely overlooked marketing principle is to give before you try and get. At the very least, before you pitch someone with a proposal that will benefit you – you need to take a few minutes and get to know (about) the person you’re asking. It’s tacky and rude to request something of a blogger or power user without knowing their name and what they do. Don’t think of pitching / requests as a one-time hustle – think of it as building the recognition and trust from someone who can help you over the long-term. You never know when you’re gonna need their help again – so first impressions are huge.

6. Be grateful and explicitly thank people.

When someone does something for you – like promotes your content or links to you – don’t forget to thank them! A little recognition and gratefulness creates a powerful reinforcement for more positive action – and it goes a long way towards making sure that person doesn’t forget you. (Big thanks for @mnphysicist and @MoneyEnergy for reminding me to add this supercritical, relationship-cementing tip.)

It’s A Jungle Out There. Be Human.

People are blitzed each week with thousands of messages online, a large percentage of them are bogus & unsavory ones. For every genuine person who wants to connect, there’s a dozen marketing hustlers on Twitter trying to blindly build up their numbers, or spammers dressed like hot chicks on Facebook… or wealthy Nigerian benefactors.

If you want to build a potent, responsive social network… the most important thing is to be social and show that you’re a real human. Communicate, comment, and show concern and care for people – and pace yourself to keep doing it. It’s not easy, but it’s the only way to build real trust and long term social capital!

What are you thoughts on winning people’s trust online? How about keeping relationships from evaporating once you’ve established them?

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Social Media Rockstar Runs on Thesis Theme for Wordpress

Thesis is an easy-to-customize, premium Wordpress theme that comes with full technical support. The beautiful style and pixel-perfect typography makes your writing look more polished and professional. If you’re serious about blogging and you want to focus more on your writing and do less hassling with PHP code… then check out the Thesis theme for Wordpress now! – Brett

The #1 most dreaded faux pas of online etiquette, for me, is when someone adds me to an e-mail list and regularly sends me corny viral e-mails or promotional stuff. It’s especially yucky when they CC: everyone’s address visibly into the header – which makes it easy for other chain e-mailers or commercial spammers to harvest my address and mercilessly blast it with more junk.

It’s not the 90’s anymore – mass E-mail isn’t the place for this.

If you stand your ground and bluntly tell relatives and co-workers you don’t want their forwarded e-mails, it often hurts their feelings. The culprits are usually warm, emotional, non-tech-savvy people who are still part of the “web 1.0″ culture which doesn’t understand social media sites and RSS feeds. Sending chain e-mail is their way of showing they care about you – and your asking someone to cease sending the “funny” and “important warning” mails can feel like a slap. Sometimes it can even end the relationship, if the person is especially sensitive or clueless.

How to Protect Your Inbox Without Hurting People’s Feelings

Being extremely diplomatic while defending your e-mail privacy can lessen the impact. Thank them for caring, explain why you can’t handle unsolicited e-mail, elicit their sympathy, and use the situation to introduce new social media tools that offer you better filtering controls:

Dear Aunt Selma,

I appreciate you thinking of me when you saw these kitten pictures – they’re quite adorable!

However, I wanted to let you know about some e-mail issues my account has been having. I typically get over 100 business e-mails a day that require a response on my part. Then I get almost 50 Viagra, penis enlargement and acai berry spams. If my inbox get even one tiny bit more cluttered with non-business or non-personal messages, I get really stressed out because I lose the important personal e-mails in the shuffle.

Therefore, I kindly ask that you do not add my name to CC: or forward me any e-mail message, unless it is written and addressed to me personally.

(Please uncheck my address from your list before you hit send.)

You are always welcome to send me a personal e-mail message about anything, and I’ll be able to see it and get back to you soon.

If you’d like to share interesting links or picture, I’d be happy to check them out outside of my e-mail box . These days most of my friends have moved over to Twitter (http://twitter.com) – why don’t we connect on there? Sign up https://twitter.com/signup (it only takes a minute), send me know your username and I’ll be able to see what you’re up to. You can discover links to interesting stories – share them with a huge community of people – and it’s so much more fun than e-mail!

Check out the Twitter Guide book – http://mashable.com/guidebook/twitter/ – and give me a call if you need any help signing up or figuring it out. I’d be more than glad to help you!

Love you and talk with you soon,

-Brett

p.s. Are you on Facebook? You can add me as a friend on there, too! My profile is http://www.facebook.com/blah-blah-blah

——-

How do you feel about unsolicited e-mails and forwards from relatives and co-workers? Do you tolerate them? How do you manage them?

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“If you enjoyed this post, please leave a comment below or subscribe via e-mail or RSS. Don’t miss out on upcoming social media articles and interviews!” -Brett

Many people criticize the corporate world as a “rat race” – a meaningless, ruthless existence. But from what I can tell, the lifestyle of a social media professional can sometimes be even more grueling, competitive and stressful than that of a top corporate exec.

Social media never slow downs or takes breaks. It just keeps going. image: tatrattery

When it’s just for personal gratification, social media is lots of fun. But for those who want to make their ideas and campaigns explode on a mass scale (with any kind of consistency) – it demands an incredible investment of time, energy and attention. The pressure to find, consume, share and create new content is relentless. The complex web of social relationships and implicit obligations multiply quickly – many new backs and egos need scratching. Endless reading and learning is required in order to keep your position.

Publish, Ping or Perish

The academic maxim “publish or perish” applies just as much to the online world. Social media people have an incredibly short attention span and tend to forget about people and destinations that aren’t compelling and clockwork consistent. The fickleness is especially harsh on Digg.com – where people will drop you as a friend if you don’t digg their stories for just a few days. When people get sick or go on vacation – they change their username to something like “Gone to Hawaii for 5 days- PLEASE, PLEASE don’t Delete me!”

On Twitter, too, you have to hustle to keep people paying attention to your updates and links. Ping people, praise people, retweet people in order to stay “tight” with them – or many will flake and quickly forget you and get enamored with the hot new social media girl or guy.

Tips for Making the the Race More Manageable

1. Pay Attention in Small Doses – There’s no way you can read everything, answer every e-mail or @reply, or interact with everyone (and still get stuff done). So interact with more people on a limited basis. Think one or two word replies. A blog comment or a RT once every couple of weeks will keep the door open to a larger number of people – they won’t think you forgot them.

2. Focus and Specialize – Some people have focused really intensively on one particular site or scene, and they aren’t burdened with trying to learn everything. There’s people who just do green social media consulting. Or people who just focus on LinkedIn. Or on Wordpress. That one section of the social media universe is more manageable.

3. Get Help and Support – Pro power users like Chris Brogan, Brian Clark and Guy Kawasaki have evolved past being “one man shows” and have assembled small, dedicated teams of support. Their virtual assistants and partners to help with some of the more tedious aspects of maintaining their presence – like editing posts, booking flights and finding fresh links.

4. Be Okay with Being Human – Not everyone can be an omniscient industry thought leader or Top 10 power user. Some people have too much of a balanced life, care too much about their spouse or kids, or have important tasks that need their focused attention for several hours a day. Don’t feel guilty for being human and not spending 18 hours a day online if it’s not for you. Make good friends with someone who does and download their notes.

Does social media marketing ever feel like a “rat race” to you? Or not? How do you deal with the pace and learning curve?

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“If you enjoyed this post, please leave a comment below or subscribe via e-mail or RSS. Don’t miss out on upcoming social media articles and interviews!” -Brett