We Can Be Reached ….

We are delighted you are paying a visit to this blog. (The first 26 posts comprise a didactic manual on social media. We hope you’ll find it useful for your organization.)

It is by no means the only way to learn about our club, and, at the present time, not even the best way.

Club community involvement varies depending on the interests and expertise of our members. You might catch us on this blog, our official club website, our Facebook Page, or our Twitter account.

The best way to learn about Palm Springs Toastmasters is to check out our meetings: Tuesday evenings, 6:00 p.m. at the Desert Sun building on Gene Autry Trail (very nearly every week; call us or check our website to confirm).

You can depend on Toastmasters to

– provide a remarkably rich learning experience for developing public speaking and leadership skills

– be one of the best deals going. (Courses often cost many hundreds of dollars; in contrast, Toastmasters dues are under $10 per month.)

Getting On Board the Social Media Train; Measurement and Inspiration

                June 6, 2012

[This blog is a continuing exploration of the public relations efforts, particularly via social media, of Palm Springs Toastmasters. It aims to be a discussion about what to do, and what to avoid. We hope that it will serve as a tutorial for anyone contemplating public relations on behalf of a local organization such as our club.]

Toastmasters and other speakers give inspirational speeches all the time. But rarely do they get to measure how much people heed the inspiration. Almost always, the speech is delivered, the audience members applaud and feel energized, and … and nobody even knows what the results are.

Last night, our club’s incoming Vice President of Public Relations delivered Project 10: Inspire Your Audience. He spoke on Getting On Board the Social Media Train. After the meeting, he tweeted that our Toastmasters were inspired to increase their social media activity and to open Twitter accounts. Now, THAT is something he can actually measure. We will be monitoring tweets from club members, and so will be able to show, definitively, how effective the speech was.

Wow! What an opportunity! There aren’t many situations in which a speaker can get that sort of feedback. Of course, in Toastmasters, speakers always get feedback—how was the vocabulary, effective use of the stage, overall effectiveness and so on. But it is exceptionally rare to be able to have proof of how well a speech actually performs in inspiring audience members.

(As an aside, I venture to guess that most speakers really don’t want that. It’s so much more pleasant, and less challenging, to just leave them feeling good. And what if that good feeling fades without them being inspired to any loftier behavior? Ugh. It’s easier not to ask.)

What better than social media for evaluating inspiration-driven action?

And what are the most effective means to inspire people to give social media a go, to get on board the train?

Extolling its virtues is one aspect. Everyone reading this blog can talk about how vast is the number of people already “on board,” about the potential for connecting with people, and about drawing in business.

The more concrete this is, the greater is the emotional connection from the audience, and the greater its effectiveness. Can you tell a personal story, one that evokes many senses?

The effectiveness of telling people how popular an activity is pales in comparison to demonstrating the involvement of a respected individual or a preponderance of peers. Although it is often difficult to accept, logic usually plays a small part in how people decide what to do. The emotional appeal of fitting in is often much, much stronger.

Another powerful tool is personal commitment. A recent winner of our District speech contest invited the audience to clap two times if they would commit to shun texting while driving. Not only is that memorable, but the speech was probably much more effective (in terms of actually inspiring people to take action) because of it.

Human beings are risk-averse. People are generally driven to act more out of a fear of losing something than by hope of gain. Incentives can be great, but penalties and the feeling that one will miss out are, in most cases, more effective. How can your speech incorporate that?

Besides motivation (more important than motivation, in fact) is ease of adoption. People often already have sufficient “reason” to “get on board,” but something is stopping them. There are barriers to them adopting the behavior. Reduce those barriers, and you are well on the way to seeing actual fruit from your inspiration. Or, to return to the railroad metaphor, more seats filled on the train.

Among those barriers might be fear of long-term commitment, fear of vulnerability of privacy, and technophobia. How can your speech address these and other barriers? If you want people to “get on board,” consider reducing the ticket price and providing a ramp to reduce the challenge of that first step.

As always, we welcome your ideas. Please share your wisdom in the comments, below.

Passing the Torch; Scorched Twitterverse Policy?

                June 2, 2012

[This blog is a continuing exploration of the public relations efforts, particularly via social media, of Palm Springs Toastmasters. It aims to be a discussion about what to do, and what to avoid. We hope that it will serve as a tutorial for anyone contemplating public relations on behalf of a local organization such as our club.]

I’m passing the torch. My six month term as Vice President of Public Relations for Palm Springs Toastmasters is drawing to a close, and my successor is taking over.

This is wonderful. I am fascinated to see how this will work out. This entire effort is an experiment to see how social media can serve a club like ours. One aspect of the experiment is how it evolves when in the hands of someone else.

And frankly, I have concerns about my efforts in this capacity. Out club’s social media presence is meant to represent our club. During my tenure, despite my efforts to the contrary, our online persona (which some call our brand) has been intimately tied to MY persona. A new torch-bearer is precisely what is called for, along with some oversight from the club. Also, my fascination with this question and my desire to provide a good foundation has resulted in less attention to other important aspects of the job.

When we started this, I wanted to find out what social media could do for a local nonprofit organization. As much as I sought, I could find no answers, except these:

From Social Media Experts:

“It’s cheap, easy, and phenomenally effective. Sorry, no, I don’t have anything to back that up. And, by the way, you should hire me.”

From myriad abandoned accounts of other Toastmasters clubs:

“z z z z z z z z z z z z z”

I finally have something to report, and it is contained in this very blog. Here’s the executive summary:

There are definite benefits to be had. Some are easy to see, others are much more nebulous. A defined set of objectives and strategies is essential. Whether the benefits are commensurate with the expenditure is debatable. Some results take quite a while to manifest.

But the report is far from complete. How will our social media efforts survive transition to somebody else at the keyboard? Can we find a workable balance of expenditure of time and energy? I have been putting in quite a bit more than can be expected from someone serving on a volunteer basis.

The incoming VPPR has been experimenting with social media. Further, he is a remarkably quick study and is passionate about Toastmasters and our club.

But who knows what the new torch-bearer will do. He may adopt a Scorched Twitterverse Policy, and decide to reverse and undo all of my efforts. That’s OK with me. Whatever he does will be another set of data points, and will undoubtedly be done in the very best interests of our club. (I do hope he doesn’t delete all of my posts on this blog, though.)

Social Media Theory: Making Friends

                May 29, 2012

[This blog is a continuing exploration of the public relations efforts, particularly via social media, of Palm Springs Toastmasters. It aims to be a discussion about what to do, and what to avoid. We hope that it will serve as a tutorial for anyone contemplating public relations on behalf of a local organization such as our club.]

One theory of how social media works is this: it’s all about making friends. And I emphasize all. To get anything out of social media, for it to benefit you in any measurable manner, you need to make friends. At first blush, that seems an extremely tedious way to go about things. Making friends takes time. And it takes energy as well: taking note, showing concern, getting to know someone. Who would want to make friends with someone in order for them to [fill in the blank—buy your product, contribute to your cause, hire your services, join your club].

But is not everything accomplished in that same way? The fan of a musician, the person joining an organization, the purchaser with brand loyalty all feel some degree of personal connection.

What are the channels that lead to that connection, that (at some level) friendship? A musician can make sounds that give a listener pleasure. Someone with a cause can demonstrate that she shares the same concerns as a potential donor. In order to ‘get a benefit’ we always have to ‘make a friend.’ Social media are nothing more nor less than a different channel for making friends. At the same time, we make friends the same way we always do.

Therefore, it’s all about making friends. So goes the theory. It seems plausible to me.

What theories do you favor?

And if I were trying to make friends with you, or you with me, how should we go about it?

Conversely, a consideration of what actions might keep us distant might prove instructive. When someone ignores my greetings, questions or comments, that makes me feel distant. So does someone’s incessant talk about a single topic. If you want to become friends with me, avoid these behaviors.

Do the opposite and we stand a good chance of becoming friends. Pay attention to me, show interest. Respect me. Demonstrate your humanity. Offer help when I need it. Do those things, and there’s a good chance that when you have a concern or invite me to do something, I’ll at least pay attention.

How about you? What are your suggestions?

Statistics

• Tweets: 1793
• Followers: 434
• Following: 732
• Google search for “Palm Springs Toastmasters”: positions #1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 14, 18, 19
• Google search for “Palm Springs Public Speaking: #1, 7
• Bing search for “Palm Springs Toastmasters”: #2, 4, 6, 7, 9, 11, 13, 14, 16
• Bing search for “Palm Springs Public Speaking”: #6, 7, 12
• Yahoo Search for “Palm Springs Toastmasters”: #1, 3, 5, 6, 8, 9
• Yahoo Search for “Palm Springs Public Speaking”: #6, 7, 24

Care and Maintenance of Your Twitter Account

[This blog is a continuing exploration of the public relations efforts, particularly via social media, of Palm Springs Toastmasters. It aims to be a discussion about what to do, and what to avoid. We hope that it will serve as a tutorial for anyone contemplating public relations on behalf of a local organization such as our club.]

Like your car, your hair, and your computer, your Twitter account needs maintenance from time to time.

But just as people comb or cut their hair in different styles, there are different preferences regarding styles of Twitter accounts. Some seek to grow the largest network possible–they want followers, and it doesn’t matter who. For others, Twitter is mainly a different way to gab and gossip with friends. Some seem to aim for world domination, ever comparing their Kout score to others’.

How you should groom your Twitter account depends on your objectives.

We aim for a targeted network. Actually, it is a multi-targeted network. Of course, we want to include all of our club members. Second, we have a keen interest in promoting our club within our geographic neighborhood. And, for various reasons, we are interested in connecting with Toastmasters around the world.

Waiting for these connections to appear all by themselves is not a very effective strategy. We have been actively seeking and following accounts that match the demographics we are interested in. And we carefully manicure our persona (which some people call our ‘brand’) to attract and maintain the attention of people in those demographics.

Promotion in our geographic community actually has two prongs. We want to connect with everyone here who has an interest in leadership and speaking, and we are particularly keen on developing relationships with people in the media.

Finding and identifying people in these parts is not all that hard. Picking out who shares our interests can be. Our strategy has been to get their attention and then let them decide.

Means of getting their attention include following them, tweeting valuable things, and commenting on their tweets. We follow pretty much anybody who lives around here, and if they are interested, they will follow back.

STOP THE NOISE!

If you follow everyone, obviously your stream will be cluttered with all sorts of stuff, most of which will not be of any value to you. There are a couple of ways to improve the signal-to-noise ratio. One is pruning out the dead wood, and another is focusing on people of special interest.

Fortunately, there are some great pruning tools out there. One of them is ManageFlitter . With it, you can easily identify and unfollow accounts that are not following back or are inactive. We unfollow all inactive accounts. And if, after a month or so, someone doesn’t follow us back, we remove them from among the accounts we follow.

Twitter provides a handy way to pay closer attention to people of particular interest: lists. You can create lists based on any criteria you can imagine. These lists then have their own tweet streams comprised of all the posts of everyone you put into the list. We have lists for Club Members (and friends), Local Speakers (including prospective club members), Local Media, and Other Toastmasters.

You change the oil in your car. You brush your teeth. You defrag your hard drive. And with proper care and maintenance, your Twitter account will serve you long and well.

Encouraging Continued Social Media Activity

                May 19, 2012

[This blog is a continuing exploration of the public relations efforts, particularly via social media, of Palm Springs Toastmasters. It aims to be a discussion about what to do, and what to avoid. We hope that it will serve as a tutorial for anyone contemplating public relations on behalf of a local organization such as our club.]

 

At the beginning of the last post, I posed three questions regarding our relative social media quiescence: 1) Does it matter? 2) Why has this occurred? 3) How might it be prevented? I only considered the first of the three.

In summary, our social media presence does indeed make a positive difference for our club, but not necessarily in all the ways I had hoped. Our lighter activity of late has not resulted in significant loss, but a prolonged social media absence would.

The reasons for our relative inactivity still pertain. They should be considered. And if our club’s social media presence is to be maintained, they should be addressed.

Oddly, our social media activity has been very lonely.

Most of our club members are apathetic toward social media, and some are wary or hostile. As a result, this labor is mostly unseen, unrecognized, and unappreciated by the club in general. My aims for greater community and learning within our organization have been frustrated.

(I actually hesitate to publish this post. One of our members thought an opinion similar to the one above denigrated our club members, and insisted that I remove it.)

Our attempts at outreach to members of the local community have not garnered much interaction, and there’s no evidence that it has been effective in inviting visitors to our meetings. This relative paucity of conversation does not mean it has failed, though; just that it is not as social nor yielded the precise results I had anticipated.

[This post does not address the benefits of social media, real as they are. Rather, it considers the problem of maintaining social media activity.]

When a person makes a statement or asks a question and gets no response, that person will feel that he is being ignored. This is discouraging, and will probably lead to a diminution of effort. (I hasten to add that the response to my work has not been totally lacking, but from within our club and our local community, it has seemed very slight.)

So, measures to avoid lapses in social media activity include interaction, recognition, and positive results. When these are at low levels, activity will wane. The converse is true: interaction, recognition, and positive results will encourage social media activity.

As alluded above and described in previous posts, our social media activity has been a boon to our club. Putting it aside would be a loss. But if it is to continue, an infusion of interaction, recognition and positive results is called for.

It may be that Twitter is not a good platform for these. I’ve been told that, within our local community and among Toastmasters, Facebook is more commonly used. (I have an aversion to Facebook, and do not pursue it. This is a personal preference, and no judgment on Facebook.) Diversifying platforms would probably help.

It is said that it is hard for people to develop relationships with an organization; that it is easier for people to relate and interact with a person. This is probably true. Changing our Twitter account avatar from the logo to a picture of the person tweeting might well be very helpful.

Thirdly, acceptance of social media will increase with time. Mark Twain declined offers to buy stock in Bell’s new-fangled telephone because he was convinced its use would be relegated to a tiny elite minority. He was wrong. In time, social media presence will, like the telephone, be expected. But not yet.

These experiments in social media have been part of my (self-defined) duties as VPPR of our club. As with all Toastmasters activity, it has been a great learning experience. My term of office will soon expire. My interest in social media on behalf of our club is equaled by observing how the foundation I have laid will be used by my successor.

 

Statistics

• Tweets: 1,671
• Followers: 424
• Following: 675
• Google search for Palm Springs Toastmasters: positions #1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 9, 11, 14, 18
• Google search for Palm Springs Public Speaking: #1, 13
• Bing search for Palm Springs Toastmasters: #1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 8, 11, 12
• Bing search for Palm Springs Public Speaking: #5, 6
• Yahoo Search for Palm Springs Toastmasters: #2, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9
• Yahoo Search for Palm Springs Public Speaking: #6, 9

Social Media AWOL–Who Cares?

                April 23, 2012

[This blog is a continuing exploration of the public relations efforts, particularly via social media, of Palm Springs Toastmasters. It aims to be a discussion about what to do, and what to avoid. We hope that it will serve as a tutorial for anyone contemplating public relations on behalf of a local organization such as our club.]

We have been inactive on this blog for about six weeks. And that is a very instructive lesson. Our other major social media presence, on Twitter, has also waned, but not so drastically.

Three questions come to mind: 1) Does it matter? 2) Why has this occurred? 3) How might it be prevented?

Does it matter? Social media evangelists and self-proclaimed ‘experts’ say (and vociferously) that it does matter. Scads of owners of abandoned, inactive accounts, and scads more that have and continue to shun social media, say it doesn’t.

To answer the question, we should re-visit our objectives for our social media presence, and see if it has delivered. My list of objectives includes:

•  new relationships with prospective members
•  enhanced SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
•  improved community standing
•  connect with Toastmasters world-wide
•  learning opportunities

I do not believe that there has been any measurable progress on developing relationships with prospective members. Relationship-building usually takes time, however, and we’ve only been at this for about three months. On the other hand, it takes two to tango; are there potential members that we can reach via social media? Is the pool of local tweeps sufficiently large? I don’t know. It seems to me that social media are generally more effective when the target audience is not geographically limited. This will change, however; the time is coming when all organizations will be active in social media as a matter of course. But that time is not yet here, and Twitter and Facebook might well not be the preferred platforms!

Judged by enhanced SEO, this has been a great success. In mid-February, about a month into this social media experiment, a Google search for ‘Palm Springs Toastmasters’ had our club in spots #1, 6, and 7. Today, our club has all the top 8 positions on the same search.

Has our social media presence enhanced our standing in the community? That is very hard to judge. Surely there are some people here who are more aware of us, our activity, and the nature of our club.

Social media have definitely connected us with Toastmasters clubs around the world. And, this being “social” media, this often involves actual exchanges, not merely announcements.

Alas, learning opportunities are limited to those involved. In our club, there are only two people involved in social media. Those two have benefitted, but until or unless other members jump in, this benefit will be negligible from a club standpoint.

At the beginning of the post, I posed three questions regarding our relative social media quietude: 1) Does it matter? 2) Why has this occurred? 3) How might it be prevented? I’ve only considered the first of the three. The reasons for our relative inactivity still pertain, so addressing the second and third questions may be significantly delayed.

We heartily welcome your comments, below!

Why Did We Tweet What We Tweeted?

                Mar 9, 2012

[This blog is a continuing exploration of the public relations efforts, particularly via social media, of Palm Springs Toastmasters. It aims at being a discussion about what to do, and what to avoid. It is hoped that it will serve as a tutorial for anyone contemplating public relations on behalf of a local organization such as our club.]

Our club Twitter account has posted 800 tweets–eight hundred mini-utterances that we have unleashed to the world. What have we hoped to gain by all that? How have we tried to achieve our aims? In other words, Why Did We Tweet What We Tweeted?

I’ve summarized our club’s social media goals here: Social Media–How Do You Get Paid?   It’s worthwhile to review them (and debate them, and revise them!). But basically, it’s about developing relationships. Relationships within our club, relationships with potential club members and friends, and relationships with like-minded people around the globe.

With that in mind (and maybe it is wrong), how does one develop relationships? You show interest, ask questions, make helpful suggestions. When it works, you have deeper relationships. Those relationships can lead to new opportunities for sharing, learning, and collaboration. They can also lead to people wanting to deepen the relationship even further by joining our club.

So we listen. We actively seek out people in our geographic neighborhood who show some concern about communications and leadership skills. When we find them, we include them among the people we pay attention to. When they post something we think is worthwhile, we comment or re-tweet. (To read our discussion on what we find ‘worthwhile,’ and what we don’t, see Guidelines for Club Brand  and  Censorship . And please add to the discussion!)

We also just say things—things we think will be interesting or valuable to our followers. We share things such as when and where we meet, and things we think will be helpful or interesting to the people in our (various) communities.

I should add that just being active in social media provides benefits of its own, even if we just were to spout gibberish. Our mere active presence puts us higher in internet searches, such as through Google or Bing.

Current statistics: 800 tweets. Following 622. 226 followers. Internet search on “Palm springs toastmasters”, via Google: #1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10; via Bing: #1, 2, 5, 7, 8, 10. Via Yahoo: #1, 3, 6, 7, 10.

Internet search on “palm springs public speaking”, via Google: #6, 7, 8. Via Bing: #6. Via Yahoo: #7.

We thrive on comments (and wither without them). Please join in the discussion, below.

Censorship

                Mar 4, 2012

[This blog is a continuing exploration of the public relations efforts, particularly via social media, of Palm Springs Toastmasters. It aims at being a discussion about what to do, and what to avoid. It is hoped that it will serve as a tutorial for anyone contemplating public relations on behalf of a local organization such as our club.]

In a previous post to this blog, I made some characterizations of our club members’ level of social media activity. One of our members found this objectionable–objectionable to the point that it ought be removed, edited out of the post.

Representing the club as I do, it is my responsibility to be supportive of our members. So I did indeed remove the section deemed offensive by the club member.

Clearly, anyone representing an organization should avoid saying things that don’t support the organization. Some set of rules is surely required (see “Guidelines for Club Brand”). (The degree of formalization of these rules is a separate question; they could range from personal discretion to some official decree.)

But that would not have averted this brief dispute over the section in the post. I still do not understand what it was about the section that the member found troublesome.

So who gets to decide what should be expunged? If the executive committee at world headquarters were to tell me to remove something, should that be reason to do so? What about a club officer speaking individually? Perhaps any club member should have absolute veto power over all PR efforts. Maybe that should even be extended to people outside of our organization.

What are the effects of a censorship doctrine on a public relations officer? What about the effects of a lack of a doctrine?

How much trust should be given to anybody representing the organization? And who should have overriding authority?

As always, we welcome your comments.

Current statistics: 761 tweets. Following 652. 211 followers.

Guidelines for Club Brand

                Mar 2, 2012

Your online presence is a representation of you; or, if you are working on behalf of some organization, it’s a representation of your organization. It has a personality. Some people call this a brand.

It comes across in what you post, what you retweet and like, and how you interact with other people. It is rather shocking to me that I am, all on my own, defining our Toastmasters club’s online persona.

It would be absurd to have every post, tweet or update pre-approved by the executive committee. Still, there probably should be a set of guidelines.

This set of guidelines would serve to keep our social media presence in line with how we want our club to be represented. It would keep the social media practitioner–me, right now–from going astray. It would also provide some direction for anyone else who would help with the job, and provide some continuity when the job is passed on to somebody else.

So here is my shot at defining our online brand.

We are a Toastmasters club. As such, our online brand must conform with our club’s mission. To wit:

“The mission of a Toastmasters club is to provide a mutually supportive and positive learning environment in which every member has the opportunity to develop communication and leadership skills, which in turn foster self-confidence and personal growth.”

Our interests, then, include oral presentation and leadership skills. More broadly, they include language, effective communication of all sorts, and anything dealing with how organizations can be run well.

Also, we are a professional organization. This will also define how we represent ourselves. We are courteous and polite, but not stuffy. We are helpful, both to individuals and our communities.

That brings up the question of what our communities are. One is our geographic community, which is, broadly, the Coachella Valley. We are concerned about local politics and community events. Our club does not espouse particular political or religious viewpoints, however.

Another community is comprised of our club members and friends. As a club, and exhibited by our online presence, we are supportive of these individuals, their interests and activities.

Yet another community is made up of Toastmasters around the world, and other people with the same or related interests.

So, that’s my set of guidelines, first draft.

Consistent branding demands consistency in online presence. How formalized should that consistency be? Where should it come from?

Dear reader, what do you think? Please add your comment below.

Current statistics: 737 tweets. Following 636. 209 followers. Internet search on “Palm Springs Toastmasters” via Yahoo: #1, 2, 4, 5, 8. Via Google: #1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 10.

Internet search on “Palm Springs public speaking” via Yahoo: #4. Via Google: #6, 7, 9.