You’ve got to start with the customer experience and work back toward
the technology–not the other way around"

The other interesting tidbit so far is the title of Chapter 4, "Create
Twitter-Like Headlines."

Posted via email from George Dearing dot com

They’re tough to track down these days.

Sent from my iPhone
—————————-
m: 214.536.7072
georgedearing.com

Posted via email from George Dearing dot com

Nice conference follow-up from Melissa Brenton at Racepoint Group..met her at Enterprise 2.0. Looking forward to reading Larry Weber’s book — Sticks & Stones.

Sent from my iPhone
—————————-
George Dearing
Voice | 713.965.4440
georgedearing.com

Posted via email from George Dearing dot com

Thanks to FSB Associates for the review copy. I’ll be posting some of the Tweets periodically. It’s pretty entertaining stuff.

It’s a well-written book that does a great job documenting the real- world insights of startups and entrepreneurs. I like the way Mitra layers her own commentary alongside the stories she profiles. You have to have a good head for business to analyze a lot of what she breaks down in the book. She makes it look easy.

Sent from my iPhone
—————————-
George Dearing
GVoice | 713.965.4440
georgedearing.com

Posted via email

Image via Wikipedia

• Barnes & Noble unveils store for digital books [Reuters]
  More details on Barnes & Noble’s eBookstore launch. Big shot across the bow here: "Eschewing Amazon’s Kindle-only approach, the bookseller said its digital books could be read on the iPhone or iPod touch, Research in Motion Ltd’s Blackberry and most Mac and Microsoft Corp Windows laptops or desktop computers."
  (tags: barnes+noble amazon kindle plastic+logic digital+distribution downloads ebooks ereaders)

  

• Announcing the NYT API Tool [Open Blog - NYTimes]
  Good to see publishers thinking about this kind of content portability. content.
  (tags: NYT APIs web nytimes newspapers media developers code mashups)

  

• Hub using Twitter, Facebook in hunt for stolen bikes [BostonHerald.com]
  "Stolen Bikes Boston" using Twitter and Facebook for theft alerts.
  (tags: social+media socialnetworking boston+herald community online internet)

• Hey Newspaper Guys: Google’s Not Making Money From News | Techdirt
  "So if you built a news aggregator, powered by journalists, this would somehow unlock the value and get to $1.5B in annual revenues?
  NO…startups would be actually making a ton of money and chewing up the pop charts. Or Digg for that matter, or the Huffington Post." – [Chris Tolles,Topix]
  (tags: newspapers topix aggregator publishing google online+content content+distribution)

I received an advanced copy of Donald Trump’s book “Think Like A Champion” recently and just as I sat down to crack it open last night, I got a follow-up email from  FSB Media. They sent me a few of Trump’s “Survival Tips” to chew on as we fight through the slowdown.
“What’s happened to the economy has been likened to a tsunami as well as an implosion. This kind of event takes shape over a period of time and then erupts with incredible force. What happened this past year is similar in that respect — it’d been brewing for some time.”

Here’s the list:

• Pay attention to national and international news and finance coverage at least several times a day, preferably hourly. In volatile times, vigilance is necessary.

• Absorb, assess, and then act. Knowledge without action is impotence.

• When a tsunami hits, there’s no time for procrastination. Keep your momentum in tune with the times.

• Avoid your comfort zone — it’s probably outdated anyway.

• If you’re honest, you should know the questions that should be asked, as well as the answers. That’s probably why there’s so much confusion out there today.

• Remember The Blitz. That can put things into perspective. Things may be tough and getting tougher, but we’re not being bombed day in and day out either. If you don’t know what The Blitz is, use your time wisely to study WWII to find out.

• Is your life half empty or half full? Half is better than zip. Count your blessings.

• Realize that fear is the exact opposite of faith.

• Resolve to be bigger than your problems. Who’s the boss?

• Don’t negate your own power. Whatever you’ve been dealt, know you can deal with it.

I’m a little behind in my reading these days, but one book that jumped to the front recently is Twitter Power: How to Dominate Your Market One Tweet at a Time by Joel Comm.

I received a a review copy on Monday and just started a skim last night. It was a bit fortuitous too as I’ve had a few fundamental Twitter configurations I’ve neglected for some time. I’d liken it to what a lot of you early adopters do when you skip the readme file.

One of the things I stumbled on during a quick chapter scan was a few mobile and SMS tips. I didn’t realize you could text “on georgedearing” to 40404 to turn on device updates for a user’s tweets. The same command applies for turning them off, just text “off @georgedearing” and my updates will disappear from your tweetstream.

From the looks of the Table of Contents, Twitter Power has something for everyone. If you’re a nuts and bolts kind of girl or guy, you can spend a few hours just reading what I’d describe as the Twitter “manual’ of sorts.

The book dissects the service extremely well. Even if your a Twitter A-Lister, you’ll probably pick up a few tips if you can overcome your ADD fits. Most of the hardcore analysis of the app focuses on the “Settings” in Twitter and understandably so. From configuring your background to automating the delivery of messages to your cell phone, “Settings” is where you’ll spend most of your time.

One of the more valuable nuggets, especially for new users, is some of the best practices and guidelines Joel discusses. In that vein, I pulled out an excerpt below that discusses 5 observations related to Twitter etiquette. I’ll craft  a part II of the review as I finish up, but don’t hold your breath — go pick it up.

1. Don’t spam.

Spammers don’t survive long on Twitter. They don’t build followers. Any followers they do get don’t read their tweets and the number of conversions they can generate will be so tiny that as a marketing method, you’d probably be better off printing a thousand flyers, folding them into paper airplanes and tossing them out of your office window.

The spamming itself though is done by constantly sending out tweets that say things like: “I’ve just put up a new blog post — check it out!” or “Sign up for my RSS feed!”

2. Follow Style Rules.

Twitter’s founders may have had mobile phones in mind when they designed the service, and plenty of users may be typing their updates from their handheld devices, but Twitter isn’t exactly the same as SMS messaging.
That means the language needs to look more like real words than the usual SMS-style abbreviations.

What is permissible, though, is to use symbols such as @ and=and to skip some of the grammar. The question Twitter asks might be “What are you doing now?” but you don’t have to begin your answer by saying “I am . . . ”
Sentence fragments such “About to start watching the football. Can’t wait.” are fine.

3. Give Credit For Retweets.

The tricky bit is to get other people to retweet for you. While you can ask specifically for retweets — and some people do — it’s not really good form.
If your tweets are interesting enough, people will share them with their friends and followers — and those friends and followers will come to your page to find out who you are.

4. Stick To 140 Characters.

The alternative is to show half-complete tweets and offer links for people to continue reading or break messages up so that they’re sent over several tweets.

You can see this happening sometimes on Twitter, and it rarely looks good. Readers expect the content on Twitter to be small. They expect to be able to read and absorb it in one bite. These are content snacks, not three-course meals with coffee.

Writing a thought that takes more than 140 characters and spreading it over three or four tweets is giving people more than they want. It also makes you look like you’re dominating the conversation.

5. Follow People Who Follow You.

It’s a bit like strolling through the lobby during a break at a conference. I can choose which conversations to join and which to walk past.

Ultimately, I think this is one place where eventually you have to skip the etiquette and do what works. As your follower list grows, you’ll have to start being a little bit choosier about who you follow in return — and your followers will just have to understand that you’re being selective, not rude.

And that’s really the ultimate test of tweet etiquette: how other people react and how you would react to the same kind of thing.
If you’re building followers and they’re responding to what you’re writing, you’re following the right rules.

Related articles by Zemanta