The first and not recommended option for Twitter users when promoting content is manually tweeting every time you post a blogpost, video, podcast. This is not recommended, especialy when most bloggers post more than once a week at their blog, FaceBook, LinkedIn,etc. and upload a video to YouTube every now and then. You would usually like to tweet on most of that. Luckly, today you can add your Twitter account to most of the existing platforms.

Some of the more simple examples are:

1.Wordpress Twitter plugin – There are many plugins for WordPress that tweet automatically every post you publish. The one I am using currently is Easy retweet.
2.Linkedin – A short time ago LinkedIn added the option to synchronize your LinkedIn status and tweets(th anks guys!) . This is how it will appear

3. Youtube Channel – You can add your twitter account to your YouTube channel, and post automatic tweets with every new video you upload.

4. Tweetdeck - One of the more popular applications for the web and mobile devices. The latest version supports multiple users on Twitter, Facebook and Linkedin.

However, although I recommend all these tools and methods, it is also recommended to keep a balance with your tweets and status updates on Facebook and Linkedin. Most people want and need the personal touch –  people would like to hear more than just your last published posts. Try to balance your tweets with a few personal thoughts, link to others and combine tweets about your activity. That part of it could be your last post or video. Another option is setting up a different Twitter user for your business – this way you’ll post only business related tweets and links.

After all that said and done, you can also follow this blog on Twitter here, or follow us personally – Yohay or Doron

Advantages:

1. Search Engine Strength: Naymz does very well in search engines. This is very important for reputation management. When someone looks you up on Google or Yahoo and finds content that you control, this helps your personal branding. Naymz content also helps push down web mentions of yourself that you’d prefer not be seen or emphasized. This is definitely the No. 1 reason to sign up for Naymz.
2. Free introductions: Introductions to people that you have no connection to are limited in LinkedIn, and aren’t totally free. In Naymz, it’s all free.
3. Reputation Monitor: Naymz supplies a tool for reputation monitoring across the web, scanning social networks and blogs. This is both interesting and useful.
4. Microblogging: Naymz offers status messages similar to Facebook and fast growing Twitter. This way, Naymz is somewhere between chaotic Twitter and intra-corporation Yammer. It can be quite useful.

Disadvantages:

1. Size: Naymz boasts that it has over one million users. This is enough for signing up, but LinkedIn is much bigger (over 45 million people) and is a synonym with Professional Networking site.
2. Anonymous recommendations: While being anonymous is necessary in some spooky cases, when you’re building your reputation, an identified recommendation is better than an anonymous. Would you trust a faceless person when networking or when hiring someone?
3. Premium Services: While also LinkedIn has premium services, one of these services is disturbing – the detailed visitor tracking. It means that only users that paid Naymz will get to see who visited their profile. This privacy issue doesn’t make me feel so comfortable – I don’t want the user to see that I’ve visited his profile. Also MyBlogLog has the same disadvantage that disturbs many bloggers.
4. No Groups: LinkedIn groups are an excellent and useful feature, that draws me to the site again and again. Naymz doesn’t have this feature, and I find it to be a big disadvantage.

I hope that Naymz will grow and get better. In the meantime, having a profile there is great for reputation management, but still not the best tool for networking.

Read more on how to use LinkedIn.

One of the most useful and effective tools on LinkedIn is recommendations.

LinkedIn recommendation link

On LinkedIn you can recommend or get recommended by any of your connections. Recommendations are added to your public profile, and can be seen by anyone.

Recommendations on LinkedIn profile

Take the time to ask your connections on LinkedIn to write a few kind words about you. The importance here is that your LinkedIn profile is part of your online reputation, seen by people you would like to conduct business with or have them hire you or be your customers. These are the exact people that will see your recommendations if you would have them. In many cases, colleagues, former employers or friends will have no problem recommending you (it doesn’t have to be more than a 4-5 lines). Of course I would suggest writing a few recommendation yourself to help friends and colleagues and to return a favor.

Another important thing is to know about the applications you can add to LinkedIn. There are many around and I will give one as an example I added to my profile. I added the wordpress app a short while ago. This application retrieves new posts from my blog (this blog in this case) and shows a preview of it in my profile.

Wordpress app for LinkedIn

In this way, my blog gets more exposure, and my connections can get closer and know what I’m writing about or what interests me. There are many more linking to other applications outside LinkedIn for many purposes.

In conclusion to the last three posts on LinkedIn, I recommend setting up a LinkedIn user, getting connected with it. Use its features as explained on this blog with recommendations, groups and applications. After a short term of 2-3 months your profile will be a substantial point on your map of business network.

…One last thing, when you need to introduce yourself to new people,  provided your LinkedIn user is up and running, you could export or link in an email your public profile instead of a short CV or abstract. This way people can see everything they need to know about you (and only what you chose to show…). Here is mine.

How to connect to unfamiliar people: LinkedIn is a great and fast way to connect to people you would like to do business with, but haven’t met before. Here are a few ways on how to do it.

First of all, I recommend as a prior step to get connected to all your existing connections as described in my last post: LinkedIn – Increase Your Networking. After doing so, the LinkedIn system will automaticly suggest people you might know, and can be used to connect to people you might want to know. This appears on the upper right side of your screen titled “People you may know”.

LinkedIn - People you may know feature

By clicking the ‘See more’ link below the ‘People you may Know’ box a long list of possible connections will appear. You can approach these connections through a third party, who will be a connection of both of you. You can also approach directly and it would be acceptable if you have a mutual work place or school or any kind of organization.

A good example would be approaching someone you don’t know personally, but heard him speak at a convention, and you might think could help your business. You could start by sending a message on LinkedIn, telling a few words about yourself and your business, write what in the speech was relevant to you, and ask politely to meet in person, talk over the phone, or maybe send some additional information. This way you might just grow your network of connections faster and beyond your current familiar friends and colleagues.

In our next post we will review the recommendations feature on LinkedIn.

I’ll start by advising  anyone who isn’t a user yet, to sign up now. Even If you are not looking for new business opportunities, or looking for a new job, you should consider using this social site. The first and obvious reason is it takes time to build a substantial and meaningful user on any social site whether it’s Facebook, Stumbleupon, a new blog or even Twitter. Linked in is no different in this case. When you will need this application for any professional cause, you would want and need your user to be already active, strong and meaningful so others would want to be connected to you and help you in your business actions.

Well, the first thing after setting your user, is getting connected. As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, you start off with the people close to you. Although most of these people are your day-to-day connections that you meet even weekly, they can become a path to new connection. Start by adding your co-workers as connection, other people you know from places you worked for. You can then add friends and family, for example, I had my mother join Linkedin,and become a connection, and now she is using Linkedin for her coaching business. From here on you’ll have Linkedin suggest new connections you might know weekly. Don’t be afraid offering people interesting to you to become a connection, even if you hardly know them. You never know who would need or want to become your connection.

LinkedIn Groups- One of the things I really found useful is the groups you can join, participate in, get information and read on Linkedin. there are groups on a wide range of topics, issues and subjects. from technology to HR, Sports, SEO ,medical issues though legal groups you will find the group right for you. I would advise not to join to many groups, but join the ones related to your field of work, or topics you want to learn about. pic 2-3 groups at first(you can add more at anytime you want) and start reading what other professionals are saying, get to know the people and even add information of your own. This is a great place to know people and make connection far from your local network.

In my next posts we will review more features that can serve your network of LinkedIn such as recommendations, applications and upgrading your profile.