HootSuite
ALERT™ Tip: Geo-Targeted Twitter Search in Hootsuite
Twitter is a great tool for discovering what people are saying about a company, brand, or any other topic. However, if you are only interested in conversations from a certain location, using Twitter’s search function might not be very helpful.
Overall, Hootsuite is a great tool for managing your company’s Twitter account. One particular feature makes it exceptional for finding conversations from a specific location.
Geo-targeted Search
Here’s how you use it:
- Log into Hootsuite (or create a new account if you don’t have one).
- Click the magnifying glass located at the top right.
- Enter the desired keyword in the Search Twitter field.
- Click the circular (cross-hair) located right of the search field.
- In the window that pops up, click the Save as Stream button.
The resulting stream will show tweets that include your desired keyword, in your proximity.
Now if you want tweets from a location that is different from your current city, you will first need to determine the latitude and longitude of the desired location. You can use http://itouchmap.com/latlong.html to figure out the coordinates.
How to Edit Geo-Targeted Search
- Locate the stream you just created in Hootsuite.
- Click the inverted triangle located at the top right of the stream.
- Select Preferences from the drop down menu.
- In the search query field, replace the existing coordinates with the desired coordinates (make sure you only replace the coordinates section – bolded in this example “canucks geocode:49.2639013,-123.1117966,25km”).
- If you want to expand or restrict the geo-target radius, change the distance configuration in the search query (25km is the default distance).
- Click the Save Changes button.
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Brought to you by ALERT™
ALERT™ is a proprietary system for creating online strategies that deliver measurable results. The five stage process (Assess, Locate, Engage, Respond & Track) and web application helps traditional marketing, advertising and PR agencies learn and adapt their skills to become online power houses.
For more information on licensing ALERT™, contact us.
Tags: ALERT™, geo-target, HootSuite, licensing, magnify digital, search, Twitter
Managing Social Media Burnout
A reporter from CTV News came to Magnify Digital today to ask what advice we could offer to people with social media burnout. Turns out, managing time spent on these all-consuming networks is a popular new year’s resolution. You can see why it would be. The problem is there’s no on/off switch for social media. It’s always on. And we have more and more ways to connect to it. Through our computers, our phones, other handheld devices. Never before has social media been so prevalent and accessible.
Here are some tips on how you can reclaim some of your personal time:
- Limit the amount of time you spend on social networks. Even go as far as setting timers, to remind you when to step away.
- If you’re spreading yourself too thin trying to maintain multiple profiles across several networks, ditch one or two. Focus on fewer channels; maybe even just one.
- Consider dropping a friend or acqaintence if they’re too chatty and constantly require too much of your social time online. If that feels too harsh, then resist always giving him/her a response. You’ll train them to stop expecting it… and hopefully, asking for it too.
- On Facebook, turn off your chat function. That way, if you’ve limited yourself to ten minutes on Facebook, you won’t get caught using 8 of those 10 minutes on a chat. To find this function, look to the bottom right of your personal profile page. If the circle beside chat is green, you’re open for business. Simply click on this to open the chat function, select ‘options’ and ‘go offline’.
- If having a daily presence on social networks is important to you, use tools that can post your content for you. You can pre-schedule messages using tools like Hootsuite to populate your Twitter profile, Facebook, LinkedIn, and many others.
- Likewise, Ping.fm & Friendfeed are two examples of tools that give you the “one-stop-shop” option. If you want to post a message to Facebook, Twitter and MySpace all at the same time – these tools will do that for you.
- Even location-based tools like Foursquare and Gowalla can be managed simultaneously. Gowalla recently integrated Foursquare, Tumblr, and Facebook into its platform.
- If you’re feeling burnt out from too many messages on Twitter – also referred to as a congested stream – free tools like Tweetdeck allow you to organize who you’re following into columns (like friend tweets only, tech tweets, foodie tweets, etc.). That way, you can limit how much you see without having to drop friends or people you like to follow.
- And finally, this post would not be complete without mentioning mobile apps! These little gems can be a friend or foe when it comes to helping manage burnout. Apps can simplify access to social media – but perhaps too much. Limit your use of applications just as you would the social networks they’re enabling.
What do you do to manage a threat of burnout online?
Erin
Tags: Apps, burnout, chat, Erin, facebook, foursquare, friendfeed, gowalla, HootSuite, LinkedIn, ping.fm, time management, Tumblr, tweetdeck, Twitter
Resuscitate Your Twitter Account
Creating, using and managing your personal or business Twitter account is a lot of work. If you didn’t realize this when you first created your Twitter account, it is likely being left idle and unattended for weeks or even months.
Many accounts have faced this fate and many more will likely join them in the Twitter abyss where fail whales loom and Twitter droppings litter the ground.
Twitter users may have abandoned their accounts for a number of reasons, for example, stating:
- “I don’t have time to tweet anymore”
- “Twitter isn’t that exiting or fun anymore”
- “I don’t think anyone is even reading my tweets”
These are legitimate reasons, but there are ways you can overcome them.
Twitter is an effective tool that can be used in a strategy to reach real goals and objective. Using Twitter effectively, however, takes dedicated time and resources.
Here are some ways to overcome the challenges of using Twitter.
I don’t have time to tweet anymore
Tweeting on a daily basis is a challenge for many people. Finding and creating valuable tweets beyond what you ate for lunch today, takes time. This is where technology comes in.
There are many free tools that can help you tweet on a consistent basis.
Hootsuite allows you to preschedule tweets to publish them at a later date. If you know you’ll be busy the entire day tomorrow, why not schedule a tweet or two in advance.
Mobile apps like Twitter for the BlackBerry or Twitter for the iPhone allows you to tweet on the go.
Twitter isn’t that exiting or fun anymore
It’s true that the dramatic growth of Twitter adoption has plateaued a bit, but what’s special about Twitter is not the tool itself, but what you make of it. If you’re bored with what you’re currently doing on Twitter, why not try something new?
Use a 3rd party app, such as StumbleUpon’s iPad app to discover new content and configure your new stumbles to publish on Twitter. (If you need help on how to set it up, ask me in the post’s comments section).
Or maybe find a new group of Twitter users who share a similar interest as you or your business industry and start conversations with them. You can discover new users through Twitter lists, through Twitter directories like WeFollow.com or through hash tags like #canucks (for Canuck fans) or #worldcup (for World Cup fans).
I don’t think anyone is even reading my tweets
It’s hard to be motivated to tweet on a consistent basis if you think you’re speaking to a void. The best way to increase the number of people who read your tweets is by building solid relationships with other Twitter users. Those who find you interesting will likely read and perhaps even retweet your tweets.
Do you feel good when someone retweets your tweets? Well, you’ll probably make them feel good by retweeting their tweets too.
Happy tweeting,
Victor
eMarketing Strategist
Tags: account, app, fail whale, HootSuite, retweet, Twitter, wefollow
Fresh is Best?
How do you send out your Twitter messages – fresh and in the moment – or stale and canned?
I’m being overly harsh to make a point.
Lately I’ve been paying a lot more attention to which tool folks are using when tweeting. You may have noticed the little time stamp under the tweet. Beside that, is which tool the person used to get their message out.
For the record, I am a big fan of HootSuite. There is no shortage of reasons why this app is excellent and worth checking out if you haven’t already. However, I must admit that I sometimes wonder if there will ever be a quiet backlash against tools that allow people to stockpile tweets. It feels a bit like predetermining one end of a conversation before the conversation even starts.
In my opinion, the attraction of Twitter is the spontaneity it encourages in its users and the authenticity it implies in its nature (‘What are you doing right now?’). A tool that takes away the ‘in the moment’ part of Twitter creates questions in my mind.
Will people look over tweets that have been preconceived?
Will anyone ever turn up their nose to a user who might not even be online when their HootSuite message is broadcast out to the Twitterverse?
Will people perceive the use of tools such as this as counter to the very nature of the social channel for which it was invented?
That said, tools like HootSuite can be invaluable for those who want to maintain a strong connection with their followers, and stay ‘top of mind’ by having consistent, reliable tweets – despite not having consistent and reliable stretches of time in which to dedicate to their Twitter profiles. Additionally, HootSuite also offers a way to track your tweets giving you an idea if people actually care for what you’re writing about.
Your thoughts? Do you ever look to see which tool someone you’re following used to get their message out? Does it matter to you? Which Twitter tools do you use and why?
Erin Garrity
Sr. Producer
Tags: HootSuite, scheduled Tweets, Twitter
