Minnesota - Social Networking & Web Tools

RE: What is your favorite web tool?

2010-01-30T17:52:19Z

Hello, my name is Eric, and my favorite web tool this week is Diigo, because it provides me a means to tapping into my students' social networking framework while discussing approaches to research.

RE: What is your Twitter ID?

2009-12-28T16:23:58Z

Slzimm1

RE: Assessment of success of social tools

2009-10-28T22:00:13Z

Thanks to iLibrarian for her post on the Christina Warren article "HOW TO: Measure Social Media ROI":

"Christina Warren at Mashable has put together a guide to How to Measure Social Media ROI. If you’re curious about how to measure the impact your social media initiatives are having, you’ll want to check out this helpful guide along with the not-to-be-missed Social Media ROI introductory presentation by Olivier Blanchard.

* ROI Reality Check
* Defining Clear Goals
* Metrics Tools
* Sentiment Analysis
* Social Media Product Suites
* Making the Data Usable"

RE: What is your favorite web tool?

2009-10-13T22:39:58Z

Hi My name is Kevin MacKenzie and my favorite web tools are at the moment Facebook, because there are so many people on it that I couldn't find in other tools, and Google Scholar, as I use it to show students that if they have to use Google for research, that it is the preferred site to visit.

RE: Assessment of success of social tools

2009-08-20T19:05:16Z

Thanks to Suzanne Smith for alerting me to this post with 100 Free Tools to Track Everything on Your Web Site.

Look like some great tools to get at the success of your social tools.

Thanks!

RE: Staff Policies for Social Networking?

2009-07-15T23:43:58Z

Hi Patrick,

I came across this blog post that I feel is a succinct summary of the different thoughts on this. The comments are especially interesting. As far as your specific example of the librarian reaching out to teens, that seems to be the easiest one to try out the blur between professional and personal--because teens don't see a separation and in fact may expect/appreciate seeing the "whole person" behind the communication. It may be less appropriate for other patrons who are less comfortable with that. It also seems to me that organizations who are leery about allowing staff to do this should articulate their reservations with staff and see if they can work together to put together some groundrules about what is unacceptable behavior or content on a staff profile that is ever used for business purposes.

Sharon

Staff Policies for Social Networking?

2009-07-09T16:23:35Z

Hello all,
Is anyone aware of any policies addressing library staff performing professional duties via a personal, social networking profile (as Facebook policy doesn't seem to allow for the creation of a second, professional profile). For instance, a Young Adult Librarian using his or her Facebook account to connect with Teens?
Thanks for your time,
Patrick

RE: Assessment of success of social tools

2009-07-08T20:46:42Z

Thanks for these excellent thoughts and questions, Tim!

I wanted to add a couple more presentations that shed light (and more questions!) from Bill Johnston from Forum One.

Measuring the Success of Online Communities: http://www.slideshare.net/billjohnston/online-community-metrics-2007-presentation

Online Community ROI: Models and Reporting: http://www.slideshare.net/billjohnston/ocrn-webcast-4-3-08-presentation

RE: Assessment of success of social tools

2009-07-08T20:14:48Z

I'm one of those touchy feelie types who thinks we need to make sure we look at more than straight metrics. Sure, we have to get "established" door-count equivalent data for our managers (or manager's managers), but what about some of the deeper stuff?

The hard part is finding the balance between all the metrics that gives the "hard data" folks want and the still looks into what I'd call the stuff of real value (ie, what is the reach? how do people feel about the org/site? Are they compelled to act? How do you you measure ROI on a video that goes viral?).

Because the balance point for that value is different for every org (think of feedback elements as being sliders that you can adjust more or less), the "formula" and criteria for success is going to be different for every org, too.

Maybe for one org, you need to weigh heavily the value of having people tweet an idea that benefits your mission? What about if they talk about it in a bar? How do you measure that and what does it look like?

I've seen estimates are that only 20 percent of what happens via twitter goes through the twitter site. So even from a pure metrics angle, you'd be missing something.

Another angle... you may not be able to totally measure ROI for any of these things to the satisfaction of the people in charge. But what about showing them the cost of NOT doing the program or social media campaign or whatever? Are they willing to be absent from the conversation? Are they prepared to lose out on that value just because you can't put a hard number on it?

Sorry this is mostly questions, but sometimes that's the problem with the interesting topics!

BTW, I've really been getting into podcasts from SXSW lately. Here are a few that are at least tangentially related to assessment:

- Stats Guru Nate Silver being interviewed by Stephen Baker: http://sxsw.com/node/1666

- Social Media Non-profit ROI Poetry Slam: http://sxsw.com/node/1510 (silly format, interesting info)

- Future of Social Networks: http://sxsw.com/node/1500 (social networks will be like air/water --everywhere -- what impact will this have on business models?

- Old Man Nielsen vs. new Market Research http://sxsw.com/node/1660 (mostly user-research/testing)-

RE: Assessment of success of social tools

2009-07-06T22:43:18Z

I thought this was a great collection of Blogs about: Social Media Metrics.

And here's an interesting list of Social Media Metrics from Rachel Happe. Saw it referenced here in Engaged Learning.

I'd love to hear if folks are writing/reading about metrics for social networking and web tools, theoretically, practically, whatever and wherever.

While the tools themselves may change over time, I don't think the need for demonstrating value or ROI of these tools in general will ever leave our workload.

Please share!

How are you using podcasting at your library?

2009-06-30T20:52:09Z

Another great question from the the webinar Bringing Web 2.0 into Academic Libraries.

-Anyone podcasting out there? I'm playing with Audacity.
-Podcasting seems like a really neat idea! What do you podcast about?
-my use of podcasting is still in the playing stage, but we are thinking of using it for school tours and lib instruction
-MSU Libraries podcasts: http://library.msstate.edu/podcast.html

How are you using podcasts?

How much time spent per week maintaining your library's Facebook presence?

2009-06-30T20:42:02Z

Another great question from the the webinar Bringing Web 2.0 into Academic Libraries.

How much time spent per week maintaining your library's Facebook presence?

A few folks answered:

About 15-30 min a day for facebook and twitter
wow!our twitter takes a lot more time than that!
Almost need someone at the computer at all times!
Our time for fb and twitter is scattered throughout the day, a minute here or there.

How do time manage maintaining your library's presence?

Assessment of success of social tools

2009-06-30T20:36:11Z

This question came out of the webinar Bringing Web 2.0 into Academic Libraries.

How do you assess/evaluate the success of the different social networking sites?

Privacy

2009-06-26T14:49:46Z

I am going to cross post this here and in the Intellectual Freedom discussion section. I think this article is worth reading although I don't necessarily agree with the suggested solution on how to achieve better privacy:

"Privacy Requires Security, Not Abstinence: Protecting an inalienable right in the age of Facebook." By Simson Garfinkel --
http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/22831/page1/

Targeting teens

2009-06-18T22:04:29Z

Here's something I think we're going to do (the stars have aligned, I guess), addressing three or four issues at one time.

The backstory is that we have lots of teenage volunteers, many of them "volunteering" as a high school graduation requirement. There are many more than we have interesting jobs (unless you consider dusting books interesting, some might).

We also now have an LTA intern who will begin his 96 hours of work in July.

We don't yet have a Facebook page, in part because we haven't developed content, in part because we've seen too many such paged "friended" only by hopeful authors and nearby libraries, and in part because I'd like to aim something at teens.

The plan is for our teenage volunteers to attend (and help with) various library programs and write reviews for a "Lake Villa District Library Programs" Facebook page. Note that they'd have to Friend the library page in order to write on its wall and that they'd likely want (need?) to point their friends, relatives, and teachers there ... with their Facebook friends, of course, having easy access and a new reason to Friend the library's page. That might go locally viral.

We'd of course post the basics of the upcoming programs on the page for whoever might be interested.

Our intern will work with our publicity/marketing department to get this started. Publicity has wanted a Facebook page for quite some time.

Here's to hoping!

RE: Technology Stewardship webinar

2009-06-16T12:39:26Z

Nancy White:

can you imagine using something like the spidergram to have conversations with those interested in technology in your communities and networks?

I started out being very excited about the application of the spidergram and I still am, but in a different way. Initially I was thinking of using the tool in a very comprehensive way to identify a whole range of technology tools that matched the activities of a community, but felt myself getting overwhelmed. More recently I have begun to think about using the spidergram in a more focussed way--doing a general mapping of community acitivies, but then applying that mapping to a specific project, in my case, website development.

For several months I have been leading a group of staff members in examining our current website to identify and implement a variety of improvements to our site. Though we call the project a website re-design, that is a misnomer in that our current site is part of a state government content management system which has some well-defined look and feel standards within which we must operate and some limitations on the tools available. We are not so much re-designing as we are trying to achieve an optimal deployment of the technology tools and services available to us.

The challenge is that with this less than comprehensive approach to redesign, we have had trouble focussing on the big picture. We get caught up in specific tweaks and changes to specific pages or content areas, but do not look at the overall picture.

At the moment, I am thinking of requesting an opportunity at our next full staff meeting to work through the spidergram activity and then start using the spidergram as the focal point of every activity and project related to our website--looking at the changes & updates we plan in relation to where it falls or how it supports the activities mapped in the spidergram.

Anyway, that is where things are in my head, but I have a long way to go to think through the actual implementation.

sheila

RE: Technology Stewardship webinar

2009-06-11T18:11:34Z

As promised, I joined WebJunction to participate in any follow up conversations. I realized I had LOTS of questions. My first one is "can you imagine using something like the spidergram to have conversations with those interested in technology in your communities and networks? What improvements might you suggestion?

Technology Stewardship webinar

2009-06-10T23:57:19Z

Please post your additional questions here from today's webinar.

RE: What is your favorite web tool?

2009-06-08T17:45:47Z

Really, wow, you converted from skeptic to fan!

RE: What is your favorite web tool?

2009-06-08T17:44:26Z

Hi Mindy, I've been hearing so many rave reviews of Leonard Cohen's concert tour that I'm starting to kick myself for passing it up. But I'm taking out the old LPs for a spin!