• brand?
• company?
• organization?
• charity?
• cause?
• issue?
• product?
• service?
• anything that someone might like?

Then give people an opportunity to become your fan on Facebook.

With more than 200 million active users (half of whom check it daily), Facebook should be a key part of your communications strategy.

Since it’s such a great tool for reaching a targeted audience, I’m exploring Facebook as part of my job search strategy (forgive me for a little self-promotion now).

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Know anyone looking for a communications specialist?
Send them my resume! Thank you.
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Today, we’ll cover the basics of creating your first fan page. You can also check out my step-by-step guide to advertising on Facebook.

Creating a fan page costs nothing, and it allows you to connect with your audiences in meaningful ways. Facebook treats pages like personal profiles: your fans will receive updates from you on their homepage, just like they do from their friends. You can’t buy that. Obviously, you want fans.

Here’s the step-by-step guide to creating a Facebook fan page:

Step 1: Visit facebook.com/pages/manage/ and click on “+ Create Page”.

Step 2: Choose a category, name your page, and state your authority to speak on your client’s behalf.

Step 3: Now you need to add content. Add (1) a photo, (2) a blurb, and (3) some background with a link to your website. If you have other stuff to add–even better!

Step 4: Check your settings. Click “Edit Page” under your profile picture. Here you have options for gender, age restrictions, published/unpublished, and applications.

Step 5: Publish. Double-check everything first, then change “Published Status” under “Settings.”

Step 6: Get fans. Congratulations! You have a fan page. Celebrate! But don’t think that we’re going to stop there. Now you need some fans. You start. Click “Become a fan!” Then you’ll have the opportunity to suggest that your friends also become fans.

Step 7: Advertise your new page to your target audience. Follow my step-by-step guide to advertising on Facebook. If you select your fan page as an ad’s destination, Facebook will automatically include social actions: users can become your fan directly from the ad, as well as see any of their friends who are already fans.

Don’t forget to send people to your page from other places as well (like your website and Twitter).

Step 8: Update your page regularly (but don’t spam).

Continuing adding photos, wall posts, video, links, discussions, etc. Make your page valuable and worth people’s time, and your fan base will continue to grow.

You can even target updates to followers with specific demographics.

Step 9: Track metrics (Click “View Insights” under your picture). Here you can see who’s interacting with your page and how.

That’s it! You’re well on your way to Facebook success.

If you’ve developed a fan page, share your experience in the comments! How have you used fan pages? How has your brand benefited as a result? What challenges did (or do) you face?

If you’re just considering creating a fan page, what’s holding you back?

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Like it? Tweet it! A step-by-step guide to creating and promoting a Facebook fan page: http://djgpr.com/FBfan

You can also become a fan of “Helping David get a job” on Facebook!

Useful Twitter searches on Twitter

• near:orangecounty free
• near:orangecounty job
• near:orangecounty lds
• near:orangecounty opening
• near:orangecounty need
• near:orangecounty pr -su.pr
• “to apply” opening
• message looking for near:california
• PR looking for near:california
• PR looking for near:texas
• #tworco
• #entrypr
• djgpr (I can use this to track links using my “Tweet it!” link)
• @DavidJGarcia -RT (Find out who’s talking to or about your friends)
• “up again” OR “is down” gmail
• traffic slow near:losangeles within:10mi

Useful Twitter searches on Google

• PR “orange county” intitle:”on twitter” site:twitter.com
• “bio * corporate communications” intitle:”on twitter” site:twitter.com

Useful Twitter searches on Topsy

• news [hour]
• times [hour]
• CNN [week]

Also, in case you don’t know: Twitter has an advanced search page: http://search.twitter.com/advanced.

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Like it? Tweet it: Tools & Tech: 21 Useful Twitter Searches – http://djgpr.com/21

Content:

1. Creative Commons music
2. Creative Commons on flickr
3. Wikimedia Commons
4. Freelance communicator
5. RecordMyCalls
6. Embeded audio player
7. Audacity
8. Simple text editor (Notepad)

Communicating:

9. Gmail
10. Google Talk
11. Facebook chat
12. (Soon) Google Voice
13. Resume
14. Contact information (phone/email)
15. (Soon) Google Wave

Your blog:

16. WordPress
17. Great WordPress theme
18. Twitter widget
19. RSS feed icon
20. Feedburner RSS subscriptions
21. Feedburner email subscriptions
22. Commenting system

Social  media:

23. Twitter
24. Facebook profile
25. Flickr
26. YouTube
27. Vimeo
28. TweetDeck

Hard copies:

29. Resume
30. Business cards

Tracking:

31. Google Analytics
32. Self-hosted URL shortener (aka djgpr.com)

Monetizing:

33. Google AdSense
34. Amazon Associates

Advertising/PR:

35. Google AdWords
36. Facebook page
37. Facebook ads
38. Business Wire
39. Marketwire
40. Craigslist

Search/Resources:

41. Twitter search
42. Topsy
43. Google
44. Google image search
45. Google Reader

What tools did I leave out that you consider must-have?

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Like it? Tweet it!

(Creative Commons image from flickr user flattop341)

So you’ve decided that you’re ready to start using video in a campaign, on your homepage, or in your blog. Exciting! Video is a fun way to communicate, and you finally have the resources and ambition. Maybe it will even go viral.

So you:

1. Decide what you want your video to show.
2. Buy some equipment.
3. Figure out how to record and edit.
4. Pick out some places to post it.
5. Wait to see what happens.

Stop.

It’s easy to approach the project this way. It makes sense, after all, to proceed from beginning to end. Usually, that’s good advice. But for your video (or any communications campaign, for that matter), you’ll get better results if you begin at the end.

Instead of the first example, approach it this way:

1. Purpose. First, decide what you want to accomplish. Are you driving sales? Increasing loyalty? Building trust? Solving a customer support complaint? After you’ve made this decision, then consider if video is really the best way to accomplish your goal. If it is, proceed to step two:
2. Distribution. How and where will this video be used? DVD? Blog? Corporate website? YouTube? TV? This will determine your format(s).
3. Process. Now that you know what you want to end up with, decide how you’ll record and edit in order to get the desired end result. How will you tell the story?
4. Equipment. Will you need one camera or two (or more)? Do you want broadcast-quality HD or just YouTube quality? If you addressed the first three issues, choosing equipment will simply be a matter of getting the most bang for your budget.
5. Content. Now you can develop your video content with confidence because you know what you’re hoping to accomplish and how you’ll get there.

In conclusion (and with apologies to Mr. Carroll):

Begin at the end and work back till you come to the beginning; then go.

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What else would you like to learn in this “Tools & Tech” series? I’m open to suggestions.

Now, I love Microsoft Office as much as the next guy, but–let’s be honest–Word is rarely exciting. Part of the fun in communicating is using our toys to create multimedia experiences.

In this series, I’ll cover video, audio, photos, and more. First up: adding audio to your website or blog. This is a great place to start because it’ll cost you little to nothing in equipment and software.

Step one: RECORD

While a professional-level recording studio will obviously provide the best results if you’re producing a music album, you can get great audio for the web with any of these (much cheaper) tools:

1. A digital audio recorder: portable, specialized equipment, great for recording interviews or voice notes. You’ll spend less than $100 for some nice features, but if you can live without it, there are much cheaper options.
2. The voice recorder function on your MP3 player or cell phone. You may already own a simple version of a digital audio recorder. I’ve used my BlackBerry to record some audio posts (1, 2, 3) on this site.
3. A microphone connected to the mic jack on your computer. How much you spend depends on the quality of mic–but you get to choose.
4. A subscription service that records phone conversations. I’ve used RecordMyCalls.com, which charges a small subscription fee but gets the job done. If you need to record a phone conversation, this is one option.

Once you’ve recorded your source material, transfer it to your computer for editing.

Step two: EDIT

Although I’ve used more expensive programs, I always return to the free option: Audacity. It’s a free download, and it’s powerful enough that it can probably handle whatever you need. You’ll have to download one more file to let it export MP3s.

Clean up the file by adjusting audio levels, deleting “umm” noises and pauses, and removing any extra material.

Export the file as an MP3. Why?

• It plays almost anywhere.
• It’s compact.
• It sounds great.

Don’t forget to take advantage of Audacity’s tagging ability to specify artist, album, etc. A dialog box should appear when you export the MP3.

Step three: POST

Surprisingly, this is perhaps the most difficult step. How you approach it depends on your site. Ideally, you’ll upload the file using your blog or CMS platform or copy it directly using FTP. If you can’t do either of these, you’ll need to consider alternate file hosts (for now, try googlepages.com).

I recommend a link to the file, which allows the reader to download it directly. You can also use this code (source) to add a Google audio player to your site:

<embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://www.google.com/reader/ui/3247397568-audio-player.swf?audioUrl=MP3_FILE_URL" width="400" height="27" allowscriptaccess="never" quality="best" bgcolor="#ffffff" wmode="window" flashvars="playerMode=embedded" />

Just replace MP3_FILE_URL with the url.

Here’s an example preview of next week’s interview on diversity PR:

Download clip (.mp3)

For this interview:

1. I conducted it over the phone and recorded it using RecordMyCalls.com (record).
2. I edited it using Audacity (edit).
3. I copied it to my server and posted it with a direct link and the above code (post).

It’s that simple.

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Let me know what you think about this “Tools & Tech” series. Was this post too simple? Too complex? What else would you like to learn? I’m open to suggestions.

If you like this article, tweet it! And don’t forget to subscribe or come back tomorrow, because I’m posting new content every day this month.

(Creative Commons image by flickr user ralphbijker)

But a recent experience finally convinced me that–in certain cases–there’s a better alternative.

Instead of the vast array of information Google uses to index and rank pages, Topsy.com currently uses only one: tweets. This leads to some specific strengths and weaknesses. And if you understand them, you’ll know when a search can benefit from Topsy and when you’re better off sticking with Google.

Topsy is the better choice:

• When you’re looking for ideas.
• When you need a recommendation.
• When you want to crowd-source, but don’t have access to the right crowd.
• When you’re curious about current conversations.
• When you want to know what others are using.

Google is the better choice:

• When you’re looking for a specific piece of information.
• When you need an obscure tidbit.
• When you want to get something in a hurry, and you know how to find it.
• When you don’t want to sort through the bias of current conversations.
• When it’s important to find something that’s built trust online over time.

I recently did a massive overhaul of my online presence, and I wanted a new theme for my blog. So I did an experiment: I searched for “wordpress theme” on both Google and Topsy. First Google:

As you can see, Google did a great job listing collections of themes. The problem? I’ve seen all the collections. I’ve spent a lot of time pouring over them. I didn’t need a collection; I needed a recommendation. Enter Topsy:

Now I have a variety of resources: whatever people liked enough to share with their networks and described using the words “WordPress Theme”. The first result is not a collection of themes–it’s a specific theme that lots of people recommended. Other results included several articles that helped me decide what I wanted in a theme. Then, on the second page, result #11:

Forty-nine times, someone has recommended this resource. After checking it out and modifying it, it’s what I ending up using.

In this example, Topsy provided a better way to find what I was looking for. Of course, it has some potential disadvantages:

• It’s biased toward sources that cater to the Twittersphere.
• It’s limited to things people are posting on Twitter. If no one’s posted something, it won’t show up.
• Tweets by influential users count more than those by the rest of us. Good or bad–you decide.
• It may still be possible to game the system.

Topsy’s co-founder, Gary Iwatani, had the following response to these concerns. Since he was kind enough to quickly and fully respond, he gets a point in my book for good blogger relations and his responses printed in full:

“It’s biased toward sources that cater to the Twittersphere.”

Twitter is sometimes discounted as a serious source of information due to its “what are you doing?” origins.  The reality is that Twitter is a communications platform.  In addition to 30M+ users, virtually every major news organization and top blog uses Twitter including the following:

NY Times:   http://topsy.com/twitter/nytimes

MSNBC:   http://topsy.com/twitter/msnbc

WSJ  http://topsy.com/twitter/wsj

REUTERS:   http://topsy.com/twitter/reuters

ABC:  http://topsy.com/twitter/abcnews

CBS:   http://topsy.com/twitter/cbsnews

Time Magazine:   http://topsy.com/twitter/time

The Huffington Post:   http://topsy.com/twitter/huffingtonpost

“It’s limited to things people are posting on Twitter. If no one’s posted something, it won’t show up.”

This is technically accurate but the wide adoption of Twitter combined provides very good coverage of search terms and the fact that Topsy generates search results mined from real-time conversation streams is a big advantage – not a disadvantage versus traditional search.   Traditional search algorithms based on document link structures are inherently slower to respond to relevance changes (such as breaking news).  Furthermore, there tends to be an old document bias in traditional search results as important documents of the past (which have accreted significant PageRank value) are still considered relevant today since fresher contemporary link citations from the social web are ignored.   (Eg. Google first page search results for “apple” still shows a result for a battery replacement program for the iBook G4 from 2003.)

“Tweets by influential users count more than those by the rest of us. Good or bad–you decide.”

This is a good thing as it maximizes the “signal to noise” ratio in the search results and eliminates spam.   Every author, regardless of influence, is indexed and discoverable in Topsy under their own author page.  Example:  http://topsy.com/twitter/davidjgarcia

“It may still be possible to game the system.”

No system is fool proof however Topsy’s influence algorithms are very robust and much harder to game than traditional search engines.

One point I found interesting–if you use Twitter, your author page is a neat way to find out how many people are tweeting the same links as you (example).

What do you think of Topsy? Will you use it? Have you had any success using it instead of another option?

(More about Topsy at TechCrunch)

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