J-P Voillequé › Comments

You may want to target senior executives, older people or others who just aren't very likely to read your blog posts, Twitter messages, etc. but chances are - those people have co-workers, family and others in their lives who would. By adding value to the lives of less senior people inside organizations, you can gain mindshare with the people in whose interest it is to make good recommendations to their superiors at work. - Marshall Kirkpatrick

Similarly, many mainstream journalists now participate in social media conversations for their research. Making yourself known as a topical expert to them online can help increase your visibility when it's time to write a story off-line. - Marshall Kirkpatrick

Here's a recommendation we offered to one non-profit organization that we often use as an example now for others. - Marshall Kirkpatrick

Let's say you work locally on a particular issue and you're interested in getting traditional press coverage. One way to pursue this is to subscribe to a feed for national media outlets, filter that feed for keywords related to your topic of interest and keep your eye out for breaking news or important topics on the national level. You might even set up an RSS to SMS alert. - Marshall Kirkpatrick

Then, when a story comes out in the New York Times about water quality, food transport costs, or whatever your issue of interest is, you can contact local press about it and say "I don't know if you've seen this national coverage on this topic [they probably haven't because you've automated watching for it] but if you're interested in a local angle, our Executive Director/CEO/[or insert more down to earth person] is a good expert source for a local perspective." - Marshall Kirkpatrick

You don't want to do that too often, but occasional and appropriate use of this tactic should be appreciated by the press you reach out to. It's mutually beneficial for both parties and could help you get that coverage in traditional media that's more likely to be read by your off-line target market. I honestly believe that even the smallest organization could grow its mindshare in mainstream markets quickly using tactics like this. - Marshall Kirkpatrick

******Readers and Friends - feel free to jump right in anywhere here with comments!! - Marshall Kirkpatrick

What if there's a way to do some "backwards compatibility" thing? Good chance people don't use social media, but use email. If there was some way to pipe communications to them in a form they recognize...Just thinking out loud. - Hao Chen

Tools to use for these tactics: For general participation and visibility among the social media users that do exist in your area of interest, check out Twellow.com for a directory of Twitter users by industry, do some searches on FriendFeed.com and find out what the top blogs in your area of interest are using the methods described in our post "Six Ways to Find Top Blogs in Any Niche." Just participating with like minded people in this space will move you up on their list for biz dev and marketing. - Marshall Kirkpatrick

If you're not familiar with RSS feeds, start with this introduction: RSS in Plain English. FeedRinse.com is one of the easiest to use feed filtering services. Feed filtering is also available inside Zaptxt.com, one of our favorite RSS to IM/Email alert systems. See also Pingie.com, a new alert service we've been using and Alerts.com an even newer one we wrote about this week. http://www.readwriteweb.com/archive... - Marshall Kirkpatrick

2. Use Web 2.0 Tools to Learn About Real Life Public Events - Marshall Kirkpatrick

MK, it seems to me that you need some demographics - who's the target? What do non-social media users need to either make the leap or improve their experience with traditional medias? "Getting edge" on information doesn't seem like news to people who already know that they should be using social media. Did that make sense? If the audience (and I can only assume RWW has an audience like this) is media savvy, then what's needed is a discussion of viral and/or "grandma emailed me a lolcat" strategems... - J-P Voillequé

Hmmmm....I think I follow what you're saying J-P and will take it into consideration. :) thx - Marshall Kirkpatrick

There may or may not be relevant events in your field that are attended by non-social media users and are listed on sites like Upcoming.org and Eventful.com. It's worth a look and worth subscribing to the RSS feeds for those searches. - Marshall Kirkpatrick

More likely, perhaps, is that your local newspaper's website has those kinds of events listings. Trade associations, nonprofit groups and other kinds of sites often have events listings as well. What has this got to do with social media tools? You can subscribe in the same RSS feed reader that you read blogs in to those event listings. All too often there aren't feeds available, but there are tools you can use to create them (see below). - Marshall Kirkpatrick

Tools to use for this tactic: An RSS reader, be it Google Reader, iGoogle, MyYahoo or another - there are lots of options. If events listings aren't being published by RSS, here's what you can do. Find pages where they are listed, scrape a feed using Dapper.net (see how to do this) then filter the feed for keywords related to your industry if need be using a tool like FeedRinse.com or Pipes.Yahoo.com if you feel brave. For example, I just scraped a feed from my local paper's news site event listings, - Marshall Kirkpatrick

then ran that feed through Yahoo Pipes to filter for tech or startup related events. The end result? A feed that's empty today but could deliver just what I'm looking for later - mainstream events that I can attend after having learned about them using new tools on the web. - Marshall Kirkpatrick

3. Use the Internet to Make Yourself Smarter In Real Life - Marshall Kirkpatrick

The best way to use social media to reach people who don't use social media is probably just to use social media to kick more ass. You may be the only person in a meeting that reads blogs (unlikely, really) but that doesn't have to be what people notice; the fact that you know more, sooner, about your shared interests (as a result of reading blogs) well will be a big help. - Marshall Kirkpatrick

Easier said than done? Check out our recommended tools in this regard: - Marshall Kirkpatrick

Check out our article about how to find the top blogs in any niche http://www.readwriteweb.com/archive... and then combine those sources with the methodology describe in our post How to Find the Weirdest Stuff on the Internet (or the best content on any topic). http://www.readwriteweb.com/archive... We also recommend taking those top sources you identify and turning them into a - Marshall Kirkpatrick

Google Custom Search Engine, which is remarkably easy for even the least technical people to do. Search against those top sources as reference and you'll unearth all kinds of useful knowledge from the archives of your industries online experts. Build your reading list with the tools described in those posts above and you'll be using social media to advance your career and connect more effectively with more non-users of social media. - Marshall Kirkpatrick

4. Make Your Blog an Email Newsletter and Promote it Elsewhere - Marshall Kirkpatrick

Feedburner, Google's RSS publishing service, makes it easy to offer any RSS feed, including the one your blog should publish automatically, as an email newsletter. There are lots of companies that buy AdSense links on Google for links to their websites and blogs for key search terms, your marketing department may write guest editorials in traditional press already and any other traditional marketing campaign can lead people to an "email newsletter" page - really your blog with email subscription. - Marshall Kirkpatrick

If your target audience doesn't read blogs or participate in social networks, they probably do like email. This is an easy thing to do and can prove quite effective for non-technical audiences if framed in a non-threatening way. - Marshall Kirkpatrick

5. Look Harder, Your Audience Probably is Using Social Media You Aren't Aware Of - Marshall Kirkpatrick

There were 5 billion videos watched on YouTube just by people in the US in July. There are people in your industry using LInkedIn, we guarantee it. Where are people talking about you or your industry online? Check out Kingsly Joseph's Social Media Firehose to find examples http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes... (click the "list" button to see a list view of links). A couple of other places to look include Ask.com's blogsearch, sort by popularity, and the social - Marshall Kirkpatrick

I'm not sure how useful it is to corral people according to so-called "generations", as it may well be a form of ageism, and as the doctator indicated, all isms are de facto proofs of the presence of dire evil. Not really, but it could happen. Blogging is like reading or writing or speaking...a basic skill that knows no age, no cohort. On your other point, there is certainly a shift toward microblogging, and fingers everywhere are rejoicing. - david beckwith

Richard, what a typical response from someone of your generation ;-) - Sprague D

There's decent research that suggests that your generation has more effect on your consumer behavior, workplace satisfaction, preferred modes of work, etc., than your ethnicity, race, and gender combined. So whether or not "is gen X the blog generation" is the right question, there are definitely big questions to be asked about generations. - J-P Voillequé

I'm having trouble locating fan-blogs about Matock. - stretta from twhirl

i can never really figure out which gen x and y refer to... or where i fall amongst them - Kyle A Koch

Aren't we on to gen.Z yet? - Slappy Line

gen y is definitely too information overloaded to blog with much seriousness. - mjc

it is manly - RAPatton

To compensate, carry him around by cradling his head in your left hand, with his body lying on your arm, and gently pull him into your side to keep him stable. You know, like a football. - DGentry

@Denton, I do that often, with either one. But my wife got a sling big enough to fit me this evening and it's not that bad. Lets me use the laptop as well. :-) - Louis Gray

Being a dad is the most man you can be. - AJ Kohn

You have produced offspring... you no longer have to worry about being manly - you are the very definition of it by that act. - Tad

It's only when you start breast feeding that you have to worry. - Rod Bauer from twhirl

Up next, mini-van! :-) - JT Perry from twhirl

I second AJ. It's manly. As your wife. - Chris Baskind

Baby Bjorns are heavenly - maybe I've just become numb to the manly part - Jesse Stay

I used a Baby Bjorn often. It was a much easier way to carry the munchkin. - DGentry

Our Baby Bjorn is good, but Matthew is less fussy in the sling, so far. - Louis Gray

The sling has always felt weird for me (like I'm crushing the kid, when I know I'm not)... and the regular carriers, well, the kid was always sticking out in front of me too far, keeping me from reaching things (or typing). Laid kid out on a blanket between me and the keyboard many nights, tho, and got a lot work done. He slept right through it. Doesn't work for long, tho, as they get too big too quickly... - abacab

As long as it's not a pretty, sparkly, flowery, pink sling, I think you're okay. - Lisa L. Seifert

Lisa, it is a dark brown. My wife's looking out for me. - Louis Gray

Phew. That was a close one. You know brown and pink are the trendy thing right now. Is it reversible? ;-) - Lisa L. Seifert

Hey, guys can wear pink - what are you saying? ;-) - Jesse Stay from twhirl

<rant>you could always put some really big sub woofers in your car and get a loud Harley and some tattoos and go to the shooting range</rant> Seriously, manly? I don't let *anyone* define that for me. - AJ Kohn

Those slings kick @ss - so much better than a Baby Bjorn. For one thing you don't take near as many crotch shots with a sling. For another you can look down and go "oooooooh, a baby!" whereas w/ The Baby Bjorn all you get is baby skull all up in your grill. Not that that's not cute, but the little Geddes-esque pea in a pod visual has to be immensely satisfying. - J-P Voillequé

Its only manly if you are fighting off lions and tigers while carrying the baby. Its a man rule! ;) - Tony C

Turn in your man card. :p Just kidding ofcourse. Enjoy your kidlets as much as you can while they're that little. I miss it. - Mattb4rd

All depends on how you wear the sling. Baby in front = woman. Baby in back = man. Any other position results in confusion between baby and purse ;-) - Slappy Line

it's totally manly! Fatherhood brother! - Thomas Hawk

It's more mommy porn. Best you keep it coming. - Mrsth

...you're a daddy now...it's good. - JA Castillo

Internet-generation has learned the ways of one-handed surfing so that they can... er.. take care of babies with the free hand ;) - Jemm

Welcome aboard! - Bill Pennington from twhirl

The model I see is a business that allows small private investors to makes small ($1 to 25k) calls in emerging businesses that have already cleared the angel investor / public offering hurdle. However, the first thing we need to make this happen is a proper summary of the legal issues involved. Kudos to Duck. - Chris

Beautiful! - Mike