Jul 23 2010

Photographers Embrace Social Networking — In Ways That Ring True

Category: Business & Marketing, Creative Process — Ethan G. Salwen @ 3:59 pm

AfterCapture Blog_100723_SocialMedia_1Chloé Browne, a London-based wedding photographer, only started using Twitter after three clients found her through tweets written by others: clients raving about her services. Now Browne tweets throughout the day, and weaves this focused social media marketing into the fabric also comprised of the threads that are her active blogging and Facebooking.

AfterCapture Blog_100723_SocialMedia_2Brown is one photographer featured in “Hello, world: Social Networking for photographers”, a great article by Diane Smyth, published in the “British Journal of Photography.” As Smyth explains of Browne:

“Browne’s Facebook and blog pages link back to each other, her Twitter account and her main website, and she updates her Facebook page and Tweets each time she publishes a new blog, which is at least once a week. It is a lot of admin, she admits, but in her case it’s had real results – she only advertises online, and wins most of her new business this way”

AfterCapture Blog_100723_SocialMedia_3In “Hello, world” Smyth reports on just a few of the different ways that photographers are finding business and (just as important) creative success with social media. One, clear message that Smyth conveys is that these photographers are finding quantifiable, positive value from social media because they are using social media in ways that are true to their personalities and business goals.

This is refreshing. It is different from the Continue reading “Photographers Embrace Social Networking — In Ways That Ring True”

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May 04 2010

Fantastic Twitter Basics from Jessica Hische

Category: Technology Insights — Ethan G. Salwen @ 3:50 pm

AfterCapture Blog_100504_Twitter Basics_1“If you’re not using Twitter yet, you may feel as if you’ve missed out,” writes Rafe Needleman at the beginning of his helpful and encouraging Webware post, “Newbie’s guide to Twitter.” Personally, I’m still struggling to get a handle on Twitter, and I’d probably find Needleman’s encouraging words more encouraging if he had not posted them on March 15, 2007 –  a million years ago in SMT (Social Media Time). Still, there’s no time like the present and luckily. . .

Yesterday, in response to my TCC (Twitter Confusion Confession), my friend @janelerner recommended that I check out Jessica Hische’s “Mom, this is how twitter works.”

@jessicahische’s insights into the very basics of Twitter protocol is a masterful must-read for all TCT (Totally Confused Twitterers) like me. You’ll also find it useful if you tweet regularly but are not entirely clear on some of the SNI (Surprisingly Not Intuitive) aspects of who receives which tweets and why.

With incredibly clarity in the “who sees what” section of her document, Hische makes it clear that there’s a big difference between whether I put “@jessicahische” at the beginning of a tweet or anywhere else in my tweet. Whether or not @jessicahische is following me (@ethansalwen) will also impact my tweeting, and my tweeting will be affected if others are following the both of us. (Unlikely. @jessicahische has 5,005 followers; I have 12.)

Hische explains the critical fundamentals with no fuss about reasons for tweeting or strategies for doing so. This is refreshing. For all the gobs of Twitter advice I encountered today on the Web, I have found none with the the basic TDI (Twitter Driving Instructions) as clearly presented as those of Hische.

(If your Titter IQ is equal to or — gasp! — lower than mine, check out the “Twitter in Plain English” video at the end of this post.)

Even if this basic information is as old to you as Needleman’s post, like @janelerner, you’ll appreciate the ability to forward this Hische’s “mom resource” to any TCT friends coming to you with a TCC.

By the by. . . Continue reading “Fantastic Twitter Basics from Jessica Hische”

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Apr 16 2010

Saving Wonderful, Indiscreet Tweets (and Images) for All Time

Category: Creative Process, Viewpoint — Ethan G. Salwen @ 5:02 pm

“So im totally published in the library of congress,” tweeted @kanetown2004 less than a minute ago. This is one reaction to the news that the Library of Congress will be archiving all tweets — considering them a worthy part of “the universal body of human knowledge.”

Frankly, I think this is a wonderful development, even as it gives me a slight pause.

AfterCapture_Blog_100416_LOC Saves Tweets

Apparently my dual reactions are not unusual, according to “The New York Times” reporting by Steve Lohr. On Wednesday, in “Library of Congress Will Save Tweets,” Lohr notes:

“Academic researchers seem pleased as well. For hundreds of years, they say, the historical record has tended to be somewhat elitist because of its selectivity. In books, magazines and newspapers, they say, it is the prominent and the infamous who are written about most frequently.”

This is what makes me think the LOC tweet-saving development is wonderful. As messy as it might be, our historical record is becoming far more robust, far more in line with the “average” human experience, less tilted to the elite version that, while cool, is, um, elitist.

Concerning the part that gave me slight pause, Lohr reports: Continue reading “Saving Wonderful, Indiscreet Tweets (and Images) for All Time”

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