Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media

What's your (blog) Conversation Strategy?

 

Source: Skelliewag

A (blog) conversation strategy is how you support and nurture a conversation on your blog in the comments.   It is a combination of how you will comment on other blogs, how you track the conversation, and how you respond to comments on your blog.  (Note that the social media early adopters are now having a conversation much faster over at FriendFeeds (see this)

As noted by Holly Ross on the NTEN blog, having a conversation in blogs and other social media is a public conversation.  Public conversation has been happening on the Internet since it started - via listservs, newsgroups, and online forums.   So, we know that there is a well documented and established lurker to poster ratio that is well established in online communities as the 5%.  It appears that the lurker to participant may also hold true for various Web 2.0 communities as well.   All that to say that you need to remember some realistic expectations about the quantity of comments you may actually receive.

In an earlier post, I covered some tips for getting "conversation ready" from Alexandra Samuel's recent workshop at Netsquared.  If you're a blogger, there are also ways that you can craft your posts to encourage more commenting and conversation.  But as the Skelliewag's diagram above indicates, you can also encourage conversation in the comments.  So, what's your replying to comments technique or strategy?

I recently commented on Emily Williamson's blog.  To continue the conversation, she sent me a private email with a very thoughtful response with a note that "I've been trying to figure out my replying-to-comments strategy outside of the LJ world, and I'm trying the email conversation tactic these days.  What do you think of it?  Effective or annoying?"

There are some basic points about responding to comments on your blog: 

• Be honest and to the point.
• Respond quickly.
• Reply to every (rational) question.
• If a commenter corrects you, thank them and update your post.

But, the real question is how do you facilitate conversation?  How do you facilitate cross-blog conversation?  How do you facilitate conversation in the comments?  What are the mechanics of replying to comments?
 

I try as much as possible to respond to comments, but also try to point them back to the post to add their thoughts so it is a conversation in the comments - and not a conversation between and the commenter that will most certainly get lost in my email box.

The other component of your commenting strategy is your "outbound" comments - comments you post on other blog.  You can do this a random way or a strategic way.  The latter requires that you think about how to integrate commenting into your overall online behavior.   If you read Michele Martin's excellent blog, you no doubt noticed her month-long comment challenge.  On Day 28, she asked "What is your blog commenting strategy?"   She points to a post by Caroline Middlebrook with some advice about developing a blog commenting strategy.

Middlebrook suggests setting some goals for your commenting and then use some tracking tools to comment on a strategically selected group of blogs.   She also describes some challenges she faced, including one that I can certainly identify with, "I can't think of anything to say!"   Here's some questions to ask yourself as you star at the blank comment form:

• What did they say well?
• What did they miss?
• Answer questions
• What are other people saying
• How does it apply to you
• Look forward
• Look backward
• Ask what if?

Williambrook mentions a plugin to follow your comments.   One that I've used is Commentful is a service that watches comments on blog posts, Digg submissions, Flickr galleries, and many other types of content. When ever there is a new comment, Commentful notifies you via email, RSS Feed or you can install an extension for Firefox.  There are other services:

• CoComment
• Co.Comments
• Discuss

Not matter what tool you choose to track comments, the important question to answer is: What will be your regular routine for monitoring your comments on other blogs?  What is your technique for responding to comments?  How do you nurture conversations?

Update:  There's been a lot of discussion lately about how the social media conversation has shifted again - this time it has moved from Twitter to Friendfeed.   A few months ago it was how the conversation had moved from blogs to Facebook or that some conversations have shifted to Twitter.  But in the nonprofit space, we've barely adopted Twitter so if we move to FriendFeed can we talk to our colleagues?   No.

This points to a larger issues of control - conversations are fragmenting and we have no control where they take place.  As Louis Gray points out in his post, "Now that comments are being bandied about like currency, both at the blog and through a myriad of RSS readers and social aggregators, maybe it's time to think about the whole structure of blogging and commenting in the first place."

So, maybe it looks like this?

Update:

While routing around the FriendFeed ProBlogger Room, I noticed that this question:

“I need advice! My blog isn't that big but I'm already getting overwhelmed with the comments and emails that I receive every day. I like to respond to all of them, plus I feel that that is a reason why it is growing right now, but it is majorly starting to cut into my time commitments. WWYD?”

Some excellent tips:

1.) Set up some email templates covering a few typical answers, requests etc. As for commenting, try to answer as much as you can without messing your schedule. Look especially for those comments that could further develop a conversation.

2.) Try to reply to several commenters in one comment of your own, there's no need to reply to everyone individually.

3.) Batch process comments

4.) How to respond from individual requests from blog readers

5.) Close your comments unless you willing to engage your commentators! You do not need to respond to everyone, even though it is desirable, but respond to main themes.

Getting Conversation Ready

Holly Ross wrote a good reflection piece about public conversations on blogs and how to get your audience ready for that conversation.  She makes the point:

What I am saying is that your audience may not be ready to have the conversation that social media enables.  That's because social media does not just enable conversations.  It enables PUBLIC conversations.

I think we have to remember that it takes time build the community to have the conversation and that it doesn't happen right away. You have to be ready as conversation facilitator.   Alexandra Samuel did a workshop called "Bringing Your Community to Life" at Netsquared and offered some terrific practical advice about you get the conversation started.

Some key points:

Key points to encourage participation:

• Focus on promoting conversation
• Make it happen, don't wait for it
• Connect like-minded participants
• Connect complimentary threads
• Plan pro-actively, implement reactively

And once you activate the conversation, your organization needs to be ready to embrace it. While NetSquared was taking place, another event There's A New Conversation - described as "reflecting on the past 10 years since the publication of the Cluetrain Manifesto and what the next 10 years will be like as more and more of us defect from marketing and join the conversation!" was taking place.  Jeremiah Owyang gave a presentation at the event and it was live blogged here.

Much of it comes from the Groundswell book and I am familiar with the content.  A new nugget of insight was about how to deal with detractors.  Here's the advice from the notes: 

Dealing with Detractors.

• Have resources ready. Staff, processes, resources, etc.
• 5 types of detractors. Legit complainers, competitor, engaged critic, flamers, and troublemakers (trolls). For trolls, ignore them, or figure out how to expel them from the community.
• Listing of why they make trouble, how to recognize them, and what you should do for each type.
• What goes wrong? Sue, shut them down, disregard, freeze, don't engage.

I wrote about dealing with criticism a while back when a colleague mentioned having to address this on social media sites.  I'm curious if how nonprofits that are switched to conversations are dealing with detractors?  Have you interacted with these different types of attractors?  Care to share your experience?  What's your advice?

Chris Brogan: What Were Your First Steps?

My first steps

On Monday, Chris Brogan is going to do an NTEN members-only expert session and I'm filling in for Holly Ross as one of the moderators.  We're going to be on a conference call and a meebo chat for member questions.  Here's the focus:

Okay, so Chris prefers to say he's not an expert, but that he advises people on social media use. That doesn't change the fact that he's smart and savvy on the social media front. One of his specialties? Starting and maintaining conversations with stakeholders.

If your organization is trying to figure out how to move your stakeholders from passive listeners to passionate participants, this is your golden opportunity. NTEN Members get exclusive access to ask questions and hear them answered, for free!

To kick if off, I'll ask an ice breaker question or too.  I was wondering  what to ask and then I noticed Chris's post this morning, "What Were Your First Steps?" asking readers to share their stories about how they got started in social media, first steps, and advice.   You must go read the stories - they're wonderful

Ah .. a great icebreaker question for Chris ..

• What were your first steps in social media?

• What did you learn that from your experience that you apply to starting and maintaining conversations with stakeholders?

I got inspired by this post and left a quick comment, but then I reading comments by others and folks who wrote the answers on their blogs.  I read Connie Bensen's story and she encouraged me to post on my blog.

What  were your first steps into social media?

I got on the Internet in the early days when it was social media. So, my first steps into social media were logging onto a BBS for disability rights and support groups called Project Enable back in 1989 via Fidonet.  Twitter reminds me so much of that BBS.  You could log on and get “just in time” answers from a chat room or wait a day and get a response to your question posted in an online forum.  I used the BBS to post questions asked by people in a local face-to-face support group who were not online.  I was networking weaving between the offline/online. 

Then I discovered the Internet and became the community builder for Arts Wire,  an online network for artists that used a unix-based text conferencing system called Caucus.   Here’s a description from an archived web page http://tinyurl.com/5f225j of how my role changed over my ten years at this job.  At the same time I discovered places like the Well, ECHO (east coast hangout) and Meta Network (where arts wire has hosted).  I think of those online communities as social media because it was all about conversation, getting to know people, and interacting.

I also discovered the gopher!  You could sit down with a beer in hand and literally visit every server on the web via Cern.  I was a self-described gopher mistress.  This was all about early aggregation!  But you could also connect to other people who were setting up gophers by linking to them or even conduct a chat by telnet or hangout in IRC channel.  My career as a gopher mistress was very short-lived because a guy in Switzerland and something called mosaic came along.   

We were all excited by the beginning of the Web in those days and there were communities and conversations. It was before the commercial web.  It was all about community. I volunteered to be the Dance Cybrarian.  It was like very primitive version of wiki collaborative organizing.  Anyone could volunteer to aggregate links in their field on their server - and would be linked to the main library on Switzerland. I aggregated web sites for dance groups, dance companies, etc. In the beginning, mostly unix programmers who liked to clog dancing would come by and criticize my code. (I hand coded from scratch and my claim to fame was that I committed all RGB codes to memory) 

But as more nonprofit arts organization hoisted their first web sites, they wanted how to information. I started Spiderschool which was my first sort of blog.  It was a link list I created on how to create web pages. Later, I used it to summarize the wisdom that came out of the community discussion related to how artists and arts organizations can use the web.  A totally manual blog!  Later, as more and more people created web pages,  I would hand facilitate comments and did primitive crowd sourcing.  My first crowd sourced piece was getting people to help me proof read my pages -

The Typo Police Page
http://www.bethkanter.org/spiderpolice/police.html
Note the blink tag!

In 1996, when the first digital cameras and web cams out - I got one. I used my webcam attached my laptop as my first digital camera to record photos from a conference that I was taking notes for - and then publishing as web pages .. ha live blogging and video blogging.  But not many people to share with or remix.  Also around that time, I discovered what would now be called sessmic or perhaps qik — you could use your webcam and go “reflector surfing” - it was chat room with video. Here’s a story from that era
http://beth.typepad.com/beths_blog/2006/10/a_conversation_.html

So, when blogging software came out - I was so excited because a) I didn’t have hand code 2.) the conversations could happen right there on the post.  My first blog was on a colleague's movetable type server in 2000 and when typepad launched in 2003?, I signed up.   I tried to apply all that I learned about facilitating online conversations, connecting, and networking to blogging.  Each social media tool that I've been introduced to, I've try to remember that it's about the weaving, conversations, and linking.

Who were your early people you admired and followed?

In the nonprofit sector, there were not many bloggers in 2004. I followed Marnie Webb, Ruby Sinreich, Nancy White, and those who are linked on the side bar.   I also followed bloggers who were not in the nonprofit space. My early inspirations were CogDog Blog, Andy Carvin, Vicky Davis, Bernie Dodge, Marshall Kirkpatrick, Steve Garfield, Jay Dedman, Ryanne Hodson,  and Chris Brogan.  The NpTech Tag  community was been gateway to the nonprofit technology social media community -I continued to be inspired by Holly Ross, Amy Ward, Beth Dunn, Allan Benamer,  Nancy Schwartz, Lucy Bernholz, Katya Andresen, and too many others.    I jumped on the BlogHer bandwagon in 2005 and followed all the BlogHer's - they were on my sidebar initially - like Lisa, Jory, Elisa, Liz Henry, Lisa Cantor, Ponzi, Lisa Williams, Danah Boyd, Amy Gahran, and many, many others. 

If you were going to give advice to someone starting out, what would you tell them?

I’ve always used the dive in approach too and highly recommend it, but you have to ask good questions and be a learner.  I would also recommend starting small with small experiments and gradually build. Rapid prototyping while working towards perfection

What will you do in the next few months with social media?

I hope to focus more on teaching and learning and intersecting with nonprofits and social media. Go deeper with social media for social causes.   I hope to get back to Cambodia -- with social media slant.  I also want to explore micro media, digital natives, and too many other topics I'm curious about!

 

Cross-Blog Conversations: Getting off the Soap Box is Messy .. but ...

Source: Skelliewag

David Wilcox has an excellent post about generating conversation on blogs or for that matter other social media tools.  In fact, I discovered his post via Facebook where I left a comment on his note and followed the links to his blog post.   

It caught my eye for two reasons:  I'm a visual person - so any visual communication of an idea I'm drawn to.   The other reason is that I'm prepping for a couple of conference sessions on Social Media Metrics and one of the areas to consider is "conversation index" - more on that later.

David's post has lots think about.   His questions are:

• How can blog conversations foster a cloud and not just a hub and spokes effect?
• How might these conversations filter across into face-to-face, Facebook, and MSM (main stream media)?

David points over to colleague Michele Martin's post "How to Facilitate Conversation Between Comments on Our Blogs?"  Michele analyzes her own commenting behavior and why sometimes she responds to the blogger, not necessarily the other commenters.   She is thinking deeply about how to encourage a blogging community.  She ends her post with: So, how do you encourage interactions with commenters on your blog? How do you interact with other commenters when you comment on someone else's blog?

I'm very interested in this and Michele and the commenters to this post offered some excellent advice:

Michele's suggestions:
1.  Make it clear in your commenting policy that you encourage commenters to interact with one another.
2.  Have some commenters modeling the behavior--responding directly to other commenters as a way to encourage that kind of interaction.

Skelliwag commenters:
3.  Using threaded commenting so that you could reply more easily to individual commenters, similar to replies in a forum.
4.  Posting on problems to solve that will invite readers to interact with one another in developing the solution (obviously this doesn't work for every post).
5.  Trying to create a culture that encourages commenter to commenter interactions through your own responses in the comments section--maybe by drawing the attention of one commenter to the thoughts of another.

Michele's commenters:
6. Using features that allow people to sign up to receive comments via email from other commenters (Via Laura's Notebook)
7. Threading/Cross-linking comments (via Atul)
8. Co-Comment can be a good tool to track commenting for participation/cross conversation (Christy Tucker)
9. Ask leading questions that encourage dialogue between two commentors, but will people come back? (Christy Tucker)
10.  Look at blogs that have a lot of cross commenting conversation (Making Light at http://www.nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/ and The Whatever at http://www.scalzi.com/whatever/.)  Is the reason age of blog or volume of readers?  (Lisa Juniker)

The Intensity of Sharing

Flickr Photo by Lynnetter

 

The comment about whether or not people will come back to for cross-commenting made me think of this chart that illustrates the intensity and intent of sharing - comments are sharing - an opinion or a voice.  Something to think about when we look at whether we've generated commenting.

This conversation is reminding of one that I had on this blog or rather across several blogs about "cross-blog conversation."   One of the key learnings was:

• The community must have some sort of nurturing structure for bloggers who are new to blogging or the conversation has no where to go and the community no where to grow.

Relating this back to the cross conversation within blog post thread, there is the technique of weaving.  I've attempted to do it here - summarize what was said in the comments and put into a new a post.

This conversation was about generating community around your blog in the comments and encouraging cross commenter conversation, but I'm also interested in the idea of conversations across blogs or for that matter across social networking sites?