Category: blogging

#AMAHigherEd session: Marketers as masters of the mix

Heading to the American Marketing Association’s Symposium for the Marketing of Higher Education? My old pal Charlie Melichar (@melicharlie) and I will be co-presenting on Tuesday, N0v. 11, with a session we’re calling “Marketers as Masters of the Mix.” Here’s the description:

Traditional lines between marketing, PR, branding and reputation management are gone. Today’s marketers need to have an understanding of all the ways in which communication can drive institutional success. From tools to technique, this session will focus on how higher ed marketers can position themselves – and empower their community – to help their institutions thrive in this era of convergence.

Intrigued? Then join us. Our session begins at 10:15 a.m. Tuesday, Nov. 11.

Even if you can’t make that session, I hope to see you around during the conference.

 

Paranormal activity in social media [repost]

In the spirit of the Halloween season, I’m reposting something from a year ago. Enjoy.

ZombieWalkWith Halloween approaching, we’ll soon see kids (and more than a few adults) dressed up as their favorite scary creatures. All manner of make-believe zombies, vampires and ghosts will come knocking on our doors.

Fortunately, Halloween happens just one night a year. And it’s all in fun. Those ghouls and monsters aren’t real.

What IS real, unfortunately, are the social media manifestations of these nightmarish archetypes. As this Steamfeed Media post points out, for some social media users, every day is Fright Night.

Steamfeed’s Carrie Keenan describes the three most common types of social media spooks:

  • The zombie. Known by their mindless auto-tweets and RSS feeds, these mindless creatures are easy to spot. “Hold onto your brains when you see them coming and run!”
  • The ghost. “A ghost user is one who creates a business account because they ‘should’ be involved in social media,” Keenan writes. “They soon disappear into the internet ether never to be seen again.”
  • The vampire. These blood-sucking creatures “take your hard work and give themselves credit,” scraping content from your blog or website and passing it off as their own.

There may be more fiends out there, but these are three common ones in social media.

It’s okay to pretend to be one of these on Halloween. Just remember to be a real human the rest of the year. The same goes for your social media identity.

Photo of ComicCon 2013 Zombie Walk by Hooman.