Friday afternoon, I glanced at my phone before going on break at work, and I saw something was weird with my Twitter account. Twitter said that I tweeted violent tweets and my account would be on hold for 12 hours. I deleted the tweets and changed my password ASAP. The next morning, I thought it was over. Saturday, I got to work and I see that Twitter has NOW suspended my account. However, I don’t know how someone was able to hack my account again after I changed the password. Immediately, I appealed the suspension, and now I am just waiting. How did this happen?! I would never threaten anyone’s life. I wouldn’t use racial slurs like porch monkey.I may be paranoid but I know that at least company wanted me to give up my Twitter handle because they wanted it. Twitter TOS doesn’t allow for people to sell their handle. I wouldn’t consider giving it up. I have been on twitter for 14 years. I miss tweeting. I am surprised at how anxious I am now that I cannot tweet. This is so bothersome because I think it is partly my fault for letting too many API access my Twitter account. Ugh. This is not how I thought I would spend Christmas week.
Tag Archives: social media
No One Wears Khaki Pants
I was asked if I were a hipster. That made me laugh. Maybe I am. Maybe I just know people who are or know people who make things that appeal to hipsters. Hipsters are the same as millennials. Some millennials are decidedly basic. They are normcore-wearing people who are averse to student loan debt and wearing pants. Seriously, no one wears pants anymore. It is either skinny jeans, leggings or shorts. I worry about the sales of khaki pants. I don’t wear pants often either, but I have some.
Anyway, there are way too many people living on this earth. There are so many generations alive right now and because of technology and internet-sharing, you can have access to all of their thoughts and dreams. This is an excellent time to be a sociologist who can use big data to provide insights into what is the culture now and what will happen in the future.
I am more interested in learning what we can do to change anti-social behavior online and offline. Sometimes it seems that the world is so mean. It makes me sad. However, it could be that I see it more with social media and the 24-hour news cycle.
What I do know is this, “intent does not absolve you from impact”. If you have offended someone with your words and actions, then recognize that even if your intentions were good, it doesn’t matter if someone was offended. We can’t please everyone, but we can be contrite if we fail.
Social Media Is Not A Bringer Show!
Lately, more people are doing social media and part of that is a numbers game. Like an amateur comedian just starting out, you have to have a certain amount of people coming to the show to perform. In the comedy world, this is known as a bringer show. If you have a friend who is just starting out doing comedy, then you know about the dreaded bringer show where comedians can only perform if they get enough people to come to the show. Similarly, some people have social media gigs which require a certain amount of engagement on a weekly or daily basis. To reach these numbers, some social media coordinators will reach out to the friends repeatedly for “Likes”, “Retweets”, “Followers”. I don’t mind when someone sends me something and politely asks if I would consider spreading the word to my community. However, I really dislike when people send me a “sample tweet” in the hopes that I will simply copy, paste and tweet out to the world.
First of all, I recommend social media professionals to stop over-promising to clients. Building social media presence is a long term process. If a client wants 1000 new followers a month, then don’t take the job. They can just buy twitter followers if they need the numbers so badly. Secondly, the strain that you may be putting on your friendships is not worth it. It is better to find which subset of friends who may be interested and message them. Stop sending blanket updates to everyone and please don’t beg for RTs. If you treat social media outreach like a bringer show, no one will come and the joke will be on you.
What Twitter Lists Are You On And What Does It Say About You
Are you using Twitter lists? If not, then you should. Twitter lists, when curated well, are a great way to cut through the noise on Twitter. I have three twitter lists that I created and they have been lifesaving, time-saving filter to find out what people are talking about on Twitter.
Foodiphiles – food bloggers on Twitter. Esential for food news.
Cupcake Bakeries– used mostly for Cupcakes Take The Cake. It is great way to see what bakeries are doing from all over the world.
Cool Black People– I actually created this list because I would get asked about other African American bloggers and twitterers, so the list made it easy to refer people to.
I am putting people into broad categories for my twitter lists, and people do the same to me. Recently, I took a look at the Twitter lists that people have put me in, and I realized that these lists give me an idea of what people think of me…at list on Twitter. I think that it shows how effective I am at reflecting my personal brand. Here are some of the lists I am on:
- Black Entrepreneurs
- Cupcakes
- Food Bloggers
- Food And Drink
- Girl Power
- Interesting People
- Media/Journalism
- NYC
- Social Media Pros
- Startupnation
- SXSW
- Zeitgeist
So I think I am putting out content on Twitter that lets people be able to assign me to the Twitter lists that make sense. Even if their Twitter lists were completely random, that’s fine. The point is that I tweet daily about lots of things, and I think that people are reading those tweets and seeing a connection between me and the content.
Multicultural Social Communications Leadership Forum
Today I attended BDI’s Multicultural Social Communications Leadership Forum at NYU’s Midtown Campus. At first I was frustrated by the lack of wifi in the classroom, but the speakers were so good that it was best to listen intently without tweeting or checking email.
First, I want to say this. If you ever run a conference, panel discussion or forum related to multicultural marketing and social media, then start from GO. I don’t mean starting on time, but I mean don’t start from talking about a “Digital Divide” or why aren’t there Blacks or Latinos in Tech. I was so happy, almost to the point of tears to see that no one on the panel nor anyone in the audience ever questioned the HUGE presence of Blacks, Latinos, or Asians online. In fact, the numbers shown during the presentations today show more than I thought before. Thank you everyone for validating that!
Now on to the presentations. There were six speakers and a panel discussion afterwards.
Noel Hankin: Senior VP, Multicultural Relations, Moet Hennessy. Noel talked about how luxury brands are not just for the rich.
He talked about three trends 1)The rapid rise of the Latino population in the States. 2)The Taking of African Americans for Granted. 3)The Growth of Secondary Segment (India, Southeast Asian immigrants.
IMHO about Trend 2). If brands continue to take the African American demographic for granted by not customizing campaigns to the community or just adding Black faces to ad collateral, then they will lose market share to the brands who appreciates the importance of executing marketing initiatives to the African American community.
Also, I learned about a very cool product that Hennessy launched last year, Hennessy 44. Whatever your politics, it is so smart of Hennessy to celebrate a historic moment of our first African American president with a special edition bottle of cognac. A portion of the proceeds go to the Thurgood Marshall College Fund.
Jon Yokogama: VP Consumer Engagement, interTrend Communications.
Jon’s presentation was a case study in experiential and online marketing with JC Penneys. Their goal was to reach Asian teens 13-17 for Back To School. They created a campaign with YouTube stars and had kids created video wearing JCPenney clothes. The interesting thing about this campaign was the excitement and high level of engagement among the teens. The Asian market is different in many ways, but one that stood out to me was how online is the first place to go. Since traditional media like TV or radio does not feature many Asian Americans entertainers, online outlets like YouTube is the place to find budding musicians and comedians.
Lesley Pinckney: General Manager, Essence.com
Lesley, who also moderated the afternoon panel discussion, gave a very good primer on social media. First, she expressed enthusiasm for Foursquare, which was cool to me since I was just talking to someone who works at Foursquare last night. She talked about the importance of working with content partners and how social media can help build a brand and make it more agile and responsive to users/customers. She also mentioned a site, Tracking Twitter, which shows a brands ranking on Twitter. When choosing which social media platform/s your company’s brand, Lesley advises: YOU MUST USE THE PLATFORM YOURSELF AT LEAST ONCE.
Ajoy Mahtab: Director of Sales and Marketing, SymCare Personalized Health Solutions, Johnson & Johnson
I have heard many analogies used to explain social media, but Ajoy said something different. He likened social media to the pool game of “Marco Polo”. It is an effective to way to explain it. His presentation focused on how to get buy-in from upper management and from brands.
Christine Clavijo-Kish: Senior VP, Multicultural Market, PR Newswire.
Christine gave lots of stats noting the Hispanic market online from a Florida State University study on Hispanic Marketing . MySpace is the top social networking for Latinos, and there is a mobile site for MySpace.
Lee Maicon: VP Strategic Service, Wing
Lee did not talk about social media, nor did he talk exclusively about multicultural campaigns. He talked about “experiential marketing in a post-digital world”. What does that mean? I gather from his presentation that storytelling and creating experiences are important. The more screens in front of us is actually less interesting. Experiences shared either offline or online can connect us. Conversations drive sales.
This event was great. I learned a lot and would suggest that conference organizers look to these people mentioned when they need a multicultural marketing expert. They know their stuff from shinola.
The Week In Links (Social Media, Sharon Jones, Shorty Awards)
Last week was Social Media Week and the parties were flowing.
I went to the Shorty Awards, met MC Hammer and drank too many fail whales.
Friday I went to the New York screening of Nerdcore Rising at the 92nd Y Tribeca which was directed and produced by the wonderful Negin Farsad. She is definitely on my list of “people I know who should be famous”.
Saturday was Valentine’s Day, and the guy and I went to see Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings at the Nokia Theatre. It was a great show!
Favorite Facebook Status Updates in of December 2007
Back when I first started using Facebook, I treated it like Twitter. I would post short and sometimes witty sentences. Presented without commentary, here are some of my favorites from December of 2007.
Nichelle will be singing karaoke and ringing in the New Year’s Eve tonight. -December 31, 2007.
Nichelle will be riding the rails on Christmas Day. Time to come up with a hobo name. – December 19, 2007
Nichelle can’t be sad online. – December 13, 2007
Nichelle is in Dell Hell. -December 10, 2007.
Nichelle is slouching through december.- December 5, 2007
Nichelle is going to do bookkeeping even if it hurts.- December 1, 2007