Sarah's Faves

Did you know? Women start businesses at one-and-a-half times the national average, yet only five percent of startups are owned by women.

And, although women now comprise roughly half of American workers and earn nearly 60% of university degrees,¹ only 24% of the people heard or read about in print, radio and television news are female.² 

^{(My FAVE tips are below the infographic.)}

Via MBA@UNC MBA Online & Women 2.0

Five Social Tips for Women to Increase Media Exposure

If you’re a women business owner, expert in your field or want to grow your online presence,  you need to become your own best publicist. No one ever became a successful business owner by sitting quietly and waiting for customers to come pouring in. Getting sourced in the media is a great way to garner awareness and build your credibility. Third party endorsements are powerful. So, how can you use social media to garner some earned publicity?

1. Locate and follow bloggers and journalists online
Most journalists and online bloggers include a Twitter handle with their online stories or other tools to follow them online. Take the time to follow, get to know them and then look for ways to insert yourself into the conversation and build a relationship. The key — instead of thinking about how they can help you, think about how you can help them. Follow them on the Internet, read and comment on their stories and posts using connecting, trending industry issues to draw them out in two-way conversation.

2. Leave a trail so others can find you 
In an era of digital technology, journalists increasingly rely on the Internet and search to locate sources and information. To be seen and heard, use basic SEO and hyperlinks to plot out each mile marker and make it easier for others to find you. Make sure that each tactic supports an overarching objective. For example, don’t create a Twitter account or Facebook page – think resourcefully and ask yourself how social media can lead you and others to a strategic online destination.

3. Produce interesting content
Create a centralized location for content, such as a website or blog, and position yourself as a leader in your industry by producing thought-worthy content. Don’t just blog, tweet or create status updates simply because you can — research the latest trends, stay up on the news and look for the unique angle that excites you and provides value. To drive viewership, learn basic search engine optimization to ensure the footprint you’re creating drives traffic to your site.

4. Be your best publicist
Utilize social media releases and pitch yourself with viable story ideas to guest post on blogs with higher visibility and traffic.

Develop a microblogging strategy that encompasses a combination of publishing and publicity. Look for existing industry groups on social networks to increase your reach by participating in industry chats on Twitter, niche networks and message boards.

5. Be a resource to reporters
Instead of pitching yourself to the media, let them come you with queries. Sign up for Help A Reporter Out (HARO) to receive daily email blasts with reporter queries from you local daily to the New York Times. Look for the stories that you can serve as an expert resource to or provide helpful information and respond.

Fact: Companies with more equalized gender distribution have 30 percent better IPOs. (link)

Fact: Women pursuing MBAs are at an all-time high. Women now make up one-third of all MBA candidates. (link)

Fact: 40 percent of large companies have no women on their boards and only 5 percent of startups are owned by women. (link)

(The “5 tips” were originally shared on PRsarahevans.com)

I love it it when great products just keep getting better. Today the Buffer team announced they acquired Digg Digg, the groovy floating sharing plug in. 

What can you do with Digg Digg by Buffer?

• Add a beautiful floating bar to your blog posts, just like Sarah’s Faves has
• Display sharing buttons easily before or after your articles
• Add the newest buttons such as Pinterest and Buffer buttons to your site

Did you know great design and easily accessible share buttons make a huge difference?

Get 7 times more Social Traffic through better sharing buttons. According to BrightEdge research more visible sharing buttons will increase the number of shares your posts get versus those without. So I guess if you don’t want people to share your great content, don’t use Digg Digg.

You can check out all of the other bells and whistles in Buffer’s latest blog post.

If you already use Digg Digg, then you’ll be stoked to find out you can now integrate Pinterest. Here’s a quick tutorial –

I have 205 apps with permission to access my Facebook account. Seriously? I don’t even remember what half of them do. It’s time to revoke access. Join me friends!

Go clean up those apps

Thank you mypermissions.org for the reminder to take my online security seriously. If you’re active on social networks then you’ve probably given third parties access to your accounts. You might want to take a look to see if you really need GlowingMonkeysTweetHacks to still have access to your Twitter account.

Have two minutes? Put down that Starbucks. Go clean up your online permissions.

Want another handy dandy resource? Here’s an ifttt recipe that sends a reminder to check your permissions once a month. (Or you could add it to your calendar.)

Way to go, Avi Charkham and Eran Sandler.

Where do Mashable, Huffington Post and Buzzfeed find the viral videos they feature? From Viral Video Chart. The most current, top 20 viral videos in the social world are featured here. Wait. So you’re saying someone does all the work of finding viral videos? And you say it’s free? I didn’t say that yet, but yes. It’s all true.

Obsessively frequented by media mavens looking for the next big thing and pored over by agency creatives hoping to see their work make the cut, the Viral Video Chart is the world’s largest, most comprehensive database of online social videos. Data is syndicated to a wide range of mainstream media outlets, including Mashable, the IAB, The Guardian, Die Welt, and The Huffington Post.

And, if you’re in to stats—oh, they have stats. You can view how many times a video has been shared across Facebook, Twitter and blogs. There’s also a running tally at the top of the video that shows how many total shares. The folks at Unruly Media also break it down by what language is sharing the video. Sah-weet.

If you think you’ve found the next big thing on their site, you can easily share via social networks or grab the embed code. Why can’t everything be this easy?

Kick your social media site up a notch and put their video chart on your site –> Grab the HTML code, here.

You can subscribe to their RSS to get “Today’s Top 10 Viral Videos.”

Of course they’re on Twitter.

FAVE on my friends.

Paging Dr. Google. Paging Dr. Google.

While searching Google won’t treat the flu, Google Flu Trends can predict where the flu is most prevalent. How?

Google found a close relationship between how many people search for flu-related topics and how many people actually have flu symptoms. By counting how often we see these search queries, we can estimate how much flu is circulating in different countries and regions around the world.

Google is now your thermometer for tracking the flu (and other epidemics). Pun intended. How do you use it? Just visit http://www.google.org/flutrends to view a world map. Flu activity is ranked by color with lime green being minimal and dark red as intense (the highest). Click on the country you’d like to view in order to get data from state and/or city level (when available). Yep, it’s that easy.

Is the data current? I’m glad you asked:

Estimates for the current week are updated daily as new search query data is collected. However, once a week is over, the estimate for that week is final and not revised. Google Flu Trends weeks begin on Sunday and end on Saturday.

Why does this matter to you? A few reasons:

• Getting ready to travel? If the location you’re visiting has high or epidemic levels of the flu you might want rethink your trip.
• Work in a local newsroom? You might want to keep tabs on your cities’ flu levels to include in online reporting.
• Have kids? While you’ll probably hear from Jennifer and Johnny’s mom first, you can still check your city to stay on top of flu trends.

You can view the information a few ways, including downloading data as needed. Here’s the current download of the Google Flu Trends estimates for the world.

**********************

CDC urges you to take these steps to protect yourself and others from the flu:

1. Get vaccinated against flu – it’s your best defense.
2. Cover your cough, wash hands often.
3. Take antiviral drugs if your doctor recommends them.

Here’s the CDC’s guide to all things flu-related.

Unable to make the trip to Vegas for this year’s CES? That’s okay. You can pretend you’re there online. No one will ever know. <sarcasm> Seriously though, there are a lot of online resources available to make it feel like you’re experiencing CES alongside the likes of Scoble and Pete Cashmore.

1. CES RSS News Feed
2. CES Exhibitor Announcements 
3. CES Multimedia library
4. CES on Twitter
5. Watch session videos
6. Follow the #CES hashtag
7. CES on Facebook
8. CES on Flickr
9. CES on YouTube
10. Twitter List of 2011 Exhibitors (yes, not 2012)
11. Create a Google Alert for CES news
12. Check out your favorite tech blog–they probably have live coverage from the event

Have another resource you’re using to follow CES online? Share below in the comments.

FAVE on my friends.

Your Mac is more than just a pretty face. It actually has shortcuts you can use to make things easier. It’s probably one of the reasons you purchased it, right? In the hopes of making your life even easier, I pulled a few of my fave keyboard shortcuts for you. Pass them on to a friend for some Internet karma.

First you need to know your modifiers (see below). You push these with another key to create a shortcut:

 (Command key) – On some Apple keyboards, this key also has an Apple logo ()
 (Control key)
 (Option key) – “Alt” may also appear on this key
 (Shift key)
 (Caps Lock) – Toggles Caps Lock on or off
fn (Function key)

(You can also print out the entire list of keyboard shortcuts from here.)

Borrowed with love from Apple. You can view a complete list of shortcuts, here.

That nifty little iPhone you’re holding is pretty cool, huh? It might be even cooler (er, hotter) to you if this is the first time you’ve heard you can make it a WiFi hotspot. Especially if you don’t have another way to get “portable” Internet for devices like your laptop.

Before you ask, no it isn’t free. Check with your service provider for the monthly fee–because there’s always a monthly fee.

Of course, you could always jailbreak your phone to get the option for free. I’m a stereotypical oldest child and too fearful of getting in trouble, so no jailbreak for me.

Here’s how to make your iPhone (iOS 4.3 and newer) into a WiFi hotspot.

Go to: Settings –> General –> Network

Now select “Set up a personal hotspot.”

For AT&T customers, if you don’t have a monthly plan already set up, you’ll see this (follow instructions):

Done with that? Now acquire your phone’s signal and enter your password.

Note: This can be a bit of a battery suck. Make sure you have a charger with you.

Remember when your mom or dad used to yell at you to clean your room? Well, this is me telling you to clean up online. Happy New Year!

Here are some of my favorite tips:

Links
I share a lot of links online and sometimes want to reference them for later or just keep track of everything I’ve shared. My two favorite tools for organizing links are:

1. Bit.ly and j.mp – In addition to shortening URLs, you can track number of clicks and use to check your “link archives.”
2. Trunk.ly – This platform monitors and collects the links that you find interesting across multiple platforms. For example, I have my blog RSS feed linked here in addition to Twitter, Facebook, etc… That way if I share links direct from another source I can easily go back and find them here.

Additional: If you’re on Pinterest, you can also create a board for “Favorite Links” to assist with archiving for later.

Twitter
Do you give other platforms access to your Twitter account? Do you remember them all? It might be time to clean up or manage third-party access. Here’s how to revoke access:

1. Check out your applications by visiting the Connections tab of account settings
2. Revoke access by clicking the “Revoke Access” button next to the application description. (For a complete overview on connecting your Twitter account to other platforms, read this from Twitter Support.)

Curate content more effectively:

• Set up Twitter lists to include those you never want to miss.
• Missed Twitter for a day or two? Make it easy on yourself and use a service like Cadmus. It displays the most relevant content you may have missed since your last check in.

Facebook

• Facebook requests/notifications – Next to each group/game/friend request, you can choose to delete or ignore all requests from that person if they’re a repeat offender. Block off time on your calendar to do this if you find it needs more time. In fact, a recurring calendar entry may help ensure you manage your online requests.
• Untag yourself. Invest an hour to untag yourself or delete any photos you may have forgotten about.
• To reduce email notifications of requests, friends, etc., in the “Notifications” setting (located in “Settings” under “account settings”), deselect notifications you no longer want to receive.
• Facebook friends – Use Birthday announcements as reminders to unfriend people you haven’t talked to, don’t know or no longer care to stay in touch with. If you would prefer not to “unfriend” someone, instead “hide” their posts so they no longer show up in your newsfeed.
• Part of your spring cleaning may also mean checking to make sure you have a secure online connection. Did you know on Facebook if your URL doesn’t look like this that your connection is not secure? https://facebook.com. You should consider enabling this option if you frequently use Facebook from public Internet access points found at coffee shops, airports, libraries or schools. The option will exist as part of our advanced security features, which you can find in the “Account Security” section of the Account Settings page.

Here are a few apps and platforms for organizing your Facebook experience:

1. TheFriendMail – delivers Facebook to your email and allows you to update your status, write on friends’ walls, view your news feed, like, comment and view friends’ profiles via email. (See review in TheNextWeb)
2. Friendly Plus (for tablets) – allows you to manage your Facebook account from a single screen on your tablet.
3. Access Facebook from within Gmail
4. Facebook Desktop
5. Facebook Page Central by Sysomos helps with Facebook page management and analytics for brands (paid platform)

Gmail
There’s a lot of storage in Gmail so you may not need to delete anything. I typically only delete emails with large attachments (which I save to files) and archive all messages. This has saved me more than once when I needed access someone’s email address and hadn’t corresponded with them in a while. Here are few ways to help organize your Gmail account:

• Use Priority Inbox to automatically identify and sort important email so that the most pertinent mail resides at the top of your inbox.
• Use filters to archive emails and bookmarks into folders, add labels or send incoming items directly to the trash.
• Mark emails needing follow up with “Star” function.
• Run a keyword search for items that can be deleted (think Groupon, etc.) and mass delete.
• To save space, run a Gmail search for “has:attachment” to locate attachments, then delete or save in a file.

Looking for apps or tools to organize your Gmail experience? Try:

• Find Big Mail – Having storage issues? In three steps, this app analyzes your inbox and categorizes mail by size (see review in The Next Web), providing a report of the largest emails in your inbox that can be deleted or saved to create space.
• The Email Game – this app makes cleaning out your inbox fun by a point-based system for tasks such as skipping a message, reply to a message – and you can also challenge your friends. (See review in The Next Web)
• Boomerang for Gmail – This app helps you control when you send and receive email, allowing you to time when emails go out.

Avatar and bio

• Set up a reminder alert on your calendar for the first day of spring every year. Include: update bio and avatar (as needed).
• Take a look in the mirror. Do you look like your current avatar? If not, it may be time to update that photo. Here are “5 Tips for Creating the Perfect Profile Pic.”
• Where is your online bio listed? The majority of active online users have a bio listed in more than one place and they’re typically not synced (meaning you have to manually update each one). Create a Word document with your most recent bio and save it, including the year in the document name. If you need to update your bio in multiple places you can easily copy and paste from this document.

Email notifications
Do you need to be notified every time someone follows you on Twitter? Maybe not. Clean up how your social networks notify you. You can do this one of two ways:

1. Go to the social network and update your notification settings. Chances are you haven’t updated them since you signed up.
2. Set up email filters in your email account of choice and have them delivered right to the trash.

Smartphone – Removing location tracking
Don’t want your smartphone tracking your location? You can clean it up:

• iPhone – In the Location Services setting on your iPhone (located in “Settings” in the “General” section), either turn off the global Location Services setting or turn off the individual location settings of each location-aware application on your iPhone.
• Android – In the “Location” setting in your Android (located in “Settings”), uncheck GPS satellites.
• Blackberry – In the GPS services setting on your Blackberry (located in “Options” in the “Advaced Options” section), stop or disable GPS.

Google Reader
Why recreate the wheel? Here’s a great post to prioritize and organize Google Reader: Prioritizing and Organizing Feeds in Google Reader.

[PREVIOUSLY SHARED ON PRSARAHEVANS.COM]

What social network spring cleaning advice can you share?