#40: What tools do I need in my social media toolbox?
As you prepare to launch your own social experience for a project or organization, there are fantastic and FREE tools to help make your job faster, simpler and smarter. Let them do the heavy lifting for you so you can concentrate on the concept and flow of what you are doing, not the technical execution of it!
Browser. Firefox. You’ve heard about it but may not yet have made the switch. Just so you know, Internet Explorer is not the only or even necessarily the best way to browse the Internet. It’s just the default setting due to vendor agreements with Microsoft. Check out Firefox for a zippy way to browse that’s incredibly customizable (which you want down the road as you get more comfortable online). Plus, hackers aren’t always trying to attack it, so you won’t spend a lot of time processing updates.
Mobile Browser. Opera Mini (of Safari for an iPhone). Again, there isn’t only one way to access the Internet from your cell phone with a data plan! The default browser is set, but you can always download another! Opera Mini can handle scripts that many browsers can’t, letting you log into and launch pages that you wouldn’t otherwise be able to access. Also a nice, zippy browsing experience.
Website Builder. You simply cannot beat Wordpress for an easy way to build a professional Website and easily customize it with plug-n-play functionality, from instant PayPal shopping carts to linking to your Twitter, Facebook and even Constant Contact accounts. If you want a free site where all of the files live on Wordpress’s servers, go to Wordpress.com. You’ll have dozens of templates to choose from, and for small fees, you can point the site to your own custom URL or get under the hood and futz with the styles. If you are more advanced and want an incredibly powerful constant management system hosted on your own servers, then grab the free full install at Wordpress.org. Thousands of templates and plug-ins to create exactly what you want with just a few clicks.
Graphics and Image Editor. I’m a Photoshopper, for certain, but there’s an extraordinary freeware called Paint.Net that also is layer-based. It’s wildly customizable, too; like many open source applications, programmers around the world love to dig into the code and come up with nifty plug-ins to add functionality.
Sticky Notes. As you hunt for information for your site, like facts, quotes and site links to add to your blogroll, the easiest place to paste and save on the fly is a great sticky note program. I like MoRUN.net’s Sticker Lite because the notes always stay visible, even as I switch pages and programs. It’s a truly “sticky” notes program - and you can change note colors, which may matter only to me…
Interactive Tools. Your Web presence will be more social as soon as your audience can actively interact with you. That means polls, surveys, games and more. You don’t have to build those; just grab a widget someone else has made and go! PollDaddy is integrated into loads of social platforms, and it lets you make interactive polls in seconds (though editing them afterward can be a pain - just make a new one and embed it again). Nothing so far beats Google Forms for surveys that actually capture the results in a spreadsheet (Google Docs) for you - and let you see gorgeous graph results with one-click (no skip logic yet, fyi). If you really want to go on a journey, visit WidgetBox and see all of the incredible, portable mini-apps waiting for you to explore and add to your social presence.
Online Back-Up. I believe in triple back-ups, desktop/local external drive/remote server. I like Mozy for the remote “cloud” offering; once you set up and run the first back-up, you can schedule a nightly update that runs automatically! They have a free level, but the annual fee for a lot of space is abot $60. Being able to access files remotely will save you every time you travel.
Music. It takes a lot of time to brainstorm and get creative and build sites and plan Facebook events and launch YouTube channels! You’re going to want to listen to good music from your favorite artists - and other artists that share the same musical genomes (haha). I recommend immediately creating a Coldplay and a Marvin Gaye station on Pandora and hearing everyone else who enters the mix.
If you have tools you love - or already love these tools - leave your thoughts below!
September 27th, 2009 at 2:21 pm
Loved your social media seminar! DMA, your presentations always rock with excitement and wisdom! I had heard a lot about “community building” but you made it come to life. The “Brainstorm Force 4″ was fantastic! Would love to see a seminar on how to budget for some web 3.0 projects that would enhance productions. Thanks for the inspiring hours on Saturday!
September 29th, 2009 at 11:29 am
Thanks for sharing your expertise. You break things down so us creative types can really grasp the technical side of things….much appreciated!!!
September 29th, 2009 at 3:23 pm
DMA, your seminar was invaluable. It helped put all the disparate pieces together to achieve some clarity in thinking out when to use which app for best results.
And always stressing that it’s all about community really drove it home. Thanks so much for your exuberance and expertise.