Wednesday, 14 December 2016

THE LAST POST.........


Image result for the last post

Ladies and Gentlemen, its been emotional!  A real rollercoaster of a ride.  Suffering the ups and downs, and the occasional loop the loop of social media and its now, akin to Southern rail, the end of the line.

Before the curtain falls, let us review all that we've looked at over the last ten weeks....... 

Blogger
You Tube
Twitter
Linkedin
Google Docs
Pinterest
Face Time
Google Hangouts
Hootsuite

Quite an array I'm sure you'll agree, so what do I have in store for the final act?   How can I combine all 9 media tools to deliver a formidable finale?  Our course tutor had just the thing,   Google once again was at the fore front.  You will recall my review of Google Docs and how I sang its praises, in the same vain, Google could deliver the same magic with Power point.  Allowing multiple contributors to combine their thoughts and ideas on slides collaboratively regardless of geo-location!

In simple terms, the task in hand was that the class were to work in unison apart.  Each individual in my team ( Di, Aeron, Terrence and yours truly) were to contribute to and produce a power point presentation, a beginning, a middle and the end. 

The Beginning to introduce the task in hand
The Middle, the sandwich filling covering social media tools
The End to convey lessons learnt

I dived straight in, penning an introductory slide and there after starting on the sandwich filling by covering Hootsuite, Pinterest and Google Docs.  I lay down the gauntlet and e mailed team members with the work to date and clarifying what needed to be done.  Due to unforeseen circumstances the gauntlet was not seized and the work remains sadly unfinished.  Below, however for your perusal is what was produced


In my opinion, Google had once again got it right,  superseding all things microsoft.  Allowing the author to create, edit, imbed video links and add speakers notes with ease.  The best bit..... there is only one presentation, no need to worry about other versions!  Never need to ask whether you're working on the most recent version!  simplicity personified!

And so as the curtain falls on this chapter of my learning, I look forward to the next semester when I will once again tread the boards of new technology and software.  The Future is bright


Image result for theater curtains

Friday, 2 December 2016

GETTING THE WORD OUT ON THE STREET - TOUT SUITE



Hootsuite is a social media platform, created in 2008.  The systems user interface (home page if you will) takes the form of a dashboard( see the below image) and allows the user to integrate their own social media preferences; currently supported are Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Google+, You Tube and many more.

Hootsuite Dashboard
Hootsuite was born when it's creator Ryan Holmes needed a tool to manage multiple social media networks at his digital services agency.  When Holmes realised that no such beast existed he went about developing a platform of his own and the launch went ahead in 2008 under the guise of "BrightKit".

Image result for brightkit

This software was the solution to many of the hiccups and headaches businesses were facing with regards to organising their own social networks and improving their clients web engagement.

I must confess I'd never heard of Hootsuite..... and why would I?  I'm not a brand nor am I a business keen to promote self and services.  Therefore when assigned our week 10 homework of registering for a hootsuite account... I found myself treading candidly .......


Having taken my first step into the unknown and registering (truth be told, quite straight forward and user friendly) we needed to add our compulsory 3 (no more than 3 as it would incur a cost) social media networks.  This I also did with ease, adding Twitter, Linkedin and Facebook.  First impression was that the dashboard was a little busy (refer to the above photo), I didn't like it, couldn't warm to it and was about to dismiss it when I realised I was reviewing Hootsuite as an individual rather than an enterprise or business. I needed to rethink and review Hootsuite through the eyes of a small business.....

Now, reviewing Hootsuite with entrepreneur hat on .....here's my review.....

Hootsuite delivers as promised.  It puts all of the clients web engagement in one place for ease of access, functionality and updates.  Hootsuite is for business what Outlook is for the office administrator.  Granted, I'm not a real business an I have no need to promote my brand accross social media.......however if I did, what could it do for me???? what are the good and the bad points?  these are my honest laymans' thoughts.....

HOOTSUITE POSITIVES 
Connects 35 Social Networks in one place
Scheduled Updates
Social medial analytics (Influences & Insights)
Social Media Monitoring (What am I getting right and what am I getting wrong?)
Free plans available
30 day free Pro Trial
Single click reply 
Identify Leads and Influences
Pre-empt.... you can write responses to regular questions in advance.
Upload bulk social media messages (time saver!!)
Mobile Apps for Android and apple
Social media management tool

HOOTSUITE NEGATIVES
The Pro Plan (Post free trial) is billed annually
30 day free trial sucks you in
Dashboard is a little busy
Expensive analytical report
No thumbnail or summary previews in facebook.
No data in facebook insights
Lower facebook insight

Reviewing the above lists.... there are more positives than there are negatives..... but is Hootsuite the creme de la creme ............ the answer to that is that its all dependant upon what you're after as a business.  Since the Birth of BrightKit and now Hootsuite there has been an emerging market of similar software and social media management tools. Some examples of the competition are :

TweetDeck
SproutSocial
Agorapulse
Oktopost
Mavsocial
and
Jollo
My advice would be to trial each one and then decide which glass slipper fits best. 

Finally to sumise, here is an honest Hootsuite review that chimes with some of my thinking