What’s Your Social Media Ritual? Sharing My Own 15-Steps

At work, we’ve been talking a lot about the information scans we all do on our own…who we refer to, which sites are the best, the most useful feeds, etc. So, now, out of curiosity and from inspiration gained from Chris Brogan’s recent post: “Where I Learn More,” I’m asking: Where do you go to learn?

Brogan’s article is great, as in it, he talks about the role of influence and asks us to reflect on what influences what we learn, think, behave and believe….so close to a social marketing (the real social marketing) question my buttons were popping with techy-excitement.

Here is my average, daily, social media ritual.

Please share me yours, and perhaps we can both expand our horizons a little. =)

Check my work e-mail account. Its true fellow co-workers.
Check my regular Gmail account. I get various e-newsletters and feeds here such as the Ad Council Creative E-newsletter, emails from the Social Marketing listserv, Chris Brogan’s new e-newsletter and others.
Check my blog email account. I get various e-newsletter and feeds here that help me stay up to date on the social media, nonprofit, and social marketing arena. Some of my favorite includes Nedra Weinreich’s Spare Change Blog, Beth Kanter’s blog/wiki, and Ogilvy PR’s 360 Digital Influence blog.
Check my Bloglines feeds, to see what good posts are up and published.
Check out both the nonprofit and the social media categories on Alltop.com
Do a scan of: TechCrunch, Trendspotting, Read Write Web, Osocio, Non-Profit Times, NextGov, BrazenCareerist, Social Times, and others. This can depend on the day and the topic I’m currently investigating.
Check old Twitter feeds I may have missed. Especially key feeds from @GeoffLiving, @Nedra, @chrisbrogan, @scobleizer, @rww, @abfdc, @allllll the others I follow on Twitter. Really, it’s a community working together and sharing. It. is. awesome.
If it’s a Monday, I check out the Carnival for Non-Profit Consultants.
Check in on Linkedin to see if anyone new I know has joined or connected. The homepage on Linkedin is becoming increasingly fun.
Surf around the NonProfit Blog Exchange if Emily has posted some great new posts.
Then, it’s on to the social bookmarks. I check my delicious, both my networks and my subscriptions. Oftentimes, those I am connected to are in a similar field or have similar interests, so thank you everyone on del.icio.us.
Then, I spend a little time on Digg, and may occasionally check in on StumbleUpon. I’m really liking Mixx more and more too, though, there doesn’t seem to be as many people on it.
I check up on the scoop of my work’s internal wiki.
Check meetup.com for upcoming events and opportunities to take online connecting –> offline.
More scooping that I probably, and I apologize, didn’t list. Though, if I remember more, I will place in the comments. There’s always MORE to learn and MORE resources to discover. =)

Important note to make: This is just the listening phase.

About the listening phase. I might do some or all of this ritual depending on the day and the time. The point is though, that my ritual is…I am always listening. Always checking in. Always asking questions. Always working to seek answers.

The FUN part, is taking it all in, reflecting, and creatively organizing the content and information in your head to implement innovative, effective communications. And, when I really want to *get wild,* I reflect further, beyond the field of communications, social media or marketing…but more to what Chris mentions, about influence. About change. About society. About trends. About what it all means.

Photo Credit: Flickr, Elias Pirasteh

9 thoughts on “What’s Your Social Media Ritual? Sharing My Own 15-Steps”

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HeyStephanie June 29, 2008 at 5:04 am

That is a long ritual and sadly, mine is probably just as long. I’ll try to put together my ritual this weekend and share with you once I get a chance.

Osocio June 29, 2008 at 9:52 am

Due to a overscheduled daily programm I changed my ritual. I became more passive but I’m lucky to get tips about anything by mail. Mail, Twitter and delicious are now my most important sources.
Also noticed that most surpises came from mediasources I never checked, which somebody in my network pointed me to.

Osocio June 29, 2008 at 10:32 am

Forgot one: referrers. Pointed me often to websites I never heard of.
A question which is related: We are all addicted to social marketing, but do you have enough time left to stumble across your other interest?

chrisbrogan June 29, 2008 at 12:25 pm

Here’s my question, and not meant rudely: what do you DO with all that information you collect? What comes next?

socialbutterfly4change June 29, 2008 at 4:45 pm

@ HeyStephanie, Thanks for checking in, and I look forward to seeing a fellow bloggers ritual as well.

@ Osocio I def. agree that there are days where the ‘ritual’ gets cut down, and that oftentimes, there are great sources others lead me to. Part of the fun for me, is discovering the new resources and especially the people behind them. Twitter is probably my most used source as well. I’m on FriendFeed, but I still prefer Twitter.

@chrisbrogan You asked a great question, which I started to allude to at the end of my post. ‘Listening’ is not only a great brainstorming tool for new ideas, but it’s especially fun for me to think about what it all means and to think about the concept of influence. I loved that you brought that concept up in your blog post. Currently, I use the information I gather for my research, that I’m fortunate to present at the World Social Marketing Conference in England this upcoming September. And, hope to turn into a paper. I also use the information I find for clients. Currently I work at a social marketing firm (the real social marketing), and we have many government agencies as clients. It’s a fun challenge to be creative and innovative to get social media integrated into government communications. Lastly, I find it well-served to always have information in the back of my mind to pull from because you never know when it will come in handy. What about you? What do you do with the information? or, what do you think people should do with the information, but don’t?

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Shama Hyder July 1, 2008 at 1:00 am

Hey Alexandra,

Great post! Do you use Facebook? If not, why not? = )

socialbutterfly4change July 1, 2008 at 2:38 am

Hi Shama,

I do use Facebook. Currently, I use it primarily to maintain personal friendships and relationships. Moving far away form home and my hub of core friends, etc, I find Facebook to be a great tool to of staying in touch, and I much prefer it to MySpace. Though, my use of the medium has declined as now I prefer connecting through my blog, Twitter and Linkedin.

Though, as time goes on, I’m finding that it’s harder to keep the various online worlds apart. What are your thoughts?

Jeffrey Levy July 8, 2008 at 11:18 pm

Hey, this is a great list! It’ll help us at US EPA learn how people are using these tools, so we can get into the right places and help them find the environmental info they want.

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SocialButterfly

Exploring the Art + Science of Social Change.

9 thoughts on “What’s Your Social Media Ritual? Sharing My Own 15-Steps”