Carol Stephen, Author at

Repurposing Your Social Media Content Is the Ultimate Time Saver

December 24, 2020 By Carol Stephen 2 Comments

By now you’ve heard that repurposing your social media content is a must-do. Right? After all, so many companies reuse their social media content. Why shouldn’t you? The answer is that you should! Read on to hear why.

Your Time is Limited

There’s only one of you. Maybe there are a few people on your team who all do the writing, but there’s only one of you. And your schedule is packed already. Spending time blogging or creating content doesn’t always get to the top of your list. In fact, some days it might not get on your list at all. Bridget Willard has an excellent post about Time Blocking Tips (and even uses a baseball analogy, which I love).

You Have Other Things to Do

You have so many things to do that sometimes you run out of space on your list! If you write your to-do list the old-school way, sometimes you run out of paper! Does that sound like you? Sometimes it sounds like me! However, people are always asking the same questions. So turn those frequently asked questions into blog posts and you’ll be set. This article from Greatist about To-Do Lists made me smile. If you’re a maker of lists, you’ll love it. For instance, there’s this golden nugget: “Start the list with at least two items that absolutely must get done today to make sure you don’t end up vacuuming instead of finishing a project report due tomorrow or remembering to buy medications.”

Evergreen Content Can Be Used for a Long Time

Evergreen content is content that can be used over and over, thus saving you time in the long run. If you don’t know about evergreen content, here’s some more info: How Long Is Evergreen Actually Good for? Share it and reshare it (but differently each time)! Some of my older posts are still evergreen years later. And yes, I still re-share those evergreen posts occasionally. After all, they took time to research and write.

21 Ways To Repurpose Your Social Media Conent

21 Ways To Repurpose Your Social Media Content

There’s a Whole Book about it!

Yes, there is, and I wrote it! Discover more about how to reuse your own content. You can find 21 Ways To Repurpose Your Social Media Content: And Why Repurposing Your Content Is Critical on Amazon in two formats, eBook and paperback. If you go to the Amazon link, you can even take a quick look inside the book. Thank you for looking!

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: evergreen content, repurposing social media

A Short History of the #DigiBlogChat Twitter Chat

December 17, 2020 By Carol Stephen 2 Comments

A few people have asked about #DigiBlogChat, a chat that Larry Mount and I started on Twitter a number of years ago. So here goes.

In the Beginning…

Once upon a time, there was a startup in San Francisco, which like a number of other startups, no longer exists. At that startup, I began a Twitter chat called #BigDataChat. That was the end of 2013.

The Before Time

#BigDataChat became very popular. We had a number of big players tweeting along with us on #BigDataChat. We had giveaways and prizes. Sometimes we gave away books, other times there were tickets to startup events. O’Reilly Media was one of the big participants in the chat.

Larry Mount Was a Participant

Larry would regularly participate in #BigDataChat. Each week he would log into #BigDataChat and contribute his thoughts.

When #BigDataChat ended, Larry became sad and lonely. Not really. I made that part up, to give this story more dramatic oomph. But he did notice that #BigDataChat had ended.

The Biggest Giveaway

The company I worked with decided to give away the chat to O’Reilly Media. The chat didn’t last too long after that, for reasons I’m not clear about. At any rate, I was no longer involved with the startup or the chat.

Friendship and Brainstorming

Over the course of the months that #BigDataChat occurred, Larry and Carol (that’s me!) became online friends. After that chat ended, we wondered how to continue the chat experience, and brainstormed ways. We decided upon a day of the week and a time.

©Andy Mangold 2010

#DigiBlogChat Was Born

We all missed #BigDataChat. It was a good time to exchange ideas, over the course of an hour. Once we decided upon Tuesdays at 1:00 pm Pacific Time, we started to collect ideas. And we reached out to people we knew. We sometimes have had prizes and giveaways, too.

The Chat Grew…and Grew

Now #Digiblogchat has a regular bunch of contributors who log in every week. We’ve become friends online and offline, too, in some cases.

The People

Since we crowdsource the topics for our chats, we have an extremely engaged audience. There’s Tripp Braden, Randy Clark, and the enthusiastic Beth Staub. John Lewis, who also runs #Innochat is a regular. Finola, Maricar, and Mitch Mitchell regularly weigh in. My friend @MistressPrime occasionally visits. @CharlesMcCool and @jpretorious are there, too. Then there are @nina_wag and @htindesigner. We couldn’t forget our friends at @interprosepr! Sandy of @CreativeWoodVT has been a friend for a long time. Loni of @JorgensonLocker is also a regular on the chat! And @JKatzaman is always making us laugh!

There are probably others that I’m forgetting and for that I apologize.

Join Us!

Come join us on Twitter. It’s every Tuesday at 1:00 pm Pacific Time. For more info about how to join, read How to Join #DigiBlogChat Twitter Chat.

Filed Under: Blog

Quick and Easy Ways to Content Creation

December 10, 2020 By Carol Stephen 4 Comments

Quick and Easy Ways to Content Creation

Maybe you’ve been blogging for awhile, but writing doesn’t come easily to you. Everyone says how easy writing and blogging are, though. There must be some easier ways to do this, you might be thinking. After all, people are creating content every day without so much trouble, right? Right! Read on for some easy tweaks to make to your content creation.

Decide to Begin

Now that might sound silly, but getting started is usually the hardest part for anyone. So get yourself into the right mindset, sit down at your desk (or kitchen table), and get started! Or, if you’d rather do a video blog (vlog), get set up for that. Give yourself permission to quit after 15 minutes. That often helps.

Spend the Most Time on Your Headline

If you only have an hour to write, spend about half that time on your headline. Seriously. Some people won’t even read your article before sharing it, but you want them to click through, right? For more info, you might like this article: What Happens When You Write 25 Headlines Before Choosing One? Lately I’ve been using Google to help me find topics for blogging about. Just type in your keyword and see what Google comes up with.

Write Every Day

Now writing every day might not sound easy, but could you write two sentences a day? Or a paragraph or two? That will definitely help you get started. And those little changes add up. I like this article from Tiny Buddha: Things Change When You Do (and Small Changes Add up). One of those changes is to take care of yourself first, by the way. (Writing can help with taking care of yourself.)

Write Out Loud

Talk to yourself and then write down what you say. Or call a friend and write down what you say to them. You may want to use the talk-to-text feature on your phone. Here are the 8 Best Voice-to-Text Apps of 2020. You’ll still have to edit your text, but voice-to-text apps are getting better all the time. You can certainly talk about your business, even if you think that you can’t write about it.

Completion, Not Perfection

If you’re a perfectionist, you might have a hard time with this one. Yes, you can write something that’s good. But it probably won’t be perfect. Aim for getting it done and it’ll be much easier.

Reward Yourself

This is another quick and easy hint. You’re not supposed to reward yourself with food, but come on. This is 2020! Have the cookie. Or go for a walk, if that makes you feel less guilty. I vote for the cookie.

What If You Have a Time Crunch?

And if you only have an hour to create a blog post? You might like this article: How to Write a Perfectly Fine Blog Post in One Hour. Yes, you really can do it! At least you’ll have a great deal of it done in one hour, and the momentum to move forward.

Have Other Ideas?

Let me know with a comment! And thank you.

Filed Under: Blog

How to Boost Your Self-Esteem!

December 3, 2020 By Carol Stephen Leave a Comment

How do you define self-esteem? And do you depend on other people to develop your self-esteem, or is self-esteem something you develop in the privacy of your own quarantined home? Whichever way you define it, there are definitely ways to develop your self-esteem. Here are some ways that have worked for me.

We’re Not Worthy

Surely everyone of a certain age remembers the “we’re not worthy” guys from Wayne’s World. And we’ve all felt that way when suddenly being recognized by someone we deem worthy. Do you ever feel unworthy of the kudos coming your way? And almost as if, as Groucho Marx said, “I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member.”

Imposter Syndrome

Everyone, me included, sometimes feels like an imposter. As though everyone else knows what they’re doing, but maybe you don’t. But there are ways around it.

Act As If

Acting as if you’re already successful can really help to avoid imposter syndrome. Pretending you’re already there to the top of your personal Mount Everest can ease some of that worry. Or even imitating or channeling one of your much-loved heroes. For instance, when I have to do something difficult I often channel my brother.

Writing as a Way to Boost Your Self-Esteem

Now you might not have thought about writing as a way to boost your self-esteem, but writing can help your self-esteem in several ways. For one thing, writing helps clarify your ideas and that always helps. For another, you can write a series of articles, scoop them up together and turn them into a book. Or start a podcast, for that matter.

Filed Under: Blog

How to Ensure Your Tweetstream Tells a Good Story

November 12, 2020 By Carol Stephen 4 Comments

©Stewart Butterfield

When you’re trying to decide whether to follow someone, or follow someone back on Twitter, how do you do it? Do you look at that person’s timeline to try to decide? Or do you have a conversation first? Here are some ways to make your own Twitter stream look better so others might want to follow you.

Don’t retweet posts with huge lists of people

Recently, people have restarted that Friday Follow tradition. Remember the one that almost made you leave Twitter? When Friday Follow first started, it was fun. That was many years ago. Then, more recently, Friday Follow became huge lists of as many accounts as people could squish into one tweet. Don’t retweet these if you can help it. It looks messy and does nothing for those you already follow. If people see too many of these tweets in your timeline, they’ll either 1. not want to follow you, or 2. unfollow you if they’re already following you. By the way, here are some Friday Follow best practices from the vault (2013!): Follow Friday: 8 Best Practices.

Read the stuff you retweet

Make sure the links you’re going to retweet really work. I admit I’ve been guilty of retweeting without reading–and it’s not a good idea. Occasionally, the links don’t work. Also, if you’re sending your friends to a site with a paywall or that’s spammy or filled with tons of popups, wouldn’t you want to warn them? Seems like a good idea to me! If you’ve tried to retweet something without reading it lately, Twitter is now suggesting that you read before retweeting! Apparently, it worked, because “Twitter says the prompts worked, and users opened articles before sharing them 40% more often than they did without the nudge.”

©Felipe Cabrera

Have conversations!

Engagement is definitely the gold standard of social media. So if you’re sharing something, say something about it. Talk to people. Ask questions. Say hello. Engage in tweetchats (even if you can only add a comment or two, it’s better than nothing. For more about engagement, you may like: For Better Social Media Results, Focus on Engagement. Still have questions? Talk to me on Twitter!

Still here?

If you’re still reading, thank you! I haven’t been blogging since August, but I’m back and I appreciate your reading all the way to the end!

Filed Under: Blog

You Need to Know about Pinterest’s Powerful New Feature, Story Pins

August 13, 2020 By Carol Stephen Leave a Comment

Photo by ShardsOfBlue

What Are Story Pins?

Story pins let you put together up to 20 pages of images and texts in one pin. If you’re inside Pinterest, you can create story pins on the top left corner of your screen (see the screen shot below). Once you’ve created a story pin, there will be a number there, too, to indicate how many pages or images exist in the story pin.

You Need a Pinterest Business Account

If you’re a business and don’t have a business account on Pinterest, you need to do that. Here’s why: Ten Arguments for a Pinterest Business Account. Seriously, do that first. I’ll wait. Bottom line–you need analytics so you can measure your results on Pinterest. Otherwise, you may be wasting your time. One tip for you? Publish in the evening, at around 6:30 pm, for the best results.

Three Types of Story Pins

Currently, there are three types of story pins: Recipes , DIY, and guides. Here’s an example of a recipe pin: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/128985976816932426/ (You may need to log into Pinterest to see it, but there’s cake there.)

Who Can Use Story Pins?

Anyone who uses stories can use a story pin! That should probably be all of us. Stories make time stand still, and keep your followers engaged. And they’re fun!

Where Do I Sign up for Story Pins?

If story pins are not yet available where you are, you can request access: Story Pin Request Form. They should be available shortly for everyone. It takes 5-7 days to gain access if you request it.

How Do I Get Started?

Here’s a short guide, straight from the horse’s mouth, Pinterest. Create Story Pins. Although story pins might seem complicated, they’re easy and fun. The important thing is to get started! You can edit story pins, so there’s that.

When Should I Use a Story Pin Rather than a Regular Pin?

Recipes are good for story pins. And, as suggested by Pinterest, anything that requires multiple steps and that you can be illustrate with pictures is a good idea. So a simple craft would make a good story pin. Or something like how to paint a wall yourself. You can put up multiple videos, or even use a video as the cover for your story pin.

React to a Story Pin with Emojis

You can react to a story pin with five different emojis! They are: Good idea, love, thanks, wow, and haha. Pay attention to the number of repins, impressions, and closeups for this pin (above), after just one day. Kind of cool, right?

What Else?

After you’ve published a Story Pin, you can edit the public note, the board you published it to, topic tags, and details. You can also delete an existing page, add a new page, or reorder existing pages. How many times have you published something (say a tweet), and wanted to edit it but can’t? You have to delete it and start over! UGH! Anyway, if you try story pins let me know!

Filed Under: Blog

#Digiblogchat Questions August 11, 2020

August 7, 2020 By Carol Stephen Leave a Comment

The topic for August 11, 2020 is how Emotional Intelligence can help you build stronger relationships with others during challenging times (questions by @Tripp Braden ). Emotional intelligence can help you connect on a deeper level with others. How do you know if you’re connecting with others if you are also being distracted? Here are a Braden’s top ten questions to help you evaluate where you are and help you get to where you want to be. They will help you remain centered and mindful of the emotions you and the other people in your life might be feeling. Join us on Twitter for #digiblogchat every Tuesday at 1:00 p.m. Pacific Time!

Q1. What does emotional intelligence mean to you?

Q2. What are your strengths when dealing with emotional situations?

Q3. How does your mood impact how you make decisions?

Q4. Are you good at understanding others’ emotions? Are you good at reading others emotions accurately?

Q5. What do you do when you feel overwhelmed?

Q6. How do you respond to criticism? Do you always go with your first response?

Q7. How important is it to be authentic when dealing with others about your emotions?

Q8. Why is it important to forgive and forget when dealing with many emotional situations?

Q9. How do you deal with your commitments to others? What about to yourself?

Q10. Have you ever considered how helping others helps meet your emotional needs?

Bonus Question: What one thing will you act on that you learned today?

Filed Under: Digiblogchat questions

10 Best Ways to Manage Time on Social Media

August 6, 2020 By Carol Stephen 2 Comments

Time is precious, and yet we all tend to waste it (including myself here). Time management can be a tricky business, especially when you’re using social media. Here are some things I’ve learned from ten years managing social media for myself and others.

Use a Timer

A good timer, such as Noko (the one I use) helps you see in graphic format exactly where your time is going. If you don’t have the money for a professional timer or app, any timer will help. I used to use an egg timer, and that worked fine. Something about the ticking really did help. If you’re short on time, you might like: What if you only have 30 minutes for social media?

Plan Each Day

Before you start working, have a plan. Now, you may not follow the plan, but at least you have a structure to fall back onto when you think “now what was I supposed to be doing?” Because you will forget and become distracted without a plan. My planning takes roughly 5-7 minutes to do, either the night before or the day of. A social media content calendar is a very good idea, by the way. You can use Excel or you can use a social media content calendar, such as this one from Later.

Photo by jakuza

Prioritize

Once you’ve written down everything you have to do, prioritize. You probably have 5-7 things you must do each day. Decide which items are necessities. Then decide which you’ll do first, second, third, etc.

Have a Reason

Why are you on Twitter? What are you doing on Facebook? Stick to your reason, post, and have a definite period of time you plan to be there. Then get out before you get sucked in! Because you will get sucked in…there are a million billion videos of cute kittens just waiting for you.

Photo by Joi

Maintain Focus

Stay focused on your purpose for being on social media. Are you there to comment on others’ posts? Then do that? Are you there to check on your own posts? Do that and (again) get out!

Delegate

If you get distracted easily, you might want someone else to do your social media for you. Find someone who can post, or who can engage on your behalf. Need more time? You might want to Outsource Your Social Media.

Keep it Quiet

Most people thrive with a quiet environment, especially if you tend to get sensory overload from being online.

Photo by judy dean

Use White Noise

A white noise generator can also work if the sound of waves or wind help you. I like one that has birds (quietly) chirping, along with a few frogs.

Learn to Say No

Saying no is perhaps the most important tactic of all. Think of a few different ways to say no. In the article 7 Tips for Saying No Effectively, Joseph Albert suggests being assertive and courteous: “You might say, “I’m sorry I can’t right now but will let you know when and if I can.” This approach is polite, and puts you in a position of power by changing the dynamic.” Isn’t that wonderful? He also suggests standing firm when pushed, which leads me to the next suggestion…

Be Ruthless

Guard your time like a dragon guards its lair. It’s your life and your business, after all! Who else is going to guard it?

Filed Under: Blog

#Digiblogchat questions August 4, 2020

August 3, 2020 By Carol Stephen Leave a Comment

The topic for August 4, 2020 is the use of Artificial Intelligence in Marketing and Social Media with @interprosepr. Join us on Twitter for #digiblogchat every Tuesday at 1:00 p.m. Pacific Time!

Q1. What are some examples of where AI can be found in marketing today?

Q2. Does Artificial Intelligence (AI) even have a place in marketing? If so, where?

Q3. Why should marketers care about AI?

Q4. How is AI impacting the marketing landscape in general?

Q5. What aspects of day-to-day marketing operations can AI be applied to?

Q6. Wait…AI can be used for copywriting?

Q7. Why should copywriters be worried about being replaced by AI?

Q8. What kinds of technical or resource challenges are there to AI’s use in marketing?

Q9. Are there any ethics, privacy, or security issues when implementing AI in marketing?

Q10. Where do you see AI in marketing going in the future?

Filed Under: Digiblogchat questions

This is What Good Quarantine Cooking Looks Like

July 30, 2020 By Carol Stephen 4 Comments

White Chocolate and Cheese Parfait by Warren Laine-Naida

Our topic for #Digiblogchat on Twitter for July 21, 2020 was Quarantine Cooking. We had so many interesting replies and recipes that I thought a summary might be nice. Join us on Twitter for #digiblogchat every Tuesday at 1:00 p.m. Pacific Time! Here are the questions, followed by some of the answers.

Q1. What’s the best dish or cocktail you’ve created during quarantine?

Justine Pretorious (@jpretorious) suggested A1) Watermelon Frozen Daiquiri! 3 ingredients: frozen watermelon, lime juice, and rum!

Interprose (@interprosepr) said A1. So, our team has been #WFH-based for 20+ years. One key to maintaining company culture is sharing, including recipes. We’ve seen lots of yummies from our team, including one person who changed his @zoom_us background to a photo of bourguignon he’d made recently.

Q2. What were some strange ingredient substitutions you’ve made?

Randy Clark (@RandyLyleClark) said A2 We’ve been using plant based meat substitutes — made sloppy joes last night.

Larry (@LazBlazter) said A2. No Muscovado sugar so had to improvise for the caramelisation element. Opted for dates and icing sugar, neighbours love it and want more. Did I write it down anywhere? Nope.

Q3. What recipes or cooking ideas didn’t work out?

Beth (@AdventureGlass) said A3. Vegan cheese. . . . . . . there is a good vegan queso but vegan queso Mac and cheese. . . um no

Then there’s this: A3. Heard from one @Interprosepr team member about trying a new recipe that was more complex than usual. It was an soba noodle dish. Like the noodles that didn’t turn out, her family’s reaction was rather limp. Love that she tried something new. #DigiBlogChat #CallGrubHub

Chinese Chicken Salad

Q4. Do you have any recipe that you’d like to share?

Justine (@jpretorious) shared this recipe with NO stale fried noodles: A4) Chinese chicken salad nomnompaleo.com/chinese-chicke #DigiBlogChat

A4: @Omneya_Nabil shared her favourite 2-minute snack recipe.

Q5. How often do you get take-out food (or do you only cook at home)?

Sandy Connoly (@sandyconnoly) explained A5. Not often, but we are tonight @Applebees

And Maricar (@MaricarJagger) said A5. It’s been a time to work on some home cooking and to use fish from our fish market that stayed open.

White Chocolate and Cheese Parfait by Warren Laine-Naida

Q6. What have you baked lately?

Chef Warren Laine-Naida (@WarrenLNaida) shared his recipe for White Chocolate and Cheese Parfait. (This looks luscious!)

Beth (@AdventureGlass) said A6. no No baking when it’s so hot outside.

And Justine Pretorious (@jpretorious) mentioned A6) Banana Bread with Blackberries and the rasberry oatmeal bars. My hubby loves his pastries!

Poppyseed cake

Not to be outdone, @maricarjagger baked this poppyseed cake for a friend. It turned out very well, delicious especially with some raspberry coulis (another secret weapon in my cooking arsenal)

Q7. What’s the simplest meal you’ve made?

Justine Pretorious (@jpretorious) made A7) Breakfast tostadas! #DigiBlogChat

Q8. Any tips for making fresh produce last longer?

Larry (@LazBlazter) said A8. Grow your own if possible and pick it when you are about to eat.

While @Omneya_Nabil said A8: I use basil leaves in almost everything I cook. I buy them fresh and freeze them in an ice cube tray with olive oil.

Justine (@jpretorious) said A8) Keep the bananas separate from the other fruit, refrigerate tomatoes/potatoes, and add a paper towel on top of mushrooms if you buy them pre-sliced.

Roast Chicken with Lemon Butter and Garlic

Q9. What’s your laugh-out-loud go-to meal and why?

Omneya @Omneya_Nabil said A9: My specialty roast chicken with lemon butter and garlic. It’s the first dish I ever cooked with my roommates at my college dorms. We always take photos and send them to each other when we cook this dish.

Justine said A9) Frozen cauliflower pizza because it only takes 12 minutes :)

Pampered Chef Chopper

Q10. What’s your favorite, most-used kitchen appliance?

Beth (@AdventureGlass) said A10. Pampered Chef Chopper – love that thing #digiblogchat

And several people mentioned that their coffee maker was their favorite! There was also a vote for a refrigerator.

Filed Under: Blog