About Nicky Kriel

Nicky Kriel is a Social Media Coach & Trainer inspiring, educating and empowering Business Owners to use Social Media more strategically. She is also the author of How to Twitter for Business Success. For more information visit http://www.nickykriel.com or to find out about her courses that she runs in Guildford visit http://www.nickykriel.com/courses

LinkedIn now has the @mention function

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Posted on April 27, 2013 by Nicky Kriel

Did you know you can tag people or @mention people on LinkedIn now? At the beginning of April, LinkedIn introduced the @mention function onto LinkedIn.

This function works in the similar way that it does on Facebook and Twitter. It notifies people that they are being talked about.

How it works

From your home page or when you are commenting on someone one’s update:

Add @ and start typing a person’s name.
It can be either their first name or surname
Choose the person from the drop down menu
This creates a hyperlink to their profile
You can only tag someone if you are already connected to them or they have commented on the same update.
You can mention companies too.

Pros

You let people know when you are talking about them so that they can respond
The person mentioned will be get a notification and an email
You find out when people are mentioning you and you can respond to their update
Companies will know when you mention them
Your name, photo and headline might pop up in the drop down menu when someone is mentioning a person with a similar name. This keeps you top of mind.
Companies will be more visible

Cons

Potential for people who tend to spam to tag random people to updates.
More email notifications from LinkedIn (although you can change the email settings)

How to change your email notifications for mentions

Go into Settings
Choose the Communication tab and the “set the frequency of emails” option
Edit the messages by LinkedIn by clicking on the pencil
Change the frequency of mentions

I personally would not recommend you stop email notification unless you get mentioned a lot. It is good to be able to respond quickly when someone talks about you.

I think this is a great feature that LinkedIn has added, what do you think?

Nicky Kriel

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From Blog to Book

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Posted on April 17, 2013 by Nicky Kriel

Photograph by Dani Maimone

Some people say writing a book is easy. Some people say you can write a book in a weekend. Having gone through the process, I am not sure I would call it easy.

Yes, I am sure you can produce enough words in a short time when you put your mind to it, but, ultimately, you want to write a book that’s worth reading.

I was lucky that when I started writing “How to Twitter for Business Success” because I wasn’t starting from scratch and I already had a publisher. I had a couple of years of blogging content about Twitter to get me started. I am pleased that I chose to produce a book even with a few labour pains!.

Here are some of the stages of the birthing process that I went through:

Collating all my written material
Editing what I had already written. It is amazing how much information was out of date and how many typos and grammatical errors I found looking at my writing with fresh eyes.
Writing content
Trying to put myself in my reader’s shoes and working out what was missing and still need to be written.
Writing
Structuring the book so that it had a natural flow.
Writing some more.

And then just when you think you are done…

.. there’s editing and proofreading!!

Let alone, the technical side such as formatting, typesetting and the cover design.

At each stage you have to proofread all over again!

This stage is far more mechanical than the creative writing phase. I am very grateful to have a publisher (The Other Publishing Company) so I didn’t have to learn to do the technical side, otherwise, I would still be trying to figure it all out.

Nicky Kriel with publisher Mike Cameron – The Other Publishing Company. Photograph by Dani Maimone

Finally, the book was born.

I was surprised how exciting it was to have a real book to hold. I still find myself stroking the front cover!

Now that I have a physical book and an electronic version in numerous different formats I am entering a new phase.

I didn’t produce the book simply to be able to say that I am a published author, I actually want people to read my book. Okay, I know it sound obvious, but I don’t want people to read the book just because they are my friends. I want people to read this book because it is useful for their business.

I am very aware that my baby needs a lot of support before it will be able to stand on its own feet. So now I am going on yet another learning curve: Marketing the book

Nicky Kriel and Dee Blick at How to Twitter Book Launch. Photograph by Dani Maimone

I am so pleased that Dee Blick (who wrote my foreword and is a best selling author) encouraged me to have a book launch event. It was lovely marking the occasion. I will never have a first book again. It was wonderful being surrounded by supportive friends and I felt like a celebrity signing books.

Here’s a great video of the Book Launch event by London Corporate Media.

It has been very exciting so far. If you are reading this and you are either planning to buy the book or have read it already, please can you do any of the following:

Tweet to me @NickyKriel to tell me about it.
Share a photograph of you with the book (I would love that!)
Let me know a bit about you and your business and whereabouts you live
Write a Review

I’ve already had a phone call from someone in Johannesburg,South Africa who had just bought my book and a offer of photograph of my book in Phoenix, Arizona. I am also waiting for a photograph from Cornwall, England. I would love to hear from you.

How to Twitter for Business Success is available on Amazon throughout the world and Barnes & Noble:

Amazon.com

Amazon.co.uk

Barnes & Noble

Nicky Kriel

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How to Twitter book is available now!

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Posted on March 22, 2013 by Nicky Kriel

Have you been thinking about using Twitter for your business? Or are you using Twitter but you’re not too sure if you’re making the most of it?

I have eventually written down (in one place) my knowledge gained from:

Using Twitter to grow my own business
Working with business owners face-to-face and online
Running Webinars
Training public and bespoke courses
Blogging about Twitter
Answering countless questions via Social Media and comments left on my posts
Working with a wide range of businesses from solopreneurs to multinational companies

This book will inspire you to get going and show you how to use Twitter confidently.

How to Twitter for Business Success is aimed at both complete newbies and the more experienced Tweeter wanting to take their knowledge a lot further.

How to Twitter for Business Success will help you:

See how Twitter is a very effective and powerful marketing tool for your business
Explain Twitter jargon in plain English
Give you tons of tips to get you started
Show you how it all works
Show you what to tweet
Help you find followers
Help you manage your time on Twitter

How to Twitter for Business Success will be available from the 5th April. I will up date this post when the book goes on sale. Let me know when you get a copy, I would love your comments.

UPDATE

Both the paperback and kindle version are now available on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk

How to Twitter for Business Success on Amazon.com

How to Twitter for Business Success on Amazon.co.uk

I have had a few lovely reviews so far and I would appreciate an Amazon Review if you have read the book. Thank you.

Nicky Kriel

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Why all Facebook Business Page owners need to understand Edgerank

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Posted on February 12, 2013 by Nicky Kriel

Did you know that even if someone Likes your Facebook Page, they may not see your posts in their news feed? According to Facebook, only 16-17% of fans are reached by Pages! Facebook apply an algorithm to choose what updates appear in each person’s news feed.

The news feed algorithm uses several factors to determine top stories, including the number of comments, who posted the story, and what type of post it is (e.g. photo, video, status update, etc.).

The exact nature of the algorithm is only known to Facebook and changes periodically. It is refer to it as Edgerank. The higher the Edgerank a post has, the more visible it will be.

The Edgerank score for a Page is calculated for each individual by:

The number of times you interact with a particular Page – i.e. the more you interact (like and comment) with a Page, the more posts from that Page will show up on your feed.
The importance a particular post by the amount of comments, shares and likes it gets – i.e. other people’s reaction to the post counts. If everyone shown a post ignores it, you will be unlikely to be shown the post. If everyone shown a post likes it, you will be very likely to shown the post.
Type of post it is: Your interactions with posts of the same type in the past will count – i.e. if you always like photos, you are more likely to see photos posted by the Page
How recently it has been posted – you are unlikely to see a post from the morning if you go online in the evening.
The number of complaints a Page receives will affect how likely you are to see future posts. Other negatives towards a Page would be a large number of unlikes, reporting as spam, unsubscribes and people hiding posts.

I have also noticed the following.

Facebook also seems to give a preference to content posted directly on Facebook rather than through a third party tool such as Networked blogs.
Facebook seems to help Business Pages to get established with greater visibility for Pages with a few Likes
It’s easier to build engagement on Pages with fewer likes. The ratio of Likes to “People talking about this” tends to be better.
You are more likely to see posts from Pages that you have recently liked.

Why is this important to Page Owners?

There is a virtuous spiral for engagement. The more engagement you get with each post, the more visible your post. The more visible your post, the more likely that you will get more engagement. Engagement is key.
Facebook has indicated that as preparation for Graph Search that Pages should “Focus on attracting the right fans to your Page and on giving your fans a reason to interact with your content on an ongoing basis.” This suggests that Edgerank is going to be taken into consideration for Search.
You need to be aware of negative behaviour towards your posts and your Page. Negative behaviour or complaints are when someone hides a post from their feed, unlikes a Page or reports a post as spam.

If you want more details about negative behaviour. I found this really good post by Chad Wittman on Socialfresh.com which goes into more detail: The simple reason Facebook Pages are losing Reach: Negative Feedback

What you need to know about negative behaviour or complaints

To find out how many people are unliking your Page, go into your Insights, click on the Likes section and scroll right down to the bottom.called Where your Likes come from. This shows your unlikes.
The greatest reason people give for unliking a page is too frequent posting.
Facebook has been taking complaints into consideration since September which is probably why many Pages have noticed a drop in numbers of people Reached.
Since my reach dropped in September, I have increased the number of posts per day which has been matched by an increase in the number of unlikes, so I have been shooting myself in the foot. Each time I have posted 4 times a day, I have lost someone.
Your complaints or negative feedback are more hidden. You have to export the data from your Facebook Page into a Excel Spreadsheet. You might be surprised by the figures. I haven’t looked at these figures before and I had naively assumed that nobody would be complaining about my Page - I don’t do things that are considered spammy like posting links on other people’s Pages, afterall. But I was wrong. I noticed that my complaints went up when I increased the frequency of posting. Another good reason to reduce the number of daily posts!
Photographs tend to get the highest number of shares, but they also get the highest number of complaints so don’t change all your posts to pictures because everyone else is doing it.

Let me know if this has helped you, I will be writing about how to improve the engagement on your Page soon.

Nicky Kriel

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Facebook Pages: Help people discover your business

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Posted on February 3, 2013 by Nicky Kriel

Facebook recently announced the introduction of what they call Graph Search. It means that the Search function on Facebook will be far more powerful than it is now. Graph Search brings with it some privacy issues, but also opportunities for businesses using Facebook as a marketing tool.

Over 150 million people a day visit Business Pages, let alone those people who see Business Page updates via their news feed.

With Graph Search, people can search Facebook by looking for things like “Italian restaurants that my friends have been to in London”, “hotels in Paris” or “Business Pages my Friends have Liked”.

Facebook recommends that you make sure your information on your Page is up to date.

When was the last time you checked what you have on your information Page?

They also recommended the following:

The name, category, vanity URL, and information you share in the “About” section all help people find your business and should be shared on Facebook.
If you have a location or a local place Page, update your address to make sure you can appear as a result when someone is searching for a specific location.
Focus on attracting the right fans to your Page and on giving your fans a reason to interact with your content on an ongoing basis.

Tips for updating your Page

Your name
Category
Vanity URL
the “About” Section
Photos (even though this isn’t explicitly mentioned by Facebook, you will be able to search for photographs)

Your Page Name

You can only change the name of your Page if you have fewer than 200 Likes.
Make sure it includes your Business name
Keep it short, but add descriptive words to help your customers find you e.g. your location or type of business.

The Category

Categories didn’t play an important role before now, but they are going to play a role in Graph Search, so check that you are in the best category possible for your business
You can change categories easily in the Basic Information tab.
Different categories allow you to fill different information in about your business for example Shop opening times or payment options. The category will affect how much space you in the “About” section.

Vanity URL

Make sure you claim your username for your Page so you can be found in search.
If you want to know how to claim your vanity URL or username, I have covered this in this post: Facebook Pages: How to claim your Facebook Vanity URL

About Section

Depending on the category you choose you have about 165 characters to say what your page is about.
If you were visiting your Page for the first time and read your About section, would you know what your business was about?
Add your website at the start of the about section and remember to include the http:// to make it a clickable link. (You won’t be able to do this if you have chosen local business as a category)
The About Section gives the meta description for your Page so make sure it contains your keywords.
Check that your About section can be read as a whole and isn’t truncated.

Photographs

People will be able to search for photographs
Make sure you tag your photographs on your Page with your Page Name
Click on the photograph and look for the Tag Photo option below it.
Click on the photo
Start typing you Page name and your page will appear in the drop down section, click on your Page name.

I will be writing a few blog posts in the next few days to help you prepare your Pages for Graph Search including:

Place Pages
Why you to know about Edgerank
Why you need to attract the right fans and build engagement

If you haven’t checked your Privacy Setting yet, please read this: Facebook Privacy: Who can see your Stuff?

Let me know if you would like to answer any questions.

Nicky Kriel

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LinkedIn: How to Tag Connections on LinkedIn

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Posted on February 2, 2013 by Nicky Kriel

Did you know you could add tags to your connections on LinkedIn? They can help you:

Filter your connections so you can review only the people with a particular tab
Add notes about how you know the person to aid your memory
Message targeted groups of people with a certain tags

This post is to help you get tagging on LinkedIn.

Tagging on LinkedIn

LinkedIn automatically tags some people. When someone invites you to connect and they don’t have your email address, they indicate that you’re a classmate, a colleague, a friend, a fellow group member, or a person they’ve done business with. They’ll be tagged with that label once you accept their invitation.

You can create your own tags which:

Allow you to add text to identify the connection.
Tags can be up to 100 characters including letters, numbers and spaces
You can add several tags to a person
Up to 200 tags can be created
The only person who can see your tags is YOU.

How to Tag a connection

Go to Contacts in the top bar
Choose Connections
Click on a connection
Select Edit Tags in the third column.
Create the tag or select the tag that you want from the list.

Tagging multiple connections at once

Go to Contacts
Select Connections
Filter your selection by selecting the relevant connections by ticking the boxes in the second column.
Note if you use Select All, it will only select the 10 connection on display, to select more, scroll down and click on Next and click on Select All and repeat the process.
Once you have selected all the connections that you want to tag, click on Edit tags in the third column.
Create the tag or select the tag that you want from the list.

Suggestions for adding tags

Where you met the person – Event, networking group, online
What type of relationship – Customer, Prospect, fellow group member, friend, attended a course
How well you know the person – acquaintance, good friend, not met yet
How you met them – referral, Twitter, inmail

Tagging your connections helps you build relationships. It enables you to focus on a particular group of people that are important to you. It also helps you to remember details about people. If you are connecting with a large number of people through networking there is a strong chance that you won’t remember everyone.

Have you added tags to your connections yet?

Nicky Kriel

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14 Days of Love: Can you show me some love?

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Posted on February 1, 2013 by Nicky Kriel

If I have helped you in any way with your Social Media Journey, I would loved you to return the favour by sending back some love…

I am entering into a National competition and I would like your help to potentially become the MOST LOVED BUSINESS :

By Town (GUILDFORD)
By Category
Nationally

AND at least I want to be in – The Top 100 Most loved businesses

All you have to do is pop over to my profile on The Best of Guildford and leave me a review or leave a review in the comments below. A sentence or two would be lovely.

And guess what? By being nice and leaving a review you will automatically be entered into a Free Prize Draw. From today until the 14th February there are some FAB prizes up for grabs:

Ferrari Thrill drive at Silverstone
Orient Express Experience
Dinner for 2 at a Michelin Starred Restaurant
Harrods Champagne & Truffle Hamper
Sony Digital Camera
£200.00 to spend on TB0
£100 Virgin Experience Voucher
Magnum Champagne
Kindle Fire HD (16gb)
A year of unlimited Cineworld tickets (Excluding London West End)
Champagne afternoon tea at the Ritz for 2
Theatre Tickets for 2
Spa Day for 2
Madame Tussauds & London Eye for 2

Every day a winner will be selected at random announced and promoted on the love-o-meter. (Unfortunately, only people in the UK are allowed to win prizes, sorry if you live anywhere else!)

Pop over to my profile which is here: … and show me some love, please. Or simply leave a comment below and I will make sure that it is submitted to the site. It will make my day x

Nicky Kriel

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Who can see your tweets on Twitter

Posted on January 31, 2013 by Nicky Kriel

Have you wondered who can see your updates on Twitter? If you aren’t getting any response when you tweet it might feel that nobody can see them, but don’t get lulled into a false sense of security and forget that your tweets are public.

Here’s a guide to how visible you are on Twitter.

Assume that whatever you post on Twitter is public and is visible to anyone.

Each Tweet has a separate URL and so in effect acts as mini website and can be found on Google.

There are a few exceptions

Protected Tweets:

If you protect your account only the followers that you have approved of will see your Tweets. As a business, you would be shooting yourself in the foot by protecting your account. Protecting your account does not entitle you to say inflammatory comments. You are still publishing your tweets and a judge can order the publication of your Tweets.

Direct Messages

These are private in the same way as emails are considered private between two parties. Twitter accounts are vulnerable to being hacked if you have a weak password, so make sure that you have a strong password on your account.

@username

A tweet starting with “@” will only be seen in the news feed by the person mentioned and anyone following both parties. The tweet can be found by other people if they are searching for one of the names. It is still public, but not very visible.

If you want a Tweet to be visible, by leaving a single character before the “@” it becomes visible to everyone who is following you.
So if you are praising someone, put their Twitter username in the middle of your Tweet rather than at the start.
If you receive a nice comment and the Tweet starts with “@”, by retweeting it, it will become visible to your followers as that person’s Tweet. Alternatively, if you reply to it, with a RT at the front and a comment at the end it will go out as your Tweet, but your followers will see the original words of the first Tweet.

Blocked People

Tweets are public and even if you have blocked someone they can still search for your Tweets. Blocking them will do the following:

They will be unable to follow you, so your Tweets and your profile picture will not appear in their News Feed.
Their Tweets using your Twitter username will not appear in your @Connect tab, so they will not be able to make contact with you on Twitter.
They cannot add you to one of their lists.

You don’t get notified if you have been blocked, but you can’t follow a particular account it might be because they have blocked you.

Just remember that although most of your Tweets can be seen by everyone, it doesn’t mean they will be seen.

The chances are that only some of your followers will be paying attention to your Tweets some of the time.

If you want some tips to make your Tweets more effective, read this:

Do you want to get noticed on Twitter?

Nicky Kriel

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Nicky Kriel | Social Media Coach & Trainer | Social Media for Business

Inspiring you to grow your business through Social Media

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