Media140 hit Perth last week to a packed house of social media enthusiasts. While everyone agreed the networking was fantastic, many people felt like no new ground had been covered. Read this post to discover why Sarah Mitchell from Global Copywriting was humming along to the Troggs and getting excited about social media all over again.

I attended the Media140, exploring the future of the Real-Time Social Web conference in Perth on Thursday, 25 February. Billed as “Brands, Marketing & Communications in the Real-Time Social Web”, I booked an early-bird ticket without really knowing what to expect. I know I wasn’t the only one. I was extremely interested to hear experiences of how other people were using social media. I was also looking forward to meeting the faces behind the avatars I’ve been communicating with for over a year, mostly on Twitter. Held at the Perth Town Hall, at the end of the long day nearly all the attendees were still in their seats. The content of the conference clearly outweighed the physical discomfort created by packing over 300 people and 20 speakers into the second floor of the old building on what turned out to be a sweltering day.

Read the full post at Global Copywriting, Media140 The Troggs, Westpac and Kanye West

Follow Sarah Mitchell on Twitter: @globalcopywrite

Debate rages about Twitter. Is it a time waster? Can you honestly impart value in 140 characters? Is it indicative of a society overloaded with information and no longer able to focus? Can you tweet your way to riches, fame and fortune? Read this post to discover 6 ways Twitter can make a difference in your business.

I read an interesting article by Jason Jordan in The West Australian Newspaper titled In defence of Twitter. It’s a good article with some good Word of Mouth (WoM) references for people to follow. Jason wrote every sentence using 140 characters or less to help prove short communications can be extremely effective. I’m glad Jason wrote the story. Twitter has done so many good things for my business I can’t be bothered to get defensive any more. Here are six of my own reasons why I think business, in particular, should be using Twitter.

Read Sarah Mitchell’s complete post: 6 Practical Ways Twitter Can Help Your Business

Follow Sarah on Twitter: @globalcopywrite

The birth of every every new communications medium is followed by a period during which the underlying technology actually cramps the communication it’s supposed to be enabling.  When it comes to Twitter, we’re all in the middle of this period – Gartner would probably call it the Trough of Technobabble – right now.

Look what happens when a simple tweet gets passed through the Twitter machine:

The original tweet

The tweet has a simple message: check out our recent blog post on The 16 Ways to Alienate a B2B Buyer.  Already, it’s got a fugly URL attached that will look hilariously retro in about five years.  Then there’s the arguably valuable Twitterchrome: who posted it, the photo, date, time and origination app.

Now the Tweet gets picked up by one of my “Followers” (I prefer ‘disciple’ but will go with the flow on this one) and becomes:

The first retweet

Already, the short, simple tweet has begun its transformation into what I call Twitterjunk. No offense to ‘rapril’ who was just doing what we all do, but look how much harder this version is to read than the original.  We’ve got two hashtags, attached like barnacles to the hull of my message.  We’ve got the RT @dougkessler prefix (a nice piece of Twitter etiquette that inhibits outright plagiarism but also kills your opener).  Then we’ve got rapril’s editoral comment (now constrained to ten characters): ‘Liked this’. (thanks rap).

Glance at this tweet and already your eye is like a hummingbird looking for a place to land in a thatch of brambles on a windy day. If your eye is like most hummingbirds faced with this problem, it will flit away in the time it takes a hummingbird heart to beat, say, a few thousands times.

But it gets worse...

More on the Velocity B2B Marketing blog.

Each week hundreds of white paper marketers post their white papers on Social Media sites such as Twitter. Now you can review many of these white papers by following the Friday FREE White Paper List via the White Paper Pundit blog.

This week’s list features 25 white papers with a wide variety of topics ranging from enterprise computing, health care, Social Media, sales management, SEO, and many others. In addition, each week I select one white paper from the list for a closer look at a unique application, tactic, or format that the marketer has applied to their paper.

Each white paper is completely FREE and does not require your email address or any personal information. Just click on the attached link next to the white paper name and download the document.

To access this list, please follow this link: http://bit.ly/YKzXe

Thanks!

Each week thousands of white paper marketers post their white papers on Social Media sites such as Twitter. Now you can review many of these white papers by following the Friday FREE White Paper List on the White Paper Pundit blog.

By regularly following this weekly post, you can pick up new tips, tricks, and techniques from leading white paper marketers such as IDC, Microsoft, Adobe, Intel, as well as a host of nationally recognized advertising and marketing agencies.

Each white paper is completely FREE and does not require your email address or any personal information. Just click on the attached link and download any of the enclosed FREE white papers.

This week there are 40 FREE white papers listed on the Friday FREE White Paper List. To access this list, please follow this link and you’ll be directed to the White Paper Pundit blog: http://bit.ly/c8xy4

Enjoy!

So, is there substance behind the social media hype? Me, I’m a skeptic, but I have found that within the swarms of social media buzz there IS real business honey to be found. But the secret is not within one magic tool or another — it’s in the way live networking, content development, social media and other efforts all come together in one effective, marketing chain...

Read more of Jonathan Kranz’s entire post: http://www.kranzcom.com/blog/social-media/backtracking-a-successful-social-media-trail/

"As companies tighten their ad spending, inexpensive social media is clearly the next marketing frontier. As with any new craze, there are enormous opportunities—and large pitfalls that must be avoided."

For this article, Mike Stelzner spoke to some marketing professionals who've been exploring the Twitter terrain for a while. His quest was to identify the Twitter landmines so you can fast-track your adventure into this vast new frontier.