Interesting thing brought via my regular email updates of Indeed.ca job postings: (I'm not in the market but I like to keep an eye on how my industry is changing, and how my own needs as an employer might be met.)
It was a job posting that, in itself, is indicative of a growing trend (and, I believe, a smart one for businesses): to hire a blogger and website copywriter with SEO and social media knowledge and experience.
A Ontario real estate and mortgage broker is seeking a part-time copywriter for his blog posts, website articles, e-newsletters and other social media marketing content creation. Good move! Content is still king online - actually with the growth of social media, more than ever. (See the job posting below.)
However, what really caught my eye was the Candidate List at the end of this job posting (see below): Full disclosure of the candidates: their name and job title - both linked to their profiles - and when they applied. This display of transparency in job application is a great boon to other employees seeking candidates for similar positions!
Also of note is the international flavouring of candidates - not unexpected given that their profiles are housed at Odesk.com - an aggregator of outsourced jobs for freelancers, IT companies, programmers and web designers. The site, which gets an estimated 290,000 unique visitors a month, is indicative of the growing trend to offshore jobs... really any jobs that aren't physically tied to doing something tangible on-site (i.e. construction workers aren't at risk of being replaced by offshore contractors)... But that's a post for another day!
Have you hired an offshore worker, or even one at home, to do your website writing work - blogging, e-newsletter, SEO copywriting or other? Leave your tales and advice here.
One of my clients, CENTURY 21 Canada, is now keeping track of the online chatter around their brand - as well as that of their main competitors, Re/Max, Royal LePage, and Sutton Group.
Statistics gathered usingCision Social Media Reports indicate that CENTURY 21 is taking the lead in both the blogging and microblogging (Twitter) worlds.
Twitter Domination
How did CENTURY 21 Canada get such an edge in this real-time platform for updatings? Some of the reasons:
PR at CENTURY 21 uses a Twitter tool known as "CoTweet" to post ALL the tweets coming out of head office - even whey are on individual executives' Twitter streams
Followers of the CENTURY 21 Tweets reached 700 quickly but more importantly, those followers list were carefully generated and nurtured by reaching out to individuals and organizations related to the real estate market, not via a mass blitz follow that can be so unproductive
Leaders in the Blogosphere
CENTURY 21 Canada has also shown real leadership in the area of blogging - with 56.9% of blog posts by organized real estate in Canada.
(All numbers shown here are for the three-month period ending Oct. 31, 2009).
The next largest creator of blog posts is Royal Lepage - way back at under 20%.
The main reason for this prolific blogging success by CENTURY 21 Canada is the Internet platform they offer all their 7,500+ realtors. Every one of their blog posts appears on the main site, century21.ca - include the thrice weekly corporate blog Talk21 that I research and write.
That means more power to the domain, more placements on Page 1 in Google Search Results, which drive more traffic and generates more leads, which is - after all - what corporate blogging is meant to do!
I just got automated email notification that I am now followd by some unknown guy on Twitter; I went to check him out and was startled to find that ...
this person had more than 300 Followers and NO TWEETS put up yet!
That's right, hundreds of people in the Twittersphere are following this person - just because he followed them.
In other words, the emperor has no clothes...
In the famous Hans Christian Andersen story, The Emperor's New Clothes, some swindlers sell a suit to the emperor they say is made of cloth visible only to those who are clever.
Neither the emperor nor his followers can see the 'suit' but they pretend they can so they won't appear stupid.
It isn't the first time, sadly, that I've seen followers for Twitterers with zero or very little content, and/or no bio profile information identfying what they do or who they are (such as a link to their site).
What I Hate about Twitter
This kind of mindless following is one of the things I dislike most about Twitter.
Twitter, in many instances, has become a Numbers Game:
How many followers do you have?
Is it more or less or the same as the number of folks you are following?
How often do you Tweet?
How many RTs or direct messages do you get?
When I teach businesses the best practices of Twitter, I put the focus firmly on getting business results. Think Quality, not Quantity. If your number of followers isn't high, but those followers are qualified leads, then who cares about the appearance of popularity?
And never lose focus of the reason you Tweet - or should be Tweeting: to supply relevant, useful information to your followers. Like every other instance of social media, Content is King (or Emperor) - so why on earth care about a crowd mindlessly following you?
In the Christian Andersen fable, the naked emperor struts proudly through a crowd of townspeople. One kid blurts out, "But he's got no clothes on!" The emperor and his followers say nothing - and the facade continues.
This, and much more, was the focus on the presentation I gave about Social Media Optimization in London, England in March 2009.
I'm happy to report that it was well-received the close to 100 internet consultants in the room - and I had so many questions at the end we had to cut if off due to time.
I am starting to give training to those internet consultants this month in Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Video and Photo Optimization, and Blogging... By learning, hands-on, how to actually conduct these Web 2.0 functions themselves, they can better sell the services to their clients.
Learning is doing.
Social media is a verb.
Give them something to DO when they get to your site... or they'll leave for more active pastures.
Hollywood is going Twitter-crazy! Stars such as television host Jimmy Fallon, popular Hollywood blogger extraordinaire and entertainment guru Perez Hilton, singer of the popular song “I Kissed a Girl” Kate Perry, everyone is connecting and making it part of their regular routine.This fun networking tool - around since 2006 - is suddenly the biggest thing since Facebook!
One of my favourite Twitterers’ is England’s beautiful and brilliant pop star Lily Allen.She has topped out London’s headlines for weeks now because of her creative use of Twitter, and in the words of Jimmy Kimmel, she’s "Perez Hilton’s dream come true."
With more than 122,000 followers and more people adding her daily, it seems Lily's secret is that she treats it like a game.Wherever she’s having a concert, she goes out prior to the concert and spends a few hours out in that town to hide concert tickets! Lily then sends out a Tweet with a clue and waits... The first local fan to figure out the clue gets a night out at Lily's concert, on her. Nice!
My personal steam can be found here. Having only been a member since the beginning of March this year, I already have 50 followers and I’m following 116 people.I post whatever I am doing at the time, whether it is cooking, researching, posting a new article, or my fun Hollywood entertainment gossip updating.
How about you? Got any Twitter favs? How's your own stream going?
CENTURY 21 Canada has also shown real leadership in the area of blogging - with 56.9% of blog posts by organized real estate in Canada.
I just got automated email notification that I am now followd by some unknown guy on 
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