by Kimberly | May 15, 2012 | Blog, Featured, Social Media, Twitter
I’m really not sure that there could be many other things that would be more fun for a social media junkie like myself than tweeting while drinking wine with a bunch of people who are doing the same thing. But, that’s just what I’ll be doing tomorrow evening! I’m really looking forward to taking part in the #TGTaste Chat with Thirsty Girl and Villa Maria Estate Wines. We’ll be tasting two of their Sauvignon Blancs: 2011 Villa Maria Estate Private Bin Sauvignon Blanc – SRP $14.99 Click here to download a PDF Info Sheet for this wine. 2011 Villa Maria Estate Cellar Selection Sauvignon Blanc – SRP $19.99 Read tasting notes for this wine. Now, I’ve been fortunate to have already tried the Private Bin Sauvignon Blanc and really, really enjoyed it. It has a nice, fruity, floral flavor. As I’ll be tasting alone tomorrow night, I’ve decided to open the Cellar Selection to taste during the Twitter Tasting. About Villa Maria Estate Wines This year Villa Maria is celebrating 50 years of winemaking. Founded by Sir George Fistonich, it remains a 100% New Zealand and family owned business today which a strong commitment to sustainability. – Villa Maria was the first wine company in New Zealand to declare the winery a “cork-free zone,” sealing all wines from the 2004 vintage onwards with a screwcap to ensure quality in every bottle. It was also the first New Zealand producer to employ professional viticulturists and is a leader in sustainable viticulture and winemaking. – Sauvignon Blanc The Sauvignon Blanc grape is originally from the Bordeaux region of France. It is planted...
by Kimberly | May 17, 2011 | Blog, Featured, Twitter
So much of what we hear is that Twitter is great for business networking, engagement, visibility and making connections with others in your industry. And this is true. However, Twitter can also be a tool for having fun socially (imagine that, using a social network socially?) I’ve participated in and moderated several Twitter chats in the course of my social media addiction, but I’m really looking forward to the one tomorrow that’s being hosted by Thirsty Girl and the You Bet Shiraz tour (Peter Lehmann Wines). This is a great opportunity to not only do two things I really enjoy (tasting wine and tweeting!) but also to really see the power of social media and social networking in action as it brings together wine lovers and drinkers- many of whom are actively using Twitter. For this particular tweet chat (#TGTaste), Thirsty Girl, one of the fastest growing social networks for women, is teaming up with Ian Hongell (The Duke of Shiraz) from Peter Lehmann Wines to chat about their 2008 Barossa Shiraz (G’day mates!). This will a great opportunity to not only chat directly with the winemaker about his wine but also to tweet with Head Thirsty Girl, Leslie Sbrocco (author of “Wine for Women” and regular TODAY Show wine contributor) about all things wine and in particular her suggestions for what to pair with this wine and her thoughts about this wine. I am thrilled to be a part of this Twitter chat and am so looking forward to connecting with other wine lovers and chatting about Shiraz (or just our love of wine in general!) I received...
by Kimberly | Apr 4, 2011 | Blog, Featured, Social Media, Twitter
The news out today on the Twitter blog is that Twitter has finally upgraded their Advanced Search feature and moved it from search.twitter.com to the be housed within Twitter’s main search feature. When you do a search on Twitter now, then it will bring up the link for Advanced Search. They have also now added a tab that makes suggestions for people to follow related to your search topic. When you use Twitter Search, there will be four tabs: Tweets, Tweets with Links, Tweets Near You and People. The two things I noticed, is that promoted tweets will come up first and within the People tab, verified high profile accounts tend to come up first. You are also only given a small sample of people to follow which is somewhat disappointing since it would be nice to have the option to sort through a few more accounts as a way to find followers within the search parameters you are using. You will also notice at the top underneath the Results headline, is a link for “operators” which are a list of different operators you can use for Advanced Twitter Search to refine your results even further. You can see in the screenshot below a list of the tips they offer you if you click on the Operator link. It’s nice to see Twitter growing up in a fuller search feature which helps to make the platform even more useful for people who are looking to connect with other Twitterers. Other news posted related to Twitter’s Advanced Search upgrade: Mashable: Upgraded Twitter Search Helps You Find New People to Follow...
by Kimberly | Nov 8, 2010 | Blog, Featured, How to, Social Media, Twitter
As a Social Media Virtual Assistant, I’ve set up many, many Twitter accounts. Some for myself (I think I have 5 of them…) and many for my clients. So, it’s really second nature to me and most of the time, I don’t think twice about how to do it. However, for many small business owners and entrepreneurs who many just be jumping into using Twitter and social media marketing, it can be a bit of a daunting task. Now, setting up a Twitter account is not really that hard and most people can easily walk through the steps to get going in a matter of minutes. However, there are some important considerations to take into account when setting up a Twitter account to help your account appear professional and optimized. 1. Got to http://twitter.com and click on the big, yellow “Sign Up” button. 2. On the sign up page, it’s recommended that you put in your real name or alternatively, you can put in the name of your business. It just depends on how you’ll be using the account. If you are a solo entrepreneur or you are the person who will be tweeting, then it is generally a good idea to put in your real name. If you plan to use the account to tweet as a “business” or if multiple people might be tweeting from the account then put in a business name. Whichever, you chose, you can always change it at anytime, so it’s not set it stone. Keep in mind that this field is indexed and picked up by the search engines, so that’s something...
by Kimberly | Aug 10, 2010 | Blog, Featured, How to, Social Media, social media marketing, Twitter
There are several different options available to help you manage multiple social media accounts at once. Among the most popular are Tweetdeck, Seesmic and Hootsuite. Depending on your needs and desire for access, then you might consider each one of these for different reasons. All of them have a web version and apps for iPhone. Tweetdeck and Seesmic also have downloadable desktop versions. For everyday non-mobile use, I have found Hootsuite to be my preferred social media management tool. Hootsuite provides you with a comprehensive social media dashboard for managing multiple social media accounts and platforms all in once place. First built as a Twitter management tool, Hootsuite has grown to include the ability to post to LinkedIn, Facebook, Facebook pages, Ping.fm, MySpace, WordPress, Foursquare and importing RSS feeds. With Hootsuite, you can pull in multiple Twitter accounts, multiple Facebook profiles, multiple LinkedIn accounts, etc. For Twitter accounts, you can quickly and easily view your Home Feed, your @ mentions, your sent tweets, your direct messages, plus add columns for any of your Twitter lists, columns to monitor keywords or key phrases, and a pending tweets column for any scheduled tweets. You can have up to 10 columns for each twitter account showing at one time. I typically add a few columns for monitoring keywords and a few more columns for lists of specific twitterers for different purposes. For example, I might like to keep up on the tweets of my colleagues, social media people and local friends. Hootsuite makes it easy to reply, re-tweet, send a direct message, add a tweet as a favorite, reply all (for tweets...
by Kimberly | May 12, 2010 | Blog, Featured, Social Media, Twitter
Last week, Twitter launched Blackbird Pie where you can post the link to a specific tweet and it will automatically generate code to embed that tweet into your blog post. Previously, most folks were mostly using screenshots to show a tweet or a series of tweets. While the code generate does seem rather long just for one tweet, it does become a pretty handy tool as it includes that Twitter account’s avatar and part of their background. To get the code you need to grab the link for that particular tweet which can be found by clicking on the time stamp listed below in small font underneath a tweet. Usually it says something like “about 2 hours ago.” If you click on that it will take you to a page for that specific tweet and you just need to copy the URL for the page. It usually looks something like this: “http://twitter.com/jkvirtualoffice/status/13878799371” And when you enter it into Blackbird Pie, click “Bake” and it will generate the code for that tweet which you can then paste into your blog post. @TR_Founder a-hem…I think you meant “SaWheeeet!”less than a minute ago via HootSuiteKimberly LeRiche jkvirtualoffice What’s also nice about this feature is that it will generate links to Twitter account of the person who tweeted it as well as to the Twitter accounts of any Twitter folks who might be mentioned in the tweet. Related articles by Zemanta What is Twitter really up to with ‘Blackbird Pie’? (socialmediatoday.com) Twitter Cooks Up The Blackbird Pie Tool To Bake Tweets Into Your Website (techcrunch.com) Twitter Launches Blackbird Pie Tool To...
