Archive for October, 2009
How to and How NOT to do #FollowFriday
One of the most powerful, but greatly misused, ways to use Twitter is networking with #FollowFriday. For those of you that have yet to give in and sign up with Twitter, #FollowFriday is a trend where every Friday, you share with your followers somebody you follow. Basically an introduction.
The problem is, too often, people just try and squeeze as many names as possible in the 140 character tweet that will look something like this:
#FollowFriday @ZackTM, @27518, @SmugMugPro, @andrew_bryant, @ohiohoya, @samandjt, @myfunkycamera ……
And some even turn the “#FollowFriday” part to “#FF” to get one extra name in. Sounds nice and generous right? Maybe, but highly ineffective! Just listing off a bunch of names, tells me nothing about them. Not only does that not give me any incentive to follow any of those listed (unless I know them already), but even if it does catch my attention, I don’t have time to check everyone that is recommended, especially when multiple people do #FollowFriday this way. I am more likely to skip the entire tweet completely rather than clicking on even one of the links. Think about it, Twitter has a limit of 140 characters for a reason. We want quick, to the point, information. If I had time to read everyone’s blog, I would be reading your blog, not using Twitter as a RSS feed to weed out information from my network. If I find something interesting, I will check it out, but if it doesn’t intrigue me, its getting scrolled over. Think of it as a tweet becoming the new elevator pitch and just dropping names won’t sell me on following any of them.
The solution is to keep it simple! Read more
Adventures in the Al Capone Suite at The Biltmore
Okay, so it was actually only one adventure and probably “adventure” isn’t even the right word to use, but to say I was excited about shooting in the Al Capone Suite at The Biltmore — where a scene from one of my old school favorite movies, Bad Boys, was shot — is definitely an understatement. Thanks to Andrew Bryant Photography, I was sent to Miami to shoot with and learn from some awesome photographers, including Ray Santana, Becker, Kenny Kim, Kenny Nakai and Lawrence Chan (SEO guru, Tofurious). It was great to see how these guys and the rest of the photographers worked and shot and feel like we all learned a lot from each other. Besides the fact that we were in one of the most beautiful cities, at one of the most famous hotels in the world, with gorgeous models, what made it extra special was the good people that were there. Anytime I can return to Miami in the fall or winter is a win for me, but coupled it with such a wonderful experience made my trip perfect.
