Why One twitter account is plenty

“Should I have separate Twitter
accounts for personal and
professional?”
I’m often asked that when I conduct my
“CEO of You” personal branding talks.
It’s a great question, because there are
so many opinions.
There’s one camp that says it is
absolutely necessary to have both,
because you do not want to confuse
followers about your brand. A recent
article on The Savvy Intern stressed the
necessity to have a recreational account
for topics that aren’t “on brand.” Tip
of the blog cap to Reganie Smith ( @
ReganiePR) for sharing the post on
Twitter.
I fall into the other camp: I don’t think
it is necessary to have two Twitter
accounts. On full disclosure, I do have
two accounts. One is for my business, @
JRM_Comm ; the other is me, @
JasMollica.
I don’t feel it’s essential for staying
“on brand” to have a second account
for myself. My JRM Comm account is
strictly business; my @JasMollica
account is a mix of professional and
personal.
Here are my reasons why you should
focus on just one Twitter account:
• Time. Regardless of whether you
know how to use Tweetdeck,
HootSuite, or Twitter’s app, it’s
not easy to juggle multiple
accounts. Focus your time on
making your personal account
great, and show people you are
worth the follow.
• Confusion. An important aspect
of personal branding is giving
people a good idea of who you are
and what you do. If you have two
accounts, which should I follow?
The real person or the other
account that just tweets business/
career information? Don’t fall
into the trap of being confusing;
it only clouds your brand.
• Transparency. I’ve stressed in
many of my talks to students and
professionals that openness and
transparency are essential. To me,
multiple Twitter accounts do not
help. I want to know who you really
are—and so do other pros and
potential employers. Frankly, if
you put the more personal tweets
on another account, people will still
find it.
• Noise. We’ve all heard folks
complain about too many tweets.
The presence of two accounts
from one person adds to the
Twitter noise. We see people tweet
the same information, at the same
time, from multiple accounts. That
adds to the noise. Tweeting
information that is valuable to
your followers from one account
cuts down on noise and confusion,
too.
• Personality. I’m in the camp that
wants to see your personal side,
and that’s not to sound like a
stalker. Before I hit follow, I look
at what you’ve tweeted about. It
gives me—and others—a better
idea of who you are and what you
do. If you posted something about
last night’s hockey game, that’s
great. We don’t, however, need to
see the posts about beer pong or
being hung over.
• Smarts. Twitter and many other
social networks might be free to
sign up for, but they all require
responsibility. You can make your
one Twitter account great by just
displaying some smarts. Don’t be so
quick to hit that tweet button.
Take a moment to consider your
audience and your brand.
Displaying smarts on your one
account will go further in
strengthening your personal
brand.
Focusing on your personal brand can be
very difficult. The more honest you are
with yourself and your audience, the
better for your brand, and the better
for your career as well.
[RELATED: Ragan's biggest social
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]
What are your thoughts on multiple
Twitter accounts? Let us know in the
comments, please.
Jason Mollica is the president of JRM
Comm , a public relations and social
media marketing consultancy. Connect
with him on LinkedIn or follow him on
Twitter @JasMollica . A version of this
story originally appeared on the his
blog.

posted from Bloggeroid

6 Ways to analyse your creative ideas

Great marketers, PR pros, and content
creators have one thing in common—
they use both creativity and analytics
to develop their successful ideas.
Christine Perkett dubbed this type of
thinking as “Creatalitics” and gave an
excellent definition for the term:
“[Creatalitic thinkers] combine really
creative and innovative ideas—those
‘dreams and visions’ with data and
analysis—the ‘blazes of insight’ that
tell them if their creations go beyond
initial appeal and into the world of
actionable value to the company’s
bottom line.”
Creativity is an important aspect of our
jobs, but we should not neglect the
warning signs from the left side of our
brains pushing us to analyze our ideas.
Here are six ways to put your creative
ideas to the test to make sure they are
worth your client’s investment.
1. Google it.
This simple test of researching your
creative idea will tell you a lot about its
future success. Has the idea already
been done? Can you do it better or
make it unique to your brand? If it has
been done, what value did it add to that
company? Can those results be
replicated for your brand?
2. Like-improve analysis.
The like-improve analysis is one of the
most helpful ways of analyzing your
creative ideas before they are
implemented. Take a sheet of paper, and
draw a line down the middle; on the left
side write “Like” and on the right side
write “Improve.” Under “Improve,”
reference everything that doesn’t work
about the idea or areas that should be
improved. On the left side, write
everything that you like about the idea
and would bring value to the company.
Next, figure out how you can change
those areas under “Improve” to work
for your creative idea or whether the
idea is still worth pursuing.
3. Answer the hard questions.
Take time to think through or even write
down your responses to those hard
questions your client or boss will ask so
you can be ready to defend your
creative idea. How will this increase the
bottom line? Does this line up with our
goals and objectives? What will be the
ROI? How will you track the results?
4. Talk it out.
Humans are social beings; we produce
the best ideas together . As autonomous
thinkers we each contribute differing
opinions and constructive criticisms that
will strengthen the creative idea. After
you have done all you can to flesh out
and analyze the idea, don’t neglect to
collaborate with your peers.
5. Test your idea.
Even after the creative idea has been
turned into action, you should continue
to improve it. What seems like a solid Web
graphic or campaign in the presentation
room may fall short when implemented.
Testing your idea through focus groups,
A/B testing or other means is often
neglected and forgotten by busy
professionals. But if you are serious
about producing the best, you have to
test your ideas.
[RELATED: Find out how to craft
the perfect pitch at our April PR
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]
6. Learn from your successes and
failures.
Experience is a valuable factor in the
communications field because
professionals have learned from years
of mistakes and successes. After you run
a campaign, take time to analyze it once
more to see what really did work or
didn’t and then apply that knowledge to
your next creative idea.
Alicia Lawrence is an online PR specialist
for WebpageFX and blogs in her free
time at MarCom Land . Her work has
been published by the Association for
Business Communication, Get In Front
Communications, and Spin Sucks.

posted from Bloggeroid