How did I become a storyteller in social media

One of the first things I did in so called social media was related to dollhouse miniatures. A funny hobby for an adult and my friends did not want to discuss about it as much as I wanted. So I joined discussion forums and eventually started our own forum, a community that still carries on. I had a web page for my hobby too and as soon as it was possible I opened a blog.

Dollhouse hobby is different for everyone: some are studying history while some are just collectors, some make their own dolls and some are interested about interior decoration and so on. For me the communities, collaboration and stories were very important parts of the hobby.

My life is pretty hectic right now so I don't have time for miniatures nor the miniature communities and sites I've built. But my backpack is still full of good experiences about the community building and management, even internationally. And I continue telling stories with a little pirate fellow.

Marika Paaso made a good comparison on Tiedottajarinki meeting this week:

Making a good impression online is like nude make-up:
it looks natural and nobody knows how much time is used for it.

People love hearing stories but to become a good storyteller you need to practice. Can anyone be a good storyteller then? Maybe not but here are some tips from I read from Psychology Today.

• Set the context: who, what, why, where, and how. 
• Avoid unimportant tangents: keep it short and simple 
• Be aware of your audience: do not upset them, don't be offensive 
• Be considerate of the people in your story: do not tell their secrets, respect their privacy

And more tips from Improve your social skills.

• Hold Their Interest 
• Start With A Hook 
• Have A Point To The Story 
• Choose The Right Time To Tell The Story 
• Show, Don't Tell 
• Use Vivid Details, Not Lots Of Facts 
• Practice Related Skills 
• Build A Connection 
• Tell Personal Stories, But Cautiously 
• Share Firsthand Thoughts & Feelings 
• Provide A Satisfying Conclusion 
• When You Get To The End, Stop 
• Don't Forget To Pass The Spotlight 

Testing a Storify code

Hello! This is a test. I embedded the following Storify story to my another blog and it got a security warning. Let's see if I can repeat the situation here.

The challenges of community managers

Long time no posts - I have been blogging mostly in Finnish. But as I just created an English storify about an interesting Twitter conversation started by +Sarah Jeong and brought to my knowledge by my former colleague +Tuukka Turto I have finally something to share also here.

Things related to community managers are important to me as I am arranging the CMAD event for the fifth time in Finland.

The top 100 tools for learning by Jane Hart

For the seventh time Jane Hart aka @c4lpt publishes results of a yealy study about the top tools for learning. No wonder Twitter is the number 1 for 5th time - it is a very good way both to follow the media and gurus around the world but also for discussing.

One of my favorite tools, Pinterest, raised 14 steps to #22. What happened to your favorites?

Top 100 Tools for Learning 2013 from Jane Hart

Why do people share online

Interesting study about why people share online found via Timo Rainio, thanks :).

Why Do People Share Online? from Heuvel Marketing

Trends in Internet by Mary Meeker

Enjoy Mary Meeker's newest report about Internet trends:  

KPCB Internet Trends 2013 from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers

The evolution of the LinkedIn Homepage

During the 10 years history of LinkedIn their homepage have had very different kind of looks. Do you still remember some of them?

Evolution of the LinkedIn Homepage from LinkedIn

The most important social media services in Finland

Last month I blogged in Finnish about the stats brought by YLE, the Finnish broadcasting company studied the most important social media platforms Finns are using.

They came up with this kind of list:

TOP 9 Social media sites in Finland according to Yle
1. Facebook - about 2 million Finns over 13 years
2. Suomi24 - a Finnish discussion forum owned by media company Aller has  1.7M registered users, during the last year 40% of them have logged in (also anonymous commenting is possible)
3. IRC-Galleria has 451 000 registered users, about 200 000 of them are visiting it weekly.
4. LinkedIn has 440 000 Finnish users
5. Twitter is used by around 300 000 Finns
6. Foursquare has about 75 000 registered users
7. Google+ about 50 000 Finnish accounts, but only some 20 000 of them are in active use
8. Instagram no estimates of users
9. Pinterest - no estimates of users. 

Early this month Antti Leino got some estimates of Finnish Pinterest users: 
100 000 Finnish accounts, almost 60% of them ladies.

Spam blog comments

For a reason or another I have been getting a lot of spam comments to this blog lately. I share some examples with you so that you know how they are like:

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This is really fascinating, You're a very skilled blogger. I have joined your rss feed and look ahead to in the hunt for more of your excellent post. Also, I have shared your site in my social networks my webpage - achilles braces 

How do I know they are spam? Because they are far too generic to be real - these comments could (and have) been added to any blog.

So sorry spammers, my blog is not worth of your time :P.

The most popular Google services by usage by Alexa

According to Alexa Google is the most popular site in the world while number 2 is Facebook.

And the most popular Google services aka sub sites by usage (hours spent on the site) are:

 

Percent of all Google site visitors

1. Search google.com  71.36%
2. Gmail mail.google.com 44.93%
3. Profile accounts.google.com 36.34%
4. Google Drive (Google Docs) docs.google.com 9.12%
5. Google Plus plus.google.com 7.72%
6. Google Translate translate.google.com 6.07%
7. Help support.google.com 5.00%
8. Maps maps.google.com 4.91%
9. Google Drive drive.google.com 4.10%
10. Play play.google.com 2.59%
11. Adwords adwords.google.com 2.18%
12. News news.google.com 1.75%
13. Sites sites.google.com 1.01%
14. Code code.google.com 0.91%
15. Feedburner feedburner.google.com 0.78%
16. Product forum productforums.google.com 0.74%
17. Groups groups.google.com 0.67%
18. Url url.google.com 0.56%
19. Developers developers.google.com 0.56%
20. Picasa picasaweb.google.com 0.55%
21. Image search images.google.com 0.53%
22. Ejabat ejabat.google.com 0.46%
23. Google Scholar scholar.google.com 0.14%

Interesting isn't it? So Google documents are used more than Google Plus while Picasa for storing and viewing photos is not used that much. By the way, for a researcher the Google Scholar is quite useful service. :)