Matt was a web application created by the Carsonified team that I discovered in 2008 and shared how anyone  use Matt to make managing multiple Twitter account more efficient. Since then, Matt has become a parked domain and the service no longer exists. Fortunately, there have been other social media dashboards that took managing Twitter on a whole new level such as CoTweet.

Today we will cover how CoTweet’s platform can help you manage multiple Twitter accounts and how you can get started with CoTweet today at no cost.

Managing Multiple Twitter Accounts with CoTweet Standard Edition

If you’re on a tight budget, CoTweet’s Standard Edition is something you should look into because it’s absolutely free. This edition is best suited for individuals and organizations that manage only a few Twitter accounts and is managed by a couple team members.

Below are a few noteworthy features that you can benefit from:

Multiple Account Users

Easily add up to five Twitter accounts through a single CoTweet login and post updates all in one interface. Feel free to invite colleagues to join your account to help manage your Twitter presence.

Tweet Scheduling

Prepare your updates ahead of time with this feature. Simply enter your update then choose the date and time you want the post to go live. The only caveat with this feature is that you don’t have the option to bulk upload status updates.

Multi-Account Posting

Have a message that can be posted to multiple accounts? No problem. You can select more than one Twitter account to publish your update.

Click Tracking

View how many people clicked on a link that you posted from the user interface. All urls are shortened with Bit.ly.

Monitor Keywords and Trends

Use CoTweet as a listening platform to monitor specific keywords and trends. I like to use this feature when following a hashtag for a conference.

On Duty Notifications

With CoTweet, you can delegate responsibility to someone else on your team. One an individual is assigned to be On Duty, he or she will receive email notifications when updates are sent to any of your Twitter handles.

Assignments

Sometimes you come across tweets that you don’t have the answer to but someone else on your team may be able to respond. When this happens, you can assign an update to a member on your team to follow up. According to CoTweet, “They’ll be notified via email and the updates will appear in their “Follow Up” queue.” Once a response has been delivered, you’ll receive an email containing their response along with the original update.

Conversation Threading

This feature makes it easy to see which updates have been responded and by whom on your team.

Archive Messages

If you like to keep a record of what updates you’ve received including ones that you’ve sent out, this feature will allow you to do just that.

Rich Profiles

Of all the features that come with CoTweet Standard, I’d have to say that this feature is the one that I use the most. When you click on any username in the user interface, CoTweet will display the conversation you’ve had with that particular person, highlight their most recent updates, and include their Twitter stats (i.e. number of follower/following). Last but not least, you can instantly follow or unfollow people from this convenient panel.

Get Started on CoTweet

Ready to make the jump to CoTweet? Sweet, follow these simple steps below and you’ll be a multi-tasking social pro.

Step 1: Go to http://cotweet.com/signup/.

Step 2: Introduce Yourself. Fill in your First and Last Name and then the company that you’re associated with. Leave this field blank if you’re not using CoTweet on behalf of your company and using it for personal use.

Step 3: Create your CoTweet login by entering a valid email address and entering a secure password.

Step 4a: Review the Terms and Conditions. By signing up you agree to CoTweet’s Terms & Conditions.

Step 4b: Then click on the “Create Your Account” button.

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It’s been a while since I’ve created a video tutorial and wanted to jump back into it again. With that said, here’s a quick 4 minute tutorial on how to add an event to Yelp. Click on the ‘Expand’ icon on the bottom right hand corner of the video player for a larger view.
 

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Just heard about the new Google +1 Button and wanted to share the news on how this new feature can help you find what you need faster and how you can join in on the experiment.

At a glance, the Google +1 Button encourages word of mouth marketing as it allows people to recommend content directly to their friends and contacts through personalized annotations. Online recommendations remain a positive influence on search behavior. According to Erik Qualman, “90% of online consumers trust recommendations from people they know; 70% trust unknown users, 27% trust experts.” (Econsultancy, 2009) Personally, the first stat resonates with me and aligns with my online behavior but I put a lot more weight on trusted experts when it comes to a purchasing decision.

With that said, I’ll leave you with the Google +1 Button video and how you can take Google +1 for a spin.

Watch a Video on the Google +1 Button

Take Google +1 for a Spin

To join the Google +1 experiment, follow the steps below:

1. Log into your Google Account (required)
2. Go to Google Experimental Labs > Experimental Search
3. Click the ‘Join this experiment’ button next to the header ‘+1 button’
4. Plug in a search query on Google.com and click the new +1 button on the SERP that you recommend

That’s it! You’re ready to go. Don’t forget, you can participate in only ONE Google experiment at a time.

For more details on the Google +1 Button, check out the official Google +1 Button landing page.

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I stumbled across the course, “User Motivation,” a lively RSA Animate which was adapted from Dan Pink’s talk at the RSA. While the video illustrates the hidden truths behind what truly motivates people, I was truly taken back by how absolutely clever and entertaining this video was. For instructors that have students that are auditory and visual learners, this is definitely a good example of how to keep your student engaged when teaching online.

Thanks to my current employer, I was fortunate to have the opportunity to attend the Online Marketing Summit (OMS) in San Diego which was held at the Downtown Westin Gaslamp Quarter. I was at the conference most of the time providing attendees with a demo of my company’s software solutions for SEM and SEO and while I wasn’t able to attend a lot of the sessions, I was able to attend a session on how marketers could leverage the location-based social media platform, Foursquare, to target and reward loyal consumers.

Mike Lewis, the speaker and  Vice President of Marketing at Awareness, Inc. kicked off his presentation with a comedy web series on YouTube produced by HubSpot, Inc. called, “Foursquare Cops,” which I had to share (see below). The rest of the presentation is up on SlideShare. If you attended the event, what was your key take away?

Foursquare Cops – HubSpot, Inc.

Top 10 Ways Marketers can Use Foursquare

Presented by Mike Lewis (@bostonmike) at OMS 2011

View more  presentations from Mike Lewis on SlideShare and visit his blog Social Episodes for more of his insight on social media and its on today’s businesses.

If you’re already on Foursquare, feel free to add me – HeyStephanie. Check you later!

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Microsoft’s new decision engine, Bing™, aims to help users make better and informed decisions by focusing on four key vertical areas: making a purchase decision, planning a trip, researching a health condition or finding a local business.^[1] The decision engine is expected to roll out over the next few days and fully deploy worldwide on Wednesday, June 3, 2009. As of today, you can access Bing in it’s ‘preview’ mode and take it for a spin – and that’s exactly what I did.

The Bing interface is clean and boasts new features such as categorized search and web groups which makes it easy to navigate. For example, in a search for mobile phones, Bing provided categories at the top left of the page (also known as the Explore Pane) for mobile brands, a buying guide, service providers etc. Once you click on a search category and hover over a listing, you’ll see a a short excerpt from that page. This quick preview can help you decide if that’s the right landing page that you’re looking for. Bing offers other features such as Related Searches, Search History, and Best Matches.

I’ll be trying Bing out for the rest of the week and see what other features will be rolled out by June 3, 2009. How about you? What are your thoughts on Microsoft’s new decision engine?

1. http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2009/may09/05-28NewSearchPR.mspx

If you’re like me, you love walking down the aisles of your local bookstore to see what new audiobooks are on the shelves. By the time you’re done walking up and down your favorite aisle, whether it be Business & Marketing, Romance, or Self-Improvement, you look down at your hands and realize you’ve grabbed five audiobooks — each roughly worth $25.00.

You end up purchasing the audiobook that fits within your budget and leave the others to be re-shelved. “Next time,” you tell yourself and the running list of audiobooks you’ve logged in your memory to purchase  grows longer.

What if I told you that you could borrow audio best-sellers and other goodies from your local library—for free?

All you need is a library card from your public library. You can browse and search hundreds of great titles and download them to your computer, transfer them to a portable device, or burn onto a CD for your listening pleasure anywhere, anytime.

Imagine my surprise when I logged onto the San Diego County Library site and discovered their large selection of downloadable audiobooks in both WMA and MP3 formats—I literally freaked out. I whipped out my library card and checked out all of the audiobooks I had always wanted.

The process was simple and may differ from your local library so be sure to see what requirements you need in order to take advantage of this opportunity.

Step 1: Download & Install the OverDrive Media Console™ software (FREE)

The OverDrive Media Console is available for both Windows® and Mac® users.

Step 2: Register Free Software

Before you can start the check out process, you’ll need to register the OverDrive Media Console software. Don’t worry, you’ll only need to do this once.

Step 3: Checkout, Download  & Enjoy.

Now you can search the library database for your favorite audio books and other downloadable content. When you decide on a title of interest, simply add it to your digital cart to checkout.

You will never accrue late fees with titles you download from this website. At the end of the loan period, titles will expire and be automatically ‘returned’ to the library. At this time, you can delete the expired file(s) from your machine. – San Diego Public Library

So what are you waiting for? Search for libraries using  OverDrive’s service here.

(Photo Credit: a glitch)

It’s 2009 and you’ve made a couple of New Year’s resolutions. And if you’re like most “resolutioners” – your number one resolution is to lose weight (myself included ).

Great — so what social media tools or communities are out there that can help us meet this goal?

Meet TheDailyPlate.com

The Daily Plate (TDP) allows you to search more than 502,000 food items for calorie counts, total carbs, fat, and protein so you can track what you’re eating. What’s great about this search function is that when you search for a certain food, TDP also provides healthy alternatives  with fewer calories and reviews made by other members. You can even log what you’ve eaten in a free food diary that you can access online, through their mobile site, or via the LiveStrong iPhone application (my favorite iPhone app) which is available for free for a limited time.

Once you’ve registered at TDP, it’s easy to get started. Simply type a food item in the search box and add the item to your daily plate. TDP will calculate your daily calories automatically. You can even track your daily activites (i.e. running, walk, etc.) and log the calories you burn each day.

So if you’re serious about keeping your resolution to lose weight, check out The Daily Plate and see what they have to offer and don’t forget – it’s FREE.

What other web 2.0 tools are you using to meet your New Year’s resolutions?

I have officially dumped YouTube. He was old, played out, and everyone got a piece of him. I moved on to a player that’s shiny and new. His name is Viddler.

I discovered Viddler from Demo Girl’s screencast on ididwork and didn’t think much of the player until I saw Viddler’s president, Rob Sandie, showcasing how you can customize your player.

We’re talking about customizing the shade and color of your player, a custom logo, and yes—you can even decide where your videos link to!

I’m all for customization and Viddler just took it to the next level. Here’s my custom logo in a recent video did for my company called “Sharing is Easy“. It’s not as cool as Rob’s. You won’t see a guy dancing in the background but it’s a start.

For an awesome step by step tutorial on how to customize your Viddler player, check out Alex Carpenter’s blog. He even has screenshots of other custom logos by Viddler creators.

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This has to be my favorite Brickfish campaign simply because it’s easy to enter and the prizes are fantastic! Who doesn’t want a $500 gas card?

Check out the prizes listed below but don’t forget to read the complete rules, regulations, and legal notice:

(Photo Credit: Brickfish)

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