Social Networks
Entries related to social networks, group psychology, anthropology, and really any of the social sciences.
Wordless Wednesday
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Wed, 12/29/2010 - 07:17
Facebook and Identity
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Fri, 12/24/2010 - 10:50How do you see yourself? How do others see you? How would you like others to see you? There are not new questions brought in by Facebook and the Internet, however the way we approach them may be changing as a result of the Internet.
I started thinking about this when a new member joined a mailing list of Group Psychotherapists that I read. Besides the welcomes and as part of the good natured joking, the new member was asked how we knew who the new member really was. I piled on saying that we can’t really be sure about who some one is until we’ve checked their Facebook page.
There are many older members of the mailing list who are not on Facebook and responded with comments like “I guess one can’t be sure of who I am or whether I truly exist because I am not on Facebook.” The discussion waxed philosophical and folks pondered not whether a person exists, but where they exist. One person asked if people exist in the group’s mind or the mind of individuals in a group. This lead to the great sentiment about people existing in the hearts of those that love them.
All of this resonates closely to me as I glance at the book “Samuel Mendelsson: A Man Who Must Not Be Forgotten” sitting next to my computer. It is the story of a man who died during The Holocaust and was given to me by his great granddaughter, a noted therapist on the list whose friendship I have come to cherish. Samuel Mendelsson, as far as I know, does not exist on Facebook. He exists in different books and in the hearts of those that loved him.
The same applies to my Aunt Susie who passed away last week. Yesterday was her funeral and I had been asked to read my blog post reflecting on her life. I learned about her death from her grandchildren on Facebook. Susie never had a Facebook page, but she is memorialized on Facebook and in the hearts of many.
Yet it is not only in memorials that we exist in Facebook. The new member responded “You gave me great awareness and questions about how I show up to the world on face book. needless to say I thank you for the chance to take a closer look at me. FB Revisions are pending.” Another friend of mine is a young high school teacher, the kind that all the students worship and want to be friends with. I heard him speak once about how he handles Facebook friend requests from some of these students. He reads over the student’s Facebook pages very closely. If he finds inappropriate behavior, he highlights it to the student explaining that he would like being friends with the student on Facebook, but he can’t because of the inappropriate behavior. It might jeopardize both the student and his own career. Many students have cleaned up their profiles as a result of this and thought more about how they wish to be perceived by others and how they present themselves online.
The discussion brought out another new member of the list who works with adolescents who suffer from eating disorders, anxiety, depression, and body image concerns. It made me stop and wonder how these adolescents portray themselves online. How do they view themselves? How do others view them? How do they wish to be viewed? The same old questions in a new format.
It would seem as if this could lead nicely into other topics, like cyber-bullying. Another topic that it might lead nicely into are the cartoon images many Pinay mommy bloggers have of themselves online. They don’t look Philippino. One Pinay mommy blogger wrote an interesting blog post about why skin whitening lotions are so popular there. How do these Pinay mommies view themselves? How do others view them? How do they wish to be viewed? Yet another version of the same set of questions.
I don’t have any great insights to offer. Perhaps some of my friends will have that to share. Yet these seem like important questions to be thinking about.
Wordless Wednesday
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Wed, 12/22/2010 - 14:44
Playing with Email Marketing
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Sat, 12/18/2010 - 11:34Back in August, I wrote a blog piece about Playing with Google Friend Connect Newsletters and other stuff. It turns out that if you have Google Friend Connect set up on your blog, you can use it to send newsletters to people who have opted in. At the time, there were 49 people that had opted-in and I sent them an email.
I haven’t sent another email blast using Google Friend Connect since then. Email blasts just really aren’t a high priority for my blog. Since then, the number of newsletter subscribers has grown to 80 out of the 289 people that have joined Orient Lodge on Google Friend Connect. I’ll probably send them an email about this blog post and random other updates.
At my new job, we’ve been talking about improving our email marketing, so I’ve been spending a bit of time looking at different email marketing systems. I’ve asked a bunch of friends, done a bit of testing and have some initial thoughts and a further request.
The email marketing system that has the greatest mindshare is Constant Contact. If you ask people about email marketing systems, just about everyone will mention them. They are very good. People also mention that they are the strictest. If you want to do anything more than very straight forward opt-in email marketing, they are probably not the folks to use.
The other email marketing system that got a lot of comments was Vertical Response. The comments I received were unanimous. Avoid them. Most of the complaints were about usability. It is just too hard a system to work with.
GetResponse got some good reviews, but I haven’t really spent time exploring them. There was one other system that was recommended called Emma. However, they seemed awfully pricy and I decided not to use them.
The two systems that got the best response and seemed to fit best with what I’m looking at are MailChimp and Mad Mimi. Mad Mimi seems to be better oriented towards building up new lists. They are pretty straight forward about who you can contact:
To add audience, each person must either:
Be a customer, member or subscriber of your organization.
Have asked to get your emails by signing up in some way.
Have bought something from you in the past 18 months.
MailChimp says
No 3rd party lists, no prospects, no lists that you scraped from websites, no chambers of commerce lists, etc
The two statements are perhaps not all that different, other than the tone, but for someone interested in building their lists, they should look at these policies to see which system feel more comfortable.
One other system I started looking at was CoreMotives running as part of Microsoft Dynamics CRM. There are some really interesting aspects of embedding an email marketing system within a CRM, but it probably doesn’t work well for smaller bloggers.
In terms of ease of use, I found Mailchimp pretty nice in terms of constructing nice emails. On a first pass, Mad Mimi doesn’t seem as strong in this area. I also like Mailchimp’s SocialPro. It pulls data from different sites, including Rapleaf and Gravatar so that you can better segment your lists. SocialPro is free until March, but still needs some work. They have some other nice integration with social media, Google Analytics and other tools for tracking and interacting with the system.
Mad Mimi does some really nice social media integration, and may be easier for some sorts of email blasts once you get everything configured just right. I’m told they have some other interesting features that are worth exploring.
Both Mad Mimi and Mailchimp put up the emails as webpages and you can see my first attempts here and here.
So, that’s where I’m at right now with testing these systems. I’ve added sections in the lower left hand part of my blog where you can subscribe via MailChimp and Mad Mimi. If you’re interested in participating in my testing, please consider signing up. Also, if you use any email marketing system to promote your blog, share your thoughts.
#ff @chcconnecticut #gedh @andrea_doane @NACHC @LNReynolds #fqhc @aabayasekara #hcct @HealthCampCT
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Fri, 12/17/2010 - 04:44An important part of getting up to speed in my new job as Social Media Manager for Community Health Center, Inc., is to start building up connections with people and organizations that can add a lot to the online discussion about how social media can help improve communities’ health. So, I’m looking at who is retweeting @chcconnecticut or tweeting messages of interest to @chcconnecticut and who I can connect with.
One of the big events last week was CHC receiving half a million dollars in grants from GE Foundation’s “GE Developing Health”. Tweets about the GE Developing Health grants used the #gedh hashtag. One person who mentioned #gedh and @chcconnecticut is @andrea_doane. Her profile says she is a “Communication professional with interests in CSR, leadership and engagement” For those that don’t recognize the acronym CSR, by the context, I assume she is talking about corporate social responsibility. Given that most of her tweets are about GE or social media, I suspect she does some sort of social media work for GE or the GE foundation. CSR is very important in my book, and it looks like Andrea is a person well worth following.
Another area that is very important is the National Association of Community Health Centers. They can be found on twitter at @nachc. @LNReynolds describes herself on Twitter as “Government Affairs and Advocacy for the Ohio and National Associations of Community Health Centers”. She liked a post on the CHC Facebook page about Dr. Howard Koh’s appearance on CHC Radio. @chcradio, or Conversations On Health Care, is a CHC project that airs on radio stations across the country. Dr Koh is an Assistant Secreatry for Health at HHS. @LNReynolds has a lot of interesting tweets.
One of those tweets was announcing that @aabayasekara NACHS’s “Tweet of the Week”. @aabayasekara describes herself as a “Bookworm interested in FQHCs, nonprofit management & marketing, and wandering the planet.” The acronym FQHC stands for Federally Qualified Health Center. @CHCConnecticut is a FQHC.
One final account to follow is @HealthCampCT. There are a bunch of interesting people working together to bring a barcamp style unconference about health care to Connecticut. They are tweeting with the #hcct hashtag. Most of the tweets are likely to show up from individuals using the #hcct hashtag. However in some cases there may tweets from the group as a whole coming from the @HealthCampCT account. In addition, it can provide a nice centralized place for lists and other twitter connectivity.
There is a lot going on in social media in health care, and this is just scratching the surface. If you know of other good social media in health care accounts that I should follow, please let me know.
