When Facebook Live first came out, I’ll admit it — I was daunted. ​

I’m supposed to go to stream live to the world without the opportunity for a second take? Ummm, no thanks!

I had to worry about sound, lighting, my "script," distractions in the background... It was daunting.

But here’s the thing — Facebook Live is a hugely important tool in your digital toolkit. I regularly work with clients who go Live on Facebook for the first time and find that their videos reach more people that like their page! (300% reach — yes please!!!)

We know that people watch Live videos 3x longer than videos that aren’t live. And that they engage with them 10x more than regular videos!

So yeah, apprehension aside — Facebook Live videos get people watching and engaging.

Before I ever went Live on Facebook for the world to see, I came up with a hack that allowed me to ease my way into the otherwise scary world of live streaming.

And here’s the thing: It’s so simple, you’re going to laugh.

Before going Live for an audience via my brand page, I went Live via my personal page with my privacy settings adjusted to “Only me.”

This meant I could practice being on camera, see how the video looked on my computer, hear the sound, play with the awesome built-in filters, and a whole lot else, knowing that I’d be the only to see my first take.

So here’s the step-by-step breakdown.

Open up Facebook on your smartphone. Where you would say "What's on your mind, choose "Live." 

If that option isn't there, then just click into the post and then click on the camera icon below.

You will then get a list of options. Choose "Live Video."

Once you have done that, directly underneath your name, you will see a dropdown menu that has likely defaulted to either “Public” or Friends.”

Click on it and you will get a list of privacy setting options. 

Select "Only me."

Now when you go live, the only person who can see your video is you. ​

A while back, Jack and his Twitter crew talked about massively expanding Twitter’s iconic 140 character limit to 10,000! Predictably, the Twitterverse went crazy. So Jack relented. Sort of.

While an individual tweet is still limited to 140 characters, Twitter has redefined what counts as a character. So while everything might still look/feel the same, you actually have quite a bit more room to get your thoughts out in a tweet these days than in the Twitter of old.

Many of these changes happened below the radar of the non-avid Twitter user. So I thought it would be a good time for a round-up.

Twitter is changing all the time. If I missed any new functionalities, let me know. I’d love to add them to my list.

This will work on your computer, your tablet or your smartphone. ​

Twitter will automatically populate a wide-array of GIF emotions to search through.

Once you have the perfect GIF, select it and it will be added as media to your tweet.

And per the theme of this post — it will not count against your character count!​

Please note though, you cannot add a GIF to a tweet containing any other media, or as part of a Quote Tweet (more on Quote Tweets below).

Another fun option, built write into your tweet, is the ability to conduct a poll. ​

Once you have selected the option, you can input a series of “answers” to whatever question you choose to pose in your tweet.​

The default (and minimum option) is two “choices,” but click "+ Add a choice" and you can tack on a third or even a fourth.

Obviously, since it’s on this list, a poll doesn’t count against your Tweet’s character count.

If someone takes your poll, they will see the breakdown of votes by percentage. Voting is anonymous. You won’t know who took your poll, nor will anyone else. But it is a fun way to engage your audience and let them tell you directly what they think about any given question.​

Quick note: each “choice” is limited to 25 characters. Prepare accordingly. Also, like GIFs, you can’t insert a poll into a Quote Tweet or a tweet with media.

Just like GIFs and polls don’t count against your character limit, pictures and videos are likewise exempted from your count. You can add up to four pictures to any tweet that isn’t a Quote Tweet.​

Use your pictures to help tell you story.

But don’t just tweet pictures. Be sure to always tell your audience why you are tweeting them. It should be easy when you still have ALL of your precious 140 of your characters to play with!

Most regular Twitter users know that they can add pictures to a tweet (although I’m not sure how many realize their picture(s) aren't counting against their character count).

This is a tool however that I’ve found few people are aware of. And if they are, I find many don't truly appreciate its power.

When you add a picture (or 2, 3 or 4), you can “tag” people who are in the picture. I put tag in quotes because they don’t actually have to be in the photo for you to tag them. ​

To do so is simple: after you add your picture, click “Who’s in this photo?”

You can then search for any Twitter user by name or handle and tag them in your photo. It’s important to note that you can’t differentiate which picture a particular user is in — you can just tag them in your pictures, generally. But the coolest part about this: you can add up to ten users to any tweet! That should help you save you a whole lot of space since now you don’t have to write out all those handles within your tweet in order to tag them. ​

Quick note: some users have privacy settings that won’t allow them to be tagged in pictures. You can still tag them in your tweet, you just can’t tag them in your picture.

I mentioned this concept earlier, with the promise to cover it shortly. This is a fun one.

Once upon a time, if you wanted to retweet something, you had to do it sort of manually. You would take the tweet's content, add an RT before it and then send it to your users. This was problematic for numerous reasons, the biggest being tweet length. If a tweet was already 140 characters you couldn’t add an RT. And even if there were three characters to spare, you might not be able to add in the original sender’s handle. That led to awkward MTs, or modified tweets (if you don’t know this acronym, here's a bunch more you also might not yet know), where you retweeted an edited version of what someone else had already said. You could modify for length, content or accuracy, but whatever your reason, it certainly complicated the heart of the RT.

So Twitter adapted. They changed the way RTs work. You still occasionally see old school RTs, but it’s rare.

Then Twitter added the Quote Tweet.

When you go to retweet on your tablet or your smartphone, you’ll see be asked if you want to Retweet or Quote Tweet. Or your computer, you’ll have the option to Retweet, or to “Add a comment…”

Similar to Quote Tweets, Twitter changed the way that replies work. It used to be that when you hit reply, Twitter automatically added the handle of the person who sent the original tweet, as well as any other handle tagged within.

But Twitter realized that people were struggling with what came to be known as “tipping canoes:” Twitter conversations that were so full of handles that there was no place left to actually add your thoughts.

So now when you hit reply, the original sender and all tagged handles will still automatically be tagged in your response, but they will be tagged outside of your actual tweet. Meaning you can respond to one handle, or a big group, without worrying about tipping that Twitter canoe.

So let’s say that instead of Quote Tweeting a response to @BarackObama, I replied to him.

I still have all 140 characters for my response.

Likewise, if I reply to @JimmyKimmel while he is thanking @SenatorCollins for doing the right thing on healthcare, they will both be tagged without taking away from my character count.

Okay, that is six ways that Twitter now offers for us to get more of each and every tweet.

But the Twitterverse still wasn’t satisfied and they are notorious for finding clever workarounds to problems that bother them.

Sometimes what you have to say won’t fit into 140 characters, no matter how many other tools you have at your disposal. At that point, you can thread together your tweets to tell a longer story.​

Anytime you reply to a tweet, from anyone including yourself, Twitter will connect those two tweets with a blue line.

So if you have a longer story to tell, break it up into tweetable chunks and then share it, one piece at a time. But be careful — they have to be in the right order, or they will be impossible to follow.

To do this is simple: send your first tweet. Then reply to it. Then reply to that one. Then that one. And so on.

FYI — Threading tweets like this is sometimes referred to as a Tweet Storm.

There are many different ways people choose to differentiate a tweet from a threaded tweet. After all, your followers won’t know there’s more to come if you don’t tell them.

The most common approaches are as follows:

• Ellipses (either at the end of each tweet OR at the end of each tweet AND the beginning of each one that follows)
• 1/, 2/, 3/… x/x
• 1/x, 2/x, 3/x… x/x
• 1/, 2/, 3/… <end>
• Sometimes people just write:
  • That’s it
  • I’m done
  • All finished
  • Or the close-off of their choice.​

If you are going to thread tweets, find a way to clarify it for your audience. It’ll help them follow along.

So that’s six new(ish) ways to get more of your tweets and a bonus user hack you should know about.

Do you have any additional tips or tricks you've found to get more out of Twitter? Respond in the comments and/or share them with me on Twitter. I want to hear from you!

Want to learn more about any of the above concepts, or anything else about this often-perplexing platform? Book a class today to become a Super Twitterer.

On Friday night, I went to see a Grammy winning bluegrass legend wow his crowd with songs spanning his 40+ year career.​

Because I’m both a bluegrass nerd and a social media nerd, I streamed one of his songs via Facebook Live.

It was late on a weekend night and it didn’t get a lot of views in real time. But over the next 36 hours or so, it was watched a few dozen times. (And now I can go back and rewatch the band anytime I want on my personal Facebook page!) But truth be told, by Sunday night, I wasn’t thinking about the video anymore than I was about the drive to and from the show.

But then Monday morning, something interesting happened — my video was “liked” by the bluegrass legend it featured.

Now let’s be clear: I don’t think that this artist liked the post himself (although he might have). More likely it was a member of his marketing or management team.

But the notification that he had liked my video popped up, and I have to be honest — I got excited. Like, more excited than I probably should have.

I work in social media for a living. I know how this works. I know he probably has some marketing agency liking positive mentions of him online. But you know what: it still got its intended effect out of me!

Having him like my video felt like getting a high five or a quick hello from a bluegrass legend.

Does that handshake mean that we are suddenly best friends? Of course not.

Does it mean I can suddenly shred on the mandolin like he can? I wish!

Am I still excited enough that I immediately want to tell all my friends about it? Yup.

Liking that post cost him literally nothing (save for whatever he’s paying his agency to manage his social media—but that’s a story for another post). Yet it added to my excitement about the show.

Social media serves many roles, not least of which is customer service and community relations.

Think about yourself as a movie star. When you walk down the street, people recognize you. You can't stop and have lunch with every fan. You can’t even stop and take a picture with them all or you’d never get anywhere. But you can nod and smile to everyone who waves at you.

That’s what a "like" or a "favorite" is on social media — it’s a head nod from a celebrity. It doesn’t suddenly make you best friends or ensure that they will buy your product/go see your next movie/buy your upcoming album. But it shows the fans that you are real, and that you respect them as people, not just as consumers. And it only takes as much time to create that connection as you need to give a single click of your mouse or tap on your phone.

If you see a celebrity on the street, and you wave at them, you are going to tell your friends one of two stories:

“Oh my goodness, I just say this famous person on State Street. It was so cool!”

*** OR ***

“I just saw this famous person on State Street. He was kind of a jerk.”

You’re the celebrity. Which would you prefer?

You are busy; there aren't enough hours in the day to do everything. Social media feels like a chore; one that never ends. You might feel that if you can't do it right, why bother doing it all.

Fret not: A good social media program can be run in as few as 20 minutes a day.

This session will help you spend your limited social media time wisely, ensuring you reap the greatest rewards from this ever-growing part of business – in as few as 20 minutes a day!

By having a plan, segmenting tasks and properly organizing your ideas, you can create and manage an interesting, engaging and valuable social media program without having to sacrifice all of your many other responsibilities.

In the session, we cover topics like:

• Optimizing Your Social
  
• Having a Plan
  
• The Importance of a Blog
  
• Creating and Curating Content
  
• The Facebook Algorithm
  
• Engaging Your Audience
  
• And more
  

Facebook makes it easy to invite those who like your content to like your page. Check out this simple trick and start growing your page today!

Spencer X. Smith asked Madison's social media and marketing experts to share their top advice from 2016. He then published their responses in In Business Madison Magazine.

I am very honored to have been included as one of Madison's social media and marketing experts.

Here the advice I offered:
“Don’t sell; build. Build trust, communities, and relationships. Remember that every Like or Follower is a real person and treat them as such.

“Add value to the lives of your audience, both current and potential. Make it clear it’s not all about the sales funnel.

“Encourage your audience to join you in telling your story. Do this by engaging with their content, responding to their questions and comments, and by sharing/retweeting content they write about you and your brand. It’s always better to let others say how great you are than to try and say it yourself.”

Anything you would add? Any questions?

Check out what Madison's other experts had to say and feel free to comment here with any tips you would add to the list.

Author's note: I wrote this post leading up to the holiday season. But these tips are valid all year round. So whenever you might be reading this post, I hope you find it helpful and timely.

The holidays are almost here and that means it’s spending season! People are going to be buying presents, taking vacations, going out for family dinners and thinking about end of year giving. There is no better time to take stock and make sure your social media is working for you as strongly as it should be.

So here is a quick top ten checklist to help ensure you get everything you can out of social media  this holiday season:

To tag on most platforms (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn...) type an @ and then start typing a partner’s username. You will see a dropdown menu of options. Choose the right handle (unique name of person or brand) and viola! Instead of just writing their name online, you are tagging them. Now they will get a notification you mentioned them and hopefully they will turn around and spread the love.

Good text is important.

But posts with pictures are better.

Video will take you even further.

And Facebook Live can take you to levels you didn’t know was possible!

If you live, work and post in a B2C world (business 2 consumer as opposed to B2B--business 2 business), you should utilize a hashtag and you should use it often. It’s okay to have additional hashtags for specific sales, events, or campaigns, but regularly using multiple hashtags means none are as strong as they could be.

Post using your hashtag and encourage others to use it as well. You can do this by displaying it in your store/office/meeting spaces, sharing/retweeting/reposting content that uses your hashtag and generally letting your audience know about it.

When you autopost from Facebook to Twitter, you are telling your Twitter followers that your time is more valuable than theirs. It’s fine to post similar versions of the same content in both formats, but copy and paste your post into each platform and ensure that everything is optimized for the platform in which you are posting. (If a post ends with a "..." that is BAD!)

One potential exception: use a site like If This Than That (IFTTT)*  and build a “recipe” that automatically posts your Instragram pictures to Twitter. Don’t EVER post a link to your Instagram picture on Twitter (automatically or otherwise). If people interact with you on Twitter, show them your picture where they are!

*Here’s an explainer blog to walk you through setting up an IFTTT recipe.

While seeing negative content online about yourself and your brand might be painful, it’s there whether or not you engage! If you see negative comments, decide if the poster is a troll or an unhappy customer. A troll should never be engaged with, but DO NOT ignore unhappy customers; if they write about you on social media, they are talking about you publicly. Respond. Don’t be defensive, just explain your side and if you offered solutions, share them publicly. Don’t cede the conversation, engage in it!

And of course if people say nice things about you, like the comment/tweet/picture, comment on it, and share it! It’s amazing how far a little TLC can go.

As a rule of thumb, you should post on Facebook and Instagram a minimum of 3-5 times per week and a maximum of 3-5 times per day.

On Twitter, post a minimum of 8-10 times per week and maximum of 8-10 times per day.

Sound like a lot? It’s not! Follow the 80/20 rule (#8) and you’ll be good to go.

Spell out ideas in great detail on your blog. Then share snippets on social. This is a great tip for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and keeping your site up-to-date and dynamic. And it will serve as a bridge between your social and your site.

You shouldn't repost the same content over and over. But it’s okay (encouraged even!) to repackage your content. Your social will have a different audience in the morning than the evening. Different people will be logged on Wednesday than Friday. Keep finding ways to share your content, creatively and helpfully.

The 80/20 rule states that 20% of your content should be about you and your brand. The other 80% should be content that your audience will find helpful/relevant/interesting/funny/provoking...

For every post talking about a sale, a new product, store hours, or the like, you should have four posts that will simply add value to your audience’s lives.

There is no shortage of third party apps and sites that will provide a tremendous amount of data about your social media’s analytics. But Facebook and Twitter each have very powerful analytic tools built right into the platform. They are free to access and will provide you invaluable data that you can learn from and use to improve your content and digital strategy.

To access your Facebook analytics, go to your brand page and navigate in the top menu bar to “Insights.” For Twitter, login to your account and open a new tab. Then go to analytics.twitter.com and they will be there waiting for you.

If you’ve never visited either, you’ll be amazed what you can learn.

If you have a brick and mortar store or a restaurant, display your handles (and your hashtag) loud and proud. Let people know that you want to see pics of their new end table or the special cocktail you just served them.

Don’t have a brick and mortar store? Promote your handles in your emails and newsletters. Put it on your website. If you have clothing or merchandise, include your hashtag on it. If you are in front of a crowd (one person or ten thousand), let them know how to find you online.

No one will care more about what you have to say online then the people who already love what you do offline!

Hope these tips help take your social media to the next level this holiday season. If you have any questions, be in touch through the comments or via email, Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn.

In the meantime, keep telling your story!

Yesterday, Donald Trump Jr. tweeted this:

The backlash was quick and it was fierce. A particularly good response (one of thousands) came from Jon Favreau, who used to work for President Obama.

And on the other end of the spectrum, here’s one from @darth:

It’s worth noting that as offensive as Trump Jr.’s tweet was, it wasn’t even an original idea.

When Ben Carson was running for president, he often used a similar analogy to justify his opposition to accepting Syrian refugees, except he substituted Skittles with rabid dogs.

Mike Huckabee, during his run for president, used peanuts. Others have replaced Skittles with M&Ms or grapes.

Former Congressman Joe Walsh—who you might remember as the guy who threatened President Obama in the aftermath of this summer’s shooting in Dallas—was offended by the tweet, but only because he didn’t get an h/t.

Suffice to say, it’s not a new argument.

Now imagine you are Skittles (the brand), and suddenly—inexplicably—you find yourself trending on social media. What’s your response?

Really think about what you would do. A massive, household name is being equated with poison and refugees and xenophobia. Do you attempt to “capitalize” on the situation, ensuring the world that every Skittle in the bowl is good and poison-free? Do you try to be funny, serious, irreverent, angry… On a situation like this one, you could ask a hundred branding experts, and they would all probably have a different idea.

And yet, Skittles managed a perfect response. Here it is in its entirety:

Skittles are candy. Refugees are people. We don’t feel like it’s an appropriate analogy. We will respectfully refrain from further commentary as anything we say could be misinterpreted as marketing.

In 30 words, they clarified that they are offended by the comparison, that they don’t agree with it, and that they would now be shutting the hell up.

In fact, despite the fact that they are a brand with a vibrant social media presence, their Facebook and Twitter accounts have gone completely radio-silent since this controversy erupted yesterday.

Here is the lesson for brands: don’t see every mention of your brand as an opportunity to raise sales or increase market share. You can’t capitalize on tragedy; trying typically raises your profile in ways you don’t want and associates you with a story which you probably don’t want to be a part of.

It’s so easy to see how this could have gone wrong for Skittles. Instead, they came out the heroes in the story. Or, at the very least, not one of the villains.

Epilogue
The bowl of Skittles in the picture that Trump Jr. tweeted was used without attribution. And much richer than that: the photographer was once a refugee himself!
 
Want to read more great responses to this awful tweet. Here are 21 you are sure to appreciate. Did you see any others in the Twitterverse that aren’t on this list? Tweet them at us or share them in the comments.