The Ultimate Social Media Tool Kit: Going Beyond 101 For Business

Facebook | The Ultimate Social Media Tool Kit: Going Beyond 101 For Business

Greetings from Creating Connections! If you, or someone you know, has been searching for a local Social Media class that goes beyond the basics, then this intermediate class on Twitter, LinkedIn & Facebook Pages for Business is for YOU!


This 90 minute Social Media seminar is for anyone who has heard the buzz about social media tools like Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook and wants to go beyond a general understanding. It will cover intermediate information focusing on profile set up, platform use and key business applications for several social media platforms. The seminar will include break-out discussion sessions and a segment on profile content creation.

Michelle Beckham-Corbin, MBA and Free-lance writer, brings a wealth of practical business experience from her 15 year career in Sales & Marketing with the Procter & Gamble Company as well as years of experience working with the Non-profit and Small Business Sectors. Her extensive knowledge of social media tools and energetic personality will keep you riveted in your seat as she shares the secret of "The Ultimate Social Media Tool Kit".

Be a part of the buzz (and tweets!) by learning how to use social media tools to connect with others in a meaningful way that will build relationships leading to business growth.


Participants will learn:

• Importance of developing a Brand Strategy
• The importance of Key Word SEO in Profile and Content Creation
• Profile set ups for:
• Twitter
• LinkedIn Company Pages
• Google Profiles
• Google Maps
• How to develop Tribes (Friends, Followers and Fans) for your Business
• How to manage social media tools in a timely way
• Brief overview of Facebook for Business

Date: Friday, June 5th, 2009
Time: 2:00 p.m.- 3:30 p.m.
Location: Benchmark Financial Services
8423 Beechmont Avenue
Cincinnati, Ohio 45255

Seminar Cost: $49.95

Call: 513-474-4555 to Register- Space is Limited

Hands-On Lab Add-on:

There will be an optional add-on opportunity for a 60 minute hands-on lab course following the seminar for those who would like to be able to end the day with completed profiles in order to hit the ground running on Monday. This class will be open to the first 7 people to register and will include guided assistance through every step of the profile process and help with amazing, buzz-worthy, SEO- rich bios and other content creation

Date: Friday, June 5th, 2009
Time: 4:00 p.m.- 5:00 p.m.
Location: Benchmark Financial Services
8423 Beechmont Avenue
Cincinnati, Ohio 45255

Lab Cost: $39.95
Call: 513-474-4555 to Register- Space is Limited


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Time of My Life.....

Never enough hours in the day, but it's all good! I'm having the time of my life. No regrets on how I'm spending my time. It's as though I'm in a cyclonic period- just want to absorb as much knowledge and information as I can. Like a person thirsting in the desert or starving in the darkness of despair. I want that well of information to quench my dry, parched lips and sprout green shoots through the cracked dry landscape that is the unknowing.

Tomorrow is 'Me' time- time to reconnect with my sisters whose words bathe me in their brilliance and sheer brightness. A writer's circle beckons and I have nought which to resist. And really, why would I anyway?

Copyright Michelle Beckham-Corbin 2009

Dichotomous Blog

Note to self: Jump on the bandwagon and separate out this Blog!

What began as a place to gently lay my creative writing has evolved into a site that includes my thoughts and commentary on local happenings (usually straight-to-the-heart stories that make you take in a deep breath, wince and whisper 'OMG' deep down in your soul); many traditional blog posts on social media and my involvement with the local New Media communities; as well as my creative writing. It's a nice cauldron of items and for the unsuspecting voyeur, there is liable to be a little lagniappe involved.

But there are times that I do feel a twinge of pity for that person following my Social Media brand who lands on these pages and comes face to face with my creative writing piece like the one from May entitled "The Rape". "What the hell!", said person may be thinking, and lacking a background in one of the basic rules of creative writing, may think that all my work is autobiographical. Any writer, or lover of literature, knows that one can never assume that the words we read are truth. There is a little notion that is oft times employed called FICTION!!! And yes, of course, I realize that even within fictional material, an author may weave bits and pieces of detritus from her life into the pages that she produces.

So if you've landed here in search of Michelle, the Social Media Marketing Strategist, then by all means use the topic list to the right to find exactly what you are looking for. Do feel free to flip around to my commentary and creative writing- perhaps something you see here will inspire you. Just remember that I have an incredibly huge imagination and an easy way with the pen, errr keyboard.

If you are in search of Michelle, the Free-lance Writer, then you have come to the right place. Grab a glass of wine, get relaxed and

ENJOY!


Copyright Michelle Beckham-Corbin 2009

A Millenial Kind of Love

It’s like that itch that just can’t be scratched

The feeling of want

Building with each passing memory of other

It can never be completely consumed

Some deep dark internal part broods in silence

Wanting the parched lips to be moistened, not quenched

Wanting the hunger to be alleviated for a moment, but not sated

Wanting to exist in the “in between”:

That place between obsession and satisfaction

“Live in the moment,” he says

How does one do that when love was once upon a time

Yet intimacy remains?

They are the best of friends, but with something more

The love is there, but it’s not romantic love

The romance is there, but it’s purely platonic

They read poetry to each other by candle-light

But insist they are no longer in love

They share a passion for indie bands

He softly strums guitar into her ears

But they are only friends

Gone is the obsession, the wild abandon

The need to be everything and all consuming with each other

Time can quickly pass into days, perhaps a week with no contact

And yet they come back together easily, seamlessly

They have a secret language, full of code words

They have secret meanings that no one else understands

They hold sacred memories of each other

And know the most intimate details about each other

Details that only a lover would know

They are friends.

They are lovers.

They are not in love.

Welcome to the millennium.

Copyright Michelle Beckham-Corbin 2009

NPR: On The Web: Living In The Now

NPR: On The Web: Living In The Now

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Original post on NPR's All Tech Considered Blog by Eyder Peralta. Peralta's quotes Nova Spivack's commentary on the "era of the stream" within this post and then expounds upon the issues raised here:

"The transition from a slow Web to a fast-moving Stream is happening quickly. And as this happens we are shifting our attention from the past to the present, and our "now" is getting shorter.

...

The era of the Web was mostly about the past -- pages that were published months, weeks, days or at least hours before we looked for them. Search engines indexed the past for us to make it accessible: On the Web we are all used to searching Google and then looking at pages from the recent past and even farther back in the past. But in the era of the Stream, everything is shifting to the present -- we can see new posts as they appear and conversations emerge around them, live, while we watch." (Spivack)

From past, to present, to NOW- how do we get the future right? Incredibly thought-provoking post, and one that I think people from my generation can really relate to. Wondering how generations X, Y & Millennium will deal with defining future when they have grown up with instant everything. I suppose only time will tell......................

NEW MEDIA CINCINNATI SPINS MAGIC: THE POWER IS IN THE PARTICIPANTS

POWER TO THE PEOPLE!!


The New Media Cincinnati networking group had their monthly meet-up last Saturday at The Pub @Rookwood Commons. Daniel Johnson, Jr., founder of the rapidly growing group, changed up the usual format and declared it an UnConference Meet-Up. For the uninitiated, or non-geeks like myself (totally used as a term of endearment!), an un-conference occurs when the meeting content is wholly created by the partipants in a highly organic fashion and members follow the "two-feet rule", which means if you don't like what you're hearing, walk those two feet over to another presentation, according to Daniel.

The group spoke up about topics they wanted to participate in and leaders volunteered to spearhead the groups; provide expert knowledge in the area and facilitate the discussion. Corners of the room were designated for each topic. In true organic fashion, new topics and groups spun up on their own. At any given time, one could wander from

• Fervant discussions on Twitter and best apps to manage tweets
• Telecommuting and Jelly Meet-Ups (founded by AmyBeth Hale: day where telecommuters meet at a local venue to create community and work side-by-side to foster the camaraderie of the traditional office-place.)
• Blogging
• Pod-casting
• Videography

This particular Saturday afternoon was gorgeous and the Pub opened up the patio to make good use of the outdoors. Smart move on their part, as the crowd was large. I counted about 60 folks in attendance from a wide variety of walks of life: Videographers, business folks, bloggers, techies, traditional journalists, recruiters, small business owners, pod casters, musicians- the list goes on and on. The key here is that the group and it's centeral focus on new media is what brought folks out on a beautiful Saturday afternoon-and once again on a holiday weekend, Mother's Day!

The opportunity to share and learn and to create conversations that lead to incredible discovery of "other" is that magic that New Media Cincinnati spins. The group discusses the topics and yet at the same time becomes the topic in two key ways.

First- everything that occurs at a meet-up is being transmitted live under the creative commons licence. Members are tweeting, texting, status updating on Facebook and a live video stream is running so that friends and fans from across the land can join in our organic mayhem.

Secondly, in the pure act of coming together in conversation, we are becoming the essence of what social media is all about: connection and conversation. In the act of conversing we are changing the course of dialogue: creating new opportunities of thought; creating working relationships and partnerships and the most important end product of all- creating friendships.

And that folks is where it's truly at. The human element. The heart. Where social media: the tools become social media: the people. Come join us on the second Saturday of every month from 4:00-7:00 p.m. at the Pub. I guarantee you will walk away with more knowledge and a new friend or two (or 10!!!).


Copyright Michelle Beckham-Corbin 2009

C3: CREATING CONNECTIONS CONSULTING, LLC PRESENTS SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING SEMINAR

Maximizing Social Networks for Your Business


You are invited to join one of the best networking groups for small business owners and entrepreneurs in the area: the Cincinnati Small Business Help Group, as C3: Creating Connections Consulting, LLC presents a FREE seminar on Maximizing Your Marketing Message Via Social Media Tools.


C3 will present an overview on tips and strategies for business owners and entrepreneurs to enable best practices on LinkedIn, Twitter & Facebook as part of a sound Brand Marketing Plan. Come discover what all of the “BUZZ” is about in the world of Social Media. Lunch available.


Details: Friday, May 15th from 11:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.
Professional Business Services, Inc.
8425 Beechmont Ave
Cincinnati, Oh 45255
513-474-4555

Click Here To Register


Michelle Beckham-Corbin, Owner of C3: Creating Connections Consulting, LLC, has over 20 years experience in the corporate, non-profit and small business arenas. Michelle is a former Sales & Marketing Manager for The Procter & Gamble Company and holds an MBA from Xavier University. She is an active member of the New Media Cincinnati and Cincinnati Social Media Breakfast (SMB) networking groups.


http://www.linkedin.com/in/michellebeckhamcorbin
http://twitter.com/michellebeckham


Copyright Michelle Beckham-Corbin 2009

Kaleidoscope Discoveries- really!

Time to post some creative writing from the past. Yeah, I know it's a cheap shot to have new material without really having new material, but I'm taking a break from social media writing. Want to get back to my roots, at least until tomorrow when I am overdue to write about the New Media Cincinnati Meet Up last Saturday that was totally fab!!! I digress. Here it is;

The Rape

Sunshine plays on the car-tops

Firing off beams of blinding light

Skies are cerulean and clear

Patrons chat in the parking lot

Birds fly overhead as leaves begin to soften

And fall floats in like a whisper

Into the cradle community

Safe, protected, similar

We are so alike

Carbon copies of one another

We joke that we live in a bubble

A bubble of sameness

Same clothes, same sports, same S.U.V.

Same college, same religion, same socio-economics

A place where truly everyone knows your name

And deals are made on a wink and a handshake

But one day the gate to Eden is left unattended

A stranger enters our community

Parks in our lot with the sun-kissed roofs

Watches the birds in the sky overhead and

Waits,

Waits for long stretches of time

Crouched in the back of a copy cat car

Evil brewed over years of dysfunction,

Bubbling beneath the surface of his actions

One spark, one careless encounter will set him off

And send him spiraling down into an abyss of sadistic addiction

Uncontrollable in his rage, he will reach out to

Stifle the silent screams that roar through his brain

What is he thinking as he lies there in wait

His muscles cramped, his body taut

Does he perspire?

Does his heart palpitate?

The car door opens, the knife reaches out

To cut a slash in the fabric of our community.

Safe no more; same no more

The bubble has been reduced to bits of saltwater tears

Raining down upon our heads

Evil has entered our gates or has it been lurking here all along

Below the surface of the same citizens.

Michelle Beckham-Corbin

10/4/02

Rev. 11/3/02

In response to the abduction and rape of a 44 yr. old woman from Beechmont Mall at 9:00 p.m. on a Monday.

Copyright Michelle Beckham-Corbin 2009

Twitterholic- will this require a 12 Step Program?

Just for kicks I just checked my status on Twitterholic to see how I match up to the Cincinnati Twitterverse. Out of about 800 local users (I didn't count those accounts with zero followers!), I am ranked #118. Click here for Twitterholic. Not sure if this is good or bad, so I checked Mr. Tweet to see what their analytics had to say about me. Mr. Tweet states that I am highly conversational and a good connector. Hmmn, I knew that already. I love talking to people, learning more about them and helping them make connections.

Feel free to join me in conversation, follow @michellebeckham.


Copyright Michelle Beckham-Corbin 2009

Mother's Day Tribute to Loyce Beckham

Love the ability to sit in my backyard and mess around on my laptop due to the wireless state of our house. It is absolutely gorgeous out here. I've got my iTouch broadcasting some of my favorite songs mixing with the sound of birds twittering and the occasional barking dog.

In honor of Mother's Day, I wanted to pay tribute to my mother. I really appreciate everything that she has done for me and my three siblings. She paved the way by her example. She was the first person in her family to receive a Master's Degree, this was way back in the '60s when many colleges including my alma mater, Xavier University, were completely male enclaves. She worked as a Social Worker placing children in need of a home with loving, adoptive families. She took time off when we were young to stay home with us. She was always an active person in the community and set a great example by sharing her gifts and talents with others. School board, parish council, one of the first lay Eucharist ministers in the '70s, taxi driver for all of our extra-curricular activities and school carpools, gourmet chef, and gardener extraordinaire. Later, when we were in high-school, she re-invented herself and became a Library manager for the well-known Montgomery County, Maryland library system (suburb of Washington, D.C.).

Now retired, she occasionally subs for the library system and continues to grow an incredible flower garden, rivaling any spread in Home Beautiful magazine. My parents always exposed us to the arts and gave us the gift of private school educations. All four of us have gone on to have exceptional careers because we started with a foundation that included much love, an emphasis on reading, focus on education and enjoyment of the arts. My parents weren't rich, didn't take lavish vacations, or focus purely on their own interests. Instead, they invested what they had in US and we are all the better for it. IT Project Manager for the Department of Labor, Brand Promotions Director for Astra-Zeneca, Director of Marketing for Cision, former Sales & Marketing Manager for the Procter & Gamble Company and founder of C3: Creating Connections Consulting firm. We are all leading incredibly successful lives. It all starts with your mother (and father!).

Happy Mother's Day to Loyce Beckham: mother extraordinaire!

Copyright Michelle Beckham-Corbin 2009

Nielsen | Connecting With Power Moms

Absolutely outstanding article by Nielsen Researcher, Jessica Hogue about the power that women, specifically, moms wield and how most marketers are missing the boat on reaching them. It's time for companies to stop transmitting and instead enter into a conversation in which listening to the needs, wants and desires of today's tech savvy Mom is key to marketing success. Make sure you read to the end and check out how Nielson is "listening" to on-line conversations of mom bloggers to determine their value propositions.

Here's the summary:

"CI SUMMARY: As any mother will tell you, there is a big difference between hearing and listening. Today’s Power Mom does it all—the house, the kids, the job, the bills, the shopping—and the Internet has become a tremendous enabler, bringing new meaning to multi-tasking. While the ability to connect with moms is easier than ever before with the advent of social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook, and a growing number of “mom blogs”, are marketers really listening to her value systems? It’s time to move beyond “messaging” to “listening”.

Full text below:
Nielsen | Connecting With Power Moms

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New Media Cincinnati Community Call and Local Music

New Media Cincinnati Community Call and Local Music

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Social Media- It's All in a Day's Work in Cincinnati

Spent a great day surrounded at the beginning and end by all things Social Media. Social Media is all about connecting with others through the use of new media tools and applications. Obviously, the best way for the social media magic to continue, is to take that connection off-line and turn it into an in-the-flesh encounter.

I am a people person. I absolutely love meeting people, discovering things about them and creating conversations which lead to relationships. I have a photographic memory and a huge penchant for remembering details about people. I put this gift to good use by connecting people to each other and to opportunites that I think might be a good fit. Malcolm Gladwell calls people like this "Connectors" in his book The Tipping Point. He states, "Connectors are the people who link us up with the world ... people with a special gift for bringing the world together." They are "a handful of people with a truly extraordinary knack [... for] making friends and acquaintances."
This is why I aptly named my firm: C3: Creating Connections Consulting, LLC.

Speaking in front of a group about a subject that I am passionate about is a joy for me. When one adds in the opportunity to meet with the audience participants in small groups or one-on-one for further conversation, I am in connection heaven. I had the opportunity to present a seminar on leveraging Social Media Marketing tools for the Small Business Sector at the Legacy Connection Group Meeting today. There were about 50 small business owners, entrepreneurs and folks in transition in attendance for my talk. It's always nice to see some familiar faces in the crowd, and today was no exception. I also met some great folks who have already connected with me on LinkedIn and/or Twitter to further our conversation.

I ended the day with a planning meeting call on TalkShoe with members of the Social Media networking group, New Media Cincinnati, founded by Daniel Johnson, Jr. In additon to being on the call, which was recorded and will be turned into a podcast for the group web-site, we were live-Tweeting the meeting. You can check out the tweets on #newmediacincy.

Cincinnati is a city brightly shining on the Social Media Highway Map. Groups like New Media Cincinnati, Cincinnati Women Bloggers and Cincinnati Social Media Breakfast, co-founded by my former Xavier University classmate, Daniel Lally are helping to raise awareness in the Queen City.

I continue utilizing Social Media into the night with this long overdue posting to my Blog (I have been sick for the past 7 days!) and will probably send out some tweets and comments to my FB news feed before diving into my Roberto Bolano book. My close friend has been on my case to finish The Savage Detectives so that we can discuss its contents. Maybe I'll tweet about what we discover, or then again, maybe not.....................



Daniel Johnson, Jr and Kevin Dugan, co-founder of Cincinnati Social Media Breakfast @prblog at a recent New Media Cincy MeetUp.



Copyright Michelle Beckham-Corbin 2009

Notice to Alien Nations- Leave Me Alone!

Well, it's been one heck of a day spent as a sick person. Did I ever mention that I NEVER, EVER get sick and especially not in late spring. I am such a high energy person and illness is dragging me wayyyy down. I had to cancel all of my meetings today and attempt to sleep. Like all over-achievers, my brain kept ticking off all of the things that I could be doing that did not involve my pillow and comforter. Finally after wearing myself down, I did fall into slumber only to dream of aliens invading my bedroom. I even "saw" the jupiter-like space shape land in my room.

Have you ever been asleep, but kind of awake enough to know that you are asleep? I don't know what the technical name is for that particular dream state, but I was very aware that I was asleep and was trying very hard to force my eyes open to see if the spaceship really existed in this place and time. In my semi-dream state I removed non-existent (must have taken them off before I went to sleep) sandals and threw them at the space ship which had landed to the right of my bed. I heard a tinny noise reminiscent of something (said sandal) hitting metal and strange voices reacting in surprise. I kept thinking that this state of illness (very bad cold, flu, HiNi-Swine Flu, or whatever) was caused by these unseen visitors. I looked down at my arm and noticed freshly made incisions in the crease of both elbows that looked inflamed and puffy as if something (a tracking device perhaps) had been inserted under the skin. This caused me to throw another (imaginary) shoe at the space ship.

At this point I had enough strength to force my eyes open (or maybe I just reached a point in the sleep cycle that brought me closer to consciousness). There was no space ship in my bedroom and thank God, there were no incisions in my arms. It had to have been a complete and total dream. Wait a minute, what if the incisions just self-absorbed quickly and I really am a tracking device or scientific experiment for an alien culture. Any psychics out there have any thoughts on this???? Lol- I guess that's why they say feed a fever and starve a cold, or some such thing. Fever can bring on delirium. I just want to get back to making connections on the social media highway. Highway Earth that is. Alien nations can just leave me alone.

(Image of Spaceship taken from http://www.northernsun.com/images/thumb/2241Spaceship.jpg)

Copyright Michelle Beckham-Corbin 2009