“Life is a long lesson in humility.”— James M. Barrie
Social media accounts are rampant and many people wish to be part of that explosion. Unfortunately, many of them only enter in half-heartedly and their contribution can leave more questions than introductions from future followers. As has been pointed out to me at least a couple of times in recent history-> Make sure it is done right, or don’t do it; or as Yoda would say “Do or do not; there is no try”.
My first suggestion to someone looking to enter the Social Media Arena is start slow, pick the site which you think would be a good starting point and jump in. Set your profile up with the same care and precision which you would give your resume or job application-> after all, if you have something important to say or a conversation to start…The world will come looking for you, and stay only if they like what they see. Yes, I do suggest some form of profile picture of yourself (as opposed to scenery, or your pet rhinocelot), something that could be considered professional and representative to you at this time. Family pictures are cool, but you do wish to be taken seriously- Yes?
My next suggestion is for you to start slow and be prepared for the inevitable bump in the road. I’m sure when the Facebook crew first started, they didn’t see much in the way of followers; and Twitter didn’t start with a million users. Start by following people or topics that interest you and build on that. Some weeks add friends and answer all requests of people looking to follow you. The more relevant your points, the more discussions get started, the more people talk about you….and it grows from there.
Once you think your new account is growing well on its own (or ‘organically’ as one of my colleagues has said) then you could consider starting on another site and repeat until you feel you are being represented as the fantastic opinion maker that you know you are. Personally, I would probably start in this order (using hind-sight as a guide)
There are many other sites out there which you could consider using as time goes by; just remember that everytime you start with the new profile, its like a new meeting or a new introduction to another group of fantastic people (referred to as ‘The Cool Kids’). None of this happens overnight; but over months and years of steady effort.
One thing to note-> When looking for followers-you should NEVER ever have to pay for them. Sure you will have an impressive looking count almost overnight; but really those people aren’t true followers as at the end of the day, they have probably very little with you or your end-game to be relevant in your (new) community.
Find someone you look up to, or go to the local bookstore and do some research. A little legwork in the beginning will save you a lot of time used in re-booting an account that has possibly gone astray. Heck, even the internet has a lot of great information you can use to place your account into the stratosphere. Take the time required and have fun; as meeting new people tends to open new doors to potentials which you may only have dreamed of. I’m not suggesting that having a good site will make your life and career; but the network you build, if solid, will be a source of future information.
Have fun in your new pastime…I hope I gave you Something To Think About….
The Sourcers’ Apprentice
Daniel J. Smith
So here’s another New Year’s tradition that most bloggers follow and that’s highlighting the top ten blog posts that were written during 2011. Now depending on the blogger the method of doing so varies (with some folks sticking to the time tested method of choosing which ones they liked best, or holding a poll)….but for me being the metrics guy that I am I wanted to let you the viewer decide….so I used my traffic stats to identify and link back to the top ten blogs of 2011, determined by your traffic. So without further ado here they are:
10. — Do Canadians really search for jobs on job-sites any more? Well here are the official stats
9. —— Language is a clever use of words
8. —— Clients from Hell and other sh*rt
7. —— How do American Job Boards Stack Up, Get the Facts
6. —— The Resume Myth
5. —- The Power of Attraction (but not in a dirty way)
4. —— The #HRTechEurope Review from the Radical One
3. —- Facebook Timeline is coming – How are you going to adapt your Business Page?
2. —— Top Ten Canadian Employment Agencies Registered on Linkedin
And the number one blog as chosen by you the Reader, with the death of Steve Jobs and some of the amazing technology innovations that Apple has developed in 2011 it’s no surprise to me that this post got the top spot of the year.
1. ——- Siri can you find me a Java Developer?
Well folks that’s been our look back at 2011, we will be back next week with regular content from myself (Geoff Webb aka The Radical One) and Daniel J Smith, Maha Akiki, Jeff Waldman and Lexi Kubrak. Don’t forget to check out our Manic Monday posts to let you know what to expect during the week and also head on over to the Youtube channel for the Radical Report, Radical Nation Daily Vlog, TPaL (The People are Listening)….and of course check out our new channel with myself and Jonathan Campbell called the Atlantic Vlogs.
Peace out…from Radical Central
So in keeping with our week long theme of looking back on the year 2011 it’s kinda awesome that we’ve seen an explosion of HR/Recruiting thought leadership taking to the airwaves to produce video content for the HR masses. It doesn’t hurt that Youtube is the number one most searched site in the world for visual media….and hey with the proper application of editing and SEO you can really make your mark on the HR world in a big way. But the question is always asked…who are the big HR/Recruitment Youtube stars.
Well you asked for them so here are your top five HR Youtubers of 2011….
In the number one spot with over 85,317 views is the man of many faces and the new face of Bernard Hodes…..
In second place with over 61,614 views is well, yours truly….
In third place with over 57, 043 views is the European masters of sourcing….but they love a funny video as well.
In fourth place with over 51, 965 views is the Cynical one herself…
And finally the man that fills out our list in the number 5 spot with over 2,640 views, the Master of Disaster….
Umm…that’s Bill Boorman BTW.
Oh and here’s a bonus vid from a real Youtuber…..
So it’s that time of year again when an old number is retired to be replaced by the incoming season….and what a year 2011 was. It’s a tradition on my blogs that I count down the top 12 songs of 2011 but based on what events/happenings and things transpired in the various months of 2011….so let’s kick it off:
January 2011
Well the highlight of January was that Vee and I officially had our first Christmas holiday together in a house that we got together in the Beaches. It was a great month of getting things geared up for the upcoming year of events. I always think of this song:
February 2011
February is traditionally the month in which TRU London happens. This year I made the trip over to London UK for the third instalment of the UnConference that has swept the globe….now it’s been often said that we UnConference organizers have a friendly competition but really I think we do pretty well in supporting each others efforts in the space…..I think John Sumser said it best when he predicted that 2012 will be the year of the UnConference. Whenever I think of my trips to England I always here this song in my head:
March 2011
In March of 2011 we held our first Radical Planet UnConference in Montreal Quebec. Both Daniel J Smith and myself made our way on what turned out to be one of the final blizzards of 2011 to Montreal via the train. I made a few phone calls and well Daniel pretty much just played with his phone. We had good conversations and although our mostly French audience was not really open to the idea of Social Recruiting I think we made some good connections, got some people thinking and of course expanded the Radical Nation….ah Quebec.
April 2011
In April of 2011 I did my first ever paid Keynote address on the power of Social Recruiting at CASPR which stands for the Canadian Association of Staff Physician Recruiters. It was a both eye opening and interesting session both for me and the participants. But more importantly Vee and I got on a plane with a few good friends to head to Costa Rica and attend the wedding of Sam and Iain Sandell. Costa Rica is a beautiful if not extremely warm country but with friendly and smiling people and the wedding was just beautiful…and although I know that Sam and Iain are more country folks, when I think of their wedding this song comes to mind….
May 2011
May saw the return to one of my favorite HR events —- the HR Demo Show, this time once again in Vegas, in fact this would end up being one of four times that I would return to Sin City for an HR event — how weird is that. I guess Vegas was just one of the happening places for 2011…
June 2011
June saw us head out to BC for our Second Radical Planet event held at UBC. I always love to visit Vancouver and being able to meet with so many peers and growing the Radical Nation was a huge opportunity for us. We enjoyed BC so much we will be returning there in March of 2012 to hold our first open BlueBelt in Internet Recruitment course on the Left Coast. Also Vee and I headed down to San Francisco so that I could hold some meetings with sponsors and then headed over to Vegas for my first SHRM National event. Wow Vegas was steaming hot and with over 14,000 HR practitioners in attendance at times SHRM National was overwhelming. Still…looking forward to working more with SHRM in 2012.
July 2011
In July I headed down for a short Porter flight to Boston to attend Bill’s TRUBoston at the HQ of Bullhorn. It was a small/casual meeting of some of the finest minds in Recruiting/Social/HR and I really enjoyed the conversation. Due to some scheduling difficulties I also got to spend a day on the town with Jonathan Campbell, Bill Boorman and Kevin Wheeler…wow, talk about spending a day with some big brains….and to top it all of we got to hang out at Harvard (seems fitting). I also got to hang out with good friends Leanne Chase and Steve Levy (thanks for the hospitality). And to top it all off I met the gang from Bullhorn who would turn out to be awesome clients in 2011.
August 2011
August (early) saw a trip to Chicago to attend ILSHRM. I had been asked by my good friend and Radical Nation member John Jorgenson to be part of the blog squad. So we spent most of our time making some awesome videos with my friend Curtis Midkiff (SHRM) and my buddies over at JSTN. I have to say I love the Chicago recruiting and HR scene, they are a lively and engaged bunch. At the Tweetup both Curtis and I showed off some of our fine DJ skillz…yeah it was the wrong crowd, wrong time….
September 2011
September was busy because we had the Radical Planet UnConference in my home town of Toronto and it was a huge success by all counts. It was just really nice to have so many friends and thought leaders from around the world come to see our beautiful city and to hang out with so many bright people. Radical Planet will return to Toronto in June of this year and we’re planning an even larger international contingent including folks from the US, UK, Netherlands, France and Canada…should be a blast. As well I headed back to Vegas for HR Tech, and by this point I was feeling a bit sick of Vegas to be honest.
OctoberNovember 2011
The October/November highlight for me must have been the trip to Amsterdam for the inaugural HR Tech Europe show. First of all Amsterdam is just an awesome city, it has great museums, great people (I love the Dutch)…and it was an opportunity to hang out with some of my favorite folks on the HR conference circuit…..and you can’t beat that.
December 2011…..
Well here we are at the end of the year…hopefully you have enjoyed this musical journey through the year. 2012 is shaping up to be an even crazier year for us here at Radical Events with Radical Planet and SourceCamp going to the US, Canada and Europe. So to wrap up here’s the Radical Nation theme song for 2012….
The very first thing I would like to say and get the ball rolling for 2012 is NOT ‘Happy New Year’ as I know the new year will be a happy one to all the Radical Nation; But ‘Thank You’ for the tremendous year 2011 became. Geoff, you and Maha were key to letting me grow in ways that I’m sure will pay big dividends in years to come; And the rest of the Nation gives me the inspiration that even when all the chips are down (and the bag lays empty) there is always a reserve set aside for one more massive attempt at success.
For the first page of 2012, I would like to start and plug my Youtube channel at www.youtube.com/thedanieljsmith as this year will be the year of the v-log. Geoff has shown me that sometimes you just have to get the point out verbally when you have something to say, rather than write it down when the moment and the train of thought is gone.
Secondly, I would like to take a couple of paragraphs and talk about followers in Social Media; how do you get them and how do you keep them. Anyone who has a Twitter or Facebook account sets in motion a communal effort of networking which is used correctly will let the exchange of ideas both flow and grow. However, the best thing about a truly original community is that you don’t have to pay any more for the followers than respect their point of view, contradict if you can see a better way, and with luck, mutually allow the new community to grow like a spider-web (exponentially and outward) until it returns home where it started.
If you would like more details on the simple way, check out a video made by Recruiting Animal a short time (sourcing term) ago at http://youtu.be/5MbJHqXxPO0 for tips on the very subject of Twitter.
Whatever the format, whatever the network of socializing you choose- It only costs time and continuous effort NOT Money. If you have to pay then they aren’t really followers, just another number. Its not a contest of ‘Who has the most followers’ but rather ‘Who interacts with others who have similar interests the best’. Do I follow everyone?- mostly due to SEO I get those I can relate to with very little spam. Do I expect everyone to follow me whom I invite? No- but I do expect that those who follow me will mutually share in thoughts and opinions that are new and unique, not the same old banal blah, blah, blah.
Respect others and respect the media which you are using; and respect that everyone has an opinion to share, link up with the cool kids and over time your community will be the one to belong to. After all the time working on mine, and with much love and respect to the members, I know there is a lot more work to be done and a lot more to be shared before the journey can truly be called ‘done’.
Hook up with me here, at my Youtube Channel [please subscribe and leave me some topic matter for future videos (hashtag it #sourcapprent—so I know it’s a future topic)] or on Twitter @thedanieljsmith or on Facebook @ http://www.facebook.com/iamthedanieljsmith (always looking for like-minded friends) or look for me alongside Geoff, Maha, Johnny and Jeff as the Radical Nation takes on the world later this year.
Time to go practice my cowbell….
Daniel J. Smith / The Sourcers’ Apprentice
Oh Hai There Radical Nation…
So first of all welcome to 2012.
I hope everyone had a fantastic Holidays and yes we are officially back to hit off 2012 in style. First thing that I wanted to do this year is thank all the folks that went in to making 2011 the succes that it was for us and especially:
I’m sure there are a few more that I am missing but these were the folks that really went out of their way to make 2011 the succes that it was. But enough about 2011 except to say stay tuned on Wed for our epic “Year that Was” post …. it’s a Radical Tradition.
I wanted to let everyone know that the dates/times have been set for our upcoming Radical Nation tour and hey they all even have websites, so you can start reserving/purchasing your tickets today….here are the dates:
I wanted to take a moment to thank our Season Sponsors for 2012:
Here are some of the other events you can expect to see me at:
So this week you can look out for posts on:
We will also be introducing a new writers to the mix hopefully very soon.
Glad to be back Radical Nation (Love Yo Faces).
Geoff
Daniel kicking backstage at Radical Central (Taken with instagram)
At last! After announcing Timeline at their F8 conference last September, Facebook have finally begun to roll out Facebook Timeline to standard user accounts, starting with New Zealand members, and then flowing through the rest of the world “in the near future”. Hopefully by Christmas, we should all have Timeline enabled and start playing with it!
While Timeline is a lovely feature for standard users, where it will be truly beneficial is with Business Pages.
Not only can you tell your Business history and retrospectively add events posts/photos/videos, but your fans will be able to see a much broader history of your Facebook page and view your posts in a neater format.
So what should Business Pages prepare for?
This is what your header will look like (taken from my personal Facebook Timeline, which I’ve enabled since last September):
So as you can see, your profile photo intersects the header image, so from a design point of view you may want to think about integrating the two images and maybe interacting with each other. See these designsfor inspiration.
Dimensions to send to your Graphic Designer:
Header image size: 851 width x 315 height pixels, and your profile photo will intersect the main header at (across) 0.9cm from the left until 5.5cm, and 8cm down until the end of the image.
Have you had Timeline enabled in your profile during the Beta period? What do you think of it? Do you think it’ll be good for Business pages?
Hey everyone.
Normally this would be a ground breaking post on metrics, analytics, employment branding and/or social recruiting. And we fully intend to get back to those, but because it’s nearing the holidays and well, we very much doubt that anyone is reading this…and if you are you are likely filled with the Holiday spirit which means you are likely stressed right out of your little minds….so we thought instead we would give you a bit of a chuckle and hey…see you back here on January 3rd. If you want to keep track of the Radical Nation daily vlogs they will continue through the XMas season and you can catch them all by subscribing to our Youtube channel here...but without further ado:
Happy Holidays Radical Nation, we’re happy that over 8,000 people who read this blog can call themselves members of the Radical Nation (in fact, as an additional holiday gift feel free to grab and use the badge below, on your blogs, Facebook pages, Walls or Bodies, if bodies send pics) because without you guys/gals there wouldn’t be a Radical Nation and that the nation stretches over 51 countries.
Have a fantastic Holiday Season and best wishes from all of us here at Radical Events. We will see you on January 3rd.
“I don’t know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody” -Bill Cosby.
Really simple thing to think about this week. Who in the Radical Nation has the ever-important “Key To Success”? Anybody? Does anyone have a hint, or even a clue? Probably not, and in that I’m not really surprised. This ethereal “Key” means different things to different people, the same way we judge success or failure. One person may see filling 5 requisitions in one day as a miracle feat; where someone else may judge it as a normal day in the park…. Do they both see it as a success ? Certainly, but to different degrees of satisfaction.
On the one hand, Person “A” may finally be seeing success after weeks of trying to tie up loose ends, where Person “B” may have been fortunate (again!) to be in the right spot at the right time. Both succeeded, but their methodology was different. Success means different things to all of us, and to say we will be “Successful” 100% of the time could be seen as a trifle misleading; as not one of us are that darn good!
Each day we have to be willing to sit in the trenches, dig through the muck to find the potential “diamond in the rough” that could put us nearer to the top of our chosen field. Some days may seem easier than others; most days will leave us questioning why we got up that morning… and still we trek forward. Falling back on past glories is not in the cards, neither is finding a better workplace “Just because..” Success is fickle, If I’m wrong then I am plying my trade in the wrong industry. Earlier this year, at Radical Quebec, I made some statements which I will not repeat here, suffice it to say, the reaction was a trifle negative. For me that was good, because in that one instance I received a response of validation to a topic I hold close to my heart—Working with people to make them better at what they do!
Do I claim to possess all the answers? NO! but I do provide a point of view for discussion which will, without a doubt, occasionally cause controversy, and possibly the odd disagreement towards my stand. And that is good, anytime someone is talking about you, good or bad, you have just done your job, because YOU are CAUSING talk about something, some people may see as mundane. In sales we had our ABC’s (Always Be Closing), because if you weren’t, then someone else on your team would, with pleasure, close out a deal you may have been working on for weeks, but negotiated yourself into a corner. Does the store want profits? Certainly! Is it already built into the margin? Definitely. No business succeeds long without profit; the same as no sourcer or recruiter will give the office away over one close. You are all only as good as the last big deal, or the last time you made a wave in the office. Good or bad- always try to create “success” in every meeting or transaction you accomplish on a daily basis. The client doesn’t know this yet, but you have already got them seeing your potential at “Hello” and they WANT and are BEGGING to do business with you!
Why do we make being successful in business so hard for so many and so long? Two reasons: 1. Because we can and 2. Because we know no other way. Success to many is just being able to look in the mirror and say to that other someone “We did it!”. And sometimes that just has to be enough. The magic answer isn’t easy to find, and if anyone other than Radical Recruit or Recruiting Animal can show me where is the flaw in my logic… Please, have at ‘er… because at the end of the day, success will take the form we least expect, and that will have to be okay; or else we will continue on our unending quest of disappointment, both in ourselves and towards others. Let’s face it: it’s those others that pay all the bills. So let’s dazzle them with our brilliance and blind them with our bullishness and knack for the right answer at the right time; because without conversation, or controversy, success is just like talking to yourself—Lonely and hollow; as the answers are there, but the audience has left the building.
Be successful and see yourself as a success, not just today; but every day you rise in the morning, head to Tim’s, SB or McD for coffee, and make the exciting trek to the office. Everyday is a new adventure, grasp it with all you can and fulfill a dream or two along the way!
Thanks, The Key to Success is closer than you think, and NO! it does NOT open the door to the executive washroom…(I already tried!) Until next week…
I AM The Sourcers’ Apprentice and Tuesday D.J. of this shindig
Daniel J. Smith
©2011 thedanieljsmith
Feel free to comment below on what you think Success should be based on? I know what I think…How about You?
