It has been too long, I know: two-and-a-half months since my last post. You may feel abandoned, even sad. And for that, I’m truly sorry.

About a year ago, at age 40, I decided it was time to do something a little different with my career. Sure I’m happy working as a consultant and have enjoyed owning and operating Codella Marketing since 2002 (minus a couple agency gigs in the mid-2000s), but I felt it was time to stretch myself.

Given my spark of inspiration and tendency to think big, I applied and was accepted into the 21-month Executive MBA program at the University of Utah (ranked 33rd in the US). I kind of thought I’d apply and be rejected and that would be the end of it. But such was not the case.

The University did ask me to take an algebra class this spring, which I dutifully, albeit begrudgingly did. My 1995 fine arts degree from Brigham Young University didn’t require me to focus much on math and science. It’s not my bag anyway, and I’m just fine with that. I did manage to get a B in algebra this spring, so that met the University of Utah’s last criteria for my official acceptance into its Executive MBA program.

The EMBA program began with a bang at the Snowbird resort in Park City in August. We spent a week there getting to know one another as a class and working our way through a few reams of reading assignments. Little did I know that was just a small taste of what was to come.

I’m writing this at year’s end, after completing basically one semester of the EMBA program and receiving a handful of grades. It has been a bit of a shock for me to be back in school and taking quizzes and exams after 16 years of work. But it has been a good wake-up call and is certainly stretching my professional capacity. I think that’s what any good graduate degree should do.

I do apologize if my digital public relations blog posts are few and far between. No doubt 2012 will be a very busy year. I’m optimistically looking forward to May 2013 when I expect to receive my MBA. Until then, we can still be friends, you just may not hear from me as often as before.

Here’s to a very happy and prosperous New Year for us all!

Your friend,
~Pete

The beta service was introduced last December and ifttt was made open to all last month.

You can glean a lot about the service and people behind it by their “learn more” page URL: ifttt.com/wtf (thus the title of this post). Love it!

Here’s the scoop:

Let’s say you’re interested in saving the tweets you favorite on Instapaper or Delicious. You can automate that.

Maybe you’d like to capture any Facebook photos you’re tagged in by sending them to Dropbox? Done!

How about receiving an email or text message if the local forecast calls for rain or snow? Would that be helpful?

Perhaps you’d like all your Foursquare check-ins to be logged in a Google Calendar? It could help you keep track of where you’ve been, and if you print your calendar each month to accompany your saved receipts, it would come in handy if the IRS comes calling.

This is all possible, and so much more, using ifttt. In about a half-hour’s time I connected to 29 different channels and now have 3,034 possible automated task combinations. How cool is that?

The New Web

The whole concept of, “if this happens on that site, then do this,” is really great. It’s moving us toward a more seamless Internet and social experience.

You can automate tasks on sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, Foursquare, Evernote, Tumblr, Posterous, Google Reader and more.

You can convert all links that go through ifttt to use your Bitly account, so you can keep track of your links and view stats.

When you get started you’ll have to authorize ifttt to access your accounts. Then you can let your imagination and creativity run wild adding tasks and connecting channels.

At first, the easiest way to create a task is to use existing recipes, which you can sort by what’s hot, new and popular. The recipes are useful tasks already saved by other users. You can also filter recipes. So, for example, you could filter by Facebook to see all the saved tasks that just have to do with that platform.

I love how ifttt connects with phones and text messaging. How’s this for a task?

Rescue me from a meeting: Send a text message to ifttt with a specific hashtag (like #help) and the system will dial your phone number (mobile, landline, you name it). Your phone rings and you politely excuse yourself from the meeting to take the call.

I’m warning you now, there are so many channels to connect and different fun, creative task options that it’s easy to get sucked-in to the world of ifttt.

But don’t worry, if someone asks what you’re doing, you can just tell them you’re doing Internet research for work. And if you get caught in a long drawn-out conversation when all you really want to do is play around with more channels, tasks and recipes, you can use the task that calls your phone so you can excuse yourself from the conversation.

Sign-up and learn more about If this, then that at ifttt.com. You can also check out their blog for additional information.

Feel free in the comments below to share your creativity with others by letting us know what tasks you’re able to create.

For this blog post I am providing a list of recent topics with links so you can check out some of the social media and PR goodness:

Google AdWords Keyword Tool – A PR pro’s guide to choosing keywords for your Web content

Website Grader and WooRank – A PR pro’s guide to making killer websites (and showing your IT staff you mean business)

LinkedIn – 8 areas where you need to pay closer attention

Kapost - New platform helps Web editors better manage their sites

Also, feel free to check out my summary from May.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with Kurzweil or his idea of ‘The Singularity,’ that’s basically the time when human life becomes intertwined with machines (check out the Technological Singularity entry on Wikipedia). Kurzweil suggests that within a couple decades we’ll have man-made, electronic parts embedded within our bodies.

I know that’s already a reality, but the type of technological parts Kurzweil’s talking about would fundamentally change mortal humans to immortals.

The question is raised in the documentary: “When do we cross the line from being human to being a robot?”

Good question!

To augment human brain power may be beneficial. But where do you stop?

If you buy-in to The Singularity, is it something to be longed for or protected against?

One idea suggested in the film is that a world war will occur between two schools of thought: those who want to become part machine and those who believe the best approach is to stay as far away from it as possible. That war wouldn’t necessarily involve nations, but individuals belonging to two polar-opposite groups.

As I heard Kurzweil talk about a future where microscopic robots roam our bloodstream to make us immortal and digital chips implanted in our brains send our thoughts out to others like we now use email, Facebook and Twitter, I couldn’t help but wonder if the social media tools we see today will play a role in human robots of the future.

Yes, it sounds crazy, I know. But think about the utility of it: instead of typing on a keyboard, you could think, “I need to send an email to so-and-so,” then summon your built-in Internet connection, compose a message in your mind and fire it away to be received by the digital chip in the mind of the recipient.

And if you wanted it to be public, like a Twitter feed, you could just mark the mental message as public and it would appear on some virtual billboard of everyone’s thoughts. Sounds a lot like Twitter doesn’t it?

Think of how smart you’d be if you could Google anything in your mind. Academia would find it very difficult to prevent cheating.

While I value the advancements science and technology have made to preserve human life and enhance life expectancy, I find little value in turning this life’s temporary experience into a forever experience.

Kurzweil fears death and is obviously still deeply affected by his father’s death. I think he lacks belief in any kind of an afterlife. He has a whole storage unit full of his father’s memorabilia so he can build an electronic entity that will include all his dad’s thoughts and memories.

I’m a fan of living this life to the fullest, then moving on to the next step in our progression. To me death is just the end of this chapter and the beginning of a very exciting next chapter.

Your thoughts?

What do you think about Transcendent Man? Have you seen it?

Do you think a social media type of technology will eventually be implanted inside newborn humans so they can communicate with the world?

Seems far-fetched to me. And sad.

I like my imperfect, mortal existence. And I like being unplugged and offline every now and then.

Here’s a short overview on a few Google+ basics.

Signing Up

Once you’ve got a Gmail account you can sign-up for Google+ at plus.google.com. Or you may already have an invitation to join from someone else on G+.

You’ll have to set-up your Google public profile in order to participate.

One challenge I’ve had is that I use several different Gmail accounts, including a Google Apps account for work. But Google+ doesn’t yet work with my Google Apps account.

The fact that Google+ connects directly to your email contacts makes G+ very seamless. You don’t have to search for your friends on the network because it already knows who you email and connects you if they’re on G+. You’ve just got to choose a Gmail profile for your Google+ account and stick with it.

Keep in mind that G+ is just for individuals for now. No business profiles are allowed . . . yet.

Creating Circles

Something G+ does well is allow you to categorize your connections into specific groups, which Google calls circles. Then you can share messages specifically with the contacts you’ve assigned to specific circles.

G+ circles do a great job of virtually creating the different social circles in which each of us operate.

Hangouts

You can create a hangout for your circles which opens a free webcam enabled virtual community where many folks can join in conversations, see and hear one another. Hangouts function like Skype with multiple participants.

Sharing Content

Like other social networks you can share just about any kind of content: text, photos, links, videos and locations. As expected, G+ easily connects to YouTube videos and Google Places.

Tip: A cool feature of G+ is the ability to bold and italicize text in your posts. Any text between two asterisks (*) is bolded and between underscores (_) is displayed in italics.

Keep in mind that, depending on your settings, content shared can be visible to the world on your Google profile, sent to circles of friends, or shared privately with individuals.

On Google+ you hyperlink to other users using +Their Name, just like the @Their Name nomenclature works on Facebook.

Also, similar to how the Facebook ‘like’ icon works, the ‘+1’ is Google’s way of saying, “Ditto that comment,” or “I really like this.”

So if you like this article, you could +1 it on Google+ or like it on Facebook.

Privacy

Be sure you understand how to configure your privacy settings on Google+. Visit that gear-icon in the top right for options, then select Google+ settings. This takes you to your Google account settings and a page just for Google+. A cool feature here is that you can control other Gmail account settings in the same section.

I elected to turn off all mobile phone and email notifications because I just can’t deal with all the noise. When I want to know what’s going on in Google+, I’ll login.

New Features

If you’re curious to find out the latest developments on G+, once you’re logged in to your account you can check out the recently launched “What’s new in Google+” from the options gear-icon in the top right of your account under Google+ help.

Observations

If you don’t use the Google Chrome browser, I highly recommend downloading and using it as you browse Google+.

While Google+ is certainly the shiny new tool in the social media toolbox, its application for PR and marketing communication is still limited. Once it grows up I suspect the platform will be home to many brands and conversations just like Facebook is now. Consider the future Google Search benefits of branded conversations on Google+.

Still, with existing platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, it’s difficult to imagine just how many additional platforms we need.

If you have Google+ take-aways, tips or observations, please feel free to share in the comments.

Rather than provide in-depth analysis and instructions for the different ways to promote your job and employer, this short outline gives direction for ways you can engage with your social networks while developing greater awareness for your work and your company.

This how-to guide lists social platforms as ranked by U.S. site traffic reported by Quantcast. It also addresses blogging in general terms and without site rank consideration.

Hopefully this goes without saying, but be sure to understand your employer’s social media guidelines before engaging as a company representative online.

Facebook

• Share work-related status updates, photos, links, videos, and ask or answer questions on your personal profile
• Join groups where colleagues, even competitors, participate in discussions
• Like your company’s Facebook page and actively share content there
• Respond to comments posted on your company’s Facebook page
• Check-in at work on Facebook Places

YouTube

• Share links to videos published by your company with your social networks: Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, via email, etc.
• Watch and like your company’s videos (you’ll have to create or sign-in to your Gmail account to do so)

Twitter

• Share links on Twitter to all your company’s content: website pages, videos, blog posts, links to other social networks
• It’s okay to share the same links multiple times
• Use Bitly (it shrinks long links) so you can track and have measurement data for your link sharing
• Consider using a desktop application like HootSuite or TweetDeck to manage your Twitter activity and searches

LinkedIn

• Build-out your profile so that it’s 100% complete
• With every new business contact, invite them to join your LinkedIn network
• Join groups and participate in discussions
• Ask and answer questions in Polls
• Follow your company on LinkedIn
• Post status updates that include links to content published by your company

Blogging

• Find and follow blogs that cover topics that pertain to your work
• Subscribe to RSS feeds and other social media channels offered by the blogger
• Comment on the blog and link back to the company’s blog (if allowed)

General Advice

The more you engage on other social channels, the more likely others will engage on your and your employer’s channels.

Plan 15 minutes one or two times a day as your social media time: check social messages, post status updates, link to work-related content, respond to comments, share work-related insights, etc.

This YouTube video shows you how Thumbtack works.

And you can check out the listing for Codella Marketing under social media and public relations consulting in Salt Lake City.

This iteration, released in June 2011, may also be viewed on YouTube.

In the two 10-minute segments we did we didn’t have time to get to everything so I decided to post my notes for the interview here.

My notes aren’t in paragraph form but you can get an idea of what I think about specific tools and online resources.

Feel free to provide feedback in the comments below.

My RSS Ray Interview

Q. What are some of your favorite social media tools to help your clients?

A. Social media tools can be just one social platform, or a utility that helps you use many platforms.

• As far as platforms go: WordPress, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Twitter, SlideShare
• Twitter tools: TweetDeck, HootSuite or CoTweet, Bitly
• Facebook tools: Involver, PageModo, PageRage, the Like button
• Google tools: AdWords keyword tool, FeedBurner, Analytics, Custom Search
• Website Grader, WooRank
• ShareThis or AddThis
• StumbleUpon, Digg, Delicious

Q. What are some of the most underrated social media tools?

A. There are many to choose from!

• Prezi – because it isn’t boring like PowerPoint
• SlideShare – it allows you to claim a position of thought leadership
• Issuu – because it digitizes publications
• GroupHigh – because it’s the best blogger relations tool I’ve seen
• Posterous – quick and dirty blogging, it’s so easy

Q. Do you have any tips that can help businesses evaluate social media tools?

A. Sure, check out what others in your industry are doing at wiki.beingpeterkim.com or casestudiesonline.com, or other directories of social media initiatives.

• Search on Mashable or PR Daily for examples
• Gather demographics info from sites like pewinternet.org or socialmediatoday.com
• Be sure to ask your constituents what tools they’re using
• Quantcast and Alexa for site stats

Q. What are the best social media tools to help determine the effectiveness of a social media marketing campaign?

A. The first rule of thumb: have a clearly defined objective at the beginning in order to determine the type of measurement you’ll apply.

• Facebook likes, blog comments, Twitter followers, video comments
• Selling a product, tickets to an event, fundraising, securing votes

Q. You wrote an interesting blog post about Tumblr for Reagan’s PR Daily. What is Tumblr? How can businesses use this popular platform? Do you see this catching on?

A. Tumblr makes blogging easy with a handful of templates for different types of content.

• You can share: text, photo, quote, link, chat, audio, video
• Businesses still struggle with blogging
• For niche audiences and specific communication needs, I think Tumblr’s the bomb

Q. What are some of the best ways to optimize your Facebook Page’s brand? What Facebook apps are a must?

A. First, share things your constituents want and need.

• Communicate daily
• Set expectations
• Use the like button with a window into your FB status updates
• Involver, ShortStack

Q. You have a great music video on your website about how to handle negative social media comments. What are some of the best ways to handle negative social media comments?

A. First, realize you’ll have haters.

• My music video is two years old – for a long time it received positive responses till someone in England saw it, didn’t like it, and tweeted it to his 750k followers
• Rule of thumb – handle the criticism in the way in which it was received
• Have criteria for when you do respond
• Address customer service concerns honestly, remain positive
• Respond quickly

Q. In your opinion, what is the one social media platform that doesn’t get used enough by businesses?

A. A social media equipped online newsroom.

Q. You’ve been in public relations for a long time. What’s the purpose of the press release in the 21st Century? Where should it be posted?

A. It’s a news release, not a press release.

• Its purpose is to tell a story – and it should be told with every possible resource – text, images, video, audio
• First – it should be housed in your newsroom and linked to/promoted on all social platforms
• Second – it can be posted on news wire type services, news aggregator sites
• Third – the story should appear in reports from media outlets

Q. Tell us about your company. What types of businesses do you help?

A. I’m doing a lot of training for communication teams – teaching them how to use social media tools effectively. Whole Foods and Brigham Young University are recent examples.

• I also provide training – webinars, seminars and workshops – through Ragan Communications in Chicago
• I work with a handful of clients on a regular basis – from writing news releases, blogs, website copy and collateral material copy, to developing strategy for social media engagement and even day-to-day social media activity
• I also do project work focused on digital communication channels, helping clients maximize their digital footprint
• I co-host the Online PR Podcast and I’m the creator of the NewsCactus online newsroom software

For this blog post I thought I’d provide a list of recent topics with links so you can check out some of the social media and PR goodness:

FeedBurner – A must-have tool for your online newsroom | 2.21.11

TweetDeck – The all-inclusive social media dashboard: 7 easy ways to master TweetDeck | 2.28.11

Facebook – 8 ways to optimize your brand’s Facebook page | 3.7.11

Wibiya – The toolbar that makes it ridiculously easy for readers to share your content | 3.14.11

Social Oomph – 9 ways Social Oomph can boost your productivity on Twitter | 3.21.11

GroupHigh – ‘The best blogger relations tool’: 5 ways GroupHigh will empower your PR | 3.28.11

Prezi – Presentation tools: 9 ways Prezi will refresh your next speech | 4.4.11

CoTweet – Managing a brand’s Twitter feed: 6 ways CoTweet can help | 4.11.11

Tumblr – Why PR pros need Tumblr in their social media toolkits | 4.18.11

Ping.fm – A one-stop social media tool: 7 incredibly useful things you can do with Ping.fm | 4.25.11

Wolfram|Alpha – Wolfram|Alpha: An online platform every PR pro should know about | 5.9.11

BoardTracker and BoardReader – 2 (mostly) free tools to help PR pros monitor discussion boards | 5.23.11