Online Information 2011: Judith Lewis seminar on SEO

Judith Lewis, who spoke about SEO and social media

There was a useful seminar from Judith Lewis (@JudithLewis) of Beyond on social media and SEO (check out the slides for stats).

I knew the basics already (thanks to the Guardian’s SEO team) but it was helpful as a refresher, and Judith’s slides provided some surprising and useful statistics and research (for example the link between sharability and profitability, which shows sales will increase if people share about you – vital for selling social media to management!).

I apply good SEO to my Guardian blogposts as a matter of habit, but not to my personal blog – I must start!

And there was chocolate, which is always a Good Thing.

Top Tips

• do some keyword research so you use the most appropriate ones – “fundamental and essential”
• change your title to good SEO if you only do one thing!
• keep your content fresh to rank higher (add a blog?)
• focus on the visuals too – use and tag pictures, video – people’s attention is drawn to images
• “if you build it they WON’T come” – you must promote your content, use social media and not just the obvious Twitter and Facebook – don’t forget LinkedIn, Flickr

To do

• read up on the Panda update (to tackle scraping, spammers etc)
• improve the SEO of this blog
• check out the SEO Chicks blog
• look at Link Footprint sites to see how the site is performing and improve it (seomoz, Majestic SEO)

CPD23 Thing 12: Where did the time go?!

I’ve been horribly lax and somehow I’ve got far far behind with CPD23. Back on track now though, I’m not sure if I’ll manage to finish on time but hopefully not too far behind everyone else!

So, Thing 12: Putting the social into social media

I’ve said elsewhere that I’m lucky in that the media sector, and the Guardian in particular, is very active online and encourages the use of social media for work. I’ve been tweeting from our work account @guardianlibrary and blogging for the Datablog and From the archive for a couple of years. Engaging with readers who comment ‘below the line’ is part of writing on the web – starting a conversation, in the latest jargon - even if the comments aren’t always favourable!

I’ve only recently started using social media for professional purposes outside work, partly because of CPD23 but also because I’m chartering. My main source is Twitter, although I’ve been trying to get involved by commenting on other CPD23 blogs too.

I can’t count the number of contacts I’ve made through Twitter who I wouldn’t have encountered in everyday professional life (well I probably could but it would be a bit tedious and, well, you get my point). I’ve started attending conferences and events in the real world too, but the best contacts I’ve made there have been with people I had already encountered online. Even if you first meet someone face to face, social media offer an easy way of keeping in touch.

I don’t think social media can entirely replace face-to-face networking – for me, anyway, there’s something more tangible in actually meeting someone.

The social media world moves at an ever faster pace, too – a break of a few hours from Twitter and you can completely miss a new revelation; take a break of a few weeks (did I mention I slacked off over the summer?) and it’s a daunting task to catch up again. It might be easier to make contacts online but I think it’s harder to maintain your place in that network than in a ‘real world’ one.

There’s also a risk that you don’t break out of the echo chamber of the library world if you keep your online contacts within your professional sphere. We all know libraries are worth saving, for example, but there’s no use just preaching to the converted! But if what you’re after is a community, rather than getting a message to a wider audience, social media can be very useful.

One of the main reasons I started CPD23 was to expand my network of fellow professionals, as my physical network has been shrinking of late. When jobs are being shed and budgets cut, social media offers a nice alternative to brainstorming on your own!

CPD23 Thing 6: Online networks

Helen’s post on Thing 6

I think I’m quite up on social networking – I’ve been using the web to communicate since uni – but I haven’t applied much of it to my working life before now and as my department raises its online profile I feel a bit like I’m playing catch-up.

Because I work for a company that has a big online presence (hello Guardian website) the need for online networking as a department is limited. I can see the benefits to a public library of having a Facebook page for example, but not a private one like ours, and if we  need to connect online we have a blog and a Twitter account.

I’m working on raising my professional profile and involvement though, and that’s where social networking will hopefully come into its own for me.

As for Google +, I’ve not had a proper look around it and maybe if enough people defect it will become the standard, but I’m a bit unsure of a social platform that is trying to be all things to all people. Will anyone bother to adopt it fully or will they keep using it alongside all the other networks? I’m not sure I’ve got space in my life for yet another site.

Twitter

My main online network in terms of work is Twitter. I use my personal account to follow other librarians, engage in discussions (not always about cake) and find out about new articles.

We also have a work account which we use to spread the word about blog posts and the From the Archive series, but it tends to be a one-way conversation so our use of it isn’t particularly social! That’s something I can work on.

LinkedIn

I’m a member of LinkedIn but I don’t think I get the most out of it. As with the sites we looked at in Thing 4, my approach has been a bit haphazard and I need to develop my network further – I’ve not followed through all the second degree links, and I’m sure there are good professional contacts waiting to be made.

I’m a member of a couple of groups but again I haven’t explored it fully. The most useful one so far has been LIKE (London Information and Knowledge Exchange), who organise talks and networking events for info pros. I went to my first LIKE event last week (see Thing 6) and will definitely be going back.

The profiles in Helen’s post were really useful and I’ll be ‘sexing up’ my profile as soon as I get a moment! I’ll join a few other groups too.

Facebook

There aren’t many online spaces I can keep purely personal, so I use Facebook as a social space for friends only. Not that I post anything I wouldn’t want professional contacts to see! As a corporate library I don’t think it would benefit my department to be on there either. I definitely agree with the “Facebook is the backyard BBQ” mantra.

LISNPN

I’d heard about LISNPN but I’d assumed it was for newly qualified professionals, not old hands like me, so it’s exciting that I can join too! I’m wary of joining too many networks – I already find it hard to keep track of everything I do online – but I’ll definitely be checking them out.

To do list:

• Improve my LinkedIn profile
• Connect to everyone I’ve met professionally on LinkedIn
• Join a few LinkedIn groups
• Join LISNPN

CPD23 Thing 4: Current awareness

Annie’s post: Thing 4 – Current awareness – Twitter, RSS feeds and Pushnote

I really struggle with current awareness. I feel a bit like I’m drowning in a sea of information – I just don’t have the time to read every blog, article or Twitterfeed that I think I need to keep up with the industry.

I like to think I’m information literate (I’ve been around computers my whole life) but when it comes to Twitter and RSS feeds I’m totally behind the times – I still use the basic Twitter site, for starters – and I’m feeling swamped. As Nicole says over at Odd Librarian Out, “I don’t have an information overload problem. I have a filter problem.”

Twitter

I’ve been on Twitter for a couple of years (@katy_bird), and I’m increasingly using it professionally – to follow other librarians, keep up with new developments and track livetweets of events I’m not able to attend. Our department has an account as well (guardianlibrary), so I use it in my daily work life. 

I also use it personally though, and I find it difficult to keep the two separate. I’m always finding new people to follow, but there are so many people tweeting it’s impossible to follow everyone, and I often feel I’m only getting half of the conversation.

RSS feeds

I’ve been meaning to set up RSS feeds for ages. At the moment I track interesting blogs and sites by subscribing for email updates, adding them to my Delicious bookmarks page or listing them on my Blogroll, but I’m guilty of tagging things and never getting round to reading them. I need a one-stop shop for everything I read regularly.

Pushnote

I use Internet Explorer at home, so I’ve not been able to try it out yet, but I’m going to take a look from work on Monday. My initial reaction is that it’s just one more platform to take up my time though!

Challenges this week:

• Set up Twitter lists to compartmentalise professional and personal followees
• Get to grips with either Tweetdeck or Hootsuite
• Weed out feeds I scan over by unfollowing accounts (it’s time I culled a few z-list celebs!)
• Set up a Google Reader RSS feed to all my usual information sources
• Take a look at Pushnote

 

CPD23: Thing 2 – investigating other blogs

As I may have mentioned elsewhere, I’m usually good at writing up notes and lists, but when it comes to reflective writing and learning my good intentions often fall by the wayside. Hence it’s only week two of CDP23 and I’m already playing catch-up!

But catch up I will. I found the participants list a little daunting, so the first bloggers I picked to read were participants I already knew or had followed for a while – step forward nataliafay and @woodsiegirl at Organising Chaos – and ones who had commented on my own blog – Annie at The Hobbit Hole, oliverpig, Variegated Stacks and Ahava Cohen at Love in the library.

I followed through some of the comments too, quite a neat way of discovering other bloggers with similar points of view (or opposing, if the comments are negative!). And I clicked through to blogs that these bloggers had written about (is there another word for blog, btw? My spell check is going crazy!).

So now I’ve added London Library Girl, Theatregrad, Sarah Said Library, The Neon Librarian and Odd Librarian Out to my CPD23 network as well. I like this way of discovering blogs by recommendation, rather than picking someone from a list arbitrarily. You weed out some of the less interesting posts, and I’ve joined some really interesting conversations.

So that’s eleven blogs down, only 603 to go!

CPD23: Under starter’s orders

The CPD23 – 23 Things for Professional Development - training course starts today! Thing Number 1 - blogs and blogging.

So why am I taking part in the CPD23 course? I’ve been writing this blog for a year or so now, but for most of that time I’ve been on maternity leave so I’ve not kept it particularly up-to-date! I need something to keep me motivated as I return to work, to keep me focused on my development rather than just being swamped by my daily tasks and ‘how do I do that again?’ moments.

Our industry is changing rapidly, and my role has changed dramatically over the past few years. Working in the media, we have always been fairly tech savvy, but developments like cloud computing, Twitter and Wikileaks have really altered how I do my job. Our department has an increasingly visible online presence, and I want to make sure we’re up to date with online resources, and that we’re getting the most out of them.

The size of my department has shrunk in recent years, and my network of fellow information professionals has shrunk with it. I’m hoping CPD23 will introduce me to a new network of info pros who are as excited as I am to be moving libraries into the digital world. Hello everyone!

I’m also starting out on my Chartership path, so CPD23 seems a great thing to add to my portfolio!

Career development: CPD23 anyone?

I’ve just signed up to the CPD23 project, a new initiative aimed at training information professionals in all aspects of social media. I’m going back to work in a few weeks (gulp), so it’ll be good to have a career development project on the go to keep me motivated while I try to remind myself how to do my job!

As well as learning some new skills, I hope it’ll help me on my chartership journey, and get me in touch with like-minded librarians and info pros. There are only a few researchers left in my company and it’s getting lonely! It starts on 20th June so there’s plenty of time to join.

From the official blog:

Free CPD coming up!
23 Things for Professional Development is a free online programme open to information professionals at all stages of their career, in all types of role, and anywhere across the world.

Inspired by the 23 Things programmes for social media, this new programme will consist of a mixture of social media “Things” and “Things” to do with professional development. The programme starts on 20 June and will run until early October 2011.

Each week the CPD23 blog will be updated with details of the next thing to be explored. Catch up weeks and reflection weeks are built into the programme, so it’s not a problem if you’re going to be away for a week or two!

Please do spread the word to any friends, colleagues, or groups that might be interested: please pass on this message and link to http://cpd23.blogspot.com. If you’re on Twitter follow @cpd23 and tweet with the hashtag #cpd23.

Book review: Marilyn Johnson, This Book Is Overdue!

I really enjoyed reading Marilyn Johnson’s This Book Is Overdue! How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All. If anyone is in doubt about the digital role librarians can, and already do, play in the 21st century I’d recommend a read.

Johnson doesn’t draw any earth-shattering conclusions from her foray into the world of cybrarians (not sure I like that word btw, sounds a bit like a Marvel villain), but her thorough study highlights a lot of the pros, and the pitfalls, of moving libraries of all shapes and sizes into the digital world.

I came away with a really positive attitude, fired up to explore all the applications I’d learned about; it’s kind of career-affirming, at a time when it seems our industry is being battered from all sides.

Websites: LinkedIn

I’ve spent the evening doing the online equivalent of housework – tidying up my blog (the blogroll on the right was horribly out of date), and getting my online house in order.

Part of that involved sorting out my LinkedIn profile. I joined a while ago, but I’ve only been checking it every couple of months. I need to make it one of my go-to places on the web, alongside my email, Twitter, Flickr, the blogs I check regularly and, I admit it, Facebook too!

So I’ve updated and added to my profile, connected to a few of the most obvious colleagues and friends, and also joined the LIKE group (pending approval!). Hopefully it will become a key way of engaging with the information profession at large. If you’re on LinkedIn, add me to your network.

Seth Godin: The fallout continues

Seth Godin’s piece on the future of libraries is continuing to foster debate in the biblioblogosphere (not sure about that term, but can’t think of a better one!).

PC Sweeney makes a good point over on his blog, that while Seth may have a misconception of what a present-day library looks like, the fact he doesn’t know that many librarians already embrace digital resources is our fault as a profession. Essentially, it’s fine to provide ebooks, increase web terminals and use social media but if we don’t tell anyone about it, how can we expect to attract new users?

While I agree that librarians need to get proactive, need to get out there and market our services, I still think Seth should have taken a proper look at the industry before he formulated his argument. But Sweeney makes a good argument and is worth a read (a bit of blog love goes a long way ).

• PC Sweeney’s Blog, Seth Called Us Out On Our Bullshit And Folks Got Mad