Techno Babble "Cheat Sheet" for Social Media Beginners

I taught a class yesterday for folks who are basically new to Social Media, and one of the things that struck me is their need to understand the LANGUAGE of Social Media. 

It's hard to be part of a conversation, if you don't understand half of the words that people are talking about!  As I think back to my initial immersion into this "stuff," I know my husband thought I was having an affair because I was spending so much time with my Laptop! LOL! All I was trying to do was figure out what people were talking about!

I am NOT the most technically advanced among us, and so if I'm making a Technical "mistake" with any of these terms - LET ME KNOW!  If I leave out any terms you think folks should know, AGAIN, please let me know!

Having said that - here's my "Cheat Sheet" for "Techno Babble" (Figured it might be useful for REBarCampRDU!)

Activerain:  Activerain is a blogging platform used by over 162,000 real estate professionals.  The site htis over 2 million views a month, has over one million blog posts, and on some days they add over 1700 posts! (Brad is the Man!)

Aggregators: These are websites that generally list headlines found on the web. Example: www.Techmeme.com aggregates technology news from many websites and blogs.

Applications:Usually for Facebook or mobile devices, more sophisticated than a widget (that does just one simple task).  Software can be divided into two different classes for end users... Actual Software programs like Excel, and Applications, that allow you to have FaceBook on your iPhone.  

Avatar: These 2- or 3-D computer representations of people are also referred to as "icons." They can be customized, and automated.  You know that little bobble head picture that shows up every time you go to put your profile somewhere?  That could be considered an Avatar, but usually they are more customized than that. (BE SURE TO PUT YOUR PICTURE ON YOUR PROFILE!) You probably won't hear anyone use this term at BarCamp... but if you have a kid under the age of 36 (or 7) they know what it is... just makes you seem cooler!

Blog: A website where individual posts (articles might be another word) are entered and commonly displayed in reverse chronological order... or by reverse chronological order by Category. "Blog" can also be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog.

Embed: a way of linking to content (this is seen on YouTube posts for instance) so that the content itself is visible on (embedded into) the page.  I think of it as a way to "grab the feed" to that particular Video!

Flickr - A searchable social image sharing site that allows users to tag pictures with specific keywords and descriptive terms http://www.flickr.com  Picasa is another great example.

Microblogging: This is a way of posting information with pictures, snippets, audio, multimedia... "Blogging in tiny doses, usually in a 'stream' with many others' tiny updates."  You could use tools like Twitter, Jaiku, Pownce and audio, video and photo tools like Flickr, Twittergram, Utterz, Seesmic and more. Example: http://www.twitter.com or http://www.flickr.com

Online community/Virtual community:Friends and Collegues that you interact with primarily interact via internet rather than face to face.

Organic:  Means you didn't pay for your page ranking (usually). 

Picnik:  A free photo shopping program (EASY way to resize your pictures!)

PhotoBlog:  A blog post of pictures or Video (called a Vlog).

Podcasting:A way to share audio (normally) with people over the Internet.  Can be "live" interviews (for instance), or for others to download to their iPod / MP3 player.

RSS Feed:Really Simple Syndication. RSS is how your "social media inbox" (RSS reader) knows when something new gets posted to a blog/podcast/YouTube/site that you subscirbe to. (we use feedburner – http://www.feedburner.com)

SEO:  Search Engine Optimization - Google Juice - These are the tools that you use to get your website ranked higher.  It's not one magic pill, and it's not the same for everyone, AND the "best practices" vary over time.  It's a MOVING TARGET (IMHO!)

Social Bookmarks and Social Rankings:del.icio.us.  http://del.icio.us, Digg http://www.digg.com StumbleUpon http://www.stumbleupon.com (there are others like Reddit http://reddit.com/) These sites are primarily a way to rank a post or a site, and make it a "favorite."  If you make something a favorite on your laptop, and then you are on a different computer and can't remember how to get to that page... you should be using social bookmarks!

Technorati - A search engine dedicated solely to indexing blogs, Technorati tracks the state of the blogosphere, ranks blogs according to popularity, and lets bloggers see who is linking to them. http://technorati.com/

Twitter - A way to update others  in short, text based posts that are no more than 140 characters long.  Some folks use this as a social networking and microblogging service, others use it as their newsfeed. http://www.twitter.com  You can use it on your mobile device, or your laptop.  Most people I know "view" their Twitter Feed through ANYTHING but Twitter! (I like TweetDeck)

ustream - one-to-many live interactive video encourages broadcast-to-viewer and viewer-to-viewer interaction. Can empowering a much more engaging experience for everyone involved.http://www.ustream.tv/  (I rank this on an advanced level!)

Viral:  Not a virus!  This is a term that refers to something that is moving around the net FAST!  It's what you WANT to happen with your marketing.

Widget: A little box (usually) that has code embedded in it.  There are HUNDREDS of them!(see the left hand bar?)

Wiki: Allows for community-edited information (here's the one on Cary), it can be considered an online encyclopedia. Example: http://www.wikipedia.org/

Here's the thing... the WAY we negotiate and sell Real Estate has NOT changed.  Some of the LANGUAGE we use... just like relying on "reader ads" has changed.  Take time to learn the NEW LANGUAGE... and then become involved in the NEW Marketing Process!  It's FUN - It's Interesting!  It's DIFFERENT!

What is it they say about doing the same thing and expecting the same results??