LiveGO: LiveGO is a web dashboard that incorporates email, instant messaging and social media in one easy-to-use platform. After connecting LiveGO to your Twitter, Facebook, and Gmail/Yahoo!/AOL email accounts, users can get a combined view of all messages and updates in the dashboard screen, or they can choose each account individually to obtain the full functionality of each tool right there on the site. For each email account, the corresponding instant messaging platform is imported, as well, and then combined into one buddy list with icons distinguishing to which network each contact belongs. LiveGO allows users to engage with their entire social network in one place, instead of keeping several tabs or browser windows open at once.

Past Words of the Week

ifttt, Chaptur, SOPA, Social Television, Flipboard, Social Commerce, Doximity, Troll, Healia, HealthTECH Live, Revolution Health, Buffer, Twilert, nptech, Taweet, MedicalCavity, DoAT, Turntable.fm, iMedix, Twylah, Masher, Proxlet, Geeje, Google+, SocialVisor, Scribd, Pinterest, Graspr, White hat, Screenr, dushare, MEDgle, PostPost, Deals, SPOT Healthcare, Evernote, dlvr.it, Bounce, iTriage, popurls, Trunk.ly, Dropbox, Storify, Newsvine, Layers, Thsrs, #tagdef, Check-in, MDJunction, Blekko, Healthline, Spindex, Vanilla, Twingr, Tweetbeat, Social Media Policy, infoMedMD, Health Care 3.0, Groupon, icyou, #MDchat, Quality 101, MedlinePlus, HITSphere, URL X-ray, Mashup, Blog Talk Radio, TweetedRanks, Ping.fm, Digsby, Qik, Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

SOPA: The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) is a bill that was introduced late last year in the House of Representatives that is aimed at protecting intellectual property on the Internet. Supporters of the bill cite its ability to improve the enforcement of copyright laws as well as protect Internet users against scams aimed at convincing them to purchase illegal or counterfeit goods. Opponents of the bill have a differing opinion about SOPA, claiming it violates the first amendment and will create Internet censorship. There is also the fear that, if made law, it could have a chilling effect on user-generated content. This is such an important issue that several major Internet companies, including Google, Facebook, Twitter, PayPal, Yahoo! and Wikipedia, are planning a coordinated blackout in protest of the bill. They say this will give us “a taste of what we could expect from post-SOPA Internet.” This is quite the controversy, and regardless of what side you take, SOPA is a term we’ll be hearing a lot during 2012.

Past Words of the Week

Social Television, Flipboard, Social Commerce, Doximity, Troll, Healia, HealthTECH Live, Revolution Health, Buffer, Twilert, nptech, Taweet, MedicalCavity, DoAT, Turntable.fm, iMedix, Twylah, Masher, Proxlet, Geeje, Google+, SocialVisor, Scribd, Pinterest, Graspr, White hat, Screenr, dushare, MEDgle, PostPost, Deals, SPOT Healthcare, Evernote, dlvr.it, Bounce, iTriage, popurls, Trunk.ly, Dropbox, Storify, Newsvine, Layers, Thsrs, #tagdef, Check-in, MDJunction, Blekko, Healthline, Spindex, Vanilla, Twingr, Tweetbeat, Social Media Policy, infoMedMD, Health Care 3.0, Groupon, icyou, #MDchat, Quality 101, MedlinePlus, HITSphere, URL X-ray, Mashup, Blog Talk Radio, TweetedRanks, Ping.fm, Digsby, Qik, Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

Social Television: Social TV, simply put, is the combination of watching television while simultaneously engaging in conversations via social media. Tweeting or Facebooking about the shows we are watching was a trend on the rise during 2011 and is expected to continue to thrive as we move into 2012. Twitter has already begun to leverage this trend in several ways. The microblogging network teamed up with the new show X Factor to implement live social voting during the show, and they have also published a guide on best practices for integrating TV with social media. We’ve also seen an increase in social check-ins – where a user checks in to watching a TV show, as opposed to arriving at a physical location – thanks to new social TV apps, which have been dubbed “second screen apps.” Other companies are cutting out the middle man completely, including Hulu, which is offering its Hulu Plus service as an iPad app.

Past Words of the Week

Flipboard, Social Commerce, Doximity, Troll, Healia, HealthTECH Live, Revolution Health, Buffer, Twilert, nptech, Taweet, MedicalCavity, DoAT, Turntable.fm, iMedix, Twylah, Masher, Proxlet, Geeje, Google+, SocialVisor, Scribd, Pinterest, Graspr, White hat, Screenr, dushare, MEDgle, PostPost, Deals, SPOT Healthcare, Evernote, dlvr.it, Bounce, iTriage, popurls, Trunk.ly, Dropbox, Storify, Newsvine, Layers, Thsrs, #tagdef, Check-in, MDJunction, Blekko, Healthline, Spindex, Vanilla, Twingr, Tweetbeat, Social Media Policy, infoMedMD, Health Care 3.0, Groupon, icyou, #MDchat, Quality 101, MedlinePlus, HITSphere, URL X-ray, Mashup, Blog Talk Radio, TweetedRanks, Ping.fm, Digsby, Qik, Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

Sabermetrics can be defined as the objective analysis of the game of baseball, specifically through the use of advanced statistics. One goal of sabermetrics is to remove certain biases in order to better understand the value each player possesses in relation to his peers. Certain traditional statistics, such as the pitcher win or the RBI, are loathed by sabermetricians because, although they don’t necessarily paint an accurate picture of a player’s skill, they are considered to be very important metrics during player evaluation.

Sabermetrics burst into the mainstream with the publication of Michael Lewis’ Moneyball. This book tells the story of Billy Beane, general manager of the Oakland Athletics, and how he put together a winning baseball team on a shoestring budget by embracing certain advanced statistics. By determining which player traits were undervalued by the market and creatively acquiring players who excelled in those areas, Beane’s A’s were able to compete with teams whose payrolls were three or four times higher.

Sometimes with social media, we tend to overvalue certain statistics, such as the total follower count on Twitter. This is understandable, as everyone wants to have the highest number of followers possible. Not only does this look nice, but it means we’re reaching a large audience. But if Billy Beane were a healthcare marketer, he’d probably compare the total follower count with a baseball player’s batting average. For starters, these two stats are generally listed first, and thus are thought of very highly when evaluating the player or the Twitter handle that precedes them. But neither tells the whole story. A player’s batting average fails to take into account his ability to get on base using other methods (such as drawing walks), it doesn’t measure how many bases the player gains with each hit (a singles hitter can’t be as valuable as a guy who hits a lot of doubles, triples and homers with the same batting average, can he?), and it doesn’t consider how many times the player reached base when an out should have been made but an error wasn’t charged.

Like batting average, a total follower count on Twitter doesn’t tell the whole story. Here are some tips for evaluating a Twitter account by looking past the number of followers it has:

• Look at the quality of your followers: While it would be nice to have 1,000 followers, what good would it do if 950 of those followers aren’t relevant to your business? Many people follow others in order to boost their own count. Take the time to scroll through your list of followers and see how many of them are your customers, prospects, competitors or industry influencers. If your content is not only solid, but is also being read by the right people, your follower total will continue to grow organically, and you will see more benefits in the long run.
• Measure follower engagement: Twitter is unique in that it can be a venue for either one-way or two-way communication. Unless you are a celebrity whose followers are only interested in the details of your daily life, odds are you want to start some conversations via Twitter. Check out how many times per week your account is either mentioned or retweeted. If you have 50 followers and get 10 mentions each week, isn’t that better than having 500 followers and getting the same level of engagement?
• Keep track of your clickthroughs: This goes hand-in-hand with tracking your follower engagement. When you post links, be sure to use a service such as bit.ly or ow.ly that will measure clickthroughs for each link that you generate. If you tweet one article a day that is relevant to all 50 of your followers and average 20 clickthroughs a week, your business will benefit much more than if you tweet 5 articles a day to 500 followers, but still see the same results.

When evaluating your social media presence, be sure to look past the surface. It may take a little extra work, but applying the methods of sabermetrics to your Twitter account can yield some pleasant results.

Buffer: Buffer is a Web-based Twitter app that combines all Twitter conveniences into one easy-to-use platform. Buffer’s primary feature is the ability to backlog tweets, so that users don’t inundate their followers with multiple tweets back to back. The scheduling is completely customizable, and as long as there are tweets in the buffer, your feed will never be inactive. For the surfer who doesn’t want to go back and forth between Twitter and the pages they read, Buffer offers a bookmarklet that allows for tweet creation right from the site currently being viewed. A short link is generated, and the user has the option to add it to his buffer or tweet it immediately. Users can check their buffer at any point in time and edit the release schedule of their tweets. For those interested in tracking and analytics, Buffer is the perfect option. For every tweet sent out through this tool, users can track the number of clickthroughs, the number of retweets, and total impressions that each tweet got through those retweets.          

Past Words of the Week

Twilert, nptech, Taweet, MedicalCavity, DoAT, Turntable.fm, iMedix, Twylah, Masher, Proxlet, Geeje, Google+, SocialVisor, Scribd, Pinterest, Graspr, White hat, Screenr, dushare, MEDgle, PostPost, Deals, SPOT Healthcare, Evernote, dlvr.it, Bounce, iTriage, popurls, Trunk.ly, Dropbox, Storify, Newsvine, Layers, Thsrs, #tagdef, Check-in, MDJunction, Blekko, Healthline, Spindex, Vanilla, Twingr, Tweetbeat, Social Media Policy, infoMedMD, Health Care 3.0, Groupon, icyou, #MDchat, Quality 101, MedlinePlus, HITSphere, URL X-ray, Mashup, Blog Talk Radio, TweetedRanks, Ping.fm, Digsby, Qik, Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

Twilert: If you’re trying to keep up with how your company or brand is being discussed on Twitter, then Twilert is the perfect tool for you. After creating a free account, which can be done through your existing Twitter account or through Gmail, simply choose any search terms that you want to follow to create your Twilerts. The basic setup includes the search term and the frequency at which the user will receive updates, but with the advanced alert setting, users can choose what language to limit the search to, which Twitter users to exclusively focus on, a specific location to follow based on geolocation information, whether or not the tweet contains a link and if the content of the tweet is positive, negative or asking a question. Once your Twilerts are set, you can control whether or not you receive the alerts; a simple click of the mouse can deactivate any Twilert, and it is saved for reactivation later.

Past Words of the Week

nptech, Taweet, MedicalCavity, DoAT, Turntable.fm, iMedix, Twylah, Masher, Proxlet, Geeje, Google+, SocialVisor, Scribd, Pinterest, Graspr, White hat, Screenr, dushare, MEDgle, PostPost, Deals, SPOT Healthcare, Evernote, dlvr.it, Bounce, iTriage, popurls, Trunk.ly, Dropbox, Storify, Newsvine, Layers, Thsrs, #tagdef, Check-in, MDJunction, Blekko, Healthline, Spindex, Vanilla, Twingr, Tweetbeat, Social Media Policy, infoMedMD, Health Care 3.0, Groupon, icyou, #MDchat, Quality 101, MedlinePlus, HITSphere, URL X-ray, Mashup, Blog Talk Radio, TweetedRanks, Ping.fm, Digsby, Qik, Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

Taweet: For the tweeter who likes to plan ahead, Taweet is a cool Twitter platform that allows users to post future events. Once you have linked up Taweet with your Twitter account, simply enter a description of the event or activity in which you’ll be participating and choose the time and the date. This will be posted as a regular tweet that all your followers can see, which includes the date of the event and a custom URL leading to the Taweet site. Once they have followed your link, other users can leave comments on your tweet. All comments left by others appear as regular tweets on their account with an @ mention of the original user. Taweet allows users to search a future period of time to see what events are coming up that may be of interest to them. The future time function can also be bypassed when using Taweet if the user simply wants to add a comment thread to his or her tweets.

Past Words of the Week

MedicalCavity, DoAT, Turntable.fm, iMedix, Twylah, Masher, Proxlet, Geeje, Google+, SocialVisor, Scribd, Pinterest, Graspr, White hat, Screenr, dushare, MEDgle, PostPost, Deals, SPOT Healthcare, Evernote, dlvr.it, Bounce, iTriage, popurls, Trunk.ly, Dropbox, Storify, Newsvine, Layers, Thsrs, #tagdef, Check-in, MDJunction, Blekko, Healthline, Spindex, Vanilla, Twingr, Tweetbeat, Social Media Policy, infoMedMD, Health Care 3.0, Groupon, icyou, #MDchat, Quality 101, MedlinePlus, HITSphere, URL X-ray, Mashup, Blog Talk Radio, TweetedRanks, Ping.fm, Digsby, Qik, Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

Twylah: Twylah is a unique tool that allows users to turn their Twitter feeds into personalized websites. By simply creating categories based on topics that you frequently tweet about, a visually-appealing, easy-to-read page is created. Any tweet that you send out containing these keywords is automatically added to the appropriate section of the site. Visitors to your page can get a great idea of what interests you, and they can better focus on the topics of interest to them. Each page has a link to follow the user on Twitter so that networks continue to grow, and the use of tags for each keyword further enhances the SEO potential of the tool.

Past Words of the Week

Masher, Proxlet, Geeje, Google+, SocialVisor, Scribd, Pinterest, Graspr, White hat, Screenr, dushare, MEDgle, PostPost, Deals, SPOT Healthcare, Evernote, dlvr.it, Bounce, iTriage, popurls, Trunk.ly, Dropbox, Storify, Newsvine, Layers, Thsrs, #tagdef, Check-in, MDJunction, Blekko, Healthline, Spindex, Vanilla, Twingr, Tweetbeat, Social Media Policy, infoMedMD, Health Care 3.0, Groupon, icyou, #MDchat, Quality 101, MedlinePlus, HITSphere, URL X-ray, Mashup, Blog Talk Radio, TweetedRanks, Ping.fm, Digsby, Qik, Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

In the days following the assassination of Osama bin Laden, you might have checked your Facebook Newsfeed and Twitter home page to see many of your friends posting the following quote by Martin Luther King, Jr.:

“I will mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.”

Beautiful? Yes. Inspiring? Absolutely. Factual? Not exactly.

While the sentiment remains, the quote above is apparently an interesting conglomeration of excerpts from King’s book, “Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?,” his speech, “Strength to Love,” and misplaced quotation marks from reposts of the original Facebook status.

You might also have seen the following quote by Mark Twain:

“I’ve never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure.”

Pointedly appropriate? Yes. The perfect description of your mixed emotions? Exactly. Factual? Kind of.

A slightly varied version of the quote was actually spoken by Clarence Darrow – a trial lawyer best known for defending John T. Scopes in the “Scopes Monkey Trial.”

In an information-saturated society, we must be vigilant about what we attribute as truthful, factual and honest. While neither of these internet memes was malicious or intended to mislead, it’s fascinating that people are so quick to not only accept information as fact, but copy and paste it, further disseminating that information into the public consciousness.

Undoubtedly, social media is a commanding platform – can you remember another time when the entirety of your Facebook Newsfeed was about a singular subject? The assassination news even broke Twitter records – the highest rate of sustained tweeting ever, averaging 3,440 tweets per second.

What should you take away from this? Social media is powerful way to increase your credibility, but it is also a powerful way to damage or lose it. Be careful about what you copy and paste or retweet.  Take five seconds for a quick search and make sure you’re getting information from a valid source. My father told me that not everything I see on TV is true – do yourself a favor and multiply that by exponents for the Internet.

For the sake of argument, we’re all going to pretend everyone reading this has passed social media 101 – you’re on Twitter, you’re on Facebook, and you’ve achieved 100% completion on your LinkedIn profile.

If you haven’t, no worries. Read this, this and this. Then come back. We’ll wait…

Great! Now, let’s move on from social media 101 to social media 1001. Even the pros make mistakes on these platforms because most of us are moving so fast, we don’t stop to think about regularly proofing our profiles or ways to improve our communication.

Here are a few things to mull over:

Twitter: Keep it short-er. – So, by now you know that your tweets need to stay within 140 characters. What you may not realize, however, is that if someone wants to reply to you and copy your message, or manually retweet you (which many still do), they’ll need space too. By not giving any wiggle room, others might wind up editing your tweet [incorrectly], ignoring it all together, or using your info but removing your @name. To encourage involvement, a good rule of thumb is to keep tweets just a bit shorter – about 90 to 110 characters whenever possible.

Facebook: One word: FACE. – Don’t be afraid to get personal. We’re all professionals, but in social media there really is such a thing as being “too professional.” By never showing a glimpse of personality or opinion, you’re losing sight of the point. People are on here to network with YOU. The real you. They want to know if you disagree with a piece of legislation; they want to know your favorite booth at HIMSS. This is what starts conversations with those you don’t know and strengthens relationships with those you do. It’s all about balance – keep your posts topical and informative, but don’t be afraid to be yourself. Same goes for Twitter.

LinkedIn: Profile check-up. – Most people aren’t as active on LinkedIn as they are on Twitter and Facebook, so it tends to fall off the radar pretty easily. Because of this, your profile may not be as up-to-date as you think. Here are a few common blunders that you may want to check simply by visiting LinkedIn, going to the top navigation, and clicking on Profile > View Profile. This will show you what other people see.

1) Does your Professional Headline match your current position (this is the label right under your name)? You ideally want this to read your current position or a brief description of what you do.

2) Is your company website, blog and twitter linked correctly? While companies regularly evolve, we don’t always think to go back and cross-reference after every change.

3) Do your current and previous company names link directly to the companies’ LinkedIn profiles? If so, the company will be hyperlinked in blue with a small note icon next to the company name.

These changes may seem small, but they can really affect others’ ability to find you, and more importantly, the way others’ view you professionally.

Bottom line? We’re updating the old adage, “Clothes make the man.” It’s 2011, everyone…“Profiles make the pro.”

Notice any other common blunders? Have any questions? We’d like to hear from you!