Working with social media: top 11 posts of 2011

Last week I shared my top 11 most popular blog posts that I wrote in 2011, as viewed on this site. This week I’m sharing some of my own favourites from 2011: the posts I wrote on different subjects, and later this week, my favourite posts by other people.

I’m beginning with my favourite posts on working with social media. These are the posts that offer insight on how to use the web and social media at work, how to strengthen your practice as a social media professional, or how to sharpen your professional practices by using the web as a catalyst.

1. 5 steps to create your social media toolkit: Building a social media presence around a specific area of expertise is your best way to connect with a network and audience that cares about your work, and gets real value from your online contributions. This blog post walks you through the 5 steps that will get you up and running with three tools that will let you build and maintain a credible online presence as an expert: a WordPress blog, a Google Reader account and a Twitter presence managed through HootSuite.
2. How to sustain a social media presence in 3 hours a week: Feel like you don’t have enough time to create a meaningful social media presence? In this post I spell out my step-by-step process for creating and maintaining a high value, useful blog and Twitter presence in just (I mean it!) 3 hours a week.
3. 7 rules for rule-breakers: The Internet may be based on standards, but it hates rules. Thanks to the Internet we are now faced with almost daily choices about when to obey, and when to defy. If you’re going to be an online rule-breaker (and you probably should be, at least some of the time) these 7 rules can help with your rule-breaking.
4. 10 ways you can help to build the Internet: You can help to create the Internet without writing a single line of code. You can help create the online world in which you and your children are going to live. This post maps out 10 ways you can help with that important and rewarding work.
5. 6 questions to prepare you for a social media crisis: On October 27, 1980, the ARPANET — the Internet’s earliest incarnation — had its first epic fail. The experience of that spectacular, network-wide outage contained lessons that every web professional should think about today.
6. 40 tips on how to make the most of your life online: How can you make the most of your time online? For my 40th birthday, my friends and colleagues offered me their best advice — including some tips that have already changed how I live, on- and offline.
7. Social media for small organizations: Why size matters: This blog post was written as part of a series, but it’s a post that many organizations could usefully read on its own. If your organization has fewer than 100,000 members, you need to recognize the constraints that size imposes on your social media strategy…and develop a social media plan that can work effectively at your scale and with your available resources.
8. Respecting the billable hour: Would you ask a friend or colleague for $500? If you’d even hesitate before asking, you need to read this post about how to understand what an hour of time means to someone whose income depends on hourly billings. And if you’re one of those people, you need to read this post so you know how to handle those awkward requests.
9. The 3 essential questions every blogger should answer: Any blogger — newbie or pro — should be able to answer these three essential questions about his or her blog.
10. 7 tips for creating a great speaker’s video: If you want to pitch yourself as a speaker, trainer or just as a thoughtful person worth listening to, web video is a crucial medium. Event planners use video clips to guide their speaker selections, speakers bureaus use videos to pitch people from their roster, and your target audience of customers, influencers and fans may form their first impressions from your video online. Here’s how to make a great speaker’s video that works for you.
11. 15 best practices for managing your first (or subsequent) web development project: If you’re about to hire someone to build a website for you — or if you’re project managing a website for the first time — this post can get you up and running by telling you what to expect. And if you’re a veteran of web development projects, this post will help you remember how they unfold so you don’t smack your head four days before launch and wonder how you could be going through this yet again!