The Week in Links

A neat article by Tim Sohn on Social Times about how NYU is using social media to engage students specifically. Very good points about how most "official" social media accounts target more of a public/alumni audience.

I'm very upset I missed another CASE Twitter Chat. I suck. But thankfully there's a great recap here. Lots of interesting questions that scratch at many of the issues we all face: proliferating social media accounts across campus, which departments do you post content for and which do leave out, social media and fundraising, etc. For future reference, here's a schedule of CASE's upcoming Twitter chats - next up, August 13, 11-12 PM Pacific.

Nice list of the 25 Most Popular College Career Services Departments by Karl Hughes on Job Brander. Props to NYU for taking the top spot! 

My most popular post this week: the wonderfully goofy, heartfelt, "Ya'll Come Back Now, Ya Hear?" video from Lee University, 

Now that Facebook allows people to post photos in comments, here's a nice run-down of ideas on how to encourage photo comments by Jim Belosic on Social Mouths. I haven't tried anything like this yet, but I really like that this is an option now. Definitely plan on exploring how to best take advantage of that feature.

Really good thoughts on institutional portal websites by Rick Allen on Meet Content. My college has a portal, and it's horrible (I can't format text, include images, or even post links... yes - it's THAT bad) and I wish I could kill it - with fire - and then throw it off a cliff. But, since I can't do that, I will just read articles like this and dream of the day it gives up the ghost.

How often should you post during the summer? Cassie Dull has a good breakdown on Ed Social Media. My own personal take? By default I avoid relentless posting (plenty of smart people disagree with me on that, but my end goal isn't just pumping up my reach numbers... when I post something, I want it to always have the potential to get lots of engagement), but I'd say once a day if you can swing it. It can be a scrap looking for content, but I think it's worth it as long as you aren't just posting junk for the sake of hitting a posting goal. 

Good list of five neat examples of good social media use in higher ed by Jim Tudor on the Future Index. Definitely spend some time checking out the Future Index... lots of cool stuff on there.

I only have so much energy in a day, and Google+ hasn't captured any of that energy yet. (Hey - this blog is free... so what if I suck at social media?) But I must say, this article by Daniel Sharkov - who is 18 and already a better blogger than me... awesome - that answers four Google+ questions on Social Mouths does make me think someday soon it will become a necessity. I do very much question some of the monthly active user stats of Google+ (not sure how many people answering surveys differentiate between Google+ and all of Google's other services like Gmail), but I know there is a devoted, tech-savvy core user-group using it.

Whelp, that does it for this week. Thanks to everyone for stopping by the blog. I've been really good about posting every day the past few weeks (yay me!), so you should send me some cookies or something like that. Email me for my address.  :)

I leave you with the greatest French Canadian 80's electro pop song EVER. The video is pretty damn fabulous too. So, so very good.