New to the social media world? Want to understand why Twitter, Facebook et al. is good for business?  Want to fine tune what you are already doing online and enhance your marketing?  Then, Friends With Benefits is for you.  I have to admit this is a book for more of the beginner crowd.  That being said, it is extremely well written, and at a level that almost anyone can understand (as long as you already know how to get online).

Friends With Benefits isn’t a book just on Twitter and Facebook (however big they are, there is more to social media than just those two companies).  This book covers everything from RSS (what it is, why you care, etc), corporate blogging, and social media new releases.  It even goes into how to approach bloggers.

This is where my first criticism comes in.  You can’t paint bloggers with one stroke.  The theme over and over in this book is that bloggers shouldn’t be paid for their work.  And yes, it is work.  The time I spend reviewing your product is time away from my family and other things I could be doing.  As someone who sometimes does get paid for reviewing prodcuts, I take offense to a book telling people not to pay bloggers.  Something else they left out is that if you send a blogger a product to review, don’t expect them to send it back.  Most bloggers have a policy on their site explaining how they do reviews.  Take care to read it, so you both know what to expect.  A personal request of my own is that if you send me a product make sure you put some marketing materials in with the product.  Sometimes bloggers get so many products that we often don’t know who they came from.  Make it easy for the blogger to contact you back with a review or questions.

The section on spammers is great.  I think marketers often forget that they are talking to real people and we don’t appreciate being addressed as “Dear Webmaster”.  The list they provide definitely makes you do a double take on your own behavior.  There is also a chapter about defin­ing suc­cess and return on invest­ment (ROI) which are the holy grails of social media mar­ket­ing.  They ask the question of how you define suc­cess.  If you don’t know your end goal, how do you know if your campaign was successful?  Are you inter­ested in brand-building? Grow­ing traf­fic? Con­ver­sion to sales? Social media men­tions? Increased buzz? How are you going to do this? Mon­i­tor­ing? Lis­ten­ing?  I love how they go into how to respond when you find bloggers talking about you or your product.  However, I wish they would have went one step further with it.  When working with clients, if I find a blog post about them that we like, I often send it to social media sites like Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon, etc.  Not only does it give the blogger more visitors, it gets more eyeballs on my clients product.

If you are looking to dabble in social media, Friends with Benefits is a must read for you.  It is one of the best books I’ve read in a long time on the social media field.

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If you aren’t in blogging world, you may or may not know that the FTC is trying to change the rules in how we blog.  Up till this point, I had been using a sitewide disclosure.  Now, I’m not sure if that covers me or not (supposedly there is a $11,000 fine per occurrence if they think you got a product to review and you didn’t disclose it).  I’ve heard that there are lawsuits to stop this going into action December 1st, but I am not counting on that.  All of my post from here on out (as long as I remember) will now have a disclosure on them that will look like this:

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/0

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/2

If you follow the link, it’ll tell you whether or not I was sent and item to review and/or giveaway. I just wanted to let everyone know of this small change I was implementing and what it means. (I know most of you probably don’t care, but I need to cover my butt just in case )

“Is This Thing On?” A Computer Handbook for Late Bloomers, Technophobes, and the Kicking & Screaming is the perfect Christmas gift for the non technical person you know.  For me, this is my mom.  I love her dearly, but she doesn’t even know how to turn the computer on.  At one point, I think we wrote her directions out, but this book is ten times better.  The book starts out assuming that you know nothing about computers (which is an awesome starting point.  Most books I’ve seen assume you have some sort of understanding).  It talks you through why you want a computer, how to buy it, how to set it up (without having to pay the GeekSquad to come to your house), and it even shows you how to get online and send email!  It teaches you about instant messaging and blogs too.  It walks you through digital photography and even items like cell phones, ipods, and blackberries.  This is must have guide for anyone who isn’t online due to fear.  Is This Thing On? doesn’t talk down to you and really makes it extremely understandable with its clear language and illustrations.  This book gets my two thumbs up!

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I recently wrote a post about Alice.com and how much I liked them. Basically, you can use Alice to order your household essentials. I have made several orders since my first post, and I am still impressed. Their prices are in line with what I pay in Chicago.  I love that there is free shipping.  I love that if you sign up you get $10 off your order!  I also love that I can make a list, and they remind me before I run out!

Alice has a new program that started on Thursday, October 1st.  (I apologize for not blogging about it then, but I refused to pay $14.95 a day for internet — I was gone to a conference for those who don’t know). Alice.com is now offering free samples that include include free cleanser, free moisturizer, free shaving cream, free floss, free coffee, free cleaners, free shampoo, free conditioner and more!  Your free sample will be specially packaged within the Alice box and along with the rest of your order.  You could also discover an extra prize, like an iPod shuffle, Flip camera, free movie rentals, a gas card, Alice swag, or much, much more among their regular purchases.  Customers that spread the word on what they liked or disliked about their sample and/or prize via their Twitter account, a Facebook status update or wall posting, and/or a blog post, will be entered into their contest to win a Mac Book! (Details on the contest are on the Alice community blog.)

What are you waiting for?  Get shopping over at Alice!

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I know I do! I’m actually running this on my other blog Lisa Cooking.  Here’s how this contest that I am promoting with GE works.

1. Go to Lisa Cooking and either enter on this GE Appliance post or the widget in the sidebar.

2. Click where it says sweepstakes on the widget, and fill in your name, date of birth, and email and your done! You’ve been entered to win a GE Appliance! And you can do this every day too!!!!!

There are around 50 blogs who are doing this giveaway. The winner will be picked from all the entries on all the widgets Here’s the really cool part of this contest though, if you win, I win an appliance too! So keep entering every day, and help us both win a new GE appliance!  Good luck!

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