David Lee King

social media | emerging trends | libraries

Nice review of Face2Face!

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My new book - Face2Face: Using Facebook, Twitter, and Other Social Media Tools to Create Great Customer ConnectionsCheck out Paul Signorelli’s review of my book in his post titled David Lee King: face2face with Social Media and Social Graces.

Here’s my favorite part of his review: “Which brings us to the playful foundation of David’s book—the understated yet implicit redefinition of our concepts of what the term face to face means in our onsite-online world. As we read through David’s sections on “business casual,” “where and how to begin,” “measuring success,” and “applying what we’ve learned,” we can’t help but see that effective use of the tools under discussion make us realize we can just as easily be face to face online as we can in the original sense of the term—when we’re onsite with someone.”

While you’re at it, make sure to check out Paul’s blog – you are guaranteed to find something that will make you think!

And make sure to buy my book if you haven’t! What book is that? Face2face: Using Facebook, Twitter, and Other Social Media Tools to Create Great Customer Connections. Get it in print and ebook versions.

Design for People

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I’ve been doing a lot of reading on responsive design lately (because my library is headed towards that), and that made me think. When designing websites, we tend to design for devices. That’s what responsive design is all about – it’s coding in such a way that your website “responds” appropriately to different screen sizes (i.e., desktops, tablets, smartphones). We design for things: for a desktop; for a screen; for a browser; for a tablet or smartphone.

Nothing wrong with that – a modern website has to work on all those devices, right?

But I also think we need to shift our focus a bit, to where it really counts. And that focus is not on the screen.

We need to design for people.

What’s that change?

We still need to do all the usual stuff – i.e., use great css, work on making our websites responsive, think about screensizes, readability, contrasting colors, etc.

But let’s also focus on people:

  • Put content first.
  • Ask customers what content they want … and then create that content!
  • Answer the why, what, and who questions.
  • Provide next steps and calls to action on ALL content.
  • Make asking questions and getting responses easy and seamless.
  • This works for our physical and our digital branches.
  • What else? Add to my list in the comments…

Simply put – put people first.

pic by Nicola Albertini

Nice Reviews for Face2face!

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My new book - Face2Face: Using Facebook, Twitter, and Other Social Media Tools to Create Great Customer ConnectionsI just saw some great reviews for my new book Face2Face: Using Facebook, Twitter, and Other Social Media Tools to Create Great Customer Connections, and wanted to share.

The first one comes from College & Research Libraries. The review was written by John Repplinger. Here are some highlights:

“David Lee King, the author of Face2Face, has put together a wonderful resource for those just beginning to investigate social media as tools to deepen their connections with customers and patrons. Essentially, this book is about how to transition in-person communication to the Internet. It is geared to reach a broad audience, and most of the examples are equally applicable to businesses, organizations, and libraries both large and small.”

and

“He takes his own advice and writes casually in a second-person perspective to readers, and this is largely what makes this book so engaging and refreshing.”

Read the whole book review here.

539087_412689465433106_1289537563_nThe second one comes from HispanicBusiness.com, written by Cheryl Terisi. Here are some highlights (read the whole review here):

“I brought Face2Face: Using Facebook, Twitter, and Other Social Media Tools to Create Great Customer Connections to bed with me, mistakenly thinking an explanation of how social media tools can help create customer service is just what I needed to lull me to sleep. Ha! Once I started to read this very common sense book, I could not put it down.”

and

“Face2Face is invaluable for organizations that currently use social media or those who want to improve their image. There are abundant examples as well as in-depth information to help you become more comfortable and relaxed, letting your customer know you care about them by showing the real face of your organization.”

and (my favorite):

“This book isn’t written like a text, but reads more like a mystery. By the time you reach the end, you don’t find out who did it but rather how to do it!”

Thanks John and Cheryl for the reviews!

Oh – and don’t forget. Face2face is on sale this summer. It’s a good time to get it if you haven’t yet 🙂

Face2Face is on Sale this Summer!

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My new book - Face2Face: Using Facebook, Twitter, and Other Social Media Tools to Create Great Customer ConnectionsJust a quick note on my book, Face2Face … it’s on sale! Information Today is running a really cool sale on some of their books from May 6 until June 10, 2013. They are offering 30% off the retail price on these books:

From InfoToday: “There is no need for customers to use a code – the web order sale prices are on the book’s web pages and the Yahoo store pages. Standard shipping is free for orders shipped within the continental United States. NJ residents must pay state tax. Ebook purchases are not included in this sale and the discount cannot be combined with other promotions.”

So, for those that haven’t bought my book yet, 30% off is a good deal 🙂 Even better, there are some really good books in this list. Get em if you’re interested!

My #ideadrop presentation During SXSWi

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Video streaming by Ustream

While I was at SXSW in Austin, TX last week, I had the pleasure of giving a presentation/interview/livestream at the #ideadrop house. The video is embedded in this post.

What’s the ideadrop house? From the livestream text:

“On 3/8, DLF brings you a live stream of the ER&L + ProQuest #ideadrop house in Austin, TX. The #ideadrop house is a space dedicated to library and information professionals to experience the diversity of SXSW speakers in the context of libraries and library-related technologies and topics.

Influencers, thought leaders, artists, hacktivists, academics and creators join the #ideadrop library house during March 8-12 at SXSW Interactive to discuss many topics including: SOPA/PIPA, free speech, privacy, open access, archives, values, humanity, civic start up efforts, civil liberty, liberty, network freedom, information access, open data, museums, community engagement, ux, social media, digitization and open source technologies.

Live streaming made possible by the Digital Library Federation (DLF)”

So – Lisa Carlucci and I talked about online conversations and community in the library world – fun talk! Make sure to watch and listen … then leave a comment here!