I just received my first holiday e-card via email from a business. It made me think of the different ways I can stay in touch with clients and prospects this year within social media sites I am on. The benefit provided with this ecard from SCS | BT Squared - Engineers and Environmental Consultants was the clever list of what to do with it afterwards.
Top 10 Ways to Recycle Greeting Cards
According to the email, I have ten ways to reuse those paper cards.
10. Create gift bags or tags for gifts. You will recycle the greeting card, as well as a bag!
9. Make an origami creation.
8. Cut the backs off and use them as postcards or recipe cards.
7. Design ornaments or coasters by using CDs with pictures from an old greeting card.
6. Send your cards to St. Jude’s Ranch.
5. Shred and use for colorful hamster bedding, so your pet can have a festive cage too.
4. Make confetti for your New Year’s Eve celebration.
3. Use the blank space to perform storm water calculations or to doodle.
2. Explore the many clever craft ideas at allfreecrafts.com
1. Recycle cards to create new cards. The front of a card can be used to decorate plain cards.
I liked the list and I have decided that I like e-cards sent as a html card. I have nothing to throw away, but I still know that I am on "The List."
What I don't like are the e-cards that may come with suspicious links from some of the services since spammers and others use this technique to scam.
Is it Bah Humbug?
I haven't sent out my own mailed holiday cards in a long time. I just can't get it on my schedule. Neither for myself personally or business. I have been searching for a better occasion or touchpoints at different times of the year, not just the holidays. As our contact lists grow, our networks expand with various social channels and our social ecosystems become a swirl of activity with global reach, just how does one keep track?
XeeMee to the rescue
I have recently participated in networking activities surrounding use of this tool and can actively track that using the tool while networking and connecting with people in my ecosystem has a 4 fold growth in activity of new people inviting me to connect. Pretty good numbers I would say.
Activity blinders within a social site
Finding strategic tools that make me more efficient is a goal of all business users in social media channels. We have a ROI problem. That is, we are constantly documenting what we are doing, the results, and the revenue that can be attributed to the activity. On the Business Development side, Xeeme lets me follow the person I am interested in across the sites that they are active on. It also makes me much more approachable for others to connect with me.
Connections good. Hard to connect bad.
As we move into 2012. Trust, approachability, quality network growth, social business activities and social capital will be the focus for business use of social media. If you are looking for a competitive advantage you should consider social tools that allow you to be focused on the person you want to build the relationship with and a way to track the social capital you are building that translate to trust in the market place.
What tools do you use?
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