when HiFi is just not an option » social media

15 Amazing Twitter Tools for Increased Productivity

Vandelay Website Design — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 12:07:26 +0000

Twitter provides designers (and other service providers) with the ability to communicate and network in a way that can be really productive for business. However, spending too much time or not having a specific purpose with social media can become a major drain on your time. There are plenty of tools and resources available that can help you to get more out of Twitter in less time. In this post we'll profile 15 of those efficiency tools for Twitter users. Connect with us on Twitter: @vandelaydesign. HootSuite HootSuite allows you to manage multiple social media profiles from one dashboard. It integrates with Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Foursquare and more. You can schedule tweets to be sent at a specific time in the future, monitor mentions, send and read direct messages, see how many people click on links in your tweets, and more. The features mentioned above are all available on the free plan. A premium plan is also available for $5.99 per month that ads features for teams and provides Google Analytics integration.

Search & Social – you can’t get the cream out of the coffee

Joost de Valk — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 14:47:03 +0000

Yesterday, Google launched "Search plus your World", intermixing search and social and providing even more "personalized" results. There's a lot of outcry about some parts of this, with people saying they don't want "personalized" results. I actually think that normal users do want personalized results and that this is, for the most part, a good thing. [...]

Search & Social – you can’t get the cream out of the coffee is a post by Joost de Valk on Yoast - Tweaking Websites.A good WordPress blog needs good hosting, you don't want your blog to be slow, or, even worse, down, do you? Check out my thoughts on WordPress hosting!

21 Resources for Effective Facebook Fan Pages

Vandelay Website Design — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 11:16:18 +0000

Most businesses now recognize Facebook as an excellent platform for connecting and communicating with their customers and/or users. As businesses have become more active on Facebook the number of resources available for fan pages has increased as well. Setting up an effective Facebook fan page isn't always that easy, but there are plenty of resources out there that can help. In this post we'll look at some of the best places to get fan page templates that can serve as a starting point, services and apps that allow you to easily create custom fan pages, and apps that help businesses to sell products from their Facebook pages.

Create Fan Pages:

If you're looking for an easy way to create a fan page for your own business or for your clients, here are some resources that may help. Pagemodo Create fan pages with no coding required. Pricing from free to $33 per month. Pro templates are available for plans starting at $13 per month.

Are ads preventing your posts from being shared?

Joost de Valk — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 12:16:24 +0000

I like sharing links on Twitter, I've been trying to find a good way of doing that without overloading people, and think I've found the solution in Buffer App, which allows me to buffer my tweets. As a result of that, I'm tweeting a lot more links. What I find though, is that I'm reading [...]

Are ads preventing your posts from being shared? is a post by Joost de Valk on Yoast - Tweaking Websites.A good WordPress blog needs good hosting, you don't want your blog to be slow, or, even worse, down, do you? Check out my thoughts on WordPress hosting!

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Blog Design Heroes — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 18:32:15 +0000

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40 Sets of Free Social Media Icons

Vandelay Website Design — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 10:55:28 +0000

Designers love free icon sets. Having quality icons can help to make a site's design look complete, and can also help with the usability of the site. Social media icons are some of the most commonly used icons, especially in blog design. Fortunately, there are a number of free sets of quality social media icons. In this post we'll feature 40 social media icon sets from various designers. Click on the links to be led to the source where the icons can be downloaded. As always when you are dealing with freebies, check the terms and conditions to be sure that you're using them in a way that is allowed by the designer. ElegantThemes Social Media Icons

Optimising the Facebook Open Graph Protocol

Alex Moss — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 13:00:08 +0000

A small note from Joost first: I'm working on a project with Alex Moss from Pleer. He knows an awful lot about the Facebook Open Graph protocol, in fact he did a couple of pretty good plugins for Facebook comments and buttons etc. I asked him to do a g...

Social Buttons: Adding them to your site & Tracking them

Joost de Valk — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 20:48:20 +0000

I've had a lot of questions recently (like literally, several a day) on how I implemented the social buttons in WordPress, whether I was using a plugin or using a theme. First of all I'm glad to see all of you noticing my social buttons section so much...

45 Design Blogs on Facebook

Vandelay Website Design — Thu, 28 Oct 2010 11:13:11 +0000

Last week we launched the official Vandelay Design Facebook page. There are a lot of other design blogs on Facebook, and we thought it might be helpful for Facebook users if we put together a list. So if you're interested in design and you're on Facebook, here are some other places where you can get connected. Vandelay Design (Blog, Facebook)

Guide to Using Social Networking to Promote Your Services

Vandelay Website Design — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 21:29:07 +0000

With so many freelancers and design agencies out there, finding work can often be a major struggle, especially for those who are just getting started. A growing number of designers are using social media as a means of marketing their services, in addition to simply using it for interacting with friends. While social media marketing can be extremely effective, it can also be a big waste of time. In this post we'll look at some tips that should help you to ensure that your time with social media is well spent.

1. Know What You Want to Accomplish

One of the most common mistakes that is made in social media marketing is not having a purpose or a goal. Many businesses and entrepreneurs recognize the power and potential of social media and social networking, so they feel that they need to be involved. However, simply having a Facebook fan page or a Twitter profile is not going to make a real difference. Developing a social media marketing plan requires having a specific purpose or goal (if you're using social networking only for fun or personal reasons then, of course, this�does not apply). Web designers may want to use social media to find more clients, network with other professionals, or maybe to build links to their blog or portfolio site. The first step to using social media effectively is to have a clear understanding of what you want to accomplish. This will shape the approach that you take and the way you use the social media sites. Without having a goal or something that you want to accomplish, there is really no way to know if it is working for you and your business.