How to Manage Multiple Twitter Accounts On Your Desktop
Dec 31, 2008 Social Media, Software, Twitter
I recently wrote a post on How To Manage Multiple Twitter Accounts On The Web, but failed to recognize a viable way to do this from your desktop, which some people prefer.
Let me introduce you to a nice little application called Twhirl. This Mac and PC friendly program allows you to create a list of your Twitter accounts and login one-by-one. Each account is shown in it’s own application window, and gives you the same functionality as the Twitter website, plus more.
Pros
- View direct messages, replies, favorites, and archive of your own tweets
- View friends and followers
- Follow other Twitter users
- Add tweets to favorites
- Use Twitter’s lookup feature (for usernames) as well as Twitter Search (for content in all tweets)
- Tweetscan Search
- Desktop notifications for new tweets
- Upload to TwitPic
- Shorten URLs (using one of three different short URL providers)
Cons
- Can’t view multiple accounts in one window
- Lack of automatic brand mention tracking
While Twhirl is loaded with features, I’m hesitant to commit because of the inability to handle multiple accounts from one window. However, this is likely a great solution for many of you who don’t want to have a browser open at all times to manage your Twitter accounts.
Link Tracking for Ministry / Short URLs
Dec 29, 2008 Internet
In the past, we’ve run on the assumption that some people will click links that we share in newsletters, on Facebook, in emails, and so on, while we also assume that others will ignore them. But what if we could determine how many people are actually clicking them? Many short url providers make this task extermely simple.
For those of you familiar with Twitter, this will probably be no surprise. The purpose of short urls is to take a long url (such as http://www.threeparts.com/2008/12/26/friday-video-a-christmas-greeting/) and make it more managable…err…pretty (such as http://bit.ly/17oA0). Both of these thinks will take you to the same location on the web. The first one is the original URL, while the second is a shortened version of the first, assigned when I signed up for an account with Bit.ly and created it.
The most common use for short urls is to make long urls more friendly to microblogging services. Lately, however, I’ve been using these free services to not only shorten urls, but to track the number of times certain links of been clicked - regardless of where I place them. The click-tracking feature of many short url providers is one that is greatly overlooked. This information can be extremely valuable for you as a youth worker. For instance – if you send a link to a medical release form via your youth ministry newsletter which 25 people receive, and the link only gets one click – you should probably head down to the copier before the next pre-trip meeting so you can have some copies available for parents. Click tracking can also let you know your ‘return on investment’ when providing resources. If you spend two hours a day scouring the web for things to share with your students and parents, and only a small fraction of the people you are sending the information to click the link, you may need to invest your time doing other things.
While many premium email services already provide click-through information, it’s safe to say most of you are not using those pricey services. Therefore, I highly recommend using these in emails, on your blog (though a plugin or addon for stats would be better), on Twitter or other microblogging services, and so on. There is no reason not to track your links, given the process is incredibly simple.
Simply copy a url you would like to share, sign up at one of the sites below, create a short url, and copy and paste the new link where you intended to share the original. It’s truly that easy.
Be aware, there are some very popular short url providers that do not give you click stats (such as TinyURL), though somehow they continue to be incredibly popular. I prefer Bit.ly for tracking my links. Not only does it track the link where I place it, but it tells me where else the link has been placed by other people. It also lets me know how many people on Twitter are talking about it. However, there are several providers. Here are a few:
There are far too many for me to A) have used and B) to cover here. Comments are encouraged and welcome!
Friday Video: A Christmas Greeting
Dec 26, 2008 Video
Since my last post talks up the service animoto provides, I thought it would be great to show you what it can do here on ThreeParts. Enjoy and Merry Christmas!
http://www.vimeo.com/2633594Much thanks to Relient K, one of Meredith’s clients, for the soundtrack.
Tags: animoto, christmas, Friday Video, greeting, Video
Animoto: A Great Solution for Youth Group Videos and Christmas Greetings
Dec 22, 2008 Video
I found a link to animoto via Tim Schmoyer’s blog last week. It’s a great service that allows you to upload pictures and music and automatically create a video greeting for friends and family. Not only is this a great solution for creating youth group videos, but a nice, professional, budget friendly alternative to Christmas cards! Here’s the low-down.
Friday Video: Senior Adult Choir Hip Hop
Dec 19, 2008 Video
Enjoy – and share it with your students!
Graphic Design on a Budget
Dec 17, 2008 Design
While some youth pastors enjoy the luxury of hiring professional designers, others have a budget. And for those on a budget, finding tools to create graphics can be challenging. Today I present to you several options for DIY design. While I can’t give you a designer’s eye, I can certainly give you some resources to help you get started. This list is by no means the end-all be-all of resources – simply a guide , especially for those who are beginners.
Software
- Pixelmator - Similar functionality as Photoshop for Mac ($59)
- GIMP – Alternative to Photoshop for Mac (free)
- Seashore - Basic image editing software for Mac (free)
- Inkscape – Vector editing software fpr PC/Mac (free)
- Photoshop Express – A limited web version of Photoshop (free)
- Paint.NET – Image editor for PC (free)
Tutorials
- Smashing Magazine – More free design resources than you can dig through in months. They offer tutorials, free templates/graphics/backgrounds/fonts, and more.
- Gimp-tutorials.net - The name says it all
- Bits and Pixels - Pixelmator tutorials
- Graphic Design Tutorials (About.com) – Introduction to graphic design with tutorials
Fonts
- DaFont.com – My personal favorite for free fonts
- Urban Font – Clean an easy to use
- Better Fonts – Also easy to use
Pictures/Graphics
- iStockPhoto – The ‘default’ of stock photo site. Thousands upon thousands of images and design elements
- Cyclops – The best tool for searching for stock photo. Searches across more than ten sites at once, finding the best pictures/deals
- Every Stock Photo – same as Cyclops
When purchasing stock photos and fonts, please be sure they are always royalty free. Most sites specify this.
Patterns (for low resolution web graphics/banners)
Printing
(This list will be updated on a regular basis)
How to Manage Multiple Twitter Accounts On The Web
Dec 13, 2008 Social Media, Twitter, Video
Update: You may also want to read How to Manage Multiple Twitter Accounts On Your Desktop
As someone who manages several Twitter accounts between work and my personal life, I was thrilled to come across Splitweet this week. Splitweet is a website that allows you to setup the credentials for each Twitter account you run to pull all of your Twitter feeds on to one page. The tweets from all of your accounts appear in one stream. While this sounds like it might get confusing, the service assigns each of your accounts a different color. To the far right of each tweet, there is a small box that is colored to coincide with the account that the tweet is associated with. It uses the same feature to show you which accounts you sent each tweet from.
Just as if you were logged into Twitter, you can post tweets, send replies, and even direct messages across all of your accounts.
One thing I love about the site is the ‘brand mentions’ area in the sidebar. Rather than having to use TweetScan or visit Twitter Search, Splitweet displays any mention of your brand on the same page that you send and read your tweets from. It displays your most recent @replies in the sidebar as well.
While I absolutely love how much easier Splitweet has made my life over the past few days, there is one major feature that keeps me going back to the Twitter website from time to time.
The site does not give you the ability to manage your followers. Yes, there are sites that allow you to do this outside of Twitter – such as MyTweeple.com. But the goal here is consolidation. I don’t want to have to visit more than one site to manage my accounts (mainly because I’m lazy). As a general rule, I try to follow everyone that follows me. While Splitweet does show you an estimated ‘tweet audience’ when you choose which account to send a tweet to, there is no way to see your newest followers and follow them back. So for my main LifeWay account, StudentMinistry, which gets a couple of new followers every day – I still have to visit Twitter to manage them.
In addition to Splitweet, this video by CHURSMO shows how you can use Netvibes to display all of your accounts on one page. However, Splitweet offers more funcationality.
Overall, I give Splitweet 4 out of 5 stars.
Tags: churchsmo, Social Media, splitweet, Twitter
Video Podcast – Episode One
Dec 12, 2008 ThreeParts.com Video Podcast
Tags: blog, camcorders, consolidation, ebay, media, nashville, podcast, social, tennessee, threeparts, tubemogul, Twitter
A Great Comparison of Mini HD Camcorders
Dec 12, 2008 Video
I’ve seen a lot of youth workers talking about mini HD camcorders in the blogosphere and on Twitter lately. These cameras (HD or not) have so many applications from a youth ministry perspective that it’d be hard to outline them all. From video podcasts to youth group announcements, the small size and usability of the devices for these things trumps your average camcorder in seconds. The Flip MinoHD seems to being getting the most attention out of them all. In an effort to see if this attention is warranted, I did little research. While the majority of my research was limited to Amazon.com user ratings and reviews, nothing proved to me which mini HD model was the best. It took me venturing out to Vimeo before I found something truly valuable to help me compare two models. The video below puts video from the Flip MinoHD side-by-side with video from the Kodak Zi6 Mini HD camcorder, with sound. Watch, listen and enjoy.
http://www.vimeo.com/2254096Based on this video, I don’t believe the winner is the MinoHD. The sound and color on the Zi6 is much better. I’m still waiting to see a side-by-side comparison of the VadoHD with the Zi6 before I make my final decision on which I think is best.
Online Youth Ministry for Beginners
Dec 12, 2008 LifeWay
After speaking at the National Youth Worker’s Conference that LifeWay holds annually, I realized I was making some assumptions about youth workers that were inaccurate. They were that A) youth workers know the importance of using the internet in ministry, and B) they know how to do this. On both points – I confess – I was wrong. This led to my article on LifeWay.com, “Online Youth Ministry 101″. Below is an excerpt.
Never forget that your content is up against literally everything else on the internet. What does this mean for you? You must update your accounts frequently. Set aside a time (or two or three) each week to upload to videos and pictures. If you’re using social networks, update your status a few times a day so people will know that you are active.
