Welcome, and thanks for assisting to a new installment of my recently launched series “Social Friday”.

Pretty cool stuff happening on the social media and blogging worlds, we continue to discuss Google + and you can see how the story develops emphasizing on 2 main aspects: how it’s impossible for Google to compete with Facebook at this point AND, how Google + is already much cooler (and useful) than Facebook.

It’s waaaay too early to say. Relax people… My opinion? if you are an online marketer, a blogger, or you’re simply taking your business online, you will need to be present. Period. Other than that, let’s see how it all develops and we’ll adjust as needed.

Let’s get moving here to some great content I stumbled upon (hmm, interesting choice of words) on the interwebz this week…

Awesome Posts This Week

What? StumbleUpon is the new king of traffic generation?

GigaOm published an article this week showing us how StumbleUpon generates more traffic for US websites than Facebook itself. I frankly couldn’t care less about this kind of stuff, I’ll go to my Google Analytics to see how my business is affected. How much traffic is SU sending YOU? I’ll share this with you: SU was usually one of my top 10 traffic sources, then it went down, now it’s back up there and sometimes, sending more traffic than Facebook.

If you got rid of your SU buttons on your website, put them back on.

The best Guest Posting story I’ve ever heard

This is a great story about how Steve Kamb from Nerd Fitness had a post syndicated by Gizmodo and generated an obscene amount of traffic and attention in general (followers, subscribers…). But I’ll let you read the post, which was published by Corbett over at ThinkTraffic.

7 days to start a blog

This one is a massive piece by Tony Hue from Lone Placebo, it’s a guest post on Kikolani. Tony starts by making fun of Darren Rowse and his 31 days book and takes you on a day by day journey to build a better blog. Like I said, massive post that deserves some bookmarking and use it as reference.

How to promote your product after its launch

Jonathan from ByBloggers, who has been a guest here at SocialMouths before, gives you a list of 11 ways pro bloggers promote their products even after launching. Here is what I like about this post, Jonathan is a highly creative individual that loves going into new territories, this is no exception so don’t expect to read the same old list of crappy items you read a thousand times.

How To Lead Without Followers

My Ebook recommendation for this week is coming from Dave Ursillo from DaveUrsillo.com and it is basically a little taste he has put together on what’s coming on his new project “How To Lead Without Followers“. Dave sent me a copy last week and today he’s making it available for everybody.

The project is an alternative leadership movement that Dave has started as a result of 3 years of changing his own life and going through a process of starting to write on his blog, quitting his job and changing his focus to a selfless life.

Leadership is one of the topics I truly love and consume as much as I can and I love some of the things Dave is sharing here. I can wait for the official version to come out.

The ebook is free and you can get it here.

Twylah

In case you missed it, Dave Gallant was a guest this week on SocialMouths with a post that covered how to increase your influence by curating content and he mentioned a few very cool tools for you to use. But I wanted to add to Dave’s post, one more tool to the list…

Twylah is basically a digital newspaper that grabs its information from your Twitter content. It organizes this content by the most relevant keywords used on your stream. In the above image you see how my Twylah displays “Blog” and “Facebook” as trending topics.

The work here is pretty much done for you and ready to be shared. Besides, it’s a pretty good looking site. Visit my Twylah!

A Special #FollowFriday

The intention of this little section is to recognize cool people doing great work online and at the same time introduce them to you (okay… it’s also good karma). So here goes, this week’s Special #FollowFriday is for…

Dino Dogan

If you don’t know Dino, he’s the founder of Triberr and that I’m sure you heard about. He’s also the author of DIY blogger. I met Dino through a post he wrote in which he trashed criticized every single blog nominated by Social Media Examiner. Luckily he was pretty positive about my blog (or I wouldn’t be writing this shit).

But in all seriousness, I want to recognize Dino and recommend this #FF for 3 reasons:

• He’s not afraid to call things by its name
• The idea of Triberr is pretty damn awesome and I wish it was mine (damn straight!)
• But mainly because this is a guy that truly cares about community (and I’m not just saying that)

Dino, keep rockin’ hard bro!

And that’s Friday kids, I hope you had the chance to kick some serious ass this week!

P.S. Saturday is technically the last day of the week… just sayin’ in case you need an extra day to drop awesomeness!

Influence was one of the most used and abused words of 2010. I probably contributed with my share too.

But it seems like lately everywhere you turn there is a discussion about it, either to redefine the term, to analyze how it should be measured or simply to say that Klout Scores are not relevant.

Let’s face it, Klout has been under fire for the last few weeks. Then you’re not helping yourself when you come out and say that Justin Bieber is more influential than the Dalai Lama, Barak Obama or Lady Gaga (I think Gaga deserves the top spot). But let’s stop right here, bear with me for a second to explain where I’m going with this and make my point. This is a short post.

Should I Not Pay Attention To Klout Then?

I’m not here to recommend you should or shouldn’t use Klout or to question their formula, Justin Bieber is probably more influential than Obama these days anyways. The concern to me is how we use this score, I think it is a fine metric as a marketing tool for your personal brand and I can even see it as some kind of social proof, you know, another counter on your sidebar. But we should not be looking at it as to measure how much influence we really have.

Let’s Step Back For A Second…

According to the dictionary, Influence is the capacity or power of persons or things to be a compelling force on or produce effects on the actions, behavior, opinions, etc., of others.

Wikipedia says that Social Influence occurs when an individual’s thoughts, feelings or actions are affected by other people. Social influence takes many forms and can be seen in conformity, socialization, peer pressure, obedience, leadership, persuasion, sales, and marketing.

I was planning on adding something on how Klout formula works so I visited the “How We Measure” page but I almost fell to sleep so let’s skip that and if you’re interested in reading that just follow that link.

My 2 Cents

I get it, I’m pretty sure whatever Justin says around these days reaches a bigger audience, has more demand and it gets amplified a lot more than a message coming from Obama. If you think about it you’ll agree that it’s kind of obvious. I was talking about this very same thing with @Nathanael_Ramos earlier this week and I mentioned the time Ashton Kutcher said he was bigger than news. Sadly he was right. Remember the “We Are Bigger Than Jesus” statement by John Lennon? was he wrong? (I ain’t touching that one).

But I want to forget about all that and move forward so, here is my proposition to you: what if we focus on being responsible for our impact!

We all impact other lives every single day and at different levels, from your kids to huge corporations or thousands of followers online. Every decision we make and action we take, every single word that comes out of your mouth has an impact on others.

So if you have “Influence” that is awesome. NOW, how do we stop talking about it and trying to measure it, how do we stop looking at a score to move on to relevant shit like what are we going to do with that Influence?

I’m not about to suggest you start a non-profit organization. I’m talking about how you can have a positive impact through your work and through what you communicate to the point that you can change or improve people’s lives.

There’s No Such Thing As “No Impact”

There is no such thing as “No Impact”, it’s either positive or negative. If you don’t do anything (I mean sitting down on the couch and not say a word all day) it doesn’t qualify as “No Impact”, it is very much ne-ga-ti-ve impact.

If you are conscious about how you affect people’s lives, on and offline, then the result is that you build up influence, you have a positive impact. Sound to me like long term tough. You can always keep staring at the thermometer.

Move on, maybe in a few months we will be saying “Influence is sooo 2010″

List of Words to Destroy:

Viral

Influence

What’s the next word on the list?

What’s Your Take?

We can talk about it, we can acknowledge when a person is influential, we can even compare and list influential people, we can even use it as digital social proof but we can’t measure it with a score and we can’t be obsessing about formulas on how to get it right.

Now, I know YOU have something to say about it so head over to the comments department and express your thoughts.

I’m not really into reading books on how to actually use a particular tool, I don’t like the technical stuff. In the case of social media, I’m more interested in learning about the phenomenon behind it, about the leadership, the tribes, the passion of unknown individuals exposed to become something awesome and how we are becoming more connected as human beings.

So here is my book wishlist for the rest of 2009 (I already read some…):

1. Tribes: We Need You To Lead Us by Seth Godin

We see Tribes behind every successful brand, organization, politician, non profit and cause. And yet it seems almost impossible to attract a tribe. In this book, I try to explain that the challenge is leadership, not marketing or hype.

You should also check out the TED Talk: Seth Godin On The Tribes We Lead

Here is the summary for the presentation: Seth Godin argues the Internet has ended mass marketing and revived a human social unit from the distant past: tribes. Founded on shared ideas and values, tribes give ordinary people the power to lead and make big change. He urges us to do so.

2. Crush It!: Why NOW Is The Time To Cash In On Your Passion by Gary Vaynerchuk

Do you have a hobby you wish you could indulge in all day? An obsession that keeps you up at night? Now is the perfect time to take that passion and make a living doing what you love. In Crush It! Why NOW Is the Time to Cash In on Your Passion, Gary Vaynerchuk shows you how to use the power of the Internet to turn your real interests into real businesses. Gary spent years building his family business from a local wine shop into a national industry leader. Then one day he turned on a video camera, and by using the secrets revealed here, transformed his entire life and earning potential by building his personal brand. By the end of this book, readers will have learned how to harness the power of the Internet to make their entrepreneurial dreams come true. Step by step, Crush It! is the ultimate driver’s manual for modern business.

You should also watch this presentation of Gary at Web 2.o Expo NY.

3. Trust Agents: Using The Web To Build Influence, Improve Reputation And Earn Trust by Chris Brogan & Julien Smith

In Trust Agents, two social media veterans show you how to tap into the power of social networks to build your brand’s influence, reputation, and, of course, profits. Today’s online influencers are web natives who trade in trust, reputation, and relationships, using social media to accrue the influence that builds up or brings down businesses online.

The book shows how people use online social tools to build networks of influence and how you can use those networks to positively impact your business. Because trust is key to building online reputations,, those who traffic in it are “trust agents,” the key people your business needs on its side.

“This one’s a keeper. If you do business online (or do business with people who have ever been online) or know someone who once used a computer, I strongly suggest you get smart about the ideas in this book.” – Seth Godin

Also, Chris Brogan is speaking tomorrow night in Orange, Cali if you’re around, check it out @ Chapman University Presents – An Evening with Chris Brogan

4. Six Degrees: The Science Of A Connected Age by Duncan J. Watts

You may be only six degrees away from Kevin Bacon, but would he let you borrow his car? It depends on the structures within the network that links you. When the power goes out, when we find that a stranger knows someone we know, when dot-com stocks soar in price, networks are evident. In Six Degrees, sociologist Duncan Watts examines networks like these: what they are, how they’re being studied, and what we can use them for. To illustrate the often complicated mathematics that describe such structures, Watts uses plenty of examples from life, without which this book would quickly move beyond a general science readership. Small chapters make each thought-provoking conclusion easy to swallow, though some are hard to digest. For instance, in a short bit on “coercive externalities,” Watts sums up sociological research showing that:

“Conversations concerning politics displayed a consistent pattern …. On election day, the strongest predictor of electoral success was not which party an individual privately supported but which party he or she expected would win.”

Six Degrees attempts to help readers understand the new and exciting field of networks and complexity. While considerably more demanding than a general book like The Tipping Point, it offers readers a snapshot of a riveting moment in science, when understanding things like disease epidemics and the stock market seems almost within our reach. –Therese Littleton

5. Here Comes Everybody: The Power Of Organizing Without Organizations by Clay Shirky

“Clear thinking and good writing about big changes.”
- Stewart Brand

“Clay Shirky may be the finest thinker we have on the Internet revolution, but Here Comes Everybody is more than just a technology book; it’s an absorbing guide to the future of society itself. Anyone interested in the vitality and influence of groups of human beings -from knitting circles, to political movements, to multinational corporations-needs to read this book.”
- Steven Johnson, author of Everything Bad Is Good for You and Emergence

“How do trends emerge and opinions form? The answer used to be something vague about word of mouth, but now it’s a highly measurable science, and nobody understands it better than Clay Shirky. In this delightfully readable book, practically every page has an insight that will change the way you think about the new era of social media. Highly recommended.”
- Chris Anderson, Wired Magazine 

Also, this great presentation from TED: Clay Shirky: How Social Media Can Make History

6. Linked: How Everything Is Connected To Everything Else And What It Means by Albert-Laszlo Barabasi

How is the human brain like the AIDS epidemic? Ask physicist Albert-László Barabási and he’ll explain them both in terms of networks of individual nodes connected via complex but understandable relationships. Linked: The New Science of Networks is his bright, accessible guide to the fundamentals underlying neurology, epidemiology, Internet traffic, and many other fields united by complexity. Barabási’s gift for concrete, nonmathematical explanations and penchant for eccentric humor would make the book thoroughly enjoyable even if the content weren’t engaging. But the results of Barabási’s research into the behavior of networks are deeply compelling. Not all networks are created equal, he says, and he shows how even fairly robust systems like the Internet could be crippled by taking out a few super-connected nodes, or hubs. His mathematical descriptions of this behavior are helping doctors, programmers, and security professionals design systems better suited to their needs. Linked presents the next step in complexity theory–from understanding chaos to practical applications.

So…

If you have any other good prospects, share them in the comments…

Photo Credit: MorBCN

We have already seen plenty of success stories from both brands and small businesses leveraging the power of social media. We have also seen the development of leaders becoming celebrities in their fields through both Facebook and Twitter.

Companies have been successful at putting a face in front of their logo and individuals have become known without the help of a powerful brand to back them up. Numerous studies have indicated how consumers trust more a brand with a blog and social media presence.

Now, how important is it for you to be branded as an individual? Or is it the right moment to do so? The beauty of social media is that it has changed the way we communicate, when everybody used to say that eventually we won’t talk to each other because of computers, emails and texting, social media has brought us together like never before. We communicate more and more everyday.

The audience became the content provider. If you have something to say, not only you can say it, but you can do so in different formats. TV and the advertising industry used to dictate our content, now we’re more interested in listening to what leaders have to say.

First, get your brand

• Regardless of if you are ready or not, you should be checking if your name is available as a domain, preferably as a .com if your lucky and purchase it. You might have to get a little creative with variations or extensions but try to get as close as possible.
• Create an email account with your domain, web-based emails such as Gmail or Hotmail are just not professional.
• Go to Twitter immediately and do the same, the demand for this names is increasing so fast (and they’re free…) that you are risking ending up with a @johnsmith23677353 and that’s not good.
• Do the same with all the other platforms. Start with the main ones such as Facebook and Linkedin.
• Fill out all the information and be consistent in all the networks.
• Put a face to it. Your image on every profile should be your face, don’t try to be funny with something only you understand…

You are not an entrepreneur…

What’s your expertise or your passion? Most likely you have that one thing in which you’re an expert or have an interest. Companies are setting up their employees on Twitter for a reason, people are more important than brands. Start sharing your knowledge little by little and build confidence. Start generating traffic organically. Meaningful relationships. If your content is good or at least you are linking to great stories on the web at the beginning, they will follow you. Just start.

Boost your career

Remember resumes? Over the last few years, not being on Linkedin became embarrassing. Now, companies are looking into how much influence you have, are you a good candidate or are you a leader? You can literally become the candidate of choice. Social media provides you with such visibility that there are people getting job offers on Linkedin and even over Twitter every day.

Listen to Seth Godin

Seth Godin’s new book Tribes emphasizes on the importance to become a leader and promote change. People want to be lead and not by brands. Anybody can do this, and social media is a great tool. This video from TED is about 15 minutes long and it has been around the world in the last few weeks, but if you haven’t seen it, I recommend you take the time…

A no brainer…

If you ARE an entrepreneur or a professional in any field, you cannot afford to ignore social media anymore. You need to brand yourself as the expert and offer your knowledge and experience as your PR strategy. Find a way to identify yourself and make the connection with your brand. In this case, you should seriously consider blogging too.

Remember that social media is based on honesty, big web startups are actively talking to users when their system is down, usually this will put any business down, but when you are honest and you give it a personal touch, people appreciate it.

Whether it is a good cause or a business, you need to focus on leadership and start a movement. Even if you’re not ready, start talking about it.

Share your thoughs…