Tag: socialmedia

23rd March 2010

April’s Central Birmingham Social Media Surgery

Social Media Surgery in March at the Studio — March's Social Media Surgery in the Studio

After a couple of brilliant and very busy Central Birmingham Social Media Surgeries in February and March we’re looking forward to our next surgery, which is now on April 14th at thestudio, 7 Cannon Street, B2 5EP.

It’s the same night as the Birmingham Bloggers’ meetup, but that seemed to work OK last month, so we’ve opted to try doing it the same.

Members of voluntary and community groups are free to drop in between 5.30pm and 7pm. Below I’ve included a form to fill in if you’d like to come, so we can keep track of numbers and what kind of help people need.

We had to move the surgery, which had been booked for April 7, because of the Easter holidays, so sorry if you can’t make it. The next two surgeries are both at thestudio, booked for May 6 and June 8.

The surgeries are organised by volunteer members of the Birmingham Bloggers group. Surgeons work as friendly advisors giving informal one-to-one help to show you how to make the best of social media. If you’ve never been to a surgery before then it might be a good idea to look here. And, if you’re interested in finding out a little bit more about what the surgeries are and their history have a look here.

How do I get to the new venue? From New Street Station walk down the ramp out of the Pallasades, turn left onto New Street (past H&M) and Cannon Street is the first road on the right. The studios are further up on the right (opposite Jigsaw), and the restaurant is on the second floor.

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12th March 2010

Review: March’s Central Birmingham Social Media Surgery

Jamie and Jean work on the Civic Centre Residents' Association blog

At another brilliant Central Birmingham Social Media Surgery in thestudio we saw a host of exciting and interesting projects either getting off the ground or being developed still further. Read more

9th March 2010

Stuff I've seen March 7th through to March 9th

These are my links for March 7th through March 9th:

The State of Social Media Around the World 2010 –
JFDI vs Being Boring – "Don’t let strategy and process get in the way of doing good stuff. At the same time, don’t JFDI and find yourself exposed."
New Proposal – “Community DigiLand Bank Register” « Birmingham Social Investment Trust – Interesting idea – perhaps citizens can put and on the map and someone in the council can flag it if they own it – with information about who to talk to?: "One idea that came out of the discussion would be for the public or council owned land to be registered and available for all communities to view on a new web based ” Community – DigiLand Bank Register”, maybe using googelmaps as a base and thereby allowing citizens to geotag and photo any plots they become aware of or are interested in."
WxWM – Sue Ellen Haz A Thirsty | Saturday Social 13th March 2010 « WxWM – "There are no tables booked. We live life by the seat of our pants and guffaw loudly in the face of caution and planning."
OGC – Home – "The Office of Government Commerce (OGC) is an independent office of HM Treasury, established to help Government deliver best value from its spending"

25th February 2010

What it’s like to go to your first Social Media Surgery

Social Media Surgery February thestudio — The surgeries are informal place to find out about social media

So what if you’ve never been to a social media surgery? You might have a few questions, right? We thought it might be good to answer a few.

So what is a social media surgery?
Social Media Surgeries are just a fun, informal way for people to meet and learn how to use social media for social good.

What is social media?
Social media is a loose term that is applied to a range of tools that use the world wide web to bring people together and communicate – including blogs and social networking sites, such as Twitter and Facebook.

How do social media surgeries work?
Our surgeries consist of patients (the people who come to learn stuff) and surgeons (the people who can answer their questions). We pair surgeons with patients, so that the patients can learn all about how to use social media.

Who should come to social media surgeries?
Our surgeries are for anyone involved in community and voluntary organisations who is looking for new, more effective ways to communicate about the work that they do. Patients don’t need to know about computers. It’s much more important that you are keen to learn and that you have something to say!

Who are social media surgeons?
The surgeons are all terribly nice people who’ve volunteered their time for free to help people. They come from a variety of backgrounds, but they all want other people to be able to make good use of the power that comes from effectively using social media.

What happens when you get to a social media surgery?
Imagine a big coffee morning, except it’s probably in the evening! We pair surgeons with patients after quickly finding out what people would like to learn. You get to sit with a surgeon who can help you with whatever question or issue you’ve got.

What can you expect to get out of a social media surgery?
Well, that’s entirely dependent on what you want to get. Lots of people who come want to set up blogs – simple websites where they can publicise what they are doing. Other people are interested in using Twitter, or other social networking services. Often people come back to learn more and more. Sometimes people who first arrived at surgeries as patients become surgeons themselves.

Is there anything I need to bring?
No. The surgeons have computers, so you don’t need to worry. Of course, if you have a laptop and can carry it easily then please bring it along.

Where can I find out more?
To find out how the surgeries started you can read this post. John Popham, who runs surgeries in Yorkshire, has done a good job of explaining things in this podcast. This site, Podnosh, gives details of new surgeries in Birmingham and elsewhere.

Where are the social media surgeries?

You can mostly fine them here:

http://www.socialmediasurgery.com/