BCOM ch. 7

Marketers can use ________ to link the virtual world of online social networking with the physical world of retail stores.

location-based social networking

One strategy an organization should use to build its social network is to

maintain a persistent online personality.

When you're applying the three-step writing process to blogging, the planning step will include

targeting the audience that you intend to reach.

Marketers use microblogging systems to send ________ that withhold key information, in order to attract the attention of current and prospective customers.

teasers.

In an organization, the use of ________ would be most effective when updating employees at remote locations during a time of emergency.

text messages

One of the greatest drawbacks to using podcasts in business is

the challenge listeners face when trying to find specific parts of the message.

One of the biggest attractions of podcasting is

the conversations, person-to-person feel of the recording.

When organizing content for a podcast, steering devices such as ________ are especially important.

transitions

Social media has the ability to increase ________, allowing stakeholders to better monitor business activities.

transparency

In order to use instant messaging (IM) productively in the workplace,

treat IM as a professional communication medium.

Because many email programs display the first few words or lines of incoming messages, you should

treat the first sentence of the message as an extension of your subject line.

Twitter-ready bites of information, extracted from a blog post or other message, are called

tweetables

As it pertains to instant messaging, ________ involves making sure that online correspondents are really who they appear to be.

user authentication

A ________ is a social media site where users, not owners, contribute most of the content.

user-generated content site

YouTube, Wikipedia, and Twitter are popular examples of

user-generated content sites.

Retweeting is the practice of forwarding messages from other Twitter users. It is the microblogging equivalent of

using content curation to share content from other bloggers.

To make it easier for people to find and follow an organization, all social media from the organization should be organized in a central hub, a

web presence that anchors the online presence.

When writing for social media, one should

write informally, but carefully.

If you do not have a constant supply of new information to post on a business blog,

you should create a traditional website instead.

If a customer uses the comment feature to criticize the content of your business blog,

you should respond promptly and honestly.

Community Q&A sites offer opportunities for building your personal brand. When you're responding to an individual's question, keep in mind that

you're responding in advance to anyone who has the same question and visits the site.

Give at least three examples of how podcasts could replace more traditional message formats in business.

(Answers may vary.) Real estate agents could record audio podcasts that potential homebuyers could listen to while walking through homes. Marketing departments could replace expensive printed brochures with video podcasts that demonstrate new products in action. Human resource departments could use podcasts to offer video tours of their companies to entice new recruits.

When it comes to writing messages in today's business environment,

printed messages are still preferred for formal correspondence or a court of law.

List at least three general situations in which you would send a printed version of a business message instead of using an electronic medium.

A printed message is especially appropriate (1) when you want to make a formal impression, (2) when you are legally required to provide information in printed form, (3) when you want to stand out from the flood of electronic messages your audience receives, and (4) when you need a permanent, unchangeable, or secure record.

Explain how to apply the three-step writing process to instant messages.

Although instant messages are often conceived, written, and sent within a matter of seconds, the principles of the three-step process still apply. In planning instant messages, view every IM exchange as a conversation and take a moment to plan the overall exchange. Think through the specific needs of your audience, and try to deliver information in a coherent, complete way that minimizes the number of individual messages required. When writing instant messages, remember that the appropriate writing style for business IM is more formal than the style you may be accustomed to with personal IM or text messaging. Avoid IM acronyms except when communicating with close colleagues. The completing phase is easy when it comes to IM. Once you've selected some basic font settings that apply to all your messages, you generally don't need to do anything in terms of producing each message, and distributing is as simple as clicking the "send" button. However, don't skip over the revising and proofreading tasks, and make sure your message contains all the necessary information.

When using social networking for personal branding and company communication, why is it important to anchor your presence in a central hub?

Although it's important to join those conversations and be visible where your stakeholders are active, it's equally important to anchor your presence at your own central hub-a web presence you own and control. This can be a combination of a conventional website, a blog, and a company-sponsored online community, for example. Use the hub to connect the various pieces of your online "self" (as an individual or a company) to make it easier for people to find and follow you. For example, you can link to your blog from your LinkedIn profile or automatically post your blog entries into the Notes tab on your Facebook page.

What are the characteristics of an effective email subject line?

An effective subject line is both informative and compelling, and captures the audience's attention. It does more than just describe or classify message content. It also builds interest with key words, quotations, directions, or questions.

Identify the nine compositional modes that apply to electronic media in the workplace.

Communicating successfully with electronic media requires a wide range of writing approaches. Fortunately, you can write successful messages in virtually all electronic media by using one of the following compositional modes: conversations, comments and critiques, orientations, summaries, reference materials, narratives, teasers, status updates and announcements, and tutorials.

________ for electronic media include conversations, comments and critiques, orientations, summaries, and narratives.

Compositional modes

Many businesses now use blogs to

keep project teams up to date.

What are emoticons? Why are they controversial in business communication?

Email is a lean medium, so expressing emotional nuances in an email message will challenge even experienced communicators. Therefore, users of email (IM and texting too) have developed emoticons to express emotions in casual communication. Over the years, using emoticons in business communication has been widely regarded as unprofessional. Recently, though, more professionals seem to be using them, particularly for communication with close colleagues, even as other professionals still view them as evidence of lazy or immature writing. Given these conflicting perspectives, think carefully before including an emoticon in a workplace email. As a rule, avoid emoticons for all types of external communication and for formal internal communication, and avoid those bright yellow graphical emoticons in all business communication.

Always read from a prepared script when creating podcasts for business.

False

An effective email subject line is very short and describes only the general topic of the message.

False

Because each electronic medium has unique requirements, basic communication skills do not usually transfer from one system to another.

False

Gamification links the virtual world of online social networking with the physical world of retail stores and other locations.

False

Spelling, punctuation, and grammar don't matter in email; getting your message out quickly should be your only concern.

False

Which of the following is a compelling advantage of IM in the workplace?

IM closely resembles one-on-one conversations.

When creating podcasts for business, should you script them entirely and read them word-for-word? Briefly explain your answer.

In podcasts, it is generally best to speak from an outline and notes rather than from a script. One of the attractions of podcasting is the conversational, person-to-person feel of the recordings. A scripted performance can reduce or eliminate these characteristics.

How can internal social networks foster collaboration and build communities within the organization?

Just as public networks can bring friends and family together, internal social networks can help companies grow closer, including helping new employees navigate their way through the organization, finding experts, mentors, and other important contacts; encouraging workforces to "jell" after reorganizations or mergers; and overcoming structural barriers in communication channels, bypassing the formal communication system to deliver information where it is needed in a timely fashion. Networks can play a major role in collaboration by identifying the best people, both inside the company and in other companies, to collaborate on projects; finding pockets of knowledge and expertise within the organization; giving meeting or seminar participants a way to meet before an event and to maintain relationships after an event; accelerating the development of teams by helping members get to know one another and to identify individual areas of expertise; and sharing information throughout the organization.

What is location-based social networking? Why is it important to business communication?

Location-based social networking links the virtual world of online social networking with the physical world of retail stores and other locations. As mobile web use in general continues to grow, location-based networking promises to become an important business communication medium because mobile consumers are a significant economic force - through the purchases they make directly and through their ability to influence other consumers

List at least three drawbacks of using instant messaging in business.

Potential disadvantages of using IM in business include (1) security problems such as computer viruses, network infiltration, and intercepted messages; (2) the need for user authentication; (3) the challenge of logging messages for later review and archiving; and (4) spim (unsolicited commercial messages, similar to email spam).

Which of the following would be the most effective headline for a new posting on a business blog?

Seven Reasons To Switch Your Smartphone Carrier

________ involves using social networks and social media to give customers a convenient way to get help from a company.

Social customer service

What opportunities and challenges are associated with the use of instant messaging in the workplace?

The benefits of using IM in the workplace include rapid response to urgent messages, lower cost than phone calls, ability to mimic conversation more closely than email, and availability on a wide range of devices and systems. In addition, because it resembles one-on-one conversation, IM's harder to misuse as a one-to-many broadcast method. However, IM is not without its drawbacks. IT departments that maintain IM platforms are challenged by security issues, user authentication, logging and archiving messages, incompatible IM platforms, and spim. Finally, because IM is a lean medium, it lacks nonverbal cues, which increases the chances of miscommunication.

Explain how inappropriate use of email at work can lead to legal problems.

The consequences of bad writing or poor judgment in email can be serious. For example, email messages and other electronic documents have the same legal weight as printed documents, and they are often used as evidence in lawsuits and criminal investigations.

Discuss how differentiating between various digital media tools can get complicated as systems and people use those tools in new and creative ways.

The lines that differentiate digital media communication tools (e.g., instant messaging, texting, microblogging, and podcasting) often get blurry as systems expand their capabilities or people use them in new ways. For example, Facebook Messages integrates IM, text messages, and email capabilities, in addition to being a social networking system. Moreover, the mobile variants of digital technologies add another layer of challenges and opportunities for business communicators. For example, the ability to scan coded labels such as barcodes or the similar Quick Response (QR) codes attached to printed materials, products, or store windows (or the ability to pick up radio signals from near-field communication tags) gives smartphone users a way to get more information—from the companies themselves and from other consumers providing reviews on social websites.

In a court of law, email messages and other electronic documents can have the same weight as printed documents.

True

In business communication, email is often replaced by other tools that provide better support for instant communication and real-time collaboration.

True

Smartphones and tablets are ideal for mobile blogging.

True

The completing step is where podcasting differs most dramatically from written communication.

True

Writing "teasers" on microblogging sites can be effective, as long as the payoffs to which they lead are valuable and legitimate.

True

Explain the role of a community manager at the workplace.

With the rise in social media over the past few years and its transformative effect on business, community manager is one of the hottest new jobs in business. In the narrowest sense, a community manager is the social media interface between a company and its external stakeholders. More broadly, some community managers also plan and manage corporate events and oversee customer support operations. In smaller firms, the community manager might be the sole voice in a company's social media presence (running its Twitter account and Facebook pages, for example). In larger firms, the job often entails supervising a team of people who carry out a broad range of audience-engagement activities.

Many companies have formal email policies that include restrictions on sending

all of the above.

Email hygiene refers to

all the efforts companies make to keep email clean and safe.

When you're blogging for business,

apply the three-step writing process as you would for any other business message.

Training content on a mobile device that is provided as workers are learning tasks is referred to as

augmented reality.

Which of the following will help you write effective email messages?

avoid sending long, complex messages

The ability to update content quickly and easily makes ________ a natural medium when communicators want to get messages out in a hurry.

blogs and microblogs

A community of interest that forms around a specific product is sometimes called a

brand community

A company can use ________ as a measure of how effectively it is engaging its various online stakeholders in a mutually beneficial exchange of information.

brand socialization

The measure of how effectively a company engages with online stakeholders is

brand socialization

Starbucks Coffee, Animal Planet, and Turner Classic Movies offer videos to their followers via their ________ on YouTube.

branded channels

People who engage in similar work, even though they might be geographically dispersed, are known as

communities of practice.

Social networks are a natural tool for bringing together ________, people who engage in similar work, and ________, people who share enthusiasm for a particular product or activity.

communities of practice; communities of interest

In an organization, the ________ is the social media interface between a company and its external stakeholders.

community manager

In terms of the three-step writing process, podcasts differ mostly from written messages in the ________ step.

completing

As an alternative to newsfeeds, ________ involves aggregating (gathering) and curating (sorting, categorizing, and presenting) information on a particular topic in a way that makes it convenient for targeted readers.

content curation

Providing free information that is valuable to the audience but also helps a company build closer ties with customers is called

content marketing.

Consuming large amounts of small pieces of information instead of reviewing a larger document is referred to as

content snacking.

You can plan for important business exchanges via IM by viewing them as

conversations with specific goals in mind.

A(n) ________ includes items such as your name, title, company, and contact information at the end of your email messages.

email signature

Some email users employ ________ to express emotional nuances in casual or informal email messages.

emoticons

Twitter users consider ________ to be the most valuable kind of tweets.

engaging messages, such as asking followers for advice

Which of the following is important when you're completing messages for your blog?

evaluating the content and readability of your message

Which one of the following is a planning step in creating effective email messages?

following company email guidelines and policies

The term ________ represents the use of game thinking in mobile apps and web services to engage audiences.

gamification

RSS feeds can benefit readers who want to subscribe to timely updates from websites or to aggregate feeds from many sites. However, a drawback to RSS feeds involves the "fire-hose effect" of

getting so many feeds so fast that it's impossible to manage them.

The subject line of an email message

helps recipients decide whether to read the message.

When using IM to communicate with clients and vendors, your greatest concern is likely to be

incompatibility between your company's IM system and the systems your vendors and clients use.

Social networks are used for many business communication needs because the networks can

integrate the company work force.

Using "teasers" in electronic media as a way to pull readers or listeners into a story or other document

is acceptable, as long as the payoff is valuable and legitimate.

When a summary appears at the beginning of an article or webpage,

it acts as a miniature version of the document.

Advantages of using IM rather than email include

its ability to hold real-time text conversations.

Compared to blogs, podcasts are

more difficult to edit.

When you're creating a blog, include one or more ________ so that your audience can receive headlines and blog-post summaries automatically.

newsfeed options

The practice of content marketing involves ________, in order to build closer ties with current and potential online customers.

offering free information that's valuable to community members

Compared to email, instant messaging (IM)

offers greater speed.

A ________ is the online equivalent of recorded radio or video broadcasts.

podcast

A ________ offers regular podcasts on a consistent theme, designed for a public audience.

podcasting channel

Many companies are now using ________ to replace or supplement some conference calls, training courses, and other communication activities.

podcasts

The ________ feature of instant messaging enables users to see which people are at their desks and available to IM.

presence awareness

When you're posting comments on social media,

provide short "chunks" of information that can help others who visit the site.

Networks that focus on a particular function or audience are known as

public, specialized networks.

When you're writing email messages in the workplace, remember that business emails

require a higher level of quality than personal emails.

Companies can use a research technique called ________ to track social networks and other media to (1) take the pulse of public opinion and (2) identify opinion makers.

sentiment analysis

Email messages

should be written with the assumption that they will be stored forever.

The use of ________ represents a fundamental shift in business communication.

social media

Online services that help people and organizations form connections and share information are generally referred to as

social networks

An unsolicited IM from a company informing you of their great rates on vacations in Hawaii is an example of

spim

The ________ of an email is important because it helps readers decide whether to read the message or delete it.

subject line