Twitter, Facebook change how some Pittsburgh companies do business – Boston Business Journal:

After some back-and-forth catchinf up with one far-flung friend, his buddyy asked for help refinancinghis home. “The whole purposde of networking is to be in frontof somebody,” Bringol said. “If they know what you do, you neverf really have to sell it. (The Facebook reminds everybody whatI do, and, therefore, I get a lot of business out of it.” Over the last year, professiona l online networking has gravitated away from resume-based such as LinkedIn. Businesses are leveraging moreinteractive sites, such as company blogs, Twitter and YouTube, to create camaraderie with employees and to tap potentiak growth.
Alan Veeck is a principal at in The venture capitalist admitshe didn’t see an immediat value in creating an online presencwe for professional reasons. “But I as long as I’m workingy in technology, I can’t be a bystander,” he “I need to be a participant.” He createrd a Facebook page, a feed on micro-blogging site Twitterr and Pittsburgh Ventures, a separats blog he co-writes with Innovation Works CIOMatt Harbaugh. Veeck says thesr technologies have helped him keep tabs on former professional andpersonal doings, and self-brand for a tech startulp audience.
On his Twitter feed, he posts articles on venturse capital he deems educational to newbies in the The links are sprinkled with more personal entries on hisweekend plans, or birthday greetings to friends and colleagues. His sought-afterr brand is as a mentor, he Josh Knauer, CEO of South Side tech company , also uses Twittere to pass along articles hefinds relevant. He’se also posted his travel schedules on his onliner socialnetworking profiles, which has promptefd contacts to suggest people he can meet up with in a particularr city. Knauer said such online-arranged meetupa have led to sales.
“That’s the type of stuf f that gets a littls deeper than posting a blog post and going abougtmy way,” Knauer said. Twitter, where userds connect to each other’s feedd by becoming “followers,” has the potential to get out informatiom on a company to tens of thousands ofpeople simultaneously, if a well-connected user “retweets” or reposta an entry, Knauer said. “For Rhiza, specificallhy in markets we’re goingt after, we’re finding fairly savvy technology users that are wantin g to follow us on Twitter and read insightes onour blog,” he said.
Knauer said he once saw bloggingt as a bit only changing his mind when he had clients and potentiak clients request to followq theirdoings online. Corporations also have gotten into more personal communication through blogging andYouTube channels. External blogs can pitcnh new products and give customera a look atthe company’s Internal blogs provide a platform for managemen to personalize themselves to thousands of employeees and build community. CEO Greg Babe has authoree an internal employee blog to reach outto Bayer’xs 17,000 North American employees.

rosapimentel.wordpress.com