Walton Search Blog

One of the first things people signing on to Twitter or Facebook ask is how to keep up with all of the content coming through the content streams. The more people you follow the more tweets and comments to read. The real answer at least for me is you don’t read them all but there is a way to manage the stream and filter through to the important stuff you want to read to remain active with your most important contacts.

The best way to do that is by using a social web browser such as TweetDeck. TweetDeck combines all of your Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, FourSquare and Google Buzz into one stream of content. Instead of signing into different accounts it allows you to read, sort, respond to all of your connections in one spot. TweetDeck also has a large number of other time saving and useful features such as spell check, tweet and URL shorteners, even a mute button if you have an active commenter you want to not see for awhile. Tweetdeck is also available via iPhone and iPad.

Seesmic is similar to Tweetdeck and offers a number of similar features such as image and URL shorterners. Seesmic also works on BlackBerry and Android Smartphones.

One of the most useful features of some of the social browsers is the ability to sort your users into lists. If you were doing a job search you might want to create different columns for the companies and people you are following or keep tabs with recruiters you may be working with. You can also create columns by keywords and you could create a column based on the job title you are searching for. Unlike doing a search once for users you might not be following, a search column keeps a running stream of content from users you may or may not be connected with. In other words you do not need to be connected to continue to follow their comments as long as their posts are public. As with job seekers this is an excellent tool to user for businesses to keep an active eye on what is being said about their company and be able to interact with possible leads. 

Some other applications you might want to check out include:

Flock – Flock runs as a side bar and makes it easy to drop and share content you view on the web with you connections.

Yoono – Yoono is a great Firefox add on now available for Windows to maintain your connections and includes other chat platform such as Yahoo Messenger, Google Talk, MSN Messenger and AOL Instant Messenger . Almost a must for heavy Firefox users.

Hootsuite  – Hootsuite offers some additional useful tools such as analyzers, Wordpress intergration and the ability to schedule tweets. It also allows multiple users to be able to gain access to a company profile. A great tool for a company to have if you want to have someone consistantly available to monitor and respond to comments.

Are you using a social browser currently? We’d love to hear about and what tools you find most useful.