iGoogle is one easy-to-create and easy-to-use dashboard.  Here’s how to do it:

1. If you don’t already have a Google account, set one up.
   If you have an account, sign in.
2. Once you’ve signed in to your Google account, click on the gear icon on the top right and select iGoogle.
3. If this is your first time using iGoogle, you’ll see the setup wizard called “Create your own homepage in under 30 seconds.”
4. Once you have the iGoogle page set up, you can being to create your dashboard.
5. Organize your dashboard into tabs for easier analysis – next to the Home tab there is a drop down menu.
6. Choose Add a tab and and name the tab according to the categories of content you plan to monitor.

Brand names, competitors, descriptive phrases about your products, and so on.

7.  Now add feeds of content to each tab.

8.  In a new browser window go to the web, news and social search engines and do a search for the brand names and phrases you have chosen to monitor.  You can use Yahoo News, IceRocket, Social Mention or Topsy. (If you use Icerocket  or Topsy remember to adjust the language you want to see.)

8. Find the RSS feed for each search. You may have to hunt around the page, but it will be there.

9.   Click that link and follow the instructions to add it to your Google Homepage

And voila!  Once you have added all the search feeds from news. blogs, twitter etc., you should have a dashboard that looks something like this

Monitor these feeds of conversations every day for two weeks.  Make a spreadsheet and keep track of conversations that are particularly relevant or the people who talk about you or your competitors often, very positively or negatively.

This simple dashboard will help you organize your listening efforts.  If you analyze the content it will also be a great tool for learning what people are saying about you and how you should respond.

Once you have narrowed down the conversations and the people you need to follow you can upgrade to a paid dashboard.  You can use the phrases and feeds you know to be relevant and use a smarter tool for long term monitoring and social intelligence gathering.

For more Digital PR and social media tips

And as we strive to improve our conversations we have to improve our grasp of the basics of communication.  Take a new look at the 5Ws.

Who:  Who are the people we might want to have a conversation with – women, men, mothers, IT executives?  Are gardeners, nurses or grandmothers?  Are they young, old, well-educated, underserved?  Who talks about you?  Who uses your products and services?  Who has a need you might fill or a problem you could solve?

What: What are people saying about you? What do they think of your company, products and service?  What do they say about your competitors?  What needs do they have that you could identify and fill? What language do they speak – and by that I don’t just mean English, Spanish or Russian.  Engineers have a language.  Surfers have a language.

Where: Where are they gathering?  Where do these conversations take place?  Do some people talk about one subject on Facebook but another on Twitter?  Where are the threats and opportunities?

When: Are there certain times of the day or the week when conversations are more likely to take place? When are most of your fans and followers seeing your content?     When do they respond? That doesn’t only mean time – take a look at when they respond to content.  What did you post and when did you post it?

Why: Why would they want to have a conversation with you – what interests them, what content can you offer that would spark an interesting and positive conversation?  Why are they talking about you – is it positive or negative?  Is it something you could or should improve or fix?

How do you find all this out?  Listen.  Do more than just monitor brand mentions. Really listen.  Dig into the conversations and look for those W’s.

The 5W’s have been a basic part of PR for over a century.  They can also be the foundation of a successfuldigital PR strategy.

The first W is Who.

Unless you know who you are talking to, odds are your communication efforts won’t hit the mark.

Think back to the basic communication theory you learned at school: Who (says) What (to) Whom (in) What Channel (with) What Effect. (Laswell)

Let’s just start with the first part of that statement: Who says what to whom.

So someone has to be the originator of the communication. (That would be you) There has to be an idea, a concept, a message. You have to know what you want to say and who you are going to say it to.

This is not new, and it is not rocket science. But it seems to have been brushed aside in the new media era.

“We must be on Twitter, we need a Facebook page.” “Oh! Everyone is on Pinterest – let’s do that.” Without a thought to who is on those channels and what they’re are looking for or interested in. So you make lots of content and throw it against the Facebook wall to see if it sticks.

Then we hear comments like:

“Social media is hard to measure.”

“Where is the ROI in all this engagement?”

“I can’t see the point, it’s just a bunch of people nattering on about nothing.”

And studies that prove only a third of Tweets have any value.

So before you start producing content, spend some time analyzing your comm theory formula so you have a viable Digital PR strategy.

Concentrate on who you should be talking to and what they might find interesting and valuable.

Listen, learn and then respond.