Monday 5 April 2010

Revamping the Blog

I've had a such a great time tonight, working with Sarah Stewart, the queen of using social media for updating about midwifery and education. Sarah has been wonderful, coaching me on getting the twitter link, the 24 hour virtual International day of the midwife link and putting the tags of my posts on the page.

Sarah's blog is well worth exploring as there are some great tips for anyone who wants to use this medium to get their message across. Sarah Stewart's blog  Sarah also has some timely advice for those of us who use Facebook and Twitter in terms of our professional responsibilities.  I think you will find what she has to say very thought provoking and useful.

I would love your feedback about the new look and any other suggestions you may have for my blog.

18 comments:

Susan Brazil said...

Fabuous new look, congratulations

Thinkbirth said...

Thanks SuzieB! I appreciate you taking the time to comment. I've had a lot of fun doing the changes and learning how to use twitter and put the tags on the page. I've learnt, thanks to Sarah Stewart, to have key tags for my posts, so that people can easily access the information. I'm very grateful for her input. She is very cluey. warmly, Carolyn

Sarah Stewart said...

Thank you very much for your kind comments - everything I have passed on to you has been stuff that soemone coached me about, so just paying things forward.

What I think is totally amazing is how we were able to work together last night, in different countries and times zones, using our blogs and Gtalk for online collaboration. This is what we need to be encouraging midwives to do.

Thinkbirth said...

Thank YOU Sarah! You are right, the evening was wonderful, who could imagine you could have so much fun on Gtalk and checking the blog updates as we went. I can see there is so much scope for international interfacing and working together (I'm not that keen on the word 'collaboration'). The 24hr Virtual International Day of the Midwife on the 5th May has the potential to be truly wonderful for everyone who participates. I really appreciate the enviro-friendly sustainability aspect of this medium and this way of working together does enable us to cross time zones and geographical zones that would be impossible for many otherwise.

Sarah Stewart said...

Why don't you like the word 'collaboration'?

Thinkbirth said...

Hi Sarah, in many minds, the word 'collaboration' conjures up ideas about war time collaborators who worked to keep people suppressed. I've had that reaction from some when talking about midwife/doctor relationships in the care of birthing women. I believe that word is still too heavily 'loaded' from relatively recent history to be a useful word for what we need to do with our inter-professional relationships.

Anonymous said...

Wondeful new look, can see alot of time and effort going into this. Well done!!!

Regards
Jannette

Thinkbirth said...

Thanks Jannette! Grateful that you have had a look and given your impression. I'm having fun with it and Sarah's been wonderful. I think social media has a great place to play in information sharing and idea generating. What do you think? warmly, Carolyn

Kylie Corrigan said...

Great work Carolyn! How amazing are you and Sarah working together internationally - i just love that. Congratulations and keep up your inspirational work.

Thinkbirth said...

Thanks Kylie. I appreciate your feedback. Wonderful isn't it that we can work together across continents. I love that too and look forward to the IMD so we can see how well it works for our colleagues across the world to communicate and learn together in this medium.

Keryn said...

Great work Carolyn and Sarah!!! Your carbon footprint is certainly reduced....Fantastic work for a fantastic way of gathering information...Well done....
Regards
Keryn

Thinkbirth said...

Thank you Keryn for your positive comment! I agree about the reduction in our carbon footprint! Actually, what we ought to do for IMD is calculate the power used by the online medium and the input from midwives, women and other interested persons on IMD and their geographical areas/time zones and see if we can do a cost/benefit analysis. What do you think Sarah?

InfoMidwife said...

great revamp... love the soft approach to the blog... easier to read and more personality...brillant...congrats to both Sarah and Carolyn....you know what they say...great minds think alike...looking forward to the virtual IMD sessions....catch you soon.

Sarah Stewart said...

Not a bad idea, Carolyn...suggestions about how we do that would be gratefully receieved.

To be honest, we had very few turn up for live events last year and I have no idea how many people have seen recordings since. I have had it in my head that it would take 5 years for the virtual IDM to gain a real momentum. Having said that, since using Facebook as a place to advertise & have conversations, I have had a greater response than I expected.

Thinkbirth said...

Thanks Pauline (infomidwife) I appreciate your comments. I'm looking forward to IMD too and the virtual conference. I'm looking forward to seeing how the whole thing works for people. Sarah is a genius putting it all together. I'm loving learning from her.

Thinkbirth said...

Sarah, you could be right about the 5 years time frame. Facebook is certainly useful for getting the news out to people. Midwives of the 20-35 generation are much more techno savvy that those at my end of the age scale, so I suspect once they know about the conference, they will embrace it wholeheartedly. I've got a couple of ideas for promoting the conference on various student blogs. This conversation needs another blog post!

Sarah Stewart said...

That's the trouble with this blogging business...one post leads to another!! :)

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