The Yammer Blog

Yammer Best Practices -- Increase Adoption & Engagement

1.  Fill out your Profile so your colleagues know what skills you possess. Be sure to add a Profile photo.

2.  Fill out your Org-Chart. The Org Chart is what drives the following suggestions engine, which ensures you're receiving relevant updates and sending updates to relevant colleagues.

3.  When you first join, be sure to introduce yourself. Stating your role at the company and how long you've been there is usually a great way to break the ice.

4.  Watch the Yammer Video Tour to understand how to use Yammer and the value it provides:

5.  Set up your mobile device with iPhone app, Blackberry app, and/or SMS:

6.  Install the Desktop or FireFox Extension on your computer:

7.  Read the Yammer How-To-Guide:

8.  Keep messages short, think "elevator speech": readers should be able to read your post in less than 7 seconds.

9.  To send a private message to another user start your message with to:username. The advantage of private 1 to 1 Yammer messages, over IM, is that your messages are archived and searchable forever by you and the recipient.

10.  Use @username to address a particular person. Address specific colleagues if the update pertains to them or if they should respond. You can also reply to another update, with @username, to accomplish the same thing.

11.  Join Groups you're interested in here:

If there's not a Group for your department, create the Group here:

Be sure to invite or add the people in your department to the Group as well.

12.  Post your message to the most relevant Group and use Tags, if applicable. This ensures proper message delivery to members who deem themselves as experts or interested in the subject matter.

13.  If you forget to add a tag to a message, simply reply to the message with the tag. Entire threads are associated with tags.

14.  Don't worry about people receiving messages that they may not be interested in. Yammer is structured so the recipient can choose what content they receive based on what or who they follow. Just make sure you post to the most relevant Group and use the appropriate Tags.

15.  Tell other people what you're working every time you switch projects or when you or your team delivers something significant.

16.  Prefer messages with business value rather than personal status update (try to avoid messages such as "I just had a good lunch" and such)

17.  Before asking your colleagues a question, Search Yammer using the search bar in the upper right. It may have already been answered.  (reduce redundancy)

18.  Turn threaded view On, in bottom left corner of feed, if discussion threads are hard to follow or you're trying to catch up after a lot of activity.

19.  Receiving too many emails from Yammer? Fine-tune your notification preferences within your email settings.

20.  Check the #joined tag feed to see who's joined recently. Welcome new members as they join and make yourself available to answer questions.

21.  Encourage conversation by taking a controversial stance on something that matters to you and your colleagues. It will get people engaged.

22.  Ask the question: "What value do you get from Yammer?" and post an example. It will help everyone understand.

23.  Develop an internal Yammer resource group within the organization. (i.e. people like you) can assist new users with questions and also help publicize and demonstrate new features. Ideally, these individuals should be familiar with the Yammer Blog, Forum, and follow @yammer_team on Twitter.

Using Yammer Groups as Email Distribution Lists

You’ve always been able to post messages on Yammer via email. Using the email address associated with your account, send your message to:

yammer@yammer.com - to post a message to your followers
[groupname]@yammer.com - to post a message to a specific group

Many clients are using Yammer groups to implement email distribution lists. If you’ve ever set up a list on Exchange or another internal email server, you know that creating, removing, or changing lists means filing a request with IT and... waiting.

Why wait? Just set up a group in Yammer! You get all the advantages of an archived, searchable, taggable Yammer group along with your email list. You’ll be able to pull up files and links posted to the list instantly, even months after they were sent. New hires will be able to browse existing threads on Yammer, helping them get oriented and productive quickly. And your IT team will thank you.

It’s just a few simple steps to get started:

1.  Click the “Groups” tab

   

2.  Click “Create new group”

  

3.  Name and customize your group. The group name will become the list’s email address (groupname@yammer.com). If you want anyone to be able to join, view, or post to the group, make it public. If the information is sensitive or you want to control users’ access to the group, make it private.

 4.  Next, add the email addresses of your new group’s members. Be sure to check the following checkboxes (as seen below):

            •    Add these members without an invitation
            •    Email

Click “Save” and you’ve created both a Yammer group and email distribution list. Each post to the group will be delivered to group members via email.  The group members don’t even have to join Yammer to start sending and receiving messages to the group. And users who prefer to use Yammer’s web, desktop, mobile, or other clients to interact with the group can switch off email delivery and interact with the group using their preferred client. Setting this up probably took less time than it would’ve taken just to file a request with the IT department.

REMEMBER: This is a great way to guarantee message delivery, but you don’t want to flood the members of the group with too many emails. At any time, group members can choose not to receive emails for messages posted to the group by changing their email notification settings. Group members can also leave the group at any time.

Create a Yammer Group Today!

Receiving Too Many Yammer Messages?

One of the most valuable aspects of Yammer is the ability to control the content you receive. As opposed to email where the sender has control over distribution of the content, Yammer empowers the receiver to control the content they receive. This enables you to surface only the content that is most relevant and interesting to you.

With our latest release, which included the Groups feature, we made a few changes in regards to the updates that you receive by default. Aesthetically, we changed the name of the Following feed to My Feed. We also changed some of the functionality:

• Following feed - Only messages from people or including tags that you follow
• My Feed - All messages from people, tags or groups that you are following and your General Feed, which consists of, all messages not posted to a Group.

The reason we include General Feed messages in My Feed is mainly because we changed the default tab from the All feed to My Feed. Therefore, people that were not using the 'following' feature would still receive updates. At the same time, the noise was reduced because many people started using the Groups feature and Group messages are not included in the My Feed, unless you joined the particular group in which the message is posted to.

If you were using the Following feed before this latest release, or your network is large, and or you are receiving too many updates because of the addition of General Feed messages, you can easily disable the General Feed. To do this follow these steps:

1. Click the My Feed vertical tab
2. Click the 'i' icon on the My Feed vertical tab



3. Disable the General Feed check box

This change will revert the functionality of the My Feed to only display the messages from people, tags, and groups you are following. If you're receiving too many uninteresting messages in your My Feed, this modification may be of interest to you.

For information about the 4 default Yammer Feeds, you can read more here.

7 Ways to Send and Receive Yammer Updates

Since day one, Yammer has enabled you to send and receive updates through your choice of 7 different mediums. The reason for providing such a vast arsenal is for you to feel comfortable and confident that you can communicate with co-workers anytime, no matter your location or working preferences. Below you will find each of the 7 ways to send and receive Yammer updates, and some qualities of each:

1. Desktop Application:

The desktop application enables you to view all of the feeds, send new updates, or reply to existing updates. It doesn't occupy a browser window or tab and can be sized to save valuable desktop real estate. The light and low profile nature is the main reason it's the most widely used Yammer application. You can choose from any of the three color schemes displayed below, depending on your preference. The ability to follow people or tags from the desktop application has been highly requested and will be available soon. Also note that you must be able to install Adobe AIR to use this application.

 

2. Blackberry Application:

The Blackberry Application is one of the Yammer mobile applications. Wherever you have adequate phone service you will be able to view all the Yammer feeds, send and receive updates, as well as reply to existing updates. You can also view full conversation threads in a single feed through the blackberry application.

3. iPhone Application:

The iPhone application is another Yammer mobile application which enables you to do everything the Blackberry application does. In addition, the iPhone application offers a members directory that lists everyone in your Yammer network. From there you can call or email each person with a simple touch. The added ability to follow people directly from the members directory is coming soon. Stay tuned.

4. IM:

Receiving and sending messages through IM is available. Much like the desktop application, your IM buddy list takes up very little desktop real estate. You can receive IM messages when a message is posted to Yammer that meets the criteria you set. You can determine whether you receive all messages, all messages you're following, or only messages addressed to you. You can also specify a time period where you don't receive updates. To start or stop receiving IM's is as easy as sending the "On" or "Off" command to the Yammer IM bot. Currently, Yammer supports Gtalk, AIM, and Jabber for IM.

5. SMS Text Messaging:

If you like the mobile capabilities but don't have an iPhone or Blackberry you may want to use SMS text messaging. You can determine whether you receive all messages you are following or just messages addressed to you. Posting an update is as easy as sending a text message to 30201.  Because you sync your phone with Yammer prior to using SMS, Yammer automatically knows what network the message should be directed to. Currently, Yammer only supports U.S mobile carriers for SMS, but International support will be available very soon.

6. Email:

Sending and receiving updates via email can be used by both computers and mobile phones. To email an update simply send an email to yammer@yammer.com from your primary email address associated with your Yammer account. For receiving Yammer messages via email, you can determine whether you want to receive all messages you are following or just messages addressed to you.

7. Web Client:

The Web Client, due to the fact that it offers every feature in one central location, is widely used. Through the web client you can:

• Send and receive new updates
• Reply to existing updates
• View all feeds in message or threaded view
• Follow tags and people
• Search for tags, people, or keywords
• Members, tags, and links directory
• Profiles for each co-worker
• Invite co-workers manually or through address book importer

 

All of the application listed above were developed internally by Yammer through the Yammer API. However, since Yammer recently opened it's API developers platform, any developer can create additional applications. Therefore, you should expect to see many more variations of ways to send and receive Yammer updates, for you to choose from and use.

Following is your friend

The default feed on Yammer is the "All" feed, which includes messages posted by anyone in your network. As your network grows, you can use the "Following" feed to surface the information that is most significant to you. This custom feed only includes messages posted by the people you follow or that include the tags you follow.  This filter enables you to determine which messages you want to receive, based on the content you feel is most relevant. 

Following the people and tags that you find most interesting is the key to getting the most out of the following tab. 

Following people

When you follow someone in your network, all of their messages will appear in your Following feed. For example, you can follow colleagues who work on the same projects as you, are involved in interesting initiatives in your organization, and who share insightful links. And of course, don’t forget to follow your boss!

Click on a colleague’s name or picture to reach their profile, then use the blue “Follow” button to the right of their name to follow them. You can also find and follow lots of colleagues quickly through the members directory, reached by clicking the “Members” tab.

Following tags

When you follow a tag, you will see every message that includes the tag in your Following feed. Follow tags related to projects you are working on, topics of interest, or just for fun. Tags can be used for topics as significant as #revenue and even as ordinary as a #coffee, to announce when fresh coffee is ready. To view the tags being used in your network visit the Tags page, reached by clicking the "Tags" tab.

Use the blue “Follow” button on tag pages to follow tags that you are interested in. When you follow a tag, you will see every message in your Following feed that includes that tag.

For more tips to get the most out of Yammer, read the How-To Guide.

Getting Started on Yammer

Because traditional enterprise software requires your IT department to install software, create users, and drive adoption among employees, many of you have asked "how do I get my company to start using Yammer?" Here are three simple steps that you can use to create your company's network on Yammer:

1. Go to Yammer.com and enter your company email address
2. Use the email we sent you to confirm your email address
3. Enter your profile information and invite your colleagues

That's it! You have now created the Yammer network at your company. Even better, if anyone else has already started the network, you can use the same three steps to join the existing network.

Make sure you introduce yourself with a hello message when you join your network. When you post a message to Yammer, it can only be read by others in your network. The privacy of your company network is ensured by limiting access to those with a valid company email address.

Remember, your Yammer network is more useful as more of your colleagues join Yammer, so make sure you invite other in your group, thought leaders, and anyone else you are interested in.

Here are a few other notes in response to feedback we have received:

• User accounts are always free and admin accounts are not required
• There are no limits to the number of users on a network
• No required software to download and install
• SSL and SMS are always included for free
• Anyone on the network can suspend former employees by making them re-confirm their email

We are rapidly developing additional features for Yammer, and would love to hear your feedback. Visit the Yammer Forum to let us know what you think.