Yammer is as awesome as you make it.

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Whether youre the new guy at a tech start-up or the founder of a multi-national corporation, your work environment is an important key to the success of your job and your company. Communication is key and Yammer is the most valuable communication tool in the ofce. Heres how to get the most out of it.

Yammer makes communication faster, easier, and more relevant to each person not to mention that its been a breeze from an IT standpoint.
Tobias Klauder | VP of Global Information Technology | Razorsh

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WHERE TO USE YAMMER: ONLINE + ON YOUR DESKTOP + ON YOUR PHONE + AT HOME + ON A + ON A BUS + + ON YOUR IPAD + IN BED + IN LINE + IN A IN A + AT SCHOOL + BY THE POOL + WAITING ROOM + ON A + UNDER THE SEA + ON A + AT THE THEATER AT THE SALON + IN KANSAS + AT THE OFFICE + AT THE LIBRARY + ANYWHERE WITH AN INTERNET CONNECTION.
but not while driving during intermission
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Tell everyone what youre working on.

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Tell people exactly what youre an expert in.

Your job title doesnt always do your background justice. List languages youre uent in, musical instruments you play, that certicate in conict resolution, and your excellent marshmallow roasting skills. You never know when those things might be needed.

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Play tag.
If you mention someone in a post, tag them by using the @ symbolthat way theyll know theyve been mentioned and get to feel popular.

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Show your true face.

Post a prole picture thats actually of you. When the people who notice you on Yammer recognize you in the hallway, the conversation might just spread into the ofine realm.

Weve found Yammer to be an excellent tool for identifying and connecting to the correct set of people for any given project, idea or opportunity.
Wilbur Swan | Senior Director of Product Management | ContactNet

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USE YAMMER ON SICK DAYS

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Start a group for everyone else who loves dachshunds.
But wait, its not about workor is it? Youll make connections that you wouldnt have otherwise. Then, if you ever happen to need something work-related from a group member, theyll be happy to help. Because heck, anyone who loves daschunds cant be all bad.

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Seek out coincidences.

Check out other peoples proles. You might discover a hidden connection with a colleague, like a shared birthday or mutual love of medieval folklore. Point out the coincidence and see where the conversation leads.

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Upload the project.

Whether its the new logo or a sales spreadsheet, Yammer is the perfect place to share what youre doing. Post almost any le type of almost any size, and the people you choose can preview and download it right from Yammer. Dont forget to give it a topic to make it easily ndable later.

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Give every post a topic.

Topics make posts easy to nd later, and easy to link earlier conversations to new ones.

Because were better connected, we have more of a sense of community and can operate at a higher level of efciency.
Nick Weaver | Chief Operating Ofcer | Stanford Student Enterprises

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ASK FOR FEEDBACK

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Say Thank You
All organizations have hurdles. Maybe its reaching a certain target market, nding a bigger ofce space, or making a department more appealing to job seekers. Sharing these issues on Yammer is only the rst steponce theyre resolved, let everyone know and thank them for pitching in. Next time, theyll be even happier to help.

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Share best practices.

Maybe youve developed your own, learned some at a recent conference, or downloaded a white paper. Share them with the team so you can spend less time justifying and more time working.

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Share what the competitors are doing.

Next time you read a blog post on the Joneses, share the link! With everyone in the company keeping an eye on the other guys, youll be able to carve out that corporate niche like never before. Plus, nothing unites a team like a common enemy.

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Post something every day.

You can post anything your progress on a project, a link to something inspiring, or that rumor you heard about the companys biggest competitor.

Any company which isnt running Yammer right now is missing out on the best communication and productivity tool available in the market today. Its a massive game changer. We got everyone [at Mahalo] to agree to do 1-3 updates a day and its taking the level of communication to a new height that we didnt think was possible.
Jason Calacanis | CEO | Mahalo

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POST AN IDEA

We know you have them.

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Post pictures from the big meeting.
People in the ofce arent all that different from people out of the ofcethey cant resist pictures from events. Yammer is the perfect place to record the whole thing up until the projector died.

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Ask questions.
Need to nd a third party vendor? A location for the next shoot? A caterer for the big meeting? Tap the invaluable pool of knowledge that is your Yammer network.

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Answer questions.
If someone took the time to ask a question, reward it with an answereven if your answer is just you should ask @Bill from accounting.

Employees from one continent ask a question and employees from another continent respond with crucial real-time information and suggestions. Our client service has improved through Yammer: as its demand-led, these connections wouldnt occur otherwise.
Niall Cook | Worldwide Director of Marketing Technology | Hill & Knowlton

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START A GROUP

FOR YOUR DEPARTMENT

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Ask someone for advice in their area of expertise.
Everyone loves to feel like an expert. Dont be shy!

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Put what youd like to be doing more of in your prole.

Your job title says nothing about your aspirations. Maybe youre a copywriter but youd really like to be doing more content strategy. Pop it in your interests and see what happens.

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Ask everyone what they think.

Or, if you prefer the hot corporate buzzword: crowdsource. Yammer was made for crowdsourcing anything from new taglines to new water cooler suggestions.

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Post your challenge.

Solve problems in real time by sharing them and using the power of every brain in your company.

People feel more connected to the company, more engaged, and more empowered. At the end of the day, that can only be good. Its been amazingYammer is a bit of a celebrity at our company.
Jaimee Clements | Sr. Online Project Manager | AAA of Northern California, Nevada and Utah

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FOLLOW SOMEONE
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Introduce yourself to your counterpart in Dubai.
Borders are meaningless on Yammer. Swap some war stories and see what you can learn from each other.

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Ask the receptionist what she thinks.

Great ideas can come from anywhere, from the corner ofce to the front desk.

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Meet the vendors.

Communities are that happy place in the Venn diagram where two networks can interact.

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Like the kind of thing youd like to see more of.

Its basic psychology reward desirable behavior with something nice. Whats nicer than being liked?

If youre an employee, you want to work in a great community, where you have friends and relationships. Weve found Yammer to put those relationships in a focused, centralized and managed space. The number of people that follow and interact with you isnt about who you are but about what you say, and thats one of the great things about Yammer.
Nigel Dessau | CMO | AMD

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INTRODUCE YOURSELF IN PERSON WITH, IVE NOTICED YOU ON YAMMER!

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Talk to strangers.
Magic happens when people of different backgrounds begin to understand each other in deep, practical ways. Cross-discipline collaboration results in new ideas and new ways of seeingand solvingproblems. So when you see someone you havent met on Yammer, dont think Theyre not in my department, I have nothing to learn from them. Instead, think Theyre not in my department! I wonder what I can learn from them?

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Swap war stories.

Share an environment with someone long enough, and youll inevitably start swapping knowledge. Its a basic human behavior that makes small groups nimble and efcient. Yammer is the environment you share with everyone in your company, no matter where they are, so get swapping!

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Learn.
What if every water cooler idea could be shared with anyone in the company at any time? Now that people are sharing those ideas on Yammer, they can be read and contributed to by anyone whos interested, whenever theyre interestednot just when theyre thirsty.

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Send private messages.

Some ideas need careful fostering in a safe environment before theyre set free in the Company Feed. Give them that environment with a private message that includes only the people wholl help it blossom.

Yammer is a learning goldmine. It enables those special connections we had created by bringing people together in the classroom to happen all the time.
Mike Petersell | Management Center for Learning and Performance Director | Pitney Bowes

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INTRODUCE YOURSELF TO THE NEW GUY

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Talk about clients behind their backs.
Its for their own good. The more information you and your colleagues share about a client, the better you can meet their needs.

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Host a Yam Jam.
From 10:30 to 11:30, well be brainstorming for the new ad campaign in the group We Will Rock You. Be there or be square.

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Plan events and invite people to them.

Meetings. Ofce get-togethers. Brainstorming sessions. Movie night. Holiday parties. Conferences. Happy hour. If you want people there, put it on Yammer.

Yammer has enabled us to harness the wisdom of our people who are spread across multiple teams, geographies and brands to help achieve our purpose of delivering business solutions for competitive advantage.
Jeff Smith | CIO | Suncorp

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FIND OUT WHAT EVERYONE ELSE IS WORKING ON

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Hold a Yammer drill.
Yammer is a great for getting the feel of the ofce when you cant make it to the ofce. But what if no one can make to the ofce? Snow happens. Hold a Yammer drill once a year, where everyone works from home for a full day. Then theyll know exactly what to do when it counts the most.

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Skip email.
Email gets burdensome for things like pictures of cute kittens and brainstorming with a group.

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Answer a question with a question.

After awhile, all the most common questions will have been asked on Yammer and every conversation on Yammer is ndable, linkable, and joinable at any time. So send your curious co-worker a link to the last time someone asked that question. No more repeating yourself.

It is amazing how much this tool has cut down on email trafc and how much more efcient the interchange of information and ideas becomes.
April Downing | CFO | Dachis Group

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42 FINALLY LEARN THE NAME OF THE GUY

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YOU TOOK TOO LONG TO INTRODUCE YOURSELF TO, WITHOUT THE AWKWARD INTRODUCING YOURSELF PART

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Tell us how you use Yammer.
It helps us make Yammer more awesome.

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Email us feedback@yammer-inc.com

now get to work!

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