Win a BlackBerry Torch — tell us why you love BlackBerrys | Fonehome.co.uk 21 Ways Non-Profits Can Leverage Social Media Like their for-profit brethren, many non-profits understand that using social media can help them reach and engage their audience, create momentum and build community. However, there’s uncertainty around how to create a sustainable social media campaign, although the tools are plentiful and often free. Here are 21 ways non-profits can leverage social media: #1: Use a blog to tell your story Treat your blog like the digital printing press that it is. Engage your audience with storytelling on your blog. #2: Make sure your stories are shareable Use tools like the retweet button, Facebook like button, and Share This to allow your blog visitors to quickly share your story with their networks. #3: Make it easy to subscribe to your stories Make your RSS feed impossible to miss by putting it “above the fold” and highlighting it. #4: Use video to tell your story Videos of volunteers building a house or driving a school bus to collect school supply donations can be incredibly persuasive.
When Every Company Is Now A Media Company, PR Should Lead Valeria Maltoni recently shared her thinking on why PR is misunderstood and misapplied. Her rationale makes sense and overall I agree with her thoughts. After the why, she lists a brief section on areas of opportunity. The areas she lists are (summarized): Developing community relations furtherElevating analytics reportingBuilding an online platform for the organizationListening and learning However I think all of this can be explained even simpler. When you switch your communications strategy to revolve primarily around owned channels (vs. placed or paid) you advance PR from something inherently tactical to one far more strategic: pull PR. I’m not saying throw away placed or paid – they still fit within a communications strategy. Most PR is still centered around placed/earned media. Speaking of trending, data is no longer the domain of just marketers, PR should be equally accountable for increasing objective metrics and relevant KPIs month over month. Allocate resources Achieve outcomes
6 Ways Smart People Use Twitter Lists at Events by Brett Duncan Twitter Lists have completely changed the way I look at conference and conventions I go to. We all like to stroke the benefit of networking when we do these things (especially while justifying the cost and time out of the office to our bosses), but we so rarely actually network. Whatever relationships we build quickly fizzle. We’re lucky if we know anyone other than our coworkers going into these things, and, at best, the people we do meet will simply get added to our LinkedIn account (which we never check). Enter Twitter Lists. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Brett Duncan loves pumping adrenaline into someone’s good idea.
5+ Useful BlackBerry Applications For Bloggers [Apps] BlackBerry functions as a personal digital assistant with address book, calendar and to-do list capabilities. It also functions as a portable media player with support for music and video playback and camera picture and video capabilities. BlackBerry is primarily known for its ability to send and receive (push) Internet e-mail wherever mobile network service coverage is present, or through Wi-Fi connectivity (via Wikipedia). Blackberry smartphones have hell lot of applications useful for several people. In this article, I’ll share some of the worthy applications for bloggers. For more BlackBerry apps, check out BlackBerry App World. #1 – WordPress for Blackberry : The all new WordPress for BlackBerry app allows you to write posts, upload photos and videos, edit pages, and manage comments. #2 – Viigo : Viigo (now merged with RIM) provides one of the best RSS reader application for your Blackberry smartphone. #5 – BBNotePad : BBNotePad acts as a text editor. Any BlackBerry Users?
Financial services: transparency through social media? in Share 0 We’ve already looked at two of the key topics from our social media in financial services round table event (niche communities and customer driven markets) and now it’s time to move on to a topic that comes up time and again in relation to the financial services industry – the issue of transparency. The current situation Matt Colebrook, CEO of First Direct bank, defines transparency in 2 ways: People need to feel secure and know that their money is protected – part of this is knowing what banks and other financial services institutions are doing with it. Clear, simple fee structures and products that are easy to understand and help people make sure they know what they are signing up for. While the conversational, sharing mentality of social media has enabled this information to exist intrinsically, albeit on a small scale, very few financial institutions are hosting open discussion platforms for customers and investors because of data and security restrictions.
Essential Statistics from Technorati’s State of the Blogosphere 2010 Blogging.alltop Jon Sobel of Technorati has published the latest State of the Blogosphere Report for 2010 including stats from 7,200 blogger respondents world-wide. Started in 2004 by Dave Sifry, this annual report has provided insight into the growth of the blogging community and helps answer questions like: who is blogging, why, what are they blogging about, how often and where are they blogging from. In 2008 Technorati added insights of individual bloggers to the report with an emphasis this year on women blogging. As a long time blogger and advocate of blogging for online marketing, I’ve always taken a lot of interest and insight from these reports. For marketers and communications professionals seeking to better understand the changing nature of the social web and the role blogs pay within in it, here are some essential statistics from Days 1 & 2 (of 3) from the 2010 State of the Blogosphere Report: 1% of respondents blog full time and 21% blog for their own company or organization U.S.
Study Says 26% of People Spend More Time Socialising Online Than In Person Social Media is a great way to keep in touch with old friends, chat with current ones and even meet new people. However it seems like sites such as Facebook and Twitter are becoming such a big part of people’s lives that they consume more of their time than actual face to face socialising. According to a press release sent to us from Yazino, 26% of people are spending more time socialising with their friends over the internet rather than in person. Their survey also found that people use up to 11 different methods to communicate with others (these include Twitter, E-mail, Skype etc.) and the average person has made 6.5 friends over the internet. I have been finding myself using Facebook a lot more recently thanks to my handheld device, and if this survey is to be believed, more people are finding comfort by socialising at home through their computer rather than going out and meeting face to face.
Top Ten iPhone 4 Accessories Since the iPhone 4's launch in June a whole slew of new accessories have hit the market. From bumpers to docks we have rounded up ten great iPhone 4 accessories Snaps Duo bumpers offer 360 degree protection via a silicon frame to guard the iPhone’s edges and front and back screen protectors. Think you know Assassin's Creed ? Check out the best iPhone 5 accessories here The 7 Personality Types Of YouTube Viewers — Which Group Are You In? People all around the world watch videos on YouTube, but viewing habits differ from person to person. Some people are YouTube-obsessed; some watch funny, viral videos; and other watch YouTube as a learning tool. Which type of YouTube viewer are you? The Viral Vixen Do you always have to be the first person to share a viral video with all your friends? A viral vixen is someone who can always tell you which videos are going viral on any given day, week or month, as well as tell you the stories behind them. The Obsessed Fan “OMG! Many popular YouTubers like Shane Dawson, MysteryGuitarMan and NigaHiga have become celebrities. The Procrastinator AKA “Bored At Work Guy” Whether you have a big paper to write or are sitting around bored at work, YouTube offers a great tool for procrastination. Try to think of where you usually are when you watch videos on YouTube. Image Credit: Exploding Dog The “Oops, I just spend 3 hours on YouTube!” The Student Image Credit: Gift Basket For All The Stalker!!
Sainsbury's Enter Digital Download Market Today Sainsbury's has announced that they will be entering the digital download market, offering music and film downloads just in time for Christmas. The announcement comes off the back of the last weeks launch of www.sainsburys.co.uk/entertainment, and is part of the retailers move to increase their online entertainment offer. The new website already provides customers with access to over 150,000 books, DVDs, Blu-rays, CDs and games to pre-order and purchase online. In a few weeks, customers will also have the option to download the latest tracks and albums. Salisbury's has said that they will carry back catalogues from every major artist and record label at competitive prices, but just how extensive their catalogue is remains to be seen. They will also be offering a full selection of films for purchase or download, and have plans to launch a range of Ebooks early next year. Pricing has yet to be announced.
317 Ways to Succeed in Social Media The great thing about social media (and blogs that talk about social media and how it can be used for personal, business, blogging, marketing and more) is that there’s a ton of information available on how it can benefit you. Hopefully, over the space of the last two years or so, this blog has offered you some tips, advice, strategy, call it what you will, that has helped you understand this cool toolset we call social media. Just in case you missed any of these posts, here are some specific ones collected into one quick bookmarking option. I hope you find them useful. Note: Each link opens in a new window, so you probably don’t want to open all at once. Social Media Blogging Twitter Facebook Online Goodness And as an added bonus, here’s a chat I had with the awesome David Siteman Garland yesterday over at his Rise to the Top show, where we talk about (amongst other things) social media “success”. Enjoy! (For more resources like these as they’re published, why don’t you subscribe to the blog?
Social media: Know your Bloggers - PR and Public Relations news - PR Week Every year, powerful and influential PR professionals featured in PRWeek's Power Book name Andrew Marr as one of their most respected journalists. It will be interesting to see if Marr retains his popularity among top PROs following his widely reported comments about bloggers at the Cheltenham Literary Festival on 8 October. According to Marr: 'A lot of bloggers seem to be socially inadequate, pimpled, single, slightly seedy, bald, cauliflower-nosed young men sitting in their mothers' basements and ranting. This perception seems to sit at odds with the respect the PR industry claims to have for bloggers. 'Generally speaking, I don't feel we are taken seriously,' says Muireann Carey-Campbell, author of popular blog BangsandaBun (see case study overleaf). PR agencies can get great benefits from targeting bloggers. Bloggers can have loyal, dedicated audiences, meaning their recommendations are likely to command trust levels similar to 'word of mouth' among these readers. Who blogs? No 31%
34 case studies that prove social media ROI Posted on October 19, 2010 by Rob Petersen inShare5 “How do I measure social media ROI?” is the #1 social media question people ask according to Social Media Examiner. Recently, at lunch with David Berkowitz, Senior Director of Emerging Media and Innovation, at 360i and blogger behind 100 Ways to Measure Social Media, this question came up and we thought: Let’s compile 100 case studies that prove social media ROI. Let’s do it in 3 installments to solicit input along the way and understand the business principles at work. Here are 34 of those 100 social media case studies. SalesShorter Sales CyclesNew LeadsImproved company operationsInnovations that resulted in a better way to do business Each case study has a summary headline with key results and links to reference sites for more complete details. We’d appreciate your input on these 34 or any examples you may have.