Does the internet really connect people?

Sadly the man who delivers straw for me is spending Christmas ill in hospital. He delivers for Betty, a fabulous lady farmer who still manages her farm alone & is well into her seventies. A straw delivery arrived today thanks to one of her neighbours, who is in fact in direct competition with her, as he also sells hay & straw to the local equine fraternity. However, in farming circles there has always been a culture of helping each other out, whether that be by loaning machinery or offering a spare pair of hands at shearing or harvest. Today I went to settle my bill & Betty & I were chatting about her generous neighbour. She remarked that he was a lovely lad & that she knew his parents & their parents & no doubt their parents too.

So what has the above got to do with web 2.0? In this always connected 24/7 culture, interaction has never been so easy. We can connect & communicate on a global scale but are these relationships of real value? How many of our online associates would be prepared to go out of their way to help us out? Fleeting interactions & business networking does not a community make. Saying that, I've met some fabulous genuine friends as a result of the net but it's all to easy to slip into the habit of tweeting & facebooking instead of meeting face to face. So my 2010 resolution is to treasure real friends & spend more time offline with them!

Rage against the machine

So the power of a well orchestrated facebook campaign & the subsequent picking up of the story by mainstream media has beaten the Simon Cowell X factor junket to number 1. Time for the music industry to learn some lessons in 2010 perhaps?!

Gary Vaynerchuk in London

(photo pinched from @IanSanders - thanks!)

Last week I grabbed the opportunity to see the irrepresible Gary Vaynerchuk speak in London about his new book Crush-it.

There's been some great coverage of the event by other attendees so I won't replicate!

@jas filmed the talk which you can view here http://www.thewebpitch.com/videos/gary-vaynerchuks-talk-the-water-poet-london/

Here's Phil Legetter's take on the real time element of the talk http://blog.caplin.com/2009/12/09/how-real-time-does-real-time-have-to-be/

Ian Sanders talks about the importance of word of mouth here http://scrambledup.blogspot.com/2009/12/word-of-mouth-is-on-steroids.html

For me personally seeing Gary speak with so much passion helped to ram home the concept behind his book (& brand full stop). I eventually made it home to Bristol at 2am & last thing I did was tweet about the talk. Within 2 minutes I had a DM from Gary who was still hustling despite a long day & a 5 hour time difference to adapt to as well. A simple thing but I was impressed! This is one man that really walks the walk.

Please whilst in Europe....

..drop the American lingo. The use of "fireside chat" at a tech conference just sounds ridiculous, although perhaps it's meant to be ironic as the Le Web conference 08 was apparently akin to sitting in an icebox.

Gah, can you tell I'm envious of those going, anyone with a spare ticket feel free to throw it my way!

Thank goodness for blogs

I read an interesting article about Silvio Berlusconi in Time magazine this weekend "How Silvio Berlusconi Uses Women on TV" Leaving aside the feminist outrage at the content of Italian TV these days, what struck me was the fact that Silvio controls 90% of the Italian television market. So in a European democratic nation, the Prime Minister controls the majority of the TV news coverage (the article states that 80% of Italians get their news from television). Scary stuff eh?!

Thank goodness for blogs & the internet in general to help even out the transmission of news that isn't dictated by the government.

Putting it out there

Increasingly I'm being asked to write articles & opinion pieces for online publication & a piece that was published this weekend raises a dilemma! I wrote a controversial piece on a dressage training technique (read it here http://www.horsehero.com/editorial/?feat=35093) which is being actively discussed on horse forums world wide.

The dilemma is whether to wade in & engage with the detractors, especially when they are directing bile) or to sit on my hands & stay away from the keyboard?! I still haven't made up my mind on this.

p.s. I don't just write on horse topics, I also enjoy covering motorsports & business in general but with a particular emphasis on web 2.0 & social media so feel free to hire me! Contact details on the website --------------------------->

The Dark Side of Social Gaming

I've never been a big PC game player & so social media gaming hasn't posed much of an interest either but I can't avoid games like Farmville & Mafia Wars as a result of friends playing them & the games spamming my facebook feed as a result. So apart from time wasting fun & spamming my feeds, what's wrong with social media gaming? Nothing if you are a successful developer as there are vast sums of money to be made. But there is a darker side of social gaming & some seriously unethical behavior.

Michael Arrington of Techcrunch explains it far better than I could so if you want to find out more head on over & read his article here http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/10/31/scamville-the-social-gaming-ecosystem-of-hell/

Even the Vatican is using social media

If anyone still doubts the relevance of social media then perhaps they should take notice of this article where Pope Benedict discusses how the Vatican is embracing social media to bring the gospel to the masses.

Pope Benedict said "The content of the Gospel message remains unchanged but the church must learn how to transmit that message to new generations and must do so by taking advantage of the new technology and new attitudes toward communications."

A neat analogy for most of us in business, the message we are trying to convey to customers hasn't changed but we do need to change how we communicate it.

A significant step in UK politics

(Note: It's only fair to disclose before you read this post that I am a paid up member of the Conservative party)

Yesterday saw the public launch of http://www.myconservatives.com/

According to the site itself: MyConservatives is a new online network that gives you the tools to campaign for the candidates you support, and issues that you care about.

Here are some of the things you can do:

* Take part in campaign activities and social action
* Donate directly to individual campaigns
* Ring voters from the comfort of your home
* Set up fundraising events with online ticketing

And you can learn more about the site by watching the video on the right.

In essence, the conservative party has built a campaign machine based on that of Barack Obama, which was so influential in him winning the election. Allowing people to engage, fund raise & campaign at a local level is a very smart move. The how to you tube videos are a nice feature too. The site is still in BETA & there a few niggles to iron out but it will be very interesting to watch it grow & I hope many of you will get involved too!

For one night only....

I'm giving a talk for the South Glos Branch of the Federation of Small Businesses tomorrow night, 26th August, (non-members are welcome to attend as well). It's at the Aztec Hotel, just off the M4/M5 interchange in Bristol, networking at 7pm, talk starts at 7.30pm & promises a gallop through social media marketing & how it can help your business. (flyer with more info here)

Hope to see you there.
Christina

Social Media Tames The Dragons

Lat week's Dragon's Den episode featured Carol Savage & her recipe sharing website www.mydish.co.uk. For the first time ever in the history of Dragon's Den, she was offered twice the investment she came in for, in the end settling for a £100k investment in return for 15% of the business.

What was interesting for me was seeing how the 5 different dragons reacted to the pitch. Some clearly just didn't get the concept & couldn't see the scalability of social media. Others couldn't see clear revenue streams. Deborah Meaden however was quick to latch on to the potential of the idea. Unusually for a web start-up, Carol had a number of clear potential revenue streams from the site, some of which were already up & running. When she mentioned the functionality within the site to shop fror the recipe ingredients from within the site, via Ocado & Asda, I was very very impressed. It's logical, makes a change from relying on advertising revenue & has the potential to be very lucrative for Carol & her investors. Great idea!

where did it all go wrong for friends reunited?

ITV have announced the sale of friends reunited at a price of £25 million, taking a £145 million hit from the price the paid of £170 million in 2005.

Undoubtedly facebook took a big slice of their market when it opened to the general public but friends reunited was very slow to fight back. It took them a long time to drop their subscription model, which restricted you from contacting old friends through the site unless you paid up. They were also very slow to embrace social networking functionality. Apart from your profile, there was little user generated content & certainly nothing that could be updated on a frequent basis by users. Add to that a clunky site design & it's no wonder the site began to lose ground.

I do think it's a wasted opportunity & perhaps something the new owners are going to try & rectify. The one big advantage that friends reunited has is that it anchors you geographically, to your old schools and workplaces. As a result, for the less tech-savvy, it's much easier to find people on friends reunited than it is on facebook.

Twitter Tips

Just a quick post this morning about some twitter resources

Don't forget to download my article on Top 10 Tips For Twitter In Business if you haven't already & here's a nice little video from Mark Shaw on using twitter in business



Finally, don't forget to follow me on twitter @christina_jones

A really positive impact

I read today about a really fabulous initiative called Colalife. Here's how the website explains it:

ColaLife is a campaign to get Coca-Cola to open up its distribution channels in developing countries to save lives, especially children’s lives, by carrying much needed ’social products’ such as oral rehydration salts and high-dose vitamin A tablets. For the latest on the campaign, please visit the blog. ColaLife is an independent and purely voluntary movement backed by thousands of supporters on its Facebook Group. ColaLife is not an organisation.

It was launched by Simon Berry, who had an idea while working on the British Aid programme in 1988:

What about Coca Cola using their distribution channels (which are amazing in developing countries) to distribute rehydration salts? Maybe by dedicating one compartment in every 10 crates as ‘the life saving’ compartment?

Having made no progress with the idea for 20 years, Simon decided to try once more but this time using the convening power of the internet. Since floating the idea on his blog in May 2008, he has managed to create a huge community around the campaign, through a Facebook group and appearances on Radio 4’s iPM programme. He is now in discussions with Coca-Cola and is looking to engage with an international NGO to move the project forward.

I think it's a great idea & am sad that it's taken 20 years for Simon to make an impact with it but the power of social media has finally started to make some noise. Please take a moment to visit the colalife website & join their facebook page.

Reflections

As my baby brother hits the job market as a freshly minted engineering graduate & engages in a whirl of interviews it makes me reflect on my "career" so far. Both my siblings are heading the more conventional route, gainfully employed in a corporate structure with an easily defined job title, unlike their older sister!

I'm firmly in the slash category (which is getting more common for generation Y according to this article) or as Ian Sanders would put it, a juggler.

Although it causes endless confusion at family gatherings & networking events (I have a nifty "elevator speech" but the general consensus is often that I play on facebook all day) for me it is the strength that underlies everything I do.

It means that every day is different, no danger of being bored & offers a wider take on things than normal. The fusion of a very traditional wholesale business & a new media consultancy is great. I have my own lab to test new ideas & projects on a daily basis & it also means that underneath all the fun web stuff is a need for effectiveness, increased sales & staying in business. Not very web 2.0 I know in the land of the crazy valuation but I would say more realistic for 99% of companies.

twitter - positives & negatives

Interesting article in thelondonpaper about the instant effects of twitter. The film Bruno saw a big slump in sales between the first friday of release & the saturday. Negative twitter reviews are being blamed. The real time effect of twitter & social networking in general means that they can have a very quick impact on sales, in a positive or negative way.

quick update

So the website www.leathertherapy.co.uk has been live for 10 days now, orders are coming in steadily. Zero advertising or media coverage so far (that will be kicking in next month) & the site isn't hitting the search engines yet either so 100% of the traffic is coming in from social network marketing.

What's great is that customers are contacting me via niche social networking sites such as ravelry (find me here on the site) to let me know their thoughts on the product, request that larger sizes are stocked etc. This is what I really love about social media, it takes retailing & customer interaction into a different league! They are also blogging themselves about the product - thank you!

oops, but I do have an excuse!

Long time no blog again, finding twitter is my mode of choice at the moment so please add me to your follow list via the widget to the right of the page.

So what's been going on in blacktype land? More practice than preaching as it happens ;-) My other company has been busy sealing the deal to bring a fabulous new range of leather care products into europe. I'm going to shamelessly plug it & say that anyone with motorbike leathers, horse tack, shoes, handbags, leather furniture or leather car interiors should immediately go to http://www.leathertherapy.co.uk & buy some now!

We don't have a huge advertising budget to launch this into the UK so our main focus is definitely on web2.0 marketing. I figure it will also make a nice case study over the summer months & those of you attending my seminar courtesy of FSB South Glos on the 26th August will hear a lot more about all this!

I have a wonderful summer intern, Brielle, who this week is having a crash course in web marketing & is doing sterling work.

So one week in, where are we at?

We have a youtube channel http://www.youtube.com/leathertherapyuk, twitter pages http://twitter.com/leathertherapy & http://twitter.com/UnicornFibreUK, facebook is having the final tweaks to the page & key niche social network sites for the different markets are being targetted.

Results so far? Good! Sales are coming in from the website & google analytics is showing this is clearly attributable to the marketing efforts.

So to return to my last post, does this stuff work - YES!

So does this socia media stuff work then?

I was at a FSB networking event this evening & the question I was asked the most was does this social media stuff work?

My response = YES! Now I don't think every business in the land should be twittering but I do think that there is a useful part of web 2.0 for everyone. For me, I generally consider a marketing effort to be working when it's resulting in more sales that can be clearly attributed to the marketing activity. The advantage of having a very traditional company which I run alongside Blacktype is that I can use it as a constantly evolving case study. It also acts as a brake when I get carried away with the latest new tech gizmo. I always ask myself - is it creating new business, because if it isn't, I'm wasting time.

I've got a lot to say about this topic but I'm going to keep you all in suspense & save the details for another blog post or three.

The Power of the Blog

Normally, I don't talk about politics on this blog, but after today's historic ejection of the speaker Michael Martin from the House of Commons (the first time it has happened since John Trevor in 1695) I can't not comment!

Blogs such as the notorious Order-Order have been instrumental in breaking recent stories concerning government smears & expense fiddling which led to the speaker being forced to resign. Whilst the mainstream press has also played a key part in the process (especially the Daily Telegraph which was the paper responsible for leaking the expense claims) I would contend that the blogosphere has whipped the general public into an unprecedented fury with the current administration. Without editorial and advertising restrictions, the top political blogs are generally more pointed in their coverage and the nature of a blog encourages commenting & discussion of the stories.

Whilst leading politicians such as Gordon Brown & David Cameron are quick to use social media, especially youtube broadcasts, to communicate their messages the real power of web 2.0 lies with the general populace. Never before have politicians been so accountable to the electorate. Their actions are quickly scrutinised around the globe and the ability for videos to go viral has leant unheard of levels of exposure to incidents such as the speech by Daniel Hannan, MEP, criticising the Prime Minister which was quickly loaded onto youtube and following mainstream media coverage has had over 2.3million views to date. Surely this can only be a good thing?

cheeky or inspired?

The irrespresible Gary Vaynerchuk has started the promo for his forthcoming book "Crush-It" & unsurprisingly he's hustling hard! It's fascinating to watch the web 2.0 marketing juggernaut roll into action.

Since the deal was announced Gary has been promoting via his site, his web TV show & on facebook & twitter but in the last 24 hours he's really stepped it up a gear.

First, he announced a ustream live chat session where he responded to viewers queries, as well as sharing his (slightly dubious 80s) music choices! This was the first chance for all the Vayniacs to see the cover art for the book & Gary announced it's up for pre-order on amazon.

He then quickly popped all of the relevant info up on his facebook page & twitter feed & asked his followers to share the content with their friends.

So, how did it work?

Well as of 6pm this evening, approx. 24 hours after the first announcement that the book was available for pre-sale, the book is ranked #112 on Amazon USA & #1043 on Amazon UK in the best-sellers rankings. Pretty impressive for a book that isn't available to ship until October & I guess goes a long way to justifying his 7 figure book deal with Harper Studio.

Gary also let slip in his live chat that he is going to ask his fans to promote the book in their email signatures, which is a cheeky request & the first time I've seen someone do this. It will be interesting to see if this idea takes off but if it does then surely it will be more effective than 3rd party widgets or the standard amazon affiliate program.

You can find out more here: http://garyvaynerchuk.com/book

it's not all about the new

Last month I had a chance to go on a factory tour at Bristol Blue Glass. It was a fascinating evening, seeing skilled craftsmen at work in what is a complex & dying art. If you like shopping or glass or both, please go & have a look at their online shop & support this great business.

Before we hit the factory floor we were treated to a talk about the origins of the glass industry. The famed Bristol blue colour comes from adding cobalt to the glass. In the 1700s an enterprising Bristol merchant gained the exclusive rights to import cobalt from the Royal Works in Saxony, Germany & launched the Bristol glass industry as a result.

With all the focus on social media and the internet in general in business, it was really interesting to realise that the basics of business haven't really changed much over the last thousand years. Find a great product/raw materials, secure the rights to distribute/manufacture & bring it to market!

In that vein, here's a neat combination of the old & the new: a youtube clip of a ship's decanter being handmade using traditional methods from Bristol blue glass. Enjoy!

a new print magazine - bold move from Joules

After my previous post on ASOS, I was intrigued to see a copy of the new Joules magazine dropping through my letterbox. It's a pretty slick production, as you'd expect from the team behind one of the fastest growing lifestyle brands of the moment & whilst carrying a small amount off 3rd party advertisement, it is primarily acting as a show case for the clothing ranges.

Joules does have a blog & a facebook page so the focus on a paper offering is fairly interesting, if a little retro. Tom Joules is one of the sharpest people in the industry so perhaps he feels as everyone else pulls away from paper & switches to social media, there is a gap to exploit?

Anyway, I'll be interested to see what they do with the magazine over the coming months (even if it does tempt me to open my purse a little too much!)

ASOS Launch In-House social network

I know it's not exactly revolutionary but ASOS has been bang on the money with thier e-commerce development over the last few years (as evidenced by their phenomenal growth) so if anyone can crank out a vibrant in-house social network, then my money's on them!

The development is called ASOS life & here's an early blog post from the team explaining a bit more

I'll be watching this site carefully over the next few months to see how they are integrating the e-commerce function of the site into the new community section.

A great example of twitter in action

The Albion bakery in London is using twitter to let customers know when a fresh batch of loaves hit the shelves. A wireless device called Bakertweet is used to broadcast the messages to followers in the local vicinity so they know when to pop down.

For me, this is a classic use of twitter - less intrusive than email, it's providing the customers with information that they want & as a result is driving sales - perfect! See it in action & follow the albion here http://twitter.com/AlbionsOven

and I thought the Italians were an easy-going nation

Evidently not when it comes to football & blogging. Italian football refs are now banned from discussing any games they have participated in via twitter, facebook, email, blogs etc.

Seems the beautiful game is taken very seriously in Italy!

twitter goes truly mainstream

As the mention of tweeting in the media grows louder by the day, here's two things that make me say that twitter is officially mainstream.

1) The first high profile relationship breakup. Jennifer Aniston allegedly dumps her boyfriend as he spends more time on twitter than he does communicating with her. Ouch!

2) The first twitter libel suit as Courtney Love's antics on the site land her with a lawsuit.

How long until twitter is cited in a divorce case? I give it until Christmas!

social networks are the new email

according to this article on the bbc website social networks are becoming email 2.0 with people using the status update facilities on sites such as facebook or twitter instead of emailing. Whilst I don't think these sites will ever be as useful as traditional email for business, I'm probably like many others who now rarely send an email to friends, tending to direct message through facebook or twitter.

As more & more micro blogging platforms appear it will be interesting to see what the dominant sites are in 3 years time.

and so it begins

The first significant newspaper group in britain to collapse into administration as advertising revenue drops sharply & online media is stealing more & more market share. I'm surprised at how slow some of the big media companies are at embracing web 2.0. Certainly in the equestrian industry IPC is lagging behind its smaller rivals. Perhaps today's news will jolt executives into action?

may you live in interesting times

is an old chinese curse that seems particularly relevant in 2009. But I'm afraid that if you are expecting doom & gloom this is the wrong blog. For me, web 2.0 is tearing down the traditional business model as we know it. The school tie old boys club, oxbridge degree & hot MBA don't seem so relevant anymore.

Instead it's all about the hustle - as GaryV so eloquently puts it in this video
You need a PC, an internet connection, a good idea, a lot of balls a a big dose of WORK!

That's it. So get going.

(P.S. See what I mean that the small guy can beat the big guy - twitter zooms ever bigger whilst ITV is trying to offload friendsreunited )

customer service is king

Whilst I firmly believe that social media has an important part to play in business success in 2009, it's not the bedrock. As always it's customer service, customer service, customer service.

I promised my baby brother (that's him in the pic above) that if he won a downhill race I'd sort out some sponsorship for him. Well, he went out there & killed it last weekend :-)

So as he's racing again this weekend I wanted to get the blacktype brand on him as quickly as possible! This is where local business can clean up in the way that internet businesses struggle. I phoned Linela, a local embroidery company yesterday morning who said they could sort me out, popped down at lunch time to finalise the order & by 11am this morning I had been contacted by phone & email to let me know the order was ready. Wow, that's what I call customer service & it's why I'll be using them again & I recommend them to anyone looking for printing or embroidery.

So in summary, social media will drive business your way, but customer service is what's going to keep that business for you.

Thanks guys, I really appreciate you sorting me out & watch out for Team Blacktype taking the downhill scene by storm in 2009.

back

Apologies for being a bit lame with posting lately, my excuse is Christmas, the spring trade show season & twitter, which I'm still very much in love with!

Any way quick update on the site I mentioned in my last post http://www.ridingresource.com/, which is created by the team at http://hustlewood.com/ (which is itself a pretty neat site) - cheers for the comments below guys.

It's up & running & looks like a great resource if you are a rider in the US so if you are, go check it out!

In other news from the social media coalface, virgin.com has announced plans for it's redevelopment, which includes some pretty cool features to allow people to interact more using the site - read all about it here http://news.cnet.com/8301-13515_3-10171231-26.html

My other business interest lie in retail so it's interesting to see that virgin is proposing to implement a rewards scheme for community users - encouraging interaction or overt commercialisation of the medium? - I'd be interested to hear your thoughts.