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PureBlue to take part in EC research on Social Media

Well it’s been quite a start to the week for PureBlue and we are pleased to announce that we have been selected to take part in a high profile piece of research for the European Commission on the benefits and challenges of social media.

The research, being headed up by the  social media giant “Dachis Group” (www.dachisgroup.com) starts this week and aims at exploring the benefits and challenges of social networking sites and social media for organisations, in both private and public sectors, for engaging customers, stakeholders and employees, for improving business performance and for promoting e-democracy.

As part of this research, they are asking leading practitioners in this area to join us in a stakeholder community for a short period of time to explore these topics through online discussion, one of whom is none other than PureBlue!

The online community not only constitutes a networking hub for all those involved and facilitate inspiring exchange of ideas, but will also gives us a unique opportunity to have our voice heard in front of the European Commission and influence the policy making that the Commission may undertake on the basis of the insights created.

Results of this research will inform:

- The final report with findings from your discussion in the online community presented during the EU’s Digital Agenda for Europe (@DigitalAgendaEU)

- A further questionnaire to add to Commission’s understanding of needs, challenges and success stories recounted by you

- Policy initiatives to facilitate the uptake and use of social technologies by European organisations.

Pretty exciting stuff we hope you agree. The research is actually already underway so fingers crossed we will be able to get our voice heard and provide some interesting insight.

Do you have any experience with social media you want us to share? If you have any thoughts or points you would like us to voice please pop through and email to sales@pureblue.co.uk or tweet us @purebluetweets and we will get it on the agenda.

 

Our top 10 tips for Twitter

So it’s a Saturday night, and as I sit on my sofa watching a rather fabulous rendition of a Kate Bush number by the rather oddly named Bo on “The voice”  I think it’s time for another blog. I have been keeping up with the tweets on the show, so I’m going to use that as my inspiration for today’s post.

Twitter is always top of my friends and clients list of things people think they should be doing but potentially are not. For whatever reason a number of business owners and chums have been reticent to get involved or are only just getting started, so I thought today I would bestow my top ten tips for using twitter, and using it effectively.

1. Get Following!

First things first, when you create your profile, make sure you find all you friends and follow them. Next, go through your client list – seek out their twitter feeds and get following them too. These people already know you and are the most likely to follow you back and be your brand advocates on Twitter.  Beyond that, you then need to find more folk to follow. Looking though your friends and clients profiles to see who they follow is a great place to start. But be careful  about who you follow – think about who you will find interesting and might want to converse with – and who could be good for your business.

2. Download the app on your phone

Twitter is a instant medium. Where as people will wait a day for a phone message, users expect replies much quicker digitally. Research has shown users expect a wait of up to 6 hours for a email. On Twitter the expected wait time is massively reduced, with users expecting replies within the hour. If you don’t have the capability to reply quickly whilst on the go you may miss a potential lead as users will look elsewhere for answers.

3. Don’t use auto follow systems to get followers

A lot of new users are obsessed with getting their follower numbers up, and you can understand why. The more followers you have the more people hear what you have to say, right? Well yes and no. The problem is you need to earn these follows. You need followers who are actually interested in what you have to say. There are a number of programs out there that promise you 1000′s of followers, however you need to ask yourself do these followers actually have any value. Overwhelmingly the accounts that are added are either little used or twitter spam. Yes it will boost your ego to have a larger number of followers, but the likelihood of these people even reading one of your tweets, let alone actually having a conversation with you is slim. You are much better off to concentrate the same time and effort talking to 1 person who might actually be interested in what you have to say, than spending time and money getting 1000 followers who really don’t care about what you have to say. It’s that time old case of quality over quantity.

4. Remember to listen!

It’s called social media for a reason,  it should be a two way conversation. Many new twitter users sign up largely as they feel they should at least be giving lip service to this twitter thing. They then simply tweet out messages about their business, without actually engaging and discussing anything. In the real world we have all experienced “one way” conversations with people who only want to talk about themselves. They aren’t much fun are they? The same is true on line. If you do not engage and converse with people on twitter, then why would they want to listen to what you have to say?

5. Use hashtags

Hashtags are the system used to mark topics or categories of conversation on Twitter. They give you the opportunity to tell the user what the primary topic of of your tweet is. For example, when I tweet about this blog I will add the #socialmedia hash tag. This tweet will then be search-able on the search term social media, and appear in the hashag timeline.

6. Keep and eye on ‘trending’ topics

Trending topics are the things that are currently being talked about most on twitter. These give a great insight into what people are interested in and want to talk about – a nice way to start a conversation! Have a look at what people are talking about and throw in your two pence, remembering to add that all important hashtag. Don’t be afraid to tweet directly to people you don’t know – this is half the point of social media.  It’s your window to engage with the world about whatever you may want to.

7. Think about the brand values of the account you are tweeting from

Your twitter feed for you business may have a different set of brand values to your personal account.Whilst people will always want to have a little more insight into the personal side of you and your profile, there may well be  other elements that are best left off the business feed. For example I make sure my curse filled rants about my beloved Queens Park Rangers football club are kept off the PureBlue twitter feed. It’s not appropriate, and more importantly nor is it relevant to my followers on this feed.

8.Be interesting

Avoid the common temptation to tweet about the mundane. Do you really think your followers want to know you just ate a cheese sandwich? Unless you are a member of the Cheese sandwich appreciation society who regularly tweets on the #ilovesandwiches hashtag to your army of sandwich fan followers I would suggest this isn’t relevant or interesting content.

9. Don’t over promote yourself

OK – when a business is on twitter we all know why they are there, to get business, but you don’t need to ram it down your followers throats. Don’t be afraid to talk about what you do, but make sure there is a balance of interesting content not just specifically aimed at flogging your wares.

10. Keep at it and enjoy it!

Twitter success won’t come overnight – like building any other relationships, social media followers take time to nurture and grow. Keep Tweeting and most of all enjoy it and it will show though on your account!

and one extra  for luck

Don’t forget to follow me at www.twitter.com/purebluetweets

 

 

Viddy steady go…

So it seems there is another new kid on the block looking to steal a march on the social media market. As if we could go a week without a new one hey?

This time the kid in question is named Viddy  – you have probably seen them popping up on your Facebook timeline with various tempting videos your chums have been watching, such as “Man is mauled by a great white “. The ones you really want to watch, but were not quite sure you could handle having posted in your own timeline, less folk judge you as a result. Nor, I am guessing, could you handle yet another addition to the list of the things you need to remember to press on your mobile phone when capturing one of life’s special little moments.

So what is it, and should you get involved? We have put together a quick rundown of the app and it’s features so you are in a position to make an informed choice.

In essence Viddy is a fairly simple mash up of you tube and Instagram. Put simply it allows you to take videos, pop on a few “kooky” effects, then send it out to the world to share though your network of followers, then post to twitter, Tumbler, YouTube and Facebook direct from the ap. So nothing really new there, and fans of Instagram will now doubt be looking at the new ap with a furrowed brow thinking “seriously – you have just taken the Instagram filters and shoved them on some 15 second limited videos to share?” And yes – that is pretty much what they have done…

The interface the ap uses is actually pretty cool and one of the slickest pieces of visual design I have seen in an ap. However whilst it’s pleasing to view, it does fall down a little on usability. Adding music to you clip was clunky and I’m not sure where the answer lies to the issues with use of music without permissions.

Sharing the videos themselves is an easy process and once configured you can share to all the major networks quickly and easily just by posting your vid and selecting the correct option. Elsewhere on the site the interface it a little trickier. Icons are small and it is not immediately obvious what they do on first use, until you have clicked on them. However it’s not terrible.

So who’s using it and should you be interested? It is becoming more and more popular, however users should be warned the content is not always vetted as closely as content from YouTube. At present browsing random feeds for content is not for the feint harted. You should prepare yourself for the onslaught of sexual deviance that may well come your way if you aren’t very selective. At the end of the day, porn is still porn, even it it does have a “retro” filter on it! But I digress. The site is growing in popularity, and no doubt we will be hearing it has the statutory 11 billion users next week, but that doesn’t answer the question should you be one of them.

My problem with viddy is I don’t really see anything new or unique here. They have essentially taken the option to share video that was popularized by YouTube, and popped  filters on it, which to be honest are not very impressive. If you want a video editing application there are many more comprehensive options out there, and if you are looking for fun video content this certainly doesn’t beat the wealth of sharing sites already out there.

My verdict. This is one best left for now – unless they make some considerable improvements – and they somehow find a way of a cat farting and hiccuping at the same time being more funny than it already was on YouTube.

Facebook snaffles Instragram

Well I don’t like to gloat, but we saw it coming. It appears our friendly international social media giant is continuing it’s march towards full social media integration through the purchase of “Instagram”.

For those of you who aren’t already part of Instagram revolution, it is essentially a photo sharing site, that uses old school “Lomo” style effects to essentially make what are pretty average looking pictures look retro cool. And I have to admit it’s one of my favorites. It’s a simple ap that you install on your phone, that transforms your mobile snapper into an filtered filled social extravaganza. Obviously it is already linked with Facebook, as all self respecting social media has to be these days, but it seems the recent purchase by Zuckerberg and co means it is set for even more assimilation.

However the main thing that seems to be catching everyone’s eye about this deal is not the potential improvements to our online lives, but the huge price-tag!! Instagram was bought for a whopping 1 billion dollars (that’s a US billion though – not a proper UK one). For a site with 30 Million users, that represents a huge cost per member, but given the site has doubled in size in the last year, perhaps this price-tag is less surprising.

Pretty impressive for a company with only 13 employees. Hopefully this will mean a few less aps and a bit more functionality from a singular site, but who knows.

We wish them all the best of luck, and hope the directors are enjoying their millions. It’s a fantastic sign of what you can do in the modern age with a good idea and clever execution. Who knows if the next one might come out of our web design london offices… Watch this space!

 

Facebook app adds “Enemy” function

A report in todays Mashable is reporting there is a new “enemy” ap that is heading to FaceBook, and we can’t help but think it is about time. We’re not a curmudgeonly bunch, but the incessant liking on FaceBook was always a little one sided in our view. We at PureBlue believe that your dislikes say just as much about you as your likes.

Enter “Enemy Graph”-  the ap that lets you dislike anything you might like (or not like… as the case obviously is!). Whether it is one of your friends who took you last Rolo without asking, or Nestle for making those packets one Rolo too short, you now have the ability to express your disdain for any thing on FaceBook you may wish.

The aps author spoke to Mashable and said – “One thing that has always struck me is the enforced niceness culture,” Terry told Mashable. “We wanted to give people a chance to express dissonance as well. We’re using the word enemy about as accurately as Facebook uses the word friend.”

Never a truer word said. I must admit when I look at my own FaceBook profile I do doubt how many of my 300+ so called friends I will ever see again. Obviously that doesn’t include any of my chums in our London Web design offices, but I’m pretty sure there are a few folk from primary school in there I haven’t spoken to in years. Not that I am going to name these folk as my enemies, it’s just nice to see the addition of a level of disdain. It’s been a far to one sided affair on social media up until now and I for one look forward to expressing some vitrolle in the world of social media.

Right – I am off to go find the One Direction page pronto.

"Dislike!!" Boom!!