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LinkedIn Contacts

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Posted on May 21, 2013 by Mary Thomas

I was excited to be given the new LinkedIn Contacts functionality at the end of last week. I talked about this in my last post on LinkedIn Changes. You can sign up for the functionality at http://contacts.linkedin.com./ I love the new functionality – though I can see room for improvement – which no doubt will happen as LinkedIn gets feedback.

When you sign up for the module, you can link to your email system – though it will work without this. I am using Google apps for my email (with an Outlook front end), so it was a simple case of linking through Gmail. This brought into LinkedIn any notes that I made against a contact in my email system and imported the latest email messages I have exchanged with a contact.

Now when I click on a contact, I can see an additional box.

For each contact I can add notes or information about how we met. I can see the lastest emails that we have exchanged. I can group my contacts by using the Tag feature. I can also schedule a reminder to contact this person again in a day, a week or a month – or regularly.

CIicking on Contacts > Connections from the Main Menu,allows me to click on Today on the left hand side.

This shows me which of my contacts have a new position or a birthday today and allows me to send them a message directly from within LinkedIn. A default message does come up but you can personalise it as you wish. Just be careful, at the moment, if you send a message, the box doesn’t go away so you could accidentally send the message twice! The message isn’t yet displayed as part of the information about the contact either which is also an error in my opinion.

Clicking on the calendar button on the right, will show me my calendar from my email system. Remember my email and calendar is part of Google apps so actually this is showing me my calendar from Google.

Looking at the list of contacts directly below ‘Today’, I can sort my contacts by recent conversation, newly added, alphabetical, location or interestingly ‘lost contact’. LinkedIn gives you a list of when it thinks you last contacted certain people. A great way of deciding whether to send a message to get back in touch or to remove from your connections list.

Just a note – you can no longer send a message to a group of contacts – probably because too many people were using this for blanket spamming.

The functionality will be available in mobile devices too – though at the moment it is not available in the UK app stores.

I do have concerns about security and the lack of backup of the notes and so will be careful what I store within LinkedIn, but in general, I can see that I will make use of this new functionality to form better relationships with my LinkedIn contacts – and of course that is what LinkedIn is all about.

Have you got this new functionality yet? What do you think?

Interview with Chris Roberts

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Posted on May 17, 2013 by Mary Thomas

The eighth of our weekly interviews in which we discover how real businesses are making Social Media work for them. Please meet Chris Roberts from the Fairford and Lechlade business club.

Who are you and what do you do?

Chris Roberts MBE. I am a town councillor, run the Fairford and Lechlade business club and I run the Fairford and Lechlade food and drink festivals. I also write for local newspapers and magazines about local issues. For example, I write for the Ripples magazine. I am also keen to help with fundraising initiatives.

How do you use Social Media?

I have created a Facebook page for the Fairford and Lechlade business club and I also have a personal Facebook account. I have two Twitter accounts, 1 for the Business Club and a personal account. I have a LinkedIn personal profile.

I’m not a big fan of LinkedIn as I haven’t seen much work from it but I do like Twitter as a professional communication tool and Facebook as a personal communication tool.

Can you share a Personal Success Story?

A couple of examples.

First a personal example. I had been having problems with a financial company, let’s call them ABC, for about 2 years. They had lost my money and couldn’t find it and they had taken money out of an ISA account without asking me so I lost my ISA allowance for the year. I was getting nowhere with letters, calls and contacting the Financial Ombudsman. Something else happened with company ABC, so I tweeted ‘Just when I thought ABC couldn’t annoy me any more, they’ve managed to mess up my account even more.’ Immediately a representative of ABC tweeted me asking me to phone a number. This was the number of the head of customer service. Within 3 weeks the whole issue was sorted out and I received a letter of apology from the MD and a case of wine! The power of Social Media!

Secondly, I find Twitter really useful to promote the Fairford & Lechlade food & drink festivals. I have found people who are interested in booking stalls and made the public aware of the festivals. It is a great way of promoting local businesses who have sponsored the food festival.

I have found both Facebook and Twitter really useful as a way of spreading information about the business club and promoting businesses in the club.

Can you give our readers a top tip?

My top tip is to use Social Media to promote yourself and your business, but be careful what you say as the whole world is watching.

Contact Information

You can contact Chris on LinkedIn, Twitter – Personal Account, Twitter – Fairford & Lechlade Buiness Club, Facebook – Fairford and LEchlade Business Club, Fairford and Lechlade Food Festival, Fairford and Lechlade Business Club

5 LinkedIn changes – May 2013

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Posted on May 15, 2013 by Mary Thomas

So during May 2013 LinkedIn made another set of updates – to round up the changes that are being rolled out at the moment:

1. Tags

You can now mention or tag people and companies within a personal status update. This is similar to Facebook. By entering @Di in a status update any of your contacts that are called Di will be listed in a drop down list. Click the right one and they will be included in the status update. They will also receive an email to say that they have been mentioned. This might be a good way of reaching out to individuals or businesses.

2. Include images or files on your LinkedIn profile

When you edit your summary, experience or education, you should soon start to see (or you may already have) the button shown on the right. Clicking this button allows you to add a link to a slideshare presentation, video or document or upload a file or image directly to your profile. This allows you to display videos that explain your business or images to show case your product or services.

3. LinkedIn Today

LinkedIn Today allows you to keep up to date with the news and share / comment on news that you find interesting or relevant. LinkedIn Today has been changed so that you can now choose ‘channels’ to follow. Channels are topics of interest eg. Customer service, recruiting and hiring, higher education. You can also choose influencers to follow. Unfortunately LinkedIn have removed the source filter that you used to be able to select so you can no longer choose to use UK based news.

News from your channels and influencers will now appear in your news feed for you to read, share, comment and like.

4. LinkedIn Contacts

This isn’t available in the UK yet – it is being rolled out to people in the US over the next few weeks. LinkedIn Contacts is an extension of the LinkedIn Outlook connector app which I find extremely useful. When you look at an individual’s profile in LinkedIn, the LinkedIn contacts app will show you all emails and other contacts that you have had with an individual. You will be able to set reminders and write notes against a contact. It will become your own personal Customer Relationship Management system. It will be interesting to see how to works out.

5. Mobile Phone App

The new mobile phone app is easier to use and customisable. It also feels very quick – definitely worth updating.

LinkedIn Online Course

By the way, all these updates and more will shortly be incorporated into our LinkedIn online course. Don’t forget for just £97 + VAT, you will get access to our course for 1 year which will include 2 updates to the course material. By working through the e-learning course, you will find out how to find more business using LinkedIn. How much business do you need to see a return on your £97 investment?

Over to You

So what do you think? I would love to get your thoughts on these changes.

Interview with Anthony Wilson

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Posted on May 10, 2013 by Mary Thomas

The seventh of our weekly interviews in which we discover how real businesses are making Social Media work for them. Please meet Anthony Wilson from Scraptors.

Who are you and what do you do?

I am one of a group of 3 people who make up Scraptors – we make sculptor out of scrap. We specialise in sculptor trials. We have recently created a trail at a Dorset eco farm and at the Stourhead National Trust property.

How do you use Social Media?

We are comparative novices with Social Media and learning all the time.

We have a blog which we update regularly with our latest sculptors and trails. I do use Twitter for getting information – for example, I needed to get my dogs micro chipped and I found out through Twitter that the RSPCA were doing it for free one weekend. In terms of Scraptors, we post our news to our Facebook page which is getting more interest now – as we are spending more time on it.

I have found Pinterest interesting – I spent time pinning images from people that do recycling sculptures. I pinned them to a board called ‘Sculptures we like” – this has already generated contacts with people all over the world. I aim to spend a day pinning more of our own images to generate more interest.

We are going to use Social Media to promote a crowd funding project on Sponsume. The Scraptors’ sculpture mad garden near Stonehenge has a public footpath at the bottom. This means that our project for a Bird Henge, next to the path, will be visible free 24 x 7. It will be a Henge, a circle of sculptors of Wiltshire birds. We are going to use 10ft high posts topped with birds made out of scrap. The birds will include a Great Bustard, a Red Kite, a Buzzard, a Kestrel, a Barn Owl and a Lapwing. The Great Bustard (the heaviest flying bird) has been reintroduced into Wiltshire on nearby Salisbury Plain recently and the Great Bustard group will receive 5% of monies raised from the project

We are looking for £2000 in funding for the project – everybody who contributes £1 upwards will receive a certificate by email with one of the birds to print. Higher contributions will receive prints and miniature bird sculptures. All contributors will be entitled to a visit, by prior appointment, to explore the 2 acre Scraptors sculpture mad garden.

I hope to use Social Media to promote interest about the project and also to inform our supporters of progress. On Twitter and Facebook we will offer certificates by email for all those that share our project.

Can you share a Personal Success Story?

We have won a commission for a small sculpture in Devon for SusTrans purely through our use of Social Media. Hopefully in a few months, we will be able to update this with the success of our Birdhenge! Social media needs to be combined, of course, with conventional face to face networking and marketing and that combination has meant that we are in exploratory talks with two estates, one at Strouhead in Wiltshire and another in Herefordshire about installing sculpture trails. In both instances the blog and other sites were a vital element.

Can you give our readers a top tip?

The words in a tweet are really important if you want people to click on a link – you need to give people a reason to click as there is so much noise out there. The other aspect I would try to remember is not every tweet should be about yourself!

Contact Information

You can contact Anthony Wilson on LinkedIn, and the Scraptors on Twitter, Facebook, Scraptors Blog, Pinterest, In June Sponsume Birdhenge Crowdsourcing project.

Interview with Alison Neale

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Posted on May 3, 2013 by Mary Thomas

The sixth of our weekly interviews in which we discover how real businesses are making Social Media work for them. Please meet Alison Neale from The Proof Fairy.

Who are you and what do you do?

I am a proofreader, copywriter and published author. Having published my own book “The Boy from Hell”, I offer a mentoring, editing and publishing service to people who want to write their own books. I also talk and raise awareness about ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) in children.

How do you use Social Media?

For my business, I use Social Media in general and Twitter and Facebook in particular as a relationship building tool.

Twitter
I have used Twitter to promote my new book more than I have ever used it to promote my business. I have been able to connect with my influencers – other people working in the area of ADHD as well as relevant media contacts. Using Twitter I have been able to make these influencers aware of the book and they have helped me promote it.

Facebook
I have used Facebook in a number of ways:

pay per click advertising on Facebook: this probably broke even in terms of book sales, but raised awareness of the book.
I have found other authors through Facebook groups – these are groups for authors to give each other support and ideas in marketing and again raise awareness.
I did a virtual launch party using Facebook events (more on this in a moment)

LinkedIn
Although I have been using LinkedIn for a while for my copywriting business, I have just started to use LinkedIn to make connections with charities and will be looking at joining relevant charitable or support groups.

Can you share a Personal Success Story?

I had no idea how the Facebook launch event was going to work. I had prepared a few quizzes and competitions but just decided to give it a go. I told my Facebook friends about it and promoted it through my newsletter. I was blown away by the result. It ran from 1pm – 8pm on a Saturday and I had about 100 people drop in through the day. Quite a few of these were people I didn’t know but had heard about the event through others. I had a competition running every hour. For example, I invited people to write a poem using the letters ADHD, find the answers to a puzzle by looking at parts of my website and so on. The prizes were e-books of all sorts (fiction, business and of course my book) – I had previously used Facebook to make contact with other authors who offered their e-book as a prize in return for a bit of promotion.

There were really good conversations throughout the day – both general chat and people asking questions and offering advice from their experience of ADHD. My son, ‘the boy from hell’ was on hand to answer questions for ½ hour as well which went down really well.

Overall the launch day exceeded all my expectations – both raising the profile of the book and resulting in book sales.

Can you give our readers a top tip?

My main tip is to not be afraid of trying something on Social Media. You shouldn’t try to do everything as not every platform is right for everyone, but do experiment to see if the platform works for you – you might be surprised!

Contact Information

You can contact Alison on LinkedIn, ProofFairy – Twitter, Facebook, Proof Fairy Website, The Boy From Hell, Twitter, Facebook, The Boy From Hell Website

Tools to create video

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Posted on May 1, 2013 by Mary Thomas

Are you using video in your content marketing? I know it is something that I want to use better during the second half of 2013. Producing a video is a great way of showing the personality behind your business and another way of communicating with your audience.

Tools to create video

A video does not always have to be a moving image of you or your employees or a talking head – although this can sometimes be valuable. We cover creation of video in our Video for Business online course. You might want to consider creating the following types of video:

A screen recording of your on line product or to share hints and tips. I use Screen-cast-o-matic to record the demonstration of the Concise Training Twitter online course.
A video made out of a series of PowerPoint slides with audio or music. This may well get your point across and is an easy way to start with video. Using PowerPoint 2010, you can save your presentation as a video file. Have a look at the instructions from Microsoft.
How about using VideoScribe to create a ‘writing hand’ style of video? I love this video from Amanda Graham of Equalta. Amanda does training in creative thinking and produced this video to share an example of what she can do. I believe it was easy to use the software – producing a fantastic result.
Another tool you might want to explore is PowToon. This tool allows you to create cartoon style videos to get your point across. Depending on your audience, this may be a more appropriate tool for you.

From 1st May, Concise Training are starting a series of short daily tips to showcase our online courses. Do have a look at the Concise Online channel and subscribe to get the tips. The May tips are all about using LinkedIn.

What tools to create video have you used? It would be great to share ideas.

Interview with Charlotte Mannion

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Posted on April 26, 2013 by Mary Thomas

The fifth of our weekly interviews in which we discover how real businesses are making Social Media work for them. Please meet Charlotte Mannion from Quicklearn.

Who are you and what do you do?

I am the founder of Quicklearn. We help business people to improve their communication skills. We run workshops covering business writing, report writing, as well as all aspects of verbal communication. We often work within departments in larger businesses. We also offer individual 1 – 1 coaching to work on an individual’s immediate skills need.

How do you use Social Media?

LinkedIn – I use LinkedIn to communicate with my corporate clients through updates and engagement.

Twitter – I have two Twitter accounts, Quicklearn has over 4,000 followers worldwide. I tend to use it on a more personal basis and can be a little controversial. I also use this account to help others by getting their message out to more people. Writingforwork is more business like and is more UK Based.

Facebook – I enjoy using my Facebook page. I upload pictures, facts and figures, tips. I get comments if I post something more controversial. Many of my fans are spread out over the UK, so it is used for more brand building.

Blog – I blog every Tuesday, scheduling blogs four weeks in advance and shifting if something more topical needs to be covered. I share the blog across Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook.

Can you share a Personal Success Story?

I share my blogs on LinkedIn which generate questions and enquiries and ultimately business.

I take part in a number of LinkedIn groups and have found business through using discussions to make people aware of spaces available on workshops. For example, recently, I let a couple of groups know that there were a few spaces available on the photo shoot workshop that I was running in Swindon. This workshop was aimed at small business owners who needed photos taken of people in an office environment. By sharing the workshop with a couple of groups, I had people recommend it to others and people travelled several hours to attend.

Twitter – I have had enquiries through Twitter which I would then follow up with a phone call to win the business.

Can you give our readers a top tip?

I have several tips;

Keep your Social Media up to date and keep using them even if you don’t immediately get a response!
Retweet regularly on Twitter
Don’t belong to a LinkedIn group unless you are going to get involved.
On LinkedIn, put what you do in your headline.
Get into a routine. I spend 10 minutes on Twitter every morning. I write an original update, I retweet several and I have one conversation.

Contact Information

You can contact Charlotte on LinkedIn, Twitter – Writing for Work, Twitter – Quick Learn Facebook , Quick Learn

Online training or face to face training

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Posted on April 23, 2013 by Mary Thomas

As regular readers of this blog might know, I love training in all its forms. I am never happier than when teaching or training people in how to use Social Media to market their business or to use Microsoft Office to work more effectively. Should you choose online training or face to face training though?

Traditionally training is considered to be a ‘classroom activity’. Indeed, I run workshops here in Oxfordshire in which I gather 5 people together in a room and talk to them about Social Media best practice and actually get them to set up profiles, think about their audience and talk about what they are going to say. Similarly I will happily travel to a client site to deliver bespoke versions of the courses. Learners leave having used the tools, set up profiles and with a better understanding of best practice of the use of Social Media (or MS Office). I offer support via email or learners can sign up to a more detailed support package. Everybody is happy…….

I offer a similar service on a 1 – 1 basis over Skype. Learners share their screen with me and we talk through how and why a particular tool is used or what happens when buttons are clicked. Individual learning, without the travel. Again, everybody is happy……

Sometimes, though it is worth considering whether your time would be spent better using an on line course to learn. On line courses have changed significantly from the old days of ‘CBT’ – courses are now interactive, fun to complete and multi-media. You can dip in and out of a course in your own time, so do not have to be away for the office or pay travel expenses. An on line course will often contain more detail than can be covered in the face to face equivalent – and you can listen to audio or watch videos multiple times to make sure you understand it. On line courses should contain an element of doing – exercises in some form to check your learning. Many on line courses (including ours) will offer support in some form (forum, email, etc.) so you are not isolated from other learners but can still participate in discussions and learn from others. On line courses can often be a more cost effective option and you will learn just as much if not more.

Learners who have bought our on line courses have learnt in their own time – at their own pace (often at the weekend), set up their profiles and got going with Social Media without time out of the office or the cost of travel. They also have access to the course for 12 months – so they will be able to see how changes in the Social Media tools are going to effect their use without need for further time or cost commitment (courses are updated in June and December). An exclusive forum is available for questions and support requests. All this for about the same price as a workshop. Everybody is happy….

So next time you are looking for training, consider all your options and don’t just assume that a face to face workshop is the best.

What do you think of the advantages / disadvantages of each?

Interview with Craig Gordon

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Posted on April 19, 2013 by Mary Thomas

The fourth of our weekly interviews in which we discover how real businesses are making Social Media work for them. Please meet Craig Gordon from HRbullets.co.uk

Who are you and what do you do?

I am a publisher at HRBullets.co.uk. This is a subscription-based online HR and employment law compliance and benchmarking resource. We explain and advise on employment law and HR issues for all businesses sizes but particularly aimed at SMEs.

How do you use Social Media?

I use Twitter as a conversational and brand building tool. I started off using Twitter on a very small and not very focused basis, now I have nearly 2,000 followers and really enjoy using it. I can engage with people in my industry area and have conversations with them. I provide snippets of HR and employment law information and occasional links to interesting websites – and to our website. I share news from HRBullets.co.uk to build the brand and the credibility of the brand. I find Twitter more informal than other tools and I like the discipline of trying to say something in 140 characters. If you can’t say something in 140 characters, is it worth saying?

Can you share a Personal Success Story?

Last year, a well-respected employment lawyer did a poll among Twitter users of top employment law tweeters. We came 12th so as a brand building exercise it is working.

Can you give our readers a top tip?

Enjoy the conversation. Retweet as much as possible. If you see somebody has tweeted an interesting link, retweet them, don’t go and find the link and make it look like you have found it first. If you retweet somebody, they will probably become a follower. Be honest.

Contact Information

You can contact Craig on LinkedIn, Twitter, HRBullets

Use of Social Media by consumer businesses

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Posted on April 16, 2013 by Mary Thomas

I was on holiday in Amsterdam last week. Had a great family holiday in a beautiful city – though it was a bit cold! Whilst there, it was interesting to see how businesses were reaching out to me as a consumer, through the use of Social Media.

QR Codes

Many of the shops had QR codes in their windows to take me to their online shop when they were closed. This is easy to do – the only cost being the sticker for the window. In the example given in the image – the QR code takes the visitor to a different website than the normal experience – other QR codes I saw took the visitor to the standard shop. What a great way of capturing interest from people passing.

Another interesting use of QR Codes was in the Amsterdam museum. The QR code was on the free guidebook given out at the entrance. The QR code was used to start some of the interactive displays in the museum. At one of the exhibits, visitors were encouraged to take a photo of themselves standing behind some armour. The photos were automatically displayed on the Amsterdam museum flickr stream. It felt like they could have made more use of the QR code to capture visitor information, but some interesting ideas.

Facebook

Not surprisingly, Facebook was used in a number of ways. The Amsterdam museum had a exhibit about Johan Cruijff. By logging into Facebook, you could take a photo of yourself with the great footballer! The Heineken Experience had a number of interactive displays, quizzes, etc which could be accessed through Facebook – thereby telling all your friends that you were enjoying the attraction.

One of the best uses of Facebook that I saw was in a restaurant. Rather than the usual dodgy ads in the toilets, there was an invitation to enter a competition to win a meal for 2 by liking their Facebook page. This was an ideal time to talk to a captive audience! They even included their WiFi code with password.

Have you seen any interesting examples of businesses reaching how to you as a consumer? I would love to hear about them.

Interview with Jody Fletcher

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Posted on April 5, 2013 by Mary Thomas

The second of our weekly interviews in which we discover how real businesses are making Social Media work for them. Please meet Jody Fletcher also known as chillijody from Chilli Promotions.

Who are you and what do you do?

I am a supplier of branded marketing merchandise and corporate gifts. This includes things for conferences and events, direct marketing and other marketing collateral including usb sticks, pens etc.

How do you use Social Media?

I use Social Media to keep in touch with people as a ‘soft contact’. I do quite a bit of face to face networking and when I meet somebody I follow them on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Pinterest as a way of keeping in contact. I have also found Social Media helpful in developing brand awareness. People have heard of the brand and know me through our conversations on Social Media even though they may not have met me or even spoken to me. I have turned up to networking events where people have greeted me as ‘chillijody’!

Can you share a Personal Success Story?

I have had numerous referrals and orders from Social Media. Twitter in particular has proved to be successful though I have had success with my Facebook page as well.

Can you give our readers a top tip?

My top tip is to be authentic and consistent. Don’t schedule a load of tweets and then wait a week before you look at the results – if you are going to engage on Twitter or any of the tools, try to be regular so people can have a conversation with you and get to know you. They will then want to help you and your business.

Contact Information

You can contact Jody on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Chilli Promotional Products

Get going with Blogs

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Posted on April 2, 2013 by Mary Thomas

Writing a blog is an important part of any Social Media strategy and in particular a content marketing strategy. Some ideas to get going with blogs…..

What is a blog?
A blog is a personal commentary, opinion or helpful piece of text. Blogs can be a personal diary but if you are writing a blog for business, you should always consider the ‘so what’. How is your blog adding value to others? A blog can be a great way of showing the personality of the business – the Marriott blog does exactly this – showing the life of the founder of the hotel business as he travels the world.

Why blog?
A great way of showing your credibility and knowledge by creating original content, a blog can reach out to a wider audience than your customers. You can help your search engine optimisation by using keywords. A blog will increase visitors to a website and ultimately add to your bottom line.

How do you start a blog?
You can start a blog for free at wordpress.com or Blogger or Tumblr. Using the free versions of wordpress.com and Blogger are a great way to get started, but the visitor analytics tools are limited, you may get ads displayed on your blog and you are not in control – you could be closed down for no apparent reason. Tumblr has a strong community of bloggers particularly amongst the younger age group. Blogs on Tumblr tend to be shorter and more image based. There is no ability to comment on Tumblr blogs, but your blog can be reposted.

Using one of these tools is a good way to get going with blogs, but I would always recommend that ultimately a business either buy a domain name if using wordpress.com or host the blog on the business website. Buying the domain name is a good alternative if you don’t have a website. If you host the blog on your website, you will be increasing visitors to your site and keep them on your site. You will also benefit from the fact that search engines like websites that change frequently – updating your blog will be a change to the website.

When should I write a blog?
If you are going to start a blog, you should aim to update it regularly. Twice a week is ideal, but more realistically aim for once a week. This isn’t so hard if you write down a number of subjects you can blog about and set aside an hour a week at the same time, to write it.

What should I blog about?
The best way to come up with subject areas is to write down any questions that you are asked about your business, products or services by anybody you meet while networking, talking to customers, or answering the phone.

Images
Include original, copyright free or paid images in your blog. This will break up the text and make it easier to read.

Keywords
Finally, make sure you think about keywords when you are writing the blog. What words would somebody type into a search engine to find the article you are writing about? Include these words in the title of your blog as well as a couple of times in your content.

Time to get going with your blog
So time to get going. It often is a case of jumping in there and getting started and making writing a blog part of your weekly life. Let me know if you need any help deciding which blog software to use, setting your blog up or finding inspiration!

Over to you
So what is holding you back from writing a blog or what success have you found from your blog? Do let me know.

Interview – Dave Griffin

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Posted on March 29, 2013 by Mary Thomas

I am often asked for real life success stories of how other businesses are using Social Media. Clearly, I can offer my own stories – but I may come across as somewhat biased! So, I have decided to start a series of blog entries in which I interview other small business owners to see how they use Social Media, what their success stories are and ask them to share their top tip. I plan to publish an interview every Friday.

I’m thankful to Dave Griffin from The Social Media Café / Dave Griffin Consultancy Ltd / Griffin Property Business for being my guinea pig on this venture!

Who are you and what do you do?

I was in the RAF for 18 years and then did some Business Coaching and Property development. In the recent past I have suffered from chronic fatigue syndrome but still work with businesses in the roles of Business coach and Social Media mentor and coach. I am also a guest lecturer in Social Media at Oxford University.

How do you use Social Media?

I use Social Media from a practical viewpoint. I believe it all comes down to the online identity of a business or individual. The business or individual needs to be found. I know that offline marketing is still important, but with the right online profiles you can get the most exposure. LinkedIn and Facebook are my two favourite tools. I have had great results with LinkedIn. It is so important to be found by people on LinkedIn – anybody can get found if they optimize their profile.

Can you share a Personal Success Story?

Yes, of course. An agency working for Facebook looked for business coaches on LinkedIn. They found my profile and could see that I had 70+ recommendations. They already liked me before even contacting me. As a result I did some work with the Facebook UK management team.

Can you give our readers a top tip?

My top tip would be to focus on your LinkedIn headline. This is prime real estate for getting your profile found. Your headline needs to say ‘what you do’ not ‘who you are’. Include the words people are searching for.

Contact Information

You can contact Dave on LinkedIn, Twitter, The Social Media Café

During the next few weeks, I hope to interview Lucinda Hart, Jody Fletcher, Kath Bonner Durham and a few others I haven’t asked yet! Let me know if you would be interested in featuring.

Using Facebook Offers

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Posted on March 28, 2013 by Mary Thomas

I thought this week I would share my experience of running a Facebook offer. Facebook offers are a fairly new type of status update for Business Pages with over 100 fans.

You first need to set up an advertising account with Facebook by creating an ad using Adverts Manager – be aware you will need to switch back to yourself before doing this as only real people can actually have a credit card! Choose Offer and follow the tips given below and enter your credit card details.

If you already have an advertising account, you should see the option to create a status update of type offer.

1. Click offer and you will need to choose what type of offer you want to display. You can choose an offer redeemable in store, online or both. I have recently implemented e-commerce on my website so can now create discount codes.

2. Next you need to enter the web address relevant to the discount and the discount code,

3. Upload an image that should be used for the discount. This shouldn’t be your logo as your logo will be displayed as well.
(Note: I fell foul of the recent change in rules with my first attempt. If the image contains text, the text must not take up more than 20% of the area of the image (unless it is clearly part of the product packaging). Out of interest, this has just changed for cover photos too – another post to come!)
You also need to enter the text for the offer. Facebook recommends that the discount or ’2 for 1′ offer comes first. You only have 90 characters for this.
Enter the number available together with any terms and conditions and the expiry date.

4. Once you have done this, Facebook will email you a preview of the offer.

5. Now you need to choose your budget. For £32, I was able to run an advert with an estimated reach of 36K – 67K

So what results can you expect?

I started my advert running Tuesday morning, it is now Wednesday night.

So far, 4,340 people have seen the post, One person has bought a different course – but interacted as a result of the offer. I have received 4 new page likes (2 from people I don’t know), 4 likes on the offer (2 different people I don’t know) and 15 people have claimed the offer. This means that they have received an email from Facebook with the link and offer code. They will also get a reminder from Facebook on Thursday that the offer will expire soon so needs to be redeemed.

Strangely the other 14 people haven’t yet bought. Could this mean that the offer was emailed to their spam folder, they haven’t had a chance to buy or they have had second thoughts? Who knows?

So has it been worth it?

Well the offer is running until Friday, so there is still time to get those sales. I think it has been worth it – selling the 1 course has paid for the investment and I have got the brand and the concept in front of people. If I sell any of the courses that have been claimed, it will definitely have been worth it. Hopefully the people that have engaged with the offer or page will engage next time they see an update from the page. I have certainly seen an increase in the number of people who have seen subsequent posts, so it has improved my ‘Edgerank’.

I wouldn’t repeat regularly at the moment – but I can see an offer working every 3 – 6 months.

What do you think? Have you tried offers or are you going to? Do have a look at my offer on the Concise Training Facebook page

Update 1/4/13 – Just to let you know the final figures. 7,983 people saw the post, 5 likes, 34 claimed the offer (though nobody made a purchase). The numbers of people who saw subsequent posts has doubled, so it has made a difference to the Edgerank algorithm. I achieved an additional 6 likes to the page. I have sold other courses during this time frame. So in summary, I think it is worth repeating every few months with different courses and offers.

Twitter chat

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Posted on March 20, 2013 by Mary Thomas

Twitter Chat

Have you taken part in a Tweet chat yet? I haven’t had a chance to get involved in one for a few months. Since I enjoyed them when I was involved before, I was delighted when I heard about #oxhour which takes place on a Wednesday evening from 8pm to 9pm. It was started by Joy and David McCarthy @wordright and @webright – Banbury based website design / copywriters.

So what happens in a twitter chat? Basically a whole heap of people come together for a chat which all happens around a particular hashtag – in this case #oxhour. Chats work best when the moderators suggest topics to discuss. I joined part way through, but the topics I saw were “Do we use Social Media too much” and “Anyone able to value business gained through Twitter” – both valid discussions.

The speed of conversation on a Twitter chat is rapid and you do have to be on your game to keep track with what is going on. It also works best when people don’t just talk about their services and try to sell – but like anything on Social Media, ask questions, add value and if possible keep on topic.

You can follow the hashtag using twitter.com or any of your normal Social Media management tools (HootSuite, Tweetdeck, SproutSocial, etc). However I always use www.tweetchat.com, a free tool which allows you to follow a hashtag and automatically adds the hashtag to all your tweets. Makes it slightly easier to follow and there is less typing required! Tweetchat also allows you to change the font of the tweets so you can see more on a screen, change the refresh rate and pause when it really gets out of control.

I really enjoyed the #oxhour tonight – met some fantastic, interesting business owners who I probably would never meet under usual circumstances. I have followed everybody I can and look forward to listening and learning from them in the future.

If you get a chance, do give a chat on Twitter a go – it is well worth the time. Can you share your experiences?

6 Tips for a sales team to use LinkedIn

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Posted on March 18, 2013 by Mary Thomas

Have you noticed an increase in requests and messages from people who are selling on LinkedIn? The message seems to have got out that LinkedIn in a great sales tool. Yes it is - but not in the traditional sense.

Some tips for a sales team to use LInkedIn to make your selling more effective (to me at least):

1. Complete your LinkedIn profile with a professional photo and enough information about yourself so I can tell how you can help me.

2. Include a personal invite when you invite people to connect to you. Don’t just click the Connect button – tell me why I should connect with you or remind me where I have met you. At the very least look at my profile first!

3. Build a relationship with me by liking, commenting or sharing my updates. Make me notice who you are.

4. Belong to the same groups as me and participate in group discussions. Don’t use the group discussions to sell to me but to offer your opinion and perhaps solve my questions.

5. Generally give me information that I might find useful in your updates. Then when you do share an update that is a sales message, I might take notice.

6. Resist the impulse to message all of your contacts at the same time with a sales message. Think about who is likely to want to hear your message. For example, it is unlikely that I want my inbox cluttered up with news about a competitor’s Social Media workshop! Use LinkedIn’s tools to tag and sort your connections.

What do you think? I’m sure you will have suggestions to add to the list. Please share.

Ofcourse if you want some help improving your use of LinkedIn, have a look at my LinkedIn online course.

Have you noticed Pinterest has changed?

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Posted on March 7, 2013 by Mary Thomas

Have you noticed that Pinterest has changed recently?

Recent changes include:

A new list of categories for the search on the left hand side of the home screen to make it easier to find content.
When you look at a pin, you see a list of other pins on that board to encourage you to look around the whole board.
You will also see related pins
Pins are larger

Is Pinterest for you?

Well ask yourself these questions:

Do you have images relating to your product or service that you can share?
For example, I have pinned the cover of my book onto a Business Books board and the images relating to my e-learning products on to another board.
Do you have images about something related to but slightly outside your immediate business products or services that your audience might find interesting?
For example I have a board devoted to border terriers – my own border terrier who appears in a variety of my training courses is one of the featured dogs!
Are these images available on your website somewhere?
Although you can upload photos directly into Pinterest, it is a good idea to have them linked back to your website or blog – you want people to click through to find out more.

If you are saying ‘yes’ to these questions, you need to explore further.

You start by creating” boards” – think in terms of a old fashioned cork board and ‘pin’ (fix) images to the relevant board. Then look for related images from others that you can also pin to these boards and if necessary other boards. For example the Border terriers board also contains pictures of other border terriers. I have a board called Infographics to which I pin any Infographic that I find interesting and might be interesting to others.

You should also follow other people and like and comment on other people’s pins and boards. Like with any Social Media the more time you spend liking and commenting, the more you will get people to like and comment your own boards.

By the way, my Business Books to Read board has been shared with networking colleagues – anybody can pin a book to this board.

One of the tools, I have found particularly useful is the Pin it bookmarklet which is a button you can add to your browser. If I find an interesting image when I’m researching, I can just click the Pin It button on my browser to pin the image to one of my boards.

What do you think? Are you going to get pinning?

5 reasons to use Google+

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Posted on February 28, 2013 by Mary Thomas

Reasons to use Google+

I’ve been updating the latest version of our on line Google+ course this week.

I haven’t looked in detail at Google+ for a couple of months and I’m impressed with the changes – the functionality seems to be developing well and coming together. This is one site that I for one, need to spend more time on, as there seem to be some great new changes in the pipeline. (I’ll need to schedule in more updates to the on line course!)

But isn’t it just another social networking site that we all need to get our heads round? Well yes, but it is also more than that:

1. When Google indexes your website for search, it takes a view on how the website / brand is viewed by others. One of the ways it does this at the moment is by looking at the quality of inbound links to the website. Using Google+, the number of +1s (Google’s equivalent of like) on your page and posts will instantly tell Google what others think of your brand.

2. if you sign up for Gmail, YouTube or other Google services, Google will automatically create a Google+ profile for you. Yes this is intrusive and you will need to check your security settings, but it is just one more way that Google+ is being integrated into all the other Google services.

3. If you are a local business, then having a Google+ page allows customers to write reviews on your business. The number of reviews you get are displayed prominently in Google search results and clicking on the reviews will take visitors to the business’ Google+ page to see photos and more information. There is even a possibility of having a 360 degree photo of the inside of your business created!

4. Google Authorship allows your picture to be displayed in search results next to any content you have written on the web. It is more likely that people will click on a results with a picture than those with not.

5. Google+ is made by Google and Google are spending time and money on it adding new features all the time and further integrating into search.

So 5 reasons for you and I haven’t mentioned Google hangouts, targeting updates or Google Events…..

What do you think? Are you going to take another look? Or perhaps you need help or training…..

Using QR Codes for marketing

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Posted on February 20, 2013 by Mary Thomas

Using QR Codes for marketing

I’ve been doing some research this week on the use of QR codes in marketing. I’ve been aware of QR codes for a while as a marketing device for print material but there are some really creative ways of using QR codes being developed at the moment.

QR codes are those 2D bar codes that can hold a variety of information including any of:

Website URL
YouTube video
Google Map location
Twitter, Linkedin, Facebook
link to App Store or iTunes
Text
Telephone number or Skype call
SMS message
Email address or Email message
Contact details
Wifi login
Paypal buy now

You read a QR code using an internet enabled phone with camera and QR code reader app (e.g. BeeTag).

I firmly believe that these days if you are producing printed material, brochure, leaflet, etc, you should seriously consider producing a QR code to offer more information, email interest, enter a competition etc. Not everybody knows how to use them at the moment, but I think this year they will become more main stream.

For example, I have included a QR code in the latest edition of my book, Social Media Made Simple, to encourage people to enter a draw for a free Skype session with me in return for an email address.

This week, I have discovered some exciting creative uses of QR codes including:

A sandwich shop allows customers to order and pay for food using QR codes to avoid queues.
A resturant has QR codes in the menu. Scanning the QR codes shows a video of the dish being prepared or a picture of the dish.
A fast food restaurant is using QR codes on their packaging to inform customers what is in their food.
A company in Brazil has included QR codes on their special bottles for father’s day. When dad scans in the QR code they get a personalised video message
A restaurant selling sushi includes edible QR codes on their food to allow people to get more information about the fish they are eating.
Special panels have been installed at First World War memorials enabling the public to learn about the history of the service personnel who lost their lives.
Teachers use QR codes in the classroom to add interest to quizs, research or learning.

QR codes are really easy (and free) to create. Use QRStuff to create your QR code next time you print any marketing material. Do create them for a purpose though and think about how they are going to be used. Make sure you add value and link to a specific page or message rather than just directing people to your home page. Other things to avoid:

including QR codes in websites or emails – the recipient is already on a computer – why would they want to use a Smartphone as well?
using QR codes as an Individual LinkedIn (or other Social Media) profile picture!
using QR codes somewhere with no internet access e.g. on a plane or in the parts of the underground without wifi
displaying QR codes in places impossible to scan (either very high or on a lorry moving very fast)

So what do you think? Where have you seen QR codes being used successfully? How are you going to use QR codes in the future?

Benefit of Content Marketing

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Posted on February 7, 2013 by Mary Thomas

One of the things I often find myself explaining to business owners and marketing managers is the difference (in my opinion) between content marketing and relationship marketing. I believe it is important to understand which type of marketing the business wants to concentrate on and therefore which Social Media tools are most appropriate for the business to use. In this blog post, I will discuss the benefit of content marketing in more detail – and give you some insight into how I see content marketing working in my business.

Content marketing should be used when a business can create a variety of added value material on a regular basis. Content should add such a large amount of value that visitors want to sign up for more information and talk about the content.

To give you an example, I have written blog entries for a while but have been particularly concentrating on the distribution of them since Christmas. As a result of writing regular, useful blog entries and using Social Media (Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn) to distribute them, my website hits have increased 50% over the month and I have a decent increase in newsletter subscribers. I also had the content on my website recommended to others in a recent networking group I attended!

Once people have found me via the blog, they can take advantage of other free content available including my newsletter and video channel. I aim to produce presentations and infographics during the next few months to extend the type and variety of content available.

It is all very well, you may say, giving content away for free – but we are in business to make money. I have a number of offerings when people are ready to find out more. At the first pricing level, my Social Media Simple book will give you more advice and value. For a small monthly fee, you can join my exclusive Social Media Professionals group – to gain access to monthly updates of all the tools as well as a webinar every other month (contact me to find out more). As visitors have a greater need and want to know more, training courses are available in the form of workshops, bespoke or distance learning training courses. At the highest level of content, the ITQ Social Media qualification is still proving popular.

By giving valuable content away initially, I can encourage visitors to engage with me further down the value chain at the pricing level they feel comfortable with.

Next week, I will discuss the importance of relationship marketing and how both content and relationship marketing can be used together. In the meantime, let me know how you implement content marketing in your business.

Somebody has looked at my LinkedIn Profile – What now?

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Posted on January 31, 2013 by Mary Thomas

A client asked me the other day, “What should I do when people look at my LinkedIn profile?”

I thought this was an interesting question – and I’m pretty sure that most people (me included) think ‘oh that is good’ and not do anything else.

There are better options – have a think about one of the following:

1. The contact is a 1st level contact
How about sending a message saying “thanks for looking at my profile, is there anything in particular I can help you with”?

2. The contact is a 2nd level contact
In this case you have a number of choices:

Look at their profile, if it is somebody who looks interesting / relevant, send a connection request with a message “thanks for looking at my profile. Would you like to connect and is there anything I can help you with further?”
Look at their profile, see if they have listed their email address on the profile and send an email mentioning any mutual contacts and the fact that they viewed your profile.
See the shared connection(s) and ask for some more information / an introduction to the person who viewed your profile (if you know the shared connection well enough)
Send an inmail – see below

3. The contact is a 3rd level contact or out of your network
In this case you can do one of the following:

See how much of their profile you can see and check for an email address. You might not be able to see much if the profile has been protected.
You might want to send a connection request with an appropriate message
Send an inmail

Inmail

Inmail is a way of using LinkedIn to send an email to somebody you are not connected to. A single inmail costs $10. If you don’t get a response, you will be given another inmail by LinkedIn. I think this is quite an expensive way of contacting people – you really need to make sure they are in your target audience and that there is no other way of contacting them.

Upgrade to Business Account

Another option is to upgrade to a business account. At a cost of £12.95 / month (billed annually), you can see the full list of everybody who has looked at your profile (rather than just the last 5) and you can see 3 inmails each month. For me, I just don’t see the return on investment for this. If you keep an eye on your LinkedIn notifications and email, you will find out when people look at your profile and there are cheaper ways of contacting people. I can see a need if you are using LinkedIn for recruitment, but not if you are using it as a networking tool.

Progress

Out of interest, my client has just contacted to say that he has contacted two of the people who looked at his profile – 1 was a 1st level contact and 1 was a 2nd level contact and received a positive response from both. I suspect it is worth giving it a go – so if you look at my profile, expect a message from me!

Would love to hear your thoughts / experiences…..

Twitter header image

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Posted on January 24, 2013 by Mary Thomas

The new Twitter header image on the profiles has been rolled out to everybody now. What does this mean for you?

When people look at your profile on Twitter, your profile picture and bio will be displayed in the centre of a box. For example, in this profile, the FT avatar is displayed in the middle of the black box with their 160 character bio in the middle in white writing.

The black box is the default, but you can change the black box to display a picture or a set of images that reflect your brand. I have created an image that displays a number of aspects of my offering. This is a great opportunity to make your profile more interesting and show the brand of your business.

You may want to use a photo that shows your interests or your business. Helen Irving from Best of Abingdon uses a picture of Abingdon which works well.

To upload your profile header, login to Twitter and edit your profile by clicking on the gear on the right hand side. In the profile tab, click Change Header and select the picture you want to use. You can either use a photograph as Helen did or you can use a graphics package to create an image. I used PowerPoint to arrange the images into a rectangle (twice as wide as high), group the images together and save as picture, by right clicking on the group. The image should be 1252 x 626 pixels. Twitter attempts to resize images for you, but you may need to resize the image using a free tool like Image Optimizer.

Note the bio text is always in white, so choose an image that will show the white writing.

So what do you think? – share links to your Twitter profile headings in the comments below so we can all learn from each other.

Update to Facebook Security Settings

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Posted on January 9, 2013 by Mary Thomas

Facebook has rolled out a new update to its security settings. Have you got the new settings yet? Well you will know because you have a new icon on the top right of your page – looks like a padlock. I’ll give you a quick run down of the security settings you should review.

1. Clicking on the padlock icon will immediately give you access to three options:

Who can see my stuff
Who can contact me
How do I stop someone from bothering me.

There is nothing new here – these options were all available before – but they are more visible and easier to understand now.

If you are using Facebook for business, you may want to set your settings to be more open than if you are keeping the profile private for personal use. Do remember though that even if you share a photo with just your friends there is nothing to stop your friends sharing the photo publicly so do be careful what you share!

If you look at your Activity log, you can see everything you have done on Facebook and choose what is public / visible to friends / private.

2. Clicking on the gear on the top right hand corner and then selecting Privacy Settings brings up further options:

Who can see your future posts
Review all your posts and things you are tagged in
Limit the audience for posts you’ve shared with friends of friends or public
Who can look you up using the email address or phone number you provided
Do you want other search engines to link to your timeline

The main things you should look at here are “limit the audience” – check your really old posts to see whether they are still appropriate to be publicly visible! and “do you want other search engines….”. If you are trying to keep your profile private, I would turn this off – my children are turning this off for example.

3. From here click the Timeline and Tagging option on the left hand side.

This section looks at what content others can post on your timeline and whether you want to review posts you have been mentioned (tagged in). Read these settings carefully – I think some are counter intuitive.

The new settings are, in general, easier to understand – but I would recommend that you really think about how you want to use your Facebook personal profile and why you have chosen a particular security setting.

What do you think – are the new settings easier to understand?

Are you Using Google Authorship

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Posted on December 5, 2012 by Mary Thomas

Google Authorship

Google Authorship is a way of personalising your content in search results. If people use keywords to search, your content could be displayed with your profile image.

Content that is displayed with an image appears higher in search results and is more likely to get clicked as there is a personal element to the profile. To use Google Authorship, you need to first create a Google+ Profile.

There are two ways you can set up your Google Authorship. The method you will choose will depend on whether you have an email address associated with the domain name of where you write your content.

For example, I write a blog at www.concisetraining.net, my email address is mary@concisetraining.net so I can use Method 1.

If I wrote a blog at www.concisetraining.net, but my email address was mary@hotmail.com, I would need to use Method 2.

You may need to use a combination of methods if you write guest blogs or write content that is hosted somewhere in addition to your website.

Method 1

1.Create a Google+ Profile with a picture and profile information

2.Make sure your name appears either on each blog post or in the side bar of your website. You need to use the same version of your name that is used in the Google+ Profile

3.Go to Google+ Authorship

4.Enter your email address and click Sign up for Authorship

5.Click the Verify button that is sent to your email.

Method 2

1.Create a Google+ Profile with a picture and profile information

2.In your content (or on the side bar of your website or blog), include a link to your Google+ Profile URL using the html code

<a href=”[profile_url]?rel=author”>Google</a>

You find your profile URL by clicking on the profile button in your Google+ account. Do not include /posts. For example, my Google+ URL is

https://plus.google.com/106663343028568137234

Note: You can use your name or ‘Find me on Google’ or a Google+ image rather than ‘Google’

3. In the Contributor section of your Google+ profile, add a link to the site you have just updated

4. Use the Google testing tool to check that it has worked.

When Google reindexes, you should find your content is appearing with a picture.

Will this persuade you to use Google+? We will be adding Google+ to our suite of Social Media Online courses soon.

Linked Endorsements – are they being devalued?

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Posted on November 29, 2012 by Mary Thomas

Some of you may have read the post I wrote a few weeks ago about LinkedIn Endorsements. In this post, I said I thought endorsements were a good addition to LinkedIn – they are a nice way of easily giving a ‘thumbs up’ to a contact’s skills.

Since that original post, I have been endorsed by over 100 different people, with the skill ‘Social Media’ being endorsed by 58 people. Now I consider myself to be very lucky to receive such endorsements and I thank everybody who was kind enough to endorse me.

However, I think it is almost too easy to endorse somebody. When that box of 4 people appears at the top of a profile, with encouragement to make an endorsement, it is too easy to click ‘Endorse’ without really thinking about what you are doing and whether the person actually has the skill you are endorsing. I find it very annoying that you can’t tell LinkedIn that you don’t want to endorse Joe Bloggs for ‘Small Business’. If you click the cross to get rid of the suggestion, it reappears the next time the boxes appear. In order to remove it you have to click endorse.

This devalues the whole process, in my opinion, as endorsements are being made that aren’t real. I wonder how many endorsements I would get if I added ‘Sewing’ to my profile?

I hope LinkedIn improve the area of endorsements as part of the major changes that are happening to profiles over the next few months. What do you think of endorsements?

LinkedIn Company Profiles

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Posted on November 8, 2012 by Mary Thomas

LinkedIn company profiles have become much more interesting with the addition of images and a new front page. Your LinkedIn company profile will be visible to anybody on LinkedIn and will also be found by search engines so it is worth spending the time to make it look good.

Front Page Image

You can load an image onto the front page of the profile. This is similar to the Facebook cover image (for those of you with Facebook pages), but the important difference is that you can include a call to action or contact information in the image. This is a good place to illustrate your branding.

About Us

The about us section has been moved towards the bottom of the page (another reason why your image needs to represent your brand). It still includes a specialities section and you should make sure your specialities are keyworded.

Products and Services

You can create an additional page (with its own banner header) to list your products and services. You can link each of your products/ services to a page on your website or use this area to publicise any special offers or discounts, links to downloads or events. This area gives you the opportunity to keep people interested in your great content. Note the first product in this list will be displayed on your home page.

The products and services page will show on the right hand side anybody who has recommended your products and services within your visitor’s network. It is a good idea to ask for specific recommendations here.

Updates

Your company updates will now be shown on the home page of your company page. You need to make sure that these updates offer value and are interesting. You can choose to ‘feature’ an update which will keep it at the top of the page. This might be useful if you have an event coming up for example. You should update your status at least a couple of times a week. To encourage new followers of the company, share the update status at an individual level.

If you have over 100 followers of your company, you can target specific groups of people by company size, seniority, industry, etc.

What do you think of the changes to the LinkedIn company profiles?

By Mary Thomas

Using Hootsuite for Twitter Location Search

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Posted on November 1, 2012 by Mary Thomas

As part of becoming HootSuite certified, I went through some of the videos in the HootSuite University. I found a very useful way of creating a location based search real time search from within HootSuite. I had previously used Twilert to do this, but the alerts are sent with delay which isn’t quite so good.

To Use HootSuite Location Search

If I want to set up a search for anybody mentioning “Twitter Training” within 20 miles of Oxford (allowing me to see what my competitors are doing as well as being able to respond to any requests), I would do the following:

1. In Google Maps, on the bottom left hand side, click Map Labs. Enable LatLng Marker and Save Changes

2. Search for Oxford. Right click over the marker and select Drop LatLng Marker. Highlight the numbers that appear and copy (Using Ctrl C is the easiest way to copy)

3. In HootSuite, Add a new column of Type Search

4. Enter my keyword term, e.g. “Twitter Training” (with quotes), then type the text geocode: (with a colon) paste the numbers (press Ctrl V).

5. Remove any spaces after the colon, after the numbers type , (comma) 20mi for 20 miles away, 50mi for 50 miles away,etc.

Example

“Twitter Training” geocode:51.7587,-1.256,20mi

Save the column and watch your real time search results appear. Remember if you make the radius too small, you may not get any real time results!

Let me know how you get on and of course, let me know if you have any problems or you would like more information on how to make the best use of HootSuite to manage your Twitter account.

What content are you creating?

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Posted on October 25, 2012 by Mary Thomas

Regular readers of my blog will be aware that I have recently suggested you create a schedule of blog entries several months in advance so that you have an idea about what you are going to write about before you come to write it. As I explained in a previous blog entry, this is something that I have recently actioned myself – and I have to say that it does work!

Now you are creating regular blogs, it is time to think about what other content you can create and include these in your content schedule.

You all have loads of information inside your heads about the products and services you offer – that is why you are doing what you are doing. You can share your expertise with others and build your credibility in a number of ways. You need to get over that fear of sharing information – the more you give, you more you will receive and the wider your reach.

Think about how you can share this content in different ways and through different medium. I was recently lucky enough to have parts of my workshops videoed so now I have 20 videos that I can release over time to share my expertise and build my credibility. Have a look at one on Tools. I package up small snippets from my blog entries to share on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and LinkedIn. I am seriously thinking about creating short podcasts of some of the key aspects of my workshops.

Other things that I could create include handouts that could be downloaded from my website, I could guest blog on other sites, share content on Pinterest, publish e-articles. All this content that is available serves a number of purposes:

increases my internet footprint
increases the likelyhood of my getting found using search
shows my expertise and credibility
offers the opportunity to reach larger numbers of people
offers the opportunity to touch people in a number of ways

What do you think? What is the way you prefer to receive content – and what is the way your audience likes to receive content? They may not be the same!

Using LinkedIn Endorsements

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Posted on October 17, 2012 by Mary Thomas

Have you noticed the ‘endorsements’ coming into your inbox during the last week? LinkedIn has developed endorsements as an opportunity for people to recommend or ‘endorse’ somebody’s skills or experience.

Over the last six months, there has been a move away from a list of specialities (new profiles don’t even get this option) and a towards listing a number of skills or expertise. You can choose from a predefined list of skills or add your own.

Now when you look at somebody’s profile, you are asked to endorse their skills. If you endorse a skill for Joe (say), your profile picture will appear next to the skill on Joe’s profile.

In the last couple of days, I have been lucky enough to have been endorsed by a number of people for a variety of skills. During the last 24 hours, I have contacted everybody who has endorsed me to say “thank you”. I just sent a message through LinkedIn, making the message personal if possible. I know that endorsing is an easy process, but I still think if one of my contacts has taken the time to do it, I would like to thank them. It has also been a good excuse to recontact people who I haven’t seen or spoken to for a while!

Well – I’ve had a great result so far. Nearly everybody has replied with some news of their own, I have had one request to quote for some training and one request to meet up face to face!

During the process of replying to those who have endorsed me, I have also been spending time endorsing others. This has brought home to me how important it is to have relevant and current skills listed on your profile - the number of people who have ‘small business’ listed is extraordinary – there can’t be that many experts in ‘small business’ – and what does an expert in ‘small business’ do?

LinkedIn will suggest that you give endorsements to people for certain skills. You can click the cross at the top right of the box if you don’t want to endorse for that skill – but unfortunately LinkedIn doesn’t remember which ones you’ve closed – but this is an annoying but minor glitch.

All in all, a good addition I think – but make the most of it. Get your skills correct, endorse others and thank those who endorse you.

Musings on Experience Business Exhibition

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Posted on October 11, 2012 by Mary Thomas

I have spent today exhibiting at the Experience Business event in Wallingford. I don’t often do exhibitions, probably about one a year on average, but I liked the sound of this one. It didn’t cost an arm and a leg to exhibit – which makes a change, I had the opportunity to speak during the day and all profits from the event went to the Aspire Charity (more on this later). The other thing that was different, was that all exhibitors were encouraged to give their visitors something practical to do rather than just talk and give out leaflets.

There weren’t a large number of visitors – something that is always difficult at these events – but the people that were there were genuinely interested in what was available. Most people I spoke to had at least 3 quality leads by the end of the today. Personally, I sold another 3 Social Media Made Simple books and had good conversations with a number of people, several of which could lead to long term work. A successful day all in all.

I met some really interesting people during the day offering exciting and different products and services. I had a great chat with Janice from Thames Training. Janice offers first aid courses to individuals and businesses. As she said, most first aid is actually given in the home rather than at work. How many of us feel competent if something were to happen?

Tim Moody from Tech Trial has a fantastic website – you can actually purchase technology from his site that you can try for 21 days before you commit to buying. He also offers reviews and suggestions of the best technology for your situation.

The final business I want to mention is Nikhilesh Haval from NiKcreationS. Nikhilesh is the Oxfordshire Google Photographer. This means that he can take 360 degree photos of the inside of your business and upload them to the Google server. From here the photo is linked to your Google+ Profile. For a local business, your Google+ Profile is linked to Google Maps and street view. Have a look at Lassco as an example.

By the way Aspire is a fab charity which helps get people who are long term unemployed back to work. When a long term unemployed person joins Aspire, they join one of the teams to provide work such as gardening, recycling or even setting up an ebay page. By working through Aspire, they receive motivation, self confidence and normally find employment.

So all in all a great day. Thanks to organisation from Chantal Cornelius from Appletree, Ann Griffiths from Vision Coaching, Jeanette Howse from Tourism South East and The Springs Hotel. I look forward to next year!

Creating a Blogging Content Schedule

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Posted on September 26, 2012 by Mary Thomas

I have a confession to make….. As anybody who has subscribed to this blog (and thank you for doing so), you may have noticed that I have been rather bad at updating it on a regular basis recently.

I have definitely fallen into the ‘cobbler’s shoes’ problem. I’m very good at telling others how to keep their blog updated – not so good at doing it myself!

So why is that? I spend so much time learning about new Social Media functions and facilities and I have been spending a fair bit of time creating learning content recently – it has just seemed too much effort to write a blog as well! But it isn’t really – part of the problem is setting aside the time – probably only 15 or 20 minutes each week. The other problem is knowing what to write about – but every business knows more than their customers (well I would hope so anyway), so just share some of that knowledge!

So, I’m turning over a new leaf. Every Wednesday night, I sit in a car park waiting for my son at badminton training. I purchased a dongle last week so now I have internet access in the car park. So I have no ‘time’ excuse.

I have just sat and written down a list of topics I can blog about each week – actually this was very easy.

I now need to make the commitment to do it! Well I know if I tell somebody else that I am going to do something, I will do it. So I’m telling my readers that between now and Christmas, this is the schedule I’m going to try to keep to. I may change some of the topics if events overtake me, but at least now I know what I’m going to write about if there is nothing else more important (and when I’m going to do it).

Wish me luck! I hope I have inspired you to follow suit – why not add a list of topics you are going to write about in the comments below and we can do it together!

Microsoft Office 2013 Changes

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Posted on August 22, 2012 by Mary Thomas

I am beta testing Microsoft Office 2013 at the moment. Not too many changes you will be pleased to hear. Still based around the ribbon user interface. The main change is the relationship that Office has with the cloud. You download the applications to your devices based on your Microsoft ID. Saving by default is to the SkyDrive though your recently used folders are also displayed when saving.

This is the first or a number of posts in which I explore some of the best features. Focusing on general features and Word to start with:

1. I really like the Resume Reading feature – if you are editing a document, save and reopen. Resume Reading will take you back to where you were last editing (Word and PowerPoint).

2. There is also improved alignment guides which will make it easier to include images and tables in a document.

3. Track changes has at last been improved so you can enforce track changes (can’t be turned off without a password) and see a conversation about a change as a conversation rather than a series of bubbles.

4. You can edit a pdf document from within the new version of Word and save it as either a Word document or PDF. Very useful but sort of defeats the idea of sending pdf versions.

5. The new version of Office is coming out with Windows 8 and the new Windows tablet device (Microsoft Surface – release date rumoured to be October 26, cost from £199) so it is good to see that the Office programs have a ‘touch’ mode which widens the space between buttons and flattens the menu to make it easier to use when tapping.

6. Also thinking about tablets, there is a reading mode for documents which is a full screen, readonly mode with swipe to turn pages, seaching and the ability to expand photos or tables by double clicking or tapping.

Overall I’m very impressed with Office 2013 so far – it all seems a bit slicker and easier to use rather than any major improvements. You can download the beta version from Microsoft

Let me know what you think.

London Olympics – Positive Energy

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Posted on August 16, 2012 by Mary Thomas

I had been looking forward to the London Olympics for 16 years ever since we were living in Atlanta during the Atlanta Olympics – got tickets to the 100m mens final and then my son was born on the weekend of the opening ceremony! We said then that one day we would go… (we did say my son would be paying – but perhaps a little harsh at 16!)

So we applied for loads of tickets and were really lucky to get 5 events – waterpolo, handball, volleyball, football and Athletics. Now it is all over – and was it worth it?

The venues were amazing, the travel, no issue (3 hours door to door from Oxfordshire to the Olympic park) – the atmosphere was great. At all the venues we went to, the vast majority of seats were taken and Hungary vs Montenegro (waterpolo) was enthusiastically supported by all nationalities which was fab! My only disappointment was watching the GB football team at Cardiff in the quarter final – and that was due to the performance of the GB football team compared to the performance of every other team that we saw!

I loved the way that nationalities came together to support each other. At one venue, we were sat near people from France, Jamaica, America, Czech Republic and England – all with flags and all supporting each other.

The other thing that I loved was the positive vibe that was apparent everywhere. Not only at the Olympics themselves but also among other business owners at the networking meetings I went to during this time- let’s keep this up. Yes we all get knocks in business – some days are pretty hard – but if you talk positively and think positively then positive things will happen.

I really hope that we take this positive energy forward as a country as one of the many legacies of the games and yes for us it was worth it!

As a final note – thanks to all the volunteers who helped with the Olympics – it couldn’t have been done without you!

5 Tips for Using Google Analytics

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Posted on July 9, 2012 by Mary Thomas

You spend lots of money on getting a website built, but what do you do with it then? Do you ever check what traffic is going to the website, where the traffic is coming from and what improvements need to be made?

Your website needs to bring a return on investment in the same way as the rest of your marketing needs to add to your bottom line.

Google Analytics is a free tool which you can use to identify the success of your website in terms of traffic, keywords and what visitors are doing.

You need to register with Google Analytics and you may need to ask your website designer to include the ‘urchin’ code on your website. (If you have a WordPress website, contact me for help)

Track trends not individual days. The numbers on a website can be misleading – your own visits for example are included, so don’t get too hung up on the numbers. The general trend over time should be increasing.
In the Standard Reporting Menu, look at Content > Site Content > Landing Pages to see the pages at which people entered your site. Check the bounce rate on these pages. A high bounce rate may indicate that your visitor was not engaged by the content of the page. Think about including more calls to actions
Use the Audience > Visitors Flow report to identify how visitors are moving through your site. Are they flowing through the site in the way you had planned? If not, or if they are dropping out too early, think about making the ‘where to go next’ clearer.
Use Sources > Referrals to identify which sites are driving traffic to your site. Spend more time updating content on these sites.
Use the Social Reports (under Traffic Sources) to identify how successful your Social Networking is at driving traffic to your site.

Copyright Free Image for Blogs and Facebook

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Posted on June 28, 2012 by Mary Thomas

We all know that you should use images in your blogs and on Facebook – they receive more engagement, can be posted on Pinterest and make your page look so much better.

Where do you get your images from? You can’t just copy any image that you find in Google Search. If you do, you could get a large bill from the original owner of the image.

Copyright is the legal protection given to anyone who creates a work of art (like a photograph, music, drawing etc.). If you want to use the image or piece of music, you must ask the owner. Since in reality, we are not going to ask every time we want to include an image, you must make sure you are allowed to use it based on the copyright license.

Some images will allow you to use the image if you credit the owner – this is easy to do in a blog but not so easy when uploading an image to Facebook.

Have a look at my collection of places to get free images. This is a list of bookmarked sites held on a Bookmarking site called Scoopit.

You may find it is easier to purchase an image (for a better quality or more relevant image). You can purchase images at

istock – http://www.istockphoto.com

Shutterstock – http://www.shutterstock.com

Getty Images – http://www.gettyimages.co.uk

Do you have any favourite places to find copyright free images? Let me know and I will add them to the Scoopit bookmark.

Facebook Admin Roles and Scheduled Posts

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Posted on June 26, 2012 by Mary Thomas

Facebook Admin Roles

Did you know that you can now set different roles for the adminstrators of your page?

Each administrator can be one of

Insights Analyst – Can only view insights, or how the page is performing

Advertiser – In addition, can create ads and view insights

Moderator – In addition, can respond to and delete comments, send message as the Page

Content Creator – In addition, can edit the page, create posts as the page

Manager – In addition can manage the admin roles

Schedule Posts for the Future

You can now schedule posts on Facebook to be posted up to 6 months in advance. To do this, create the post and click the button in the bottom left hand corner. Choose the year, month, day and time in which you want the post to appear. Click Schedule and it will automatically appear at the appropriate place in your Page’s timeline.

Does this make your life easier?

What Does New EU Cookie Law Mean?

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Posted on May 17, 2012 by Mary Thomas

On May 26^th the EU Cookie law will come into force. Websites that don’t comply could face a fine of up to £500,000. You may think that as a small business owner this law is not going to apply to you – this is not the case. At the very least, you need to understand what cookies your website uses and make sure that you inform your visitors.

What are Cookies?

Cookies are small text files which websites place on visitors’ computers. Websites use cookies to learn more about the visitor. Some websites may use cookies to remember what you last looked at and make recommendations for you. As a small business owner, you will more than likely use cookies to check how visitors use your site using tools like Google Analytics.

What is the EU Cookie Law?

The EU Cookie law came in last year, but the Information Commissioner’s Office gave websites a year to implement it. The law requires websites to get permission from visitors before placing cookies on their computer. You should ask visitors outright if you can put cookies on their computer and explain clearly what the cookies are used for. You can’t bury the information in your website’s terms and conditions.

Implementing the Law

This law is not going away and it will be necessary to make changes to your website to work towards implementing the law. You should work towards having a opt-in box for people to tick to allow you to put cookies on their computer.

What Should You Do Now?

The Information Commissioner’s Office has suggested that the most important thing is to take steps to moving towards full compliance. You should understand what cookies your website uses and create a plan to implement an opt-in.

In the Guidance on the New Cookies Regulations document available on the Information Commissioners website, it is stated

“In practice we would expect you to provide clear information to users about analytical cookies and take what steps you can to seek their agreement. This is likely to involve making the argument to show users why these cookies are useful. Although the Information Commissioner cannot completely exclude the possibility of formal action in any area, it is highly unlikely that priority for any formal action would be given to focusing on uses of cookies where there is a low level of intrusiveness and risk of harm to individuals. Provided clear information is given about their activities we are highly unlikely to prioritise first party cookies used only for analytical purposes in any consideration of regulatory action.”

Use Attacat Cooke Audit Tool to find out what cookies your site is using. You will then need to work out how to make sure cookies are only set once people have given their permission. At the very least make sure you know which cookies your site is using and be open and honest about it. Make sure you clearly tell your visitors what cookies are on your site and what you are using them for. Create a clear cookie policy (separate from your privacy or terms and conditions policies).

I would suggest you contact your website designer to see what they suggest you do about this new law. I would love to know your thoughts.

Find out more information at http://www.itdonut.co.uk/sites/default/files/ITD_Cookies_4D_0.pdf

Update to the Cookie Law 25th May 2012

The ICO have released revised guidelines which states that “Implied consent is a valid form of consent”. So long as your visitors know which cookies are being used, if they continue to use the site, they have given consent. For example, there is a video on the ICO website with the text “NB: playing YouTube video sets a cookie - more info.)” If I now go ahead and play the video, I have given consent for the cookie to be downloaded to my computer. This is an important change which will make it easier for websites to comply. What do you think?

Facebook Timeline for Business

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Posted on March 2, 2012 by Mary Thomas

On 29th February, Facebook announced the introduction of Timelines for business pages. Businesses have between now and 31st March to investigate and create their timeline with an ‘automatic’ change happening on 31st march. (In the past, Facebook automatic changes haven’t always happened when scheduled!).

It is worth spending some time reviewing your page to make sure that it looks good before the change.

Access your page in the normal way and then select the Preview option to look at the Timeline. From now on, the only way to access the Timeline version (until you publish it) is to use your Personal Facebook profile and search for the page. If you use the ‘Use As’ option, it will display the old version.

The areas you want to look at are:

1. Cover Page – load a picture that represents your business. Facebook states that you are not allowed to include calls to action, contact details, discounts ‘like us’, etc. You could include a QR code of your contact information perhaps?

2. Make sure the profile picture looks OK. It needs to be square and 180 pixels wide.

3. The About Me section can include your website, contact info and a brief description of what you do. It is a small amount of text though, depending what business you are.

4. You can display up to 12 apps on the right. This are equivalent to the old tabs. Make sure you display the most important ones first. The only one that can’t be changed is Photos at the beginning – another indication of the importance of photos on the Facebook business pages.

5. Important status updates can be pinned to the top or starred to go across the whole page to indicate importance.

6. You can add old photos of your business (if applicable!)

Have a look at my business page https://www.facebook.com/ConciseTraining I would love to know what you think!

Social Media Buttons

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Posted on January 1, 2012 by Mary Thomas

As part of marketing your presence on Social Media sites, it is a good idea to create Social Media buttons on your website and content. It can be quite confusing though – which button to use in which circumstance. Once you have decided on the button that you want, click on the link to choose your own options in terms of name, size, colour, etc. Then copy and paste the generated HTML code and include in your website – or give to your website designer.

Twitter

1. Twitter Follow Button

Create this button to promote your business Twitter account. Visitors can follow with just one click.

Get the Twitter Follow button.

2. Tweet Button

This button is used to allow your visitors to share a link to your content on their Twitter stream. You can modify the button to add a @mention if you wish.

Get the Tweet button.

3. Twitter Website Widget

This option allows you to create a dynamic widget to showcase your Twitter activity on your website.

There are 4 types of widgets you can create:
Profile Widget – shows your most recent updates,
Search Widget – shows search results in real time (use for a hashtag you are promoting)
Faves Widget – highlight tweets you’ve marked as favourites
List Widget – Showcase tweets from users on a particular Twitter list

Get the Twitter website widget

Facebook

1. Facebook Like Box

You can create a smaller version of this box if you prefer. However, if Facebook is a appropriate place for your audience, it may be appropriate to display who likes your Facebook page.

This widget allows visitors to become a fan or ‘like’ your Facebook Business page without leaving your website.

Get the Facebook Like button

2. Facebook Share Button

This buttton allows visitors to give a virtual ‘thumbs up’ to your content. By clicking the Like Button, a story also appears on the visitor’s Facebook profile and in their friend’s news feeds with a link back to your content.

Get the Facebook Share button

1. Follow LinkedIn Company Profile

Allows visitors to follow your company profile which means they will see your company updates in their stream.

There are two alternatives to this button as you can see.

Get the Follow Us button on the left

Get the button on the right – you will need to use the Follow Us image from LinkedIn and add html code to link to your website.

2. LinkedIn Share Button

Allows visitors to easily share your content with their LinkedIn connections.

Get the LinkedIn Share button.

3. LinkedIn Product / Service Recommend Button

Allows your website visitors to recommend your products and services if you’ve added the product /service to your LinkedIn Company Pages’s Products tabs.

Get the LinkedIn Recommend button

Google +

1. Google+ Page / Profile Button

Allows visitors to follow your Google+ Page. Visitors will need to click the button and add your page to one of their circles to follow you.

Get the Google+ button.

2. Google +1 Button

Allows visitors to recommend your content (to others and to search engines)

Get the Google+1 Button

What do you think? What buttons do you use? Please let me know below.

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LinkedIn Contacts Read it!
Interview with Chris Roberts Read it!
5 LinkedIn changes – May 2013 Read it!
Interview with Anthony Wilson Read it!
Personal Brand on Social Media Read it!

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