Social Media
Q&A: How first direct made the case for social media
In the first of a series of three posts, we’ve been talking to key figures at first direct about how the bank has integrated social media across its marketing efforts.
Here, Amanda Brown, first direct’s head of public relations, talks about how the case for social media was initially put forward within the bank and the challenges involved…
When did you start to look at using social media?
In 2007 our then CEO was interested in blogging and felt that whilst it was something the bank should be looking at seriously, we weren’t quite sure of its application to the banking sector and we hadn’t looked at the legal side of things, but nevertheless, the technology looked like it was something we should at least make an effort to understand.
We’ve always been a bank that keeps a close eye on what our customers are saying about us and by 2008 it was clear that there were conversations happening of which we knew nothing and with which we didn’t engage.
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Q&A: Radisson Edwardian on QR codes and social media
Radisson Edwardian, which operates several hotels around the UK, has been running some innovative social media campaigns recently.
These include adding QR codes to its menus, which send users to videos of dishes being prepared, as well as a new Foursquare campaign offering late checkouts.
I’ve been speaking to Radisson Edwardian’s E-commerce Manager Amy Clarke, as well as Aalia Walker from I Spy, the agency behind these campaigns.
Why place QR codes in menus ?
The reason we used the QR codes on our menus was that we had a lot of video content – on our YouTube channel, promoted through Facebook and Twitter.
It was I Spy’s idea to take that experience offline and turn it into something useful for diners, as well as to appeal to people who haven’t been introduced to our social media channels.
It has been a useful tool for our waiters too, and they have been able to prompt people who chose the highlighted dish that they could see the video of it being prepared by our chefs.
We didn’t want to bombard every diner with it, though it was clearly promoted on the menu itself.
How well has it worked? Have many diners
Is Saatchi & Saatchi’s graduate challenge one big social media faceplant?
Global advertising behemoth Saatchi & Saatchi is challenging wannabe Don Drapers to sign up to a social media challenge, as part of its annual summer scholarship programme.
Graduates interested in working for the firm have been invited to generate as many new Twitter followers and retweets as they can in the next eight weeks.
Here’s the detail, from the firm’s Facebook summer scholarship group:
Create ONE new Twitter page. The objective is to get the highest Twitter rating and social influence as possible before the deadline.
The top 250 participants will then make it through to the next round. The firm is measuring success on the basis of the number of followers, updates (tweets), retweets and @mentions.
It’s a little arbitrary perhaps, but it’s relevant. Advertise
Why your social media strategy shouldn’t be owned by a PR or ad agency
There is some talk over at NMA about the battle for control of social media. In one corner we have the PR agencies, and in the other there are ad agencies.
Personally I can’t see any value in allowing either of these types of agencies to develop and manage your social media strategy. Or any other agencies for that matter, even those dedicated to social media.
Controversial? I should hope not…
So who should own and manage your social media strategy?
I firmly believe that a company’s social media strategy should be owned and managed by the company itself, rather than by external agencies.
Why? Well, mainly because…
a) Your people are your best asset, when it comes to social media, or at least they should be (if they’re not then you’re doing something wrong).
b) You cannot fake it. The people you want answering questions and dreaming up ideas are the people with real insight into your business. The best agen
How Social Media Helps Businesses Increase Profits and Reduce Debt
If you have a small business and want to promote it on a wide scale, social media can be the best way to do it. It may happen that you may incur debt and need to get help from bill consolidation options, but you can increase your profit in spite of debt.
This is possible if you promote your business using social media. Social media can be a huge platform to boost your business and can also help you increase the profit of your business. There is a direct relationship between the good performance of a business and the social media.
Support Given by Social Media to Small Businesses
You may have difficulties starting up a business but due to your determination and perseverance, you succeed in it. You may face many hardships on the way such as falling in debt but you can take help of bill consolidation options to get out of debt. Social media can be another way to increase your profit even when you’re in debt. T
Targeting Your Social Media Efforts
Whether you like it or not social media has become a piece of the marketing puzzle and can be a great way to reach your target audience on a more personable level. But before you start making Facebook fan pages and YouTube channels, you should do some research on who and what people are looking for when they go to these sites.
A Look at The Numbers
A study done by Chitika, a full service online advertising network, has broken down the users of Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and Digg. They found that an overwhelming 47% of Twitter users go there to find news, while 51% of MySpace users are there for either video games or celebrity/entertainment purposes. Twenty-eight percent of Facebook users go there for the news, while Digg seemed to be distributed evenly between news, tech, and video games.
= These types of numbers are important to know where to target your social media efforts. Ha