Posts Tagged ‘Blogging’

Plane talk on blogging and writing techniques: Part I

Friday, February 1st, 2008

Over at Epiblogger the guys Rhett and Lee have been writing a series of blog entries on how to get the most out of writing posts by trying different styles such as using a narrative or taking a first person view. This is a great way to liven up posts and not only makes it fun for the writer as well as a challenge, but hopefully will be appealing to the readership too. In my last two interlinking posts I used a dialogue between myself and a fictional client in the first instance and with Dr. Pete in the second. Now with this article I am writing it on an easy jet to Turin. Writing on a plane is a first for me and a rather strange experience, especially when you’re at the very back of the plane, yes that’s right, right next to the toilets. Lovely. Everyone seems to need to go one after another so every few minutes I can hear the flush of extraordinarily super suction force clearing the toilet bowl. That’s quite enough toilet talk— I just wanted to set the scene of why it is such a different experience to the comfort, solitude and peace of my regular blogging environment.

So what is the point of this article? Well mainly just to try out a touch of blogging outside of the comfort zone, try new techniques, inspire you, my readers to try different writing styles for your own musings and with any luck produce an interesting article in it’s own right. The idea that popped into my head when I began this was to try and produce a post which takes on the feel of being on an aeroplane, perhaps using the run-down of safety procedures that we receive on flights from the cabin crew/flight attendants. Alternatively maybe the captain’s tannoy announcement. So far you and I both know this hasn’t happened!

I felt it worthy to set the scene beforehand. This surprisingly now has developed into a two-part article. In the next there will be none of this faffing; straight into the style. And it will be written on my return journey so I can detail another snapshot of the cabin crew and captain doing what they do best. Until then, Ciao! In the meantime I am off to slide down some snow covered mountains with on a laminated board that my feet are strapped bound to.

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Tags: birminghamuk, Blogging, digital media, social media
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Socialites prosper as the aloof fail

Saturday, January 26th, 2008

Client:
“We are happy to embrace social media but if we are going to enter a forum and help our public with there questions and issues we would like to pose as a ‘valued customer’ of the company who has had a high-quality service and wishes to scream and shout about it rather than having a representative of the company.”

DigiKev:
“This is not a very sound thing to do, in doing so and repeatedly being the ‘valued customer’ you will be rumbled. It hardly takes a lot to know that the so called valued customer is a representative of your company. The community you are trying to embrace will ignore you, or worse you will be flamed and spammed and bad-mouthed until you are so buried you won’t be able to see above ground. The press will likely catch on and your good name will be dragged through the dirt.”

Client:
“…Okay, granted but this is the only way that we are prepared to communicate with our public as we do not want to lose control of the company pr. Having an individual or individuals representing our company and taking our stand point on our behalf could go badly in our favour. What if they get it wrong? What if they get bombarded with off topic questions? What if? What if?”

DigiKev:
“There is a great opportunity here to get down to the grassroots. Yes you will have to let go of the control. Social media is all about human communication. You don’t need to get sucked into off topic questions; if they are irrelevant say so, if the information is contained in your site then direct them to that information. Don’t be worried about losing control and if someone makes a mistake they just tell the community, look sorry I am human, I made a mistake and this is what it should have been. Finding out where your company is lacking from those that you are selling to is golden information; giving that up is just business suicide and your competitors (who are or will be employing a public figure to the company) will succeed. If you can’t trust whoever you have employed to be the voice of your company to speak to your public then I am afraid you have employed the wrong people.”

Does this sound familiar to anyone? Plenty of businesses are yet to jump on what the web can offer at the detriment of sales and popularity. Hiding behind thickly built walls of pr and controlling every element of how the company is seen and portrayed isn’t going to cut the mustard. The trends section of Marketing Week 17.01.08 notes “two thirds of social networkers are likely to buy a product as a result of a referral by a friend or online acquaintance – equating to £750m in online sales”. I am not saying that the only method is to deploy public speaking figures of the company in forum websites. Embracing social networking and the new age of digital media by conversing, allowing comments and feedback on a blog or by whatever other means you feel fit is key to business survival online. Non-communicative businesses that turn there back on social media, or worse try to control and fake in the social playground as described in the opening dialogue, in my opinion will begin to lose out to competitors that fully embrace and get social media.

What experiences have you had with clients and there perception of social media? How have you dealt with and explained the subject to them? Do you agree that businesses embracing social media and engaging conversations with the public will prosper?

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Tags: birminghamuk, Blogging, digital media, social media
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The BIG Picture

Tuesday, January 22nd, 2008

Stefan Lewandowski and Jon Bounds have launched In The Big Picture today. I was very lucky to get a sneak preview at The Birmingham Bloggers Meetup a week or so a go. The idea is to make a big picture of the West Midlands in 2008. There will be a World Record attempt to gather as many photos together as possible into a huge montage. The website makes clever use of the Flickr API. Simply login with your Flickr account details or create a new account from the In The Big Picture website to take part.

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Tags: birminghamuk, Blogging, digital media, Flickr API, In The Big Picture, jon bounds, social media, Stefan Lewandowski, upYerBrum
Posted in Birmingham, Social Web | No Comments »

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