Category: Business

Digital links – Monday January 13th 2014

Why not get rid of some of your fans? Maybe a lot of the ones? Highly interesting post from John Bell on this. Real fans versus those there for a freebie debate coming back again.

Facebook can now tell of those who saw your FB ad (not just those that clicked), who purchased something in a physical store. In the store! jumping from the digital to the physical.

Facebook is also the number two ad network in the world now. Google is number 1.

Just read ALL of these.

(PDF). The Social Media Policy from the HSE is quite good and full of common sense.

Jeremy Waite’s social strategy for 2014.

P.O.S.T. People Objectives Strategy Technology.

Facebook ads, like growing crops. This guy suggests highly targeted and lots of ads. Or something.

Businesses: Time to get your Vine on

Mulley Communications does training courses and consultancy around strategy. Sign up to the courses list or our mailing list.

Main takeaways:

  1. If you are on Twitter already, get a Vine account
  2. Practice by making lots of quick videos
  3. Vine videos should be instructional not promotional and fun not boring
  4. Make your Vine titles obvious/informative
  5. Share them on Twitter
  6. Get your public URL

Vine is an app from a company Twitter bought a while back. Vine lets you make 6 second videos. Just 6 seconds. All in one go or you can make them in smaller bits and put them together. They have to be done via your Vine mobile app. Another mobile first company. You can get the app for iPhone, Android and Windows.

Back in August about 3% of people in Ireland had a Vine account and this is growing, not rapidly but steadily. The value of Vine is that the video you record can be shared into the Twitter feed of everyone that follows your Twitter account and can be played on desktop or mobile instantly. No clicking and it popping out into a browser or anything like that. As Twitter grows and it is already massive in Ireland, your Vine videos can, in a way, be seen by more people.

Now in addition, your Vine videos can be seen on a public profile page. Which means lots of Google traffic to your videos so you don’t need just Vine traffic and Twitter traffic. So if you were dithering about Vine, now is the time to decide. All the elements are there now to use it for marketing.

And they can also be embedded, like this from Pendelton:

6 seconds can add a hell of a lot of context
Images can give more context than text only. animated images even more context, video with audio way more. The issues with video have always been the production that goes in to getting them right, even if they’re just two minutes long.

Now while you don’t need 10,000 hours to get them right, you do need some practice so playing with making really short videos means you can get your experience level up quite quickly.

A nice example is Essential French in Cork sharing 6 second French lessons.

Some guides on how to use Vine. From Convert with Content. Beginners Guide from Mashable.

Mulley Communications does training courses and consultancy around strategy. Sign up to the courses list or our mailing list.

A nation of chocaholics, Red Bull losing their wings?

The Checkout magazine Top 100 brands list is out. Coca-cola is top dog again but really it’s chocolate that we Irish buy a lot.

12 confectionery brands featured in the Top 100 list; Cadbury Dairy Milk (5th), Galaxy (36th), Nestlé KitKat (49th), Haribo (53rd), Maltesers (55th), Kinder (56th), Nestlé Rowntree (67th), Cadbury Roses (75th), Nestlé Aero (82nd), Cadbury Snack (87th), Cadbury Twirl (95th) and Mars (100th).

With all the huge online and offline media coverage of Red Bull in the past 12 months, Red Bull has actually dropped four places in the table to 26th from 22nd last year. Coke is 1st, Red bull 26th and Pepsi is 48th. Were I an agency I’d be pitching to Pepsi this week.

And in terms of the bad for you brands: Budweiser is still the number one off-trade alcohol brand, Blossom Hill is Ireland’s leading wine brand, Smirnoff is Ireland’s top spirit, and Silk Cut holds on to its position as Ireland’s leading tobacco brand.

8000 – So here you go

Well it seems the unofficial account of Junior Vice-President Damien Mulley hit 8000 connections a short while ago. As a thank you or a “D’fuck did that happen?” style response, management has decided that he’ll give you a day of his time to consult with you or a chosen company/organisation.

You can choose a day of training on the usual suspects, a day of consultancy or a mix that you choose.

This picture of chocolate has nothing to do with this post, hello!

Few simple rules: the company does not work for telcos, political parties or alcohol companies. You can’t resell this to someone else or make this a premium event that you get payment for. Still lots of opportunities there.

What digital skills do you want for your interns?

I’ve noticed a lot of people asking me on Twitter to retweet Tweets where they are looking for intern positions with marketing or PR companies or looking for digital work in other companies.

Companies have different criteria depending on the work they do. I’d be grateful for some feedback from PR and Marketing companies in particular as to what they want interns schooled in before they start the job.

Are things like the below important?

  • How to create and run Facebook Pages
  • How to run Facebook Ads
  • How to create Facebook Tabs
  • Running Twitter accounts
  • Creation of content plans for Facebook and Twitter
  • Running Google Ad campaigns

What other digital skills are needed?

Facebook Places Ireland finally launches

MulleyFacebookPlaces1

Facebook Places for Ireland finally launched today. Some of the nerdier types have been waiting for ages to get to play with this. (Some even nerdier ones did all kind of hacks with networks toe be able to check in).

What does it mean for an individual?

More stalkeridge! You can now see where you friends are and with whom, if they wish to share this information. You can tell your friends where you are now, show them pictures from that location etc. As Facebook Places matures you will be able to avail of deals in locations near you or go to the locations based on offers.

What does it mean for a business?

If you claim your Place/location you can merge it with an existing Business Page. When someone checks in, their friends see this, might click on through and see your business details. If people are frequenting your business, why not give them the option of telling their friends? The average Irish person has 160 friends on Facebook. That’s the potential audience every time someone checks in to your location on Facebook. The longterm goal with this is Facebook Deals. Check in, get 20% off, win prizes and so on. Rewards for being loyal.

Right now: As a business, get your physical location created or claim it and enable people to check in. Get some Facebook Stickers made too to encourage people to check in!

Here are some of the frequently asked questions on Facebook Places.

The above pic is me outside Facebook HQ in Dublin with a giant Places icon. Courtesy of Made In Hollywood Props.