Archive for March, 2010

Ada Lovelace Day Pledge: Beauty and Brains – Hedy Lamarr

Thursday, March 25th, 2010

hedylamarrWith all of the running around I have been doing recently, I have left my Ada Lovelace pledge until the last minute unfortunately. But I have been spending a lot of my time recently working with women in business and I know all of us suffer from the problem of having too much to do, not enough time to do it in, and worries over what we let slip. Well, today’s exemplary woman in technology is one that proves that you can be clever, beautiful, and successfully achieve two very different careers.

I knew of the actress Hedy Lamarr from watching old films of the 1930s and 1940s. I have always loved the glamour of those films – the women are all so unblemished and beautiful and Lamarr was a particular favourite. You can imagine my surprise when I discovered that Lamarr was probably the archetype of ‘brains, body, both’ (thank you George Hrab).

As well as playing Delilah, it turns out that Hedy spent her spare time inventing a communication system which was to evolve into modern spread-spectrum communication technology, used in wi-fi connections and wireless telephones. The system, presented as a secret communication system based on frequency hopping during the Second World War was way ahead of its time. In fact, despite it being granted a patent in 1942, it actually wasn’t implemented until the 1960s. Lamarr’s contribution to this frequency hopping technology was only commemorated with an award in 1997. She died in 2000.

I think Hedy Lamarr should be placed on a pedestal at a time where apparently the only talents that celebrity women have is to look pretty and sound stupid (yes, I am overgeneralising, but anyone who knows me knows how little time I have for celebrities). In fact, Lamarr herself famously quoted:

“Any girl can be glamourous. All you have to do is stand still and look stupid”

Fortunately, she proved that a girl can also be glamourous and have a sharp mind and a good brain. I would like to see more women following her model rather than her words. Perhaps we will see more visible women in technology who do as much for the industry as they do for womenkind themselves.

Happy Ada Lovelace Day.

Thanks to BooBooGBs for the image

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How NOT to interact with your Customers – NestleFAIL

Friday, March 19th, 2010

failI don’t actually have a lot to say about this as I am pretty stunned. I don’t know how long this page will stand although I know we aren’t the only ones who have taken screen grabs of the truly atrocious way that Nestle have decided to deal with its customers, critics and the general public.

While it stands, it is worth having a look at the Wall of the Nestle Fan page:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Nestle/24287259392?v=wall

In case the wall has been removed by the time you click on this link, Nestle’s policy seems to be

  • Abuse their fans/customers/critics
  • Call them names
  • Remove posts they don’t like (although they don’t have a policy against sarcasm, so there are quite a few negative posts still there)
  • Get more and more sarcastic and hysterical themselves as more critics start laying into them

As @Suw said in one of her Tweets alerting the world to this, it’s a trainwreck.

What were they thinking? I know it must be tough to be a company with a lot of critics (perhaps they need to reconsider some of their less than exemplary activities?) but getting argumentative and hysterical is NOT the way to do it. Someone needs to give Nestle a lesson in how to communicate effectively via social media. This isn’t just going to go away…

Thanks to hans.gerwitz for the image

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Blog Reruns or The Best Of… Summer Season

Wednesday, March 17th, 2010

3145980733_43f1a82df2The amount of content, information and words that is now on the internet is immeasurable. With the number of people blogging, the amount of blogs they write, the frequency with which they write them and the enthusiasm with which they produce them, have you ever wondered how you are going to get your voice heard? It seems that you spend time and effort writing a post but because of the cacophony of noise, it only takes the blink of an eye and it has been lost or forgotten and all that hard work has been wasted.

For those people who have been writing a blog for a few years now, this can be frustrating. Of course, I know that there are some blog posts I wrote in 2007 which I am probably not so proud of now, but there were a few which I was really pleased with. But how is anyone going to find them?

One way is to rely on your SEO. If you had a quirky, eye-catching heading when you first posted your post so it would stand out in people’s readers, you could change the heading to something keyword heavy and (more) search engine friendly.

Another way is to do a Best Of…Summer Season.

Christopher Penn describes how to do that very well, giving tips on ensuring you choose your best posts according to statistics. He then suggests you go back over the popular ones re-read them and re-edit them. If there are things which need updating, do so. Ensure you don’t break any links. Then shine a spotlight on to it

There are several ways you can do this:

1. You can tweet it out, making clear that this is a ‘best of’ post, not something brand new

2. You can write a ‘Best of…’ post with links to all of your old gems

3. You can write a new post which references the old subject matter and link back to it

All of these things (and others, I’m sure) will help some of your newer audience members to find some of the older content which you might have written before they discovered you. Just because you have seen it before doesn’t mean the rest of the world has. Give them a chance to read it if you are really proud of it.

It is difficult to continually come up with new ideas (although the Chris Brogan’s of the world dance around that statement and prove ever day that it isn’t impossible). Sometimes reviving an idea can be just as valuable to your audience and give you a little bit of inspiration.

Thank you to Stuck in Customs for the image

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You May In Fact Be Eating Your Own Tail

Tuesday, March 16th, 2010

buffetI have been in this business for several years now. I admit, I haven’t been working in social media as long as some, but I have a good four years under my belt which is a lot longer than a lot of others. That doesn’t make me special or clever in any way, but it does allow me to have something of a perspective. Combine that with my natural tendency to question, particularly when I sense people evangelising (which to me is an immediate indicator that it is not all wonderful) and it has led me to a number of conclusions.

There is no doubt at all that social media has impacted communication, business, marketing and much of the first world in many ways. However, while people are gorging themselves on free information, community activity and all of the bounty of the online world, there remains an underlying reality that the rent needs to be paid, products need to be sold, and the end of year bottom line needs to show some degree of profit. That’s business.

Geoff Livingstone discussed this, using the analogy of a buffet and eating at a fine restaurant. Much social media activity resembles the buffet style meal. We all do it. We try and bit of this, and try a bit of that. We load our plates high and leave some of it, and then head back to the buffet table and load our plates high again. Sometimes we takes seconds of something we like but there is such a smorgasbord of choice that we don’t want to miss anything.

As a marketer or business owner, we make ourselves feel good with numbers. 50,000 tried our smoked salmon terrine therefore it is a hit. However, if none of those 50,000 people liked it so much that they want to order it a la carte, then actually it is a very surface hit. It might not be because they didn’t like it – it is just it got lost in amongst the rest of the bounty and everyone was too busy trying everything.

Ultimately, success in business comes down to how many people actually convert to such an extent that it brings growth. And as anyone in business knows, it is a lot cheaper and more profitable to retain customers than it is to constantly find new ones. You need them to choose you off the a la carte menu, regularly and consistently. By all means, let them discover you on the buffet table by using social media and online communication, but don’t fall into the trap of thinking that that is all you have to do.

The point I am trying to emphasise more and more in my training, speaking and writing is that no matter what new tools appear, achieving success in business still occurs through the very same tried and true methods as it always has. In that respect, things haven’t changed. What has changed is the temptations on offer.

As a business person, it is your job to keep a level head. Don’t think that because you have huge numbers you have done all you need. You may discover that you have been feasting on your own tail.

Thanks to skidder for the image

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More than 70% of Twitterers are in Permanent Winter

Monday, March 15th, 2010

TweeterOne thing I am noticing with Spring arriving here in the UK is that there are more birds in the garden first thing in the morning. I can sit with my coffee and listen to them tweeting away (remember when a tweet was a noise that came from a sparrow?) and it heralds the arrival of the sun, blossoms and some warmer weather.

However, some recent statistics have demonstrated that the vast majority of those other Tweeters – i.e. the people who are using Twitter, are actually preferring to remain permanently in the winter and are keeping quiet. In fact, this statistic doesn’t surprise me.

One of the reasons for this is that when the big Twitter hype hit (at about the time the celebrities jumped on the bandwagon) a lot of people thought ‘Hmm, I might give that a go’. They got on to the site, started gathering followers, tweeted a few times and then…lost interest. That is actually a very human thing to do. Not everything suits every person and we all have different things taking up our time. Without knowing exactly why you are going on to Twitter, it isn’t at all surprising that when the initial enthusiasm wears off, it wanes. I wouldn’t like to start on the number of social media sites that has happened to me for…

This is not to say they are not watching the Tweetstream. They may well be, but they are preferring to be in the audience rather than contributing and as a result, they aren’t engaging in conversation.

What are the implications of this? I think this simply highlights the fact that Twitter is just one tool in your marketing arsenal. You might have enormous numbers of people following you, but if only 30% of them are engaging with you, then you can’t be sure of your audience. You need to be mixing up your activity, including traditional marketing methods and varying your plan regularly.

I wouldn’t let this put anyone off – if your perfect audience is within that 30%-odd, then you are set to do very well. What I would suggest is that this little statistic helps to keep you grounded and not get carried away with the hype – something I will continue to advocate.

Incidentally, I also was fascinated to see that the most prolific Tweeters are those with around 1000 followers. This looks like the ’sweet spot’ as Andy Beal has commented. Once again, this doesn’t really surprise me. The people who know how to use Twitter as a conversation tool are often those who aren’t there to build their follower numbers (and egos in many cases) – they are there to converse, pure and simple.

Perhaps the people with 25000+ followers are too busy reading fan mail to actually use Twitter?

Thanks to Matt Hamm for the illustration

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Women Can’t Network? I Beg Your Pardon????

Thursday, March 11th, 2010

networkingAn article in today’s Times was brought to my attention which seems to suggest that women are poor networkers, which is one of the reasons why they don’t do so well in business. After I had managed to pick my jaw off the floor with incredulity that this article even made it to print (and more importantly, after I had calmed my ire at being labelled a ‘cyber loser’) I tweeted it out. I received a host of comments from business women I know, all expressing their own amazement that such an opinion could make it to press.

I spent Monday at the Women Unlimited conference, and I regularly network with Sister Snog, and have recently tried the Athena women’s networking event, and let me tell you, women are fantastic networkers. They are particularly good networking with one another, but I also feel that women excel at networking even in mixed company. And here’s why

1. Women tend to understand the meaning of a relationship. No matter how much bravado, brashness and ego you carry with you, ultimately people will do business with people they like and trust. Personally, the bigger the ego, the smaller the trust in my opinion and I suspect I am not alone.

2. Women have the ability to converse and ask questions. They don’t assume that everything is all about them and if you aren’t a good sales opportunity, they don’t start losing interest and looking for someone else in the room who might be more lucrative in the middle of a conversation with you.

3. Women take an interest in all aspects of what you do. Business is only one of them. This fosters both relationship and trust which is where long term business relationships start to form.

I don’t want to overgeneralise here, because I know men who are equally good at these things and I know women who aren’t, but in the five years I have been doing business and the countless hours I have spent networking, as well as the years I have spent networking online, the most memorable, trustworthy and longstanding contacts I have made have been with women. And I don’t think I have ever had a woman shove a business card in my face, spend 5 minutes talking about herself and then walking off without so much as a question to do the same to the next person.

If that is good networking then I really do think I come from another planet.

One of the new ventures that will be up from this weekend is a new blog site called Social Media 4 Women (www.socialmedia4women.co.uk although it will only be live this weekend for all you eager people). The idea is not to segregate women in any way, but to demonstrate how the skills I have spoken about above can work even more effectively online. I think this article has come just at the right time because there are plenty of us out there who are already proving it wrong. I plan to bring a course and a book out to accompany the site and I can see that it is none too soon.

Now, excuse me because I have a number of follow up calls to make, a proposal to complete for someone I met networking, and a course to plan for someone else I met networking…oh, and another networking event to attend.

I wonder whether the journalist who wrote this article can say that….

Thanks to PhOtOnQuAnTiQuE for the image

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Even Estate Agents Should Fear Twitter…

Wednesday, March 10th, 2010

soldThis story was brought to my attention today and it really made me smile. Yes, before any of you say ‘Nancy!! What on EARTH were you doing reading The Mirror????” I would like to say that I actually know Peter personally, and the news can be verified by him. It’s a case of a tabloid telling it as it actually happened! He sent me the article to look at…via Twitter (naturally enough).

Anyway, the point is, when a tool can be used to bypass the not-inconsiderable expense involved in selling your house through an estate agent, then there clearly is something to that tool. It isn’t just serving a purpose, it is changing how things are done. I would like to remain a little level headed about it though – people have been bypassing estate agents and selling their houses on Ebay for a while now, so it isn’t the actual bypassing itself which is the great thing. It is the medium he used.

I would like to point out, however, that to undertake a transaction such as this one, you need to:

a) be a trustworthy person with a decent reputation (I can vouch for the fact that Peter certainly is that)

b) have built an audience which you have some rapport with and who you trust

and

c) (perhaps this is just me, but) be doing it genuinely, not because you are actually an Estate Agent in disguise hoping to bag a decent commission (again, I know Peter certainly isn’t that).

As Peter himself said to me, they got sick of waiting for nothing to happen with the estate agents (more than a year they waited, so it’s not like they were being impatient) but the final straw came when the agent (who hasn’t managed to achieve anything to that point) announced that their fees were going up to cover for the recession. Peter’s thought? It shouldn’t be me who pays you for bad times, and he turned to the community he has built and trusts. Is this evidence of community being recession proof? Perhaps, or perhaps it is just smart thinking.

I will continue to maintain that Twitter is a tool which requires authenticity and trust. I don’t want to see it go the way of MySpace where it becomes little more than a bland sales channel. If we can prevent against that, and keep using it for the conversational tool that it is, then fantastic stories like this continue to arise – Peter, I hope you truly enjoy a pint or two with the money you didn’t have to pay in commission and fees. Your ingenuity is brilliant. You deserve it!

Thank you to Azhure* for the image

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What’s Your Blog’s Raison d’être Today?

Friday, March 5th, 2010

reasonI was delivering training last week to two fantastic women who were reasonably new to social media, but who were keen to learn and spent the day questioning and exploring. I love doing training sessions like that one because I absolutely love helping people to really understand what social media is all about and how it relates to them. But I also like the fact that it forces me to go back to basics with much of the material and question everything that I have been doing over the years.

For those of us who have been online for a while, it is easy to get complacent and to think you know exactly what you are doing.

But do you? Take a moment to think about your blog for instance…

  • what was your purpose on the day you started? If you wrote it down (what? you didn’t write it down?) go back and look at it.
  • what audience was it targeted at?
  • what were you hoping to achieve with your blog?

Now – how closely aligned to your past goals is your blog as it stands today?

Things change of course. A blog shouldn’t be static. It should move and change as often as necessary. But sometimes as you are moving, things can become a bit blurry and the clear focus you had for your blog to start with.

If your blog was there to comment on latest news stories and break stories where you can, is it still doing that?

If your blog was to inspire people within your own industry, is it still doing that?

If your blog was to give people advice on a particular area, is it still doing that?

It can be difficult to maintain enthusiasm for a blog over months and years, especially as more and more blogs come online, many of them repeating the same kind of information over and over again. If you lose focus or you forget your raison d’être, that enthusiasm can be even harder to maintain. Believe me, I know this from experience.

So go back to the birth of your blog and try and decide whether your purpose is the same today as it was then. If it isn’t, then restate your goals and start afresh with the same blog. It will make it a lot easier to still be writing in another 5 years time if you do.

Thank you to ellajphillips for the image

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