Blogging -

Beware of bloggers.. or how #socialmedia has serious influence #biz2012

I blogged about what was billed as a big business event in London headlined by some serious speakers like Sir Richard Branson and Lord Sugar… because it was not what it said on the tin… the response was astonishing, over 1100 hits overnight and 30 comments registered. So why was it so powerful?

Well naturally I don’t just blog it and leave it at that, I also add it to twitter, facebook and linkedin and even created a follow up youtube video of how to turn a negative in to a positive. If you look at the pic below of when it hit google you will see it is the LinkedIn one which ranked first… I only have some 2,500 followers on twitter but obviously they are connected to others who happily shared the blog worldwide. This happened because I used the hashtag for the event and maybe the title I chose caught the imagination… a celebrity is always a good draw. By using the hashtag #biz2012 everyone at the event or following it could see what was going on.

Now sadly for the event it had gone very badly wrong and there were a long list of mistakes which prompted a whole host of responses… remember if people are unhappy they will share with more than those who love something and online that is magnified big time. By writing my personal account of the event I had more space to tell the story and also give people the right to reply. I reported exactly what I felt at the time and posted it. Then I tweeted it out to my main accounts and scheduled it via Posterous to hit again at my next peak time for readers in the morning. The reach of the internet is actually pretty amazing and the content stays there..

Within 6 hours over 1,000 people had seen the blog and thousands more the tweets and it had been shared at least 50 times on twitter, over 30 comments are on the blog and many people who hadn’t been to the event were thinking whether or not they would bother. People with big networks and huge influence were agreeing with the opinion and sharing it. Within 16 hours it is page 1 of Google for the hashtag… and trending on twitter…

Whether you are listening or not (and I sincerely hope you are at the very least using Google Alerts) your audience will be talking about you, and sharing their experience… especially if they are bad. Harness the power for yourself and get involved and if something goes wrong… publicly share how you are trying to resolve it.. do not ignore comments and brush them under the carpet… they will not go away and a determined blogger will amplify the issues even more..

Now this event has a huge amount to learn and hopefully this will help create a better experience next time… and by sharing things we are creating a whole new world of what we want to see, hear feel, buy and even experience. Whether we like it or not we all have influence… it may be on style, colour, shops or just our choice of places to eat and that is very powerful, in fact the like button on facebook is so incredibly powerful because of that. By using the facebook plugin on your blog you open it up to the peer factor… that is the old fashioned “well if it is good enough for xxxx it is good enough for me” or even better they see their competition or someone the trust or admire liking something… This is very powerful.

By blogging you are sharing with the world and engaging with them, you are also showing your areas of expertise and making yourself the person people recommend or go to first in your world so why not get started and showcase what you do? You can start by being a guest blogger on someone’s site and get them to help you get started… around 500 words should do it. We’d love to hear about your wins.. why not share them below…

Why the lure of Sir Richard Branson couldn’t keep me at #biz2012..

If this is the best in business for 2012 we may as well shut up shop and go home…

As events go this was a bit of a no brainer to publicise.. Sir Richard Branson, Lord Alan Sugar, Penny Power and even Cherie Blair headlining.. plenty of businesses and seminars were promised at the O2 business event aimed at kicking us in to 2012.. and it was free… unless you fancied a VIP ticket wow… so why didn’t the 2012 business show live up to the hype?

Well the glossy website was great but finding something as simple as who is speaking and when and even what time the whole thing kicks off was not easy… eventually I decided that 10am looked good as it was when the exhibition opened. In fact I even toyed with paying the £297 plus vat for a VIP ticket to include the cocktail evening… which when I looked a few days ago had only 10 remaining (oh and guess what still does now) and had I done that I would have been horrified…

The show was shockingly organised… no signs in the car park.. head for the building and hope for the best… wander in and spot a long snaking queue to one of the main seminar rooms and join it only to be told you are in the wrong one and need to go all the way to the back of the O2 to register as this is VIPs only… head a small exodus of people to the not inconsiderable walk through the cobbled areas to the very back where we pass another webinar area and loads of girls desperately touting some of the speakers… in fact there was even a board outside saying get your picture taken with some guru type, Stedman Graham, in 30 minutes… really?

I don’t do the celebrity picture stuff… and there is no way I would join a queue to have my picture taken with someone… and the thought of a load of people touting some speaker as the next best thing really leaves a bad taste.. especially given the headliners…

Asking the people in the show t-shirts where things were and what to do was a waste of time… Having been herded yet again to the very back of the venue we knew we were in the right place… it should have opened 50 minutes ago but no one had been able to get in to the exhibition… and there was a very unhappy atmosphere and loads of people.. technology had let them down and no one could register and get tickets.. eventually they decided don’t start a stampede and just let everyone in without registering them.

Once in there were an abundance of stands.. but nothing really new… there were loads of mini seminar stands (well something had to take up the spare spaces) with hastily rewritten signs on the glossy outline of who was doing what and when as well as the usual suspects such as Regus, Google, Blackberry, Microsoft, internet marketers, social media specialists and networking companies like 4networking (in fact as at previous shows they were organising the speed networking which you could hear all over the show… that will perhaps tell you how small it really was).

I tried (and failed) to see when the key speakers were on and where.. so I asked and was told oh you can’t see them unless you have a VIP ticket… seriously? Seeing red I stomped off in my knee high boots to speak to the organisers office. After politely waiting outside with 2 competition winners who had been waiting 3 hours for something to happen I asked to speak to an organiser… having explained that I felt people were being duped by the advertising they said no that was wrong the seminars were all free and anyone could go in… having already been turned away I explained that none of their staff were really helping and they agreed.. one of their assistants walked all the way back to the main seminar room with me and we were turned away and told to use the back entrance… we didn’t even have a clue who was on… even she agreed it was shocking that no one could easily find out what was going on. The mafia on the door at the back heard the lady with me say she was with the organisers and they said she should keep that quiet… and as she disclosed to me she had a queue of over 30 people to deal with having a go she thought it would be good to hide at that side of the show.

We wandered in to a presentation on forex.. seriously… not impressed so I asked one of the staff to see if I could find out who was on and when.. I was pointed to reception (the back of where we had been refused entry) and asked about two speakers including Sir Richard… I was told you don’t have a VIP pass we can’t help you… really? They have the only list in the building of who is on and when and because I have not paid £360 I am not important enough to be told anything… sorry but I don’t waste my time on idiot organisations that really cannot organise a P*ss up in a brewery.

I chatted to a few cool stand owners, met a few people I knew and caught up but didn’t achieve anything I couldn’t have done elsewhere or online… oh expect for the people I chatted to in the queue to get in or maybe the turquoise knee high boots, silver hotpants and my black social media cafe shirt were the reason they chatted to me?

I may not do things by the book and have a few quirks of my own but the Tshirts for one of the seminars shouting WTF were about spot on… seriously this is a shocking show… far too many seminars… not enough substance and the venue absolutely does not work.. technology issues aside.. this was style over substance in a big way. Having pushed this show to the max on-line.. I will now hold my hand up and say “Don’t bother” and did in a tweet.

If Lord Sugar was in charge he would fire the lot of them… and Cherie Blair is a lawyer who should do a class action for the poor exhibitors who have invested time, effort and money in to one of the most shocking shows I have every had the misfortune to go to and believe me I have been to a few turkeys in my time..

The O2 was absolutely wrong for this type of event and with the misinformation, bad organisation and technology issues, not to mention starting it on Mother’s Day… no wonder the hashtag #biz2012 is going in to melt down. Even worse there are tweets the winner of the competition to win 30 minutes with Richard at the show has not had it… we really do need to know if this is the case… as thousands of people all over the globe joined in on that.

I would have loved to listen to Sir Richard but really couldn’t justify the wait for this car crash of a show… I will one day.. but it was so bad that I really didn’t want to waste any more time there.

I know 2012 is something special and there are brilliant businesses all over the world that are really doing something special… I have been working with many of them and the prospects and things going on are so amazing and incredibly encouraging – hopefully they are doing much better than this business show which was a masterclass in how not to excel at something…

You may also like the follow on: http://thesocialmediacafe.visibli.com/share/138dbG

If you are in business you should be at The Great British Business Show and The Business Start up Show – we’d love to see you on Stand 971 – book in here.. http://ht.ly/aqwgV

Sir Richard Branson Talks Social Media Live From Virgin Atlantic’s Inaugural Philadelphia Flight [Video](socialtimes.com)

Are you what you are showing on your social media profile?

Does your social media profile give a true picture of who you really are? Is it an very flattering picture from 10 years since? Or an avatar that is absolutely nothing like you? Have you accurately said what you do or just left a blank space? What you show and what you forget could easily be costing you business.. so getting it right is very important..

You have various places that are free social media real estate.. you should use them to the hilt to get the maximum benefit but don’t try to be something different to what it says on the label. There are lots of reasons for this but the main one is trust. The chances are you will actually meet the people you connect with on-line especially if they are in the same country as you… and I have been to many networking events where people are scouring a room knowing that some people they have networked with on-line are there but not recognising them from their pictures. Think of it like a date for business.. would you trust the person who portrayed themselves as the dashing cover model of 30 years ago they may have once been who is now a little out of date… (same 80s suit, which is now back in fashion, but had far more hair back then)? You would probably stand them up rather than try not to laugh throughout the date. Obviously we all want to show our best, and why not, but at least have a photograph that is less than a year old and resembles you, even if it is on a very good day or an avatar or cartoon character that is easily recognisable as you. If you choose an avatar, then creating one that reflects who you are is a very good place to be.. a sophisticated, blonde business woman in elegant and stylish clothing doesn’t reflect the dumpy goth with bright red hair so why show it in your branding? Your tone on-line can be easily misread but your actions speak much clearer… if helping people is in your nature you will always show that naturally by sharing and a vivacious and sparkly nature will shine through no matter what.

So be brave and be you… then you may end up with much more fulfilling conversations with people who already have met you on-line and are now part way on the trust route… if you show something you very clearly are not, you are likely to disappoint and shatter any illusions your connections had of you and end what may become a beautiful friendship… Before you post a picture.. why not share it with a close friend and see what they say? Think of it like looking in the mirror but neglecting to look at the back so you don’t realise you have tucked your skirt in your underwear… only a true friend, or a complete stranger, would tell you the truth before you reveal tomorrow’s dirty washing to the world. I love my new pictures… yes they are very flattering and make me feel good… but what about you? What’s the best picture you have had done or how about the worst ones?

I Look forward to seeing yours or those you think are worthy of merit… the new timeline gives you a fabulous opportunity to be creative and still be you so let’s see them..

8 Industry Experts Weigh in on the Toughest Social Media Topics (hubspot.com)
Social Media Gives Beauty & Plastic Surgery Industries A Major Boost [Exclusive Infographic] (socialtimes.com)
If you are in business you should be at The Great British Business Show and The Business Start up Show – we’d love to see you on Stand 971 – book in here.. http://ht.ly/aqwgV

New business? Build your own wordpress website in our 30 Day Training…

WordPress made simple

We will take you step by step through

- domain names
- hosting
- adding wordpress
- themes
- plugins
- widgets
- creating menus - seo - posts

pages - social media icons and lots more.

Learn how to add legal pictures to your posts, make them measure up in google, link other pages and find ways to get free publicity and drive traffic to your own wordpress website.

Join the thousands of people taking control of their own destiny and create your own hosted wordpress website you can not only be proud of but change at the drop of a hat without paying ongoing web designer fees.

Create a platform where people can engage and share your content and get involved in your own business.

Just £189 will get you a selective slot on our wordpress made simple programme with 8 (2 per week) recorded hourly wordpress training sessions that will be recorded and emailed to you for future reference; extensive course notes; homework and ongoing help and assistance.. as well as over £100 worth of freebies:

A premium genesis theme (with the platform) worth £50
£20 off your first year’s hosting fee (just £29.99 instead of £49.99)
Assistance finding social media icons to match your theme
A premium plugin for your site worth £30

There are just 10 places on this selective training course and you will get real time training as well as professional assistance over and beyond the 8 live training courses..

Make 2012 your Olympic year and take control… there is an early bird discount for the first 3 people to sign up so don’t delay…

I look forward to seeing you online!

Course starts on 20th Feb so pick that date.. if you miss the first one you can still get the recordings if you fancy catching up…

Event Registration Online for Starting your own business? Then build your own website in wordpress – learn how from scratch… powered by Eventbrite

This course is for self hosted wordpress websites only – not the free version. Please get in touch if you need a hand with a domain name or hosting before starting the course.

What Can WordPress Plugins Do For You? (tfollowers.com)

New Year’s resolution…. Get your accounts organised…

It’s very easy not to be organised… but actually with a little and often approach to your accounts you can be on top of everything in your business and this free accounts package is available on line to help you get to grips with it.

It has a quotation facility as well as invoicing and a dashboard. You can send email reminders of accounts as well as statements, add clients and do reports for tax and vat.

Great reports facility and you can keep your accounts up to date very easily… and best of all? It’s free for tons of it…

This is a very easy to use accounts package and is very intuitive. It will also save you time and effort as well as get your more organised and you seeing where you are at a mere glance.

At the social media cafe we try and test everything we recommend so we have and we love it. It’s a pretty cool and easy to use package so why not try it out for yourself and see if it can help you get your business.

You might even think about getting in to the habit of regularly updating your accounts little and often. A few minutes here and there and that hard work at the end of the month or even worse – the year and you will find it’s an absolute breeze.

Schedule regular time slots in your diary to add your invoices and payments to the site and you will find it a much easier task.. or you could outsource it to a VA if your time should be better spent elsewhere… and we’re all great at taking on far too much.. should that have been another resolution?

This is held on the cloud not your pc so you don’t need to download expensive and difficult to understand software and you can log in and update wherever you are without any hassle or fuss, you can even log in ff your iPad.

For a freebie this is pretty powerful software and can easily help you see where you are at a glance so why not take a peek. There will be a paid for version with extra facilities but this does everything I need and can even handle my vat returns so it’s a no brainer to have a play.

I am sure there are loads of other things on the market that help you get your business organised so why not share what’s working for you and we can compare and find the very best… so what’s your favourite accounts package or freebie?

Are You Using Expertise For Know-how’s Sake? (pctechmojo.com)
http://easypayrollservices.co.uk/

If you are in business you should be at The Great British Business Show and The Business Start up Show – we’d love to see you on Stand 971 – book in here.. http://ht.ly/aqwgV

50 Second Blogging – Content Curation – How to set yourself as the expert

content curation why you need to use it for business

This is a very quick way of showing you are an expert at what you are involved in… you can curate content in blogging without actually having to write it – and still be credited with the quality of the content. Here are 3 videos showing you how to do the same.

So even if you don’t have anything to say – you can still show yourself as an expert in your field by curating content that is helpful to the people in your social circles.

A very small percentage of people actually create their own content, many rely on curating quality content on social media to associate themselves with it and be seen as the expert in their world. You may think about writing something of your own – get inspired by others around you and add your own thoughts and twist to what you want to say.

2012 is all about content, as only 1% of people actually create their own blogging content the rest are merely sharing. If you want to truly show yourself as the go to person of influence in your sphere you will have to get used to creating your own content rather than relying on basking the glory of everyone else’s.

Think about what is helpful to those around you and see what you can come up with that will solve a problem or help them progress. It is easy once you get your head around it – but in the meantime you can start with this content curation trick and get in the habit of doing a little something often.

On-line presence is set to become more and more important so get your head around what you actually want to be found for and create a strategy of how you can achieve the exposure you are going to need.

Get cracking with some 50 second blogging to align yourself with the best quality content for your world and why not share what you are using… we’d love to share…

CurationSoft: Creating Content Has Never Been Easier (famousbloggers.net)
Curation Coming To Television and Film: Channelisation (wcntransmediaworld.wordpress.com)
If you are in business you should be at The Great British Business Show and The Business Start up Show – we’d love to see you on Stand 971 – book in here.. http://ht.ly/aqwgV

Are you blogging for business? Want to know why you should? #bloggers

You really should be blogging for business… there are lots of reasons but just the seo benefits alone are powerful enough… take a look at this social media cafe webinar and see how you can be seen as the authority in your world with just a few simply planned blogs that will get you seen in all the right places for the right reasons and show you as an expert in your field.

This is just one of our webinars that we do monthly to help you get more out of social media platforms… It is very important that you pick a platform that suits you and if you are comfortable writing you should be looking at blogging for your business.

Amanda Hill and Dave Griffin of The Social Media Cafe share why you really should be blogging for business. If you would like to find a business blogger for your business then get in touch. We have bloggers who work with businesses all over Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire, Essex, London, Kent, Newcastle, Manchester, Hertfordshire and all over the UK. Our bloggers are focused on delivering quality social media content that helps your business get seen for all the right reasons. Here are a few blogging for business tips to help you get started…

Social media content should be focused and contain a call to action as well as written for engaging the reader.. it should not just contain sales messages. With less than 1% of the online community actually creating, you may struggle with what to say in your blogs. There are several things you can draw on straight away to get your company seen for your speciality niche. A great blogger will help you create a fabulous online profile for your company and drag out the sory behind your brand, customers and world as well as relevant, timely content for whatever is currently happening.

Don’t forget to add pictures to highlight your stories and give credit back to the creators.. look for those with creative commons licences and you will be fine or ensure you have zemanta added to your wordpress site to pic some for you.

You should also think about adding in relevant links to bring the value of your page up, preferably for a reliable and well visited site. Don’t do this for the sheer hell of it, make sure they are similar content and complement each other to make them valuable. Internal links to other articles you have written and are located within your own site are also a very good thing to link to.

Size matters… well ok it doesn’t really but go for around 500 words so there is sufficient data for the search engines to get their teeth in to. A few words, a video and a stack of pictures look great but are not really good feeding ground for a search engine so add a few paragraphs about your blog and get creative.

Try to be consistent, people love reading quality blogs so ensure your content is not only good but comes out regularly, you may even schedule them the same time and place so those following your musings are waiting in anticipation for what you are talking about this time. If you are posting regular, quality content in your blogs you will find your audience are more likely to share it and help you get your messages out in the stratosphere.

Hope that is helpful and we look forward to seeing more.. why not post us a link to your blog so we can share it…

Is your social media strategy a 2012 winner? 12 things to get you thinking… (amanda-hill.org.uk)
Fabulous chocolate inspired free social media icons for your blog or website (amanda-hill.org.uk)

If you are in business you should be at The Great British Business Show and The Business Start up Show – we’d love to see you on Stand 971 – book in here.. http://ht.ly/aqwgV

Which wordpress plugins work for you…? My Top 10 wordpress plugins…

There are millions of plugins available for wordpress… some good, some bad and some dangerous… there is every possibility that some will conflict with each other so be sure to pick them from the wordpress site… I have picked 10 goodies but feel free to suggest your own…

As you may know I am a relatively recent convert to WordPress having been guided to the free version and one with a rubbish theme very early on… this along with it’s annoying habit of completely corrupting everything I copied in text wise was enough to put me off for life…but thanks to Sarah Arrow I persevered and now enjoy tinkering…

So here we go with my top 10 wordpress plugins…

1. AnimatedTwitterBird
I love my animated bird… on my blog http://www.notasocialmediaexpert.co.uk – I know it drives some of you bonkers… as it follows you down the page sorry… he is staying…

2. CommentLuv
Reward your posters by placing a link to their last blog post after their comment… this is a great plugin.

3. Count Per Day
This wordpress plugin is pretty easy to suss.. shows your visitors and reads per day every day…

4. Eventbrite for The Events Calendar
If you use this for your events… then it is very easy to integrate and add to your site…

5. Favicon Rotator
Make your site look professional by adding your own favicon (picture) on the tab at the top of the site…. great plugin.. and you can rotate them

6. Google Site Verification Plugin
Great WordPress plugin in.. on click google verification…

7. Google XML Sitemaps
Make it easier for your WordPress site to be indexed by Google, Bing and whichever other sites want access…

8. Ozh’ Admin Drop Down Menu
I like my pull downs at the top… what can I say… and this plugin enables that…

9. PostRank
Showcase your posts, track analytics and encourage more engagement on old wordpress posts… excellent plugin

10. Zemanta
Add relevant creative commons licensed pictures and links in your posts… with just one click great for seo and absolutely easy…

Oh but I have sooo many more wordpress plugins that I love…. like… SexyBookmarks (by Shareaholic) and Quote Comments hmm think we may need a part 2 of my favourite wordpress plugins…. what are yours…?

Google Webmaster Tools Provides Plugin for Self Hosted WordPress Sites (searchenginewatch.com)
If you are in business you should be at The Great British Business Show and The Business Start up Show – we’d love to see you on Stand 971 – book in here.. http://ht.ly/aqwgV