March New Media Breakfast - What are you talking about 2 - Preparing a Content Calendar for your business

    

WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? 2

DATE: 28th March 2014
VENUE: 29 Member’s Club, Royal Exchange Square, Glasgow

The March New Media Breakfast will be the Case Studies from the Edinburgh breakfast session in February. You will have the opportunity to gain some content ideas from a further two businesses which are entirely different from those used in the previous breakfast.

One business is an established specialist holiday tour operator, the other an accountancy practice. Regardless of your inductry, there will be something for you in the presentation.

Overall, the four businesses were carefully selected to provide a broad range of case studies across different industry sectors, selling to a large variety of target markets. It is well worth hearing both the presentations as we have taken a different approach with each to avoid duplication of content in the presentations.

One of the biggest challenges we come across when talking to organisations about social media is Content - what will we talk about?

Most companies start out really well with some great ideas to get their story out there but they very quickly run out of steam. We see it every week.

Many of the businesses we talk to think they are boring and don’t have anything to say but we haven’t spoken to any who don’t actually have a library of useful Content, they just don’t know they have it and they don’t realise it is valuable if presented in the proper manner at the proper time.

For the March New Media Breakfast we thought it would be useful to explore Content and provide some ideas about what to talk about. We will also demonstrate how to create and maintain a content plan which will enable you to manage your content and make sure it is being shared with your community at the optimum time.

THE SPEAKER
The March breakfast will be presented by Gordon White and perhaps other members of the fatBuzz team and the case study organisations.

HOW TO BOOK
Venue: 29 Member's Club, Royal Exchange Square, Glasgow
Date: Friday 28th March 2014
Time: 7.30am for 8am
Cost: £10+VAT

BOOK FOR NEW MEDIA BREAKFAST GLASGOW HERE:

No.29 MEMBERS GO FREE 

If you are a 29 Member you can attend the breakfast free of charge. Please email fiona@fatbuzz.com with you membership number and she will add you to the attendance list.

We hope you can make it along to this event. If so, I look forward to seeing you on the day.

If you have found this post interesting please share it with your online community using either the Twitter, Facebook and Share buttons below. Thank You.

    

  

Facebook page managers...are you struggling with the reach of your posts?

    

  

FACEBOOK PAGE OWNERS/MANAGERS 

During my recent meetings with the 4 diverse businesses involved in the New Media Breakfast case studies there has been one recurring issue - the diminishing reach of their posts on Facebook. 

 This is something we are hearing more and more people talking about and it is a genuine concern for page managers. There are things you can do to dramatically improve the reach of your posts without having to spend money to 'boost' the posts. So, in addition to the case study presentation outlined below I will be sharing a couple of these proven tips at the breakfast on Friday.

WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?

DATE: 28th February 2014
VENUE: 29 Member's Club, Royal Exchange Square, Glasgow

One of the biggest challenges we come across when talking to organisations about social media is Content - what will we talk about?

Most companies start out really well with some great ideas to get their story out there but they very quickly run out of steam. We see it every week.

Many of the businesses we talk to think they are boring and don’t have anything to say but we haven’t spoken to any who don’t actually have a library of useful Content, they just don’t know they have it and they don’t realise it is valuable if presented in the proper manner at the proper time.

For the February New Media Breakfast we thought it would be useful to explore Content and provide some ideas about what to talk about. We will also demonstrate how to create and maintain a content plan which will enable you to manage your content and make sure it is being shared with your community at the optimum time.

To do this we are using two case studies; the first is a 5th Generation retail business, the other a new start manufacturing/retail business.  They are two very different businesses but we hope to demonstrate just how to go about creating a content plan regardless of the business history, size and reputation.

We will also provide some examples of other Content plans along with some Content ideas and examples of good Content by other organisations.

THE SPEAKER
The February breakfast will be presented by Gordon White and perhaps other members of the fatBuzz team and the case study organisations.

HOW TO BOOK
Venue: 29 Member's Club, Royal Exchange Square, Glasgow
Date: Friday 28th February 2014
Time: 7.30am for 8am
Cost: £10+VAT

BOOK FOR NEW MEDIA BREAKFAST GLASGOW HERE:

No.29 MEMBERS GO FREE 

If you are a 29 Member you can attend the breakfast free of charge. Please email fiona@fatbuzz.com with you membership number and she will add you to the attendance list.

We hope you can make it along to this event. If so, I look forward to seeing you on the day.

If you have found this post interesting please share it with your online community using either the Twitter, Facebook and Share buttons below. Thank You.

    

  

Join The fatBuzz Team

In response to an increase in business and the addition of several new contracts, we are looking to bring in a new account manager to join the fatBuzz team.

Ideally, you will be a marketing, journalism or PR professional, who is not only able to write creative, in-depth blog content, but also comprehensive social media strategies and reports.

You will have a good understanding of social media and digital marketing, but more importantly, you will have excellent written and oral communication skills, as you will be expected to build credible relationships with clients from various geographical locations and industry sectors.

The successful candidate will be responsible for creating in-depth blog content, writing clear and error-free copy, and managing various social media platforms.

This role also entails writing comprehensive social media strategies, which includes identifying key influencers and key opinion leaders, writing in-depth content plans, and mapping out key objectives with meaningful KPIs.

The position will be based in our Glasgow office, and although not essential, a driving licence would be a distinct advantage.

Salary and package will be commensurate with experience.

Knowledge, Skills and Experience Required:

Essential

• Educated to degree level or equivalent professional experience.
• A strong understanding of digital marketing and social media.
• Journalism, copywriting or blogging experience.
• Exceptional written communications skills, with ability to adapt style to suit different media and audiences.
• Articulate and confident communicator (both written and verbally).
• Excellent time management and organisational skills, with the ability to manage multiple projects and work to tight deadlines.
• Ability to build and maintain working and credible relationships.

Desirable

• Good understanding of Wordpress or other CMS.
• Experience of working with large corporate and/or B2B clients.
• Previous experience in an agency environment.

In the first instance you should send your CV, cover letter and any other relevant information to jobs@fatbuzz.com. Closing date for applications is 28th March 2014. All applications will be strictly confidential.

If you have know someone who would be interested in this role, please share it with them using either the Twitter, Facebook or Share buttons below. Thank you.

    

  

Social Media Podcast Edition 62 - Facebook's birthday provides us all with the opportunity look back

In Social Media Podcast Edition No.62, Gordon White, Derek Howie, Graeme Geddes, Malcolm White and Cameron Wilson, all from the fatBuzz team, chat around the latest news and topical issues from the world of social media.

The recording of this podcast coincided with Gordon's birthday which was on the same week as Facebook's 10th birthday so there was a party atmosphere in the office and during the recording.

It was also the same day as the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics in Sochi, and the week Twitter's latest financial figures were released so there was lots to talk about.

Here are some of the things we discussed during the recording:

• Facebook's 10th birthday and the 'Look Back' video promotion
• Facebook's diminishing page reach and the effectiveness of boosting posts
• A new report suggesting 50% of children under 10 are using social media tools
• The recent 'Necking' craze - Good or bad?
• Personal branding and employability
• The Super Bowl - Advertising review and a look at what JC Penney did to muscle in on the party
• Trademarking hashtags - Is it worth doing?
• Has the Twitter bubble burst, or has it simply found it's level? 
• The Winter Olympics - Why are the big brands taking all the flack?

We hope you enjoy the podcast, please also share it with your friends and colleagues, you can do so using the share buttons at the top of bottom of this post.


Play the podcast here:

Subscribe/Download Social Media Podcast on iTunes

Would you like a presentation on social media and customer service?
We're offering a range of bespoke or generic presentations on the topic of social media and customer service, if you would like to find out more please go to the following link: Are you prepared to lose control?

Have you listened to the digital copyright podcast?

We continue to see people using images, video content and other files taken from the internet without consideration to potential copyright issues. We would encourage all of our listeners to download Social Media Podcast 50 which clearly outlines what you should and shouldn't do with images sourced online. Find it on iTunes now.

WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE US TO TALK ABOUT?
If there is a specific topic you would like us to cover in a future podcast please let us know. You can email gordon@fatbuzz.com or send us a message on Twitter @MediaPodcast or, you can post it as a comment on the Social Media Podcast Facebook page.

If you have found this post interesting please share it with your on-line community using either the Twitter, Facebook and Share buttons below. Thank You.

Optimising your website speed: be a cheetah, not a snail.

    

  

The prominence of smartphones has allowed people access to content on-the-go like never before, with information literally at the tip of their fingers.

Search engines and social networks have opened up a plethora of information to us, whilst Google Earth and Apple Maps allow us to go anywhere in the world from the comfort of our own homes.

However, we live in an ever increasingly impatient era. People want all of this information yesterday and don’t want to wait around for a page to load. Although I reference Google, Apple and social media platforms, these issues still apply to your website.

The average user will spend 10-20 seconds on a new website, and included in that 10-20 seconds is the time waiting for the page to load. So if a page takes, say 5 seconds to load, you’re really only being left with 5-15 seconds to capture their attention. Double that load time and you’re undoubtedly reducing the likelihood of a user engaging with your content. Yahoo estimate that as little as 400ms increase in load time can result in a drop of traffic between 5-9%.

At this point, a few things should be cleared up. If a user has an abnormally slow or outdated internet connection, there is not an awful lot you can do to compensate for that. If somebody is still on a dial up connection, it’s not your responsibility to cater for someone using vastly outdated technology. It wouldn’t make business sense to reduce the impact of your site content for the sake of a tiny section of the market.

Secondly, if you’re about to test the load times of your own website, then remember to clear your cache on your web browser, otherwise components will already have been pre-loaded, which will give you a false reading.

Ways to speed up your website
There are many different options when it comes to decreasing the load times of your site, some of which are inexpensive (and sometimes free), others which can be costly depending on how far you wish to go in improving speeds. I’ll start with the least expensive.

Content
The main building blocks for your site is what a visiting user will read and interact with. Generally speaking, text will impact on load times very little. Whether it’s a paragraph or 50, the load times will be rarely noticeable.

What can impact on load times is the inclusion of images and how your site is styled. Images are great and it’s a fact that inclusion of images improves engagement. However, there’s no need to have a super hi-resolution picture in your blog post or pages (unless of course it’s relevant to your industry) and using tools such as Photoshop (paid) or the GIMP (free) you can reduce the file size of an image while trying to maintain an acceptable quality. It should be noted, in almost all cases there’s no way of reducing file size yet improving quality!

Videos are again, good for engagement, but always let the user decide if they want to play them or not. If you’re embedding something from Youtube or Vimeo, don’t set them to autoplay as it’s just another resource that’s being used up while the user tries to navigate around your site.

Hosting
This may seem obvious, but make sure that your existing hosting can support everything that your site requires. If you have a lot of concurrent activity and processes going on (i.e a booking system, a complex search facility, an online store, a live chat system), make sure that you're meeting the minimal requirements for any system.

Remember that all of your web traffic are sharing these resources, so it's always best to overcompensate in this department in the event that you get a large number of visitors at the same time.

Caching Software
What is caching? In a web sense, it’s a mechanism for the temporary storage of web documents to increase performance. Almost all web browsers perform this by downloading images and styles to your local machine, so that when you access a site again, it loads quicker.

At fatBuzz, we look to add server side caching wherever possible. What this means is the caching is shared between the browser and the server, increasing performance on the machine itself and balancing the load on both sides. This can mean less requests from the user to the server, as some of the content isn’t being downloaded, which will improve load times.

This is not something that I intend to go into in great detail, as it can be quite a complex system that if setup incorrectly, can cause more problems than it will solve, but if you do wish to discuss this with any of the web team at fatBuzz, give us a call on 0141 427 0727.

Content Distribution Networks
When a user is accessing your website, they’re connecting directly to the server that your site is hosted on. If that user is in the UK and your server is in the USA, then the load time will be increased compared to a US user, purely due to physical distance between the two points. A CDN alleviates this problem.

A copy of your site is distributed to various servers throughout the world, so that when people are accessing your content, they’re not having to cross several continents and then back again to read what you have to say. This can be a more costly method, as in all likelihood it will require a subscription with a CDN provider such as Amazon, Cloudflare or MaxCDN. I’d advise this setup for anyone that is providing a service that goes beyond your local area.

Finding ways to improve the speed of your site is something that should always be pursued, and when teamed up with quality content and stunning design, it completes the package to help pull people into your website. Google have also started ranking sites based on speed of delivery, so it can also make a difference in that push up the google rankings.

I've only touched on a few of the issues here, so If you have any questions about your site and what we can do to help improve it, or any other related issues, please get in touch by e-mailing jon@fatbuzz.com

If you have found this post interesting please share it with your online community using either the Twitter, Facebook and Share buttons below. Thank You.