Faye wins the prize against stiff competition from other course delegates who demonstrated great enthusiasm in their entries.

The reasons Faye has won the prize are as follows:

We were immediately impressed with Poppy Treffy’s efforts to establish a community around the company and its products. The Facebook page, which was clearly created the day after the course, already boasts 90 fans and a range of content.

The content of the page has a good balance of company created and user generated content. Status updates shown on the wall are personal and engaging whilst business focused. Links to products and further information are regularly included.

Efforts to engage users in conversation have been initiated with a couple of discussions appearing on the discussion board and requests for users (fans) to add their own photos or videos to the collections.

A mixture of different content has been utilised with photos, video, links and text, all forming key elements of the page.

In their entry on the UKNetWeb wall, Faye has clearly detailed further plans to integrate their Facebook and Twitter campaigns, showing a staged development plan is in place. This is important as trying to do everything at once can mean that businesses risk spreading themselves too thin to truly engage with their audience.

Like their Facebook page, the Poppy Treffry Twitter account shows high levels of interaction with their community. There are regular exchanges of ideas and requests for feedback, once again showing their focus on engagement. Many Tweets feature a link back to the main site, driving traffic towards the ecommerce site.

The ongoing monitoring of Google Analytics (referenced in their entry) shows that they are keeping track of the results, demonstrating a focus on the business results.

Thank you once again to all who entered. We hope that you will see the benefits from your activity despite missing out on the initial prize of the champagne. Please continue to keep us informed on your progress through the UKNetWeb Facebook Page, Twitter accounts (@UKNetWeb, @TobyParkins, @ArenGrimshaw) or UKNetWeb Blog (http://www.uknetweb.com/blog/).

It can help you understand the changing marketplace, provide a route to inform and educate your target market as well as drive new and returning business.

It is not just about technology. Social media may rely upon it, but the value is created in the exchanges of information, the conversations taking place and the relationships formed over it.

Reducing social media to a particular platform or technique is to misunderstand the underlying ideals that separate this medium from more traditional marketing approaches. It is about creating mutual benefit – not the age old targeted message delivered through the appropriate channel.

In fact, social media isn’t just marketing at all. It goes way further, taking on areas of PR, business strategy, market research, customer service and sales. Understanding the operating mechanisms and principles behind it can unleash whole new worlds of possibility for those businesses that understand them.

Let’s take networking as an example to start with.

Good networking is built on getting to know people and building rapport with them. It is built on mutual respect and a desire to help each other’s businesses grow. Through helping each other we foster good will, which over the longer term is rewarded by trust, referrals and new business.

Bad networkers treat the experience as an opportunity to hunt new business. They bore those around them reeling off their achievements. They try to dominate and push people towards doing business with them, with no interest in returning the favour. They operate on a ‘numbers game’ philosophy, thinking that as long as they keep trying some business will come out of it.

Eventually, people become wary of the bad networker. They don’t really want to talk to them. They cannot be confident referring business to them as they themselves feel intimidated by them. They do not feel the need to pass business in their direction because they never really did anything for them.

Good networkers see their credibility increase over time. Other business people know what they can do for them as they have heard first hand how they have worked with or helped others. They get recommended with confidence because they have taken time to build rapport with those around them.

Now think about your approach to social networking. Does it sound more like the first or second approach? Are you after the quick buck or in it for the longhaul?

OK, so what about the other uses of social media?

Market Research

Whatever business you’re in, there is sure to be some need to research your market, the competition or another facet of your business.

You can take time to compile industry statistics, read the latest trade magazine or conduct your own research into previous buying habits. However, it may all seem a bit flat and logical without a more human aspect – a more qualitative element to your research.

By understanding the opportunities created by social media you can bring your customers and potential customers into the process from the very beginning.

Take Walkers Crisps in the UK as an example.

They recently invited customers to suggest new flavours. People responded with their suggestions and eventually the most popular were launched in shops across the country. Not wanting to stop there, they invited customers to review the new flavours and vote to keep the one flavour they felt passionately about.

So what?

Well think about this. The customer did the work of the R & D department in suggesting flavours. The data recorded in the first process showed the most popular suggestions eliminating the need for focus groups or other surveys. The customer tested the products during the first release and recorded their findings by voting for their preference.

The customer felt ownership throughout the process. The customer engaged with the campaign, in many cases offering up their email addresses, phone numbers and other contact details in the process. The customer will have discussed the campaign and choices with others creating valuable word of mouth marketing for the company.

Win – Win – Win.

Walkers Crisps created a new product with an established market ready to adopt it.

The Customer got a new flavour of crisps that they had a role in deciding upon.

Suppliers and retailers could have confidence that demand for the product already existed.

Customer Service

There is a statistic repeated the world over which goes something along the lines of ‘A happy customer will share their experience with one other. An unhappy one will share it with ten.’(The numbers may differ but the idea’s the same)

Identifying the unhappy customer before it’s too late has always been a difficult task.

In a world where everyone has the tools to communicate their dissatisfaction with many others, finding them has never been more important.

For example, say I have a gripe against Company X which has just sold me a faulty widget.

I outline my gripe in a short message over Twitter which automatically updates my Facebook status. Some friends join me in berating Company X with comments on my Facebook status and a couple of reply Tweets.

Soon my complaint with Company X has been shared with not 10, but moving on for 1,000 (Total of Facebook Friends and Twitter Followers).

Add in, that my complaint is now supported by others, who have added their own perspective and shared details with their own networks, Company X is now facing a lot of negative attention.

By understanding the principles, you can seek to identify and address customer service issues before they get out of hand. You can turn those negative comments into positive ones, retaining the original customer and demonstrating to others your focus on customer service.

Business Strategy

Getting to know your way around the emerging digital landscape can open entirely new models of doing business.

We are no longer constrained to working in the same office, or even the same continent.

Take the recent Twestivals held across 175 separate locations across the globe. Although not strictly a business event, the Twestivals highlighted how the tools used within social media could be put to use in making funds for charity.

The process began with a single message shared over Twitter and led to volunteers organising their own teams to put together an event in their city with sponsorship, food, drink, live streaming of footage over the internet, local and regional news coverage and event bookings.

In many cases even the local teams had never met before, nor did they know the guests that would be attending on the night.

I was lucky to be involved as the Cornwall Twestival organiser. I had a rare chance to watch all this come together in just 4 weeks. To see organisers collaborating on a global scale. To see people coming together locally with pride in their local event.

If all this could be achieved from a message over just four weeks, what could a business do with the same tools over the space of a few weeks, months or even years?

PR

There are many different aspects to public relations, some of which will have been covered in the previous sections relating to networking and reputation management. What remains to be mentioned is the role of blogs and other internet news or article sites.

Getting media attention for your company is no longer just a case of firing a press release off to the local hack and ensuring you buy him or her lunch once in a while. The media is now in the hands of millions of individuals acting outside the constraints of the traditional press, TV and radio institutions.

Bloggers, are independent commentators reporting on or discussing events, launches and other matters that they believe to be of interest to their their audience. Many are not restrained by the presence of editors or advertisers. They speak to build their own credibility, to generate revenue from advertising (often in the form of Google Ads) and in many cases just because they like doing it.

Bringing bloggers into your marketing mix can be powerful for your business. Acting more like a word of mouth referral than traditional news coverage, bloggers can shine a light on your business should they decide to mention you or write a post about you. Understanding their motivations and engaging with them is like the other areas of social media, more about mutual respect and a win-win approach than the age old, message – channel – target market.

Coming back to where we started, social media is a lot more than just marketing. It is a lot more than the latest platform or service offering – those are just fads.

What matters are the changes taking place in the way we communicate and manage our businesses. The conversations initiated, the relationships formed, the new models of business and the emerging possibilities created as we move forward in an ever more connected, ever more sociable world

A copy of the slideshow and video footage of the presentation are included below.

UKNetWeb will be running a free follow up taster course on using Social Media for Business on the afternoon of the 2nd of April. For details and booking for the event please click here.

Here is my list of celebs and radio shows currently using Twitter…

General Celebrities

Stephen Fry – http://twitter.com/stephenfry
Jonathan Ross – http://twitter.com/wossy
Phillip Schofield – http://twitter.com/Schofe
Britney Spears – http://twitter.com/britneyspears
MC Hammer – http://twitter.com/MCHammer
Robert Llewellyn – http://twitter.com/bobbyllew

BBC Radio

Radio One – http://twitter.com/the_4th_floor
Radio Two – http://twitter.com/BBC_Radio_2
Radio Three – http://twitter.com/bbcradio3live
Radio Four (Today Programme) – http://twitter.com/r4today
Radio Five Live – http://twitter.com/bbc5live

Chris Moyles and the Radio One Breakfast Team:

Chris Moyles – http://twitter.com/CHRISDJMOYLES
Aled Haydn Jones – http://twitter.com/ahj
Dominic Byrne – http://twitter.com/domisatwit
Carrie – http://twitter.com/sportycarrie
Rachel – http://twitter.com/ProducerRach
Matt Fincham – http://twitter.com/mattfincham

Other Radio Personalities

Fearne Cotton – http://twitter.com/Fearnecotton
Andi Peters – http://twitter.com/xxandip

And finally, the rather random…

Darth Vader – http://twitter.com/darthvader

It has probably occurred to you that it seems like an odd idea to spend time sending 140 character messages over the internet to a group of people you might never meet. Entering a strange world where people have ‘followers’ and ‘tweet’ like birds all sounds a little bit odd to say the very least.

Probably the most difficult aspect of explaining Twitter to a new user is to explain what the big fuss is all about. It’s such a simple act to send short messages over the internet that it seems odd that such subtlety and complexity has built up around it.

Twitter can be different things to different people. Please take this post as it is intended – my own viewpoint on some of its many uses.

A Social Network

Twitter offers a space to meet new people and extend your social network. Likewise, it offers you another route to stay in touch and connect with the people you already know.

Unlike other networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn and MySpace, Twitter places the emphasis on the words expressed in your messages (tweets) and your interactions with other users.

Space for biographies, photos and other items is limited to just a few small boxes on your homepage. The connections made through Twitter are based more on shared interests or lifestyles and less on location, past contact or other factors.

By ‘following’ another user you are opening a window to their messages. You will need to ensure that those messages coming in are relevant and interesting to you the majority of the time to avoid getting overloaded with too much content.

Your reasons for extending your ‘social network’ will be personal to you. You might want to meet new people, you may be looking to market your business or possibly you want to gather new perspectives on an idea or subject. Whatever your reason, Twitter can be a very effective social networking tool.

In later posts I will explain some more ways to find people on Twitter. For some basic ideas please go back to my first post.

A News Channel

Twitter can become your very own news channel, feeding you the news you are interested in, as it happens.

Apart from the many traditional media organisations feeding news flashes out through Twitter (BBC, Sky, The Daily Mail, The Guardian and so on) you will also find users acting as ‘citizen journalists’. People just like you and I, who hear a story, see an event or are on location providing commentary.

Take the recent Hudson River Plane Crash in the US as an example. One Twitter user was stood on a ferry heading out into the middle of the river to rescue the survivors and took the very first picture and sent it out through Twitter. (Click here to read the Telegraph’s report)

Hundreds of users subsequently added their own comments or passed the story onwards to other users, breaking the story before many news teams could even make it to the scene.

Similarly, there are a number of commentators on Twitter who report on, or feed information on, a particular area or subject. For example, in social media, users such as Robert Scoble or Jason Calacanis will often report from conferences or events, helping other users like me keep up to date with the latest developments within the industry.

You will find your own news sources and commentators as you begin to become accustomed to the site.

In future posts I will provide you with links to some of the tools you can use to find your own news sources.

A Search Engine

Your traditional search engine such as Google or Yahoo allow you to search for sites offering relevant content based on a number of factors such as; the number of sites linking to it, the frequency of relevant words or phrases on the page or how recently the information was updated.

Twitter offers a more human led approach to the search engine model.

By fostering your own group of experts you can pose questions to them instead of trying to search for the information yourself. You will know the opinions to trust as you will have been listening to and interacting with those in your community (the people who you follow or those following you).

Likewise, when one of your own community posts a question, you might be the best person to answer it. We all have our own areas of knowledge, Twitter helps facilitate communications between those needing an answer and those with the knowledge to answer it.

Further still, by fostering a group of people with similar interests to you own, you are often fed information in the form of links before you even go looking for it.

Later posts will go into more detail on fostering your own team of experts.

A Marketing Tool

Twitter offers those in business another tool to market their products or services.

Unlike, most traditional media, Twitter offers two way communication between the ‘marketer’ and the ‘marketed to. This can be a daunting prospect for traditional marketers who are wary of allowing their customers to add to the conversation.

However, let’s make this clear, should a marketer not enter the communication in the first place, they have no control over what is said! If someone wants to talk about them they can, whether they’re taking part or not.

The challenge from a business and marketing angle is the age old ‘return on investment’. What do I get out of this? Why should I invest my energy?

Social Media Marketing (encompassing Twitter, Facebook and Blogging amongst others) can be difficult to quantify or measure results from. So before you start engaging in any activity be clear on what you are looking to achieve and work out how best to monitor success.

Spamming (the sending of bulk unsolicited sales messages) is more likely to damage your reputation than build it. Users found to be spamming on Twitter often find themselves becoming the topic of potentially damaging negative conversation.

An Organisational / Communication Tool

Twitter can be highly effective as a communication or organisational tool. Whether planning a night out with friends, organising a dinner party or a business event you will find Twitter built for the job (providing those involved are using Twitter too!)

Take the upcoming Twestival as an example. The event is taking place in over 180 locations across the globe with the bulk of communication and organisation taking place over Twitter.

Messaging made simple:

• Through using the ‘Direct Message’ function you can message individuals privately.
• Through ‘@replies’ you can ensure that multiple recipients are aware of the same details.
• Through ‘Protected Updates’ you can protect information that you would like to keep between a team or private group.

Please refer to Twitter for Beginners Part One: Getting Started for further explanation on using these functions.

In future posts we will look at some of the freely available web based tools that link with Twitter to take its organisational or communication capabilities a step further.

This concludes the second post in our series, Twitter for Beginners. Future posts will look at some of the great tools designed to aid you in getting the most out of Twitter.

We would love to hear about your own experiences, please feel free to Tweet @arengrimshaw or @uknetweb with your views or leave a comment at the end of this post.

We have released this post to help new users get to grips with the site, which we believe has a number of uses to individuals and businesses alike.

We have published this in the run up to the Cornwall Twestival – a global event organised through Twitter to raise money for Charity:Water. The event promises to be an insightful and enjoyable get together of the diverse users (and potential users) of Twitter. For more information or to book a ticket please click here.

The Basics – What is Twitter and Where Do I Start?

Twitter is a social network and messaging system which allows its users to post short messages (140 characters in length) with information on their movements, interests, links to articles, websites or other content that they feel will be of interest to others. [Click here for the Wikipedia entry for Twitter]

Each user of the site needs their own account which is available free of charge at Twitter.com. Once an account is setup the user can choose to ‘Follow’ others, enabling those users of the site to send direct (private) messages to you. (Often referred to as a Tweet).

As you use the service to post your own messages, those interested in what you have to say will begin to follow you. Likewise, as you read the messages of others you will see people that you may want to follow.

This process occurs because all messages you send through the site are openly available to other users of Twitter (unless you have selected to keep your updates private). Users can use the Twitter Search System to identify messages (Tweets) that mention words or keyphrases of interest to them.

Those that you follow on Twitter are listed under ‘Following’ on your Twitter homepage and those that follow you are called ‘Followers’.

Why should I be interested?

There are a number of ways Twitter can be useful to you.

As a business it creates opportunities to extend your network and meet new people, cultivate a group of people with similar interests or expertise and keep ahead of news or information relevant to your business interests.

Further still, Twitter can be useful in marketing your own products or services; however, it should be noted that some care is advised to avoid spamming (over marketing products in a ‘buy, buy, buy…’ kind of manner).

As an individual Twitter can help you meet people with similar interests, follow your favourite celebrity, talk to your MP, keep abreast of the news and much more. It has the potential to be a great social network, news site and search engine all in one.

We will uncover more on these areas in future posts.

How do I use it?

It’s really very simple…

1. Create an Account

Go to Twitter and create an account. You will need to specify a Username (Twitter ID). This name will be the name that appears on your messages and the name used by other members to message you.

You will need to add a short bit of detail about yourself (your bio) and you may want to add a website address or link to a blog or other site.

*Remember to keep your updates public if you want others to be able to find you. If you select to protect your updates other members of Twitter will not be able to read your messages.

2. Follow People

Once your account is set up search for people that you think would be of interest to you.

If you’re a business try searching for others in your industry.

If you’re an individual try looking for people listing similar interests to you.

In both cases have a look and see who else in your area is using the service.

You can perform searches to find these people or businesses by visiting http://search.twitter.com and selecting the ‘Advanced Search’ option. Using the Advanced Search you can look for locations, interests, message content and much more.

3. Listen to Others

Take a while to see what others are messaging. Where you find a member interesting continue following them and where you find a member’s messages boring or irrelevant drop them off your list be clicking on their name and selecting ‘Remove’.

You are looking to cultivate a group of users that you find interesting and you in turn can be of interest to.

4. Start Messaging (Tweeting)

Once you are comfortable with the site start messaging.

Try to avoid sending erroneous messages about the content of your lunch or what time you woke up this morning. Try to make your messages interesting and relevant to the people ‘following’ you.

People can message you directly by typing the letter ‘d’, then a space followed by your Twitter ID i.e. ‘d arengrimshaw This is a direct message’. Likewise you can do the same; however, the person you are messaging will need to be ‘following’ you before you can do this.

You can send a message out to be flagged as a ‘reply’ to a particular person or number of people by adding the prefix ‘@’ to a Twitter username i.e. ‘@arengrimshaw You can find that information here – www.uknetweb.com’.

Where ‘@’ is used, the message will be publicly available to everyone and will show up on the referenced user’s ‘replies’ when they log in to Twitter.

This concludes the first in our series on Twitter for Beginners. In future posts we will look at using Twitter for business in more detail, Tips, tricks and tools you might find helpful and other subjects that will help you get the most of this exciting service.

It is great to see we already have a lot of interest in the Cornwall Twestival planned for the evening of 12th February. We are now looking to put together a working group to ensure the evening is a major success. We would love it if you could be involved.

Areas that need attention include:

• Sponsorship
• Donations / Raffle Prizes
• Drinks and Food
• Media Coverage and Partnerships
• Format for the Evening

If you would like to be part of this working group we would love to have you on-board. As time is of the essence we are looking at a quick get together one evening early next week – Mon / Tues? If you could spare an hour to come along on one of these evenings we can host the meeting here at the Engine House in St.Agnes.

Please message me with your availability and we will start to put together the details.

Many thanks for your interest – We look forward to meeting you all very soon… Aren (@arengrimshaw)

A free of charge service, Twitter allows you to keep customers or other interested parties abreast of information from you with options for them to respond online or via their mobile phone.

This tool can be extremely effective for publishing links, promotions and sound bites to your audience. The system can be integrated to display on your website, blog or other sites adding additional levels of updated content to each.

Within a sales team the Twitter system could be used to communicate with field sales operatives, with the tool allowing secure communications from one account to all subscribers, allowing them to respond directly to each others posts.

To set up your own Twitter account go to – www.twitter.com