Social media marketing is no longer just a nice to have. For many brands it has quickly become ‘the’ marketing channel, rather than an addition to other media choices.

For consumer brands this is an easy fit. Consumers are now accustomed to proactively seeking out what they need via online channels, rather than being ‘sold to’. The trick is to provide the destinations and content for them to find. And engage with.

Google has now made its social networking site Google+ available to everyone following a 12 week invitation-only trial. With an estimated 20 million members already, Google+ has undoubtedly been quicker off the mark than Facebook was, but I can’t help thinking that the old ‘tortoise and hare’ adage might ring true in this case. Google [...]

Facebook’s main aim is to attract one billion users worldwide but with numbers already nearing 700 million, the social networking site is said to have suffered a second slump in users during May 2011. In January, Facebook saw its first drop in UK users since July 2006, as numbers fell 5% from 8.9 million in [...]

A corporate blog can be a very powerful tool in engaging with your customers, providing you with an insight into their thinking and buying patterns. They can work if you give them time, if you write about things your audience responds to and the posts you are writing tie into your business and add value. [...]

With over 500 million users on Facebook alone, no-one is disputing that social media are an increasingly important channel of communication for businesses to engage with potential customers. Yet, how many marketing managers out there have struggled to make a compelling business case for implementing a social media strategy for their company? Our customers don’t [...]

The Obama election victory was not won online and neither will the UK general election. Here’s why. The success of the Obama campaign had less to do with the use of new technology and far more to do with good organisation and its empowerment of its supporters at grassroots level. Despite all the attention that’s [...]

If you are old enough to have witnessed the birth of the internet, you will remember that ‘me too’ websites were all the rage. It was much more important then to BE online than have a reason for being there, whatever it cost. And how the internet designers cashed in! Thankfully, the rise of the [...]