But I am also confused when I subscribe to some peoples Tweets or Facebook Page – it seems like everyone is now a social media expert. No matter where I look I see people publishing content about social media sometimes to the detriment, potentially devaluing and diminishing their own brand.

Many people I meet get concerned about how much time engaging with social media channels will take and if they can manage a single Twitter channel, or manage a single Facebook Page.

Working with my clients who are living beyond getting started in social media marketing, I encourage them to  consider developing different communication channels based on where your audience is and creating content connected to what they are interested in.

Let’s take for example the Mayo Clinic who have several different blogs and use a number of social media channels:

The Mayo Clinic News Blog – where physicians and researchers from the Mayo Clinic share health and news

The Sharing Mayo Clinic Blog – where patients, families, friends and staff of the Mayo Clinic share stories

The Physicians Update Blog – where the Mayo Clinic share information about patient care and new treatments

The Advancing The Science Blog – Mayo Clinic’s medical science blog for people interested in medical science

The Diversity in Education Blog – written by students in the Mayo Clinic’s education programmes

The Health Policy Blog – covering issues related to healthcare reform

The Mayo Clinic Centre for Innovation Blog – covering subjects related to the future of health and wellness

Mayo Clinic Podcasts – a blog hosting the podcasts from the Clinic

The Mayo Clinic on YouTube

The Mayo Clinic on Facebook

The Mayo Clinic Diet on Facebook

The Mayo Clinic on Twitter

The Mayo Clinic Meditation iPhone App in iTunes (a paid app and not available in the Irish iTunes Store)

The Mayo Clinic Symptom Checker iPhone App in iTunes (a free app and not available in the Irish iTunes Store)

Yes there is some cross over – for example you can see below the YouTube video that promotes the Symptom Checker iPhone App which was also promoted in their Facebook Page.

Yes it does take time to create content, publish stories, engage with the different communities, but would the Mayo Clinic be using these different channels for communication if it was not making a difference and positioning them as authorities in healthcare? Can you see from their channels that they have clearly defined the different audiences they want to connect with – what a physician is interested in is different to a student and different again to taking an active stance in lobbying for future changes in healthcare.

So before you next click  to publish an update in Facebook or Twitter, write a new article, or record a new video or podcast, think about the Mayo Clinic and whether you need to be segmenting your audience and publishing to more niche channels and if your communication is relevant to what you want to be known for.

I know it’s got me thinking. What other organisations do you think have segmented their social media communications effectively? Do you think it makes a difference to what content channels you subscribe to?

Share on Facebook ]]> http://www.krishnade.com/blog/2010/social-media-mayo-clinic/feed/ 15 http://www.krishnade.com/blog/2010/business-blog-content-plan/ http://www.krishnade.com/blog/2010/business-blog-content-plan/#comments Mon, 15 Mar 2010 14:45:05 +0000 Krishna De http://www.krishnade.com/blog/?p=1558 How do I get inspiration for my business blog so that I know what kind of articles, videos or podcasts to post is a question I am often asked.

One of the great ways is to read other peoples business blogs – and not always blogs in your own business niche as you can be inspired to develop content learning from others.

So here are seven ideas that might help you develop a content strategy for your business blog:

1. Get ideas from your RSS feeds – remember to model not copy articles respecting the copyright of the original site where the content is posted and always give attribution and a link to the source article

2. Explore the blogs listed in the Technorati blog directory HERE or in other niche directories

3. Review the list of business blogs that are listed in other peoples blog rolls – the list that many bloggers have on the side bar of their business blog

4. Do a search within Google using the Google Blog search engine to find other business blogs for inspiration

5. Review your email, your Facebook Page or Tweets that you receive for questions that your people ask you and turn those answers into blog articles

6. Think about the questions your clients and customers have asked you over the last 3 months and turn those questions into articles – but make sure that you don’t disclose confidential information about your clients

7. Look at award winners of business blogging competitions – for example the short list of the Digital Marketing Awards which was announced recently and hosted by Ashville Media – you will find the shortlist HERE or the list of blogs nominated for a blogging award for Best Business Blog with the Irish Blog Awards

Note: If you already have a business blog and are in Ireland you might be interested in being nominated for the IIA Net Visionary Awards 2010 – nominations for best business blog and best business podcast are open along side many other categories through until 26 arch 2010.

What other ways do you get inspiration for content for your business blog articles and content plan?

REVIEW OF YOUR COUNTRY YOUR CALL

‘Your Country Your Call’ is a new project and is a countrywide competition to identify and reward two proposals that, when implemented, they can help to secure job creation and a prosperous future for Ireland. There will be two competition winners and the winning proposers will each receive a cash prize of €100,000. Both winning proposals will then be implemented with the support of an independent working group and with a development fund of up to €500,000 for each project.

President Mary McAleese launched the programme on 17 February 2010 – opening up the Irish Times yesterday you would have seen an article and a full page spread to help build awareness of the programme.

From a social media perspective, the organising team reached out to a number of people who are active in the area of social media including  Darragh Doyle, Brendan Hughes, Pat Phelan and myself for input ahead of the launch to share ideas and assist in gaining online visibility of the project – now that is forward thinking and I know that those of us invited to comment welcomed the opportunity to share ideas for the programme which has the potential to truly impact the future prosperity of Ireland.

Take a look at their website and you will find there is a link to a Facebook page, a Twitter Profile, a YouTube channel, a LinkedIn group and a Flickr channel. There is also a facility to share the content to social networks and to book mark content.

You will see on the YouTube channel a short video about the blogger outreach event that they held on the 15 February (unfortunately I was not able to attend).

The project team have allocated resources to supporting the social media channels and it is great to see that there is a real commitment to this channel for communications.

My three recommendations for the project in terms of helping their online visibility of their content online at the moment would be:

1. to have a more complete profile and more effective descriptions, titles and tags on their YouTube channel videos

2. adding a full profile, titles, descriptions and tags on their Flickr channel and allow some of the photo’s to be available to use under Creative Commons licence. That way bloggers who were not at their launch event can add images to their blog posts

3. adding a full description and a URL to their Twitter channel so people can find their web page about the programme easily.

You can read Brendan’s blog post about his experience of attending the blogger event for Your Country Your Call here.

BALLYGOWAN BOTTLES GO PINK

I have to disclose that Ballygowan sparkling water is my bottled water of choice! On Sunday 14 February I was made aware that Ballygowan had changed it’s dress – it had gone pink.

In a 360 marketing campaign which I first came across on TV, Ballygowan announced that it had launched a new campaign to raise awareness and funds for breast cancer in association with the Marie Keating Foundation in the Republic of Ireland and Action Cancer in Northern Ireland.

Every bottle sold will raise funds for breast cancer awareness and contribute towards cancer support projects.

Ballygowan Pink has a microsite and a Facebook page which already has almost 4000 fans.

The campaign which was managed by McConnells Integrated encompasses TV and Radio, an is in consumer and trade press and on outdoor posters. My one observation on the TV launch was that as a consumer it did come across to me as being a bit too repetitive – I think every ad break I saw on Sunday featured Ballygowan Pink.

From a PR perspective I was thrilled and surprised to find that a case of Ballygowan Pink bottles had been delivered to me – this being organised by the PR team of WHPR. I have had to confiscate the bottles from my three daughters or they would have all gone by now.

You see what I thought I would do is take bottles of Ballygowan Pink with me to events and locations that I know I am meeting female colleagues or clients. Yes my household could drink the bottles of water ourselves – but instead as a blogger who also lives in the real world, what better way to spread the word than sharing a bottle with a friend! You see I want my friends to ‘be part of it’.

In fact the campaign has had such an impact on me in terms of getting into my subconscious that when I attended a women’s networking event last night I found myself wondering why I could not see Ballygowan Pink bottles being served!

What I did do is take a couple of bottles with me – one to pass to my friend and colleague Emma, and one to drink myself.

So there we have it – one established brand and one new campaign both embracing 360 marketing here in Ireland.

Both also engaging bloggers to help them share their message with the world.

What other 360 marketing campaigns of note have caught your attention this month?

Google just might have the answer for you – in this video I go through how to use the Google Wonderwheel search tool to help you with ideas for your topics.

Of course – model NEVER copy someone elses articles won’t you!

What other places do you like to get ideas for topics for your articles? Here are three other ideas that you might find of assistance:

1. Questions that you receive from clients or prospects – how can you turn those questions into an online article, content for your newsletter, an idea for on online video tutorial or podcast episode?

2. Your RSS feeds – if you subscribe to news channels, websites or other peoples blogs, their articles might give you an idea for a topic to write or speak about

3. The calendar – could you write something that is relevant to the time of year either in the annual calendar or the calendar related to your industry or sector?

Check out Google Wonderwheel and let me know what you think – is it a tool you would you could imagine using?

During the last week I’ve had the privilege to speak on a panel at a non-profit conference and also deliver a social media marketing and communications workshop for some of Ireland’s most well known non-profit organisations.

Of all the case studies I covered, one of my favourite and most comprehensive programmes of the adoption and integration of social media platforms by a non-profit organisation is that by LIVESTRONG.org.

In August 2009, LIVESTRONG.org hosted their first ever Global Cancer Summit in Dublin which was attended by 500 delegates from 60 countries.

At the end of the Global Cancer Summit I had the opportunity to meet with Brook McMillan the Online Community Evangelist for LIVESTRONG.org about how they use social media from Facebook to Twitter, from blogs to YouTube, from Flickr to Ustream.tv.

Today is LIVESTRONG Day, a global day of action to raise awareness in our communities about the fight against cancer and the founder and patron of LIVESTRONG.org, Lance Armstrong commented in the Austin American Statesman:

A new Economist Intelligence Unit study commissioned by the Lance Armstrong Foundation pegs the global economic impact of the disease at more than $300 billion in 2009 alone.

If you are a non-profit and are wondering how social media can support you in outreach to volunteers, raising donations, advocacy or stakeholder engagement, I hope you find this interview inspiring.

And remember – you don’t need to have as an extensive programme as LIVESTRONG.org – choose one platform that will help you achieve your communication goals and do that really well.

You can find LIVESTRONG online at:

• LIVESTRONG Blog
• LIVESTRONG on Facebook
• LIVESTRONG on Flickr
• LIVESTRONG on Twitter
• LIVESTRONG on YouTube
• LIVESTRONG on Ustream.tv

What non profit organisations in Europe do you think provide inspiring examples in their use of social media to help them achieve their goals?

ADDITIONAL RESOURCE

Here is a great example of a post that LIVESTRONG has on it’s blog sharing ideas and ways on how to participate in LIVETRONG Day – it’s a model you too could use to help your community actively participate in your social cause.

Well that’s the question I also put to Ronan Lyons and Irish Economist who I met at the Future Focus conference in Dublin a few months ago.

We caught up at the end of the conference so you will hear the contruction crew dismantling things around us – you’ll also notice my poor camera work for which I apologise. But if that gets in your way close your eyes when you turn on the video and listen to what Ronan has to say about the power of Twitter, LinkedIn and blogs to help you connect to thought leaders and to add value to your community.

Other resources that Ronan refers to are:

• Richard Florida
• Paul Krugman
• Brad DeLong
• The Irish Economy blog

In addition, this last weekend the Global Irish Economic Forum has just taken place – you can access the video archives of the event HERE and it would be remiss of me not to include Irish Economist David McWilliams who you will also find on Twitter and on YouTube.

The Austin American Statesman ‘Weather Watch’ page says:

This has been a summer we won’t likely forget — thanks to the record-setting heat. Today, we get something of a break and, for the third consecutive day, should stay under 100 degrees. We’re expecting folks to get out and take advantage of the relative cool.

Help us document a “day in the sun” by snapping a photo today and emailing it to post@austinheat.posterous.com.

The subject line of your email becomes the headline on your photo. Include some description in the email text, if you like. To have your photo considered for print publication, be sure to credit the photographer.

View your photo (once it’s approved) and the photos of others at austinheat.posterous.com, a blog that we’ve set up just for this heat project.

You can find the Austin Heat Posterous blog HERE.

You can also follow the Austin Heat photo blog via Twitter.
On the Posterous blog for Austin Heat it says:

We’re zeroing in on the all-time Austin record for 100+ degree days. The record, which has stood since 1925, is 70 days. The Statesman has set up this blog to give you a chance to record what you did during Austin’s blazing hot summer.

Just e-mail a picture of what you are doing today in the heat and a short description to post@austinheat.posterous.com. (If you want your picture to be considered for print publication in the Statesman, you must include the name of the person who took the photo.)

This is a terrific example of making it easy to enable content to be sourced from your community with them simply having to send an email. And with the cross posting ability, you could also share the photo’s into your Facebook page or Flickr – just be sure that you make it clear with your contributors what your plans are for using their content.

Can you think of ways you could use Posterous to crowd source ideas and information?

Posted via web from Krishna De: Insights From Ireland On Digital Marketing, Social Media And Entrepreneurship

The ad called ‘Lyrics’ will be aired to coincide with the launch of Sky’s Green Button advertising technology, and the advertisement will appear exclusively through the channels on the Sky platform for the first week of the campaign.

‘Lyrics’ is an ad about people from all over a city coming together to spell out the words to the Beatles track ‘All together now’ in time to a train as it passes by. The song is not one of the most well known Beatles songs and was recorded on 12 May 1967 at Abbey Road Studios and mixed the same day, but was not released until 13 January 1969 when it appeared on the sound track of the film Yellow Submarine.

The ‘Budweiser Lyrics ad was written by Dave Henderson and Richard Denney of DDB in London specifically for the Budweiser brand in Ireland, though we were advised that it may be used by other markets.

We had the opportunity via Skype video conference to speak direct with the DDB London team and the ads director Chris Palmer (who also created the Skoda ‘Baking of…,’ ad which saw a car created out of cake, and the ‘Carlsberg’s Old Lions’ ad’.

The Budweiser ‘Lyrics’ ad was shot over 5 days from an actual train on the metro-rail as it tracked around the city of Chicago. The sound track was recorded by ‘The Hours’ who recorded the track in their hotel room and some of the percussion was  the banging of a fire extinguisher against a metal heater.

You can find out more about the making of the Budweiser ‘Lyrics’ ad here in my interview with Matt Delahunty of DDB here:

You can watch the Budwieser ‘Lyrics’ ad here.

Budweiser Lyrics Ad Challenge

To coincide with the launch of the ad there is a challenge: the ‘Lyrics’ ad was put together using 30 different scenes, each one illustrating one of the lyrics in the ‘All Together Now’ song. The challenge is for the general public to create another version of the ad with video clips submitted.

All you have to do is record a short video clip depicting one of the letters, numbers or words from the song. Upload the video with that lyric to the Budweiser ‘All Together Now’ website. The best 30 video clips will be edited to create a new video – dependent on the quality of submissions it may even be aired on TV.

The first 100 people to upload their clip to the ‘All Together Now’ site will win a case of Budweiser.

The closing date for video entries is the 15th August 2009.

About Sky TV Green Button Advertising

This new service allows for advertisers to watch extended ads and unique content, find out more about particular products or services, or accessing related behind-the-scenes or exclusive footage.  Green Button content can range from 2 minutes to 2 hours and the service even allows for the series-linking of advertising content, for those brands wishing to create episodic advertising.

Additional Resources

You can read Christian Hughes review of the evening here.

Update: Read more reviews from Richard Fitzgferald, Niamh Smith, and Darragh Doyle

Watch the original clip of ‘All Together Now’ from the Yellow Submarine film:

View the other photo’s I took from the Budweiser blogger outreach event here.

Personal Perspectives On The Budweiser ‘Lyrics’ Ad

It is great to see more Irish companies starting to consider connecting to bloggers in a meaningful way – I know Matt Delahunty of DDB and the Ogilvy team appreciated the feedback they received about how to share information about the AllTogetherNow.ie campaign and website – Matt actually commented to me that he wish he had spoken to me 3 months ahead of the campaign being launched.

And my personal view on the Budweiser ‘Lyrics’ ad?

I was not at all blown away by the first viewing of ad (yes I do drink Budweiser and if you check out my profile you will see that I’ve a long history with Diageo PLC and Diageo Ireland though I am not connected to them in any way now).

I was underwhelmed at first but realised that it was due to 2 reasons – I was not close enough to the screen to watch the ad and understand the intricacies of the shoot and I have to agree with the others who attended the event who said that the ad grew on them the second and third and fourth time of watching.

I think watching the ‘Lyrics’ ad close up or on a huge screen allows you to appreciate the real detail of the ad and I’m excited to know what the response will be from the public to participate in  creating a follow up version.

I am also waiting for spoofs to be made of the Ad – can you imagine a remake by the YouTube generation on the Docklands Light Railway or the Dublin Luas? You could really have some fun with it!

I was watching TV this last week and also caught the new Guinness Ad raising a glass to Arthur Guinness to celebrate the 250th anniversary and the Guinness brand manager said on a clip before the ad that they hoped that the new Guinness ad would be remembered as an iconic ad.

Personally I don’t think it will. Of the two ads to be launched in the same week by Diageo Ireland, my money is on the Budweiser ‘Lyrics Ad’ will be one one that stands the test of time – but what do you think?

Disclosure: I was invited to the Budweiser blogger outreach event and was not asked or requested to write this review.

When we write our articles so that we increase the chance of being found online we need to consider the key words what we use.

From today, determining those key words when blogging just got a whole lot easier thanks to Wordtracker who have just released a plug in for Firefox called SEO Blogger.

It is free to install and you can type into SEO Blogger the words that you are considering for your blog post and it will provide you with research about your key words and alternative key word phrases so that you can add them to your blog post.

SEO Blogger sits on the left hand side of your screen and what I noticed is that that meant that my screen for Wordpress was minimised. It also won’t work if you write your blog posts in an offline editing tool as I do – you would need to check your blog against your key words before you publish online when looking at your draft post in the Firefox browser.

The SEO Blogger will also help you identify how many times a chosen keyword has been used in the blog text – key word density is something that we need to be aware of when writing our articles. But do take care to make sure that you don’t over burden your articles with key words so they are not as compelling and engaging for your readers.

If you are using Firefox and author a business blog I would certainly recommend testing SEO Blogger – and remember it is free.

What other tools do you use to help you identify the key words for your blog posts and articles?

My children love to sing and dance and I am always on the look out for new places to visit and activities for them.

Recently they enjoyed a great afternoon learning circus skills – here you can see my youngest learning how to spin plates which is a life skill I think we all need!

One event that I wish I could take the children to on the 28 and 29 June 2009 is taking place at Waddesdon Manor near Oxford (England). The Manor itself is a National Trust property, and yes they have joined the world of social media communications with a new blog to help spread the word about their events and news from the Manor.

The event this next weekend has a host of performances – from brass bands to ballet, choirs to story tellers taking place in the gardens of the Manor house.

And there are also workshops in which you can participate.

I hope they set up a Flickr page too to share more photo’s of the weekend which certainly looks fun – and it’s all for a good cause – to continue to support the Manor. Details of how to get to the event and admission fees are detailed HERE.