Archive for April, 2007

A recent survey by the wonderfully  named Luxury Institute reveals that over three quarters of the rich in America read blogs - up 25% from two years ago. In contrast, only one quarter of the general population read blogs. A third of rich Americans use social networking sites as compared to only 16% of the general population. The “rich” in this study were 1000 web users making more than US$150,000 (GB £75,000) a year.

This is good news for businesses with high-end goods or services to offer - especially if they are blogging or considering a blog for their business.

The study focuses only on America. I expect that one could make a correlation with the same demographic over here in the UK, or anywhere else in the world. It wouldn’t surprise me that those with more disposable income would have the means to read blogs and interact on social networks - computers ain’t cheap. And knowledge, information and networking are valuable assets that contribute to the success of business people and professionals - so it is probably natural that they would be the ones checking out blogs for information and social networks for contacts.

I think that it’s not so simple as buying a whole bunch of ads on social network sites or on blogs. The audience is likely to be more sophisticated and have higher expectations than the general population so the content of a business blog or social network presence needs to be tailored with that in mind.

Technorati Tags: wealthy, luxury, blogging, social media, social networking, rich

For clients of my ZenGuide Consultancy, I am offering a special Client Resources category on this blog. This resource is available on a members-only basis exclusively for ZenGuide Clients. Access is free and by invitation only. This means that as a ZenGuide Client, you will be able to benefit from additional resources to help you make more effective use of your blog and social media tools.

All ZenGuide Consultancy Clients are given login details to this members-only Client Resource section. All you have to do to access the additional resources is to login to ZenGuide via the Login link in the far right sidebar under “Networks & Communities”. You will then be able to view the private content in posts marked “Client Resource” as well as viewing all the other posts on this blog.

Following my post looking at the use of online multi-media by the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign, co-ordinated by Team Hillary, I’ve just heard that her rival Barack Obama has signed up for a Twitter account.

You can now get his hot-off-the-press tweets of his campaign trail. Well, in theory anyway: his last update at the time of my writing post said “1 day ago”. He - or his staff - are going to have to gain a bit more momentum with Twitter to have any credibility at all with the technoscenti.

In contrast another presidential candidate, John Edwards, has been on Twitter for longer and has been tweeting much more prolifically.

You may have heard people say “Skype me” or “Are you on Skype?” and wondered what on earth that’s all about. Skype is the name of a company that provides a means for you to have voice conversations over the internet, using VOIP (Voice Over Internet Protocol - a technology that enables voice conversations to be transmitted over a data network using Internet Protocol). There are other companies that offer this service but Skype seems to have become one of the most well-known and well-used - particularly by solo professionals.

So what’s the big deal about Skype? Why not just use the good old-fashioned telephone?

Free voice calls over the internet

Skype - and other VOIP providers - offer free voice calls to other Skype users via your computer: the call is made from your computer and you need microphone and speakers plugged into your computer to use this service. You can also buy telephones that plug into your computer so you can maintain the familiar telephone interface and experience that you’re used to.

Low cost international telephone calls

The advantage of Skype, I think, is that you can also make cheap calls to landlines all over the world, using SkypeOut. You pay in some money to your SkypeOut account via your credit card and as you make calls, they take money out of your kitty and you will need to top it up from time to time. Calls to UK and USA landlines are currently 0.014p a minute - as are calls to Malaysia (where my parents live).

Call forwarding and voicemail for incoming calls

You can also use SkypeIn to get a regular telephone number which you can answer via your PC or forward to any other number eg your home or office landline or your mobile - and this comes with voicemail. You pay a sign up fee for this service and then pay for the cost of the forwarded call on a per minute basis as if it were a SkypeOut call. So for a small business or solo professional, this can be a useful feature if you want your clients to remember only one telephone number for you wherever you are. Having checked out other call-forwarding services in the UK, my view is that this is so far the most cost-effective for this kind of service.

Conference Calls

You can arrange conference calls with a number of callers - whether other Skype users or via landlines/ mobiles - using the control panel to initiate calls via your PC. This is handy for small businesses or solo professionals - but the sound quality is unfortunately not brilliant the more people you have on the call.

Text messaging

If you have SkypeOut credit, you can also use it to send text messages to any mobile phone anywhere in the world - I love this service because I can type my text message using your PC keyboard rather than fiddling with my mobile phone keys!

Chat

It’s also handy for text chatting with other Skype users - which is free as that is entirely handled over the internet, without interfacing with phones.

Practicalities

You will need a PC or laptop, of course. You will need a broadband connection - dial up connections are too slow for VOIP calls. You will need to go to the Skype website at www.skype.com and download the telephone software onto your PC or laptop - it’s an easy process and it’s free.

Even if your PC/ laptop comes with a built-in mike and speakers, it’s a good idea to get a headset mike - the sound quality deteriorates if you are using your speakers and mike on loudspeaker mode (due to feedback and echo from the loudspeaker mode). You can get headsets from around £15 in the UK, marked as Skype compatible.

You will need to download the Skype software onto your PC and/ or laptop (it’s free) and sign up to a Skype account online. Once you have the software, you can use it to access any number of accounts you / your family/ business partner may sign up on Skype - so each person can manage their own calls, rather like having separate online email accounts.

On your laptop, you can sign in to your Skype account anywhere you are in the world, via a hardwire connection or wi-fi. The same call rates as shown on their main website will apply - unlike using your mobile phone abroad, where call rates abroad are very high.

If you have a webcam, you can also make video calls - but note the issue with sound quality if your webcam works on a loudspeaker mode.

Overall View

The annoying thing about VOIP services is that you can only take advantage of free calls, generally, with other users on the same provider. Skype seems to have the advantage in that many people have signed up to it so it’s more likely that your friends, colleagues and business associates are also on Skype and you won’t have to sign up to loads of different providers in order to connect for free with different contacts.

The downside of Skype is that the quality of their voice service is sometimes unreliable - with echoing and intermittent sound break-up, especially on conference calls. So I wouldn’t rely on it entirely for all your business communication needs but it’s handy to have as a second line, for short conference calls and for use on your laptop if you travel a lot.

Overall, I use Skype regularly because I like the integrated PC and phone and messaging service - and also the cheap call rates, and many of my professional contacts as well as my friends and family use Skype.

Further resources:

Tech FAQ - what is VOIP?

Skype isn’t the only VOIP provider - you can check out other VOIP Providers (UK) here.

The world was horrified by the events at Virginia Tech last week when a student went on the rampage and shot fellow students and teachers at the campus, killing 32 people. Like many people following the unfolding of events, I am saddened by this tragedy and offer my sympathies to the families of those killed and injured.

Traditional media

When I hear about such horrific things in the news, I turn first to the press and traditional media. I expect to get from that source a reliable and factual reporting of events. We trust the traditional media because we know they cross-check stories and are careful to distinguish speculation from facts and opinion from reportage. Professional journalists arrive at the scene and start finding out what happened, talking to people who were involved, getting stories from witnesses and taking photographs.

New media

With email and social media tools like blogging and Twitter - and the ubiquitous mobile phone, the people involved and others who witnessed the Virginia Tech shootings began spontaneously to tell their own stories, in some cases even as the events were unfolding. The Guardian reported on 17 April that the traditional media was looking to websites for their sources:

News outlets turned to CollegiateTimes.com and PlanetBlacksburg.com, as well as to amateur reporters huddled in college rooms or near the scene who were sending frantic emails to friends and media organisations such as CNN.

CollegiateTimes.com, the website for Virginia Tech’s student newspaper, filed up-to-the-minute online dispatches.

Students were using Facebook and MySpace, social networking sites, to express their responses to what happened, sharing their shock and grief online as they might have done coming face to face in a crisis. ABC News reported these comments from students writing in Facebook:

~ If you are okay! Please update your status in facebook to say something like “I’m okay”

~ We need to get a facebook group started to keep this news story factual and not sensationalized.

~ I too started getting messages from people from different countries wanting more and more info about the incident. Some even went to the extent of asking me to record my reaction over a video cam and send it to them. Disgusting!

Suicide Video

Later, it emerged that the killer, Cho Seung-hui, had compiled a suicide video and digital photo album which he sent to NBC, a US television network. The Guardian reports that following the TV broadcast, the tapes were “rebroadcast instantly around the world on TV and online represents the sinister side of user generated content….The NBC video is the most visited story on the BBC news website and dominates the front page of the Sky News site.”

Plays posted online

Cho was a literature student and wrote plays which centred around murder, paedophilia and revenge killings, according the London Paper, which also reports that two of Cho’s plays “were posted on the internet by Ian MacFarlane, a former classmate of Cho’s.”

Two sides of the media

In this one terrible event, we see the two sides of the media, both traditional and new. The two forms of media can be a source of news and information - and also, a prompt to voyeurism and the unsavoury desire “to know all the gory details”. Social networks can be a place where people can support each other and talk about what happened on the path to healing - or a place for gossip, rumour, hate postings and dark rantings. We can gain fame or infamy by the mere fact of being on TV or online alone. It is hugely disturbing that killers such as Cho can become celebrities overnight for one heinous, savage act and their poor creative efforts pored over like great literature - where they might otherwise trudge on unnoticed and uncelebrated in their lonely lives if they had done nothing at all. For people like that, there is no reward in being good and a huge reward in being evil.

I was in two minds about writing this post. I didn’t want to this post to be yet another space where Cho and what he did is noticed and given airtime - “rewarded” with attention. Yet, it felt important to discuss the role of traditional and new media in this event - in reporting it and also in some ways, being a part of the story by being a means in Cho’s mind to air his grievances and justify himself.

Remember the heroes

So I don’t want to end this post on Cho. I want to end it talking about a hero. Liviu Librescu was one of the professors in the room that day. He was 76 and a survivor of the Holocaust. He blocked the doorway with his body and bought precious moments for his student to make their escape. The Guardian reports “Messages were posted on the web praising the professor. “No act could be more selfless.” one poster wrote.” Let’s remember Professor Librescu and celebrate him. Let’s remember and celebrate the 32 people who died at Virginia Tech.

You may not have a blog or even a website. How can you market yourself online without these tools? A simple and effective way is to guest-blog on an existing blog run by someone else.

Here are some success stories of a number of people who were guest-blogged on my writing and culture blog over at Fusion View.

Case Study - Nicky Harman

Nicky Harman, translates books and novels from Chinese into English. She doesn’t have a website of her own for her books and translations although she is profiled briefly on her work website. I was curious to learn more about the process of translation and asked her to write a first person piece about her translation work and the Chinese author Han Dong whose book Striking Root she was working on at that time - and for which she was looking for an agent and/ or publisher. She produced the article very quickly over a weekend and I had it up on Fusion View the next week.

A few weeks later, I was contacted by a leading publisher in China who had come across the article on Fusion View, asking to make contact with Nicky. I forwarded her email and Nicky started discussions with her about publishing her book. Around the same time, a UK-based literary agent was told about Nicky’s work and Googled her. Up popped Nicky’s article on Fusion View and the agent invited her to submit her manuscript. Go Nicky!

Case Study - Pey

My cousin Pey Colborne is an aromatherapist and poet based in Bath. She doesn’t have her own website for her business. I interviewed her for a podcast on Fusion View, talking about her fusion life and how she uses her Western and Eastern experiences and interests in her poetry - and also in her aromatherapy practice, which incorporates Chinese herbal medicine as well as Western aromatherapy principles. She has gained at least one new aromatherapy client through that podcast - he specifically mentioned it as he had had a choice of therapists and decided on her after hearing more about her practice and healing principles on the podcast.

Case Study - Lucy Luck

I interviewed Lucy Luck, a UK literary agent for advice to writers hoping to find an agent in the UK - and specifically answering emailed questions from overseas writers. She talked about how to submit your work, how to write your covering letter and what agents re looking for. She also invited Fusion View readers/ listeners to submit their writing to her agency. I chatted with her last week and she told me that she has had over 30 submissions from potential new clients, mentioning the Fusion View podcast. The quality of their covering letters and submissions have been much higher than those who had not listened to the podcast, which has made the process of working through them much easier for her. She also feels that the podcast has raised her profile in the search engines, coming up just after her own literary agency website, and also generally for her business as the podcast was also featured in Mslexia, the UK journal for women writers.

Action point

So could you offer an article to a blogger you know? Here are some ideas to get you thinking:

• your article needs to be relevant to the theme of the blog you’d like to write for

• what you write about needs to be helpful, interesting or useful for the readers of that blog

• read the blog you would like to write for and read the About page

• think of the blog and its readers as a community that you’d like to be a part of

• does that blog regularly have interviews/ guestbloggers? If not, will your approach be appropriate?

• make your approach courteously

• remember that the blogger does not have to take your idea, so accept “no” gracefully

• how might you help the blogger in return, as part of his/ her community?

I am always on the lookout for interesting guestbloggers on both Fusion View and ZenGuide - please make sure you read my Guestblogger Submission Guidelines: click on that Category in the far right sidear. Email me first with an outline of what you’d like to write about, who you are and why you think the readers of Fusion View or ZenGuide would be interested in the story. If I like the idea, I can then invite you to write the full story. I may decide it’s not appropriate, in which case, I will let you know.

Pic: thanks to
www.dnrec.state.de.us

Invitation Only

1. Guest blogging is by invitation only. I will usually invite specific guests to blog but occasionally, there will be an open invitation to readers to submit their stories/ posts.

Open Invitation Guest Blogging

2. Posts can be up to a maximimum of 1000 words and must be relevant to the topic that the open invitation relates to. Submissions should be contained in an email in simple formatting so I can copy and paste it into the blog. Regarding style and content:

# Read the posts already on the blog to get a sense of the tone and feel of ZenGuide

# Generally, the focus is on blogging, social media and technology, focusing on their practical uses and advantages for businesses, in particular relating to business communications, marketing and PR.

3. Please also provide your full name, email address and any website, together with a description of who and where you are eg. Lee Tan, 36, a computer programmer in Utrecht, Netherlands. The description can be like the “About the Author” paragraph in a book - this is so that Fusion View readers can get a sense of who you are and your context and and then you need not explain who you are in the actual post.

In the spirit of community blogging, your full name and description will be added to your post so that my readers can appreciate your post in your personal context.

Anonymous submissions will be automatically ignored.

4. I will consider submissions and decide if an entry is suitable for posting on ZenGuide. This is my personal blog and my decision is final. I may edit the post and/ or I may ask you to edit or make amendments to it for clarity and/ or relevance. I will let you know by email if your submission will be posted or not. This blog is run by me alone so please bear with me.

5. I cannot make payment for Guest Blogger posts. I hope that you will submit your post in a community spirit and enjoy the benefit of offering your writing/ story to the ZenGuide global readership. For this reason, copyright remains with the author of the post.

6. In return, I would ask is that you link to ZenGuide (if you have a website) or refer potential readers to ZenGuide to help me build a community around this blog. The link is http://www.zenguide.co.uk

Guest Blogger Views

5. The views expressed by guest bloggers are entirely their own and do not necesssarily represent my views.

How to submit your story

You can email your story by using the “Email me” link in the sidebar.

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The US presidential campaign is being fought online, according to the BBC - one sure sign that blogs and social media are forces to be reckoned with.

Hillary Clinton’s campaign site has a blog as well as HillCasts, videos of Hillary speaking directly to you, her online audience, about what Hillary as President would mean. There are also a range of videos of her campaign trail, speeches, photographs, press releases and of course a section where you can contribute to her campaign as well as take part as a volunteer.

Her blog is not written by her - the byline of the bloggers are clearly evident at the top of each post and they include a volunteer Michael Brasher and also her Chief Strategist Mark Penn. Hillary’s chief blogger appears to be Crystal Patterson but I couldn’t easily find any information on the blog about her. As a blog-watcher, I think that it’s a good move to be transparent where the blog is written by someone other than the figurehead who has top billing on the site. I also like the fact that there are guest bloggers giving their particular perspective on the campaign. Having a volunteer, especially a student, write about his experiences brings in the view “on the ground” and also helps to connect with other students and volunteers - and potential volunteers. My one feedback point would be: It would be good to see an “About” page that tells us something more about the regular blogger(s) so visitors are aware of the context in which they write. However, this could just be my non-US ignorance of the personalities in the drama or my not being able to easily find the relevant information on the site.

The overall impact is to present Hillary Clinton’s message in a range of media and also to share it in a way that is easily digestible and understandable for ordinary people. It’s not mediated by the press so she can say what she wants to say direct to her audience. It makes her seem accessible and in touch with ordinary people’s lives and concerns. It keeps her real by sharing information about the process of campaigning. She is referred to as Hillary and her team are Team Hillary - the first name adds to the sense of her being approachable and in touch while emphasising that she is a woman. And also, distancing her from her husband Bill, which is who think of when we hear “Clinton”.

Hillary is not the only candidate using multi-media online. You can visit Barack Obama’s site at http://www.barackobama.com/. John Edwards also has a presence online at http://johnedwards.com/ and famously, he is using Twitter to keep friends and followers updated on his campaign trail. I added him as my friend on Twitter to see what it was all about and he added me back! He seems to twitter himself - when a staffer twitters, it says “(from staff)”.

“Free blog hosts are great for getting started - but if you are thinking of using a blog for professional purposes, use the free blog to get a feel for what blogging is about but don’t get too attached to it just ‘cos it’s free.” That’s what I wrote last week in my post “Have a Go at Blogging”.

Why shouldn’t you use a free blog host for your business or professional blog? It saves costs, doesn’t it? And it’s easy to set up and link to your main website, it’s quick, it’s hassle-free - what’s the problem?

That’s all true. But consider some of the following:

1. As I mentioned last week, a free hosting site isn’t really “free”. It lumbers you with “advertising” the hosts brand and product with the same prominence as your own brand or company name by giving you a domain name that reads www.yournamehere.blogspot.com. In a business context, that’s the same as mentioning another business’s product every time you mention your own.

2. You can get around the domain name issue by buying your own domain name and pointing it to the hosted site name and visitors will not know the difference by just looking at the domain name. However, whenever your blog comes up in a Google (or other search engine) search, it will show the original site name. Again, lovely free advertising for the other business alongside yours.

3. Blogger.com allows you to re-design the look of their templates entirely by giving you access to the code that the blog is built on. A lot of people like that flexibility. But you will always retain that strip at the top of the screen that has the Blogger logo and options for your visitor to create their own blog in Blogger. The search facility in that top strip takes you to results that are displayed on the Blogger site - a nice touch of theirs to take visitors off your site into their own.

4. Wordpress.com offers free hosting as well and it isn’t as intrusive as Blogger. However, the free version gives you limited templates and restricts your ability to edit them so most free Wordpress blogs are variations on the same 10-15 free themes though some bloggers who are adept at fiddling with the template within those restrictions manage nice semi-personalised looks. Also you are limited in what multi-media elements you can incorporate into the free site.

5. On the free sites, there is no facility to back up your content. In particular, Blogger does not have an easy way to export your content should you wish to use another platform later - you will have to manually copy and paste each post and each multi-media element into your new site. Another clever way to keep you bound into their product.

It may be that as a solo professional like a writer or for a personal blog, there are good reasons to stick with the free version - cost being one. You may also like the fact that your blog isn’t too “establishment” or “corporate” and it shows you as part of the democratised, everyone is equal mix of the blogosphere. You may not care about having a unique look on your blog or about maintaining a smooth interface with your special professional image or brand. It may be that your free generic blog can give you the opportunity to show a different, more casual side of who you are compared with the carefully branded look of your main website. All these are good and valid reasons to stay with the free blog.

On the other hand, if your brand or profession is aimed at high-value clients who are used to quality service and quality products, it’s worth having a think about what impression look and feel of your blog is going to give them. If you want to stand out in the crowd so that your visitor notices that what you have to offer is different from others, you may want to look at whether your blog is giving a sense of your uniqueness. If you want to give your visitor a special and memorable experience when visiting your blog, you need to ask if the free stuff is going to be able to deliver that Wow! factor. If it is important to you to own and control the content you have invested time and resources into producing, you may not want another company over whom you have no control or influence over being the ones who control what you can and cannot do with that content.

As a business or professional person, you know the value of designing your logo just right, getting quality headed paper and business cards, commissioning a great website, making sure your office or shop or therapy clinic is projects the right welcoming image. You of course take time and care to dress well and look your best at business meetings. Your presentations are professional and you work hard to develop your reputation or brand.

A business blog needs to be an integral part of your business and image. It is powerful means of communicating with your clients and stakeholders, with a potential reach of millions. Through your blog content, you can showcase your know-how and expertise to the world - literally. Your blog represents you and your voice on the internet. So, is it worth paying for a bespoke blog design and your own hosting to commmunicate the value and quality of what your business has to offer? I don’t know about you but I’d say: Yes, definitely.

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Disclosure: we offer a bespoke website and/ or blog design service starting from £500 and a year’s hosting from £30. But you don’t have to use our design services - our consultancy is about helping you enhance your online presence not just selling web design services. So, if you want a bespoke blog, one place to start is to speak to the people who designed your main website and see what they can do for you - or if you’d like to find out more about how we can help with designing your integrated website and blog, by all means email or call me via the Contact Us link at the top of this page.