bob's blog

Following up on our post last week about the launch of new Google + business pages, it's time to have a look at what that means for you. By now, we know that we can have a Google + business page but maybe aren't too sure exactly how to do it. If that's the case then have a look at this great tutorial that was put together by our friends over at Social Media Examiner.

Download the pdf and get started with your own Google + business page. If you're interested you can have a look at the r//evolution marketing page here.

Google launched it's new service, Google Music on Wednesday in the US in beta phase. The new service will sell individual tracks as well as complete albums, offering the user free preview clips of selected tracks and the opportunity for tracks to be shared through social networks. Google Music has all the features to compete with iTunes and is set to be Googles biggest push in to this market place yet.

Initial reviews coming from the US are suggesting that there is still quite a bit of work to do before the service will really be ready for use as a reliable music platform, but with it still in beta test phase that's to be expected. Hopefully all the teething problems will be ironed out by the time the service reaches the UK. We're still not sure when that will be, but following the US launch it shouldn't be too far away!

Google + was launched earlier this year. It’s Google’s biggest push so far to break the Facebook domination in the social networking world. Google + has managed to grow faster than both Facebook and Twitter since its launch, by capitalising on their userbase of Google accounts from services such as Gmail.

Until this week, Google + was only available to individual users with a Google account – however, it’s now available to business users too! The introduction of Pages for businesses and brands will inevitably increase the amount of customer focused content in the Google + arena as awareness grows over the next few weeks.

After having a look at the new features that are available we’ve noticed a few differences between Google + Pages and Google + Profiles (personal accounts). The key differences that we can see at the moment between profiles and business pages are:-

• Pages have the +1 button
• Pages can’t +1 content – including other pages and web content but personal profiles can
• Pages don’t receive notifications via email or text etc. like personal profiles do
• Pages can’t use the Hangout (video call functionality) on mobile devices
• Local pages have special location fields to help users find them by their location

It seems that everyone should now have access to Google + Pages to create their own business and/or brand page in any of these categories:

• Local Business or Place
• Product or Brand
• Company, Institution or Organisation
• Arts, Entertainment or Sports
• Other

So far it looks like managing a Google + business page will be much the same as managing your Facebook Page with a few key differences.

The main difference between the two at the minute is the ability to conduct Hangouts (video conferences) which we think is the biggest advantage Google + has over Facebook. It creates the opportunity for businesses to conduct live sessions, how to tutorials or even virtual meetings with their clients. This looks like it could be a real USP for Google.

The other big difference is related to the way that Pages gain their followers. Pages can follow people, but not until the people have followed the page. This looks like a very welcome development from the way Twitter currently operates. Business pages won’t be able to follow loads of people, hoping that they’ll follow back. From now on we’ll all need to work a little bit harder to earn the follows.

It’s likely that Google + Pages will have more of an impact on SEO than other social networks currently do as Google is planning on including them directly in its search results, although we’re not exactly sure how or where just yet! It’s likely that the ways people are interacting and sharing with the + pages is likely to be fed back to Google and used to help with the calculation of the Search results.

Finally, it’s looking likely that there’ll be a Google+ API release in the not too distant future so we can probably expect a rash of app development and website integrations like we saw with Facebook. That should give us the freedom to be a bit more creative with how we start to use the Google + Pages.

That’s about it for now but we’ll be keeping you updated with the new developments over the coming weeks. You can have a look at our Google + page here. We'll be adding more content to it soon so keep checking it over the next few weeks.

As we explained in the campaigns review checklist, it’s really important to start by reviewing your campaigns from last year to give you a solid baseline to work from, but what next?

Once you’ve reviewed the past activity it’s time to start deciding what you want to achieve with this campaign. A set of solid, realistic business objectives and campaign KPIs will help you set goals and keep track of whether you reach your targets. These will inevitably change from business to business but it’s important to make sure that whatever your targets, they can be tracked and quantified. It’s really important to be able to measure the performance of the campaign to know whether it is working or if anything needs to be changed throughout the course of the campaign.

As soon as you have a set of objectives it’s time to decide the best way to achieve them. It’s really important to decide the best platforms to use to talk to your customers, so play to your strengths! If you have a strong social media presence then exploit it and utilise social media as an integral part of your Christmas campaigns. Equally if you have a good quality email database then utilise it for sustained and targeted email marketing campaigns. Beyond your core contacts that you’ve built up, you can still target new customers too. Paid search and PR campaigns are both excellent ways of supporting targeted campaigns, particularly in an e-commerce, attraction/event or hotel context.  For maximum impact, make sure your landing pages are optimised to maximise your conversions. When you’re working hard to attract your traffic you want to be able to keep them there.

The reality is that to deliver a truly effective campaign you’ll need to develop an integrated campaign using several different mediums with a consistent tone and message. If you need any advice on developing integrated marketing campaigns operating across email, social media, paid search and PR then let us know more@r-evolution.co.uk

Christmas online marketing campaigns are an important consideration for all types of business from e-commerce stores to B2B organisations.

Before you decide what you want to do with your upcoming Christmas digital marketing campaign it’s important to review the results of last year’s campaign. That will give you a good base-line to start planning what will work well this year. When you’re analysing your previous campaigns it’s important to focus on the following questions:

• How did your campaign perform last year? What should you do again, what should you not?
  • What creative was used?
  • What promotions technique did you enforce?
  • How did your website perform during the campaign? Conversion rates, bounce rates, ROI
  • Where did your conversions come from?
    • New or old customers
    • Via website or offline
• Has your marketing mix changed throughout the past year?
  • Are you now using new marketing platforms?
  • Where do your biggest strengths lie?
• Are there any new tools/methods that you could use to be more efficient, contact more customers or improve ROI?

Objectives & Campaigns

• What are the business objectives for the campaigns over the festive season?
• What are the campaign KPI’s – web traffic, Sign-ups, online sales, greater footfall etc.

Finally, and possibly most importantly is to monitor and manage your campaigns as they are running.

Heinz soup has been a favourite for all of us when we are feeling a little under the weather, be it chicken, tomato or minestrone, perhaps with a bit of bread and butter! But the classic brand has embraced social media to offer its Facebook fans personalised tins of soup!! The tins come with personalised messages on the front, such as 'get well soon...' or 'hope you feel better' or any humerous anicdote you may wish to add!! It's a great way of engaging their customers, and to order one you have to be a fan on Facebook..... driving traffic to their social media sites, and it gets people talking. Very clever, we like it a lot. And with all the winter colds going around, I am sure we will be ordering a few....!

Look who paid a visit to Vindolanda today as part of their new TV series!!!!!!!! It looks like they had a whale of a time, they are back again tomorrow to continue thier filming and have thoroughly enjoyed themselves.

The US canine travel accesory sensation, Kurgo, has recently been launched in the UK and we have developed them a fab e-commerce site. We carried on the branding and theme and designed the site with best practice SEO and conversion rate optimistion in mind. Since going live the site has been hugely popular and has been a fantastic success traiding nationally.

The project, lead by Adam our fab head of digital, has been really well receieved by the client, UK distributor, Andrew Geere, who says; 'Adam and the team have done a great job on the site, the design is fab, it's easy to use and all of our customers have loved it!'

Following on from this praise Adam said 'it's great to see a project through from beginning to end! We developed the site in house and we are really proud of it!'

With new laws coming in about driving with your dog, it's really important to ensure your dog is safe when you are driving in your car. To see the full range of dog gear click here!

Our tasty client John Bull confectioners has a wide range of spooky, tasty and scary looking sweets and chocolates on their website, available to order to your door from today! To have a look at what's on offer click here! Happy Halloween!!

A fab advert from Specsavers!! Created by the brands in-house team this advert proves that the brands slogan, 'Should have gone to Specsavers' still has a lot of mileage to it.

Otterburn Mill launches Otterburn Life website!!

We have a fab article in The Journal today about Otterburn Life's website launching, to have a full read CLICK HERE!

The Mill sell a wide range of great outdoor brands including North Face, Joules and Berghaus, visit www.otterburnlife.co.uk or you can find them on twitter @otterburnlife where you can be kept up to speed with all their latest offers! So, what are you waiting for?

 We are really excited and looking forward to working with Dales Countryside Museum on the design of their new website! Can't wait to get started!!

We’re pleased to announce that Mediaworks Online Marketing have chosen r//evolution to coordinate their PR for the coming months. The company, launched in 2007 is approaching its 4th birthday and has grown to encompass almost 30 staff and an envious portfolio of clients. Visit Mediaworks Online Marketing here.

Twitter is a powerful platform for websites to share their content, and drive traffic and engagement. However, people have struggled to accurately measure the amount of traffic Twitter is sending to their websites, in part because web analytics software hasn’t evolved as quickly as online sharing and social signals.

Today we’re announcing Twitter Web Analytics, a tool that helps website owners understand how much traffic they receive from Twitter and the effectiveness of Twitter integrations on their sites. Twitter Web Analytics was driven by the acquisition of BackType, which we announced in July.

The product provides three key benefits:

Understand how much your website content is being shared across the Twitter network
See the amount of traffic Twitter sends to your site
Measure the effectiveness of your Tweet Button integration

FULL STORY HERE

Pundits, journalists, and PR professionals are regularly guilty of buzzword abuse, and a new site is highlighting them as they flare up. 

Newswordy, a site by IDSGN, is an ever-growing collection of these words, updated every weekday. Here’s how it works: You click on a word, and the site gives you a definition, a quote with its use (or misuse) in the media, and a news item or tweet on the subject. 

Some recently featured buzzwords were: 

• Opprobrium
• Nascent
• Impasse
• Intransigent
• Dearth
• Salacious
• Regime

Might want to keep Newswordy in mind when you’re writing that article or press release.

Source: www.prdaily.com

We are looking for new talent to join the team at r//evolution. Take a look at our recruitment page to see what we are looking for.

Starting today, people have the ability to tag Pages in their photos on Facebook in the same way they can tag their friends. Photo tagging for Facebook Pages enables people to share richer stories with friends about the things they interact with in the real-world, such as businesses, brands, celebrities, and musicians.

A Page can be tagged anywhere that someone can view a photo in the photo viewer. These photos will appear on the Photos tab on the Page, and not on the Wall. In addition, a Page can be tagged by anyone on Facebook, not just people who have Liked your Page.

Click here for the full article

To see our Facebook page click here

Not only did Apple surpass Microsoft in market capitalization to become the second most valuable U.S. company in 2010, it also superseded Google to become the most valuable consumer-facing brand in the world, according to a study published by global research agency Millward Brown.

Apple’s brand value jumped 84% to $153.3 billion, driven largely by the company’s success with the iPad and iPhone 4, the study found. Google’s brand declined 2% to $111.5 billion. IBM, McDonald’s and Microsoft rounded out the top five.

With a 246% increase in brand value to $19.1 billion — the greatest leap of any company in the survey — Facebook made its debut on the top 100 chart at number 35. Baidu, the leading search engine in China, was the second-fastest climber at 141%, placing it at number 29.

Other notable findings: Amazon (14) overtook Walmart (15) to become the most valuable retail brand in the world at $37.6 billion; Toyota once again became the most valuable car brand; and 12 of the top 100 brands in 2010 came from China.

Brands’ values were determined by a mix of factors, including future earnings (discounted to their present-day values) and in-depth consumer surveys, Millawrd Brown says. For the full article, and a chart of 2011's 100 most valued brands Click Here

(Mashable.com)

Everyone knows Kate Middleton is marrying Prince William. Well, almost everyone. The people behind a souvenir mug that commemorates the royal wedding didn't get the memo and made a pretty big gaffe.

They got the picture of Kate Middleton correct, but instead of William, the mug features an image of his younger brother, Harry. Uh oh.

According to the UK's Telegraph, the mug was supposedly designed by Guandong Enterprises, a Chinese firm. But the Telegraph found that the company is "apparently registered in Britain." Does that mean that this "mistake" could instead be, in the Telegraph's words, "an elaborate spoof"?

Maybe so. Nothing moves "collectible" merchandise like an error that was supposedly never meant to occur. Indeed, this mug's joke appeal could make it a hot gag item as the big day draws closer. You can have one of your own for £10 plus shipping and handling.

If royal-inspired mugs aren't your thing, there are plenty of other souvenirs to consider. And some of them are pretty official. Britain’s Royal Mint released a commemorative coin in honour of the wedding, but it was met with little enthusiasm thanks to the questionable likenesses of William and Kate.

And that's not all. The Royal Collection is selling approved items like plates, pill boxes, and English china. You know, classy stuff. But not everybody wants to be classy. For those who are tacky and proud of it (or just plain tired of all the royal wedding hype), there are commemorative sick bags.

Full article here

Louise and Gill went to 'True Integration - from conventional to digital marketing' an entrepreneurs forum event.

With 5 excellent speakers the event focused on harnessing your marketing efforts accross a range of medias including traditional, digital and social, to see the power point slides and talks click here

We came away with some interesting points to action and some points to discuss. What makes us at r//evolution different is that we can integrate conventional and digital marketing from within the same agency - with a team of experts all in one place!

Thanks to the entrepreneurs forum and we are already looking forawrd to the Womens dinner next Tuesday!

Not strictly written by Bob - but taken from the econsultancy blog - highly relevant when considering what makes people stay on your website, or why they enjoy visiting it. 

Web personalisation is about delivering targeted content and adaptive web experiences based on what you know about each visitor. For ambitious web marketers looking for the next leap in returns, this is a massive opportunity.

Of course, it’s not without risks. Get it wrong, and you’ll confuse visitors, waste resources and depress conversions. But get it right and you’ll surprise and delight your web visitors while driving your website to new levels of effectiveness.

Personalisation can be taken from any or all of the following sources of insight:

- Users' profiles and preferences:  everything they’ve told you about themselves (if you already know them).
- Customers' history with you:  what they’ve done on your site, in your community, in response to your emails, etc.
- How they found you:  the search terms or PPC ads that delivered them, or a tagged URL that they clicked on.
- Their immediate behaviours: what they’re doing in the current session (clickstreams, site searches, etc).
- The context: including time of day, day of the week, geography and your own strategic agenda (targeted offers, surveys…).
- The dynamic environment: real-time factors like the weather and commodity pricing. When the rain falls, you can show ads for umbrellas or raincoats, and when the snow lands, skis and goggles. 

Your own personalisation efforts can use as much or as little of this kind of insight as you need to drive the content you choose to present in each session. The point is not to make every session perfectly targeted from day one, just to improve the relevance of each session so the visit is more compelling. As the project proves itself, you can grow your ambition and sophistication.   

Start with clear goals and objectives
The best goals are quantifiable, so write them down! Things like demonstrating a clear return on investment (ROI) of 50% within six months, increasing monthly new lead supply by 30% for nurturing campaigns, boost quarterly campaign quality index (conversions / visits) by 40% and the classic measure of personalisation impact in Customer Satisfaction Index.Do people feel the “personal” touch is providing a better service? 

Make the workflow simple, and work rapidly!
Here’s what your workflow needs to do:

• Think about your segments.
• Identify opportunities to personalise.
• Create a rule.
• Test it.
• Go live.
• Analyse the results.
• Tweak.
• Repeat.

Start Small
Personalisation projects often die because they try to do too much too soon. Pick one or two of your low-hanging fruit and make them work before moving on to trickier stuff.

• Returning customers should always be treated like returning customers. Even the smallest acknowledgement that you know who they are goes a long way.
• Geography can be a simple start to targeting. One hotel chain improved bookings by serving up different offers to visitors from different countries.
• For B2B marketers, starting with vertical industry targeting is a no-brainer. If you don’t yet know the visitor’s market, you can use an IP-lookup plug-in to find out, in real time.

For more about eConsultancy visit: www.econsultancy.com/uk

Having fought off strong competition, we are delighted to be working with The Real Apprenticeship Company, we have developed them a fantastic logo and we are currently creating them an equally fantastic and dynamic website that will incorporate three user portals; staff, students and learners – enabling an online business model to take formation. We will also be formulating a social media marketing plan to enable TRAC to showcase their vacancies across social media. There isn’t a better time to get involved in apprenticeships with the Journal's recent scheme to promote apprenticeship learning as well as the success of apprenticeship week in Feburary. TRAC’s current vacancies can be viewed on their Facebook page or to become an employer, give them a call on 0191 280 4233. 

What do your brand communications say about you? With the coverage of media and the complexity of media channels that even small businesses need to engage with. It is vital, now more than ever, that your brand messages are harmonious across the board. The importance of harnessing your brand messages across all platforms; print, design, digital media, social media, is essential. Many brands focus heavily upon one channel, or adopt different marketing plans for each element of the marketing mix. While this is the best intention of the brand manager – it often creates cracks in which marketing messages and brand communications can fall down. An effective marketing plan needs to incorporate every part of the marketing umbrella, granted some items may be more geared towards online marketing and others may be more relevant to PR but they all have the same underlining message that needs to be sent to the audience.

A marketing plan should in no way be fragmented. While in the first instance the brand may only want to focus on one element; a new brochure – for example – there needs to be scope for the brand to be evolved across other platforms. To ensure synergy is established and maintained so your audiences receive a consistent brand message.

The importance of hiring a marketing agency that has a range of experts working within it is paramount to the way brand messages are put across. Brands look for expertise; they want a simple holistic solution to promoting their brand. Using a single agency throughout the marcomms process enables a seamless development, the brand does not have to juggle various agencies – they can receive all the expertise they need under one roof, with one account director and one point of contact.

For an agency to produce top notch work they’ll need a top notch brief. Should this brief be repeated to three or four separate agencies it can become diluted and it is tiresome having to repeat the same information several times. Letting one agency receive the brief ensures the excitement and energy surrounding a new project is maintained and developed at the same pace. With one agency working across all marcoms they can really get to know the brand and the ethos of the company – allowing the agency to act as an extension of your any existing in-house resource. The synergy created from the agency should be echoed in both style and tone of voice ensuring print, online and design all develop and evolve at the same time.

And ultimately, it’s better value.

There is the view that an all-encompassing agency is a ‘Jack of all trades and a master of none’ this is not the case. Small creative agencies can only afford to employ the best in their field who work to the best of their ability 100% of the time. By having all your marketing requirements developed by professionals from under one roof ensures your money goes further. r//evolution marketing ensures it employs experts within their individual fields; employing account management staff to ensure seamless client liaison as well as talented graphic designers, fresh and dynamic digital marketing staff as well as PR experts who are highly experienced in both on and offline communications. 

Tuesday saw The Vindolanda Trust take to the big screen as they premiered their 3D film - 'The Edge of Empire - The Eagle's Eye.' The Roman Army Museum, where the film will be based, is the country's first visitor attraction to offer visitors a rich 3D experience. Both Roman Vindolanda and the Roman Army Museum have undergone stunning redevelopments and open to the public on the 12th March! r//evolution coordinated the PR for the film launch; with tv crews, journalists and photographers in attendance the coverage has been fantastic. 

The trailer for the fantastic Edge of Empire - The Eagle's Eye has been released. The film, created for The Vindolanda Trust, forms part of their multi million pound redevelopments at both Vindolanda and The Roman Army Museum - where the film will be housed as part of the museum experience. The film premier takes place on 1st March 2011 and the r//evolution team are working hard to promote The Trust in the run up to their official opening on 19th April this year.

We are thrilled to announce that we have been chosen to work with The Vindolanda Trust, working towards their grande re-opening in March 2011. This is a fantastic opportunity for us to showcase our marketing talents and elevate The Trust into the forefront of North East tourism arena – we can't wait to get started!

We have been included in Howard Smith paper's profiles carbon edition. By including a carbon offset in the Newcastle Central Mosque brochure over 3013 car miles were neutralised and 203m2 of land was preserved. Carbon management is good for business and great for the planet. Click here to view

Congratulations to our friends at Triplet Media Ltd who have been shortlisted for a national e-government award for their innovative work on the West Yorkshire Police iPortal. We created and developed their application for the prestigious awards so we are basking in the reflective succcess, and what a success it is – Well Done guys!!

The iconic US brand Gap recently launched its new logo to a more than disappointed reception.

The redesign received over 2000 negative comments on Facebook and and even more on Twitter.

A ‘make your own Gap logo’ website has appeared with tens of thousands of entries believing they can do a better job (we like #4640!)

It’s a great example of a brand failing to engage with its customer base and this proves the need for customer feedback in every step of the process.

But has this all been bad news for Gap, we expect visits to their website have rocketed in the last week and people are certainly talking about them. What’s more their customers feel empowered after having been listened to on social media.

There is no such thing as bad PR…. as the saying goes!!

Recently we were given the opportunity to work in a market we had never thought we would – the canine accessory market. After initial research I think we underestimated just how huge the market is. An article in the Guardian claims ‘We now spend more than £2.4 billion a year in Britain on our pets, 40 per cent more than we spent a decade ago. Not only are we spending more, pet owners are also becoming increasingly demanding. Seventy per cent of dog owners now list their pet as 'like a child/family member’ and after looking into the number of canine publications, blogs and more – this doesn’t even make me bat an eyelid.

The brand we are promoting is the US sensation Ruff Wear. It has been available in the UK for a number of years and the distribution rights have recently been acquired by Accapi UK. Producing items for dogs on the go – they originally created a water bowl that you can fold down flat and store in your backpack. This evolved to backpacks for dogs, fold-able beds, harnesses, shoes, leashes, toys... the list goes on!

The products are designed with the same attention to detail as human wear. The newest product, the polartrex boot uses gore-tex and Vibram icetrek ice-specific sole!!! After all, when we buy winter walking boots to protect our feet we look for these fantastic innovations, it’s not really fair that we let poor pooch wander along with bare feet on the ice and sleet (especially if we have a winter like the last one!)

And with all the cliché PR-isms available ‘barking up the right/wrong tree’ ‘howling’ we’re having a pawfect (groan) time promoting Ruff Wear!!

Below is a lifestyle image for the Autumn/Winter catalogue – See if you can out cliché us with your best headlines/captions to match the picture!

After ten years Tetley has reintroduced its Tetley Tea Folk in a new TV ad, with the objective of attracting a younger audience. The characters are woken up after a drop of tea finds its way to them across the office building. They open the cupboard where they have been sleeping and say 'we're back'. Tetley claims to have received over 10,000 enquiries from people asking for the characters to be reinstated.

Campaign, 24 September 2010, p5

Enjoy them at www.teafolk.co.uk/

North east agency, r//evolution have been appointed to the Accapi UK account. Accapi UK are distributors of a technically advanced sports underwear range, which uses Nexus Energy Source, a revolutionary Japanese fabric with unique, infrared properties. Set up by keen climbers George Heydon and Steve Roberts, Accapi UK has just appointed Andrew Geere (formerly of French footwear and clothing giant Aigle) as CEO.

r//evolution have continued to grow their tourism portfolio, with work for the 2010 season for Hadrian’s Wall Heritage Ltd, Kielder Water and Forest Park, Visit Durham, Walby Farm Park, Beltingham House and Bede’s World.

The Northumberland based agency have developed a niche in destination marketing and are looking to develop this further over the coming year. “We have had some fantastic feedback on the work we have done and are now in discussions with others in the tourism industry” says Gill Burgess, r//evolution Director, “ so I anticipate this area of work to grow significantly”.

r//evolution marketing have been working with leading training provider, Distance Learning College & Training to deliver ambitious growth plans for the forthcoming year.DLC&T, who operate worldwide, including a significant contract in the UAE, and also for the UN in Italy, are seeking to further grow their client base across the UK and internationally. Karen Hope, General Manager said “ r//evolution’s work has contributed significantly to our development, and we see then as a long-term partner in achieving our ambitious growth plans.”