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You (probably) don't need a rockstar engineer

If you work in the tech industry, you've probably heard somebody lament just how difficult it is to find "good" engineers these days.

Thanks to the booming internet economy and the fat wallets of companies like Google and Facebook, it's a good time to be a software engineer. There are more jobs than viable candidates, salaries and benefits are high as a result and the best engineers have no shortage of opportunities to work on interesting things.

by Patricio Robles 06 February 2013 16:29pm 3 comments

Five examples of social media marketing excellence

To celebrate the launch of our new digital marketing and ecommerce awards, #TheDigitals, I've rounded up five brilliant examples of innovation in social media.

To avoid any accusations of bias, these are all examples that fall outside the eligibility period for the current awards, but give an idea of the sort of thing we are looking for.

#TheDigitals are the new awards that recognise the best in digital marketing and ecommerce. Award entries must be submitted online before the deadline March 13, 2013.

Award categories cover both industry and platform specific areas. There are special categories for best new technology, rising star (free to enter) and the overall Grand Prix winner. Further information on categories and entry requirements is available at thedigitalsawards.com

So without further ado, here are the five innovative social campaigns...

by David Moth 06 February 2013 10:28am 5 comments

Demographic shifts: a social media marketer's worst nightmare?

For digital marketers, understanding the audience a platform offers access to is crucial. After all, if you don't know who you will be reaching, it's all but impossible to craft messages and experiences that resonate.

The good news: digital channels are generally understood far better than their offline counterparts because users can be tracked far more comprehensively and accurately. The bad news: the make-up of digital channels can change, and sometimes quite rapidly. This is particularly true in social channels, where what's hot today is not hot tomorrow.

by Patricio Robles 05 February 2013 15:00pm 0 comments

How ASOS uses Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+

ASOS is streets ahead of the competition in many aspects of ecommerce, so it’s no surprise that it was quick to see the potential in social media marketing.

It has won numerous awards for its social strategy and clocked up millions of fans and followers in the process.

I’ve previously looked at how Walmart and Tesco use the major social networks, so thought it would be useful to shift the focus onto one of the world’s most innovative social brands.

So here is a quick look at how ASOS uses Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+...

by David Moth 05 February 2013 10:57am 6 comments

Did Twitter win the Super Bowl?

The Super Bowl is arguably the most important day in advertising, and every year, as much attention is focused on Super Bowl ads as the game itself.

With social media such a big part of brand advertising today, it's no surprise that many observers pay close attention to how social media is used by brands in conjunction with their multi-million dollar Super Bowl ads as outlined in our earlier Super Bowl post.

by Patricio Robles 04 February 2013 19:35pm 0 comments

Whoopsy daisy log-ins: a further look at good and bad micro-copywriting

I wrote a piece about micro-copywriting earlier this year, and in my ignorance thought this was a new concept, and that I may even have coined the term.

Shows you what I know. It’s a term that’s been used for a number of years, and great examples have been collected already, e.g. this Flickr Microcopy Group (thanks to Doug Kessler for pointing to this).

As the last post was popular I thought I’d bring together some more examples. So here’s a look at some micro-copy from the log-in error messages of four big players in the tech world.

These were easy to collect as I didn’t have to remember my passwords. In the end I found that although this could be an area where it’s not worth trifling with a user’s frustration, there’s still a lot to be improved upon.

And although looking at some of these fine-grained areas could be seen as the pedantry of a dilettante, I like to think of these little things as a microcosm of brand identity.

by Ben Davis 04 February 2013 10:52am 2 comments

Small businesses are not impressed by Twitter: survey

Much of the attention lavished on social networks as marketing platforms focuses in on large brands, many of which have invested heavily in these channels and can boast about large audiences.

One of the most popular social networks with brands has been Twitter, which is now generating hundreds of millions of dollars a year in ad revenue and may go public in the next year.

by Patricio Robles 01 February 2013 14:42pm 0 comments

Are brands overestimating the value of social data?

Brands love social media, and as evidenced by the number of high-dollar acquisitions of social media monitoring and analytics firms last year, they love the data that social media generates.

And, on the surface, there's a good reason for that: popular social networks like Facebook and Twitter give brands a front-row seat to the collective conversation consumers are having about their products and services. From that conversation, brands may, in theory, be able to gain valuable insights that help them connect with consumers and serve them better.

by Patricio Robles 31 January 2013 15:37pm 5 comments

B2B businesses to focus on their websites in 2013: report

Nearly half of B2B companies will up their marketing budgets in 2013, with more than half of those saying they'll increase their investment in email marketing, social media, online video and search.

But one marketing asset will be receiving the biggest investment by far: the company website.

by Patricio Robles 31 January 2013 13:37pm 4 comments

Facebook drives most social B2B traffic, but Twitter is top for conversions: report

Despite the huge attention lavished on social media, it still accounts for only a fraction of the traffic and leads for US B2B websites according to a new report from Optify.

Overall, social accounts for 1.9% of traffic compared to 41% for organic search, however there is potential for it to become a more important and effective channel.

This is a topic we touched on recently in a post about how to use social media to widen your sphere of influence in B2B and in an infographic looking at how B2B companies are currently using social.

Optify’s report found that companies that actively manage social media campaigns (as measured by companies who had more than one lead from social or more than 10 visits per month) have seen comparatively high conversion and engagement rates.

by David Moth 30 January 2013 12:01pm 3 comments