Business | Money – U.K. To Get Its Own Version of Small Business Saturday

May 24th, 2013 Rockstar Team

Small business owners; listen up! This year, the U.K. will be getting Small Business Saturday this year! In the United States alone, their version of this highly popular event say over $5 billion in sales for small businesses.123jpg

The Shadow Business Secretary Chukka Umunna spoke to The Independent regarding Small Business Saturday;

“The UK version will be launched against the backdrop of a traumatic time for many retailers in town centers  where an average of one in seven shops is empty after a series of failures over the past five years.” Mr Umunna said: “I want to make Small Business Saturday a reality in Britain to actively champion, celebrate and showcase small, independent businesses on one of the busiest shopping days of the year.”

My Umunna has been a huge supporter of this event that will take place on the 7th December 2013. Small business retailers in the U.K., like many in the U.S. have struggled during the tough economic time. This is the time to really celebrate the achievement many small businesses have managed despite all odds.

This event in the U.K. is being backed by several influential groups including the Chambers of Commerce, Federation of Small Businesses, British Independent Retailers Association, The Association of Convenience Stores, the National Federation of Retail Newsagents and the Northern Ireland Independent Retail Trade Association, to name a few.

We should expect to see other well known small business advocates celebrating the event. Startup Britain and Startup Loans are two leading organisations who will be marketing this great event to their audience.

The U.S. version of Small Business Saturday is held on the Saturday after Black Friday. The idea was first formed in 2010 by American Express who picked up on the growing trend that Small Businesses were succeeding in such harsh times. They then decided to promote it around the holiday season and now has hundreds of supporters including cities, states, chambers of commerce, small business advocacy groups, high profile public officials and large brands like American Express, FedEx and The Small Business Administration (SBA)..

The U.S. have managed to successfully tap into Social Media to promote the event. Not only has Small Business Saturday become a major movement, social media activity is constantly active throughout the year. With it’s own website (www.shopsmall.com), Twitter handle and Hashtag (@Shopmall / #Shopsmall) Small Business Saturday has proved its ability to impact Twitter but even more so on Facebook with over 3 million likes on it’s Facebook Page.

I am a huge advocate of Small Businesses as I am an owner of one myself so I will definitely be supporting this cause, even if it is on both my Sister’s birthdays! Voted as one of the UK’s top 100 Startup’s by Startups.co.uk, keep an eye out for Gloople’s name around the 7th December!

What will you be doing to support Small Business Saturday?

If you want a deeper understanding about how Warren Knight thinks and works, or you would like to get in touch with him, feel free to do so here: warren@warrenknight.co.uk or visit his website – www.warrenknight.co.uk

Business | Social Media – The “Know, Like & Trust” Factor

May 23rd, 2013 Rockstar Team

Networking and referral expert Bob Burg is famous for his quote (from his excellent book Endless Referrals): “All things being equal, people do business with, and refer business to people they know, like and trust.”

So, in order to build relationships it is important to raise your Know, Like and Trust factors with the people from your network.

What does this mean in practice?

  • Know factor: what do people know about you? What is your background? What are your interests on a professional and personal level? Which organizations do you belong to? To raise your Know factor it is important to complete your Profile on LinkedIn as fullyas you can(but achieving a balance before you swamp them in detail!)
  • Like factor: people like people who are helpful, kind, and not pushy. Applying the networking attitude, thinking about what you can share with other people and answering questions in Discussion Groups helps to raise your Like factor.
  • Trust factor: there are two kinds of trust:
    • Trust that you are an expert. This part of the trust factor can be raised when answering questions in Group Discussions in your field of expertise. By giving solid answers you will be perceived as an expert. Also, having recommendations from other people describing your professional expertise will increase your Trust factor.
    • Trust that you will behave in a decent way when you get an introduction or referral. This is a consequence of your behavior described in the Like factor. Receiving recommendations from other people describing your attitude when working with them will also raise this part of the Trust factor.

LinkedIn helps to raise your “Know, Like, and Trust” factor in many ways. As Stephen M.R. Covey wrote in his book, The Speed of Trust: trust can also be transferred via an intermediary. Therefore, it is good to ask for introductions and to pass on messages of trusted connections; this is one of the best and easiest networking actions to take. It works both ways, too: trust (and your reputation) can be damaged very quickly. So be a good advocate as well as a good filter!

If you want a deeper understanding about how Michael Clark thinks and works, or you would like to get in touch with him, feel free to do so here: mike@reallylinkedin.co.uk or visit his website – www.reallylinkedin.co.uk

Business | Marketing – How to get your emails delivered into inboxes

May 22nd, 2013 Rockstar Team

Most e-mail marketers measure open and click-through rates to gauge the effectiveness of their e-mail marketing campaigns. But too often they overlook factors that reduce the percentage of e-mails that make it into a recipient’s inbox.compemail_jpg_280x280_crop_q95

Major providers of e-mail addresses to consumers are increasingly focused on rewarding good e-mails by ensuring they land in consumers’ inboxes rather than just blocking bad e-mail. (Those e-mail providers, such as Yahoo, Microsoft and Google are typically called Internet service providers, or ISPs by e-mail marketing experts.)

In the past, for example, ISPs were more likely to block a high percentage of a sender’s e-mail if some of its recipients clicked their spam button. But now, if that same sender also takes proactive steps to show its e-mail is legitimate and engages the recipients, ISPs are more likely to deliver a higher percentage of e-mail to the inbox even if some recipients are hitting the spam button.

But you still need to ensure you’re taking the right steps that result in better treatment from ISPs.

Sender reputation remains the cornerstone of deliverability.

Here’s what we’ve learnt about getting e-mails delivered. I’ve laid it out, in what I believe is the order of importance, the following factors ISPs consider in scoring a sender’s reputation.

● Invalid addresses – E-mails that bounce because they were sent to invalid and inactive e-mail accounts.

● User complaints – Recipients click the Report Spam button because they don’t recognize the sender, they don’t remember opting-in to a marketer’s list, the content of the message is no longer relevant to their needs, they don’t like the sender’s e-mail frequency, or they want to unsubscribe from the sender’s list.

● Domain – Most ISPs augment their IP-based reputation systems with domain-based reputation services that rely on DK/DKIM, or DomainKeys/DomainKeys Identified Mail, which is used to validate the domain name associated with an e-mail message. Under the DK/DKIM system, ISPs can check the coding a sender places in the e-mail header with information the sender has registered with the Domain Name System, to ensure that the e-mail is being sent from the sender’s web address. This is used to guard against e-mails that, for example, may be sent by criminals who attempt to use variations of legitimate domain names in phishing attacks that lure consumers into revealing confidential information like credit card details or account passwords.

● Frequency – ISPs favour senders whose frequency follows regular patterns. Sending too frequently or infrequently will damage a marketer’s reputation.

● Volume – Sudden bursts of high volume can lead to penalties. You should segment your e-mail list into small groups and stagger delivery patterns so that all e-mail marketing messages don’t hit ISPs at the same time.

● Size – E-mail messages should be 10 to 60 kilobytes and never include attachments (plain text consistently gets the best results for us).

● Content – Even though ISPs’ text filters are not as strong as they once were, words such as “free” can prevent an e-mail message from getting delivered, especially if the other tips on this list are not followed.

● Third-party reputation services – ISPs rely on certification and accreditation services to vouch that a sender is legitimate.

● Engagement – ISPs monitor the number of recipients who open and click on a sender’s e-mail messages, along with the number who ignore or delete the sender’s messages. Thus, sending messages to inactive subscribers can hurt a marketer’s reputation and deliverability rates. Message – PURGE your list. The days of list size being equated to dick size are long gone.

● Spam trap hits – So-called spam traps are old e-mail addresses that their users have abandoned. ISPs monitor these e-mail addresses even though no one uses them, and sending to these addresses results in a lower effective delivery rate for the marketer.

● Sending infrastructure – Marketers can help to maintain good reputations with ISPs by sending e-mails compliant with RFC standards and ensuring content and links are not misleading or otherwise inappropriate. RFCs, or request for comments, is shorthand for rules for e-mail and other Internet-related operations.

As you can see there is a LOT you can do to improve your sending reputation.

100% of people reading this can go to their email client and delete all the bad e-mail addresses. Just doing that will result in a 20 – 25% bump in deliverability.

If you want a deeper understanding about how Nicola Cairncross thinks and works, or you would like to get in touch with her, feel free to do so here: nicola@roarlocal.com or visit her website – http://ROARlocal.com

Business | People – You say potato and I hear tomato

May 21st, 2013 Rockstar Team

As the effects of the council elections reverberate around Westminster, party strategists will be asking themselves what message got across to the voters and whether it was the one that they wanted them to hear.

I doubt it.

It seems to me that politics has been reduced below the level of Twitter and has reached the level of titter. Politicians such as the inestimable Margaret Hodge, and media tigers such as the Spoonerist Jim Naughtie were reduced to tittering, when Bill Dodwell, the head of tax at Deloittes, said that Starbucks didn’t make a profit in the UK. “How can you believe this?” they asked disparagingly. Dodwell replied calmly that Vince Cable had reviewed the situation and agreed. He could have added that HMRC had reviewed the situation and agreed it too.21st may1

We seem to be ruled less and less by facts, even simplified ones, and more and more by innuendo and insinuation. At the same time, Governments bemoan the fact that corporations are getting stronger whilst they are getting weaker. Hmm. Maybe these two facts are related? For whilst political parties spend a lot of time saying what they are going to do, and explaining why they haven’t done it or it hasn’t worked, the best companies spend less time saying what they are going to do and concentrate on reporting fully and accurately when they have done it.

But sadly this approach is becoming less common as directors and leaders share a growing belief that their stakeholders’ value rests largely in their Brand, which they promote in many ways. This gives the Twitterers and titterers opportunities to exploit and sometimes similar messages are so mangled that they can apply to either companies or parties.

I have picked up messages from companies which they would prefer that I hadn’t. Maybe they apply to our political parties too?

  • From Google I get “We seem to have all the answers but you may have overlooked our further aims, which are less obvious (and frankly a bit worrying)”.
  • What I have heard from RBS is “We borrowed far too much and messed up. But don’t worry we’re under new management now. And you can borrow again!”.
  • I recall that MG Rover’s message was actually “We were a bit shabby but had some good ideas, like the Mini, worth taking over.”
  • And now the predominant message I hear is “We listened to our customers and they told us to defer any serious decisions for at least five years.” But not from any company. No company would do this and expect to be taken seriously. Maybe the real message isn’t getting through David?

If you enjoyed this post by Malcolm Durham, and would like to get in touch, feel free to send e-mail at: malcolm@fdsolutions.uk.com – or visit his website: http://fdsolutions.uk.com

Business | Social Media – To Tweet or Not to Tweet….?

May 20th, 2013 Rockstar Team

If William Shakespeare were around today I’m sure this would be one of his quotes!

My love affair with Twitter began about four years ago when I started using it to promote events for Baby Loves Disco @blduk. It was love at first tweet for me as I connected with other like minded businesses and people and found I had a voice in a way that had not been previously possible. I then started tweeting as myself @naomitimperley to build my profile, which I have done very successfully.

Twitter can be a fantastic tool to get your message across about your business, keeping an eye on the competition, networking, customer service, industry news and so much more. I launched a business @enterpriselabuk with two people that I met on Twitter and we have built up our profile for the business very rapidly by using Twitter!

Here are my top tips for making it work for you:

  • If you’re new to Twitter – observe first and listen
  • Look up your competition and see what they are tweeting
  • Don’t be an ‘egg’ – make sure you have a profile picture or logo
  • Have a compelling bio and a website link (or Linkedin profile if you don’t have a website) first impressions count!
  • Follow strategically – people you know, exnetworking contacts, other related businesses, the competition, industry related media, industry peers, related bloggers.
  • Join in conversations.
  • Use appropriate hastags (#)
  • Use # for events/seminars/training
  • If someone mentions you respond to them
  • If someone retweets (RT) you, thank them
  • Listen to what other people have to say.
  • COMMITMENT – DON’T WASTE YOUR TIME UNLESS YOU’RE GOING TO COMMIT TO TWEETING EVERY DAY!
  • If your company is doing the tweets make sure the employee you choose to do it is the most passionate about the business – don’t assume it’s the youngest person in the office!
  • If someone complains about your business respond to it publicly and then take it offline – this is a good sign of customer service.
  • Welcome new followers.
  • Become a guru of what you do online – tweet information that is going to be of interest to your followers
  • DON’T JUST SELL SELL SELL! It’s about building up relationships first and then the sales will come!
  • ENGAGE – listen to what other people are tweeting about and engage with them – this could be the start of a beautiful relationship with a new client!

For more tips, you can read this guide to Twitter from @smartahq http://www.smarta.com/advice/ebooks/smarta-twitter-ebook 

If you want a deeper understanding about how Naomi Timperley thinks and works, or you would like to get in touch with her, feel free to do so here: naomi@enterpriselab.co.uk or visit her website – http://www.enterpriselab.co.uk/

Business | People – They Used to Burn People at the Stake for Saying The World Wasn’t Flat

May 16th, 2013 Rockstar Team

I am a contrarian thinker.

 
As a way of getting attention when I was growing up, I used to deliberately take the opposing view just to be argumentative. If it wasn’t for my mischievous grin, I would have got into far more trouble that I actually did. You can imagine just how many people found it annoying!flamesweb1

 
What’s great about spending a lifetime of taking the opposing view is the insight it has brought me. I discovered that there are often incredible ideas and opportunities out there, and huge inconsistencies in what is considered to be right and wrong – or correct and incorrect. Children question everything – wanting to understand – and you only have to spend time with a young child to be driven crazy with their persistent questioning ‘why?’

 
As adults we grow more jaded, questioning less and accepting more, although we may still wonder about whether or not what is accepted as ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ actually is the truth. I think everyone suspects this to some extent, but the signals we receive from the world around us, and from our own brain, make it difficult to give it deep thought. Unintentionally, through decades of being obnoxiously argumentative, I have managed to do it.

 
In the same way that white blood cells in the human body attack a donor organ meant to save us, we are wired to be wary of new ideas and situations. Our brain evolved like this to keep us from threats like sabre tooth tigers! In the past, new and novel things were often life threatening.

 
I’ve always played devil’s advocate, keen to ask, ‘But what if…?’ And arising from this lifetime of contrarian thought, I invoke the title of this blog post:

 
“They used to burn people at the stake for saying the world wasn’t flat.”

 
Not much has changed in society since then. A great deal of what is negative in the world is based on what is correct and incorrect. Which is a shame, since given our history, I don’t think that ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ in this sense even exists. After all, if we look back just 100 years, how much of what was viewed as ‘correct’ is now considered to be right? It was believed to be impossible to run a mile in under 4 minutes. Fixed thinking reassures us of our ‘rightness’, but it keeps us stagnant.

  • What beliefs do you hold to be ‘right’  that could be tomorrow’s ‘wrong’?
  • What ‘wrongs’ are inside you that could be tomorrow’s ‘rights’?


And yet, the world is changing faster and faster. Look at the speed and impact of technologies on the world, like the internet and mobile phones. Remember what life was like without them? It wasn’t that far back! Think of all the industries that have come and gone as a result of these two technologies alone. In 20 years’ time, imagine all the undreamed-of technologies we’ll be talking about in the same way!

In a world that is speeding up exponentially, just consider every current institution, industry and way of doing things and let’s think of them as ‘flat earth’. Assume, as a default, that everything is probably ‘wrong’ and take it from there.  From experience, I know that this approach reveals far more than if you just accept what you see in front of you as the only truth.


The status quo is not really an option in this Darwinian race, despite what our brain tells us. If you are not thinking about reinventing things to improve them  ten or a hundredfold,  you can be sure that someone else will be. You may not be able to see the answer, but you can assume that it will be there somewhere, and that someone will find it, given enough resources. And with the internet, every individual has access to more and more resources. Think of crowdfunding, the open source movement and even freelance networks. If a share price could reflect what an individual today was technically capable of, it would be rising at a very fast rate. In the past, ideas might have been kept hidden forever, but great ideas can no longer be held back by large companies or governments, and individual brilliance is shining brighter every day, and getting more powerful.

My advice is to get comfortable with not having the answers, but start acting as if they are there somewhere. Holding onto ideas you think are ‘right’, for fear of the sabre tooth tiger, is actually a quick way to become extinct. The irony is that the part of the brain designed to keep us safe and alive is precisely what can deaden us. Come alive! Question everything! 

So my provocation for you is: stop thinking about what is ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ – or what’s possible or impossible – and start thinking about how you can significantly improve the world around you! Ignore that primeval fear of the sabre tooth tiger, and start listening to – and acting on – what is deep inside you. Even if it doesn’t fit in with what the world around you. Your capability of making those unimaginable ideas a practical reality is increasing every day!
 
Change is going to happen anyway, so you might as well join the party. Today’s ‘crazy’ is tomorrow’s ‘normal’, and the transformation happens much faster than you think.  CLICK TO TWEET
To thrive in this speeding world, start listening to the fantastical ideas inside you (or around you), and start asking ‘why not?’ – and even ‘how?’ The solution or practical application might just be something that you cannot see – yet.

If you want a deeper understanding about how Marc thinks and works, or you would like to get in touch with him, feel free to do so here: getintouch@marcwinn.com or visit his website – http://www.theviewinside.me

Business | Marketing – The Future of Mobile Commerce

May 15th, 2013 Rockstar Team

The number of mobile purchases are growing rapidly and more online and offline retailers are changing their business strategy to incorporate mCommerce. Mobile Commerce should not be seen as just another sales channel; it is a way to improve product experience and brand presence. So, what can we expect to see in the future?mobile-commerce-uk

To give you an example of how quickly mobile commerce is growing, Paypal had to update their 2012 mobile estimates three times, going from £3.3 to £5.3 then finishing on £6.6 Billion. They also finished on a yearly mobile increase of 150%.

Paypal isn’t the only company showing significant mobile improvements. Amazon and eBay have reported that around 20% of their sales are coming from smartphones or tablets.

We see, on a daily basis how attached people are to their mobile phones. When I travel to work on the underground, around 60% of the people in my carriage are using their smartphone and it would be safe to say that nearly every single person would not travel without their mobile. We, as a country are attached to our phone for personal reasons but now, we like to shop on them too.

The line between the real world in which we live in and the online world is very thin indeed. The growth of interactive content and augmented reality is down to the hype of the online world.

When looking at the mobile customer journey, we will see a lot of businesses developing a separate strategy including the use of QR Codes and Location Based Marketing.

There has been a lot of research taking place on mobile commerce with a strong suggestion that the statistics are going to keep rising, in favour of mCommerce. 80% of smartphone owners use their devices to shop with Amazon being the most popular. 68% (male) and 58% (female) are likely to make a purchase based on mobile ads and by 2016, mobile influence for retailers will increase to £460 billion.

Unfortunately, it has been reported that 86% of sites on the web are not mobile and have received negative feedback on the mobile experience. With mobile online time growing 14x faster than desktop time, you need to optimise your website so that your customers can purchase smoothly when using their smartphone or tablet. A great way to do this is to build your website responsive.

Over the past year, Responsive design has become a hot topic in the web design community. A Responsive design allows you to view a website on your smartphone or tablet/iPad as you would on your desktop. Something that was once so bespoke that only one man could build it, has now gone global. Not only is it being used by millions of websites all over the world, you can now use it as a theme inside of WordPress. Speak to your web designer and optimise your site so that your users can have a smooth journey when purchasing on mobile.

There was an 80% growth in 2011, 105% growth in 2012 and the mCommerce market is expected to generate between £780 million to £665 billion in revenue, worldwide by 2014.

Are you ready for mCommerce to evolve?

If you want a deeper understanding about how Warren Knight thinks and works, or you would like to get in touch with him, feel free to do so here: warren@warrenknight.co.uk or visit his website – www.warrenknight.co.uk

Business | Social Media – 8 Tips for an Attractive LinkedIn Company Profile

May 14th, 2013 Rockstar Team

LinkedIn has been offering a Company Profile for a while, but not many organizations actually use it to showcase themselves. That’s a pity because they don’t benefit from the (mostly) free visibility a Company Profile provides.

Here are 8 items to take into account when creating a Company Profile.

Overview page (free)

  • Use a banner: spice up [your] corporate branding.
  • Company description: use this field wisely! This is not only the first thing people see when they visit the Company Profile, but the first three lines are also shown in each employee’s profile when someone hovers over the company name or logo. Remember to include specialties, website, HQ, industry, type and address.
  • Recent updates: as on your personal profile you can broadcast updates, but this time for the company. Most often used for new jobs, announcements, blogs, etc.


The advantage on this page is that you only have to set it up once.

Careers page (paid)

  • Jobs: if you post a job on LinkedIn, it will appear on this page as well. In other words, your job listing doesn’t only benefit from being found in the job section, but also on this page.
  • Premium page: for companies that want to take it a step further. You can use video, employee testimonials and other visually attractive features that help to showcase your job openings in a more visual way.
  • If you don’t post a job: only a number of employees will be shown.


Products and Services page (free)

  • Overview page: you can use product/service pictures, feature products and services and use YouTube videos to create your own products/services showcase. You can even create different versions of this page for different profiles of visitors.
  • Products and services page: use a picture, a key list of features, a YouTube video and a promotion for each product or service. LinkedIn makes it very easy to set up a page for each product or service; satisfied customers can even recommend on which to choose.


Remember that LinkedIn is a website with a high Page Rank in Google and other search engines. This means that its pages appear at the top of search results.

Make sure your organization benefits as well by creating an attractive Company Profile!

If you want a deeper understanding about how Michael Clark thinks and works, or you would like to get in touch with him, feel free to do so here: mike@reallylinkedin.co.uk or visit his website – www.reallylinkedin.co.uk

Business | Marketing – If you do what you love, you’ll never work a day in your life is BS

May 13th, 2013 Rockstar Team

Louis C.K. is arguably the most successful standup comedian working today. Not just because of his sitcom or standup specials, but because of his do-it-yourself mentality. He famously produced, shot, edited, and distributed his standup special Live at the Beacon Theater.

This smart self-distribution model was quickly adapted by others.

In an interview with the New York Times Louis C.K. asserts that such creative freedom didn’t happen overnight (the bold questions are the Times reporter):lck

Does it matter that what you’ve achieved, with your online special, and your tour, can’t be replicated by other performers who don’t have the visibility or fan base that you do?

Why do you think those people don’t have the same resources that I have, the same visibility or relationship? What’s different between me and them?

You have the platform. You have the level of recognition.

So why do I have the platform and the recognition?

At this point you’ve put in the time.

There you go. There’s no way around that. There’s people that say: “It’s not fair. You have all that stuff.” I wasn’t born with it. It was a horrible process to get to this. It took me my whole life. If you’re new at this — and by “new at it,” I mean 15 years in, or even 20 — you’re just starting to get traction. Young musicians believe they should be able to throw a band together and be famous, and anything that’s in their way is unfair and evil. What are you, in your 20s, you picked up a guitar? Give it a minute.

Notice his use of the phrase “horrible process” in describing his rise. This is exactly what is wrong with telling people, “If you do what you love, you’ll never work a day in your life”. You’re providing them with a flawed description of reality.

Building a business requires a lot of work. Sometimes even “horrible” work.

For me this adds value to my belief that those self help types who tell their clients to “find a job they love” are totally missing the point of having a meaningful career.

The problem with this is the self-serving bias behind it. The New York Times does not interview all the people who are not successful, but put the hours in, who also went through the “horrible process” but in one way or another were not that lucky. Don’t get me wrong: you have to put in the hours to be successful, but it is a necessary and not sufficient condition.

Listen, as entrepreneurs, sometimes we have to do shitty things that we don’t love, or even like, doing.

That’s a reality of being an entrepreneur that few will talk about, but it’s true.

Those people who are lead to believe that “they’ll never work a day in their life if they do what they love” are often the first ones to give in when the going gets tough.

It doesn’t help that self help gurus preach the gospel of being happy all the time and thinking positive.

Don’t get me wrong, a strong mental focus will help, but what helps more is the realisation that the business you’re building will be a pain in the ass sometimes and your source of greatest joy at others.

If you want a deeper understanding about how Nicola Cairncross thinks and works, or you would like to get in touch with her, feel free to do so here: nicola@roarlocal.com or visit her website – http://ROARlocal.com

Business | Social Media – How to Protect Your Brand Reputation

May 9th, 2013 Rockstar Team

image

It’s no secret that social media can break a brand’s reputation in one single tweet or facebook post. How can YOU make sure you either avoid this or take control of the situation straight away? You need to use a tool which allows you to monitor your businesses mentions on Social Media.

Most people would suggest using Google Alerts for this but there is one huge problem with this. The alerts are not in real time. By this I mean I receive google alerts on my mentions a week later than when I was mentioned. This means it takes me one whole week to react to a mention which isn’t good enough. A tool I have been using for a long time which allows me to see how I, or my business Gloople has been mentioned in real-time is Mention.

Mention was recently nominated as “Startup of the Year” at the TNW French Startup Awards proving it’s worth in the social tool market. This application can be accessed via the web, desktop and even iPhone. You can create alerts for key terms based on your business so you can monitor your industry, brand mentions and competitors.

After setting up my alerts, I found it much easier to track and mute all of the social noise on the world wide web.

As I am a contributor for various sites, I find Mention great to see what has been published and in real time. Without the use of Mention, I would never have found an article written about me byZoneTwo from when I was at Pure London earlier this year. I also found an article written by theTelegraph on Gloople and the SEIS.

One of the reasons why I stand by Mention is the fact that I can use their platform on my mobile. A lot of companies have managed to make the transition from desktop to mobile but not quite made it as user friendly as most consumers would hope but this isn’t the case for Mention. As you can see in the image below, their iPhone and Android app is very easy to use and still works in real time.

mention_mobile-1

If you have enjoyed this post and would like to get in touch, feel free to send e-mail at: warren@warrenknight.co.uk – or visit his website: www.warrenknight.co.uk

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