The theme for this year’s event was all about getting content out to your customers and getting them to connect with you through the various networks your message can be on, like Twitter.

Attracting and keeping customers

• Attract – ‘what’s in it for me’ attitude to why people should visit your web site
• Engagement – search, copy, tools – creates awareness
• Motivate – the dance between the customer and owner, you can “entertain” your users by following these steps:
  • Popular – relevant content
  • Useful – an online tool to save them time and costs having to research elsewhere
  • Accessible – not hidden, integrated with other networks – feeds, etc
  • Social – interactive, changing daily, eg: reviews
• Commitment – show customer you care and you value your relationship with users
• Make any offers online easy to adopt and participate, make it distinctive so your site stands out

Social media increase

A recent Nielsen report in the last year alone, time spent on social networking sites has surged 73 percent.

More recently, stats show that Online video more popular than blogging and social networking

Brand new world

Andy Hobsbawm’s (Agency.com) Keynote

Be a verb not a noun – be about action rather than words. All about the ‘active principle’ at the centre,
eg: topshop at fashion week, podcasts, rss.

The way to multi task and handle information is the way brands will be managed in the future – easier to get info from social network – Twitter search. May become a superbrand, completely up for grabs. No right answer now.

Technology is the campfire around which we tell our stories. These social networks allow us to tell our stories.

Unless you have a great product someone could ruin your product using social media. eg expensive acai berries, or organic pomegranite. Don’t always aim for a narrow slice of the shelf, or share of market. Compared to Tesco who manage all of these exotic fruit and much more.

Micro brands, enough people that buy them might make a business, but no right answer at the moment.

Media industry based on old costing model. DVD region 2. Publishing on Internet is next to nothing compared to costs of producing and marketing a advert on TV. Television at the moment is just another screen to display content.

Communication is what makes the world go round, and the essence of social media.

We were pleased to be interviewed by Dave Chaffey – who is one of the UK’s best known professional in search and marketing.

Where we discussed a variety of subjects, including ‘user centered design’, and meeting client business goals. As well as showing some examples of effective and clear design process that make it easy for a site user to understand how a web site can help them in their task to achieve their tasks on the web.

Perhaps the most important question for a client is ‘essential pitch questions’ that you should ask any web design company, to help distinguish between an agency that will be good, and one that is going to be great and deliver results.

Read the full interview