Pinterest has caught the imagination of many and looks like the lastest scocial platfrom to catch fire after Instagram last year, but what is it? My take  – a digital Scrapbook/pinboard for curation. Simple idea (they always seem to be the best).

Most of us are collectors, hoarders even, we also in these digital times feel the need to share and be heard or seen. Facebook , Twitter, Flickr, Instagram and others have  enabled us to do this and eased us into an openness that didn’t exist 10 years ago. Read More »

If you’ve been reading the media press this last week or two, you’ll be convinced of two things: everyone wants to see David Beckham in his pants, and Facebook is about to take over the world.

I’m not going to argue with the former, but I believe there’s a long way to go before the latter materialises. Read More »

Are you a fan of the H&M David Beckham Super Bowl ad? It has had a mixed reaction from sone quarters and none more so that from CNN political analyst Roland Martin who was suspended on Wednesday for “offensive” tweets during the Super Bowl.

The tweets have been taken as anti-gay by some and it is easy to see why. In one  Martin said as the Super Bowl took place on Sunday that if a “dude at your Super Bowl party is hyped about David Beckham’s H&M underwear ad, smack the ish out of him”. Read More »

Something big has happened to social media. In case you hadn’t noticed, social media is big – and getting bigger all the time. What was once the domain of just a small number of people is now everyday currency in and outside of business. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc are now familiar channels for many of us.

Now 23% of all the time we are online takes place on social networks and blogs. Internet users are now spending more time on Facebook than on any other web brand combined (Source: Nielson). Business is quickly catching on to the potential, with recent research showing that a third of companies in the UK now put up to 20% of their marketing budget into business social networking (Source: Regus). Read More »

The Twittersphere lit up last night as it was reported that Sky News was introducing a new social media policy that bans its journalists from retweeting non-Sky sources. Essentially the broadcaster that has done so much to establish its reputation in social news is taking an anti-social media approach.

Staff were informed of the new social media policy in an email that told staff not to “re-tweet information posted by other journalists or people on Twitter”. Read More »

I don’t have a Tesco Clubcard and I’m not a part of Boots Advantage. I don’t have a Starbuck’s card. I’m not even part of the Ikea Family.  I’m just not a loyalty programme sort of person.

My shopping is generally online where I can sift for bargains, compare sales and per unit prices and generally not be tempted by chocolate at the checkout.  I will click through to Gilt from a link that my sister posts on Facebook and I have even impulse-purchased a holiday online – not a danger I would face in your average checkout lane.  Rather than Hilton Honors or Nectar, I’m more likely to belong to Amazon Prime, have an Ocado delivery pass or to go through the quirky things on offer daily on Groupon. Read More »

I was recently asked to help someone I know promote their business product on my personal Facebook page. “Just post a link to our webstore” they enthusiastically suggested. I refused. One, because I didn’t have any interest whatsoever in their product, nor did I think any of my friends would, and two, because it would look so utterly false and out-of-place on my profile that it wasn’t worth the effort. I explained to this person that I very rarely, if ever, post status updates on Facebook. So if I was going to break that habit, I was certainly not going to do so in order to flog a bunch of crap; I’d just post some song lyrics or a cat picture or something like you’re meant to.

I give my friends more respect than selling miscellaneous products to them, and besides, they would all recognise it as being completely incongruous with my usual mute Facebook behaviour. It’s this blatant, heavy-handed advertising-dressed-up-as-genuine-communication-between-friends that really irks me about social media, and it’s the cynical monetizing and hierarchisation of this concept by companies like Klout that irritates even further.

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Digitally, Japan is now more ‘socially’ integrated than ever. Now is the best time for western brands to promote themselves in the same way they do for other nations. Here are 5 reasons why. Read More »

This marks the inauguration of our sector-by-sector examination of how well businesses are really performing in terms of social media.

With high street retailers closing down at an alarming rate, we felt the time was right to examine how some of the major players are performing in terms of social media. In the first of our snapshots, we look at the casual outdoor fashion sector, namely Fat Face, White Stuff, Joules, Superdry and Crew Clothing. Read More »

So this morning I went to create an account Pinterest, the new and very pretty virtual pinboard site that, like, EVERYONE is talking about. And oh no! They’re doing that thing where you can only sign up using your Facebook or Twitter login details. Like This Is My Jam. and Quora. And countless other new applications.

I mentioned on Twitter how much I dislike being forced to do this and had a flood of replies from people saying the same thing – along with the odd one saying well actually it’s quite a reasonable thing to do. So I thought I’d open it up to the group… Read More »