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Guest post by Jason Cobine from Cobine Carmelson

Cyber risks are losses and liabilities that a company faces as a result of using the internet, computer systems and email. A recent article highlights the £27billion cost of cyber crime in Britain.

Metro Article: Cyber Crime

Advances in technology bring a whole new set of risks to be managed, risks which traditional insurers generally exclude from their policies.

Examples include:

• Damage to your computer network due to harmful virus or hacker
• Loss of revenue due to downtime of a computer system caused by a virus or hacker
• Theft of your money (or your clients) due to hacking or employee electronic theft
• Theft of product designs, credit card numbers, address details, trade secrets
• Threat or extortion relating to your computer system, the dreaded DDOS attack
• Libelous or derogatory material posted by a bulletin board user
• Inadvertent release of clients confidential material
• Websites that don’t function properly
• Liability to a third party due to libel contained in an e-mail
• Liability to a third party due to a virus transmitted by you
• Liability to members of your staff due to them being exposed to sexual harassment via electronic systems i.e. pornographic images unintentionally viewed on a colleague’s PC

Examples of real life claims that traditional policies didn’t cover

The Financial Services Authority hit Zurich Insurance with an enormous £2.3m fine for losing thousands of British people’s personal data.

Norwich Union paid Western Provident £450,000 in order to settle a claim that a Norwich Union email incorrectly alleged that Western Provident was about to be investigated by the Department of Trade and Industry.

British Gas were forced to pay over £200,000 to an ex-employee arising from comments circulated via the internet that breached his privacy.

Citibank lost £6.25m to a hacker using an old computer in an accountancy office in St Petersburg.  He was arrested in the UK and extradited to the US where he is now serving a prison sentence.  The FBI has still not recovered £250,000 of the funds.

A computer engineer who had been employed to update the computer system of a sheet metal company was fired due to incompetence. When the company refused to pay him, he hacked into its computer system and deleted their files. It cost the company over £70,000 to rectify the damage.

A company used a celebrity’s name and photograph on their website and were sued for the “fair market value” of using his name plus additional damages exceeding £500,000.

How do you know if you are at risk?

It has never been easier to trade online and as consumer confidence in e-trade grows, online trading is only likely to increase.

Companies providing ‘shopping cart’ facilities and retaining credit card information on internal systems have experienced incredible growth.

Email and electronic newsletters are now used in abundance as a means of communication with customer’s suppliers and employees.

Those providing the following services may need to review their exposure:

1. traditional professional services over the internet
2. website developers, systems and computer consultants
3. companies that live on the net – clicks and mortar businesses
4. content providers such as portals, search engines and specialist providers of content
5. advertising agencies and traditional organisations utilising the internet for marketing

Why might you need the cover?

Anyone with the website has the liability of a publisher. Creating a website is simple, the exposures that come with it are not. Just this week there was news of a judgement on privacy.

Metro Article: Facebook and Google privacy

Typically, commercial companies have little or no concept of their resulting legal responsibilities. Moreover legislation continues to create new potential liabilities.

Why else should you be concerned?

Your computer or network may well have internal and external email. Perhaps you have a website? You might even generate income through e-commerce. Yet traditional insurance products do not address internet exposures such as copyright infringement, defamation or invasion of privacy.

Use our checklist to see if you are exposed to Cyber Liability Risks.

The main concerns of those we’ve helped recently related to costs incurred and losses made when a hacker struck or a web presence was hijacked.

Jason Cobine set up Cobine Carmelson after 19 years with 6 different insurance brokers. From looking after corporates for one of the three biggest brokers in the World to helping local businesses and property owners his ethos has always been the same – get the claims paid. Full stop.

An initial 15 minute exploratory conversation will help determine whether he can offer some benefits to your business. Visit www.cobinecarmelson.com.

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Marketing and PR: What’s the difference and do you need both? is a post from CtheChange: Web design packages to help you build online muscle. Visit us today to download our free report: "7 things london cabbies can teach us about building effective websites". Go to cthechange.com and enter your details.

Guest post by Tamsin Fox-Davies of tamsinfoxdavies.com

I am a marketing specialist working predominantly with small businesses. That’s ‘marketing’ with a capital ‘M’.

Marketing is what I blog about, tweet about, do videos on, and post about on Facebook. I run marketing events, mentoring programmes, and online marketing training sessions.

All marketing, marketing, mar-ket-ing.

However, I get a lot of enquiries which start something like this:

“We’d really like to have you help us with our PR…”.

Yes, that’s PR as in Public Relations, and I don’t do PR, I do marketing, as I mentioned in passing above (just in case you didn’t notice).

At this point I sigh to myself and wipe away a little tear at the thought that my lovely enquirer doesn’t want me after all or has maybe got me confused with some PR whizz. Woe is Tam…

…but then I realise that I shouldn’t be all woeful at all!

The thing is that many people (probably about half of entrepreneurs) don’t know when they start out that PR and marketing are actually different things with different jobs (which they are).

Of those that do know the difference, about half of them will start out thinking that marketing vs. PR is an either/or choice (which it’s not).

I’m here to give you one of my super-simple explanations of the difference between marketing & PR, why your business needs both things to make the impact you desire, and how you can take your first steps in the right direction.

Marketing vs. PR – what’s the difference?

“Marketing is everything that you say about yourself. PR is the art of getting other people to say nice things about you”.
Tamsin Fox-Davies

Yes, I just quoted myself, but I’m fed up with other people claiming that they said it first!

To break down what this quote means, marketing is every image, communication, product or service that you put out.

This includes your branding, your website, your emails to customers and partners, your packaging and your customer service. There’s a lot more to add to this list, but you should get the idea of the breadth of marketing now – it’s EVERYTHING you put out.

All of these things should be transmitting the same message about your business and your brand. As marketing is the bit that it’s easiest to control, you should be able to make sure that your marketing is in tune with the values of your business.

PR (or Public Relations, as it is sometimes still known) includes things like getting journalists to write articles about you and your business, to ensure that your brand reputation is maintained (and improved).

There IS a crossover between marketing and PR (for example, writing articles for other publications and using social media for business). However, if you are a smaller business, then you are likely to focus your PR efforts on getting column inches, and encouraging journalists and bloggers to write about you, rather than sponsoring big events, for example.

Small business PR tip: Your biggest potential pitfall is bad handling of negative press, comments and complaints. This is because people will now tweet or facebook about their poor experience, which is then seen by their friends who are probably your potential customers. What you have to do is spot those public complaints and work very hard to satisfy the complainer (also in public, so their friends see how nice you really are).

How to get started with marketing and PR for your business

Most businesses are ‘doing’ marketing and PR in a reactive way, even if they don’t know it.

They could be commissioning a new website because their competitor has just done so, or created a brochure because a customer asked for one.

This sort of ad-hoc approach is better than nothing (most of the time) but will be wasting time and money, and won’t be nearly as effective as a planned approach. So, the secret to getting started with marketing & PR is to make a plan. You can do this by going to marketing and PR agencies or by doing it yourself.

If you want to go to an agency, get clear about your budget and find a team that know about your industry and target market.

To create your own marketing & PR plans, you first need to learn a little about the subject, and good places to start are www.doyourownpr.com (for PR) and www.tamsinfoxdavies.com (for marketing). Both sites have lots of free info available.

Next, put your plan together using nothing more complicated than a pen and paper. At this stage you don’t need any fancy planning tools, just write a list that includes what you want to achieve, how you want to achieve it, and when you need to do it by – everything else follows from there. The important thing is that YOU can follow it.

More tools and information

For more information and PR or marketing tools, read around appropriate blogs (like this one!), follow some good people on Twitter, and consider going to a relevant seminar or two as well. You’ll pick up quite a lot of knowledge quite quickly, and if you want to come on one of my courses a little later on, it would be a pleasure to see you there.

Tamsin is London’s favourite marketing mentor, and specialises in helping small businesses get the biggest bang for their buck. Go to www.tamsinfoxdavies.com to download your complementary guide to The Top 5 FREE Marketing Tools All Small Businesses Should Be Using.

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Guest post by Jason Cobine from Beyond Networking

When business networking is done correctly it is a great source of connections, alliances and eventual business leads. But many networkers fail to exploit its full potential because they are being boring, unprofessional, or both.

In a recent LinkedIn poll, 50% of businesspeople indicated that dull presentations are what really puts them off when it comes to networking:

LinkedIn Poll Results

Being dull beat “getting up early” and “pressure to bring referrals”. Who would have thought a presentation can be such a turn off? It’s a timely reminder that everything we do when networking can be a debit from, or a credit to your brand’s credibility bank account.

I recently attended an event where the presentation given didn’t actually help the brand of the presenter, or that of the host. Their brands were reduced in quality, and there were unfulfilled attendees at the event. By remembering the 7 Ps of networking, you can prevent such unfortunate results.

How do networkers fail to plan?

The presentation involved IT equipment that wasn’t up to scratch. The presenter’s continual apologies attracted more attention to the problem than to any solution. Possible buyers were left with second thoughts about a real project for which the presenter was in the running. The failure to plan meant this one-off job probably went to someone else — especially if feedback wasn’t sought, and a recovery wasn’t set in motion.

The host at the seminar failed to have an agenda, loose or otherwise, which meant there wasn’t enough time to cover everything detailed in the invite. This left the paying attendees unfulfilled and having second thoughts about attending future events, and possibly re-considering the host’s other services.

Time spent planning is often wasted.

Without a doubt, both the presenter and the host prepared, yet in each case their brands were devalued because they provided less than they outwardly offered. The time that they did spend preparing was wasted. A little more preparation time would have ensured satisfaction for everyone.

A prospect having second thoughts is pretty dire. Yet seminar attendees have already spent their money, and there are usually a few that are happy to spread the word, good or bad as it may be. That’s the price of being a host: attendees have the ability to promote your future events … or not.

What are the 7 Ps?

The 7 Ps are often used by the armed forces to prevent the waste of time, effort and resources — yet can we apply them anywhere? “Prior preparation and planning prevent perilously poor performance.” Do you think this mantra would have lead to a different outcome for the presenter and host? (In the armed forces they don’t use the adjective “perilously.” I’m far too polite to repeat the word the armed forces use, so you’ll have to use your imagination.)

After taking this on board, remember the 3 Ps: practice, practice, practice. Every business networking presentation is a real opportunity to shine, and practicing before presenting avoids irreversible damage to your brand.

If a presentation is perfect, that means it can never be improved. Securing feedback will change that. I think your most dissatisfied customer is the most important source of feedback. What do you think? Share your opinion by leaving a comment below.

Wrap up

Every time you are in front of potential clients, or in front of people who can offer you useful introductions, you have an opportunity. Will you make that opportunity into a credit or a debit? Branding and rapport take much time to build, but only seconds to ruin. Remember the 7 Ps.

Top Tip

If you are using technology in a presentation, do a dry run if you are not familiar with the equipment. And have a non-technical backup, just in case.

Jason specialises in generating endless introductions for all kinds of businesspeople. Beyond Networking offers seminars, workshops and individual mentoring, all aimed at helping you get the best return on your networking efforts.

Do you want to turn cards into cash? Download Jason’s free report to learn the 5 questions you must ask before you go networking again: http://www.beyondnetworking.co.uk/5-networking-questions-to-ask

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How to get great value when you hire a virtual assistant: A beginner’s guide is a post from CtheChange: Web design packages to help you build online muscle. Visit us today to download our free report: "7 things london cabbies can teach us about building effective websites". Go to cthechange.com and enter your details.

Try writing up the role of “small business owner” as a job specification. The results are scary, because the list of tasks and responsibilities will be many pages long, ending with a one-sentence paragraph summarising the future employee’s desired personality trait: “Must be certifiably insane!”

Many small businesses struggle to get off the ground because they suffer from a lack of leverage and scale. They’re unable to grow because each and every task, from product development through marketing & sales to delivery, customer service, finance, IT and administration all have to pass across the desk of one isolated, over-worked individual: You.

If I had the chance to go back two years and start this business over again, I would do one thing differently, and that is to look for outsourcing opportunities from the start. Alas, as it happens, it has taken us a while to start unlocking the hidden potential of targeted outsourcing
.

Things to keep in mind when you hire a virtual assistant

We were amongst the lucky winners in Chris Ducker’s Virtual Business Lifestyle “Win a free virtual assistant for a month” competition. The prize: 10 hours’ service from a virtual assistant (VA).

My first question was “How much value can someone add to my business in 10 hours?”

I then looked at my ever-growing To Do list and came to a realisation.  If I set aside tasks that I deem to take 10 hrs to complete, it would take me 3 days to work my way through that list. Why? Simply because I deal with so many interruptions during the day. So having a VA dedicate 10 hours of their time to completing my task list is a real result.  I don’t have a degree in economics but this seems like a good deal.

I knew from following the VBL blog, Tyrone Shum’s blog & Cliff  Ravenscraft’s Virtual Assistant podcast that you have to be specific when assigning tasks to a VA.  So I sat down and created a comprehensive list of the tasks I needed to get done.

Things I did right

1. Picked the right kind of task

Seeing that this was only going to be for 10 hrs, I was not going to ask the VA to take repetitive admin tasks off my hands.  That would require training, so it would be the wrong approach for this exercise. I opted instead for giving them a fixed number of research tasks which I knew could be completed in 2 to 3 hr blocks.  See this link for the detail.

2. Let them know how this piece of work would benefit us

Any task description would start with an opportunity for the VA to familiarise herself with a section of my business or one of our websites. E.g. 15 min – go to the website InspectorGrape.com and familiarise yourself with it. I felt it important to give them adequate time to get an idea of what my business is about.  It’s pointless expecting them to add value to my business if they have no idea how that piece of work will benefit it.

3. Be specific – give them detail to work with

I indicated how much time should be spent on each task, and specified

• search terms to use in Google
• specific data items to look for on these sites inc contact details & social media links
• further research to find independent reviews
• how to structure a report containing all this information

4. Further Guidance

As a guide I also mentioned that I would prefer a list of 10 well-researched institutes rather than a list of 100’s with no prioritisation.   I felt these instructions had the right combination of specific steps to follow while leaving a little space for initiative on the VA’s side.

Some mistakes to avoid

1. Assuming stuff

I sent an email with the request “Please review the assigned tasks & timeslots and let me know if they are adequate or too ambitious?” I received no reply and ASSUMED that my all my tasks would be completed within the allocated time slots. However 1 report was not completed because the VA ran out of time.

2. Failure to prioritise

If I had prioritised the tasks I would not run the risk of the most important report not getting done.

3. Not following up

I was told the VA would spend 5hrs on 2 consecutive days completing my tasks – Thursday & Friday.  By Tuesday the following week I had not received any feedback. I should have followed up the email trail on the previous Friday enquiring about the completed work.  Turns out there was some miscommunication and the VA had completely different timeslots assigned to the work over a 2 week period.

What about the actual work delivered?

I have to say that I was really – and I mean REALLY surprised when I reviewed the reports Nilo produced for us.  I was afraid that someone would just copy & paste stuff willy nilly from the web into a report.  But I could actually see that she had put thought into searching, filtering and presenting the findings.

For example one report was about the use of Facebook Pages VS Facebook Groups.  The easy thing to do would be just to copy text from the Facebook help section. However my report – cheekily titled Facebook Groups VS Pages: The Definitive Guide (I like it!) contained screenshots, grouped arguments, tips, comparison tables and forum comments.  And to top it all off a fantastic forum post showing step by step how to use both Pages & Groups in a way that capitalizes on the strengths of each.

So what was the result of my experience?

At the risk of sounding like an Oscar acceptance speech – first off I have to thank Chris for running this competition and handing us a consolation prize.  In a very short period of time I learnt so much about how to work with a VA, what to expect, what input to give them and how valuable my own time is.  My business partner and I are now looking at our processes and task lists to see how we can ensure we outsource to the maximum affect.  Pretty soon we will be knocking on Mr Ducker’s door to help us find a super VA.

Do you have any experience hiring virtual assistants? What kind of tasks do you use them for? Any tips and/or lessons learnt? Drop a comment below to join the conversation.

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6 Easy Steps to World Domination through Social Media is a post from CtheChange: Web design packages to help you build online muscle. Visit us today to download our free report: "7 things london cabbies can teach us about building effective websites". Go to cthechange.com and enter your details.

Guest post by Kimberly Moore from Parasol Creations.

The world of business becomes more challenging every day – hostile economies, increasing competition and in the midst of it all, the new-fangled world of Social Media emerges. Suddenly everyone is talking about tweeting and facebooking, linking in and out, flickring this and foursquaring that – not to mention the whole government-toppling revolution bits.

Attempting to sort the relevant information has left many business owners confused and prone to taking a negative stance. But if I told you that you could achieve world domination in six easy steps with a social media plan – would you be interested? Of course you would. You are savvy, forward-thinking and not about to let a silly blue bird run you off from dominating your market.

World Domination is a mindset.  Social media platforms have equalized opportunities for reaching customers at a fraction of the cost of traditional methods – it is time for you to get your battle plan on.

1.  Identify and Isolate your Targets

You can’t dominate a market if you don’t know who your target is. Customers are what keep the doors open for any business; and businesses that have been relying on traditional and print media may have seen a drastic downturn in leads from those sources. The reason?  Your customers are spending more and more time online:

In 2010, 30.1 million adults in the UK (60 per cent) accessed the Internet every day or almost every day. This is nearly double the estimate in 2006 of 16.5 million. The number of adults who bought or ordered goods or services online within the last 12 months reached 31 million in 2010. These Internet shoppers represented 62 per cent of all adults. (Office of National Statistics)

Targeting your customers where they are spending their time every day is a no-brainer. Optimizing your online presence also means that you are reaching beyond a local or regional base – going global is within the realm of success for small businesses with the appropriate products and services and will allow you to achieve true World Domination.

2.  Have a Battle Plan

All good Generals have a plan.  Business owners need to approach marketing and social media the same way that Generals look at a battlefield – with a plan. Many businesses are working with limited assets so wasting time and money is not an option.  Informed decisions and a strategic plan will win the day.

Answer these questions: What is your current marketing plan? What is your monthly/annual budget for marketing? Is your customer base online? How would you classify your current online presence? What are the lead sources that are no longer producing?  How are you ready to change your mind about connecting with your customer base?

3.  Who is in Charge?

As the General for your business, you know that every good General has experts and Brigadier Generals for all specialties.  Why would branding and marketing your business be any different?  Spreading your assets too thin means a hole in your line and that is the hole that will cost you customer leads and referrals.

You have a choice to make at this point. You can either be the expert, or hire one for your team.  Most of the Social Media platforms are free – there are lots of online tutorials, blog posts and opinions out there and it seems fairly simple, right?  Sure, if you have the time and energy to learn a whole new area of expertise.  A Social Media specialist will provide you with the expertise and knowledge that you need to analyze your critical business and marketing requirements, craft a strategic plan, execute the plan and achieve success.

4.  Engage the Battle & Press the Big Red Button

You have identified your targets, you have a strategic plan, you have experts to lead you to the right decisions – now it is time to press the big, red button. The key component to successful execution of a Social Media and World Domination plan is engagement and networking. The most successful brands and businesses on social media are doing the following:

• Talking to their customers every day online via Twitter, Facebook and other platforms
• Providing relevant information on their industry, their products and trends via a corporate blog
• Establishing themselves as an expert in their industry and networking with other industry leaders
• Engaging their customers to find out what motivates them to buy and what inspires loyalty
• Responding to customer concerns and experiences in real time
• Accessing a larger customer base and generating leads from new sources every day
• Testing micro-marketing campaigns before putting all of their eggs in one basket
• Engaging, Engaging, Engaging & building influential networks

5.  Go Guerrilla

Guerrilla Marketing is the name of the game and it’s time to take no prisoners. Final goal – World Domination.  Social Media is the optimal theater for Guerrilla marketing tactics; fast-acting strategies, the ability to manoeuvre quickly in response to results, application of non-traditional methods and true engagement with your customers without a corporate barrier.

6.  Achieve World Domination

The final initiative – ask yourself – Are you ready for World Domination?

Kimberly Moore is the Managing Director for Parasol Creations – A New Media Consortium of Creative Professionals.

The philosophy of Parasol Creations is Social Media Marketing for World Domination.

Service specialties are social media management, cross channel networking and promotions, and helping brands and businesses achieve success in the world of new media.  One day, she will have a pink tank.

Related posts:

1. Marketing and PR: What’s the difference and do you need both?

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Guest post by Nikki Hutchison from Chilli Pepper.

Did you know that most people make their opinion of someone in just 90 seconds? This applies not only to employers, but applicants too!

Would you be impressed by a potential employer who kept you waiting in the reception area for more than 10 minutes, wasn’t professionally dressed or had a limp handshake? Yes, the applicant has to make a good impression but don’t forget that the applicant also needs to be impressed. How can this be achieved, and what are the common mistakes employers make in this regard? Here I’ve identified 5 of them.

1. Lack of enthusiasm

The biggest fault an employer can make when hiring people is to not take the interview process seriously. Interviewing applicants may not feel like the best use of your time. However, don’t make the mistake of sending a more junior member of staff into the interview as this can put the organisation at risk of losing a strong applicant. I would always recommend that the first interview especially is conducted by someone senior within the organisation.

2. Forgetting to sell

Not giving enough attention to the job specification is the 2nd biggest fault that an employer can make. Many job specifications are out of date, recycled and put together within minutes. If you are looking to attract the best candidates, including individuals who may not necessarily be actively looking for a new role, then you have to entice them by selling the role through exceptional job specifications.

Many employers fail to understand that they need to sell the role, the organisation and its employees to entice the strongest candidates in the market. It’s important to emphasise how candidates will benefit from joining your organisation.

3. Being unrealistic

Wouldn’t it be great to find the perfect candidate who ticks all the boxes for a role? However, did you know that people are unlikely to go for a like-for-like role unless they are currently being underpaid or have personal issues within the team or company that they work for?

In order to find the right candidate for your role you need to be realistic as to what motivates people to move. Selling the benefits of the role (see above) are important along with financial compensation. Why would a candidate move out of their comfort zone and into essentially the same role if there is no financial incentive for them?

But beware, if you’re recruiting someone who is moving purely for a monetary reason then there is a risk that this employee may move along swiftly once someone else offers them better money.

4. Passing unfair judgement

Don’t assume that someone who is not currently working is unsuitable to take on a new role. There is absolutely nothing wrong with being made redundant.

When interviewing an applicant who is not currently working it’s important to identify what they have been doing to keep active. Ask them to explain their current day as, after all, it’s now their job to find a job.

Has the applicant enrolled onto courses to improve their skills, knowledge or self-development? Perhaps they have attended seminars or workshops to improve their job seeking or personal skills?

Perhaps they have pursued an interest or hobby which otherwise would have been put to one side if working. There is no right or wrong answer but showing initiative and having something of interest to say during an interview adds to the person’s character and can also help you to identify their approach to work.

5. Keeping silent

Feedback is an important part of the process when hiring people, however it’s generally extremely poor and in some cases even forgotten.

For various reasons people don’t like to pass on bad news, but constructive feedback is very important to an applicant. It can help to improve interview technique and will also leave the applicant with a positive impression of the company should a more suitable role become available in the future.

It may seem obvious, but passing on good news is also vital during the interview process. If you’re keen to proceed then informing the applicant as soon as possible is essential, as any time delay could mean that you lose a potential employee.

Please note that I would never encourage an employer to make an offer after a first interview, this can sometimes overwhelm an applicant, it can also give the impression of being desperate and on many occasions any offers made in such a short time will be declined.

A City Banking Recruitment Consultant since early 1999, Nikki has proven experience in supporting individuals to secure their next career move within the Investment Banking sector.

Prior to her roles in recruitment Nikki spent eight years working within the Investment Banking industry. Over the years Nikki has built up a strong reputation for providing the highest level of service to all her clients and building long term relationships as a result.

Chilli Pepper Global provides a career mentoring service that specialises in giving executives an edge over their competitors. It’s important to note that Chilli Pepper Global is not a recruitment agency and work only with talented people to support their success www.chillipepperglobal.com

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There is a lot of hype around video marketing. It is often driven by affiliate marketers who want to sell the latest DIY, promote-your-business-on-autopilot products. The result? An Internet spammed with low-grade, ill-focused and ineffective videos which look like your 3-year-old niece could have made them.

The poisonous “must have” fallacy

Small business owners are simply bombarded with an ever-growing list of online “must haves” … you MUST Tweet, you MUST have a Facebook fan page … if you don’t use YouTube you’re stupid … it makes my head spin sometimes.

And what utter rubbish! Yes, there is no denying that these tools, applied correctly, can be hugely beneficial to your business. But on the flipside, there is nothing worse for your business and brand than having a Facebook fan page with 3 followers (2 of which are your own kids) and a lonely status update saying “Hello World”.

I see many, many examples of these, where small business owners attended a course by some “social media guru”, excitedly opened up a new Twitter account, pasted links to said account all over their website, email signature and monthly newsletters … only to leave the account dormant and sadly unattended because they do not have the time, knowledge or inclination to make it work for them.

The same holds true for video. Many people will disagree with me here, but I cannot see the point of spamming YouTube with crappy-looking, ineffective, slideshow-based videos “promoting” your business. OK, so sometimes really cheap videos can be extremely effective, but there’s an important word in that sentence – sometimes.

First, you must ask some important questions

When it comes to online marketing, there are some points you need to address before you press “record” or post a single Tweet:

• Who is my target market?
• Where do they congregate?
• How will they find my content? Search engines? Social bookmarking? Social networks?
• What will I offer them that is unique / entertaining / thought-provoking to make them come back for more?
• What are the desired outcomes? Brand recognition? Direct marketing? List building?
• How will I measure performance against these outcomes, and how will I improve performance?

Video marketing: A specific example of a successful application

One of our clients, T2 Direct Ltd, sells Home, Garden, DIY Products & Homeware online and via mail order.

THE CHALLENGE

• To add an extra dimension to complement their existing offline marketing efforts

• To show the features and benefits of their products online and re-enforce their brand values

THE METHOD

We decided to produce instructional videos showing products being used in a home environment, emphasising the key features and benefits. Rather than just sell, they aim to educate as well.

THE RESULTS

• They started with nothing, but have since clocked up 170,000 video views on their YouTube channel
• The videos were embedded on their e-Commerce website, and the conversion rates for video products increased by up to 77%. That’s pretty impressive, right?
• One unexpected benefit has been the impact the videos have on customer enquiries. The customer service team can now refer clients to the videos when they have questions about using the products. This makes customer service calls more efficient, cuts down on follow-up calls and ultimately saves time and money.

BUT TAKE NOTE

These videos were made with a specific objective. They were planned, scripted and shot with professional voiceover. They were not made “on the fly”.

A lot of the YouTube channel views were attained through the videos being embedded on paid-for advertising sites. In other words, video marketing has enhanced and complemented their existing marketing efforts, but it has by no means replaced them.

THE POINT

Don’t be a Luddite, but don’t be a fad junkie either. Yes, embrace and use the latest tools such as video marketing but know why you’re using them and have a clear, measurable strategy to adapt and improve.

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Customer Testimonials: 7 Tips to get the most from client feedback is a post from CtheChange: Web design packages to help you build online muscle. Visit us today to download our free report: "7 things london cabbies can teach us about building effective websites". Go to cthechange.com and enter your details.

When was the last time you booked a hotel online without checking customer testimonials, either on the booking site or by reading reviews on Tripadvisor? When it comes to making buying decisions, we have always valued the opinions of those who took the risk and spent the money before us. And recent advances in social media and user-generated content has made it easy for us to get access to this information.

In fact, the Nielsen report of July 2009 (www.nielsen.com) finds that “Opinions posted by consumers online are the most trusted forms of advertising globally … 70% of people trust consumer opinions posted online – up 9% since April ‘07?.

Using customer testimonials is a powerful way to tap into this psychology, but they can sometimes lack punch because of poor execution and a lack of credibility. Luckily, these problems can easily be overcome if you follow some basic guidelines.

Customer Testimonials: How to capture, present and use them

1. Have a plan

This may sound obvious, but many companies miss out on the opportunity to get good feedback simply because they don’t have a clear strategy to capture it. The best time to get a customer’s opinion is directly after the product or service has been delivered, when the experience is still fresh in their mind. Make sure that you have an easy, efficient process in place.

2. Ask specific questions

It’s important not to be lazy. Questions such as “How did you find our service?” are easy to formulate but may lead to vague, weak answers. Take some time to identify specific issues which you may want to address when encountering new prospects, or brand values which you’d like to emphasise, and ask your questions accordingly.

3. That’s me!

Don’t forget the power of storytelling and social proof. Prospective clients are much more likely to respond to testimonials they can associate with. Something to make them think: “That’s me!” Encourage your existing clients to give specific examples describing the problem they faced, why they decided to choose your service and how it helped them overcome their challenges.

4. Location, location, location

Once you’ve made the effort to capture testimonials, don’t hide them on the About Us page. They are most powerful when addressing specific questions that may be running through your prospects’ heads. Split them up, and place them strategically through your website where they can be most effective.

5. Add credibility

At the very least, ensure that you name the person and/or company who provided the testimonial, and get their permission to include a link to their website or blog. It is vital to show that these have not been made up to add credibility. Using audio or video is of course a great way to overcome issues of trust and credibility, although the practicality of going down this route does depend on the nature of your product or service.

6. Get talking

Think further than your company website. Are you using social media tools such as Twitter to find out what people are saying about you, and are you participating in that conversation?

7. Get talked about

In addition to having static testimonials, make sure that people are able to leave unsolicited, un-edited comments, like Apple does. This shows confidence and a commitment to client feedback and satisfaction.

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Video promotion: 7 ways to increase the visibility of your business is a post from CtheChange: Web design packages to help you build online muscle. Visit us today to download our free report: "7 things london cabbies can teach us about building effective websites". Go to cthechange.com and enter your details.

There is a lot of talk out there about the merits of using video promotion. Still many companies, especially smaller businesses, fear that the exercise may be prohibitively time consuming and expensive.

Of course there are times when marketing materials (text, still – or moving images) need to be produced professionally. But this is not always the case and the trick is to know which tools to use under what circumstances. If you want to create a personal and informal conversation with your target audience, you can use technology such as Sony’s Bloggie to create content of acceptable quality. Look at this example of a real estate agent in the US who uses this kind of video quite effectively.

Video Promotion: What are the options?

So what to do with your video once you’ve fired up the webcam to deliver some punchy lines? Here are some useful tips on how you can make your content work for you:

1. Use free hosting services

You don’t necessarily have to approach your web developer or ISP to ask for extra functionality or bandwidth to host your videos. For most purposes, free services such as YouTube or Vimeo will do the trick. Learning to use these websites is really straightforward, but if you do get stuck there is a wealth of good “how-to” sites and videos out there to help you on your way (note: Vimeo is not really meant to be used for commercial purposes, so tread carefully if you’re a for-profit organisation).

2. Tag & link to let them find you

YouTube is more than just a video hosting service. It is also the world’s second largest search engine. Adding descriptions and tags will ensure that people find you as and when they’re looking for information related to your product or service. You can also use the built-in links functionality to include hyperlinks back to your site or blog from the uploaded video, at precisely the point in the video where you may have a call to action. Both tagging and linking are effective ways to boost your SEO efforts.

3. Bring your blog to life

Once your video lives on YouTube, it is easy to share via email and social networking sites. More importantly, you can use the embed functionality to include the video in your blog posts. Here’s an example of a YouTube video, embedded:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pd4d8A6Czq8

4. Many birds with one stone

As you get more confident, you may want to get your videos seen by a much wider audience. There are lots of video hosting sites out there, but it can become time consuming to upload the videos to each of them, every time. Using a distribution service such as Tube Mogul means that you only have to load the video once to have it automatically posted to a range of different video hosting sites.

5. Get in their pockets

If you have the time to produce a series of videos focusing on a particular topic, a useful way of distributing them is to create a video podcast. Services such as Libsyn will do the work for you to ensure your episodes appear in various podcast directories, including iTunes. This opens up a whole new potential audience of interested people who choose to consume their content via mobile devices. Having your podcast episodes listed and/or hosted on many different directories also gives you excellent exposure in search engine terms.

6. Get shared

The holy grail of video distribution is to get shared. If you ensure that your videos are interesting, informative and to the point, people are likely to share them with their friends on social networking and bookmarking sites. This way your message goes on autopilot. Remember to kick-start the sharing process by posting links to your video and/or blog posts using your own social networking and bookmarking accounts such as Facebook, Twitter,LinkedIn, Delicious and Digg.

But beware: Don’t fall into the trap of making long, tedious and un-edited videos which bore people to death! Unsurprisingly these don’t tend to get shared that often.

7. Participate

You can’t make video and social media work for you if you treat it as a one-way street. It’s all about having a conversation. Use Google and YouTube to search for relevant content, comment on other people’s videos, ask questions and respond to comments others leave for you.

This kind of online video  promotion will not replace your existing marketing and promotion efforts, and it will take some time before you realise the benefits. But a little bit of thought and targeted, regular effort can lead to huge long-term benefits. And if you execute it sensibly, the exercise doesn’t have to take over your life or ruin your bank balance.

Concerned about spam and your privacy? There is no need to be. Read our privacy policy for more details.

Related posts:

1. Video marketing: Look beyond the hype to reap the benefits