velvet connect

Creating buzz through interactive online competitions

velvet — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 14:08:21 +0000

With the rise of social media platforms like facebook and Twitter, the world is quickly learning to interact online in a multitude of ways. The magic words these days seem to be ‘interact’ and ‘engage’. This development has clearly influenced the way online competitions are held nowadays. In the past, competition formats were somewhat limited to participants submitting an entry (a bit of text, a photo, or both) and learning a few weeks later if their entry received favorable marks from a panel of judges. These days, as media becomes more social, it’s the power or rather, the discretion, of the public that counts. Companies are learning that they can create a lot more buzz by not only soliciting entries from the public but by encouraging participants to lobby for votes, thereby spreading the word about the competition. You can count on the contestants to post links to their entries on their facebook pages, emails, blogs, tweets and other social media platforms. This is a brilliant marketing (and link-building) tactic and a powerful new instrument to build brand awareness.

One of the latest competitions to employ this tactic is the new Radisson Blu ‘Greatest Holiday in the World‘ competition. The Radisson Blu chain of hotels is offering a grand prize of 365 hotel nights in any of their 200+ hotels around the world over a 5 year period.

To participate, contestants visit the greatest holiday in the world site and tell Radisson why they deserve the prize above everyone else and upload photos or videos to back their arguments. Contestants are urged to spread the word by asking their friends, family and colleagues to vote for their entry. The contestant with the most votes wins! This competition is only open to citizens/residents of the European Union as well as Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Switzerland. However, everyone can vote for the entries. It’s that simple! The competition closes on July 24th 2010.

To keep the momentum of the competition going, Radission Blu is offering up to 10 weekly prizes for the most entertaining entries. Winners are selected based on humour, creativity and originality used to present their stories. This is a simple competition but oh so effective in creating buzz around the Radisson Blu brand. All thanks to social media!

Go ahead, submit your entry, start lobbying for votes and who knows, you might be the lucky winner of 365 hotel nights anywhere in the world!

Note: this is a Sponsored Post.

How I Use Apture On My Blog

velvet — Tue, 11 May 2010 23:22:01 +0000

Those who frequently read my posts on Velvet Escape will have noticed the funky-looking pop-up maps, Twitter profiles or Wikipedia notes. I had been searching for a while for a way to effectively integrate maps, videos and photos into my posts. Then, last November, I discovered Apture. I tested it and within minutes, I was convinced that this was the plugin of the year… for me anyway! Apture has since lifted my blog to a whole different level by facilitating an enhanced reader experience.

How I use Apture on my blog

A pop-up displays the Amazon product

Since using Apture, I’ve been able to do many cool things with amazing ease. Here are 6 ways I use Apture (including examples of posts to illustrate how the plugin is used):

Search for and embed photos & videos in my posts
Create links to Twitter profiles
Include maps to my posts (either as a pop-up or an embed)
Provide extra information sourced from Wikipedia
Sell Amazon products (e.g. books) from within my posts
Upload documents (such as pdf’s) that can be viewed by my readers without having to leave the page.

The Apture Search Bar

Apture recently introduced another cool feature: the Search bar. The Search bar only appears when readers scroll down the page. The bar houses a logo of my blog (which links back to my home page), social media icons which allow readers to easily share the post via Twitter, facebook or email, and a search field. Apture neatly organises the search results by source, including a separate header for my blog posts that contain the search term. That way, readers are encouraged to dig deeper into my blog and hence, prolong their stay. Brilliant stuff!

Two more reasons why I love Apture

For such an amazing plugin, it hasn’t noticeably slowed down the load time of my blog.
Apture’s Customer Support is excellent – they’re helpful, personable and prompt!

I have absolutely no qualms recommending Apture to every blogger.

Note: this post was not sponsored by Apture. I just love this plugin!

Promote your blog in your email signature

velvet — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 11:08:12 +0000

It’s in many top-10 lists of things to do to drive more traffic to your blog: promote your blog in your email signature. It’s difficult to track how much traffic one gets from email signatures but I’m convinced it works. Having your blog name and URL as well as links to your Skype and facebook/Twitter pages under each email you send provides your contacts with more options to connect with you. Furthermore, each and every person you email is a potential reader of your blog. In addition, signatures give your emails a distinctive touch.

Until recently, I used Gmail’s built-in signature option to add my name, blog URL and Twitter account to every email I sent. Then, a few weeks ago, I discovered WiseStamp.

WiseStamp

WiseStamp is a brilliant application that allows its users to create customized email signatures. You can include your own text, change the colour and font style, add an image and URLs AND it features a nifty set of social media icons to which you can link your various facebook, Twitter, flickr accounts. These icons are included at the bottom of every outgoing email – you can specify if the signature appears only in new emails and/or in replies/forwards. You can also create separate signatures for personal and business emails.

sample email signature

That’s not all WiseStamp offers. You can also include your MSN and Skype names – these appear as icons as well. The best feature, in my opinion, is the simple RSS feed that adds a link highlighting your latest blog post.

WiseStamp is still in beta and is currently available for a limited number of browsers, such as Firefox and Google Chrome (they’re working on including Safari soon). It also only works with the big names in webmail programs: Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail and AOL.

I’ve been using WiseStamp for about a week now and I’m pleased with its many customizable features – the coolest thing is seeing my latest blog post at the bottom of every email I send. WiseStamp certainly gets a thumbs up from me!

Follow WiseStamp on Twitter.

Boost your reader base by commenting

velvet — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 15:31:49 +0000

In the past few months, I’ve received a steady amount of traffic from sites like Mashable, ProBlogger and recently, the New York Times. At first I wondered why I was getting traffic from these sites, then I realised that I’d left comments on various articles. The traffic I receive isn’t much – at most 5-10 views a day – but it introduces new readers to my blogs. I once left a comment on a Mashable article that was trending. My contribution to the discussion prompted a modest ‘rush’ (30-50 visits a day during the first few days) to my blog.

This has taught me that leaving relevant comments on other blogs or websites does help to increase the readership base of your blog. Most blogs/sites allow commenters to add their URL’s and that’s how readers find you. Leaving comments on other blogs/sites is now one of my strategies to drive traffic to my blogs. I’m not too particular about which blogs I leave comments on – just as long as the post piques my interest and I have something to say about it.

When leaving a comment, please keep the following points in mind:

Read the post!
Leave a comment that’s relevant and which adds value to the discussion
Fill in your URL
It’s ok to add a link to one of your blog posts if you think it adds value (don’t include more than two links)
Go back to the post a day later and see if anyone has replied to your comment. If appropriate, leave a follow-up comment.

Marketing travel: travel blogger case studies

velvet — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 14:30:16 +0000

I wrote an article several months ago about the role travel bloggers can play in marketing travel. My fellow travel blogger, Andy Jarosz recently published an insightful post about travel bloggers promoting destinations. Since my first ‘Marketing Travel’ article, I’ve been on two travel blogger press (or ‘fam’) trips.

Travel bloggers in Barcelona

Travel Blogger trip to Catalonia

The first was to Catalonia, Spain, organised by the Tourism Department of Catalonia. Ten travel bloggers from Spain, the Netherlands (me), France, England and the USA were invited for a four-day all-expenses paid trip to Catalonia. The tweeting started in earnest in the run-up to the trip. A hashtag for tweets #catexp (for Catalunya Experience) was created, making it easy for everyone to follow the trip. The trip itinerary was diverse and action-packed, from a culinary course in Barcelona to hiking and quad-biking in the mountains to a Segway tour of Barcelona. The organisers did a brilliant job and the trip received tremendous exposure by means of thousands of tweets and retweets, and a broad array of blog posts (in English, Spanish and French), videos and photos. One of the participants, Rich Whitaker, compiled a list of the blog output generated by that trip. The amount (30 blog posts, 10 videos & 6 flickr photo sets) and quality of the content is truly staggering. Here are the stats of my three posts:

Experiencing Catalonia: 940 views, 26 retweets.
Culinary Journey: Castellar del Riu: 1,081 views, 53 retweets.
The Delights of La Boqueria: 1,328 views, 85 retweets.

The Catalunya Experience travel blogger trip is a classic example of how tourism offices and tour operators can collaborate with travel bloggers to generate buzz for a certain destination. Using the boundless possibilities of social media (primarily blogs, twitter, facebook and flickr), travel bloggers are able to generate publicity for destinations that can reach thousands, possibly tens of thousands, of people. The best thing about a blog post or online video, as opposed to a newspaper or magazine article, is that it stays on the internet for as long as the blog exists. In addition, social media channels are interactive platforms which allow readers to ask questions and find out more, making it even more appealing as a means to convert initial interest into a booking.

Publicity for City Inn Birmingham, with their iMac-equipped rooms

Birmingham

My second fam trip was my recent weekend in Birmingham, England. The trip was sponsored by Visit Birmingham and bmibaby. Unlike the fam trip to Catalonia, I was on my own this time. I specifically asked for lots of free time so I could experience the city on my own. I tweeted as I explored the city, sending photos and links of places I visited to my Velvet Escape Twitter account. I also wrote two posts on my Velvet Escape blog covering the trip. To provide an idea of the kind of publicity that can be generated by a single blogger on a fam trip, I’ve listed below the stats of my Birmingham tweets and blog posts (all stats as at Feb. 2nd, 2010, though the numbers will rise after this post is published).

Posts

Experiencing Birmingham (1st post): 667 views, 117 retweets: http://su.pr/2h1l8u
Ten things to do in Birmingham (post-trip post): 888 views, 48 retweets http://su.pr/2kOmka

Tweets with links

180 views; 11 retweets: And… it’s stopped raining! #brumtwitrip Off for a pint now before dinner at Asha’s http://su.pr/1baAa5
139 views; 1 retweet: City Inn has attentive service, good b’fast selection, iMacs/free wifi in evry rm. Bthrms a tad small tho! http://su.pr/2ScyIj #brumtwitrip
228 views; 5 retweets: I really enjoyed my tour of the BBC. See my news broadcast by entering code: 012478578 in BeOnTV http://su.pr/5L77Ec #brumtwitrip

Twitpics

121 views: http://www.twitpic.com/z6xmo (me & my iMac in the room: City Inn)
61 views: http://www.twitpic.com/z9arv (Brindleyplace)
26 views: http://www.twitpic.com/z9aym (ferris wheel B’ham)
61 views: http://www.twitpic.com/z9bas (curry at Asha’s)
47 views: http://www.twitpic.com/zdu4c (BMAG)
72 views: http://www.twitpic.com/zducr (the Bull)
72 views: http://www.twitpic.com/zdun0 (jelly bean bull)
121 views: http://www.twitpic.com/zdux8 (Selfridges building)
72 views: http://www.twitpic.com/zdvjo (Baskerville font)
57 views: http://www.twitpic.com/zdvvu (Custard Factory)
91 views: http://www.twitpic.com/zdwg7 (interior Selfridges)
51 views: http://www.twitpic.com/zdz9c (interior BMAG)
56 views: http://www.twitpic.com/zj23f (Mailbox building)

A quick glance will tell you that thousands of views and hundreds of retweets were generated by this trip, and it doesn’t stop there. These numbers will only grow as time passes. Moreover, these numbers were generated by a single travel blogger. Imagine what a group of travel bloggers could do!

Velvet Escape (@velvetescape) offers travel writing and travel marketing services while Velvet Connect (@velvetconnect) offers social media advisory, community-building/management and networking services. In addition, I am well-placed to collaborate with tourism offices/travel companies and/or PR agencies to select the best travel bloggers for fam trips as well as to generate exciting ideas to facilitate a successful travel blogger fam trip.

The importance of your last tweet

velvet — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 21:08:45 +0000

I know the feeling. It’s late, you’ve been on Twitter for hours (why didn’t they warn me it’s addictive?!!) and you’re about to nod off. Just one last tweet to sign off, you think. Before your fingers hit the keyboard to say “Good night”, think again about the importance of that last tweet.

The great thing about Twitter is it’s global 24/7 character. We can interact with people from all walks of life, across the world, throughout the day. Our Twitter feed doesn’t stop when we shut down our computers and go to bed. It remains a hive of activity as your followers in other time zones (or the insomniacs among us) continue to tweet. While you’re sleeping, many others will be checking out your profile to see if you’re worth a follow. With this in mind, it’s worthwhile to save a link to an interesting article (it could be your own) for your last tweet. Save the best for last… as they say. If you haven’t saved anything, run through your tweet stream and re-tweet anything that takes your fancy. If you find it interesting, chances are, your potential followers will find it interesting too and will hit the ‘Follow’ button in a flash, and re-tweet.

By the morning, your last tweet may have gone viral and you would’ve added loads of new followers. Something like this probably wouldn’t happen if you’d simply tweeted “Good night”!

Read about other Twitter tips:

8 Plugins I Can’t Do Without

velvet — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 14:02:41 +0000

In the wonderful world of WordPress, thousands of plugins are available which have a myriad of functions. There are plugins which do some serious behind-the-scenes work while others simply add an appealing touch to blogs. When I visit other blogs, I always make it a point to check out which (visible) plugins are being used and if there’s one which may be handy for me. That’s how I made my latest (and biggest) discovery – an absolutely brilliant plugin – but more on that later.

I currently use 16 plugins on my Velvet Escape blog and 10 on Velvet Connect. I’m always careful about adding new plugins as they may make a blog pretty heavy and hence slow down the page load speed so I try to keep the number of plugins used to around 15 (though less is better). There are some plugins though which are indispensable as they add enormous value to blogs, either behind-the-scenes or aesthetically. I’ve listed below eight of my favourite plugins which I cannot do without:

1. Add to Any This plugin inserts a small bar under each post which allows readers to email, bookmark or share the post on a variety of social media platforms.

2. All in One SEO Pack Another must-have plugin that does great behind-the-scenes work. It optimises blog posts for SEO purposes by, among others, automatically creating meta tags. It’s perfect for blogger newbies as you only need to install it and it does the rest.

3. Google XML Sitemaps This plugin automatically generates an XML sitemap, hence making it easier for search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing to index your blog. Anything that makes it easier for search engines to find my posts and index them gets a thumbs up from me!

4. Ultimate Google Analytics enables Google’s famed analytics on your blog. It’s a great plugin that tracks traffic, external links, email links, links to downloads, etc…

5. WP Spam Free This was one of the first plugins that I installed. It helps to eliminate spam on blogs, both in the comment fields and the contact form. So far, it’s blocked almost 6,000 comment spam on my blogs!

6. StatPress Reloaded Ok, you might be wondering why I use two analytics plugins. The answer is simple, I’m just hooked on this plugin! This plugin’s biggest draw is that it provides real-time stats. It also features a graph which provides an insightful illustration of my traffic stats with just one glance. Oh, and there’s the Spy feature which shows who’s just visited my blog and it also tracks traffic generated through Google Images searches (and the search terms).

7. Broken Link Checker It’s quite annoying for readers when links stop working – they may get so annoyed and never return! This plugin continuously scans all links on my blog and checks if any link is broken. Any broken link is immediately highlighted on my Dashboard, prompting an action.

8. Ahhh… I’ve saved the best for last! I discovered this plugin a month ago and I’m totally blown away by its features and the enormous value it adds to my blog. It’s called Apture and I highly recommend it. What does it do? Gosh, where do I start? It allows you to easily search for relevant content (be it a map, an article, an image, a video, etc… on Google Maps, YouTube, Flickr, Wikipedia, etc..) and either link to it or embed it in your blog post. You can also upload and embed your own content such as pdf’s, Powerpoint presentations, Word documents or Excel worksheets. I can’t stop raving about this plugin and I recommend you check it out. There are so many features, many of which are still unknown to me, but an article on Problogger provides a detailed description of this brilliant plugin!

How to turn my blog into a business?

velvet — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 15:41:48 +0000

Many people, including myself, start their blogs as a hobby. Blogs provide us with a platform to share our experiences or dreams or an outlet to express our creative spirit. We work hard to produce original content, we’re continuously fiddling with the technical aspects or with the layout and we’re on social media channels marketing our articles every day.

Soon this hobby turns into a full-time job; not exactly a source of serious income but one that provides a high degree of contentment. Many of us then begin to wonder if this blogging hobby could actually be turned into a business. Is it possible? We’ve heard so many stories of bloggers earning a decent income each month so it must be. So, how do I turn my blog into a business? Before that question can be answered, a critical mind-set switch has to be made: we have to start to treat our blog as a business.

The most important step in turning your blog into a business is to think of it as a company, with its own brand and product suite. This switch in mind-set may seem logical but if it isn’t made, the lack of business focus may result in missed opportunities. One method of facilitating this mind-set switch is to ponder on the following questions:

Objective: What is the objective of my blog? Do I want it to generate direct income for me (for instance, through advertisements, affiliate programmes, selling merchandise)? Or as a platform to showcase my skills and talents? Or to establish myself as an expert in my field and generate business leads? Or elements of all three?
Goals: How do I want to further develop my blog? Grow my audience? Expand its functions? Increase its page rank?
Brand: What do people like about my blog? What differentiates my blog from others? What does my blog say about me? Does it sufficiently reflect my perceptions/expectations?
Product: Which products and/or services can I/do I want to offer?

To be able to answer these questions, talk to other bloggers and your readers and get some feedback; do some research on brand-building, increasing traffic and ways to monetise your blog; and reflect on your skills and talents and how these can be turned into selling points.

Once you have the answers to those questions, I recommend creating a business plan. It can be as specific or as general as you wish: some scribble on a blank sheet or a bound 10-pager. I started with a few notes, then later expanded on each note. In any case, it should describe your brand and your mission, as well as contain a list of your goals (short and long term) and how you intend to achieve them. I suggest creating a ‘To Do’ list and attaching it to your list of goals. Maybe there are aspects of your blog that you would like to learn more about (e.g. traffic, SEO, ads, etc..) or new contacts you would like to make, or new marketing avenues you would like to explore. Include these in your ‘To Do’ list. Your business plan should also include a list of your products and/or services and the rates, the income you expect to earn, how you aim to earn it, and the cost associated with it.

The business plan is a great way to put your thoughts and ideas on paper in a structured manner. It also helps you to maintain your focus when you’re writing new content, building your brand, marketing your blog or chasing business leads. When opportunities arise simultaneously from different directions, or when you have the feeling that you’re not progressing, pick up your business plan and use it as a guide or as a source of inspiration.

When you switch your thinking and start to treat your blog like a little company, and you put your soul (i.e. passion and honest hard work) as well as every ounce of positive energy you can squeeze into it, doors start to open and voilá… your blog has become a business!

Problogger is an amazing resource for bloggers. There are literally hundreds (if not thousands) of insightful articles. I’ve listed several relevant articles below which I hope you’ll find useful:

Measuring your Twitter influence

velvet — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 13:15:42 +0000

You’ve been on Twitter for a while, your number of followers has been growing briskly, your tweets are being read and re-tweeted, you enjoy having chats with your followers and you’re on many followers’ lists. If this is the case, CONGRATULATIONS! You’re an influential Tweep. You’ve achieved this by sharing quality content and great ideas. In addition, you’re actively engaging with your followers by participating in discussions, helping with advice and/or tips and recommending other Tweeps. These aspects contribute to a higher level of influence within your Twitter community.

Influence

Influence is becoming an increasingly important measure of your presence on Twitter. It is your level of influence that stimulates a reaction from your followers: from clicking on links included in your tweets, to re-tweeting these tweets, and commenting or launching a discussion about your tweets. A high level of influence translates into a higher number of re-tweets and active discussions, as well as a strong awareness of your authority within your niche. For individuals, organisations and companies who utilise Twitter for marketing and brand-building purposes, achieving this level shows that you’re on the right track.

Measuring influence has always been tricky. The number of followers is insufficient to measure influence as it doesn’t say anything about how that person grew the follower base, if the follower base is actually ‘listening’ or how many people in the follower base are actually active. In this sense, analytics tools that use different variables provide a more concise picture. I’ve discovered various tools that do a good job at measuring influence levels. These tools’ ability to add context to a person’s influence is critical for businesses that want to leverage influencers in spreading the word about their companies or products. These are my two favourites:

Tweet Level is a tool that measures an individual’s importance on Twitter. According to TweetLevel: “Each score is rated out of 100 – in other words, the higher your score, the more important you are. There are four result metrics:

Influence – what you say is interesting and many people listen to it. This is the primary ranking metric.
Popularity – how many people follow you
Engagement – you actively participate within your community
Trust – people believe what you say

Klout is an analytics tool that measures your influence or “Klout” on Twitter. “Klout allows you to track the impact of your opinions, links and recommendations across your social graph. We collect data about the content you create, how people interact with that content and the size and composition of your network. From there, we analyze the data to find indicators of influence and then provide you with innovative tools to interact with and interpret the data.”

Non-profits on social media

velvet — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 16:04:08 +0000

In the past few months, I’ve noticed a substantial increase in the presence of non-profit organisations on social media platforms like Twitter. A few days ago, a CNN Money article appeared on my Twitter feed which more or less confirmed my observations. According to this article:

The vast majority of nonprofit organizations (88%) are experimenting with social media to engage key audiences, but a significant majority (79%) are uncertain of how to demonstrate social media’s value for their organizations. Only half (51%) report active use of social media (source of the survey: Weber Shandwick’s Social Impact survey conducted with KRC Research)

I’ve noticed many non-profits making tentative steps to build a presence on social media platforms. I applaud this as I’m convinced social media is the perfect tool for non-profit organisations to mobilise and build active communities that share an interest in their cause. A case in point of how social media can be utilised to generate interest in a cause and contribute to fund-raising efforts passed by my Twitter stream today: a Tweet-a-Cause campaign organised by the Make-a-Wish Foundation in collaboration with Leap Fish. The concept is brilliant. Every re-tweet of the article would result in a $0.15 donation by Leap Fish to the Make-a-Wish Foundation to help send little Jacob to Disneyland. The chances of something like this going viral is enormous. In addition, I’m sure this campaign will generate an invaluable amount of exposure for both partners, and the cause to send little Jacob to Disneyland. This is but one of many examples of how social media is being utilised by non-profits.

For the non-profits out there who are thinking of entering the social media sphere, I’ve listed a variety of interesting articles below as a guide to inspire and assist you with your efforts.

For more tips on social media, please read A Twitter Education in Social Media for your FREE E-BOOK.