feeling the love for infographics

by Gillian Hudson

Government is making lots more data available openly but as communicators we can do much more than release a lot of excel spreadsheets and expect it to improve everyone’s lives.  

That’s why I love infographics.

They make data (maths, spreadsheets... eurgh) into simple, powerful images that express things so that people like me can understand them (fonts, colours, hooray!)  

So if you too would like to learn to love infographics, here are 14 top tips I’ve picked up along the way...

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just when you thought it was safe...

By Susie Lockwood

I love it when a piece of writing brilliantly captures an idea or observation that, when you read it, feels both obvious and revelatory. It’s a kind of joining the dots moment I suppose, and I experienced it most recently when reading this comment piece by Simon Jenkins on the Guardian website.

I’d definitely recommend reading it but, in a nutshell, Simon Jenkins suggests that far from isolating us into pale faced-creatures lit by the glow of an LCD screen, the digital world is bringing us out into the real world again by providing a customised map to where we want to be and who we want to see.

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looking for social media guidelines?

by Darren Caveney

do you want to create a simple, straightforward set of social media guidelines?

do you want to ensure you 'engage', 'explore', 'discover' ... and still 'conform'?

don't want to write war and peace?

how about a set of social media guidelines in less than 140 characters?

sound good?

here you go then.

confessions of a gritting geek

by Geoff Coleman

My name’s Geoff Coleman and I’m a gritting bore. There, I’ve said it and a cathartic experience it was too.

Now, in mitigation, can I explain how I’ve tried to turn that strange obsession into something useful?

With the weather taking a turn for the worse over the last fortnight, you may have noticed the advent of the #wmgrit initiative on twitter.

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we the people

by Jon King

We’re in a whole new world.

Social media has changed the landscape of society. The implications for the democratic process are profound.

Popular uprisings can no longer be suppressed or marginalised by the machinery of state as citizens create new, organic networks of communication freed from the grip of a complicit national media.

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get some social media

by David Grindlay

I have always been a supporter of the local press.

‘Life is Local’ as it appears on a masthead of one of our local newspapers and so it should be (mostly).

But times are changing and the population at large is becoming a bit more sophisticated in terms of what it expects and how it gets its news.

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to Google+ or not to Google+?

by Dan Slee

There's nothing quite like the launch of a new social profile for the hype machine to swing into operation.

Google+, Google's fourth attempt at social networking, is no exception.  Around 40 million users registered within five months of launch in summer 2011.  You can find out the basics of it via Wikipedia.

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trust me, i'm a follower

by Carolyne Mitchell

On Friday I hosted my first unconference on behalf of the Scottish Improvement Service. The theme was social media in the Scottish public sector and you can check out #smuncon of you like.

I knew the discussions would be lively and I knew I’d learn a lot.

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getting the most from Flickr – the Midlothian way…

by Stephen McLean

Midlothian Council has found Flickr to be a really effective way of engaging with enthusiasts while also building a bank of photos of the local area.

A number of groups have been formed via the council’s website and through Rose Dewar -Midlothian Council’s Web Manager, who is a photography enthusiast herself.  These groups have submitted stunning photographs of Midlothian.

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not one big Facebook page please, but lots of little ones

by Dan Slee

A few days ago I had something of a Eureka moment.

We were looking at how a leisure centre could best use Facebook. In the room with me was a colleague and the centre manager himself.

"Maybe we should just have the one Facebook page for leisure centres right across the borough."

Hmmm. That didn't feel right.

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is it time to change the way comms teams work?

by Darren Caveney

Let's assume, just for a minute, that the accepted norm is that all organisations have Twitter feeds, Facebook pages and a website or two. How does that area of work stack up against the daily churn of media enquiries, press releases and marketing & communications plans?

And how do we manage the growth in demand for all of this work against a backdrop – for many - of cuts and reduced resources?

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building your business image through flickr

Flickr is home to over five billion of the world’s photos and is, without doubt, the most effective way to store, sort, search and share your photos online.

For business, quite aside from eliminating the need for expensive photo management software or suppliers, Flickr can also be a valuable branding tool and a great way to engage with your staff, customers and your business contacts.

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connecting with your public through social media

Northumberland is the most northern of English counties. It's quietly created some of the most pioneering and widely adopted social media accounts in the country.

Ross Wigham, head of communications at Northumberland County Council tells how...

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are you reaching your true potential?

As with all marketing channels, your twitter activity can only build your business if you’re maximising its reach. 

Who’s following you? Are they key to your business (potential customers? existing customers? suppliers? stockists? bloggers or journalists from your sector?) Are they responding to your tweets?  Are you creating dialogue and interaction? Are you getting re-tweeted?

If the answer to any of these questions is ‘no’.  Then it may be time to take a few minutes to rethink your strategy.

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want to build your business? it's time to join in the chat

Successful marketing in 2011 is all about the conversation. Whether you want to shift more widgets or shift customer perception, there is no better piece of advice to take on board than to BUILD BUILD BUILD a dialogue with your customers.

Social media offers many simple, manageable - and free - ways to do this. 

Twitter is one of them.

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