Podcastmatters App now listed on iTunes

The podcastmatters iPhone App is now fully listed in the iTunes Store. The App allows you to download and listen to the latest Social Media Podcast from Podcastmatters and displays show notes for each episode. You can link to our pp page on iTunes here

Looking forward to a good discussion...

With 83 people pre-booked for the New Media Breakfast at 8am in 29, Glasgow, we're looking forward to some interesting discussion about Social Media in the workplace.

We've got representatives from over 60 organisations and a wide variety of market sectors so hopefully we'll get a real cross section of views.

Watch out for our report and social media podcast.

We've got our own iPhone App!

Podcastmatters now has an iPhone App called "Podcastmatters" (lots of thought went into that). with the App installed you can access the Social Media Podcast directly from your iPhone.  You can also read the show notes for each podcast and share an episode with your Facebook friends.

I created the App in iSites which is a new site that allows you to create you App for $25; you create all the graphics and links and they take care of the iTunes submission for you - it's all very simple.

The company has been inundated with applications, so much so that they sent me an email yesterday saying they intended to batch all the orders and submit 75-100 Apps each day to iTunes.  They also said they have stopped taking payments until they clear the current backlog. I thought I might have to wait a while for the App but this morning I noticed two mentions of our new App on a Google Alert for Podcastmatters - I clicked the link and there it was.

It works extremely well and, not that we've got it listed, we can start to tweek it and improve it.   I have already noticed that the iTunes Store graphic is too small so I've changed it and uploaded a new graphic - it will be interesting to see how long that takes to filter through.

Social Media Podcast No.13 - We are currently at No.2 on iTunes

We released Edition No.13 of the Social Media Podcast on Thursday and it's now at No.2 in the Audio Podcasting section in the Podcast Category. Download it to find out what we did in a car park in Inverurie and what happened to Evan Ratliff...you could just help us to that No.1 spot AGAIN!

Download the podcast on iTunes Click Here

Social Media Podcast No.13 - What we did in a car park in Inverurie!

In this episode we discuss the Wired Magazine article - Vanish. Evan Ratliff tried to disappear for a month, did he conduct a realistic exercise. Can you disappear and maintain a social media profile? Read the article in Wired

We talk to Eddie Gilmour, MD of Spymasters about the exercise and your digital footprint

We also talk about Bakupify which offers a back-up service for all your social media activity

What we got up to in a car park in Inverurie with a cow!

Beans on Toast - We review the Red Laser iPhone App

We also review a couple of other iPhone Apps - AudioBoo and Four Square

Although, we may have referred to Four Square as SquareSpace in the podcast which is something completely different! We will address this in the next podcast (I blame Kyle!)

New Media Breakfast 29th January - Social Media in the Work Place

What happens at a Fake Bake at Home Party?

We recently filmed a FaKe Bake at Home Party to capture what actually happens at these events, what we didn't figure out in advance was how much of the footage we couldn't use on a public channel!!!  I guess that's what happens when 20 women get together in their casual gear drinking wine and champagne!!!

Here's the video footage we could use.

New Media Breakfast Glasgow 29th January

SOCIAL MEDIA IN THE WORKPLACE

Exploring the issues surrounding employee access and the use of social media as a communication tool.

We have been asked on numerous occasions in the latter part of 2009, and already in 2010, about allowing employees access to social networks at work; should they encourage employees to use social networking in connection with their business and, what are the potential pitfalls if they do?

There is no right or wrong answer to this; many factors will influence whether or not it is right for your business.  With this in mind, the next New Media Breakfast will explore the topic in order to help you make a more informed decision about allowing access and the use of social media in your business.

The meeting will be an open discussion with two or three very short presentations designed to help the process.  We are still formalising the exact content of each presentation however, we will structure them to help cover the following issues:

• Does enabling social networks in the workplace adversely affect productivity?

• What are the options if I do allow staff to use social networks?

• Are guidelines available?

• What are other organisations doing?

• What are the potential risks and rewards?

• Will it fit with other marketing activities?

• What does it cost?

• What are the common mistakes?

• Can you keep your brand off social media?

We don’t particularly want to focus too much on actual social media tools, they will change; this discussion is more about the principle of adopting social media as a communication tool.

There is little doubt you will continue to hear about social media in 2010 and you will probably be asking if, and when, it is right for your business; hopefully this New Media Breakfast will help you to focus on the issues you need to consider to make the right decision.

So, if you would like to be part of the discussion or, you simply want to hear what others think, come along on the 29^th to No. 29, Royal Exchange Square, Glasgow.  We would like to see you there and we look forward to finding out the thoughts of business leaders, charitable organisations and the public sector about this extremely important issue.

To book your place click here and follow the payment details at the bottom of the page.

No.29 Members

If you are a 29 Member please email Malcolm with your name, company name and 29 membership number.

Social Media Podcast No.12

Just like buses, you wait ages for one then three come along in quick succession.

This is a short interview with John McTaggart of Modernity Scotland. John talks about social media in education and how Modernity Scotland are using social networks to deliver up-to-date content. He also talks about the use of social media by the political parties ahead of the General Election and why social media may be even more important in the Scottish Elections.

Thank you to John for the interview.

Forget No.5 we're No.1 now!

Thank you to everyone that downloaded or subscribed to the Social Media Podcast, We're No.1 in the Podcasting Section for Audio Podcasts this morning and, No.4 in the combined Audio and Video Podcasting Charts.

Gary Dixon, Spectrum Personnel asked me this morning why the podcast was doing so well; I said to him that, whilst word-of-mouth plays large part in these things, it is the extent and reach of our social media footprint that gets the word out there in the first place. When we released this podcast we promoted it on several platforms some of which are listed below:

• Podcastmatters Blog
• Podcastmatters Social Network
• Podcastmatters Twitter
• Gordon White's personal Twitter
• Design Matters Twitter
• Kyle Murdoch's Twitter
• New Media Breakfast Twitter
• Facebook
• Social Media Group on Spectrum Social Network
• New Media Update Group on Engage (Entrepreneurial Exchange's online network)
• Social Media Podcast Group on Podcastmatters Network
• Linked-In

These were the main outlets however, there are other networks that our updates post to via Ping.fm and FriendFeed

This highlights the benefits of a good social media presence. It is also worth noting that we didn't create this presence yesterday - it has taken a long time and we will continue to develop our community and take advantage of all new opportunities. New Year is traditionally a time to reflect on where you are and plan for the future, you should be looking at how you can create your on-line community during 2010, believe me, it's worth it.

If you want to download or subscribe to the Social Media Podcast please click here

Social Media Podcast Top 5 positions on iTunes

We are delighted with the progress we're making with the Social Media Podcast - today it rose from No.57 to No.5 in the Podcasting category.

The most recent podcast No.11 is a round-up of the year and some discussion about recent news stories like Telstra's commitment to Social Media and Pepsi's decision to put their $20 million Superbowl advertising budget into a Social Media campaign meaning they will not launch a new advert during the ball game for the first time in 23 years.

We round off the year with a look back at 2009 and a look forward to 2010 when we will continue the New Media Breakfast series as well as launching a new event in Inverness.

You can download all episodes of the podcast or subscribe here

Rounding off the year

Social Media Podcast No.11 is now available on iTunes. We chat about the hot stories this week in Social Media nad round up the year with a look at some of the work we've been doing and explore things like the "Book of the Year", Quote of the Year, Video of the Year and some other general ramblings.

You can search for "Social Media Podcast on iTunes or, link to it here.

Very encouraging story...

It's very encouraging to read stories like the recent post on Mashable about Telstra and their commitment to social media.

Telstra have recently announced mandatory social media training for its 40,000+ staff. They have formalized a '3R's' policy (responsibility, respect and representation) which will empower every member of staff online.

Furthermore, they are re-enforcing their commitment to transparency by announcing their intention to publish their training guides on line.

Well done Telstra.

If you look at the Mashable link you will also see that Pepsi have announced they are withdrawing from Superbowl advertising after 23 straight years. This is not a cost cutting exercise, they are spending the $20 million budget on a social media campaign instead. As reported on Mashable, "Rather than spending money on a Super Bowl ad, Pepsi will launch the Pepsi Refresh Project on January 13, 2010. At that time, users can submit their ideas to Pepsi for ways to refresh their communities, making the world a better place."

This is a major piece of news because Pepsi were one of the companies that made Superbowl adverts iconic in the past, their shift to social media speaks volumes about the changing nature of communication, advertising and engagement.

Can you opt out of Social Media?

You may have seen my recent Twitter post about the Atholl Hotel in Aberdeen not allowing us to plug in a laptop - we were asked not to use their electricity. There were many comments and retweets about this; one Twitter user even recalled a food poisoning scare from last year at the same hotel - not something they would have wanted to re-kindle I'm sure.

This was a good example of how businesses will end up on social media whether they like it or not. People can update their status anytime, anywhere. So, people involved in customer service should be particularly mindful that a bad customer experience will be transmitted around the world instantly. Just the other day a friend of mine, John McGlynn of the Airlink Group posted about a bad experience he was having with EasyJet, I knew all about it, while it was happening. To be fair to EasyJet, they do monitor Twitter posts and I know that Iain Murray of ChardFM received a voucher because he did defend EasyJet in a Twitter post.

The Atholl Hotel incident was closely followed (the next day) by a similar set of circumstances in Simpson's Hotel in Aberdeen - we needed to charge our laptops whilst having a meeting and coffees in their lounge area, they were happy to let us do it - and their coffee was better and cheaper!

The whole incident reminded me of a blog post I read back in February this year from Chris Brogan about the Roger Smith Hotel in New York who actively promote their understanding and commitment to new media by encouraging users to have their meetings in the hotel. Now it's the place that most new media people (and I suspect many from traditional media) choose to stay in New York City, the Atholl Hotel could do with taking a leaf out of their book.

The point is, you can't opt out of social media, everyone is now connected and bad customer experiences will be reported. Understanding and embracing social media is the way forward, connect and engage with your customers, watch what their saying about you and act accordingly.

Christmas Videos for Heroes - 16th December, Holiday Inn, Glasgow

Christmas Videos for Heroes from Holiday Inn
Families offered chance to record personal video messages at Holiday Inn Glasgow

This December, a vast number of men and women from the UK will be serving abroad during the Christmas period. To help spread some festive cheer, the Holiday Inn Glasgow Airport is offering family and friends the chance to record a personal video message for their loved ones overseas.

Taking place from 10am until 1pm on Wednesday 16th December 2009, the Holiday Inn Glasgow will provide staff, cameras and a media suite to enable family and friends to come in and record up to three minutes of footage per video. Each video recorded on the day will be uploaded to the dedicated YouTube channel, www.youtube.com/HolidayInnHeroes, for service men and women to view online.

Commenting on this initiative, Douglas Winfield, General Manager at the Holiday Inn Glasgow said, “We wanted to do something for those local serving men and women who will be away from their families this Christmas, and we hope these messages will make this time more bearable and remind them that they are always in our thoughts. This is a way for us to show our appreciation for the work they are doing to make our country safer. We look forward to welcoming friends and families to record their messages of love and support for our brave heroes.”

Anyone wishing to record a personal video message should call Kate Trussler on 0131 226 3000 and book a time slot.

IHG, the world’s largest Hotel company, owners of such popular brands as Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express, Crowne Plaza, Intercontinental and more, have set up a 35% discount scheme on short breaks, for all Forces/MOD family and personal as part of their commitment for Help For Heroes. This means that forces families can benefit from this great offer all year round across Europe for Short Breaks, Holidays, and theme parks. Visit www.IHG.com/forces for more information. The offer is available to all forces members from cadets to vets.

New Media Breakfast Glasgow 27th November

The Glasgow breakfast in Friday 27th seems to have been a success with lots of good feedback about John MacKenzie's presentation on legal issues and user generated content. John MacKenzie, partner with Pinsent Masons is clearly an expert in this field and, a very enthusiastic user of social media. And, what a great compliment to his presentation that we ran out of time for the scheduled look at some viral video, the Q&A session and discussion was too good to cut short.

John took us through case studies covering the following topics:

• Using third party's material
• Ownership of material posted on social networking or blogging sites
• Mashups
• Web-scraping
• Protecting reputation on Facebook
• False testimonials

John also referred to some articles and web sites during his presentation, I have listed these here in no particular order:

• Bogus online reviews face EU ban
• ECJ rulings on Google keywords might not resolve controversy, warns High Court
• Monsterski raising money for the MS Trust
• Swede can't swallow McDonald's Pizza
• Tech companies revealed as source of fake reviews
• Why the Advocate General got Google Adwords wrong
• Wikipedia:Text of Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License

Thank you again to John for his presentation, I recommend you come along and hear him at the New Media Breakfast in Edinburgh if you missed him in Glasgow. (Date of New Media Breakfast in Edinburgh to be confirmed)

Thanks also to No.29 who again provided the bacon rolls, tea and coffee with excellent service and attention to detail. What a difference it makes to turn up at a venue and have everything provided the way they said it would be. (See my previous post about Pittodrie in Aberdeen)

The December New Media Breakfast would have fallen between Christmas and New Year so, we have decided to make the next one on the 29th January 2010, we will be posting details about the topic and speakers in due course. To be sure that you are kept up to date with all the events you should join the Podcastmatters Network then join the New Media Breakfast Group where you can get all the details and leave comments or suggestions for the New Media Breakfast Team.

New Media Breakfast Aberdeen 24th November

We were delighted with the response to the first New Media Breakfast in Aberdeen last Tuesday.

The morning got off to a bad start when we arrived at Pitoddrie (home of Abedeen Football Club) at 6.30am as arranged and there was nobody to let us in. In fact, some attendees had arrived before us for the 7am start and we were all left out in the cold for 20 minutes.

Inside things weren't much better; the sound technician they had promised us hadn't turned up and still hadn't by the time we finished at 10am. Thank you to Graeme Coghill of K10 Solutions who managed to figure out the projectors and sound for us.

The late arrival of the Pittodrie staff meant there were no bacon rolls for people on arrival so, we moved them back to the scheduled break at 8.15am.

There were over 80 people in attendance which was remarkable for such an early start on a cold November morning and, all in all, the feedback was superb. I attended the CLAN Ball in Aberdeen on Friday evening and I was still getting great feedback from people who had been at the breakfast. CLAN were also the beneficiaries from the profits of breakfast with a cheque for over £400 being presented to them as part of the fundraising on Friday evening.

The Ball raised over £130k and this was in no small way due to the extremely hard work put in by Pauline Cook of Fraser Media and Steve Cook of Empire HR who we also owe a big thanks to for arranging the Aberdeen New Media Breakfast.

We haven't set a date for the next New Media Breakfast yet but, we are looking to be back in Aberdeen for the next event around the end of Jaunary or beginning of February - watch this space for further details!

Do you know your legal position with social media?

There are many issues surrounding New and Social Media that users must be aware of, particularly if you are adopting this as a medium to promote your business, your brand or, your products.




• Who actually owns the content posted on social network?
• What rights do your employees have to the contact base they create in your time?
• Astrotrurfing - the issues of transparency and disclosure
• Scrapping – gathering content from other sites for your own use
• Social networks in the workplace – employers and employees rights?

These are just some of the topics that need to be considered when employing social media. John MacKenzie, Partner with Pinsent Masons, will discussing these and other issues at this week’s New Media Breakfast (Friday 27th November at No.29). This promises to be an extremely informative presentation with lots of valuable advice for anyone using social media. I hope you can make it along, I’m sure you wont be disappointed.

We will also take a brief look at some effective viral video to show you how some consumer products and business to business users are utillising sites like YouTube to get their messages out. I hope you can make it along, I’m sure you wont be disappointed. You can book your place at the breakfast here or, call Fiona on 0141 616 3152 and she will add your name to the attendance list.

I look forward to seeing you there.


John is a Solicitor Advocate who deals with a range of commercial litigation matters. His principal expertise lies in intellectual property, and IT litigation. John also advises client on IP portfolio management, and particularly online disputes. John has dealt with many major claims before the Court of Session and appears before the higher courts on a regular basis. His clients have included UK and global banking, IT, energy, manufacturing and utility companies. He has also carried out extensive advocacy before the Inner House of the Court of Session (Court of Appeal equivalent).

John regularly lectures and writes on IP and dispute resolution issues and is the author of the book ‘Written Pleadings’. He sits on the Lord President's Consultative Committee on Commercial Actions.

Breakfast Update and welcome Aberdeen!

We already have 60+ people attending the New Media Breakfast in Aberdeen on the 24th November but, as I mentioned in a recent Tweet, Pittodrie is a big venue so there's still time to book your place.

GLASGOW & EDINBURGH:
The next Glasgow breakfast is Friday 27th November. The main speaker for this and the next Edinburgh event is John MacKenzie, Partner at Pinsent Mason who will talk about IP and legal issues surrounding user generated content.

We will also take a short (light hearted) look at Viral Video and how organisations are using this to great advantage.

If you would like to book your place at any of these events please click here.

Speaker announcement for New Media Breakfast

We are pleased that John MacKenzie, Partner with legal firm Pinsent Masons is going to be the main speaker at our next new Media breakfast in Glasgow (27th November) and Edinburgh (4th December - TBC).

John will be talking about various legal aspects of user generated content in social media in what promises tobe a most interesting useful presentation.

John is a Solicitor Advocate who deals with a range of commercial litigation matters. His principal expertise lies in intellectual property, and IT litigation. John also advises client on IP portfolio management, and particularly online disputes. John has dealt with many major claims before the Court of Session and appears before the higher courts on a regular basis. His clients have included UK and global banking, IT, energy, manufacturing and utility companies. He has also carried out extensive advocacy before the Inner House of the Court of Session (Court of Appeal equivalent).

John regularly lectures and writes on IP and dispute resolution issues and is the author of the book ‘Written Pleadings’. He sits on the Lord President's Consultative Committee on Commercial Actions.

To book your place at the New Media Breakfast please click here.

New Media Breakfast Edinburgh 13th Novemmber

The next New Media Breakfast Edinburgh this Friday will look at Niche Networks and Building an Online Community. This will be an interesting (and sometime humorous) look at what companies are doing in New Media and how they are engaging in converstaion and building relationships with their customers.

If you would like to come along please reserve your place, you can get full details and booking information here