How to get the right content for your online properties: free event in Staffordshire

Do you struggle to come up with ideas for content for your website, blog or other online platforms? If so, we believe we have the answers to your dilemma. 

In the wise words of Lord Sugar “You either have a good idea or you don’t”. We do and loads of them.

Friday June 14, 2013 will see Stone Junction and Stafford Chamber of Commerce form a partnership by holding an informative seminar for businesses across Staffordshire and the Midlands.

How to generate the right content for your website, blog and social media channels, held at The Stafford Gatehouse Theatre, will open for registration at 8:30am for a 9am start. The event will allow attendees to gain a useful insight into the profitable use of online content for business.

Not only this but, attendants can walk away from the event with the following:
• The ability to find out which online channels your customers use
• An appreciation of the benefits of different content marketing methods
• An understanding of how you can create content easily
• Recognition of what impact content will have on your business
• The ability to create a plan to turn this impact into sales
• And possibly one of the most important - a few hours out of the office and motivation for the rest of your working day!

The Stone Junction team will interact with the audience to help businesses present to develop ideas for their online properties.

Does this sound like something you may be interested in? Don't worry, we're not as intimidating as Alan Sugar and there'll be no ridiculous tasks, just ideas, help and coffee. You can sign up here.

Thanks to the generous support from The Stafford Gatehouse and Stafford Chamber of Commerce it won't cost you a penny.

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Farage faces barrage

By Boris Sedacca

I listened with amusement to a BBC interview this morning with UKIP leader Nigel Farage following the news that he had hung up during a telephone interview yesterday with David Miller, BBC Scotland's environment and transport correspondent for the BBC radio show ‘Good Morning Scotland’.

Just by way of background, yesterday UKIP leader Farage faced a hostile crowd during a campaigning visit to Edinburgh. He took refuge in Canons’ Gait pub in the city’s historic old town, and had to be escorted into a police van as protestors chanted ‘scum, scum, scum’.

Farage was in Edinburgh to launch his party’s Scottish campaign following recent electoral gains in England. Police said two men had been arrested following the protest. Farage told the BBC he had never had a reaction like this before.

 James Cook, Scotland Correspondent tweeted: “Nigel Farage hangs up on @bbcgms saying he senses ‘hatred’ in questions about UKIP’s understanding of Scots politics.”  Farage told ‘Good Morning Scotland’ yesterday’s protest against him on the Royal Mile proves that parts of Scottish nationalism are akin to fascism.

Then today he told BBC Radio 4 he was surrounded by 50 ‘yobs’ yesterday saying: “if this is the face of Scottish nationalism, it’s pretty ugly.” The words ‘frying pan’ and ‘fire’ spring to mind.

I don’t know how well-oiled UKIP’s PR machine is, but Farage has jut thrown a massive spanner in the works there. Whatever he may think of the Scots, this kind of outburst is bound to horrify UKIP supporters, let alone the wider UK electorate.

If you missed UKIP leader Nigel Farage hanging up during an interview with BBC’s David Miller you can listen again here. If you want to avoid PR disaters like this in the future, please contact us. Enjoy your weekend all!

Media Moves

Press Gazette has appointed Gavriel Hollander as news editor. He can be contacted at gavriel.hollander@pressgazette.co.uk. He will take over the position from Andrew Pugh, who left in April.

Peter Marsh has left The FT. His role is being filled by david.crow@ft.com, robert.anderson@ft.com or andrew.sharman@ft.com.

Construction News has appointed Lucy Mair as a reporter covering education and skills, retail, health and safety.

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When keeping silent brings trouble

By Boris Sedacca

Over ten years ago, when I was editing an electrical magazine, I had bought some light bulbs from my local B&Q. The bad news is the bulbs had a habit of exploding when switched on. The first time, I didn't think much of it, but then when it happened a few times I kept one damaged light bulb and made contact with the manufacturer.

Wearing my editor’s hat, I asked the manufacturer to comment, who in turn asked me to send the damaged light bulb so they could investigate, but also promised to come back to me with a comment. When I subsequently told another fellow editor about it, he advised me on no account to send the damaged light bulb to that manufacturer.

He said: “They will just hush it up and you’ll never hear from them again. They are a right bunch of b*&^%%$ds!” He added that he had experienced bullying from that particular manufacturer and that I might expect the same treatment.

Therefore I kept the light bulbs and waited for a comment which never came. Finally I decided to write a story about what had happened. On seeing the story, my fellow editor asked if he could run the story too because lighting was his specialist subject and there was a lot more he could add to the story, and I agreed.

Whereas I ran my story over one and a half pages in an A4 magazine, my fellow editor ran three pages in his tabloid magazine, going into great depth about the inadequate fuse of the light bulb. In fact it had no fuse at all – the light bulb itself acted as a fuse.

Now all this made the story far more damaging to the manufacturer, and this was totally avoidable had the manufacturer made good on its promise to come back with a comment.

Fast forwarding to about five years ago, when I had moved into public relations, one of our clients had seen tough business conditions, which forced it to cut back on staff. One member of staff tipped off the local newspaper, one of whose reporters then left a voicemail asking the client for comment.

The client asked me what to do, and I advised him to call the reporter back straight away and to be absolutely candid about everything that was going on. I told him to explain that it is not uncommon for companies to lay off staff during difficult economic times.

The client took my advice and called the reporter back, who heard what he had to say and then concluded there was no story in it. Had the client not responded, the reporter might have wondered what the client had to hide, and run a story putting forward only the ex-employee’s point of view and saying the client had refused to comment.

The moral of the story: don’t ignore reporters. It’s their job to get the other side of the story when someone gives them one side. They may appear scary, but being candid usually disarms them. 

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Microsoft’s New Coke

A news story from Microsoft caught my attention in yesterday’s copy of The Guardian. As we all know, the corporation generates significant profits from its Windows licenses and thus relies on the sales of Windows to remain successful.

In 2012 Microsoft took a huge leap by launching Windows 8 - a whole new look and feel for the software. This included tablet style tiles and apps and also the removal of the start button. Of course, the drastic change meant that the complaints began to roll in about how difficult the system is to navigate now.

After launching the new design, Microsoft boss Steve Ballmer said he was ‘betting the company’ on it. And what a bet that was, computer sales have made a record breaking drop of 14% in the first three months of this year and Windows has been blamed for the disaster.

Not only this but, ironically,  according to research the two most downloaded apps for Windows are Classic Shell, an app to bring back the Start button and an app named Skip Metro Suite which allows you to skip the confusing tiles.

To conclude, Windows is now expected to release an update, which will bring back these key features that are currently upsetting the market.

This smells a bit fishy to me. The last company u-turn that I remember reading about was Coca Cola’s New Coke, which was abandoned within three months of its launch in 1985 after customer protests. Coca Cola was forced to apologise to customers and bring back the original recipe.

Understandably, Microsoft may have made the changes after witnessing the great success of tablet sales. Perhaps the company contemplated the need to stay relevant for what the future may see as a desktop-computer-less world.

If this is the case, it will be interesting to see how Microsoft deals with the whole kerfuffle. As Technical PR people and users of Windows 8, we can’t wait to see this unfold.

Will the company apologise to the market when the update brings back the old features just like Coca Cola did? What do you think? Why not contact us and let us know?

By Ashleigh McLeod

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Hitting the beach and the front pages

Regular readers of this blog will know that actually we don’t really use it to promote Stone Junction all that often. We tend to stick to irreverently analysing the world of PR and marketing and providing hints and tips that we believe are genuinely useful for our readers. 

But today I thought I would use it to boast a bit instead. Why? Because in the last 30 days Stone Junction has generated for its clients:

- 16 full page feature articles in magazines including Components in Electronics, Drives & Controls, Electrical Engineering, Electrical Review, DP&A (Design, Products & Applications), FMUK (Facilities Management UK), Food & Drink International, Industrial Technology, PBSI (Panel Building & System Integration), Process & Control, Process Industry Informer, Water, Energy and the Environment and Works Management

- 79  other clippings across the print and online media

- And one front cover

I think it’s doubly impressive that our small team of four consultants found time for nearly four weeks of annual leave between us in the same period.

In other words, we hit the beach and the front pages at the same time!

If you want your brand to benefit from this kind of coverage, get in touch on +44 (0) 1785 225416.

And sorry for the bragging, we have to do it sometimes :-)


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The fruits of Lib Dem’s double dealing

Yesterday’s by-election trouncing of Lib Dem makes me wonder if the party won’t try and combine with UKIP to survive. The previous time the then Liberals were in Government was back in the 1970s with Labour under Jimmy Callahan. They pulled the rug out from under him and were severely dealt with by the electorate then. 

Having once been a Lib Dem voter myself during Paddy Ashdown’s time in charge, I can’t help feeling sorry for them because now the punishment is happening well before a general election. Gladstone must be rolling in his grave.

Off course the media is having a field day. Comments posted up against BBC’s online story include, ‘the Tories need to listen to UKIP now, or the prospect of a disastrous labour government looms’, ‘I'm glad UKIP won so many votes even though I doubt I'd like to see them win’ and ‘although, a Tory/UKIP coalition would be an interesting proposition, they are certainly closer bed fellows that the current partners.’

I have this idea: what if UKIP joins with Labour? Wouldn’t that be a laugh? Between them, they could carry off a voting coup in the Commons. Hmmm, yes – unlikely! Mind you it wouldn't be unknown for ideologically opposed camps to make a deal. I'm thinking of Hitler and Stalin. Look at how that ended!

Sometimes I'm almost tempted to vote for the Loonies. I've never done it before but there’s a first time for everything.

Meantime, the Daily Telegraph has run a story with the headline ‘Don't give politicians final say on changes to press regulation system, say public’, while the Independent says ‘David Cameron set to defy newspaper industry over press regulation.’

Nearer to home, from FeaturesExec comes the news that Motor Industry Magazine has appointed Tim Kiek, previously from Professional Motor Factor, as editor. Also that Hamerville Media Group has appointed Eugene Allen as editor of Repair and Refinish Review. Allen was previously editorial assistant at sister publication Professional Motor Mechanic, and will also edit Apprentice Vehicle Technician and Apprentice Vehicle Workshop.

If you want to stay as close to the technical media as we are, it’s a piece of cake - just contact us!

Have a great bank holiday weekend all.

By Boris Sedacca

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How can photo sharing app Instagram benefit your business?

Since the launch of Instagram in 2010, the social media platform has gained over 50million users. The figure shouldn’t come as a surprise because the app and recently launched website is owned by social media giant - Facebook.

What makes this app benefit business, I hear you ask? Here are five reasons why Instagram is not just your average cat photo sharing app:

1. Instagram has the same hash tagging ability as Twitter. This means that with the use of hash tags, the pictures shared become visible to 50million users across the world.

2. Long gone are the days of time consuming, individual posts; Instagram allows you to post pictures to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Flickr and FourSquare at the touch of a button, resulting in visibility from an even larger audience.

3. Businesses are able to show a softer, more human side. Sharing a picture of your dinner may have put your professionalism at risk twenty years ago, but using Instagram today will give you the much applauded status of social media savvy.

4. Be creative! Why not host a competition or run a 30 Day Photo Challenge using hash tags. These are both brilliant ways to increase website traffic.

5. And finally, here comes the cliché… Pictures speak a thousand words. Forgive me, but it’s true. Studies show that customers are now more visually receptive than ever before.

Here at Stone Junction we run a range of different Technical PR campaigns. Our expertise in social media recently earned our client Hedgehog Security 150 extra genuine Twitter followers in the space of a week.

Interested? Why not give us a call?

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Press gang stumps Cameron

Not quite The Guardian...

By Boris Sedacca

I read a lovely story in yesterday’s Guardian about the press saying they rejected the "stitch-up" put together by the three political parties to regulate the press. Now the press gang is applying for a Royal Charter instead. My journalistic instinct convinces me to predict a right Royal bun fight. 

Of course, this has all come about as a result of the excesses at Murdoch’s News of the World. One month ago, I talked about how Murdoch’s poodles retaliated to BBC coverage about Geoff Webster, The Sun’s deputy editor being charged with allegedly authorising two payments to public officials for information.

Now a couple of days ago, the BBC ran a story about police collective 'amnesia' over the Milly Dowler phone hack claims. Surrey Police's handling of the Milly Dowler murder inquiry was criticised by the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) for failing to check claims the schoolgirl's voicemail was hacked.

This comes in the wake of the IPCC report earlier this week, whose investigation found that there was knowledge of the allegation in 2002 at all levels Surrey Police’s investigation into the abduction and murder of Milly Dowler. Regrettably, no action was taken despite an indication that a crime had potentially been committed.

So here’s a poser for our readers out there: who do you think will win; the press gang or Cameron? Please get in touch.

Media Moves
This week in FeaturesExec media moves, Event has appointed Georgia Cotton as reporter and Samantha Edwards as news editor. Talking of events, this is something that we at Stone Junction can organise effectively and at a surprisingly low cost.

Last year we organised the high profile press event for the GAMBICA Automated Britain conference at The Commonwealth Club in London. This year we have a press conference coming up at the IET Savoy Place. So if you want to shout about your company’s success, why not get in touch with us?

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Videos - making more with less

It's showtime!

In the past we've talked about how useful videos are for promoting your organisation. Sharing your video collateral with stakeholders, employees, journalists and potential clients can only enhance your company profile and attract more website traffic. However, the mental hurdle for many comes down to the time and costs required to produce a good quality, engaging video. But that's just what it is - simply a mental hurdle. In this post we'll show you an inspiring short film illustrating how you can do more with less!

Yesterday I was invited to see a video created by a group of film students from Staffordshire University. The 13 minute video was in fact a documentary about a local charity called House of Bread. Set up three years ago, the volunteers get together once a week to provide a hot meal and a few kind words for the homeless and less fortunate in the area.

I must confess that I didn't know what to expect and I was taken aback by the quality of both the footage and the storyline. A few days of filming, one handy camera and lots of smiley faces were the ingredients for this uplifting video - you can watch it here.

But what impressed me most was the way in which the message was conveyed to the audience - clearly, informatively and with a touch of humor. Although the subject matter was difficult to tackle, the team manages to make it interesting, fun and engaging, without spending a fortune on decor or state-of-the-art techy devices.

The lesson here is that irrespective of the size or industry sector you are in, a short, simple video can effectively convey your cornerstone message to your audience. Try finding the interesting story in your own back garden and then show the footage to the world. You may not reach the Cannes Film Festival, but you will most definitely reach the people that matter most to your business!

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