Our task highlighted just what you can do with video content and how you can make your message more memorable.  If a picture is worth a thousand words then video has the potential to pack an impressive punch.

According to recent research by Google’s DoubleClick, rich media generates somewhere between a 400% and 700% increase in viewer engagement and response rates compared to static content. It’s no surprise when you can condense pages of text into a short snappy video of a minute or so.

Not only this, but it can also help cultivate your online community. The number of online video users is expected to double to more than 1 billion people by 2015. So, there’s certainly a captive audience, looking to consume and engage with video content. And with video is becoming increasingly favourable in the search engine rankings, it’s well worth investing in some eye-catching videos for your website or blog.

TMIM has featured a video series looking at using video beyond conventional public relations so that it generates leads as well.  In terms of PR, video can really bring company to life and set your company apart from the crowd. Overall it gives you license to deliver your content in a much more creative way.

But the smart thing to do is create videos that both enhance your reputation and generate leads. Existing and new audiences can be reached through a medium that has engagement at its heart, so why not make the most of it and deliver compelling content that features real life case studies that demonstrate the benefits your business brings, with personable spokespeople that can deliver the key messages?

Engaging video content presents a more credible view of your company and customer endorsements will boost your reputation and result the all-important sales.

The romance that can spark through using SEO tactics

My friend raised a very good theory to me the other day which I felt deserved expanding further. He proposed that the rules for good SEO can be utilised for winning the heart of someone you desire.

After five minutes of thinking this through and perhaps one too many alcoholic beverages, the true genius of this theory began to shine through. After all, Search Engine Optimisation is all about getting your site to appear on your audience’s internet searches as often as possible and in the most prominent position. Let’s face it, the early days of dating is all about trying to stay on someone’s mind as much as possible, (but, you know, in a good way, not in a “I’m creeped out because this person’s in my head, kind-of-way”).

So, below I have taken this general idea and listed the five key rules to effective SEO and posed the question, does this also apply to the art of ‘making a move’.

1) Keyword search is the first step

For SEO purposes this is vital. You must know the keywords that your audience use to search the topic you are discussing. That way you can build your site and tag your posts to ensure you are appearing on the correct searches and start building upon your ranking.

For dating this is just as important. You need to do some research into what words gain the interest of different types of people. For instance, if they’re from the Shoreditch/Hoxton area then you’ll know that certain words will catch their interest. Use words like ‘dub’ or ‘retro’ in one of your first sentences and you’ll notice an increase in attention. I’d also recommend dropping in something about some form of art or design degree or at least the name of a DJ best friend you have (or have just made up) who’s latest work can be heard on Soundcloud. Similarly, if they’re from the lovely southern countryside, then try vocalising a hatred for the 50% tax bracket and suggest that foxes are actually a true scourge on our wonderful woodland regions. This will almost certainly peak their interest.

2) Build an easy navigation

When trying to make your site SEO friendly it is important to link between pages. Search engines like sites to be easily navigated.

When trying to stay on the mind of a “seed waiting to blossom” (as the same friend calls it) it’s important that they can get to you easily. Facebook, Twitter and general ‘social research’ are all there to ensure you keep popping up on her mind. Facebook and Twitter can also give you some good indications on keywords – for instance they may have have ‘liked’ TOWIE, suggesting that your opening conversation should almost certainly be about vajazzles and definitely avoid any classical literature (Charles Dickens will mean nothing to them).

3) Give good links

When it comes to SEO, each link you have facing your site is like a vote. It’s people saying that they found your topic interesting and others might too. Search engines take this into consideration and it’s the quickest way to boost your position.

One of the keys to successful dating is friend approval. Similarly to getting links from relevant sites, you want to create links from the person’s friends to yourself. If they see that their friends like you then they will think “oh…well they must be a nice person because I trust my friends opinions” – the beauty of this is that it works even if you aren’t.

4) Content is vital/it’s what’s inside that counts

Search engines like sites with regularly updated content. With that in mind, it’s important to build good content and use the correct keywords to tag each page. Also, let’s face it, there is no point boosting your SEO if nobody wants to read what’s actually on the site.

With dating, good content translates to good personality – I am not sure why this matters to people but from my understanding it does.  On the plus side, this does mean that anyone with a good personality can be attractive – it’s all about emphasising your best attributes. I’m not talking about dominating your date with a massive personality, but you need to try to impress. Looks can only get you so far, but if there’s nothing beyond a glossy front page, you’re not going to retain much attention after an initial look.

5) Own your domain

To reach the top of Google rankings you must hire a good hosting service with fast and stable servers. Search engines will not wait too long to load your page. Worse yet, they hate it when your page is off the air and if it is repeated many times you fall in rank with certainty.

We all know which domain really counts when courting and if you want to impress you best start owning it! There is nothing worse than putting all that time and effort into getting the person into your domain and then letting yourself down on the final hurdle – and if it is repeated let downs you will drop down their rankings with certainty.

To summarise…

The same tactics that will take your webpage to the top of Bing and Google will also help you land the object of your affection. Which, in my mind, one hundred per cent disproves the theory that none of us techie geeks can land a date on a Friday night, and instead spend it on Warcraft until the early hours.

To try and guess who might win I’ve been taking a look at the number of Google searches for each contestant’s name, how many Facebook fans they have, how many Twitter followers they have, and how many daily page views each of their personal websites have been getting according to Teq Pad.

I’ve then given each contestant a score from one to four. The contestant with the lowest score is most popular with the public, and so in theory, may be most popular with Lord Sugar too.

The results are as follows:

1. Tom Pellereau (8 points)
1. Susan Ma (8 points)
3. Jim Eastwood (10 points)
4. Helen Louise Milligan (14 points)

Monthly Google searches in UK:

1. Jim Eastwood (1,900 searches)
2. Susan Ma (1,000 searches)
3. Tom Pellereau (480 seaches)
4. Helen Louise Milligan (260 searches)

Facebook fans:
1. Jim Eastwood (30,420 fans)
2. Tom Pellereau (6,836 fans)
3. Susan Ma (2,732 fans)
4. Helen Louise Milligan (1,982 fans)

Twitter followers:
1. Tom Pellereau (2,536 followers)
2. Susan Ma (1,642 followers)
3. Helen Louise Milligan (1,606 followers)
4. Jim Eastwood (23 followers)

Website traffic:
1. Susan Ma (1,146 page views)
2. Tom Pellereau (961 page views)
3. Helen Louise Milligan (568 page views)
4. Jim Eastwood (48 page views)

So there you have it! One of these four will win it.

Interestingly the top two match us with the latest odds on BettingPro.com.

1. Tom Pellereau (9/4)
2. Susan Ma (5/2)
3. Helen Louise Milligan (7/2)
4. Jim  Eastwood (5/1)

Apple’s strong brand value will not come as a surprise to many people. Us media types are usually found walking through Central London clutching on to iPhones, or if we are feeling especially important that day, an iPad. These two products have been Apple’s major successes in recent years, allowing the brand to appeal to a consumer market and an enterprise market simultaneously. They have essentially done this by making their products really cool and really useful at the same time – or at least giving us enough of an argument to convince our IT managers that we simply can’t live without an iPhone, other PR agencies would surely mock us if we turned up with a, god forbid, Nokia.

Google on the other hand have had a year of crisis after crisis. The campaigners for data privacy always seem to end up at the door of Google and have such hurt their brand image. They now appear to be the evil company that they are, having managed to keep the ‘funky start-up’ image going for far longer than deserved. However, a 2% drop isn’t exactly crisis times. They are still seen as a company pushing technological innovation – their work with Twitter during the Egypt crisis was a massive coup for the brand name in that respect.

The other interesting mover in the index is Facebook, which made its debut in the top 100 at 35; achieving the highest increase in brand value at 246 percent. I am sure that next year we will see Facebook sore into the top 20, if not the top 10, as Google, Facebook and Apple continue to be the technology brands making the most noise. I am sare that Microsoft and IBM will forever be a permanent fixture in the top 10 but it these three that dominate our consciousness.

For university students, managing your online presence offers invaluable experience, showing that you fully understand the importance of reputation management and can navigate online networks with ease. It also presents you with a fantastic opportunity to demonstrate your skills, share your thoughts, and build links with influential people in the industry.

Managing your online presence isn’t just about appealing to new employers though; it can also be a key part of winning new business. If you wanted to hire a PR agency, would you not be tempted to google the names of the consultants that you would potentially be working with? And if you were impressed with a particular company’s communications, would you not want to try and find out who was behind it? Of course you would!

It’ll be very interesting to see how this trend evolves. Already PR agencies are offering firms help with developing social media guidelines for spokespeople and other staff. But as more businesses start caring about how staff carry themselves online, perhaps we’ll see more PR agencies and SEO firms working with time-poor individuals to ‘clean up’ any social media mistakes that could affect their employability or put off prospective customers.

So, for companies looking get acquired in 2011, what do they need to think about when developing their communications strategy?

1) Know your assets Will your company’s acquisition provide a cash cow, support growth, enable innovation or open the door to a new market?  Divide and conquer. Identify your best assets and talk about them in front of the right people.

2) Price it right. Attracting a better price is down to reputation and belief. Will your ‘unique asset’ change an industry or offer another company a significant competitive advantage? Demonstrate that your company will help shape the future or can deliver accelerated growth.

3) Courting the right people? Times have changed and the acquirers of yesteryear may not be the same as today. Which markets are your acquirers operating in and what are they interested in? Adapt your message quickly, but with substance.

4) Adjusting to the competition: the lines between sectors are blurring.  Has your product innovation put you up against a new type of competitor? Or, have other companies scooped up your old rivals?  Companies might find themselves competing for a different share of voice, in a market that behaves differently to what they are used to. Make what you say is relevant.

5) Build trust:  People buy from people they trust.  And, trust in the deal is more critical in today’s economic climate. The profile and personality of the management team is everything.  Does the acquiring company believe that the execs have the right market nous? That they have understood their customers’ enough to develop a technology or service that will make a real difference.  Show intellect by offering insight into market innovation and acquisitions.

6) Timing is everything: PwC believes that the first half of 2011 is prime buying time. Why should your company get bought now?  Have you educated potential acquirers on the dynamics of your business, growth strategy and why a technology shift needs to take place today?

7) Get social: M&As can be hostile, cultures may clash, employees become unsettled, customers twitchy and partners unnerved.  So, it is inevitable that conversations will spill over into social media platforms. Organisations that already understand the dynamics of the online communities and have a voice will be best placed to quell rumours and allay fears during M&As.

Don’t forget sales:  Whilst the management team may be focused on getting the company noticed for its best assets, the sales strategy must not be overlooked.  What sales campaigns are underway and how can they be supported? Put your products on your customers’ door steps and show them that other companies trust you.

At the core, it is about getting people to buy you because they’ve heard they should and managing reputation and risk in the process.  Of course, if you are in financial technology, the ‘Cloud’, mobile data or security, you are in with a better chance of getting acquired this year.

Throughout the day more than 160 tweets were posted, with many people offering their thoughts on the presentations that they had seen, commenting on the demonstrations that they had received and what they were hoping to get out of attending the show.

But despite this just eight of the 33 exhibitors were tweeting about the event and only two of them tagged their tweets with the official #CEE11 hashtag yesterday. This meant that people who were following the stream of tweets about #CEE11 might have missed out on their tweets.

It seems to me that some of the exhibitors missed out on a great opportunity to engage with their target audiences online, many of whom were having conversations about the event on Twitter.

However a few companies were getting it very right. Matt Wood from Amazon Web Services (@mzee) shared his presentation on Slide Share and Molton Technology posted a sneak peak of the presentation that Ivo Murris will be giving today.

I also thought RackSpace had been very clever by snapping up Google Ads for searches for “Cloud Expo Europe”. Highly targeted search advertising, such as this, can be a very effective way of reaching a specific audience, without having to spend a small fortune.

Day two of Cloud Expo Europe is already underway, and I’ll be posting another blog tomorrow about the online activity surrounding the event today.

Related articles

• A day at CloudExpoEurope ’11 (secyority.com)
• Open Source Expo 2011 (alexhudson.com)

With print circulations continuing to fall and pay walls popping up all over the place it seems a strange time to launch a paid-for daily newspaper. However I could be very wrong. Dominic Ponsford makes an interesting point in his Press Gazette blog about Portugal’s third biggest selling newspaper, also called i, which launched last year. Unlike conventional papers, the Portuguese i offers readers a magazine-style experience, with a very creative and visually-rich design. Whether or not the British i will be quite as daring remains to be seen.

It’ll be interesting to see what the online version of i will look like too. I tried to grab a sneaky peak, but my attempts at finding its website were completely fruitless. Despite tirelessly searching for the letter ‘I’ on Google, Bing and Yahoo I was left none the wiser. Even the much-hyped Wolfram Alpha let me down.

Come Tuesday I know I’ll be buying a copy, but whether or not I’ll fork out on a second will depend on what it offers over the likes of the Metro and The Evening Standard. And whether I’ve got a 20 pence coin in my pocket.

Will you be grabbing a copy of i? How do you think it will impact the UK’s newspaper industry?

As the news, from comScore, that we’re now spending more time socializing on Facebook than searching with Google breaks, I get a message saying “Nicole, you’re starkers in a picture on your wall!” My immediate reaction was one of shock and horror – how could there be an explicit picture on my Facebook wall?! Completely confused and searching frantically on my Facebook account for any photos – even though, for the record, it’s not possible that there are naked pictures of me circulating the internet – I probed and probed; “what pictures are you talking about?”

So after ten minutes of desperate searches, no images appeared. The wall was actually the one in my parents study, not my Facebook ‘wall’ and the picture was when I was barely two showing off my beautiful baby bottom (things have changed since then). Although I was relieved it also got me thinking… when did we become so caught up in the online world? When did a wall immediately mean my Facebook page?

Whilst I think brands have a long way to go in terms of developing their social media strategy, it is with little wonder why more and more are turning to it as another marketing channel. It is an incredibly powerful tool when you consider that 9.9 percent of people’s Web-surfing minutes for the month are spent on Facebook.

Google has launched a new ‘priority inbox’ service for its web-based email service, Gmail. Basically Gmail monitors a user’s email behaviour and ranks email’s in order of importance, bumping the most important and unread emails to the top of the reading pane.

This got me thinking, could a priority email service spell the end of the PR mailer? By PR mailer I mean a mass mailed press release with something like ‘Innovative, groundbreaking thought leader comments on market leading spanner’ in the subject line. As 99% of hacks would hit the delete button every time they received something like this, a priority inbox system would send this mailer to the bottom of the pile, meaning not even the catchiest of subject lines will make it onto the journo’s email radar.

Good PRs will always thoroughly scrutinise whether a story is newsworthy or not, select the right journalists that would cover that story and then contact them by their preferred method. Crap PRs will send a mailer to a Gorkana (replace with whatever service you use) list.

So in an industry under constant pressure to reduce spamming, a priority inbox could be the catalyst needed to encourage more sophisticated PR activity.

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• Gmail Priority Inbox Kills Email Overload (techie-buzz.com)
• Google adds ‘priority inbox’ to Gmail (telegraph.co.uk)
• Google set to unveil “priority inbox” for Gmail (independent.co.uk)
• Google set to unveil “priority inbox” for Gmail (reuters.com)
• Google to Roll out E-mail Prioritizing Feature in Gmail (pcworld.com)
• Gmail’s New Priority Inbox Feature Knows Which Emails Are Important To You [Google] (gizmodo.com)
• Gmail Priority Inbox: 5 Tips for Better Productivity (mashable.com)
• Gmail priority inbox is an email PA (tech.fortune.cnn.com)
• Gmail Filters Email Beyond Spam (webpronews.com)