Saturday, May 29, 2010

The pillars of social media

Many companies are interested in getting onto social media, like in the dot com boom, having a webpage. But like before, building a webpage is not enough, getting traffic is the key to a successful webpage.

Even when these marketers successfully mastered optimizing their webpage to reach people, the Internet today is a slightly different place. The audience is creating and people have so much information on their fingertips. They are more unlikely to trust a corporate page's information, and they would believe a fellow blogger.

With Web 2.0, the trick now is not only to have presence and have a blog and webpage, the goal now is to grow your influence.




This presentation give you a good idea on getting more follower and growing your influence -- a must have today if you want to have a successful social media campaign.

-- Robin Low

Thursday, May 20, 2010

Social Media for Event Management

I just finished a training session with an event management company.

After researching and getting advice from network and friends, I came out with this presentation. Social Media could help a company a great deal if they can fully leverage on their social networks to spread their events through word of mouth.


Let me know your thoughts.

-- Robin Low

Sunday, May 16, 2010

Unleash your Brand

In today's digital age, it would be naive to think that it would be enough by just "getting by", doing your job, working for a company. With the financial turmoil, there is no such thing as a stable job, and the old saying of "studying hard and finding a career with a big company" does not hold water anymore.

With tons of mergers and acquisitions, companies going bust, it is no longer true that you can just work for a company for the rest of your life. Even though there are no world statistics on the accumulated number of jobs of the population, there is some information on the US and UK: the book “The Economics of Earnings”, by Solomon W. Polachek and W. Stanley Siebert, presents a study in which the UK population aged between 60 and 64 years had accumulated an average of 6.9 jobs; in the US, this number for the same population equals 10.5. An average between these two figures corresponds to 8.7 jobs in a lifetime. It is safe to say that getting known and branding yourself is becoming more important than ever.

The Brand -- YOU

People have been long searching for a way to one-up the competition. With the world going into the digital age, the process of applying for jobs also have became digital.

HR departments, headhunters, VCs and other stakeholders are using the Internet and their personal networks to find opportunities. Whether it is looking for a job, starting your own business or selling your products and services, the Internet plays a big part in many industries.

Personal branding is not a new thing, for several years now, many people have been sharing good value in the Internet on their blogs. Through other social media channels or search engines, their thoughts and deeds are made known, giving them opportunities to network and even better -- find a job or business opportunity.

I have personally know many individuals who have found jobs by just networking online. How do they do it? By simply making themselves more valuable to the marketplace by showing their skills and competence.

Digital Footprint

Your digital footprint plays a very big role. In job hunting or starting a business, many people do use search engines to find out more information about you. When is the last time you search for yourself online? Is the outcome positive?

Well it is not too late. Personal branding takes time and effort. Building relationship online is the same too. It is never too late to start. Whenever you post good information on forums or blogs, or if you contribute any articles online, remember to use your real name. You will never know the things you write would be picked up somewhere and your brand would be BIG someday.

-- Robin Low

Friday, May 14, 2010

Countries participating in the World Expo 2010

Expo Shanghai 2010.

In Shanghai, the World Expo can be overwhelming, I'm here for the third day, and I've barely seen enough exhibitions. (I blame it on China Expo for the long 2 hour queue.) Every participating country brings its A-game to the table and plan before you venture in blindly. Here is a list of participating countries... Hope it helps.

-- Robin Low

AMERICA (26 countries) Participating in World Expo 2010

El Salvador Antigua and Barbuda Brazil
Nicaragua Mexico Grenada
Venezuela Ecuador Suriname
Jamaica Haiti Guyana
Peru Chile Uruguay
Argentina Trinidad and Tobago Guatemala
Costa Rica United States Bolivia
Commonwealth of Dominica Cuba Canada
Dominican Republic Barbados Bahamas
Panama Paraguay Honduras
Belize Saint Lucia Federation of Saint Kitts and Nevis
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Colombia

EUROPE (44 countries) Participating in World Expo 2010

Malta Iceland Bosnia and Herzegovina
Estonia Slovakia Norway
San Marino Sweden Denmark
Austria Cyprus Ireland
Romania Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia Czech Republic
Greece Finland Serbia
Portugal Russia Belarus
Moldova Montenegro Lithuania
Belgium Turkey Albania
Luxembourg Poland Bulgaria
UK Croatia Germany
Ukraine Italy The Netherlands
Spain Monaco Switzerland
Hungary France Slovenia
Azerbaijan Latvia Liechtenstein
European Union Armenia Georgia

AFRICA (50 countries) Participating in World Expo 2010

Malawi Libya South Africa
Botswana Ghana Somalia
Chad Liberia Guinea-Bissau
Mozambique Niger Mauritius
Ethiopia Uganda Democratic Republic of Congo
Madagascar Sierra Leone Tunisia
Rwanda Cameroon Gabon
Morocco Kenya Sudan
Namibia Zambia Zimbabwe
Senegal Tanzania Egypt
Angola Cote d'Ivoire Comoros
Seychelles The State of Eritrea Mali
Lesotho Mauritania Cape Verde
Guinea Nigeria Djibouti
Benin Equatorial Guinea Togo
Burundi Central African Republic The Republic of Congo
Algeria Burkina Faso Gambia

ASIA (45 countries) Participating in World Expo 2010

The State of Qatar Israel Jordan
North Korea Syria United Arab Emirates
Bangladesh Afghanistan Maldives
Iran Oman Iraq
Thailand Bhutan
Lebanon Brunei Kuwait
Korea Indonesia India
Palestine Uzbekistan Saudi Arabia
Japan Yemen Laos
Malaysia Kyrgyzstan Cambodia
Bahrain Myanmar Kazakhstan
Viet Nam Mongolia Nepal
Pakistan Sri Lanka Singapore
Timor-Leste Tajikistan Turkmenistan
Philippines China

OCEANIA (15 countries) Participating in World Expo 2010

Marshall Island Solomon Islands
Kiribati Tuvalu
Niue Cook Islands
Fiji Samoa
Micronesia Tonga
Papua New Guinea Palau
Vanuatu Australia
New Zealand Nauru

International Organizations (45) Participating in World Expo 2010

United Nations Environment Programme World Trade Organization
United Nations Capital Development Fund International Network for Bamboo and Rattan
Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS International Council of Museums
International Maritime Organization World Intellectual Property Organization
International Atomic Energy Agency

Friday, May 7, 2010

Traditional Twitter via phone

I saw on Twitter Trending Topic,
Bedok MRT

I was a little surprised and read the news on Twitter, "Suicide at Bedok MRT." in Singapore. As I search Twitter, the information was a little garbled, some say 2 girls, and others 1 guy. But all came with the words "Stuck under the train" and "Gore". After doing a little more work, I later got more confirmation and eventually this was about 3 hours after the incident, "Man trapped under MRT train" which did not say much in the story at all.

"TRAINS running eastbound from Eunos to Tanah Merah stations on the East-West Line were disrupted on Friday afternoon after a man was trapped under a train at the Bedok MRT station.

How the incident, which occurred at 1.42pm, happened is still being investigated.

SMRT said that it immediately deployed buses to help stranded passengers at the two stations after the incident.

It is also assisting the Police with investigations into the incident."

I mean it was either an accident, murder or suicide. When people describe it with words, "gore" and "under the train" I don't think the guy survived.

But anyway, I told my mom this and she did her own search by calling her friends and her friends calling other friends. Within minutes, she got a story from a friend. "I was on the train, then I heard a crack sound and screams outside train. we were then ushered out."
-- She actually did a search among her friends and got the result!

She then called some of her friends and others called her about the incident as well.
-- Her network actually RTs

They referenced the incident as #BedokMRT
-- They have Hashtags!

I realized that all the principles you use on twitter is the same as your normal day to day communications. She just showed me that she could do similar viral messages via her house phone.

-- Robin Low