Sales, Social and Tech

You can call her Muthu the firefighter if you bump in today’s featured blogger Isabelle at the popular night club. Social PR chats with Isabelle to find out why she likes cows so much. Who are you? Ie what is your blog name and your real name. Why did you come up with the blog title? I am Isabelle. But you might also know me by my more provincial sounding Chinese name "Xiaoyun". Or "Muthu the firefighter" if you bump into me in clubs when I am high or not thinking staight. My blog "Isabelle Neo" is named after me and "weecloud" is just a word play on my chinese name. What are you? In ten (or so) words, you would describe your blog as: … I am a dreamer and an escapist with a quirky take on life. I blog about topics that interests me, in particular food, fashion, beauty, entertainment and travel. In addition, you also get to view the daily humdrums of (my) life through my eyes.  Editorial Deadline? Ie when should PRs NOT call?

Philippines' no 1 ladies’s man evolving into a technological singularity. Social PR catches up with Philippines Blogger Mike Abundo on his “Gamechanging” blog. Who are you? Ie what is your blog name and your real name. Why did you come up with the blog title? My name is Mike Abundo, and my blog is called The Mike Abundo Effect . My blog's title comes from a phrase coined by PR guru Steve Rubel , in reference to Filipinos' rapid early adoption of YouTube. What are you? In ten (or so) words, you would describe your blog as: … The Mike Abundo Effect explores the rapidly growing intersection of technology and media, and how that intersection is changing your world. Why do we need you? Why is your blog different? What makes it stand out from the crowd? Why is it special? “Mike is truly a leading advocate for the responsible use of technology in everyday life. He has proven himself time and time again as a voice of reason in a sea of gobbledygook and technical ch

There is Ian, Liam, Kristian, etc at Vocanic and Social PR caught up with Ian McKee of Vocanic to find out more about the social media agency.   Who are you? Ie what are the names of the people on your team? Ian, Liam, Kristian, Jasmine, Josie, Bobby, Dom, Eileen, Teck Hooi, Ai Hong, Anne .... What are you? In ten (or so) words, you would describe your agency as: … A team of people passionate about the field of earned media Why do we need you? Why should new clients go to you? Because there is nothing more valuable for a brand than a personal recommendation from one friend to another  - and we help you measure, manage and amplify the recommendation that happens for your brand Contact? Who’s the best person on the team for new business? The CEO – the buck stops with him Best Pitch or Campaign? Please highlight your best pitch or campaign. StarHub .. too many campaigns to mention .. but including www.facebook.com/StarHub www.twitter.com/StarHubCares plus www.ripp

socialmediatoday.com blog debunked the five social media myths and I agree with all of them. Here are my thoughts. Myth 1: E-Mail Is Dead Over my dead body and email is far from dead. In fact, if you are looking to increase awareness of your social media campaign, email is by the most effective way to reach out to your database. Why? Simply because it is easier and more effective for somebody to click a link to the social media platform from an email than for the campaign to made via print or even an online ad. Most of the fan pages that I am responsible usually see spikes in fans joining the page when an edm goes into the mail box of the targeted audience. Email isn’t dead, it is striving form of communication and social media needs it to very badly. Myth 2: The CEO Needs to Blog Blogging is tough and lots of CEOs I am aware off can’t sit down for 15 mins to string a 300 word post. I recently approached a CIO who promised to participate in my FST interviews and for

Those who live by the sword die by the sword. For Malaysia’s Information Minister Datuk Seri Dr Rais Yatim, insulting the social networks made him the butt of jokes for early 2010. Wrote The Malaysian Insider, If the government needed proof of the power of the new media, they got it on Twitter this week when Information Minister Datuk Seri Dr Rais Yatim — who recently spoke out against Web lovers — became an overnight Internet sensation. The incident highlights how the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) remains detached from young, Internet-savvy urbanites. On Tuesday afternoon, what started on the popular micro-blogging site Twitter as a handful of jokes about Rais swiftly and unexpectedly snowballed into a torrent. Most of the posts, or tweets, were about Rais’ age and started with “Rais is so ancient...”. (For example, “Rais is so ancient, he can settle the debate over who started using ‘Allah’ first.”) So #yorais so old….

Jay Baer of Convince & Convert wrote an interesting post about the differences between bloggers and reporters. His post can be found here but the main points can be found here. My comments can be found below. Bloggers are self-made Social PR: Most of the bloggers here started their blog from 0 readers to a few hundreds to thousands over the years. They create content that are of interest to them not because the brands tell them that it is important to write about them. Bloggers are time-starved Social PR: Many PR agencies often in the name of cost savings would like to combine their press conference to get bloggers in during the day. Unfortunately, most bloggers have a day job and are often unable to attend during the day. So it is important to understand this time factor. Bloggers need traffic and influence Social PR: Most of the blogger engagement in Singapore can be summarized in two activities, p

( Update: Sassyjan tweeted that the Inspecting Officer has already contacted her this morning via his assistant.) Singapore blogger, SassyJan, blogged recently about her experience with loansharks and the “indifference” she felt from the police when she made her report at the police station. Prominent Singapore bloggers, Cowboy Caleb and Little Miss Fun, have reacted shockingly to the “indifference”. SassyJan wrote that when she reported the incident to the police, she waited for the inspector in-charge to call her but no one did. Wrote SassyJane, He helpfully suggested CCTV, but looked equally as helpless as I was. His job is to write the report and forward this to the CID Inspecting Officer. I called said IO again and the phone rung and rung - Nothing. The police officer said he’ll try to help me call this Inspecting Officer, but with the same helpless look, told me he will try to email him too, however, sometimes it might take more than a week to

She sees her blog as a pretty pink flamingo. Urban lifestyle blogger Holly Jean , who can’t wait to get invited to the Resorts World, answers Social PR’s questions about her blog and herself as a blogger. Who are you? Ie what is your blog name and your real name. Why did you come up with the blog title? I'm Holly Jean, and My Blog is titled A Thing (or Two) About Holly Jean because it's about my life and how I live it. What are you? In ten (or so) words, you would describe your blog as: … Humorous, light-hearted, yet thought-provoking urban lifestyle blog about relationships, beauty, fitness, fashion and food. Why do we need you? Why is your blog different? What makes it stand out from the crowd? Why is it special? I have good rapport and connection with a strong (and growing!) base of loyal readers. You can view my past advertorials/columns/articles here - http://hirehollyjean.blogspot.com/2008/11/creative-portfolio.html Perfect story? First, what kind of s

It seems that Indonesia is the Social Network capital of Asia when it comes to the game of numbers. Sysomos reported that Indonesia has the highest number of twitter users (2.41% of twitter users) and Indonesian tweeters contributed 2.34% of tweets from October 2009 to November 2009. In my post yesterday, Indonesia had the highest number of Facebook users in Asia as of December 2009. From jonrussell.posterous.com , While Thailand does not feature in either list Southeast Asian neighbours Indonesia (6th with 2.41%) and Philippines (15th with 1.08%) are included in the top 20 countries based on share of Twitter users. Analysing Twitter activity and each, Indonesia is 6th (with 2.34% of the world’s tweets), Singapore is 12th (with 0.88%), Philippines is 13th (with 0.85%) and Malaysia 18th (with 0.47%), Thailand fails to make the top 10. Finally Sysomos looked at individual cities and their share of users and activity. Jakarta is the sole Southeast Asian representative

According to Nick Burcher , head of the VNC UK, Indonesia has the highest number of Facebook users in Asia as of December 2009. Singapore was not in the December 2009 list but there were 1,650,660 Singapore Facebook users as of September 2009. Rank Country Number of Facebook users 12 month growth % 6 month growth % 1 Indonesia 14,681,580 1536.7% 126% 2 Philippines 8,387,560 2046.8% 208.4% 3 Australia 7,611,920 75.8% 25.7% 4 Taiwan 5,490,300 4763% 701% 5 India 5,397,480 403.8% 66.8% 6 Malaysia 3,975,640 367.5% 9

Do you need a free tool to listen to what is being said of you or your brand online? Here’s 20 tools for you to do so. Courtesy of mcpromotions.blogspot.com . 1) http://BackTweets.com : A search engine for Twitter. See who's tweeting your links and more. Can also sign up for email alerts of new findings. 2) http://Addictomatic.com : A little different than the others , you type in a keyword, topic or phrase and out it goes searching the top blogs, news sites, Google, Technorati, Ask, YouTube, Flickr, Digg, Topix and more. You'll be given a personalized results page to bookmark with everything it finds related to your topic. 3) http://Buzzoo.net : All about Internet buzz, it tracks several different websites to bring you what's "hot" right now. 4) http://Surchur.com : Search for the latest and greatest on topics that are popular right now. Type in a keyphrase and it searches blogs, social news sites, photo and video sites for your chosen topic. 5) h

From econsultancy.com Big newspapers are joining Twitter at an alarming rate, in part because it offers another avenue for story ideas and scoops. Some newspaper execs are also trying to find a way to make money from Twitter. This is a tricky area, because the people who use Twitter have shown that they are not fans of spam, or anything remotely resembling spam, and will take swift action (unfollow, possibly report the account) if it is suspected. For big newspapers, which often have big debt loads and vastly diverse audiences, using Twitter as an advertising platform is challenging. But for small and medium-sized titles, an opportunity exists. Last week I attended the news:rewired event put on by Journalism.co.uk , and hosted by City University London . Billed as a look at how the news industry needs to change its approach to journalism online, those in attendance included editors at the major national titles, and editors at small papers with just a few thousand readers.

He sees himself as dolphin and connectivity is his secret keyword. Social PR talks to The Pacific West Communications’ Andrew Peters and he shares with us how he will sell his services to aliens. Who are you? Ie what are the names of the people on your team? Independent with a host on online passionate social media friends & agents. What are you? In ten (or so) words, you would describe your agency as: Connectiveness is our objective for and with all stakeholders Why do we need you? Why should new clients go to you? Social Media Marketing is in its infancy, yet the opportunities SMM offers has been followed and executed with passion unseen elsewhere by the other service agents in this space. Plus we are connected. Contact? Who’s the best person on the team for new business? This dude called APLINK Best Pitch or Campaign? Please highlight your best pitch or campaign. Singapore Tattoo Show 2009 http://www.webinknow.com/2009/01/how-an-active-facebook-group-dr

From mashable.com Companies large and small are rushing to understand and get involved in social media. But most of the agencies and consultants who are being paid to establish social media campaigns for corporations are afraid to tell their clients three things they don’t want to hear. 1. Everyone Must Work Together In most big companies, IT, digital, marketing and sales not only don’t work together, they compete with each other. Until they start collaborating as a team, you will not succeed in social media. For example, I recently handled social media advertising for a major retail chain’s holiday microsite. The promotion was conceived by the digital department and involved augmented reality. But the IT department refused to allow a link from the homepage to the microsite because the microsite’s design was done by an external agency. Further, the marketing department refused to allow a dedicated e-mail to go out to the company’s mailing list, and when placed in the compa

He updates his blog daily and will post anything that catches his attention. A good blog post to him is one that makes full use of the multimedia aspect of the online medium. Social PR catches up with Alvin of Alvinology to find out more about the blogger and his blog. Who are you? Ie what is your blog name and your real name. Why did you come up with the blog title? Alvin is a 100% geek who spends a lot of time surfing the web. Alvinology is a light-hearted blog and the content is totally random, ranging from things Alvin experiences to web gossip – basically anything that catches his attention. What are you? In ten (or so) words, you would describe your blog as: … Random, hyper-local, geeky. Why do we need you? Why is your blog different? What makes it stand out from the crowd? Why is it special? I update on a daily basis, which is rare. I also try to include as much hyperlinks, videos, photos and graphics elements in my entries as best-suited to make full use

From USA Today When Chinese student Rachel Zhang discovered Twitter last April, she realized her "little dream" of sharing with strangers the movies that made her laugh and the books that made her cry. Then, in July, Beijing blocked the U.S.-based microblogging site, where users post brief updates as fast as they can tap on their cellphones. Zhang, 24, a postgraduate student at Communication University of China, fell silent. That is, until Chinese media giant Sina launched its own Twitter-like service recently. But that service came with a price: Chinese authorities can monitor traffic and curtail its use. "No one likes to have second thoughts before writing personal blogs," she says. Microblogging — the sending of brief text, audio or video to select groups — is growing rapidly among China's estimated 360 million Internet users, according to New Weekly magazine in China. The magazine's Jan. 15 cover story is titled "Micro Revolution.&qu

Singtel MIO TV has stop the delivery of popular pre-school channels CBeebies and Luli. A check at the Singtel MIO TV channel page has confirmed the missing pre-school channels.   How are parents going to explain to their kids of the lost of CBeebies and Luli? A blogger posted his disappointment over the silent disappearance of CBeebies and Luli. Jimmy Mun wrote, “I signed up with miotv last year for two channels only: CBeebies and Luli. “It is not even one year yet, and yet miotv has managed to lose both channels with little warning. Yes, they have lost Luli rights as well, and they did not announce anything until the channel was dropped. miotv now has absolutely NOTHING to offer preschoolers. “If I am not on contract, I will terminate my miotv subscription immediately. “The set top box is now a white elephant .”

From communitymarketing.typepad.com In 2009 there was a lot of talk about social media, but how do you know if the people giving advice are competent in the field or theorists? In 2009 this blog I had the opportunity to innovate an event called Blog-Off contests. These were events that offered social media enthusiasts the opportunity to be measured and show they knew how to apply several of the fundamentals critical for social media marketing effectiveness… …What Does It Take To Be Effective In Social Media? Sean Nelson - "The results I achieved were based on tapping into what I call the 4 C's of social media; Communities, Content, Conversation and Conversion." "When it came to the contest I tapped into my networks and benefited from the credibility of the last two years." Email . Blog . LinkedIn . Sam Diener - "The key to building community is to interact with your readers through your content. Content writers seem to forget that there is

by mashable.com The modern American school faces rough challenges. Budget cuts have caused ballooning class sizes ,  many teachers struggle with poorly motivated students , and in many schools a war is being waged on distracting technologies . In response, innovative educators are embracing social media to fight back against the onslaught of problems. Technologies such as Twitter and Skype offer ideal solutions as inexpensive tools of team-based education. Pockets of experimentation are emerging all around the world, and I hope to inspire my fellow teachers with some stories of success. From cell phones to social media, below are three schools that have chosen to go with the flow of popular technology to turn the tide for education. Read more on how social technologies are being used by educators here .

By VEXNEWS Traditionally over summer, it is common for folks to relax and let their hair down. Sometimes this leads some of us to do things we later regret. Living and hairy proof of this is the Sunday Age’s Michael Bachelard who oddly submitted his body to the unloving gaze of the small but loyal army of doctors’ wives and Portsea residents who read that increasingly desperate publication. His disarmingly frank account of his multiple physical deficiencies probably seemed like a good idea at the time. After all, his much more successful competitor the Sunday Herald Sun had splashed with a discreetly nude shot of Australia’s most attractive bogan queen Jennifer Hawkins who managed to look most pleasing despite declining the aid of Photoshop. To see Michael Bachelard in his birthday suite, click here .

Christmas is over so was the Ris Low episode. But if you can’t get enough of Christmas and Ris Low, this youtube video would bring a smile to your Monday blues.

From sgentrepreneurs.com Filmcamp is an ad-hoc unconference, born from the desire to share new ideas in, and learn about, the filmmaking industry in an open environment. If you are interested to learn about film-making and interacting with people who are interested in the area, you should attend this conference. The conference is happening in National Library Board Singapore on 31 Jan 2010, 9 am to 5 pm. If you are interested, please register here for the event. Being the world’s first independent, grass-root run film unconference. This is not an “unconference for filmmakers”. This is Filmcamp – an inclusive unconference about anything related to film & filmmaking. Filmmakers and non-filmmakers are invited to attend, share, learn, have fun, and make a lot of noise :) Read more about Filmcamp here .

From readwriteweb.com Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg told a live audience yesterday that if he were to create Facebook again today, user information would by default be public, not private as it was for years until the company changed dramatically in December. In a six-minute interview on stage with TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington , Zuckerberg spent 60 seconds talking about Facebook's privacy policies. His statements were of major importance for the world's largest social network - and his arguments in favor of an about-face on privacy deserve close scrutiny. Zuckerberg offered roughly 8 sentences in response to Arrington's question about where privacy was going on Facebook and around the web. The question was referencing the changes Facebook underwent last month. Your name, profile picture, gender, current city, networks, Friends List, and all the pages you subscribe to are now publicly available information on Facebook. This means everyone on the web can s

mashable.com   A strong earthquake (magnitude 6.5) hit off the coast of Northern California today, breaking windows and taking out power lines in some areas. The quake hit at 4:27 pm PT, with the epicenter around 25 miles from Eureka. Being a Saturday with most of the news media not at work, it was left to Twitter to tell the story, with users posting pics to photo site Twitpic almost immediately. Here are the most retweeted Twitpics from the incident, all of them from @amyeureka – her full Twitter feed paints a picture of the damage more detailed than any news outlet has achieved. More Twitpics can be found here .

from socialmediatoday.com I spend a great deal of time working within the B2B sector, among other things, and social media is a growing and or pervasive program within a comprehensive, integrated communications and service strategy. In almost every scenario I’ve encountered, executives, marcom and service executives, and brand managers have generally assumed that social and interactive activities and programming were ideally best suited for consumer applications. However, as we recently explored, in Social Media, it’s not just business, it’s business-to-business . Indeed, Social Media is not limited to B2C applications, its impact and effects are actively measured and felt in B2B as well as government, education, military, and other prominent verticals. As decision makers take to the social web, their research, activity, communication, and most importantly, their relationships only intensify over time. If you’re working in B2B, perhaps this post will provide you with value. Or

From ReadWriteWeb , We love site-building and story-telling applications, and social webizens love sharing their content - particularly multimedia content - in new and compelling ways. YouTellYou is a fun and simple tool that allows users to grab, annotate, tag and share their pictures in an online magazine-type format. Users can pull in photos from Smugmug, Facebook, Flickr or one's own computer, then go to town in a frenzy of sequences, captions and true pictorial story-weaving. youtellyou can be found at here .

From holykaw.alltop.com Forbes picked fourteen power women to follow on Twitter. The list is filled with wonderfulness like: @kriscolvin . Kristi Kolvin is the prom queen of online design, usability and branding. Her design work is engaging—incorporating both homemade or handmade elements and high tech—just like her tweets. You can’t help but like her approachable and engaging delivery. @prsarahevans . Marrying her PR background and a passion for social media (a self-described “Twitterholic”), Evans has developed a devoted following that she likens to “a giant cocktail party.” If there’s any doubt about her guest list, take a look at her following. @jessicagottlieb . It is not an exaggeration to describe Jessica Gottlieb as one of the most decorated guards of the mommy bloggersphere. She will make you blush, laugh and cry with her trademark candor, often calling out other bloggers for poor behavior. Somehow the Twittersphere feels a bit safer because she is in it.

From Mashable, Google is struggling to provide adequate customer service for the Nexus One (aka Google phone ), according to reports. The Google Mobile forums are brimming with unanswered queries and problems, as customers turn to Google itself for support. One recurring issue in the forums is a problem with the phone either not switching to 3G or switching back and forth between 3G and EDGE too frequently — it’s not clear if this is a significant issue or if the complaints are just a symptom of Google’s less-than-stellar customer support. Read more, click here .

From Mashable:   The Simulcam and Fusion 3D camera inventions were not the only technologies that made James Cameron’s Sci-Fi epic Avatar a massive box office success. While smaller films have used social media to spread the word guerrilla-style, no other major blockbuster has employed a full-on social web marketing assault quite like Avatar. The results in its case were a $232 million opening weekend, a total of one billion dollars in revenue by year’s end, and the rank of #2 highest grossing film of all t..   show all text

Social networks might be on the rise, but interestingly a survey of the top 10 Internet activities for Gen Y Singaporeans (age 15 – 29) showed that email is still a very popular activity online. The ACNielsen Oct 2009 survey showed that 80% used email. Social Networking is 53% and gathering information on product or service is at 46%. Another report from ComScore showed that the average time Singaporen spend online is 21.4 hours per user per month in August 2009. That puts Singapore the 2nd highest # of hours in Asia. Are these scores a surprise to you?

A Singapore pro-government Member of Parliament recently responded to a blog posting about her being misquoted and found that it wasn’t as scary as it is perceived to be. This raises two questions about how Singapore government are not making use of the right tools to monitor themselves in the social space and the difference between how traditional media and social media look at one’s right to respond. Today wrote, “She felt she had been misquoted, and wrote to the editor of a local website for a correction. But that simple request by NTUC deputy secretary-general Halimah Yacob to The Temasek Review has sparked off a buzz among netizens, with some viewing her move as a positive one in engaging the alternative media. In an interview with MediaCorp last week, Mdm Halimah had noted that some middle-aged degree holders lost their jobs and ended up driving taxis because of the downturn. Under-employment, she said, was unavoidable because of limited job opportunities from slow econo

The advertisement showed the daughter preparing a drawing to give her mother for her birthday. A caring bank teller sees the drawing and surprised the family with a birthday cake. Why did OCBC do it? Because their tagline is “It’s our pleasure to serve you!” Is such service for a real? A blogger found that in real life, you don’t get your cake at OCBC on your birthday. Kitchen Tigress wrote, “After an eternity, the bank teller lady who went off to consult her supervisor emerged from the internal bowels of the bank. “'We don't have any cake . . . . It's just an advertisement . . . .' 'If you don't give customers birthday cakes, why do you advertise that you do?' She went back to her supervisor. “Tick, tock, tick, tock . . . . After another eternity, she came back, this time with a bright yellow shopping bag. Would I like the shopping bag instead? 'That's not a cake,' I said. NO CAKE! NO CANDLE! NO GOOD! She disappeared behind the do

I am getting enquiries from entrepreneurs, start-ups and SMBs on engaging me for PR services lately. So what better way to start the new year with a few basic PR tips. However, before I continue, it is very important to remember that PR stands for Public Relations, not Press Relations. PR isn’t just about getting the press to know about you, but your stakeholders to be aware of your brand or the person behind the brand. You engage the media because you are looking for a third party write-up of your brand and seeking their medium to reach out to the greater audience. Engaging media is called media relations and I will touch on that in another post. However, with Web2.0, everybody is media so it is as important to return the public to Public Relations. Tip 1: Appoint your spokesperson early Human nature usually encourages humans to support other humans. As such, choose a spokesperson for the brand as soon as you decide to go on a PR campaign. The designated spokesperson will