Introducing: BomoTechBlog.co.uk
The SocialTech blog has always included posts about web related events going on locally. As many of you will know, I’m passionate about creating a tech/web community in this area and I think the time is right for a blog that showcases all this stuff in one place and that was independent of agencies or specific groups.
BomoTechBlog will include all the Tech / Web / Creative events I can find out about in a handy calender, posts about cool agency projects, start-ups, awards and anything else tech / web / creative.
It’s a pet project and I’m not hoping to be the next TechCrunch/Mashable/TNW. I might include some affiliate linked ads for products I love (Capsule / Freeagent for starters) to hopefully cover the hosting, ready for when it starts getting millions of hits per month! (yeah, whatever…)
What would I like from you?
YOUR NEWS!
If your agency does something cool (not just a new site, but a new way of doing something), wins an award…. raises a squillion pounds for charity… please email it to the newsdesk!
If you’d like to help me write articles, I’d love to hear from you too.
Read MoreTweet n Delete twitter spam: twitzend.info
Beware the “tweet n delete” twitter spam twitzend.info
Twitter spam is nothing new, nor are rogue apps that promise followers and tweet on your behalf… but recently I’ve spotted an odd new trend, what I’m calling the “tweet n delete” twitter spam.
I spotted similar looking spam messages on a couple of accounts recently, when I went to view the accounts to warn the owners on the first 2, there were no messages listed, so I assumed the offending spam issue was resolved….
When I saw one from a friend of mine, I replied to him to suggest he check his authorized apps and he replied he hadn’t sent anything, I checked his feed and sure enough there was no spam… then the following day, there was another one from his account – this time I took a screenshot and checked his feed to find it was no longer listed.
<<<<< screen shot of the twitzend spam
vvvvv Screen capture of the feed for that time
He was keen not to be sending spam, so sent me his login details – as expected I found the rogue app listed (slightly in disguise) – A quick check of the link from the spam message (tinyurl translated to twitzend.info) confirmed it was the app in question and I removed it.
Forgetting the fact it’s a waste of time to fake bulk up your following numbers, beware authorizing websites to update your twitter feed.
If you do see a friends account tweeting anything odd, that’s then not listed in their stream when they/you check later, suggest they go to twitter.com, login, select settings (top right) and applications tab to see what is listed and remove ones they don’t need or recognize.
Thanks to @darylhales, club manager extraordinaire, for letting me login to his account to get to the bottom of this one.
Read Morechanging twitter usernames around
@alukeonlife is the new @socialtech is the new @alukeonlife… wait a minute, I’m confused?
The more eagle eyed of you will of noticed I’ve switched my main twitter account from @socialtech to @alukeonlife (and my previously more personal account @alukeonlife is now @socialtech btw)
Why? What does it mean? Do I need to do anything?
I wanted to combine the two and use @alukeonlife as my main account, it seemed a more personal sounding one, especially as I’ll be using it in my role as editor at BomoTechBlog.
Yes, I will still monitor @socialtech, just not post on it anymore… and… no, you don’t need to do anything to continue to get my updates – I swapped usernames. If you followed me as @socialtech, you’ll now get my updates as @alukeonlife. If you followed @alukeonlife, you’ll need to follow the new @alukeonlife.
“Hold on… BomoTechBlog – what’s that?” Aha! Well spotted… more on that here.
Read More7 tips for running an event
I’ve helped with and organized a few events in my time; occasionally I get asked for my advice on doing so… as happened twice in the last week, so I thought a blog post was in order on some of the things I’ve learnt from Startup-meetup, BarCamp Bournemouth, Ignite Bomo, Meetdraw etc… and also from attending events.
1) Be specific if/when you ask for sponsorship, you get better results – When we asked sponsors for £340 to cover a meal at a conference, we got better responses than when we asked for £100 to be a “micro-sponsor”. I have to thank Mark Ng for this one when he handed Bar Camp Bomo over to us, by far the most useful thing anyone said to us.
2) Get EVERYTHING in a google doc (or similar) for anyone involved to see: contact details, to do list, speaker contacts etc etc.
3) Don’t rely on committees, assign tasks clearly to specific people. It’s quite well documented that you have less chance that someone will volunteer to do something the more of you there are about. This is especially true of tasks “can someone…” means noone will (usually).
4) Allow people to do tasks their own way. It’s easy to micro-manage every little detail (or end up doing it yourself) – learn to accept that people do things in different ways and that most times this really doesn’t matter. I’ve even witnessed people working at an event say “I was going to do … but I know (the boss) will tell me I’ve done it the wrong way”.
5) Schedule EVERYTHING. Know when you need invoices paid, things booked, press releases sent… I’ve certainly got this wrong in the past on events and it’s on my “must try harder” list.
6) Be open, honest and transparent with your attendees. My pet peeve at events is when you get conflicting stories about why there is a delay / cock up etc… just be open n honest. Customer service 101: acknowledge what has happened, say what you’re doing to ensure it won’t happen again and what the next steps will be.
7) On the day… Don’t panic. Things WILL go wrong, kit will be lost, people will fail to show, someone will complain about something… So what? Try and enjoy your event, make sure you ask for help as soon as you need it and just roll with it.
As ever, I’d love to know your top tips in the comments.
Read More4 minutes of wisdom from Bill Morrow (Angels Den founder)
This week I went to South Coast Connections at the Queens Hotel and spa, where the guest speaker was Bill Morrow, founder of Angels Den.
After hearing the story of how he came to set up Angels Den he set out the five questions start-ups have to answer to secure funding from Angels, perhaps interesting is to hear where most fail; I wanted to share it with you so here it is:
Note: this recording was made off my phone so it’s not amazing… and yes, I did ask Bill if it was ok to post it online! (especially to share with the Startup-Meetup group on LinkedIn)
- What do you do?
- What is the pain in the marketplace that you solve?
- How do you solve that pain?
- How do you differentiate yourself from your competitors in the market place?
- How much money do you need? (& does the money you ask for show a relation to the valuation I put on your company?)
I especially liked his openness about failure, one for a future Failure Swapshop perhaps?
Read More
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