Neoco’s blog – keep up to date with the best digital marketing agency in the world!


Rage Against The Machine takes on X-Factor in the Russell Athletic viral
December 18, 2009, 4:38 pm
Filed under: Coffee Break, Social Networking/ Word Of Mouth | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

It’s all about timing…

Today we are going to have a quick example of bandwagon mixing.

Take one spoonful of an existing viral creator, you can choose any of those out there. You might decide on the well known Elf Yourself viral but today I’ve gone with Russell Athletic 80’s maker.

Then add a variable amount of celeb factor. I’ve added two lumps of Simon Cowell and Louie Walsh, with a sprinkling of Cheryl Cole – Simon Cowell looks awesome as an 80’s aerobic dancer!

I already had a copy of Rage Against The Machine: Killing In The Name Of on my iTunes but you can buy one here for only 29p and fuel the crazy buzz around Xmas number one. (In the spirit of fairness you can also buy the X-factor Xmas song from http://tinyurl.com/joemcthingy.)

Give them a nice little mix up and sit back to enjoy the results. It literally only takes a few minutes and then you can successfully sit back and know you’ve taken part in the latest internet-bandwagon-buzz-thingy! Well done.

Kudos to our agency mates at Scorh London for putting way more effort in and coming up with this nice little video:

3 Comments


What is your SM-ROI?
December 14, 2009, 3:05 pm
Filed under: Social Networking/ Word Of Mouth | Tags: , , , ,

Social Media, like most industries of today, is experiencing an increasing pressure for metrics and deliverables upon project completion. It is interesting to meet up and chat about how others do it. Measurement Camp is a public project that is open for anybody and which bring together quite a diverse group of people to discuss how to measure social media activities.

It seems that wanting to measure media is related to how people like to use familiar and perhaps ‘safe’ business terms such as transactions, revenue and customers when taking about returns on investment. And it’s up to the ‘social media guy’ to be creative around how to meet these requirements.

But why is it that no one seems to know how to measure ROI for social media? Could it be that ROI is a business metric inapplicable in this instance?

One of the many suggestions that came up during the last camp involved going back to basics, and therefore monitoring the baseline before and after social media activities. This has proven to work in a few cases where ROI has increased as brand image and customer communications has improved. However, on big projects social media might not have any threshold weight and so it is very unlikely to be measured against the baseline… Also, how do we apply this when the social media activity is no longer new to the business, but rather built in? I’m afraid, this evening Measurement Camp didn’t manage to measure a lot…

Two final notes: Firstly, although this may sound obvious, organisations should really get better at saving buzz and sending over a copy to the RnD department. Talk about valuable leftovers! And secondly, a little bird tweeted in my ear and said that ‘if it easy to measure it is useless’. The debate about how to best measure social media is not over yet!

Leave a Comment


Over 50’s are twittering away!
December 11, 2009, 2:51 pm
Filed under: Social Networking/ Word Of Mouth | Tags: , , , , ,

Grandma loves Tweet(y)

Some still struggle to see the point of being on Twitter. Because how could a simple 140 character platform bring any sort of value whether for your personal social life or for an multinational organisation? Yet many others will say that their Twitter account is their claim to fame, others again will show how the platform has developed their brand, introduced them to their clients and now function as their main port of contact with the surrounding world.

There is no doubt that lies great value in identifying what types of people use different social media channels, how they use them, when and why. Reports from 2008 (PEW Internet and American Life Project) presented a picture of how the younger Internet users, 18-24-year-olds, were more likely than any other age group to be found on Twitter. Back then, users aged 50+ accounted for somewhere in the region of 4% of the total usage.

But as Twitter continues to see an incredible growth rate we see tendencies for more mature users turning to the site. Recent research issued by Nielsen Online confirms that twice as many 50-64-year-olds than 18-24-year-olds in the UK are now using the platform. This shift is visible throughout the whole user population. Today, the 50+’s account for over 22% of the entire Twitter audience, making them the second most frequent user group after the 35-49-year-olds (33%).

Check out Ivy Bean who is 105 years old and tweeting away – to 50,000+ followers!

So what is it with Twitter that attracts the 50+’s? Are the younger users loosing interest? What are the implications for organisations? Is this an opportunity for new types of businesses and industries to join? These and many more questions answered by getting in touch with us at Neoco towers. We are helping brands communicate and engage this audience already.

Leave a Comment


WOMUK IAB event re paying for social media
December 11, 2009, 1:18 pm
Filed under: Events, Social Networking/ Word Of Mouth | Tags: , , , , , ,

Last Monday WOM UK organized another debate, this time the topic was whether social media should be paid for or not. They panel consisted of; Molly Flatt, President of WOM UK and WOM Evangelist at 1000 Heads; Kate Box, Head of Social Media Sales at Microsoft Advertising; Steve Filler, Commercial Director for Unruly Media and Ciarán Norris, Head of Social Marketing at Mindshare.

It would probably have been useful if the organisers had determined the definition of social media before the debate begun, as this was the main part of the whole debate and its aftermath.

There were a few interesting questions that came up during the debate though; if you pay for viral is it still viral? If you pay for social, have you really earned it? Are social media users, and more importantly bloggers, really in it for the money, or for increasing status, their passion and personal expertise?

For sure, the social platforms are all out there, open for any user or organisation for free. But there is a huge benefit from getting help from people who knows the drill. The debate took silly proportions as there is no way of neglecting the value time and money spent on social media brings to businesses. Social media management is a long-term investment that requires people’s time. The pay-offs are amazing though.

At the end of the event all present took a vote, and it became clear that over 65% of the audience thought that social media could or should be paid for – and thereby got Neoco’s sign of approval!

Leave a Comment


new team at neoco
December 7, 2009, 6:44 pm
Filed under: Our team | Tags: , ,

A big Neoco welcome to Angie and Lexy who join our Creative Services team at Account Manager level.

so good, the Stones sung about her...

Angelique ‘Angie‘ Smit
Joins us from the lovely land of Amsterdam, coming from Oberon Interactive. Her previous clients include; Google, Electronic Arts and Akzo Nobel.

Had the choice of Alex#2 or something else, so Benn came up with Lexy...

Alexandra ‘Lexy‘ Hall
is joining from social media agency theDBMgroup. Previous clients include Vauxhall, Bodyform and Tena Lady.

2 Comments


Social Media MixMix!
December 3, 2009, 6:09 pm
Filed under: Events, Social Networking/ Word Of Mouth | Tags: , , , ,

Mashup* runs a series of industry networking events over at Monument. This time around the focus was on the ever-increasing social media sphere. The event kicked off with the Social Media Guru video – If you haven’t seen it yet, have a look, because it is really quite funny http://bit.ly/5Z2Hgc

The main act, Chris Thorpe from Jaggeree, delivered a presentation on his views of the social landscape, something he described as odd shaped, in constant change and… very hard to describe! Having been a chemist prior to starting to play and work with computers/digital and online he likes to refer to the different elements of social media as our new ‘raw materials’. Examples of these materials, which are all based purely on data, include Identity [ID], Intention [In], Attention [Atn] and Location [Lc]. These building stones shape the foundation of what we call social media. He continued with asking:

But where does ‘media’ enter the picture? Is social media not in fact separated from media, and something solely produced and spread by social people?

I think that Chris is on to something here – this is why social media does not equal advertising, just as talking doesn’t equal broadcasting. The great thing with social media is how it is authentic. We find ourselves in a world where the digital life is very much identical with real life – there is just a keyboard in-between.

After the key act followed a number of 30 sec introductions by members of the audience, intended to stir up conversation. Sadly, many took this opportunity for throwing out a 30 sec sales pitch, which can only be blamed on them. I felt a little sad looking at the faces of the organisers. Cold beer and cold pizza followed, all in all a pleasant evening. Well done to Chris and Mashup*!

Leave a Comment