Micro Biter

Whilst not entirely related to digital, I do feel inspired to create some content to support my fundraising efforts for the Virgin London Marathon. I have some ideas of my own, but please do post any ideas and inspirations in the comments below!

In a future post, I’ll explain why I don’t really like running very much, why I’ve done more than my fair share of it, and importantly, why in Batman’s name I’m doing it all again.  I’ll also say a bit more about my chosen charity, Barnardo’s 150th anniversary - one of the reasons I’m running 42 kilometres.

To find out a bit more and pledge your support, please visit my personal fundraising page.  

Thank you!

That’s exactly what Search Laboratory did for Tiger Log Cabins, and it turned out to be an inspirational SEO masterclass.

You'd think that a brief requesting an increase in organic search rankings for what's technically a glorified garden shed would be the most boring project. Garden sheds are not exactly the sexiest products at the best of times. This campaign proves you should never judge a book [brief] by its cover.

The strategy was never intended for conversions. It was totally for quality inbound links, in order to increase visibility in organic search, which later on would lead to conversions from the quality traffic. The organisation, Tiger Log Cabins, was ranked outside the top 100 positions for the keyword 'log cabin' prior to this campaign. Soon after launching, 'log cabin' was yielding page two results on Google.

How did they do it?

In a nutshell, they designed the most desirable garden shed you can imagine owning if there was a zombie apocalypse:

1. They designed a real product that could actually be manufactured and purchased (from £69,995.50)

2. They timed the release during zombie season - just a few weeks before Halloween when there were popular Zombie related programs being aired on TV

3. Distribution was executed perfectly so the campaign went viral, which lead to high levels of traffic to the landing page

And this next bit is genius

4. They made it so that you could customize your cabin by adding extras including security cameras, solar panels and a riot protection outfit - this meant that people spent longer on the page clicking around, engaging with the content – Google’s algorithms obviously love a bit of that, therefore ranking the page higher. 

This was all topped off with extras such as spoof reviews and a 10-year anti-zombie guarantee.

I’m aware I’m not doing it any justice with this post so check out the Gorkana website for a more in depth run down of strategy, execution and results. 

This is a question I get asked often. It’s a good thing because it means that more and more people are looking to learn the the skills required to keep up with the speed at which all things digital are developing. 

Rather than responding individually, I thought I’d post it here so that more recent students or alumni are able to chip in and update bits where the course has inevitably evolved. 

The course by its nature is designed to be adaptable, meaning it is constantly changing based on feedback from current and past students. My comments are based on my experience from the January 2014 cohort, so it’s likely to have changed slightly since then. Anyone who has completed the course more recently is welcome to post any corrections or updates in the comments below.

Content

Course content is engaging and varied with a healthy combination of blog posts, video, lectures, discussions, and images. Lesson slides are available for download and students are provided with ‘further reading’ lists. However, other than the lectures and course slides, there’s little in the way of bespoke, original content – most is delivered through a curation of content readily available on the web.

Teaching style

Classes are mostly delivered via live online lectures and discussions accompanied with a deck of slides. Students are provided with a pre class brief which usually includes the content mentioned above. Live classes include a discussion box where students can chat in real time – a bit like if MSN messenger allowed everyone to chat at once in one conversation. These were eventually deactivated and activated at the discretion of the tutor as some people couldn’t help but discuss their dinner during a class. There’s always one, at least.

In my cohort, lectures were scheduled every Tuesday and Thursday evening from 7pm to 8pm GMT. Classes are recorded so you can watch on catch up if you miss a live lecture.

The tutors themselves tend to have impressive credentials and track records, having either been around at the dawn of the digital age, and/or have had a hand in developing a tech start-up or few. Over the course, many students feel like they’ve got to know the tutors, as you would in a real life class, which is testament to their individual personalities and their engagement with students during the online lectures

Coursework/exams

There are no exams as such, but assignments after each module to be completed in groups. These assignments need to be project managed, but groups are left to their own devices to organise themselves. This can be a bit of luck of the draw in terms of who you get to work with. Bear in mind that a number of people have signed up to the course under duress from an employer, as some sort of compulsory training. This can result in significantly varying levels of motivation and engagement across team members.

Whilst assignments were graded between 1-10, you only needed a pass (average of 6) to succeed. There was no merit or distinction available. There is a peer review at the end of each module, and at the end of the course students vote for  their top five most inspirational fellow students (what sort of suck up gets that?!).

General experience

Overall I found the course useful, but I knew what I wanted out of it. It’s not a specialist course in any one particular area of digital – meaning that it won’t teach a person to become an analyst or a strategist, for example, but it will certainly provide the opportunity to understand how each area works, enough to know how and where to explore more if need be. It really is up to the individual how much time they wish to put in. It’s rare that anyone fails, but people who don’t engage are unlikely to gain much out of it.

At a minimum, the course will help someone gain confidence when discussing digital aspects of their work at meetings or when speaking with contracting agencies. The rest is entirely dependent on the individual– you could find your learnings useful in any situation - from conceptualising an idea, putting together a pitch for venture capital, or piecing together a fully integrated cross-channel digital marketing strategy. It simply depends on how much attention you paid to a particular module.

It’s impossible to write about this without mentioning possibly the greatest take-away resource of all – your peer students. Cohorts could include anything between 350-400 students at any one time. This is an incredible resource of knowledge, experience and creativity. The ever growing alumni group on Google+ appears to be alive and kicking with interesting articles and topics for discussion. This is particularly great for keeping up in digital advancements in areas you may not be exposed to on a day to day basis. Having the Squared course in common also means that most posters are approachable and will engage when asked a question.

Time commitment

As mentioned earlier, this is entirely dependent on the individual – how much they already know, how fast they can read and understand, how confident and willing they are to reach out to networks for advice and help when needed. I would say it needs a minimum of 7-10 hours per week in addition to lectures in order to get something worthwhile out of it. This does depend on how organised teams are and how effectively they work together. The groups I worked in agreed to meet regularly in weekly Google Hangouts which meant we could check in and keep our assignments on track.

I did write a couple of short blogs about my learnings – one of which was specifically about my top five tips for working with strangers, which was well received.

It's rare that you'll find someone who simply doesn't like a good infographic, although I am certainly not immune to the fatigue felt when bombarded with fancy illustrations that explain pretty much any issue in the world in simple visual statistics.

The key point of an infographic is that it is an effective method of crunching down and simplifying data into easily digestible facts that can then be shared in their entirety, or individually.

The simplicity of an infographic is, however, an illusion in some respects, as it is not in any way a simple or easy task to put one together. Similarly to many other things, such as top selling pop music, it's the simplicity that makes it a winner. The difficulty is stripping away all the unnecessary bits that nobody will miss, the bits that don't add anything extra other than noise, and presenting the important, useful information in a clear and coherent way.

Our group was tasked with presenting the past, present and future of telecommunications in an infographic that was to be submitted as file no larger than a 1MB .jpeg.

Having successfully worked through the challenges of previous modules we acted according to the best practices we had learned along the way - get organised early, divide up the work accordingly, set deadlines to work to, have a plan b (OK, that last one might have just been in my head).

Initially this task seemed easy. We were to go off, do a bit of research, which we would hand over to the design team, who would do come copying and pasting and come up with something magical.

As the discussions in meetings progressed it became increasingly clear that this was not as simple as it seems. We were once again overwhelmed by large amounts of data, we didn't have a clear narrative and we were all so busy with other important stuff such as sunshine and festivals.

One thing that did define this module from the rest was that there were slightly clearer defined roles for team members based on skill sets. We needed researchers, analysts, a project manager, and designers. Fortunately everyone naturally fell into the area they felt most comfortable in and most areas were covered.

Not everything ran smoothly as one team member struggled to make it to meetings and when they did, they had severe technical issues meaning that communication was difficult. Fortunately other team members pulled out a contingency plan and work was redistributed, just in time.

Top tips for approaching this sort of project:

1. Research early

This is important to get up to scratch on the area of expertese you are presenting. Find out who the authoritative voices are and read a healthy selection of research papers along with analysis in blogs and press.

2. Get a vague narrative/story drafted

Once the group agrees on a simple paragraph length story to work to it makes it a lot easier when trawling through data to pick out the bits to fit your narrative.

3. Start the design work early

This should be started as soon as you know your theme. Background, main images and icons can be designed and the data points filled in later down the line. It's a good idea for 3-4 designs to be drafted so that team members can agree on which best fits the narrative.

4. Plan in extra time

When there are so many stages and parts to a project that rely so heavily on each other, it's inevitable that someone or something will delay progress. Set deadlines that take into account that some days might be lost so that you allow a buffer zone before final deadlines.

5. Have a plan b

Learning what to measure and how was a steep learning curve for our group, but we quickly managed to identify the areas we felt would be most beneficial for the purpose of our assignment.

Whilst Google Analytics is fairly intuitive, there is an element of information overload, which can be difficult to analyse and select relevant information from. We found it helpful to meet regularly and present our research to the group for further analysis and feedback. Working in this way we eventually managed to drill down through the data in order to present recommendations for improving the efficiency of the Squared website.

Initially we were so focused on our own specific sections of research that we found it tricky when considering how to join up all of our findings and recommendations. The collaborative method, with regular meetings was the answer to that as we familiarised ourselves with the rest of the data.

This was by far the most difficult of all the assignments, possibly because we didn't have any experts in GA within our team. It meant we had to be agile in our approach and adapt as we learned and progressed. It also meant we relied heavily on our team mates as there was so much data to extract and analyse the workload had to be shared.

Top four tips for anyone else tasked with this assignment:

1. Get organised early

Read the brief carefully, divide up the work and get familiar with GA's interface as soon as possible. Even if it's just clicking around to find where stuff is.

2. Meet regularly

Meet at least 1-2 times a week with clear ideas about what each team member is tasked to do and feedback to each other with any issues and learnings. Keep records of minutes from meetings, including actions.

3. Be open and critical

Not everyone will get it immediately and some areas are more difficult to analyse than others. Don't be shy from giving open and constructive criticism to your team mates if you spot something in their research that they might not have. You may inspire them to look at it in a different way, adding more depth to their analysis. The same goes for feedback on your own work.

4. Link it all together

Modules 2 and 3 of Google's Squared Online course were very insightful and beneficial. Aside from the advanced digital marketing course content, there were some extremely valuable lessons to take away with regard to collaborating with strangers online in order to hit looming deadlines.  

Whilst some groups may have been fortunate enough to have an awesome project manager amongst them, the random selection and nature of the groups means that nobody can guarantee a rock star of this sort on their team.

With a range of skills, strengths and experience, groups need to quickly identify how best to divide up the work and how to tackle the task at hand - problem solving and communication are key. 

Here’s a list of the top 5 obstacles faced, and how we overcame them:

1. Logistics and operations

Problem: As we were based all over the country, we needed a place to meet online, as well as a communal area we could discuss and share ideas and work with group members in between meetings.

Solution: Google Hangouts was the preferred platform for meetings, and we agreed that we would use a Google+ community page to dump interesting and relevant links, and discuss ideas.

2. Timetables

Problem: During the first assignment we realized that our schedules were not in sync, and this made it difficult to hold regular meetings and set deadlines.

Solution: We set up a simple Google Spreadsheet as a calendar so that each team member could put an 'X' on the days that they were not available. This meant we could visualise availability of team mates more easily.

Download the team availability calendar template

3. Minute taking

Problem: Being a small team meant that no one person should be burdened with the admin stuff such as taking and sharing minutes, booking meetings, compiling the agenda and chairing the meetings.

Solution: We set up a simple rota in Google Drive so that each team member took it in turn to do the above tasks. A link to each meeting’s minutes was then provided next to the corresponding meeting date.

Download the rota template

4. Storing and sharing our work 

Problem: We needed to be able to share our work so that it’s accessible to all team members, ensuring we are not deleting over one another’s efforts.

Solution: We set up a shared folder in DropBox where each team member would put their name at the start of every file they uploaded. Within this folder we set up sub folders, into which we dropped files as they were developed and ready for the next stage.

5. Workflow

Problem: After meeting and distributing work, some of us became stuck as we felt we couldn’t complete our tasks without information from other team members. For example, it was difficult to agree on the customer journey and touchpoints without knowing anything about the persona.

Solution: At our next meeting we reviewed what each task entailed and connected the dots where we saw linkages. We then broke off into smaller working groups that merged as the task progressed.

I hope this is helpful to anyone approaching project work of this sort for the first time. This list is by no means exhaustive so please share any of your learnings below. Likewise, please ask if you have any questions. 

Follow me on Twitter @Shaf303

How do you hack a budget?

On Sunday 16 March 2014, possibly the sunniest day of the year, a small group of digital-loving professionals, including campaigners, creatives, designers and coders got together to use their skills to disrupt the misleading narrative of mainstream politics, in time for George Osborne's budget announcement on Wednesday. 

The results of this work were distributed shortly before the announcement took place and triggered a fair bit of discussion, not only about the politics, but also about the evolved use of the word 'hack' and how it is being increasingly used by activists to describe general disruption. 

Over 100,000 views and rising

The pages were viewed over 100,000 times within 24 hours of going live, and interestingly shared on Facebook significantly more than Twitter - 6000/500 in one case. Does this suggest that people are more willing to share their political allegiances within what they perceive to be more closed networks of 'friends' such as Facebook, rather than in public on Twitter? 

Check them out here:

1. National Pulse - every blip tells a story

2. My Long-Term Economic Plan - how is your region faring with Osborne's plan? 3. What Recovery? - are you jet-setting or sinking?

Please note that these were created in one day with a bit of final tweaking between Sunday and Wednesday.

Would you talk to your fridge if your friends said it was OK to do so? That's what the academic research into Facebook sharing seems to suggest. 

For my third blog post I’ll briefly consider some of the topics that have caught my attention in the past two Squared Online classes. One thing that I have taken away from it all is that with the progress we’re making in technology, I feel a bit less weird when conversing with inanimate objects.

Beyond the internet of things

In the talk by Andy Sandoz, he mentions the progress that's being made in technology and how these ideas from science fiction are becoming a reality. These ideas fascinate me, and for those interested, Duncan Geere elaborates on some of the technologies being developed in a recent article, where he briefly explains concepts such as ‘Claytronics’ and 'Smart Dust'. Patrick Gos slaps a bit of reality into us in his article pointing out some of the downsides of a fridge that refuses to open because it’s decided you’re too fat.

Will we fall Prey?

What this all reminded me of was a book I read a while back by author of Jurassic Park, Michael Crichton. The book is titled 'Prey', a horror story about a bunch of nanoparticles that manage to reproduce and escape from their laboratory causing all sorts of havoc. I managed to stumble across this critique from 2003 where the author debunks the science behind Crichton's story. Have we moved on so fast since then that the technology is now actually possible?

Getting social

Monday's class was an insight into the world of social media and a chance to reflect on how and why we use the platforms that we do. One part I found particularly interesting was the discussion around whether we trust customer reviews over adverts. When shopping on Amazon, I’ll usually read a selection of reviews across the various ratings, paying particular attention to the one-star reviews. The reason I do this is to determine whether the fault is in the product, or the user.

People can be fools

Whilst researching the purchase of a coffee machine on Amazon, I noticed it had a relatively high number of one-star reviews. This surprised me as it was a trusted brand. Upon closer inspection, it emerged that the complaints were mostly because people were losing a small widget that was necessary for the machine to work. Most of these people were washing it down their own sink - then giving a one-star review out of frustration at their own incompetence.

Are adverts more accountable?

I am not aware of a case where someone has purchased a product based on a customer review, and later held that customer accountable for a bad purchase. There is a certain amount of legal protection for consumers, and standards that need to be adhered to by organisations when they advertise a product or service. In the UK we have the Advertising Standards Agency who regulate advertising across all media. Would it work if there was a body that held people accountable to their reviews? Probably not. Consider this in light of the discussion about the fading of anonymity on the internet.

Ace of Base engaging fans through social media

Old skool music aficionado and Squared Online tutor, Aiden Caroll challenged me to incorporate some Ace of Base into my next blog post. So here it is, Ace of Base talking social media:

And here's a bonus tune:

Please post below any comments/abuse/words of admiration for Ace of Base/links to a much better blog.

Yesterday's Squared Online class was superb, covering topics such as how digital media has been used for good, in particular within the charity sector, and online privacy. Not surprisingly, the majority of Squares admitted to not reading the Ts and Cs when singing up to stuff online. The main reason for this was that they're simply too long. 

Digital for good

The examples of digital helping charities were great and got me thinking about one particular platform, Snapchat. In a recent article, Ben Austin discusses how the platform has been used, and concludes with a suggestion that any Snapchat campaign is more likely to be successful if the brand is already 'down with the kids' - this is mostly due to the main demographic of Snapchat users being young people, mostly teenagers.

I can't help thinking there is potential for something to be done by both charities and commercial organisations. Snapshat's USP is that the images vanish after a short time.The first topics that spring to mind when I think of stuff disappearing are climate change and animals.

If Snapchat is already being used by young people, surely this could be a great way to tap into the concious of the youth and get the real stakeholders involved by illustrating how fast our wildlife and planet is changing, in some cases disappearing. For example, by using images of endangered animals, or small islands that are vanishing due to rising sea levels.

In the private sector, this could be used in a similar way for environmentally friendly products. For example, Lush and The Body shop could use a similar tactic to promote the sustainability of their products.

Settling on a name for this blog reminded me of trying to come up with a ‘cool’ DJ name back in the day –  I'm overly aware that I'll have to live with this in the same way that I had to live with that.

This has been set up as part of my first assignment for Google's Squared Online course that I've recently started. I want this blog to be experimental and fluid. I plan to mix it up using a range of media, particularly to document new platforms, software, and the tips and tricks that we learn from our tutors, and from one another.

I’ll go into more detail in a future blog post, but my background has been pretty varied – from working in music production, events and artist management, to mixing cocktails at one of London’s award winning establishments. Over the past few years, I’ve worked at The Elders, UNICEF UK, Mind, and in my current role I make up half of the Digital team at Action for Blind People. I also do a bit of freelance work for Chairman’s Reserve Rum (UK) and Alice’s Bakery. 

Working in the charity sector is great – it means we can use digital tools in order to do something good. The added challenge of having relatively small budgets means that we need to be creative when coming up with ideas and solutions. 

My career path so far has made me something of a generalist when it comes to digital. I’ve worked with PR, campaigns, fundraising, marketing, corporate partnerships, policy and, of course, communications. I’m hoping that Squared Online will help me consolidate my experience, build on my skills and fill any gaps in preparation for the next stage of my career.

Finally, I have to confess that I also purchased www.takingthepeace.com, but decided to save that one for poking fun at the likes of Cameron, Clegg and Miliband during next year's general election. Please get in touch if you enjoy the irony of modern day politics and wish to collaborate. I'm not entirely sure of the angle to take just yet, although it will certainly involve looking at the Parties’ digital strategies, particularly any social media gaffs they make. I'm praying for something akin to the Susan Boyle album launch party hashtag debacle (#susanalbumparty).

I very much look forward to learning and working with you all. Video coming soon…meanwhile: