Archive for January, 2010

The Zoomable Paper Map of London

Posted
28/01/2010
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Marketing Tips
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Prefer a paper map to you Iphone???  Take a look a the Zoomable Paper Map of London; ‘map2′

map2 is a pocket-size map which allows you to quickly find what you need without wrestling against a king-size map.  map2 removes the need to unfold unnecessary parts or the entire map.  map2 lets you zoom into greater detail.  In a single folding action chosen parts of a smaller scale map can be unfolded to give an enlarged and more detailed view of that same area underneath.  When the map is folded to its minimum size either of the sections facing outwards can still be quickly unfolded and refolded, allowing immediate magnification or miniaturisation.  Since the map can be folded to keep any two of the sections on the outside, you can decide which section is visible for quick consultation.

Check Out ‘All Top’

Posted
07/01/2010
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Marketing Tips
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For a long time I have used Google IG as my home page for news and latest industry topics but I Just signed up to ‘All Top’ or All Topics to see if it can provide more relevant feeds than Google.

So far so good, check out the extract from their bio:

The purpose of Alltop is to help you answer the question, “What’s happening?” in “all the topics” that interest you. You may wonder how Alltop is different from a search engine. A search engine is good to answer a question like, “How many people live in China?” However, it has a much harder time answering the question, “What’s happening in China?” That’s the kind of question that we answer.

We do this by collecting the headlines of the latest stories from the best sites and blogs that cover a topic. We group these collections — “aggregations” — into individual web pages. Then we display the five most recent headlines of the information sources as well as their first paragraph. Our topics run from adoption to zoology and hundreds of other subjects along the way.

You can think of Alltop as the “online magazine rack” of the web. We’ve subscribed to thousands of sources to provide “aggregation without aggravation.” To be clear, Alltop pages are starting points—they are not destinations per se. Ultimately, our goal is to enhance your online reading by displaying stories from sources that you’re already visiting plus helping you discover sources that you didn’t know existed.

Give it a go, http://alltop.com/

The KEY to Effective PR

Posted
06/01/2010
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Marketing Tips
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Sometimes the most ordinary of things can capture the imagination…

And bring about great PR; but it’s fair to say that more often than not organisations don’t have PR within their marketing plan; in fact, it’s not usually even on the radar.

The simple front door key was the subject of the most successful PR campaign we have ever been involved in. The company in question was the UK’s leading retail services company, specialising in dry cleaning, photo processing and key cutting amongst other things. During a new product development workshop we were shown technology that allowed a key to be covered in a coloured pattern. We quickly jumped on the idea and went about designing all kinds of patterns and images; they were introduced to market with an incredible impact on sales.

We started to work alongside a well-established, very creative PR agency to come up with an angle on which to base our campaign. After much hard work and debate we launched the ‘FunKee’ campaign that generated over £250,000 worth of coverage, was featured on Channel 4’s Big Breakfast by Wayne Hemmingway, coverage was gained in the majority of national newspapers and we even had a dress made out of keys that was modelled at London Fashion Week.

You would be surprised at what can be achieved through the effective use of PR; it’s a fantastic tool that can deliver a big impact for small expenditure.