Success for Startups that look to the future

We’ve all watched entrepreneurs with ‘brilliant’ ideas struggling to make an impact on Dragons Den. Okay, some of the ideas aren’t so brilliant and some are just plain mad but why is it that some truly brilliant ideas fail once they have the word ‘incorporated’ tagged on to them?

At the end of last year Jason Fried of 37Signals gave a talk at Y combinator’s startup school in Berkeley, you can see the summary of Jason’s talk on TechCrunch. Among the many insights into the pitfalls of starting you own company, Jason gave the advice that ‘failure is not a pre-requisite for success or a rite of passage.’

Having worked in and amongst startup companies, I find this advice very sage. Starting a business is a huge undertaking and, to be successful, every step taken needs to be carefully weighed and measured and small successes built upon and expanded.

This considered, the business and its brands should be planned with longevity in mind. It’s easy to put off making big decisions when you are building a business but it’s sometimes those bigger decisions that will determine your success.

A useful and insightful piece of advice for any new company comes from David Liss’s article on brandchannel: “Successful companies begin by addressing the important questions that prove there is a need for their product or service, a market exists to buy it, and that they have the capacity to meet the needs of this market.”

And this is why the process of branding begins by demonstrating that there is a need for your specific service or product in the marketplace. Determining market need and identifying who your consumers will be is a crucial first step for any new business.

Investing time and money up front to explore these issues and create a cohesive brand story alongside your business plan will ensure that your business looks to the future and has a greater chance of success. This is something we are experienced in at thebluedoor, helping you create a brand strategy and plan which will look to the future.

Social media and Web 2.0 statistics: a round-up

In order to truly understand a business sector and develop an expertise, an avid reading habit is required. thebluedoor is a digital PR agency so consequently our reading material is quite varied to cover both the PR sector and those of our clients. Our PR focused reading list is quite broad (both online and in dead-tree format), and includes Wired, New Media Age, .Net, PR Week, Marketing Week, B2B Marketing and The Economist.

I thought it might be useful to post some of the recent digital media and online PR statistics that we have read about.

Facebook:

• 300 million global active users
• 22 million UK active users
• 50% log in and spend 25 minutes daily
• Average 'heavy' users spent 125 hours over the last 12 months
• 59% year on year growth
• 75% of all time spent on social networks
• 8,325 billion minutes spent in the UK in September 2009

(Sources - B2B Marketing; NMA/Nielsen)


LinkedIn:

• 52 million users globally
• 3 million in the UK
• Growing at 1 million every 12 days

(Source - B2B Marketing)


Twitter:

• 1,959% year on year growth
• US leads by Twitter countries, followed by UK
• 6th largest social media site
• There have been over 8,000,000,000 Tweets to date, and counting

(Source - NMA: Nielsen; GigaTweet)


Wikipedia:

• 3,1720,120 articles in English
• 19,245,419 pages in English
• 684,000,000 visitors in 2008

(Source - Wikipedia)


iPhone App Store:

• 30 million iPhone users
• 20 million iPhone Touch owners
• Over 2 billion apps have been downloaded from 100,000 apps
• AdMob estimates that $200 million worth of apps are downloaded per month ($2.4 billion per year)
• By June 2009, the app software-development kit had been downloaded 1,000,000 times

(Source - Wired: AdMob)


3G Phones:

• 3G mobile penetration in western Europe has risen from 17% in 2007, to 29% in 2009
• It is forecast to reach to 67% in western Europe by 2011
• In Japan penetration rate is 67%
• $43 billion was made from mobile Internet in Japan in 2008
• 610 million of the first two billion App Store downloads were for paid applications

(Sources - Wired: Morgan Stanley, Pinch Media)


Blogs:

• 133,000,000 blogs indexed by Technorati
• 3,561,000 RSS subscribers to TechCrunch
• 346,000,000 people read blogs
• 900,000 new blog posts every 24 hours

(Source - Technorati)

I tend to bookmark interesting articles on Delicious. Do have a look at what I've been reading recently, and I would be grateful of any recommendations. Thanks!

The year of innovative communication – a PR view of CES 2010

Las Vegas has been the place to be this month for anyone with an interest in technology and/or PR. So for an active digital PR person like me, it was a dream to follow the latest news online and via Twitter. The 2010 International CES (Consumer Electronics Show) saw more than 2,500 technology companies introduce more than 20,000 new products over the four-day event.

From a PR perspective, there was a vast amount of work to be done. The show itself claims in its official press release to have launched the ‘next decade of innovation’ with a record number of new consumer electronics products being announced.

The main consumer focus has been on the amazing new technology being launched and the impact it will have on our daily lives. But without effective PR to communicate the key messages and news accurately in a way that consumers from around the world can easily digest, that innovation - and ultimately sales - could easily be lost.

The PR effort doesn’t stop at just the event. Each of the exhibitors had a story to tell and that means:

- product launch announcements

- company information updates

- press packs

- visuals and photography

- interviews with company spokespeople

- product demonstrations.

This all involves a lot of logistics and forward planning. However, a lot of the PR activity has to happen just before the start of the event: last minute details about new product launches, availability of company representatives, products for demonstration, etc. These are all things that often can’t be finalised until the last few days before the launch event. And that’s not even mentioning the need to gain legal and third party approvals on announcements.

That’s when a PR agency can be invaluable for a company – ensuring the external communication of news on time and to target. Equally important is also sharing key messages consistently to that potentially global audience.

As a start-up or an established company with an innovation to share and a target audience to reach, having effective PR consultancy can make the difference between success and failure at new product launch stage. When it comes to the crunch, communication is the true key to successful innovation.

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Twestival Farnham: 25 March 2010

On 25th March 2010, cities and towns across the world will be harnessing the power of Twitter and digital media to raise much needed funds for Concern Worldwide. Twestival is a global event organised by a fantastic team of volunteers, and for those interested in hosting a similar event, the UK Twestival office is run by the very helpful @claireatwaves and @arengrimshaw.

In the charity's own words: "Concern’s work is informed by a vision for change and their education programs target the poorest people in the poorest countries in the world, with particular emphasis on reaching out-of-school children such as girls, orphans, street children, working children, children affected by conflict, children affected by HIV and AIDS, and children with disabilities."

Twestival can truly make a difference. The first Twestival event, held just under a year ago, involved 220 international cities and raised over $250,000.00. The money donated funded the building of over 55 water wells in Uganda, India and Ethiopia, positively impacting over 17,000 people.

thebluedoor has decided to organise a Twestival in Farnham, with the generous support and sponsorship of iBundle, the Surrey based innovation hub. We know that there are a fantastic number of people and businesses in Surrey who actively use Twitter to network, do business and have fun. We hope that people will be inspired to support this event by coming along, lending a hand (in kind or in sponsorship), and helping us to raise some funds for a truly wonderful charity.

We have set up a Twitter account - @twestivalfarnhm (yes we know, it's missing an 'a' - Twitter won't let through longer account names LOL) and hashtag #twestivalfarnhm so interested peeps can keep up to date with our progress. Very soon we will be launching a farnham.twestival.com blog as an official source of event information and the global organisers are planning to ensure that tickets will be on sale some time in February. One way or another, thebluedoor will aim to keep everyone up-to-date with our progress.

If you are interested in finding out more, helping or even sponsoring an aspect of the evening's events (give-aways, prizes, music etc), please don't hesitate to let us know - info at thebluedoor dot com. We'd love to have you on board and are committed to creating an interesting, fun and productive event worthy of the main Twestival event.

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Surrey networking: Tweet-up in Farnham, February 2010

Twitter has become an established part of the digital PR communications tool-box for companies around the world. Twitter has increased the opportunity help businesses engage effectively and transparently with target online audiences, whilst evolving established communication processes in the public relations and journalism sectors.

As a PR agency based in Surrey, and following the success of thebluedoor’s last Tweet-up in December, we have decided to organise a second Surrey networking event on 3rd February 2010. And we’re very pleased to thank locally based iBundle for kindly agreeing to sponsor the evening’s drinks. iBundle is an innovation hub for software and web companies, providing innovative new tools and services for their target markets.

As before, proceedings start at 7pm at the Slug and Lettuce on East Street, Farnham. For those that are driving, there is a convenient car park at Sainsbury’s on South Street, and the nearest train station is only a ten minute walk away from the venue.

The Tweet-up offers an opportunity to meet up IRL (in real life), network with the local digital community and enjoy discussing some of the key developments in the digital space.

I hope that this is the start a regular Surrey-based free networking event. All are welcome: PRs, journalists, developers, programmers, freelancers – in fact anyone on Twitter or in the digital space who is interested in meeting up for a drink and a chat.

If you’re planning to attend, please let us know via email (info at thebluedoor dot com) or leave a comment below. We wish all the local tweeting community a happy new year and we look forward to seeing you all again in person.

P.S.: Date for your diaries – thebluedoor is already looking forward to supporting the global charitable event Twestival 2010. We will therefore be organising a Tweet-up in Farnham, Surrey on 25th March to raise funds for Concern Worldwide. Further details will appear on our blog shortly.

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Digital PR: my education at thebluedoor

I am thrilled to be starting 2010 with an eight week internship at the Surrey PR agency, thebluedoor. After completing PR placements in London in the travel and tourism sector last year, I am eager to continue my education and learn from a PR agency that is growing rapidly with exciting prospects for the year ahead.

thebluedoor – its clients and its digital PR expertise – offered me an internship which I was delighted to accept. As a relatively new PR agency I felt that I would be able to both learn from their experience as well as significantly aid the team in implementing PR strategies and campaigns for their wide portfolio of impressive consumer, B2B and digital brands. And from speaking to the team, I know that the coming two months will greatly improve my knowledge of PR and the importance of digitised communication for businesses.

And I’ve not been disappointed: on my first day I was I was asked to help organise a Tweet-up, inviting interested Tweeps in the Farnham, Surrey and Hampshire areas to meet and celebrate Twitter and its effects upon the world of PR, communications and business. I’m really excited about this project as it will provide me with first-hand knowledge of digital and social networking tools such as blogs and Twitter, and getting to grips with their power beyond sharing what I’ve eaten for breakfast.I know I’m going to be challenged and supported whilst at thebluedoor, they have committed to ensuring that I learn rather than just being thrown in at the deep end. And having met the team, I know that as well as some hard work, there should also be plenty of fun to be had along the way.

Written by Liam Sherry, Intern at thebluedoor