New iPad2 and iOS5 Functions

June 10, 2011

There is more you can do with the new iPad2 / iOS5 than you have ever imagined.

This video was published on June 4 and had already more than 2,6 million views. Almost looks like magic!

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Why You Should Never Start With Nothing

June 6, 2011

A couple of weeks ago I found a new technical forum sponsored by a big industrial automation company. The site looked polished and professional. The forum was devided in different topics and included a download area, a calendar, a gallery and more.

It looked like a great forum. But there was one problem.

The forum was empty. Very empty.

There was nothing. Apart from a few posts by people trying to sell cheap medicine.

Empty

Do you know the feeling? If you go out for diner, there is a big chance you will not enter the empty restaurant. You are more likely to choose the restaurant where already some tables are occupied.

It is the same with a forum on the Internet. You don’t want to be the first one to post there. Because you have no idea about who reads your post or who (if anybody) is going to react. And the last thing you want is to be associated with people  trying to sell cheap medicine.

Never

Therefore you should never start with an empty forum. Like you should never start with an empty blog or an empty Twitter or Facebook account or YouTube channel.

Always make sure there is something there when you open your new channel for the public. Write at least four or five posts in your new blog before you inform you customers about it’s existence. Upload a few videos to your YouTube channel. Never start with an empty Twitter or Facebook account.  Do not promote them before you have at least written a few tweets or updates.

Likewise if you start a new forum. There is nothing wrong with entering a few topics or questions yourself. As long as the questions – and off course the answers – make sense, nobody will have a problem with that. The important thing is your forum looks like a forum and not like an empty restaurant.

Later

Last week the forum was still empty, apart from the cheap medicine. Today I found out they have done something about it.

The forum is now password protected. I was no longer to get in and see what is happening there.

I don’t think this extra barrier will add to the success of the forum.

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This Is How You Create Killer Content

May 25, 2011

You have probably heard it  before. Content is the key to your success. Content is King.

But that is not totally true.

Because people may not be very interested in content that tells them about how good your company is. Like they may not be interested in all kind of technical details of your products.

Therefore it is better to say Great Content is King.

But what is great content?

Great content is content that benefits the reader. He should be better off after reading your whitepaper, listening to your podcast or viewing your video. Therefore it is all about the four keywords: save, solve, increase and improve.

Save

Content is great content if it helps people to save. Save time, money, energy or whatever. If your content helps people to save, your content is good content.

Solve

If you are able to create content that solves a problem for your readers, you have created great content. Because people will always like you for solving their problem.

Increase

Many people are interested in content that helps them to increase. To increase their knowledge, production, quality, safety, reliability or whatever else that can be increased. Content that increases is always great content.

Improve

Your content should help people to improve. People are always looking to improve something or to do something in a better way. Improving will upgrade you content to great content.

So look at all the content you have  created. Whether it is a text, a podcast, a Tweet, a video or whatever. If people are not able to use it to save, solve, increase or improve, your content is useless.

And if they can save, solve, increase or improve, you have created killer content.

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Twitter Conference Coverage – The Do’s And Dont’s

May 24, 2011

I follow a Twitter feed that recently covered a conference at the opening of an industrial fair on Twitter in real time.

Doing this is a great way to promote your conference or event. You are able to engage with the people that are not able to be there and at the same time you generate interest for (the next edition of) your conference.

However, it was not done the right way.

They did it wrong because their Tweets only mentioned things like “Mr. Jones is now giving his opening speech” or “According to Mr. Smith the question is not how to win but how to survive”. Without links to additional information and therefore quite useless.

Good Content

Whatever content you create, it should always contain something that your readers can benefit from. Content without a benefit has no use.

So if you have plans to Tweet during a conference you should do as follows.

  • Do not Tweet soundbites that are meaningless when taken out of context.
  • Do make sure you have the speeches and presentations available online before the conference starts and link to them in your life Tweets.
  • Use a unique hashtag for your conference. Remember the hashtag should not be too long. You have only 140 characters for your Tweets.
  • Do not write about 500 or so people joining your conference.. Make a picture and show how many people there are.
  • Make more pictures or – even better – use a camcorder and record what is going on and what is being said. Then put your videos on-line right away and link to them in your Tweets.
  • Or even better, do a life recording of the conference and link to that in your Tweets. Like “Now Mr. Brown is giving his presentation, watch him here …”.
  • And if there are discussions planned during your conference, ask people to participate on Twitter and join the discussion.

Tweeting about what is happening on stage during your conference or event is not enough. Your Tweets must always be supported by good content.

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