So it’s d-day today for the London mayoral candidates. The culmination of months of blood, sweat and tears to decide the direction of London for the next four years. Quite exciting really isn’t it? Well, not if you take a straw poll of the Launch office. There is a significant portion of people who aren’t going to be voting today. They have their reasons, but one can’t help but think, as Blonde_M pointed out to me on Twitter yesterday, that politicians aren’t doing enough to inspire people to want to be involved.

This election campaign feels like a real damp squib to me. Apart from a few flare-ups between Boris and Ken (including some rather amusing swearing), no-one is standing out. Maybe it’s due to over-familiarity with the candidates, but I don’t feel that any of them have made a real effort to separate themselves from the pack, to stamp their authority and their vision on their campaign. It’s (unfortunately) come down to personalities – who do you like? And if you don’t like any of them, what do you feel like doing? Exactly….not voting at all.

Obviously politics relies a lot on personality, but one really felt that after the General Election social media would play a huge role in UK politics in the future (as it does in the US). However, whilst the mayoral election race has generated a lot of conversation online (according to this anyway), and even predicted the result, it hasn’t been harnessed or crystallised by any of the parties or the candidates. Yes, Boris did an #askboris twinterview, but a lot of the questions were like the man himself – hugely frivolous. As far as our research here can tell, there  isn’t even a hashtag that has been decided for interested people to group their conversation around. #londonelects is getting a fair amount of activity today (polling day), but it is nothing to the #GE2010 that captured imaginations two year ago.

Maybe I’m just being too unrealistic and idealistic, but I think it’s up to politicians and their advisors to explore new channels to come up with new ways of inspiring new people to vote and get involved in politics. If Obama and his team can do it, why can’t we do it in England? Admittedly, we don’t have Jimmy Fallon, but there are plenty of other options.

One of the most common questions we get asked as digital consultants at Launch is, as We Are Social noted this week, ‘Where should we start with social media?’

There’s no quick and easy answer, as every company’s challenges and opportunities. However, for complete newbies (newcomers), a social media audit is a great place to start.

A good social media audit should help you analyse your current position online and in social media, identify potential influencers to engage and fertile ground for active to be targeted at.

We’ve put together a short simple template to help guide your thinking. Of course, if you want us to actually carry out the audit for you, you’ll have to get in touch.

Pinterest is a social network that has been creating a lot of interest online in recent months, but what exactly is it and how does it differ from old favourites Facebook and Twitter? Take a look at our handy need-to-know guide below, and then look up Launch Group’s very own Pinterest page!

What is it?

Pinterest is a new social network that allows users to ‘pin’ the things they love from around the web into one place. These ‘pins’ are organised into ‘boards.’ Try to think of Pinterest as a great big interactive scrapbook where you can show off everything you’re interested in, and follow, as well as comment, on others with similar interests. Anytime you pin something, you are given the option to share it across your Twitter or Facebook pages.

Re-pinning, following and likes

‘Re-pinning’ works much in the same way as ‘re-tweeting.’ If someone has posted something you like too, re-pinning it will add it to one of your own boards. You also have the option of following other people – either every single one of their boards, or one in particular. Those that you follow will appear on your Pinterest dashboard when you log-in. ‘Liking’ a pin tells the person who pinned it exactly that – you like it! It does not automatically add the pin to any of your boards.

How does it work?

First of all, you need to download the ‘Pin It’ button from the website and add it to your browser. That done, it’s incredibly easy to use. When you’re browsing the web and come across an image or a video you like, hit the ‘Pin It’ button. This brings up a window with all of the available ‘pin-able’ content. Select the image or video you want, choose which of your boards you want it added to, add a short description and BOOM! You have successfully pinned an item. When others click your pin, they will be directed back to its original source, which is great news for brands who have had pins taken from a product page and will benefit from the back-link.

What are the demographics?

According to Mashable, 42 per cent of users are aged between 25 and 34, and of those 56 per cent are male (versus 44 per cent female).

Why are people using it?

Pinterest is a slightly different kettle of fish from your Facebook and your Twitter – primarily because the emphasis is on being inspired. People flock to Pinterest for ideas on what to have for dinner, how to re-model their bathroom and what they should wear to a friend’s wedding. In this way the site gives its users vicarious pleasure in taking a look at what other people – all over the world – like. Visitors are also already in a ‘buy hungry’ state of mind by the time they arrive at Pinterest, which offers a not insignificant opportunity for brands.

How could brands use it?

Showcase ‘exclusive’ never-before-seen content
Let followers get involved in curating brand content by selecting the function that allows others to add to your boards
Request images or video of followers with a particular product in return for rewards
Run image and video competitions
Run focus groups and use the comments functionality to collect feedback
Promote new products and campaigns in a visually interesting way
Upload a selection of coverage
Inspire a brand lifestyle by going beyond simple product-pushing. We really like the Whole Foods Market Pinterest page, which inspires not just on the culinary front, but across exercise, well-being and environmental too

I know I’m a bit late to be commenting on the Snickers Twitter hornet’s nest from a couple of weeks ago, but today’s announcement about the new Digital Trading Standards Group and the post-Super Bowl buzz threw everything back into focus.

In case you missed it, the Digital Trading Standards Group has been set up to develop a set of industry-wide principles aimed at reducing the risk of ad misplacement at impression level. And in case you missed them, the Super Bowl showcased the usual headline advertising campaigns, alongside a record number of mentions in social media.

Back to Snickers  – the reason its ‘takeovers’ of celebrities caused so much debate, and a certain amount of opprobrium in certain quarters, was that it was using Twitter PURELY for awareness building, rather than encouraging any form of action or advocacy. Most people follow brands on Twitter to get something from them – special offers, customer service, competitions, even just entertainment (as with someone like Betfair).

The Snickers activity was a self-contained package, with a message, but didn’t add any value to any conversation or provide anything but a message to the celebrities’ followers. And it was created and executed by AMV BBDO, which is an advertising agency. Spotted the link? It was essentially an advert. Played out over a series of tweets.

It grabs your attention, keeps it going for a short amount of time, before revealing the denouement. Just like an advert.

There’s nothing wrong with it – it’s a perfectly fine piece of awareness building (and almost as newsworthy as some of the Super Bowl ads), but it’s slightly disingenuous of Snickers to have not paid Twitter for the placement (I’m sure the celebs were handsomely rewarded). We could spend hours debating whether or not it affected Snickers bottom line, but that’s probably not really the point (I very much doubt it did affect sales). The guerrilla ‘ad placement’ is an issue Twitter themselves need to sort out – all the trading standards groups in the world, or the ASA, won’t stop creatives trying to get out of paying for placement – especially when they can get so much for free at the moment.

Monitoring specific websites and keywords online is critical to keep up to date with the latest trends associated with your clients, as well as understand what your clients’ competitors are talking about.

Using a combination of manual searching and automatic tools, it is relatively easy to keep up-to-date with what is being said about your client and relevant topics.

However, as well as monitoring conversations, it is also important to identify who your top influential – client friendly – bloggers are, who you should be regularly engaging with, as well as being aware of any potential negative bloggers. This will enable you to monitor for relevant posts, understand the sentiment around an issue and tackle any potential situation early on.

After all, one of the best ways to identify and tackle a problem, that may escalate if left alone is to ensure you track online conversations about your clients.

Below are some essential tools and tips to help you monitor conversations effectively:

Google Alerts: In addition to setting up daily or even hourly alerts for a series of keywords that you have identified that may be relevant for your client, you will also need to set-up alerts for your key spokespeoples’ names

Whilst Google Alerts can be very helpful, they can flood your inbox with results so it is important to only set keywords alerts and review them as soon as they hit your inbox – do not put it off!

Free online tracking tools: We recommend Socialmention.com, Monitter.com, Blogsearch.google.com and omgili.com for tracking mentions of specific keyword terms

Twitter: Identify and follow the influential journalists and bloggers relevant to your client, as they will be the ones most likely to spot issue and make them public. Tweets often create specific hashtags when an issue is breaking (e.g. #hacking) and these can be picked up by Google. Twitter also has a basic search function where you can set up automatic alerts. TweetDeck is the best tool for monitoring mentions on Twitter

Key industry and enthusiast websites and blogs: Identify who these are, and regularly check RSS feeds. Ensure you know which sites are likely to be negative. Monitor these very closely anyway, but particularly during any announcement. Tracking an RSS feed from these sites can help to alert you when a new post has been written

Now that you understand what tools to use to monitor and track local noise, it is vital that you define your objectives. Monitoring anything in isolation is a pointless exercise. You should incorporate the insights and information gathered to your advantage, to enhance your communications plan and enable you to reach a larger audience.
Do get in touch if you’d like to discuss our all-channel approach in more detail and how we can help you with your online conversations.

It’s that time of year again – the first day of advent.  And that means only one thing at Launch Towers – the return of the famous Launch Advent Quiz.  Every day a festive brain-teaser is circulated with the fastest-finger winning the chance to open one of the 25 packages.  Check out our Twitter feed to join in!

Well us Launch ladies have done it again! Firstly, we’d like to say a huge congratulations to the ladies who coordinated the whole event, which as usual was a roaring success, and secondly to all the ladies who took part at Battersea Park and made it round the 5k course.

This year marked a decade of Tesco’s support for Race for Life. To celebrate this anniversary we’ve been doing our bit for fundraising and over the last 2 years raised well over £550 to help beat cancer.

Whilst we were out on the course the rest of the Launch team were doing a sterling job to raise as much awareness and coverage for the event as possible, as well as the other 300 Race for Life events happening across the UK from May to the end of July this year.

Needless to say KPIs are already smashed, with coverage achieved on Daybreak, The Metro, Hello and OK! to name a few.

Well done girls, we did it! Time now to don the leg warmers and get into training for next year.

Don’t forget to check out the RFL Twitter feed for all the latest news!

Twitter has become the most important soap-box of the media world – forget reading about gossip in weekly mags and online rags, these days we want it immediately from our favourite ‘slebs smartphone.

It really is a wonder the impact that just 140 characters can make on a campaign.  You can have a steady increase of followers, and then BOOM! Stephen Fry gives you a mention and your figures leap.

Lazy folk don’t even need to write a personal message, they can just retweet somebody, and then your reach automatically widens to their avid followers too.

Celebrity endorsement from shampoo to cars is a multi-billion pound industry with temperamental results, yet the power of a recommendation on Twitter is immense.  Simon Cowell asked the Twittersphere where he could get a Poppy Twibbon (like a bumper plate sticker for your Twitter avatar, a way to show your allegiance to a cause), PoppyLegion (aka us here at Launch!) replied linking to the Official Royal British Legion Twibbon and Simon told his 40,000 followers that he “highly recommends” following PoppyLegion.  The result? 160 people started following Poppy almost immediately. 

It is also a great outlet for enquiries; after the X Factor gang wore personalised sparkly poppies, everyone wanted to know where to get one.  As a result, they completely sold out (raising massive amounts for the Poppy Appeal) particularly after Dannii Minogue and The Saturdays tweeted about how much they loved theirs. 

The charity 2 Minute Silence single is supported by myriad public figures – from sports stars to musicians and politicians – and has created a great Twitter publicity push that reaches a great scope of the population; Thom Yorke reached the alternative crowd, David Tennant called out to his Dr Who devotees and Stephen Fry enlightened his 2 million fans.

In the two weeks of the 2010 Poppy Appeal , PoppyLegion has multiplied her followers by a third, an amazing achievement which I’m sure is down to  the passion for the cause – not just celebrity advocacy…but it sure does help point people in our direction.

So if you too want to join the clique of a media mogul, ex-Prime Minister and top popstars I’d recommend you follow @PoppyLegion too.

Last Friday I travelled to Dublin for a wedding. It was a bit of a whistle-stop tour; we left home at 7am (leaving the doting grandparents in charge of our two dependents), hit Gatwick and embarked on our Aer Lingus flight.

All went smoothly, bar a hairy moment at check-in when the clerk pointed out that my husband had booked the tickets in my married name. Thank goodness for the new style driving licence (slap on the wrist for being a bad wife who has yet to change her passport!). Anyway, four hours later we were sitting pretty in the church awaiting the formalities.

As expected, the ceremony was a traditional Christian service with communion, but to accommodate the mixed congregation the service lasted just one ½ hours, instead of the traditional Irish two. The words, although faintly familiar from my convent school education, were very traditional. In particular, the wedding address “may she always follow the example of the holy women whose praises are sung in the scriptures,” seemed a little out of sync with the modern woman (lurching out of a bar on Sunday morning, fuelled up on red bull and vodka).

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According to Ask Jeeves (that search engine we’ll forever associate with a stuffy butler), up to half of online users have logged on in the name of love .

Whether it’s spying on a long-lost ex, looking up a prospective partner or attempting to locate a childhood sweetheart of old, more and more surfers are using the internet to give their love lives a proactive kick up the rear. This isn’t so surprising when you consider just how wide and knowing the web is. Such phrases such as: ‘He’s bound to be on Facebook,’ ‘Looking won’t do any harm’ and ‘I’m just checking for peace of mind’ pepper far too many late night conversations in the pub.

Profiles on social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and Myspace have become our online imprints, straining under the weight of our holiday photos, shaky video footage and declarations of loves, hates and interests. We tell complete strangers whether we’re single, coupled or engaged; where we’re working, who we’re friends with and how we’re feeling. With all this content at our fingertips, it’s hardly a shock to discover that some of us have taken advantage and become the most efficient of online detectives.

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