Good Sport

If you follow me on Twitter, you know I tweet a lot. If you follow me on Twitter, you know I love a good pun. If you follow me on Twitter, you need to follow Umbro.

My recent awareness of my own character; my love of puns, one-liners, chit chat and football has led me to think about how companies might target me through social media. My realisation, Umbro are miles ahead.

As an arena, the twittersphere is stocked full of people trying to get noticed. Whether this is noticed by their favourite musicians, comedians or companies, the competition is fierce. I am one of those people, not just trying to get noticed by celebrities, but by anyone who'll listen. Anyone that'll have me. Desperate? A little, but what's the point of doing something if you don't want people to appreciate it? The opportunity to get one's name "out there" is more available than ever thanks to Twitter. With a well worded, 140 character status update, what you have to say is potentially broadcast to the entire world - something only the internet as a medium can offer - instantly. However, something I have discovered is that to be successful, whether as an individual or a company, you have to engage. In my opinion, and please say if you disagree, Twitter (and social media in general) is there to socialise, not just advertise. This point is being missed by far too many people and I am sick of those companies who merely post information or pieces of generic advertising, who never respond to others and never engage.

If engaging with your customer is vital in your social media strategy - which it is by the way - then one should look no further than the boys at Umbro. As I sit here and write this blog, my body is overflowing with envy at their job. Getting paid to write about football is a dream many of us have but very few will accomplish. So despite my blood boiling and my eyes turning green, I have to admit that these guys, Aaron and Tom, are bloody fantastic. The beauty of Umbro's social media campaign is not just that their blog is interesting, entertaining and brilliantly written - which it is - but that their use of social media is creative and steeped in interaction. They use competitions amongst fans and offer rewards of tickets and shirts, they join in debates and discussions, they share interesting insider gossip and information, but their greatest creation is pun Fridays. Every Friday they release a different football themed pun. This weeks for instance was called Seaside Footballers. The results were very entertaining. Below are just a few entries I read.

• @thesemgroup went with "Roberto Mankini"

• @josh_mccarthy went with "Morten Gamst Pedalo"

• @teacherobert went with "Salmon Kalou" "Clint Deepsea" and "Coral Poborski"

• I entered "Marco Tanned Bastard" "Fabio Capadelo" "Alboato Aqualungi" "Seabasstian Bassong" "Fabio Auwhalio" "Dirk Trout" "Alle-sand-row Delve-pier-roe" and "Paul Conchesky".

Now, as you can see, I went too far and am a bit of a loser. Please leave your own Seaside Footballers in the comments at the end, I know you want to.

People reading this clutterance may ask why this matters? I'll tell you. There are thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people exactly like me, i'm no snowflake. Before Twitter, I wouldn't have considered Umbro for my sports gear, I'd have gone with Nike or Adidas. However, simply because of this brilliant piece of brand management I find myself inclined to think differently, very differently. Call me impressionable, but i'm not alone in being like this and Umbro have realised this brilliantly. Now, I'm off for a kick about, where are my Umbro Speciali?

Getting started on Twitter

Time to Tweach Twitter to Twits

Recently I have been posting more opinionated, informal articles and getting nowhere.  The following is merely a 15 step guide to Twitter to help people out when they get started.  Hopefully someone will find this helpful!

1. Let’s go!  Visit www.twitter.com and click on the ‘Get Started – Join!’ button and let us begin.  Enter a username, password and email address, then click ‘I accept’ and then, ‘create my account’.

2.  Friends? Twitter will now ask you to invite your friends, if you have any! These will be imported from one of the supported services: Googlemail, Hotmail, Yahoo, AOL or MSN.

3. You’re in.  Let’s sort out your stuff out.  On your Twitter home page, click the link that says ‘settings’.  Pan down the page and enter your full name in the appropriate place and check all the other fields are in order.  You can also enter your website here which will be visible on your profile.  Don’t check ‘protect my updates’ as this will limit the amount of people seeing your tweets as only those whom you approve will see them!

4. What do you look like? Click ‘settings’ and then also click the subheading, picture.  You’re picture can be anything from your ugly mug to a cartoon, but try to get something noticeable, you’ll be amazed how many people will click a picture that provokes interest.

5. Give a dog a phone!  Twitter is great if you’re on your phone.  Once more enter the world of ‘settings’ except this time click on the ‘mobile’ tab.  On your phone, add a contact called Twitter and save the number 86444.  Now text the word START to this number, and you should receive a confirmation that it is set up – now you can tweet everywhere! (note: Twitter does not charge for this service. It's just like sending and receiving text messages with your friends — your carrier's standard messaging rates apply.)

6.  Follow some Fellows.  Go to the ‘find people’ tab in the top right of the page.  Here search for people you know, friends, family, celebrities, companies, whoever you think is on Twitter.  You can search for them using their first name, last name, or Twitter username.  You can also do a much more advanced search i.e. by location – its not necessary though!  If you want to, you can now ‘follow’ the twitterers who appear on your search results. Now you can see what they tweet on your homepage!

7. Time to tweet! Think of your home page as a room full of people, it’s a conversation.  When you want to say something, write it in the box at the top saying “What’s happening?” When you’ve written it, all the people who follow you will read what you have written. That’s a tweet!

8. Replies.  If you want to reply or direct to your tweets to one person in particular but want everyone to see what you’ve said add a little @ symbol before their Twitter name and then say what you want.

Eg: “@rustyrockets you’re new DVD is very much overrated!”

Those twitterers not following you or rustyrockets (Russel Brand) will not see what’s been said, but everyone else will.  Using the @ symbol you can also reference people to get their attention.

Eg: “I’m going to grab lunch at Pizza Express with @wossie and @ladygaga”

This would attract the attention of those mentioned and anyone referenced. Referenced accounts are also clickable links so anyone who sees the name mentioned are able to click it and find their way to the page, thus being able to choose to follow them as well – Genius!

9. Lets get direct! Twitter also offers direct messaging.  This can be done by clicking the “direct message” tab on the side of the profile of whoever it is you want to message.  Alternatively, you can write “d” and then the name of the twitterer to send a private message to their twitter inbox on their homepage.  Direct messages are private and can only be seen by the users that are involved.

10. Hash can be good for you! Hash keys (#) are like forums or questions.  If you create a hash key comment, everyone who enters the same hash key will have their tweet shown collectively.  Then, when someone clicks the hashkey, all results talking about the content will be visible on one page. These are known as trending topics, and the ones with the biggest following are shown at the side of your home page.

Eg: “#favouriteboysname” is David from one person would show up on the same page as “#favouriteboysname is Michael”.

11. Tweet twice as much!  Now you’re familiar with what’s really going on, start tweeting properly.  The first thing to remember is that you can’t write anything longer than 140 characters.  This might not seem like many, but it’s more than enough! Be brief, be snappy, be clever.

12. What to Tweet?  Content is arguably the most important thing to master.  There are certain tweety traditions that you’ll notice the more you use Twitter.  The language is a blend of proper English and informalities.  I think Twitter itself has its own jargon of sorts.  Try to get someone’s attention through a funny line, interesting quote, or shocking yet inoffensive tag line.  Remember that each tweet is a self-branding tool; so think about how you want to be perceived.  Also – Be Careful.  Don’t say “going to the shops quickly, kids alone in the house asleep on sofa so won’t be longer than an hour.” Mind you- probably shouldn’t be doing that anyway.

13. Retweets! This is what you want.  A retweet is when something you say is enjoyed so much by one of your followers that they decide to pass the information on to their followers using a retweet.  This means that what you’ve said reaches everyone who can see your profile and everyone who reads the person who’s retweeted it!  A retweet is almost like a little award, obtaining one can snowball and before you know it you’ve reached hundreds maybe even thousands of people!  To retweet someone else’s content should you choose to, look under the post you want to do it to and click the button saying “retweet” – job done!  By retweeting others people should be appreciative and take more notice of what you are saying.  Remember, do onto others as you wish done onto you. 

14. Links.  By posting links, whether a youtube video, article or funny story, people will start to look to you for more of the same.  Due to the 140 character limit URL’s can often take up too many.  This is why URL shorteners have been created.  I personally use bitly.com but there are others out there.  Simply visit www.bitly.com and enter the URL you want to relink on twitter into the box provided.  For instance;

http://funnyjokesblog.blogspot.com/2009/06/why-men-are-never-depressed.html would take up far too many characters, but when put into bitly.com it becomes;

http://bit.ly/8UFxFn

Much better.

15. Pick your Pics. Although not fundamentally appreciated for sharing pictures, that’s Facebook territory, Twitter does offer this function.  To do so, visit www.twitpic.com and log in using your Twitter account.  Here you follow the instructions to upload pictures from your computer, when it says ‘post this’ if you do, a link will automatically be tweeted on your Twitter account. Excellent. 

Follow me at your own risk!

As I looked at the clock reading 10.35am and took a sip of my 4th strong black cup of coffee and began feeling the twinges of restlessness and an overwhelming need to go to the bathroom again, I began questioning why I was looking at this post?

“Raining in La- this is not the deal. London has snow. SNOW! This better be Hollywood rain that tastes of lemonade and gives superpowers.”

This beautifully articulate and charmingly smug utterance is from none other than the delightfully articulate, intelligent and hilarious Russel Brand (@rustyrockets).  I’m not ashamed – though perhaps I should be – that he is one of many celebrities that I ‘follow’ on good old Twitter.  Yet I found myself becoming alarmingly jealous.  I have never necessarily felt jealous of celebrities before, admirable and appreciative of their work yes, but not jealous.  So as I sat there, blood boiling, eyes turning green I began to ask myself whether it is healthy for social networking to allow us constant updates on how exciting their lives might be when some of us are by the looks of things writing for our own eyes only.

Russel Brand and the others have at no point forced me to follow them, far from it in fact.  He has absolutely no idea who I am - he has over 719,000 followers to my 32 – some of which probably don’t even know who I am anyway.  I have replied to posts from Davina McCall, Fearne Cotton, Chris Moyles, Max Rushden, Jonathan Ross and good old RustyRockets, WHY?  Is it some sort of desperate attempt for one of them to just put “@clutterances haha” so I can go to the pub and say, “Jonathan Ross found me funny today, what did you get up to?” – Maybe.  Is it so that one of them might offer me a break into the entertainment industry by picking me out of the crowd and saying “You’ve got talent, have a job.” – Possibly.  Is it because I, like so many others have to justify to myself that they’re not so different from us - just harder working and more talented? Undoubtedly.  The press paints celebrities as aliens – although Lady Gaga might actually be one – yet in truth they’re definitely just people with jobs.  Sure their jobs pay millions, they live in luxury, travel the world and have enough casual sex they could raise an army from aborted babies (Brand) but they also deserve it.  I read Russel Brand’s Bookie Wook again this month and it is an excellent example of how focusing on what you want will result in your success, even if your focus is blurred from a concoction of heroin and hairspray.  I imagine most celebrities will admit that a lucky break was certainly needed, but the difference is that because they knew what they wanted, they deserved it.

Twitter is a constant reminder of how much more successful you could have been, how relatively disappointing your own life is in comparison.  This is an incredibly morbid realization of what Twitter can do - and I think myself an upbeat person, mind you Kerrie Katona thinks she’s thin – and therefore I question the healthiness of it.  We’re constantly surrounded with celebrity gossip, television and all sorts of stories, so why insist on letting them dominate our social life too.  Celebrities are not to blame in the slightest but why do I look? Why do I follow? Why do I care? WHY?! It seems that knowing what celebrities are doing is an addiction.  Twitter is the dope fiend jacking celebrity toxins straight into your veins through your eyeballs and fingertips.  Even the term ‘follow’ seems a bit filthy.  It makes me feel like I am hiding in a dark corner somewhere with my pants round my ankles smelling like a computer and Twittering my little tweeter until my hands are raw, my eyes hurt, I have a headache and I can only offer one last status update before I fall into a deep, dirty slumber.  

The fearful realization of this is when someone with bad intentions uses social networking to their advantage.  Take this post from naughty little Russel Brand again:

“I just read that my tweets are the 3rd most influential in Britain. I will only use this power for good. Now send photos of your sex organs. “

I bet they did too.

Imagine if someone with less frivolous intentions than Russel Brand began being more and more influential? It is quite an alarming thought that social networking can truly have such an influence.  I am willing to bet that it is only a matter of time before something bad is generated because of Twitter.   I’m not sure the screening process of Twitter could work quickly enough to cull a threat when just with a celebrity retweet can turn your followers from “15 to over 200 followers in 5 minutes @trevorwesley” because of an endorsement from @rustyrockets.

So lets see whether following celebrities will help us, hinder us or hurt us in the future.  2010 could be an interesting year for social networking, it could reach new heights or could cause chaos.  I guess we’ll have to sit back, watch and when it happens see whether in 140 characters we can generate a response from one of our favourite celebrities.

“The Mannerless” VS ‘The Forgotten Generation’ – Can Social Networking save the day?

At university, Facebook was used to laugh at friends photos, organize drinking sessions and compete in those addictive little games they offer.  Since graduating I have found myself so overtly effected by the economic crisis and the knock on effect it has had on the employment market that I find myself labeled under the umbrella of ‘The forgotten generation.’  However, those tools we used solely to socialize could now offer our salvation from the mire we find ourselves living in.

The old enjoy criticizing the young but this time they’ve gone too far.  It is clear to me that the generation spanning 30-50 now have essentially shat all over those to come - and I’m not just talking about the bankers.  Generally speaking, the generation who came before mine have no concept of manners, etiquette or respect, yet love to look down on us from their X5 driving, huge loan owing, DKNY be-speckled pedestal that they find themselves sitting on - selfishly cocking everything up and waiting for someone else to sort it out.  It is they who have made appalling financial decisions on our behalf and have ruined the economy to such a degree that jobs are in short supply and unemployment is spiraling higher and higher out of control.  What annoys me most is that the people we’ve set the task of saving the day are the very same who got us in this position to start with.  I read recently that there is a strong campaign to make the retirement age older than 65, which will once again reduce the opportunities for the young.  Ultimately I agree with the idea, it is true that we are a healthier and fitter society than before and that most of us have a perfect sense of mind at that age - so it is simple logic that the retirement age is pushed back.  However, it is who is campaigning for this that annoys me.  It is the very same snob filled generation that has already done enough damage and they’re doing this is to protect their own interests.  Yet where roles the roles for the present are being protected, nothing seems to be being done to create new positions.  This generation - who I would like to call “The Mannerless” - have created a world where opportunities are at an all-time low, yet I constantly see articles about how misguided and ill equipped my generation is for the world we graduate into.  

A while back I saw a BBC interview with Sir Stuart Rose where he said that recent graduates don’t have the necessary skills for the working world.  The way he said this rubbish it looked like he thought we were to blame, if it was true that is.  Are we really to blame? That’s rhetorical by the way - no, we’re not.  Our syllabuses are decided by “The Mannerless,” we are taught by “The Mannerless” awarded our grades by “The Mannerless” and then criticized and denied jobs by….”The Mannerless.” 

All the time I have been driving, which I appreciate isn’t a massive amount of time – 5 years – 99% of people who pull out in front of me, don’t offer a thank you wave, never let me out, drive up my arse, overtake at ridiculous points of the road and just generally behave like utter prats are one of (you guessed it) “The Mannerless.”  Ever held open a door only then to be ignored by the people passing through? “The Mannerless.”  Ever worked in a shop and helped a customer only to be offered absolutely no appreciation for your help? “The Mannerless.” Ever applied for a job only to never receive any form of response? “The Mannerless.”

My point is this, if we live in a world where opportunities are limited and often decided by muppets, what chance do we have? My answer - Facebook.

Well actually, social networking in general is where we can find success.  I don’t know a single person around my age not on Facebook, I don’t know anyone who doesn’t use Youtube at some point and more and more people are starting to realize the powers of Twitter.  Our ability to network effectively online is what sets us apart from the average member of “The Mannerless.” Social media offers us a platform to make a name for ourselves.  Industries are beginning to realize how massively important social networking could be to them and are actively seeking people who ‘know about it.’  Essentially our text-talk, picture sharing, status updating, socializing obsessed members of society, most of whom part of “The Forgotten Generation” are beginning to be required.  Often criticized and accused as pointless by the small minded idiots out there who can’t get their sweaty little palms or bigoted naïve minds around social networking, we’re starting to bite back, one well worded status update at a time.  With effective advertising being more and more needed, companies whose eyes are open wide enough to see past their current blinkered “mannerless” employees are starting to reap the rewards.

Ultimately it seems that we, “The Forgotten Generation” may be able to get past the prejudice thrown our way consistently by the utter clowns who came before us by merely being ourselves and doing what we do best – networking.   It is apparent that as a consumer demographic, we are still targeted by advertisers and that slowly but surely people are beginning to realize that we are more useful to today’s business world than people like that Rose prick (sorry for the pun) would suggest.  So people, keep adding those photos, updating your statuses, poking each other and soon we’ll be in a position to treat those around us a hell of a lot better than we have been.