Orbital Media Targets Twitter Athletes To Promote Colantotte’s Flex Loop Launch

Posted by Hayden Allen-Vercoe on April 17 2012
Filed in Online PR

Last month, Orbital Media was asked by Trion:Z and Colantotte to launch their brand new magnetic wristband – the Flex Loop.

It needed something special and something inventive – here is what we did:

We targeted top athletes and asked them to get involved by providing testimonials and images with the Flex Loop. In order to get athletes interested we tweeted them with one of our exclusive invites to review the product.  These athletes were specifically chosen because of their strong twitter followings and a high level of social media activity.

The attempt to get top athletes on board has been a roaring success.

Trion:Z and Colantotte now have support from prominent Olympic athletes (Steven Burke), professional darts players (Jamie Caven) and well known charity fundraisers (such as John Hibbs).

So far, this is one of Orbital Media’s fastest and most successful social media promotions of a new product, as it has ensured that the Flex Loop is well and truly out in the Twittersphere.

Orbital Media Improves Rangemaster’s Social Media Presence

Posted by Hayden Allen-Vercoe on March 26 2012
Filed in Online PR, Social Media Marketing, Social Media Research

Orbital Media has teamed up with the iconic British brand Rangemaster, in order to help improve their social media presence, through a fully integrated campaign.

To kick start the campaign will be giving away a Rangemaster cooker worth £1,999, on the brand’s Facebook page. Click here to have a look https://www.facebook.com/RangeMasterUK.

We will then promote the competition to the world utilising optimised social media techniques; through these techniques we aim to bring thousands of people to the Rangemaster Facebook page. This will be made possible by contacting our vast blogger database and encouraging them to feature the campaign, we will also contact influential press targets and conduct optimised tweeting. However, these are only a few of our methods for developing the brand’s presence.

In only 4 days the Facebook page “likes” increased by over 200% - and this number is always growing!

We will update you on the success of the campaign soon…

Social Media & SEO Summary January 2012

Posted by Hayden Allen-Vercoe on February 02 2012
Filed in Blog Network News, Online Marketing Tips and Advice, Online PR, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), Social Media Analytics, Social Media Marketing, Social Media Research, Social Networking

What a month! Dominated by the launch of Google ‘Search plus your world’ (and the other Social Network’s discontent of this Google – centric search), and the SOPA Blackout, with the big guns in full support.

Here’s what happened in January 2012 in the world of Social Media and SEO.

SEO Summary January 2012

* Google’s social search, incorporating G+ in its search results, are discussed by Danny Sullivan at Search Engine Land.

* Mashable’s Sarah Kessler comments it is too much, too soon – I agree.

* Erin Everhart, also from Mashable, comments on the SEO perspective of this new Social based search

This could all kick off - The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), has called for the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) to investigate the recent search changes. There are concerns that the new features favour Google’s own services over those of competitors.

CNN Money even reported that Google may be sued for the new ‘Search plus your world’.

We need to remember that, according to Google, facebook & Twitter did not want Google to crawl their content, if this had been agreed search plus your world would have been so much more relevant.

And as far as SEO goes, I think it is important to highlight these personalised results are only visible if you are logged into Google. With G+ gaining more ground daily (see below!), more people are likely to be logged in to Google – which may become an SEO issue for the future.

But….Google said facebook and Twitter did not allow access to their social graphs and that’s why Search plus your world results are steered towards purely Google listings.

By the looks of it, not true. Engineers at Facebook, Twitter and MySpace have got together and produced a tool that shows clearly that Google’s new search could have been more driven to the user and not to Google. The new bookmarklet tool, ‘Don’t Be Evil’ goes beyond G+ search results. Search Engine Land have a full write up and install instructions.

Social Search as it should have been?

Meanwhile….

* WebProNews led with Google’s stunning announcement Larry Page claimed whilst discussing their results for the 2011 fiscal year; “Google had a really strong quarter ending a great year. Full year revenue was up 29%, and our quarterly revenue blew past the $10 billion mark for the first time. I am super excited about the growth of Android, Gmail, and Google+, which now has 90 million users globally – well over double what I announced just three months ago.”

This was posted by WebProNews on 19th Jan. To really see how fast this Social Network is growing, the same site also revealed that G+ users have now reached an estimated 100 million users. That’s an extra 10% growth in less than 2 weeks. Is Mr Zuckerberg concerned? I know I would be, G+ now looks to be a really viable contender to facebook.

* It’s not all good for Google though. Concerns over the new privacy settings may seem searchers adopt a new approach. Microsoft capitalized on this with a blog post ‘Google doesn’t put people first’. Google responded to these claims in their own blog post.

* The huge internet campaign led by the big players saw sites blacking out sections of their pages (or even complete sites) in support of anti SOPA. Examples of Google, Wikipedia and others during the ‘SOPA Blackout’ can be found here.

Not sure what all the fuss is about? You need to know – it affects each and every one of us. Mashable cover why SOPA is dangerous very effectively. Scary reading.

But, the blackouts seem to have worked! (For now). Mashable report on Lamar Smith, the chief sponsor of SOPA, pulling the bill. SOPA is dead.

Social Media Summary January 2012

* Social Media Examiner mentions Google’s new social integration, as well as highlighting Twitters new embeddable tweets and a really interesting, useful and free email tool for Gmail users – Brand My Mail, where you can add blog posts, Twitter or facebook updates and much more to your emails.

* Hubspot’s Pamela Vaughan also talks about Google’s “biggest social search update yet”.

* Bharati Ahuja discusses Google+ “as a complete blogging platform” at WebPro Tech.

* Brian Solis shares 10 social media strategies for defining a successful 2012 at his blog.

* Pinterest continues to grow, with Etsy being the latest to add a pin it button.

* More social growth? Danny Goodwin of Search Engine Watch  reports that YouTube is now serving 4 billion videos a day. If you are a stat freak, click the link, there are some more YouTube related stats there!

* Pen.io continues to grow as the fastest online content publisher. Although basic, it is also very effective at publishing a web page online quickly. We like.

* Too many Social Networks to handle?!! Macworld report that Twitter have acquired social media feed condenser Summify. Summify summarizes Social content in people’s Google, Facebook and Twitter social media feeds and delivers a daily summarized version via email, a website or an iPhone.

* Google were not the only ones to reveal good financial results for 2011. Facebook has just filed its IPO for 2011 with a figure of $3.71 Billion.

So in the first month of 2012, although Google has reported huge success, Facebook, Twitter and Microsoft have all expressed some negative views. This year is going to be interesting, with a few more scraps to come.

I cannot wait!

Orbital Media brings thousands to Sudocrem Ireland

Posted by Hayden Allen-Vercoe on January 16 2012
Filed in Online PR, Orbital Media Press Coverage, Social Media Marketing, Social Networking

Last October, we launched a campaign on behalf of Sudocrem Ireland, with the intention of increasing their presence on social media outlets and to celebrate Sudocrem’s 80th anniversary.

Read more…

Promoting dunhill’s AW11 ‘Voice’ campaign

Posted by Hayden Allen-Vercoe on August 12 2011
Filed in Online PR, Social Media Marketing, Social Networking

If you haven’t popped along to dunhill’s unique content portal ‘Day 8’ then you’re missing out. The concept is simple, produce a stream of ongoing, engaging short movies that inspire and align the brand extremely well with people known for their individualism and creativity.

We’ve been lucky enough to promote many of the movies and achieved some fantastic coverage on some of the world’s leading blogs and news portals.

This month it’s the turn of ‘dunhill’s second series of ‘Voice’ campaigns featuring Sir Ranulph Fiennes, Rupert Pennefather and Michael Grandage all sporting dunhill’s AW11 collection. But enough of the chat, check out these inspiring movies below:

Sir Ranulph Fiennes interview – Celebrated Explorer

Often described as the world’s greatest living explorer, Sir Ranulph Fiennes has dedicated his life to conquering continents and summits. Despite now being in his 60s, he is currently preparing an expedition to cross Antarctica during the ‘wrong’ season in temperatures of up to minus 80 degrees - something that has never been done before. He has to date raised over £15 million for UK charities and in recognition of this he was appointed OBE in 1993 for ‘human endeavour & charitable services’.

Rupert Pennefather interview – Ballet Dancer

In 2008 Rupert was promoted to principal at The Royal Ballet aged just 27, making him one of the youngest ever in the company’s history. His focus and talent have taken him to the very top of his field. He is currently performing in London in Manon to outstanding reviews. He dances all the leading classical roles such as Prince Florimund in The Sleeping Beauty, Prince Siegfried in Swan Lake and Count Albrecht in Giselle, as well as the main roles in MacMillan ballets such as Romeo and Juliet and Mayerling.

Michael Grandage interview – Theatre Director

In 2002, Michael Grandage took over from Sam Mendes as the artistic director of the Donmar Theatre in London. He has won numerous awards including several Olivier Awards, Critics Circle Awards and a highly prized Tony Award for best play with Red, in 2010. To great acclaim he has directed the likes of Kenneth Branagh, Judi Dench, Derek Jacobi and Jude Law. This year he steps down from his post after a triumphant 10 years to take on more international roles.