Venturing into a new sector in your industry?

In times of recession – sorry to start on a gloomy note but as officially last week, the United Kingdom re-entered a recession this is surely more than a double dip now…..? Anyway we will leave that bit for the Government to battle out; this part is out of our control.  There are things we can do to work ourselves through a recession and come out the other side stronger than ever. We are talking about diversification and entering new sectors of an industry in which an organisation already operates.

At Box PR, we regularly work with clients who are successful in one sector of the marine industry (e.g. superyacht) and want to take their product to a different sector (e.g. commercial) without disrupting their day to day business organisation and with as little disruption and change to their production as possible.  As their PR and Marketing team, we look at what we can do and how we can help them break into a new sector.

We do not pretend to be business consultants, or experts in managing change; however we are a team who are experts in using its contacts, knowledge and expertise of promoting brand and company awareness and work with its clients to reach new audiences. And quite simply here is how:

Let’s go back to basics………at this point we are starting from the point at which you have a successful product/service that has a proven track record in at least one sector of the industry you are looking to target.

You need to make new contacts….right?

• Shows

• Exhibiting at the right shows, walking the floor at shows going round and physically meeting and introducing yourselves to the new sector you are looking to target

• Media

• Journalists are not all bad, honest! They love new material, news products and application stories to write about.  So if you are not in a position to have a PR company, make sure you find out the key magazines and get yourselves in front of them.

Your marketing material……make it targeted.

You may have experience within one sector of the industry, however make sure what you present and give out is applicable to this new sector.

Go back to basics

• Business cards that have all your correct details on
• Folders, inserts, brochures that show all the company offerings, remember you are a new company to this sector they may not have heard of you so want to know you can deliver the good you promise.
• Flyers. We are not talking about a cold calling flyer drop on all stands and in the post/email.  Make it targeted, personally deliver to stands at shows, to the media office or a targeted email with a contact name of who you have spoken to.
• Press Packs.  If you are at a show, make sure the media office knows you are there. Present good quality press packs for journalists to collect at their leisure.
• Website – people will check out your profile online so make sure your website and social media sites reflect the company as a whole not just the one sector you operate in.

Advertising

• Advertising is all very well, but if you are not known in anyway shape or form, then your ad will most likely fail to make any impact.  Get yourself known, build contacts and then look at branding and advertising.  Remember it can take up to 3 hits to be recognised either  – face to face meeting, piece of editorial and an advert.

Entering a new sector of a market should not be taken lightly.  You need to do your research and ensure you have the capabilities within or if necessary recruit to make sure you can target the sector successfully without the risk of damaging your existing market share.

So to summarise, you are entering a new sector to build on your existing database and product portfolio.  Establish your contacts and your media and work with these contacts to re-establish your company, brand and product.

So what sector are you next going to enter into, let us know how successful you are and what you did?

Enjoy the week!

Box PR Team 

www.twitter.com/boxpr_ltd 

Social Media - Work or Pleasure

Last week we noticed a new kid on the block for Social Media and apps. This new app is called BranchOut and is connected to Facebook, which now boasts more than 25 million registered users.   The concept is that BranchOut allows users of Facebook to leverage their Facebook friends to find jobs, recruit talent and strengthen professional contacts.

But then isn’t that what LinkedIn is for, so you can use your contacts to find a new job, recruit talent and strengthen your professional contacts? LinkedIn, in case you’ve missed out started as the social media site used when looking for a job.  It started in 2003 and now has 2 new members per second and 150 million members. LinkedIn has now become a key search engine when trying to find out about companies and specifically their employees.

A quick search on Google revealed over 345 different social media network sites with more appearing every week.  Some of those admittedly are aimed at specific groups, such as Asian Avenue, which caters for the Asian American community, but there are plenty of other sites that do very much the same as the main contenders we all hear on a more regular basis Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, MySpace and Google+.

So where should the line be drawn between business and leisure?  With more online activity, the two areas seem to have blurred over the last few years.  Will those who have Facebook accounts and post picture of their weekend ‘antics’ on the site need to tidy up their act if they then start job hunting and link into BranchOut.  Will we have more ‘gossip’ appearing on LinkedIn.  There have already been some well publicised cases where employers have searched employees on Facebook and have not been overly impressed with what they have found. At least for now on LinkedIn you don’t know what party your contacts have attended recently!

Twitter however does appear to have successfully straddled the areas of business and leisure.  Perhaps because the information or Tweets are just 140 characters long and there is no chance to get into too much detail.  It works on both platforms.

With this huge pool of information we need to be careful about how much benefit we are really getting from the sites. Which are best to use? How much information do you want to reveal about yourself? Or what you want others to know about you. 

We just can’t guess where social media will go in the next few years, for now it seems to dominate new feeds and information feeds.   Who can tell, but it’s something to keep a watchful eye on and make sure you know where the line is between your business contacts and your leisure time friends.

Now where did I put my note pad and paper……………………………

We would love to hear your comments on BranchOut and how you view social media in general?

Please comment here or find us on Twitter: www.twitter.com/boxpr_ltd

Protecting yourself online - don't become a victim

Sorry we are a day late with this one - this can be Marketing Monday's on a Tuesday afternoon, it doesn't quite have the same sound to it, does it? We will do our best to get back on track next week!

Well back on with this week’s blog post - and we are talking about having your social media account hacked and in particular your Twitter.

No matter how careful you are on the web, one simple mistake and you can compromise the security of your accounts online.  Last week we experienced our twitter account being hacked (sorry if you got a message from us) and in order to protect us in the future and our clients, we thought a few reminders (that may seem obvious) might help you to secure and protect your accounts for the future.

Have you noticed the following on your Twitter account?

• Unexpected Tweets by your account
• Seen unintended DM (Direct Messages) sent from your account
• Observed other account behaviours you didn't make or approve (like following, unfollowing, or blocking).
• Received a notification from us stating that, "You recently changed the email address associated with your Twitter account" (even though you haven't changed your email address).

We followed this up with Twitter and they provided the following as actions to take:

Change your password

Change your password immediately from the Passwords Tab in your Account Settings. Select a strong password you haven't used before. If you can't log in to your account as your password has been compromised then visit - Twitter AccountTroubleshoot

When you set up your account, choose a strong password (at least 10 characters that include upper and lower case characters, numbers, and symbols). It is highly recommended that you use a unique password for each website you use; that way, if one account gets compromised, the rest are safe.

Also use a secure and private email address to associate with your Twitter account. If you forget your password, you'll be able to get instructions for resetting it emailed to that address.

Revoke connections

While logged in, visit the Applications tab in Account Settings. Revoke access for any third-party application that you don't recognise.

If a trusted external application or widget uses your Twitter password, be sure to update your password in the application. Otherwise, you may be temporarily locked out of your account due to failed login attempts.

Safe?

According to Twitter you account should now be secure, and you shouldn't see the unexpected account behaviours moving forward. If you're still experiencing issues, Twiiter say you should now file a support request for more assistance.

Moving forwards and not becoming a vicitim again

Always Check that You're at Twitter.com Before Logging In

Make sure you're on Twitter.com before logging in: Whenever you are prompted to enter your Twitter password, just take a quick look at the URL and make sure you're actually on Twitter.com.

You can find the URL in the address bar of your browser. Twitter domains will always have the http://twitter.com/ as the base domain. Here are some examples of Twitter login pages:

• https://twitter.com/
• https://twitter.com/login

Phishing

Phishing is when someone tries to trick you into giving up your username and password, usually so they can send out spam to all your followers from your account. Often, they’ll try to trick you with a link that goes to a fake login page.

Phishing websites will often look just like Twitter's login page, but will actually be a website that is not Twitter.

If you think you may have been phished, change your password as soon as possible and revoke all their party connections you do not know as above.

Direct Messages

Be wary of weird links in DMs and be cautious when clicking on odd links in DMs. Even if the link came from a friend, it's possible that their account was compromised and the URL was actually sent out by a spammer.

Log in directly at Twitter.com if you're unsure: If you’re ever uncertain of a website, just type Twitter.com into your browser bar, hit enter, and log in directly from our homepage.

Use HTTPS for Improved Security

To turn on HTTPS, go to your settings and check the box next to "Always use HTTPS," which is at the bottom of the page. This will improve the security of your account and better protect your information if you're using Twitter over an unsecured Internet connection, like a public WiFi network, where someone may be able to eavesdrop on your site activity. In the future, we hope to make HTTPS the default setting.

In summary, always keep your passwords safe and secure, never share them with a third party, they don't need them!

Hopefully we can have a week free from hacked accounts.....

Box PR

Follow us @boxpr_ltd

PMA Feeds Success

At Box PR, we strongly believe that PMA (Positive Mental Attitude) feeds success, here we look at how just a little bit of PMA can help you succeed.

This weekend a member of the Box PR team headed to Salcombe in Devon, for a sailing event based out of the Yacht Club.  Nearing 50 boats turned up for the 2 day event and looking round the fleet it was clear that this was not going to be an easy outing………in fact far from it.  Not only was the fleet made up of previous class National Champions but the wind direction was a Northerly gusting between a Force 2 – 4 (so very up and down). Being on the South Devon Coast and the nature of the Harbour, this meant it was very shifty with big gains but also big losses to be made on the water.

When the going is good and you are picking up places on the water and moving forward in the fleet, there is plenty of positive vibes in the boat.  Both Helm (person steering the boat) and Crew (person in the front of the boat) are smiling, thinking tactically and strategically about where to go on the water and how you are going to overtake the next boat.

When things are not going in your favour and a boat from behind catches up, even overtakes it is hard to keep thinking positive and fight back. In effect you lose your clear vision, you struggle to think tactically and therefore you don’t necessarily pick the best strategic path.

This is very much the same in business, when things are going well, our thoughts are positive, we look for new business and seek opportunities to get our company and its’ products in the medias’ eyes. When times are tough, we can be seen to hide away and not maximise our potential, as we are fighting for survival rather than planning a route out.

So our top tips:

• Do not hide away when things get tough
• Although we may all try, we can’t all be positive all the time, so work with people who complement each other
• Everyone measures success differently, make sure you know your goal and work as a team to achieve that goal

In conclusion the sailing may have not all gone to plan this weekend, however we came off the water smiling and are now have a clear plan for the next event so we can achieve our goal on one day winning an event in our class.  

Same applies to your business, a little bit of PMA, will help you see through the mist and help you think outside of the box!

Until next time

Box PR Team