Giffgaff: The uprising

If you haven’t seen or heard of Giffgaff yet, I can guarantee by the end of 2012 you will be aware of their presence. Giffgaff have branded themselves as a simple to understand mobile network: no contracts, just reasonably priced ‘goodybags’ for a sim only deal.

So how do you get started? Well order a sim card online and have it delivered to your home address. Worried you will lose your number? Fear not, with Giffgaff you can keep your mobile phone number. You simply insert a Giffgaff sim card, activate it and transfer your number across (instructions are provided by them). Then the fun begins.

For example, topping up your mobile by £15 a month will give you 400 UK minutes, unlimited UK texts, unlimited UK data usage (within reason) and free calls to other users on Giffgaff. This well-developed ethos of mutuality and fair deals, runs parallel to Giffgaff’s ethics of: online use only, with a small close-knit team and second-hand items within their offices, which emphasises the team’s dedication to recycling.

Not only do Giffgaff offer ‘goodybags’ for your mobile phone, they offer ‘gigabags’ for your tablet pc and schemes such as, earning cash (credit) by recommendations. The online community, where users can ask questions to one another, is also another opportunity to earn cash. The Giffgaff schemes are honest and encouraging which makes the company stand out from the noise of other mobile phone services or providers.

Still not convinced? Well, even after you have used up your ‘goodybag’, Giffgaff still prove to be unbeatable within the pay as you go market. See the comparison of pay as you go providers.

I for one, truly advocate Giffgaff as the cost is low, the promise is high and you get a service which is understandable; a sim only deal. Forget the days of being bombarded by phone contract jargon. So, order your sim now and join the Giffgaff revolution.

Five steps to surviving your dissertation

Having finished (and survived) my final year, I thought it the perfect opportunity to offer some words of advice for those approaching their dissertation. If you have typed dissertation into Google then you have begun the journey of your final undergraduate year.

Hopefully these steps will provide you with guidance and reassurance:

1. Decide your topic: research a wide variety of topics/subjects that interest you. You will be spending a year on this, so make it count to you!
2. Once you have chosen an area, narrow down to a more specific area or a couple of questions. Usually lecturers use the comparison to a funnel, heading for the detail and depth that a dissertation is aimed to produce.
3. Set a timetable for the year (or however long your timescale is). Plan an approximate guide of when you want to have completed certain sections and as you progress through your dissertation these can be changed and/or altered accordingly. This helps you stick to deadlines and manage your other units alongside your final piece.
4. Make sure you make time for yourself. Do not get too bogged down by your workload. Dedicate time for doing things that make you happy, whether it is going to a concert, cinema or night out every week; this is the best way to get good results.
5. Have fun with it! As a Communication and Media student I decided to do something of interest and a discursive dissertation; religion within horror films. It certainly makes a good talking point for interviews and although the process was ‘horrific’, it was an enjoyable topic to investigate and analyse. Whether it is a social science, discursive or creative piece, make sure it appeals to you! As it is you, and not your supervisor whom will be working on it for months.

Inevitably this will also occur:

 

 

Do ordinary, extraordinarily well: sponsorship in 2012.

Bournemouth University graced the sixth Mike Warne Annual Marketing Communications Lecture; covering the vibrant, challenging topic of successful sponsorship: leading the way in 2012. Students, staff and local and national media welcomed Jackie Fast, Managing Director of Slingshot Sponsorship and Jeff Dodds, Executive Marketing Director of Brand and Marketing Communications at Virgin Media. The evening juiced our brains, whilst the sponsors of the event Little Miracles quenched our thirst and tantalised our taste buds.

Jackie Fast kicked off the evening by delivery a ‘punchy’ and succinct presentation an agency’s perspective of sponsorship. Through humorous photographs Jackie transported the audience back to 2008 where our dear friend, the recession, came to visit. Although as we all know, the visit went from short to long-term overnight. The year 2008 saw a dramatic decrease in sponsorship, meaning businesses had to adapt.

The glass half full, half empty imagery was painted by Jackie. The change meant businesses had to change their marketing plans and generate new revenue streams with business synergy at the very heart. Businesses had to devote further time to competitor evaluations with their individual infrastructures and tactics. The big question that came from all of the renovating; what is sponsorship doing? What is the value of sponsorship for companies?

The dominoes fell down and subsequently saw one way communication dynamically adapt to the marketplace into two-way communication. Most companies may refer to this as ‘the social media bandwagon’ which we all must ride. Jackie supported this claim with sources proving the increase of users on social media websites and also the demographics changing over the past few years; witnessing the older generation using more social based sites.

So why sponsorship? Why is it so important?

Sponsorship as explained coherently by Jackie is rewarding. It involves engagement, brand experience, interactivity and ultimately fan loyalty can be achieved. The equation of sponsorship reads: logos + media vs. engagement. Not to anyone’s surprise, Jackie revealed sport is the fastest growing industry for sponsorship.

Jackie’s inspirational talk was complimented by fruitful examples of sponsorship. Here are two of them alongside simplified interesting facts (click links for further information):

Jay Z and Bing

• Month long campaign
• Relevant to young audience within popular culture
• Attracted on average 11 minutes per person
• 1.1 Billion media impressions
• BING were within top 10 visited websites
• 11.7% increase in traffic to BING

Coca Cola Polar Bear and Superbowl

• Marketers focusing on second screen consumers
• 9 million users tuned into campaign
• On average people dwelled for approx. 28 minutes

Concluding her passionate talk, Jackie left the room with wise, inspirational lexis on sponsorship: it is not about logos, integration is key, be unique and above all engage and create relationships; social platforms are ideal.

“Open with a film, it does a better job” exclaims Jeff Dodds. The video fills the lecture theatre with pleasing audio and visuals of the wonderful works of Virgin Media. From V Festival to Britain’s Got Talent to comedy. Just “another day in the office” remarks Jeff in a jovial tone.

Jeff begins by inviting the audience into the corporate strategy at virgin Media. Four basic areas: mission, payload, boosters and thrusters. The mission statement has the customer at the forefront with the NPS (Net Promoter Score) being fundamental and core to Virgin Media’s ethos. The company want to know would you recommend. Advocacy is the cogs within Virgin.

WWRD? Can you guess what it is yet…(and no, nothing Rolf Harris related). What would Richard do? Three undeniably wise steps from Richard Branson reflect the company’s success in the current marketplace.

1. Grow through advocacy
2. Demonstration not declaration
3. Virgin only joins the game to change the game

Jeff confidently explained the three-way architecture of sponsorship within Virgin Media. The first two, obvious avenues can be communications (telling) and advertising (showing). However, sponsorship manages to hit customers at a personal, experience level. In his words the Virgin Media consumer life.

Virgin Media’s use of sponsorship demonstrates clearly this level of personalisation. Sponsoring V Festival Virgin Media manages to encapsulate a ‘once in a lifetime’ experience for the festival goer. The customer experiences rich moments that incidentally create positive feeling towards the company. Only last week, V Festival came fourth on Google Insights emphasising Virgin Media’s strategies are literally buzzing.

Virgin Media’s current advertisement informs customers about the double speed Broadband coming soon, with the website link to confirm specific dates. Richard Branson and Olympic runner Bolt star in this humorous advertisement.

It has been highly successful for Virgin Media and is innovative. Innovative, live and now. In the first eight days one and a half million people typed their postcode into the website. This is a phenomenal result generated from a fun and appropriate form of advertising. The talent sponsorship in this example was beneficial for the company.

Jeff confidently announced Virgin Media’s sponsorship of Britain’s Got Talent in “the year of Britain”. The sponsorship will give stature to Virgin whilst also creating feelings of pride for customers, and also employees. Exclusively at Virgin Media, employees are seen as the first advocates. Therefore they are given special privileges, such as audience tickets for Britain’s Got Talent and a concert is provided with the finalists for staff. These experiences then promote conversations and encourage advocacy. This is a unique outlook which other companies should appreciate and possibly replicate, where appropriate.

Jeff’s talk was engaging, dynamic and informative; leaving most listeners wondering why on earth they were not currently working for Virgin Media; a forward thinking and innovative, strategic company.

A half an hour question and answer allowed audience members to quiz the panel; joined also by Dr Yue Meng. Questions were also submitted via the Twitter hashtag #CIM12. The final question left marketing hopefuls on a prosperous, high note. Sponsorship is a brilliant, explorative avenue offering companies “better things” structured by “engagement” in an “instant” fast paced world. The panel all agreed that there are many areas that remain untapped, such as the arts, which could potentially suit and benefit some companies. Jeff Dodds left the room tingling with enthusiasm and expert knowledge, sponsorship is not worried about saturation, but “attribution, this is the most difficult aspect.”

In reflection, we should all walk away, pause our TIVO and ponder, WWRD?

SOPA and PIPA, will they leave us speechless?

It has been a while since I have last blogged and this is mainly due to the demanding workload of my third and final year at university. However, today marks an important day for the internet that cannot be ignored, with SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect Intellectual Property Act), anti-piracy bills, being considered in the USA.

The legislations are aimed to stop online piracy but many people feel there will be devastating consequences regarding freedom of speech and movement online. If the laws are put into action they can create blacklists of websites to be censored, remove these websites from search engines and cease funding. The DNS (Domain Name System) would be manipulated by these laws and could therefore make websites vanish in the blink of the eye. This might not always be a “bad thing” you may say, but for example, if it were to stumble upon a contaminated blog, instead of discarding of that one, single blog the entire website/company would cease to exist.

Innovation, liberation and freedom would all be squandered by these two movements. If the legislations offered greater fairness and well-thought and developed arbitrary values then perhaps they would be considered more useful to the internet. However, this is not the case.

The BBC (2012) state that

The bills propose that anyone found guilty of streaming copyrighted content without permission 10 or more times within six months should face up to five years in jail.

This will benefit those that are damaged by people committing piracy which is right and just, however as stated above the delivery methods of punishment are not as clear-cut nor effective.

Those in favour include music publishers, film companies, book publishers and television channels and networks. Though PIPA and SOPA have caused a stir amongst large online presences such as Wikipedia whom are feature a black out showing their utmost support against the proposed laws. Others include eBay, LinkedIn and Google.

PIPA is currently being cradled by the Senate whilst SOPA currently remains in the hands of The House of Representatives. The body of the internet is yet to be disfigured but these changes may just be the making of an unattractive global medium.

Useful links

BBC article discussing sites protesting the legislations

The Guardian- Stop SOPA or the web really will go dark

Book swapping: a novel idea

The Guardian is leaving 15,000 novels around the UK for people to find and read. Publishers and authors have joined this campaign to encourage reading and swapping books with one another.

The idea is to give your favourite novel away and leave a message within the cover for your ‘new’ reader. This is a fantastic idea and people can follow where books are left and the new journey their favourite novel has taken. You can follow this exciting adventure on Twitter: #guardianbookswap and upload photographs and a commentary following the progress of your swap.

Sharing books is an idea that has been around for a long time. Books clubs and societies ensure groups of people can empathise with one another on their precious novels. Swapping books also ensures they do not end up in your loft, being neglected and gathering dust. Readitswapit is an ingenious website that lets users swap their books for books they want to read, with the small cost of posting.

The internet also makes reading and novels more accessible. The Guardian are also offering this weekend a free audiobook download of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy in the Saturday Guardian.

So prepare your favourite novel for a real adventure and read some helpful tips on swapping. Write that stranger a memorable note and get ready to book swap. The story begins this weekend.