Does anyone actually read your tweets?

Twitter has just released its Twitter analytics dashboard to all users (as long as you've had an account for at least 14 days) and we love it! Unlike some more complicated and in-depth analytics tools, Twitter's dashboard is very basic and easy to use.

Log in to your Twitter account and go to:

http://analytics.twitter.com/.

A dashboard will then display the "performance" of your recent tweets.

Because the Twitter timeline moves so fast with constant updates and interactions, it's often said that a tweet has a "life" of just a few minutes and hardly anyone sees it unless you're lucky enough to get retweeted by a celeb or influential tweeter.

With Twitter Analytics, you can now find out how far the lifespan of your tweet has actually reached.

The dashboard shows you how many impressions your tweets have earned over the last 28 days, including a breakdown per tweet of impressions (how many times users saw the tweet), engagement (how many times a user has interacted with the tweet) and the engagement rate (engagement divided by impressions).

If you want a high level of engagement on Twitter, here's what you have to do:

Find out the real reasons that your followers find you interesting. If you start to notice a pattern in the types of tweets that spark a lot of engagement compared to those that don't, adjust the content you share accordingly.

Here's Twitter's official guide on how it works.

For further advice or info on social media analytics, get in touch: @LambintheCity or 020 7264 7880

photo credit: opensourceway

Dough-nut start a digital battle with Greggs - they will win!

Greggs this week provided a glowing example of how to handle a social media nightmare after an offensive version of their logo appeared on Google on Tuesday.

On 19th August, Britain's biggest bakery chain was inundated with thousands of tweets after a fake company logo appeared in Google searches, insinuating that Greggs has been supplying faeces to the less classy end of society for over 70 years.

The spoof image, pulled in from uncyclopedia.wikia.com, appeared on the right hand-side of Google when users typed the company name into the search engine.

Thousands of people were quick to point out the error to the company’s social media team who reacted brilliantly to the unexpected busy day at the office.

 

^{The infamous fake logo. Photo: uncyclopedia}

A common reservation of starting up a social media presence is often the fear that it will encourage negative messaging.

With their response to this nightmare, Greggs proved that PR disasters can occur even without the adoption of social media networks, and goes even further to show that using platforms like Twitter can be fundamental in very quickly turning a negative into a positive.

Here's how the social media team at Greggs cleverly used Twitter to control the situation, whilst using it to their advantage to portray their fun personality through light-hearted responses to tweets received and jovial interactions with Google:

Greggs' intelligent, witty and timely handling of this incident via Twitter has resulted in huge positive feedback and buzz around the brand. 'Greggs' was trending on Twitter and stories have been published surrounding the baker's reactions to the event in the likes of the Telegraph, the Daily Mail and the Guardian.

What we can learn from this is that to be absent on social media is to lack a powerful crisis management tool. The risks of negativity resulting from being active on networks such as Twitter are far lower than the likelihood of such activity generating positive and impressive engagement, which would otherwise be unattainable when relying purely on traditional forms of media and communication.

If you'd like to chat to one of our social media gurus, contact the office on 020 72657 880 or tweet us @Lambinthecity

How to 'handle' Twitter

Do you make this 'Twitter handle' mistake? Gone is the belief that Twitter is a platform exclusively for celebs.

Everyone these days seems to be on Twitter - are you? If so, are you aware of all of the mistakes people make on this platform?

You have probably spotted the following examples:

• Those who haven’t quite grasped the concept of Hashtags:

• Those who don’t pay attention to the character limit:

• Those who don’t shorten links:

But there’s one important mistake you could be repeatedly missing, especially if you use Twitter for your company's marketing communications..

You may know that to ensure a tweet includes another tweeter's account and is alerted to them as a notification, you must tag or 'mention' their Twitter handle by typing an '@' followed by their username. However, many people are unaware of the implication of placing these mentions at the start of a tweet.

Did you know that by starting a tweet with someone’s Twitter handle, you are limiting who will see it?

When using Twitter as part of an integrated social media marketing strategy, you probably spend ages crafting the perfect tweet. We know we do.

When wording a tweet, front-of-mind are your efforts to show your clients and followers all of the impressive tweeters you interact with, and the goal to ensure that your communications are exposed to as many relevant and influential people as possible.

All of this hard work can be wasted if you are unaware of this widely unknown Twitter rule.

Unless you have a word/character before the @ symbol, ONLY the followers of BOTH you and the person you have mentioned will see the tweet on their feed.

To guarantee that you are not one of the millions of Twitter users making this mistake, you should always avoid starting a tweet with a mention.

Sometimes, however, this may alter the effectiveness of your message, or take up valuable character space. Here’s a sneaky tip: begin your tweet with a full stop.

Simply inserting this (or any) character before the handle will remove the rule which restricts who the tweet is visible to, and will no doubt go unnoticed by most people who are unaware of this catch.

Had you noticed it before?

What other Twitter mistakes have you come across?

photo credit: mkhmarketing

Are you smarter than a 6 year old? Maybe not when it comes to technology...

What's your DQ?

As part of their eleventh Communications Market Report, Ofcom has conducted a research study measuring the confidence and knowledge of communications technology to calculate an individual's 'Digital Quotient' score, or 'DQ', with the average UK adult scoring 100.

The study, among nearly 2,000 adults and 800 children, found that six year olds have the same understanding of digital technology as 45 year olds, while digital confidence seems to go into long-term decline when people reach their 20s, culminating in a steep drop at the age of 60. The graph shows that 60% of people aged 55+ have a below average 'DQ' score.

According to Ofcom, the ‘millennium generation’ of 14 and 15 year olds are the most tech-savvy in the UK with the highest score of 113. The research suggests that this mid-teen peak is due to increased broadband and digital communications access while growing up.

More time online than asleep

The difference in score is reflected in shifting communication habits, with younger consumers embracing newer technology and taking advantage of mobile devices. Children aged 12 to 15 are less likely to talk on the phone, with the vast majority (94 per cent) of their communications seeming to be text-based via instant message such as whatsapp and social media services such as Facebook.

In contrast, UK adults spend a fifth of their communication time speaking on the phone and a third on email. On average, UK adults now spend 8 hours 41 minutes using media and communications - more time than they spend sleeping!

“The communication habits of all ages are shifting as they embrace newer services and take advantage of portable connected devices,” says Ofcom.

Communication and media habits 

• More than six million consumers have 4G mobile subscriptions out of a total 55 million
• 4 in 10 households now have a tablet, up from a quarter a year ago, while 61 per cent have a smartphone
• Total communications revenue was unchanged at £60.2bn in 2013, although average per household fell to £117.08 with the largest decrease in mobile services
• TV viewership dropped below four hours per day for the first time since 2009
• The UK TV industry generated £12.9bn in 2013, up 3.4 per cent mainly due to higher spending on sports channels

Lamb had some new animal friends in the City with a stampede at Liverpool Street Station this week

We thought we were the only animal in the City but turns out we were very wrong this week.

Commuters at Liverpool Street on Wednesday were met by an even more animalistic stampede than the usual rush hour pandemonium (or should we say panda-monium) when live art collective Artful Badger performed their pop-up performance to promote the upcoming Wilderness Festival.

Beginning round the corner to Lamb HQ at Liverpool Street Station, the troupe swanned (or rather owled, foxed and zebra’d) their way in full costume across to Soho Square.

For the full article and more pics, check out Time Out London's website.

Lamb loves the Royal Albert Hall

We're becoming black-tie regulars at the Royal Albert Hall this week! Thursday's event was Post's British Insurance Awards, followed by last night's Investment Week Fund Manager of the Year Awards 2014, sponsored by FundsNetwork.

Check out our gallery of highlights from the FMYA evening below, with thanks to Investment Week and Mike Jackson from FundsNetwork for the few pics we've borrowed.

To see some snaps from the BIAs, check out our brandformula blog.