7 steps to yes: what are my options?
March 3, 2008
How can you help your potential recruits apply for the best job for them? Perhaps more urgently, how can you stop them wasting your time (and theirs) by applying for the wrong positions in your organisation?
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5 ways to market your company on YouTube
February 8, 2008
Have you visited YouTube recently?
No, I don’t usually have time either, but I have identified five different examples of using YouTube as a marketing tool for you. Each of these is a slightly different approach to marketing the company to potential recruits.
1. Classic talking heads: executives and experts
The first example are the videos placed by companies to discuss issues related to their industries.
For example, BDO Stoy Hayward have added a series of videos discussing retail issues such as the ethical agenda, and the resurgence of the High Street. These are a way of conveying the expertise of the organisation, and are a long way from the singing guineapigs or roller skaters racing against cars for which YouTube is well-known. But is YouTube the right place for this kind of video?
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Signing the web
February 1, 2008
Is your site truly accessible? Are you providing the best possible service to all your visitors?
I expect you’ve taken the first step, and perhaps your site is accessible to level A (or even AA). But have you considered taking the extra step, and providing accessible charting in your investor section, transcripts for all your video or audio sections on site, or providing a sign language translation for your webcasts and videos?
There are up to 70,000 users of British Sign Language (BSL) in the UK, and up to 500,000 users of American Sign Language (ASL) in the US. This is a big constituency which you should perhaps be considering.
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Put your brochure in their pocket
January 21, 2008
Have you considered using podscrolls to communicate more detail about you?
Podscrolls are like presentations, or brochures, and are composed of a series of images, but they are read using an iPod or other personal media player with a colour screen rather than on paper. These were first used by travel guides (Rough Guides), but potentially have a lot of different applications.
Accenture are using them in their Careers section to enable prospective candidates to download brochures for reading later - on their ipods.
I can see that this might work for documents or presentations that you’d like people to review, re-read, and think about, and it is certainly convenient - no need to carry about a document in case you’d like to have another look later.
However, the pixel size is small (320*240) so you probably wouldn’t want to put your annual report or financial statements on podscroll.
But do you have manuals - either for your end customer or for your staff - that it would be helpful for them to have available in a size that would fit in a pocket? Or price lists? What about other presentations that people could download and read on the bus without having to get out their PC?
I’m going to be looking out for interesting uses of podscrolls, so if you come across something, do let us know.
Starbucks: how to communicate change
January 8, 2008
Starbucks provides us with a demonstration of a great way of communicating the significant changes under way (changes in their approach and in their senior management structure).
The home page has been replaced with a letter from Howard Schultz, addressed to all customers. At the bottom are links to copies of a letter and a voicemail from him to all Starbucks partners (employees), together with a link to a Questions and Answers page dealing with the changes, and to the Investor Relations pages, which shows the press release at the top of the list. If we click through to review the details of the Board of Directors, we can see that the changes have been reflected on this page, which is up to date. Even potential job applicants have been provided with a link to the letter/voicemail to partners and letter to customers in the careers section.
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