CitySocialising the UK's leading Socialising Network that bridges the gap between online and offline networking has this week been named as one of the 10 European technology companies to watch.

The list which was compiled for The Telegraph by Brent Hoberman (co-founder of Lastminute.com) and Rogan Angelini-Hurll named the top 10 businesses to track and use over the next 12 months. Along with their PROfounder partners (Micheal Birch, the co-founder of Bebo, Peter Dubens, head of Oakley Capital, Sean Seaton-Rogers, and Jonathan Goodwin, Head of the Media Investment Banking Group at Jefferies) the pair have been scouring Europe for the last year looking for the new pioneers of the dot com industry.

CitySocialising which was named as one of the top companies was founded in 2007 by entrepreneur Sanchita Saha with a loan from the Prince’s Trust. In the last four years Sanchita and the team have grown the events based social networking site and community, primarily aimed at 25 - 40 year old urbanites who want to make new friends and socialise with likeminded people in their city, from zero base to over 100,000 registered users who logon to meet new people in their area. By combining offline social events and activities with online social networking tools and features, CitySocialising successfully bridges the gap between virtual and real world experiences or ‘O2O’ (‘Online 2 Offline’) - a trend which is set to see massive growth across the web.

Sanchita Saha Founder and CEO of CitySocialising commented:

“It comes as a huge compliment to be named on this list, CitySocialising has seen huge growth over the past year so to get some recognition of that and the potential we have amongst some truly exciting ventures is fantastic.

We’ve got a lot planned for CitySocialising over the next 12 months and I’m also interested to see what some of the other companies named have coming up, I’ll definitely be watching them closely.’’

The other businesses named as ones to watch were:

Wonga an e-loans business service which provides small, short-term cash loans to UK consumers.

Playfire a social network for gamers which describes itself as “the new social network designed for gamers, by gamers."

Everbread is yet to go live but claims it will offer one of the fastest travel search engines, focusing on cheap flights as it integrates a number of low cost airline carriers into its search results.

Mendeley a management and sharing tool for academic knowledge which offers both desktop and web tools focussed around organising academic information with greater efficiency.

GroupSpaces develops technology to help groups offline run their memberships with more efficiency and ease online.

VouChaCha a mobile app that partners with retailers to deliver discount deals within walking distance of a person’s location.

Made.com a furniture retail site that cuts out the middle men and delivers products straight from the manufacturer to consumer at a lower cost.

Mangahigh a games-based learning site focusing on maths for secondary school students which features games that emphasise rapid-fire learning of different maths techniques.

Shazam a mobile music discovery provider which was launched over 10 years ago but has recently seen huge growth thanks to the introduction of their mobile application. Add a comment

The future of social media dictates that every website will eventually become a social networking site. Both businesses and individuals will follow in the footsteps of the media and offer some kind of social network component to market themselves and their services, if they aren’t doing so already, according to experts.

In the last decade, businesses have had to readjust their model to succeed. Whether its messaging, chatting or uploading videos, companies and entrepreneurs are relying more on Internet-based communications to build their community than they are in their physical storefronts, traditional office spaces or even out in the real world, with these business social networks (http://www.socialgo.com/business-social-network.html).

To further build these online communities, instead of simply reaching out into the unknowns of Facebook and Twitter, businesses are incorporating networking components on their sites, giving customers already drawn to their page a reason to return, whether its through chat bars, games or blogs.

Social network (http://www.socialgo.com) maker SocialGO is helping companies and individuals design social networking sites based on their personal preferences and objectives. From zero cost to the $150 per month Concierge plan, where SocialGO provides full support and does the design for you, businesses can build their own sites with SocialGO’s variety of themes and premium widgets, like self-made video channels, ad and banner management, reservation booking and direct revenue monetization features.

Hundreds of businesses have already turned to SocialGO to build their customer base, including clothing designers, television stations and sporting retailers. Several companies in the US, UK and other countries have used SocialGO’s capabilities to create online forums, blogs, video channels, plus several other ways of user feedback and interaction.

SocialGO offers social networking (http://www.socialgo.com) services for all needs and budgets. To find out more about boosting business through customised and supported social networking sites, go to www.socialgo.com

Add a comment

A benchmark study released today by Wildfire reveals that while 90% of technology companies have a presence on two or more social networks, a significant majority are just not being social and are failing to use these channels to engage in a two-way dialogue with customers and followers.

The results of the benchmark study, which analysed the social media activity of the 2009 Deloitte Fast Tech 50, are revealed in a whitepaper, Putting the ‘social’ back into social media.  The whitepaper, which also offers over 60 social media best practice tips, is available to download from http://www.wildfirepr.co.uk/tech_social_media.

Twitter was the most popular network used (74%), followed by Linkedin (72%) and then Facebook (20%). Less than half (48%) had a blog. But the study confirmed many technology brands view social media as an opportunity to push out marketing messages and corporate content; 60% of companies with a Facebook page used it purely as a distribution channel; 57% of companies with a Twitter account used it solely for one-way marketing activity; and only 25% of blogs received comments on a regular basis.

In addition, a large proportion of technology companies in the study are ignoring feedback from their audiences. While 66% of Facebook pages received comments from users, 75% of these companies failed to reply to the comments: only 3% of the tweets in the study were retweets and just 12% were replies. Shockingly, 43% of brands with a Twitter account had never replied to a tweet. A tiny 9% of companies replied to comments on their blog.

Companies also failed to integrate social media with their online presence: only 34% of companies assessed link to their social network accounts from their website homepage, with only 18% linking to a Twitter account and 2% linking to Facebook. Only 22% featured their blog on their homepage and on social networks themselves, the integration wasn’t any better, with only 51% of companies on Twitter even including links to their website or blog in their tweets.

Debby Penton, Managing Director at Wildfire said: “Social media marketing is not some black art requiring vast experience or knowledge. After all, the vast majority of us use social networks on a regular basis to chat with friends or network with colleagues. It is therefore surprising to find that so many technology companies are trying to force old marketing techniques onto the way they use social media. They are using it to simply ‘push’ marketing or corporate messages.

“To be truly effective, social media requires a different mindset entirely to traditional ‘push marketing’ and our research demonstrates that brands haven’t factored this into their thinking when using social media. With correct foresight and planning, social media can be a wonderfully effective and cost efficient way of developing relationships with end users and achieving bottom line returns.”

Wildfire recommends that technology companies step back and reassess how they are using social media and work out how best to reach their target audience through these channels. Wildfire has listed ten key questions that any company should ask before embarking on social media activity:

1. What is your target audience/s?
2. What are the most appropriate social networks to reach this audience/s?
3. What content is going to be of interest to your audience?
4. Who in your business is going to be in charge of social media activity?
5. What happens when you get customer service enquiries through social media channels?
6. What is the tone and personality of your brand? How do you want this to be conveyed through social media?
7. How does the real-time response required with social media affect your existing approval processes?
8. What should your corporate social media guidelines look like?
9. Who is going to develop and create content for these channels?
10. What is the business goal for social media? How will you measure and evaluate whether social media activity is having a successful effect on your bottom line?

The full results of the research can be downloaded from www.wildfirepr.co.uk/tech_social_media. You can follow Wildfire on Twitter: http://twitter.com/wildfirepr

Add a comment

IFA Life, the social networking site for IFAs and financial planners has launched two new tools to help consumers find, connect with and refer IFAs.

With over 5,000 registered on the site and a strong presence on the Internet, increasing numbers of consumers are finding social networking site IFA Life as a valuable source to make contact with IFAs, to assess them and make contact.

The first search tool is a simple but powerful location based tool, where consumers can find IFA Life members within specified distances. Founder of IFA Life Philip Calvert said today: "It's commonplace for people to use the Internet to find an IFA, and increasingly they are also using Social Networking sites such as LinkedIn, Ecademy, Twitter and YouTube - and so we have responded to increasing use of the IFA Life site by consumers.

"The good news for IFAs is that when their name comes up in a search result on IFA Life, people can click though to their profile page where they can find out more about them, their interests, their expertise, what other business networks they use - plus their website and contact details."

Calvert added: "There is no charge for IFAs to have their website address visible in our search results."

Find, follow, assess and refer IFAs on Twitter
IFA Life's second search tool is believed to be a first and unique within the industry. IFA Tweets is aimed at more sophisticated Internet users who use Social Media tools such as Twitter to find, follow and assess IFAs before engaging their services or referring them on.

Indeed, many consumers do not actually want to engage an IFA's services directly, but 'follow' them in order to benefit from their financial expertise and observations expressed through Twitter. Many will then refer that IFA on to friends and colleagues as is typical use of social networking sites.

Philip Calvert added: "Most IFAs will tell you that referrals are a key source of business. They are gained because clients trust their IFA following years of great service. Social Media is a new way for IFAs to build a reputation and trust, which in turn leads to their followers referring them to others."

IFA Tweets is a special Twitter page which enables people to find, follow and refer IFAs who use Twitter. IFAs who have added their Twitter address to their profile page on IFA Life will see their Twitter posts (tweets) automatically featured on the IFA Tweets page, and the page itself will be heavily promoted on the Internet.

Philip Calvert added: "This is pretty cutting edge stuff, but given that Social Media is reinventing traditional referral mechanisms, we thought it time that the financial advice community should also benefit.

"This is a completely new way for consumers to refer IFAs, but in time we believe that the 'Social Web' will be at the heart of how people find an IFA."

Only members of IFA Life will be featured in the new search tools, and are free to IFAs.

The location based tool is at http://www.ifalife.com/FindanIFA and IFA Tweets can be found at http://Twitter.com/IFAtweets

Add a comment