Mike BG, Author at Switch - Digital & Brand

U is for Usage

Mike BG — Mon, 05 Oct 2015 09:48:50 +0000

When hearing the word usage, the first thing that comes to mind is my monthly data usage *yikes*. However, apart from the fact that this month I will be paying a lot, we could also focus on the many different usages of the internet.
Be it shopping, messaging, gaming, researching, or getting lost in the thousands of Maury and “cute cat” videos, we are all using the internet for large portions of every single day.
Shopping online has become one of the biggest uses of the internet. Online shopping has benefitted the whole planet, allowing you to purchase anything that is available anywhere around the world.
ASOS, River Island, Hollister, Abercrombie and Fitch, you name it! All of these are massive online clothing outlets that generate millions in online revenue daily. However, let’s not forget the biggest stores online; eBay and Amazon. These 2 websites have everything you need in a click of button, and will be delivered to your door a few days later.
Nowadays everyone also uses the internet to text each other. WhatsApp has become one of the biggest applications on smartphones. It became so popular that they are now implementing it on computers and tablets! Fun fact for you: WhatsApp is worth $19 Billion. This application is the reason to why people are non-stop on their mobiles texting.

Not only do people pay to have Wifi at home (and how can we forget the good old days of the dial-up internet? Not being able to connect to MSN because someone was on the phone – horrible memories), but they also pay for internet data to be used on their mobiles, despite the free Wifi spots available. This is because we all want to be connected and to communicate. Humans fear loneliness – this is why we are always glued to our phones, even when waiting on line at the bank.
This is why digital marketing has become so efficient. The internet has brought new opportunities for brands to advertise, to reach to possible customers, and communicate with their audience. Take a look at Facebook, by simply scrolling through the homepage we see different sponsored-post, all belonging to different businesses that try to reach us. What about those newsletters we receive in the email that remind us about a product or service that we are interested in? I love those daily reminders!
Just imagine having no internet available, and an essay about “The Evolution of Humanity” to be handed in tomorrow. Pretty much impossible right? And can you think of a faster way to reach out to your customers? I think not. The digital era has given us the opportunity to communicate with our audience right away; we are able to interact with them almost immediately – that is an advantage we definitely didn’t have before.
We have reached an era where we cannot imagine our life without the internet, both for personal and professional use. The effectiveness of digital marketing has allowed companies to expand their business overseas, reach new markets, and increase their audience’s brand awareness. There is no going back now, just forward, so make sure that you make the most of the online world.
Happy browsing!

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Why I chose marketing

Mike BG — Fri, 02 Oct 2015 09:43:25 +0000

As a kid I really wanted to become an astronaut and explore the galaxy – but yeah, that didn’t quite work out as planned. I am now aspiring to strive in the marketing field. Why? Simple – “Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.” Do you want to sit at a desk everyday of your life and let your job take over? Or do you want to meet people, learn customer trends, styles, understand the way people think, create innovative adverts, receive first hand feedback, create competitions and watch people enjoy taking part? That’s what I thought.
Every since I was young(er), I always enjoyed watching adverts – this is how I decided I wanted to become one of those persons who comes up with the ideas for the ads. Every year they would get better and better. One day I found the goldmine of advertisements, the SUPERBOWL; Doritos and bud light to be precise. Just imagine being the person coming up with these brilliant adverts:
Advertising can be tricky, but when it’s done properly you can just sit back, sip on your coffee and watch it go viral. Shout out to Evian, hats off to their advertising strategy. To this day people still talk about their baby adverts.
Even though their advert doesn’t actually show their product throughout, they have managed to grab the audience attention through humour – the customer engagement was huge! But keep in mind, viral commercials does not necessarily lead to a growth in sales. In actual fact, after the baby roller skating commercial, sales had declined for Evian.
But when a commercial is out of this world, then sales increase by, let’s just say 107% *cough* Old Spice *cough*.
To me marketing isn’t just a job, it’ a hobby. I always enjoyed the fact that there is competition, and one of your main aims is to beat that competition. Pricing strategies, effective commercials, promotions, whatever it may be, you must strive to make your product the top-selling product! If other companies can do it, why can’t you? “The sky is the limit”, I disagree, you have no limits, take a field trip within your imagination and think of anything that can beat your competitors.

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Q is for Question

Mike BG — Fri, 11 Sep 2015 08:55:43 +0000

Naturally, when you cannot solve a query you end up turning to the internet for answers, sometimes, not exactly the brightest idea (but we’ll get to that later). For the past years the internet has always had our backs, be it for school assignments, or just to prove someone wrong in an intense argument. The internet does provide some pretty good places to go to ask and answer questions, such as: Yahoo! Answers, answers.com, Wiki answers, and more.
The thing about Yahoo! Answers and the similar websites is that the sources cannot be reliable because you do not know who the users are and what their knowledge is – users have access to all the questions asked and can answer as they wish. However, many answers get upvoted and therefore prove as some sort of legitimacy. On the other hand, as well all know, some people surfing the web simply wish to joke and may ask silly questions or give trolls answers.

On a positive note, due to the technology we have today, there are many websites that provide real time assistance, such as Microsoft Support. You may also ask medical questions to doctors online (realself.com/ask-a-doctor), and technology based questions in forums (techrepublic.com). These are extremely beneficial for either those people who need professional advice, quick help regarding the latest technology, and require assistance with their account management.
Yes, the internet may answer all of your questions with the reliable websites from all around the world, but, the one thing every internet user must know is to never ask someone to photoshop your photo.

The internet is the home of very unusual activity, but we can’t help but love it. Before asking questions online you should first search for the top reliable sources and then fire away. Just don’t ask Yahoo! Answer user “Jd_Mcfly” any questions, I can’t even imagine what his next answer will be!

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N is for News

Mike BG — Mon, 24 Aug 2015 08:01:33 +0000

Extra! Extra! Read all about it!

IOS9

Every minute of the day something interesting somewhere around the world happens. However, instead of focusing on news like who Donald Trump is going to offend next or One Direction splitting up, we are going to be focusing on news related to technology and computer related news.
Firstly, IOS9 is almost here! Bringing you a better Siri, enhanced multitasking, better Apple maps, and new built-in applications. But the one thing that really caught my attention was, the long awaited power saving mode! IOS9 will give the users the opportunity to enable low power mode and which will award them with longer battery life. Now that’s what I call an update!

Ashley Madison hack

In other news, some people just got caught red handed after the Ashley Madison hack. If you don’t know what Ashley Madison is, it’s basically a website where married people sign up for “internet dating”. A few weeks ago it was hacked and everyone’s details were revealed. The hackers responsible for the hack are known as the “Impact Team” – and what an impact they made. This must teach everyone a lesson, always be careful with what social media websites you are signed up to, because one hack and all of your information will be leaked, leaving you exposed. Apparently these hacking groups can get through to anything!

Bionic hand

Lastly, 3D printing has gone the extra mile and actually printed an artificial limb! Joe Oxenbury was born with upper limb deficiency, but now has a fully functioning left hand thanks to a charity who specialised in 3D printing where a kind soul named James Holmes-Siedle crafted the hand. The charity which created the 3D printing took measurements of Joe’s right hand and designs inspired by George Lucas’ Star Wars (Darth Vader’s hand). The future is here, the bionic hand!

From longer battery life, to hacks, and bionic limbs, the past few months sure have been hectic! Who knows, maybe next up is flying cars and fully functional hoverboards (a boy can dream).

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M is for Mobile marketing

Mike BG — Mon, 10 Aug 2015 07:46:50 +0000

Just to make myself clear before I start rambling on about the different uses of mobiles in the marketing scene, there is more to mobiles than Candy Crush and your daily dose of Clash of Clans. Whilst you wrack your brain over when you’re going to upload your next selfie on Instagram for the ultimate amount of likes, people around the world are using mobiles to promote their company and products. This is known as mobile marketing.
There are various different types of mobile marketing that are being used nowadays. The most popular methods of mobile marketing are:

SMS marketing
MMS marketing
Push notifications
In game mobile marketing

SMS marketing

When a company sends you a text message regarding a new offer they are providing or what new stock they have. SMS marketing is permission based, meaning that the company must first attain the prospect’s mobile number with their permission, and then proceed to promoting to them.

MMS marketing (Multimedia Messaging Service)

Similar to SMS marketing, however, through the use of MMS marketing the company is able to send pictures, video, and also text.

Push notifications

A great way of attracting the attention of people addicted to their applications and tempting them to purchase online. An example of an application which uses this type of marketing is eBay. Don’t pretend you were never tempted!

There’s a very simple way to explain what in-game mobile marketing is. You know when you’re playing a game on your mobile and there is a small advert that you keep accidentally clicking? Well there you go.
Let’s face it, the average person spends more time looking at their mobile phone than looking at people. A company actually made an application that shows you what there is in front of you whilst you text (using the front camera) so you can walk and text and not bump into anyone! So basically – though a bit on the bombastic side, this shows that people are constantly looking at their phones, especially millennials. With proper market research, and an effective strategy, mobile marketing can be just what your company needs.

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K is for Klout

Mike BG — Mon, 27 Jul 2015 13:48:10 +0000

First of all…

What is Klout?

Klout is a social media website that tracks your internet influence. It turns your internet popularity into a score, through which eventually you may win freebies. Klout was started in 2008 but only kicked off properly at the end of 2011. When it did kick off, many celebrities around the world started using it to display their social media rate of popularity. At a point Justin Bieber had a more influential online presence than President Obama. Clearly, this didn’t indicate much and instances like this led to some slight changes to the system.

How it works

Klout generally works through an algorithm that tracks all of your influence on almost every social media website that you are active on and transforms that into a score through which it will define how “popular” you are. After getting a certain amount of points, Klout will reward you with a freebie. The freebies that Klout provide will definitely make you want to post. Just by updating a status here and there, and uploading a photo of your cat sleeping which is bound to get likes, you could win prizes such as; Samsung televisions, Sony cameras and also Microsoft phones, along with others. This automatically creates a vicious cycle where the more you interact the more freebies you get and so on, leading to an automatic increase in social influence.

Customisable

New movies? New music? Street art? Technology? You name it! Klout allows you to follow categories that you are interested in and provides you with a news feed with different articles, whilst also allowing you to share interesting articles you might find. The more you share, the more points you score, and the happier you are.

In short

It’s a website/application that provides you with articles on what you’re interested in and tracks your popularity on the web, and then offers you rewards for it, what more could you ask for? So check it out here, and who knows, maybe one day you’ll top Justin Bieber’s score (or whichever sensationalist star happens to be popular at the time)!

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