A NOTTINGHAM design agency that has doubled in size in the last 12 months is now looking to grow by a further 30% with the appointment of four new key staff members.

Website design business Soula says that, over the last two years, it has experienced a “huge” increase in enquiries from companies and organisations looking to invest in digital marketing solutions.

Managing director Martin Pykett said: “I have to say, without embarrassment, that we are experiencing a boom period.

“Clients are looking for new and more sophisticated options to keep their brands front of mind with customers.”

Soula’s clients operate in industries like music, health, education and finance, with an increasing number of enquiries from the pharmaceutical sector and gambling organisations.

If you are interested in working for Soula – see our latest vacancies here

This story is a little different however; this is about the United Airlines handling of a complaint made by a guy called Dave Carroll that UA damage his guitar while on a short internal flight. This I am sure has happened to a lot of people but guitars are particularly expensive as well as obviously fragile and the baggage handlers really should have known better.

Anyway after a year of chasing them Dave decided that he world should know of his problems, so he and his band put together a song and video and put it on YouTube.  It’s embedded below.

It’s really funny and well put together and a deeper background of the song is available on his own blog.

Obviously this is a huge embarrassment for UA, they have a company Twitter profile that was basically bombed with RT of this video and the video itself has thousands of comments and a full 5 star rating.

At this point SEOMoz featured a post about management of this type of problem and how so many companies don’t take social media seriously etc. It’s a very good post which I recommend you read but the crux was that UA should take this as a marketing opportunity, get in touch with him and make sure everyone knows you are doing what you can to rectify it.

Well it seems someone paid attention because shortly after they did contact him and since then have taken several positive steps for both themselves and customers.  Dave did a video response here .

The company offered a decent amount of compensation which Dave has diverted to charity and the company have gone as far to actually use the song as a training video according to Twitter. There are also talks of a follow-up song made in co-operation with the two.

Fantastic move by UA and great initial effort from Dave and his friends. Social media management si becoming a necessity in todays business world and case studies like this should be shown to all the “savvy” marketing guys heading up multinationals.

There are many different ways to market your product but some companies are taking advantage of the currently very popular social messaging site Twitter.  Twitter gives you the potential to connect with many “followers” and Moonfruit have explored the potential of this with their latest competition.

If you haven’t heard of Moonfruit they are a free website builder site currently celebrating their 10 year anniversary marking the occasion by giving away 10 free MacBooks.  All that you have to do to be in with a chance to win this great prize is tweet “#moonfruit”.

Other companies have also tried the same technique but Moonfruit have taken on board how they could make the campaign work better for them.  A good example of this is SquareSpace (also a website builder) who offered the chance to win iPhones (gift certificates) and are now under scrutiny for deceptive advertising.  I think the more expensive prize and it not being a gift certificate easily makes this prize stand out – although I would love an iPhone too.

Moonfruit have gained a lot of interest in this social media campaign and went almost instantly from 1,000 followers to 30,000 followers.

If you have not signed up for Twitter yet – may be this post will encourage you to see the potential for your company.  But, whether the tweeters that have helped promote Moonfruit in the last few days (in order to be in with a chance to win the MacBook) will use the sitebuilder is another question?

Although there are other brands which have been going over 60 years, they appeal to the mass market. A brand like Vespa appeals to a more exclusive market and not because of what it can provide the user. There are any number of 2-wheeled vehicles that can nip you through traffic  and park you in the most ridiculously small (and usually free of charge!) spaces so why would you choose a Vespa when there are cheaper and probably more reliable alternatives? Maybe because you are buying into a lifestyle choice. Or maybe you just want to own a classic piece of Italian design.

Obviously popular back in the 60’s with the mod culture – the Classic film Quadrophenia – who could forget Sting on his GS?! I definitely can’t and I know I’m not alone I wasn’t the only one riding miles to see Stings original Vespa. Today although the mod scene is still alive the Vespa has an even bigger following and for other reasons. All Vespa lovers out there buy into what the brand is offering – a fun, classic, timeless vehicle.

Take another brand though for the sake of comparison – seeing as I had it for breakfast lets get onto the subject of Marmite. Random comparison you might say but look at the history behind it – been going for over 100 years. Look at the brand message – the message is strong “LOVE it or Hate it”. Everyone has heard of it and it’s true you do either love it or hate it and the nation obviously loves it. What other company could produce a limited edition jar nearly every year and watch it fly off the shelves and sell on e-bay for a stupid amount of money? Guiness edition, Champagne edition, Zippy edition and the most recent limited edition cricket ball jar. Brilliant I LOVE it!

What about the packaging? It has not changed greatly over the years with the same distinctive logo, colours and product shape. So surely that can’t be making consumers buy it unless that is half the appeal of the product that it is part of our history? Is it just because it tastes so fabulous? Or are consumers buying into a timeless classic just like our old friend the Vespa. Or maybe just maybe the brand of Marmite is what keeps it selling to this day.

Vespa and Marmite are 2 totally different brands in their own right but both lasting the test of time. In fact really just 2 classic design icons.

Microsoft will once again be back up in front of the courts for self promotion as they were 12 years ago with the promotion of IE4. Only this time it is IE8.

Many of you will have noticed the latest windows updates, requiring you to install IE8 as this is now being classed as an important upgrade. Many of you may not have noticed the small print on the user agreement which states that once IE8 is installed you will accept it to become your default search browser. For those who are unfortunate to have experienced this I share your frustration. Microsoft is clearly using its own operating system as a means of promotion its other products.

Many of you who are old enough will recall a very similar technique being used when Microsoft promoted IE4 using similar methods. At this time the rival was Netscape who eventually were bought by AOL. In 95′ Netscape enjoyed its almost monopolisation of the web browser market. However with Microsoft’s new OS on the horizon with its on board web browser, Netscape soon fell and Microsoft Conquered.

14 Years later Microsoft are looking to repeat history though they now face the massive force of Google defending their first new born; Chrome.

I for one will hope to keep a close eye on this and will look forward to the outcome. The case begins later in June and is due to end in July, however the bickering will continue for months after.

Now I guess that Facebook being the number one ad publisher is only common sense really, after all it is still by far the most used website on the internet, despite Twitter making a serious challenge to this claim in recent months.  But the fact that the next nearest display ad publisher, Microsoft Websites, achieved less than 1/3 of the ad impressions with figures of 3.8 Billion, demonstrates the huge advertising potential that Facebook offers.

These stats make very interesting reading, and they will undoubtedly have marketing professionals once again questioning the effectiveness of display advertising.

Do people buy from adverts displayed on Social Networks? Surely people are on these sites to socialise and not to buy goods and services!

Do these display adverts have any impact on the viewer when there is so much else going on on the page?

Etc, etc – the questions go on.

Although I cannot give you a definitive answer to whether display adverting is an effective use of your valuable online marketing budget, what I will say is take a look at the type of companies who are spending the most on display advertising (again published by ComScore recently). 5 of the top 10 display advertisers in April where telecoms companies.

Why? Well these companies rely heavily on reinforcing brand awareness and it is an ongoing process for them. They do not know when you or I may want to change out telecoms provider, but when we do make that decision they want to know that we are aware of their brand. These companies are not necessarily looking to make a sale from their display advertising instantly, they just want to ensure that we know they are out there – and what better way to do that than have a strong presence on our favourite website.

Obviously not all of us can afford to take this route. Generally we need to know that our money is being spent effectively, providing a good level of that all important phrase, Return On Investment.

However, if building brand awareness is one of your targets, and you have some funds to put towards this aim then I suggest that running display ads on Social Networks is an excellent place to start.

I’ve also been hearing a lot about how Susan Boyle (Britain’s got talent) has been appearing all over the USA and is considered one of the best upcoming ‘brands’ and she was unique in under-promising and over-delivering.

At the moment many brands related to beauty and makeovers are clamouring for her attention and to be associated with her. I think we should combine these two latest affairs frankly and get Ms Boyle launched as the new face of Pepsi… If triangle head Duffy can do diet coke, then why can’t Susan do Pepsi?

If you think this makes sense too – join the revolution… http://www.facebook.com/home.php?ref=home#/group.php?gid=81829937608

This will be the first thing we will dare brands to do that may appear to ‘marketers’ as detrimental to their brand however we know would actually be so random that it can’t not be a good thing.