You remember our clients, newly elected Cllrs Saima Mahmud, Mark Rusling and Ahsan Khan at Hoe Street ward in Waltham Forest, London (we blogged about it).

We had been discussing their website header pic for some time and one of their constituents obliged them with taking a marvellous picture the other day. (more…)

I really wish I could use a photograph of John Cleese from Fawlty Towers in this post or some of his memorable lines to the German tourists (you have to watch it if you haven’t even though I can’t imagine anyone has missed it).

I digress.

Visit Britain just published some tips on welcoming overseas visitors to the UK.

Britain’s national tourism agency has extensively revised its markets and trends profiles as part of its campaign to help enhance cultural awareness, avoid misunderstandings and boost UK performance in caring for customers.

I love the fact that the tips have been written by VisitBritain staff, who are natives of the countries featured. It gives a more personal touch to the advice and even though they can never be absolutely true for everyone they can provide a sufficient guide for people to err on the side of safety rather than just outright insult visitors. I would heartily recommend going through the profiles, even if you are a native of the country in question (or especially then) – you’ll find some surprising bits of info! (more…)

So I’m having a catch up with a client today and we eventually come to the newsletter issue. They have progressed from the initial work we did for them and it’s time to keep in touch with their audience.

Normally I don’t support newsletters. However, each company is different and – crucially – the audience has different needs. So we analysed things a bit, I asked questions that needed to be asked and we decided on some next steps.

Newsletters are a tricky thing. I find that it pays to first think about what you want to achieve with them. Our client has genuine content and genuine updates that need to be sent out, which is why we think the newsletter is a good idea. (more…)

The Greek campaign is progressing and Theodora is doing her thing these days.

You will recall that we have started an outreach campaign aimed at Greek hoteliers. As part of that campaign Theodora is on the phones talking with small and medium hotel owners and managers up and down the country.

When we approached her to do the work she was a bit worried. “Is this about sales?“, she asked to which we most emphatically answered “No“!

The principles are simple. Introduce us, discuss, connect. The whole point of the campaign is outreach and engagement rather than sales.

| Introducing SoMaFusion |

We are a relatively new company and there is something intrinsically different about us when it comes to hospitality. Our hospitality services are specialised and offer the whole spectrum – from digital communications to pricing policy. Not something you find often.

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It is a great pleasure to announce the GREEK campaign. Targeted to Greek hoteliers with small and medium – sized hotels it has been a long time coming.

The centrepiece for the campaign is the hotelspro.gr website – a version of the SoMaFusion website in Greek and set up specifically with tourism professionals in mind.

Other actions include a targeted e-mail campaign (extremely targeted) and an outreach campaign (even though the details of the later are surprise). (more…)

When you are involved in local politics, what is the balance you should be aiming for when communicating?

This is a discussion we have again and again with candidates and Councillors in Local Authorities.

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Photo from the relevant MailChimp blog post (please click)

Good news from MailChimp. I don’t want to spoil the surprise but we’ve been setting up something over there these last few days.

I’m glad we waited.

* Easy integration for Facebook Like buttons
* Facebook App
* A Social Pro add-on

and some more – check it out on their blog.

A lovely new project for Athens, Greece just launched, THIS IS ATHENS, brought to life by mindworks.

The idea is that the website can become one big photo-stream for Athens, an opportunity for people to share corners of the city that they love.

Having lived my adolescence and early youth in Athens I know how wonderful it can be. It is great that Breathtaking Athens took the initiative.

Being who I am though I couldn’t help ask the difficult question. (more…)

Sometimes you have to explain what you do. In simple terms.

I certainly dislike lengthy presentations and documents and frequently wish that people would just get on with it.

When I started putting together this presentation about how we work with hotels I had a chat with my colleague Manolis about this idea I had to just put things in simple terms. However, there is always the challenge of the prospective client who knows what he/she wants and really wants a bit more detail. (more…)

Chip Conley (pic from the Joie De Vivre Press Room)

I watched this really interesting talk on TED by Chip Conley, CEO of Joie De Vivre, about measuring happiness in staff and guests of his company’s hotels.

Conley realised early on in his career that companies tend to base their strategy on what they can measure and not necessarily everything that is important – counting what can be counted instead of counting what counts (I love that word play). Happiness, Conley maintains, is one thing that brings people fulfilment yet is never measured.

Using the example of Bhutan, with its Gross National Happiness (GNH) instead of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) Conley goes on to speak about the need for new ways of measurement which will show the rich complexity of a company’s performance and will allow for new ways to connect with customers.

Conley and Joie De Vivre looked for ‘less obvious’ metrics, based on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs concept. They did this in an effort to promote a sense of belonging and to ensure that staff and hotel guests felt connected with the company in more ways than one.

Conley says:

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