Yammer is a micro blogging service aimed at businesses, it allows individuals from the same organisation to join a company network and share thoughts, comments and questions with co-workers. Launched in September 2008, Yammer started as an internal tool for staff at the genealogy site Geni, however Geni founder David Sacks liked it so much that Yammer developed a life of its own.
The idea behind micro-blogging is simple – short and simple. It's an update on what an individual is doing at a particular time. Yammer takes this idea and directly targets the world of business, providing a simple and free platform for users to easily share ideas and thoughts with co-workers. Working from a simple business model, Yammer allows free access for all, but charges companies $1 per user per month if they want to take control over their Yammer network.
Yammer is also well supported, with a desktop application, and Firefox plug-ins. The desktop application allows users to see Yammer updates pop up on their desktop, just like email whilst the Firefox plug-in can be configured to prompt you every so often to 'Yammer' about what you are doing. Both of these make Yammer quick and easy to use.
On the face of it this might seem like a waste of time and just another way for employees to waste time – in reality it turns into something quite different. At Bluhalo we have been using Yammer for two months, and the impact has been extremely positive. Employees update their status every few hours during the day, letting others know what they are working on, what problems they are having and any new things they have found. This provides a continuous stream of updates around the office letting everyone know what everyone else is up to.
When people get stuck on a new problem they will Yammer the problem, often within a few minutes someone else will contact them and provide them with a solution or suggestion. This kind of communication, team work and team building is something that is difficult to achieve without a tool like Yammer.
Why have we made this our site of the month?
Communication is key to business success, both internally and externally. Yammer is a great tool to help achieve this vital part of business life, and as a website it has built itself upon business use, it is not something that has grown from hyped up media coverage or from popular culture. Its growth has been down to being a fantastic tool to improve internal business communication, productivity, team work and morale within a working environment.
As far as we are concerned, any opportunity to improve communication between employees is a good thing – and finding a great tool to do it that makes it simple, fast and easy is even better.
Why not try it for yourself at Yammer or read here what other people have to say about it.
David C
Programmer
Showing posts with label networking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label networking. Show all posts
Tuesday, 18 November 2008
Thursday, 3 April 2008
Make Social Media work for you
Social media is one of the most talked about phenomenon in recent months. The term given to a new breed of websites that facilitate greater interaction with your online audience, social media offers a wealth of opportunity for B2B and B2C businesses alike. A comprehensive social media strategy tailored to your business needs will allow you to invest in social media effectively (we can produce one for you!). In the meantime, here’s our top five ways to make social media work for you:
1. Understand it
Before you can use it, you need to have an understanding of it. You don’t need to become an expert, that’s our job, but a good understanding will mean you know why you’re doing what you’re doing! A good place to begin to understand social media can be found in our blog article – 2008 – the year of going social online.
2. Get Digging
Add social bookmarking tools to all of your news and product pages which will allow your visitors to easily bookmark and share your content within their own networks. Sites such as Digg, del.icio.us and reddit are a good starting point.
3. YouTube
Youtube now receives more traffic than Google.com. That’s proof enough that user generated content (UGC) is fuelling the new web. Try and think of unique and novel ways in which you can use YouTube to promote your products and services. It could be a clip of your products in action, interviews with your staff or even a full blown promotional video.
4. Twitter
Twitter is a great way of keeping tabs on your friends, colleagues and workforce. It’s basically a site that lets you tell people what you’re doing. Sounds simple but many people don’t get it initially, once you do, you’ll be hooked!
5. Get Networking
Sites such as LinkedIn, Plaxo and Facebook are amazing resources for getting in touch with people, generating leads, raising brand awareness and much more. They’re also becoming powerful business to business (B2B) tools, enabling companies to effortlessly communicate with their stakeholders. You don’t need technical knowledge to use them and they can be great fun too.
To continue with our marathon of web tips, click on one of the articles below:
Increase your website traffic
Hot 5 design trends
Blog successfully
Must-have website features
1. Understand it
Before you can use it, you need to have an understanding of it. You don’t need to become an expert, that’s our job, but a good understanding will mean you know why you’re doing what you’re doing! A good place to begin to understand social media can be found in our blog article – 2008 – the year of going social online.
2. Get Digging
Add social bookmarking tools to all of your news and product pages which will allow your visitors to easily bookmark and share your content within their own networks. Sites such as Digg, del.icio.us and reddit are a good starting point.
3. YouTube
Youtube now receives more traffic than Google.com. That’s proof enough that user generated content (UGC) is fuelling the new web. Try and think of unique and novel ways in which you can use YouTube to promote your products and services. It could be a clip of your products in action, interviews with your staff or even a full blown promotional video.
4. Twitter
Twitter is a great way of keeping tabs on your friends, colleagues and workforce. It’s basically a site that lets you tell people what you’re doing. Sounds simple but many people don’t get it initially, once you do, you’ll be hooked!
5. Get Networking
Sites such as LinkedIn, Plaxo and Facebook are amazing resources for getting in touch with people, generating leads, raising brand awareness and much more. They’re also becoming powerful business to business (B2B) tools, enabling companies to effortlessly communicate with their stakeholders. You don’t need technical knowledge to use them and they can be great fun too.
To continue with our marathon of web tips, click on one of the articles below:
Increase your website traffic
Hot 5 design trends
Blog successfully
Must-have website features
Sunday, 13 January 2008
Digital Marketing in 2008 - 10 Things you should be doing
What a year 2007 was!
In the digital arena, most critics are saying it was the year of Facebook, and I’m inclined to agree. They were by no means the first to market however their intuitive, easy-to-use interface and clever information sharing tools meant that it was adopted by millions of people in a very short space of time. Facebook did what no other social network has ever done particularly well – they made it easy to network and share information. Such was the ease of use that viral word of mouth was one of the key drivers in making the site the success that it is today.
However, Facebook is only a tiny slice of the pie; there are thousand of other ways to share, syndicate and market key information and messages online, all of which with their own merits, so here’s my list of the things you should be doing in 2008…
1. Embrace social media
We’ve all heard the buzz about Web 2.0, Social Media, Facebook etc, however these new channels should already be part of your online marketing mix.
2. Write a blog
You’re reading this one, so that’s proof enough that they work! Blogs are a great way of informally communicating with your audience, and they cost nothing more than your time! They’ll also improve your SEO, which is always a good thing!
3. Keep your content fresh and interesting
Regular updates and site content is the key to the success of any website today – consider outsourcing your news to a specialist agency who will be able to provide daily news releases for your site. Content forms a key part of your SEO strategy, the more frequently you update your website, the more frequently search engine will index it.
4. Get into Social Bookmarking
Add social bookmarking tools to all of your news and product pages which will allow your visitors to easily bookmark and share your content with their own networks. Sites such as www.digg.com and http://del.icio.us/ are a good starting point.
5. Know your enemy
Regular competitor analysis is key to keeping ahead, look at how many sites are linking to your competitors, how regularly they update their sites, keep track of their special offers by subscribing to their newsletters.
6. Start regularly emailing your customer base
Build an opt-in email list and start sending regular emails out to your customers to keep them informed of your offers and promotions – from experience, one-off emails rarely get good results – the art of a good email campaign is to regularly broadcast to build affinity and a relationship with your customers.
7. Create a search engine strategy
Pay Per Click or Search Engine Optimisation? Ideally you should be doing both, you’ll see instant results with PPC however long-term, you’ll see more for your money from SEO – however seeing results can take many months. Look at multi-layer marketing; don’t just rely on one channel for your promotions. Look at clever ways of tying in your on and offline activities to better communicate your offering.
8. Use your own website
It’s amazing how many people don’t use their own websites on a regular basis. It may sound silly, but it’s an important thing to do – look at your site from the point of a customer and see if there are things that stand out in terms of usability – are your buttons clear enough? Is your shopping cart easy to use? Does your search engine return accurate results? If you’re answering no to these questions, you might want to look into the reasons why and correct them. Visitor to customer conversions are key to the success of any online business, therefore making your site as easy to use as possible is paramount to their success.
9. Measure your online performance using Google Analytics
It’s free and incredibly good at what it does. The web is the most measurable form of marketing, you should constantly assess your web stats, understanding where your traffic is coming from, what visitors are looking at, where they may be potential problem areas on your site and look at how to improve your content based on these results.
10. Get the right agency
Even if your agency is brilliant technically, they might not be experts at marketing, advertising or PR – it’s not uncommon for many companies to outsource different areas to different agencies, to get the best of both worlds.
To see what Evolve can do for your business online, please drop me an email: oliver@bluhalo.com
Cheers, Oliver
In the digital arena, most critics are saying it was the year of Facebook, and I’m inclined to agree. They were by no means the first to market however their intuitive, easy-to-use interface and clever information sharing tools meant that it was adopted by millions of people in a very short space of time. Facebook did what no other social network has ever done particularly well – they made it easy to network and share information. Such was the ease of use that viral word of mouth was one of the key drivers in making the site the success that it is today.
However, Facebook is only a tiny slice of the pie; there are thousand of other ways to share, syndicate and market key information and messages online, all of which with their own merits, so here’s my list of the things you should be doing in 2008…
1. Embrace social media
We’ve all heard the buzz about Web 2.0, Social Media, Facebook etc, however these new channels should already be part of your online marketing mix.
2. Write a blog
You’re reading this one, so that’s proof enough that they work! Blogs are a great way of informally communicating with your audience, and they cost nothing more than your time! They’ll also improve your SEO, which is always a good thing!
3. Keep your content fresh and interesting
Regular updates and site content is the key to the success of any website today – consider outsourcing your news to a specialist agency who will be able to provide daily news releases for your site. Content forms a key part of your SEO strategy, the more frequently you update your website, the more frequently search engine will index it.
4. Get into Social Bookmarking
Add social bookmarking tools to all of your news and product pages which will allow your visitors to easily bookmark and share your content with their own networks. Sites such as www.digg.com and http://del.icio.us/ are a good starting point.
5. Know your enemy
Regular competitor analysis is key to keeping ahead, look at how many sites are linking to your competitors, how regularly they update their sites, keep track of their special offers by subscribing to their newsletters.
6. Start regularly emailing your customer base
Build an opt-in email list and start sending regular emails out to your customers to keep them informed of your offers and promotions – from experience, one-off emails rarely get good results – the art of a good email campaign is to regularly broadcast to build affinity and a relationship with your customers.
7. Create a search engine strategy
Pay Per Click or Search Engine Optimisation? Ideally you should be doing both, you’ll see instant results with PPC however long-term, you’ll see more for your money from SEO – however seeing results can take many months. Look at multi-layer marketing; don’t just rely on one channel for your promotions. Look at clever ways of tying in your on and offline activities to better communicate your offering.
8. Use your own website
It’s amazing how many people don’t use their own websites on a regular basis. It may sound silly, but it’s an important thing to do – look at your site from the point of a customer and see if there are things that stand out in terms of usability – are your buttons clear enough? Is your shopping cart easy to use? Does your search engine return accurate results? If you’re answering no to these questions, you might want to look into the reasons why and correct them. Visitor to customer conversions are key to the success of any online business, therefore making your site as easy to use as possible is paramount to their success.
9. Measure your online performance using Google Analytics
It’s free and incredibly good at what it does. The web is the most measurable form of marketing, you should constantly assess your web stats, understanding where your traffic is coming from, what visitors are looking at, where they may be potential problem areas on your site and look at how to improve your content based on these results.
10. Get the right agency
Even if your agency is brilliant technically, they might not be experts at marketing, advertising or PR – it’s not uncommon for many companies to outsource different areas to different agencies, to get the best of both worlds.
To see what Evolve can do for your business online, please drop me an email: oliver@bluhalo.com
Cheers, Oliver
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