Offered by our client, Allia, a charitable social investment organisation, the Future for Children Bond will help to fund a programme of family support for these children and will repay capital plus a variable return according to success.  It combines two investments: a low-risk loan to a provider of affordable housing that will return investors’ initial capital; and a high-risk investment in the social impact bond (SIB) for Essex County Council, which will provide the variable return depending on the success of the programme.

What is a Social Impact Bond (SIB)?

• An investment model to provide funding for prevention and early intervention programmes that, if successful, repay investors out of longer-term cost savings to the public sector.
• Fourteen SIBs are live or in development in the UK – the first was in 2010 for Peterborough Prison.  See infographic
• SIBS have, until now, been funded through private placements with institutional investors, charitable foundations and high net worth philanthropists.
• The Future for Children Bond presents the first public offer for investment in a SIB.

Facts about Allia’s Future for Children Bond

• It combines a low-risk ethical investment into affordable housing (Moody’s Aa rated Places for People Homes) to provide the funds to repay capital to investors, with a high-risk investment into the SIB – with the aim of delivering a high social impact and providing an additional variable return.
• Advised product – applications must be completed by a financial advisor.
• Full terms and conditions here

About the Essex Social Impact Bond

• The Essex SIB (developed by Social Finance) will fund a programme of intensive support to approximately 380 children and their families with the aim of diverting young people from entering care. The success of the SIB will be measured by the reduction in days spent in care.
• State care costs up to £180,000 a year for a child in residential care.  If the programme is successful, it will result in cost savings for Essex County Council, which can be used to provide a return to the investors.
• The Essex SIB has already raised £3.1m of capital commitments from investors including Big Society Capital, Bridges Ventures and Esmée Fairbairn Foundation.

For an Investment summary please go to Allia news

For terms and more information or to apply, please go to www.allia.org.uk/futureforchildren

I went because funding is an issue for a lot of the businesses I work with and I know Doug does a good job of educating entrepreneurs.

Delegates surely got what they were looking for, and more.  There was something for companies at all stages of development, from ideas in the bedroom to revenue generating and growing business.  Lots of meaty talks from engaging speakers too, like angel investor Dale Murray, Seedrs founder Jeff Lynn and Platform Black’s Sales and Marketing lead.  And of course Doug Richard, whose sharp wit and straight talking approach kept everyone on their toes.

One of the messages that came across loud and clear was that if you are open to online funding sources, there are LOTS of crowd sourced or peer-to-peer funding models on offer.

Here are 5 of the options covered at the event:

Equity investment

Seedrs online platform for investing in start-ups.  Up to £150,000 can be raised, with the minimum investment set at £10 (Seedrs holds the share and manages the investment)

Invoice trading

Marketinvoice SMEs can raise cash by auctioning invoices from large customers to generate bids from global professional investors who advance up to 90% up front

Platform Black – similar to Marketinvoice but for larger/more mature companies

Peer-to-peer loans

Ratesetter – matches creditworthy borrowers who are looking for a low cost loan with ‘Smart Savers’ who are looking for a better return than they can get from a bank

Funding Circle – same as above; average rates of 9.5% – 10%

All these platforms make a compelling case but I can’t help thinking they beg a question around the value of personal relationships.    Call me old fashioned but being able to look your investor or bank manager in the eye is important.  Just like it’s important – and useful – to be able to build a relationship with him/her as your business grows.  That of course assumes you HAVE investors and/or a supportive bank manager.  Both are hard to come by so it’s not difficult to see how digital technology and market forces have spawned new alternatives.  And they’re plugging an important gap.

NB you need to do your own due diligence to get comfortable with how the above platforms work, but the websites I looked at did a pretty good job of communicating the processes and heading off questions.

The last event in the Windows of Opportunity series takes place in Portsmouth on 27 November.  Oh – and the events are FREE because it was funded by the government, via the GrowthAccelerator programme.

PS I’m interesting in views on the whole relationship issue.

Many start-up founders are a bit nervous of social media. Maybe you haven’t got the resources or a marketing specialist on your team. You don’t know what to say. Even worse, you’re worried about saying the wrong thing and having to deal with the fallout.

But it can be a really good way of shaping your brand’s voice, and raising awareness while you are in the early stages – which gives you a head start when the real marketing work begins. The following five tips should help you get over some of the obstacles to taking the plunge with social media.

1. See what your competitors are up to

If you’re scratching your head about where to start with social media, it’s a good idea to look at your competitors and see how they’re using social media. What are they saying? Which platforms are they using? As a punter, how do you rate their success?

You might find that people aren’t half as effective as you expected them to be, because they’re facing exactly the same challenges as you. So there’s an opportunity here – learn from their failings and do it better yourselves.

Or if they’re doing it brilliantly you can learn from that too, using their social media tactics as a model for your own activity.

2. Stuck for something to say? Think beyond your own business

A common misconception with social media is that you have to write updates about yourselves all day long. And what if there’s simply not that much going on about which you can post? Simple – talk about Other Stuff.

Put yourself in the mind of your audience. While they’ll be interested to know the latest news coming from your company they’ll also be interested in industry news and your thoughts on developments within the sector. Phrase this as a question on Facebook and you’ll be giving them an opportunity to comment too.

If you’re stuck for content to share, try signing up to Google Reader or a similar service and subscribe to RSS feeds on a particular topic. This will give you a regular stream of interesting items to plunder!

3. It’s all in the planning

Social media is a bit of a time vacuum. It’s not like you can do a week’s worth of updates in one go and forget about it – you need to go back and check for replies, or respond to current events. And then you come across an interesting link on Twitter and then watch a funny video on Facebook and ooh look…half an hour’s gone.

However, there is a lot of planning you can do. Think about the topics you want to cover during the coming week and plan what to post and when. You can use a third party client like Hootsuite to schedule tweets and Facebook updates in advance. Facebook have recently introduced the option to schedule and backdate posts in business pages – look for the little clock icon below the box where you write the update.

With your blog, a good tip is to write a schedule for the next three months – and stick to it! You can write a bunch of posts in one go and schedule them to publish at regular intervals (while you sit back, sip your coffee and feel smug at being so organised!)

4. Don’t spread yourself too thin

Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Instagram, Pinterest, Flickr, YouTube…it’s a lot to keep on top of, isn’t it? If resources are tight, it’s better to have, say, a quality Twitter feed which you update three times a day than to spread yourself too thinly across different platforms.

If you’re travelling around and have an image-heavy product, it could be that you could focus on Facebook and Twitter, but squeeze in a bit of Instagram when you’ve got time to kill on long train journeys. Or if your product is quite complex it could be worth investing some time in ‘how-to’ videos which you can then share on Facebook.

Then as your business grows and you increase resources you can look at expanding your social media offering.

5. Monitor your results

There’s no point spending all this time on social media if you’re not monitoring the results. This also allows you to tweak your campaigns as you go along, thinking all the time if you’re reaching the right audience and making them engage on your social channels.

There are lots of free tools available, for example:

• Google Analytics, which will tell you where the traffic to your website is coming from. It might yield interesting results – maybe all that time and effort put into Facebook is wasted and really it’s your Twitter account that drives interest.
• Hootsuite, which will give you all sorts of interesting stats on the content you are sharing
• Facebook Insights comes built into your Facebook page and gives you loads of information about who your updates are reaching
• Social Mention offers a real-time search on who’s talking about you, your product, your competitors or any topic related to your industry
• Take a look at this list for even more handy (and free) social media monitoring tools.

Here are 7 easy ways to increase the number of visitors to your stand, generate more leads and boost sales.

1. Make full use of the exhibition website

Filling in your company and product information on the trade show organisers’ website may seem like a no-brainer, but it never ceases to amaze me how many exhibitors overlook this free and vital resource. The exhibition site will be visited by buyers, who will be searching by product category (not company name, unless they already know you) in order to find what they are looking for. Some sites, such as the one for MEDICA (the world’s largest medical technology trade fair) will also allow you to post company news on their site for free, and then tweet this to all their followers, giving your news a huge audience.  The only caveat here is, make sure your site is up to scratch and up to date if you’re going to encourage more people to visit it!

2. Get a professionally written press release

Unless you have in-house resource with the requisite skills and experience, it is generally better to outsource this to a PR and marketing professional. He/she will know how to get your message across and who to send the release to. Whichever route you take, don’t forget to upload it to the news section of your website!

3. Advertise in the trade show directory or show daily

You will usually be included in the directory as part of your exhibiting fee, but there is always the option to pay for an enhanced listing. Given that this book will be referred to by everyone visiting the show, often at great length (there’s lots of hanging around at exhibitions, after all!) making your company stand out with a listing that allows extra company and product information to be added, could make it the best value ad (or advertorial) you ever take out.

4. Make your promotional material accessible – and light!

It may be nice to have attractive-looking brochures to display and hand out but many of these will end up in the bin as people can only carry so much paper around the halls without getting a hernia.

To keep your content out of the recycling bins, put it on CD Roms, or even better, memory sticks, can be far more effective – and environmentally friendly. If you include your press release, product catalogue, images, and all your company information, it will be useful and informative for all the delegates and you’ll make the journalists’ lives easy which will increase the chance of coverage.

5. Look into speaking opportunities at the show

Having a speaker on the conference programme is a great profile booster. Check out the topic streams well in advance – and find out if speaker opportunities are free or paid (they can be expensive). Assuming there’s a ‘fit’ and you have a good speaker on your team, investigate the options for a speaking slot or workshop.

6. Maximise the social networking opportunities

Most event organisers are social media savvy these days so there should be plenty of opportunities to connect with delegates, speakers and other exhibitors before, during and after the event. Assuming you are up to speed on how to use social networks, here are a few ideas:

• LinkedIn – if there’s a group, join it and monitor/participate in discussion. Use your profile/company page to tell people you’re going to the event
• Facebook – like the trade show page and keep an eye on who is saying what; comment on posts that catch your eye
• Twitter – follow the trade show organisers and monitor the hashtag if there is one – or start one yourself. Retweet the tweets that interest you and engage with people that look interesting

7. Don’t forget to tell your customers you’re going to the event

Your key objective will be to meet new customers but industry events are also a good time to catch up with existing customers. They’ll be reassured to see that you’re there and may help evangelise about your company. If you issue a regular e-newsletter, remember to tell readers that you’re attending x or y event too. If you don’t, include it in an email.

!Entering awards is time consuming!

So, here are a few ‘top of the head’ thoughts on the pros and cons:

Starting with the cons:

• Writing a good entry takes time
• You need evidence to support the claims that you will make in your submission (often it takes longer to collate this than it does to write the submission)
• I’m a ‘glass half full’ kind of girl generally (love this cartoon!) but let’s face it, you might not win

But there are plenty of pros:

• If you are short-listed or win, it’s a great platform for PR and you can feature the award logo on everything that moves!
• Winning could help your career and give your team a boost
• Even if you don’t make the cut, it can be a good way to get on the radar of influential people e.g. judges
• The awards event itself can make a fun night out for the team and be a useful platform for entertaining clients or networking
• The content you submit can prove useful for proposals, pitches and your website

In my view the pros have it.  If you go for it, just a few points to consider:

• Think carefully about which award(s) you enter
  • Are you better off chasing generic/local business awards or taking a focused, sector approach (it depends on your client focus)
• Check out the panel – are the judges the kinds of people you’d like to get noticed by?
• Are there a number of categories you could fit?  If so, is there one that gets your mind racing with evidence of success/impact more than the others?
• Who’s going to write the entry?
• Is the deadline realistic?
• Is the profile of the audience at the awards event right for your business?
• Does the date of the awards night clash with another date in your diary?

There are LOADS of awards out there but here are a few that have been on our radar for various clients recently:

Queens Award for Enterprise (deadline end of September)

Chartered Institute of PR (CIPR) Awards – for in-house teams and agencies (or a joint approach) – deadline December

EHI Awards – rewarding excellence in healthcare (2012 entries closed)

Cisco British Innovation Gateway Awards - rewarding the UK’s most innovative start-ups (2012 entries closed)

Talk Talk Digital Heroes (deadline 30 Sept) – chance to win a grant of 5k or 10k

And a few local business awards (all closed or done and dusted for 2012) for companies in Cambridge or Huntingdon:

Cambridge Business Excellence Awards

Business Weekly Awards

Hunts Post Business Awards

Clinked goes beyond file sharing to help people seamlessly manage projects and collaborate over content.   Its user-friendly wiki-like pages, secure hosting and unique preview technology make it easy to develop and share content without the confusion that arises from versions and endless emails.  With Clinked, everything – from messages to documents, video, calendar and tasks – is in one place and optimized for all devices.

An early iteration of Clinked won the Red Herring 100 Europe Award in 2009.  The product, launched in November 2011 is shortlisted for the Cisco British Innovation Awards.  It is already being used by companies across a variety of sectors including manufacturing, architecture, education and business services. Available in 10 languages, it is gaining traction in new sectors and countries fast.

Tayfun Bilsel, Founder and CEO at Rabbitsoft commented:

“We chose The Foundry House for their strategic insight and expertise in integrated campaigns but their knowledge of our sector and experience of working with young companies was another draw. We are a small, ambitious team in fundraising mode. Their associate model and flexible, straight-forward approach, combined with their willingness to mentor our less experienced staff, makes them an excellent fit for Rabbitsoft.”

The Rabbitsoft account will be led by Marcie Bell, founder of The Foundry House, working closely with social media marketing specialist Luke Brynley Jones, as well as other associates where needs arise.

Marcie Bell said:

“Rabbitsoft is a great addition to our client base.  They are a switched-on and ambitious team with an exciting product that appeals to a diverse audience. We’ve hit the ground running and look forward to helping the team grow their customer base with a strategic, well co-ordinated campaign.”

Rabbitsoft joins The Foundry House’s growing client base, which includes clients in a wide range of sectors, from healthcare to lighting and finance.  For more information please visit www.thefoundryhouse.com.

To find out more about Clinked or to sign up please go to www.clinked.com

Ends

Further information:

Marcie Bell, The Foundry House

T: 01480 880986

E: Marcie@thefoundryhouse.com

Kevin Short or Tayfun Bilsel

T: 01223 244845

E: tayfun.bilsel@clinked.com

As Julie Meyer said in her presentation to Cambridge University’s Technology Ventures conference last week:

“Entrepreneurs bring the future to us.”
“They are willing to live abnormal, obsessive lives.”
BUT
“They are typically egotistical, self-centred and paranoid!”

I enjoy working with entrepreneurs. It’s just that communication isn’t always among their arsenal of strengths (not a problem if they acknowledge it) and often they don’t see beyond the end of their nose. An entrepreneur’s view of the competition is a case in point. In my experience, the first time entrepreneur is either overly pre-occupied with the competition (paranoid) or they believe resolutely that they have none (egotistical). Denial is certainly a dangerous way to go. On the other hand, keeping a close eye on who is doing what, is useful but it’s what you do with the knowledge that matters.

For instance, if a competitor is regularly stealing a march on you in the media, at conferences etc do you:
a) conclude that the media covering the competition is biased and should be avoided?
b) look at what your competitor is doing/saying, messages etc, then work out where you fit, what strengths/USP’s you need to highlight and what you need to do, to secure your share of voice?

I’m hoping you’ll say b) but I suspect (in fact, I know) there are entrepreneurs out there, who, without advice to hand, will unwittingly go for a). This is the stuff of missed opportunities and it derives from a combination of intense focus on their business, time pressures and lack of communications know-how, all of which are forgiveable but there are a number of points to make here:

• Firstly, it may seem obvious but success in today’s competitive markets requires a compelling product/service and a strategic approach to marketing/PR.  Make sure you’re not so busy looking for new opportunities that you overlook the need to share your progress/success.
• Secondly, a weakness can become an opportunity.  A journalist that regularly writes about your competition may be overlooking you because he/she doesn’t know about you or thinks you are something you are not.  So put the record straight.
• Thirdly, messaging is paramount.  Is yours on the money? If not, focus on what distinguishes you from the competition and invest time in developing strong messages that clearly articulate the need your product/service meets and the benefits it delivers (evidence of these will help e.g. case studies, testimonials).  Then shout them from the roof tops and push out the evidence via your website, collateral, speeches, press releases, social media et al.
• And finally, if PR/marketing/communications are not your ‘thing’, seek advice. Much of it is common sense but when you’re so close to the coalface it can be hard to see the most obvious opportunities. You want journalists, conference organisers, search engines et al, supporting your efforts and that calls for clear messaging, clarity around your audiences and and a ‘smart’ approach to tackling the competition, both online and off.  This could all help if you’re raising finance too.

All it takes is a step back, time to think and open ears.

Is this you? If so, wake up and smell the coffee!

And here’s some food for thought and an action plan focusing particularly on the use and accessibility of ‘how to’ videos.

I have a couple of clients for whom ‘how to’ videos are the perfect solution.  As a medium, video (not just YouTube) is a great platform for answering questions and explaining/demonstrating benefits.  So, if you run a business that attracts recurring questions and you’re looking for a cost-effective means of answering them, without losing the personal touch, look no further! Get it right and your ‘how to’ video will solve your customers’ problem quickly and easily, leaving them with a warm and fuzzy feeling towards you, your company or product. Customer support and marketing rolled into one!

Much of my work is in small business PR/ marketing so I’m always conscious of budgets, but getting it right doesn’t have to cost a fortune and you don’t have to aim for anything flashy. YouTube et al are packed with content of hugely variable quality.  The corporate stuff is inevitably slick. You’d expect a certain quality of a ‘how to’ video from big brands – Vodafone have a huge library of mostly ‘how to’ videos on YouTube, for example) but there’s loads of what I call ‘skinny video’ that lacks the wizzy production finesse but is equally informative.  Obviously it depends what you’re selling and who to (some customers have more sophisticated expectations than others) but at the end of the day, a shaky hand, bit of background noise or poor light may make your video imperfect but by no means ineffectual.  Content, after all, is king.

So, if this strikes a chord, here’s some entry level advice and an action plan for small businesses looking for affordable video:

• consider what – or who – you could bring to life with video to help market your product/company or strengthen customer relations (NB – don’t assume everyone will be good with a camera pointed in their direction – it’s not easy, as I discovered myself recently!)
• think about where you could film (somewhere light and quiet)
• put time into planning the content – what are your objectives?
• decide if you want to commission a professional cameraman to shoot your footage or if you have someone in your team who will step up.  If you go this route, you’ll need a camera – we find the Kodak Zi8 very user friendly – and whoever is behind the camera needs a steady hand and a good eye for what looks right. It depends what you’re trying to do – DIY is sometimes a false economy.
• keep it short – most of us have the attention span of a gnat these days!
• get a YouTube account (free) and complete the ‘channel information’
• upload your video(s) – all pretty intuitive if you’re using YouTube – but there’s plenty of ‘how to’ advice available!
• make sure the title says exactly what it is/does e.g. ‘How to teach your dog to play dead’ – best way to get this right is to ask yourself what words people will use to pose their question
• use the description and keywords to help with social SEO
• share the links via email, blog posts and social networks
• keep an eye on the analytics

Good luck!

As a long time PR and marketing consultant, testimonials are a stalwart in my toolbox.   Whatever you want to call it – third party endorsement, advocacy marketing, quotes from happy clients – the voice of the beneficiary goes a long way.

In the case of the kidney donor, the benefits were clear – someone was given a new lease of life free from dialysis and the donor came away with the satisfaction that he had made that possible with little or no risk to his own well being.  The interview went on to explain the donor screening process (not for the faint hearted) but he highlighted the upside of getting a thorough MOT and said if he had 4 kidneys, he’d donate 3 of them.

A powerful message and endorsement that Kidney Research UK is making great use of.  The radio coverage follows a host of articles in the broadsheets and there’s a fair bit of chat in the social networks too.  With ‘World Kidney Day’ around the corner (as I’ve just discovered from their website) it all makes sense.  Great content and joined up communication.  Textbook stuff.

So – if you haven’t already done it, think about who is saying what about your business/product/cause and whether you’re making best use of their ‘voice’ to educate and inspire others into engaging with you.

And if you missed the piece on Radio 4 this morning, listen again.  It educated me and gave me food for thought.

This is where business users often come unstuck.

Teenagers delve into Twitter without as much as a backward glance but they’re only in it to soak up celebrity gossip and find out where their favourite comedians, singers or sporting heroes are ‘playing’ next.   For them, it’s entertainment, pure and simple. They also fancy the scope for anonymity (see this interesting piece from Associated Press).

If you’re in business, it’s a whole different ball game.  Ultimately it’s about winning ‘friends’ and influencing people but there’s a lot of giving to do in the networks before you get there and YOU NEED A PLAN.  A digital plan, integrating traditional PR with social media and with your website at the heart of it.

Below are 12 practical tips to improve your chances of success in social networks and save you hours of fruitless tweeting, liking and connecting:

WILL YOUR WEBSITE ENGAGE YOUR VISITORS?

• Make sure your messaging is clear and that it supports your business objectives – what’s the point pushing old messages through a new channel of communication if they’re not hitting the sweet spot in your existing channels?  Ask yourself “What messages do I want my customers to take away from the website?”  Then ask “Am I getting that across?”  Get an unbiased view from critical ‘friends’ too.  You may need a re-think on look and feel or content but it’ll be worth it.
• Make a good first impression – will your site inspire confidence in potential customers based on visual impact?  Does it look professional?  Is the branding consistent?
• Tidy, expand or re-structure your website – take a fresh look at the navigation; is the key information easy to find?  Have you proof read the copy for typos?
• Testimonials are powerful tools – have you got any kind of endorsement on your site?  If not, get some!
• Give some thought to web-friendly content – rich media such as presentations, videos, photos etc (assuming they’re reasonably good quality) could be useful fodder to share in the social networks.  Are you making it accessible?

WHICH NETWORKS AND HOW TO GET STARTED?

• Think about which networks are right for you – research pays dividends.  Find out which social networks your customers/partners are active in by a) asking them or b) looking for them in the networks yourself (more time consuming – and very diverting – but often illuminating) and connect with them.  They will be an excellent starting point for community building.
• Think about the tone of voice you want to adopt and if/how you will balance business and personal
• Think about resource – make sure you have some – or a few people – who can commit time to monitoring the networks you launch in to, keeping the ‘conversation’ going and refreshing content regularly
• Remember to tell people you’re active in the networks – put the link(s) on your home page, in your e-signature, at the end of presentations etc
• Remember to check in to your website tracking regularly for hints on what’s working (or not) e.g. spikes in traffic
• Don’t rush it.  Time spent watching and listening to what’s going on in the networks BEFORE you start, can be time well spent.

At the end of the day it’s about developing a digital mindset.  I hope this helps.