Josh Chandler

Due to technical difficulties, there is no video available for today’s interview. I hope I can sort this out for the next episode.

In today’s interview Ann Holman, founder of The Ann Holman Company and I discussed a variety of topics related to social media.

Here’s a list of our topics of conversation (with Ann’s very smart observations included!)

• Social Media Policies
• How local businesses make use of social media
• Control of the message whilst using social media

I had a very enjoyable discussion and actually finished the interview before I’d finished my proposed questions, simply because we ended on a very strong point.

Here’s the audio for today’s interview:

Ann Holman Interview

About the Ann Holman Company

The Ann Holman Company delivers seminars and speaking events on the topic of social media and business across the UK.

Links mentioned in today’s show

Ann’s Blog – http://annholman.co.uk/

LikeMinds Conference – http://www.wearelikeminds.com/

Zappos Twitter Page – http://twitter.zappos.com/

Tomorrow I will be interviewing Ann Holman who is the founder of The Ann Holman Company, a social media and small business consultancy firm based in Exeter, UK.

Two Exeter startups in a row. I know!

The Ann Holman Company delivers seminars and speaking events on the topic of social media and business across the UK. You can find Ann’s thoughts and opinions about social media and business at her blog.

The focus of our conversation will be on how The Ann Holman Company makes use of social media. It’ll be exciting to hear Ann’s perspective on the topic.

Be sure to check out my interview with Alastair Banks of Optix Solutions which was recorded on July 2nd 2010.

In the first episode of “How Small Businesses Use Social Media” Alastair Banks, co-director at Optix Solutions provided some invaluable tips and strategies on social media for small businesses.

Alastair shared a lot of great information about Optix Solutions’s strategy in social media. He also spoke about his admiration for the work of other companies.

His example was a London based restaurant chain named Giraffe. You can find them on Facebook, Flickr and Twitter

Here’s the audio interview with Alastair:

Interview With Alastair Banks, Optix Solutions (Slow Internet Connection)

Interview With Alastair Banks, Optix Solutions (High Speed Internet Connection)

About Optix Solutions

Optix Solutions is a leading edge Web Design & Online Marketing company based in Exeter, Devon.

They specialize in the development of professional websites and bespoke web solutions including Search Engine Optimization, Online Marketing, Social Media Strategies, Content Management Systems, Intranets and Extranets.

Links mentioned in today’s show

Scott Gould’s Blog – http://www.scottgould.me

Alastair’s Personal Twitter account – http://twitter.com/banksy6

Optix Solutions Twitter Account – http://twitter.com/OptixSolutions

Tomorrow I’ll be interviewing Alastair Banks who is the director and co-founder of Optix Solutions Ltd, a web development agency based in Exeter, UK.

This is part of an ongoing series of video interviews I will be doing. The topic of the conversation, social media.

Precisely, how do small business use social media.

I really hope I can get a wide and diverse range of guests to share their experiences and insights.

It would be great if you could share your feedback about each episode. Leave your thoughts in the comment section below the blog post.

With your feedback, I really hope I can develop this into a worthwhile resource which will help other small businesses just getting started in social media.

Got some suggestions on a small business I could interview? Let me know in the comment section below.

I know those of you who read this are likely huge fans of Mashable.com (a blog founded by Pete Cashmore in 2005). I am too. I just have an issue with his term “ingenious” when he described Twitter Promoted Advertising in a recent CNN column

Twitter wrote a blog post about the introduction of Promoted Advertising back in April 2010 entitled “Hello World”.

In this post Biz Stone wrote that they had “resisted introducing a traditional Web advertising model because we wanted to optimize for value before profit”.

Despite the continued battle against fail whales and downtime, Twitter have certainly gained an important status in the mainstream culture.

It’s impressive during the past four years that they’ve sustained (just about!) an ecosystem of tweets, photos and link sharing for free.

However, I really don’t believe that Promoted Advertising is going to have much success.

Read my Guest Post at Social Geekiness about the alternatives I think small businesses should be looking into.

Thank you so much for taking the time out of your day to visit my blog.

What is a blog?

For those of you who are not aware of what a blog is, let me explain. A blog is a chronologically organized online journal. The posts are stored in an RSS Feed. You can find out more information on RSS here.

Who are you?

My name is Josh Chandler. I’ve worked on the internet since the age of 16.  In the past I contributed to blogs and podcasts on the topic of technology and business.

I now run a virtual assistant website called “Josh Chandler VA” which I launched in May 2010. This website aims to help inform small businesses on the benefits of hiring a virtual assistant.

I currently also run a successful Windows Media Player Support website.

If you’d like to read more about my story, please visit my About page.

I’d like to thank you again for your time. If you have any further questions on this blog or any other relevant feedback contact me.