7 TIPS to Kick-start Social Media in Your Business

If the term ‘Social Media’ is relatively new to you, then you may have not yet pondered the benefits of promoting your business by using this media. To find out whether social media is going to work well your business it’s really quite simple, I have just two questions for you to answer:

In relation to your business, do you:

1. Have a story to tell?

&/OR

2. Important news to share?

If you have answered yes to either of the above, then Social Media is definitely going to be a good move for your business. So then, what next you might ask?

First and foremost, you need to be sure that your company understands what social media is all about:

- Enabling conversations with your target audience.

- You cannot control these conversations, but you can influence them.

… and by influencing the conversation you are building genuine and real relationships with your target audience.

- And remember this… You CANNOT aim to just sell the product but you CAN aim to build relationships… If all you do is try and sell then your audience will not be interested in you!

There is a myriad of Social Media tools out there and it pays to do your research to find out which will suit your business. Having a Social Media Strategy is then necessary to identify those tools that are going to work best for your business.

Let’s get you started on your Social Media Strategy, with some key points to work through:

Action # 1

Identify those main target groups for your business. Build a picture of a fictional person(s) that represents the main user group(s) for your site.

a. Who are they?

b. What do they do?

c. What do they want?

d. What are their goals and motivations?

e. What are the outcomes they want?

Action #2

Create a community concept for your target group(s). To be successful with this, you must:

- Entertain

– Educate

– Collaborate

- Communicate

Action #3

Identify those words that your online visitors use to describe tasks.

– These words can then be used as tags across all your social media profiles.

- They are likely to be very different to the words you or your industry uses.

- Determine the top 10 keywords or phrases a visitor would use to describe that task.

Action #4

Establish a biography for your brand: For example a New Zealand business – 80 Minute Game, has used the following for their bio -

“Kia ora and welcome to RugbyMAD 2011! We can get you sorted for accommodation keep you up-to-date with the latest rugby news, discussion, travel tips and laughs for NZ’s big game in 2011.”

- They have used this across all their Social Media Applications…. Youtube, Facebook and Twitter. Remember, if you use different bio’s and pictures it just makes it harder for people to find you!

… CONSISTENCY is key!

Action #5

Depending on your outcome of #1 & 2 above, you will have identified those tools that will work best within your community.

- You may decide to create a Facebook page as I have done for the 80 Minute Game brand:

… and possibly a YouTube, Blog, Twitter or Wiki page.

Action #6

As the strategy is deployed you will want to measure your success, but how?

- Google Analytics

- Twitter Stats

- Facebook Insights

Action #7

Once you have established a community for your brand you can then begin to look at campaigns to:

- Sell the product

- Build brand awareness

– Build the fan base

Summary

Social Media is about enabling conversations. You cannot control conversations but you can influence them. Influence is the bedrock on which all economically viable relationships are built.

The best way to influence conversations is to create a community in which people influence one another, but you must be able to measure that influence.  If you cannot measure influence you cannot manage it. If you cannot manage it your business will suffer the consequences.

You still have the seven P’s of marketing, you still have to do a marketing plan and you still have to do marketing research. What’s really changed is the media that you have available to you to do marketing in a whole new way and an affordable way.

What are your thoughts about Social Media for your business? Do you have any tips from your own experience developing a social media plan? Please share your thoughts in the comments box below.

The Rise of Social Media Within New Zealand Agricultural Businesses

The statistics say it all; Social Media is here to stay…  But hang on, what about New Zealand agricultural businesses?  Most of the statistics out there are based on American studies and we all know that Americans love to talk, hence social media, which put simply is people talking to people, is of course going to take off in the USA.  They also have bigger companies, with bigger budgets, which means they have more resources to expend in this area.  So where does that leave the more conservative Kiwi within rural New Zealand, has Social Media really taken off among us?

Research for the NZX Agri rural publication readership was undertaken between 31^st March and the 13^th April as part of a quarterly omnibus survey of agri-businesses in New Zealand.  The omnibus survey interviewed 450 farmers. The graph below shows that while 44% mentioned farming publications as a source of farming information, 7% mentioned Internet and website as a source for Farming information (NZXAgri, 2010).  These results confirm that Social Media is not yet mainstream within the New Zealand agriculture industry.  Broadband access is something we are battling with in rural New Zealand at the moment and this could be holding farmers back from taking on social media applications, such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.  We do know that New Zealand’s next generation (Generation Y) of Farmers will be much more tech-savvy than their predecessors, having grown up with computers – ‘What you present to them as your Internet presence (including all web products, podcasts, etc.) is highly likely to impress them and you will gain 24/7 access to this segment of the market. Get your brand out there, online and offline, to build recognition for a market that will pay attention – especially if you “think outside the box” to set yourself apart from other brands. Generation Y lights up over innovative approaches’ (HREF 1).  The question I have then, is now the right time to be utilizing social media as a marketing tool within New Zealand’s agricultural industry?

Let’s take a look at The Farming Show, which is a Rural New Zealand brand with a strong and loyal following that has recently embraced social media as a marketing tool.  They have established for themselves a company Facebook page in February 2010 and now, only 4 months on they already have a following of 449 people.  That’s people that are genuinely interested in being a part of The Farming Show’s conversation and a member of their online community. The Farming Show is building a captive audience with which they can inspire, influence and engage with.  With Social media being about people talking with people, this means that The Farming Show will get word of mouth advertising that is faster, more targeted and more efficient than ever before.  While most in the New Zealand agricultural industry may be slow to take it on, this is positive for those businesses like The Farming Show that have taken the time to understand that where and how to compete for the future will earn that edge over their competition.  They are establishing for themselves an advantageous position to shape and steer the perception and build awareness of their brand.  You can view their Facebook page at http://bit.ly/acwBtn

In business, we learn through everything we do and it influences all that we try and repeat. When something new comes along, we tend to view it with either enthusiasm or scepticism, or in some cases a bit of both. Such is true with the advent of Social Media.  As business, marketing and service leaders, we face new challenges. We’re not quite sure how or why to implement the lessons and promises of social media into what we’re already doing. Nor do we understand how to experiment with it in ways that are safe and useful. We need answers, but questions and concerns face us at every step ahead (HREF 2).

Even though Social Media represents nothing short of a revolution in business, it starts with practical steps that help you find the answers to move forward with confidence and direction.  Who you appoint as your Social Media portfolio manager must be a good communicator, mature enough to understand that what they say can have long term ramifications to the business image, and responsible enough to ensure that your brand and its values are understood, respected and maintained to the highest standard at all times.  If you don’t have the time, or the staff to do this, then there is always the option of outsourcing this to a company like Wildfire.  Wildfire Solutions has helped businesses like The World of WearableArts (WOW) develop an online community using social media applications (Facbeook, YouTube  and Twitter).  WOW already have a Marketing Manager in place but realise the value of having a specialist in social media to develop and implement a successful Social Media Strategy.

Look out for my next blog where I will develop a set of questions that will help you decide whether Social Media is a good move for your brand.

References:

HREF 1: 2007, Ruth Klein – Branding, Marketing & Productivity Coach, http://www.thematuremarket.com/SeniorStrategic/-9409—5.html

HREF 2: 2010, Brian Solis – 7 Steps to Creating and Cultivating a Brand in Social Media, http://www.briansolis.com/2010/06/7-steps-to-creating-and-cultivating-a-brand-in-social-media/

David Patterson, South Island Field Agent, NZX Agri, 2010

Follow me on Facebook:

www.facebook.com/WildfireMarketing

IS THE WEBSITE DEAD?

… I’ve been pondering this thought for a while and with the advent of Social Media, we now have at our fingertips hundreds of new online applications, such as Facebook, Youtube and Twitter.  They all allow you to create a profile and hence an online presence for your business… with the best thing about it being that it’s absolutely free!… But hang on, isn’t that why we go to the trouble of creating a website?  What’s the difference between a website then and all these profiles we can create online?

Firstly, lets cast our eye over the term ‘Website’ as defined by Wikipedia:

A website … is a collection of related web pages, images, videos or other digital assets that are addressed relative to a common URL, often consisting of only the domain name… The pages of a website can usually be accessed from a simple URL called the homepage. The URLs of the pages organize them into a hierarchy, although hyper-linking between them conveys the reader’s perceived site structure and guides the reader’s navigation of the site.  Some websites require a subscription to access some or all of their content.

Now we are clear on what a website is, lets compare a typical Facebook Business page with a Website, looking at the pro’s and cons of each:

Creating a Facebook page for your business, the Pro’s and Con’s:

The Pro’s

+ It’s free.

+  There are no ongoing costs.

+ You can create an online presence for your business in minutes.

+ You can make changes to your Facebook page 24/7 (except your page name).

+ You have the opportunity to engage with your customers.

+ You can upload and link to video, images,  podcasts (audio) from you Facebook wall.

+ You can have a new user to your Facebook page land on a ‘Welcome’, ‘About us’ or ‘Home’ page just like a website.

+ You can add a basic online store by adding the application to your Facebook page.

+ Facebook has more than 400 million active users with 50% of their active users logging on to Facebook in any given day… People spend over 500 billion minutes per month on Facebook.  So, you have to ask yourself, how many people are coming through your website?  At a guess I would say not as many as Facebook.  Being on Facebook then gives you the opportunity to tap in a MASSIVE market compared to that very small market coming through your website (People can still search and find your Facebook page on google as well).

The Con’s

- Your branding does not stand alone on a Facebook page, as the Facebook branding is very prominent.

- If you have a website that requires a booking engine for accommodation or tickets, Facebook does not yet offer this.

- If you have a website that requires subscription for access, Facebook does not yet offer this.  Examples of subscription sites include many business sites, parts of many news sites, academic journal sites, gaming sites, services and sites providing real-time stock market data.

- If you want to customise your online store, this is not possible on Facebook, unless you create your own application, which would cost money and time (however, it would also cost money and time if you incorporated it into your website).

So there you have it in a nutshell!  I believe that there is still a reason for some companies to have a website.  If you are still wondering if you need to create a website or save a few coins and create a Facebook page instead then you need to sit down and take a few minutes to weigh up the reasons discussed above, as to whether a website is suitable for your business or not.  If you still can not figure it out, then contact me kelly@wildfiresolutions.co.nz i’d love to hear from you!

HOW TO MAKE TWITTER WORK FOR YOUR BUSINESS

Twitter is a micro-blogging service that enables its users to send and read messages known as tweets.  Twitter has a large following among older professional audiences and over a ¼ of Twitter users are high earners ($100k+).  Evolving into a news, brand marketing, and customer service tool, Twitter is ideal for reaching out to influencers, handling customer service queries, and forging personal relationships with customers.

The aim of Twitter is:

1. -To promote conversation.
2. -Build new and existing relationships with customers.
3. -Direct traffic to your website(s).
4. -Increase the reach of your brand to your target market.

Twitter will create a human presence for your brand, a voice for the company.   Twitter can be used to engage your target market around aspects of your content that are of interest to them and direct traffic to your companies website and community (Facebook Fan page and forum) as information is updated on these sites.

So you’ve just set up a twitter profile for your business and you’re like ‘Now what…? What have I got to say that can bring value to the conversation?  Is tweeting ‘Bugger it I’ve left my bloody lunch @ home’ going to work for your business?  Unless you’re Gordon Ramsey it could work, but for the rest of those businesses out there, No… on so many levels!

- You have to remember each tweet is representing your company, so it must be professional.

- Depending on your industry will depend on the type of language you use e.g. if your product is targeted at the older and more sophisticated market then ‘@’ should be replaced with the full word ‘at’.  If your target market is very young then the ‘@’ symbol is likely to work just fine.

-Finally, the tweet must bring some value to the conversation.

So keeping this in mind lets take a look at a health food company for example.  A tweet for them could include the following – ’For a healthy mid-afternoon pick-me-up beverage… http://bit.ly/aKX8tR’.  Their target market includes those that aspire to a healthy lifestyle and this tweet links them through to an easy to make, yet healthy smoothie recipe.  So we have just communicated to them a tweet that educates them on how to make a smoothie.

Content that brings value to the conversation should be a major objective of any social media plan.  Think of issues, questions and/or queries that your customer has come to you with in the past.  If you can’t think of any, then post the question on Twitter, asking them what they want to hear.  They may wish to learn more about how they can use your product &/or service, they may want to be kept up to date with news related to your industry.

So you now know that the key is bringing value to the conversation with your potential customers out there in cyberspace.  But what’s the first step in this journey of learning to master twitter?  The first step should involve gathering all imagery and video footage related to your business (…yes, best to toss aside those personal ‘on tour’ videos for now) that you have.  These can be uploaded to YouTube, Flikr and your Facebook Fan Page ‘videos’ and ‘photos’ tabs.  You can then tweet about them and add a link for your followers to click through to.

Hopefully that gives you some helpful insight into how Twitter can work for you business.  If you have any questions then please just post them on my Facebook fan page at www.facebook.com/wildfiremarketingand I will be able to answer them from here.

Over and out for now.

IS FACEBOOK FOR YOUR BUSINESS?

So you’re thinking, hmmm this social media thing just isn’t going away and maybe there’s actually something to it? Well, lets take a look at how the face of the average Facebook user is currently tracking…  It has actually shifted over the past few years.  While the Facebook population continues to grow, its total users have started to represent the worlds population more closely, but right now Facebook is in the middle of a shift from a college crowd demographic to a more eclectic one.  The fastest growing demographic is the 35-54 year olds, which have a growth rate of 276%.  The next fastest growing demographic is the over 55 crowd, which has a growth rate of 194%.  The core of the Facebook audience, the 25-34 year old group is still doubling every six months.  The largest demographic concentration, the college crowd of 18-24 year olds, is down from 54% six months ago to 41%.  Don’t discount this though as Facebook currently has 350 million active daily users, which is people that actually login and use Facebook on a daily basis; 41% is still about 143 million of these active users of Facebook.

So yes with growth like that it does look like it’s here to stay!  Well why don’t you just jump right in then, get yourself a Facebook page and get your brand connected with these millions of people?  Maybe some of you have had a go and found that hey it’s just not that easy.  For a start which page should you set up… a Fan page, Group page or Friends profile??  For a start a friends page is against Facebook policy for a business but Groups and Fan pages are OK.

OK so we’ve narrowed it down to Groups and Fan pages, which one should we go for?  Well, a groups page is not going to show up in your members newsfeed, they will actually have to click through to it on the left hand side of their page to get to your information, which is a BIG negative.  However you can invite people to become members of your group and grow your members base this way as opposed to a Fan page where you cannot invite people to become fans.  Still, the fact they can’t see you in their newsfeed means they are very unlikely to be kept up to date and join your conversation.  Fan pages are easier to search for than Groups as fan pages are a public profile that is visible to unregistered people and thus indexed by external search engines like Google, Groups are not.  Pages are therefore generally better for long-term relationships with your fans, readers or customers.

So, I suggest that a Fan Page is the way to go for a business.  Be warned, ‘just because everyone else is doing it,’ doesn’t necessarily mean that it will be good for your brand.  In order to create a successful fan page you need to ask yourself – ‘What does your company really want to achieve on Facebook’?  This answer will give you an idea of how to go about achieving it with the assistance of a fan page.

Ok, so if you’ve decided a fan page is a good idea then how are you going to get fans?  This is a very good question and requires a good understanding of your audience – your target market; what do they want to converse about that is related to your brand?  What value can you give them?  A comprehensive customer database, if you have one can be one great way to start building your fan base.  Striving to have lots of fans should not be the objective; the key is to have a page with a loyal fan base – fans that will actually interact with your brand.  10 fans that interact on your page are worth more than 10,000 fans and no interaction!  Remember, it takes time to build a good loyal following.

A good Fan page takes some planning and it helps to have a look at those that have been there before.  Please see below for a list of some companies both big and small that are using fan pages effectively:

1.SUJON BERRIES

This small business uses plenty of great imagery and video footage to engage its audience.  They are quick to respond to their audience and have created a landing page for new visitors called the ‘Welcome!’ page, which tells new visitors what they can get from being a fan with a call to action ‘click the become a fan button above’

2. RED BULL

Red Bull has incorporated the use of a live Twitter feed.  This is not just of their tweets but of all those Red Bull athletes that are on Twitter.  This is a great way to create engaging content by feeding a variety of conversations into your Facebook Fan Page.

3. 100% PURE NEW ZEALAND

Use plenty of great imagery and videos to tell their story.

CLIMBING AORAKI – MOUNT COOK, NEW ZEALAND

Friday, 28 May 2010

We had 12 days stormy weather before summit day which meant a lot of snow on the mountain.  We flew into Plateau Hut on Monday 14th December and while the weather was good the avalanche conditions were extreme.  We went and climbed Glacier Dome, a small peak nearby and waited a few days for the snow to stabilize.

A very keen Swiss and Dutch guy and a couple of Kiwi’s had plugged steps the day before we set out, which helped no end, we were all eternally grateful to these guys for their hard work!  We set off at 1 am on the morning of Thursday 17th December from Plateau Hut at 2200m.  The stars littered the sky, but with no moon, head torches were a must.  We made our way across the plateau and up the lower Linda Glacier.

The glaciers went as deep as a very tall building goes high, they were beautiful to look at, but deadly.   Linda Glacier was very glaciated for this time of year and it even had the guides a bit rattled, the first glacier we came to had a VERY skinny natural footbridge to cross.  Look left or look right, either way you looked was a long, long way down before you would reach the bottom… This was a very BIG wake up call for everyone at 2 am on a Thursday morning!  We continued up the glaciers, over skinny natural galacier bridges, past the gun barrels that are renowned for avalanches and made it to the top of the Linda Glacier at 5.45 am; in time to see a magnificent sunrise, which bathed the mountains in pink.

We were now at the bottom of the summit rocks.  With 4 other parties in front of us there was a bottleneck allowing time to take some pics of the sunrise before we began our ascent up Bryce’s Gully and through the summit rocks.  It is massive country in their, those mountains are just HUGE!

The ice was in good condition as we climbed our way through the summit rocks, at times using anchors from those that had gone before.  It is sometimes tricky to test their stability when there is a lot of snow and ice surrounding the anchor.  On those common routes it would have been ideal if the anchor points were bolted into rocks that had been tested and were known to be safe, the guides said that it would most definitely save lives and valuable SAR time and money.

With a lot of vertical climbing I could feel the calf muscles screaming out!  On this leg, the weather started to come in and the views became obscured with cloud; you’d be looking at a wall of white then all of a sudden it would give way to a view hundreds of metres below, a surreal feeling.  As we were approaching the false summit we cramponed across Green’s Coulier, Dave my guide said this is where my mate skied down – he skied right from the top of Mount Cook and I was looking down the Coulier which had an absolutely massive drop off… crazy!

We finally summited Aoraki at 1 pm that day in cloud, wahoo!.  With 10m falling off the top of the mountain in 1991 the summit is no longer safe to stand on and we were just below this point.  Just enough time to take a couple of pics and eat a few dinosaur sweets, mmm sugar hit… and we were on our way back down.  We teamed up with another guide Tim from Adventure consultants and his client Eddie from Oz so that we would have more rope to rap down.  The wind picked up just slightly enough so that there was a bit of spin drift.

We reached the top of the Linda Glacier at about 8 pm and zig zagged our way back through the glaciers.  Right at the top Tim heard the Glacier cracking and moving… just glad I didn’t hear that!  The snow has softened through the course of the day and every now in then you’d find your leg disappear into the snow.  We bypassed one of the glaciers and went over avalanche rubble rounding the Silverhorn corner.

As we were coming across the Plateau back to the hut, the wind started to pick up as forecasted and soon after we were in our hut the winds picked up to 130 km / hr.  With the hut on a cantilever the wind was whipping up underneath and buffeting against the hut shaking a bit!  All in all it was a 22 hour round trip, I was absolutely exhausted when I reached the hut and after having a small feed went to bed and slept for 17 hours (with breakfast in between). When I looked out the window that next morning, just right near where we had a drinks stop, before we crossed the Plateau back to the hut there had been a huge rock fall/slide that night.

We were lucky to fly out on the Saturday, our helicopter pilot definitely had balls to fly into the white wall of cloud to come get us, it was still windy and raining quite heavily.

Through out those 22 hours of the climb I lived every single moment… you had no choice when every foot step counts!  And right now, I’m just looking forward to drinking beer in the sunshine and enjoy the festive season with my friends & family…

I climbed Mount Cook for Arthritis NZ, the TImaru Herald and The Press ran a great story on it the other day you can check out the article at www.bit.ly/peD5w.  If you would like to support this cause by making a donation to Arthritis NZ you can still do so by clicking on this linkhttps://secure.flo2cash.co.nz/donations/arthritis/donate.aspx.

Merry Christmas everybody and a safe and happy New Year!

Training from Mueller Hut – Mount Cook National Park

Climbing up to the Annette Plateau,                Standing in front of Mount Cook at Sunset.                                                                                 Mt Footstool in the background.

I arrived in at Mount Cook Village and met my Mountain Guide, Dave McKinley who will be guiding me up Mount Cook next weekend. I went and hired some plastic boots from Alpine Guides and then we hiked up to Mueller Hut at about 1800m on the first day. It was perfect weather, very hot and those plastic boots just make it hotter!  Anyway we went up just underneath Mount Ollivier (The first alpine peak that Sir Edmund Hilary summited) and Dave taught me all about snow anchors… Upper top-clips, mid-clips, T and how to stop yourself when you’ve fallen down a slope, with and without the ice axe.

The following day we were up with the sunrise and Dave was teaching me the ropes – how to tie up for glacier travel.  We tied up and with our crampons on, we set off in ‘glacier travel’ mode up to the Annette Plateau at about 2235m.  It took about 3 hrs to get there and the snow was quite soft but still good training ground, with a couple of drop offs to keep you on your toes!

Once we reached the Annette Plateau Dave proceeded to teach me how to do a glacier rescue.  For an amateur that meant learning lots of knots, at this stage I was a master at getting it in a tangle!  We spent a couple of hours here learning this and doing a bit of abseiling and belaying then it was back to the hut.  Buy now the snow was quite slushy and it was quite a trudge back to the hut, but awesome views all round.  Back at the hut I spent a few more hours going over the knots, finally starting to get it.  There were only another couple of Kiwis staying in the hut that night, which is strange considering the hut is usually choca with tourists.  The weather came in that night and with the space in the hut we opted to do some more rope work indoors the next day.  We hiked out that afternoon back to Mount Cook village.

All in all a great learning experience! Bring on next weekend where we will give Mount Cook a good crack.  I am climbing Mount Cook for Arthritis NZ, the TImaru Herald and The Press ran a great story on it the other day you can check out the article at www.bit.ly/peD5w.  If you would like to support this cause by making a donation to Arthritis NZ you can do by clicking on this linkhttps://secure.flo2cash.co.nz/donations/arthritis/donate.aspx.  When donating, please select ‘Event’ under ‘Appeal’ and put ‘Mount Cook- Kelly’ here.  Thanks!

Training Run Up Little Mount Peel

Friday, 6 November 2009

Thought I would get a little run in before I started my days work… just 20 minutes drive North of Geraldine lies Little Mount Peel, 4293 ft (1303 m) which is great training ground for my climb up Mount Cook!  I wove my way up the track and reached the summit in about 1hr 15min.  For those of you who’d rather a stroll it’s a nice day walk.  Got some fantastic views of the Canterbury plains from the summit, as you can see in the pics above.  The track was a bit muddy in places, you really have to watch your footing when running and grasshoppers were jumping at me from all angles, very cool little critters!

If you haven’t read about my big mission to climb Mount Cook for Arthritis NZ in December this year, the TImaru Herald and The Press ran a great story on it the other day you can check out the article atwww.bit.ly/peD5w.  If you would like to support this cause by making a donation to Arthritis NZ you can do by clicking on this link https://secure.flo2cash.co.nz/donations/arthritis/donate.aspx.  When donating,please select ‘Event’ under ‘Appeal’ and put ‘Mount Cook- Kelly’ here.

Anyway I had better go and do some more work on SRL’s social media strategy, they are launching a uniquely New Zealand product (www.superrecovery.co.nz) which i’ve really enjoyed working with them on…. it’s exciting stuff helping an NZ company go global!

In Training for Aoraki Mount Cook

Thursday, 29 October 2009

Wasn’t it great to see moments of summer in the weekend!  Well we decided to make the most of it and I really needed to get a nice heavy pack on my back so I could start getting the feel of it for Cook.  I plan to climb Aoraki Mount Cook, which is New Zealand’s highest mountain at 3754m in December this year.

We tramped up to Pinnacle Hut from Woolshed Creek Carpark and then back to Woolshed Hut for the night, about 5 odd hours in total.  There were some amazing rock formations and heaps of waterfalls to see along the way.  Views of Taylor and Old Man ranges dominated the scenery.   You could drink the water straight from the stream, it was beautiful.  There was a small canyon just near the hut and i’ve heard people do use that general area for canyoning which would be awesome.  The hut that night slept 26 people and it was packed out.

The next day we took the Bus Stop track back to Woolshed carpark, which took about 3 hours.  There was a lot of water on the track in parts but amazing views made it worth while.  All in all, Mount Somers Walkway is a tramp I would recommend and except for some gear I lost downstream it was a great break away!

I’m climbing Mount Cook to raise money for Arthritis New Zealand.  It would be wonderful if you want to support this cause, you can donate by following this linkhttps://secure.flo2cash.co.nz/donations/arthritis/donate.aspx and in the message box put ‘Mount Cook- Kelly’.  Thanks everybody!

Free Wireless Hotspots for New Zealand

Does your destination have a free wireless hotspot?  This is becoming increasingly popular worldwide.  Having wireless hotspots throughout New Zealand would allow tourists to connect with their friends and family worldwide, and these of course are all potential customers to your business.  Most importantly the connection to the prospect is coming from a trusted source- their friends and family, the best form of advertising at a very low cost to the region.  Lets take a look below where we compare a public toilet with a wireless hotspot.

Public Toilet

-Person spends an average of several minutes

-Approx $10k maintenance per year of public

toilet including the cleaning, toilet paper etc

-Potential for community interaction is low

Internet

-Person spends an average of 1 hour, while partner may browse the shops.

-Approx $1k maintenance of Internet for the year.

-Potential for community interaction with traveler is high.

Source: Dr. Ulrich Speidel, Associate Director for Tourism and IT, NZ Tourism Research Institute AUT University, E Tourism Conference , October 2009

So if you are looking at ways to keep tourists in your town longer it would make sense to offer free internet, they stay longer, are therefore likely to spend more, have a more rich experience… and this is all cheaper than a public toilet!

So it doesn’t get out of control users could be given a time limit on the internet.

What do you think? Is free wi-fi something you would like to see in cafes or i-sites?