Mark Zuckerberg Facebook Live

Mark Zuckerberg hosted an in-person Q&A yesterday in Berlin (February 26th, 2016).

The first question he was asked was about Facebook Live.  Mark confirmed that his goal is to “give the power to broadcast live in everyone’s pocket around the World” and not only is Live available on IOS but as of yesterday Facebook have started to roll it out to Android too! Mark hopes that everyone will have access to Facebook Live in the next month.

Do you think you will use Facebook Live? I love live streaming, and can really see it taking off in the UK. Periscope (Twitter’s live streaming app) is increasing rapidly in popularity and you can see that Facebook Live will go the same way. Why use live streaming? Well it’s real time, it’s what’s happening now. As Mark puts it “Live video is so raw  …. it gives people the ability to express what’s going on without having it to be super curated”. The idea is that you video live, not planned, just sharing exactly what is on your mind, there and then.

I think it’s a great way to connect with your audience. To make them feel that they actually know you! And we all know that we buy from people we know like and trust!

Do you think you will use Facebook Live? Are you already or have you already started streaming on Periscope? I’d love to know what you think about it.

If you haven’t heard Mark’s Q&A session you may like to catch it here

One of the best questions Mark was asked was “If you were the CEO of Twitter what would you do?” – it caused quite a laugh from the audience and Mark’s response was perfect “There is no right way to answer that question!” I thought he got out of that one really well.

Children and Technology

Another question he was asked was “What is the perfect age for kids to start in Technology?”  Facebook state that you have to be a minimum of 13 years old to have a Facebook Account. My kids were a bit younger when they created their accounts – it is, in fact, why I actually got involved in Social Media! My daughters were using Facebook and the boys wanted to, so I thought I should check it out.

I don’t think you can answer a question like that – technology has changed so much and there are some great apps for youngsters to play with which are both fun and educational. When my youngest child started nursery, I’ll never forget a phone call I received from his teachers.  They had to call me in to “fix” their computers. At the age of 4 he had decided that he didn’t like the layout of the school’s computer so he created himself his own user account, decided upon and set his own background image and set the desktop up with the programs he liked best! All this at 4 years old!! And do you know, he picked this up from sitting on my lap, or sitting with his siblings, and watching!

The other memory I remember from Andy being at nursery was the lovely calendar he made one year. He was to write on it what his mum and dad do for a living. His response was “My dad goes to work and builds towers (he was and is a print finisher) and my mum sits at works and eats all day” (mmmmmm no comment).

Have fun playing with technology and Facebook Live or Periscope, and do let me know when you’re streaming so I can pop by and say hi!

Welcome to North East Social Media and my first blog on my new fancy website!  I have been managing social media accounts for client’s, working on their strategies, helping client’s with their SEO and teaching Social Media here in the North East of England for 6 years.

I have trained over 5000 North East businesses in the use of Social Media for raising their profiles, raising brand awareness and increasing both traffic to websites and of course sales. And I have enjoyed every minute of it!

In September last year things changed in an instant! We were an Social Media Management Agency of 4 and one of our fabulous team left to become a full-time Primary Teacher, another left to do a Psychology Doctorate and the third to become a Priest! Which took our Agency back to 1, little old me who managed to get ill in the same month and ended up with septicemia – but that’s another story!

So, whilst recovering I had plenty of time to reflect on my way forward and decided it was time for a change. With the help of my wonderful Coach Karen Rutter that decision has finally been made and…

North East Social Media is born

The thing I love most about my work in Social Media is being able to teach people how to use their own accounts effectively. I have an ability for being able to explain to people how they can use the different platforms for their own purpose, and how to actually use them; create campaigns and strategies so you can actually see results. And this is what I love! Yes I love content creation, and was very happy managing accounts, but I still taught people that Social Media works best in real-time, it works best when accounts are managed in-house rather than being outsourced.

So that is what in intend to do now at North East Social Media Ltd. I am going to concentrate on working with North East businesses, from start-up through to fully established companies, to teach you how you can use Social Media yourself.

Amanda Dixon – North East Social Media

So who am I? My name is Amanda Dixon and I’m a Social Media addict!

The wonderful World of Social Media changes on a daily basis and I love keeping up to date with all the changes, so now that the decision has been made to move forward with teaching North East businesses how to use Social Media themselves, in-house, it will free me up with time to keep studying! Believe me, it’s an absolute necessity!

The plan is to run weekly Social Media courses at our Team Valley office as well as offering 121 bespoke training for those who prefer a private environment and I’ll also be offering packages to work with your team, over a period of time, helping you to create the perfect Social Media Marketing strategy, ensuring the whole team knows how to use the platforms correctly

Huge thanks to both Karen Rutter for helping me sort the thoughts clouding my brain and blocking me from being able to put any of my ideas in to an order and Chrissy Scott of Bag Tree Design who quite simply “got me” and was able to design my logo in a matter of hours and is now working on making this website beautiful for me.

My accounts are all set up now on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and I’m still working on the others so I had better get on. See you soon either in the Real or Virtual World!