Doing a search through social channels over the past six months for mentions of London I was able to find 2.7 million blogs, 3 million online news articles, 1.7 million forum postings and 10.9 million tweets.

When I take that data and trend it out over time we get the popularity graph below. We can see that six months ago there was the ending of a large spike in talk talk of London, which we’ll dig a little deeper into later on in this post. What’s even more interesting is in this graph is that talk of London seems to stay fairly steady across all channels for the rest of the six months minus what appears to be a slight lull around Christmas time. This we don’t see very often.

I then looked into where all this social chatter about London was coming from. No surprise that most amount of mentions were being generated from the UK (37.3%). Like all the other cities I’ve explored previously, the United States and Canada are also among the top countries creating chatter (29.2% and 3.9% respectively). We can also see that London is being talked about around the world with countries like Germany (3.7%) and  Australia (2.9%) also creating significant amounts of mentions.

When I pulled up a buzzgraph about all of the London chatter it started to become clear why there was so much talk from all over the world. Looking at the buzzgraph we can see two main themes; the London riots that occurred last summer and the upcoming 2012 Summer Olympics, which are being held in London.

I then a dug a bit deeper into who was creating all of the London chatter. I started on Twitter and used technology exclusive to Sysomos to discover that 55% of the mentions of London were made by males while females accounted for the other 45%. I also pulled up the top Twitter sources that were mentioning London. These were the Twitter accounts that mentioned London the most and had a higher authority score. In most of the cities I’ve previously looked at the account with the most mentions of a city were news or classified accounts. In the case of London though, it turns out that the most mentions came from @H2kRadioDotCom, a local radio station (12.87%). The second most mentions of London came from two job classified accounts, @jobldnit and @mathfi_jobs, who accounted for 10.89% each.

Next, I delved into the blogs that were mentioning London. Here I found almost the same gender split as I did on Twitter, except the ladies had gained a percentage. Male bloggers accounted for 54% of those mentioning London and the females 46%. I also found the bloggers mentioning London the most were aged 21-35 (43.1%). While bloggers aged 20 and under talked about London the least with only 13.6%.

While bloggers who are 20 and under accounted for the smallest age group talking about London, I found that blogs categorized as student blogs made up the largest amount at 16.1%. Student blogs were tied for the most mentions with arts blogs. These were followed by blogs that were classified as education blogs at 10.2%. This may have something to do with the riots in London that drew attention from and were mainly being acted on by a lot of college and university aged people.

I then dug into some of the activity spikes we found in the popularity graph above. The first and largest spike was right at the beginning of my six month look between August 9-12. As I stated earlier, this was the tail end of the London riots that occurred this past summer. We can see a lot of riot related chatter in the buzzgraph including the terms “riot,” “riots,” “rioter” and “rioting” right in the center. We can also see locations of the riots like “Totenham,” “Liverpool” and “Manchester” scattered around te outside of the graph along with other riot related words.

Since there wasn’t a second large spike in activity to really dig into, I decided to try something a little bit different. Here I decided to investigate this big dip in activity that seemed to happen across all channels. This dip occurred between December 23-27, which could leads to one obvious answer as to why it happened; Christmas. When I looked at the buzzgraph for this time period it became obvious that the dip had to do with “Christmas,” which was one of the most connected words. It’s interesting that most of the talk mentioning London at this time focused around the Royal Family’s Christmas. We can see words like “royal” and “Buckingham” as prominent words in the buzzgraph.

And that is going to bring my look at London to a close. Join me again next time as I use Sysomos to find out what the world is saying about another one of our Social Media Week host cities.

Two individuals swap cities– equipped with nothing but a Lumia 800, they attempt to live off the goodwill of the locals through social media for a week!

In conjunction with Social Media Week, Can Man Live on Social Media Alone is a daring cross-city social experiment to evaluate whether one intrepid traveller can depend on nothing but the good will of locals and the power of social media to survive in a foreign city for one week.

From 9th – 15th February, our #CanManLondon and our #CanManSG will trade cities, power up their social media channels and prepare for the best (or worst).

The #CanMan Candidates

After weeks of searching for the right candidates we would like to introduce you to our #CanManLondon and our #CanManSG (or woman in this case). Meet Martin and Daphne:

Along with the clothes on their back and a smartphone, Martin and Daphne will be given the opportunity to bring ten non-digital items in a backpack as part of their survival kit.

In addition to having to ensure they have food and lodging each day, the candidates will be issued daily tasks, which will be posted on their Facebook Fanpage walls. In the spirit of social good, the tasks will be charitable in nature and will help raise awareness around specific causes within the respective city.

You can get involved with their exciting journey and help them along the way. Simply follow both candidates on Facebook by liking their fanpages: 
www.facebook.com/CanManLondon// www.facebook.com/CanManSG and following their updates on Twitter: @SMWLoveMessengr // @deafknee.

Stay tuned with the #CanMan experiment as we will be announcing more exciting updates and giving you a sneak peek inside both agendas soon.

This is reposting from our team, SMW London. Check out their blog regularly for highlights and to keep up with all that’s happening with #SMWLdn!

It’s more than a financial and cultural center; it’s a thriving metropolis, seen as a must-see around the world. London. And one of our hottest cities for February. Behind SMW London is Chinwag, a leading UK community for connecting digital professionals with a reach of more than 35,000 people. The four-man team behind SMW London since 2010, also heads up a digital recruitment site, Chinwag Jobs, and Digital Missions, focused on helping UK digital firms. We’re talking with Francesca Heath on their team.

 
1. What are the three most exciting things happening in social, mobile and digital media in London?
London is such a unique city, as it’s the digital hub of the UK coupled with having a massive mix of communities and essentially a melting pot for creativity. We are expecting some really innovative events this year which could only happen in such a city. Curated content is really big here at the moment, especially using video content to influence people and getting them to participate. There has also been a big surge in mobile ecommerce due to the rise of smartphones, which is really cool. Don’t forget that London is also hosting the Olympics this year, which is going to be huge for London and digital.
 

2. Give us a sneak peek at the most exciting things coming to SMW London.
We have some brill events taking place in London. A sneak peak at a few goodies: Twitter, the Butterfly Effect and the Future of Journalism; Making Video Rock; The Socialympics- Social Media & London 2012; ShoreditchTwit + Google Places; and aMetropolitan Breakfast.
 

3. How will SMW London stand out from other conferences happening in London?
We want to put back the ‘social’ in Social Media! Unlike many ‘traditional’ conferences, SMW London strives to maintain a model where free access to content, programming and events is made possible. The hectic week of SMW London offers a series of interconnected activities and conversations around the world on emerging trends in social and mobile media, in the form of panel discussions, meetups, barcamps, themed networking events, competitions and more.

A little bit more exciting than just a long list of conferences – don’t you think?!! Even better – anyone is welcome to get involved and the majority of SMW London events are free to attend!
 

4. How is SMW London embracing our global theme of Empowering Change through Collaboration and how is that playing out in your city, the UK, and the EU?
The sheer diversity of events throughout the week brings to life the idea of collaborating, connecting and contributing, whether presenting at a session, a treasure hunt, asking questions at a panel, engaging in a tweet-up or networking. The themes help bring together different topics, with events at all levels from novice to expert.
 

5. What three things are you hoping to gain from SMW London 2012?
It’s a great opportunity for all our local partners to get involved globally and share ideas. It’s also a chance for individuals and smaller companies to take to limelight and broadcast their events to the global digital community. Finally, we get to meet all the amazing people who use digital to empower change.

 
The London team is in high gear, full of creativity and enthusiasm. A big thanks to them and all their work. You can keep up with what going on across the pond by following them on Twitter at @SMWLdn and on their Facebook page. And if you do nothing else, make sure you follow the SMW London and SMW Singapore Exchange Challenge – Can Man Live on Social Media Alone? It’s an opportunity for one socialite to uncover the power of social media and how it can be used for social good- with both Singapore and London working together to create our first SMW cross-city cultural exchange.
 

Photo by Anthony Dodd

While the question of Mark Duggan’s death is a murky subject, filled with political intrigue and a questionable police behavior, the community that Mark belonged to had apparently warned the police that there would be riots.  But the key is to separate the wheat from the chaff, so to speak–the riots may have started because of Duggan, but they continued because like all people in the spirit of burning and looting, the cause isn’t always the reason these things continue.  Instead, most of the rioting has been blamed on youth with blackberries and too much time on their hands.  In fact, the whole of the riots have caused a serious issue between the youth who are going around torching buildings and the middle and upper classes, who can’t seem to understand why all of this is happening.

A Class War

The main problem here is that there is a gigantic social divide between the people rioting and the people against the rioters.  Unlike in Vancouver, where the riot can be chalked up to idiocy and anarchy, most of the commentary in England has said the major cause is social divide and what is called in England the ‘Big Society.’  There have been a lot cuts (naturally) over the last few years because of England’s financial woes relating from the last recession. Van Badham puts it nicely when she says, “Those asking why these young people aren’t concerned about the personal consequences of their behaviour need to understand that thanks to the efficient policy implementation of the Tories and their Liberal Democrat buddies, these kids effectively have no future… so why not grab a nice television if you’re spiralling towards oblivion, anyway?”

To put it in further perspective, the youth unemployment rate in the U.K. is 20.5 per cent for young people ages 16-24.  Compare that to Canada, where it’s around 15 per cent.  Add in the astronomically larger population of the U.K., and that’s a lot of unemployed, hormone-driven looters.

Social Media Movements

The really sad part is that the looting hasn’t stopped with London, but has carried on into Manchester and Birmingham.  The looters are almost all the same–young, unemployed people.  (Although, if you look below, not completely unresourceful…)

The key here is that social media has sparked some good ideas, and some unfortunate consequences.  There are citizens using social media to mobilize over twitter to prevent further violence (Like this live blogging Tumblr blog by a concerned citizen or the itv live news blog) or people posting photos to Flikr of the rioters to help speed along arrest and quell the violence.

The sad truth is that a lot of these younger people own smartphones and also participate on Twitter.  There was a giant spike on Twitter regarding the riots, but whether that was looters coordinating on it, or do-gooders coordinating clean-up is hard to say.  Of course, the riots have also inspired some viral pics, noted down below, like the guy planking during the riot, or ‘tea-on-a-riot-shield’.

The Blackberry Controversy

Smart-phone technology like secure messaging has finally become a widespread tool for thuggery, exposed on the world scene.  Blackberry is under a hailstorm of criticism as part of the reason why the looters have been able to coordinate so well during all the chaos and while the police struggle to mobilize.  Blackberry messages are encrypted and difficult to trace: it’s made it easier for rioters to tell other people where the ‘prime looting’ is.  Not to mention, Blackberries are often sold at feature phone pricing and pay-as-you-go options, which would be the choice of people on  the dole who still want to have the latest gadgets.

But the backlash is not against Blackberry solely, but against opening up the data of British citizens to the police for the sake of catching mobbers.  Team poison, a hacktivist group concerned with citizen privacy has told Blackberry that “You Will _NOT_ assist the UK Police because if u do innocent members of the public who were at the wrong place at the wrong time and owned a blackberry will get charged for no reason at all.”  Team poison has promised to retaliate against Blackberry if they do decide to release secure and private information to the public. The Globe and Mail article explains more about them and the problem Blackberry is currently facing.

Analysis

More than anything, the London riots are a sign of youth unrest.  The youth unrest there is much different than the youth unrest in the Middle East, or even elsewhere in the Western World.  This isn’t an Arab Spring, but there’s something to be said for the unrest and meaningless destruction and why it exists in the first place.  The reason being, I imagine, that there’s a very disgruntled group of youth in the U.K., most of whom are poor, without an education or a means to support themselves.  Why they are so unhappy is a loaded sociological question that Brits everywhere are going to need to answer in the very near future.

But the real problem, if you ask me, is youth unemployment and gang related crime.

The disenfranchised part of U.K. society has managed to rebel against their circumstances, using a mix of social media and messaging technology spurred on by the death of a young black man.  The widespread looting that has occurred is a sign that something is not well, and people in other Western countries are starting to ask if such an uprising from places with higher youth unemployment rates might not create the same kind of problem London or Greece had–where people are immune to rational arguments or help, even if that’s what they’re demanding.  We could blame the U.K. for not seeing its own social ills and societal problems, but most Western countries have these problems, thanks to the recession.   In short, how do you stop a mob from becoming more intelligent than the good citizenry?

The problems created by the recession and the loss of our quality of life in Western countries is finally starting to manifest itself, and it’s looking like social media is going to be a big factor in how a lot of these economic struggles are played out.  The key to resolving these problems will be how well organizations and governments can honestly respond and ethically use new media and new forms of communication to rebuild a lot of the social infrastructure we used to have, but can no longer afford.  In the end, the question is not about why the London riots happened, but when will they happen again, and how will Westerners use social media to respond in the future?

Brennan Sarich is a practitioner of public relations and digital strategy in Toronto, Ontario.  He is a freelancer with several years experience and specializes in online content, event management and social media.  Visit his blog www.brennanpr.ca/blog or follow him on twitter @bsarich.

Interested in joining the Social Media Week Global Editorial Team? Apply here!

“In London tonight, all the police cells are full”

BBC TV News

It’s the fourth consecutive night of rioting and there are an unprecedented 16,000 officers on the capital’s streets.

Last night and today law abiding Londoners reacted in the way they know best – with humour.

…and here’s the picture:

The hashtag #LondonRiots starts reporting the ‘news’ that London Zoo had been looted and there’s a tiger loose on genteel North London’s Primrose Hill.

Soon, there’s another rumour of another animal on the loose:

Groups set cars on fire in Camden Town on the first night of breakthrough comedian James Mullinger’s new show, leaving Mullinger to react by stretching irony to its limits:

Those watching from home start to realize that what they’re seeing is brought to them by incredibly brave reporters:

And this viewer thinks it’s time that their names are adjusted to recognize their bravery:

The night wears on and the rioters’ endurance exceeds that of the concerned citizens, who are now thinking about work tomorrow:

The sun rises. A new day. But with the police overwhelmed yesterday, people’s attention naturally turns to what will happen tonight. Can nothing be done?

Rumors spread about riots being planned in other areas of the country.

Shopkeepers have to take a difficult decision. In Manchester, a Subway store owner faces up to reality:

(photo (c): @xsophmayx)

Some stay open, stay defiant.

Blogs are quickly set up to identify – and shame – the looters.

And as law abiding citizens (and BBC reporters) get ready for another night, anxious parents from all over the world are calling to check everyone’s okay:

There have been terrible scenes and feeble justifications for criminal behavior. One man was shot dead. Families have been made homeless. Small and large business have been burnt to the ground.

But all today, ordinary people rallied round the hashtag #riotcleanup with brooms, plastic bags and smiles. There are Twitpics circulating off tables laid neatly with tea and home-baked cakes as refreshments for police officers with some using their riot shields to carry tea out to their colleagues.

Sometimes there seems little to reason to laugh at any of this. But somehow, we’ll find a way to clean house.

(photo: @chris_stark)

If you’ve seen something that made you laugh, please send it to me and I’ll repost: @verbid or yowesty@verbalidentity.co.uk

But wherever you are, be safe out there.

Chris West is on Twitter @verbID. He is a contributor to the Social Media Week Global Editorial Team, based in London, and he is the Main Voice at www.verbalidentity.co.uk He worked for 20 years as an award-winning copywriter in the world’s best ad agencies, including Saatchi & Saatchi, BBH, RKCR, Leags Delaney and a little start up called Mother. For the last ten years he ran a project-based ad agency with clients including Sky, Selfridges, Unilever, Ocado, Christie’s, EMAP, Harry Winston and Tourneau. He also writes for the Sunday Times and is a Contributing Editor at the UK’s leading luxury magazine, Lusso.

Interested in joining the Social Media Week Global Editorial Team? Apply here!

Following on yesterday’s post by Toby Daniels, we thought it might be helpful to provide some inspirational examples of some ways in which the Social Media Week platform can deliver upon these new ideas of “experience design” for events.

In just a few short years since its inception in February 2009, there have been hundreds of Social Media Week events that have taken place across the fifteen cities that have hosted SMW. It’s true that many of these events have been panel discussions, but there has also been a consistent stream of exciting, innovative and creative attempts to bring people and ideas together while making use of the flexibility of the Social Media Week platform and the outgoing and adventurousness of its community.

While there are countless examples to draw from, I wanted to pull out three particularly innovative ideas that constitute a sort of “trains, planes and automobiles” theme.

TRAINS

Possibly my favorite Social Media Week idea yet, this event in SMW Rome last February really shows how a smart idea can pick up steam and carry a freight train’s worth of impact when executed well and by the right folks (pardon the puns).

“Journey to the Center of the Net”, organized by Augmendy, SMW city partners for both Rome and Milan,took the idea of a pre-SMW kickoff event and put it rails. Many SMW cities host pre-week launch events as press conferences, lunches or virtual events, but Augmendy had the ingenious idea to go above and beyond all of that with a cross-country blast that managed to combine all of the above plus networking, high-speed travel and multiple SMW city connectivity.

How did it all happen? For ”Journey to the Center of the Net”, the Augmendy team worked with SMW Rome sponsor Ferrovie Dello Stato, aka the Italian Rail, to commandeer a high speed train heading from Milan to Rome for an SMW journey like no other. This event pulled in leaders and luminaries from the Italian tech, media and press and invited them to take the three hour trip across SMW cities to connect and learn more about social media “in Italia”. This event featured an immersive cultural speed dating experience where attendees rotated on 10 minute shifts of meeting face-to-face with other train attendees. The event then wrapped with a press conference at the Central Station, where SMW Rome held court throughout the week.

PLANES

Another great example of the flexible, multi-city framework of Social Media Week providing event inspiration in ways no other conference platform can provide includes last February’s participation of PepsiCo, who sent Bonin Bough, their global director of digital media, on a worldwide tour across three cities during the February SMW program.

Beginning at the opening global press conference in New York on the Thursday before the week, Bonin helped commence the week with remarks about SMW and the exciting things to come throughout the week. He then began a whirlwind of activity to discuss the idea of Brands in a Borderless Society that should include the phrase: Don’t Try This At Home:

• He flew to London to oversee PepsiCo involvement in a panel there on the week’s opening day,
• Then flew to Sao Paulo to give a midweek keynote to a packed crowd and
• Finally, returned to New York to provide closing remarks at JWT’s Business Media and Communications Hub

And somehow Bonin even had the energy to attend the official Closing Party that evening! Truly a showcase of what can be accomplished when a conference connects not just a city but a global community, and a great opportunity for PepsiCo to make a worldwide impact in just one week.

AUTOMOBILES

Not every great Social Media Week event idea must involve high-speed transit or international travel.

One great city-focused idea put forth during the February 2010 conference in New York was by an organization called Dollar Van Demos, who decided to enact their unique brand of travel-meets-art on an excited and willing Social Media Week audience. Dollar Van Demos showcase musicians, rappers and comedians performing inside a “dollar van” with real passengers. They brought their talents to SMW by integrating with the platform and to provide rides and entertainment for conference-goers all over the city through tweet and email requests for pickup. Dollar Van Demos Live!” was not just a hit, but a great showcase of how an organization can think outside the box to showcase what the do and connect with a larger network.

See below for a quick example of one Dollar Van Demo captured during the week:

So what can your brand do to take part in Social Media Week this September? Brainstorm and think big, and maybe your organization just might be the one to make a splash this September in your city or perhaps around the globe. If you know already, go here to submit your event or get involved, or contact us if you want help talking through an idea.

I mostly like robots when they are useful for humans. For example, if they’re willing to do my household chores for me including dusting, vacuuming and even mopping my floors. Yes, I confess: I have some domestic robots at home. To be specific, three vacuuming robots, including one for my dog’s hair and one for washing the floors.  Ocassionally, the robot sucks up a coin or a piece of paper with notes written on it, but it never aspired to collect the array of strange objects like those found on this list drawn from iRobot (the same that produces the most popular domestic robot in the world, i.e. Roomba).

From March 1 to 30, iRobot UK interviewed 100 British adults about their home cleaning habits.  Almost one third of respondents (31%) spent less than one hour a week house cleaning. Yet in that time, many admitted to finding forgotten valuables in the process including a whopping 60% of respondents who found money when they emptied their vacuum cleaners.  Among them, one person retrieved 50 pounds, while others recovered foreign currency (this is always useful in view of the summer holidays!). Almost half of the people interviewed (47%) had “sucked up” jewelry and apparel. The most commonly found objects are socks (22%), and toys (15%). It is even more common to vacuum-clean ties, belts and underwear.

Here are the top ten compiled by iRobot of unusual objects found in UK vacuum cleaners :
1. Underwear
2. Mobile phone
3. Medal of Valor
4. Chicken bone
5. A spider
6. Pacifier
7. A human tooth
8. £ 50 banknote
9. A stuffed toy
10. Spaghetti (!!!)

If it is true that money and jewels are hidden in those nooks and crannies and forgotten corners inaccessible to the common broom, then perhaps we should all consider using robots to flush out our forgotten treasures.  Hidden treasure may just be closer than you think.

Francesca Tarissi is a contributor for the Social Media Week Global Editorial Team. She writes about technology and robotics for important italian newspapers and magazines. You can find her on twitter @Robotrix

Interested in joining the Social Media Week Global Editorial Team? Apply here!

In the UK, April 2011 was Bowel Cancer Awareness Month. Throughout April Beating Bowel Cancer launched new promotional content and activities, including a new website, video (The Bottom Line) and a strategic online campaign to raise awareness of symptoms and the importance of early diagnosis.

I spoke to the charity’s digital development manager, Angela Cummings, to find out more about what they did, and how social media influenced their strategy. See highlights from our conversation below!

What were your objectives for the online  campaign?

• To engage with supporters and encourage them to donate and share campaign content
• To raise awareness of bowel cancer symptoms and the importance of early diagnosis
• The Bottom Line was particularly aimed at men aged 40+ who are often reluctant to visit doctors and discuss their symptoms

Those people who had taken part in a previous fundraising challenge were encouraged to share our promotional film, The Bottom Line, to everybody they knew who had donated.  The film was also promoted through online advertising, on our Facebook page and through Twitter.  We also ran a Twitter competition to encourage retweets using #TheBottomLine hashtag.

You used a lot of film as part of the campaign. Why was this?

We use film in two ways. Firstly to promote awareness of bowel cancer symptoms, which is The Bottom Line. Secondly, we use film to illustrate Louisa, one of our in-house nurses, answering frequently asked questions.
Film is engaging and lends itself well to being spread virally. During April we encouraged supporters to help spread the word on Facebook, Twitter and email by asking their friends to watch The Bottom Line and embed it in their own blogs and websites.  The film provides longevity as a tool on our website to show why it is so important to act on symptoms early.

Our FAQs film works well because people are often nervous about calling a helpline particularly when discussing issues they find embarrassing. Watching a film of one of our nurses not only answers their questions but makes them feel less anxious about calling our helpline because they then feel as if they have already have met Louisa. Film also helps people with low literacy skills.

We have also used film of bowel cancer patients, because feedback has shown that people find it helpful to hear from others who have been in a similar situation.

Was this the first ‘online’ campaign Beating Bowel Cancer has delivered?

In 2010 we launched our Cheeky Warning campaign, which was a digital campaign aimed at raising awareness of bowel cancer symptoms amongst young people.  We learned from Cheeky Warning that people enjoyed being able to support us through Twitter and Facebook and that running a competition was a good way to get people on board.  We also learned that some channels worked better for us than others: a Facebook app that we developed for that campaign had limited success.

How has social media contributed to the results of the campaign?

Social media channels contributed a great deal to the success of this latest campaign.

The Bottom Line spread virally through Facebook and Twitter and resulted in many online conversations both from existing supporters and new followers/fans.  They included people concerned about symptoms, newly diagnosed as well as those interested in supporting our cause by fundraising or helping spread the word.  We are currently supporting a number of new patients as a result of the campaign.  As well as the online noise that the campaign created we also delivered the following results:

• Our online donations increased by 135% during April
• We had the highest number of monthly visits to our website ever during April which was a 26% increase from March
• We saw a 10% increase in calls to our nurse helpline
• 4,200 views of The Bottom Line during April
• 1,500 views of our nurse FAQs films during April
• We gained 250 additional Facebook fans and 368 additional Twitter followers.
• We encouraged supporters to contact their local Member of Parliament (MP) and encourage them to support a debate – 73 MPs committed to this, which is a great result

What aspects of the online campaign are you most pleased with?

We are pleased that The Bottom Line had 4,200 views during April and was named Digital Campaign of the Week by Third Sector magazine.

What would you do differently next time?

Ideally we would have had the film ready earlier so that we were in a position to show it to other organizations prior to Bowel Cancer Awareness Month. This would have meant they could have the film available on their websites and social media channels from launch day.

How did you work with other organizations online?

We were able to work with both NHS Choices and the UK Department of Health.  NHS Choices are now hosting The Bottom Line film on their site. We also worked with Rowlands Pharmaceuticals, Thames Valley Cancer Network and various other NHS and Screening organisations.
A number of our supporters added details of Bowel Cancer Awareness Month to their blogs and websites.

Did you receive any negative feedback or questions as a result of the activity online?

Not this time.  During April 2010 when we were running Cheeky Warning a couple of people questioned why we were only aiming a campaign at young people.  With that in mind this year’s campaign was aimed at people aged 40+, in particular men.

Has the activity from April influenced your long-term digital strategy? If so, how?

We now have two year’s worth of evidence that digital campaigns work and proof this time that engaging with supporters earlier helps with the initial distribution of content and online partnerships.

It has also helped all those working for and supporting Beating Bowel Cancer to understand the impact and influence that digital can have on our work now, and in the future. It will make use of social media and the web much easier to justify in the future.

You can follow Beating Bowel Cancer on Twitter or find them on Youtube.

Tim is a contributor for the Social Media Week Global Editorial Team, based in the UK. He works in the digital communications team at the Department of Health. Follow him on twitter @timolloyd
Interested in joining the Social Media Week Global Editorial Team? Apply here!

by, Tim Lloyd

Being part of the first wave of Social Media Week blogs presents more questions than answers for me.

I have a familiar and fundamental question. What is this blog for, and is it personal, professional, or somewhere in between?

Enough questions. The answer is in the phrase: social. I’m writing here because I use social media, I am interested in social media, and social media forms an intrinsic part of my daily work at the UK Department of Health.

Inevitably there is an overlap between how I use ‘social’ media in a professional capacity, and outside of the office. This week I’ve been more aware of the overlap than ever. I have a week off work, but I’m not traveling; just catching up with friends and lounging about. However every time I scroll through Twitter (because its something I use in a personal capacity) I can’t help but see lots of work-related posts and links.

I don’t mind that, because I can ignore the majority and in an odd sort of way I quite enjoy maintaining some contact with what is happening in the world of public health in the UK. Particularly this week, of all weeks to be away from the office.

At times like these I just have to be mindful about what I use different social media platforms for, and what I say on them. I really value my job, so barring any genuine mistakes I am never likely to say anything inappropriate or political. For some people this presents a real challenge when managing their own profiles, because they feel it is an infringement of their right to free speech. There are some notable examples of test cases, including this one from the UK.

I don’t have an answer yet, but I do believe that as social media tools are adopted by more people, and used in a greater mix of personal and professional capacities, we’ll start to see greater understanding of the risks and benefits, both as individuals and employers or managers.

I’m keen to explore this subject some more, because its been a major theme of my Social Media Week experiences so far. Please share your thoughts and I’ll report back soon.

Tim is a contributor for the Social Media Week Global Editorial Team, based in the UK. He works in the digital communications team at the Department of Health.