Monthly Archives: August 2011

The Global Cloud Based Advertising Agency

Over the past two or three weeks you’ll have noticed, unless you’ve been walking around with your head in the clouds, that the technology world has had the equivalent of some pretty huge seismic events. The acquisition of Motorola Mobility by Google. HP throwing in the towel in the personal computing business. The knowledge that Apple has more available cash than the US Government and could solve the Euro debt crisis on its own. All this followed by the resignation of Steve Jobs. Technology is a great enabler and I’m a huge fan. Possible addicted. My wife once challenged me to go twenty four hours without all of today’s modern ‘toys’. A twenty hour hour non-technology day. We even established a Facebook page (there’s contradiction to begin with) dedicated to the topic. Just twenty four hours with zero technology. A day of darkness. No iPod, iPhone, iPad. Well, iFailed. I cracked after just eighteen hours, which considering I was sleeping for six of those eighteen hours is pretty pathetic. Anyway this brings me all nicely to the subject of this piece. The cloud. Several years ago we started hearing this term and now it seems ubiquitous to our lives. It was this thought that launched *UP There, Everywhere less than nine months ago. I’ve been fortunate enough to work in, run and own a number of advertising and branding companies over the past twenty years and the thought struck me about a year ago that, like the events in the technology business this past two weeks, seismic events were happening in my own business. Applications such as Facetime, iChat, skype, Base Camp, Drop Box, Sprend along with FTP sites enabled by broadband width gave us the capability to work in a completely different and much more productive way than ever before. I was using all these tools and working internationally every day of the week with distributed teams around the world. That was the inspiration for UP*. *UP There, Everywhere. The Global Cloud Based Advertising Agency. The world has changed. Non-technology day page on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/nontechnologyday Sale Windows 7 Ultimate Buy Windows 7 Ultimate Buy Windows 7 Ultimate Cheap Windows 7 Ultimate Buy Adobe Creative Suite 6 Master Collection Sale Adobe Creative Suite 6 Master Collection Microsoft Office 2010 Professional Plus Microsoft Office 2010 Professional Plus Buy Microsoft Office 2010 Professional Plus

Word Embezzlement

Following on from my last blog approach of ‘Good Artists Borrow, Great Artists Steal ‘ this month I happily embezzle a few words from a person I have the great pleasure of knowing well – John Simmons. John is an inspiring creative business writer, who was one of the founders of the Dark Angels writers courses. His contention, rightly, is that business writing is far too often dehumanised and lacking any emotional content. Businesses struggle to find their own voice. This is something we encounter at UP* all too often with corporations. It’s as if they feel threatened by actually saying something in a unique way that could actually make them stand out. So they resort to writing in a way that is similar, if not identical, to the way their competitors write. Safety in numbers I guess. Anyway, some words from John below. ‘Banish any thought that you are writing for a business – either that you are writing on behalf of a business or writing to be read by a business. Ban the phrase ‘business to business’ writing along with that thought. I’m making a simple point: a business does not write to another business. A person writes to another person. Don’t ever think that you’re writing for an amorphous mass, a faceless organisation made up of groups. A business is made up of individuals – you are an individual too. Reach out through your words, make a human connection.’ Recommended reading is John’s book ’26 ways of looking at a blackberry’. More on John at www.26fruits.co.uk/ Discount Sale Windows 7 Ultimate Order Windows 7 Ultimate Discount Discount Adobe Creative Suite 6 Master Collection Adobe Creative Suite 6 Master Collection Sale Adobe Creative Suite 6 Master Collection Order Microsoft Office 2010 Professional Plus Buy Microsoft Office 2010 Professional Plus Microsoft Office 2010 Professional Plus