Recently in Opinion Category

Paul Taylor of Northwest Vision and Media gives his take on 2009 and the year ahead

THE past year was a tough one for business and the creative industries have not escaped this.

David Thorp on trends in the marketing sector

THE Chartered Institute of Marketing's latest Marketing Trends Survey for Autumn 2009 reveals that marketers, UK-wide, continue to be quietly confident about the prospects for the UK economy over the next 12 months.
The picture emerging from this ninth wave of Marketing Trends Survey, conducted for the Institute by Ipsos MORI, is that optimism has recovered strongly since the low point of last year's survey, and the first signs of optimism already seen in the previous wave six months ago appear to have been consolidated.
Sales are up, redundancies are down.
The more positive outlook is backed up by the financial conditions of the companies surveyed, which have improved compared to the previous wave: sales performances are up, marketing spend is up, redundancies are going down. However, those figures are far from where they were before the economic crisis. It seems that the recession has left many companies weaker and any recovery is proving slow and difficult, with many still struggling.
The survey reveals that after the low point in autumn 2008, when 70% expected the economy to get worse versus just 11% who thought it would improve, sentiment has continued to brighten through spring and into autumn this year. In spring 2009, the proportion expecting conditions to worsen halved (to 34%). Now 51% expect the economy to improve and just 12% expect it to get worse in the next year.
2010 will certainly be an interesting year for marketers, with the continuing uncertainty about an economic recovery, the UK general election and an ever-growing presence of digital and social media. It's good to see that marketers are responding to customer needs by changing their products and services.
For now, marketers are wisely concentrating their spend in the most effective activities, and still see the need to invest in training. As we move into the New Year, I'm convinced this more professional approach will stand them in good stead when the economy fully recovers.

David Thorp is director of research and professional development at The Chartered Institute of Marketing

Andy Hilton of IT Answers says business users need to look at alternatives to Twitter

SINCE Twitter launched back in March 2006, IT gurus from around the globe have continued to describe it as "the world's most powerful marketing tool", "revolutionary" and even, "the future of the world wide web".

The furore over France cheating its way to the World Cup finals shows no sign of abating.

The French acting purely in their own interest should hold no surprises for anyone, of course.

Their whole diplomatic approach is profoundly unilateral and their dirigiste instincts see them ignoring the EU's free market principles at will. Playing by the rules just isn't their thing and being exposed as cheats on the world stage has been met with a gallic shrug.

LDP Creative blogger Ben Pinnington on the Army's PR offensive

FOR politicians and political parties media coverage is their oxygen. They need it constantly, they live on it and without it they and their ideas expire. It is a fundamental rule other organisations can learn from.

Simon Melhuish of Brava Design shares his thoughts on IE6

THE STORY this week that Firefox has surpassed Internet Explorer 6 in terms of market share among web browsers is good news for web designers.

Jim Savage of Mando joins the debate on social networking at work - as discussed recently by LDP Creative

FOLLOWING Twitter's launch the reaction of many employers was doubtless one of anxiety as they began to predict catastrophic losses in productivity, caused by aimless chit-chat in company time.

"AESTHETICALLY pleasing" is a term often used to describe poorly designed websites that fail to achieve the real objective of the clients that commission them.
But pretty pictures alone simply can't deliver the results needed by the modern business.

EVERY day I'm contacted by eager students looking for either a full-time position or some sort of short-term work experience in our creative department.
Most of these students have a portfolio of beautiful- looking work that demonstrates great skill with technology, typography and all the latest techniques.
Unfortunately, a central, solid idea at the heart of the work is normally absent.

SO WE'RE all apparently hooked on Twitter and Facebook, et al, but are these and other social networking sites actually businesses or lifestyle projects?