social media marketing

It's a tough place out there at the moment, and it's widely believed that this current generation of kids/youths/young adults (delete the inappropriate) will be the first in modern history to be poorer and worse off than its parents.

So after Generation Y - Welcome Generation R (RENT).

As a marketing agency, we've been involved in youth marketing for some time now, and for us the 'back-to-school' promotional period is always really busy, but we can tell the times are changing. With less uni applicants, conflicting stats saying youth unemployment is up or down, and more fear creeping in with raising costs, everyone is looking at this space with a wide open and somewhat puzzled eye.

With two weeks left to go 'til Facebook Marketing Conference (18th Jul, ICO Conference Centre, London) we're very pleased to announce more amazing speakers joining our line-up from the likes of Cadbury Dairy Milk, Manchester City FC, TBG Digital, GlobalWebIndex and We Are Social.

That's in addition to our already super line-up: we'll be hearing from Nokia, BBC Worldwide, Yorkshire Tea and more! Find out more about our new speakers below.

There are a few tickets remaining, which you can get your hands on for only £145 + VAT. Check out the Facebook Marketing Bootcamp (17th July) for hands on training the day before the conference and if you fancy coming along to both the Facebook Marketing Bootcamp and Conference, grab a combo ticket for just £395 + VAT. Book your place now!

Finally, proof that social media marketing isn't just a case of cranking out a few Tweets, checking Facebook walls and Pinning pictures of shoes.

A post on Business Insider, reveals an infographic - and you know how we like a pretty picture - from Buddy Media's recent product launch, showing just some of the complexity of the current social media landscape.

Nick Bennett is a man with a number of digital achievements under his belt. Managing partner of STEEL London; NMA top 100 digital agency, a client list boasting a string of high profile brands and blogger for SocialMediaToday; Nick has extensive experience in creative social media strategy.

“It's not as difficult as it seems,” Nick says about this strategy, “...it's about being human.”  He elaborates on this point; “social media is about people; it's not the channels, it's not the next fad.. it's about people and how people behave.”

For a man that lists “making the world a little bit better” among his interests, Will McInnes isn't doing too badly. He's co-founder and MD of social media agency NixonMcInnes, he's a non-exec at Wired Sussex and he's spoken at TEDx Brighton about radicalising business. Only a “little”?

Internationally renowned speaker and CEO of PeopleBrowsr UK, Andrew Grill describes himself as “passionate about marketing.”

He tells me he's been an advocate for using technology to connect people for around thirty years – through the current form of social media, amateur radio and even the original online bulletin board. “We've started to call it social media in the last few years,” he says, “it's really about communication.”

Nokia is a brand that has never been afraid to hold it's own in the social space. No doubt as a result of this, they have a global audience of over seven million.

Tejal Patel leads social commerce at Nokia. She's passionate about the accountability and ROI of digital, and during her time with the brand she's been working to prove the value of their social efforts.