From Unemployed to Ambassador – How the Prince’s Trust helped me.

The Prince’s Trust does not save lives. It doesn’t change them either.

It gives young people the power to change their own lives and gives them skills they will use for years to come.

This, among many reasons, is why I feel so passionate about the Trust.

When I joined the Team Programme in June 2013, my confidence and prospects were at an all time low. Without going into already covered territory, I was in a pretty bad place and needed a kick up the backside.

I agreed, after an annoying (yet necessary as it turned out) amount of pressure from my JobCentre adviser, to attend the open event and see what the fuss was about. The idea of spending twelve weeks in a room with people I didn't know was an image of hell for my introverted self.

My life changed after the first day.

I immediately opened myself up to possibilities and opportunities with the intention of experiencing everything I possibly could from those 3 months. I found myself doing things I never would have considered – like getting in a canoe despite having a gripping fear of drowning.

I didn't finish the programme and immediately go into work, as some young people assume will happen. I gave everything to that course but the opportunity for work just wasn't there. However, I knew full well that the skill set the course gave me would lead, however long it took, to better and more fulfilling job prospects. This, it has done – I am now a proud social media apprentice for West Midlands Fire Service, a fantastic job and the start of what will hopefully be a successful career.

Just over a year on, I am privileged to say that I am a Young Ambassador for the Trust, and am due to attend my first event in early October. What has been given to me in terms of confidence, skills and positivity is a debt that can’t be repaid with any number of promotional events that I speak at.

The summer of intake of Young Ambassadors for the Midlands

What I hope is that I can encourage young people to get involved with what is, in fact, a fantastic and essential charity in this country. If every young person was able to get participate in the huge range of courses offered, the future of this country would look very bright indeed.

Young people are the future of this country. Their well being, their prospects, and their attitude are essential to how we progress as a nation. Whatever our age or background, we all have a responsibility to give something to the people who will determine how we live our lives in the future. This is something The Prince’s Trust have set about doing with fantastic schemes and programmes that will, and I repeat with certainty, WILL give young people the skills to change their lives.

Let me tell you a story.

On Wednesday night, I was on my way home from poker at the pub after a good night. I’d had a couple of beers and had that pleasant fuzzy feeling one gets before destroying it with “just one more.”

I passed a guy in the city centre who was clearly homeless. He didn’t ask me for money. In fact, he barely lifted his head to acknowledge he had even noticed me. I carried on walking for a few yards. Then turned back.

Handing him the food and drink I had just bought from McDonalds, which he accepted gratefully, I sat down next to him. I sat there for probably about half an hour, listening to him talk about his problems and his life.

Before leaving, I gave him £5. This was both all I could really afford, and it was a minimal amount so that he may make the most of it and appreciate it more. I told him to spend it wisely, to which he promised he would and then went on my way.

After work the next day, I saw him again. This time, he was sat on a wall with a woman, clutching a can of cheap lager. He noticed me, and called his thanks, raising his can and smiling. My heart sank and I reprimanded myself for my own folly in giving him money.

But, being an overly analytical person, I began to look at it from a different angle.

First; he was smiling. Regardless of whether was drinking beer or not, he was smiling. This was a stark contrast to the miserable man I had seen huddled in his coat on the high street the previous night.

Second, I considered the person he was with. He had told me that he had split up with his partner and she had kicked him out, leading to his current situation. Was this the same woman? I can’t make assumptions, but I believed it to be her and it made me glad to see that they were at least on talking terms – hopefully something that will lead to an improvement to his circumstances.

Third, his thanks. He recognised me and made the effort to thank me for what I had done. Of course, there’s always the potential that he was mocking me as he had lifted the can in the traditional “cheers” movement, but I have more faith in humanity than that!

Reflecting on this story, I can look at it one of two ways. Either I made a huge mistake and gave a homeless alcoholic money after he told me his sob story, or I genuinely helped a guy and brought even the smallest amount of light to his night/day.

More valuable than the money or the food that I gave to him, was the time I spent with him. Having been in a similar situation myself, I can understand the sheer loneliness of being on the streets, so having someone just to listen to you and to talk to would be a huge thing that a price can’t define.

It might be that I made a mistake by doing it, but there was no getting away from the fact that he was smiling and grateful when I saw him the next day. This post isn’t to say “oh, look what I did.” It’s more to ask people to think about things from a different angle now and then. Things are usually more than they appear on the surface.

From my perspective, I tried to help the guy and I gave him the option to help himself by feeding himself for even just a couple of days. He chose to spend the money that way, so I have no regrets.

Did I make a mistake? Should I be disappointed that he had spent that money on a couple of beers, even if that’s what made him happy? Let me know your thoughts below.

Should you be on Google+?

There’s been a lot of talk this year about the rise of Google+ as a social network. It is now the second largest, behind only Facebook. Experts predict that by May 2016, it will overtake Facebook in the social sharing kingdom – a staggering consideration when you think it currently accounts for a measly 2% of the global sharing (onlinemediadirect.co.uk).

What’s so great about Google+ then? It seems that almost nobody I know personally uses it as a social network.

Well, having done lots of research on the platform for work, it appears to me to be one of the most underrated options out there for marketers and brands.

It pins together a lot of the features of its competitors (and tweaking them, it is worth adding) and adds its own unique features to create a user experience that is actually pretty fantastic.

Of course, there’s also the additional feature of Hangouts, a video platform in which, from a marketing perspective, a company can hold live Q&As or open forums to gather opinions.

The simple fact, ladies and gentlemen, is that Google+ simply just isn’t big in this country. Across the pond, its fantastic potential is being realised and we need to follow suit and get on there before it becomes the “thing” that every business automatically does.

Remember, also, that with Google+, you can link all Google products under one account, a rather neat move by the online giant. There just seems to be something really smooth about the way you don’t have to log in to each account and can share your thoughts from Youtube automatically on G+.

“Circles” is also a slick way of grouping your contacts and allows you to ensure that your content is seen by a specific group, rather than a generic audience. This allows you to filter which content goes where, maximising the relevance of your content to its audience.

Facebook, of course, is still the biggest platform. The focus of my research for work has been kind of “Facebook vs Google+.” My perspective? Why not Facebook AND Google+?

There’s certainly the attitude that “Facebook is dying” or that it is past its peak. Be that as it may, it is still by far the largest platform and has a rather frightening dominance in the social media realm. This simply can’t be ignored, whether the company be big or small, private or public sector.

So, which should you be on, if you HAD to choose just one? Both platforms have their benefits and their drawbacks and it all really does depend on what you want out of social media. Perhaps this a rather sketchy analogy, but allow me to refer you to my main man José Mourinho, following criticism from his Man City counterpart that Chelsea were overspending. He said that Man City were building a team for now, to succeed whereas Chelsea were building a team for long term success in the future, even if it meant failure in the immediate term.

My opinion? Man City is Facebook, where the audience are now. But if you want to get ahead of the game and build a social media platform that is yet to establish itself, you need to get on Google+ (and also start supporting Chelsea. Just saying).

Poppy Ingham: My Apprenticeship, My Company & My New Found Career in Social Media and Marketing

With the prospects of my final A-Level exams on the horizon, the daunting task of filling out UCAS and the uncertainty of what I even wanted to do with my life - I couldn’t help but feel slightly put off with the traditional methods of education. I felt isolated and forced into the educational “norm” of school, college and then universities. These pressures were not only laid onto me from friends and family - but by my college tutors too. “You’ll have a brilliant time at universities!” they’d all exclaim - and that’s exactly why I’d go, for the fun and the experience. Do I really want to commit for three or four years studying something I might not even want to do in the end? No thank you.

Instead, at 17 years old, I made the unnerving choice to drop out of college, move 50 miles away to a town I’ve never even heard of and take a different and totally unspoken approach of building a career. This was a terrifying experience, though I’m sure my sheer impulsiveness and “bravery” warmed my friends and family to support me - my college tutors? Not so much, but who cares about that anymore?

I’ve always loved media. I gained an A grade in my AS Levels and it was one of the only subjects I really loved and could see myself working in. I was only made aware of mostly traditional media in my studies; the structure of newspapers and radio production. At this point, I didn’t even know social media could be classed as a real job. It seemed too good to be true, right?!

I fell into an interview at my company, SocialSignIn, rather abruptly and last minute. I was fortunate enough to be given the place a mere 7 minutes after I left my interview.

SocialSignIn is a fairly new company - we celebrated our first, proper birthday in April this year. Quite simply, SocialSignIn is a software dashboard that allows organisations to manage their social channels from one place. From this one place, you can post out, schedule, plug in RSS feeds, monitor key words and phrases and even grab all your analytics. We found our wide niche audience by speaking to UK based companies - we’re awake when you are! Our clients include the likes of Staffordshire Police, Kirklees Council, Luminar Group and BAE Systems. We even work with The Square Kilo Array - soon to be the worlds largest radio telescope, how cool is that?

My role at the company is anything from customer service (providing training webinars for new clients, being the chatty person on our live messaging service on our website) to content creating, weekly marketing emails and giving demonstrations to potential clients. I like to get involved with a little bit of everything!

Since working for SocialSignIn, I’ve noticed just how many companies are getting on board with various social media channels. It’s not just the strictly technical companies, it’s universities, housing societies, pet foods (yes, we have the lovely Burn’s Pets Foods as a client) and many more.

There is no longer the excuse of “I don’t have time for social media”, as software such as our dashboard allows you to manage your accounts quickly and in house - be it scheduling a few posts for the upcoming week or bulk uploading 12 months worth of Tweets, even plugging in an RSS feed to our dashboard to give you some pre-created content in an area related to you.

I’ve realised the true value of social media in business now. I feel rather disheartened or even “put off” when I’m interested in a company but they aren’t on Twitter or Facebook. “I’d really like to visit this cafe but - oh - no, wait, they aren’t online. How should I know what they’re actually like?”

Moreover, if I have a question, I tend to turn to social media.

On Twitter, I tend to post out “Where should I go for dinner tonight in Birmingham?”

Our dashboard provides a social listening tool. Bars and restaurants could use our software to search for the words ‘dinner’ ‘tonight’ in a proximity of 3 miles from Birmingham. Furthermore, our councils can use us if disgruntled locals Tweet something such as “I hate my council.” They weren’t been mentioned directly, but if someone Tweets that in the Aberdeen area and Aberdeen Council use our listening tool, they can presume it is about them and reply as they see fit.

I feel companies who aren’t efficiently managing their social accounts or don’t feel it’s worth being online may be missing out on a huge potential audience. I’m the era of millennials, generation Y - social media is my directory, my enquiry form and my main purpose of networking.

Come on - step away from those traditional business strategies and get onboard with the online craze. If SocialSignIn could help you, or if you’d just like a friendly chat about your social media, feel free to chat to me on Twitter or find me on LinkedIn - happy to connect! 

Social Media: A means to an ends for Joe Stapleton.

Following Chris Moneymaker’s fairy tale World Series of Poker Main Event win in 2003, where he beat 839 opponents to win $2.5m having qualified online, poker saw a new era. Thousands of new players took to the felt, believing that they could follow Moneymaker, a former accountant, into wealth, fame and the history books.

Since that momentous day, Main Event fields have swelled to thousands, peaking at 8773 in 2006, when Jamie Gold took the mind blowing top prize of $12,000,000.

This rapid growth can be likened to the social media explosion. Now, in 2014, social media has become almost unrecognisable compared to its infant self a decade ago. Far from being just a way of updating your friends and family on your eating and toilet habits, it is now a way of marketing yourself, your brand, and most importantly: networking.

The rise of televised poker, and following that online live streams, has been incorporated into social media, leading to viewers being offered the chance to put their views across, while having fun watching their favourite game. #EPTLive, which is quickly increasing in popularity.

Joe Stapleton, co-host of the live stream and regular poker commentator on Channel 4, said: “I love the EPTLive viewers. The interaction with them is a major part of the show, and I’d dread a live stream without it because the action can sometimes be slow. I love social media for that purpose.”

It’s not all sweet smelling roses when it comes to social media for Joe, though. Wary of the number of trolls online, he asserts that almost every positive of social media can also have a negative impact. He offers an example:

“You can rapidly spread information and ideas, but the negative is that it can also spread false information and hateful ideas.”

Hardly a point that can be argued with, when one considers the number of times it’s been falsely reported someone famous or influential has died for the sake of retweets and the minority of people who seem set on causing misery with constant and unwarranted abuse.

The concession has to be made though, that social media is a huge part of professional networking, and is the best way to build influence and a contact list that could prove to be useful. Building relationships with people online has become a key part of becoming successful, particularly in the digital industry, or in a job where being exposed to the media is a regular thing.

“Even though I need [social media] for my job and mostly enjoy it, I would avoid it entirely if I didn’t,” Joe explains. “I post on social media to be better known in my field, but more importantly; beyond my field.”

This is a poignant point that we can examine with interest – social media, which used to be purely about socialising with those you love or care about, has become a tool more than anything. It is a necessary part of improving one’s chances of chances in an industry.

This is actually reflective of a recent session at The Juice Academy our group had with Sian Ediss, Head of Social at Online Ventures Group, which I will discuss in an upcoming post. She stressed the importance of using social media in the best way possible, even outside of our jobs.

Although he appreciates the benefits and necessity of social media, Joe remains unconvinced:

“I’m not sure its positive impacts outweigh its negatives. I follow my friends because I’m interested in how they’re doing. But apart from that, it’s not really my idea of fun.”

Do you agree with Joe, and use social media as a means to an end? Or do you use it because you love it? Let me know in the comments section.

Pictures courtesy of Neil Stoddart.

Living the social media dream.

I've been here at West Midlands Fire Service for 4 months already! Time has absolutely flown by and it's been quite a journey.

It's crazy to think that 4 months (and 1 day) ago, I was still unemployed and looking desperately for any job that I could get my hands on. Social media didn't even occur to me as a career, but now? I couldn't imagine doing anything else.

It's been a bit of a drastic transformation – from being jobless and hopelessly having my fingers crossed for a supermarket job, to being on the bottom rung of an exciting and opportunity-filled career ladder.

So, I say opportunity filled, but what opportunities have I had? I've conducted interviews, most notably with the Chief Fire and Rescue Adviser to the UK Government, Peter Holland CBE. Great experience for me as someone who loves to talk to people and develop my confidence in doing so. He's also a fan of my beloved Chelsea. Happy days.

Possibly one of the most rewarding and heart warming of the opportunities I've had so far was to meet Destiny Africa, a Ugandan choir made up of orphans. I found their happiness inspiring, and felt privileged to spend a morning with them. They’re also extremely talented, giving us a sneak peek into what they can do.

The work itself has also been fantastic. I still look forward to getting up every morning for work (even though I still struggle with the 5:30 am start), which is something not everyone can say. I get to do a huge variety of stuff, with the constant flexibility to try my hand at something new and creative. It's great to be a part of a team that works well together and gets on, making for a productive workplace, but just as importantly, the ability to have a laugh at work.

I can't forget, of course, the training given to me at The Juice Academy - something I always look forward to. It's always good to go there and catch up with the other apprentices, and also to learn a whole load of new stuff that I can apply to my work at WMFS. The journey to Manchester? A little arduous perhaps, but well worth what awaits me at journey's end.

My passion for the industry just keeps growing and growing. This may sound geeky, but I find myself at home looking through what’s new in social media, keeping up on SocialMediaExaminer.com, doing research into anything I might be able to develop into the fold at work, and just trying to increase my knowledge of social and the ways in which it can be used. I've always had a burning desire to improve, and this has been consolidated in the last few months – I don't want to just do my job, or to be an employee of the industry; I have an unquenchable thirst to do more and to be more.

I can definitely see an improvement in myself since I have been here – my communication has certainly got better, and I feel like I can put my own ideas across more assertively – something I have struggled with previously. Not only that though, I feel like I've developed as a person. I'm happier, and feel like I live a more fulfilled life, which is brilliant.

So, to sum up: life is good. I love this job, I love the prospects it's giving me, I love the opportunities I've had, I love that it's developing me as a person and most of all? I love that it's breeding a passion for (hopefully) a long and successful career.

The Juicy Revolution: How Tangerine PR hit a sweet spot.

I began this blog with a post that championed the apprenticeship scheme, and praising in particular the fantastic course at The Juice Academy, the brainchild of Tangerine PR.

As if that point needed to be justified, The Juice Academy (TJA) have now done so by announcing that a THIRD apprentice from their first cohort has secured permanent employment after their apprenticeship has finished.

The latest in the string of successes, Rob Watts of PH Creative, said “I'm ecstatic. 12 months ago I had no idea what I wanted to do, but now I can’t imagine myself doing anything else.”

This is a sentiment I can repeat myself, much like an elongated echo in the Grand Canyon. I didn't imagine I would ever be employed in a role where I’m using social media on a day to day basis, and it’s thanks to TJA that I’m now completely head over heels in love with a career that ten years ago, didn’t even exist.

For Rob though, a career in marketing has appealed to him for a long time. Having successfully completed his A levels, he shunned the idea of university and instead began applying for apprenticeships. He explained:

“From day one I knew I wanted to go straight into work. I feel that I've learned more at TJA than I would at university.”

The immediate impact that the Academy has had on the social media industry, as well as the apprenticeship scheme in general, is astounding. It offers a unique and well built programme of study in an industry where there is a chasm in the skills required (trying to restrain myself from using The Grand Canyon again. But you get the idea).

Life is exciting for these apprentices (including myself). We get opportunities that we simply wouldn’t get in any other job. Some of mine are detailed in our #SMAvlog. Rob had an incredible opportunity himself:

“I was given the chance to help out at the Hillsborough variety awards evening. It built up my confidence and I got to meet some of the legends from Liverpool FC.”

Rob with Liverpool FC's second keeper, Brad Jones

So, where has the success come from? The need for skills is an obvious reason. But social media apprenticeships are popping up left, right and centre at the minute, so what has Tangerine PR done to set themselves apart?

Well, they are in the industry. They are the experts, and they are training young people to become experts. This is a unique situation, and they've grasped it firmly with both hands. It’s incomparable to anything else that has been done – they have found a niche and fulfilled one of the great needs this country, and indeed the world, has.

I have nothing but praise for The Juice Academy. The sessions they organise are not just informative and useful, but they also are taught by people who are passionate about what they do, which for me, is the most essential thing.

For anyone reading this who isn't already a part of TJA, but wants to get into the industry – I highly recommend it. Regardless of the general benefits of an apprenticeship, this particular scheme is fantastic – both for businesses and potential apprentices.

For the brand new apprentices in Cohort 4, Rob has some advice that I whole heartedly agree with: “Work hard, don't be afraid to speak, and grab every opportunity you can.”

Wise words indeed. 

For me, there is no comparison between this job and any other apprenticeship programme. Hats off to Tangerine PR for what is a brilliant and innovative course that will provide long term benefits not just to the apprentices they hire, but also to the entire industry. Viva la juicy revolution. 

What are your thoughts on apprenticeships? Do you have any advice for new apprentices? Let me know in the comments section below.