Stilton Studios Blog

Sound Design for Online Game 'Icycle'

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 10:55:48 +0100

Stilton Studios have recently created the Sound Design along with Studio 42, for the seriously addictive online game ‘Icycle’ by DampGnat Games. Click the link to view (and try to beat the high scores!)

E-newsletters, what are they and how can they benefit your business?

Thu, 11 Jun 2009 11:50:40 +0100

Useful stats:

Over 1 billion people used e-mail in 2008 (many checking e-mail more than five times a day)

In 2008, 16 million households in Great Britain (65 per cent) had Internet access. This is an increase of just over 1 million households (7 per cent) over the last year and 5 million households (46 per cent) since 2002. Ref:www.statistics.gov.uk

What is an E-newsletter?

An e-newsletter is an on-line newsletter sent directly to your subscribers/mailing list by email.
Subscribers can also sign up to receive your e-newsletter from your website, increasing your mailing list.

What differentiates an E-newsletter from a normal email?

With an E-newsletter it is designed using your brand identity (logo) and can include images, photos and links directly to your website, blog and your social networking sites. You can manage all your mailing lists from one ‘Bulk e-mailer system’ and track who opens your e-newsletters, date and time, and if they click through to your website, which is invaluable information for marketeers! You can also create multiple e-newsletter campaigns to target specific users groups and see which campaign is more successful.

How do I manage and send E-newsletters?

E-newsletters can be managed and sent using a Bulk e-mailer application. This is accessed from a ‘back-end’ administration section. The Bulk e-mailer application is a database of your complete mailing list and all contacts generated from signing up on-line. From this database list you can target emails to specific lists you create, add, delete contacts and update as necessary. You can also personalize your e-newsletters with your client/customer name. All your existing mailing lists can be imported into the bulk e-mailer system so you can keep track of your entire mailing list, so as not to leave anyone out!

How do I know if my E-Newsletter is being opened/read?

With E-newsletters you have the ability to track who opens your email, what date and at what time of day. You can also see what e-newsletter campaign was more successful by how many people opened your email and who clicked through to your website (CTR - Click Through Rate).

Why use E-newsletters? How can they benefit your business?

Cost effective (free to send and free to receive)
Targeted marketing to your audience
Instantly delivered to readers throughout the world
Tailored with your own business branding and identity
Cultivate new sales opportunities
Increases your profile with your current customers
Can be used effectively in-line with your website, blog and social networking sites
Generates traffic to your website
Gives something back to your customers – if your e-newsletter has useful information in your specialist area, customers will be pleased to receive some helpful free advice

Where to go from here?

As part of your marketing plan for this year its not too late to consider using e-newsletters as a means of targeting your customers with useful information directly.

Unsure of setting up an E-newsletter facility yourself?, we can set you up with a system that is right for you with training and support to produce ongoing effective e-newsletters. Contact us to discuss how we can sort it for you!
T: 01273 277665

What is RSS? and how can it be used?

Fri, 05 Dec 2008 15:42:52 +0000

If your involved in the Marketing of your business then this info is for you!..

So what exactly is RSS?
RDF Site Summary, or Rich Site Summary, or Really Simple Syndication as it is most popularly called, is a way of reading news and information of your choice from across the web. The most common use for RSS is for news and blogs.

How can I use it for my business?
By adding an RSS Feed to your Website or Blog, regularly updating it and getting users to subscribe to your RSS feed is rather like users having a direct live link to your latest news page, that notifies them of any updates when you update your latest news section - This is described as Syndication. A great asset for business and customers alike. It also means that subscribers are actually reading information that has interested them enough to subscribe!

Alternatively if there are websites that you want to keep regularly updated with, subscribe to their RSS feed and you will be updated as and when they update their latest news pages. You can subscribe to as many RSS feeds as you like. All your RSS feeds you subscribe to are all in one place so you can catch up with all your news from one convenient location.

Benefits:
Main benefits are;

Helps increase qualified traffic to your website

Keeps your subscribers updated with your news content
Easy to update your feeds
Cost effective form of online marketing

Subscribing to a Feed:

What will I need to subscribe?
You will need a browser, internet connection and a reader (or aggregator). The process for subscribing to a feed varies from reader to reader. One is to enter the URL of the RSS feed into your aggregator. The other is to follow a subscribe link from a web page.

Whats an Aggregator?
A feed aggregator, also known as a feed reader, news reader or simply as an aggregator, is software or a Web application which corrolates syndicated web content such as news headlines, blogs, podcasts, and vlogs in a single location for easy viewing. Once subscribed to a feed, an aggregator is able to check for new content at user-determined intervals and retrieve the update. Users can easily unsubscribe from a Feed.

What is Syndication?
Syndication is the supply of material for re-use and integration with other material across the net such as RSS Feeds.

If you would like a RSS Feed set up for your business Contact us for more info T: 01273 277665

Subscribe to our Stilton Studios RSS News Feed

May 1^st 2008 was RSS Awareness Day
http://www.dailyblogtips.com/may-1st-rss-awareness-day-get-involved/

Social Networking sites

Tue, 09 Sep 2008 18:17:40 +0100

Below is our list of Social Networking sites broken down into categories that best describe their focus;

General

Bebo
Gets its name from ‘blog early, blog often…’, general user-base.
MySpace
Most popular social networking site globally. Most customisable amongst top sites.

Facebook
Successful social networking site, with applications that can be used to gather new members.
Friends Reunited
UK based social network. Main feature is connecting school friends.
Windows Live Spaces
A multipurpose social networking and blogging tool. Intregrates well with MSN messenger.

Business

Ecademy
Build your stature in social networking terms, through various levels. Setup groups and schedule meetings.
Linkedin
See other peoples contacts to expand your range of networks and outsource skills.
Xing
Manage business contacts globally. Use as a human resource tool and search for members.
Brownbook
A free business directory. Networking through reviews of your business. Spread word of mouth through recommendation.
Plaxo
Connect al your social networking sites together and sync contacts and calendars.

Photosharing

Flickr
Social networking around an image gallery framework, Flickr is one of the first web 2.0 apllications.
smugmug
Online gallery and network that incorporates e-commerce. Requires a subscription fee and is most suitable for professional photographers.

Messaging/microblogging

Twitter
Send and receive short updates between friends (microblogging). Notable for its ability to send from mobile phone or web to a website.
friendfeed
Collects feeds of web pages, photos, videos and music that your friends and family are sharing, and displays them in one place.

Bookmarking

Digg
One of the earliest social bookmarking sites, it allows you to see what other members are looking at on the web. Useful to get a picture of what sites are successful in your field.
Technorati
Social bookmarking with a bias toward monitoring blog updates.
Del.icio.us
Share bookmarks with friends and discover new sites. Differs in the organisation and hierarchy of discovered links.

Video

Youtube
Combines video sharing and posting with networking tools. New content can be time consuming to produce, but has excellent potential as viral marketing.

Music and Radio

Jango
A a free social music service that lets you create your own custom radio stations and share them with friends and others who share musical tastes.
Last.fm
Last.fm builds a detailed profile of each user’s musical taste by recording details of all the songs the user listens to, either on the streamed radio stations or on the user’s computer.

We wanna be top of the 'T'

Mon, 08 Sep 2008 17:21:00 +0100

Hi, if you find this blog useful please vote for our t-shirt at a great site called ‘teetonic.com’. They make some trendy,cool and downright groovy t-shirts and we have entered ours into the competition.

You can vote for us by clicking the image below:

Online Social Networking in Business

Thu, 28 Aug 2008 12:15:00 +0100

What is Social Networking?

Online social networking can be defined as the interaction between other Internet users via a web interface. This usually consists of message boards, photo galleries, contact details, favourite links etc. The purpose is to connect other users with similar tastes, interests or contacts.

What are the Advantages?

Networking 24/7
If this sounds to you like the common business practice of Networking, you would be correct! There is however one fundamental difference, Web based Social networking can be working for you in your absence and twenty four hours a day!

Online Social Networking is a huge phenomena and given the press that websites such as Facebook and MySpace have had, you may be forgiven for thinking that this is for students to pass notes, or to organise their diaries. While this is undoubtedly the case, the potential to use this as a marketing tools has begun to be realised.

The depth of potential for this form of marketing can be seen in the following;

‘84 percent of American Internet users have used the Internet to contact or get information from an online group—more than have used the Internet to read news, search for health information, or to buy something. ‘

src: http://entrepreneurs.about.com/od/onlinenetworking/a/10steponlinenet.htm

Recommendation
Bringing your clients together can have an effect similar to word of mouth recommendation and is also another valuable point of contact. It is also an extremely economical form of direct marketing to advise of new products and services with immediate effect. This is especially true of Sites such as ‘Twitter’ that allow you to send messages directly from your mobile phone to your user base.

Search Engine Results
Use of social networking can often dramatically improve your search engine ranking, with inbound links for social network sites to your website resulting in higher search engine listings, particularly in the case of Blogging (web diaries) where valuable and informative content can drive traffic to your site.

Feedback and Monitoring
Social networking is a two way process and can allow you to obtain important feedback from your users. Monitoring comments posted or messages received, can allow you to respond quickly to address any problems that arise in your business. The resulting effect is a more positive experience for your customers and a higher percentage of recommendation.

Social networking is also being used as an internal communication strategy with companies such as CISCO using facebook to disseminate to its workforce of 1500.

What are the Disadvantages?

The downside of social networking can be the drain on resources that can be required to maintain a strong presence in this area.

Infrequent updates in your social networking posts can effect your readership. If users find there is no new content or information they may drift away. Search engine algorithms pick up on content change and this can lead to poor placement if no new information has been posted.

Conversely, too many posts can lead to frustration in your readership as they struggle to keep up with information overload.

Src: http://www.problogger.net/archives/2008/06/11/what-is-the-ideal-post-frequency-for-a-blog/

How We Can Help

Careful management of these tools is the key.

Stilton Studios are developing a new service to help businesses achieve the best profile in the online social networking and blogging world. We will recommend the most appropriate format for your needs from the wide range of services available, instigate the process if required and maintain regular updates to ensure all is running smoothly.

See Our website for more details…

What are Internet Scams, Phishing, Viruses and Spyware?

Mon, 18 Aug 2008 15:56:42 +0100

Scams and hoaxes

Internet scams are often chain email hoaxes that involve removing a file from the users computer as it is warned that this file is a dangerous threat. Often the user may be tricked into removing a file which is necessary for the computer operating system.

Phishing

Phishing usually begins with an email that urges you to enter your banking details into a web page to update records. The web page is designed to convince you of its authenticity and steal your banking sort codes and pin numbers. Signs that an email is untrustworthy are frequent mis-spelling, lack of 128 bit encryption (padlock symbol), and an incorrect URL.

Viruses

Viruses are malicious software applications that are designed to corrupt your computer data. They can be passed from computer to computer via illegal software, emails and text document macros. There are many commercial and free software applications designed to identify and remove computer viruses.

Spyware

Spyware is unauthorised software that monitors your internet usage and steals the information that you unwittingly provide. For example, this can see web pages you have visited or keystrokes input into e-commerce or banking sites. Spyware can be picked up in similar ways to viruses or be included with any downloads. Some Spyware is sent to see your buying habits and to advertise to you in a targeted fashion.

There are many commercial and free software applications designed to identify and remove Spyware from your computer.

Robots that are more human?

Mon, 18 Aug 2008 10:43:01 +0100

Robots that are more human?:

The latest innovations and prototypes with eerie facial expressions are on display at the SIGGRAPH Conference & Exhibition in Los Angeles.

Stilton Studios Facebook group

Fri, 15 Aug 2008 17:57:04 +0100

Stilton Studios Facebook group:

Join the Stilton Studios Facebook Group and invite your friends.

Slow Motion Lightning

Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:10:31 +0100

Slow Motion Lightning:

Fascinating to see fork lightning in slow motion!

Wii Jamming

Fri, 08 Aug 2008 10:58:09 +0100

Wii Jamming:

Jam sessions with the Wii! playing Guitar, Violin, Drums and percussion. Check it out!…

Chat with Artificial Intelligence

Wed, 06 Aug 2008 18:21:00 +0100

Not like talking to yourself! or chatting up a pocket calculator!… this one is great!

http://www.pandorabots.com/pandora/talk?botid=a84468c2ae36697b

try this one too!

http://demo.vhost.pandorabots.com/pandora/talk?botid=b0dafd24ee35a477

Collision 2008

Thu, 31 Jul 2008 17:16:45 +0100

Collision 2008:

Collision is an annual festival of moving image, music, art and performance.

Uses of the internet...

Mon, 28 Jul 2008 09:38:00 +0100

The internet is a useful resource for communication and commerce. It can be used as a research tool or for purely educational purposes.

Video sharing sites, web games and internet radio have made a large impact on entertainment markets.

With the advent of Web 2.0 social networking websites have become increasingly popular, offering an addictive means of keeping in touch, or just people watching.

As an educational tool the web has enormous potential, although care must be taken to ensure information is cross-referenced as the internet is a largely unregulated medium.

The internet has had a huge global effect on marketing and selling of goods through e-commerce systems and is arguably the biggest force in globalisation.

What is a modem and how does it work?

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 10:13:04 +0100

Modem as an acronym for modulator demodulator.

A modem is commonly used to connect to the internet by converting analog signals passed through telephone lines into digital information such as web pages and email.

What is Malware?

Sat, 12 Jul 2008 11:33:00 +0100

Malware is a general term for malitious software, such as a virus or spyware.

It is design to disrupt, destroy or steal information from computer systems.

Antivirus XP 2008

Sat, 12 Jul 2008 11:15:00 +0100

Antivirus XP 2008 is a sneaky and downright insideous piece of malware (laywers note -allegedly).
It installed itself on to my computer without any confirmation from myself (possibly piggybacked on a virus) and delivers what I believe to be fictional warnings, used to induce the purchase of this software.

HELP IS AT HAND !

The antidote is a fabulous piece of software called ’ MALWAREBYTES Anti-Malware’

This a very thorough piece of antivirus software that picks up more than my usual software did!

We should note that we are not affiliated with this company, but we would like to show some gratitude for doing such a good job!

What is the difference between the Internet, Intranet and Extranet?

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 12:26:00 +0100

The Internet is an open means of communicating with any computer using a communications protocol called Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol or TCP/IP.
This usually takes the form of web pages that are accessed through a web browser.

An Intranet uses the same underlying technology as the internet but is a closed system that is on a local network and cannot be seem by people outside of that network. This usually takes the form of an internal company Intranet that uses web pages to disseminate information to a company workforce without the information being accessible to the general public.

An Extranet is usually built for the same purposes as an Intranet i.e. to inform a company workforce, however, this is accessible via the internet. Unauthorised access is prevented via username and password protection. This allows employees to view company details outside of work networks, for example at home.

Rosy Lipped Batfish

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 11:03:41 +0100

Rosy Lipped Batfish:

This is amazing, nothing to do with multimedia but theres some crazy fish out there!

Expo Brighton

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 14:41:29 +0100

Expo Brighton 4-6 July 2008 The UK’s largest weekend of free sound art and experimental music.
http://expofestival.org/