1. Greetings

In the last month, the Imagine team has been working on some challenging projects. We have an ongoing in-house project that is developing well and we have seen the Tomorrow's Leaders programme go-live (see below). We have also been audited by the National Association of Approved Internet Services (NAAIS) and have been given approved status as an Internet solutions agency. The NAAIS logo acts as a 'Kite Mark' for professional competency obtained through a strict series of quality and capability criteria.

2. Tomorrow's Leaders

Imagine has been working closely with the Society of Chemical Industry (SCI) on a pioneering initiative to bring together and foster learning among young managers in science-based industry. The programme, appropriately named Tomorrow's Leaders, launched on 25th June and aims to build a community for members to network with some of today's industry leaders, their peers, consumers and suppliers. SCI has been marketing the programme to its 4,500 worldwide members and plans to grow the community with a number of well targeted resources. The I-cast section allows members to view live and archived video streams from heads of industry (today's leaders) and the Boardroom allows them to discuss the video streams in real-time and even pose questions to the speaker after his presentation. Members also communicate through two well proven community resources - the bulletin board and email newsgroup. Visit the site at www.tomorrows-leaders.net.

3. Feature - building a community

Creating a thriving online community is one of the most effective ways to build repeat visitors to your site. However, building a community is similar to building a brand - it takes time and commitment from a number of people. The first step is to build community awareness, which means marketing. A mixture of well targeted online and offline marketing is needed to spread the word about the community. This needs to be quite intense in the early days in order to achieve the second step of recruiting members. A useful technique when membership is low is to specify times that chat rooms are open so that everyone comes at the same time rather than throughout the day when the chat room may be empty.

When membership starts to rise, the third step is to communicate with them regularly to promote involvement and stimulate debate - surprisingly only 10-15% of members actually contribute to discussions (SitePoint). The fourth step is to manage the community by nominating moderators to help stimulate discussion, control troublesome members and obtain feedback from members. By acting on feedback, the site can be improved and new resources provided to continually build the community around its members.

4. Feature - part 2. offline marketing

Last month we looked at improving site visitor numbers through online marketing. However, most companies already have an established offline marketing strategy and business model (unless they are start-up dot-coms) into which your Internet strategy should be integrated. Here are some ways to achieve this:

• Publish your URL - your domain name should be added to as many appropriate places as possible to raise awareness (including stationary, packaging, advertising and merchandise).
• Online promotions - run special offers or competitions that require your consumers to go to your site to participate in. We are currently running a competition for Mars® Drink to win one of over 100 digital cameras.
• PR - write an article about your site including any interesting facts and figures or unique resources. Circulate this with relevant trade and consumer publications (magazines, journals, local / regional / national newspapers) radio stations and TV shows. If they like your story you could get free, well-targeted traffic.
• Dedicated advertising - an expensive way to target your client base but if you are selling online, promoting your site by offline advertising (magazine, radio, hoarding etc.) may pay-off.
• Transfer resources - add support resources (manuals, FAQ's, product/service support pages) for clients to refer to online that they would previously have referred to offline.
  

5. Useful Sites

Weather prediction seems to have improved from the days when Michael Fish was pushing magnetic icons around a map of the UK. Forecasts are not only more accurate but they are also more accessible via the Internet. Here are some of the best sites around to help you plan your summer days out:

• UK Met Office - Forecasting, UK flash weather warnings, educational resources, aviation resources for pilots - this is a comprehensive Government site.
• BBC Weather Section - Five day forecasting, weather in your local area and a cool screensaver from the BBC.
• Online Weather - Good worldwide foreacsting available from the Data Centre.
• Space Weather - Did you know there are 312 known potentially hazardous asteroids coming to Earth and that the solar wind is currently travelling at 377.9 km/s? All the space weather facts and figures you ever wanted are here.

6. Website of the month

Obsession is commonplace on the Internet, but coupled with talent it can reach new heights. The dubbinternet is one of these rare websites, Ed Wild (a medical student at Cambridge) holds a strange fascination with Dubbin - that strange substance people polish shoes with. Rumour has it that a tin of Dubbin once saved his life and he has since taken it upon himself to build a rather extensive website dedicated to furthering the Dubbin cause. Sections include Dubbin Facts, The History of Dubbin, Dubbin FAQ and our favourite - celebrity Dubbin Fans, where he genuinely photographs celebs brandishing tins of Dubbin. Past targets include Ann Widdecombe, Barbara Windsor and Richard Branson. The dubbinternet is an original, well-written, well-polished site, which, if you take it with a pinch of salt, is guaranteed to raise a smile.