Here at Tartle Media, we ghostwrite articles for national business publications, many of which include insightful comments from entrepreneurs and leaders. We collect those comments up, select the best, and then we ask each spokesperson (or their PR rep) to supply a headshot. About 30% will reply saying they have no headshots, another 20% might send us something that looks like it was taken at a rave in the Eighties, or in their back garden (shed in view). Some eager PRs hurriedly shoot their clients using iPhones, and then we’re sent images that are slightly wonky, or slightly out of focus ..read more

Writing a fantastic piece of content can induce untold stress. You tinker with sentence structure and flow for hours, only to find no one clicks on your masterpiece because the headline is letting you down. The headline of your article is like a first impression – you only get one chance, so it needs to turn heads. But there are plenty of things at play to confuse matters. What's the ideal length? Just how important is search engine optimisation (SEO)? Where's the line between clickable and clickbait? As former multimedia journalists, we’ve had rather a long time to think about this, and to ..read more

"Should I be using LinkedIn if I’m trying to reach consumers and I’m not selling to other businesses?". This question crops up frequently when we talk to startups. We’re all stretched, and if you’re selling baseballs, beer, or bundt cakes, LinkedIn – the professional networking site – is hardly going to be your first choice social media platform when Instagram and Facebook are a better fit. But there are five good reasons B2C companies should, regularly, dedicate some time to LinkedIn... 1. To build an ‘employer’ brand If you struggle to hire good people, LinkedIn is where they’re lurking ..read more

Ever lived through that excruciating moment when you have to introduce two people and their names appear to have vanished from your memory? That common social faux pas is called a ‘tartle’. This Scots word has no literal translation in English but probably should. In fact, there are many wonderful untranslatable words we can borrow from other languages that perfectly summarise ideas and concepts we’re all familiar with. At Tartle Media, we’re ghostwriters and copywriters, not just PR people. We have to simplify what business folk have been struggling to encapsulate in one company strapline ..read more

It is quite possible to do your own PR if you know how. I've been mentoring startups for a few months now, and one of my proudest moments was last week, when a mentee who runs eponymous lingerie business EllaVine.co.uk emailed to say she needed to postpone our next session because she'd been inundated with orders. Why? Because Ella had got herself and her business featured in Mail Online – the biggest news site in the world – Daily Star Online and on the front page of her local paper in Essex. In just 48 hours, almost £1,500 worth of orders had come in from as far away as Australia, and the r ..read more

If there were a bootstrapping award, it’d surely go to software designer and developer Max Shelley, who spent just £8 securing his first two paying customers. And his method is easy to replicate. Max built a simple landing page offering email marketing design. He spend his £8 budget on Adwords to drive traffic to it and, during the evenings, he manned the page’s live chat window, waiting for visitors to fire questions at him. He recalls: “I knew my skills were a scarcity in business, and that I was offering a niche service, but it was even easier than I thought.” Max, 33, believes lead pages ..read more

Commonly the stomping ground for digital marketers, an SEO conference is almost alien territory for your friendly neighbourhood PR man.But I have heard tales of the legendary Brighton SEO: from humble beginnings, it now attracts visitors from all over the world.I ventured forth to discover the insights of PRs less-charismatic sibling and learn from the SEO conference that packs out the Brighton Centre year after year.While I’m sure you’d love to hear my thoughts on the goodie bags and complimentary doughnuts, I’ll cut to the main thrust - the truly mind-boggling schedule of talks. For every co ..read more

When Tom Parslow's dad retired from the IT department at Brighton council, he did what many retirees do, and got himself a job.Bill Parslow's part-time role was as a 'Games Master' for Escape Rooms, which meant he got to flex his talent for acting and storytelling. Tom Parslow secured his first Escape Room customer before he'd written any codeHe soon noticed the company's analogue approach was slowing them down. Players were handed paper feedback cards on their way out saying 'please leave us a review'. Every souvenir team photograph was individually branded with their logo on Photoshop, creat ..read more

There was a time when posting job vacancies – or being Apple – was the only way to grow followers on your LinkedIn company page.Company pages were the neglected distant cousin of personal profiles, unloved and unnoticed. But LinkedIn has been busy giving them a makeover.Analytics tools now provide rich visitor data, the mobile app has been vastly improved, community hashtags are making companies easier to find, and the new Content Suggestions tool (which, to be honest, could be a lot better) helps you find content to share that'll boost engagement. New-look company page analytics show engageme ..read more

We're in the business of bagging press coverage for our startup clients, so if we were to keep all the pickings for ourselves, they might have a few choice words for us.But occasionally, we have a little flutter...Here are a few bits we made earlier, with more to follow, just as soon as our clients stop nicking all the good stuff:Yours truly in Forbes debating a very important topic – whether or not lunch is for wimps – and admitting to all who cares to read it that I'm about as effective as a fart in the wind at 4pm.Next up is Director Magazine – which has been published by the Institute of D ..read more