Tuesday 27 November 2012

What Is #CambsHour?


I am a Twitter fiend, in fact, I love Twitter more than Facebook (But shhh, I don’t want to hurt Facebooks’ feelings!)...

As many of you will have found me through Twitter (@thesecludedtea), a booming Social Media site, you will know just how much I like to Tweet about my Afternoon Tea and baking exploits, I Tweet about my events (mostly based around tea and cake), my latest blog posts and about my various Columns for local publication, TheCambridgeshire Journal Magazine.


I do use Twitter mainly to document what I am saying and doing and it is a very helpful tool in recruiting new fans and guests to my events whilst I am at it. Twitter has been so much fun, making me brand new (And physical!) friends who I meet for a cuppa and a catch up and it has provided tables full of guests at my Secluded Tea Party tables.

A month or so ago, a fellow networker and Tweeter, the lovely Ann Hawkins of The Inspired Group, invited me through Twitter to join a Hashtag (#) conversation on a rainy Wednesday evening after a monumental weigh in on my weight loss journey. So I joined, relieved myself of my excitement for the weight loss and chatted about *Healthy* recipes with local Cambridge-based food lovers and did an hours’ worth of networking without even thinking about it.


I made a new contact in the form of a mobile cocktail bar (Useful for upcoming events) and I caught up with some old Twitter friends who I hadn’t spoken to in a while and it was great to find out what they had been up to and have a bit of banter with them.

If you don’t use Twitter, you must get on there, you are missing out!

#CambsHour is the brainchild of local business woman, Helen Reinson, a Marketing and Technical Sales Consultant for IT Hummingbird.
With this Hashtag, she has managed to reach over 57,000 people/Twitter accounts and has been featured in local press due to the quick success of this new form of connecting/networking - It's only been running since October!

The beauty of this way of networking is that you can sit at home in your PJs after a busy day in the office, not needing to get dolled up, buy loads of business cards to dish out at a physical networking meeting and you can pick who you want to talk to without any awkwardness. You can look at peoples’ Twitter account and connect to their website right away to have a nosey at what they do and you can follow up afterwards with ease.


Don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge fan of networking in the physical nature too, having been to many of the ever-growing number of local and national networking meets, I do like a good face to face chat with new and interesting people, if not just for the one reason of it allowing me to become more confident in talking to strangers in business.

However, when I can, I like to join #CambsHour because it’s just that, an hour (between 8pm-9pm, Wednesday Evenings). I can sit and watch the dinner cooking after a busy day and connect with one or two new people on my favourite Social Media site, through my iphone, whilst dancing around the house in my slippers. It’s a fantastic idea and one that will be sticking around I’m sure.


Please do visit Helens’ website below for more information, stats and even a video on this (of which prompted me to write about it) so that you can see for yourself how it works for business people all over Twitter. I was even pleasantly surprised to hear my name mentioned in the Video, I’m very excited to be a part of this mini online world.

Miss Sue Flay




2 comments:

  1. Wonderful blog Sue, I felt I was sitting with you sipping tea and eating cake as I read it. Thank you for the very kind mention.

    Helen

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    1. Aw it's a pleasure, I think it's a fab idea. I may well be walking the dog tonight in a panic, as a lot on, but will try to Tweet you all if I can : )

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