Two of the Optix Solutions team were recently invited to sow the seeds of Social Media success among franchisees of interior plant design, installation and maintenance specialists Urban Planters from UK and Europe.

Urban Planters, one of our longest standing clients, specialise in supplying and maintaining indoor plants for offices, restaurants, shopping centres and even private residences. The plants not only make interiors look better, they are also proven to absorb toxins in the air and relieve stress.

Director Alastair Banks and Business Development Manager Alistair Gleave flew out to the company’s annual conference at the Hotel Hampshire in Amsterdam last week. They were there to help franchisees and support staff understand Inbound Marketing and the benefits of using Social Media to grow their Urban Planters business locally.

This included a presentation on the potential for individual franchises to use Social Media to expand their local customer-base by building relationships with businesses in their area and letting them know what they are doing in the locality via Social Media platforms, especially blogs and e-mail marketing.

They also underlined the importance of establishing clear Social Media strategies and guidelines following the recent publication of Optix Solutions’ Social Media Survey 2010, which includes a number of important findings around how businesses monitor and measure the effectiveness of their Social Media activities.

“As there are Urban Planters franchises from the North of Scotland to the South Coast of England, and now Europe, we wanted to emphasise the importance of generating locally relevant content and contacts,” said Alistair Gleave.

As a franchise you need to be fully engaged with the local business community as that is where your customers will come from. Social Media is a huge opportunity to do just that.”

The two Als’ presence at the conference underlines the close and highly productive partnership that has been established between the two companies since Urban Planters first teamed up with Optix Solutions back in 2004.

The businesses have continued to expand side by side ever since, including winning the prestigious Franchise Website of the Year award together in 2007.

and Alistair Gleave’s next speaking engagement is…

at the Shine Charity Recruitment Lunch Event on 19th November, taking place in the spectacular setting of Somerset’s Hestercombe Gardens, near Taunton.

Alongside Shine’s Managing Director Jackie Dawkins, Alistair has been delivering free seminars on how the charitable and third sector can harness the power of Social Media for the past two years.
He will be talking to sector leaders about what Social Media has to offer charitable organisations in terms of engaging with the wider community, how it can be used to promote fundraising efforts and to develop a volunteer base.