LinkedIn isn’t Facebook, Honest!

I know it’s Friday. And I am, like many of you, very happy about that.

But is LinkedIn really the place for me to tell everyone I’m going to drown myself in wine and Doritos this weekend?

I really like LinkedIn. I also really like Facebook, but they are very different beasts. I use LinkedIn to keep in touch with my professional contacts. It’s perfect for sharing interesting articles, websites and events, and keeping up to date with what my contacts are talking about. Professionally.

If you like LinkedIn and want to use it properly PLEASE don’t use it like Facebook. Don't post pictures of cats in dresses, or tell me what you had for breakfast. It will just distract me and get me into trouble. And as a fellow professional I’m sure you wouldn’t want that. As for posting comments; as a general rule, if it would make your mother frown - don't write it!

That’s because LinkedIn is for professional networking. Not social networking.

All that being said, this is a blog. And I am VERY glad it’s Friday!!

Have a great weekend!

Author: Laura Biddiscombe

Are you a 'Social' Company?

There are many companies whose employees are banned from using social media at work. Yet those same companies often have feeds and pages across all the best known sites. So why do some companies see social media as a beneficial resource of information for a company and its employees, and others, well, just don't?

Many companies still view social media as a “build it and they will come” exercise, creating pages on Facebook, setting up a Twitter feed, and starting a blog to share their 'message', expecting an influx of new followers and, as a result, business. But it doesn’t happen overnight, so can be percieved as a failure when it doesnt yield results immediately...

As far as our industry is concerned, business is a large percentage social. There can be months, or even years of interaction before a project starts generating income. Social media gives you a great opportunity to share news, events and general industry updates with your customers, especially when a project update isn't required.

Social networks are best used for communicating and sharing information. There is no pressure on the customer to respond, and they can take their time to read something they are interested in, without feeling ‘sold to’. That being said, because social media allows you to actually have a no-strings conversation, it helps create a community of followers that see you as more than just a business entity. They’ll view you as someone they trust, and people prefer to buy from people they trust.

Here at Sarsen we run a Blog, Twitter feed and monthly News Bytes email. We’ve just started putting together a Pinterest page, and our LinkedIn page is updated regularly. If you'd like to see what we're talking about you can click one of the following icons to find out more.

LinkedIn

News Bytes - Feb '14

Twitter

Are you a Successful Person?

This isnt the normal type of blog post we put up, but I thought it was really interesting.

I saw this infographic on LinkedIn today, and it made me think about how I act and how I could improve my own performance. I think I'm definitely more green than yellow, but I do watch TV every day, and I'm not sure if a Filofax counts as a journal....

Its a thought provoking exercise, but it's important to keep improving and challenging yourself.

So I'm doing my bit:

Dear Diary...

Sarsen Spotlight Series ... This week, All You Ever Wanted To Know About 'Our Tim!'

Tim Norris
Tim's Twitter Feed
Tim's LinkedIn Profile
NAME – Tim Norris
ROLE – Sales Account Manager
TIME SERVED – 7 years

Tim is one of our longest serving inmates, and has been a part of the Sarsen sales team for nearly 7 years. Tim manages some of our biggest accounts, across a variety of market sectors. He has been focussing on our HFT customers recently, winning some significant business with the BittWare Altera Stratix V boards.

Because he’s been here so long, Tim is a walking repository of useful information. (Mostly.) He is able to help with queries about any of our 10 manufacturers, and is pretty handy with a screwdriver when the situation arises and we have to get intimate with the hardware!

Tim’s Hobbies
Tim has recently learnt to ride a bike….. down hills, through mud, over ramps. He’s a keen mountain biker, and spends his weekends on 2 wheels around Wiltshire and Wales. Tim is also captain of his local pool team. When he has a spare 5 minutes, he takes pictures with one of his many cameras.

Tim’s Favourite things -

Favourite music – (Very) Loud Guitar Rock
Favourite Colour – Black
Favourite Food – Mexican
Favourite Movie – True Romance
Favourite book – Jaws (Peter Benchley)
Favourite flavour Crisps – Smoky Bacon

Final Insight
What did you want to be when you were little? - A ZooKeeper

If someone were to make a movie about your life, who would you hope to play you? – Hugh Jackman.
(We actually did a scientific experiment on an unnamed app, and Hugh Jackman was the first name out. Tim – “He wouldn’t have to work out much more to be as muscly as me”).

Every Tuesday we shine the spotlight on an area of our lives at Sarsen Technology; whether it's a type of technology, one of our manufacturers, or as we have today, giving you a peek into the (sometimes strange) world of our staff!

If you'd like to get to know us even better, give us a call on +44 1672 511166, or drop us an email. We look forward to hearing from you!

Sarsen By Numbers - Friday Facts from the Team at Sarsen Technology

12 – The number of years Sarsen Technology has been supplying embedded hardware solutions to our UK customers.

10 – The number of US-based manufacturers we currently represent.

5 – Exciting new board variants from VersaLogic released this year.

8 – Ways to contact us….
The obvious ones; email, phone and direct contact through the website.
The retro choice – fax and snail mail.
For the social butterfly – LinkedIn, Twitter or even a visit to the office here in Marlborough. We like visitors….

830 – The number of hits on our blog last month. We are actually very interesting….

3 – New COM Express modules from Extreme Engineering. For more info click here…

25 – days until Christmas!!!

5 – Twitter feeds from the team here at Sarsen.
@Laura_Sarsen
@Nigel_Sarsen
@Robbie_Sarsen
@Embedded_Tim
@Sarsen_Tech

24 – Current issue of NewsBytes, released today. There are lots of new technology releases from our manufacturing partners this month including OpenCL support for Altera Stratix V FPGA COTS boards, plus a new technical paper on "many-core" strategy written by Jeff Milrod, President of BittWare.

½ - The new S5-PCIe-HQ from BittWare is a half-length PCIe x8 card based on the Altera Stratix V FPGA. Check it out here.

2 – Number of times we have had cake in the office this week. Soon to be 3.

Have a great weekend!

Tech Source in New Deal with RunTime, A Sarsen Facelift, and a Birthday!

Today is Tims' birthday.  

No, we aren't going to mention ages! Happy birthday Tim.

This week Tech Source have announced their new partnership with RunTime Computing Solutions to accelerate GPGPU (general purpose graphics processing unit) development on its Condor 3000 XMC video graphics cards. This will make it much easier for customers using Tech Source boards to develop high performance GPGPU applications in the OpenCL world. For more info please contact us.

The Sarsen Technology LinkedIn page has had a bit of a facelift. Follow our page to keep up to date with new products and news from the team.

 

Remember Remember.......

Sandwiched in between the festivities of Hallowe'en and Christmas is Bonfire Night. A time to remember the Gunpowder plot of 1605, when Guy Fawkes was caught guarding explosives hidden under the House of Lords, in an attempt to assassinate King James I of England.

Fireworks date back to 7th century China, where they were invented. Also known as ‘Explosive Pyrotechnics’, fireworks are actually designed not to explode. To give a good visual show the ingredients need to burn slowly, in order to produce the colours and sparkles found in today’s displays. You learn something new every day! 

But don't forget, while that Youtube video of the guy shooting fireworks from various parts of his body is really funny, fireworks are dangerous, so be safe this weekend.

Team GB, A Big Secret, and The Chance to Win an iPad with Sarsen Technology!!

First and foremost a massive congratulations to Team GB for their awesome performances so far this week.

With Jessica Ennis and Louise Hazel starting their heptathlon events today, Victoria Pendleton looking to get over yesterday’s disappointment with a medal in the Keirin and Rebecca Adlington defending her 800m freestyle title it’s going to be another exciting day for British sport.

There is a bit of a buzz in the Sarsen office – we have some exciting news to share with you next week! Keep an eye on Twitter and LinkedIn for more details!

This time of year is usually a little quieter for sales activity, and we were all looking forward to a bit of a rest, but we are still really busy! With some of the team off on their summer holidays it’s left the rest of us a little jealous, especially as our UK quota of sunshine seems to have been and gone!

Sarsen Technology are running a competition in this month’s MTE magazine to win a brand new iPad, simply for signing up to our monthly newsletter. It really couldnt be easier!
You can sign up and enter the competition here.

Have a fantastic weekend, and dont forget to cheer on Team GB as they go for more golds at

London 2012!

There's more than one way to keep up with the latest news from Sarsen Technology.....

Social media is now de rigueur in the world of business, and never ones to be left behind we’re keeping up with the Joneses, and have a huge amount of information available every day, in a variety of formats, including Twitter and LinkedIn!

• To celebrate our 10^th anniversary in 2010, Sarsen Technology launched a brand new corporate image, including a new Sarsen logo. Alongside this we started ‘NewsBytes’; our company newsletter with updates on the latest products, events and news from the last month.
• LinkedIn – Here you can find our latest company updates, career opportunities, personnel changes, interesting articles and product information, as well as contact details for our office here in Marlborough, UK.
• Twitter – Check out the Sarsen Twitter feed for real time news and updates from the team. You can follow us here - @Sarsen_Tech. The Sarsen sales team also have individual Twitter accounts, each with a different flavour –

Laura Jeffs - @Laura_Sarsen

Nigel Norman – @Nigel_Sarsen

Robbie Burns – @Robbie_Sarsen

Tim Norris - @embedded_tim

• Our website www.sarsen.net is always being updated with new products and updates from our 10 US manufacturers.

And of course, if you're reading this then you've discovered our blog. It's a more relaxed format, so we might share some of our more social exploits - charity fundraising, achievements, staff party photos...... It's updated every week so stay tuned and who knows what you might see!

Each of these services give you a different insight into the world of Sarsen Technology, so follow us on Twitter, check out the blog, and subscribe to Newsbytes to make sure you aren’t missing out on anything!!

As they say, miss it, miss out......

Have a great weekend!!