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

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 puts the Spotlight on...... Robbie Burns!

NAME – Robbie Burns

ROLE – Sales Account Manager

TIME SERVED – 2 years

LinkedIn Profile

Twitter - @Robbie_Sarsen

Robbie Burns is part of the Sales Team here at Sarsen Technology, and is responsible for looking after some of our largest customers. He tends to work remotely, spending a lot of time on the road meeting with existing and potential customers, so it’s always a treat for us when he makes it into the office.

Robbie joined the team in 2011, coming from a semiconductor based sales role with an international distributor. After initially training as an electronic engineer at the start of his career he then made the lucrative move into sales.

Alongside his engineering and sales skills Robbie has also worked in personal growth and development field utilising NLP, hypnosis and other techniques to enable positive life enhancing change. Strictly Non Hippy.

Robbie's Hobbies
When he’s not at work Robbie has his hands full with his one dog, 2 cats, a goldfish and 6 children. When he does have a spare minute he likes to clear his head with a walk along the beautiful coastline near his home in Somerset. As a West-Country resident, he’s a cider drinker, and is a frequent visitor to the local cider farm. He is also planning on brewing his own beer – Robbie, just so you know, you have plenty of willing taste-testers here!

Robbie’s Favourite things -
Favourite music – Electric Blues
Favourite colour – Blue
Favourite food – Lamb Rogan Josh
Favourite movie – Blade Runner
Favourite book – 1984
Favourite flavour crisps – Salt & Vinegar
Favourite Smell – Bacon sandwich

Robbie's knowledge about the embedded hardware and technologies available from Sarsen is extensive, and he is always looking for new ways to build on this knowledge base. If you have any questions about a new project, or would like to know more about Robbie, please give us a call 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!

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!!

Meet the Sarsen Team!!

A recurring thought when working with our partners round the globe is that it would be great to be able to put a face to a name, especially when you’re speaking to the same people every day.

So, by popular request, here is our guide to the main players at Sarsen Technology, in no particular order….

Colleen Jameson – Colleen is our Office Administrator. She manages the day to day administration for the sales team to ensure things run smoothly, as well as all the business admin that goes on behind the scenes. She is first point of contact for our manufacturers and organises all of the events and exhibitions we attend. She is also organising our Christmas party this year, which is probably the most important job she will have to do in 2012!

Tim Norris
Twitter - @embedded_tim
Tim is one of our UK account managers. His role is to engage with a set of key accounts and to understand their technical requirements in terms of embedded hardware. Tim has been working with Sarsen Technology for 6 years and has experience providing solutions on the complete range of products.

Lynn Scholefield – Lynn is our ‘numbers lady’. She is very popular with the team because she arranges payment of salaries. She also has to channel her inner terrier to chase up the overdue invoices and hound customers for payment! Lynn juggles cash flows and foreign currency requirements, and analyses the many pages of data that summarises how the company is doing financially.


Robbie Burns 
Twitter - @Robbie_Sarsen

Robbie is one of our UK account managers, and is responsible for some of our largest customers. Robbie works remotely, spending a lot of time on the road meeting with existing and potential customers, and attending local industry events including WEAF.  Also answers to Vic.

 

Laura Jeffs
Twitter - @laura_sarsen

Laura is both the newest member of the team, and one of the longest serving.  Laura was promoted to Product Manager in December 2011, having represented another service for Sarsen previously. Laura is the liaison for United Electronic Industries and VersaLogic Corp, and coordinates the marketing activity and sales support for these manufacturers.

Nigel Norman
Twitter - @nigel_sarsen

Nigel is the captain of the Sarsen ship. Nigel started Sarsen Technology in 2000, and the company has grown significantly in the last 12 years. He has lived in the Marlborough area for 15 years and enjoys developing the business, working with his colleagues at Sarsen, sailing, music festivals with his teenage kids (when the sun is shining), football and playing cricket for the village team.

There are lots of other people who help Sarsen stay a well oiled machine, but these are the people you will speak to day to day at the Sarsen Technology office in Marlborough, Wiltshire.

We're a nice bunch - give us a call on +44 1672 511166 and we'll tell you all about our products and services.

Follow Sarsen_Tech on Twitter

You can follow all the news and updates from Sarsen Technology on our Sarsen_Tech twitter feed: Sarsen_Tech

Sarsen_Tech on Twitter

Follow Sarsen Technology on Twitter: Sarsen_Tech for all our latest news.