Digital Exeter, meetups, places and things to do!

Exeter is on fire at the moment, so many digital events so little time! 
Tech Nation report highlighting the growth of digital sector in Exeter
The arrival of Hub@TechExeter  and the second Generator co-working space on the Quay,Exeter Science Park open for business, those Cosmic people offering digital leadership courses. I can hardly keep up! 
Slight problem is knowing when everything is on and where to find out! Yes you can follow Twitter and Facebook feeds and email lists, use meetup app,  but not definitive!

I've made a list of the initiatives I know of here:
Hang out and work
Innovation Centre & Cafe - Exeter University
Exeter Science Park
Generator - Co working space Exeter
Exeter Library Meeting Rooms for hire
Exeter Phoenix Arts Centre
RAMM Museum, Art gallery & Cafe Exeter
Devon Work Hubs - work hubs dotted around Devon
Tech Exeter, community, conference and co-working space (formerly Exeter Web)

Maker Space: 

FabLab Devon - Exeter Central Library
Raspberry Pi Jam

Go to events:

Exeter Castle Demos pitch your business
Exeter Startup Weekends - Start a business in 54 hours Twitter: @innovexeter
Digital Exeter - talks and networking Twitter: @DigitalExeter
TechExeter - community and conference
EXIST - Science and Tech talks and networking Twitter: @ExIST_Exeter 
ODI Devon - open data - talks and networking Twitter: @ODIDevon
GeekCampX - sporadic geek fun and games Twitter: @GeekCampX

Many of these are also on Meetup.com  Download the app if you have a smartphone

Please comment on this blog with any I've missed and I'll update and add to the post. Hopefully it'll become a useful source of reference.
Happy Geeking!

Digital Exeter made me think! Laura Rose Guest Blog

Digital Exeter Makes you think!

Last Thursday week  the brilliant Laura Rose and I went along to the fledgling Digital Exeter meeting. The meeting was well attended and all the speakers were fun and thought provoking. Laura views such events as a sand pit for learning and applying tactics and she has kindly shared her thoughts below.

My focus is always on the development and social science aspects of meet ups and what will happen next – there’s a separate blog coming on that one.

Laura Rose - What I learnt at Digital Exeter

From the RAMM museum presentation I learnt that you've got to really segment your audiences and have clear objectives about what you want to achieve with them from the very start. It was unclear whether encouraging footfall to see the physical museum collection or getting people to engage with the museum about their archive collection were RAMM's primary objectives. You could see the danger of trying to target too many audiences with the same homepage and structure.

From copy dojo

 I'd learnt about clever things you can do when copywriting to engage your audience from using calls to active language. But I questioned the notion of 'social proof' and the evidence behind it. I think there is a real difference between a company saying "I have millions of users" and somebody who I socially identify with, like a friend, recommending a company or brand as an intermediary or brand advocate.

From Jasper at Borders

 I learnt about the changing world of in digital app development and just how many are dead to users after the initial download. We discussed the difference between generating content for an app, or any other digital platform, and using apps and digital platforms for distributing messages about that content, and the clash of that this can create between editorial and advertising teams within companies that have an app of their own.

What I will do

I'll consider tailored landing pages on WordPress websites to target a specific audience and repurposed content on the website for that audience and focus on their user needs.           

I will also think carefully about the role that apps and other digital platforms play within whole digital strategy to keep users re-engaging with our app or organisation.

I'll also be keeping an eye out for developments in push notifications to see whether we can make them smarter to target our audiences at the times they want information from us not when we want to give it out! 

Thanks Laura! 

Next time I'll be talking about forming communities, what the recipe is and why you can't force form one. Cheers,Joe