Tourism Ireland wins top social media award at Travolution Awards

Congratulations to Tourism Ireland who won  “Best Use of Social Media” at the Travolution Awards which took place in London on the 11^th of October.

Tourism Ireland  beat Virgin Atlantic, Cunard and Radisson Edwardian Hotels to  the top prize.

Their winning strategy was a Twitter-driven campaign dubbed “My Irish 140” which connected everyone with Irish blood, or who felt connected to Ireland, to Tweet about it.

This netted the tourism board a 3.4 million audience in Great Britain with another 33,000 participants, including some well-known celebs like M.C. Hammer.

Public Relations researcher, Carol Geraghty reports that since the beginning of 2010 Tourism Ireland has grown its Facebook fan base from 75 fans to more than a half million.

This makes Ireland, Geraghty reports, the third most popular tourist board in the world on Facebook, after Great Britain and perennial favorite, Australia.

To read more about it on Technorati click here

Why the Irish will always be in business

Just came across this great video from IBEC on why Ireland will always be in business.  It really drives home how important the investment made in education over the last 10- 15 years has been and how important it will be in our recovery. 

Check out the video below

Andor Technology creates 166 new jobs for Belfast

Andor Technology intends to create 166 highly skilled jobs as part of an £18 million investment in an ambitious five-year growth strategy to target new markets and acquisitions.

The company which was originally founded in Belfast as a spin out from Queens University, employs more than 321 people in 16 offices worldwide develops and manufactures high-performance scientific digital cameras and has a 10,000-strong customer base in 55 countries. Andor also has ambitious plans to more than double its turnover as part of the strategy.

Andor has been offered financial assistance totalling £1.5 million towards the cost of the investment project from Invest Northern Ireland and a further £18,200 from the North’s Department for Employment and Learning