Starbucks is not an advertiser; people think we are a great marketing company, but in
– Howard Schultz, CEO, Starbucksfact we spend very little money on marketing and more money on training our people than advertising
Training pays off in dividends. We train all our customers to use the tools we give them, be it the tools, eg, WordPress, MailChimp, etc, or the processes, eg, social media, content management, search engine optimisation, etc.
Training is the most satisfying work we do, as it empowers our customers to not only do more of the things they thought were beyond
Our trainer Marc Hindley has been training groups and individuals in the media since 1995. He wrote and delivered training courses for journalists and editors in Aldus PageMaker, Quark Xpress, Adobe InDesign and Photoshop for two of the north’s largest newspaper publishers, The Oban Times and Scottish Provincial Press.
At Canary Dwarf, his courses in WordPress, MailChimp, content management and social media are highly regarded by the people who have taken them.
“Marc empowered me to be in control of my website by delivering tailor-made guidance in a patient and supportive manner.”
Nancy Hurst, Varis Training
All training is available for delivery to groups or individuals on your premises anywhere in Scotland.
WordPress training
WordPress is easy to learn, but what we teach is not only how to use the software, but how to use it to manage your content and optimise it for discovery and conversion. We’ll also show you how to create content that your readers find shareable and distribute it through social networks.
We provide WordPress training to local authorities, companies and individuals, and have taught groups of up to 15. We can tailor courses to suit indvidual needs. Typically, we offer:
- WordPress full-day workshop
- SiteBuilder – our one-to one WordPress workshop
- Introduction to WordPress – for business groups and networks
- Ecommerce with WooCommerce – selling online
MailChimp training
MailChimp is the popular, easy-to-learn newsletter and mailing list management software. It is used for email marketing campaigns, still one of the most lucrative digital marketing channels. Our courses and workshops cover:
- Building a genuine mailing list
- Writing killer newsletter headlines
- Getting above average results
- What makes good newsletter content
- Seeing who reads your newsletter and what links they click
- Building mobile-friendly newsletters
Content management
Every business today has the power to be a publishing company. But as grand as it may sound, in today’s economy, it’s what you need to be doing to stay ahead of your competitors. To a degree, you may already be ‘publishing’ through your website, leaflets, etc, but now there is a whole slew of tools at your disposal to help you:
- Gather content from internal and external sources
- Pick the right channel to publish on
- Using your website as a content hub
- Using social networks to distribute your content
- Analysing your efforts and understanding user behaviour
Social media management
As the latest tool in the marketer’s arsenal, social media may have come as a bit of a surprise to many businesses. That’s no problem, we can bring you up to speed in using social networks. We started using them in 2007, we won a national award in 2009, and hold regular one-to-one workshops for business, organisations and events.
Topics we teach include:
- How social networks can help and hinder your marketing
- Using social media for customer service
- Researching your markets using free tools
- Social media as part of your content strategy
- How to measure success
Full support is available following any of our workshops and courses. We can provide tailored sessions to suit individual needs. If you’d like to discuss your training requirements, please contact us.