10 Lower Mainland parks you should visit this summer

It's summer time in Vancouver (well, almost)! It'll soon be time to crack out the BBQ, meet with friends, and take a stroll in the beautiful parks around the Vancouver area. The popular parks, such as Stanley Park and Kits beach, fill up really quickly, so here's my top 10 small, lesser known, but beautiful parks to consider for your summer fun!

10. Burnaby Mountain, Burnaby
OK, so Burnaby Mountain is pretty well known, but have you taken the time to visit the trails and check out the immense views? Take a short hike, try mountain biking, or go for a run, then set up your picnic by the totem poles!

Incredible views from Burnaby Mountain. Photo credit: JiWiz

9. Camosun Bog, Vancouver
If you want an educational afternoon stroll, check out the self-guided tour at Camosum Bog. You'll see cool fauna and plants. Perfect for a family stroll with grandma!

Amazing fauna to be seen. Photo credit: Eric Bog

8. Cates Park, North Vancouver
If you want to beach comb, skim pebbles, throw a frisbee, take a short hike, and light up the BBQ, then head on over to Cates Park. It's small but beautifully formed, with views across the Burrard Inlet. You can also kayak from here, if you're feeling adventurous!

Beach combing ahoy! Photo credit: OurBC.com

7. Deer Lake Park, Burnaby
Deer Lake Park is perfect for a longer summer family stroll. You can rent a boat and paddle on to the water, or stroll around and check out the gorgeous scenery. The beach area and grassy area by the Shadbolt Centre tend to get pretty full, but head over to the west side of the park, under the overpass at Royal Oak Av, and you'll find a couple of small and quiet green parks. Lovely!

I always think it looks like a futuristic city! Photo credit: City of Burnaby

6. Byrne Creek Park, New Westminster
Byrne Creek park is a forested area near the Edmonds Skytrain Station. If you're looking for a stroll through the forest with amenities nearby, then this is your spot! Bring a picnic to eat in the park!

Beautiful forest stroll right in the city! Photo Credit: "StephansMap"

5. Burnaby Lake, Burnaby
Again, a fairly well know park that is incredibly accessible via skytrain or by bike (check out the Burnaby bike map). The more adventurous can tackle the ~10km trails by foot (no bikes allowed). Beside the nature house is a small open park which is great for BBQ's and family picnics! Small, sheltered, and quiet!

Incredible lake views, with lots of birds and other wildlife! Photo credit: VancouverTrails.com

4. Princess Park, North Vancouver
Tennis courts and a covered picnic area right beside a beautiful forest makes Princess Park a wonderful place for a family picnic. There are also some great trails for a short hike, although the terrain is quite steep, so maybe leave grandma at the picnic shelter!

Amazing forest! Photo credit: aozora.ca

3. Iona Island, Richmond
It's not technically an island, more of a peninsular, but if you want bird watching and to explore interesting fauna, then come to Iona! You can also watch the planes take off and land at the airport, and it's a perfect place to watch the sunset.

Take a stroll along the peninsular, but don't get caught by the tide! Photo Credit: Stephen Hui

2. Cleveland Dam, North Vancouver
Cleveland dam is one of favourite places in the entire Lower Mainland! The hiking is challenging (lots of steep uphill!), but just beautiful. Be sure to check out the salmon hatchery, as well as the most amazing view of the Lions beside the lake! There are benches to BBQ at, and a word of warning - don't swim in the lake; it's where our drinking water is stored!

It doesn't get much better than this! Photo Credit: Annacat

1. Barnet Marine Park, Burnaby
Burnaby's best kept secret, Barnet Marine Park has it all - beach, grassy areas to kick a ball or throw a frisbee, short walks, and a BBQ area. This is an amazing place to watch the sunset, and keep a look out for seals!

The beach at Barnet Marine Park, courtesy of JiWiz 

Is there a park you think I missed? Or do you have a story to share about any of the parks on the list? Your comments are always welcome!

You Tube moves from "views" to "engagement"

I was interested to read that YouTube is changing the focus of how it wants its users to engage with the site. The article, referenced by MarketingMag.ca, explains that YouTube has changed it's 'related videos recommendation' from number of clicks/views to time spent viewing videos or channels. The idea is that users will spend more time viewing videos and be more engaged with the site, rather than clicking quickly through quirky videos of cats playing the piano or a baby biting his brother's finger!

I posted this article to Digg, as I was interested to see how the community would view this change in the YouTube user experience. This change took effect on March 15, 2012, and so far the number of views is down slightly, but the length of time spent viewing videos is up slightly.

From MarketingMag.ca

There was an interesting Forbes article released yesterday, where contributor Adam Theirer talked about the relationships between advertisers and consumers. He acknowledges that consumers hate advertising and do everything to try and avoid it; using PVR's to record shows and fast forwarding through commercials, and downloading AdBlock software for internet browsers. However, he points out that without advertising revenue, we'd all be paying for online content, we'd pay more for TV subscriptions, and so on. For companies who choose to advertise on YouTube, having users more engaged with the videos they're watching means they are likely to also be more engaged with the advertisements. It will be interesting to monitor whether this is actually the case, and if metrics, such as click throughs, increase due to this change in user experience.

What do you think? Do you think advertising click-throughs rates will increase with this new model? 

Research in Social Media

In case you haven't noticed yet, I'm heavily involved with a sport called Orienteering. As well as keeping me fit and active, I have the opportunity to do some marketing and communications work, both for my local club and for the Canadian High Performance Program (HPP).

As part of my communications assistant duties for the Canadian HPP, we are trying to raise the profile of our athletes within the Canadian orienteering community. Our main communication tool is our online blog. The blog is now fairly well established and has a reasonable following. However, I would like to increase the number of people viewing our blog, and the number of interactions that take place on each entry.

To increase the number of people coming to the blog, I would do a survey of members of the orienteering community (online, distributed via local club member email lists) to see which websites these people frequent most, and look at setting up accounts on these sites to push traffic through to the blog. I would also do a campaign to ensure the community members are aware that the Facebook, Twitter, and Team Canada blog exist, and that they are connected with us.

To increase the number of interactions, I would have athletes post on a variety of topic categories, such as race report, training report, goal setting, athlete interview, and health and wellness. I would also look at factors such as the author of the post, whether photos were used, whether maps samples were used, and so on. Using the number of views and comments per blog post, the number of 'likes' and comments on Facebook, and the number of retweets and replies through Twitter, I can clarify which blog posts were not only popular, but compelled viewers to engage in further interaction. The athletes would then have further clarity no only on what topics to post, but also whether they should use photos, map samples, and so on.

Can you suggest any further metrics I could use to measure engagement?

Social Media Personality ~ Think before you leap!

I believe that your social media personality will effect how you interact with people online, how you are perceived, what your goals for social media are, and what social media channels you decide to use. That's why it's important to consider your online personality as part of your overall social media plan (whether you have a formal company plan, or just some informal ideas on how you wish to use social media for personal use).

Before you post, tweet, comment, or insert appropriate verb here, it's important to consider how your comment could be perceived by other people who don't know you. I, for example, have a very dry sense of humour, which doesn't come across well in the written form! I understand this, and realize that if I want to keep my professional personality intact online, I must carefully watch my choice of words. It's much easier to choose your words carefully before you post, rather than having to try and explain yourself after you post!

Staying true to my psychology training, I did some online research on social media personality. There are numerous attempts to explain and pigeonhole online personality types in 5, 7, or 11 nicely defined categories. In reality, I'm not sure that you can really slot yourself nicely into anyone of these categories (let me know if you can, because I'm having a hard time doing it!).

So, research aside, my opinion is that defining your online social media personality really comes down to staying true to yourself or your company's values, and being honest. Social media is, after all, a place to be sociable! I see this as the approach of many companies that have chosen to have an online presence. Vancity, for example, engages their customers and community through Twitter, LinkedIn, and You Tube. What I was most impressed with, however, is that Vancity publicly displays their social media approach and guidelines. From these pages, we can see their approach is to "engage with people" and have conversations about community. Their guidelines reflect that the employee should be themselves, use casual language, but also be mindful before they post. My favourite guidelines is "...I will think twice and write once". Words to live by!

In terms of my own social media personality, I would say that I exude a casual, but thoughtful personality (still unsuccessfully trying to fit myself in to one of those personality types...). I administer the Facebook page for the Greater Vancouver Orienteering Club (shameless plug - really, it's a LOT of fun!). On this page I use a friendly, chatty tone to entice people to our events, to be part of the club, and also to engage with the orienteering community, both in Vancouver and across Canada. On my LinkedIn profile (again, shameless plug!), I maintain the professional side of my personality. But that's who I am as a person. I am professional in that I consider everything I post for tone and content, but I prefer to keep things friendly and accessible.

People are not stupid (you can interpret this as a good or a bad thing!), and therefore honesty is the best policy! When creating your social media personality, keep it real, but "think twice and write once".

What do you think? Do you have any tips for creating your online personality?