SMARTAPPS

Using Google Sitemaps

If you're launching a new site, using Google Sitemaps is a must. The reason is simple - it alerts Google about your existence. Including all your pages in the XML file ensures that Googlebot will have an easier time crawling your site.

Just 10 years ago, all major search engines accepted and highly valued user-submissions. However, page spam killed the goose that laid the golden eggs (i.e. traffic). Nowadays, most of these submissions are either paid or ignored.

Google Sitemaps is a win-win solution. It allows webmasters to let Google know about new pages or sites. At the same time, it cuts down the amount of crawling that Googlebot does (refreshing only pages that have been added or updated).

Creating a sitemap for you site is easy:

1. Sign-up for an account here (if you already have a Google/Gmail account, you don't need to sign up again)
2. Verify you are the rightful owner of the site by uploading an HTML file to your webserver's root directory.
3. Create an XML file listing all pages and adding relevant info about them like update frequency.
4. Upload the sitemap.xml to your webserver
5. Let Google know where you've uploaded it

Voila! In addition to keeping track of Googlebot's spidering your web pages, you also get statistics that are useful if you plan to improve your Google rankings. For example, if you find out you're all of a sudden N1 for Mentos + Coke videos, you can build on that success.

Note: If you're using Wordpress to power your blog, there's a plugin that will create your sitemap automatically. It will also update it every time you post. Nifty!

AUTHOR: Krasimir Koichev, iConcertina Creative

Playing the domain game

According to Bob Parsons, 35 million domain names were registered in April. I trust him - GoDaddy's one of the biggest registrars on the block, so they probably have their facts right.

Compared to a few years ago, this is a manifold increase. Surely, this is a good sign - a growing number of sites and so on.

Not so. The vast majority of these domains are NOT paid for and in reality are used by unscrupulous registrars to earn PPC (pay-per-click) traffic. This means that over 30 million are never paid for, yet none of them are available to the public, i.e. you and me.

Here's how the scheme works: any registrar can leave a deposit at Verisign (more on Verisign here) which allows it to purchase domains up to that deposit's limit. There's a 5-day money-back period in which the registrar can cancel the domains it purchased. What happens is that registrars continually cancel domains on the 5th day just to register them again immediately after. The only limit is the size of the deposit, a $6,000,000 one takes care of a million domains being permanently "kited" by a registrar.

Case in point (provided by Bob):

Consider the case of a little-known registrar with a Miami, Florida address known as Domain Doorman LLC ... [it] registered more than 11.5 million domain names in April 2006, but only permanently registered — or paid for — 68.4 thousand of those. This same discrepancy occurred in March as well. Doorman registered 4.8 million names, but only permanently registered — or paid for — 40.4 thousand.

Unfortunately, ICANN has had no comment. Until this practice stops, non-registrars (you and me) will have to settle for 25-letter-long domains. On top of that, we do need to pay to keep them. Not a level playing field by any standard.

AUTHOR: Krasimir Koichev, iConcertina Creative

Bill Gates at MIX06

Bill Gates showed up at MIX06. Being a Certified Microsoft Partner, we [at iconcertina] had to tune in to what he had to say. You can do the same by clicking this webcast (Windows Media Player).

A BIG part of his presentation focused on how web sites and traditional application are coming together. Naturally, this plays well with the new Internet Explorer 7. There were guests from MySpace and BBC talking about how Microsoft is helping them.

On the negative side, IE7 is part of the upcoming OS - VISTA - which is delayed again. The most serious concern in the bloggosphere following Microsoft's presentation was that things are moving VERY sloooowly. On the REAL funny side, Steve Ballmer's Developers video is gathering momentum. It's almost as popular as the funny Mentos + Coke videos.

Not surpringly, no one from Google attended. Kinda disappointing.

AUTHOR: Krasimir Koichev, iConcertina Creative

Verisign - hate them but buy their stock

ICANN recently announced that its Board of Directors approved the pending deal with VeriSign for the .COM registry. ICANN has been under a lot of pressure to transfer the "ownership" of domain names to the UN. A few months ago, ICANN got another five-year lease ... so they hurried to cast in stone VeriSign's monopoly.

The .COM registry already is VeriSign's highest-margin business, netting VeriSign $450 million each year. The deal with ICANN will allow VeriSign to increase prices significantly (as much as 28% in the next four years). Combine that with the explosive growth of domain registrations in general and VeriSign will soon be looking at a cash cow that yields $600+ million per year.

GoDaddy's CEO, Bob Parsons, is one of the most vocal opponents of the deal. Another opponent is Paul Garrin (a complete article about it in The Village Voice).

In short: sell your domains, buy VeriSign stock. Your domains are going to get more and more expensive to renew. I personally own about 50, so I was thinking about selling half of them to buy VeriSign stock. That way, no matter what happens, I win!

AUTHOR: Krasimir Koichev, iConcertina Creative

Software on CDs - Dead?

Ever since the advent of the internet, sending software on CD's has seemed like a dying art. According to the blogosphere, the 95% profit margins on the software sent on these CD's have been dead for some time already.

If you like grim predictions for the future of software companies who still stick to this arcane approach, you just need to tune to Burnham's Beat, a blog dedicated to software technology and investing.

In an post aptly named The Incredibly Shrinking Software Industry, the author starts with the facts for 2005. Despite NASDAQ's growth by 1.4% (modest, I know), the combined capitalisation for software companies fell by close to 10%. What factors contributed to this downfall? I'll summarise some of them briefly:

1) Software stocks move from “growth” to “value” - In essence, what happens is that software stocks exit from growth portfolios and enter value portfolios. If there's one thing certain about "value" managers, it's that there's no way in hell they are going to pay for stocks at 35 times earnings. The focus shifts from spanking new products to maintenance charges and service revenues.

2) Open Source and SaaS - We've been babbling about open source and its impact on software vendors. Instead of shipping CD's at a healthy 95% margin, open source gives away the code for free and charges for support. Similarly, SaaS (Software as a Service) charges customers fees for the services offered. Both models are difficult to scale up easily as you need to scale recruitment, training, etc. (instead of just printing more CD's to meet demand).

3) No platform transition - although web services (and web 2.0) are being touted as the next big thing, the shift hasn't happened yet. Or rather, it moves at a pace that doesn't compensate for the loss of revenue with the last platform change (N-tier architecture).

There's plenty more insight in the post itself, if you have 10 or so minutes to spare.

Update:  You need not look further than the PC Game industry to see the changes. Long time leader Blizzard has 6,000,000 subscribers for its World of Warcraft franchise. There are rumors that Diablo 3 will be a MMORPG as well.

AUTHOR: Krasimir Koichev, iConcertina Creative

SAP's CEO claims India is expensive

In a recent post on outsourcing, I reviewed a new book (Multisourcing: Moving beyond Outsourcing to Achieve Growth and Agility) which tries to change the way we think about outsourcing in general. It seems that the specifics are changing quite rapidly as well.

In an interview published Monday (in the German edition of the Financial Times), SAP CEO's said that outsourcing software development to India is proving to be more and more expensive. India's the world's largest market for off-shore software development services. The increased competition from global companies (IBM, Microsoft, etc.) and local off-shore companies is driving personnel costs higher and higher.

Frank Hartman, SAP's spokesman, confirmed this and added that the major contributing factor to the high personnel costs is the high turnover. Recruitment and training costs have escalated rapidly in recent years.

Discussing plans for growth, SAP's CEO said that the business software vendor is looking to Eastern Europe and China. China's potential is seen as limited because of its lack of protection for intellectual property rights. At the same time, Eastern Europe offers political and economic stability. "Turnover is low and the costs aren't too high," he said.

The consensus in the "blogosphere" is that the three factors for successful "offshoring" are:

Offshore interesting and motivating projects

Develop local leadership talent

Hire, train and manage local staff with a long term view in mind

I'd like to add that all this holds true UNTIL Microsoft moves into the local IT market. Once this happens you either run (like SAP) or you switch all your products to open source. Steve Ballmer's love for developers (video) is a well-known fact.

AUTHOR: Krasimir Koichev, iConcertina Creative

Who rules your Internet?

The five-letter answer is ICANN. Nominally, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is a private corporation. A recent meeting in Tunis of the WSIS sparked up the debate for the independence of ICANN and its transformation to a more “international” entity.

Currently, ICANN’s founding document states that “neither national governments acting as sovereigns nor intergovernmental organizations acting as representatives of governments should participate in management of Internet names and addresses.” In effect, the corporation’s bylaws prohibit government officials from sitting on the Board of Directors.

The critics of ICANN, which is mostly the EU, argue that ICANN is a US corporation and as such is not independent to the extent it should be. After all, the Internet is not just US “space” anymore. One suggestion was to transfer the control to a UN committee which will ensure a high level of independence from the government.

Another argument, albeit extreme, is that the US might use ICANN as a beating stick for countries they consider a threat, e.g. Iran or North Korea. They could (in theory) shut-down the TLD (the country-specific domain extension) for that particular country immobilizing all sites based on that domain, including government sites.

In an article on the BBC’s site, US rejects changes to net control, Ambassador David Gross is quoted to say: “We will not agree to the UN taking over the management of the internet. Some countries want that. We think that's unacceptable."

Obviously, this is a flat rejection of the proposal by the EU. The defense of the US position is simple: not all countries share the same ideas about freedom of expression. Relegating this authority to a UN committee might infringe on the freedom of expression.

“Reporters Without Borders” officially supports the US position with an example that speaks for itself – the UN committee for human rights is currently chaired by Libya.

The WSIS meeting in Tunis ended with ICANN getting a 5 year extension. Hopefully, in 5 years all rogue states (from the US point of view) will adopt a US-like freedom of speech. I strongly doubt this will happen so we’ll be staying with ICANN for some decades to come.

AUTHOR: Krasimir Koichev, iConcertina Creative

Outsourcing is dead; long live Multisourcing

At her recent presentation at the Symposium ITxpo, Gartner analyst Linda Cohen officially announced the death of outsourcing:

You have to stop outsourcing now! Research suggests that 50 percent of outsourcing contracts signed during the last three years will fail to meet expectations.

The reason for the failure of outsourcing seems obvious, if you ask Cohen: most organizations are utilizing ad-hoc approaches to outsourcing that are both short-sighted and ineffective. Corporations go offshore because investors like the concepts of outsourcing. Too often, the teams that end up managing multiple contracts lack the experience and the governance discipline to complete the projects successfully.

Linda Cohen and Allie Young have published a book on the subject, Multisourcing: Moving beyond Outsourcing to Achieve Growth and Agility. The book identifies eight myths of outsourcing, I'll highlight three:

1. The enemy: Thinking of the service provider as an enemy to defeat in contract negotiations.
2. Procurement: The notion that best price is the key metric, discounting other important factors.
3. Sourcing competency: Believing that the required management capabilities necessary to manage external services exist in house.

The multisourcing model, on the other hand, "seamlessly blends internally and externally delivered services not just to cut costs or gain efficiencies, but to maximize growth, agility, and bottom-line results."

The book is definitely not the be-all end-all of sourcing books. Ironically, most of the advice inside is taken from recent outsourcing books, some reviewers say. If you don’t have ANY books on outsourcing though, you could as well start with that one.

AUTHOR: Krasimir Koichev, iConcertina Creative

IBM encourages employees to blog

In a surprise move, IBM encouraged its 320,000 employees to blog. A set of draft rules was posted on the company’s Intranet site to govern blogs that are on IBM-related topics.

Big Blue’s own internal blogging system already hosts about 9,000 blogs (that’s less than 3% of employees). There are numerous employees that are hosted on external services and the draft rules will apply to them as well – at least with matters pertaining to IBM.

The author of the draft rules, James Snell, is a member of IBM's Software Standards Strategy Group. "IBM believes in dialogue with among IBMers and with our partners, clients, members of the many communities in which we participate and the general public," Snell wrote. "We believe that IBMers can both derive and and provide important benefits from exchanges of perspective."

The rules encourage employees not to hide behind anonymity but to clearly identify their real name and their affiliation with IBM. Bloggers are also asked to exercise personal responsibility when posting and not to engage in covert marketing or PR plots.

"The core principles are designed to guide IBMers as they figure out what they're going to blog about so that don’t end up like certain notable ex-employees of certain other notable companies," the post states.

This is not an IBM insider’s joke. Snell is referring to Delta’s recent decision to fire a flight attendant because of her blog, Queen of the Sky. To cut a long story short, the flight attendant posted photos on her blog which were deemed “inappropriate.” The photos are not X-rated, it’s mostly leg and cleavage shots (non-nude).

In conclusion, it seems most companies feel at a crossroad regarding blogging. I’m very much in support of IBM’s position of clear rules for all. I doubt Queen of the Sky wanted to get fired, most probably, she claims she wasn’t aware of any regulations that Delta had in this regard.

AUTHOR: Krasimir Koichev, iConcertina Creative

You Wot?

Language as usual continues to be a segregator, even in our on line environment. Sitting on the bus on my way to the office, I was at once entertained and taken by the multiple names for the same thing.   And all in a single bus journey.

This is by no means a fully researched survey, but a passing observation on the growth in the range, acceptance and adaptation of internet technology into our everyday vocabulary.

A huge assumption in user experience seems to define how and what people say, usually shouted across the bus down a mobile line.

Loud Americans shout about ‘EARLS’. I can assume that this man was around in the mid 90s and worked on US web projects. I’d say that this was a heavy browser – sorry uses the web a lot for work, oh!, OK, and pleasure.

Young women ask for a ‘Website address’, as does my mother-in-law and no doubt her friends. I’d say they were on the cusp of changing from dial up to broadband.  And then when they write down the url, they always start with http://www.... not yet realising that this is generic to sites.

And those we like to think of who are in the know ask for a ‘YouareElle’, and they're probably using WiFi – sorry - wireless broadband.

Just for the record, a URL is “a standardized address name layout for resources on the internet”.

Anybody heard a URL called anything else?

What do iTunes and open source have in common?

Normally, you’d have to wait till the end of the story to get the answer. I can’t stretch it that far. They have NOTHING in common. In fact, they’re more than that – they’re like Microsoft and Linux.

We all love our iPods. Who wouldn't pay 0.99 for Coldplay's new single? It’s all good until you try playing your now $500 collection on anything BUT your iPod. One problem is Apple’s DRM license (called FairPlay) is very flexible and can be changed on fly by whoever is in charge. If they decide tomorrow that you need to pay a monthly fee for your collection, guess what, they could do that. They’ve already decreased the number of times you can burn your play lists from 10 to 7.

In addition, Apple is not happy licensing its FairPlay to just anybody. Motorola is the only company who sells a device (new iTunes phone) that plays FairPlay music.

Music is just the first step. The new video iPod is too small to play movies but it plays all sorts of low-rez videos fine. Soon our collections will grow with tens of TV shows and music videos and we’ll be even more reliant on Apple for future access to OUR collections.

As a result, the tech community has growing concerns about creating another monoculture (a discreet way to refer to a monopoly). A recent “editorial” blog at ZDnet, issued a Declaration of InDRMpendence – effectively a big NO to DRM-protected content. To sign the declaration, all you need to do is post a comment on the blog. As far as I’m concerned, MP3 is all the encoding I need.

AUTHOR: Krasimir Koichev, iConcertina Creative

My absence explained

Sorry for being absent for so long - Imogen - our baby daughter was born on Sept 2 and both the run up to her birth and the last 3 weeks have been pretty eventful!

I am back in the blogging seat and lots to happen this coming week both on Smartapps and www.haveyoursay.com

Sorry for being absent, but hope you understand!

[update- after pressure from family members I have updated Imogen's Photograph!]

The Blogosphere Rules are about Credibility and Reputation

There has been some debate about whether the traction Jeff Jarvis received with his Dell Blog Campaign is down to Jeff being an A List blogger.

As Neville Hobson and Shel Holtz commented on their podcast #50 - I am not an A-List blogger, so how have I gained a daily readership of close to 3,000 on my haveyoursay.com campaign against Land Rover ?

The answer is that I had to win credibility from the blogosphere before my readership proved itself. Neville rightly encouraged me to identify myself and when I ‘came out ‘- I watched people move from the Campaign site to this blog site – accessing my career profile – almost doing a mini-due diligence on me before they took the haveyoursay.com campaign seriously. Once I had won their credibility, people started posting comments and trackbacks and my readership and traction increased exponentially. Therefore, the power of the blogosphere is available to anyone out there: just be prepared to establish your credibility first.

In their Podcast #50, Shel questioned how we should manager the blogging platform when it gets into unreasonable hands. I am convinced that if a brand is being beaten up unfairly, people will come to its rescue. Whilst I have struck a chord with many Land Rover owners, others accuse me of blackmailing the brand, and some describe me as obsessed and advise me to let go: everyone is entitled to their opinion and bloggers express theirs openly for the world to see.

My take is that the blogoshpere is a pretty free and fair medium – as readership, contribution and general uptake increases – there are enough credible and reasonable bloggers to ensure that a matter settles in a balanced and credible way.

A natural force exits between blog readers and contributors: credibility and reputation mediates the game.

Incentivisation or False Advertising?

We’ve all wondered about it.  We’ve all intercepted a special offer delivered via a myriad of mediums.  We are bombarded by direct mail, advertisements on line, tv, radio and in print, and via email. 

My inbox gets filled daily with such special offers that somehow never ever apply to me.  My favourites over the last two weeks have been:

1. Fly Bmi for 25 pounds.  Yes on days I don’t want to fly to places I don’t want to fly and oh, don’t forget you have to pay tax too?  I like travelling so was genuinely interested.
2. Showsavers offer to see Chitty Chitty Bang Bang top price tickets reduced from 40.00 to 32.50 pounds -  Perhaps but never when I’d like to see the show, or on any day in the near future either?  I'm trying to take my son to see the show before it closes in September.  So was genuinely interested again.
3. and lots of others but as I wasn't really interested, they ended up in the delete folder - immediately.

In this age of real time stock control accessible via a web interface – which is what most booking systems for each and every industry are -  why are we still being mislead about availability? 

In the live age of communication, why can’t email have a gadget in it that shows how much of the special stock in the proposition is left over - and available to me.  There could be a reducing counter that ends up with ‘only 5 items left’ or ‘We have now sold out.  We recommend you take up our offer quicker next time’.  And then ‘Visit our site for other offers’.

What I find spectacular is with the advent of permission marketing and our desire to opt in to marketing offers, the sender hardly ever sends us a special offer that applies to us.  Database driven campaigns can store multiple layers of data on people that would truly allow individual incentives to be delivered. They could find out that I am female, a mother, have a job, like travelling and then come up with something applicable - if they thought I was a valuable enough customer. I'm a marketeer. I'm a sucker for all forms of research and fill out copious forms - mainly to see what the competition is doing and how they do it.  There must be copious dull information on me out there in the depths of a database.  Who is taking up this challenge to truly incentivise their customers?  Or is it that true incentives have a negative impact on the bottom line so there just aren’t that many to offer?

There are may sources on information about incentives - or Marketing through Motivation (read the magazine dedicated to it Incentive Mag or visit Incentive Marketing organisation devoted to further ideas).  I like the recent text lottery incentive used for the London Live 8 show.  The instructions were simple and straight forward - text and you could win.  And people did win.  It was called a lottery so people knew the chances of winning were slim.  75,000 people won two tickets each.

Wikipedia lists the main areas of false advertising are:

1. Closing Down Sale -  when you’re not closing (a bit like those Cashmere Shops on Regents Street and Picadilly)
2. Price Comparison - indicating that you are saving money when you are not
3. Lieing – what they are telling is just not true – it’s not 'FRESH' fish at all
4. 2 For the price of one – the other one is inferior, they are both inferior etc
5. ‘Bait and Switch’ – sounded too good to be true?  We’ll you are right, we’ve sold out (that one item) but why not buy this more expensive one now that you are here…

One of the most highprofile cases of false advertising was when McDonalds were accused that their burgers in shops don’t look like they do on the adds.  McDonalds also came under attack again over their introduction of nutrient information on packaging.

In simplified legal parlance we’re looking at freedom of speech vs regulation of commerce.

In smartapp land we’re looking at improved use of data mining for email campaigns, gadgets or gizmos or even better customised online programing that reflect the current and true positon of the offer and let’s face it; honesty.

But for those that aren’t inflicted by honest bones and where self regulation doesn’t seem to apply, we should report abusers to the relevant authority.  Try your Ombudsman first.

AUTHOR: Michaela Carmichael - iConcertina Creative London

My First Podcast Interview!

I am famous! Neville Hobson and Shel Holtz are leading the way in analysing the impact that new media (blogging. podcasting etc etc) has on the way big brands communicate. Shel and Neville broadcast their 50th Podcast yesterday! Its called For Immediate Release: The Hobson and Holtz Report. They interviewed me and talk at length about my haveyoursay.com campaign.

Visit this link to download excerpts from the podcast. Thanks Nev - you and I have something in common - we love disruptive technologies!

Mugabe, online brands, and Cybersquatting

We’ve all seen the recent images of bulldozers tearing through walls and driving thousands of people homeless in Harare. It made me realize the old claim, that domains (dot coms especially) are a lot like real-estate, still holds true today.

Mugabe’s campaign – promoted by the government as “Murambatsvina", or "drive out trash" – has displaced more than 200,000 people, not just in the capital Harare but also around Victoria Falls (30,000 people) and throughout the country. As their homes were torched and their possessions looted by the security forces, the people were told to "go home". The ones that have no home (I assume that’s most of them) have been herded into re-education camps – deep in rural Zimbabwe.

UN’s special envoy called this “a new form of apartheid” and the reaction around the world hasn’t been very flattering to Mugabe’s regime. President Mugabe is 81 though, so at least the people of Zimbabwe have something to look forward to.

Back to online brands and cybersquatting. President Clinton signed the Trademark Cyberpiracy Prevention Act. The Act was supposed to prevent trademark infringement by making domain name holders (a.k.a. cybersquatters) legally liable, if their domains are "confusingly similar” to a registered trademark.

Since 1999, thousands of domain owners have received Cease & Desist letters and have been evicted from their virtual “homes“. Only a few of them made headlines – like the guy who registered www.avon.com in 1997 and tried selling it to Avon for an undisclosed amount.

However, you won’t be reading anytime soon about the guy who bought Sprite.nu for 16 year-old son (an aspiring graphic artist) only to get a virtual knock on the door 6 months later. Enter the lawyers of the Coca-Cola Company. Sprite is a popular term for anyone who’s into 3D computer graphic (games too!).

In effect, the Act gives trademark holders more rights than they previously enjoyed. The traditional trademark covers only a reasonably specific class of goods. For example, although the Coca-Cola Company has a trademark on Sprite (soft drinks), a footwear company should be able to trademark Sprite shoes.

This Act however allows courts to award damages of up to $100,000. No proof of lost profits or actual harm is required. The domain holder has to file the lawsuit, affirmatively demonstrate good faith, and prove s/he is innocent of trademark piracy. All that in a country where people are innocent till proven guilty.

A practical word of advice: to protect your company’s domains, check for any trademarks that already exist. Establish your LEGITIMATE interest in this domain (i.e. no placeholder for a homepage). Under no circumstance discuss selling the domain or engage in criticism, parody or satire as that may lead to an accusation of using the domain in bad faith. Transfer your domains to a reputable registrar who will follow ICANN’s rules while the domain dispute lasts. Last but not least, talk to your lawyer.

I know most of us are safe but you can be absolutely sure that on this blog, you’ll get only PRAISE of the amazing SMART cars. Aren’t they the cutest little cars in the world?

AUTHOR: Krasimir Koichev, iConcertina Creative

Land Rover's Opportunity

Thanks to Neville for picking up my campaign : he  has articulated Land Rover's opportunity so well... Have a read.....

Taking Land Rover Online - past the online brochure (that is)!

You will remember that I justified the birth of this blog by explaining that the advent of the personal web platform was undoubtedly a disruptive technology and for me to understand it I needed to learn its rules… the hard way…. by getting out there and blogging… pushing my comment past anecdotal chatter.

Along the way I have learnt a lot from one of my company’s partners, Hill & Knowlton. H&K manages their clients’ reputation by keeping a keen eye on the blogosphere. Not only do they watch it but they lead the way on understanding how to manage it. Niall Cook and H&K Netcoms run workshops for their clients to help them prepare for a new world of high transparency and public accountability.

My Haveyoursay.com campaign against Land Rover has taught me a lot. Firstly, that even big brands like Land Rover (and their PR Companies) don’t really understand how to manage the blogosphere. After today’s lengthy conversation with a senior manager at Land Rover I felt good, I felt that Land Rover cared and saw eye-to-eye with me – a valuable customer. The truth is that they were very aware of the campaign from the outset! Their PR Manager had picked up my email, so had their PR company yet they had chosen to ignore me. At the end of it all … that is their only crime. All they needed to do is reach out to me in the early days of the campaign and a short piece of communication would have doused the flames of my passionate frustration.

I did take the opportunity to explain to Land Rover that it was about time they took some of their Customer Relations online – their contact page only relies on the Royal Mail and a good old fashioned call centre that encourages you to put everything in an envelope for the man with the cleft stick.

In my view, a good online strategy linked into Land Rover’s business objectives could accelerate bridging the chasm that Land Rover needs to cross -

- thats after they have drawn up a plan to manage the blogosophere to best advantage!

We are not afraid!

Neville who plugged my campaign against Land Rover pointed me in the direction of a blog entitled We're not Afraid - they claim it took 4 million hits today!

Good on you guys....here is our contribution!

Cost and Risk: a case for tailored software

I found an old text book which I studied in 1990 in my first year of Accounting Information Systems and found a chapter on the pros and cons of Custom Solutions versus ‘off-the-shelf’ packages.

The advantages of Custom Solutions are unchanged and are obvious: No compromises : you get exactly what your organisation needs. It’s all about sculpting your software around your business as opposed to losing sleep over the constraints placed on your business by off-the-shelf solutions. I call off-the-shelf solutions, FIFO solutions. Not first-in-first-out, but Fit in or F*** Off!

The old text book cautions readers on Bespoke Solutions saying they are risky and costly. This has all changed dramatically over the last 15 years. Whether you throw Microsoft or Opensource tools at your custom software strategy, both the risks and costs have diminished to a point where I think its reckless for your organisation not to adopt a custom software strategy.

15 years ago, costs could be high: development skills and understanding was limited. Today you can find talent everywhere you look, on shore and off-shore. This translates into a reduction in cost. In 1990, if a bus hit your software developer, you were in difficulties…. now, with platform and coding standardisations anyone can pick up the code where it was last left off… this has decreased risk substantially.

There are only two caveats to the above… 1) Don’t reinvent the wheel 2) Make sure you spend as much money on defining your requirements as you do on developing the piece of software. I will talk a little bit more about these in future blog entries.

So if your organisation doesn’t have an online strategy why? : take the poll on the right hand sidebar – its anonymous so don’t think it’s a sales tool – I am just interested!

(Having said that - if you want some help defining your Custom Online Software Strategy - you know where to go - our website! )

7-7 : Online saved the day.

7-7 was a tragic day for London - no doubt. A friend and associate of mine, Joel Cere, talks about his day - I was fortunately safely in the office at the time the havoc was reeked so I avoided the sense of panic and confusion by turning online.

I recently criticised on-line for dropping the London2012 ball. Now I owe Online nothing but praise.

The traditional news sources just couldn’t keep up. The blogs were full of the latest images and breaking news. We all communicated with friends and family by msn messenger, email and Skype as we weren't able to rely on mobile phones or land line telephones.

Don't want to discount the magnitude of the tragedy by engulfing it in poor-taste humour - but it's a relief that we can avoid any cross-atlantic date-formatting confusion by  referring to it as 7-7!

Won the battle, but not the war: Software Patents in Europe

Rob has been bravely waging a war on the European Software Patent Directive: all info can be found on his blog Open Ideas Register.

I am ashamed not to have been engaged in this struggle to-date, ( it really impacts my chosen domain) but am pleased that the first round of the war has been won - the directive was thrown out yesterday by the European Parliament: well done Robert & Co!

Keep watching and do what you can to support the cause.  Apart from the 5 minute briefing on the blog and his call to action, you should visit a rather rude URL which amusingly spells out the case for maintaining the pressure and awareness - the war has not yet been won!

 

Online: Letting the side down: Olympic 2012 bid

I have to confess that we were all huddled around the radio in the office yesterday at 12:45 eagerly awaiting the news on 2012. The irony:  we are an online business and you could rather expect us to be glued to our browser screens. Ashamedly, I had a sense that we would miss out on the moment if we relied on the www.... and I was right: BBC news was down for a few minutes and the London2012.com and .org sites also collapsed... so much for an online strategy to support communication!

Another embarrasing moment for online happened yesterday when Yahoo News ran the announcement next to the New York Share your Dream 2012 Campaign. Thanks to Steve Rubel for spotting that amusing one!

Anway, the good old fashioned radio came shining through and we managed to crack open a few bottles of bubbly.... well done London 2012 and our friends at Hill & Knowlton who played their important part in the London2012 olympic bid.... the hard work payed off... now let the real hard work begin....let's get the online components working though!

Goodbye Royal Mail - Hello Vismail!

I spoke to a room full of Charities at UK Fundaising's Perfect Pitch last week and I told them it was time they stopped sending me all this random junk mail which must be costing them a fortune! They couldn't even tell whether I opened the mail. The only value they were creating was padding the Royal Mail's letterbags and coffers.

I told them they needed to go online where the chances of getting my attention was much greater at far less cost. I also told them I thought they should look seriously at Vismail - something which a co-presenter Michael Kaufman of Fundraising Initiatives was presenting later. Even your email has to be different, catchy and visually stimulating.... you know that old cliche: content, content, content!

Vismail rocks! Its a superb little piece of technology - I wish I owned it - but sadly I don't! But that doesn't mean I can't blog about it! It's a small attachment which is embedded into an html based email - it doesn't call any content from a server - so it can executed off-line, it gets through fire-walls. Vismail means that your campaign no longer relies on words and static images... your email now arrives knocking the socks off the recipient with some slick video and sound. Campaigns and communication will never be the same again!

Email Michael and ask him to send you a vismail - seeing is believing. As soon as I have posted this entry, I am off to buy it for my organisation.

Ask not what you can do for Charity…. Ask what Charity can do for you!

At the UK Fundraising Perfect Pitch last week, two of the presentations were based on similar business models. Both were based on the presumption that they could leverage Charities’ databases and campaign communication to springboard their marketing initiatives. By attributing revenue generated to the Charity referrer, (in-return) they promise to plough back a portion of the resulting revenue.

Priceless Buyers is an organisation that has set up a centralised personal buying service. It has bulk buying agreements with a range of well-known brands and has organised discounts and commissions. Simply put, I phone Priceless Buyers on a particular telephone number, (supplied to me by the Charity I support), speak to a specialised buyer who can give me information and advice. That buyer will come back to me with the best price and I contract directly with the vendor. I win, ‘cause I get the benefit of Priceless Buyer’s research and collective agreements and save money. Priceless Buyers earns commission and then passes a portion of their earnings back to my Charity. Only catch is that unless the charity of my choice has signed up with Priceless Buyers directly, I can’t nominate them as my beneficiary. So the model should work if the Charities understand the value proposition and agree to sign up and put Priceless Buyer’s marketing collateral into their next mail shot.

Everyclick.com is a new search engine. which “gives your mouse a heart” – using a similar model: they expect the charity to market their proposition and in return will plough back a portion of their revenue. They presume that their users will give up traditional search engines in favour of an ethical and charitable alternative. I am not sure whether using everyclick.com will compromise the quality of the results you get from your existing search engine experience. I suspect some people will be willing to make this compromise.

I like the model and think both businesses have legs... spread the word.

A blog that casts a shadow over the Land Rover Brand.

Neville Hobson talks about PR Week's feature on Reputation Management questioning whether Blogs cast a shadow. In it he quotes, Mark Rogers, of  Market Sentinel  "PROs must realise more consumers find a company through Google than going straight to its homepage, and that's where they will see blogs mentioning that company first."

I have recently waged war on Land Rover in my very own Case Study on Blog Brand Terrorism. (see www.haveyoursay.com) I wrote to both the PR manager at Land Rover UK as well as their PR Company but without response. Despite the lack of response from the Communication leaders, I am pleased to say that I am taking delivery of a brand new replacement Land Rover Discovery on Thursday.  The dealership only started taking me seriously when I referred them to my blog's URL.

I am now receiving 700 hits a day on this site- the bulk of which are being referred by MSN.com, search.yahoo.com and Google - I was surprised that Land Rover didn't ask me to take the website down when they agreed to replace the car. They either don't understand Blogs or they consider themselves too important to take a single individual seriously. Oh to measure how many potential Land Rover clients I have steered into the jaw's of their competitors!

I will write to the Land Rover Marketing Director Andy Griffiths to thank him for my replacement Disco but I don't expect to hear back from him... as far as blogs are concerned - I think Land Rover's PR and Communication function have their head buried in the sand. I wonder if I would solicit a response out of Ford int he US (Land Rover's ultimate owner) - now that's something I am going to try.

UK Fundraising's Perfect Pitch: Perfect

I am a real sceptic on the potential value of these type of 'Speed Dating' seminars where organisers attempt to match buyers with suppliers. I presented iConcertina Creative in a 30 minute slot yesterday talking about Online: not just Marketing's domain. Take our online survey which gives you a taste of the questions I raised and issues I covered (as a little incentive you will have a chance of winning an iPod Shuffle!)

Not only did I engage in valuable conversations with some of the leading UK charities but  I also found the other eight presentations to be riveting: real innovation and true complimentarity.

Not everyone knew that I was wearing two hats: both a Custom Online Solution developer (aka bespoke software vendor) - as well as a trustee of small charity called Inspire - and I left the event feeling that I had just as much to gain by following-up conversations with my co-presenters as I will have with the sales leads we generated.

Over the course of the next few days, I will share with you some of the innovation, bright ideas and clever business models that I learnt about yesterday : all in all a superb day: well organised, efficient and great value - well done to UK Fundraising's Howard Lake and Lindsey Hood for putting the event together. I am waiting for their next perfect pitch - as a delegate though, as I am sure the attendees have heard all I have to say... that's until we discover another disruptive technology!

Charities don't seem to be online...

I must receive close to a dozen appeals a month from charities.....somewhere along the line I must have forgotten to check the data protection box... so they all come spilling through the letter-box and pile up at the front door. I can recognise them and it may sound really harsh and uncaring but there is little chance I get to open them. (I do my fair share of giving and I have already chosen my beneficiaries).

These postal campaigns must cost a fortune. As far as I am concerned, they would have a far better chance at getting me to read their appeals if they emailed their communication. I guess they don't have a database of email addresses - I hear opportunity knocking....

It doesn't look like UK charities have really got to grips with the positive impact that an online transformation can have on minimsing costs and maximizing fund raising..... so I am going to talk to a delegation this Thursday at fundraising.co.uk and will share a case study or two with them on Online Communication and database integration. Attendance is free so come along.

Just a personal plug as well... please visit www.inspire.org.uk - I am a trustee of this charity and we have just rebranded it - my company has just donated a new website and brand identity- There is an online donation button so please click on it! We are going to be developing an online community for it using the technology we developed for 2B Mates

Can Land Rover's PR Company spell BLOG?

In previous posts, I questioned whether PR companies actually do take notice of blogs... or whether they even understand them?

Interestingly enough, I conducted my very own experiment on brand terrorism. Although the war waged on Land Rover harvested great result, I still am yet to hear back from Land Rover's PR manager or their PR Company Harrison Cowley - not even the Chief Exec returns my email. This is despite getting some decent traffic on the site (200 hits per day) and proudly achieving some good Search Engine Rankings. For instance discovery 3 land rover in msn.com or "discovery 3" problems in Google. I even had a terrific comment from Adam who test drove a Discovery and is still waiting for one .... wonder if I changed his mind?!

Is blogging just Academic?

I was invited to discuss Academic Blogging recently at Queen Mary’s College London.

I focussed the main part of the presentation on the difference in approach to blogging between business and academia.  It is clear that whilst business has been reacting to it as a disruptive technology, there are many researchers who are embracing the technology as a useful tool.  For example, blogs already exist about what libraries are doing with blogs.  Furthermore, a mass of resources are available for academic bloggers, most notably Crooked Timber which is an academic group blog with a mass of interesting links to blog sites and truly insightful discussions which outsiders to research would otherwise be unaware of.

The University of Minnesota Libraries have already announced UThink, an initiative to make it easy for faculty, staff and students to use blogs, either for educational or personal purposes.  Such ideas would translate well in the business world, especially for large project teams where it is very easy for individuals to become so focused on the details they forget the bigger picture.

My presentation steered towards the subject of using of blogging as an educational tool.  Several educational facilities are beginning to use blogs in the classroom, such as the University of Bergen in Norway or Georgia Tech
in America where group blogging is becoming an indispensable tool, opening up discussions and new lines of questions previously muted.  Again, if such practices could be nurtured in business, I believe greater in-house expertise could be cultivated, perhaps even when considering the traditional approaches to internal communications of company rules, facilities or guidelines.

I believe businesses should consider themselves lucky that academia is so transparent with its research too.  For example, I am sure many businesses could gain useful free knowledge from institutions such as the University of Maryland, where they have published a paper on implementing campus-wide blogging software.

Just like the commercial world, academic institutions and their staff/students must also beware of blogging.  Stories are already out there regarding students and staff using inappropriate language or references or being too ‘free’ with their opinions.  For example, Elaine Liner aka The Phantom Professor became an outspoken critic of the her academy telling tales of campus life which hit a little too close to home for her colleagues.  As such her contract was ‘not re-newed’.  Such stories are likely to become ever more familiar in both business and academia.

Overall, as the blogging phenomenon is still in its early stages, I believe that business and academia can learn a lot from each other, whether this be through the openness and educational tools provided by free-thinkers in academic circles through to the placement of clear guidelines for staff required by business.  Whether they do or not is a different matter. I will watch this space with great interest…

Author: Dean Russell

Time is the measure of business - so why waste it?

As this is my very first blog I was happily surprised at how simple and easy it was.  Although I work with new technologies everyday and should have more faith, I still find I am a little hesitant in approaching them unless I know I have spare time to learn how to use them!

Thinking about this topic led me to scrap my original thoughts of writing about accessibility, and comment instead on how much time we waste learning how to use software and their many ne’er-seen-again features.

Surely, when using software we should be able to get stuck in, do the task and then forget about it.  Instead we end up spending longer using the software than actually DOING the task! This has to be the most inefficient way of working.  I can’t ever imagine looking for tutorials on how to get my pencil to write for me.

It doesn’t end at the initial use of the software either, the ongoing solution to the increasingly complicated features is the annoying stalker-esque help facility that pops up every few minutes, merely highlighting the fact we are unlikely to figure out how the use the software without it.  Once again, this just takes us away from thinking about the task, and back to the software itself.

I would argue that most of us use less than 10% of most software features anyway for repetitive tasks, and when we do want to do something a bit different, we usually end up having to spend ages painfully searching these help guides with ingenious phrases only to find it’s not possible after all.

I am not saying the usability of software has not improved – it has – but we are still far away from being able to work without additional thought and time being wasted on the software and not the task-at-hand.

My thoughts are instead of trying to add all features for all people, leaving most people unhappy with the 10% they use.  Wouldn’t it be much more logical to create just that 10% perfectly for the specific needs of the known users?  Hence, rendering the actual software use invisible and freeing us all up to do the actual work we need to do.  To quote Adrian’s earlier posting - keep your eyes posted - this blog will reveal all!

Author: Dean Russell

Off to France on vacation - (with my Dummies Guide to HTML!)

I am off on vacation for two weeks - taking my "Dummies guide to HTML" - after years of believing that I should surround myself with coders rather than master development languages myself - I am slowly starting to change my tune. I am not suggesting I become a master at .net or anything like that - but a shallow knowledge of all the bits would be useful - HTML, is my start, and a necessity for me to be able to edit my typepad templates on this blog - I want to add new and interesting content and functionality without having to ask for favours from my development team!

I haven't been great with material this last week - so its already catching up - the content demands that Blogs place on a blogger stir the deepest feelings of guilt! In my absence I have invited Dean Russell, our Client Services Director at iConcertina to contribute - he has a wealth of stories and views to share on Custom Online Solutions, blogging, usability, accessibility and the like - all of which I am sure he will share with you!

My thanks also go to Joël Céré for dropping by on Friday morning and delivering a riveting presentation on blogs and blogging. What he had to say: Blogging is a minefield of intrigue, power and fun! - As he concluded though: damned if you do, damned if you don't!

See you in a fortnight, happy blogging Dean!

To Excel you need to be the Lotus King

I am interested to see whether you have any formal training in Excel?

My guess is you are no different from me: self-taught to use most of the software that empowers our lives. I remember teaching myself Lotus 123 – that trusty old “/” command. I am still convinced that the speed of my backslash commands could beat any of my colleagues forced to navigate by point and click.

Lotus suddenly faded away and we all began praying to the Mighty Microsoft Excel. I don’t have a vivid recollection of the way I used Lotus 123 in the early 90’s. What I am confident about: if I was forced to go back to the 64k machine and my old friend Lotus, I would still do my job just as quickly and efficiently. Ok, I have to admit that it all looks sexier with graphical presentation and interface but how far have we really come over the last 15 years? My point is that we should have progressed with leaps and bounds.

I think I am lucky if I use more than 10% of Excel’s functionality. I learnt most of what I know by watching colleagues performing routine tasks in excel not admitting that I didn’t know how to perform a vlookup or a whatif! I haven’t had any formal training and I am sure I could do my job more efficiently if I learnt just one new thing each day.

Brand Terrorism: PR Companies – take note!

Blogging provokes the brand terrorist in all of us. It’s all about bringing power to the people and that’s why PR companies are starting to take serious notice of Blogs.

Niall Cook  (Netcoms Director, at Hill & Knowlton (H&K)), spends his time wisely: understanding how this disruptive technology impacts the way in which Brands need to communicate. Most PR companies panic when forced into a stand-off with a brand-bashing-blogger mostly because they don’t understand it. Another interesting read is Steve Rubel

Personal Web Publishing makes our soapboxes so more effective and visible that our new maxim becomes “it’s easier to beg for forgiveness than permission!”

Niall reminds us of the seemingly obvious- but take heed – think carefully before you hit that publish key – your friends, colleagues, clients and competitors are probably reading your journals!

H&K understand the impact that blogging has on brand-terrorism. They take it so seriously that they have (justifiably) released guidelines on the use of personal weblogs. The most important message – keep your employment contract fresh in your mind – Weblogs don’t neutralise your responsibilities and obligations under the various IP and confidentiality clauses in your contracts.

Oh, and one last thing…. Blogs don’t change the rules of defamation and libel- so please be careful- it might be too late to beg for forgiveness!

Beware of the Blog!

Four blog entries down and a lot of reading and tinkering, I am proud to say I understand blogging a little better. But, do Brand Guardians and their PR Companies? The advent of blogging has changed the profile of brand-influencers.

In an article on rules for highly effective PR blogs, the blogherald suggests:

It’s no longer just about the media - But remember that customers, prospects, suppliers, industry associations and others who can influence your brand also have blogs. Converse intelligently with them as well.

I am neither a Brand Manager nor a Communications Professional: so I read a bit about this subject: I am a card-carrying brand terrorist and yearn for traction in my fight to bridge the gap between Corporations’ Brand Promise and the stark reality experienced by the lowly consumer. I recommend reading comment by Niall Cook, Steve Rubel, and Joel Cere on this subject.

You must have read about the Apple iPod battery saga – a case study that witnessed the Neistat Brothers – enviable Brand Terrorists - leverage the power of the internet to expose Apple’s “Dirty Little Secret” – its had close to 2 million visitors - Apple was quick to reform its IPOD battery replacement programme!

Or, Dow Chemical who ended up having several expensive conversations with their PR Agency about The Yes Men. Its easy to find this link if you Google “Dow Chemical”.

The latest worth following is covered by Steve Rubel entitled Kensington Lock Kryptonited-Company Silent . More interesting is Larry Borsato’s comment about the PR company’s role in all of this

I met with my Company’s PR Agency (unnamed as they’re a fantastic bunch) to talk about blogging– I was pretty convinced that they were blog cynics and hadn’t spent much time understanding the potential impact on their domain. I promised to send them some reading material- but on second thoughts, this posting is a good start! I hope they see it!

Death to (our current use of) Excel!

There - I got your attention! Don't worry I won't take Excel away from you! - I

don't have anything against it- it's a powerful tool, but it’s more that I accuse its' users of relying on it for the wrong purpose. We are forced to use Excel as a tool to gather data instead of using it to make informed decisions.

Our organisations are to blame. Rather than build databases to provide us with centrally stored data facilitating sharing and collaboration, they force us to build up and protect private stashes of data in personal Excel models.

We often have to re-key information from different places or at best copy and paste it from different sources. Sometimes you have to buy a colleague coffee and a doughnut to have access to ‘their’ data. Interfaces between disparate automated and manual systems are sadly lacking and the bulk of our time is wasted gathering and collating the data. We spend most of our time in data gathering when in fact we should be spending our time in Analysis and Decision Support – making informed decisions based on what the data tells us.

The winner of the Corporation Game is awarded to the creator of most sophisticated Excel model which sports the latest snapshot of the company’s data. This leads to a territorial protectionism – we are individuals proud of ‘owning’ information by merit of having spent hours collecting and manipulating it. Rather, our organisations should be responsible for the central collection and storage of this information and we should be proud of the decisions we make using this information.

Depending on Excel to pull together data has further consequences: by the time we have manipulated and crunched the data, our decisions are often academic: the organisation has moved on since that snapshot was taken. Secondly, in the manipulation and collection process the data is often corrupted which means we are using the wrong data to make our decisions. Lastly, we may not have access to all the required data so we end up estimating or inferring important elements. So despite the effort of pulling the data together its integrity is still doubtful.

Can you imagine a world where our organisation had all its data in a central, fully accessible store? A world where we could be confident of reliably transforming this data into information and making sensible informed decisions for the greater good of our organisations’ overall goals (and our careers)? With all the advances in on-line database platforms, this isn’t a tall order. Keep your eyes posted - this blog will reveal all!

Software: One Size Can't Fit All!

I used to redesign business processes before the Oracle, PeopleSoft and SAP gurus were wheeled in to perform their package implementations.

The level of customisation that these ERP packages afforded multi-national businesses was revolutionary and gave them a distinct competitive advantage.

Why shouldn't SME's gain competitive edge using bespoke software? In the late 90's it was too expensive and too risky for an SME to invest in custom software solutions. Now with stable development platforms like OpenSource and Microsoft - the skills availability and code standardisation have reduced both the cost and risk to a point where I believe Bespoke Software is often more cost effective than off-the-shelf package solutions.

Organisations compromise efficiency on a daily basis with the one-size-fits-all mentality -  they yearn for a software solution that caters for their uniqe needs, that gives them the competitive edge. Custom Software Solutions - or SmartApps are built around an organisation's unique processes and not the other way round.

Build an online custom software solution and start communicating and transacting with your potential and existing customers - now thats what I call competitive advantage.

To Blog or not to Blog - the Egotistical Question?

I have thought long and hard about whether I should embroil myself in what I've always considered to be such a self obsessed past-time. I still have to pretend most bloggers aren't egotistical time-wasters, yet, the news is full of blogging. So to justify the launch of my blog here is my rationale:

Its a disruptive technology and I need to understand it (especially since my career seems to be following the path of the  biggest disruptive technology of all - The Internet!)

Let's face it there is a lot of rubbish out there and bloggers deserve a bad name if judged by the average content of the blogosphere. However, spend a little time with tools like Itelliseek's Blogpulse or Technorati and its like discovering Google for the first time - it helps you navigate through a mass of detritus and I must confess: navigating through the web of thoughts and opinions is more than a little addictive!

I learnt from the Businessweek feature on blogging and visit their very own  blogspotting.net which is supposed to "...cover the business drama ahead, as blogging spreads into companies and redefines media" - there are some interesting entries that lead you all sorts of places and, on the whole, I felt a tad more educated after reading it. It played a small part in convincing me to dabble in my own blog.  gapingvoid's Why Corporate Blogging Works makes it all sound practical! But, if you want it simple and straight I suggest you read a briefing note written by clients of mine -the Netcoms team of Hill & Knowlton (Download Netcoms_January2005.pdf)
 

So forgive me for being a hypocrite - feel free to judge me as yet another egotistical time-waster but hopefully along the way you may identify with some of my thoughts, links and entries and end up some place useful - if not, you could always start a blog of your own!