Blether

Yakety Yak time to talk back!

Mark — 2010-02-22T10:46:08+00:00

This is a quick plug for a friend's new business based in Edinburgh.

Fiona Gomes is the name of the friend in question and she has been talking about starting The Yakety Yak Laguage Cafe in Edinburgh for a while; and now she's up and running.

The idea is perfect - don't learn to speak Franch or Spanish in some old polytechnic on a cold Wednesday night in February. Learn over a good cup of coffee and set your own agenda or just go with the flow...

The fees look very good to me and to prove it I'm going to be booking in on some dates in anticipation of our holiday to France (and excitingly the Tour de France) this summer.

I think it's a fabulous idea and I wish Fiona the very best of luck.

J'espere vous rencontrer a une classe bientot! (thanks Google translate..)

Farewell, Jack Pickard

Dan — 2010-01-21T13:44:31+00:00

In November 2005 a small bunch of geeks met on a grey day in Manchester to discuss web accessibility. That's when I first met Jack Pickard in the flesh (we'd met virtually on AccessifyForum some time earlier that year). We quickly became friends and over the next few years I had the privilege of working and socialising with Jack.

Jack died suddenly last Saturday. It's a tragedy that someone who had so much to give, and gave it so freely, has left us far too soon. Whenever we met Jack always talked about his family, the GLW and his two sons, and my thoughts are with Tracey and the boys.

I wish I could do justice to Jack's memory here, but I can't express just what a great person Jack was. He was funny, thoughtful, intelligent, committed, and did more for web accessibility than can be measured. We never fell out, even on the day we first met when Chelsea beat his beloved Newcastle 3-0.

Farewell my friend, you'll be missed and remembered.

Trademarks: Where have all the words gone?

Mark — 2009-08-21T16:42:54+00:00

Google adwords do a good job for us. There is no other way that we can drive highly qualified buyers to our sites at the 5 or 6 pence we currently pay.

There are challenges - succinct messages, effective calls to action and maintenance of real time prices to name a few.

Maintenance is taken care of by the increasingly impressive Mooch Engine. We can now receive a voucher code at midday, apply it to every relevant price immediately and include all of those prices in adwords within 10 minutes. We can now often get the price to market before the issuing merchant... which is good.

My recurring annoyance is the unrestricted spread of trademarks. Merrell don't want us to use their name to sell their products, neither do Ferrari, Brasher and a host of other name brands. This I can cope with (albeit we are actually trying to increase their revenue). These aren't words commonly used in conversation outside of the brand.

But how about "dancing on ice" this phrase, that used to belong to everybody, now belongs to a private company for the purposes of making money. No one is now allowed to use this three word string without the permission of a faceless marketing man... bad, but not the worst.

Imagine my delight when today I found out that buffalo is now a trademark. Someone owns this word and they won't let you use it (at least not on adwords).

This annoys me, but I bet it annoys mozzarella manufacturers, close relatives to bison and those gals who dance round the outside, a hell of a lot more. Not to mention the residents of that US town in the state of New York.

It is stupid but not unassailable - you see BuffaIo is perfectly acceptable... do you see what I did there...

Oh and while I'm at it could someone tell Google that Speed is more often used to describe motion than it is to describe amphetamines and Need for Speed is not a junky mantra it's a movie and a Wii game.

So use the words while they're still in the public domain, you'll miss them when they're gone.

Insert key for XP under Parallels

Dan — 2009-08-04T13:50:15+00:00

I'm working on an MS Project file running on XP under Parallels on my Macbook Pro. I'm missing the 'Insert' key that creates a new task - digging around the menus for it becomes old very quickly.

Searching turned up lots of old solutions around the 'Help' key which is non-existent on recent Mac keyboards. Finally found the solution, and to help anyone else who might be searching for this, it's: fn + Enter

Run Tool Mooch as your business

Mark — 2009-07-13T20:53:47+00:00

We've finally had to accept that knowing absolutely nothing about Power Tools is an unassailable barrier to making the most of Tool Mooch. If we weren't convinced previously then the amazing start Gayle has made with Baby Mooch has unequivocally proved that subject matter experts do better.

So unsurprisingly we are now seeking a knowledgeable individual to run Tool Mooch for us on licence.

Mooch Engine is pretty intuitive there's no real need for technical knowledge but knowledge of tools is essential. Location isn't vital but local to central Scotland might be useful.

If you fit the bill and fancy having a chat then drop us a note via the website.

What do Affiliate Networks actually do?

Mark — 2009-07-03T15:09:39+00:00

Babalu: Rickshaw Pilot and Affiliate extraordinaire

Mooch Marketing currently makes its way in the world by producing affiliate sales. We point people to the merchant with the cheapest price for a given product, they buy it and the merchant gives us some money.

If you've ever sat in a bicycle rickshaw in Delhi and ended up at the best 'Government Approved' sari shop in India you will know that the concept is global.... payment for introduction / sale.

However, unlike India in this market we introduce a third party who sits between the sari shop and the rickshaw pilot and takes some of the proceeds of the deal.... but for what?

To date, apart from one notable exception (which is the main reason for this post) our only contact has been to ask them to help us with problems we're encountering with merchant and network technology. Almost universally this has resulted in our chasing them 2 or 3 times as the Chinese whispers start, the complication ramps up and the problem remains static.

In every one of these cases we would have preferred to speak directly to the merchant because when we do things happen.

But earlier today I had a teleconference with Sophie Metcalfe of Affiliate Window and Martin from one of our mutual merchants. The whole thing was set up by Sophie who had identified both parties as having the potential for a closer working relationship and had clearly started to consider what and how was possible.

In one sense this is pretty straightforward but as we are a price comparison site who aren't prepared to promote or suppress prices (you know who you are) the opportunities can, at first sight, appear pretty blunt. Despite this we spent 40 excellent minutes learning about what each other did, finding some common ground and seeing if we could make something of it.

And we can - the potential for mutual benefit looks really promising.

So thank you Sophie for doing what we kind of hoped Affiliate Networks would do and for actually doing better than we had hoped.

The price of principles

Dan — 2009-06-26T10:03:40+00:00

It's 40 quid.

In October we're going on holiday to Skala in Kefalonia. We're staying at the Villa Costa, a small family-run hotel with just 7 rooms. Neither of us has been to Greece before and we're really excited about it - it'll be our first holiday for 12 months and it's been a busy year.

Skala wasn't our original destination. Back in January we made a booking for the luxurious Hyatt Regency in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, for the same week in October. It was expensive, but it looked worth it. We've been to Egypt before, cruising from Luxor to Aswan, and were looking forward to exploring Sharm.

Then in April the Egyptian government responded to the outbreak of H1N1 (known by the media as swine flu) by ordering the slaughter of more than 300,000 pigs. Putting aside the issues of potential religious persecution (the vast majority of pigs in Egypt are owned by Coptic Christians, the majority of the country being Muslim and non-pork-eaters), the bad science behind the cull (this is a human pandemic, the virus is not transmitted through pigs), and the potential public health implications (many of the pigs in Egypt are fed on organic waste which will now rot in situ), it was the nature of the cull that appalled us.

Few countries have the facilities to carry out a cull on this scale. The cull of cattle in the UK during the foot and mouth outbreak in spring 2001 showed how ill-prepared we were then. Although large numbers of cattle could be killed in a relatively humane fashion (although even here the use of captive bolt guns and intra-cardial injections was controversial), the logistics of disposing of the carcasses led to vast mass burial sites (up to 500,000 cattle in each) and the unforgettable pyres.

The solution in Egypt? Throw hundreds of live pigs on top of each other into dumper trucks, drive them some distance to mass graves, throw them into the pits and cover them, still alive, in chemicals including quicklime. This results in a lingering, painful death. It's a shocking way to treat any living thing, and as small-scale pig-keepers we know how sensitive pigs are.

Warning - you may find this video distressing.

So last month we cancelled our planned trip to Egypt, paid Sovereigh the 40 quid amendment fee, and saved about £1000 in the process. Some of this went to support Compassion in World Farming, who are campaigning for the Egyptian government to introduce animal welfare legislation outlawing this barbaric treatment of livestock.

Yahoo Search Marketing. First Impressions or lack of...

Mark — 2009-06-23T11:20:29+00:00

We have a small problem: we can't move our ad budget through Google without compromising margins. As a result we decided to offer some money to the Yahoo people through their 'Sponsored Search' programme, which whilst sounding like the latest fund raising idea for the local primary school shares most of its characteristics with Google Adwords.

The initial sign-up process was largely uneventful although I'm not sure why all of the networks insist on the creation of a complete campaign, adgroup, keyword list and ad before being able to seriously look at how you're going to structure the account or anything else.

We had established that it was possible to upload our Google campaigns using csv files and chose the most straightforward example as our test - 6 ad groups in a single campaign. The import process starts with an export from the Google Adwords Editor. Top tip here is to only export one campaign at a time, since the Yahoo upload can get a bit lumpy otherwise.

Next you use the Yahoo interface to convert the file to its format before uploading it as a bona fide Sponsored Search campaign. This proved a bit tricky. The interface shows two fields where the link 'download' could be shown, unfortunately if there are errors in your file this lionk only appears in the comments box, and if you don't immediately realise that this combination of box and term are negative you assume all is well and try to continue.

At which point you have your first encounter with the message: 'The upload file you selected does not contain a valid header', which is Yahoo code for "You haven't sorted out the errors yet because you've taken this from the comments field and not the Converted Campaign File field where the nice downloads hang out".

The way you go about breaking the code is to do the same thing 3 or 4 times again before googling (sorry yahooing) the term and surfing the forums and blogs.

So if you're arriving here at this point in a similar journey I can tell you that "the upload file you selected does not contain a valid header" is almost certainly a result of negative keywords in the original Adwords Editor csv - just delete them, start again and you'll be back in business.... or will you?

No, you won't. Yahoo want to check your site out before running your ads and this will take them.... 3-5 business days!!

So our first impressions are, well none yet, unless we're talking about being a customer of Yahoo which, so far, is significantly less impressive than being a customer of their major competitor.

I think I'll go and see what Bing is up to....

Turn2us - Anita's story

Dan — 2009-06-22T12:29:05+00:00

In May 2007 I started working with Turn2us, a then embryonic charity based in London. Their aim is to help people to to access money and support that is available to them, through benefits, charitable grants and other avenues.

The Turn2us website supports people by providing a benefits checker, a database of grant-giving charities and a growing knowledge base of help and resources.

Anita's story encapsulates what Turn2us is about - "Someone's there helping me in my time of need":

This series of videos is their first foray onto YouTube: if you enjoy them and want to support the aims of Turn2us please help to spread the word, or just give a nice rating. Ta.

Adwords Professional

Mark — 2009-06-19T11:28:05+00:00

I'm chuffed to say that this morning I passed my Google Adwords Professional examination and having fulfilled the other criteria of loitering for a while and giving Google a few bob in ad spend I can now sport the natty GAP logo.

Now the next step... Mooch is currently running 5 accounts with upwards of 3,400 adgroups and even though we've automated 95% of them (more of that in later posts) there's plenty to go at.

Our oldest account celebrates its first birthday on Monday and we've amassed a huge amount of practical knowledge (none of which appeared in the test...) that has made a significant impact on our effectiveness.

The single most important thing for us is (in the words of Douglas Adams) the 'fundamental interconnectedness of all things' that's to say all things in the customer journey. Therein lies the rub, the approaches we get from Search Engine Marketing (SEM) consultants only point at that end of the journey, they often revolve around a very limted number of keywords and they rarely concern themselves with the bigger picture of site structure and customer experience.

So we're thinking that someone needs to properly join the dots and that maybe it's us.....

Where I've been, part one

Dan — 2009-06-18T16:23:55+00:00

It's about 18 months since Blether was last updated with any regularity, and I thought that an absence of that length deserved some explanation.

Just over two years ago I walked away from my safe, comfortable, gainful employment at Clackmannanshire Council to concentrate on my own business, Champion IS. It's been a big success, and I've been extremely fortunate to work on some fantastically interesting projects with a group of dedicated and talented individuals and companies.

Looking back I wish I'd made the time and found the energy to document that period of my life - I've learned more than I ever expected to, have been to some amazing places, and together with the teams I've worked with produced some quality work. The main reason I didn't post here was a lack of energy - over the past two years I've worked harder and longer hours than ever before, and coupled with an often stupid travel schedule (Johannesburg for the day being the stupidest) it left little for much else than family and sleep.

[As an aside and a preview of some future posts I've got lined up, here's my number one tip for anyone thinking of going freelance: the one thing you need that will earn you more money than anything else is enough sleep. The difference in your productivity between fully charged and dog-tired is exponential.]

My work through Champion IS has been diverse. Most people will know me from my web work in local government at Clacks, through speaking at Public Sector Forums and other events and the occasional bit of writing, and a good deal of my work over the past two years has been in the public sector:

As a consultant for London Councils during their redevelopment project, helping them develop their vision for their site, produce specifications and procure the most suitable CMS
As a strategist, most memorably with West Sussex County Council where we did some ground-breaking customer insights work as well.
As a developer, producing among other things the London Councils Grant Directory and Waterwatch Scotland's new website
A a trainer with lots of local authorities, most often covering accessibility, the fundamentals of HTML and CSS, and producing accessible PDFs
As an auditor, producing reports for bodies such as the Care Commission on their use of the web and plans for improvements

There will be case studies of some of these on the Champion IS site in the near future, once I get around to revamping it. We've got a fair bit of new public sector work on the horizon, and one particularly exciting new service in development, more of which anon.

One of the most fortunate and enjoyable working relationships I've developed has been with Landmark Consulting, in particular with the founder Alan Meekings. With Alan I've been fortunate enough to be involved in the birth of a new charity, to brainstorm in the South African bush, and to work with companies like Orange and Money Supermarket. I've also been lucky enough to work with and learn from top-notch web development companies like Reading Room and Clickthinking.

Business continues to be good, I'm having a ball and there's more to tell - in part two I'll talk about how Mooch Marketing came about.

I own six suits

Mark — 2009-06-16T17:53:36+00:00

My first ever blog..... a bit of an introduction maybe?

I have six suits because until 2 months ago I worked for a bank and suits were the order of the day... every day. I was considered something of a maverick as I mostly eschewed ties but that aside I was a 'suit'.

Now I wear anything really, my wardrobe and my day are my own. At the bank I had a role... I could explain it but we'd both be very bored before I finished - although at one point I was a 'senior leader' but they had to cut the junket numbers and I had that title revoked...

Now I'm a Web Publisher apparently (that's what I told my new bank and they didn't so much as snigger) and I'm talking to the world on a blog. As I look from side to side I see web standards, accessibility and the brave new world of the new economy....

I like it. I like the people who build inaccessibility for others to make accessible and I like wearing shorts and flip flops to work. I love the idea of affiliate marketing and decent price comparison. I'm amazed by Google with their analytics, adwords and webmaster tools.... such wonderful accessibility to every sort of data except that which tells you how (what) Google themselves think.

I think I'm going to like it here amongst the techies. I hope Mooch can do all of the things we want it to because more than anything I hope to throw away my suits....

Here's hoping. Mark.

It's been a while

Dan — 2009-06-11T14:43:19+00:00

My, has it really been that long?

When things started getting busy with the business, Blether was one of the first things to suffer. That maybe wasn't the wisest decision - apart from helping to make sure people don't forget I exist, blogging is good for your health, IMHO.

There have been many times since September (has it really been that long?) when venting my spleen or sharing a problem, or sharing a solution to a problem on Blether would have made me feel better, and potentially helped someone else feel better too.

Enough angst, Blether is in the process of resurrection (a few months too late to benefit from any Easter traffic) and is returning in some form. I'll be blethering (see what I did there, eh?) about different things, and being joined by my 'bro Mark. We're working together on various projects now, and this wind-swept, derelict place seemed like the ideal vehicle.

So thank you both for reading, there will be ~~blood~~ more.

Wii Mooch

Dan — 2008-09-11T19:40:43+00:00

One of the benefits of being freelance is the ability to dedicate more time to little side projects. I did this when I was fully employed, but without the freedom to pull an all-nighter when it was needed the possibilities were limited.

In our spare time for the past month or so my bro and I have been working on the first product of our new company, Mooch Marketing. It's called Wii Mooch, and if you own a Wii and live in the UK we hope you'll find it indispensible.

To celebrate the launch we're going to be giving away a copy of Wii Fit - all you have to do is register your interest for the site.

If you've got a Wii and have the time and the will to help us with testing let me know and we'll give you the keys to the backdoor. We're hoping to launch by next Friday, 19th September.

betMooch Euro 2008 fantasy footy

Dan — 2008-05-31T21:59:01+00:00

Even though none of the home countries feature in the european championships the anticipation is growing around these parts for what should be a cracking tournament. With so many top europeans playing in the english premiership there will still be plenty of home interest, and the inevitable Spanish under-achievement will remind us why it's maybe just as well England aren't there.

It's also going to be fun because we've just launched betMooch Euro 2008 Fantasy Footy. Sadly I can't actually claim any of the credit - it's almost all Cole's work and he's done a great job.

If you fancy putting together the ultimate team for the tournament head over to the website at http://euro2008.betmooch.co.uk/

Entry to the game is free and once registered you can set up your own custom leagues to pit your wits against friends, family, colleagues and arch-nemesi (sp?). There is even Steve McClaren's® Lucky Dip, so if you think Arshavin is something that should be done behind closed bathroom doors then get England's ex-manager to pick eleven random players for you.

If you do enjoy the site and think it is something others might be interested in then please do pass it on. The more the merrier and if interest is good then will see if we can sort some prizes out...