Read one Irish entrepreneur's blog as she operates a business in Dublin
Enterprise Ireland
June 23, 2004
Brightspark has been added as a solution provider on the
Enterprise Ireland website. Hopefully this will bring in lots of business. Brightspark is listed as an online marketer and website developer, so you can search for us there.
Failte go Lastminute.com
June 22, 2004
Lastminute.com is to launch in Ireland on 1 July. Now we can all put off planning til Friday afternoons and just hop off around Ireland or Europe as we please!
It will be interesting to see how it fares in this market as we already have quite a lot of competition in the holidays/breaks/hotels space. But I'm sure they've got a groundbreaking marketing strategy all ready and sure, anything that raises the profile of the internet can only be a good thing.
Ya Gotta Love Dreamweaver
June 20, 2004
I've just spent a little time updating the client side of my site.
"A little" being the operative words. I had a fair bit of shifting things around and adding to do, but with Dreamweaver it was quite easy. The hardest thing about the task was being consistent. Remembering to change the title in case study 2, 3, and 4, because I did it in 1.
So when you're looking around for a web design company - think about consistent and diligent checking of items, and not just 'out there' design. Think "Accountant Lost in a Designer's World" and you should be alright with that company.
Or you could contact Brightspark for advice on who to use. We have relationships with most of the major and many of the minor web designers in this city - a 5 minute conversation with you and your website objectives is enough to put you in touch with the right designer for your needs. And of course, for your budget.
Brightspark is 1 Today
June 16, 2004
Hurray - it is the first anniversary since the creation of Brightspark! And what a year that has been. There has been so many good things and only a few annoying ones. Clients are pleased with results achieved, new ones are coming on board all of the time...and I am happy working for myself.
It is also the 100th anniversary of Bloomsday. In honour of that occasion, I have donned a floral dress and am going out for a Joycean lunch with some scholar friends of mine.
Sun is shining in Dublin city today. Temperature is expected to be 24 degrees. People are smiling more, the city looks great. Summer if officially here at last!
Vote for Me-I'm Good Looking
June 11, 2004
No, not me - I'm far too busy running Brightspark!
That was the impression I got when I went off to vote today. I knew how I'd be voting in the "Let's rush it through like we did Nice I" referendum. And I had a fair idea who I want to send to Europe as an MEP.
But the candidates for the local elections? I hadn't a clue. I was hoping to have a few flyers to read when I got to the polling station but that practise has been outlawed.
So I attempted to cast my vote using the information provided: a photo, their name, their party and their job. Hhm, shall I put a Financial Analyst in there or a Photographer - who hadn't even bothered to submit a photo of himself? Well he definitely wasn't getting my vote - dodgy, faceless person.
Poor old Anrai Mac Somebody or other from Sinn Fein. A bit of the fat side, he won't get the 'good looking' votes. A glance at his occupation and he works as a manager in the telecoms industry - I dislike him already, he's not getting my vote.
It's a pity really because it's the local councillors that can actually make a bit of a difference to my life in a very local level. They can lobby for more recycling facilities in apartment buildings around the city, they can bring a new degree of energy to City Hall. And I voted for a good looking girl and a rather attractive man. How superficial is that! I feel guilty - I don't think that's what Padraig Pearse et al gave their lives for....
Wireless World of Smithfield
June 09, 2004
I'm delighted to be able to write something good, positive, happy and buzzed up today. I feel like I've been having a bit too much of a rant of late. But it's hard not to when all the good news stories are locked away in a world of confidentiality agreements! Like the Irish operations of a global FMCG company that is launching its Irish intranet. Or the Irish food company that has made the right decision and switched to Brightspark...
There are happy things going on here but I just can't blog about them.
The good news that I can blog about is that summer has officially arrived in Dublin. For today Brightspark was out in the lawns of Brightspark HQ working away on the laptop, enjoying the sunshine, visiting websites and responding to email thanks to the wireless connection. [If anyone has tips on how to adjust the screen so that it is visible in glaring sunlight, please provide! I looked cool though].
And there is a new cafe opening soon on Capel Street. I'm very excited because it's the first one up the top of the street and it's really near me. Now I can work wirelessly while sipping a skinny machiato in Dublin city!
The only downside is that I have to get past the skangy Claddagh Ring pub with all the smokers standing around outside it. Thus, setting the tone for the blogs to follow, I sign off on this warm and breezy Dublin night...
Brightspark Moves Overseas?
June 08, 2004
As the first birthday of Brightspark approaches I'm really very excited to mention that I had a meeting with a UK based company last week to discuss how Brightspark can help them to achieve results for their site. They were referred to me by an Irish company that excels at what it does and was talking to Brightspark about how they can really start to profit online using their website.
Speaking of profiting - it's no surprise that the banks in this country are in disgrace. I moved my bank accounts from BOI to AIB in March, largely due to the fact that BOI makes no distinction in how it charges you for the 'service' you receive. So I was paying the same for using the internet as someone who demands to see a bank manager!! Also, BOI doesn't have a great many branches on the northside of Dublin so I was finding it hard to deposit the many cheques that flow to Brightspark.
Anyway, I moved banks and was surprised to receive a bill for €100 from BOI. Without any request from myself, they took it upon themselves to issue me with some new credit cards, and yet their credit card services department had no working phone lines for the past couple of weeks. Not only that, but the government charge which they levy on 1 April somehow found itself charged to my account in May - 11 months early. I wonder if they would have charged me again in April? And also, the bank continued to pay out on a direct debit mandate that has now been cancelled 3 times. All of that and the levied a charge for the use of Business Online, the BOI business internet offering which isn't available for Mac users, ie. me. But they still charged me for it.
I just spent 40 minutes sorting this out. I agree with Conor from Stephens Green BOI branch that this "really is a complete fuck-up". True. At least some people in Bank of Ireland speak the truth.
Victim of Own Success?
June 03, 2004
A couple of weeks ago I did a course that was of great value. It was a course in cold calling and really - I don't know how I have survived so long in sales related roles without the knowledge I now have.
The course taught me how to get meetings with people I have never met before - how not to take no for an answer! Being a diligent student, I made the time to put the theory into practise a day or two after the course and I was delighted with the results. I had a success rate of 40%, ie. 4 out of 10 calls turned into meetings.
One of those meetings was with a consultant called Patrick Talbot. His consultancy, imaginatively named Talbot Associates, offers advice to its clients on how to make processes more efficient, so I contacted him to see if we could talk about Brightspark's intranet services. We were due to meet last week, but on the morning of our meeting he called to say he couldn't make it. There and then we re-scheduled for yesterday at 11.30am.
I arrived at his serviced office on Fitzwilliam Square about 5 mins before our meeting and was told he had just walked out the door! The receptionist called him on his mobile and told him I was there. He hadn't got far so he came back to meet me. Get this - he said he could give me 5 minutes, that he had another meeting to go to.
Not only had this man wasted my time not once but twice, but he insulted me by offering 5 mins to me. I am not so desperate that I need to break into people's lives for 5 mins. I told him that my time was as valuable as his, that enough had been wasted, and went on my way.
This has gotten me thinking - the success of the cold call to Mr Talbot has cost me time and money. I don't want my cold calls to bring about time wasters like Mr Talbot who do not have the honesty to say they are not interested in meeting me.
So, Brightspark in this case is a victim of its own success at cold calling.