Read one Irish entrepreneur's blog as she operates a business in Dublin
New Mobile Provider
September 27, 2004
The new Brightspark mobile provider will be: [drum roll] - Vodafone.
It's a pity that Meteor doesn't do any contract package between the one I'm on now and the one that offers 1250 minutes per month.
It's a tedious job trying to work your way around the various contracts that are on offer, but one well worth doing once a year. Mobile is quite a large part of Brightspark's expenses so it's peace of mind to know that I'm getting the best deal for me.
If I hadn't done the shop around I did last week I would have ended up paying 20% more than I need to pay, every month.
If you're thinking of doing this exercise yourself, what you need to know is how many minutes you use per month. Then work out from your last bill the % spend on each of the providers. Then get all the bumpf from all the providers and drop their charges into your bill. And you'll get the answer!
Life Coach That's Right On The Money
September 21, 2004
I'm really enjoying working on a website for one of my clients right now and I'll tell you why.
It's a site for a very switched on, non-airy fairy life coach and I'm telling you, it's going to be a flier! Life coaching ireland is an area that's rapidly growing in this country. There's a huge need for life coaching services, because despite the rapid increase in people's financial wealth, there has been a corresponding drop in our time. We probably have more things today than our parents or grandparents ever dreamed of having - but are we happier?
So where does life coaching fit in and what's it all about? A life coach is a person who can help you to get your life back on track. She asks the questions of you that will draw out the answers that are already within yourself, but which we never allow ourselves the time to consider. What kind of life do you want? Now and in the future? Are you happy doing what you're doing now for the rest of your life? Or do you want to change it?
Better than a best friend because a life coach won't judge you or agree with you just because she has to. Fitting a life coach into your schedule for an hour a month is probably the best present you can give to yourself because the effects will be long lasting. [Next time you're out late night shopping and about to make an unplanned purchase think about that!]
One of the reasons I'm enjoying working on the site is because it fits entirely into my view of how the best sites these days are structured.
If you look at the client sites that Brightspark has produced, you'll notice that the navigation not only lists the business services, but also is accessible by need. Even on our own site, you can see this on the home page in the boxes. Freedom Unlimited's life coaching Ireland site lends itself perfectly to this because, by its very nature, it is a business that attracts people by need.
Jackie Fitzpatrick, the life coach, is not targeting Ireland's top executives, nor is she going after the much marketed at business owners segment. Freedom Unlimited's target market is made up of 25-40 year olds. They are not the top exec's, but they are not the office juniors either.
They are people that you and I know well, people that are you and me?
People who have worked hard to get on in the education system, to secure that well paying job, but who are stuck in the rat-race of working hard all week, slogging it out in the gym (because we must strive for that great body), busy catching up with friends at the weekend (we have to be sociable), tired a lot of the time, and possibly getting a little sick and tired of it all.
All this by the age of 26? Or 32? Or 40?
When you visit Freedom Unlimited's site, you can enter it by need - The Quarter Life Crisis, The Terrifying Thirties, The Fabulous Forties.
If you're reading this and you think, "I'm so glad that's not me". Well good for you. But if you're reading this and a little part of your soul identifies with the possibility that you could do with a new set of goals and dreams, that you're finding life can be a bit humdrum and meaningless, that you're sick and tired of being sick and tired - and you haven't even reached 40 yet, then there's definitely something in it for you.
The other reason I'm enjoying working on this site so much is because Jackie is a lovely person. She draws out the best in me, I want to give her the best life coaching site in Ireland, and I'm enjoying it as I do it.
If you have any comments on Jackie's site, why not tell her? She'd love to have your feedback. And so would I. Please hit the contact us section of this site and let me know. I'm sorry I can't leave this blog open to comments anymore because it has only encouraged spam.
Which Mobile Provider?
September 20, 2004
I'm thinking of changing mobile provider. I'm making too many calls to be getting value from the plan I'm on at Meteor, yet there is a huge jump from the one I'm on to the next one. The next one would give me 1250 free minutes per month - yet I only use 670, so I need to leave them.
I looked at the O2 site and rang their business sales number to get a bit more info. God, their business model sucks. I was put on to 2 different people and they want to send an O2 sales rep out to meet me. He'll be able to fit me in end of this week or early next. I tried to tell him that I'm a small business, very busy and that I want to make my decision today. Fitting in to some sales rep's schedule is not what I had in mind. Nor have they earned a meeting with me, why should they get my time?
And so to Vodafone - the eircom of the mobile world. I've made my views on eircom pretty well known in the past, so I shall say no more.
So I'm going to take a walk down Henry Street later this afternoon and visit the Vodafone and O2 shops and make up my mind. Meanwhile Gary from Meteor customer care got really snotty when I said I was leaving. Suddenly he didn't have answers to questions such as "how many minutes did I use last month?". He wanted to get someone to call me back. In my experience, they've never called me back, so I said I'd hold. I suppose I should feel all warm and fuzzy because Meteor Customer Care obviously cares about me and doesn't want to lose me as a customer!
Back to World of Finance
September 17, 2004
Brightspark's background is in finance. You name it and we've marketed it - fixed interest investments, retail banking services, equity funds, high net worth banking services.
So it is with great delight and anticipation that we are embarking on an email marketing campaign for Byrne & McCall accountants. Beginning in October, Byrne & McCall will be sending a fully branded HTML email each month to its clients and contacts. This will feature a leader article from the well known and respected economist, Jim Power, as well as articles on investments in overseas property markets, growth and strategic planning advice for SME's, as well as newsy pieces on tax.
"Newsy pieces on tax?"
Yes, that's what Brightspark is all about. Making stories come to life through a lively "news you can use" writing style!
If you think this is something you might like to receive, visit Byrne & McCall's site, hit the contact us, and sign up.
Brightspark Does Beauty
September 15, 2004
Another beauty site in our portfolio. This time for a long standing client, Madison Clinic. We've been managing pay-per-click campaigns for them since last year which have been bringing in very good results. The previous site had been designed and built by the owner of Madison Clinic. She did a very good job on it, but the time had come to update it to a professionally designed site.
Another of our long-time collaborators, Matrix Ireland, did the design, and part of the brief was to include plenty of icons and user-friendly tables that Madison could use as they update the site themselves. Madison enjoys quite a high search engine ranking already (thanks to Brightspark), but now that the site has been redesigned, the spiders should give it a bit of a boost, as the file names and structures are much more search engine friendly.
Point to note for anyone out there who is thinking of going down the road of getting the nephew, IT guy, or "bloke I know" to design a site for you - if the site isn't built by a professional it can work against you in terms of getting a high search engine ranking. Would you get a part-time builder to build a house for you, or would you go to an architect?
Speaking of which, if you'd like to see some creative work by one of Ireland's hottest new talents, check this out. Tara Cooke, a name to remember for all your architectural needs.
Google is a Female
September 08, 2004
A witty article by Catherine Parker of
http://www.quirk.co.za/
I've got a piece of ground-shaking news about Google that trumps even knowing their algorithm. It's so classified even GoogleGuy doesn't
know it. It hasn't even been made known on any forum or SEO news site, let alone Google's Webmaster Guidelines. So what do I know that
everyone else doesn't?
Google is a female.
It's true. All the signs are there.
For starters, she's smart and capable. She has a pleasing exterior, and she can multitask (what with all those millions of searches
conducted daily). On top of that, she can raise a family too! Just look at all those kids she feeds: AOL Search, Netscape, Lycos,
Hotbot...
She tends to get a bit emotional and slightly tempestuous every now and then. After each update, webmasters reel over Ms. Google's latest
tantrum. Today, Google is showing a whole different set of backward links that weren't there yesterday, and many are from pages with a
PageRank lower than 4! Webmasters who have optimised their site using one criterion do not know whether they're coming or going. "What is
going on with this latest update?" they scream. "This wasn't in the guidelines! This doesn't make any sense!" they rant. Well, neither does the link: command, but she didn't tell you that either.
Google has her reasons. And because she's top-of-the-pile of search engines, she can pretty much do what she likes. She's also allowed to
change her mind on a regular basis about the things she likes in a website. First it was the Meta description and keyword tags. Then it was the alt tags. Then it was reciprocal links. These days, she's a fan of one-way inbound links.
And of course, there's nothing like a woman scorned. All you have to do to see evidence of this is to talk to the guys over at a certain high-profile search engine marketing company or their poor
unsuspecting clients. This company (and its clients) has recently been kicked off Google for using spammy doorway pages to cheat the
algorithm. Because of their spam tactics, they've been punished, and I suspect it will take a very long time for them or their clients to get
listed again, let alone climb the rankings.
But underneath all the tantrums and apparent irrational behaviour sits a young lady who's yearning for something quite simple. All she's
really looking for is a stable, long-term elationship with a nice guy. That of course would be a useful, relevant website with loads of scintillating, informative copy and some great inbound links. (This would of course assume that websites are males, but that's another story altogether.)
So you want to be liked by your favourite lady? Then don't be a player. Don't use underhanded tactics and try to spam the search engines to climb the rankings. And don't cheat on her by setting up link farms and running around with every bad guy on the block. Be nice, and be decent. Give her what she's looking for in a long-term relationship -- a stable, meaningful site with a lot beneath the surface and someone who's in it for the long haul and for the right reasons. Because when Google smiles on your site, the rest of your target market will smile too! And of course, you'll have one smart girlfriend.
Phone Message Etiquette
This blog is one I've had in my mind for quite some time. If you happened to have called Brightspark HQ recently, please don't think this is aimed at you. No, it's just another Brightspark blog on how to make the world a better place...
When leaving a phone message on a landline consider this:
If you are going to ring the mobile number straight away, and you know that person has voice mail on the mobile - don't leave a longwinded message on the landline. Simply say you called, try the mobile, and if the person isn't available leave your message there.
Leaving a message in 2 places doesn't ensure a doubly quick response.
On the subject of phones, it took 25 minutes to cancel call waiting with eircom today. They have a new voice activated call answering system - it's rather amusing actually because it makes the eircom voice almost seem real...while at the same time fulfilling eircom's mission of totally exasperating its customers by not providing the answers we're looking for.
How To Walk On Busy Streets
September 03, 2004
The population of Dublin city has substantially increased in recent years. We are now a major European city in many respects, and not the Western European backwater we were in times past. As such, the good people of our city need to learn how to share more densely packed urban spaces. The government is taking it upon itself to police a lot of things - smoking, drinking, children in pubs at night...but not walking on city streets.
Dubliners are bad at walking in a straight line, and that's the crux of the problem.
I know this because most days I have to walk down O'Connell street in order to get to my gym. I've lived in other large cities where you quickly join the flow going in your particular direction. From memory, the Aussies walk on the right, while Londoners tend to go for the left. Maybe it's an equator thing?
In Dublin, people walk all over the place. Left, right, straight, in, out, oh - admire the shop window, and move out to walk past the bus queue. Bus queues are surprisingly ordered and regulated, we are quick to dive into a 180 degree stright line when we're standing behind a blue painted pole. And wo betide the poor soul who chooses to stand under the shelter - yes! even during the pouring rain and even if they have a prepaid bus ticket!
We still have kept a hold of that lovely tradition lost to many other big cities of making eye contact. But it's rather unnerving to have some tracksuited person keeping eye contact with you while they're weaving around the pavement. And if they're wielding a buggy, it's even more hair-raising.
I felt compelled to write about this because last week I had a guest over from Australia who found it took ages to make it from one end of Henry Street to the next on Saturday afternoon. All these individuals walking this way and that, my Australian friend didn't know what to do!
And so, as Dublin grows up and becomes even larger, our city streets remain the same size and sooner or later we're going to have to work out some sort of system for handling the flow of foot traffic. In the absence of any government dictat, it's anarchy out there.
Have a nice weekend everybody.