Tag: Business

My BS warning is flashing

Seems to me that everyone you talk to these days is flat out. Problem is guys, I just don’t believe you.
 
Ok, once in a while I can understand but every bloody time I talk to you? I doubt it. Geeze, if you are really that busy it tells me that you aren’t very good at managing your time and that you are probably wasting it doing stupid things your not supposed to be doing but you do them any way just so you say that you are busy and look important to others.
 
Someone once told me that they associate being ‘flat out‘ with being successful. Maybe, but to me if someone is always ‘flat out’ it tells me they are inefficient, they aren’t working on improving things they are just doing things the same old way. If you had any brains I’d think you would say, hey maybe I’m so busy because I shouldn’t be doing some stuff or maybe I need to find a way to do this stuff in less time. From there improvements spring forth – surely?
 
Now, after speaking with a few people about this issue I have confirmed that I am definately from a different planet because everyone thinks being ‘flat out’ is good. Hmmm…to me a person who is in control of what ever they are doing (but can go ‘flat out’ when required but not constantly) is far more successful.
 
But hey, as I said, I’m from a different planet!

Can I just say these people still don’t understand e-commerce

Well it is coming up to Christmas time and the “easiest” way to go shopping is the via the net right? Let me just show you how even big suppliers don’t understand e-commerce.

Firstly, I wanted to buy some DVD’s and CD’s from a major retail chain. I login with my credentials so it knows who I am and records my purchases. Nowhere can I see how many “bonus points” I have with this supplier on the page, which would be nice. So I select what I’m after, add it to my shopping cart and then head to the checkout. After putting my credit card details in I’m now taken to “Verified by Visa”. Here I have to put in a “Verified by Visa” password that I have no idea what it is. Sure I set it up but this is the only site that I’ve seen that uses “Verified by Visa”. Not having my password means that I am unable to complete my purchase. So I request my password (which terminates the checkout process anyway). I have to wait a few minutes and check my email for the details, then I go back in and re-order everything, put in my ‘Verified by Visa’ password and complete the transaction (and only get shown my bonus credits at checkout). When I receive a confirmation of my purchase on the web site I also receive an unknown pop-up that gets blocked by my browser. Hmmm… I wonder what the pop up says and if it is important? I take a screen shot of my completed transaction details because I know what is about to happen next. I enable pop ups in the browser so I can see what the message and is and surprise, surprise my completed transaction details have disappeared from the original browser window because the window was reset when I enabled the pop up.

Issues :

1. Why, oh why do I have to jump so many hurdles to give you people my money? Why, oh why can’t I check my ‘Verified by Visa’ password BEFORE I have to enter it? Why, oh why can’t I elect to not use ‘Verified by Visa’ if I so desire? Sure there is security risk but I just want to pay my money and get out. Dumb.

2. Why is the site using pop ups? Geeze fellas these things went out with Internet Explorer 4.0. The only things that use pop ups these days are annoying ads and spyware. Every browser these days blocks pop ups by default so everyone is going to have the same problem of losing their transaction info if they view the pop up. Was there are warning prior to processing that I should enable pop ups? No. Dumber.

Next, I went to purchase some books. I locate the first book I want and add it to my basket which conveniently displays. Ok boys, now how the hell do I get back and make more purchases? I scout around the page and see no indication of a return link. So where’s the encouragement for me to buy more? Finally I find that if I click on the company’s logo in the top left of the screen I go back to the main site. Hmmm…my basket now shows that it has 0 items. I click back on my basket and find that it does in fact still have my initial item. I again return to the main page and make more purchases. When complete I proceed to the checkout where I am asked for my loyalty card number. Yes, I do have one of those. I enter the number and it says “invalid number or password”. Hmmmm…. ok I’ll request my password (again) and guess what it was correct! So what’s the problem here? After much stuffing around I work out that the number I need to enter must not include any dashes (‘-‘), I must just type the number in straight. Where the hell did it tell me that? Bloody hell I just wasted 5 minutes trying to working out what I was doing wrong when all you needed to do was tell me that I should only use the numbers on my loyalty card. Mr(s) supplier, you have either just wasted my valuable time and gotten pissed me off or I have wasted time I could have spent shopping for more product on your site.

Issues:

1. Navigation. Has anyone else except the snow boarding web designers and poor suffering customers ever looked at the shopping basket page? Clearly not, since it must be so bloody obvious to press the logo in the top left of the screen to return to the main page to purchase more (Yeah right).

2. If you give me a card with a number separated by dashes I am going to assume that when I’m asked for that number you want it exactly how it is printed (ie with the dashes). If not, then pay me the courtesy of telling me this rather than wasting my time and pissing me right off. Dumbest.

In the end, sure I made my purchases and sure maybe I should be more forgiving but take a look at the check process differences between US and Australian sites. The big US sites really make it easy and want me back, these Australian sites just piss me off so I would rather go into the store. C’mon guys get the fundamentals right. Set you sites up to make it EASY for the customer to buy, stop putting all these barriers up. You complain about the lack on online sales but have you EVER looked at the check out process through the eyes of real consumer? I doubt it, I doubt it and that is plain stupid.

More than 30,000 views

We’ve cracked more than 30,000 views of our technology videos on YouTube. That works out to an average of almost 850 per video we have posted (currently we have 34 videos available). Our most popular video is Getting started with Virtual PC, which has been viewed almost 4,000 times.

You’ll find all our videos at http://www.youtube.com/saturnalliance. As always we welcome any feedback or suggestions you on how to improve our offerings. also, if you would like to see us cover a particular topic in our upcoming video also please contact us.

Thanks to all those people who have taken the time to watch our videos, provide ratings and feedback. We hope that you’ll continue to watch what we upload.

Popularity of Facebook

Been thinking more about the popularity of Facebook. In one of the previous posts I was proposing that the reason is the fact that it allows non-geeks to create and maintain a web site. I now also think that it goes beyond this. A big part of the appeal is that you can add “applications” to your site that allows other to interact with you.
 
For example you could add a “game” application to your site and invite other to compete. Your web site is then updated with your gaming results. A bit like a medal of honour you could say.
 
The foundation of Facebook’s popularity is clearly the “social” aspect. The ability to interact with people you know or have met anywhere you have internet access.
 
Now is it such a stetch to imagine this sort of application being recast into a business networking environment? I’m sure we all understand the potential issues but for a moment let’s dwell on the possibilities. If you created a site that was your business and then invited your customers to link to your site. They could post their testimonials up there and you could interact with them directly. As they developed their own corporate site you could see if there maybe anyone else they know that could use your services.
 
The above is just one example that springs to mind. The more you think about the application to businesses the more you see that it will only be a matter of time before something like this emerges.

Second shot Microsoft exams

If you want to get a Microsoft certification under your belt then if you register here, take the exam before January 30, 2008 and heaven forbid, not pass then you are entitled to retake the exam again for FREE.
 
Having done a few Microsoft exams I know that some can be quite tricky. It generally isn’t that you don’t know the material, it is that you don’t know exactly how Microsoft wants the questions answered. My advice is that if you are unsure then try and examine the question again from Microsoft’s perspective (ie which option requires the implementation of more Microsoft software?).
 
Now with this free double shot you should have no problems getting through, even if it takes two goes!

Thoughts on Facebook

All you hear about these days in the popular media is Facebook, Facebook, Facebook. We are also noticing a sharp rise in Facebook usage in many businesses whose Internet we monitor. Clearly more and more people are into Facebook.
 
Interestingly, we also heard about a company that has reversed it’s policy on blocking Facebook because it wants to attract “younger” employees. Interesting eh? No Facebook access no attraction to work for you.
 
This got us to thinking, why is Facebook so popular? Could it be that these sort of sites allow anyone to create a page on the Internet about their most interesting topic (ie them)? Now, geeks like us have been doing web pages for years. If you want to see the earliest copy of our original web site click here. I think our first eb page went up in 1996 over 10 years ago and we remember how chuffed we were that we ‘had a page on the Internet’.
 
Could it be that Facebook and MySpace provide a simple means for non-geeks to post information on the Internet so they too can be proud of being part of the revolution we know as the Internet? We’re not sure and we don’t have enough Facebook friends yet to really understand this yet.
 
What interests us most is how this phenomenon will be extended to businesses. Apart from the all the issue but imagine a Business Facebook site where business could go and post information about themselves, quickly and easily. They could also link to their customers who could endorse theire products and services and so on. We can see it happening.
 
However, the key to coverting the existing success of Facebook and MySpace to businesses lies in understanding the appeal of these site at its most fundamental.