Internet World 2009

I spent the day at Internet World, at Earls Court, hoping to learn a bit more about ecommerce best practices and also gen up on online marketing.

On my way there I was given two salutary reminders of the real world, the one that's still running in parallel with the digital world I inhabit for much of my time. Coming off the tube I saw my first evidence of the swine flu scare - two women in business suits sporting face masks. Ten minutes later, sitting in a café across from Earls Court, there was live coverage on BBC of a memorial ceremony for troops killed in Iraq - one by one platoon leaders would stand at a lectern and read the names of those who died fighting for us - very moving and of course just the thing to set me up for a day here.

They're all the same, these exhibitions. A mixture of clever companies trying to get noticed; desperate salesmen trying to drag anyone they can onto their stands; market leaders using their huge stands to brag to their industry; promotional girls and over-priced food.
First off, I realised that I had a practical need for a notebook, so I feigned interest in an email marketing solution - for the cost of five minutes of my time I gained a couple of brochures to bin and a handy notebook for the day.

My strategy was to concentrate on the seminars and keynote presentations. I always think that I'll learn at least one thing that makes the day worthwhile - I just don't know what it is and where I'll learn it. And so it turned out.

The first seminar, 'Innovate or die; lessons from 10 years of the internet, was pretty dull - the CEO of Cheapflights throwing a few facts and opinions around. Nothing I didn't know. The next one, on website usability, was far more useful. No rocket science, but a valuable round-up of some best practice in search and browse, product pages, basket and checkout. Some of it is available at www.webcredible.co.uk/ecommerce2008.

I treated myself to a shoulder and head massage before walking the floor for a bit, and then forking out the best part of a fiver for a sandwich. After lunch, a keynote by Justin Moodie, head of online at HMV, on multi-channel retailing. Really interesting, this one. He spoke about HMV's strategy of Messaging, Measurement and Improvement - aimed at achieving measurable improvements for a reason, not change for change's sake. And having demonstrated some of the testing they've done, the biggest shock for me was that they use the free Google Optimizer rather than an expensive tool to manage all of this activity.

I queued to get into a Chartered Institute of Marketing seminar on SEO. Fast, furious and a good top level overview of how search is evolving from keywords and links to more sophisticated measures of trust and user experience. Ten minutes later I was back in the same hall listening to the same speaker talk about SEM, and it hadn't got any cooler. The same format - an overview of things to consider when formulating and executing an ecommerce strategy.

Finally, I managed to talk to one of the developers at webjam about some bugs I'd found when setting up a webjam site for the Chiswick Casuals. Always thinking of my friends.

So was it worth the day out? The exhibition itself had very little to commend it but yes, I did find some nuggets that I'll take with me - enough to make it worthwhile. It's a draining way to spend a day though - right now I could do with a stiff drink...

Twitter for beginners

Twitter is one of those disruptive and decisive technologies. Some people use it all the time; some (like me) dabble in it, and there are lots who just don't see the point.

Twitter also has that fad factor, which can annoy people. You can't read a paper, or browse the internet, without reading about how Demi Moore is supporting someone on Britain's got Talent, or how 20,000 people knew when Stephen Fry was stuck in a lift because he was posting tweets about it.

I always think with these new technologies (if, indeed, a technology is the right way to describe Twitter - social media may be more accurate) the way to approach them is to look for the value they can give you personally. If you can find value, use them; if you don't, then don't use them. But it's worth taking a little time to explore and understand before you say no.

Facebook has value to me because it lets me keep in touch with friends and what they're up to. Of course I can call them and email them and - gasp - even meet them in person. But that's just not possible with everyone, or as often as I'd like, so Facebook fills that void.

LinkedIn fulfils a different need. It's my professional profile, and I have a different persona there. For those of us who have been in the job market LinkedIn is invaluable - these days it's a primary interface with recruiters. Over the last few months I've been contacted directly by Amazon, BestBuy and Waterstones, as well as by quite a few headhunters, because they saw my profile in LinkedIn.

With Twitter, I admit I haven't yet found the killer value, although I'm getting closer. According to Twanalysis I'm still a newbie, so I'm still learning.  What I've learned is that the basic "I'm on the train" or "I'm watching The Wire" or "I'm stuck in a lift" messages aren't the future of Twitter.  The future is in collaboration of the dissemination of information, in a way that's relevant and accessible.  

One example is citizen journalism.  During the demonstrations at the recent G20 summit, some of the most up-to-date news was coming from people on the streets who were posting real-time updates from across London.  It would be physically impossible for news organisations to cover so many locations on the ground.

At a more personal level, Derek Dunlop told me that he looks for my tweets on Rangers scores when he's travelling as it's the best way for him to keep up with games.

Or for a more imaginative use of Twitter, I saw that Dan was taking part in a Twitter wine tasting.  You get a bunch of people to buy the same wine and taste it at the same time regardless of where they are - then post comments and see what others are saying.  Maybe a gimmick, but a fun one.

I think part of the problem with Twitter is that the website is so awful, and doesn't actually help newcomers to do anything but the most basic posting.  You can post links, photos, videos on twitter.  You can send and receive messages directly with friends. You can search for anything and see tweets relevant to that search term.  But those things can be pretty daunting for someone who's new to it.

As I said, I'm still pretty green so I don't pretend to be an expert.  Until recently my Twitter access has been mostly on my mobile (using Twitterberry) - just posting the odd update and seeing what friends are posting.  I've now discovered Tweetdeck, which I highly recommend. Tweetdeck allows you to view your Twitter activity including any groups or searches in neat columns in one dashboard.  As a bonus, you can also see all your friends' Facebook status updates, and update your status direct from Tweetdeck.  Awesome.

So my message is; don't think of Twitter in terms of learning what people are having for breakfast.  Think of it as a new and rapidly evolving form of social media that is here to stay. And the sooner you embrace it the better placed you'll be to use it to your benefit.

Follow me on twitter

Our man at the ministry

A few random observations from the world's greatest club...

Compared with zavvi, there's an obsession here about cleanliness. You could walk into the South side kitchen on any day when Trading were responsible for cleaning it, and you'd be lucky to see a square centimetre of worktop space - as for a clean sink or mug, forget it. Here, not only do people wash up their mugs after use but there's a team of cleaners who walk the floors all day, constantly cleaning up. The only problem is that it's almost impossible to use the toilet without bumping into a male or often female cleaner (sometimes both)...

A few weeks ago I moved desk as a new person joined the eCommerce team so the desk I was using got reallocated. It's a shame because I liked working in that team and the banter was always good. However, it's forced me into a bit of hot-desking and that in turn is allowing me to really find out how fantastic a machine my MacBook is. Running both Mac OS and Windows so I have the best of both worlds, with a good wireless network here, and with remote access to my Ministry emails and calendar, I'm not really missing having a permanent home. Having said that I'm sitting in the design area right now and anyone who works here will know what I mean when I say the view is sooo much better.

And I'm getting to know the neighbourhood. I've found a little cafe run by (I think) a Turkish couple. They make a fresh Greek salad on demand, which I mentioned to Chris, one of my colleagues here. Today, Chris went out early and picked up one of their salads. I mentioned it to the owner when I went to get some lunch, and when I went to pay not only did he round the amount down but he gave me a free slice of carrot cake on the house.

Maybe this could become my new manor...

Where are they now?

Delighted to get a call from Mike Moss, one of the good guys, to say he's starting a new job at Asda in a few weeks. Some of my most enjoyable times at zavvi were with Mike, so that news made my day, although it does mean that the cleaning of my hypothetical conservatory will have to wait...

Same old, same new

Yesterday was our wedding anniversary.  24 years since I drove out to High Wycombe on a scorching, sunny evening and got married a day later in snow - ah, the British weather!

Anyway, I left Wenge a card yesterday when I left for work, and when I got home there was one sitting on the table for me.  Yes, you've guessed it - of all the cards in all the world we both went out and got the same one... there's one for the romantics.

And, no, we don't wear matching woollen pullovers and jackets when we go out.

Good times

Last week was one of those good weeks, where everything just seemed to go right (apart from Chelsea beating Liverpool on Wednesday - but it was an absolute belter of a match so that made up for it...) and I seemed to be on top of things.

Relaxed by the long weekend and buoyed by the success of the ministryofsound.com relaunch, I got into the office on Tuesday fired up and ready to go.  Those who really know me know that I'm what in football circles is called a confidence player - when I'm feeling good about myself I operate so much better, so I was ready for a good week, and so it turned out.

Rudy was on holiday, so I hot-desked in his chair for the week with the rest of the eCommerce team - much more fun than the new desk that I moved to a couple of weeks ago.  The banter was flowing all week.  

I had one main thing I needed to achieve, and that was to produce a requirements document to give to the agency that we've appointed to design a new Hed Kandi site: the strangely-named but very impressive (so far) Code Computer Love from Manchester.  Team meetings, wireframes and mind maps all came together by Friday afternoon and I managed to do what I set out to do.  Box ticked.

Over the Easter weekend I had sent out an update to many of the recruiters and headhunters I've been in contact with - taking the opportunity to bring them up to speed with what I'm doing at Ministry of Sound.  I had a really good response with a number of them contacting me during the week and a couple of potential opportunities coming my way for consideration, so that's encouraging.  Having said that, if the right permanent opportunity came along here at Ministry (and I know exactly what that is) I'd definitely be interested.

To the weekend: always good to see the sun, and I took advantage of it on Saturday when Wenge and I had a walk in Hampstead Heath followed by lunch at Carluccios; later we went for a Thai at The John Baird and then saw "In the Loop" at the Odeon.  Some very funny moments and world class swearing, but still more suited to TV than film for me.

Yesterday I watched Rangers beat Hibs, a game that featured two of the best goals anyone will score this season (watch them - they're in the link).   There was even a minor bonus when I found out that Razorlight at the O2 is on Thursday 7th May and not Wednesday 6th when Chelsea are playing the second leg  of their Champions League tie against Barcelona. 

It's the end of Monday as I write, and the new week has started off reasonably well, so let's see if I can stay on the roll...

Tube mystery

Can anyone explain to me that curious London underground phenomenon where a train stops at the station, and there are people who stand on the platform and don't get on?

I'm not talking about packed trains, or lines where there are different destinations - just normal trains. What's going on there?