The Which? cover letter had 5 color blocks on the right with all the contact details I need, plus my details and Membership Number. All very handy & practical. So I called the Which? Helpline and met their automated phone system. I fully expected the usual hellish experience. The first thing that struck me was the calm, level male voice giving me 5 options. They were clear and unhurried. Reassuring. I chose option 2 to cancel my subscription. A brief moment of music and “Richard” came on the line: “Hello, how can I help? Do you want to cancel your subscription?” He confirmed my name and address, gave me a cancel ref code and thanked me for telling him why I didn’t want the subscription. All done.

I came off the phone thinking this is the smoothest automated phone system I’ve encountered in a long while. Everything worked. There was no rush. No barrage of options. No wrong clicks – no dead ends, wrong department, try again. It just worked. I’m sure the folks at Which? know they have a great system. I would encourage any businesses that use automated phone help and directory systems to dial up the Which? Helpline on +44 1922 822 800 and listen to how they do it. Which? has proved their goal is quality. They focus on creating satisfaction for their customers. Even the ones who are signing off. That’s class!

Which? integrates website, print and phone with customer satisfaction as priority.

Wordnik's single-focus is on finding the definition of a word.

Wordnik delivers the definitions for the word you search – drawn from live web sources, together with synonyms and hypernyms (similar but more generic words) as well as Lists. Why no Antonyms? You’ll also find Comments and Visuals. That is packing a lot of “finds” in one search. Give it a try!

A new study by 2 University of California research groups carefully mapped out the registration, hosting and monetization of several spam and scam efforts. What they found wasn’t anything new. We all know that there are countries you can register and host in that turn a blind eye. But what was new was realizing that the whole chain rests on the spammers getting paid for whatever they’re pushing. And that was like a lightbulb? Would it be possible to pressure the banks NOT to clear these questionable transactions?

It is an appealing idea. No doubt fraught with legislative and regulatory issues, cross-border diplomacy and a whole lot more. However, it is “common practice” for the clearing banks to vet and approve individuals and businesses. So why not extend this to vet the spammers food chain?

To read the report “Click Trajectories: End-to-End Analysis of the Spam Value Chain” – a free PDF download -  click here.

Here’s the Abstract from the research report:

Spam-based advertising is a business. While it has engendered both widespread antipathy and a multi-billion dollar anti-spam industry, it continues to exist because it fuels a profitable enterprise. We lack, however, a solid understanding of this enterprise’s full structure, and thus most anti-spam interventions focus on only one facet of the overall spam value chain (e.g., spam filtering, URL blacklisting, site takedown). In this paper we present a holistic analysis that quantifies the full set of resources employed to monetize spam email— including naming, hosting, payment and fulfillment—using extensive measurements of three months of diverse spam data, broad crawling of naming and hosting infrastructures, and over 100 purchases from spam-advertised sites. We relate these resources to the organizations who administer them and then use this data to characterize the relative prospects for defensive interventions at each link in the spam value chain. In particular, we provide the first strong evidence of payment bottlenecks in the spam value chain; 95% of spam-advertised pharmaceutical, replica and software products are monetized using merchant services from just a handful of banks.

Dim those lights! Each has an IP address.

What’s the IP address for that lightbulb? NXP, a Netherlands-based semiconductor company has invented Greenchip technology that will be in many Wi-Fi connected lightbulbs on sale by early 2012. What? WiFi lightbulbs? Well, crazy as it sounds, it will let you “talk” to the lightbulb – for example from a smartphone or iPad or laptop. Not home? No bother. Bring up the IP Manager for your house and turn on all the lights, or dim the front room and boost the upstairs.

Thanks to microchips and the new ‘limitless’ range of IP addresses under the IPv6 protocol, it won’t be long before the fridge really does talk to Tesco’s. This is a world emerging faster than Bill Gates millions. And he’s the man who turned his house into an experimental electronic abode. How that plays out in the everyday world remains to be seen. But we can expect some dazzling light show examples in the next couple of years.

It may be too much fiddly technology for the average person, but the ability to micro-control all the lights in your place opens up all sorts of creative potential. Lighting designers are going to have a fantastic new toolkit. At home WiFi lightbulbs could save you money too, because you don’t need to waste it if you’re not around to enjoy it… just open your smart device and turn ‘em down!

For the whole-r story, go to FastCompany’s website here. Ten years ago FastCompany was the fattest internet/interactive magazine in the world. It still publishes interesting and breaking tech, social and marketing news. Enjoy!

I teamed up with Eoin Kennedy of Slattery Communications for this brief but comprehensive overview article – just published in Chambers Ireland’s InBusiness magazine. Click here to read the full 4-page article online. You’ll find Eoin’s blog here and Chambers website here. Enjoy!

SOCIAL MEDIA IS NOW THE MAINSTREAM. No longer the territory of nerds and techies. Globally it has come of age. However, the idea that social media marketing can be achieved by tinkering for a few hours online is entirely false. While it is easy for individuals to engage, making social media work for business requires knowledge, skill and insight. Social media is the public space and for companies wanting to leverage this new market, real expertise is needed. It requires clear aims and clever thinking to get good results.

Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, Flickr and Pix.ie are all social media portals. Facebook is by far the largest with over 500 million daily users worldwide, including 1.5 to 1.9 million in Ireland. Social media is where we find the majority of people hanging out these days, where users share news, photos and gossip with friends and colleagues. It has spread all over the globe and is ever present.

In the social media world it is the public who rule the airwaves. It hasn’t taken long for businesses to realise that’s a lot of people and a vast potential market. In the past couple of years we have seen huge growth in social media campaigns, from some of the largest global brands to some of the very clever smaller companies too.

The term ‘going viral’ belongs to social media and is the Holy Grail when ‘talking up’ your brand, product or project. It can spread instantly around the globe. But how do you ensure that your message stays on track and doesn’t backfire? This has already led to a new service offering called reputation management and is changing how the public and media relationship works.

To read how you can make Social Work for your business – click here to read the full 4-page article online. InBusiness is published quarterly by Chambers Ireland – click here for website. To view the InBusiness magazine archives – click here.

click above to read full graphic version online

How a young Cork entrepreneur is doing it

Kieran Walsh was born into business. His family founded Walsh Engineering in Cork, one of Ireland’s leading industrial suppliers. But he wasn’t born with a silver or golden spoon. He was put through his paces by elders who “knew a thing or two about business” and he has had to prove himself at every step.

This year Kieran appeared on The Apprentice (TV3) and underwent a grueling and rewarding baptism. As followers of the show will know, Kieran didn’t make it all the way. But the moment he was freed from “television prison”, as he calls it, he came home to his apartment in Cork city, looked around and said to himself “I need a cleaner!” His next project was born…

And it’s called PigSty.ie – everything you need to find someone to clean up your house, flat or office.

Read the full article on Chambers Ireland’s website – select Winter 2010/11 issue.

Six attempts to choose dates came up with “The Special Package isn’t available for those dates. Change dates?” Without any way at all to GET AT or SEE these darn Special Package rates!

Cassa Hotel New York City (SPAM)

So, here’s this VERY UPSCALE New York Hotel, with rates in excess of $400 a night, sending out SPAM and screwing up the booking process so even the method doesn’t work. It is very surprising to me. We all like to think the Americans have the internet down pat, don’t we? Not always the case, or Cassa in this case.

1. I don’t understand why such an expensive, upscale hotel would resort to spamming. Is this the quality of their enterprise? It doesn’t fit at all.
2. NOT getting all of the parts in place to ensure it works, just adds incompetence and annoyance to the “new brand” – the Cassa Hotel New York. I shall remember them, and be sure not to book in!

Click above to read full color version online.

The Autumn/Fall issue of Chambers Ireland’s In Business magazine is out. For this issue I wrote a 4-page article focusing on why Customer Satisfaction is No.1. Here’s the intro. (Click on magazine cover pic on right to read the full color magazine online.)

“To really win (customer) loyalty, forget the bells and whistles and just solve their problems,” says an article in the prestigious Harvard Business Review (July-Aug 2010). Andrew Lovatt agrees that problem solving is the Number 1 “satisfier” but argues we shouldn’t overlook the need for good business design and helping customers every step of the way. Customer satisfaction should be the aim. Your reputation hangs on it. If you get it right, you can take it to the bank. What is your website doing for your bottom-line?

Fast and efficient problem-solving should be the Number One goal but it is all about Customer Satisfaction. To achieve this, you will need to sit in the customers‘ seat and test your website as if you were seeking a solution. See if you can use it to solve a set of “customer problems” – whether this is finding the right PDF document to download, filling out a request form or contacting Customer Support. See how long it takes you. Look carefully at the screens and see how “easily and quickly” you can solve the problem. Don’t be surprised if you find the solutions hard to find. Your aim should be to get the solution right in front of your customer as fast as possible.

How much surveillance is good for us? EFF (www.eff.org) has battled in the courts and on the airwaves for individual “user rights” from the beginning… and the fight goes on. A worthy group to support too, if you have a few dollars to spare.

I saw John Perry Barlow a few years ago at the IFI, talking about how the internet was no longer free and open. In Ireland we were in the throes of the Net Boom and no one in the audience was interested. Instead they asked him how to sell things online. He must have gone away with a raw impression of uz!

Woofers by Sander Mulder

For a quick view of some of the best creative ideas in media, you’ll enjoy Creativity’s On Design, part of a suite of blogs celebrating interactive, cross-media and installation design. Go ahead and enjoy poking around – and be aware that not far into exploring you’ll be hit with a well-crafted lightbox pop-up ‘inviting’ you to subscribe for $99. You can ignore and you’ll still get plenty of eye-food for free and some refreshing ideas too.

I fail to understand why Creativity’s main page, which offers the latest campaigns from ad agencies, requires a $99 subscription to view. Seems to be a self-defeating approach. But do check out their “Integrated Production White Paper“, which dis-integrates some of the most productive agencies to see how their departments and their talent execute all manner of new ideas. A bit of a mouthful, but worth the PDF download. Who said getting at new ideas was easy!