word hotel

A.I. and machine learning usage in the Healthcare of the UK: Ethics.

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 19 Jun 2018 20:58:00 +0000

With the onward march of the machines, how can we ensure that the companies working in this field have an agreed ethical framework, are not biasing the learning of A.I, are unable to propriety own the data they collect about us and that the 5 or so current major technology players are unable to create a monopoly and that we have transparency over their business models to ensure transparency and their monetization road-maps?

Digital Marketing analytics..don't stress the small stuff...!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 08 Apr 2018 12:00:00 +0000

let's just try and remove the 'digital' fog...!

I'm putting this post together as I've recently had the pleasure of getting to know a few folks who have either entered the 'digital focussed' workforce from a more traditional marketing background or are returning to work after a leave of absence. One thing that both groups share is a seemingly genuine 'fear' of digital marketing and the associated disciplines.

This isn't an advanced post on the finesse of digital marketing and neither is it meant to be. I do hope though that this post (and others to follow) helps anybody that feels a little adrift in meetings, feels that 'they should know this (digital stuff)' but doesn't feel as sure-footed as they would like to be.

It’s easy to assume everyone nowadays has at least a passable enough knowledge to not get swept away by the flood of digital marketing theories, platforms and analytics.

Specifically, in the world of analytics, it can seem that there are so many things to track, how do you know which ones are really integral to making sure your business stays afloat, or better yet, sets sail?

As a starter can I suggest the following, really focus your attention on the buyer’s journey, how do your visitors go from not knowing your company to your company becoming part of their consideration set to becoming a customer or even an evangelist, ultimately delivering revenue to your organisation.

The important part is that your analytics should always be tied back to your return on investment, (R.O.I.).

I'm in no doubt you'll have a real range of metrics that tie back to your business goals,
but let me drop in a health warning here! Companies can very often get caught up in 'vanity metrics', these are things like; registered users, downloads, and pageviews. These are so very easily manipulated, and don't necessarily correlate to the numbers that really matter; active users, engagement, the cost of getting new customers (c.p.a), and ultimately revenues and profits. See this from TechCrunch and off those company's go, merrily paddling down-stream, trying to chase every number in the book and coming back with nothing that they can build on.

What is a 'vanity metric'?

A 'vanity metric' refers to a number that looks 'really great (but truly it's poor) on paper', but in the bigger picture really doesn't play a significant role. These kind of metrics are really, downright deceiving, (in my opinion). But hey, a million Facebook likes, who wouldn't want that? Well unless they're engaged, active on your platforms, becoming customers themselves or are talking about you in such a way that through their 'evangelism' influence others to become your customers it's just a big number.

So can you see the problem when a company sets its focus on these metrics when they aren’t actionable? Large numbers can feel like great accomplishments, but if only a small portion of those numbers actually matter to you and your company, should you really be spending so much time and effort on them? PLease just ensure you're numbers = action.

There is an argument that the greater the traffic, the greater the opportunity. I'm sorry this just doesn't cut it. This is like cold-calling, drag-net fishing, 'spraying & praying', throwing good money after bad, wishing on a prayer, crossing your fingers and finally... yes, you should always be looking at getting your numbers up, so here are five digital marketing analytics that tie back to the end goal and provide actionable insight into your business efforts.

1. Traffic

I WANT US TO BE REALLY CLEAR ON TRAFFIC..! Traffic numbers without context could and to my mind should be considered a vanity metric, but broken down, it can be extremely valuable to your marketing strategy.

Segmenting your traffic by its source is a pretty good place to start. Track these top five channels.

Organic: Those who have typed in a query and come to your site because it showed up on a search engine results page (SERP)
Direct: Those who typed in the URL to get directly to your site
Referral: Those who came from another website via a link
Social: Those who were directed from social media to your site
Paid: Those that have clicked on a paid ad or promoted piece of content

Most of the time, companies are focused on bringing in organic traffic, this covers two very key areas for a good website.

One if your content is well written, adds value, and engages customers you will not only be delivering a great customer experience and we hope because of this they chose your service
That well written, engaging content will be rewarded by having its position in the search results improved hence the need for search engine optimization (SEO).

So what to do with the traffic you're generating? I tend to lean towards wanting to focus on traffic that looks like it might be acquisition, however, this is only ever part of the story, by separating out your traffic by the source it can help you identify other opportunities for your company, like whether you should focus more on brand awareness or increasing social engagement.

Most content management systems (CMS's) allow you to break down your traffic by source. Google Analytics also provides this capability, however, it can be a bit more difficult to decipher if you don’t spend much time on the platform but it's worth bearing with it.

I can't express how much more satisfying it is if you just dive that little bit deeper into your numbers to see how visitors (your potential, or actual customers) are interacting with your site. To try and get a real digital understanding of your customers I recommend you pay close attention to:

How much time they spend on your site
How many pages they view during their visit (and which pages they’re spending the most time on)
Whether they are a new or returning user
Whether they are using desktop or mobile

The goal is to be able to identify things like:

Which of your content pieces drive the most traffic
Why does the content you've identified resonate with your customers
What actions are visitors taking on your site
Where are a majority of your visitors dropping off

You may or may not have begun to realise that everything we do in digital is about asking questions, questions, questions. If you aren't fundamentaly inquisitive....

This will help you focus your efforts on the areas of your marketing strategy that matter. Once you understand more about your visitors, how they’re getting to the site, what they’re interacting with and where they’re dropping off, you can develop a plan of action to keep them engaged and lead them to conversion points.

2. Conversions

Conversions are the good stuff, the actions you want people to be taking on your site. You'll hear of “macro” conversions, like downloading an eBook or filling out a contact form, but “micro” conversions, like subscribing to your blog, are equally important. It gets a visitor into your system as a contact. From there, the goal is to get them to be a customer or (even) an evangelist, but how?

We’re all familiar with the four main steps to gaining new customers in inbound marketing:

Attract.
Convert.
Close.
Delight.

But let’s break this down a little further. How do you establish a relationship with your potential customers from the outset?

Create content that is helpful and engages your visitors
Establish trust and expertise
Help them identify their problem or need (they may not even know they have one yet)
Provide a solution

By tracking conversions, you'll start to quickly recognise the actions visitors typically take before becoming customers. Maybe your average customer reads three blogs, downloads a piece of content and receives five emails before agreeing to talk to a salesperson. This knowledge can help you optimise the user’s journey to conversion.

Once you understand your customer, you can identify common themes and develop content with helpful suggestions, responses or answers. As with any marketing tactic, the most important part is measuring the success of these efforts. Some pieces of content, emails or ads may work better than others. This is where conversion rate optimisation (CRO) comes into play. You know what they say — never stop improving.

Take the insights you gain from tracking conversions to improve your overall marketing performance.

An example I'm happy to share from part of my own strategy is; as well as creating ads on Facebook (paid) and hoping they stick, identify posts that already have high engagement and boost those. This way, you already know the content is relevant and more likely to reach an audience of like-minded individuals.

HEALTH WARNING: The Social Platform algorithms are as apt to change as the search engine algorithms so it's really important you stay abreast of these. I'll be publishing further gumf on this sort of stuff so keep popping back if this might be helpful to you.

3. Engagement

When thinking about the influence of social media, many often think of reach; or the number of people who could potentially see your social media post or ad. It’s a great number to reference when you plan to promote something since it can help to justify why you’re using social media in the first place (if at your company you're having to justify the use of social platforms, we need to talk) but it is another one of those numbers that (without context) could be considered a vanity metric. Since it is just a potential number, it doesn’t take into account those who don’t see your ad, those who totally tune it out and those who are actually interested in what you have to offer.

Think of it this way: If your company had the opportunity to create a commercial for the Wimbledon Championship, your reach would be incredibly high. But some of your most valuable customers may have missed your commercial because they were in the other room, some weren’t able to catch the matches and others just may not be interested in your business. (Top takeaway: this is why targeting is so important.)

A better measure of social media analytics is engagement. Engagement refers to the number of likes, shares or comments a post receives. Visitors who are engaging with your brand are much more likely to be customers or evangelists (since they’re taking the time to connect with you) and often this also leads to more qualified audiences. Keep a close eye on your traffic and engagement from social media. If you can see you’re getting a number of contacts and qualified leads from social platforms, it might be time to focus on up-weighting your social presence to drive more engagement.

4. Click-Through Rate (CTR)

For internet users who aren’t sure they have a problem yet, or don’t know your solution (what you sell) exists, another way to drive brand awareness is to invest with paid campaigns that target people using certain criteria. The click-through rate of the brand ad's you publish is an important indication of relevance. Your audience wants to feel like you understand them.

A small health warning on bidding on brand terms. It's a good way to drive engagement but the quality of the lead can vary wildly, what you want to avoid is your PPC ads generating calls or leads that are for information you could have provided to customers deploying other tactics.

It’s important to pay attention to the performance of your ads as a low CTR can mean a few things:

Your target audience isn’t specific enough
The landing page does not match the expectations given in the ad
Your offer isn’t strong enough

To identify the issue, try A/B testing. Switch up the offer, update your landing page or try a more targeted audience.

5. Site Load Speed

This is a killer, not only for a users experience but also for how your website is considered by the algorithm. As internet users ourselves we know how frustrating it is to have to sit and wait...we're no longer built to have that kind of patience. How many of us have given up on a site that took too long to load? Well according to Kissmetrics, 40 percent of people abandon a website that takes more than three seconds to load. That my friends is a whole load lot of traffic to lose.

A great tool to check your site load time is Google Page Speed Insights. While this is a helpful tool to see how you might be able to improve your site, as Google says, “A high score is correlated with a fast user experience but does not guarantee it.” The tool focuses on two areas—above-the-fold and the full page—and uses only those aspects of a page unrelated to a network connection. However, this doesn’t take into consideration items like animation that may delay load on purpose.

Don't sweat it if your site doesn't score 100/100, this is fine (for now) The goal is to improve your site load speed so that users don’t get frustrated and leave, not necessarily to impress Google (however as with all things to do with algorithms, these can change fast, and you and your team need to be on your toes and keeping yourselves up to date).. Pay attention to these key areas for optimal speed:

Image sizes: There is no point putting images on your site that aren't clean and crisp, we're very much in a visual age now and a picture can convey in an instant the message you want your customers to remember. Having said this it doesn't mean they have to be thousands of pixels in size. Compress your images and size them according to how large they will need to be displayed on the site.

Content Distribution Networks (CDNs): CDNs are used to house your website content closer to your end user, therefore reducing the amount of time it takes for a server to load a request (this delay is known as latency). Be sure you’re using a CDN to help decrease the distance your website information has to travel to your website visitors.

It's worth re-iterating, know which digital marketing analytics are important to you and your bottom line, it'll help you stay focused on things that matter. Before getting started on any marketing initiative, define your Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) like traffic, engagement and conversion rate and how they tie back to your business goals.

Then, create yourself an action plan to ensure you're optimising the performance of your content and campaigns...Happy Days..!

Jack Russell and other tails

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 01 Apr 2017 07:30:00 +0000

It's dawned on me that if I want to get my walk with Arthur in before his school arrive to pick him up I'm going to have to beat Dr T to the bathroom most days.

If I don't, mine and Arthur's schedule of an espresso, bathroom duties, shower and getting a full hours walk in gets all a little bit stressful as it means I'm trying to get Arthur back to the house within a whisper of Fabio (his school teacher) pulling up at our gate.

So today I put my new plan into action, awake, up, espresso made, toilet duties, shower, cold espresso drunk (unintended for it to be cold), dressed (with Arthur going bat-shit crazy) as he knew he was off on an adventure with me and out the door by 6.50 a.m.

So good, so far.

The common (Clapham) is just at the end of our road so taking Arthur out couldn't be easier, however this morning work has begun on ripping up the pavement that runs alongside the common, this for some reason has also meant the traffic lights at a three-way junction have been switched off resulting in traffic pandemonium and Arthur and I struggling to figure out how to cross less than 5 metres of tarmac (road) to get to the green and lush common to play and to frolic...

Urban hazard manoeuvred and we're off on our walk proper. In the main Arthur goes off lead when we get onto the common and gets an even better walk as by being off lead he's free to race from one tree to another, and any other object visible to the human eye or not that has caught his interest. I tend to stick to a route that's well-trodden, knowing certain waypoints of the walk he'll wait at should he not have seen me for a little time.

I'm trying to get the walks to be 5km in the mornings as it sets both of us pretty well for the day, later I'll do a 5km stop/strat run and this seems to be having the desired effect on my mid-drift general state of mind.

Onto the BIG common now and we're taking a very circuitous route, this is good for Arthur as it refreshes our walks and good for me as if we went on a direct route we wouldn't hit the 5km

Programmatic, Privacy, Viewability, Fraud?: "Kansas is getting complex again"

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 20 Mar 2017 16:48:00 +0000

I've held off until now wading into the programmatic conversation which in the main has been due to me wanting to watch and observe where this windy programmatic road has taken us so far, what it means for us, our budgets and our creative input to the marketing mix.

As you know: In a nutshell programmatic is the ability to buy display space via technology, versus the traditional human process of buying direct from publishers.

The convenience and proven efficiency of programmatic have been discussed at great length by nearly all marketing publications, estimates of spend hover around the 2.5 billion mark as reported by The Drum in September 2015 but where it's not working so well is in the view-ability of the bought inventory

And this is a problem....

There is some thinking that publishers are holding back on prime real estate, and this may or not be the case, but what it does mean is naff, non-engaging display ads just aren't going to cut it.

I've banged on for as as long as anyone cares to remember that acquisition is based on a fundamental quora of SEO (technical, on page and off page (this means top flight content)), well researched and laser like PPC (no spray and pray please), display ads that support and move the brand or sales proposition forward and social activation.

For a mature marketing mix we still see too many shoddy and confusing display ads that tell us nothing, make us feel nothing and don't tell us what they want us to do.

...and you know what it's not as if we don't know how to do it! It's just content, so why are so many companies getting it so wrong? Thoughts?

#safetypin

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 29 Jun 2016 23:15:00 +0000

I am only me, but I am not just one. I will not let our country tear at it's dignity, courage and hard lessons learnt. We will, with heart and mind and tongue, fight intolerance and bigotry and hate of any kind. I am only me, but I am not just one. #safetypin

Morrissey - Sunny - Drew J Robinson - Looking in the rear view mirror...!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 23 May 2016 19:46:00 +0000

Morrissey - Sunny - Drew J Robinson - Looking in the rear view mirror...!

So this is a 'snippet' of a previous me..! At times I buy into a 'cod' theory that there have been many me(s), or should that be I's?

The reality is all the versions of me, or the I's, are potentially just an I, or just me!

Q: why look in the rear view mirror like this?

A: i'm in/at the beginning of a bit of a new chapter (a new me? a new I? I don't know) and I want to write about it but I'm unsure if I should write here, on a seperate blog, not write, be public, not be, and on my mind goes a whirling.

So I thought, dig something out, share something people may not know about (and for those of you that do please excuse the repetition ;-) you, it might be a start, it might jolt something free, it might allow you to write and not comment (this thought has just come to me and I think it's probably 'right on the money').

So here's the 'snippet' of me, seen through the rear view mirror...

bloody tories

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 08 Oct 2015 01:05:00 +0000

Bit miffed actually by the race to the darkest territory of the conservative narrative. Is it just me but is the backdrop to the Tories getting darker and darker?

The fresh faced Blair apparent that was Cameron, proposer of middle ground reasonableness, earth friendly speeches, primary and secondary care user and defender of, seems to have morphed into a terrible puppet like ghoul, that has spent too long suckering on the putrid Grandees and hatefulness of old Tory waywardness.

There's no longer "bright new day blue" it's been replaced by a "bubonic vampiric hate mongering blue". Go look to the speeches on tonight's media, listen to the sound of our freedoms being tossed to the wind like so much discarded husk, hear the petrifying sound of boots on gravel that echo through our shared history and tell me we're going to be ok.

When we become misty eyed Islanders and choose to be metaphorically deaf and blind to the shift in rhetoric I can only offer history up as a guide, so as the very same notes, cadence and discord seem to be in revivalist mode, can I ask you to not agree or disagree with me but be on your guard against anything, person or party that has a murder of crows just waiting to blacken our skies.

Content strategy II

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 24 May 2015 21:32:00 +0000

That means that, at their best, strategists will provide a document explaining how their teams will accomplish these goals.

Relly Annett-Baker, in her article Why you need a Content Strategist, suggests you might apply a rough methodology: When you first meet, ensure you ask a lot of questions about their business works, what messages they want to get across and what their business’/products’ best features are.

Look at, and if required create the wireframes and the proposed information architecture of their website, consider interaction instructions, and determine whether a message is best explained with a screencast or a series of step-by-step by pictures.

Content, just like the websites they inhabit, are living, changing things. When strategists seek to assess and improve the quality of a website’s content, they typically follow a four-part process.

analyse; In this phase, strategists figure out what what kind of content they’re dealing with.
Ask questions about content, right from the start. Utilise user research or personas to decide what content is needed. Answer the question, “who cares?” Carry out a content audit, and/or a gap analysis.

Collect; Here we figure out (or plan for) the commonalities across our website’s content. Establish key themes and messages. Write a plan for creating and commissioning content. Insist upon yourself that you create plans for content production over time (an editorial calendar).

Publish; In this phase, we’ll see our content through to publication: where does it live on the website and how does it get there? Annotate wireframes and sitemaps to explain how both interaction and content will work. Specify CMS features like content models, metadata, and workflow based on the content strategy. Write and aggregate your killer content.

Manage; After we’ve published content, it’s time to look back, see what worked, and plan for the future. Write comprehensive copy decks, based on common templates. Write a style guide for tone of voice, SEO, linking policy, and community policy.

Where we're heading with the Human/System interface

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 26 Apr 2015 10:15:00 +0000

interface

ˈɪntəfeɪs/

noun

1.
a point where two systems, subjects, organisations, etc. meet and interact.

"the interface between accountancy and the law"
2.
COMPUTING

a device or program enabling a user to communicate with a computer.

"a graphical user interface"

verb

1.

interact with (another system, person, etc.).

"you will interface with counterparts from sister companies"
2.

COMPUTING

connect with (another computer or piece of equipment) by an interface.

"the hotel's computer system can interface automatically with the booking system"

It'll come as no surprise that my information sources, feeds, alerts, blog rolls are very often filled with tech, SEM, mobile, UX information and articles. I can often miss stuff due to overload and so on rare occasions I actively take some time out of the weekend to find a quite spot and try and have a good catch up.

One article I didn't miss was by Jefferson Graham (USA Today technology writer), titled; "My (rough) first day with Apple Watch" The reason this wasn't missed was it chimed with some of the thinking I've been having around design, intuitive design, human/machine system interfacing and where this whole area is heading. In his article he makes a particularly pertinent reference to the method of releasing Apple products into the arms of customers, i.e. no instructions needed. Jefferson says "...The company has always been known for creating products that were intuitive, and didn't need instruction manuals because they were so simple to use." This however seems not be the case with Apples latest offering. I reference this as an example of where as much as we might try the user interface currently faces many hurdles.

Back in the day, when I ran teams in customer service centres and sales centres I had the opportunity to observe first hand the impact, both good and bad of the human/machine system interface relationship. What I observed has coloured my thinking in all areas of design, usability and beyond.

I observed there seemed to be an upper limit of systems we could expect a co-worker to successfully work across and still be optimised in their outputs. There were fluctuations in the upper limit, such things as system experience and attitudinal elements but overall five different enough systems seemed to be the average that would ensure optimised outputs, seven for those with a good length of use of the systems and seven for those with a high attitudinal approach.

[A quick health warning here, I ran no formal insight work, and didn't run clean variant testing, my view was formed from on the job observation and analyses of co-workers performance. The systems I refer to include phone hardware where call coding would be inputted, reservation systems, availability systems, email systems, company website, share point etc.]

I reference this as whilst each of the systems they were required to work across had some greater or lesser degree of intuitive design, in concert this was lost, resulting in a very unintuitive set of interfaces.

Time however has moved on. We have been through dramatic moves forward in both visual, spacial and Human/system machine interface design.

THE INTUITIVE INTERFACE

...and yes we have moved on, however Timoni West from the Department of Design Brooklyn and formerly a designer at Foursquare, makes a really valid point, she says;

… don’t feel like every single action you design right now, in this Wild West time of interaction design, has to be completely intuitive. There are things we think are intuitive now that we learned using tutorials decades ago...

One of the finest of such examples are the early Apple tutorials showing us how to use a mouse, we didn't come out of the womb knowing how to do this and yet today the use of this tech has either been completely superseded or it's become intuitive!

Another such example is being told to "pinch glass", back in 2013 the very idea that by pinching a sheet of glass we could have direct control over resizing images seemed fanciful and yet today and the variants on "zoom-pinch" it seems second nature, one might say intuitive.

So what? We learn and that learning becomes embedded and becomes second nature, but where are we going with this? I think we're in an age of NO INTERFACE.

THE NO INTERFACE TIME IS UPON US

So you want to publish online content?

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 04 Apr 2015 12:31:00 +0000

A common occurrence? You or someone you know wants to create content, and have it published online.

A slightly less common occurrence? Having that same someone articulate high aspirations for their content.

For those select few, instead of creating content destined for some digital landfill, their content is going to be special; it’s going places and it’s taking them, their brand, and their experience with it.

I'm going to be looking at the following areas.

What is Content Strategy?
How is Content Strategy performed?
Content Strategy Luminaries
Tools of the Trade
Related Resources
Content Strategy Books
Additional Resources
Managing and publishing content requires that we deal with a necessary evil known as content management.

Content management is just what it sounds like, a way to manage the creation and dissemination of content. To effectively and systematically do that, it’s imperative that publishers employ what’s (aptly) known as content management systems (CMS's).

The most common of kind of which is called a blog. I have to put this out there right up front, our industry is full of jargon, and more often than not it's pretty difficult to succinctly summarise, so I'm going to have to assume that you already know the basics around blogging and potentially content management. That way we can discuss the larger issues at hand, such as strategy. If you don’t, can I suggest a few Google searches and to come back when you're a little more confident?

So to begin by quoting Louis Rosenfeld, “If [Information Architecture] is the spatial side of information, I see content strategy as the temporal side of the same coin.”

This abstraction is important, If you or someone you know is getting ready to unleash content into an unsuspecting world, what guides the creation efforts?

At this point, visual design, design of the actual CMS itself is utterly irrelevant. Nobody should really discuss what the system will look like (expect, maybe, the visual thinkers in the room), but instead, the heart of the matter; what’s this all about? What content will this website deliver? Why are we doing what we're doing? Moreover, when will it deliver it? And everyone wants to add their tuppenceworth,

It’s kind of like debating what content should be on the homepage. Which is another thing, what content should be on the homepage? Egads. Content, you’ll find, is everywhere. In this article, we’ll take a look at Content Strategy, that odd amalgamation of Web Savvy, Information Architecture and editorial process that adds up to something infinitely greater than the sum of its parts.

We'll look at when and where to apply strategy to your content endeavours and when you should simply raise your hand and start asking the important questions.

“Content strategy plans for the creation, publication, and governance of useful, usable content,” says Kristina Halvorson, author of the book Content Strategy for the Web. “It plots an achievable roadmap for individuals and organisations to create and maintain content that audiences will actually care about. It provides specific, well-informed recommendations about how we’re going to get from where we are today (no content, or bad content, or too much content) to where we want to be (useful, usable content people will actually care about).

”Information Architecture helps us say “where” content lives, Content Strategy tells us decide “when” it lives. The combination, in due course, helps us as well as our clients (internal, external) understand “why” it’s there in the first place.

This quote from Louis carries extra significance because it’s based on actual experience. You see, Louis is the guy behind the UX publishing house Rosenfeld Media. His company makes real, honest-to-goodness books, b o o k s, that's right you diginoids, you can hold them in your hand. So if I had to guess, Louis knows quite a bit about Content Strategy even though he might not identify as someone well-versed in it, because Content Strategy is part and parcel to the publishing world.

DIGITAL PUBLISHING the distance between print and the web, when it comes to a prudent publication process, isn't all that vast. In fact, if you think about all of the stuff required to publish books, authors, reviewers, technical editors, copy editors, publishers, graphic designers, distributors, etc. we really begin to see that their analogous roles on the web are just, by default, not designed into the process …at least, not when everyone and their Mother can publish content.

Content Strategy is the way forward. It helps both clients and project teams understand what content is being produced, how it’s being produced, by whom, when, and why. Kristina Halvorson, in her article The Discipline of Content Strategy, says that “at its best, a content strategy defines: key themes and messages recommended topics content purpose (i.e., how content will bridge the space between audience needs and business requirements) content gap analysis metadata frameworks and related content attributes search engine optimization (SEO), and implications of strategic recommendations on content creation, publication, and governance.”

NASA | A View From The Other Side

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 28 Feb 2015 17:25:00 +0000

Bedroom redesign | It may have taken some considerable time

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 14 Feb 2015 15:41:00 +0000

Whilst there is some snagging to do and a bit of minor repairing to plaster work and of course the need to add a bay window curtain rail.

I'm really pleased at how far I've managed to bring the bedroom forward.

There's a real sense of calm and it is a great space to relax as well as sleep in.

Next project will be to remove the wardrobes from the small guest bedroom currently Arthur's [the dog] bedroom. This feels really daunting as they've been fitted really well, and in some ways feels quite wasteful, verging on extravagant. I'm also quite worried about wrecking the walls as I remove them.

I wonder if old fitted wardrobes have any takers on freecycle, will need to investigate this.

Today however it's a focus on the garden, we have a tree surgeon [Adam] from Graftin Gardeners coming over in 10 minutes to quote for our Silver birch to have a trim and for the BIG ornamental cherry tree next door to get a bit of a haircut.

It sounds so nimby but if it doesn't get cut back now to the boundary line we will have no sun in our garden when it's in full leaf.

Once that's done and dusted, start the work on the garden, we're really lucky to have such a big space in central London but the previous owners decked the whole thing so it does rather resemble a massive beer garden, as was pointed out by a friend before he could stop himself.

Dr T isn't convinced about me removing part of the deck to make a full raised side border/bed but he has got to let me crack on as he's the one that made us spend over 3/4 million an what at the moment is very much a glorified one bedroom flat

Men United. Keeping friendships alive.

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 05 Feb 2015 22:06:00 +0000

Those working weeks when letting your hair down...OoopS!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 31 Jan 2015 22:48:00 +0000

We've all been there, following a tough week a glass or two of shandy [sic] is a well deserved treat.

But what happens when "Wine goes Bad" the little video may just serve as a warning...!

Food to warm the heart

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 14 Jan 2015 19:09:00 +0000

You get days where you have been as busy as a May fly but things have all slotted into place, maybe only by a hairs breadth, and you may have had to hold your breath a couple of times, but in place the day has slotted.

It's days like this you want food that warms the heart, food that says; this is a good day.

This day is a day for Meatballs in Goulash.....I promise you, it is. Hot Paprika, onions, peppers, garlic, noodles, poppy seeds....

So for the ingredients.

Two approaches to the meatballs, and I frown on neither approach, remember you've worked hard all day so no meatball snobbery here.

FOR THE MEATBALLS

Method 1.

Buy fresh meat meatballs from the supermarket.

Method 2.

12oz lean minced pork

12 oz lean minced beef

1/2 red pepper very finely chopped

1 fat buddha of a clove of garlic (crushed or finely chopped)

a fistful of flat parsley roughly chopped

1 egg

seasoned flour, this is flour with sat and pepper...! (You don't buy it btw, just chuck some salt in and grind or shake some pepper in)

Vegetable oil (you can use Olive but vegetable has a higher burn point so you should get a better brown on your balls).

FOR THE SAUCE (I'm not going to advise a shortcut on the sauce as the sauce is so simple yet tasty I haven't found a supermarket version that holds a candle to doing it yourself.)

2 very level tspoons of hot paprika. Be careful on this as different companies produce Hot Paprika with different hotness levels. I'd recommend going with the two level teaspoons if this is your fist outing with this dish. BTW, it could really do with being Hungarian Paprika.

1 medium onion chopped

1/2 medium red pepper, (this is the other half of the pepper from the making of the meatballs (see what I did there?) if you only have peppers of other colour in the fridge use those, let's not be overly purist hey...!

another fat Buddha of a clove of garlic (crushed or finely chopped)

A tin of chopped tomatoes or 1lb of ripe tomatoes

1/2 a tub of creme fraiche.

You'll also b=need a heavy bottomed casserole dish with a tight fitting lid.

1st make the meatballs.

I a large bowl pt in the minced pork and the minced beef chopped red pepper, garlic, parsley and breadcrumbs (if you don't have breadcrumbs don't stress, these are really to make them go further and some people don't like too meaty a meatball).

Mix them all well, and I have yet to find an implement that is better than your hands at this, get in there and mash it all together, and then mash it some more. if however his is too uck an idea ten a big fork will do the job.

Now you're aiming for 24 meatballs with this amount of ingredients. once you've got your meatballs all sorted you want to roll them in the seasoned flour. I find a takeaway container really helpful for this as per the pic below... Roll them around or use your hands

Now in the casserole dish heat up the oil to HOT, we want to get a really good colour on the meatballs. and they'll taste that much better. You don't have to do them all in one batch, do six at a time, get them brown take them out and pop them on a plate then do the next six etc.

Once all meatballs are browned it's time to make the sauce.

DO NOT WASH THE CASSEROLE DISH at this point.

Put the chopped onions into the casserole dish but turn the heat down, we want the onions to soften not colour, a low heat makes them soft and sweet, a high heat firm and coloured. We want soft and sweet for this dish.

After about five minutes add in the chopped pepper

Another three to five minutes put in the garlic

give it about a minute then add the paprika nd the left over flour mix well

NOW add your tomatoes and maybe half a tin of water.

Bring up to simmering point and now put the meatballs in the sauce, put the lid on and put it all in the oven.

Half way through take it out and give it a good but gentle stir,

For the noodles, use about 3 oz of tagliatelle, or spaghetti per person, bring to the boil and when cooked use 1/2 oz of butter and let it melt through the noodles, take the dish out of the oven, swirl in the creme fraiche, pile the noodles on plates and serve up your food for the heart.

ENJOY

drewrobo .

An ad served doesn't necessarily equal an ad viewed... 'Kansas strikes again'

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 25 Dec 2014 10:25:00 +0000

An ad served doesn't necessarily equal an ad viewed.... starts the heading of the thinkwithgoogle article published this month.

To say that I thought this was stating the bleeding obvious would've been an utter understatement, compounded further by the editorial which I felt its sub-text was '...it's just the way it is' got me to writing this piece.

I think we need to take a much wider view of the display ad landscape and see where the issues really lie, and if there's a way the industry can respond in a meaningful way to not kill off what historically has been a potent and well converting way to get your brand and product noticed.

I think there are three culprits lurking in the wings and we'll call each out to examine them to see how much they're involved in the demise of the display ad.

The three culprits as I see them are;

Mobile
Programmatic
Multiplatform beaviour

Let's take a look at each and then bring the argument together.

How to really overdo it and not in a good way

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 01 Nov 2014 22:54:00 +0000

http://houzz.com/photos/11724285

Two-Minute Tales: Dubai's Working Falcons

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 01 Nov 2014 18:31:00 +0000

Days in Dubai

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 06 Sep 2014 08:45:00 +0000

All the Dubai posts will go up once I've had a chance to make some edits and ensure my typing isn't as lousy as I've noticed it has been in the last few posts...!

However this short Birthday message created by David and Amanda deserves a special edition post...

http://youtu.be/KjIYjrpoUlw

Dubai Holiday September 2014

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 02 Sep 2014 08:56:00 +0000

Today is our third full day in Dubai and we're feeling slightly worse for wear after what was a relatively relaxing day, not withstanding the struggle with the ferociousness of the heat! Our struggle is the result of the incredible generosity of both David and Amanda and the hosting and food delivered by Ricky and his very attentive team at the restaurant known as http://okku.com.

Plate after plate of delicious morsels kept being delivered to table with barely a bad note amongst them, a personal favourite were the sticky ribs, these were generous and sticky and sweet with a dark rich molasses flavour that still allowed the meatyness to come through; mouth, beard, chin, fingers all covered which only added to the joy of this dish.

My other (of many) passions is my garden

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 08 Jun 2014 02:20:00 +0000

So we moved from Kieldon Manor to the Dowager House know as Lavender Garden Mansion, it's been a bit touch and go. New spaces, spaces we don't know what to do with, spaces that are cool but a little contradictory.

What I do have though is My Garden...

Here's a walk through of what we've managed to do in the short space of time we've been here, and by the way did I say I have a SHED...for those of you who get this I salute you, for those of you that don't... ;-)

Arthur not too sure what to make of the extra space

Very early doors with the new garden

A bit of the apartment and the Garden

Hand built and "lined" vegetable plot

First set of seedlings transplanted

First "big" use of the garden

If I lay here....

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 14 May 2014 20:42:00 +0000

#NowPlaying "Chasing Cars" by Snow Patrol on @Sonos

Why bounce rate reduction puts conversions on steroids

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 21 Mar 2014 22:57:00 +0000

I've been playing with different ways of reducing bounce rate recently and have on occasion struggled to get the "C-Suite" to understand why this is an Uber important metric that should be given considerable focus and in many ways should trump traffic volumes and even conversion, this I believe is true whether your site is lead generation or pure play e-commerce.

I'm going to lay out some basics, so for those of you that are already thinking in the space you can scroll through the next few paragraphs as you'll be fully up to speed on what I'm going to write...!

Let's start with the basics, what are you're key landing pages for your products, service, offers etc? Whatever analytic package you're using you will be very quickly be able to run a report that tells you this, but for those that are Google analytics users I'll step you through it.

Open up your analytics account...!
Click on the behaviour link in the left hand panel and then click on the landing page link

Now dependent on the size of your site you could have a crazy number of results but we're going to get your bounce rate sorted step by step. If the bounce on your homepage is pretty high (the homepage in GA is represented by this /

Graduates looking for a career in digital

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 31 Jan 2014 23:12:00 +0000

This is a slight breakaway form the usual SEO, PPC, MY OPINION, piece's that I normally write but as I was preparing for the coming week I noticed in my diary one of my team had a work anniversary. Some folk may think it soft that I have these set up in my diary and I actively celebrate these anniversaries with the team.

For me it's just another way I can express to them and the wider team the importance they play for all of us in Digital and the wider company. So I'll ensure there's a thank you card on their desk from us all and we'll have a small moment of congratulating them.

But it got me thinking how I came to recruit this person in the 1st place and just how hard it is for graduates to get that first role to launch successful, mind blowing, super satisfying careers.

I don't know if in the next few paragraphs of musings any of this will be of value, but it's meant to be. If at times I come across as a bit "cross" it's because I've interviewed talent that have thrown it all away at interview and there are times when I see talent really pushing both at my own company and at others where I know the future of digital in it's constantly tectonic plate moving kind of way is in good shape.

So here goes my view on what pitfalls to avoid, what to do to put you ahead f the game.

The internet of things, all things, small things, big things, kindthings

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 30 Jan 2014 12:00:00 +0000

You know those times when you haven't spent any time thinking about something, then someone says something, then you think I don't know too much about this, then you have a few drinks one night and a week later you know so much about the thing you didn't know about and yet don't know how you now know so much.

Ever happen to you?

Well that's how I got started on The Internet of Things...