So while I’ve been living in the UK for nearing onto 8 years (minus a few months pottering back and forth to finish University in Canada), it still blows my little mind that I can get from London to Paris in just over 2 hours, or fly to Barcelona in even less.

While my travel schedule doesn’t rival the travel calendars of most of my esteemed industry colleagues, it makes me smile that in the course of a month, my Canadian passport will be stamped with Belgian, French and Spanish stamps.

In Bruges (with a detour via Brussels)

Last weekend was the Bruges trip; a hectic two-day trip to Brussels, where we visited the Cantillon brewery home to Lambic, Gueuze, Faro and Kriek beers. I was lucky enough to try an elder blossom lambic, which was rather unusual and flowery but worth a try. We then moved on to Bruges for the evening, wandering the streets and trying more Belgian beers from Edric’s 100 Belgian Beers to Try Before You Die list. The next morning, we did the classic boat tour, ate more mussels and fries, then slowly (very slowly, thanks to National Express useless train services) made our way home.

Next, Barcelona

In just under two weeks, I’ll be popping over to sunny (I hope) Barcelona for a spot of brainstorming with a brilliant client’s team. If I’m lucky, I’ll have a few hours to pop by Las Ramblas and soak in some Spanish vibes (and Spanish wine).

Last stop, Paris

My last stop before Christmas will be Paris, for the LeWeb ‘09 conference, where they’ve kindly invited me as official blogger. I’m looking forward to seeing old friends, meeting new faces and seeing new startups and entrepreneurs get passionate about the web.

For those who aren’t familiar with Le Web, it’s a yearly conference with over 1800 attendees with themes relating to the web, technology, but with a broad appeal that will tickle the curiosity of non-geeks as well. Some of the speakers this year include Twitter’s Jack Dorsey, productivity geek Tim Ferriss, TechCrunch’s Mike Arrington (who will undoubtedly get into mudslinging as he does every year), an unusually sober Paul Carr and Her Majesty Queen Rania of Jordan. A rather varied bunch then!

If you’re also attending, drop me a line or leave a comment, as I’d love to meet some new people!

[As a complete aside, titling this post "On the road again" caused me to start singing Richard Séguin's "L'Ange Vagabond", which contains the lyrics "On the road again". I ended up downloading the album from iTunes - gobsmacked iTunes UK has a French-Canadian album from 1993 in its catalogue! Time for a trip down memory lane...]

The next “Blogs & Social Media in Business” introductory workshop day is next week, on Thursday 19th November, at Wallacespace St Pancras in London and due to a change of plans with one company (who have now opted for an in-house training course for their whole team), all of a sudden, I have 8 places available on the course.

In order to fill the course and have enough participants to make the course interesting, I’m offering these places at cost, only £95, instead of the usual £395!

If you secretly wish you understood why people use hashtags on Twitter, how to work social media tools into your existing marketing plan, need to manage online relationships or just wonder how to approach bloggers in your industry, then this one is for you. We tackle all the jargon that flies around the web, and make it make sense.

Complete this form and mention the blog post to get the course at the awesome low-cost of £95 + VAT (I feel like Billy Mays in an infomercial, help!) for a full day of training, as well as tasty breakfast, lunch and snacks throughout the day.  

In the past, we’ve had attendees from a range of industries – solicitors, travel & tourism marketers, luxury fashion retailers and small business owners – all of whom said they thoroughly enjoyed the course and learned a lot.

Grab the workshop brochure here for more details, and join me next Thursday for a fun and insightful day on social media.

It’s rare that I start a blog entry by apologising for the radio silence – but it’s also rare that I go nearly an entire month without blogging – so please accept my apologies for going a month without publishing anything.

It’s certainly not for lack of things to write about, that’s for sure. The past few months have been some of the most exciting of my life; self-employment is in full swing and Pepsmedia is doing great, we’ve had two fabulous holidays (first was a quirky narrowboating trip with friends, second was a relaxing two weeks in Canada to see my family), and life has generally been very good to us.

Amongst all these brilliant events, however, time to step back and admire how far I’ve come since getting to the UK in 2001, which now feels like a lifetime ago.

But today, I’m feeling contemplative. Perhaps it’s because, as of yesterday, Pepsmedia now has a Cambridge office and I’m basking in the autumnal sunshine. Or perhaps it’s because our first employee is starting next week and I can already feel a weight lift off my shoulders, safe in the knowledge that I’ll soon have a secondary brain available to help me (what can I say, the cloning attempts have all failed…) Or it might simply be because I’m in a good mood.

When I chose to take online marketing and social media consultancy seriously, I didn’t know how well I’d fare, but I took the plunge. “What’s the worst that can happen?”, I told myself, “Worst case scenario, I get a new regular job or take on a temporary contract.” But after a good dose of hard work, long hours and a bit of luck, things are going brilliantly. An old colleague commented, saying I was so lucky to be where I was today, doing what I love and working with truly awesome clients.

While thinking about what proportion was luck, and what was blood, sweat and tears, I came across a post by Tara Hunt on people who seem to be lucky, and others who don’t seem to benefit from this supposed luck. Paraphrasing Richard Wiseman, a psychologist at the University of Hertfordshire, she highlights four main characteristics of lucky people:

Four characteristics of lucky people

1. Lucky people are skilled at creating and noticing chance opportunities;
2. Lucky people make lucky decisions by listening to their intuition;
3. Lucky people create self-fulfilling prophesies via positive expectations; and
4. Lucky people adopt a resilient attitude that transforms bad luck into good.

To some extent, some days the planets probably do align better for you than for someone else. But generally speaking, luck isn’t about crossing your fingers in the hope that something good will happen, but rather taking every opportunity to MAKE your own luck.

If you’re passionate about something and you want to be “the lucky one who gets to do what they love for a living”, sitting in a job you dislike, slogging away on demotivating work hours a day, the lucky break won’t happen by itself.

Talk to people who understand where you want to be and may create serendipitous situations where you meet the right people to help you get where you want to be. Find pet projects in the evening, things that get you closer to learning the skills you’ll need to get to your goal. If it’s possible, even consider talking to your current boss to see if you can come to an arrangement; for example, my last employer let me move from full time to two days a week, providing me with a “safety net” while giving me the flexibility to get started.

Most of all, enjoy the journey. It’s like a long hike; while the destination matters, you’ve got to keep your head high and enjoy the view along the way!

So while I’m blogging less regularly, be sure to say hi on Twitter in the meantime.

[Photo credit: John-Morgan on Flickr, Creative Commons]

In HSBC’s defence, I don’t usually have to wait very long with them, but when I do, I get a hell of a twitch. As for HP, there was no excuse for the lengthy wait times I experienced.

In fact, an HSBC staff member admitted on the call that day that he’d had many complaints about last summer’s choice: Amy Winehouse’s cover of Valerie. He confided that it wasn’t unusual for customers to be in a call queue for half-hour with nothing but a lo-fi version of Valerie as company – Enough to send anyone into mental meltdown. At the very least, it’ll cause your mild annoyance to snowball into a murderous mood by the time the poor call centre guy/gal picks up the phone.

Anyone who has had to call the Applecare phone line will have experienced the same frustration I did when my MacBook casing cracked:

I went through to an Indian (?) call centre where the quality of the phone line was so poor and crackly, I had to shout my MacBook’s serial number six times, with Andrew giggling increasingly with every “E for Echo, L for Lima!”

The amount of time spent repeating information to the call centre was a waste of my time and theirs, and a crackling poor quality phone line caused tempers to rise. Clearly, the relationship between customer and call centre needs to change.

What’s wrong with the current relationship?

1. Businesses need to value existing customers

Generally calls to call centres are made by EXISTING customers. Is it any surprise then that it takes five times longer (scientific finger-in-the-air statistic) for calls from already-acquired customers to be answered, versus nearly instant answer for the new-customers-only line? Businesses need to stop treating existing customers like crap based on the assumption that we’re tied in with them.

The “Brand new customers only” approach doesn’t work anymore.

Click here to view the embedded video.

2. New technology needs to be adopted more widely

If Online Chat widgets were more commonplace on business sites, I’d often be just as satisfied to ask my questions that way. However, in my experience, the staff answering questions on online chat are often under-informed and working based on a very strict data sheet, most often leading to a conclusion that I’ll need to call the sales line to get an answer to my question.

Some businesses have embraced services like Twitter as an informal customer service channel, and their success is usually proportional to the efforts they’ve put in; a consistent and regular response to questions, rather than the occasional outburst will no doubt have a positive impact. But reality is that not everyone’s on Twitter, so while I enjoy seeing businesses use it, I also want to see the more mainstream services like corporate websites and call centres acknowledge that new technology can help make customers happy, albeit at a cost.

3. Staff need to be encouraged to have a friendlier approach

Treating customers like liars, making them guilty until proven otherwise is a nasty way to start a relationship so while it’s fair to ask for a proof of purchase receipt in order to provide a refund or ask callers to provide identification details before answering questions, customer service needs to be friendly, approachable and proactive in wanting to solve the customer’s issue.

No more robot-like scripts or refusing to escalate the call to managers who can take action, the entire team’s objectives should be to create happy customers, resolving problems and using common sense to solve them in a timely, cost-effective way.

While working on this post, I came across David Cushman’s customer service manifesto, and Heidi Miller’s post who flagged up BL Ochman’s bad customer service experience over a $34.32 accounting error.

How would you improve customer service online, on the phone or in person?

Members of your community do a lot. You rely on them to make the community a success. You can influence the direction of your community, you can influence its content and you even have an influence over the type of members you want in the community. However, when it comes down to whether your community is going to be successful, your members are all that matter. You need to not only attract members that will help your community grow and continue to develop, but you need to keep them. You can do this by making sure they feel special.

via communityspark.com

Community Spark has turned out to be a real gem in explaining how community building works and why community management is such an art.

The best thing a company can do to its community management efforts is to put a passionate and dedicated person in charge, and give them the *time* to do their job well.

The pen improves on regular pens in two key ways:

1. It registers anything that is written on paper, effectively scanning my handwriting as I go, which means that as soon as I get back to the computer, the pen transfers it to the LiveScribe software for future reference.
2. It records all audio in the room, which means I can take a few headline notes without writing down every single piece of information.

Back in university, I had some form of RSI in my right wrist, so I made it a habit to record lessons on tape so that I didn’t need to write everything. In reality, I could never find the time or energy to dig through the 3-hour lecture recording to find the 5-minute segment that interested me, so it was pretty much a pointless exercise.

With the LiveScribe, it all becomes much easier: Tap the pen on the headline note relating to the audio clip you need, whether it’s a title or a graph, the recording will automatically go back to that point and start playing.

Normally, I’d shrug and say that this is a gadget for geeks and will never reach into the real world. Past similar gadgets have existed and gone nowhere fast. The biggest difference? This one prices its accessories reasonably.

The pen itself is £120-£150 so it’s a small initial investment, but Moleskine-style notebooks cost about £1 more per unit than their traditional Moleskine counterparts, and the A4-sized school notebooks are £16.99 for a pack of 4. The paper is thicker than with the Moleskine, which makes me happy as I’m a heavy-handed writer. Next time I need to get some notebooks, I think I’ll get a 4-pack of the pink flip notepad which is far cheaper than Moleskine journalist flip notepads. (Plus it’s pink, wayhey!) The ink isn’t overpriced either, and in a pinch, since it writes like a normal pen, it’s possible to use the pen without the fancy paper (unlike stylus-based systems).

The pen does raise some interesting ethical and legal questions: What if I forgot to mention to someone that I’m recording our conversation? Or maliciously chose to record a private conversation? Of course, I have no intention of doing that, but the technology is now becoming available and affordable to people who aren’t MI5 or hired spies (albeit in a pen the size of a large cigar!) so we’ll undoubtedly be seeing these issues show up on the Information Commissioner’s agenda in the future.

As far as I’m concerned, this is a great new addition to my arsenal of tools to support my sieve-like memory and no one needs to worry about me using it stealthily. I’ll be too busy showing off the piano party trick it can do!

Now you can watch my first pencast below…

[Note: Before you ask, this isn't a sponsored post and LiveScribe didn't give me a free pen. I just am that much of a geek that I get excited over pens.]

I must have a friendly personality because, while I’m not in the IT department by any means, I seem to be anyways have been a first port of call for tech support (especially on Macs) in offices I’ve worked in. I usually don’t mind helping out, really!

I used to find myself grinning at the thought that someone needed to be shown something that seemed so obvious to me. Then just over a year ago, I discovered the Quickbooks accounting software, and felt humbled again. It was my turn to have NO idea what I was doing. With monk-like patience and a few pointers from my brilliant accountant, I managed to learn my way around so that I’m now reasonably proficient with Quickbooks.

The experience made its mark though: Learning something you’re new to when you’re scared of screwing up is tough!

Now imagine being freaked out by technology in general rather than just Quickbooks or Photoshop? That’s the relationship many (most?) people have with computers, even today. The difference between them and us is that we’ve developed the confidence to try things, knowing that (generally) it won’t break the computer.

So how about taking 15 minutes to sit down with your tech illiterati colleague to show them how to do something this week? Think of it as time investment: If they learn how to do it and gain confidence, they’ll stop panicking every time that task arises.

How to successfully teach a tech illiterati

1. Before starting, make sure you’re in a good, open, positive mood.
2. Before starting, make sure your illiterati is also in a good, open, receptive mood.
3. Remove distractions: If you can, forward their desk phone to someone else, close email and “misplace” their Blackberry. Without their full attention, you’re wasting your time.
4. Ask them what they need to achieve and where they’ve been stumbling. Listen to their answer to see what spooks them most.
5. Take a deep breath. Take another one. Then start teaching.
6. Go at half-speed: Speak slowly, avoid jargon and show them where you’re clicking. You may know the software or website by heart, but they don’t, so let each step sink in.
7. Encourage them to take notes: Your student should make their own notes, since your notes or step-by-step most likely takes certain things for granted, skipping steps that are essential in their eyes. For particularly complex tasks, print a screenshot of the page and let them scribble directly on it.
8. Do it again: After you’ve done the steps once, if you can, let the student do it a second time under your supervision but without any hints/tips from you. This will help the process sink in, yet provide them with the confidence that you’re there to ensure they don’t screw up.
9. Praise: Give them encouragement, but don’t be patronising.
10. Go grab a glass of wine and have a giggle at Eddie Izzard’s video on technojoy & technofear.

Considering the URLs generated by sites like Google Maps can often be over 200 characters in length, being able to shrink them down to a tenth of their length before sharing them is hugely handy. However, the recent announcement from tr.im, one of the many shorteners out there, saying that it felt there was no way forward for its service and that it would close its doors by the end of 2009. (They’ve since said they’ll stay the course. For now.)

It sent a shiver down our collective web archiving nerd’s spine, as we imagined the graveyard of dead links the future held as more of these services shut down.

Best practices on using URL shorteners

There are times where short URLs are appropriate, and others where it’s best to avoid them:

1. Use them in time sensitive contexts

Short URLs are great for sending a link via IM, over Twitter or in email to a friend or colleague. If it’s likely that you’ll need to refer to the link in more than a few weeks, then don’t rely on a short URL and send the full original link.

Don’t use them in blog entries, research papers or anything that has long-term value unless you want to have to go back at a later date and change them all when a shortener announces it’s closing down.

2. Put together a super-quick campaign

Running a competition this afternoon and need to track participation without worrying about asking your web developer to set up Google Analytics for your microsite? Use a few short URLs and you’ll have some rough and ready data immediately. It may not be as reliable or thorough as classic site analytics but it’s a great way to get moving fast.

Once the campaign is over, copy your data somewhere safe for future reference.

3. Use them only in trusted environments

Recently, I received an email from an ex work colleague inviting me to look at some holiday photos. I suspected something was odd because I’d not heard from her in years, so didn’t click on the short URLs. My spidey senses were right and when prompted, she said that she’d never sent the email and that her computer hadn’t seen a virus scan in centuries. The short URLs? They would have sent me through to some phishing sites.

Short URL hacking unfortunately hasn’t been completely eradicated yet either.

Avoid opening short URLs without knowledge of where they lead, and preferably use services that allow you to preview the destination address like TinyURL’s Previewer.

4. Always archive the full URL

Fond of bookmarking what you find for future reference? Be sure to bookmark the full URL, not the short URL, otherwise your entire archive may become a road to nowhere a few months down the line.

How to make the most of short URLs

1. Use a shortener that allows you to track clicks

Many URL shorteners allow you to create an account to track clicks on the URLs you create.

For example, Bit.ly allows me to see and share the stats on the latest blog entry I published of who clicked on the short URL (in this instance, the link was used to share the post on Twitter):

http://bit.ly/info/15wBen

Bit.ly allows us to find out total clicks, breakdown of when the clicks happened and where they came from. More interestingly, it aggregates conversation and lets you know who has been talking about you and where.

2. Create a customised URL name

Make it memorable by changing the default generated name to something easier to remember.

bit.ly/tastythai will be more memorable than bit.ly/gbXt5 won’t it?

3. Use publicly viewable results

This one won’t be to everyone’s taste: If your team is involved in a campaign where you’re using the short URLs, showing everyone how to look at the number of clicks each link has received is a great way to make them feel empowered.

A twist on this: Give everyone their own short URL and compete over who gets the most clicks. Of course, this only works if your team clearly understands the difference between useful sharing and spamming. We don’t want it to turn into a spam competition, do we?

There is a place and time for every web tool, so use your short URLs wisely!

The towering birthday burgers we made this weekend contained (from top to bottom of the burger):

• Toasted top bun
• Fresh tomato salsa
• Parma ham
• Mature cheddar
• Homemade burger patty
• Fried egg
• More cheese
• Another homemade burger patty
• Fresh guacamole
• Toasted bottom bun

This followed a massive bowl of tasty chicken wings with Reggae Reggae sauce, and was accompanied by some pink cava sangria. Once we recovered from the food overdose, we topped it all up with some birthday cake! Oooofff…

Once the competition ended, I used the Random Number Generator to choose a comment out of the 38 valid comments, with a view that if my own comment came up, I’d draw a number again.

And the winner is… *drum roll* Zoe Rose from Cambridge. LG will be sending Zoe a monitor very soon, and I’m sure Zoe will send us pics of her new home office setup.

As for my views of the LG screen, well…  I think the reality speaks for itself: I’m still using it instead of my 24″ Samsung screen. The main benefit of that switch is the huge difference the brightness sensor has made; it’s been a summer of days that varied wildly from very bright outside to cloudy and dark, yet at no point did I get that searingly bright light feeling. Also, being such a wide screen (1920 x 1080), it fits plenty of my crap on a single screen.

I won’t harp on because I always feel awkward when the schwag is given to me, but all in all, the LG monitor comes pretty highly recommended for its reasonable price (around £150). We spend such long hours in front of a screen, it’s worth getting a good one so as not to go blind by the age of 40!

Since the comments from the readers were so good, I’ll most likely make an entire post summarising them in the near future. In the meantime, go read them for yourself here and, while the competition is obviously over, feel free to add your own tips and tricks.