tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-48260529679496905062024-02-22T14:10:54.399+11:00Nicki's websites blogGeneral rants about online experiences & product development processes and how I think they can be improved. Australia and UK bias.Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comBlogger21125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-77842616778274945012009-03-04T16:06:00.004+11:002009-03-04T16:20:15.040+11:00Where's my in-flight internet?!I was contemplating my upcoming short trip to London and what I am going to do with the 48 hours of flight time from/to Sydney besides watch films I've already seen, and eat over-salted plane grub. So comes the question... why do we still not have broadband available on board?! Or do we already, but I just haven't seen it / need to get out of cattle class?<br /><br /><a href="http://www.freeaccess.com.au/Structure:%20/2008/09/19/why-did-qantas-abandon-in-flight-internet-access/">It seems that</a> from October last year, Qantas A380 Melbourne to Los Angeles has offered 'cached internet content along with accessing web-based email and chat services' but their prior plan for live internet has been put on hold while till later this year while they work out filtering systems to avoid 'questionnable' sites being accessed <a href="http://industry.bnet.com/travel/1000217/american-airlines-in-flight-internet-raises-porn-questions/">as happened at American Airlines</a>, who offer access for US$12.95.<br /><br />Apparently Qantas is also considering the Sydney - London A380 route for live internet access later this year. We don't know the costs to the traveller yet,but I for one would definitely pay for access! It sounds like it is only mobile internet available on A380 whereas the new Boeing Dreamliner 787 may be fitted to provide access for laptops later this year.<br /><br />The airline for my flights, Virgin Atlantic, may be talking with Aircell about the <a href="http://www.gogoinflight.com/gogo/splash.do">Gogo Inflight Internet</a> who provide internet via an air-to-ground (ATG) link. <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYx5Q1LRmaB6HgPk04Ip_NCaIdmqOEjuijn086z-yqX5_z_6VOCm57iXlB1BEj1NVT_4RUP2uJ_6yV6bydIzIXQ24qXcCCG0sp-tpXq43YIUWF3x1zJj0joESS5Yohdmk9Jh6qSpw7pxE/s1600-h/gogo.jpeg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 133px; height: 83px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYx5Q1LRmaB6HgPk04Ip_NCaIdmqOEjuijn086z-yqX5_z_6VOCm57iXlB1BEj1NVT_4RUP2uJ_6yV6bydIzIXQ24qXcCCG0sp-tpXq43YIUWF3x1zJj0joESS5Yohdmk9Jh6qSpw7pxE/s400/gogo.jpeg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5309196554200535026" border="0" /></a>Aircell/Gogo is already the provider for Virgin America, American Airlines and soon United, Delta and Air Canada. <a href="http://www.flightglobal.com/blogs/runway-girl/2009/03/virgin-atlantic-eyes-in-flight.html">This article</a> suggests a trial by late 2010.<br /><br />So it's all great if you live in the US, but it's probably not ready in time for SYD - LHR next Thursday then!<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPZm-sK5iskZPtHWcJQ9yuFFdpzquwE97Z4AQtNMCVkzruzaTyReS-BkLDKA-nj1g3QnLVs-P4XFcSDRI1vTgpZwPEM1BuPp5hhYcDjdJljrf13hLpchCavDL8zQt3ADgr2IWd9RS-X6w/s1600-h/Virgin_atlantic_b747-400_g-vbig_arp.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 247px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPZm-sK5iskZPtHWcJQ9yuFFdpzquwE97Z4AQtNMCVkzruzaTyReS-BkLDKA-nj1g3QnLVs-P4XFcSDRI1vTgpZwPEM1BuPp5hhYcDjdJljrf13hLpchCavDL8zQt3ADgr2IWd9RS-X6w/s400/Virgin_atlantic_b747-400_g-vbig_arp.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5309196553037414018" border="0" /></a>Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-72228501165372100382009-02-26T12:51:00.004+11:002009-02-26T12:59:42.524+11:00Word cloudThanks Lena for introducing me to <a href="http://www.wordle.net/">http://www.wordle.net/</a> Here is the word cloud of my blog! Interesting which words it's picked up on, and looks a lot nicer than the tag cloud I'm using.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijU9vX3exHiyRG9VHXF3MmGUT53NqrGfya33mDKtm0F_cdlGD9zwBHWXNrNMvNBTYB5bPPP33h08hw3QaGqvaUNMPmOpshxMmOZNKHBzoYkbMDuST1BFa7xR18gs-UUXIw7qhcrQNYd7g/s1600-h/wordle.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 237px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijU9vX3exHiyRG9VHXF3MmGUT53NqrGfya33mDKtm0F_cdlGD9zwBHWXNrNMvNBTYB5bPPP33h08hw3QaGqvaUNMPmOpshxMmOZNKHBzoYkbMDuST1BFa7xR18gs-UUXIw7qhcrQNYd7g/s400/wordle.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5306919187391024642" border="0" /></a><br /><a href="http://www.wordle.net/gallery/wrdl/587421/nickijb">http://www.wordle.net/gallery/wrdl/587421/nickijb</a>Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-58252546936155592262009-02-09T16:20:00.003+11:002009-02-09T16:33:55.637+11:00Online shopping stats in UKJust read this <a href="http://www.nma.co.uk/Articles/41372/Online+fashion+retailers+see+31+growth+in+traffic.html">nma article</a> about online shopping in the UK.<br /><br />According to the Experian 'Engaging Online with the Empowered Customer' report, online shopping grew 31% in the past 12 months compared to 1% for off-line catalogues. 31%! Wow! Isn't that amazing with the UK recession?! Thinking about it a bit longer though, I don't have all the figures for this. Maybe it is a move from the high street into online because users feel they are getting a better price online?<br /><br />It goes on to say that although there is this great increase, the report finds that 70% of the business is done by 30% of the customers, so not much repeat business... are people so price sensitive that they are just using search engines or comparison sites to check prices and are not loyal to an online brand?<br /><br />Maybe it's a bit of that, but also the user experience is still frustrating customers or just not making enough of a positive impact, to make them remember the brand and return?<br /><br />I like ecommera's <a href="http://10ps.wordpress.com/">10P's of ecommerce</a> methodology. This covers not only the usability and functionality of the website (point 3 - Place) but also everything you need around the platform, processes, order management systems and promotions to support the site. I like the analogy of the website being the tip of the iceberg visible to the customer, with all the processes and systems that must be considered for the site to be successful below.<br /><br />As the nma article suggests, I also think the issue around online/offline channels needs to be addressed still. Too many retailers treat their website as a completely separate business. E.g. If I buy something from a site's online shop, and it's not right, I want the piece of mind to know that I can easily return it to my local high street store, and not have to queue up at the post office (that can be so annoying!).<br /><br />Some stores are allowing this now (I think the Arcadia group?) and others are moving in the right direction by clearly stating returns policies and by having detailed product information pages so that users aren't as likely to need to return items.<br /><br />Truly integrating these channels would also not only benefit the customer, but the marketing opportunities created by merging customer databases could be great.<br /><br />I look forward to see what happens in this area over the next 12 months...Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-369313399624113572009-01-30T17:05:00.004+11:002009-01-30T17:19:35.068+11:00Thoughts about launching mobile internet sites in Australia<span style="font-weight: bold;"><br />User demographics</span><br /><br />Some of the research gives conflicting stats but according to the CCi Digital Futures Report - <a href="http://www.blogger.com/www.cci.edu.au/projects/digital-futures">The internet in Australia</a> approx 4.2 million Australians (out of the 21 million population) could access the internet through handheld devices. The number who actually do on a daily basis though could be lower.<br /><br />The people using mobile internet are younger - A quarter of the mobile net audience is aged 15-24, compared to 16% for the PC [<a href="http://www.nielsen-online.com/">Nielsen Online</a>] . These users will likely be using the internet on their phones as they are on the move so maybe time-poor and be very focused on a particular goal, they're not interested in browsing around so much. They have different motivations to users on their PC internet, so mobile site (msite) design shouldn't be treated as a 'mini-web'.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br />Data plan costs</span><br /><br />Data plans are more expensive than in UK or US but tariffs are coming down. You can easily get 1Gb for ~$30/month<br /><br />now, although this still isn't as good as the UK t-mobile 'web and walk' all you can eat for 7.50 GBP! Until Aus gets unlimited plans msites will still need to consider download costs in the design. I think this is really important when it comes to advertising. Who wants to waste their data plan downloading a big ad image?!<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Handsets</span><br /><br />Handsets are becoming easier to use. AS well as the i-phone there are many smartphones and other web enabled phones available in Australia which can give a good user experience. When designing an msite there is a business decisions that needs to be made around which types of handsets you want to support.<br /><br />It is possible to design sites which will 'fit' to the majority of handsets, and implement handset detection functionality on entering the site, but is the cost of this really justified? Will those with lower spec phones really be likely to use the msite or have a data plan anyway? Designing for i-phone definetly has marketing advantages because then you can get into providing iphone applications too and be listed on the iphone App Store.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTLQ25r9ERHKUwoS-6KGBsvayCg_-_aI7zwYNtiBExvM0VZ0PiueG902vmSVVLAqnbNTN1bZmrJwHiw2W43GUZLmeSKdRI1N2TADM3SmKY7tlQxvCJM0-hsMhqew8dmxDkzTaJ9GuFq4c/s1600-h/iphone.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 163px; height: 166px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTLQ25r9ERHKUwoS-6KGBsvayCg_-_aI7zwYNtiBExvM0VZ0PiueG902vmSVVLAqnbNTN1bZmrJwHiw2W43GUZLmeSKdRI1N2TADM3SmKY7tlQxvCJM0-hsMhqew8dmxDkzTaJ9GuFq4c/s400/iphone.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5296966183133804722" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Relevant site content</span><br /><br />Customer data is not given out so freely by telcos. The MSISDN is the telephone number linked to a sim card in a mobile phone http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MSISDN if you can get hold of this number you can identify who owns the phone and personalise the msite accordingly. In some countries (US and UK I think) you can get this number but in Aus the telcos won't due to privacy laws, although this may change in the future. You can however work out where is user is based on the location of the tower their mobile is using. This can be great for localising a site, making it<br />quicker to use and more relevant.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Marketing</span><br /><br />Premium sms channels are being used in Australia by some companies. For example the user can send a premium cost sms to recieve access to a certain site to enter a compeition or get information. The company then gets a share of the cost of the message with the telco provider. Proximity marketing can be used to promote sites by sending a message to bluetooth enabled phones which pass by. There are some legal issues around 'opt ins'.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Walled gardens</span><br /><br />In Australia a lot of the telcos operate walled gardens where the user doesn't always have to use their data plan if they remain on sites within the 'garden'. In certain cases telcos may even pay the site for their content being available 'on-deck'within their walled garden.<br /><br />Partnering with a telco in this way could initially help to raise the profile of the new msite, which is important as users do not necessarily access msites through search engines at the same level as they do on the internet.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Business benefits of launching a mobile site?</span><br /><br />For certain companies having a mobile version of their website can give big advantages:<br /><ul><li>they have access to their customers while they are on the move, so increasing conversion opportunities (need to be careful that this isn't cannibalising traditional web traffic though)</li><li>they can earn additional revenue through premium sms charges</li><li>they can put ads on their mobile site (although this should be done with caution to avoid longer load times)</li><li>it is a good story for their brand if the site is done well and takes off</li></ul><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Aus mobile sites</span><br /><br />The autralian based msites working well at the moment are either related to be on the move or very targeted towards a specific goal:<br /><ul><li>find information based on location e.g. <a href="http://mobile.citysearch.com.au/">city searc</a><a href="http://mobile.citysearch.com.au/">h</a>, <a href="http://mobile.wunderground.com/auto/mobile_metric/global/stations/94767.html">weather </a>, <a href="http://mobile.131500.com.au/mobile/">transport </a></li><li>catching up with news e.g. <a href="http://mobile.smh.com.au/">Sydney Morning Herald</a> , </li><li>searching for jobs, cars, or homes e.g. <a href="http://wap.drive.com.au/">drive </a></li><li>there are some niche ecommerce sites starting to appear too e.g. <a href="http://mobi.readyflowers.com.au/">Ready flower </a>(could be useful for the forgetful on Feb 14th!)</li></ul>Where sites are becoming more transactional, to make the msite process easier some sites are requiring sign up through their internet site, then simply log in to the msite where your information is prepopulated. If the user is not already signed up, the msite can ask for the minimal amount of info necessary to complete the purchase.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">So we need msites to...</span><br /><ul><li>Have a purpose which is useful to be able to access on the move / away from PC</li><li>Be relevant to user and quick to use through Personalisation, Customisation, Localisation </li><li>Be simple to navigate and have fast loading pages using the targeted handsets / platforms</li><li>Provide monetization opportunties for the site through advertsing or marketing</li></ul>Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-57498081612962867592009-01-23T12:06:00.004+11:002009-01-23T12:32:51.326+11:00Google searchwikiThe <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/11/searchwiki-make-search-your-own.html">Google search wiki </a>is interesting, if you’re logged in to a Google account, it lets you rerank the results of your search and write comments against each link. The reranking is only logged to your personal account, but anyone logged into Google can see your comments.<br /><br />E.g. if you search for ‘tickets’ then click ‘see all search wiki comments’ at the bottom of page, you can see what other people have been writing about ticketing sites.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEid_QPSOuFLd7lfNA-8wbD_ttox9Z318Wqs0c-pkuhqgX38OBfG3zFEiqK5IHdFPjwktzTLxEj4GUm-yPWCK9zpWnLYErRKBPW4h_Oeb3E8s-u4yrSzrU8Y_Vf3OSzeLn3ZkeQD3WeyD0g/s1600-h/searchwiki.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 337px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEid_QPSOuFLd7lfNA-8wbD_ttox9Z318Wqs0c-pkuhqgX38OBfG3zFEiqK5IHdFPjwktzTLxEj4GUm-yPWCK9zpWnLYErRKBPW4h_Oeb3E8s-u4yrSzrU8Y_Vf3OSzeLn3ZkeQD3WeyD0g/s400/searchwiki.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5294295585245676850" border="0" /></a><br />I don't think Google would take notice of people’s personal re-rankings or comments within their algorithms right now but it is a cool feature and will be interesting to see how it grows. Could it learn your personal result preferences and start ranking results to be more relevant to the individual?Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-3242148452965812902009-01-20T23:03:00.005+11:002009-01-21T07:31:10.724+11:00Running toolsLoving <a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/">mymaprun</a> functionality with its mapping tool, my saved maps, map search, my training log and the community. It has made my exercise a lot easier to keep track off, I used to do a lot of this through spread sheets which took ages and didn't look half as cool.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSelsPSa6r3ylFpmc6TuK7UrYpQmgzbdZFdUv8-xsLSbf0bZElAz309U8V9KSb_sz02jiDn5gAwBw4GU556g6v-p7lu5WHFi_Bogvx_ZujMCqWPg1ONl3oMNuF0PFA3VvPT0n8meQNVdU/s1600-h/map.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 291px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSelsPSa6r3ylFpmc6TuK7UrYpQmgzbdZFdUv8-xsLSbf0bZElAz309U8V9KSb_sz02jiDn5gAwBw4GU556g6v-p7lu5WHFi_Bogvx_ZujMCqWPg1ONl3oMNuF0PFA3VvPT0n8meQNVdU/s400/map.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5293348091064400258" border="0" /></a>(Obviously my running still needs some work, the knees are still my excuse!)<br /><br />But, the display ads are really starting to bug me (full screen in some cases) and login has a painful amount of 'explanation text'. It's not that complicated is it? Also, I got to this page from a friend request sent to my email, so can't you work out who I am?<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiC3W4zyvmScrX_l4DxGm0l_NS2e12V2y4dhQMk02TNs7v9lD0Kbww8rYHSA9OcXPnYcFrBXSyZ9xIfV3y4ODKaQwvPmo1id52eHX_XdRiSs0pfpttbGDv1L0MjlBGMMJRZr2nfBO_6pYE/s1600-h/mapmyrun.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 290px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiC3W4zyvmScrX_l4DxGm0l_NS2e12V2y4dhQMk02TNs7v9lD0Kbww8rYHSA9OcXPnYcFrBXSyZ9xIfV3y4ODKaQwvPmo1id52eHX_XdRiSs0pfpttbGDv1L0MjlBGMMJRZr2nfBO_6pYE/s400/mapmyrun.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5293346003239152802" border="0" /></a>Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-5686121843885365062009-01-20T22:18:00.005+11:002009-01-20T23:01:24.116+11:00Aus food sitesI've found the site <a href="http://taste.com.au/">taste.com.au</a> really useful recently. It's well designed and they seem to have thought of it all...<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6ZU6tokyHeLLZ0wGBewt_hqOXeF7BEM6iwqKQnVUX1Y2AWUpF8bd1jjfp7EVu5e3DWCDhJTzAvAL4PC6rPgEKMOtqn_nKvLzVHUYEv4ouy1f4sVfpTOq9zxBYPB8MuxxNMYOZfSd1nk4/s1600-h/taste.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 292px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6ZU6tokyHeLLZ0wGBewt_hqOXeF7BEM6iwqKQnVUX1Y2AWUpF8bd1jjfp7EVu5e3DWCDhJTzAvAL4PC6rPgEKMOtqn_nKvLzVHUYEv4ouy1f4sVfpTOq9zxBYPB8MuxxNMYOZfSd1nk4/s400/taste.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5293338979858454978" border="0" /></a><br />Not only does it aggregate recipes from a whole load of different recipe/food sites, but also:<br /><ul><li>Recipe reviews by users<br /></li><li>news</li><li>cooking tips</li><li>info about ingredients</li><li>info about specific cuisine types<br /></li><li>forums to chat to other foodies</li><li>member login where you can save recipes you like, add your own recipes to your 'folder', save a recipes ingredients to build a shopping list</li><li>Recommends similar / related recipes<br /></li></ul>Certain recipes are grouped to make it easier to browse for specific types like collections of side dishes, turkish food... I particularly enjoyed looking through the <a href="http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/collections/barbecue">barbecue collection</a> and am planning to try the prawn skewers this weekend - yum!<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB7G8Rp9jKWWnFB1OC1adjg84BYvqT6ypS8cxG3vOLIsjIS4Wtvkyh7TkMdVi8lnUOMZN9kiCyej_Ums6Tii_pb6H0qL4fxZizHEhXF7LeB24Ly-szqDdR0lSC7BE4ZDgGb0BvIRyZlDk/s1600-h/prawns.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 289px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB7G8Rp9jKWWnFB1OC1adjg84BYvqT6ypS8cxG3vOLIsjIS4Wtvkyh7TkMdVi8lnUOMZN9kiCyej_Ums6Tii_pb6H0qL4fxZizHEhXF7LeB24Ly-szqDdR0lSC7BE4ZDgGb0BvIRyZlDk/s400/prawns.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5293342037918029554" border="0" /></a>I also looked at <a href="http://www.cuisine.com.au/">cuisine.com.au</a>, I prefer the more subtle look and feel and its groupings and search are simpler and make a bit more sense, but doesn't have the same level of functionality with the member login, user reviews and forums which Taste has.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsFPpKiMVYw1vTDzP_nhY0wqOAZRs-XL9QTxq8EMdmFErUfHN7fwix4Jos4pc4BJ7XWLcELMztGdxCSyxMir7vNacknL-YeohdUvgPS6q69UkaBmHaHF_FkBkhthoYlvAz6F7BFjjji1Y/s1600-h/cuisine.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 290px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsFPpKiMVYw1vTDzP_nhY0wqOAZRs-XL9QTxq8EMdmFErUfHN7fwix4Jos4pc4BJ7XWLcELMztGdxCSyxMir7vNacknL-YeohdUvgPS6q69UkaBmHaHF_FkBkhthoYlvAz6F7BFjjji1Y/s400/cuisine.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5293342040458642898" border="0" /></a>Love the wine matching tool though!<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5VLJ47aZ_0Z5XajEVrF0IDjtBFzWSsxc9-t5LU3pC6aVzpiFyR4WkAlpq0d_56gB7R_N1v7eC_swytAj9IYp9W5U_YWP5DAcGUQnC_na6gEYuIknzvgMdItsNkobc-L6N1w0nxJZnQQM/s1600-h/wine.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 306px; height: 378px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5VLJ47aZ_0Z5XajEVrF0IDjtBFzWSsxc9-t5LU3pC6aVzpiFyR4WkAlpq0d_56gB7R_N1v7eC_swytAj9IYp9W5U_YWP5DAcGUQnC_na6gEYuIknzvgMdItsNkobc-L6N1w0nxJZnQQM/s400/wine.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5293342042454542082" border="0" /></a>Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-31686185483606471042009-01-19T17:26:00.006+11:002009-01-20T23:27:49.644+11:00Australian media ownershipA high percentage of Australian media websites are owned by just a few large media corporations. This seems to be much more so than in the UK or US.<br /><br />Some of the big players are:<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">News Ltd</span>, the Australian part of News Corp (Rupert Murdoch).<br /> * 68 per cent of the capital city and national newspaper market;<br /> * 77 per cent of the Sunday newspaper market;<br /> * 62 per cent of the suburban newspaper market;<br /> * 18 per cent of the regional newspaper market.<br /><br />It's major digital publications through <a href="http://www.newsdigitalmedia.com.au/">http://www.newsdigitalmedia.com.au/</a> are:<br />-<a href="http://www.news.com.au/"> http://www.news.com.au/</a> National news<br />- <a href="http://www.realestate.com.au/">http://www.realestate.com.au/</a> Housing classifieds<br />- <a href="http://carsguide.news.com.au/">http://carsguide.news.com.au/</a> Cars classifieds<br />- <a href="http://www.careerone.com.au/">http://www.careerone.com.au/</a> Careers classifieds<br />-<a href="http://www.truelocal.com.au/"> http://www.truelocal.com.au</a>/ Local business search<br />- <a href="http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/">http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/</a> National news<br />- <a href="http://www.taste.com.au/">http://www.taste.com.au/</a> Recipes (I love this one!)<br />- http://www.vogue.com.au/ Australian Vogue<br />and a whole load of other national and regional newspaper and lifestyle <a href="http://www.newsdigitalmedia.com.au/about-ndm-products">sites</a>.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Fairfax</span><br /> * 21 per cent of the capital city and national newspaper market;<br /> * 22 per cent of the Sunday newspaper market;<br /> * 17 per cent of the suburban newspaper market;<br /> * 16 per cent of the regional newspaper market.<br /><br />It's major digital publications through<a href="http://www.fairfax.com.au/"> http://www.fairfax.com.au/</a> are:<br />- <a href="http://www.fairfax.com.au/">http://www.smh.com.au/</a> Sydney Morning Herald Regional newspaper<br />- <a href="http://www.watoday.com.au/">http://www.watoday.com.au/</a> Western Australian Regional newspaper<br />- <a href="http://www.domain.com.au/">http://www.domain.com.au/</a> Housing classifieds<br />- <a href="http://www.drive.com.au/">http://www.drive.com.au/</a> Cars classifieds<br />- <a href="http://mycareer.com.au/">http://mycareer.com.au/</a> Careers classifieds<br />-<a href="http://www.rsvp.com.au/"> http://www.rsvp.com.au/</a> Dating<br />- <a href="http://www.afr.com/">http://www.afr.com/</a> Financial news<br />And many other news, entertainment, classifieds, travel, specialised careers, and lifestyle <a href="http://www.fairfax.com.au/index.ac">sites</a>.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Seven Network</span><br />owns a number of free and pay TV channels, also has a partnership with yahoo known as Yahoo7 <a href="http://au.yahoo.com/">http://au.yahoo.com/</a> through which you can access all Yahoo products.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PBL </span><br />Owns the 9 TV network and also has a stake in Sky News. It has a partnership with Microsoft Nine MSN <a href="http://ninemsn.com.au/">http://ninemsn.com.au/</a> through which you can access all of the MSN products.<br /><br />Figures here and more info including telecommunication and internet service companies can be seen <a href="http://aph.gov.au/library/INTGUIDE/sp/media_regulations.htm">here</a>.<br /><br />The websites developed or bought by these companies are definitely going to have more financial backing and economies of scale than independent startups. I'm wondering how they manage the balance between advertising opportunities and the user experience, how they're affected by the economic climate right now and what kind of product development processes they use. Would be interesting to hear what it's like to work inside these companies...Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-34763149502937977242009-01-19T17:14:00.005+11:002009-01-19T19:24:21.826+11:00Australian eCommerceI am getting a little frustrated with the lack of decent ecommerce sites in Australia. There's even no Amazon - where do I get my books from now?!<br /><br />A couple of good (bad) examples of this are the <a href="http://www.myer.com.au/">Myer site</a> (Myer is one of the biggest department stores like house of fraser) which looks quite pretty and then you realize all you can do is view the catalogue (page by page of the physical catalogue), you can't purchase and theres no proper search functionality. And the <a href="http://www.bunnings.com.au/">Bunnings Warehouse site</a> (like B&Q) which lets you look through their catalogue again at (sometimes handrawn) pictures of the products and you can't buy, search or even see the prices.<br /><br />These are on the better side, sometimes these sites just scan in their catalogue pages and put them up as PDFs and call it a website. There are no good places you can go to buy clothes or household goods online, if you search for ages you can sometimes find specialist like for PC parts or fridges, which will transact but then the design and navigation all looks a bit dodgy. Woolworths (one of the main supermarkets) does let you do online food shopping, but will only delivery to certain inner city postcodes.<br /><br />I think maybe it is because the the country is so massive and the relatively small population is all centred on a few places that the delivery doesn't work out to be cost effective. I've also been reading that maybe the public have privacy / fraud concerns which is more an education and culture thing. Also I've heard that some shops like to set prices by store which wouldn't work very well with the web!<br /><br />The situation does look to be improving. According to <a href="http://ecommerce-journal.com/news/11876_australian_ecommerce_enjoying_bonanza?drgn=1">Ecommerce Journal article</a> "eCorner, a leading ecommerce solutions provider, that hosts over 170 Web stores in its Australian SME cluster, reported 90% increase in traffic volume for November year on year." They also reports increase in use at Paypal and Eway (another payment system). There are also a few good comparison site like <a href="http://www.getprice.com.au/">GetPrice</a> now which make the process easier.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_2-L2zT_y8LpeKZuhtj7G6-L8kL_4xcNcfnTdDTpbqp-2ZwLgGDBGvxNZ1_Cubwae273Zd-dlKXxX5nMqI2ucIXIJJ5Sw7JZmGKxj-Id3dUX9ElRm9oBy1jdrHqomlMt69VNU3vS0B4I/s1600-h/33464v2-max-450x450.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 356px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_2-L2zT_y8LpeKZuhtj7G6-L8kL_4xcNcfnTdDTpbqp-2ZwLgGDBGvxNZ1_Cubwae273Zd-dlKXxX5nMqI2ucIXIJJ5Sw7JZmGKxj-Id3dUX9ElRm9oBy1jdrHqomlMt69VNU3vS0B4I/s400/33464v2-max-450x450.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5292885923935087330" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCz4KzeKtvt2ivC80-F5EO3voGxOKdr3_GSEJftmgXMIiAiuLM9Yf_XRSSh3eVw3TAwljdWJor8uoEqHPzgBTdgQvCxeUncJod7gPVoMgBUG0krWeJ9LEMWw4oKMPkQCOCnKCfidQ-5SA/s1600-h/tjoos.png"><br /></a>Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-2149609461017098712009-01-19T12:19:00.004+11:002009-01-19T12:28:07.842+11:00Weddings pt 1!After organising my blogs I'm now thinking about our big event of the (British) summer. Had a bit of a shock a few days ago when I realised that there is only 8 months to go. Still have a few things to sort out.<br /><br />I set up a wedding site to give all our info to guests using <a href="http://www.momentville.com/">Momentville </a>There are a few companies out there who will do this kind of thing, but momentville is free, simple to set up, and doesn't look too bad. You can add forum areas for guest to chat and add comments (e.g. favourite song recommendations for the reception!). You can upgrade and design your own template if you like too, but I found one of theirs which was ok. I particularly like that these guys are really enthusiastic about their system, are often updating it (and blog about the <a href="http://blog.momentville.com/">updates</a>), and they respond really quickly to support questions.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3_dlQF5ta7uHz61R9FNRzde3UkcY2vLOwPs2Wfx5TrSCzZ6cSg5I4xJjFKJeEH4Hm9caZuj5pn_F6kq4OyDo2K_Xx74Wgqc1S_6PTa6S4krucOCpTJL_IHLQM3e8F7Ws0uCSHUIdXN3k/s1600-h/Picture1.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 285px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3_dlQF5ta7uHz61R9FNRzde3UkcY2vLOwPs2Wfx5TrSCzZ6cSg5I4xJjFKJeEH4Hm9caZuj5pn_F6kq4OyDo2K_Xx74Wgqc1S_6PTa6S4krucOCpTJL_IHLQM3e8F7Ws0uCSHUIdXN3k/s400/Picture1.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5292809108651035090" border="0" /></a><br />On the other hand, trying to find a photograher was not so great. I would have thought having a decent website was an essential piece of their business these days. But a lot of the sites I've seen take so long to load, have links which don't work, and l<a href="http://www.kevincowellphoto.co.uk/">ook awful</a> . I don't expect them to be hard core developers, but surely a photographer wants to have a online experience which supports and enhances his work? True, the great sites I have seen tend to be the ones charging a fortune, but it doesn't cost much to just ensure there are no errors, the images display and you're not using clashing colours? Anyway, I have now booked Michael Marker, who has great references, seemed lovely when we spoke on the phone and has a simple, but effective <a href="http://www.29gallery.co.uk/">website </a>:-)<br /><br />The wedding forums I've looked at have been helpful too, there are so many - will write more of a review of them later...Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-67459029041953568562009-01-19T11:17:00.000+11:002009-01-19T11:22:17.534+11:00Organising blogsI have forgotten about this blog for a while, having been so busy with moving over to Sydney, and using <a href="http://sydneyexpat.blogspot.com/">this blog</a> to tell our friends and family about adventures. But that is not really the place for all the posts I want to write so am picking this one up again.<br /><br />By now I definitely do have a lot to say about Australian ecommerce, internet and mobile and looking forward to getting it all down.Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-37682451433173238542008-09-18T00:21:00.001+10:002009-01-19T19:41:25.479+11:00Asos.comI love this site - too much for my bank balance!<br /><br /><a href="http://www.asos.com/">ASOS </a>(As Seen on Screen) is one of the largest online fashion and beauty As well as its own fashion label ASOS.com for women and men, it also offers a range of products from high street brands (e.g. French Connection), premium brands (e.g. Miu Miu) and independent UK designers.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Search, browse & inspire</span><br />ASOS has a wide range of products and does well at helping users find what they want by giving a range of searching options. It has a search function which searches through the whole site and is present on every page.<br /><br />Users can browse by product type (e.g. trousers, skirts…), or brand, by fashion trend, by magazine article the product was featured in, or by celebrity (e.g. view products in the style of Sienna Miller). Users can also select to only view products which are ‘just in’ or products in the sale. Filters are then available to sort by size, colour, price and celebrity style. These filters (and the filters created whilst browsing can be removed again if wished.<br /><br />ASOS is good at merchandising and through the site the user sees promotions and inspirational links to help guide them to offers and product sets.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcW_UYVCs4OD8sUDw3sUwxIZr1Xadzg0ZZQXMbBqTDw9Fc-STaz1LLdcBrCX6PwQ9tfMxRHAV5VV7-4BxzUhtBrM8OfUPJEoPFV9dMqH5jyyVlLPytYRteLQF2XwxO-kad2nao-qaVhe0/s1600-h/asos1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcW_UYVCs4OD8sUDw3sUwxIZr1Xadzg0ZZQXMbBqTDw9Fc-STaz1LLdcBrCX6PwQ9tfMxRHAV5VV7-4BxzUhtBrM8OfUPJEoPFV9dMqH5jyyVlLPytYRteLQF2XwxO-kad2nao-qaVhe0/s400/asos1.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5246995624807689026" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Product details screen</span><br />The product display is very detailed giving many angles photographs and a zoom and drag function so the user can see all aspects of the product. ‘Catwalk videos’ are also provided for some products.<br /><br />Very detailed product info given for sizing, material type, care instructions to help the user make the decision.<br /><br />The returns and delivery policies are very obvious on the page to reassure the user.<br /><br />Stylist recommendations of products which might fit with this one are also given at this point to push cross-sell opportunities.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRGGfMk7XjmrGZrNB_vE0G4SlxF9XJlVGwfopuN5l262t4LnjmOdSR23x3kX7-qZgOYA-yfBS0PoDZkTr68-hCWqH4EnUnW_nClYBegXtQ2dnk8Zs_uTKCdIhwh6ZRvjoY8cUYK7XBQMQ/s1600-h/asos2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRGGfMk7XjmrGZrNB_vE0G4SlxF9XJlVGwfopuN5l262t4LnjmOdSR23x3kX7-qZgOYA-yfBS0PoDZkTr68-hCWqH4EnUnW_nClYBegXtQ2dnk8Zs_uTKCdIhwh6ZRvjoY8cUYK7XBQMQ/s400/asos2.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5246995630154245122" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Help</span><br />A detailed FAQ section is provided and also a ‘How to shop video’ to show users how to use the site, which is great for first time buyers.Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-51327608874873195992008-09-17T23:57:00.000+10:002008-09-18T00:11:40.975+10:00eCommerce considerationsA while ago I was thinking about ecommerce sites - here's what I thought!<br /><br />eCommerce sites will give the highest conversion rates if the following points are considered<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">User experience and look & feel</span><br /><br /> * The interface should be intuitive and the navigation should be simple and easy to follow<br /> * Easy and visible access to help files should be given<br /> * The site should be accessible6 for those who are visually or physically impaired<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">User workflow</span><br /><br /> * One click shopping should be an option to save user’s time (e.g. Amazon remembers card and delivery details if you want), or if this is not possible, the order and payment forms should be as short and simple as they can be<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Search</span><br /><br /> * Different people like to use websites in different ways so users should be given a choice of how they want to find products. Some people will know exactly what they want so will want a quick, powerful search function. Some people will be less sure and want to be shown a range of the products on offer; these people need good browse functionality. Others will be looking for inspiration, those people may respond well to promotions, merchandising offers and ‘3-pack’ tiles.<br /> * Post search filters are helpful to allow the users to drill down according to what is relevant to them. It is important to understand the users’ motivation and sensitivity. For example sites targeting bargain seekers will benefit from allowing easy filtering by price.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Personalisation</span><br /><br /> * Targeting particular products or service to users based on information about them gathered from their log in details, cookies, or history of activity on the site. Information and trends gathered from other similar users can also be used. It improves the user experience as they can then access information relevant to them more quickly. It increases the chances of a sale as users do not have to search for items they are interested in.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Customisation</span><br /><br /> * Allow users to customise the pages they view as they want to and record this information with their user account. This allows the user to remove irrelevant information and arrange content as suits them. An intelligent system will then learn preferences and update personalisation techniques.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">User accounts</span><br /><br /> * Allowing the user to log in to manage their account details helps to keep customer records up to date.<br /> * The account view should let them see their past history of purchases and where current purchases are in the shipping process to reassure users and also provide opportunity to cross-sell.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Relevant supporting content</span><br /><br /> * Technical information about the product helps users to come to their buying decision, such as sizing, washing or installation instructions.<br /> * The product display should have high quality images. Trends are for sites to use zoom technologies to view the details, rotating images to see all angles, and video to see how a product moves or functions.<br /> * Reviewing systems showing what other buyers in the community think of the product or the company can help to reassure the user of their purchasing decision. This is especially useful in lowering the perceived risk in high involvement purchases where perhaps the value of the purchase is large.<br /> * Customer testimonials work in a similar way, this could be help where the buyer’s reputation could be at stake (e.g. a recruiter advertising on a fish4 wants to know that their brand will be handled correctly).<br /> * Recommendations based on what the user or other similar users have viewed or bought before help to show users around the site and show them more relevant products and give them more choice.<br /> * News and information about the marketplace can set the site up to appear as a market expert. This will drive more traffic to the site as users go there for information as well as improving SEO.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Pricing</span><br /><br /> * Discounts should be promoted to show users that they are getting the best deals<br /> * Pricing packages will give users more financial options<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Channel continuity</span><br /><br /> * Online and offline experience should complement each other. In a traditional retailer the customer should be able to take products bought online back to store and the store should know what online stocks.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Technical excellence</span><br /><br /> * The search engine should be powerful and reference all areas of the site, returning relevant results<br /> * Component based system - no section is dependent on another, component can be replaced easily for simple upgrades<br /> * Multivariable testing systems could be introduced so that the design and layout of the site can be optimised for maximum conversion quickly and in some cases by region or user type<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Security and reassurance</span><br /><br /> * To enhance user’s trust of a site it should be obvious that their payment system is secure by using https and a well known payment mechanism such as PayPal or one endorsed by a major bank if the brand is not well known.<br /> * The returns policy should be easy to find and if possible should allow the user to take an unwanted item back to a store.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Communications</span><br /><br /> * Marketing communications through channels such as email and banner ad should be used to promote new products<br /> * Messages should be targeted and personalised to only give information that users are interested in<br /> * Merchandising tools should be used to give promotions on price points and special deals<br /> * Opt in / opt out procedures should be followed to ensure users are not spammedNickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-4251328745019490212008-09-17T23:54:00.000+10:002008-09-17T23:55:19.666+10:00Facebook knows all about me!I think facebook is doing really well with ads, they obviously have so much information about their users so they can put this to use by making sure their advertisments are well targetted and relevant. I recently changed my status to 'engaged', straight away the ads all changed to "get your wedding dress here" / "wedding photography" / "Save the date cards" (what are they?! - that's another post).<br /><br />To check I tried also changing my status to "Nicki wants a wii" and I got some ads for Wii Sports.<br /><br />These ads are actually useful to me!Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-1072110931620275492008-09-17T23:29:00.000+10:002008-09-18T00:31:07.534+10:00Web advertising - saint or sinner?As a product manager I want my site to be engaging, well designed, simple to use, include useful content, and fun! I don't think adding tons of pop ups and ads to take up all the space and annoy my users is going to help achieve this.<br /><br />However, we all need to make money, and our site needs to be commercial. Especially in these <a href="http://www.fool.co.uk/news/investing/2008/09/16/scary-similarities-to-the-great-depression.aspx">dire times. </a><br /><br />Recently I had a project to look at my site and produce mockups with the designer for new ad positions.<br /><br />I think by making keeping to a few rules we can minimise annoyance levels:<br /><br /><ul><li>The ads should be consistent - not in different places on each page</li><li>They should obviously be advertisements - we are a personal financial information site which writes many articles about things like new credit cards, mortgages, bank accounts... our jornalists recommend ones they like for real reasons, not because we're being paid.</li><li>We should try to avoid too many on one page, but we need to have some 'above the fold' as those are the ones people pay most for.</li><li>We don't want ads which roll over the whole screen</li><li>If possible we'd like to avoid ads with too much movement (although most do these days)</li><li>The positioning should fit with our new page design, align with our borders and layout</li><li>The content should be relevant to the page content, users don't mind seeing an ad if it's something which might interest them</li><li>Each position should be commercial - if it wasn't going to give sufficient revenue, there's no point in taking up the space</li></ul>We also have an issue because on our financial comparison page we want users to click on the products we offer there, that makes us the big bucks, not the advertising. Somehow certain moneysupermarkets seem to be able to put hundreds of ads on these pages and still be making a mint but with the amount of traffic they have maybe it is a different situation.<br /><br />After several meetings and mockups we eventually settled on a banner and an MPU on most pages, keeping them in consistent positions and also fairly standard when compared to what most other similar sites are doing.<br /><br />Hopefully we won't see a sudden drop in traffic when they go live soon!<br /><br />In the future I hope we can start looking at other formats and methods other than straight web position ads, maybe like sponsorship of certain areas, or advertising in our video podcasts. These <a href="http://www.google.com/ads/videoadsolutions/demos.html">demos by google adsense for video</a> give me a few ideas...Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-47509565805468557822008-09-17T22:41:00.000+10:002008-09-17T23:27:48.845+10:00Agile vs. waterfallFirst of all, what am I talking about?<br /><br />The <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterfall_model">waterfall methodology</a> is a very traditional way of managing software development. this is what I (and countless others) was taught at school and university and is a logical system which fits most projects across all manner of industries and business.<br /><br />It fits the name as the diagram the model produces shows the project flowing from one discrete stage to the next, like a waterfall.<br /><br />The main stages usually are:<br /><br />Requirements specification<br />Design<br />Implementation<br />Testing<br />Installation<br />Maintenance / feedback<br /><br />It suits larger companies as it's easy to report on, you can track what stage a project is at, and the idea is that it should give certainty around when the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">project</span> will be delivered. The requirements and design stage are very important and produce many detailed and accurate documents about the project. Once the requirements have been signed off, they should not be changed. This means that someone new coming in should be able to understand all the details of the project simply from the documentation. It's good for multinationals who may have large development teams over several countries, everyone needs to be able to refer back to the same, correct set of documents.<br /><br /><a href="http://agilemanifesto.org/">Agile</a>, on the other hand, as it's name suggests, tries to be a lighter and quicker method for managing projects which enables a team to change direction if necessary.<br /><br />It places much less emphasis on <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">documentation</span> and more on face to face <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">communications</span> and producing working software quickly. The project will be broken down into smaller tasks which can be developed in 'iterations' (small 2 to 4 weeks worth of development). These tasks will produce prototypes or pieces of working code which can then be shown to the customer or internal business owners to get more feedback. You don't need to wait till the end of the project for feedback.<br /><br />Within an iteration, the requirements for the team should not change, but requirements for the project as a whole can change and will feed into subsequent iterations.<br /><br />The process involves daily short 10-15 minute meetings (scrums) for all of the small team to discuss what they are doing and any blocks they are facing. Business owners or customers can come along to those meetings but they shouldn't get involved in the discussion, they can come to the iteration planning <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">to</span> demo/review meetings to see what has been produced and what is planned for the next iteration. A simple addition I've found in my current role is to have the whiteboard which shows each task in the iteration and at what stage the task is at (to do, doing, done, blocked...), in a very visible place like the kitchen or the reception area. No-one can say they don't know what's going on!<br /><br />I've found that the agile methodology works best for web development in smaller companies. The nature of most web projects mean that requirements are difficult to pin down 6 months or a year before (as the waterfall method would need). In the time taken between signing off the requirements and the project being completed the online market may have changed, the internal structure of a company may have changed, a competitor may have entered... it is a fast moving space. So developing in an agile way means that a team can adapt as necessary. It's still very important to have a vision and high level <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">roadmap</span> of where you want the product to get to, but the details of that don't need to be set in stone.<br /><br />However, I did say "in smaller companies". I have worked on web projects in large companies and this is a different kettle of fish. In the larger organisation where your developers may be in another country, it could be difficult to have the level of face to face communication needed. Also many corporates have their own project management standards, it can be difficult for a central admin group to understand why your team doesn't need to (or can't) spend time filling it's hundreds of forms which the rest of the project will do. They need to sign off your work and to report up the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">progress</span> of your team and they can't do that without you jumping through the same hoops as everyone else.<br /><br />But for in a small, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">co-located</span> team, it works well and is really motivating to see functionality being delivered often, and to know that what you ultimately produce will suit the needs of the customer and the market.Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-81153251995747505052008-09-17T22:38:00.002+10:002009-01-19T11:41:57.270+11:00What is a product manager?<p><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">Weve been talking about this a bit <a href="http://www.carlknibbs.net/blog/2008/9/8/the-role-of-the-product-manager.html">at work recently</a> so thought I'd record my thoughts here too...<br /></span></p><p><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">I think it is always going to be difficult to give a definitive answer to what is a product manager in all cases, because all companies and teams have different structures and influences.</span></p> <p><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">In previous roles I’ve been called a product manager, a business analyst and a project manager when really I’ve been doing similar day to day things.</span></p> <p><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">I think some of the traditional tasks of a product manager are:</span></p> <ol><li><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">Understand customer needs through research, stats analysis, user groups, interviews…</span></li><li><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><span></span></span><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">Competitor and market analysis</span></li><li><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><span></span></span><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">Work with all stakeholders and business owners to create longer term vision and strategy for the product</span></li><li><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><span></span></span><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">Prioritise requirements, get agreement from the business and provide enough detail for development</span></li><li><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><span></span></span><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">Act as product expert to answer questions on functionality </span></li><li><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><span></span></span><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">Communicate out changes to the product and champion the product both internally and externally<br /></span></li><li><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"><span></span></span><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">Log feedback and integrate into requirements prioritising process</span></li></ol>Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-45072221397610940772008-09-05T23:39:00.000+10:002008-09-18T00:42:49.819+10:00ExodusWe used <a href="http://www.exodus.co.uk/holidays/tyz.html#result">Exodus </a><a href="http://www.exodus.co.uk/holidays/tyz.html#result">to book our holiday</a>, a trekking holiday specialist. We found them to be well priced, good for information before, and on the trek we were well fed and we had our own group 'toilet tent'. Only problem was that our bags got lost between Nairobi and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Kilimajaro</span> airport, so we had to start the trek in clothes from a 'hire shop' (small hut with old clothes they'd found left on the mountain), which wasn't nice, but wasn't really their fault either. The company on the Tanzanian side, African Walking Company, didn't really seem to understand our apprehension at walk up to 6000m in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">someone's</span> old stockings and a t-shirt, which was a bit frustrating. We got them in the end though, and even though we must have spent an extra £150 on the hire clothes and porters to bring the bags up, it was worth it to have my own gear (especially my North Face Greenland <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">down-jacket</span> which I love to bits and I think actually saved me from getting hypothermia several times).<br /><br />The holiday also included a few days in Zanzibar, which was a lovely place to relax after the walk, but I wouldn't go there again. I thin<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">k you</span> get better value, beaches and service somewhere like Thailand. Can't complain though as I did get proposed to on the beach!!! :-)<br /><br />I quite like the <a href="http://www.exodus.co.uk/">Exodus website</a>. You can see other travellers' reviews of that exact trip, and if you sign in can access community forums to meet the other people on the trip before you go. the forums are a bit clunky at the moment but the idea is there. They also have videos of the trip, and <a href="http://www.exodus.co.uk/community/google-earth-tours">Google Earth videos </a>to show you the route which is a nice touch and got me really excited before going!<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9SSy6f7NY35Cp9mQxw8Bwy1sme0yPD4IcRfg48Oopc8_zG2-B3kIKoiFM6yLgG9aRJpDXz3sMnxtp2_JMTB5kaNJqlOU0rtyIo84X8kEamHjmH1JzNIe3VyJ1Kdj4T-hlGDvHMhwsMKU/s1600-h/exodus.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 428px; height: 271px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9SSy6f7NY35Cp9mQxw8Bwy1sme0yPD4IcRfg48Oopc8_zG2-B3kIKoiFM6yLgG9aRJpDXz3sMnxtp2_JMTB5kaNJqlOU0rtyIo84X8kEamHjmH1JzNIe3VyJ1Kdj4T-hlGDvHMhwsMKU/s400/exodus.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5242534457339777506" border="0" /></a>Only problem I had with it, although you can book online, you can't then manage your booking or go back and check the details easily. I would have liked to have seen a screen with my booking details, showing dates when I had to do things by (pay deposit, get visa etc), and dates for when I could expect things from Exodus (final joining instructions, kit bags etc). This could be integrated with the existing 'my exodus' part which currently is really only useful for accessing the forums. I did mention this to one of the guys there (I do like to give feedback!) and hopefully they will implement that soon.Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-88143014411944582902008-09-05T09:43:00.000+10:002008-09-18T00:43:20.443+10:00Kilimanjaro!My fiance (Adam) and I recently went on a trip to Tanzania to climb <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kilimanjaro">Kilimanjaro</a>. I trained hard but didn't make it right to the top due to altitude sickness. According to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altitude_sickness"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">wikipedia</span> </a>it's caused by the low atmospheric pressure giving low CO2 levels which causes a rise in blood pH. To me that meant nausea, really dizzy with an awful headache and generally feeling like I was about to die. After walking for 4 days with no problems, on the summit night (we got up at midnight to start, and the temperature dropped to minus 20!) we started at 4700m and at about 5000m I started to have the problems, I carried on to about 5500m, but could continue up to the top (5,895m). <div><br /></div><div>Anyway, I enjoyed the rest of the walk apart <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">from that</span> night. It was an amazing experience, the landscape was like nothing I'd seen before, we got to see a bit of the local culture (the porters are incredible) and the others in our group were a really nice bunch. I got into the camping more than I thought I would, it was nice to be away from everything, but I have to admit I enjoyed the first shower back at the hotel after 7 days! </div><div><br /></div><div>I would like to try a high hike again sometime, maybe something in the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">himalayas</span>. Although I'm not sure I'm quite as addicted as Adam who wants to go for a 7000m next! </div><div><br /></div><div><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizfouokAIanhZsVfbHORgcGwYivMM9Tijmwltmx4dFYnn0y1RWme02V7g-SFly4OwIS9gx3zAPzZouP4uOhPVyjpompZoIZ1edGpWDYvBk7bETZFQebI-EjxzOCdSs0T4wE9vJpYC2XRE/s400/kili.jpg" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5242318150131319266" border="0" /><br /></div>Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-55766329527000489792008-09-05T08:20:00.000+10:002008-09-05T10:13:35.226+10:00Running and keeping fitI enjoy keeping fit with running and love my gym (<a href="http://www.thethirdspace.com/home.aspx">the third space in <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Soho</span></a> - I love it, you can do any class in the world, there's a DJ and it looks like some cool bar rather than a gym) where I'm trying to get more into yoga and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">pilates</span> to balance out all the running (according to the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">pilates</span> instructor I'm completely <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">mis</span>-aligned and about to fall apart). I have <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">actually</span> just come back from a yoga class tonight, I got a bit ahead of myself and went to a normal class rather than beginners. With the crazy positions we were getting into I think I will be hurting tomorrow!<div><br /></div><div>I try to run 3 or 4 times a week. Sometimes it's hard (especially if Adam comes with me!), but most of the time I enjoy it once I get out there. I'd like to do this all outside, we have a nice 10k Regents canal route near us, </div><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwBMVQw8d7wpr2Gws6z8_lxH66Dy86_arZUvCHwVxsNX00YFRFl5_J2-L9BwQO4PhsysYYhyQH2Bsw1K3bcwbgx8bRZfE8DgC6pYsu4z-eGWbpp_Gv2wHGjMcRKOwUzhQJakS0p17MkaU/s400/regents+canal.jpg" style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5242298081893017442" /><div>but there's not always the time so I sometimes just pop to use the treadmill. this is a bit better on my hips and knees too, which I seem to have problems with every now and then.</div><div><br /></div><div>The photo is towards the end of my run and when I see this bit of the canal it's great to know there's only a few minutes left! Also this is where the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Canadian</span> geese tend to hang out in large gangs, have to be careful not to get too close or they will try to bite your ankles off!!</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div>I like reading <a href="http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/">Runners World</a> for tips on training, shoes, and forums. But it does look a bit dated now. Also with all these new maps and communities mash ups </div><div>like <a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">mapmyrun</span> </a>, cool G<a href="http://www.garmin.com/garmin/cms/site/us"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">armin</span></a> GPS running watches, Nike+ web integrated <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">gizmos</span> etc. I generally use <a href="http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">gmaps</span> pedometer</a> as it's simple and does the job. I was quite excited about <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">mapmyrun</span> with all the training plans and social side you can set up, but the map routes themselves didn't seem to save properly last time I tried. </div><div><br /></div><div>I would have thought Runners World would be thinking about integrating some of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">this kind</span> of stuff themselves. Hope so!</div>Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4826052967949690506.post-46713256497350056252008-09-05T07:52:00.000+10:002008-09-06T00:02:05.532+10:00Brief work history and interests<div>I've been working mostly in London for about 5 years, in various technology type jobs for <a href="http://www.reuters.com/">Reuters</a>, <a href="http://www.fish4.co.uk/iad">fish4.co.uk</a> and now The Motley Fool (<a href="http://www.fool.co.uk/">fool.co.uk</a>). I've focused on website product management and like to keep up to date with what's going on with the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">internet</span>. </div><div><br /></div><div>Further back - I took a degree in electronic engineering at Birmingham Uni. I enjoyed the course but decided I wanted to get more into the business side than be a pure engineer. </div><div><br /></div><div>I have a lot of experience with finance related sites from Reuters and fool.co.uk, and also a big interest in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">eCommerce</span> and portals from fish4. My latest projects with fool.co.uk include improvements to the mortgages area to increase the number of high quality leads coming through to mortgage <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">advisors</span>, and a review of current and potential ad slots on the site. How to monetize the site further without comprising it's design and usability is always a hard one.</div><div><br /></div><div>I'm interested in how websites can become not only more usable but also more fun and relevant to your users. I think that's important if you want your site to stand out and for your users to return. I think this can be done through cool design, novel widgets, user generated content techniques such as tagging and social networks, and by allowing personalisation to suit the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">individual's</span> needs. </div><div><br /></div><div>That of course means I need detailed understanding of your users, which can be done through creating user profiles and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">personas</span> to use during requirements gathering, and user testing and workshops to verify those requirements. I've been through varied ways of doing this, from structured 1 on 1 questioning to popping out into Soho with a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">wireframe</span> idea to see if people get it! This is one of my favourite parts of the job :-)</div><div><br /></div><div>In terms of processes, I've worked in quite varied positions for very different companies. At Reuters, we were mostly working in quite rigid <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterfall_model">waterfall </a>project management processes, which I think is needed for the big global software projects there, but when working on websites <a href="http://agilemanifesto.org/">agile </a>processes can work better though as I've seen at fish4 and fool.co.uk. </div><div><br /></div><div><div>I prefer this way of working myself, when done correctly it can be quicker and more flexible. You get small bits of functionality delivered often and as soon as they're ready, and can change direction if needed, rather than waiting for some gargantuan all encompassing master project which maybe have been spec'd 2 years ago and contains functionality which is no longer relevant. The scrum techniques I've been using also mean it's easy for everyone to know what's going on though the quick daily meetings and using visible tracking methods such as whiteboards, shared spreadsheets and team blogs.</div><div><br /></div><div>It's not for everyone though. Small, co-located teams work best where everyone buys into the methods.</div><div><br /></div><div>I could go on with these topics but sure I will go into more details with future posts. :-)</div><div><br /></div></div>Nickihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15919493206349459934noreply@blogger.com