Archive for February, 2008

The past 2-3 years have seen massive growth in GPS navigation. Most people we know (clients, friends, and family) have either purchased a ’satnav’ or are planning to do so. Whilst the market for these devices may be reaching saturation, the opportunities for marketeers, are only just starting to come to fruition. For instance, leading manufacturers ‘TomTom‘ recently introduced an ‘add to TomTom’ button for business websites, stating:-

“Put an ‘Add to TomTom’ button on your website and customers can instantly download your business addresses onto their device. It takes minutes to install the button using the easy-to-follow wizard and it’s free”.

Here’s the button we’ve created for blue sky (we’ve also added this the ‘contact‘ page).

The ‘button’ could be a really useful tool for larger companies with multiple branches (e.g. restaurant chains) where the user could potentially download all of the branch addresses and save them as ‘favorites’ in one step (alleviating the need to manually search for addresses and type in postcodes).

The ‘Add to TomTom’ button could also be useful for smaller businesses (an idyllic country pub that’s tricky to find for example)… or those aiming specifically at the motorist (e.g. independent garages).

The opportunity is not just limited to retailers however. Brand owners or product distributors could also use this feature in conjunction with their ‘find your nearest stockist’ page of a website… directing consumers to the relevant locations, in turn driving footfall for retailers.

In our view, the implementation isn’t as quite as straightforward as tomtom make out. We’re assuming that most of our readers will not have access to their website’s files (or even if they do, it is unlikely they will start wanting to edit HTML code – the language used to construct web pages)… so really this a job for your web designer. That said, it’s pretty simple task for a web designer to undertake (so don’t let them charge you a fortune!).

Another feature TomTom is promoting (and this is something we really like)… is integration with Google Maps. Simply search for a business on your office PC for example, and it’s location can be downloaded on to your TomTom device. Click on the video below to see this in action.

We’ve been using Office 2007 for some time now, and whilst we were not huge fans at first, we’ve grown to like the software (and now actually prefer it over it’s predecessor, Office 2003). One useful feature of Office 2007 is the option to save files (Word, PowerPoint, and Excel etc) as a PDF. There are number of benefits to this:-

1. You can send documents to people who do not have Office software installed.
2. It does not matter what version of Office your recipient is using, your document will still be displayed as you intended.
3. File sizes tend to be smaller (better for e-mailing)
4. Your file cannot be edited.

Surprisingly this functionality is not ‘built in’ to Office 2007, and you need to download and install something called an ‘add on’ from the Microsoft downloads site. This should only take a couple of minutes though, and (in our opinion) is well worth the effort.

Microsoft save as PDF

If the above link does not work, then use your search engine to look for “2007 Microsoft Office Add-in Microsoft Save as PDF or XPS”

And in case you’re wondering… the ‘add on’ is available free of charge!

A week or two ago, a client (and also a good friend) asked us if we might be interested in attending a local business networking event. If you have read the ‘about‘ section of ‘Pick n Mix’ then you will already know that we’re great believers in ‘word of mouth’ as a marketing tool… so we thought ‘sure why not?’ At the very least, we could rate the experience for ourselves, and form our own opinion on the subject.

He then informed us that the event would be held over breakfast, and that we should aim to be there for 6.30AM! We often work evenings… so the idea was suddenly a little less appealing. We succumbed to the temptation of ‘a good fry up’ though, so duly accepted. Even if this was going to be a complete waste of time, we would still be back in the office at a normal business hours, so our work would not be affected.

This turned out to be a good decision. Earlier today, we attended the event, organised by the Woking chapter of BNI

As well as meeting some really nice ‘like minded’ business people, we were highly impressed by the structure of the networking session, and the way in which members interacted. We were also given the opportunity to promote blue sky and offer our services to BNI members (local businesses).

So whether you’re a smaller business looking for a cost effective local marketing solution (or perhaps a local branch of a larger organisation) we recommend that you give business networking a try. It might not be for everyone, but we’ve already picked up three quality business leads which we will be following up.

Finally, since BNI kindly gave us the opportunity to promote our business to its members, it seems only fair that we reciprocate! The BNI Woking chapter meets every Tuesday, 6.45am to 8.30am, at Pyrford Golf Club. We plan on attending future events (and yes, we are considering joining!)… so who knows, we might even see you there!

PS. Many thanks to Ruth Williams and Alex van Oortmerssen for organising our invite.

When it comes to advertising, we’re big fans of the campaign for directory enquiries service provider ‘118 118′. We are not, however, big fans of paying a fixed fee of 69p per call, with a subsequent rate of 19 pence per minute!

If you need call directory enquiries on a frequent basis, then you might be interested to know of a couple of new FREE services:-

Free directory enquiries 0800 100 100
The Number 0800 118 3733

So what’s the catch?… well, you have to listen to a short (20 second) advertisement before receiving the number. OK, so time is money… but we tend to do something else whilst waiting (e.g. checking our e-mail).

You can read the pros and cons of each service at moneysavingexpert

Telephones photo by givepeaceachance

We’ve just come across ‘MagMyPic’… a website that allows you to create your own magazine cover from any photo! As you might expect, it’s mainly for fun, but it’s a great idea all the same. We’ve ‘mocked up’ a cover below using a recent photo taken at the Brooklands museum circuit… but the site undoubtedly works best with ‘close up’ photos of peoples faces.

MagMyPic probably won’t win any awards for productivity, but it’s an unusual and entertaining way of sending a friend or family member something memorable. You could also use it to create an amusing opening slide for a conference PowerPoint presentation too… just choose your image carefully, or it might be rather (shall we say) rather career limiting!

Article via Photojojo
Image of bus via Flickr by Rich007

Imagine you’d recently renovated you kitchen and you’ve got an old chest freezer to dispose of. It’s not particularly pretty, it’s too big to fit in your family hatchback, and it’s probably not very valuable… but it does work really well. It would be a shame for it to go to landfill wouldn’t it? “I’m sure someone somewhere would find this useful” you’re thinking… “But who?“.

Imagine now, that you could advertise the item completely free of charge, and that someone would come and collect it from your home for their own use. Not only would you have a problem taken off your hands, but a warm fuzzy feeling that someone will benefit from your generosity.

Enter ‘Freecycle‘.

We were going to write an explanatory paragraph about Freecycle, but they’ve already done the hard work for us, so here’s a direct quote from them:-

“This amazing worldwide phenomenon known as Freecycle(TM) started in Tucson, Arizona in 2003 by Deron Beal. Freecycle harnesses the power of the Internet to connect people who have stuff to throw away with others in their area who would like that stuff, so it doesn’t wind up in a landfill. We ALL have things in our garages, closets, attics, offices, etc. that we don’t need. Freecycle lets you find someone who does. No item is too big or too small but ALL must be 100% FREE with NO strings attached. A perfect consumer/earth friendly circle is no overhead, no money, no waste and no catch. After all, there is no point in throwing something away when it still has good life in it or it can be of use to someone else.”

OK, so ideally, we would prefer to donate unwanted goods to charity, however there are certain items that charities will not accept. For instance, here’s a list of what Oxfam will and will not handle:- Oxfam

Another option might be to sell unwanted goods on eBay, but this can be time consuming, and unfeasable for larger bulky items. In addition, it might not be particularly environmentally friendly if your old TV gets shipped up to Glasgow.

So in summary, if you have a ‘useful’ but relatively ‘low value’ item that the ‘charity shops don’t want’, then we think Freecycle is a great solution.

www.freecycle.org

When you visit the site you can search for a group in your area (the local group for Weybridge is listed as ‘Elmbridge’). Freecycle does require that you have a ‘Yahoo id’… if you don’t have one, you can get one for free here

Cartoon via clangnuts.com

Whilst February might be a little late to be writing about a year planner, we thought we’d bring this to your attention anyway (especially given the price). US productivity software company Sciral is offering a range of ‘free custom calendars’ on their website. You can download a monthly calendar, year planner, or something they call a ‘life page’ (which plots 100 years on one sheet). The calendars have some configuration options too (for example, you can choose which year you would like to print, or the day of the week you would like the calendar to start on). Once you have selected your preferences, you can download a printer friendly PDF.

Personally we think the year planner will be the most useful item…

www.sciral.com

Some people love Microsoft Outlook. Some hate it. Many have to use it whether they like it or not! Whichever camp you fit into, if you use Outlook on a regular basis, it’s worth learning a few keyboard shortcuts. Not only will you impress your office colleagues, but you will save quite a bit of time in the process.

For example, let’s imagine you receive a verbal request from a colleague, and want to enter a reminder in your ‘task list’. If you use (let’s call it) ‘mouse only’ navigation to compose a new task, you will need to click on the ‘tasks’ tab, then ‘file’, then ‘new task’ (a two or three stage process). The quick and easy alternative would be to press CTRL + Shift + K… which will open a new task whichever screen you’re in.

It might take a few minutes to learn some of these shortcuts, but the time saved usually far outweighs the time taken. In fact after a while they just become second nature. Below are a few other Outlook shortcuts that you might want to try:-

Ctrl + Shift + K ….. creates a new task
Ctrl + Shift + N ….. creates a new note
Ctrl + Shift + M ….. creates a new e-mail message
Ctrl + Shift + A ….. creates a new appointment

The version of Outlook we use (2007) actually lists the shortcuts within the ‘drop down’ menu (look under ‘file’ on the menu bar at the top of the screen).

Travelling by air nowadays can be a bit of a nightmare. It’s not so much the flight itself, as the ‘pre-boarding drama’ at the airport. Just exactly how early should you arrive at the terminal? how many ‘carry on’ luggage items are acceptable? is taking liquids on-board still prohibited? and what are your rights if your flights are cancelled, overbooked, or delayed?

In the case of delayed or cancelled flights, some airlines don’t tend to be too proactive when it comes to explaining what you may be entitled to (at best, they may try and ‘palm you off’ with an upgrade on your next flight, at worst they might offer nothing at all).

At some time or other, most of us experience delays or cancellations. We recently experienced a cancelled flight ourselves… so we thought we’d do a bit of research. We were surprised to discover an organisation called the ‘Airport Transport Users Council’ (AUC). The AUC is affiliated to the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA). It is the ‘UK’s consumer watchdog for the aviation industry‘ and offers tips and guidance for passengers. The AUC site also highlights a European directive (EC261/2004) which (unlike rulings on bendy bananas) would actually appear to be quite useful. By answering a number of questions, you can quickly and easily establish your rights, and whether you are entitled to any compensation.

AUC – Home page
AUC – Your rights if your flight is cancelled
AUC – Your rights as a passenger under EC261/2004

So whether you’ve never flown before, or you’ve stacked up thousands of frequent flyer miles, we recommend that you take a quick look at the site. If you’re really organised, you might want to print a copy of the directive keep it with your travel documents! That way, if your next flight doesn’t go to plan, you will be in a much stronger position… possibly even saving yourself from being ‘bumped’ off the flight by another passenger. At the very least, you can be reassured that the ‘know it all’ check-in counter assistant isn’t ‘getting one over on you.’

Happy travels!

Sorry about the dreadful pun, but we had to get your attention somehow… rather like this unusual marketing idea for a hairdressers. Personally, we prefer the screens at Tottenham Court Road tube station, but (like it or loathe it) you can’t dispute the simplicity and effectiveness of the ‘escalatising’ (and yes, we did just make that word up).

via Gizmodo

If you’ve been following the news recently, you may have heard about the new Indiana Jones movie, due for release later this year. OK, so this isn’t really a tip, trick or time-saver… but c’mon… its Indy! Besides, we understand that some of our (mainly lady) clients love Harrison Ford, so we know this will drive a little more site traffic!

Here’s an interesting idea from Japan… an interactive ‘fishing’ game for your mobile phone. Catch a fish in the game, and a local fish wholesaler will deliver the real thing to your doorstep (just make sure you’re going to be at home when you play the game… otherwise things might get a bit whiffy!). Although somewhat bizarre, we think this a great idea! At the very least, it’s an interesting way to engage consumers with your brand (whilst attracting some free PR to boot).

via gizmodo

SiteAdvisor is a natty little piece of software designed for safer internet surfing. When you type into the Google search box for example, it places a small icon next to each link in the results page, advising you of any site that may be a security risk. It uses a ‘traffic light’ system. Green = ‘go for it’, amber = ‘approach with care’, and red = ‘a site likely to infect your machine with spam, viruses, or other nasties’. We won’t go into further detail here… as the McAffe website is pretty self explanatory. We will however recommend that you install SiteAdvisor today… it’s completely free, and takes just a few minutes… so what are you waiting for?

www.siteadvisor.com

Updating your software regularly will often help prevent problems rearing their head in the future

Some programs (such as iTunes) automatically check for updates and make these easy to install. Many programs don’t however (and the process for checking for the latest version is often inconsistent and time consuming). At this point you may be asking ‘Is it really worth the hassle?‘ and to be fair, if your PC is running just fine, then it might not be. There are some very good reasons for installing updates though, such as fixing security vulnerabilities, adding new features, or resolving bugs and system crashes.

Why don’t we update stuff more often?… partly because we’re too busy (and have much better things to do) but also because there’s no quick and easy way to find out which programs need updating. Enter the on-line health check from F-secure. Simply visit their website and (within a few minutes) you will be able to see which of your programs have later versions available. There’s even a ’solve’ button that will advise you what action you need to take, and direct you to the latest update (if one is available). The site is primarily designed with security in mind, but it’s also a great way of getting a snapshot of the status of your PC’s software. NB. the health check only works in Internet Explorer.

F-Secure on-line health check

We recommend that you create a ’system restore point’ before installing or removing programs. This isn’t essential, but it’s a good safeguard (and we might even post on how to do this at a later date).

Via Lifehacker

When using Microsoft applications (including Internet Explorer) you can press and hold the ‘CTRL’ key, followed by the ‘F’ key to bring up a search dialogue box. We’ve been using this ’shortcut’ for several years, and we assumed that most people already knew about it. A recent meeting with one of our clients however, revealed that they were unaware of the command (they stated that they will find it really useful in the future). The trick works particularly well when searching through long lists (such as in Excel or Word).

Microsoft Vista has now been available for over a year. If you work for a large company, it’s highly likely that you will still be using a PC running Windows XP Professional, and you may be wondering ‘what is all the fuss about?’ Vista has had some pretty negative press over the last few months, but (whether you like it or not) it will probably be around for a few more years. If you are not familiar with the software, now might be a good time to keep one step ahead of your colleagues by seeing it in action (even if it’s just to say, ‘actually I prefer XP!‘). You can try an on-line demo on the Microsoft site.

www.microsoft.com

If you still haven’t quite quite brought yourself to upgrading (or some might say downgrading) to Microsoft Vista, then there’s a really nice desktop theme that will give your Windows XP machine a ‘whole new look’ for Spring!

If you’re familiar with changing windows desktop themes, jump to www.istartedsomething.com skip through the ‘back story’… and follow the instructions on screen. f you’ve never ‘changed the clothes in your ‘windows’ wardrobe’ (that’s just our metaphor by the way)… you can read how to do so here www.microsoft.com

Go on……give your PC a change of clothes (after all, you probably spend more time looking at it than anything else!). Noir… it’s the new black!

Tesco is to launch a ‘Dragons Den’ style program on ‘five’ TV in February, in a drive to recruit new independent suppliers. According to Brand Republic:-

“The peak-time series, which begins on Five on 3 March, will follow the people behind the new brands as they go through a genuine pitch process to Tesco’s buyers. Although the supermarket said it did not commission the show, it is an attempt to help improve perceptions of the store and its attitude toward suppliers.”

This might offer a good insight in to the minds of Tesco buyers… we wait with anticipation.

Brand Republic

IGD Retail Analysis

It has been a couple of weeks since we saw this ad (which was broadcast during the US superbowl)… but we’ve shown it to a few clients who suggested we should include it in ‘Pick n Mix’.

We like the ad for a number of reasons:-

• It’s different
• It’s memorable
• It’s clear what is being adveristed
• It’s easy to relate to

We also like the interactive website which encourages user involvement www.mytalkingstain.com Overall we think it’s a well executed campaign… re-enforcing our view that the simplest ideas are often the best!

Definition of a blog
We occasionally get asked “what is a blog?”. We’ve given our own definition below, but it’s probably easier to watch this short clip called ‘Blogs in plain English’ (which explains the concept really nicely). Simply click to play the embedded video below, or watch it at YouTube.

Clip reproduced courtesy of US company Common Craft.

Our definition
Here’s our own definition, adapted from an article in Wikipedia.
The term ‘blog’ originates from the combination of ‘web’ and ‘log’. A ‘blog’ is basically a website where written entries (also known as ‘posts’) are displayed in chronological order (usually the most recent ‘post’ is shown first). Many blogs (such as this one) provide news, articles, and commentary on a particular subject or area of interest. A typical blog combines text, images, and links to other blogs, web pages, and other media related to its topic. The ability for readers to leave comments in an interactive format is an important part of many blogs.

Using blogs for marketing
Whilst blogs have only been around for a few years, they can be a highly effective marketing tool. They can work particularly well for organisations with regular news for customers (e.g. a restaurant could regularly post a list of forthcoming events). In addition, blog posts can be integrated into a marketing campaign, where customers are automatically sent a new post when it is created (by e-mail for example). The team here at Pick and Mix can give you advice on how to use blogs as an effective marketing tool.

Need more help?
Pick and Mix can offer fully customised blog templates which incorporate your company logo and brand identity. Blogging software is widely available at zero cost (yes you read that correctly) and setting up your own system might cost significantly less than you think! So, if you’re interested learning about how a blog might work for your business, then why not contact us?