Posted on March 25, 2011 by Ali Cochran
I have quite excitedly signed up for the London 2012 Olympics ballot. But I’m not sure I really like the idea of paying for something so unknown. Why do I need to pick which qualifiers/semis/finals to go to when I don’t even know if Canada (sorry but I am Canadian so no blue allowed in my various Olympic outfits) is going to be playing? Whilst I’m sure the level of sport will be good I just won’t have the same emotional investment if I end up watching Uzbekistan v. Uruguay in the Men’s Beach Volleyball quarter finals. What I can say though is that my ticket application process was an altogether fast and painless experience.
Sign-ups are a really important part of any online platform that requires information from its constituents. One of the best websites for this is Vimeo, enter your email & password and you are through and operational. The consumer in me says, ‘I hate filling out forms, and I resent having to wait to get through to the content I’d come for in the first place.’ I’m one of the first people to give up and go elsewhere.
For many businesses the sign-up can be the single most important point of operation yet it’s also the one place where customers may leave in droves. In marketing terms, the email & password system of signing up is frustratingly simple and devoid of the intimate details that we like to have in order to understand our customers.
So, now we have a paradox: how to get the information that you need as a marketer without irritating the consumer with a grueling sign-up? As far as I can see within my limited realm there are 3 things most organizations can do:
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Posted on March 17, 2011 by Darragh Keenan
As Ultraspeed’s resident Irish, I’ve been tasked with providing a helpful little guide on a few things to do (and avoid) this St. Patrick’s Day. This being my first St. Patrick’s day away from the home country in 5 years, I feel it’s my duty to rise to the occasion and ensure that your Paddy’s Day will be another to remember.
Given this is a company blog, the list below offers a civil and very rough guide on a few things that, if followed diligently, will ensure a memorable day. While my day will conclude with a delightful celebration in North London with some similar expats, you too can be Irish for a day (for this is what you all want right?) with the right advice…
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Posted on March 9, 2011 by Jordan Gross
There is a small black box currently residing beneath my television. The TV itself is a lovely 46inch Sony LCD number, that frankly deserves more attention than I’ve been lavishing on it recently. Even worse, it occupies pride of place in my living room, nestled precisely where a fireplace would have been yet I watch very little TV, in terms of live broadcast content, less than 2 hours a week on average.
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Posted on March 4, 2011 by Namuli Katumba
I was wondering recently if we were becoming more like computers… or, if I was getting really philosophical, whether computers were becoming more like us. It started when I watched one of my favourite episodes of Friends in which Ross talks about ‘interfacing’ and ‘being able to live life as a computer’.
I laughed a lot the first time that I watched this but as each incessant repeat of that episode comes on, I feel like it’s becoming more true to life – or more particularly, my life. I’m not talking about being able to calculate complex pure mathematical problems. More that the terms we use every day to describe the features we want from our computing, online or server environments can be applied increasingly, and appropriately, to our daily activities.
Multitasking = Running two or more programs at the same time on the same single-processor computer.
This is so empirically true of my (and surely everyone’s?) life right now it’s almost too obvious to mention. But take a moment to think about the term multitasking as it used to exist. It used to be deemed as a ‘talent’ or a ‘skill’ that only the gifted possessed. Now, with all our gadgets and cries of ‘there’s an app for that’, we don’t have to work so hard at it.
Example: The other night I found myself using my iPhone to follow a recipe for soup, whilst also using the same device to brainstorm with a friend on career strategy, using the laptop to answer emails, surf Facebook and pay bills, and watching my SkyPlus to catch up on my missed television – simultaneously. I struggle to include all that in one sentence. Yet believe it or not, I was able to satisfactorily achieve all my tasks, although I do wonder if I had done so to my full capability… which brings me onto…
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