Posted on November 3, 2011 by Ali Cochran
So I’ve been playing around with Google Page Speed performance testing tool; already I can feel your interest draining away, where’s the fast, where’s the sexy? I imagine you asking…
Well, number 1: I am a nerd, so tough it out, and number 2: speed is important and yes, some people might have sexier lives but give me a new online tool and I am officially the happiest girl in the world. So when Google released Page Speed from Google Labs and into my bumbling hands, I was very occupied with testing everything in sight for days. Much to the amusement of my web developer of course who ended up with an itemised list of need-to-haves and nice-to-haves (we’re friends, honest).
Now there are numerous development-based reasons for a website loading slowly. However, during particularly ‘load-heavy’ periods a site often slows down quite substantially. Excellent coding can create a robust site that will withstand heavy traffic surges and ensure you maximize revenue in the boom, BUT a solid infrastructure behind it is equally important.
Like Yin & Yang, having both can enable a ‘perfect’ (or close to) web experience for each web user. Working at a managed hosting company but in marketing I get to see how both contribute. Why is this important?
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Posted on August 26, 2011 by Ali Cochran
Outsourcing can be a pain.
You can’t confidently say that this new ‘department’ will be as mindful of the company’s concerns as you are. Can they do a better job? Really? How do you monitor them effectively? What are they doing when you can’t see them?
I realise this is heading into OCD territory, but for a perfectionist like me life often goes that way. Relinquishing control of anything can be a drawn out, controversial process. Even so, there are many reasons to outsource.
Economies of scale, for example.
It’s more efficient for a dedicated team to perform a duty for multiple clients; they have a high level of expertise (hopefully) in that one area you may not have been able to develop internally. You can also offload activities that aren’t essential to your core actions, thereby, freeing you up to focus on the essentials and driving your main business forward.
So how do we reconcile these concerns with the benefits? There are numerous ways of managing outsourcing and a method that works for one firm may not suit another – I’m just going to share a few points that work for me:
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Posted on August 11, 2011 by Ali Cochran
Hello All,
We are happy to say that today we will be moving into some shiny new offices. Not to worry, pictures will be soon to follow. However, in the meantime it will still be business as usual of course and we still have all our old phone numbers.
Our new address is:
Ultraspeed
118 Commercial Street
London
E1 6NF
As usual you are all more than welcome to visit and have a pot of tea in our new kitchen!
Marketing-in-a-Box anyone?
Phones packed? Check! Marketing? Check!
Posted on July 13, 2011 by Ali Cochran
We love our Jack’s Place digs but unfortunately we are starting to touch elbows. So we’ve got a new place! It’s a little rough around the edges but Tina Bernstein from Colourliving is kindly sorting that out for us.
One of the new toys the office is currently playing with is Microsoft’s Photosynth – so here’s the before photo in all it’s glory…and see how many Richards you can spot? It’s our own version of Where’s Wally.
Moving date is set for early August and we’re only down the road from our original home so please do come and drop by for a cup of tea.
You can expect an ‘After’ photo this August!
Posted on June 30, 2011 by Ali Cochran
After 4 years in England I’m pretty used to conversations along the lines of “Canadian? So, um, seen any bears?” or “Do you know my cousin/friend/acquaintance named Bob/Fred/Kevin Smith in Toronto/New Brunswick/Canada-but-I-can’t-remember-the-city”, or this one VERY random moment: “what is your opinion on the pinewood beetle epidemic?”….sorry?!
The fact is that to most people I meet Canada is a wispy concept involving the scent of trees, cold, snow and the odd bear/beaver chucked in (with a sprinkling of hockey obsession of course).
So when I announced that it was going to be Canada Day on Friday – the tumbleweed that blew through the office convinced me that people needed a little guide to help them cope with the Red & White madness that will soon be occurring in Trafalgar Square.
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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 February 24, 2011 by Ali Cochran
As fashion week in London draws to a close, even the non-fashion conscious in London can’t help but be aware. Between the cleverly integrated underground Twitter displays starring the #LFW, and the schedules & reviews everywhere; London Fashion Week’s dedication to customer engagement across all of its online and offline marketing channels is certainly admirable.
So this week the mail elves at Ultraspeed have been industriously packaging up cScape’s 5th Annual Customer Engagement report for our clients. Together with Econsultancy, cScape have researched and put together one of the most comprehensive publications on Customer Engagement available. Seeing that organisations are increasingly engaging with their customers to improve performance across the board Ultraspeed are sending a free copy to all our clients, which we hope they will find useful for planning their marketing in 2011.
Our own Jordan Gross has written a lovely article about what to look for when house hunting for your (customer) data, which you can read here. For numerous other useful articles from the report you can purchase your own copy here or wait for your very own copy in next week’s post!
We hope you are all having an enjoyable 2011 and watch this space for some new online developments and soon-to-be released products.
Posted on February 1, 2011 by Ali Cochran
Here at Ultraspeed while we can certainly say we provide some of the best Managed Hosting services on the market – we can’t lay claim to predicting the future. Which is why we’ve asked some of the our friends and clients who are doing wonderful things in the online world to let us know what they think are the top three things to look out for in 2011.
In the second part of the New Years Series, Claudie Plen of Edge Thinking kindly shares her top 3 online tools to look out for in 2011.
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Posted on January 25, 2011 by Ali Cochran
Here at Ultraspeed while we can certainly say we provide some of the best Managed Hosting services on the market – we can’t lay claim to predicting the future. Which is why we’ve asked some of the our friends and clients who are doing wonderful things in the online world to let us know what they think are the top three things to look out for in 2011.
Phil Crawley a Senior Systems Engineer at John Brown Media Group is the brave first volunteer to let us know what he thinks are the 3 big stories to watch for 2011.
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Posted on December 22, 2010 by Ali Cochran
Happy Holidays from Ultraspeed
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