As one of the foremost luxury hotels Ireland Fota Island is a welcoming, relaxing and utterly stylish retreat set on a private Island. Partake in a round of golf, or soothe your soul in the luxurious spa.

• Cork Hotels
• Golf Hotels Ireland
• Luxury Spa Breaks Ireland
• Luxury Hotels Ireland

Appointment Reminder App

Launching in April is Diary Monitor, new appointment reminder software.  The website is live, although sign up won’t be active until April.  This is something myself and my brother Mick Skelly have been cooking up for the last while together.

This appointment reminder system differs to other in a few ways.  First and foremost, we wanted to make it easy to use.  It’s online, so there is no download, system integration or specialised IT expertise required.  We’ve  built in a smart import system that allows you to update missing records during upload.  Making an appointment is as easy as clicking and dragging, and the smart bit is that this systems enables responses.  Your clients can respond and the system will display whether or not a client is coming.

Appointment reminder systems typically reduce no shows by 30%. This system allows you to reduce your waiting lists further by re-booking vacant slots.  If your business could benefit from an appointment reminder system, contact us to talk about your requirements or trialling this solution.

Any comments or feedback is welcome.

Hotel Deals Ireland

We’re delighted at Activate Marketing that our hotel booking website Hotel Deals Ireland has been shortlisted in 3 categories in the 2010 Irish Web Awards.

• Best (Guerilla) Social Media Campaign – Sponsored by ebow
• Best eCommerce / Services Website – sponsored by OnlineAdvertising.ie
• Best SME/Small Business Website – sponsored by Pivotal Communications

Thanks to the organisers, judges and sponsor who make these fun awards possible (and affordable!) for the Web Industry in Ireland.  Best of luck to all shortlisted, if 2009 was anything to go by, we can look forward to a fun evening.

I’d heard good things about the HTC Hero for some time, and interested in the Android platform I decided to switch from Vodafone and avail of the HTC hero with Meteor.

My first impressions were that I loved the phone. I loved the ease of use, I loved the logical layouts, the ability to get into the settings and easily customise.  The ability to set different ‘desktops’ was a huge bonus.  I could hide away my work-related apps at the weekend.  I thought that this phone and myself were going to get along famously.

The day after I bought it, I woke up to find that I had no service and it was operating on emergency only calls.  After turning it on and off a couple of times didn’t resolve the issue, I phoned customer service.  They informed me that the sale hadn’t being ‘closed properly in the system’ and that I should turn it off and on again, after they had ‘closed’ the sale on their system.  This worked, issue resolved.

Or so I thought.  A week later, the same thing happened.  A few days in a row.  So I gathered the bits and pieces and headed into the Meteor store in the Crescent Shopping Centre in Limerick and spoke to the manager, Laura.  Laura herself owns a HTC Hero and told me that it had happened to her phone at the start but the issue had been caused by the SIM card being slightly loose.  Once she had reinserted her SIM card she hadn’t had the problem again.  So Laura removed my SIM card and reinserted it.  She also told me that if that didn’t resolve the issue to come back in and they would exchange the phone.   If she wasn’t there at the time, I was to mention that I had spoken to her and that it was a flagged issue and I was to get the phone exchanged.

So far so good in terms of customer service.  Unfortunately a couple of weeks later the same issue started happening again.  So, today I took my HTC Hero back to Meteor in the Crescent.  Where I was told I was outside the 28 days and the phone couldn’t be exchanged.  I duly explained that it was a flagged issue and that I had spoken to Laura.  I was again told that I was outside the 28 days, and I explained that I had initially come back within 28 days of buying it and that the ‘fix’ that time had not resolved the issue.  I asked them to phone Laura who was working in another store at the time.  Laura agreed that I was outside the 28 days and therefore the only thing they could do was send the phone off to be fixed.

I refused.  The phone hasn’t worked properly from the start.  So another Manager called Kate was phoned.  Kate couldn’t do anything for me either.  So apparently an area manager has to get involved, Ellen.  Ellen is on leave at the moment and won’t be back until “Tuesday or Wednesday”. At which point I will have to make my 3rd visit to the Meteor store in the Crescent.

And in the meantime, I find myself falling out of love with the HTC Hero.  With it’s sluggish start up (my PC loads faster) with it’s poor opening times for apps, with it’s loose SIM issue.  I am beginning to wonder if this was all a mid-life crisis.  Perhaps I should abandon my fling and return chastened to Vodafone and the iPhone.

I will suffer no guilt issues cancelling my direct debit with Meteor, and letting them loose time and money chasing me for a change.

*** UPDATE:  Apparently this is a known dropped service issue with the HTC Hero on the Meteor network.  It is not a handset issue, despite what Meteor tell customers.  I suggest you do not touch this phone on Meteor until the issue is fully resolved.  See this boards thread http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055851942

Cue Damien Mulley’s Online PR Training Course.  I attended the inaugural one last Sat (23rd Jan 2010) in Dublin.  Damien not only possess the theoretical knowledge, he’s also a hands-on practitioner and an avid industry-watcher.   Addressed were the issues of getting your information out into the online space in terms of channels, approaches and etiquette.  Also on the agenda were:

• Developing a Business Communications Bible
• Developing an Online Communications Philosophy
• Clever ways of utilizing the free online tools available
• Crisis Communications – the one we all hope not to have to use but the one it’s most critical to get right.

Bad crisis management remains evident on the Internet for a long time.  Darragh Doyle, Community Manager of Boards.ie, spoke about how they dealt effectively with the fallout of their very recent hack attack.

There was a broad range of participants, some good questions and discussions.  One topic that I wondered about afterwards and perhaps it’s something to touch on briefly in future courses was Truth/Ethics:

• At what point does online PR become more than engaging with users, guiding an online conversation or responding to misinformation?   At what point does it become misleading, untruthful and loaded with the potential to damage the reputation of the organization?
• We all want to promote positives about ourselves, our companies and our achievements. So how do we do this while remaining truthful to less appealing aspects and not leaving ourselves open to accusations of spin?  How can organizations build this into a communications philosophy or bible, given the subjective nature of truth and ethics?
• Google famously adopted a ‘do no evil’ company philosophy from very early on.  Whether that philosophy is truly reflected in how they operate is debatable and whether that sort of philosopy is compatible with ambitious business expansion plans is also debatable.
• Consider the ethics of bare-faced lies crafted to protect a company and its shareholders (as per Apple’s spin on Steve Job’s illness).  Which is the greater evil, allowing the truth to potentially harm a company or deliberately crafting an untruth about something that may indeed impact on company performance?

Good course, well delivered by a highly regarded practitioner.

Having a browse for a Gaggia Classic Espresso Machine this morning I wanted to see if I could beat the price I found on Amazon.co.uk.  A quick look in Google showed me that Bewleys were advertising in Google Adwords “Gaggia Espresso Machine”.  However, clicking on the advert brings users to a page where they can sign up to the Bewleys online club.  No sign of Gaggia or any other coffee makers for sale.  So I navigated to the Bewleys shop at buy4now.ie and found that there were indeed coffee makers, but nothing by Gaggia.

So I am annoyed after a pointless diversion and Bewleys have paid for an irrelevant visitor who is not going to make a purchase.  Who is running Bewley’s Adwords campaign?

Launched today was the affiliate hotel bookings website HotelDealsIreland.ie.  Activate has devised a broad online marketing strategy to include Email Marketing, Pay Per Click, Search Engine Optimisation, Facebook & Twitter.

Hotel Deals Ireland enables users to book superb rates on wide stock of  hotels in Ireland.  Categories include:

• 5* Hotels Ireland
• 4* Hotels Ireland
• Budget Hotel Breaks Ireland
• Hotel Deals Dublin

Accommodation is a extremely competitive sector in Ireland and the site will need a strong push to make any impact.  We plan to revisit this client as a case study later in the year to analyse &  share some of the results of the online marketing push.

I really enjoy the meat from McCarthys of Kanturk and currently have a good stock in my freezer.  I placed an order online last Saturday for a relative of mine in Dublin.  Said relative is currently unwell and I wanted to make sure that (a) she would be home when the delivery arrived and (b) that she would have someone at home to help her with the delivery.  So after ordering online on their website, I sent an email to McCarthys to follow up with delivery instructions and tell them suitable dates.  By Wednesday (the day AFTER I had requested delivery) I had heard nothing.  So I picked up the phone and gave them a buzz.

I discovered that the “fella who looks after that is away for the week, and we don’t have passwords or anything for the computer”.

I believe said fella is back next week, so I have a good chance of delivery sometime next week.

Retailers who conduct online transactions, and are happy to take immediate payment from customers, need to understand that online doesn’t operate on a 9am -5pm, Monday to Friday basis.  And you certainly can’t put a ‘Gone Fishing’ sign up on the door.

Hi there, you’re part of a beta group receiving this feature, which means you may start seeing retweets in a new way. People who don’t have this yet will see your retweets prefaced by “RT”.

I also noticed that when following new users I was given the option of either opting in or out of receiving their Retweets.  I thought this would be useful functionality where many of the people you follow overlap and know each other.  It is not uncommon to see the same RTs on many occassions within certain sets of people.

Logging in this morning and seeing the new RTs in action has been a letdown though:

1. Retweet Display

Image 2: What a RT now looks like

• The profile pic of the original poster is shown in your timeline & you only see a small text attributing the RT to the user you follow. I think this is mistake #1.
  • I trust the people I follow before I trust people I don’t know.  It is disconcerting to see unknown profiles show up in my timeline.
  • I shouldn’t have to search to see who sent the RT -  I should see the profile pic of the person I am following.
  • The above example was Retweeted by @Eirepreneur, a Twitter user whose input I value and whose RTs I am likely to read.  However I see the profile pic of someone I have never heard of (no offence to mikebutcher).
  • This indicates to me that Twitter don’t realise how users read Tweets.  I scan quickly for anything of interest, I do not read all of the Tweets or RTs in my timeline.
  • Logically, I should see @Eirepreneur’s profile pic in my timeline and only the username of the Retweeted user.

2. Retweet Functionality

Image 3: Automated Retweet Link

• There is a new “Retweet” link underneath each Tweet as per image 3 above.
• However this “Retweet” option is not as handy as it first seems unfortunately.
  • The Tweet is automatically send to followers without giving users the option of editing or commenting on a RT!
  • I can’t stress enough that this ability to edit and add to a RT is a fundamental part of the spirit of Retweeting.
  • Users recommend articles, ideas, users etc to their followers.
  • Users comment on RTs.  Users compliment, ridicule, discuss, debate, encourage.
  • Ideas propegate and develop via creative use of RTs.

We can still of course use the ‘old-fashioned’ method by copying and prefacing with the letters “RT”.  That’s what I’ll be doing until Twitter listen to the feedback and make some changes before they roll out the new functionality across the board.

These are my initial thoughts.  Any other comments, compliments or gripes about the new functionality are very welcome!

However, this week I heard from Temple Gate that they had an issue with a client who booked a room under the impression that the Temple Gate Hotel is close to the 02 in Dublin (some 240km away).  In fact they had found the hotel in Google by typing in ‘hotels near 02 dublin’.  I tried to replicate the search myself and found that Temple Gate Hotel was showing up on the map in the local search results, and for some strange reason Google maps was now placing them firmly on Ennis Grove in Dublin 4!   Not only that, their map listing for Ennis related searches had disappeared.

I have come across cases where it took some time to get an old address updated, but this is the first where I have seen Google change a correct location to one that has absolutely no connection to the business in question.   We have now tried to reclaim the listing and update the address.  Any of you who have gone through this process will know that the options for doing so are limited.  You can either get Google to send an automated text or phone the telephone number they have on file for the business  to confirm.  I didn’t fancy the chances of an automated Google call to the receptionist so opted for the postcard.   It’s rather ironic really that we are waiting for snail mail from the U.S. from one of the the biggest Internet companies in the world.