Feb 19
Ben KingBusiness, Internet Business, Interweb, Web/Tech
It seems my blog entry on my great experience with Autoglass hasn’t gone unnoticed, even apparently generating business for them.
Its a good job that I did have a good experience as a quick Google search for ‘Autoglass’, brings my blog entry up as fourth.
This goes a long way to demonstrate the power of blog and other content entries on Google results, its especially interesting for organisations like Autoglass for whom in the normal course of events don’t get much content written them about them. Therefore one good or bad customer review can make a huge difference to their business.
At bit10 we often experience the reverse of this problem for SME’s for whom we do SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) for, the classic problem is that no-one links to them with good or bad reviews, therefore their Google ranking suffers terribly, so even if you tick all the other SEO boxes, they will still do badly on a perfect search phrase for them.
A good example is Food4WildBirds, who as the name suggests specialise in ‘Food for Wild Birds’, basically they are the one stop shop for ‘Wild Bird Food‘ and other small animal feed and treats. Great company, great service, and great SEO work on our part, however they still suffer because of the lack of links to their site.
So how do we fix this? Well one way of course is blog entries like this, however more effective in the long term is to get affiliate marketing and linking engrained into the organisation, so they are building relationships and activities that will legitimately improve their Googlerank.
Feb 19
Ben KingBusiness, Internet, Life Interweb, Web/Tech
Just in from MS:
Hello Ben,
Thank you for writing to Windows Live ID Technical Support. I apologize for the delay in answering your e-mail. We normally respond within one business day, but we have received an unusually large number of messages recently. We appreciate your patience as we handle every customer request as quickly as possible. This is Juhn and based from what I have read on your message, you suspect that someone may have compromised your King@hotmail.co.uk account. I know how important this issue can be to you and I look forward in helping you resolve this problem.
I have successfully verified the data you provided and I have sent a password reset message to the e-mail address that you asked us to respond to, ben@bit10.net.
– so i am now happily back on MSN!
Update (21/07/2008)
After recieving many posts and emails with people asking and pleading with me to help them get their hotmail back I have prepared a handy document that tells you everything you need to know. I am making a small charge for this of $10, you can buy it here.
Feb 12
Ben KingBusiness, Internet Interweb, Life, Systems, Web/Tech
I just found this on the web, someone with the same challenge:
http://www.itoctopus.com/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=18&Itemid=27
I am just beyond part 1 of the problem, fingers crossed for a response from MS with a reset password email for me.
In the meantime my hacker continues to cause trouble!
Update (21/07/2008)
After recieving many posts and emails with people asking and pleading with me to help them get their hotmail back I have prepared a handy document that tells you everything you need to know. I am making a small charge for this of $10, you can buy it here.
Oct 26
Ben KingBusiness Business, Life, Web/Tech
Yesterday I had the pleasure of a meeting with a Nominet, the Internet registry for .uk, at their Oxford headquarters.
It is, without doubt, the first time ever, I have been offered coffee and asked ‘What sort of milk would you like sir?, full fat? semi-skimmed? skimmed?’.
I have been trying to think anecdotally how this reflects on Nominet, good customer service? good choice? too much time on their hands?!
Whatever, I think its great! However I am not sure that bit10 consumes enough milk to justify 3 types of milk which is a shame!
Sep 13
Ben KingInternet, Life, Play Cannonball, Interweb, Life, Web/Tech
For the next few days I am away on the Cannonball 8000, from London to Budapest.
You can see our progress on our Team 30 Cannonball website… http://www.team30.com.
So until I get back I will be blogging there, so pay us a visit and see how we are progressing.
Sep 11
Ben KingBusiness, Internet bit10, Business, Interweb, Web/Tech
Wow who’d have thought that having a great website developed was soo traumatic, especially when you own a company who does web design.
My trauma however is no reflection on the bit10 people doing my project, its more of a reflection on my inability to really know what I want!
We are now on our 3rd major design iteration and probably our 50th minor iteration, and its starting to look fantastic.
The main thing I have learnt from the experience so far is that we employ fantastic designers however they aren’t mindreaders. So unless you are the sort of person who can visualise exactly what you want and convey it in simple terms others can understand (neither of which I can do), then the design process has to be iterative.
Mental note to self ‘sell clients far more design iterations’. :)
Sep 07
Ben KingBusiness, Internet Cannonball, Interweb, Web/Tech
Marketing Week have published my letter to the editor regarding click fraud in response to their piece on the subject last week.
Unfortunately Marketing Week, don’t make content available to non subscribers online, so you will have to do with my copy below, or grab yourself a copy of the 7th September issue!
–
Dear Editor,
The rise in click fraud is a real cause for concern amongst UK businesses, (Search marketing feels pressure of click fraud, Marketing Week, 31 August 2006) and companies now need to reassess their pay-per-click advertising campaigns to make sure that they do not become the latest fraud victims.
Undoubtedly there are some companies that take great pleasure in clicking their competitors’ links when they first set up a Google AdWords campaign but this is not really a serious problem. The fun soon dies off, especially when companies realise that their competitors are probably doing the same to them.
The real threat actually comes from the automated click-fraud bots which are increasingly widespread, and with more and more PCs around the world now ‘owned’, the opportunities to commit click fraud are significant.
Companies need to protect themselves by limiting their daily spend on cost-per-click campaigns and by undertaking regular trend analysis which will quickly reveal if someone is trying to hurt them. Significant traffic from one region or IP range is relatively easy to deal with if the right controls are in place.
Unless companies start to put more rigorous processes in place to help them analyse and understand the clicks they receive, then the click-based advertising business could soon spiral out of control.
Ben King, Director, bit10, Coventry
Sep 01
Ben KingBusiness, Internet Business, Web/Tech
Last week saw bit10s first ever appearance in NMA (New Media Age) , for our work we have done in developing, refining and hosting BMG Musicsearch. You can read the whole article here (if you have an NMA login/password), or our press release here.
Aug 10
Ben KingBusiness, Internet bit10, Business, Interweb, Web/Tech
We are redoing our website, because frankly its a bit rubbish, it consistently fails to convert traffic into leads, and it is a pretty poor reflection of bit10, a classic case of the cobblers shoes.
We know what is wrong with it and we have kicked off a project to get it right.
The great thing is that Ally and I get to be bit10 customers, and we are running the project as if it was a client project and we are going to do it textbook.
Steph is our messenger (project manager to the non informed), Stuart is our technical lead.
The first step, which is to complete high level project requirements is complete, and a budget allocated… you can read it here.
The next step is to kick off the ideas generation and actually decide exactly what we are doing… that happens this afternoon.
So far my experience as a bit10 customer has been a good one, however I am frustrated by the time it takes to ‘do the job properly’ – although I totally appreciate the necessity!
Aug 04
Ben KingInternet, Life Life, Web/Tech
This blog has meant that a vanity search for Ben King on Google has seen the first reference to me in the search results rising from the complete obscurity of page 16, to a far more impressive position 4 page 2 (at time of writing).
This is pretty impressive, especially given the stiff competition of the famous Ben E King of Stand by Me fame.
However I don’t think that particular Ben King is going to be the problem that denies me my Google ‘top slot’, its this Ben King, a freelance journalist (who has apparently just got a job for Channel 4 news), a relatively prolific blogger and above all he owns benking.co.uk.
This is going to take some beating, I am especially gutted as I seriously considered buying benking.co.uk for myself 8 years ago, however at the time I could not think why I would need it and I was poor and at that time and we were not Nominet members so the domain would have cost me £80. 
Why do I care at all!? I am not entirely sure, however now I have got the bit between my teeth I am going to do my upmost to get that top slot.
So Ben King, my nemesis, enjoy your domain, however beware I am coming after you!! 
–
PS - The irony of me linking to him, improving his Google rank, thus shooting myself in the foot, has not escaped me.
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