Strategic Web Masterclass

Following on from my recent post about Strategic Marketing Masterclasses, the same company is now running Strategic Web Masterclasses. So what is a “Strategic Web Masterclass”? In simple terms it will help a business owner or the person tasked with looking after the website to be able to an action plan that is tailored to their business and not just something off the shelf. For those that are interested the course can be fully funded for eligible businesses. Read on for more info:

Overview
Award winning marketing consultancy, Fresh Marketing Solutions have put together a course to help all businesses maximise the return from their website. The 1 day Web Masterclass will provide the opportunity for learners to put together a website action plan that is tailored to their business. They will learn about the different considerations when producing a successful website and will be able to put together an action plan to be used in their business.

Masterclass Content
During the intensive 1 day course, learners will cover a variety of topics such as graphic design and page structure, web standard and technologies, getting the right content, search engine requirements, being realistic with your budget, planning your website and writing a brief for web designers. The course is suitable for any team member that wants to understand how to maximise return from their website.

The Benefits
Upon completion of the course each learner will have a good understanding of the various elements that will help their website to become more successful. By having this first hand understanding you will be in a better position to chose the right web company and get the most from their current website.

The Web Consultant
With over 10 years experience, our Web Consultant selected to run the Masterclass has a wealth of experience across businesses from a variety of sectors. These range from large organisations, small to medium enterprises and independent sole traders.

Course Details
Masterclasses will be held in May 2009. The course will be delivered in a local training facility where refreshments and lunch will be included. Specific details of location, times etc will be issued in the learner packs sent 2 weeks before the course begins. All learning materials will be provided.

The course is priced at £500 per learner (excluding VAT) with the option of group discounts.

Funding Now Available
For eligible companies*, Fresh will be able to arrange government funding to meet 100% of the course costs.

Important Information
The course will be delivered over 1 day from 9.30am to 5.30pm You will receive notification by email that we have received your booking form.
A pre-course information pack will be sent out to all learners in advance of the course. The course must be paid for in full before the start of the course. This booking form constitutes a legally binding contract. In the event of cancellation, refunds will be made minus any associated costs.

* For businesses that are eligible for funding, payment will be required prior to the course which will then be reimbursed to the learner.

If you are interested then please feel free to contact me directly rob@freethecityone.co.uk or contact Fresh Marketing Solutions directly on 01623 786786

The past is there for a reason

Funny statement to make but it is all too valid, the reality is that without the past we cannot develop or grow. Today has been a funny kind of day really. With the onset of the nice weather the shed beckoned to be sorted out and as much as I didn’t really want to do it I needed to so that is what I did.  We moved in our house about 7 years ago and when we moved in there was some stuff that still needed sorting, as it always does, that was never sorted and it ended up in the shed. This was the day when it was going to be sorted out once and for all as I needed the space back that was being occupied by this stuff that had not been looked at in over 7 years. The first job was to empty all of the day to day stuff, such as the kids bikes, scooters, mowers, tools etc until I got to the old boxes that were hiding at the back. I knew, for the most part, that almost all of it would end up in the bin as I was working on the basis that I had not looked at it in about 7 years but I needed to go through anyway just to be sure. What I didn’t expect to find in the shed was “regret”.

As I was sorting through all of the old stuff I found some letters, and at first I thought they were from an “ex” so thought I had better make a hasty disposal. However, I checked them first and that was not the case. When I was about 13 years old I joined a cycling club as I loved cycling, something which I was good at and won a number of trophies for. When I joined most of the people there were “old”, at 13 everyone over 22 was considered old. But there were some younger people there, older than me but only by a couple of years which meant that I was at least able to relate to them as I had always tended to hang out with people a little older than me. There was a couple of lads and a girl, Ali, but they all welcomed me in which for a young and timid lad was great.  Over the next couple of years we all became good friends with regular “club runs” at a weekend taking us cycling into the Derbyshire Dales as well as cycling weekends which took us as far as Ladybower Reservoir. Now at that age it was like travelling to the other end of the planet. As you can imagine we all became kindred spirits as we became a group within a group because of the age gap. We all drifted away from cycling in the end as we got older, this would be around 1991 as I started working on the nights that the club met. However, I never lost touch with Ali, as she was that little older than me she went on to college in Lincoln at Riseholm Hall studying ‘arboriculture’ which is Tree Surgery. I went up to see her there a couple of times which was great as a young kid like me, only 16 at the time, never really got out that much. She then moved on from there and got a job in a youth hostel up in Yorkshire and again I went to visit this time on the motorbike I had at the time, again a long trip for me at the time though now I wouldn’t think twice. Not too long after this she went off to University in Aberdeen as this was one of a few uni’s that ran the course she wanted to study. This is where the past catches the present as what I found in the shed was the letters that she used to send to me when she was there. Now just to clarify; we were just friends and I mean really good friends which makes it all the more disappointing that I had not really thought about this properly until today. It was the kind of friendship that normally does not exist between a boy and girl without some kind of sexual tension but it just wasn’t the case as we were great friends. I did once ask her out but she said no as we were such great friends that it would be wrong, at the time I struggled to understand but now I see it with such clarity.

So what’s the point of this I hear you thinking? Well the point is that after she went up to Aberdeen Uni we just drifted apart and despite letters passing I could have tried harder to keep contact with her, my friend, but as a 19 year old I was busy working and not seeing what was really important in life.

Now we have regret, something which I do not really partake in as it is a flawed emotion, as far as I’m concerned, due to the fact that things cannot change just because you realise that you f***ed up. But on this occasion I do regret not doing more and I wonder what happened to her. Whether she completed the arboriculture course which would have qualified her to cut back trees that were overhanging busy roads. Whether she got married, had kids or all the other things that we do when we “grow” up. So how do you deal with regret? What is the value of such a flawed emotion in the modern world if nothing can be achieved as the past is the past? Well the first thing that you can get from it is to learn. When I say learn I mean you learn from the mistakes you made, and lets face it they are mistakes that’s why you feel regret. You make damn sure that it doesn’t happen again. The second thing that you can do is to try and put things right, if possible. What I mean by this is that in my case I can try to track down Ali, I don’t know how yet but I will try, as I said before this is not some “old flame” but a true friend and for that reason I owe it to myself, and to her, to try and see if there is some way to reach out and just say “hi, how’s it going? has life been kind…”. There are no perfect people in this world only perfect intensions, I am certainly not perfect but I am always looking for ways to get a little closer even if I know I’ll never get there I can still try.

So the thought of the day is to embrace all emotions as they all hold some benefit to your life even if it is not always clear some part of you can develop because of it. For now though I will try to find my old friend just so I can say “Hi”.

- Rob

2 day Strategic marketing masterclass for £75!!

I try not to do any shameless “whoring” but sometimes it just has to be done for the greater good.  There are a great deal of small business out there trying a great deal of marketing tactics without success because it lacks structure. Unless you have a natural flare or have had training it can be very hard to market your business/product and succeed but with a little training you can.

I am pleased to say that a fellow BNI member and good friend of mine, Kirsty Cambers from Fresh Marketing Solutions, is running a marketing masterclass.  Now in conjunction with Business Link eligible business with 2-249 employees that have not had previous Lead to Succeed Training should be eligible for Business Link support.  This support means that the course cost is reduced from £650 + VAT to just £75.00 + VAT!!  If you are interested please read on:

Overview
Award winning marketing consultancy, Fresh Marketing Solutions have put together a course to help all businesses achieve their commercial objectives in 2009. The 2 day Masterclass will provide the opportunity for learners to put together a strategic marketing plan that is tailored to their business.

Masterclass Content
During the intensive 2 day course, learners will cover a variety of topics such as tools and techniques for analysing their business environment, objective setting, evaluation of different marketing tools, implementation planning and measuring key performance indicators. The course is suitable for any team member that wants to have a structured approach to business growth or who may be relatively new to marketing.

The Benefits
Upon completion of the course each learner will have an accurate and relevant marketing plan to implement within their business. The marketing plan will be an action plan to ensure their commercial objectives are met for 2009. By attending this course, businesses have a much more cost effective method of obtaining strategic focus than hiring in a 3rd party which can cost thousands of pounds in consultancy fees. There will be options for post-masterclass support to ensure that the newly produced marketing plan is being implemented and remains relevant to their business.

The Consultants
With over 10 years of experience, both Consultants selected to run the masterclass have a wealth of experience across businesses from a variety of sectors. These range from large multinational organisations, small to medium enterprises and independent sole traders. Both Consultants are of a high marketing pedigree with proven expertise as practitioners and hold Chartered Markeeter status.

Course Details
Masterclasses will be held across April, May and June 2009. The course will be delivered in a Nottingham training facility where refreshments and lunch will be served on both days. Specific details of location, times etc will be issued in the learner packs sent to you.  All learning material will be provided.

The course is priced at £650 per learner (excluding VAT) with the option of group discounts.

Funding now available
If you have 2-249 employees and have not had previous Lead to Success Training you should be eligible for Business Link support. If you are eligible for funding you will receive a £575 contribution towards the cost of the course.

Kirsty will arrange for Business Link to call you and allocate the funding. If you are eligible for funding you will be reimbursed by Business Link for the amount that you are entitled to. You will be asked to pay the full amount up front then you will receive the £575 reimbursement from Business Link.

If this is of interest to anyone, which it should be at that cost, then please use the form below to contact Fresh Marketing Solutions.

End of shameless whoreing, have a great week all!!

- Rob

More IT support woe’s

One of our clients called a couple of days ago to say there was a problem on on of the workstations.  In summary the workstation kept crashing on the user and was generally unstable.  After looking I found a number of errors on the workstation and the main one which caused me concern was the errors below:

When we look closer at one of the entries we see the following:

Quite clearly this is a problem. Now the “D” drive is actually a CD/DVD drive and after checking with the client the drive was empty.  The errors were occurring throughout the day as well as overnight when clearly no-one was using it. So I recommended that he call Dell support as the unit was under warranty and it was most likely going to be a hardware fault probably a controller issue.  I spoke with him again later to check how things went and he told me the guy on the phone, in a strong Indian accent, has got him to run the diagnostics and everything checked out fine.  He was told that the error he was being shown was “normal” and was caused because there was not a CD in the drive!!! I really wish someone would have told me about this…all these years I was under the illusion that this symbol combined with the word “Error” was a problem.  I’m so glad that a “quality” support service was able to clarify this clear mis-conception of mine, cheers Dell

- Rob