The Magic of Stories
03 July 2008
My little girl, Abbey, was five last week, so we had a party. Five is a big deal birthday so the boat was duly pushed out... big hall, lots of friends, and a Magician! I don't know who was more excited, Abbey or I.But wait, why am I wasting time telling you about my five year old's birthday party, and her magician?
• It isn't that the magic show was brilliant, although it was.
• It isn't that AndyCadabra was polite and cheerful, although he was.
• It isn't that Abbey had a lovely time, although she did.
These are all things that you might have guessed, or taken for granted. We expect a magician to be good, polite and cheerful. We expect a little girl to have a good time at her birthday party. These are nice details and utterly unremarkable. For AndyCadabra, doing great magic shows for kid's parties is an everyday thing.The problem is that "everyday things" don't spread. I might tell a few interested people that Abbey had a great time, or that the magician was fun. But not many. On it's own it's unremarkable.
But here's the thing. Andy did do something other than put on a great magic show. He spent an hour (an HOUR!) entertaining Abbey and her brother before the party even started. He laughed with them, joked with them and even (God help him) let them help! It was way beyond the call of duty. While Wendy and I ran around with balloons and cakes (and yes, some degree of panic) he took the kids off our hands.
That was something we didn't expect, and because of that it's remarkable.
For most of us, web developers included, being good at what we do is just the price of admission. If we want our name, our reputation or our brand to spread, we need to be remarkable. No one tells stories about "good web developers".
And stories are the magic ingredient when it comes to spreading ideas. Humans rarely share facts, but we are story-telling machines. We'll tell stories all day, and the Internet has magnified this a thousand fold. Now, when a remarkable story gets told online it gets blogged, or dug, or linked to, or commented upon.
AndyCadabra is telling a great story, and because of that I've been telling it too. The question is what stories are your clients telling about you?
Posted by Nick Warren at 3:36 PM
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Your analysis of... Semantic?
26 June 2008
Pop quiz. PPC, analytics, multivariate testing, usability, pagerank, stories, web copy, structure, Seth, conversions, goals, landing pages, segmentation, white hat, bounce rate, meta-data and WOMMA. How much of this do you understand?Supplementary question. Are you fun, friendly, talented, helpful by nature, articulate, happy and of good standing? Do you have great experience, backed up by references from real people? You do? Brilliant. Then we'd love to hear from you.
Semantic is looking for an awesome Web Analyst & Marketeer to impress, challenge and charm us.
We've been creating brilliant web sites for nearly ten years, but we also deliver consultancy, develop strategy and build online businesses for our wonderful client's. It's an extraordinarily exciting, vibrant position to be in... right at the point where the magic happens.
If you know that buzz, love the numbers, and fancy helping us become even more effective, drop us an email at ialsomakecoffee@semantic.co.uk. This may be an association of like minds, a one time thing, or (in time) a permanent position.
(Just two quick pieces of advice before you click. First... don't rush. Spend some time on the site to see if you think we'll fit. If you're right for us, we'll wait. Second. Don't tell us how good you are... show us).
Posted by Nick Warren at 3:37 PM
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5,861 potential Clients incoming.
05 June 2008
Five thousand, eight-hundred and sixty-one is the number of people who have viewed our most dangerous water-pistol in the world video on YouTube. That's about fifty times more than our other most viewed video. What's going on?For some reason Water Pistol has tipped... it's broken out of our control and got out into the world. It's left home, and is out there in the world spreading a message. The fact that it's a pretty dumb message matters not at all. The only thing that matters is that people have been showing it to other people.
The four second video is about as ludicrous and unprofessional as a special effect video could be... but here's the thing. The web doesn't reward slick professionalism (necessarily)... it just rewards things worth spreading. Water Pistol is a dumb thing we did years ago for fun... and now it's put Semantic in front of five thousand pairs of eyes.
For more information on this you might want to read just about anything written by Seth Godin in the last ten years. As usual he was way way ahead of anyone else.
Update
13th June, 2008: 8,048 views
Another Update
26th June, 2008: 17,202 views
Yet Another Update
3rd July, 2008: 24,771
Posted by Nick Warren at 7:10 PM
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Why small things matter
23 May 2008
Yesterday I received a letter from a prominent UK motoring organisation, of which I am a member. I don't get much from them because I opted out of all of the "valuable partner offers" they"As it turns out", they said, "we have become part of a larger group, and are now able to offer services that weren't available when you opted out. As this is the case it seems only fair to let you know what we can now offer, and give you the opportunity to reconsider your opt-out."
Hmmmm. Yes, I guess that is fair... I mean, they might be offering something I really want. So, even though this kind of breaks an agreement we had, I read on. As it turns out they aren't doing anything too new, and certainly nothing I need right now. Sorry fellas.
But this is the kicker. If I want to
Un-flipping-believe-able.
It's a small thing, but as businesses chase profits we get to see how much they respect their customers... how much they are prepared to risk long-term relationships for short-term growth. I may be in a minority of people who get properly narked about this stuff, but I think it matters. I think all these little seeds of discontent add up and make a difference.
As I say, my renewal is coming up...
Posted by Nick Warren at 11:35 AM
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"Insourcing" - because we don't really sell web design
19 May 2008
Conventional wisdom has it that there is a tidal flow of skilled jobs from the expensive West to an army of inexpensive graduates in the East... and that as a result a lot of us in the technology sector are going to hell in a hand cart.
I can't speak for others, but at the moment this isn't affecting Semantic... indeed recently something rather surprising happened. We were approached by a company based in India who are unsatisfied with the assistance they have been getting from local developers. Economic realities aside they have seen our work and are extremely keen to work with us. I guess they recognise the true cost of cheap web design.
I have no idea whether we will end up working with them, but it has made me think about what it is we offer at Semantic. Of course we develop web sites... but we don't really sell web sites. What we are selling is the thinking, the strategy, the design... the nouse! Our success is all about the soft stuff.
Which is why, perhaps, a company based in the capital of tech outsourcing may soon be outsourcing to us.
Posted by Nick Warren at 7:29 AM
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Two of the best days of my life!
22 April 2008
Thursday 17th, 6.15AM. My alarm clock goes off. I don't think I have got out of bed quicker. I was so excited. After weeks, months and even a year or so of eMails (maybe 2 years), I am finally going to meet the people that do all of the web-design magic.In the shower, two pieces of toast and nagging dad to hurry up (God these old people are so slow)! Finally we are on the road to Semantic and you guessed it we got lost. We stop to ask someone for directions only to find it's Nick! Dad came in to meet the rest of the team but I can't wait for him to go - he's cramping my style and ruining my street-cred! Look on the bright side at least mum's not here! (only joking).
Nick started me of with some XML which Chris (the Flash genius) helped me with, I've never done any of this before so it was great to learn a new skill. I continually stared at it all day as I really wanted to learn as much as possible, and to generally understand what was going on. When everyone in the office had started talking I stopped. Silence. Looked around to find Nick, Chris and Neil working on their projects for their clients. I said to myself in my mind; this is where all of it happens. I couldn't believe that I was in the same office with the people that make all of those really cool sites.5:00 Was near. We all powered down and went home. I was staying with Chris, which was a great opportunity to annoy the king gentleman with some Flash tips :-)
Day Two
The next day soon arrived. I woke up and thought, this is the life. Waking up every morning, about to go to Semantic, meeting new people, playing un-real tournament at lunchtime, picking up tips from the Semantic team, couldn't get any better than that really could it? Soon arrived at Semantic HQ. Said morning to Nick and Neil and got straight to work. It was great. I was asked to make a change to the Chessington website, add a picture and some text, which I did successfully which was great.
I then had a look at some other Flash that Mike and Chris had done. I looked at one piece of animation and learnt so much like: Attaching a movie clip to the stage in ActionScript, Shape tweans, XML with Flash, Gaming and other animation. I learnt so much just by looking at it. I am using some of the tips and tricks from my two days at Semantic. I have never felt so good about myself.
All too soon both mum and dad arrived to collect me. I really don' t want to leave... so much to learn and I have never felt so happy inside. Can't wait to practice all my new skills.
I've said it before but THANK YOU SEMANTIC YOU REALLY ARE THE BEST.
Thanks to our guest blogger, David O'Hara, for this post... and a very enjoyable two days.
Posted by Nick Warren at 2:15 PM
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Semantic's simple guarantee
21 April 2008
Ever since we started Semantic, way back when, our clients have enjoyed an implicit guarantee. Now, just to be clear, we are making it explicit. Here it is: "If we don't make you smile, you don't pay".This simple position has always made perfect sense to us, both as business strategy and point of principle. It's a decency thing. We ask our clients to invest healthy chunks of money in us and our ideas... and often this investment is a leap of faith.
Because of that it's always seemed reasonable to us, not to mention good business sense, to give people a bridge back if, for whatever reason, the leap doesn't work out.
We only want happy clients, and we'll do everything we can to make that happen. But if, in the end, it doesn't work out we'll bow out with a handshake.
No invoice, no hard feelings.
Posted by Nick Warren at 2:41 PM
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Lend a little, do a lot
18 April 2008
I can't help it, whenever I think about doing stuff for "Charrrriteee" I think about Smashie and Nicey. They ruined it for the rest of us :-)But stuff it. The way I see it it, we are doing a little bit for charity, and the very best thing we can do is talk about it... at least a little.
It's been a real pleasure to donate some money to good causes over the last couple of Christmases. With the agreement of the team, and on their behalf, Semantic has made donations to the Starlight Foundation, Cancer Research, Shelter and other charities. Hey, it helps us feel good while we play on our Playstations!
But that's Christmas, and the high wears off pretty quickly once you realise how lucky we are in comparison to so many. So for a while now we've been thinking about how we could extend Semantic's "do gooder" programme through the year. Enter Kiva, a not for profit organisation that makes it easy for you to feel good about yourself.
If you haven't heard of Kiva I'd recommend you check them out. They are in the business of micro-finance, allowing rich people (that's us... if you are reading this) to lend money to people in the world who can do something with it.As the term "micro-finance" suggests we aren't talking big bucks here. In fact most of the loans requested are tiny, a few hundred pounds at most. At Semantic we've decided to put a modest pot of money into Kiva... and I mean modest, and have invested in four businesses.
These include a food seller (and father of two) in Tajikistan, a beauty parlour & cyber-cafe in the Dominican Republic, and a transport business in Cambodia. In each case we've contributed part of the money requested, along with other donors from around the world.
And when, as we expect, the loans are repaid, we will re-invest to make a difference to other peoples lives. It's true that the returns will be measured in "feeling good about ourselves" rather than money, but that's fine. If things go well we will increase our "investment" over time - we are capitalists, after all... even when it comes to feeling happy.
Try it for yourself. You'll like it.
Posted by Nick Warren at 2:28 PM
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The SECRET is out... well nearly.
17 April 2008
Last December 2007 we got the opportunity to think about something unusual and interesting. Our friends at Usborne Publishing have a new book out next month, a wonderful adventure story called... well, I wish I knew... but I don't... in fact The name of this book is SECRET.It's a great story, full of adventure, mystery, secret codes, shadowy organisations. Usborne wanted to do something online to promote it, and of course we jumped at the chance.
Can web sites have plot?
And rather than building a web site about the book, we built the story into the web site... well several sites actually.
Can web sites have plot? We think so... but have a go yourself, and tell us whether you agree.
www.thenameofthisbookissecret.co.uk
P.S. If you registered for the site after my last post you'll get an email in the next week or so, to start off the adventure. If you sign up now, you'll get straight in :-)
Posted by Nick Warren at 9:16 AM
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Welcome Patrick!
Remember Patrick? A while ago I mentioned him in a post about helping people out. Then later, I revealed that his real name was David, and why had become so impressed with him.Well David's stuck around, kept asking, kept learning... frankly kept at us... and I'm pleased to say that he will be here with us for a couple of days on work experience... at least the experience of how we work here at Semantic.
We'll let you know how he gets on :-)
Posted by Nick Warren at 7:05 AM
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