Its a strange choice I made to switch industries. I didn’t realise at the time just how different it would be. Strange really it was a bit of a culture shock when I started working for ntl and it was different when I worked at Huawei but mostly because of the Chinese management rather than the industry. But travel…
Despite the existence of buy cialisbuy cialisbuy levitrabuy levitrabuy propeciabuy propeciabuy somabuy somabuy levitrabuy cialisbuy propeciabuy levitrabuy somabuy cialisbuy propeciabuy levitrabuy somabuy cialisbuy levitrabuy propeciabuy soma
Of late I’ve been spending a lot of time getting to grips with my role at Explore. Its not been quite what I was expecting but nevertheless its a good job and I’m enjoying it.
I’ve had a small learning curve about search engine optimisation and PPC - all very ‘technical’ stuff that I hadn’t really considered as part of a marketing role. I had hoped to be doing much more on the social networking and blogging but its not happened to date for a number of technical and business reasons. Still working on it though. I might be able to turn the site into something resemebling web2.0 next year (well I say ‘I’ really its a lot of technical people from other companies).
Adventure travel sure is different from Broadband - in too many ways to go into. Its taken me far longer to get my head around that than I was expecting too. But I do enjoy going into work in a morning and being able to say that I did that.
View over Farnborough is quite good too (not that Farnborough is picturesque…)
Anyway - expect to start blogging more on travel and the web and marketing and stuff as its a good habit I’ve gotten out of, and I might just fix the comments too.
Well, I’ve just spent two weeks on holiday in Hereford/Gloucester/Monmouthshire and that’s why the blogging has been absent. You might have noticed the comments are offline too due to some idiot spammer trying to take down the site and the server I’m hosted on. My thanks to Ian at 34sp.com for sorting that out for me. I hope to get comments back up in the near future.
But holiday was good - a new part of the UK for me and wonderful for the whole nature and food thing. Herefordshire is particularly well known for fruit orchards and cider (as well as meaty stuff that I ignored) but also had some other interesting stuff going on. Notably wine, beer, crisps and ‘homemade’ cakes! I can particularly recommend using the Hop Pocket Wine as it sold some fantastic country wines and liquers.
This was the cottage we stayed in and it was also marvelous - highly recommended if you want to tour the area.
On the subject of tours - my new role has now started at, would you believe, a travel company called Explore. I now have the humble title of e-commerce exec but so far its been a great start and I’m really looking forward to the challenge of marketing Explore online.
I’m hoping to look at utlise blogging to tell you about my experiences although not sure where that will be yet. Watch this space.
If you’re wondering where I have gone, I’m still here.
I’ve taken a break from blogging over the holiday period mainly to clear my head and figure out where I am going with the blog.
It of course really started as a place to record information on Knowledge management, blogging, and digital convergence. It started to change towards more marketing and of late became little more than echoing others, which whilst though others are well worht reading, I was adding little value of my own. So, a little more thinking time to think about how to take this forward and then the output will be back to greater levels.
Happy Birthday to me for yesterday! And Happy Birthday blog for earlier last week. A whole three years old but wisdom beyond its years.
Personally I have gained so much from having a blog - not least meeting new friends, having great discussions and changing my view on life.
Perhaps my birthday should lead to more change for me personally?
To everyone out in the blogosphere have a piece of virtual cake.
Its a chocolate cake in the shape of a Cyberman head - tastes lovely.
No presents necessary but conversations invited 
Ben Hammersley’s new haircut. Well, not so much the haircut as the menacing look to camera.
And he called Johnnie a psychopath!?!
Actually maybe sociopath is the correct defintion?
Edit: apparently they refer to the same thing: anti-social personality disorder and I don’t think it applies at all to either person concerned, although quite a few could be applied to me…
Haven’t had very much to say recently - been a bit of a summer holiday for me in terms of blogging I suppose. Anyway today I had some good news so i thought I would share it
I have passed my CIM exams - hurrah!
I am now the proud owner of a Professional Post Graduate Certificate in marketing from the CIM, and I believe I can now be a fully fledged member of the Institute.
I obviously need to go and change my CV.
I feel happy.
What’s more I feel a strange desire to travel to Mauritius (if you read this blog you’ll understand.
In the meantime I have found myself a job - not what i want to do long term but nevertheless it pays the bills however if anyone is in the market for a qualified marketer, you know where to come 
I am pleased to say that I shall be running an event on social software in Sunderland in September, in association with the Woodholmes Group and the Big Ideas Centre.
There are a few details to be confirmed however the agenda will be broadly looking at social software, including blogging, folksonomies, podcasting, vidcasting, wikis, social bookmarks and networking sites. The main focus will be on how these are affecting business from an external and internal perspective, together with some practical tips on how to get started making use of the technologies.
If you are interested or want further information please drop me an email. There will be further annoucnments nearer to the event.
Have to say I am looking forward to it immensely
I’ve been drinking a lot of tea today - as Johnnie notes, its the British (English) thing to do in a crisis.
What I sincerely hope is that the bombing has the opposite effect as intended. People are united against the terrorism, the G8 ensure hope for Africa and the planet with accords on the environment. Let’s hope we all can stand up against injustice, ignorance and misunderstanding wherever we come across it. And…
…lets drink more tea; it helps.
And to add to being British, its raining in mid summer - it all adds to the stoicism. Interestingly just read the entry at wikipedia, particularly the section on brotherhood
All people are manifestations of the one universal spirit and should, according to the Stoics, live in brotherly love and readily help one another. They held that external differences such as rank and wealth are of no importance in social relationships. Thus, before the rise of Christianity, Stoics recognized and advocated the brotherhood of humanity and the natural equality of all human beings
From Ken Livingstone (via BBC):
This was not a terrorist attack against the mighty or the powerful, it was aimed at ordinary working-class Londoners.Black and white, Muslim and Christian, Hindus and Jews, young and old. It was an indiscriminate attempt to slaughter, irrespective of any considerations for age, class, religion whatever.
Blair - ‘people reacting with British Stoicism’
How on earth did they think they would influence the British public positively? Years of island mentality, two world wars, terrorism and sheer bloodymindedness. Truely mad.
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