I constantly sign-up for Betas and Alphas and usually Im let down. I know that its a Beta/Alpha but I just dont see a use for many of the products I look at. Times when I do see promise, they are so far from being scalable and full featured that I simply move on to the next “great” thing. Im not sure where Evri.com fits with my past Beta looks but I have liked what Ive seen so far.

People, Places, and Things

On the “main page” you get the option to view by People, Places and Things but that is it. Where is the search? I like how you show me what is popular but I want what I want. Perhaps a directory or something would be an option if they are trying to silo people to only look at “main topics”.

Read more...Evri Review

Yes I said it.

- start rant -

Why you ask? If a site requires a user to visit it…. and you cant. It sucks. If a website screws up your order what do you do? You shop somewhere else. If you click to read a review and you get an error what do you do? You hit the back button. So why do we put up with it? Perhaps Loren knows.

Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, Plurk, Seesmic all have (or had) serious down time and outages. I could list more but they all know who they are. How can people join in on the conversation and participate when you are cut off mid sentence? There is nothing like writing an msg/post/anything only to get some lovely 500 internal server error message.

How do any of these services expect to go mainstream and grow? *Yes I know Facebook and Myspace is “main stream” but you get my point.

Services need to stay in Alpha or Beta or AlphaBeta longer and stress test their systems more. So for that next service out there that is “going to change the world”. Go slow, work out your issues, make sure your servers can take a beating and THEN slowly let us bring your service down.

- end rant -

Read more...Web 2.0 Sucks

It has been quite some time since I had time to blog - and even now I dont have time. I still thought I should try and keep you updated (even if way late) of some great links I have found on Twitter. Over the past few weeks I have spent some time in San Fran, Boston, and here and there - always keeping me super busy. Even as I write this, I am on vacation in Boston and really should be sleeping. So without further delay - I present the newest Link Find.

All Twitter Finds

1. @chriswinfield Link: Microsoft Gives Up Earning Your Loyalty; Launches “Cashback” to Bribe You Instead
2. @kdpaine Link: KDPaine’s PR Measurement Blog: How many different types of conversation are there?
3. @kid_disco Link: The Ultimate Guide to WordPress Conditional Tags | Theme Lab
4. @msaleem Link: Dembot - Twitter Down Art Collection
5. @chiropractic Link: CIMG3305 on Flickr - Photo Sharing!
6. @leeodden Link: Trendrr - Track Compare Share
7. @lisabarone Link: Bruceclay.com - My College President Kills Kittens!
8. @problogger Link: TwitPic - Share photos on twitter
9. @andybeal Link: Cre8pc on Usability & Holistic SEO Angry? Destroy Their Reputation Online!
10. @leeodden Link: Twitter Alerts - TweetBeep.com
11. @jdersh Link: June Dershewitz on Web Analytics: eMetrics Recap in 100 Words
12. @webmama Link: eMetrics Marketing Optimization Summit Error 404 Page Not Found
13. @gapingvoid Link: Gin, Television, and Social Surplus - Here Comes Everybody
14. @Omomyid Link: eMetrics Twitter Backchannel Analysis » Instant Cognition

Read more...Twitter Link Find V19

This session started out with Gary Katz of Marketing Operations Partners running through A LOT of content somewhat quickly.

I didnt write down much of what he said, but I did get his “Top 10″ style list

You know your marketing resources are at risk…..

1. Your metrics for success are ill-defined
2. People are slammed
3. Institutional memory is leaking
4. Creativity is suffering from constipation
5. Team & supplier relationships are dysfunctional
6. Decision making ….(ok so I didnt get them all)
7. Marketing portfolio is lacking

Next up was Gary Angel of Semphonic and Nancy Abila of O’Reilly.

They talked about the process and used O’Reilly as the example.

Much of the presentation was them talking over slides (go figure, I know) and explaining the ups and downs and the process they went through to move O’Reilly more towards an Analytical Company.  They went over the process of getting buy-in from stakeholders, C-Levels, and everyone else. As this is the Lite version, I have included some of what I wrote down below:

Some of the Challenges they highlighted include:

• Data integrity
• Resources (busy teams)
• Evolving online strategy
• Changing tools and platforms

What does the Future hold?

• Continue building the foundation
• Longer term - continue to educate, process of road map project, and create culture of actionable analytics

Read more...Optimizing Marketing Operations - eMetrics Lite

I am at eMetrics all week and will post some of my quick session notes as the week goes on. If you want to follow what everyone is seeing, I advise you check out twemes.com.

The first session was: Deep Data Diving - Bringing Online and Offline Inline w/ Rufus Evison.

13 million pieces of mail every quarter using 9 million variables

Data (is meaningless on its own) -> Information (has context) -> Insight (taking actions based on information)

EMetrics

Justification -> Usability -> Information Strategy

Great Example: Someone had said that they did a test of Gap, Macys and (some other store) with a set number of users. Those users were given $1000 to spend and one hour to spend it in. The worst store had only 5% of its users complete the task of making a purchase. The best one only converted 60%. Is this due to usability?

Talks about the McNamara Fallacy… lots of details

Gives some interesting numbers about loyalty cards, shopping habits and the UK.

Recap

- Loyalty cards help us change data -> information

- There is a difference between data and information

There was some Q&A but since this isnt Live Blogging - I didnt take notes for you

UPDATE: So that Susan doesnt get mad at me… follow @BruceClayInc for more coverage.

Read more...Deep Data Diving - eMetrics Lite