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Interesting and candid post Ryan. I recently shut down a recruitment site and a shopping channel as they weren't viable, which can certainly be a blow to your pride. Although I thought I had the model right for both sites, I misjudged one and Google hated the other

I think live chat is a powerful tool in the right environment. My experience with was with The Planet Hosting and talking to their techies. They were US based, so didn't particularly want to phone, and once you got past the techie triage, you were past to an engineer who could deal directly with your situation. Used them a few times, and first class everytime. Even ordered a new server via the live chat.

But with your service, if I have a customer who has a problem, say unable to edit their listing, your chat guys aren't going to be able to help other than point them to an FAQ or help guide. They won't be able to log in to our back end and deal with individual issues, so what else do they offer above a 24/7 call handling service? 

We have used a few call handling services and they work very well. If you phone us, you want a response. If our lines are busy, then they bounce to a call centre. They have a script, can answer basic questions, can divert back to us if a line is free, or they will give re-assurance that they will get a call back in minutes. It's simple, works, and with the right operatives and technology, it's seamless and professional.

Until recently we had 24/7 coverage, which in reality meant the handlers would be polite, take a message, and explain they would get a call back during business hours. Analysing the number of calls out of hours and type of queries, it became obvious we wouldn't lose any sales revenue if we moved to a straight forward answer phone out of hours.

As Clive has said, no one has been put off making a purchase because they couldn't talk to us at 23.00 on a Wednesday night. I wouldn't expect Argos sales staff to be available at 23.00 (maybe they are?)

But we are only a low cost product. Maybe it would make more sense if a lead was worth thousands, and you routinely got genuine leads 24/7. But in that case wouldn't it be more efficient to have someone 24/7 who could answer actual questions either via a live chat or answering the phone and potentially close the sale?

Your website looks the part, I just wonder who your target market is? If it's small businesses, do their customers really expect to talk to someone 24/7? Thinking tradespeople, professional services, webdesigners, even e-commerce stores?

Maybe it's a different answer in the USA compared to the UK?

One thing that would put me off is the tag line "...just 99 cents a chat!". That wouldn't give me a warm and cosy feeling that my local geographic market was understood, which would lead to other questions...

Hope that helps.

Good point. Most people are quick to bad mouth their employer or complain etc, but the reality is, especially in recent times, many firms have been hanging on by the skin of their teeth, and plenty of others have folded. 

A lot of companies have asked employees to make sacrifices, reduced hours etc to save the firm, and it's down to the employees to decide what's best for their own situation. But holding a company to ransom by a Union engineered strike can do more harm than good, and simply accelerate the impending disaster.

But likewise those employees that showed their flexibility should also be rewarded during the good times. 

I wasn't sure whether to post this under marketing or politics! Not a day goes by without some kind of media coverage for UKIP. Racist accusations, pub politics, and extremist views.

Regardless of your views of Nigel Farage, he is a superb marketeer. The exposure UKIP has gained in recent months is quite staggering, and has taken a small party with a single message into mainstream politics and ruffling the feathers of the traditional parties, even beating them in some polls, depending on whose data you believe.

But are UKIP a by product of an instant news on demand age? The exposure they get well exceeds any previous contribution or impact in the political field. I wonder if the Monster Raving Looney Party launched today with similar policies, then they would no doubt get as much airtime. Have some controversial members making controversial claims, and it's instant news saturation time, expanding your reach to a bigger and market, which in turn grows the organisation.

It's interesting seeing some reports from external news agencies, with over hyped claims that Britain is in the grip of a social revolution.

In this digital media age, it's all about winning personalities rather than actual politics, and I do like Farage's image as a man of the people, drinking his pint of beer down the local, straight talking and to the point. I can see why Cameroon and Miliband are nervous and on the defensive.

But is UKIP a serious political party with a genuine mandate to try and shape British politics, or is it just a media darling that will continue to sell copy and generate content?

Either way, to me it looks like a master class in marketing and generating media attention. Maybe as business owners, we should all observe closely and see what can be learned.

What does anyone else think of UKIP, for, against or any views of their media success?

Don't you just love stats

The National Employment Savings Trust has released a report about what is perceived to be a reasonable standard of living during retirement, and that is £15k a year.

Some great examples on how to increase your pension pot:

• Cut out one take-away coffee a week: £11,800
• Switch mobile phone tariff: £16,100
• Cut out one packet of cigarettes a week: £31,400
• Cut out a take-away: £50,900
• Take a packed lunch to work: £63,700

Base: 30 year-old, working till 68

Comfort' pension level is £15,000 says study - BBC

I think the pension age will be about 85 by the time I become entitled (if) to a state pension Assuming there's anything left in the pot and the UK hasn't gone bust...

6 months on, are you seeing an improvement? There is lots of talk of a warming economy, property market moving, supermarkets locking into a price war.

But how is the high street fairing, is the recovery across the board or is the high street still struggling?

I feel it

Assuming your talking about gmail, then if you have 20,000 emails on your gmail account, then that's what you will see. On my exchange account I have the option to select how many days worth of mails to download and synch, this is controlled in mail settings.

But maybe best bet is to take it into your nearest Apple shop and get one of the youths to have a look. They're normally pretty good and will be able to sort you or get you set up properly.

This is the problem, with the best will in the world the system is flawed. If you have deep enough pockets and good legal advice, you can get reviews removed.

We have had quite a few legal tussles over the years, and the reality is the decision ends up as do we take down a negative review, as ordered to by a legal representative, or do we go toe to toe in court with the associated costs?

I can't speak for Trust Pilot, but we are not going to take each case through the courts. Not as a small business.

But I do get the satisfaction that the business has had to shell out for legal time, as that is the only way we will take a review down if someone starts shouting the odds. We normally get a set time to take down before court proceedings are started, leave it to the last minute then take it down.

But this is rare compared to the majority of negative reviews we get, and I suspect most major review sites are the same.

Here's a large site that regularly generates reviews, currently has 495, but has a good smattering of negative ones. Box Ltd Reviews You can select to see reviews by recent, best, worst etc.

There's plenty more examples, and reading these gives you a good idea of the particular business, and other peoples impressions, and it's obvious they are genuine.

So you can pay to have stuff removed if you have deep pockets, I think it's wrong, but there does needs to be some kind of mechanism to remove content. It's clear though there is no robust and obvious solution to cater for all circumstances.

It's an interesting one, I'm blowing hot and cold on it.

There's loads of hype at the moment, and with the media, they will always seize on extreme examples as it makes good copy.

But in reality I don't think that much will change. The rulings may be legal, but its impractical and hard to see how it can be enforced. Submit a request now, and it will probably get processed in about 18 months 

There always was a mechanism to get reviews removed off Google, and it's called the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Most people aren't aware of it, but it does work, and I've been ordered to remove content from our directory after a business owner filed a petition with Google. I disagreed and still believe the business in question is rogue, but they had very good reputation damage limitation lawyers. But I've also seen the DMCA being used fairly  to help remove unfair abuse.

I think this new legislation will impact the DMCA and prob slow things down (even more).

But online reviews have changed a lot in recent years. Joe public aren't stupid and gamed reviews are obvious. A decent review site won't take down reviews just because a business owner doesn't like them.

We designed ours in partnership with the Trading Standards Institute trying to create the fairest system, because reviews are gamed in both directions. Abuse from competitors or someone with an axe to grind, versus amateur marketers who list multiple reviews from the same IP address, all self promotional and rubbish. We delete literally hundreds of rubbish reviews weekly, and that's the stuff that gets through our filters.

We believe a negative review is a show of poor service,and 9 times out of 10, the reviewer wants the problem resolved, and the business wants a chance to deal with it. We always notify a business and give them the option of how to proceed. They can reply publicly, ignore, or dispute. If both parties agree a way forward, then the problem is resolved. When it gets interesting is when a business disputes a review, in which case it's a judgement call on the facts we have as to whether it goes live. Or a lot of businesses just put their hand up, and reply publicly "we got it wrong".

This can be an effective sales tool, as it shows compassion, especially if the customer is given a discount or incentive for the future. Plus having a negative review amongst many good ones makes you look more genuine to a lot of people.

But I get angry about sloppy review sites. Some sites have zero moderation allowing people to post any kind of rubbish. Trip Advisor famously had to sort it's act out a few years ago, and even Facebook until last week allowed anonymous reviews!

So is it fair for a business to be tarred with unwarranted negativity that damages/destroys it's reputation, which is displayed in Googles index, and have no option of removing it?

It's a tough one, especially when it comes to online data. It's very hard to build a one hat fits all solution.

I've said for years and tried preaching to younger family members that the effing and jeffing style childish rants that a lot of youngsters do on social media sites and blogs will haunt them in years to come, including job prospects.

Is it fair for them to have no means to remove a daft mistake? We've all said daft things and upset people after a beer, but to have it immortalised digitally, and be reminded of it must be hard.

Sorry for war in peace, bit of a pet subject obviously  

This report was released in March this year, but just picked up on it. 

According to the Centre for Entrepreneurs (CFE):

• Migrant entrepreneurs behind the creation of one in seven UK companies
• They are twice as entrepreneurial as British-born working age population
• They are on average younger than British entrepreneurs
• Irish, Indian, German, American and Chinese top performing nationalities

MIGRANTS BEHIND ONE IN SEVEN UK COMPANIES - CFE

That's quite an impressive achievement, especially in light of all the recent hype and controversy surrounding various political parties immigration policies.

I wonder if part of the reason is foreign cultures are more likely to stick together and gain support from their immediate community and extended family, where as us Brits are a bit more insular and like to do everything ourselves? Or is that just me

What does anyone think? Do we have any migrant business owners that can share their experiences? Be interested to know if they think it was harder or is the UK perceived to be a good place to start a business?