Computer specialist and online marketing professional

On February 1, 2012 in Business, Development, General, Internet, marketing, Off Topic, Website Design.
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It’s never too long between business card iterations for me; I’ve just designed my fourth version. However, this time round I’ve mixed things up a bit, working from the ground up with new key points and a different overall message.

Replicated on this website, I’ve moved away from the dated strapline (‘computer scientist and IT professional’) in order to better reflect my career path, hobbies and passion. Ladies and gentlemen, I’m proud to present:

John Alexander Rowley – Computer specialist and online marketing professional’.

So maybe a strap-line launch party would be a bit much, but I thought I’d take this time to go through the new lines added to the new cards – coming to a wallet near you soon.

computer and technology specialism

Ok, number one. I think the first few words are pretty obvious (especially to those reading articles on this site). The vast subject of computing and even broader area of technology is fundamental to my education, career and hobbies.

My grandfather used to say “There’s no such thing as a specialist”, and I tend to agree. However, the definition for ‘specialist’ over at ‘the free dictionary’ is pretty accurate to what I’m trying to convey. ‘One who is devoted to a particular occupation or branch of study or research’. Add something about pastime into the mix, and we’re just about there.

online marketing strategy development

This is much more accurate to my career path than the previous ‘IT Professional’. Whilst I hope I remain professional, I definitely don’t work in IT. I’m sure there is thousands of online marketers across the country that get as wound up as I do when approached with the line “Oh, you’re in IT then, right?”.

Online marketing is another massive and complex area, covering campaign analysis, brand promotion and online presence management, to name but a few. Add email & social marketing, search engine optimization and Pay-Per-Click analysis and you’ll hopefully have an overview of what this sentence is attempting to define.

website production and analysis

Half way through now. Phew. The keyword ‘production’ caused some concern. Attempting to summarise ‘design and development’ (as per previous business cards), website production covers the whole journey of a website: initial graphical mock-ups, structure design, coding, maintenance, updating and migration. Not to mention database management and server setup / migration.

The ‘analysis’ postfix was added to identify the overlap between online marketing and website production. As mentioned SEO and PPC, as well as SERP supervision and keyword investigation are all integral to producing a successful website.

business information management

My final point relates to my final year and experience in the industry in an effort to depict my business comprehension. With one third of my final university year being business orientated (as well as a twelve month placement the previous year) I feel this is justified as I continue to develop my personal credentials.

Studying and actively engaging in elements such as project management, KPI production and business analysis assists me in fine-tuning my knowledge of organisation’s critical information. Handling and analysing this data is defined as the process of ‘business information management’.

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The new Facebook layout and what it means for online marketing

On October 10, 2011 in Development, Internet, marketing, Website Design.
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If you’re keen on online marketing, you may already know that Facebook is about to roll out a major update to user profiles layouts. This UI update adopts a “timeline” approach, enabling a chronological view of a person’s activity. Using Facebook’s developer centre, it is (and was) quick and easy to view the new layouts before general release.

Ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce you to my timeline Facebook profile (annotations to follow!)

Facebook's new TimeLine layout

Iv’e blacked out the parts of the profile which remain (pretty much) the same, and highlighted four new / highly altered page areas.

When you see the new layout for the first time, it’s quite shocking. Not much has remained the same. I think a lot of people will be put off by such a large change at first. Anyway, that’s not what I’m here to talk about… So let’s get onto the four annotations.

Firstly, there’s the all new “cover” for your profile. This is a banner across the top of the profile, which users can customize by uploading their own images. Note that I’ve already been playing with mine, to incorporate the profile picture (which lays over the top of the cover). The introduction of these “covers” is a huge step for brand awareness via Facebook pages, as I’ll discuss in a minute!

The second alteration is the timeline. Contrary to previous speculation (including my own previous article) the timeline takes a vertical approach, rather than a horizontal one. The “horizontal rumors”, as we shall call them, were imagined with the possibility of reducing the amount of content under the fold of a typical profile. The ATFC (Above The Fold Content) has been addressed with annotation four, however!

Annotation number three comes in the form of conglomeration. Friends, Photos, GeoTagging, Likes, Music and much more are now accumulated in respective groups (almost like Folders) which can be expanded independently. This generally tidies the profile (in my opinion) and leaves more room for the all important “wall”.

The final point is the wall itself. Facebook have divided the area into two columns (4″ to 9″ wall, for those in the building trade?!) to maximize on space saving. This works well, especially with a blue timeline running down the middle to show when individual posts were added.

It’s a good looking, next generation profile layout (and it’ll look lovely if replicated for Facebook’s iPad app!).

Want to know what this means for Online Marketing? Read More »

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Start-Up Businesses use of Social Media

On July 17, 2011 in Business, Internet, marketing.
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According to a recent survey, performed by Market Research company ‘Opimium Research LLP’, less than half of small businesses use any form of Social Media. The broken-down stats go something like this;

  • 28% of small businesses said they used a corporate Facebook page
  • 18% own a LinkedIn Profile
  • 8% have a company blog
  • 6% use YouTube or similar video-streaming service
  • 2% own a corporate Twitter account

With over 2 million enterprises in the UK alone (according to the governments ‘Office for National Statistics’) that’s over 1.4 million businesses which don’t utilize Facebook, the world’s largest social media / networking website (with over 750 million users!).

Seems crazy, given the focus and publicity of these potential market avenues! Sure some businesses wouldn’t find all of the options necessary, but with such a high volume of service based business in the UK I can’t help but think some of the 1,000,000 businesses with no social media avenues are missing out.

Ultimate Hairdressing, Wolverhampton Case Study. Read More »

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Online Work Examples – Smart or Stupid?

On June 29, 2011 in Internet, Nottingham Trent University, Off Topic.
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DocumentationThe last week or so Iv’e been updating the current pages of the website, namely the Professional Portfolio. This got me thinking, would it be a good idea (or not, as the case may be) to add a couple of examples of work / coursework / reports that I’d completed over the last few years. These documents could include Real-Time Engine Control Unit Analysis reports, Human-Computer Interaction Documentation and possibly even a chapter or two from my Final Year Dissertation.

There is, however, a couple of issues that immediately spring to mind.

Firstly, ownership. Nottingham Trent University in effect own all the work and ideas you produce as part of their modules over the years you study there. Publishing these reports could land me in a sticky situation with them. However, a courtesy email could be sent out to confirm it was approved to publish before making the content available.

Next, there is the risk of theft and plagiarism: If the same (or similar) module specification is repeated with upcoming students, the availability of my work may give them the opportunity for plagiarism. This could raise some serious issues with the university, but again an informative email could solve this issue.

Finally, there is a more personal issue of privacy and hard-copy impact; If I were to put chapters of my dissertation online, for example, the overall effect of my beautifully bound thesis (not to blow my own trumpet, too much!) may loose some of it’s impact when shown or lent to others. This is a much harder issue to overcome; Maybe just the Thesis shouldn’t be put online? Stick to smaller module reports, which to be honest are unlikely to see the light of day now (stored somewhere deep in DropBox) unless someone asks specifically for said report.

So, what do you think? Vote below! You’re more than welcome to leave a comment too!

Online Work Examples - Smart or Stupid?

View Results

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The making of an introductory video

On March 6, 2011 in Development, General, Tutorials.
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Video CameraSo, hopefully you’ve watched the “An Introductory Video” video? If not, why not? Go check it out!

It had been in the back of my mind for some time, so the first available Sunday (after the stress of exams and deadlines for final year) I took my trusty (although ageing) camera (Cannon IXUS75) and an old Sony tripod into university to try and get some clips. I’d roughly planned out the sections I wanted to talk about, and had written five or 6 bullet points for each section on different pieces of A4 paper. These auto-cues were pinned directly under the camera (you can probably see my eyes move down slightly every now and then).

It was actually really intimidating talking to a camera, with no-one else in the room. The task of getting over a fun, bubbly character and also one who is serious about computing and work is no easy feat! However, I think I did OK, after about 25+ attempts!

So then the videos were reviewed and the best chosen; Into Windows Live Movie Maker 11 they went (which I don’t rate at all by the way – far too pretty with a lot of useful features removed!). There were however a couple of nice transitions, and knocking up the section headers only took a couple of minutes.

Finally I added a transcript using WLMM11 captions, which was tricky and time consuming. Finally, I used a piece of software called Watermark Maker 2 (Free trial for 20 days) to add the watermark in the top left.

Hey presto! One upload to youTube and a couple of blog articles later and I’m done. I’m pretty proud of the result, considering it only took one afternoon (and evening!).

Let me know what you think.

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An Introductory Video

On March 6, 2011 in General.
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Here it is. The “Introductory Video”, giving a quick review of myself, my education, work experience and hobbies. Take a look!

And why not read about how I came to make the video HERE!

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AirDropper adds additional functionality to DropBox

On September 5, 2010 in #60SecondShout, New Technology.
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AirDropper. Not heard of it? Neither had I, before this evening. It’s a simple website (currently in BETA) which provides additional functionality to the wonderful application called ‘Dropbox’. (Read here about it here).

“But what could possibly make DropBox even better than it already is?”, I hear you cry. Well, DropBox has typically been used for one user to sign up, and share folders and files with himself on other computers (using an online server). Next came along shared folders; The ability to share folders with other DropBox users. This is great for collaborative work.

Now though, AirDropper aims to evolve DropBox one step further. What AirDropper does is generate a link which can be shared socially or privately for people who don’t have DropBox. The link gives non-users access to download files specifically or a folder to choose from. Pretty impressive, especially for distributing to lots of non-users at once, much like how P2P works.

What’s even better though, is that links can also be generated for users to upload files to a User’s DropBox without having to have an account or download any software. This creates an ‘AirDropper’ folder, which I think is probably a security feature in the DropBox API.

Let’s only hope there will be more developments like this from both DropBox and third party applications such as AirDropper!

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Make money online: Affiliate Marketing

On August 17, 2010 in Affiliate Marketing, Business, Internet, marketing, Website Design.
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Affiliate Marketing. Iv’e heard this word tossed around all year, but never really delved into it that much. It was only last week when writing my previous article about student laptop deals that I found myself wondering why I was sending my hard-earned traffic to another site with nothing to show, I mean, not even a friendly thank you! This, coupled with a wise word from my old manager, was enough to get my heart racing and mind into gear. “What is Affiliate marketing?” I asked myself, “and how can I use it with MY website?”.

I started by heading over to AffiliateWindow, a site all about affiliate marketing. Here it described how I could be making money online, quickly, simply and with relatively little effort. Now, to make big bucks everyone knows you need to do more than sit back and watch the money roll in (unless your Google!), but I was after a relatively small amount! It is a small venture, but a venture none-the-less!

After paying £5.00 to AffiliateWindow which has now been credited back into my bank, I started linking to merchants. Let’s go back a step to stage one for a minute: Affiliate Marketing is, in essence, using other websites (affiliates) to send traffic (customers) to eCommerce websites (merchants). If you do this and it results in a sale, you get a commission of the sale (usually about 2% – 10%). The customers can often get special discounts too. Everyone’s a winner!

There are other methods of doing Affiliate Marketing (using banners, discount codes etc) but I think this is the most popular method. It means JohnAlexanderRowley.com is officially classed as a ‘content website’ aka A website that reviews and discussed items that it is affiliated with.

Anyway, I’m already affiliated with PC World, Laptop Direct, Play, Maplin and LoveFilm – and there is more to come! Check out some of my articles which make use of this handy money making tip!

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Multi-platform file sharing software – Introducing Dropbox

On June 26, 2010 in Business, Internet, New Technology.
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DropBox, it’s not just any other FTP. It installs a local folder on each computer it installs on, and any files placed within it are automatically uploaded to an online server. The files can be modified on the local computer, and when saved the version control software within the application automatically does the rest!

They are working on a business version which would solve the ongoing strain on local servers, and make pen drives and data DVD’s obsolete. The software even has an iPhone and iPad application, so you can upload photos and videos strait to the folder, magically appearing on your computer within seconds! You can also view some of the file types using additional applications like good-viewer, which are compatible with dropbox.

Files can be shared between multiple users for advanced use, and there is also an invitation scheme where you get additional space (although 2.0GB is provided as standard to free customers!) to a maximum of 8.0GB.

It’s definately worth a look! There are PC, Mac and Linux versions all available from the website.

Finally, check out the latest developments being worked on to make DropBox even better HERE.

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Attacks on Google exploited Internet Explorer

On January 17, 2010 in Internet.
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It has emerged this week that the attacks on Chinese human rights activists were made from, yes you guessed it, Internet Explorer. Microsoft’s director of Security was quoted earlier this week saying that the attacks were “targeted and limited” and were mainly “exploiting Internet Explorer 6″. Similarly, McAfee stated that the weeks attacks “showed a level of sophistication above that of typical, isolated cyber criminal efforts”.

In Germany the government has urged Internet users to find alternatives to Internet Explorer. In the same article (taken form BBC News) Sophos (an Internet security firm) told readers that the warning should be adhered to IE6, IE7 and even IE8 as the exploits had not only been proven to work on all these browsers but also the details of how to do so posted publicly on the Internet. Google has come under even more criticism as of late, with an open letter from security firms and lawyers asking why the security settings to enable HTTPS 100% of the time when accessing Gmail, Docs and other Google applications is so hard to find.

Google is reportedly considering it’s options regarding their operations in china. It may be that the years of strict censorship over the Chinese Internet has finally built to a head, and the recent attacks have broke the camels back. Either way, Google pulling out of China would be a devastating event for Chinese companies and civilians alike.

Not according to one company; ‘Baidu’, Chinese search engine giants recently posted the following on their blog:

“Google claims it will quit China. What it’s proved is not what the Google fans have claimed, that Google is a ‘Human Rights fighter’. Just the contrary. It’s proved that Google is a hypocrite.”

It’s a bit of a legal battle at the moment – let’s hope Google and China manage to come to some sort of agreement soon.

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