It’s been pretty quite on this blog recently and that coincides with my new role at my primary place of work. I now manage the entire Project Services Group (PSG) which comprises of a Business Analysis team, a Projects Office and a development team.

It’s pretty hard work and it’s left little time for my casual “mojofactory” clients and this blog. But I now that I am settling into the position I am hoping to find time again for the things I love (including mojofactory).

One thing that is essential to my new role is the immediate need to re prioritize my work, keep track of what I’m doing so that I don’t forget something, or someone, important and to get even better at time management.

Given I have been a project manager for many years all of this is second nature to me now, however, now I need to take it to a whole new level. This is where my tools come in handy and I thought I would share these with you in case you are looking for something to help make your day easier to track and manage.

1. iPhone – the tool that keeps me in touch, and online all the time
2. iBlueSky – keeping a record of what it is I have to do
3. Outlook – my calendar! and my email
4. Outlook Tasks for my iPhone – syncronisation with my desktop outlook and my sharepoint/infopath workflows
5. WordPress for the iPhone – I wouldn’t be typing this unless I had it

Without the wonderful tools above, I would never remember where I had to be, what I was supposed to be doing when I was there, or be in constant contact with my teams.

I would love to hear what personal tools you use to make your day more manageable. Comment here and share.

If you haven’t heard about the Australian Federal Governments Internet Censorship trial, then you probably should find out about it because it will effect what you can see, what you can hear and how fast your internet connection will be.

The plan is that the Federal Government will regulate what internet traffic and material can be served to the Australian people via their internet connection. Basically whatever the Government deems ‘inappropriate’ will be blocked, and this is done by simply adding any ‘unwanted’ site to a secret blacklist.

Testing has already begun on systems that will slow our internet by up to 87%, make it more expensive, miss the vast majority of inappropriate content and accidentally block up to 1 in 12 legitimate sites. Our children deserve better protection – and that won’t be achieved by wasting millions on this deeply flawed system.

GetUp – an independent, grass-roots community advocacy organisation which gives everyday Australians opportunities to get involved and hold politicians accountable on important issues – has recently released this video spoof that they plan to air on television programs that the politicians themeselves watch, in the hope that it will prompt them to think twice about approving any legislation that will allow the Federal Government to implement their plan.

I love it, and I hope it will educate and help people understand how absurd the idea is.

If you like what you see, and agree that the Internet should not be filtered by the Federal Government, please visit the GetUp campaign for more information on how you can help: GetUp Censordyne campaign

Believe it or not, the average time the average “potential” customer spends on a website is 60 seconds. Thats not very long to guide your customer to the right place on your site, give them the sales pitch and close the deal is it? 

So what can you do to ensure that you make the very most out of that magic 60 seconds?

Show them what you’ve got

It never ceases to amaze me how much money people are willing to spend to create their website, advertise their address only to confuse the visitor by not making it immediately clear that they are at the right place once they’ve arrived. 

You must make it obvious to people what you are offering. In the first few seconds they will determine whether the product they want is going to be on the site, or if they have been duped into going to the wrong place.

Finding what they want

It goes without saying that your website needs to be intuitive, straightforward and to the point.

Think of your site as shopping isles in the super market. Imagine each isle is a single page of your website… make sure the related items are together, and that each page has its own purpose. If you use categorisation to associate products, show only one category per page.

Don’t make people click around to find out about you or your products or services. Summarise on your home page the key products or services which you offer, with clear lead-ins to more detailed descriptions further into your site.

Getting in touch

Make it easy for people to contact you. A recent survey showed that up to 50% of the people that visit the site will navigate away if there is no obvious way they can contact the owner if the product they buy has a problem.

The phone number is often one of the most important pieces of information on a website; make it clear and obvious, throughout your entire site.  A good rule of thumb is that it should be at the top of each and every page, be prominant and large.

Summary

There is more to making your website a success than ensuring your site design covers these three things. However, if you dont get the basics right, your clients will be “gone in 60 seconds” no matter how good your product or price is.

While almost every economy in the world is in recession and businesses across the globe are worrying whether they can keep their head above water, it appears that the news is not all bad. According to IMRG and Capgemini, growth in e-retail is expected to be around 15% in 2009 despite the financial turmoil.

I almost didnt believe it, so I contacted my e-commerce clients and asked them how they were performing. Almost all of them said that their sales were performing poorer than expected, but all of them reported sales growth over this time last year (on average 6%).

So why are e-commerce sites able to buck the economic trend? The answer is that even though consumers were spending less, more and more shoppers were going on-line to do what shopping they were doing.

I did a quick survey of my friends and family to find out if they were indeed spending their hard earned dollars online when they were normally the “bricks and mortar” type spenders.

The results showed that even the older generations were showing a definate move toward shopping online and almost all of them agreed it was because they felt could no longer afford to pay the high street prices, and instead were shopping around “On-line” to find the best bargains.

In addition, many of them felt that now they were becoming “expert online shoppers”, they were unlikely to return to the high streets for their big purchases when the economy returned to normal levels.

This is definately good news for future e-commerce shop owners.