pics

Financials

Here's a knotty problem.

How do you set your price? Do you charge what your competitors are charging, or maybe a little less? What about a simple mark up on your costs? Simple, if you have a product to sell, not so easy if you're a service provider. What about saying 'OK, I want to earn £xxx a month. I can do three jobs per month, so will charge £x per job and earn enough'

All valid ways of working out your price. BUT, what if you can't find out what your competitors are charging, what if you have nothing in the market to compare it with, what if...?

What do YOU think?

Hive successes

We've had a busy week of PR for NTU and the Hive.

SPEED graduate Kawsar Miah has had alot of exposure in the local media, so I'll join the bandwagon and feature him here. Kawsar is currently running his business from an office in the Hive alongside his final year studies.

Plus, we've had SPEEDsters Nathan Thompson, Andrew Dean and Dan Breen shortlisted for the HSBC Unipreneur competition to win £20,000.

Nathan is having to manage his time studying his 2nd year of Product design alongside his Mystery Shopper Brand.

Dan got a phone call early in the morning from his local radio station and honed his 'off the cuff' interview style! Dan's website is www.uni-fied.co.uk

Andrew's business www.thewiserevise.co.uk featured in an article in the Nottingham Evening Post last week. Read it here

Well done guys, come on female entrepreneurs...what are you waiting for?

Talking of female entrepreneurs, check out Harriet Lynas' blog for news on the upcoming Thirsty Thursday event on 21st Feb at Oceana. If you're curious about it, check out the blog and post your commments or questions on the blog!

See you there

What's a Wiki then?

So I finally gave in, and got me a wiki...I don't know why I didn't do it before. Well actually, I know exactly why I didn't. FEAR! I know, you're shocked. Me...afraid of some technology, crazy eh?Let me tell you a terrible story of ignorance and education...

A certain lecturer mentioned the word wiki to me months ago. 'What's that?' I think to myself, why don't I find out from the web? And where do I go for my information? well Wikipedia of course! So I visit Wikipedia for their definition of a wiki and I try to read about it. I see the first bit of techie stuff about syntax and html and think 'aggghhh!'

Meltdown.

OK. I think, I can handle this, it can't be that hard. What's a great example of a wiki? Oh right, Wikipedia! (Yes, it took me that long to work out what a wiki was, and yes I now know the clue's in the name)Well, that just looks like a big encyclopedia, what benefit would that be to our SPEEDsters? And how can they interact with that, wouldn't it be really (really really) boring? So I guess I just said nah, it's not for us.

But that lecturer was joined by other people saying, no you've got it wrong, it's not just for facts and figures. It can be for anything...huh? So I look again.

Now, how many pages has Wikipedia got? According to the stats page Wikipedia has 2,186,422 articles in English today. How do they keep tabs on all of that? How do they make sure they stay in control of it all? How do they stop people putting up bad stuff?

Meltdown number two.

OK, so I haven't quite worked out meltdown number two, but I felt my fear and did it anyway . Let's face it, there's not going to be 2 million pages on any wiki I can make. Not this side of Christmas anyway. So I am now prepared to give it a go. YouTube (and Simon C) then got me into Lee LeFever, and he helped me to get my head round it (finally) with this simple clip

OK, next question what can we do with a wiki? The scary answer is pretty much anything we want...the less scary option is to use our wiki like a yearbook, or as a directory for ourselves, and see what grows from there.

So here it is...The NTU SPEED wiki...use it!

Brands

What's your favourite brand? What makes that brand attractive to you?

After careful consideration, I think my favourite brand is Apple, mostly because I love my iPod. They have made some interesting moves over the last few years, coming back from the 'wilderness' years with a very strong image and product line. Although I didn't think the PC vs Mac ad with Mitchell and Web fitted that image

and in a way it opened the door to PC users getting their own back...

I hanker after a Mac, although I have noticed that being a Mac user makes you a bore about PCs and how rubbish they are! I can't have one yet anyway, because my lovely sewing machine and it's design software doesn't speak geek yet.

Anyway, back to branding, the Design Council published this article before Christmas, you may find it interesting reading. http://www.etelligent.co.uk/etelligent/mp-getEmail.asp?CID=30999&SEID=1358&CC=designcouncil&CEMAIL=shall46417@aol.com&T=0&FRM=1

Thoughts on the first day back

Let's get the cliches out the way shall we? Happy New Year to you, I trust you had a pleasant break and are feeling refreshed and ready for the year ahead!!

I am setting out to learn even more about Web 2.0 (with 3.0 on it's way?) this year. You will know I can see potential for many businesses, which is why I bang on about it so much. But don't for a moment be fooled that the internet makes being in business easier. In fact it can be harder. Your customer can't see you, they have access not only to you, but also to your competitors at the click of a mouse, they are increasingly impatient and difficult to please (no, wait.. that's not just internet customers)

What the internet does is allow you to access many new markets, and if you are canny enough you can do it without a massive marketing budget. You still have to have a great product that you are passionate about, and importantly, one that other people will pay you money for (!)

What do you think? Is the internet really changing the way we do business? Are your online customers really any different to the ones you deal with in the real world?

Think on...

What's your new years resolution?

Yes, this is the one and only post for December. I do feel a little embarrassed to be saying that, after all I said in the last few months about keeping in touch with your customers, and perseverance, and good manners, and customer service, and staying on top of it all and ... well, you get the picture.

My aim for 2008 (is that a new year resolution?) is to get consistent comments on my blog, and more feedback from our online and offline networking. I know that's going to take more work on my part, I will try and keep up with it.

Quite a few SPEEDsters have up and left Nottingham for the Christmas holiday, so we'll be seeing them all again in the New Year, refreshed and full of energy! Phil and I have been planning some sessions for the next term after what we hope was the success of the financials session.

I am looking forward to next year, I can't believe I'll be celebrating one year at the Hive (as well as my birthday) at the beginning of February. Life in the University has been great, I was a little culture shocked when I first came, but the edges have rubbed off me and I am a little more forgiving now. Things still appear to move at a snail's pace, but they do move. I think they might go a little faster in 2008. I am determined to make the 2nd year of the SPEED project a success , to hopefully extend it past the pilot phase. Should be fun!

Anyhow, the University is closed for Christmas week, therefore Hive will close on 21st December until 2nd January. We wish you a very Merry Christmas and look forward to working with you in 2008!

Oh, and join us in Second Life in 2008