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Ashley and I are back from 2 weeks in South Africa, refreshed and full of the joys of Spring!

This photo is one of the highlights of our trip – spending 20 minutes that close to a fully grown male lion was quite an amazing experience!

We’ve now got 2000 photos to wade through, and will be boring friends and family for the next 6 months until our marriage when we’ll start all over again with the wedding photos!

Between now and then there’s much going on including, starting tomorrow, SES London 2009 which I will be attending at full throttle!

I don’t know about you, but given the choice of fine wine, gargantuan steaks and seafood all served under blue skies in 85 degree heat and an SEM conference in a cold and grey corner of North London, I know which one I’d choose!

🙂

See you there?!

You may remember Ashley and I filmed an episode of the BBC’s property show – Escape To The Country – back in October.

Well we’ve been told the series we’re in starts on 23rd February!

We don’t have a definite date yet, but take a look at these photos for an idea of what to expect!

Speaking at De Montfort University last week was a joy! The students were good listeners (they had to be as I banged on well over my allotted time) and Diane Taylor, their esteemed doctor of humanities and media, was a great hostess.

I was given a tour of The Curve Theatre, a brand-spanking-new entertainment hub in the town which towered into the mid-day blue sky with a curious infinity-like grace.

I’m not normally in awe of modern architecture but could have craned my neck at it for hours!

Product placement at its finest or a bit too cutting? – http://www.veet.com.au/

From the front!

Can you see what he sees?

The big moment!

These are just a fraction of the photos uploaded by the public to a synth created in partnership with CNN and the Microsoft Photosynth guys!

It’s like you are there – simply awesome! 🙂

Check it out: CNN Photosynth 44th Presidential Inauguration of Barack Obama

Pretty good 3 min video explaining the concept and outlining the undeniable benefits!

Thanks to Steve Clayton the the tip! 🙂

When you’ve just taken out insurance with a new provider, it’s bad enough to get an email with a subject line saying:

“Customer reminder: You (sic) home insurance is due for renewal in 15 days”

But when you get another one a few minutes later saying –

“Customer reminder: You (sic) home insurance is due for renewal in 5 days”

– alarm bells should definitely start ringing!

This happened to me this week but Swinton were swift to rectify the problem with yet another email with a subject line:

“We’re sorry…”

The emails content was perfect:

“We are very sorry but we have made a mistake in sending you an email informing
you that your home insurance is due for renewal.  This email has been sent to
you accidentally by an over enthusiastic member of our team.  Please ignore this
and we are sorry for any misunderstanding this has caused.

If you do have Home Insurance with Swinton, please refer to your policy
documentation or local branch for details of your exact renewal date and ignore
the email that has been sent in error.

Yours sincerely,

The Swinton Team”

Nice customer service Swinton!

Just goes to demonstrate the effectiveness of putting your hands up, admitting your wrong with a bit of humour, and setting your customers expectations that they have nothing to action or worry about! 🙂

Has to be some of the best email marketing around!

Wonder what the click-through-rate on that is?!

You may remember the contest I posted last week? Well the votes are in and I’m please to announce the winners are:

Matthew – AKA http://www.twitter.com/screename for “I’m A Graphic Designer” – good luck with the course and remember, there’s lots you can be learning while you’re working at McDonalds too!!

Gary Robinson – for “I’m A Socialist!” – very clever play on words! Maybe Matthew could mock up some T-Shirts with his new found graphic design skills!

All I need now are your addresses, so contact me through my contact form and I’ll send the prizes out ASAP!

Thanks for everyone who participated! 

And please….no Kate Winsletesque acceptance speeches! 🙂

Further to my Woolworths Eulogy a couple weeks back, I was passing a store in Putney which was all boarded up with signs about refunds.

Obviously if all the stores are now closed, there’s nowhere to turn if you bought something in the “Woolrush” and want to exchange or refund it!

There is a helpline number – 0844 8117 112 – if you found something dodgy in your pick ‘n’ mix. 🙂

I wonder how much the www.woolworths.co.uk domain name is worth though?

How much would you pay for it?