Archive for February, 2008

Some Estate Agents have no idea how to sell

One good thing about the property crash is that free-loaders who got rich with the skills and dedication of a piece of wood floating down the river are gonna get a wake up call. Not saying all estate agents are bad, i’ve met a few good ones, but several really bad ones. So here’s some advice for estate agents:

*If you can’t fit a bed in it, don’t call it a bed room, your not fooling anyone.

*If someone tells you what there looking for don’t just show them what you’d like to sell unless it matches their needs. It wastes both your time and mine.

*Visit the properties yourself before you bring a client there. Its so off putting when the person showing you around has no idea of whats in the house and can’t tell you a single feature with it being blatently obvious. “Lets see whats behind this door, oh this must be the master bed room. And this is the ensuite… oh no wait its a walk in closet”.

*If someones in the market for renting do not utter these words (yes this really happened!) “Don’t suppose you’d wanna buy one of these houses im selling them too.”

*Dont cancel meetings within minutes before your due to meet up saying the property was rented earlier. Cause you should have let the person know before they left to go view it. Find an alternative, even if its a colaboration with anyother estate agent or firm.

*Know what unoccupancy cost rate is and value it, have the ratios worked out in advance. There’s more to a deal than price and price negotiation has many varieties.

*Never reject an offer outright, always counter offer – even if the counter offer doesnt budge on price – counter with some small value add. Discount on Wireless with an agreed supplier; discount on SKY (everyone can get 75 quid for a refferal); discount on the local gym joining fee; restaurant voucher; the list goes on and on and on. Reason for this is an intelligent person in a market with excess supply will never offer asking price, but if you reject out right its human nature not to say ok then if you wont negotiate then i’ll give in.

Changing Names

As of today www.irelandcostumes.com has changed to www.TheCostumeShop.ie.

Its all part of a slow strategic rebranding of the online shop.

Eight million Americans admit they send themselves Valentine’s Day gifts

Heard this today from Reuters – Eight million Americans admit they send themselves Valentine’s Day gifts — they may feel lonely and unloved but at least they will get something nice!

Tesco Have No Heart!

Called into two Tesco’s this evening trying to get Valentine Cards! Someone there really dropped the ball in the product department because they had NO CARDS!!! So you gotta ask yourself where is the love?

Valentines Cards have such a high return that it’s over 50,000% ROI. I ended up in a shop that was charging from 4.99 to 8.99 for the card(s) that i bought. But it’s not just the ROI that Tesco and other Supermarkets are missing out on, when your there you’re highly likely to get some spontanous transactions (chocolate etc).

Can anyone think of any reasons why they wouldnt sell the cards??

Record companies still don’t get it – And its costing them MILLIONS!

Shopping for a few new tracks for a DJ Set i’m playing tonight in one of Dublin’s top nightclubs – Velvet in Swords and i’m shocked that in this day and age when companies are spending millions trying to get people to legally download music, record companies are still acting like they can pick and choose who they will and wont sell to.

One of my favourite places to shop online for music is BeatPort and was shocked to see a notice saying that people in my “terrority” can’t purchase one of the tracks that i wanted!! What sort of idiots would come up with such restrictions – its a blatent loss of revenue. I could buy the track on i-tunes, same version, but its part of a mix CD so that’s not acceptable for putting into a DJ Set. What annoys me further is its a newer remix of a track that i’ve bought several times over throughout the years… and the average punter can log onto a p2p server and download it illegally easily. Essentially meaning that a non professional or any average Joe can pull together a better record collectionas the expense of records company etc.

Not that i really loose sleep that record companies who refuse to make available songs legally loose revenue when people illegally download music they can’t buy anyway, then they download music they could buy, because frankly nowadays they are still making it harder to do it the legal way. The only reason i don’t use the illegal way is cause (1.) i believe in contributing to the people that are making the music i use to fill the clubs and (2.) the authorities are gunning for Professional DJs that illegally download music – which is fair!

My point is Record companies, should insist that the moment a song is on MTV, promo’d or released in America (etc.) it should be on worldwide LEGAL release on ALL TERRORITIES and ALL REMIXES! If they are sharing a licence like, for example, Nalin and Kane ft Denis The Menace – Cruising (Beachball Again). They should insist that the record companies make it available and share the license profits. After all punters like me are happily paying upto 2.5 times the normal download rate to get niche music like the music in this example ($2.49 instead of 99c on I-Tunes).

Max Roam

Get a MAXroam SIM and Enjoy Global calls at local prices

Max Roam pull it out of the bag with thier latest upgrade to their service. As well as knowing some of the Team and holding them in the highest regard, I use my Max Roam daily – and can vouch that it works great.

Key Features of the update include:

· Full LIVE billing

· Local number list expanded, reductions on cost on local numbers

· Free call forwarding of your MAXroam numbers- zero cost roaming

· Send global SMS from your MAXroam account for only 5c

· Sales are 120% over targets for first Qtr.

· 5 new global carriers interconnected

· Connectivity running at 81% for QTR

· Full customer service hub opened

· Large upgrades planned for next two Qtr’s

· Appointment of Mr Christopher Kennedy as platform manager.

· Alliance with Global roaming, new group has 80,000 subscribers

There’s always loads on the blogsphere about max roam with several great bloggers, independant service companies such as Hotel Express and ofcourse my good friend Pat and the maxroam team all reporting good things. The reason for this chatter is that a small Irish company came along and gave the big bullies in the industry a slap in the face. That was just over a year ago and it now seems that with the latest upgrade, this company is no longer a small kid in the play ground, rather they’re giving the bullies reason to question their cartel. It’s is a success story worthy of any MBA studying.

Hey Pat, when your done any chance of writing a book???