Open Source

Thank you for all your emails!

780 days
by in Auction Management, Consultancy, E-Business, eBay, Google, Internet Marketing, Open Source, Paypal, Search Engine Optimisation, Shopping Comparison, Social Shopping, Web Mastering

Thank you to the people that have email though in recent weeks – sorry I have been slow replying. I always read and reply to email’s personally and still love to hear your thoughts. I will blog about the following support topics as soon as I am able:

1. De-bunking the ChannelAdvisor Premium store set up process – a guide for those with little concentration.
2. Breaking down eBay’s changes for real people.
3. How to be the client in a web project (I like this one, no one ever tells the client what they need to do – and you are so important to the development process)

Thanks!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

874 days
by in Auction Management, Consultancy, E-Business, eBay, Google, Internet Marketing, Open Source, Paypal, Search Engine Optimisation, Shopping Comparison, Social Shopping, Web Mastering

Well, next year involves quite a big change for me – real office space and a design partner so I hope 2010 is as eventful for everyone. I will pimp my case studies here as well as keeping it real with my musings on eBay, e-commerce and e-life in general.

In fact next year I will have more time to devote to my crafty projects and this blog so you will be hearing more from me next year than the one just past.

Hairfreax – new site and restricting handmade hairpiece catalogue. Adding handmade rockabilly Yukata and Kanzashi, as well as funky obi and Japanese/Anime inspired fashion.

Hairfreax eBay – just a few pre-made hairpeices

Keirotech will be partnering with Createyourtemplate and be absorbed into CYT UK – eBay Design, Web Design inc ASPDNSF design, Flash programming, brick to bytes – on-line business integration and business consultancy. New site/info to come.

See you in 2010!

Open Source Consulting Reviews and Support

1050 days
by in Auction Management, Consultancy, E-Business, eBay, Google, Internet Marketing, Open Source, Paypal, Search Engine Optimisation, Shopping Comparison, Social Shopping, Web Mastering

OK, well this idea might not work, but I am opening the floor for such a thing. The web is all about user generated content and interactivity so lets see if we can make this blog responsive to your needs and questions.

So I am adding two new ‘sides’ to the blog as such.

Reviews:

Just so you know what I am harking on about, this is where you can email me your reviews of any web related shop, service, software and it will be posted on this blog un-edited for all to see. People read this blog and sometimes the people who are responsible for said services. So they can sit back and smile to themselves for a job well done or jump too if they haven’t.
The only catch is your eBay shop/website will have to be included in the review. This is so said companies can address any issues with you and to avoid anonymous rants.

Reviews are so important to readers as it helps with customer confidence and also to avoid pitfalls in their own e-commerce adventures.

Support:

Have a question or quandary? Not quite sure what decision to make? We have done this on and off since the inception of the blog, but if you are stuck or confuzzled about something e-commerce, drop me a line and support will be blogged.

Ask about anything e-commerce related. Humour/comedy is permitted.

*Please note this is not a invitation for free consultancy, you can try your luck but as I am in charge I will select the questions and reviews (probably group the reviews) that appear.

Please email me:

contact

and lets start sorting out the e-commerce world and make it accessible to all.

What *SHOULD* you charge for support?

1117 days
by in Consultancy, eBay, Open Source, Web Mastering

There has been a bit of a hoo-hah around the new charges for support by Frooition (on top of the purchase price and monthly subscription charge) for their eBay templates and associated services. In all fairness they needed to charge for support, but I do wonder what level of support is provided for these amounts.

I quote:

EMAIL & PHONE SUPPORT:
Emergency Email & Phone Support Response Rates: £199 per hour.

What Does This Cover? Urgent critical work that requires a rapid response.
Response Time: 1 working day*

Now, that’s kinda of expensive. If you pay 3 support members £20K a year that is a little over £30 an hour. Plus *costs n profits* lets round that up to £50.
£50 per hour is normally what consultants charge. I charge £15-20 per hour, but that’s because I am new to consulting.

Next:

Standard Ad Hoc Service Support Response Rates: £99 per hour.

What Does This Cover? One-off / un-scheduled work that requires a fast response time.
Response Time: 5 working days*

Five working days is a long time to wait for something costing you £99 per hour. Five days is not fast in the e-commerce world, not in my e-commerce world anyway.

I would probably price this up at around £30 per hour as you would be able to manage the requests better and prioritise clients.

But the next bit takes the biscuit, the whole Marks and Spencer’s Belgian selection…

GENERAL SUPPORT / REPORT A PROBLEM:
If your issue is not urgent and of more of a general nature then why not log a “general” ticket.
Although we can’t guarantee to respond to these tickets, we would really appreciate any comments or suggestions you have.

Every support request is assigned a unique ticket number which you can use to track the progress and responses online.
For your reference we provide complete archives and history of all your support requests.

Which means that for two of my clients any template/store issues will not be resolved to make sure they end up paying for it. My main client is moving away from Frooition design and I am glad because I am the one who has to fix things and contact support charging my £20 per hour……

So to answer my question, what should you charge for support??

What your clients can afford and what you can sensibly justify. If you are choking on support then raise the initial price of the ‘item/service’ in order to cover the labour intensity. Hidden and add on charges that are not fully disclosed or introduced later on a whim get peoples backs up!

I feel sorry for the guys/gals who will be offering Frooition support as their clients will RAPE them for there services, and it won’t be pretty.

P.S Paying someone £199 per hour to configure/programme Parcelforce shipping zones in a php based e-commerce system is well worth the money, if only I could find someone too! Oh wait, it’s me who their paying….should…..charge…more……

What would YOU charge for support? Open comments…

Comments closed now 06/05/2009

eBay Designers feel the ‘pinch’

1195 days
by in eBay, Open Source

We are in a rough recession and only the strong will survive. It seems as though the arena of eBay design is starting to suffer with the departure of Frooition’s Managing Director Grenville Whelan.

Frooition has suffered with redundancies in the last 18 months loosing approximately 7 of its members with Gren making 8.

If Frooition does go under then my 3 clients who use their design will loose it, just as they are about to pay up for the shops upgrade. I already have concerns over the stores working with the European eBay sites.

Worrying times. Looks like I am going to have to focus on creating a compliant store design (which will all be open source) that fits in the new eBay experience and re-work. Templates too.

I do wonder where I am going to get this time from. I suppose I have always known the danger of renting design, it just comes at a busy period when I am clocking up 13 hour days.

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