This and That on a Friday

Posted On: 2007-09-21

Well with a title like that it obviously means that another week has come and all but gone. Here in our neck of the woods it's been an amazing time with incoming work hitting the point where we're struggling to keep up with the demand. If it goes on increasing at this rate it won't be long before we'll be looking at trimming back our client list.

While that may sound rather strange I think there is a danger for small businesses that work in a specialized area to become just too busy. Not only do your workers get burnt out but you have to reach a point where you're missing deadlines and your customers are becoming less and less satisfied as your inability to fill their orders in a timely manner gets more noticeable.

Of course we could always take on more workers but the quality and reliability of many of those who are interested in working for us is less than impressive. I've found that people who often cry for work on the boards soon lose interest when you give them the work they seem to be looking for. It obvious that they like the money but putting in the effort to actually earn it is a bit beyond some of them.

Quite frankly reaching a point where I would be turning away clients is not a point I ever thought I would reach and now I'm just about there it's looking rather scary.

The falling value of the dollar
The falling value of the dollar has got something to do with the decisions I've got to make. It's now possible for my business to make as much here at home as it makes from work that pays in US dollars and, while the exchange rate has been poor in the past, it's not been that way since I started my business.

I notice it's affecting others out there too. Of course there have been plenty of affiliates complaining about the poor exchange rate but up until now content providers have been rather quiet. This morning I noticed one photographer from Europe announcing that he would only be selling his work in Euros from now on.

That's going to increase the price of content for American sponsors and of course it brought out one very minor sponsor who suggested that situation was good for American photographers. I guess it will be good for them as long as those photographers can produce content that is of the same high quality as what's coming out of Europe. If it isn't it won't be long before sponsors may either have to pay for the more expensive content or face the possibility of losing sales.

Even Google can't get it right
Earlier this week Google ran a webinar here in Australia for Adsense publishers. Google anticipated that there would be lots of interest so the scheduled two sessions. It really was something that we wanted to be part of so we registered in plenty of time for the first session and we were notified of our acceptance and given a link to that we needed to follow on the day to have access to the webinar.

At the appointed time we clicked link and found ... like many others ... that we were looking at the entry page for the later webinar even though the email from Google plainly stated that this was the link for the early session. Oh well ... too bad ... but then things got a little comical.

Later that evening I was checking my email and there was one from Google advising us that quite a few people had experienced the same problem as we had and so Google had decided to allow us to attend the later session. That was all well and good except for one slight problem ... the email didn't arrive until after the later session had finished.

For some reason I expected much more of Google.

Mobile Adsense
While we're talking about Google it's interesting to note that some publishers are being invited to take Adsense to those who access the Net via mobile phones and hand-held devices. It's interesting because the Apple iPhone is about to go international. Apple has been busy in the last few weeks setting up deals with European carriers. They've joined with Orange in France, T-Mobile in Germany and I think they've also linked up with a carrier in the UK.

That means that more people will be doing some surfing via their phones so it may just be worthwhile to take Google up on their Adsense invitation. It also means that local search will become more important in those countries too and that's something else that you should be taking advantage of.

And that's it for this week; I love to be able to say that I was taking the weekend off but that's just not going to happen. Instead we'll be working flat out ... except when we're taking a walk on the beach - you can't live in a sub-tropical paradise without hitting the beach sometime over the weekend.