Post Offices were once a major part of village life. They were usually in the village shop and provided postal services to the local population. As email and the internet have grown as people make decide to communicate with family, friends, colleagues, customers and suppliers, the demand for traditional services from the Post Office have diminished.
Some services like eBay have benefited the Post Office as people selling products from home need the local Post Office to dispatch their parcels. However, businesses and government organisations are using email to communicate with their customers because it is cheap, effective and highly measurable.
The net effect is that rural Post Offices are closing down rapidly because they are leaking money out of the Royal Mail in an unholy fashion and the Post Office is struggling to replace services they used to offer, such as pensions, with other financial, banking services and utilities.
BBC Lincolnshire asked me to comment on some interviews they carried out recently with the Post Office. You can listen to recording here.
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Tags: BBC, business, internet, post office, technology
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Print on Demand is not a new initiative. It has been around for a number of years. But recent news that more new titles are being printed through Print on Demand (PoD) than through traditional printing methods shows how the PoD industry has come of age. It allows out of print books to become available again. It allows authors of new books to publish them themselves without risk and for custom books to be printed quickly to respond to demand.
Digital photography is prolific and free software enables people to create panoramas and 3-D worlds easily by stitching their photographs together quickly and easily.
Will was recently on BBC Radio Linclonshire with William Wright talking about these technologies. To listen to the show, you canplay or download the podcast by clicking the link below.
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Tags: BBC, books, business, digital, photographs, photography, print, print on demand, publishing, radio, risk, stitching, William Wright
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The next time you are standing at a bus stop, or you are waiting for a train, take a look around at anything that interests you and take a photograph of it with the camera on your internet enabled phone. For instance, that poster advertising a film that you have heard good reviews about, or perhaps the advertisement for a chocolate bar. Chances are that you will just have photograph of an advertisement on your phone and a pretty shaky one at that unless you are a professional photograph specialising in photos taken through phones.
But wouldn’t it be useful if that photograph led to you finding out where you could see that film in the cinema nearest to you, at what time and buy tickets for it then and there? Or by photographing the chocolate bar on the poster you received a digital voucher which you could redeem in your local corner shop on one of those chocolate bars? Another useful application of your mobile phone could be when you are driving around an area looking for houses you might be interested in buying.
Currently, you have to get the details from an estate agent or an online service about houses and then plan a tour around the area to see which ones you want to view. But, if you see a house on your tour for which you had not printed off the details you would have to mess about calling the agent or logging onto the web to get the details. It’s frustrating and the speed at which you find details on the internet at home or at work makes it all the more so because you cannot find them so quickly when you are away from the web. It would very useful if you could take a snap of the outside of the house on your phone and see details about it immediately to see whether it is in your budget.
Well, this capability is now available through your Nokia mobile via their ‘Point and Find’ service. It allows you to find information like this now. All you need is the ‘Point and Find’ software on your internet enabled phone to get instant information. The service is quick and easy to use. For marketers, it gets around a major hurdle with mobile marketing which is the fact that people don’t like having to tap out more than basic messages on their phones. The three keys activities carried out on mobiles are search, social networking and photography. But search is limited by people’s reluctance to type on their keypads so Google is developing a voice driven mobile version of their search engine.
With services like ‘Point and Find‘ or ‘Amazon Remembers‘ you just need to photograph what you are interested in to get the information you want about the product or service you have seen. The possibilities are endless. And they both meet the ‘Want It Now!’ feeling that we all experience now. Consumers hate having to wait.
Marketers will be able to understand which of their off-line marketing collateral is most effective and which locations are most productive. Marketing investment can be targeted more effectively and efficiently. Mobile marketing will become more mainstream with the reality of instant gratification as the database of products and services are increased in these services.
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Tags: amazon, BBC, business, digital, google, internet, marketing, media, mobile, networking, Nokia, photography, Point & Find, print, radio
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What do banks do?
I get a few emails with humour coming around at work, which I am sure most of you do too. Most of them, I read and delete. I thought I would publish this one because, although it first came out in 1957, it seems entirely up to date.
Imagine a banker being interviewed about what banks do:
“Q: What are banks for?
A: To make money.
Q: For the customers?
A: For the banks.
Q: Why doesn’t bank advertising mention this?
A: It would not be in good taste. But it is mentioned by implication
In references to reserves of £249,000,000,000 or thereabouts. That is
The money they have made.
Q: Out of the customers?
A: I suppose so.
Q: They also mention Assets of £500,000,000,000 or thereabouts. Have
They made that too?
A: Not exactly. That is the money they use to make money.
Q: I see. And they keep it in a safe somewhere?
A: Not at all. They lend it to customers.
Q: Then they haven’t got it?
A: No.
Q: Then how is it Assets?
A: They maintain that it would be if they got it back.
Q: But they must have some money in a safe somewhere?
A: Yes, usually £500,000,000,000 or thereabouts. This is called
Liabilities.
Q: But if they’ve got it, how can they be liable for it?
A: Because it isn’t theirs..
Q: Then why do they have it?
A: It has been lent to them by customers.
Q: You mean customers lend banks money?
A: In effect. They put money into their accounts, so it is really lent
To the banks.
Q: And what do the banks do with it?
A: Lend it to other customers.
Q: But you said that money they lent to other people was Assets?
A: Yes.
Q: Then Assets and Liabilities must be the same thing?
A: You can’t really say that.
Q: But you’ve just said it! If I put £100 into my account the bank is
Liable to have to pay it back, so it’s Liabilities. But they go and
Lend it to someone else, and he is liable to have to pay it back, so
it’s Assets. It’s the same £100 isn’t it?
A: Yes, but…..
Q: Then it cancels out. It means, doesn’t it, that banks haven’t
Really any money at all?
A: Theoretically……
Q: Never mind theoretically! And if they haven’t any money, where do
They get their Reserves of £249,000,000,000 or thereabouts??
A: I told you. That is the money they have made.
Q: How?
A: Well, when they lend your £100 to someone they charge him interest..
Q: How much?
A: It depends on the Bank Rate. Say five and a-half percent. That’s
Their profit.
Q: Why isn’t it my profit? Isn’t it my money?
A: It’s the theory of banking practice that………
Q: When I lend them my £100 why don’t I charge them interest?
A: You do.
Q: You don’t say. How much?
A: It depends on the Bank Rate. Say a half percent.
Q: Greedy of me?
A: But that’s only if you’re not going to draw the money out again.
Q: But of course I’m going to draw the money out again! If I hadn’t
Wanted to draw it out again I could have buried it in the garden!
A: They wouldn’t like you to draw it out again.
Q: Why not? If I keep it there you say it’s a Liability. Wouldn’t they
Be glad if I reduced their Liabilities by removing it?
A: No – because if you remove it they can’t lend it to anyone else.
Q: But if I wanted to remove it they’d have to let me?
A: Certainly.
Q: But suppose they’ve already lent it to another customer?
A: Then they’ll let you have some other customer’s money.
Q: But suppose he wants his too….and they’ve already let me have it?
A: You’re being purposely obtuse.
Q: I think I’m being acute. What if everyone wanted their money all at
Once?
A: It’s the theory of banking practice that they never would.
Q: So what banks bank on is not having to meet their commitments?
A: YOU GOT IT!”
Tags: assets, banks, Finance, Five, liabilities, practice, reserves
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