Blimey - I’m getting good at this blogging lark - two in one day!! It’s a record.

Anyhoo, I’ve started to undertake a wee twitter experiment.

Why? I hear you ask…

Well, firstly, I’m fascinated by it. I think it’s both bizarre and brilliant that people will post the most random things that they are doing. It’s a complete social taboo from the very private times of yesteryear (when I was a lad, etc etc) and apart from it being a bit of a burglars delight (”hey, I’m on holiday - feel free to rob me” often reads the message), it’s also a really weird social phenomenon, not dissimilar to when Big Brother launched all those years ago. So, there we go - you can tell I’m hooked.

So, my experiment is very simple and is two fold.

Initially I’m going to try and get as many followers as possible - I’m hoping for 1000 to begin with. Now, I’m doing this in a ‘two pronged’ attack type manner. Firstly I’m following a number of people whom I hope will then follow me back. Again, this is pretty interesting as you get to see what type of ‘friends’ other people have. For example - I went through Hugh Hefners friends last night. Man - he is one lucky dude!! I’m now following about 50 play boy bunnies - all in the name of research I have to add - it’s hilarious!!

Secondly I’m trying to reply to famous people with pretty random comments to see if I can evoke a response from them and thus get some of their followers to follow me. You follow? So, if you see me tweeting some famous dudes some pretty weird stuff - don’t worry, I’m not going bonkers - just trying to get some exposure.

The second part of my experiment is thus. I’m going to see how easy it is to monetise followers from twitter and convert them into users/purchasers on Prezzybox.com. I read recently that Dell had generated £1m turnover from users on twitter in 6 months. Not huge admittedly - especially for a company their size - but it does prove that the concept works. I don’t know how I’m gonna do this yet - hopefully something a little cleverer than merely linking to products etc. I’ll keep you posted.

So, I’ll be tweeting with renewed vigour from now on. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Toodle pip!

Zak.

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Prezzybox.com is looking to employ a junior member for their technical team.

You interested?

Based in a Farm House in the rural Midlands (junction 11 M42), the award winning online gift retailer is looking to recruit a highly motivated candidate to be part of their forward thinking - yet fun and personal – team.

Role: Junior Web Developer

Mandatory Skills Required

• Programming experience
• ASP.NET with VB.NET 
• An understanding of general programming algorithms such as Sequence, Selection, Iteration, and Recursion 
• An understanding of HTML 
•  Trouble Shooting in Windows XP/Vista and Microsoft Office

Desired Skills

• PHP
• Understanding of XML
• Classic ASP and/or VBScript would be useful 
• SQL would be useful 
• JavaScript would be useful 
• Familiarity with Dream Weaver and Visual Studio are an advantage. As is an understanding of Flash. 
• Web design skills are NOT required  
• Management of peripheral devices such as printers and external storage devices
• Basic networking skills including network card configuration IP addresses, subnet masks, routers

The Role

Because of the small, yet dynamic nature of the company the role will be incredibly varied. It will encompass a range of tasks including;

• Development, deployment and maintenance of web applications in VB.NET. Includes anything from producing new features for the website through to formulating reports and queries and actually developing new sites for our portfolio
• Wordpress website management and installation, Integration with 3rd party e-commerce websites such as Amazon and Play.com
• Desktop Application Development of custom tools, for example an automated Web page generator
• Assistance in Server maintenance
• Security and office software management
• Basic hardware diagnostics and repair
• Basic network configuration

This hands-on I.T. role will go to a candidate who is happy to work hard, but is keen to get involved in exciting new projects and become a member of a fun and dedicated team in a fast growing company in the online gift sector.

Anything else?

• Flexible Working Hours
• Attractive Holiday (22 days a year plus bank holidays including a 10/11 day break every Christmas)
• Good Career Prospects in a small yet fast growing team in a dynamic and fast paced market sector
• Delightful working environment in a farm house in the middle of the Warwickshire countryside

Interested?

If so please feel free to email Zak Edwards on jobs@prezzybox.com with your CV or call 0844 2495 007 for an informal chat. Alternatively write to: Zak Edwards, Prezzybox.com, Hollybank Farm House, No Mans Heath Lane, Austrey, Warks, CV9 3EW.

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Hi guys,

For today only Prezzybox.com are giving away a gift voucher which allows £5 off all orders over £10.

Voucher Code: FATHERS-DAY

Promote away at your leisure guys!

Cheers,
Zak.

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Hi guys,

Voucher codes, and particularly (some) voucher codes websites have come in for a bit of flack of late.

Some affiliates aren’t happy with the way in which some voucher code sites are doing business, affiliates are “borrowing” other affiliates vouchers and using them when they shouldn’t be, whilst at the same time some merchants are either dropping voucher codes altogether or reducing the commission that they pay to voucher code affiliates.

All in all it’s getting a bit messy, so me and the guys at PB.HQ thought we’d best do something to lighten the mood surrounding voucher codes.

So, I’m pleased to say that we’ve developed a system whereby users of Prezzybox can either redeem their voucher code against their order as normal, or if they are feeling generous donate their gift voucher to charity.

You can see how this is done here:

We’ve been running this for approx a week now and it’s proving pretty popular. To tie in with Fathers Day we’re donating the vouchers to the Orchid Charity for Male Cancer and we’ll be changing the charity on a regular basis.

Want to get on board?

If there’s anything you need from a promotional point of view then give either Ben or myself a shout and we’ll gladly assist.

Cheers,

TBW

2 Comments »

Over the last 3 years Prezzybox have won 5 Awards at the A4U Awards and been shortlisted for 3 others. Without blowing our proverbial trumpets I feel that this is great credit to my team (bear in mind we’ve only got 15 staff in total) and testament to the work that they do. We are very often pitted against MUCH bigger companies and so far have faired really well against them in the Affiliate sphere. But why is this? What do we do a ‘lil’ old Prezzybox that gets us so much credibility? Well…

• We communicate with our affiliates. A lot! I don’t think enough emphasis is put upon communication. We talk to our affiliates - be it over the phone, on messenger, face to face, email, twitter, blog etc on a DAILY basis. Many of them are now my mates and I think regular communication is vitally important.
• We listen. Again - not rocket science but we listen to what they want.
• We then respond. Once they told us what they want - be it a content unit, a banner a product video or whatever - we do it. Quickly.
• We launch promotions EARLY. For us this is a no brainer. Launch your creative early and then more people are likely to use it. I’m sometimes astounded when people launch their promotions only a few days before the actual event itself.
• We think outside the box. A bit of a cliche this one, but we do try to push the boundaries - hence the launch of our vidibox video content units and our page peel creative for example. Basically we think “if we were affiliates what tools would we want to promote Prezzybox” and then do it. Again not rocket science….
• We run decisions by our affiliates. If we’re making a big change to the website or a decision that may impact upon our performance then before we implement it we run it by our affiliates to get their input on it. Not only does this get their ‘buy in’, but it also takes account for their expertise which is obviously really valuable.
• We enjoy it. We genuinely enjoy what we do, and of course enjoy working with our affiliates and we hope that comes through in our communication and tools that we produce. Consequently our affiliate scheme generates a large % of our orders come through our affiliates.

There we go folks. As I say, it’s not rocket science and I’m not professing that we are the best affiliate marketeers ever, but we obviously do something right, so fingers crossed I’ll be doing a similar post next year

Toodle pip.

TBW.

3 Comments »