Rodrigo A. Sepúlveda Schulz

why you should regularly check your credit card payments #amex

About every month, I take out all my credit card receipts from my wallet and compare them to my bank statements. it's not that I am an accounting maniac, or that I need to control my expenses tightly, but you never know.

Hence, moments ago I noticed my American Express statement stated that I paid $167.68 for a quick bite with a friend in Napa earlier this month (the second number is euros).

huh? for 2 dishes. I checked through my credit card slips, and there it was: I had actually paid $100 less, including tip.

The food at Bouchon (Yountville) was nice, the setting enjoyable, and the people there pleasant. So my guess is that this is just a mistake, but you never know.

I called American Express, and sent them a copy of the receipts above. I should get a refund in 10 days more or less.

So payment also has its issues in the offline world, with reputable merchants. Be cautious.

iPad, my new magazine reader

I took me a long while until I finally went to buy an iPad last week. I spent the first few days trying to find proper iPad apps, and organize them into something useful. As I only got the wifi version, I don't really use it as a portable computer, but as a content reader, and I update the content when I get a wifi signal.

There are a few thoughts, in addition to the current comments on the iPad magazines being wall gardened and the new form of interactive CDROMs. I tested the device in various environments, including a couple of hours outdoors in the park, in my bed (20% of the time spent it seems), sitting in a couch at my club, etc.

• the iPad (with the Apple cover folded) is rather comfortable to read, at least for 2 hours. I lay it on my lap while reading, so I'm not holding it up high
• battery life is a non issue, it just lasts for the day no problem
• the screen is bright enough for reading outside, and colors are crisp; the size is slightly too small for a magazine, but the zooming is OK. However when you display 2 pages (as when you open a magazine), then the screen is too small.
• donwloading of a new issue of a magazine does take a while (300MB to 2GB !!!), and connecting it to iTunes should only be done at night as the backup takes forever; prices of magazines is about what you'd pay at a newstand, so I guess it's a non issue. However there seems to be subscription services to magazines that offer a whole year subscription price (and you get a PDF) for less than the single issue price for a magazine).

A few comments on the apps:

1. yes, it's a bore to have so many different apps, which means you have to learn how to use each app; actually each one of them has a tutorial at the beginning; there should be some standardization on movements such as
   
   1. double tap for zoom / unzoom
   2. swipe left or right to navigate between articles
   3. swipe up or down to navigate between pages of the article
   4. double swipe up for menu (not standard)
   5. pinch for zoom
   6. navigation between thumbnails at the bottom of the page
   7. smart apps even display an arrow on each page to tell you which way to swipe. it should be subtle but present.
2. nevertheless many of the apps bring different interactive experiences to the reader, and I'd hate a standardized app for all magazines; that would hinder innovation. I'd rather have standardized navigation with a few extras on other apps. Besides I like having an icon for each title; with folders coming up, I can even bundle them together. Or they could just go on the shelves of iBooks (or iMagazines ;)
3. I like the idea to get either a free issue or a preview with several pages for each magazine ; then in-app purchase is indeed the way to go. The smart apps even use notifications to tell you there's a new issue out. That might wear me off if I start tracking several titles. There should be a unification for that (iMagazines ?)
4. I really like the double layout (horizontal and vertical) for most magazines. Nevertheless it's a bit annoying when you get more content (larger picture) on oen direction without warning. I just don't want to be moving my iPad sideways all the time. There should be a notification somewhere.
5. Apps that are mere PDFs on the iPad represent little interest (OK, it's great to have them), but addition of interactive stuff makes them great: videos, choices, etc. Wired does a good job at that with multiple selections on one page (yes it feels a bit like interactive CD-ROMs). The New Yorker for example has a section called "this just in" that updates automatically like a twitter feed. Smart.
6. I couldn't find a way to annotate articles ; it should be synced with something else that unifies all magazines and books ? (maybe evernote ?)
7. social media: I have yet to see an app that adds a twitter / facebook / addthis button to EACH article, or even to Instapaper. This should not only make the app as social as a website today, but also drive sales up for people not reading that app.
8. web sites use technology to speak articles aloud. I have yet to see this on the iPad. Wired has some voice interviews (dull).
9. I don't like videos that open up separately and not in context within the page. Magazines that add video to their pages (excerpts of theatre, examples) are real winners. kudos. The Javier Bardem mini video intro is fun on Esquire
10. Gourmet is testing a reather interesting idea : you can unlock content (just like in games) by gaining "experience points" (just like in games) by reading more articles, and interacting with it. I like the idea, but I'm not sure it will hold, unless the issues is free or very cheap. Ad supported b-model is fine for this (watch an add, grab XP...).
11. Many of the ads I read, have little interactivity (a few extra pictures, a video). Some don't even include a link to their own website. There's a huge opportunity here to create "ad mini-sites", with videos, 3D models, a configurators (for cars), links to local retailers (based on GPS), best prices (in the neighborhood), etc. The iPad is a really very high engagement device, and advertisers are just plain dumb not to use it. Any product advertised or displayed should have a link to a whole range of ecommerce options such as what gdgt.com is trying to do for tech (price comparison, forums, reviews), including secondary transactions. For example, Food & Wine talk about recipes : it's a great way to sell a whole shopping basket in one go (a bit like what macperformanceguide.com does over and over again for spare parts on Mac).
12. I don't see any forum like interaction on articles. it should be a great way to discuss with readers, add new information on the article, create a community (like a blog post)
13. There's also an issue with DRM : when I buy a print magazine, I can share it with my family and friends at home, as it sits on the coffee table. Eventually my family will probably have several iPads. I need to be able to declare a group of "iPads" (up to 5 is probably fine) so that I can share an issue with a member of the family (OK if only one of us can read it at a time), and a mechanism to give the digital copy to someone as I would with a paper magazine.
14. finally, there's an issue with the file sizes of magazines : after a while, they'll fill up my iPad, so I'll have to start deleting them. At a minimum, I need to be able to redownload them for free if I ever want to read them again (since I've already paid for them). Maybe however the future is an HTML5 version that offers full interactivity in a browser (for online viewing) instead of downloading it (offline)
15. In terms of opportunities : it seems to me that most magazines are outsourced to creative agencies so far; why not. But with the advent of connected TVs (and the existance of web and mobile sites), there is definitively a need for a full suite of authoring tools including touch devices that will make an iPad just one of the screens of a digital strategy, from the same original content. I don't believe there's such a tool available yet, but it would definitively help keep the skills required for digital magazines inhouse.

Opportunities for e-commerce : buy a whole basket of products

 

Turning magazine reading into a game : the more you read, the more content you unlock and experience points you gain

Updating content after an issue has been published (just like the web ;)

 

More intuitive navigation between articles

interactive pages

Multimedia ads:

Opportunities for ecommerce (on this watch for example)

Thinking out of the box with social media and internet marketing

Last december (2009), I was fortunate enough to attend a small conference in London, Noah Conference, focused on Internet-related growth companies. It was a real breeze of air, with companies in "boring" sectors, doing fantastically well, with clear business models and execution. Many of them really impressed me, reinventing how to sell tires online, gold online, downloads, etc.

In these days of the World Cup, I'll just mention Kentara / Perform's campaign to bring online the 1st and largest pay per view live streaming of a UK football match. All major TVs refused it (although they felt it could target 8-10m unique viewers), so they went themselved and marketed it as www.UkraineVEngland.com.

They brought a fantastic 360 marketing approach including :

• buy-in (free advertising and promotion) from all top UK newspapers (with rev-share)
• deals with betting companies (a UK specialty until now), including bet365
• press conference, interviews on press, radio, TV
• online emailing
• online affiliation
• distribution with cinema theaters
• deals with ISPs (Orange, Virgin Media)
• 11th hour deal with the BBC for highlights, etc.

Watch the presentation below:

Link:

They did not give financials onstage, but with prices at £4.99, £9.99 and £11.99 pounds, including free streaming to armed forces and bet365 new sign-ups, we can guesstimate a 6-8 pounds average income per user ?

Multiply that by the close to 600K users who watched it eventually, the operation brought in £3.6m-£4.8m  on this operation. Not bad for one operation, that could be repeated regularly.

That said, I'm going back to Noah this year for inspiring speeches by successful entrepreneurs.

noos.fr : a case study on how to loose a customer.

I've been a customer of Noos (also called now Numericable, a French cable ISP and TV provider) since 1994 (16 years), although I canceled the ISP part a long while ago, because it was definitively sub-par.

Since about 2001, I've also subscribed to another ADSL ISP called Free. Free has always given me the "best" available on the market for a fixed price at 29,99 eur/month: VoIP, triple play, Tivo-like PVR, games, digital radio, wifi, etc. and more recently HD TV. I've never had to do anything aside of accepting a new set top box regularly, all at the same price. I use it mainly for everything :)

I kept my Noos subscription for my bedroom with a second TV. It was a 4:3 image in SD, cropped on the sides of my 16:9 TV. When I finally decided many months ago to set up a power line internet with a 2nd STB from free, I got immediately a 16:9 HD image ! (I had never bothered to check before, because I have an old and small CRT in the living room, definitively not HD-ready, and the big HD TV was for gaming, VOD and DVDs). Switching between the two set top boxes on this big TV became annoying (4:3 cropped image in SD vs. 16:9 HD …), and I started investigating why, as it definitively makes a difference during this world cup. Was it a connectivity problem with a faulty cable? a wrong setup somewhere ?

Eventually I called Noos' hotline today (had to dig through old papers to find my customer number; and of course impossible to remember my customer password online).

* the hotline call said it was free from a Noos account : no clue how much I paid for that 25 minutes call. Mind you, they make you wait 1 min after getting your number, just to "access" your file information…

* when I asked about the 4:3 cropped image, they said, well, that's because you don't have an HD box. (aaah! …). "but you can upgrade it at any Noos retail store for 70 euros !" (they never offered me before an upgrade by email...). We had to change the box though a few months ago only because it just died of long life... I would have expected them to send me a recent box no ?

So let's get this straight : just to be a loyal customer I have to go to a store, and pay more money ? Remember, I RENT the box every month for 5 eur !!! well I guess it didn't include maintenance…

* so then I ask to cancel my account. 5 min to transfer me … boring music… : a new guy comes up, and says, well, we're happy to OFFER a new HD box to you (-70 eur !), delivered to your home (nice), and 12 months box rental for free ! (12x5 = 60 eur). Nice touch. But he adds, in order to get HD channels, you need a *new* bundle of HD channels (yeah! I was on an *old* bundle), that will cost 29eur (and something), instead of the 26eur I pay now, but they are glad to put it in for me at about 24 eur a month (that's another 5x12 eur = 60 eurs). nice.

(Keep in mind that I already have a TV subscription with 16:9 + HD from free…)

But there's a catch:
to get the HD channels, I need to accept a 12 months renewal engagement .
And that was it for me. Not because of the price, not because of the great new offers. But because they just treated me twice like a big cow they can milk :

1) just because I want to cancel my subscription, they offer me a new box, discounts, etc. (if you're into this sort of things, you should definitively try canceling to get these promotions !). I expected to be treated the same way without asking. Being rewarded for being a loyal customer. Just the way Free does it !

2) I can't believe they asked me to sign again for 12 months more when I'm telling them I'm unhappy they didn't offer me this before and that I had to ask for an upgrade (the guy's answer : "oh, we're doing a campaign right now to inform our customers…" yeah right).

The right answers?
step 1: offer me all of that, and not ask me to re-sign for 12 months. What are the chances I'll cancel after being a customer for 16 years ?
step 2: upgrade me automatically or at least inform me regularly in the future.

Bottom line, after posting this, I'm posting my subscription cancellation letter.
- registered mail compulsory : a few euros more

- 1 month notice required (there goes 26 euros more…)

- 40 EUROS cancellation fee ! (and the guy tells me, but you've left twice 66 euros deposit for the boxes… so we'll take it from there).

Absurd !

Hey Free, when are you bringing fiber to my neighborhood :D ?

My pix from DLD'10, Munich

Uploading contineously, so please refresh :)

The Apple Store is down... what's coming up ?

14:46 GMT+1

Indeed, new hardware:

cashstore.fr launches v3

Lovely Catherine Barba has just (exactly 27 minutes ago) launched a rband new version of her online cashback service, cashstore.fr (at last !!!).

Now, you’ll find 3 fantastic new additions to the site:

– price comparisons (exactly liek kelkoo.fr in the old days) for over 4.2 million products

– customer feedback (like ciao.fr in the good old days)

– coupons (just above the search box!)

and other nice little features: you can now even skype the team at cashstore and have lovely voices on the other side

 

Update: ans she's just back from holidays (and sent me this pix. blogged with permission of course)

 

Congrats to Lukasz on raising cash from Accel Partners

The alarm:clock euro broke the news last night. In this little video I had a chat as back as early may with Spreadshirt's founder & CEO about this deal :) Published here with his permission.

You'll see how he launched this company to compete with the american giants back in 2002, and the impressive numbers today: over 200 employees, 200.000 online shops, a dozen countries.

I had an earlier interview with him here.

update: and congrats on buying La Fraise, THE community T-shirt company in France. I'm just saddened that Patrice would not want to give it a try and keep running the company for a while ?

what I don't like about Apple Inc. ...

…is their logistics! sucks big time. In a world where DELL computers ships a made-to-order computer to you in just a couple of days, Apple takes a cool 2–3 weeks to get stuff your way. I placed an order for some gear exactly 7 days ago. Shipping today it seems. not expected to arrive before 9 days. And in nine days (a Friday), it’s national day here, so holiday. add 3 more days…

Sucks…

ps: last time I ordered my iPod and iMac from Apple, it took a whole 5 weeks (well… just after they announced in last november). I could almost track the stuff coming from China…

Dudes! Get a DELL guy to optimize your online AppleStore !

A chat with Michel de Guilhermier

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