ProjekBrunei.com - Social Media Posts

Greetings Readers! Recently I scrolled through my Foursquare logbook of places visited over the last year. I tend to frequent the same places over and over again. I do like discovering new places and visiting places I have never been to before but my Foursquare timeline tells me there are only a few places I go back to over and over again...and they tend to be coffee shops, cafes and / or restaurants. What this means for those locations is that I am a happy and satisfied customer. More than that, I am a repeat customer which means I am likely to recommend those respective places to friends and family. And we all know that word-of-mouth trumps high-budget marketing any day.

A key reason why I go back to these places is because of the level of customer service rendered, which leads me to this post - Seven Tips to Happy Customers. This is an account of things that make me go "yup, I am definitely coming back here".

Image Source: Dilbert.com

1. Newspapers. One of the first things I look for when I go to a cafe or coffee shop is the newspaper. Let me explain. Everyone loves a little bit of downtime, i.e. time where they can just take a break from the rest of the world. One of the things I do when I have a bit of downtime is to read something. Anything. I will read menus, labels, magazines, tweets, anything...but especially newspapers. I am using newspapers as an example here, but it could be anything which shows your customers that you want them and are ready for them to feel at home. If they feel at home, it means they are comfortable. If they are comfortable, they will come back.

2. Remember Faces. Do not be afraid to say to your customers "Hello. We have not seen you in a while. Where have you been?" It tells the customer that you have noticed they have been missing. In essence, you are telling the customer, "Hey, we miss you". This is a simple one, but it is often the simple things that matter. Mind your tone here by the way. "Where have you been?" and "Where have you been?!" are two very different things.

3. Serve from the Right. I used to work as a waiter in a cafe back in Adelaide. Up to that point, I had never waitered before so I agreed to work for peanuts as long as they agreed to train me. One of the first things they taught me was to serve from the right of the customer, i.e. I would take their order, serve them and clear the tables from the customers' right (or my left). This is based on the assumption that most people are right-handed which makes it more natural to move towards or turn towards our right. Try it with your customers. See what happens. Just make sure you do not ever spill the coffee.

4. Don't be over Familiar. We have all experienced it. We all know of that one store where the waiter or waitress believes that you guys are soulmates. They are over-polite, over-friendly, over-helpful, over-everything! They linger on at the table and maintain eye-contact for a little longer than they should. Of course, there is a time and place to be friendly and to 'remember faces', but always always try read your customers. It is always better to be invited in for a conversation than for things to get a little awkward.

Greetings Readers! The Nation's eight legislative council meetings are currently underway. Last week, the local papers announced that there would be an open day on Saturday 3rd March 2012. I locked it into my diary. I have never been before so I did not know what to expect. I have watched and listened to many Parliamentary meetings back in Australia so I went to the Saturday session half expecting lively discussion, questioning and debate. I suited up (note: strict dress codes apply) and sat in for the said session. I have been researching about the history and expectations of Brunei's Legislative Council since. Here's a good place to start.

Another great place to start is on Twitter. Asides from #HBT2012 (the Hassanal Bolkiah Trophy), a lot of the buzz across the past few days has centred around the 8th Legislative Council sessions. The Brunei Times and their reporters have been current and speedy with their updates from within the sessions through hashtag #LegCo8.

Some screen shots of discussions to date.

Join the Conversation on Twitter - search hashtag #LegCo8.

Some photographs from the inside

Happy Sunday folks! I read the following short article about on the Evolution of the Office by Seth Godin. It's food for thought.

                                                                                              Source: Visual Photos

Oh, I forgot, you're never out. You've got your cell phone in your pocket all the time, and wherever that is, you're on duty. And the rare exceptional moment when you are out, a computer plays tag for you.

Wait. I was wrong. Never mind about the out thing. You don't even have to be in, do you? What's the point of paying money for a cubicle somewhere when your entire office fits into your laptop? There is no in. You say you miss the receptionist? She works at Starbucks now, you can visit her there.

Say goodbye to carbon paper, rubber stamps, a fax machine, the storage cabinet, the coffee cart guy, the office librarian, the secretary who sat in front of your door and guarded it, the guy who used to make announcements over the office call speaker to find someone when a delivery came, slide carousels for presentations, the team that made the slides, the woman who carried the slide projector, the copy machine, the curator of the company art collection, the man in the suit who fixed the PBX, the PBX, the guy in the mailroom (and the mailroom itself) and yes, sadly, the three magazines you used to read every month that were the sole source of business insight.

That's OK, though, because we also get to say goodbye to the two meetings a day we had with everyone in the office, mostly because everyone was in the office and we didn't want to hurt anyone's feelings. And we get to say goodbye to finger-pointing when a project hits a hiccup, because the timelines online don't lie.

And don't bother sending me the annual Christmas letter or telling me you've been promoted or run an ad letting me know that you've launched a new product or landed a new client. I saw all of it as it happened, on Twitter.

I know it's difficult to imagine, but what's a briefcase? What's a brief? Is it something you brought with you to a chamber of commerce meeting? Or wore under your suit?

What's a suit?

Greetings Readers! Just over three weeks ago, over a hundred people from the Twitter, Facebook and Instagram online community in Brunei gathered for the first official tweet-up of 2012. The idea behind the FAB February Tweet Up was to organise a casual catch up with Bruneian Netizens. The general feedback received was that it was great meeting people we connect with online for the first time.

I realised one of two things after the event. One, I did not send a single tweet during the duration of the event, and two, I did not take a single photograph...both because I was having too much fun connecting with people who attended the event. Thank you everyone for your support and of course, special thanks to Each a Cup at the Airport Mall for supporting the event. Check out the video I put together from the event plus some of the photographs courtesy of @Earvs and @AnakBrunei from Twitter.

Dear e-journal,

I am new to you. I have known you existed from way back but have never bothered to give you any attention. However, due to the influence of a certain fellow xanga-ian, I find myself now typing this. I must be honest though. I do not know how long I will be able to keep up with this for I know that, deep down, I find it hard to keep a 'real' journal - what more, an e-journal.

Ah well. I am ready and willing to try new and different things. So, teach me and learn from me.

For now,
Del

That was my first ever blog entry dated 25th August 2004 on Xanga. I wrote sporadically. I wrote about everything and anything. I wrote about stuff I used. I wrote about Britney Spears (it was 2004 remember?). I wrote about relationships I was in (and out of). Back then, the term ‘emo’ had not yet been invented, but gosh there were some emo entries. About a year later, I moved on to Wordpress and there I stayed until 2009. Across 4 years, I submitted (a very measly) 53 posts.

It is now 2012 and over the last seven years I have learnt a few things about blogging from trial and error. I practice these seven principles and since the launch of Projek Brunei, traffic has increased by over 500%. This post is more so a reflective post and a reminder to myself about the art and craft of blogging, something which is now part of my day-to-day brand. May it be of some help to you too.

Here are my seven tips for outstanding blogging.

                                                                                               Source: ErikBrillo.com

Build the brand, not the Blog

This has been, is and will continue to be my mantra for this blog. Do I want to give my readers a great experience on my blog? Of course I do, but equally if not more important to me is the blog’s branding. This means putting myself out there to initiate things, to collaborate, to push for change, to keep lifting the quality of content, to support the underdog, to embrace failure.