Great piece of eMarketing

It's Alan's birthday this month (all together now, Happy Birthday to you...) and on the first of the month (yes, that's today, this blog really is hot off the press) he got an email from Waterstone's (he's a loyalty card customer with them) saying that as it was his birthday this month they'd treat him to £5 off his next purchase (when he spends £25 or more) before 14th December.

This is a great piece of eMarketing, we love it. OK, so they had to collect his date of birth as part of the loyalty card application process, but then they've used it in a brilliant way - he feels they've remembered his birthday and he's being given a present, they get a £20 purchase (within quite a tight timeframe) that he probably wouldn't otherwise have made... everyone's a winner! And everyone feels good.

Tip for all of our clients, particularly in eCommerce - if you collect data about your customers, make sure you use it to market to them, and do it imaginitively!

By Kate Wooding
Published: 1 December 2008
1 Comment

Hot off the press

Our very own Tom Beddard wrote a letter to NMA ages ago (in response to an article back in July about Ruby and Rails) - so long ago in fact that we'd given up hope of seeing it in print. And yet, yesterday, there it was in all its full colour glory. We thought we'd share our pride (and his opinions) with you.

I'd like to echo David Heinemeier Hansson's words that Ruby on Rails is great for developing more than just community sites (NMA 10.07.08). At tictoc we've used it to develop more than 200 websites, including ecommerce, and it has won us over. We now use it exclusively and are convinced it has advantages over .Net and Java. We've never experienced problems with scaling and the open-source background has been a benefit, not a problem. We find that Ruby (and Rails) allows us to be the organisation we want to be - a real mix of creative and technical - and to produce sites that don't compromise on design or functionality.

As the biggest Rails agency in Scotland, we're keen to foster the community. So if any fellow Rails enthusiasts want to drop in for a chat, please do, or find us at the next ScotRUG meet. We want Rails to take off and would urge more clients to consider it, and more developers to experience the flexibility it offers. For now, it's a chance for specialists to get ahead of the big boys.                            Author: Tom Beddard, technical director, tictoc Family  Published: 11.09.08

By Kate Wooding
Published: 12 September 2008
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Aaah the old ones are the best!

I was reading a wee article recently and it made me smile so I thought I'd share it with you all!

A man walks into a butchers and says "is that yer Ayshire Bacon?" to which the butcher replies," Naw, it's ma hands a'm warmin'!!!!

For those who don't get it, pop up a reply and I'll explain!!

Here's another one my Mum rattled off over dinner:

Did you hear the one about the Sea Scouts?   .....their tent sank!!!

Sorry, I know these are childish but those of you who know me will know that's me!!!

By Melanie Russell
Published: 3 September 2008
1 Comment

The family gets feline

This weekend Muffin and Cheeky joined my household, and are settling in nicely - and taking all the best seats on the sofa as this pic shows (yes, I clearly chose them to match my furnishings).

By Kate Wooding
Published: 21 August 2008
1 Comment

Trouble at tictoc

There was trouble at tictoc this week when Andrew challenged the "you can't hit a man wearing glasses" rule.

p.s. No developers were harmed in the making of this photograph.

By Fiona Dorman
Published: 8 August 2008
2 Comments

Olden days

Colin's parents found a picture of Newton Terrace in the good ole days. It was in a book, possibly an old book - sorry I can't be more specific. Anyway, it shows the other end of Newton Terrace (home of tictoc's Glasgow office) which used to belong to Henry Samuel & Sons, furriers. Cue much excitement about Newton Terrace being the birthplace of the high street chain of jewellers (furs and diamonds are both luxury goods after all), but a little research on Wikipedia showed us this was unlikely. Ho hum.

By Kate Wooding
Published: 9 May 2008
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Birthday Present Roulette

There has been a recent spate of birthdays at tictoc towers with Drew, David and Tom all celebrating getting another year older! The quality of birthday presents received has however varied enormously.

Tom was deighted with the robot that his boy's had made for him, Drew's bookshelves were stocked up with what sounds like a very interesting collection of books and David......well David's star present was a Pot Noodle (complete with bow)!

This started us thinking about best and worst presents we'd ever received. Whilst some of us couldn't remember what Santa had brought us this year let alone create a present Top 10, others were happy to share:

Mel
For my 16th birthday (I think) just when you're at that really annoying teenager stage when everything in life is "so unfair" my main birthday present was an Encyclopedia!! Imagine my excitement!!! Those totally impractical, cheap rubbish stiletto shoes and bat wing sleeve jacket would have to wait for another year! My most traumatic present issue has to be when I was around 4 or 5 and wanted a real silver cross bouncy pram like the lady next door had (mine would have been child sized obviously!), came downstairs and what did I get? a wee plastic buggy with orange and pink flowers that wouldn't last the week never mind the year!! gutted to this day!!

Alan
Aedan was born just after my birthday so he was my best, aaawww.

Paul
Best present. My first skateboard when I was 11. Got a skateboard for my birthday and christmas every year after that and still am. Don't think i've ever had anything i considered bad. In my book anything that's free is good.

Kerry
Best present has to be my Dyson that was initially bought as a joke but turned out to be a surprise hit - love it! Presents that year also included Nigella Lawson's 'How to be a Domestic Goddess' now that in my opinion is a rubbish present and after gathering dust for the past few years I'm sure it will soon be looking for a new home via the local charity shop.

By Kerry Reid
Published: 14 March 2008
1 Comment

tictoc DevELFopers go mad

Here's a little insight into the mindset of some of our web developers!

tictoc DevELFopers

By Melanie Russell
Published: 10 December 2007
6 Comments

Mel the Great

By Super Administrator
Published: 25 September 2007
0 Comments