Items for sale
March 26th, 2008
Measuring the effectiveness of email campaign
March 26th, 2008
Buying electronic components online is not something new. RS Malaysia, one of the pioneer in Malaysia who setup their first online store many years ago, are improving from time to time. I am happy to see that as they gradually gather users feedback and improve the website.
Just one thing, I received their email newsletter today. Sadly, I can’t find any link from the email to their website. In Analytics, we refer clicks from email newsletter as Referral. With the link properly implemented, it can give us a better ideas of how effective is this channel in bringing traffic to your site.
You may want to take a look at our related postsClicks and Conversion
March 21st, 2008
It’s been said many times and I shall say this again:
Conversion rate is inversely related to the clicks required to get things done.
Though simplicity is not a necessity, it’s definitely a virtue when attention span is getting shorter every second.
Show your customers you are sincere in helping them out.
You may want to take a look at our related postsGoogle to pay $3.1 bln for DoubleClick
March 19th, 2008

Another giant online deal was struck between DoubleClick and Google.
SAN FRANCISCO, April 13 (Reuters) - Google Inc. said on Friday it would pay $3.1 billion for Web ad supplier DoubleClick Inc., its biggest acquisition, accelerating a push into the graphic ad market led by Yahoo Inc.
The juggernaut of Web search-based advertising beat out suitors Microsoft Corp. (MSFT.O: Quote, Profile, Research) and Yahoo in the final stages, sources familiar with the negotiations said. Time Warner Inc.’s AOL online unit had earlier considered a bid.
The agreed price represents a huge payday for San Francisco private equity firm Hellman & Friedman, DoubleClick’s majority owner, which 21 months ago paid $335 million for the assets acquired by Google, a source familiar with the deals said.
With this new acquisition, Google will further strengthen their leadership in the world of web advertising.
Here’s the official press release from Google…
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., April 13, 2007 - Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) announced today a definitive agreement to acquire DoubleClick Inc., a global leader in digital marketing technology and services, for $3.1 billion in cash from San Francisco-based private equity firm Hellman & Friedman along with JMI Equity and management. The acquisition will combine DoubleClick’s expertise in ad management technology for media buyers and sellers with Google’s leading advertising platform and publisher monetization services.
The combination of Google and DoubleClick will offer superior tools for targeting, serving and analyzing online ads of all types, significantly benefiting customers and consumers:
* For users, the combined company will deliver an improved experience on the web, by increasing the relevancy and the quality of the ads they see.
* For online publishers, the combination provides access to new advertisers, which creates a powerful opportunity to monetize their inventory more efficiently.
* For agencies and advertisers, Google and DoubleClick will provide an easy and efficient way to manage both search and display ads in one place. They will be able to optimize their ad spending across different online media using a common set of metrics.“It has been our vision to make Internet advertising better - less intrusive, more effective, and more useful. Together with DoubleClick, Google will make the Internet more efficient for end users, advertisers, and publishers,” said Sergey Brin, Google’s Co-Founder and President, Technology.
“DoubleClick’s technology is widely adopted by leading advertisers, publishers and agencies, and the combination of the two companies will accelerate the adoption of Google’s innovative advances in display advertising,” said Eric Schmidt, Chief Executive Officer of Google.
“This transaction will strengthen our advertising network by expanding our access to publisher inventory and enabling us to serve the needs of a broader set of advertisers and ad agencies,” said Tim Armstrong, Google’s President, Advertising and Commerce, North America.
“Google is the absolute perfect partner for us,” said David Rosenblatt, Chief Executive Officer of DoubleClick. “Combining DoubleClick’s cutting edge digital solutions for both media buyers and sellers with Google’s scale and innovative resources will bring tremendous value to both our employees and clients.”
“When we acquired DoubleClick in July 2005, we saw an opportunity to partner with a great management team to further enhance the company’s capabilities and growth trajectory,” said Philip Hammarskjold, Managing Director of Hellman & Friedman. “This transaction affirms the successful transformation of DoubleClick, positions the firm for the future, and greatly benefits our investors.”
Both companies have approved the transaction, which is subject to customary closing conditions, and is expected to close by the end of the year.
Of course, not everyone is happy with what Google is doing with the customer profiles they will be taking over from DoubleClick.
“Google will operate with virtually no legal obligation to ensure the privacy, security and accuracy of the personal data that it collects. At this time, there is simply no consumer privacy issue more pressing for the commission to consider than Google’s plan to combine the search histories and Web site visit records of Internet users,” the complaint says.
In 1999, DoubleClick drew criticism when it announced a plan to merge an offline database of consumer records with its online user-history database. The ensuing uproar and a 2000 FTC complaint filed by EPIC led DoubleClick to cancel the plan, but since then, the online ad industry has become more sophisticated.
The consumer groups also want the FTC to order DoubleClick and Google to destroy cookies that can identify users and to order Google to give people access to the personally identifiable data the company keeps on them.
With Yahoo and Microsoft eyeing for web dominance, this new acquisition might just land Google with lots of anti-trust lawsuits…
You may want to take a look at our related postsConneting LAN remotely with OpenVPN
March 19th, 2008
Finally, VPN for our office was in place. This means we are another step closer to working from office. VPN allows me to access to our LAN remotely!
We use OpenVPN. It comes with VPN server & client together. VPN server was installed in our Linux box inside LAN. Since most of the clients connecting to the VPN server are notebooks running Win XP, therefore will use Windows GUI version of OpenVPN.
If you are interested to setup one, you can refer to this HOWTO, which I feel it is most helpful! Few things, remember to allow port forwarding in your router, and also make sure no firewall blocking the client and server.
Including multiple machines on the server side
http://openvpn.net/archive/openvpn-users/2006-02/msg00252.html
Passion is the best customer support!
March 19th, 2008
Recently, I was looking for the latest Redhat Enterprise 5, to be used for our new projects. Redhat Enterprise comes with their technical support (yearly subscription) which we hardly use, but that is what you are paying for, not the software.
I emailed to one of the Redhat official office in Malaysia, never get a reply (we are kinda used with this, it happens to AirAsia too). Leaving no choice, I tried my luck emailing Magnifix Malaysia. I bought Redhat Linux 3 from them before, 7 years back during my University days.
The good people in Magnifix replied me and advise me how to go around with this. They even introduce the alternative CentOS platform which is compiled from the same Redhat Enterprise source. In a short 2 days, I have received 3 emails from their team…
All these are not going through any complicated helpdesk system which dump you with ticket number to scare you off than helping you… but genuine people who has the passion in their work, and trying to help! Bravo, Magnifix!
You may want to take a look at our related postsSquidoo’s inevitable destiny
March 15th, 2008
Seth Godin’s books are our bibles. When Seth started his new project, Squidoo, we are as excited as him. The building of a knowledge base with Seth’s ‘lens concept’ is pretty interesting. Yet, it is never easy for a market already dominated by Wiki, and the coming Google Knol project!
Looking back, we have started our Kumomo project a year ago. We are ambitious to believe it would taking up and to serve as an Ad Space Marketplace for everyone. It nearly become the albatross around our neck. The file closed when we sell the domain name and successfully funded two schools in Cambodia!
It seems that everyone is finding their way to create their own version of Web 2.0 project. Who will be the next FaceBook or Bebo? :)
You may want to take a look at our related postsEveryone loves to share
March 15th, 2008
Google has done their part to make searching of information more easily. Yet, do we have the tool to easily share our knowledge? The answer could be, NO!
Everyone possess useful knowledge, or having feedback about anything they come across. Can you tell how many of your visitors actually read your post and reply? Why not 100%? Could it because of the unfriendly Leave a Reply form at the bottom of your post?
You may want to take a look at our related postsNo frills online florist
March 13th, 2008

The concept of no frills works so well with AirAsia, TuneHotels, why not on florist?
We are looking for Florist Partner!
You may want to take a look at our related postsWhat’s the cost of an online business?
March 13th, 2008

It is important to understand what are the fixed cost associated with an online business. The following are an example of cost breakdown for an small-medium scale online business for your reference,
Setting up
Hardware, backup, setting up servers (RM20k)
Trademarks and copyright (RM10k)
System development (RM800k)
Monthly operation
Co-location, email hosting, domain name (RM2k)
Customer support, 24×7 (RM10k)
System maintenance (RM5k)
SSL certificate (RM50)
Monthly marketing budget
Online & offline campaigns (RM5k)
It’s never too late to change a bad name
March 3rd, 2008
I was reading our partner, Pat’s Blog. Pat started Webmail.us and we have been working with him to provide email hosting services in Malaysia for more than 4 years!
Recently, they have changed their company name from, Webmail.us to Mailtrust! Through lot of time, energy and money were spent over the years for the branding of this domain, but the hard decision was made recently and this is what Pat wrote,
But then one of my business mentors said something I will never forget. He said, “Pat, it’s never too late to change a bad name.” He’s right. As soon as I heard him say that, I never looked back.
The word Webmail is too generic as a brand by itself. It does not accumulate values over the years unlike many other names such as YouTube, Facebook, and a lot.
Good move, Pat!
You may want to take a look at our related postsBooks & stationery to donate!
March 1st, 2008
We will be making a trip to Cambodia on the coming October to officially launch the Kumomo Schools, Cambodia build school by Bernad Krisher. We wish to take this opportunity to call for your help if you have any English story books or stationery to be donated to the students.
On behalf of the students, we wish to thank you for your generous help!
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