Archive for August, 2010

Business Senses…

Thursday, August 26th, 2010

Hi everyone – Gary Vine here!

Seeing as we’ve been without electricity in the flat this week, I’ve used the time to think about good business senses. Here are my top five:

1. Sight
Make sure you always have your eyes open in business. Look at what’s ahead, and what’s behind that (perspective).

2. Sound
Always be prepared to listen in business. Whether it’s music, sound effects by that guy from Police Academy, or even words from people you’re having a ‘meeting’ with – listen up.

3. Touch
Always touch your clients in some way. The handshake is a good one. Another method I employ is to slap someone on the arm whenever they have a good idea. Also, when you do it, say “Hey!” and give them a thumbs up. This combines the sight, sound and touch senses and is a 100% 110%-er.

4. Smell
If the man you’re doing business with smells – get out.
If the woman you’re doing business with doesn’t smell – get out.

5. Taste
It’s a good idea to eat as much as possible during a meeting. If they’re paying, even better. I got my first contract out-eating a Mexican man in a Nandos. There was a real respect.

So, there you have it, my top five business senses. If you’d like to read an expanded version of this, I’m currently considering releasing a book entitled Business and Me: Staying Awake In a Tiring World: Enjoy Tomorrow’s Business Today, Stupid!: My Story: Volume 1, but Anya’s not even started it yet!

Gary Vine Associates is still coming on a treat though, folks. We haven’t opened yet, but we have bought a small fridge so I can have milk whenever I want. We also put the coffee beans in there because Warren in Starbucks told me to. I like Warren, he works out a lot.

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Escaping the net

Monday, August 16th, 2010

This marks the end of a very difficult period for Gary Vine Associates. Basically, Lucy has decided it would be really funny to not pay the electric, SDSL line and water bills, leaving us with only the gas for some reason.

Anya seemed fine in these conditions, perhaps due to her rural upbringing and large frame, but I wasn’t happy. It didn’t feel right for Lucy to cut stop paying the direct debits we’d taken out together in her name. Then I gained some perspective and thought that it was probably a good thing that someone so selfish was out of my life.

Business needed to be done and, while we still haven’t ‘officially’ set up shop, Gary Vine Associates has really started to take shape. The office, my flat, looks good, especially with the 42″ widescreen on and BBC 6 Music playing through the digibox. I don’t know most of the music they play on there, but it sounds like it’s supposed to be good.

The time spent ‘disconnected’ was put to good use, especially by me, as I carefully read out the instructions to help Anya build the new coffee bookcase I’d bought from Ikea. Anya really is amazing with her hands – they’re like boxers’ gloves but hands instead.

On Friday Lucy called. She said she didn’t realise everything had been disconnected, and then had the audacity to suggest I had taken all of her debit and credit cards from her anyway, essentially controlling her finances. Sure enough, the cards were in my secret wallet along with my breathalyser and a load of hotel receipts.

I spent the next five minutes giving her a piece of my mind – how dare she place her cards in my personal, secret wallet, and invade my privacy. How dare she!

Needless to say, I now have four coffee bookcases and I haven’t paid for any of them!

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Working from home

Wednesday, August 4th, 2010

I’ve decided to work from home as I’m thinking outside the box so much I’m getting sunburn! Plus, Anya has moved in completely now and she’s happy to cook all the time, so I’m saving close to £150 on my credit card every week on lunch.

Subconsciously, I think I was always moving towards working from home and that’s why I didn’t really try to find an office. Plus, I’ve now got a coffee machine for the bedroom. Fair deal? Ker-ching!

It’s nice having Anya stay here now Lucy’s gone. If there’s one thing she has that Lucy does not it’s pure, unadulterated physical strength. She can lift things that Lucy could barely look at, and has already crushed most of the records Lucy set during Gary Vine’s Home Olympics 2008.

(If you’re wondering, I won all the competitive events at top speed, going from zero to awesome in 0.4some!)

Anya also understands my moods. For example, when she sees me walking around the room like a slow indoor runner, she grabs a pen and paper. If there’s no paper, she’ll left my use her arm or back. When I’m not feeling in a great mood, she’ll simply go into the kitchen and have a lie down on her bed.

My living room is essentially our office these days. With the big screen TV (42 inches of pure TV) and my laptop always on the go, I’ve essentially created a cinema/office/casino hub for whenever I need to watch, work or play. Not a bad way of living.

I received some nice feedback for my SEO tips blog and even received a boost in Twitter followers. It isn’t easy setting up a business, especially when you spend all your time talking about it online. I’m really lucky to have Anya here helping me. Right now she’s cutting up some ‘Business Tards’ – business cards with stupid spelling mistakes. They’re a Gary Vine original!

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Top SEO tips

Monday, August 2nd, 2010

To be an SEO guru, it’s important to follow the readings of various giants in the industry (SEOgres). I’ve done this using Twitter and a number of online websites, and used everything I have learned to put together some top SEO tips…

1. Get rid of your girlfriend
SEO is a man’s world, and you’re not going to make it if you’ve got a girlfriend who is constantly showering you with affection and making sacrifices for you. Do what I did and kick her to the curb, even if it is after she leaves you first.

2. Avoid black shirts
Black shirt practice is a SE-no. Basically, there are three types of shirt you can wear in the SEO world – white, grey or black. Each represents how good you are at SEO. To ensure your website gets the right number of hits you need to get rid of every black shirt in your wardrobe. In addition, be sure to get your secretary to wash your white shirts separately to avoid being detected by Google.

3. Buy an iPhone
Following on from tip one – your iPhone is essentially your new girlfriend in that you will caress it at night, see it first-thing in the morning and throw it at the wall when things aren’t going well. Download every app you can find, especially the lightsaber one which is just like lightsabers.

4. Tweet
Whenever you are doing nothing, Tweet. Don’t worry if you have nothing of any importance to say – that’s the point! Twitter is a great way of getting your website out their and I’m so pleased Stephen Fry invented it.

5. Keywording
It’s important to use the right keywords whenever you can, but to keep the content of your website as organic as possible. Therefore, my site is mainly filled with humous recipes and I hyperlink the words ‘the’, ‘and’ and ‘a’.

6. Keep an eye on the traffic
Everyone hates traffic jams.

7. Watch The Apprentice
A no-brainer. Gary Vine wouldn’t be the man he is today if he hadn’t spent the last five years shouting “You’re fired” at strangers in the street.

8. Treat your Arachnophobia
Google is literally made up of millions are spiders linked together by wires in Japan. These spiders are your friends and you need to set aside any fears or differences you might have with them. As soon as I started my business I bought four tanks full of tarantulas and stuck them mine and Lucy’s bedroom. I’ve lost two of them, but that’s probably because they’ve gone back to Japan to tell Google how good my website is. God speed, Sugar and Jobs. God speed…

That’s all for now. Feel free to me-Tweet this post in order to help others with SEO.

SEO is A-OK!>

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