Nomadic Media

We've been having a pretty satisfying time over the past few weeks building out the content on a couple of our sites. It's a great feeling as you take a website thats reasonably good and keep adding pages, each one of which makes it that little bit more useful. For example, our Thailand Holidays website used to be more of a glossy brochure type site, with brief overviews of destinations.

Now, with the content we've been adding and the huge list of pages we are writing and researching we feel it won't be long until it is useful as a general purpose travel guide to the country that is applicable to luxury holidaymakers and backpackers alike.

Its a bit of a shame that one of the side effects of the age or trust filter on many search engines is a demotivational factor - why struggle to keep writing content every day when you know that it won't appear anywhere for a number of months? - but once a website reaches a point where new content ranks almost immediately its great to start thickening out the pages and making a site more useful.

I often forget to list my domains at Sedo, but having received my first ever offer on a domain this weekend I think I probably ought to add them all!

The domain was related to a very popular bit of consumer gadgetry, which reminded me I had iPhone Case sat around doing nothing, so I threw up a quick site on it. Definately needs work.

After 3 1/2 years of fun, its time to go.. much as I love the energy of the city its started sapping more and more of mine - the traffic and noise in Saigon was entertaining for the first couple of years but now its a wee bit draining, I find myself dreaming of tropical islands half the time, forgetting I'm living just a few hours from a gorgeous coastline.

So, after a trip home for Christmas we're upping sticks and heading up to Nha Trang for the next six months - I'm looking forwards to the clean, fresh air, the rolling hills, the beautiful bay and the spectacular sunrises, should I ever manage to be up on time!

Being back in the heat of Vietnam has put me in a holiday mood. Much as I love Saigon I'm looking forwards to our next trip to the beach - we should be heading to Nha Trang this weekend.

At the start of the summer I was lucky enough to go with my family to Lake Como, a beautiful lake near Milan in North Italy. I had such a wonderful time that I've decided to make a little website in tribute so I've just slapped up a holding page. There should be some photos in the next day or so but at the moment they're on my other computer.

After a wonderful couple of months back in the UK we've returned to Saigon to settle down - fed up of moving around so much we've opted for a nice apartment in Phuc thinh in District 5 - its great as we still have the street life of the city on our doorstep but when its all too much we can sit on our balcony and take in the views.. and they're pretty stunning!

The view east

Watching the sun set on our balcony

Now all that's left is for me to buy a new motorbike and some scooter insurance and we'll be well and truly sorted.

This week we've been busy updating the Vietnam website with some great articles contributed by our friend Nell on the Vietnam War, offering an overview of key events - plus articles on the remnants of the war today, such as the unexploded ordinance that still litters the country despite ongoing cleanup operations, and the effects of agent orange which causes untold suffering. Despite US war veterans receiving billions of compensation, the Vietnamese people - including those who served for the USA - are yet to receive any significant assistance from the USA or the companies that made the chemical

Thought I ought to really start using this as a blog to talk about what we've been up to lately, so..

In the last month we've seriously overhauled Thailand Holidays with a fully fledged package holiday search, allowing people to find the cheapest holidays to Phuket, Bangkok and Koh Samui, among other destinations. There's also a good range of tours listed on the site. Its quite cunning behind the scenes, gathering fares live from multiple travel agents and bringing them all together with jQuery. I was impressed, at least :)

Following the success of Eternity Rings, our jewellery search engine, we've launched Diamond Bracelet, a jewellery site devoted to beautiful diamond bangles and chains.

Also this week I've published a guide to HD Boxes on our HDTV comparison website. I'm thinking about producing a full comparison chart, watch this space in the near future.

After a very enjoyable spell working at Propellernet in Brighton I've decided to return to Vietnam, a country I love and a source of constant fascination. While there I'll be doing consultancy work as an internet marketing/SEO consultant, and PHP / Drupal web development as well as working on some personal projects I've been thinking about for some time.

It'll be sad to leave Propellernet as they are a great bunch of people, and full of very exciting and progressive ideas about the future of internet marketing - I expect they will go very far indeed, and I gained a lot whilst working there.

It has been a great working in a search marketing team with such a clear focus on the end consumer and ensuring sites are meeting their needs and answering their questions, as this is clearly the direction the industry needs to take.

However after a miserable summer in England and a year away from Vietnam it is calling me back, so it's time to put my freelance hat on and go out and find some work.

I will be in Brighton for another month yet before making the jump to Ho Chi Minh City, and after a miserable summer we are finally having some lovely sunshine - its great to leave on a high note!

Please get in touch if you would like to meet and discuss your online business strategy and see how I can help you reach your goals, either here in the UK or in Vietnam.