Retired Climber

There are a few exceptions I'm sure. But yes, generally, I completely agree. Some of the worst (least persuasive) adverts and other promotional marketing efforts I see come from Charities (and, to be fair, government departments).

I think you misunderstand the terms profit and surplus funds. They can easily not make a profit by investing surplus funds. It's only a semantic arguement though as a not-for-profit can easily have surplus funds. Not-for-profit does not mean it has to run at a loss, or even break even.

They may have done that with mine too. Note to self - pay more attention in the future.

My local garden machinery shop used to do mine. They used to collect everything up and then once a week send everything away to get sharpened somewhere else. I think a lot of places do this now. Prices I used to pay probably aren't relevant now though.

Your first priority should be getting basic tickets. You are much more useful if you can use a saw. You also need to check the English in your CV; it's very poor. Don't make the mistake of thinking that because you are applying for an unskilled labour job the person reading the CV won't notice a split infinitive. Obviously you don't need immaculate English skills to work in arb, but showing you have made an effort with your CV is never a bad thing.

You got a nice shape to that. Looks like it's been lifted a fair bit in the past too.

Ah, finally something we can agree on.

A bloody snowflake; you lot crack me up.

If you want to argue about the psychology of why people do things, you are going to need to find someone else. You are way out of your depth trying to win points against me. You've been looking for an argument since I made you look like a Wally when you were posting homophobic nonsense. I shall repeat, for those who are 'hard of thinking', I'd be quite interested to see arb sites that have been built recently. I'd be very happy to be proved wrong, and find a good one.

I mentioned that, only in the context of explaining why it wouldn't be fair for me to give an opinion. This conversation came about after I mentioned (in passing) that tree work websites generally tend to be poor, for the reason made clear by Skyhuck. I then simply mentioned I'd be interested to see Marks website when it was done. I didn't ask anyone else to provide a link to their site, and only really explained why it would be fair to offer an opinion on it when someone did.

How is any if that relevant to the conversation? No, I'm not Scottish, a cleaner or an idiot.

It's very little to do with design; design is of very little importance for a site like that. I'm not going to go into details as it's very easy to sit here and criticise work that was probably done a long time ago for not a lot of money. If it generates the required amount of work, it's doing its job. With websites though, the build is only one stage; you can't just let it sit there.

If it's the https://lowimpactforestry.ltd/ site, it wouldn't be fair for me to give an opinion. Running a couple of quick tests it would seem as though it was made a long time ago when some of the stuff that we know is critical today, wasn't so important (or its importance wasn't as well known). Many of it's basic problems are things that will soon have a much more detrimental effect though, so it may be time to think about a rebuild sooner rather than later. Equally, from a content perspective, businesses pay me many thousands of pounds just for my opinion. It wouldn't be fair for me to judge a site you've paid a few hundred quid for, based on my standards. Anyway, my real interest (call it professional nosiness) was Mark's site that's currently being built as its brand new and will be built based on more modern best practices.

I'd be very interested to see the website when it's done. @Mark Bolam

I realise it seems that I'm being deliberately argumentative; that's not my intention. I hear these kind of things every day though " so and so's day rate is a grand, so he must be on 240 grand a year". In my experience, many professionals only end up actually charging themselves out at their hourly rate for a few hours per day. I myself spent a lot of time putting systems in place to make sure someone is paying me for every hour I'm working. Most people don't manage it though. Anyway, it's been interesting to hear the opinion of someone who's ' in the trenches'. No, there's no money in journalism and I have neither the patience nor focus to write a novel. I am writing a book (based mainly on the psychology of how people make decisions and how we can influence those decisions), but at the moment my bread and butter work involves advising businesses along similar lines. I basically tell people how to persuade other people to do things.

No I don't, I'm not even basing my comment on an assumption. Let's just agree to disagree as I can't see us getting anywhere useful with this. Edit. Just to add, you won't get anyone capable of doing your business any good trying to sell you such a service. Building websites for small businesses isn't really financially viable for anyone good enough to do it well. They certainly won't be bothering you on the phone trying to sell you their services.

I'm not saying they should care, I'm simply saying that there are tell tale signs that a company is run by someone who is a better arb than business person.

Is it the one that often has a banner ad at the top of the site?

I'm not confused; quite the opposite in fact. Whilst I completely agree that a company with a decent marketing strategy may not even need a website, some of the very common mistakes made on such sites simply wouldn't happen if the owners were business / marketing minded.

😀 That's the problem with a lot of small businesses. It's a bit of a paradox really; those who tend to end up running the businesses are usually those who've been good at the actual work, but are not necessarily any good at running a business. It's probably why tree surgeons websites are pretty much universally bad.

I don't really see it like that; I was doing tree work because I enjoyed it and it was what I wanted to do at the time. I never did it as an employee, only ever on my own terms. I could pick and choose the jobs I wanted to do, so only ever did the jobs that would be appreciated. I knew at some point I'd have to grow up and do something else, but I enjoyed it whilst I was doing it.

Between 12 ½ and 13, depending on how much time I spend sitting around.

When I was climbing a lot I was usually just less than 10 stone, at about 5'11. I was built for small percentage reductions, not lumping heavy stuff around.

Strange how we are all different. I love a good reduction. I'd have probably done that whole thing with a silky so no need for chainsaw trousers or boots. A day scampering around a tree in a comfy pair of trousers and some old comfy boots is a great day. I'd much rather a technical climb, than dragging a big heavy saw around the place and rigging big heavy bits of timber.

Do you actually know any consultants who regularly earn 100 grand a year, or are most scraping a living for 30 or 40 grand a year as I suggested? I left the industry entirely. I'm now a writer.