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Harrys Shave Review – Better for the Average Man?

August 12, 2019 By Andy Kinsey Leave a Comment

Background: I shave and by 9 am the next day the five o’clock shadow has returned. I should be a shaving companies dream, but because I prefer wet shaves and no wet shave and the smoothness it brings – but its such a fuss (and we know it is), no blade seems to last very long or they just get clogged so you end up using loads of them I have grown to love my beard more and more. And lets not forget, almost no blade can get the bit right under your nose!

This all means I don’t shave that often and when I do, I use my Philips One Blade.

Over the past few years I’ve seen Harry’s from a distance and recently got interested enough to sign up for a trial – more on that below.

Who Are Harrys?

Harry’s was founded by Jeff and Andy, because they were sick of overpaying for razors by the big name brands – I am pretty sure we all know that story. They asked around and found pretty much most guys were also P*ssed about this, and so decided to do something about it – in 2014 they created Harrys and by 2016 had over two million subscribers.

Their massive success from 2014’s launch started before they even launched when they raced to 100,000 emails for launch on kickstarter within 10 days – pretty much meaning they were destined for success. You can read more about this massive marketing success story for Harrys Startup over on the Tim Ferris Blog (it’s well worth a read if you are in marketing or a startp).

What Do Harrys Offer?

So, you already know I don’t shave, I find it a real pain in all honesty most of the time. The photo above is about 2 or 3 weeks growth…

Harrys offer reasonably priced razor blades (from £1.81 each), which like most wet shave blades switch out when dull onto a long stay handle and they offer a range of foams and creams.

Harrys Razor Blade Handle — Harrys Razor Handle

They have a range of handles, I went with a blue truman which is all plastic (rubberised) though there is a nice metal one too.

Interesting to note, they do also offer specific headshaving blades distinct from face blades, if you require those.

The Razor Blades themselves are German made. With the $100M pay day from kickstarter, Harrys bought out an almost 100 year old razor company in Germany known for quality razors – it was called Feintechnik, now Harrys Feintechnik, and you can still find some of the original blades it produces in Aldi (though they don’t really fit Harrys so don’t bother trying!).

The Blades are 5 on the face with a detail trimmer, or as I use it a nose hair trimmer, on the top. Its got a flex point at the base. It simply clicks on to the handle easily and pushes off when you need to replace it.

After
Before

The Harrys Subscription

First off, with any subscription like this, always start with the trial subscription heres why.

you get a free razor handle
You get free shaving foam / gel
you get a free blade and cover
you only pay for the shipping £3.95
You can cancel if you don’t like it, no fuss, or hit delay if you only try it once and still aren’t sure and can decide later.
If you carry on your subscription or cancel it, you’ve got the razor handle and can always buy more blades from Boots!

Basically, the Harrys Trial is a win win.

The Normal Subscription, starts at only £19 – depending on how often you shave this could be monthly, bi-monthly or quarterly. The more blades you need the more expensive it is, and whether you want shaving foam etc etc.

Top Tip. If you just want the blades each order (8x) this is just £14 per delivery, that is only £1.75 per blade which is pretty cheap compared to the big brands. You will still need to buy your own foam etc, but you may already have a preferred foam or soap to use.

My Thoughts About Harrys

Overall, I am pretty impressed with Harrys.

The shave is fairly smooth, but it is no longer lasting as a shave than any other wet shave – though it does feel closer. The shave is a little quicker and feels less of a fuss, and after a few shaves the blade is yet to show signs of dulling. (blade drying on jeans ensuring longevity is a great tip here).

It’s not all glory for Harrys though. The blade seems to get clogged fairls often, and I’m not sure if this is due to the foam in the trial pack or if it’s the blade design. I am inclined to think its the foam as it’s pretty thick. This requires some real tapping out, and makes the shave the fuss it can be (and why i hate it, plus the pulling).

The handle is really comfortable too and doesn’t feel at all cheap despite being plastic. Its unclear whether there is metal in the handle for balance but it has a nice weight to it.

The cost of a subscription is pretty affordable, not least a the Harrys Trial is just £3.95 (postage basically) and then you can just pay for the blades if you want. – a quick side note here, get it delivered to work, hermes are annoying and despite the fact it would fit through the door wouldn’t put it through when I was at work… it ended up on 3rd attempt in the yard.

I love the idea of Harrys and it’s story over the past 5 years, the product is really good too – it could do with some improvement to stop clogging but other than that its really nice.

WP Engine Reviewed, by a real user (me)!

July 24, 2019 By Andy Kinsey Leave a Comment

Earlier this year, I was in a situation where a security vulnerability in WP meant that I spent several days with a dead website trying to rebuild on my existing hosting before deciding to move and rebuild what I could (if you go onto my older articles you will note the lack of images!).

This wasn’t that I did and don’t love my previous hosting partner, I did and do.

Background: CloudAbove have been my hosting partners for years. They offer affordable hosting for pretty much any requirements and they are UK based, which in years gone by has been fairly important to me – it is for my clients. CloudAbove are till my hosting provider for 90%+ of my clients and I can’t fault them or the help the gave me when I had issues. It is simply, my view that sometimes a site like my own with such a long histry (founded 2008) has outgrown them to some degree.

After some looking around, I moved to WP Engine. Partly becuase I have a client who uses the platform and so I know a little about it, but also because they own Genesis Themes and the site has been using a theme from Genesis for sometime, so it is a bit of a bonus to not need to pay for that subscription whilst being a WP Engine member.

PROS – What I Like About WP Engine

There is a ton to like and dare I say love about WPE. Over the past few months I’ve become a bigger fan of it than I thought I would be, because i was fairly sceptical of it as an outside user via clients – i thought it was fairly limiting at times, but actually what i saw as limiting i now see as a feature to some degree.

WP Engine is really really FAST!
WPE has its own CDN making it super fast once activated, but it’s fast without that too. You can also opt (as with any WP install) to use your own CDN, for example if you wanted to use KEYCDN or another CDN to load specific filetypes such as videos. As a search ranking factor, this is incredibly cool, and it seems to only improve with time.
It has daily AUTOMATIC BACKUPS
Ok, if you set them up or your hosting provider does (CloudAbove does this) then you have them anyway, are amazing checkpoints. If anything screws up you are pretty much covered. Its not a promise of a fix as i’ve found out – how do you know when something screwed up to start with, but its a good start. They are also extremely quick to restore – and yes you can download them to restore else where, or indeed restore to staging areas for testing in 1 click!
1-Click from Staging to Production
I can’t tell you how stupidly cool this is. Gone are the days of editing a database or root files to move from a testing enviroment to your production enviroment, then hoping your image directory was correct. In 1 click you can move from staging to production (and vice versa), this has to be one of the best features of WPE.
Security is Paramount to WP Engine
WPE puts security at the forefront of it’s thinking and operations. WordPress is known to have vulnerabilites (i ended up here because of that) and WPE has state of the are protections to try and protect against that, part of that is using cloudflare as DNS (if you wish) initially and secondly to scan websites constantly for vulnerabilities and lock down anything they find suspicious. This also includes preventing insecure plugins from running on websites – I previously got a bit narky about not allowing many plugins on websites, however as a full owner running a site i now see the advantage of this from a security view, that said it is also a bit of a balancing act as some amazing plugins still aren’t allowed simply because of the processes they use in my view.
Free SSL for All Sites
WP Engine offers free SSL for all websites. Again given this is part of organic search ranking factors this is a really cool thing to be offered, and makes me really happy. Its just a few clicks to install and from what I gather just updates on renewal without any interaction – again really cool.
Domain Mapping and Redirects are Easy(ish)
Once your domain is pointing at WPE it can then entirely control the domain and it’s mapping including subdomains for staging (eg test.abc.com) its all automatic – nice! Secondly redirects are really easy you just add them in with the editor if you’ve only a few or you can put them into notepad and a specific format add them to a ticket and the support team will upload them. The great news is you can use REGEX too, its not far off the normal regex format but just be a tad careful as it can get a bit trixy and the support team aren’t always on fire with this as I found out and it can take some testing – they will get the devs involved to help where needed though which is fab support. I went from a couple of hundred redirects to about 50.
East File Permission Resets
Again with 1-click you can now reset file and folder permissions with WP Engine, this was the biggest pain in my arse and I used to rely on scripts to run or support teams in hostng companies. Im happy its now just one click away.
PHPMyAdmin access
I say this is a clear advantage because i recently was informed a lot of hosting companies do not give you access to phpmyadmin. Also i should add WPE gives you the ability to add SFTP access and SSH access, both of which being secure access are pretty cool.
Direct Migration from Current Hosting
WP Engine’s migration for none broken site’s is really amazing. Simply sign up to WPE and install a plugin on your existing WP install. Then follow the on-screen setup and shortly after your install will be transferred/migrated. Its really easy and no fuss. It’s so much easier than anything i’ve used before and you don’t even need to backup your old site to use it.
Simple Error Logs
Because WPE is so security aware, they give you direct access to error logs via the user portal. It means if you’ve an issue with a plugin or anything like that you can see it instantly – no more worries about a runaway plugin or random access to your admin area. Its now easy to trouble shoot.
You can GitPush to WPE
I don’t personally use this, but you can GitPush and pull to your WP Engine space. I know the power of Git and I really like this idea. If i was doing more direct development on my site I’d be doing this. Its a great tool and advantage to WPE over other platforms.
Multiple Sites in one WPE
WPE offers you the ability to manage multiple sites in one user portal. How many sites depends on your plan obviously but its a neat feature and makes life much easier all round. Oh any by the way there isn’t an additional charge for staging / testing sites of the production / main site. You can have as many staging sites as you wish.
You can have WPE operate a multi-site network!
This is something that is really cool and I really love about WPE. You can wiuth 1-click switch your WP install to a WP-Multi-site install. Not many sites use multi-site in reality but if you do this is superb news.
Its Affordable WordPress Hosting
Its only $35(usd) pcm for a single site. Paid yearly its a little cheaper, as with if you have multiple sites. This $35 is the basic setup but gives you pretty much everything you need – and will do 95% of websites, unless you have an insane amount of storage needs (10gb of storage included).

CONS – What Makes Me Grumpy

Rather than your normal list of issues, each of these is a blurb of experience I’ve had. Pain points to consider.

Its Not Always Easy but IT IS WORTH IT
I wish there was huge note in the welcome emails that read “the process of migration is not going to be easy, setting up won’t be the easiest thing you’ve done, but the results will 100% be worth it” because it would be true. I spent days trying to figure out how to make WP engine work for this website (im still not 100% sure it does fully) and making the site faster and faster. But out the other end, it is definately worth it – don’t forget there is light at the end of the tunnel.
WP Engine don’t do DNS!
WPE don’t mess with DNS, which is fine they just ask you to point your domain at their service but sometimes it works sometimes it doesn’t and it gets more complicated as you want to add more security. I heavily suggest using CloudFlare to do dns, particularly you want to add DNSSEC for security to your domain.
Bad Plugins Disallowed
Remember I said I got grumpy about plugins that wern’t allowed? Thats because it really limited versatility of WPE, so SEO’s like me can’t do a great deal to make sites awesome – but also perhaps photographers can’t do certain things with certain gallery plugins or article plugins and actually it does a fair bit to limit sites. I get it in some cases and other sites I really don’t. You can see the full list of disallowed plugins on WPE here (and the reasons why they and others like are banned).

My Review of WP Engine

Overall, I’ve grown to love WP Engine as an affordable hosting solution for my website and whilst it’s not for everyone – I would recommend it for those with a growing WordPress website pressence, certainly if you’ve a fairly large traffic presence or you consider yourself to have a vulnerability issue.

WP Engine offers enterprise level speed without a huge cost each month, at only $35 for a single site, tailing down for more sites and if you buy yearly, it is fairly affordable. I know its not affordable for everyone but thats where suppliers such as CloudAbove come into play offering services such as self-hosting WP.

Personally I will be sticking with WPE for the foreseeable, I can’t fault the level of service I recieve in hosting or customer service. Its a little ticky to get used to intially and a learning curve if you aren’t technically minded, but it is well worth it.

BitPanda Review – Buying & Selling Cryptocurrency in the EU

June 22, 2019 By Andy Kinsey Leave a Comment

A long time ago in a galaxy far far… distant… I mined a few coins and sold them, I now buy and sell the odd bit of Crypto online and I mainly use BitPanda as a platform to do this. This service review isn’t sponsored, its my ‘cut the crap’ review looking at the good and bad of the service, there are others available so I hope this is part of your research.

The Good

BitPanda is fast and secure. This isn’t just about transactions, which are pretty much instant from deposit to buying crypto or metals, to swaps and transfers and selling. But also about the verification process which is really swift and because BitPanda is EU only adds a great level of security.
BitPanda has really low buying fees at 1.49% which is the same as coinbase and lower than the big names of coinmama and bitstamp. Selling fee’s are just 1.29% too which is really good, but this comes with a caveat, see ‘the bad’ for this.
BitPanda offers a wider range of deposit and withdrawal methods from visa card and mastercard to wire transfer to skrill and others. Each has its own fee rate so just be aware of that, but its a superb range of methods.
I’ve had nothing but great customer service from BitPanda, i’ve had dealings with them a few times around deposits and my verification (i accidentally used an old ID where my address didn’t match) it was really quick and professional. It matches everything you read on their trust pilot about customer service.
BitPanda offer a savings service, so each month you can automatically save a minimum of £25 and buy crypto or metals to this value, investing safely via the platform. Its a neat little service and handy if you want to know are planning to consistently invest in crypto.
The platform is not cluttered and really simple to use.
BitPanda has been around since 2014 and is a trusted name, its not a flakey come lately or a potential scam on the board. Its range of currencies to buy is massive and growing.

The Bad

The selling fee of 1.29% mentioned above is pretty low, however its hidden in the prices of the commodity/crypto shown – therefore its really hard to see the true value and compare it to other platforms often. This is sometimes annoying until you get used to it.
To setup a savings plan you need to make a first payment there and then, even if you are setting up the plan to take a payment in the future. Tip here is to set it up on the date of the month you want to start saving.
BitPanda only operates in the EU and this means if you are in the rest of the world you can’t use it, sorry. But it does mean they feel much more secure and whilst this feels like a drawback in some ways in others its a positive.

Overall, BitPanda is a really neat platform with very few drawbacks, I like the sleek platform and swift transactions. I’ve used it for a few years and never had an issue.

Andys Score:
Trustpilot Score:
Average:

The Hoth – Blog Writing and Link Building Service Review

June 18, 2019 By Andy Kinsey Leave a Comment

It was a while ago I wrote my “cut the crap” review of FatJoe’s content writing and link building services, and I thought I’d share my experiences of another pretty cool services I use but have held back on writing about for sometime – The Hoth.

Let’s cut the crap, here is my review…

The Good

The Hoth has a huge array of services available to pick from, you could even outsource your entire SEO to them through their managed SEO services! However, the two best services for content are “blogger” where they write blogs for your site, and “guest post” where they will post on other peoples sites with really good domain authority. I’ve not been let down by these two services yet. Another cool service is the link building services (blitz and boost), they’re awesome. – you can find all their services on this product page.
Customer service is rock solid, i’ve not been left standing when asking a question of live chat or on email. Its answered quickly and often they can adapt to your way of working, though sometimes I must admit to pushing a little too far… I have many round pegs for square holes!
There is always a great offer available, and if there isn’t one today there will be next week (usually). Whether its 10% off in an email or 50% off across a certain type of solution for a whole month, The Hoth are really good at looking after those who sign up and use their services (even if its only once in a blue moon.
The links are high quality and tend to stick. I can’t say this of all services I use, which many tend to be a quick hit in the pan on a large scale site and worth it for traffic but don’t stay live for link, The Hoth has an ability to find good quality links which more often than not stick live for a good amount of time.

The Bad

Ordering, as with FatJoe, can feel clunky as hell – but I am yet to find a system where this isn’t the case.
Updates on link building are non-existent, you get a mass list at the end and this feels a little annoying but I understand the reasoning given the scale of the company The Hoth is. I just wish for my own client reporting it was “live” or more updated, as waiting a few days or a week for an all or nothing isn’t easy.

Overall, I would recommend The Hoth as a service, it is really good – but it does come with caveats, there are lots of services that I haven’t yet tried and not everything has ran smoothly everytime. But The Hoth is a great service and for me it gets 4.5 stars.

FatJoe Copywriting and Link Building Services Review

November 13, 2018 By Andy Kinsey Leave a Comment

I have always been wary of services that offer copywriting and link building. Afterall link building which is paid for is not the cleanest of all things for an SEO, so when a company offers them together I am even more sceptical. FatJoe was a company I first discovered on a search of the web and then at a conference, I took them up on an offer an I can honestly say they are pretty good.

So here is my honest, cut the crap review:

The Good:

FatJoe is pretty damn quick at delivering copy and outreach work.
I’ve never been let down by the service and asked for an extension, nor had to go back for an amend (yet), and I’ve sent a lot of technical work!
FatJoe’s link building is outreach link building and local citations mainly, it’s not using PBN’s or anything spammy, its placing real links in real content with industry influencers. It’s a great way of getting links – even for lower DA sites!
It’s affordable (content writing starting at £15 and links from £35)! Ok, this isn’t the cheapest place you can buy content or links, but you don’t want cheap you want quality – don’t pay peanuts and get monkeys. Pay affordable and get great results.
The links they deliver are reliable. I’ve had over 100 in the last few months for many clients, in many industries, they stick and very few have been lost. The ones that have, have been lower DA to mix up the stack. (top tip: when buying links, even like this with influencers mix your keywords, ask for click here as a link or your url, don’t always go for keyword rich links!).
Customer services is top notch, any questions – they’re on it.
FatJoe also offers three free tools! FatRank (a chrome exstension to check a keyword ranking), a blog title generator (always handy) and a tool to help you embed an infographic you’ve found.

The Bad:

I can only think of one, it feels a little clunky at first. But its a matter of getting used to it.
Remember the more info and detail you give the better the results (its always the case with copywriting and outreach services).
I wouldn’t put my very very technical copywriting into FatJoe (eg finance industry or medical), it just doesn’t feel like it would suit this, but almost everything else would.

Caveats:

I haven’t tried the press release or infographic services offered by FatJoe. But I have read other reviews and believe they are pretty good value, though I understand the infographic design service has some limitations (if you have any experience let me know).

Overall, I love FatJoe. I recommend the service and while it is a little clunky at times, it is swift and affordable.

Review: Wrist Donut

October 14, 2009 By Andy Kinsey 2 Comments

If you have RSI at any level then I want to share a little something with you, The Wrist Donut, a little device that will save you money, hassle and increase your work rate.

Recently I had my RSI flare up, mainly in my right hand and arm, though it has begun to spread. Now I know there are all sorts of reasons for RSI and never just one of them alone will cause it… so I am attempting to fix various other issues I have which may cause RSI. However I spend a heck of a lot of time in front of a computer each day (actually a few of them at the same time), this doesn’t change at the weekend when I am doing other work…

Anyway with this in mind I went about doing a search for these gel pads you can get for keyboard and mouse, but I’ve never really liked the look of them nor the real estate they would take up on my desks… and I wouldn’t need just one i’d need 7 or 8 … so this solution just wasn’t practical and I would guess a lot of webby people are in my situation. That said I should emphasise this would also be brilliant for the average office worker or telesales person who spent all day on data input or the likes.

I eventaully after a while came across the wrist donut … a simple band that cushions the wrist, effectively being a gel pad without the gel pad and you take it around with you so regardless of the machine your using it works perfectly!

Now I admit I’ve only had them a few days and that you can’t buy them as a pair (they are sold individually) and they look like swimming armbands for your wrist but all the same for around £20 for 2 (including shipping) this product is worth every penny. I am already feeling the difference and am able to type at almost full speed once again… without them my type rate more than halves.

I also want to add that the customer service from these guys really is second to none, I ordered one afternoon, posted first class recorded and it was here the next day at 9AM … seriously superb.

After posting this review I was contacted by the lady at wrist donuts and a few things were mentioned I want to share. For example, should you require a little more support in one area of your band than another the material inside can be manipulated by your fingers or my rubbing it down the edge of a desk (quite handy since my keyboard was still a tiny bit higher than the normal… works a treat). Next is something I realised when I was eating lunch but was also mentioned in the email is that you can use donut to exercise your hand and increasing strength in the hand and flexing your tendons a little.

I also want to add at this point that you can visit the official website and if you buy 2 donuts you will receive 10% off, oh and you can customise the donuts! So hope over and visit WristDonut.com and give them a try for yourself.