Twitteriffic

Hi members, potential members, and non-related lurkers,
We wanted to bring to your attention to what we believe is a fabulous new invention known as Twitter. Well, it's not that new, it's been around for a few years now, and I'm sure more than a few of you have heard and maybe even use the service.
The good news is it's completely free and allows you to easily keep up to date with friends, family, current events, and just about anything else you have an interest in. We missed out the most important one there though. Did you spot it? It allows you to keep up to date with us here at Exchange Holiday Homes.

We 'tweet' (technical term) throughout the working day with updates on new members, people looking for swaps, and even the odd unrelated to business updates. It allows us to keep in touch with you efficiently and you can tweet right back.

So we encourage you to have a look at Twitter, and start to follow our Tweets. Our personal page is found here: http://twitter.com/holidayhomeswap

We hope to be adding you to our list of Tweeps (people who follow us on Twitter) soon.

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Invite to Hotels and B&B's

Now that we have added short breaks to our Exchange system, we are inviting Hotels and B&B's to join.

You can add a min of 2 nights to gain credits which you can use to select other members properties. This opens up the choice even further for our members as there is always a time when we need a Hotel or Bed & Breakfast for a couple of nights!

Don't forget if anyone needs more info contact us at www.exchangeholidayhomes.com, admin@exchangeholidayhomes.com or 01579 321402, we are here to help!

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Swap Swap Swaps!

Firstly, our sincere apologies to our regular blog readers that we have been blogless for quite a while. We promise the disappointment has been without good reason.

We've been busy building up relationships with some fantastic estate agents and property developers which in turn has kept us busy registering all the new members' properties and arranging swaps left, right and middle.



My personal new favourites are the four properties we have available in Killerig, Carlow in Ireland. Nestled amid 130 acres of manicured parkland within the grounds of the stylish four star Killerig Resort Hotel. Located just 1 hour from Dublin, you are surrounded by a fabulous scenic hinterland landscape and framed on the west by the Killeshin Hills.

My favourite part though is that all lodge residents have full use of the resorts facilities. An example of which being the 16m Deck Level Swimming Pool Sauna, Steam room and Jacuzzi.

The lodges can all be found on Exchange Holiday Homes and we can make the enquiries for availability on your behalf.

We will keep you updated and list more new properties next week.

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You can now take Short Breaks with EHH

We have added the facility to take short breaks with EHH. We hope this will appeal to our members.

Out of season particulary there often spare days here and there, why not add them and if they are taken up, then there are extra credits to use for your holiday.

We will be also approaching Hotels and B&B's to see if they wish to add nights that can be used by our members!

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Short Breaks

We are just re doing our pages to include information about the short breaks, and once that is ready we will be uploading and enabling our members to add short breaks.

This will open up lots more possibilties for our members and as there are always odd days here and there available when you have a holiday home it will be easy to build up lots of credits to use on other members properties. Ideal!

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FAcelift!

Our design team have given the Home Page a little facelift with a new logo and slight change of colours today. Will be tweaking it over the next couple of days, but we are very happy with it so far!

Hoping it implement the short breaks very soon and then we will be looking to invite Hotels/B&B's to join our club, all very exciting!

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Feedback

We have now added a feedback section to each property, so people will be able to see if a member has visited and what they thought. It is important to remember everyone has different standards, but hopefully it will be useful.

Not many there yet, but early days dont expect to see many for a while as a lot of exchanges that have been arranged since we have changed over to the new system are for next year.

We have also added a link to see the last 7 members that have joined and the latest dates that have been added.

Still working on more improvements and features, particularly the short breaks... watch this space!

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Search By Month

We have now added 'search by month' so members can select a month and see what is available at a glance. But it is always good to remember that many members upon request will add a week if they have it available, so it is always worth asking us to contact them about a particular date.

We are about to add feedback forms to the lsiting so that members can see if anyone else has visited and if so what they thought of it. Will be up and running very soon just adding the final tweaks.

We are also about to add the button to see the latest members that have joined and also the latest dates that have been added so this will make it easier for members to see new dates or potential properties.

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More and more members are joining every day, we are so pleased by how enthusiastic everyone is about our website and system.

The feedback forms that we have started to send out now are coming back and so far we have only had really positve comments about the swaps members have done. We will be adding them to the relevant swaps when the links have been added to each listing.

Working on the short breaks and how Hotels/B&B's system will work, we are hoping that will all be added by the end of September. Should open up the possibilities even more!

Dont forget everyone if you dont see a week added against a property, send us the ID number and we will request a suitable week for you, lots of members are happy to add weeks upon request.

We will be welcoming a new member of staff (Matt) in a couple of week , the Head of Sales and Marketing, he will be working hard to promote Exchange Holiday Homes worldwide , so we hope to see an even bigger increase in members once he joins the team !

NB All photos shown on this blog are (at the time of publishing) members of Exchange Holiday Homes

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Adding Weeks

New members are joining every day and we are working on adding short breaks/hotels/B&B's by the autumn.

We hope that members understand that many other members dont always add weeks until they are approached and we are thinking about changing the wording on the website to make this more clear to new members.

We do want members to add weeks, it does make it easier, but we are happy to try to sort out an exchange for any member.

We have found this is part of the process as many members are unsure about which weeks to add. Msot members that have been approached by ourselves on behalf of another have tried to help and are willing to add weeks if they can.

So dont forget to ask us, it is a free service after all!

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Going from Strength to Strength!

We have had a very positve response to our new website and new members have been joining daily!

We had a mention in The Sunday Times this week (also online)
Click Here

We have now started sending out feedback forms to people who have returned from an exchange. This is to help all members and to make sure tht everyone has successful and enjoyable exchanges!

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Late Offers

We have added a 'Late Offers' section for our members.

Less than 6 weeks away are available at discounted credits.

up to 3 bedrooms 28
up to 5 bedrooms 35
over 5 bedrooms 42

If members do not wish to use their credits or don't have any credits, here they can purchase credits for the total value of these late availability weeks at £39 per 7 credits.

Although the late availability weeks are offered with discounted credits, the member that owns the holiday home will receive the full weekly credit rate.

These weeks are offered with discounted credits to encourage selection, thus enabling our members to keep the credits allocated to them for the weeks.

We think it's a great idea , so join us now if you have a holiday home it's FREE to join!

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We have been busy with exchanges and now are planning to improve the website with more options. Until all our old members have been contacted we will continue to show the list with both porpeties with weeks added and propetiew without, but once they have been contacted we will separate the list.

We will also be adding late availablity, search options such as search by date and so on,

We are still really interested in hearing peoples thoughts on the new system and whether it's easy to understand

We are woking hard to make sure that our website will be the best holioday home exchange websktie on the net !

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New members joining every day!

Lots of work to do on the new site, maybe to make it a bit more clear.

However we have lots of new members and new ones joining every day so we are really pleased and excited by the way it's going.

Weeks have been booked out and we have also been really successful with finding exchanges for members, lots of the old members are happy to add weeks although they haven't got around to it, once asked they are happy to do so though.

We have added the words in red "includes" dates to each of the previews to make it easier to find dates.

So, if you are a holiday home owner join now , membership is free !

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Getting used to everything

Well we are all getting used to the new way of working at Exchange Holiday Homes.

New members are joining every day and we have been contacting all our old members who so far have been positive about the new systeam and wish to stay as members (over 80%)

We need to persuade more members to add week/s, rather than wait to see a week they want before adding one ( bit of a catch22 situation going on) They can if they need them back take them back (as long as they are not booked) and they dont go into negative credits (if that is the case then thaey can take them back as long as they replace them with another week)

Whilst its all changing we are helping people to find places and so if they dont see anything suitbale, contact us. I have been working hard contacting other members to arrange something for them, I have had good results from this, so let me know what you want and we will try to help!

We are in the process of improving the searching facilites, so that you can see just holiday homes with available weeks, and also the latest additions/ new weeks will be shown on the home page, this is in the pipeline and will be up and running soon.

We will be adding short breaks to the website soon and by the end of the year we will be having a section for Hotel/B&B's exchanges, so all very exciting!

We are here to answer questions or help in any way so if anyone is unsure or needs any questions answered, contact us we will be pleased to help !

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Great Start !!

We have been very busy over the last few days, with new members joining and contact old members to add weeks etc, but it all has been very positive. Most old members are happy to stay with the new scheme and we are seeing the weeks increasing daily.

We have found that not all understand how it works and we are looking at how to explain ti better.

We have seen a couple of potential problems and are working out those now.

But overall it's been great.

We are organising exchanges for people and have been successful in that, lots of members that don't actually have dates , when contacts are happy to add a week or two, so we have been able to sort out exchanges for members.



Overall very good start and come on everyone add more weeks, you can have them back if you need them after all!

People are being very patient while we change over and are helping us enormously by giving up constructive feedback, thansk and keep it coming !

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Busy , but need more weeeks added !

We are getting a very positive response to our system, but we need even more members to add weeks!

They can get them back if they need them and they can add them up to a year in advance, the credits they earn are valid for 3 years too

It's understandable that people hold back, new system and everything, but weeks added are the key to making it work.

We will contact any member that has a place that someone likes the look of to see if they will add weeks to help spur things on, but we need old and new members alike to take a step and add weeks so there are plenty to choose from

Weeks are being added but come on all our members , log on and lets get some more to make the choice even bigger

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Very busy and pleased with the new system!

Been so busy sorting out the new system and contacting existing members to see if they want to add weeks etc! Lots more to contact, very positive so far and we are having lots of people join , but it's important to get photos and weeks added.

So if you read this and have just joined, please add photos as your advert wont be made live until there are any photos .

We also need people to bank weeks to get the ball rolling , you can change the week if you want it back and it's not been taken and you have up to 3 years to use the credits earned.

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Finally uploaded!!

It been uploaded now and the new system is up and running at last !!

We have to go through a few of the pages and re do wording etc and I am sure we will find somethings that need sorting out over the next few weeks, btu at least it works!

We need our members to add weeks and update thier photos and information so that will take a bit of doing. Any members reading this please log in and add more info , photos and weeks. Remember you can change weeks that have been added should you want them back ( as long as they havent been taken by another member)

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We are now changing over the system finally, and by the end of the weekend we will be able to make the new system live!

We hope that all the people that expressed an interest in joining will do so (we will email them when it's switched over) and that our old members will add weeks once it's ready.

We will need the help of all our members to get this up and running by adding dates, more photos and information or they can contact us with the information and we will add it to their new details.

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Dar I say this .... we are still working on the new system !! There has been so many holdups that we are all here in the office very frustrated ( an understatement ).

I think that the system will be up and running very soon, but I have heard that a million times before from the web designers/coders!

However, we have been testing it and it does appear though to be almost there so I am hopeful, but we do feel a little silly having told people that it will be ready in a few days about a month or so ago!!

So my apologies to everyone that is waiting ( we have a big list of people that want to join and we promise as soon as we can we will contact you all the very instant it is ready !) and we will continue to be optimisitic that it will be fully functional VERY soon !

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Well it's Monday morning and we are working on the new site. We are receiving looks of enquriies to join everyday now and I so hope tht it wont be long before we can get it up and running.

We are almost here but I must admit I didnt realise how technical this was until we started the process. Perhaps I was too optimistic in the first palce , but it's neqrly ready and it's easy to say things in hindsight as we all know!

We will be contacating all our old members soon getting them to add weeks to the system and explaining how it will all work. There is a brochure that explains it should anyone want to know more details , CLICK HERE to view the pdf brochure

Prospective members can still email saying they woukld like to join , when its ready and we will contacat them all once it is. After all the more people wanting to join the better the choice

So email us at admin@exchangeholidayhomes.com with " Please let me know when the new system is ready " in the title and we will do so !

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Getting there !!

As soon as I think that it will be ready , another problem crops up. It seems to be difficult to link the 2 different systems togther , but I think there are just 5 more files to sort out before the it works ! The photos can be uplaoded but they are trying to work out a uniform size for them and then we are in business.

I do wish though that deveolopers would be more pessimistic about the time frames as I have been told so many times "only a few more days" & "almost there" which I pass on to discover it is more complicated !
I then feel responsible for the fact I have told others "only a few nmore days" and that is not the case !

Well back to work and will update when I hav emore news !

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Well it's an agonising wait to get the new system added to the website. There have been various problems connecting the two systems togther, but I am told that it has been sorted and we are on the final straight!!

It has been quite complicated, as it will be automatic , the new system will calculate all the credits, bookings and you will be able to join direct from the website and add photos, make amendments, add weeks and so on.

This is a big improvment, and it has to be checked thouroughly to make sure everything is working as it should be.

Well I will wait and see, we are over a month behind scedule but I hope that it will be very very soon and we can get on and start our new system !!

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Patience is a Virtue ( so I am told!)

It's so frustrating , when you are thinking that it is all ready and then something else happens ! I know this is normal with updating websites and I am not at all technical so I dont understand all the techy stuff, but we are all geared up here in the office and ready for our big changeover and still it's being altered!

I am told that most of it is in place and that the delay is connecting up the main database with the new one, a few gremlins here and there. Well I hope that I can report that all will be well in a day or two ( I hav ebeen assured that it just a matter of days)

Once it is ready of course we have to get our members to add weeks and let the new Owners waiting to join know its ready, so it will still be in a transitional stage for a while, I hope that all our members support us at this time and add weeks, because until we have weeks on there the system wont work. So calling all members please help us start this new system off and add some weeks ( you can change them later should you need to and they havnet been taken)

I have pasted below a little video/slide show we did ( first attempt by the team, will be doing a better one shortly we promise !)

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Well we are still plugging away sorting out the automation of the new credit system and connecting it to our orginal database. I am being assured that it is only days away, so I will keep all informed

We have a good list of people wanting to join once the new system is ready so we are very keen for it get a move on !!

Have a look at our brochure for details of how the system will work

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A Long Haul !

Well it's been a long haul, getting everything working , but we hope that we will be able to activate the new system by the end of the week.

Ther are at the moment all sorts of things happening on the website and you may find some error/test pages.
Sorry , but all in a good cause!
Once the new system is in place we will be contacting all our members to add weeks so that the system can really get started, but it will take time for that to happen. New members can go straight ahead and add weeks, but may have to be patient before they see a good choice from other members !

We will let everyone know once it is all ready !

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Gremilns

Well we still have a few gremlins in the system, so we are working on that now.It 's big changeover so it's not surprising, will keep you posted ....still !

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Update: the new registration system has been loaded so we are hoping that the rest will be mainly done over this weekend.

We are very excited about the new system and hope that all our members will add weeks to start the ball rolling once it is ready

Will keep you all posted !

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Uploading this weekend !

Our new system is due to be uploaded over this weekend and so we hope that we will be able to invite all our members to add weeks and earn their credits next week !

If you have a Holiday home and want to join ,just email us and we will let you know when the new system is ready !

admin@exchangeholidayhomes.com

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Well the testing is almost over and we will ( hopefully) be changing over to the new system within days !!

It will take a little time to get all our members to add weeks and to add more photos and so on, so this will be a transitional stage and I hope that everyone will bear with us until all is well.

There are bound to be some hiccups, but in the long run this will make swapping so much more interesting with lots more to choose from.

We have people emailing us every day wanting to be added once the system is up and running so contact us if you want to know when it is ready to view and then you can decide to join if you wish.

After all it is free to join !

Contact admin@exchangeholidayhomes.com

with "Let me know when the new system is ready" in the title bar and we will email you when it is.

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We're Excited !

Our new Banking system has been made and the developers are now linking it to our system and testing it !

This will open the possiblities for all our members , not to just be able to swap direct, but choose from a much wider choice of holiday homes

We are hoping that it will be ready by the end of next week , but will keep everyone posted, still lots to do !!

HAPPY NEW YEAR !!!

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