Lately, Match.com has been sending me invitations to communicate with single people in my area.
The Internet is a wonderful thing. I receive so many lovely invitations. This one I think is unnecessary. I already know many single people and always make an effort to say hi to them. If they want to talk about it, I’m happy to let them know how much I enjoy being married. But maybe married life isn’t for everyone, so I don’t like to push it on them.
AB — 4 July 2016
Today a telemarketer from AT&T interrupted my workday (even though I’m on the do-not-call list) and offered to sell me a triple-play bundle of digital TV, Internet, and phone. When I asked him if AT&T offered digital TV in my neighborhood, he looked it up and said no. Way to go, AT&T.
AB — 10 May 2012
What I keep hearing is that businesses don’t want to expand, take risks, or hire new people because they don’t know what direction the economy’s going to go. Supposedly this fear turns into a self-fulfilling prophecy, because most businesses are thinking the same way and nobody’s willing to get moving to generate more business in the economy.
I have to think that this represents an opportunity for businesses large and small that are willing to get off their butts and start doing something. While the competition is busy wringing their hands, you can be out gaining market share.
While the competition is skimping on their marketing budget, you can expand yours and gain more visibility in the marketplace.
While the competition is afraid to take risks and try new things, you can invest in some product development and market testing to get a new product out on the market at a discount rate.
Since the competition is afraid to hire new employees, you are in a position to hire someone good at a reasonable rate. What about taking on a part-timer? A paid intern? A promising young person with little hard experience? A bright, creative, diligent worker who only has a high-school degree? An older person who might appear “over-qualified” on paper but would love to have a great job working for you?
AB — 2 September 2011
Smithsonian.com recently started a new “Department of Innovation” blog to “track all things innovative.” However, Michelle Malkin rightly notes that the logo used on the blog represents a non-functional set of three gears.
Maybe this is an unintentional admission of the organizational gridlock that often throttles innovation!
AB — 8 August 2011
Tracey Schelmetic at ThomasNet Green & Clean today throws some much-needed cold water in the face of affluent consumers who think they are helping the environment by driving a hybrid SUV or building a 5,000-square-foot “green” house:
The Ford Escape Hybrid, considered the most fuel efficient hybrid SUV on the market, gets about 32 mpg combined. This is about the same as a Toyota Yaris with a traditional engine, and far below the efficiency of a Honda Civic Hybrid, which gets 42 mpg combined.
She also takes a swipe at Whole Foods, along with some comments that will please Trader Joe’s fans:
Sitting in opposition to Whole Foods is more environmentally minded chain Trader Joe’s, a company preferred by many eco-minded shoppers. Keeping an eye on the most important factor in a green business – building size – Trader Joe’s operates out of far smaller buildings. Stores tend to average between 8,000 and 12,000 square feet, compared to Whole Foods average store size of 50,000 to 80,000 square feet. Trader Joe’s also pledged to eliminate all GM foods from its shelves in 2001, and by next year will sell no seafood products that are not sustainably sourced.
AB — 2 August 2011
A long time ago, I stopped telling people that I write about “green” issues (now I say “environmental”), because of just the sort of silliness David Sims highlights in today’s article at ThomasNet Green & Clean, “Green Products We Don’t Need — Solar Bikinis? Eco-Plastic Bottles?”
Sims writes,
Somehow we don’t think surveying a garbage dump’s worth of Poland Spring plastic water bottles with 30 percent less plastic and paper warms the hearts of diehard greenies. It’s a bit like marketing Big Macs to vegetarians by saying they’re now 30 percent soybean and only 70 percent meat.
AB — 1 July 2011
Here’s one of my favorite Amazon products — the Zenith Men’s 96.0529.4035/51.M Defy Xtreme Tourbillon Titanium Chronograph Watch! Generously marked down from $145,000.00 to $86,999.99!
Visit the Amazon product page to read some of the hilarious product reviews. One review titled “$9.95 shipping…..Outrageous!” says:
I had decided on this watch, but then I noticed the shipping charge. Outrageous! I’m shelling out close to 100k, and they want me to take care of the shipping too. Forget it!
AB — 8 May 2010
Many who manage web sites invest great effort and expense in search engine optimization (SEO), the practice of optimizing the content and format of a site and its pages so as to attract the most search engine traffic.
SEO is important to online businesses, because qualified web traffic can translate into eyeballs (if a site sells advertising) or sales (if it’s an e-commerce site) or potential clients (if the site is run by, say, a consulting firm).
I’ve been around the practice of SEO for about 15 years (before it was even called SEO), and I’ve come to believe in a central truth about it:
If you want search engine traffic, the first thing you have to do is deserve it.
This means providing honest, substantive content.
This also means offering well-executed services and a customer experience that serves the visitor well.
This concept is approximately equivalent to customer-centeredness in marketing or user-centered design in software development. A business has to make a profit, try to grow, strive for market share — but business success in the long term is hard to come by without a strong customer focus, or user focus in the case of web traffic.
By all means, optimize your site for search engine traffic, but be aware that few businesses make it for very long by tricking Google.
Do what you can to direct web traffic to your site, but make sure you deserve it.
AB — 5 May 2011
Most marketers would say that good strategy requires you to treat your customers well — turn them into raving fans and they will recommend you to friends and family. In the online world, good reviews and links from grateful customers will contribute to good search-engine optimization (SEO), that much-sought collection of factors that results in high rankings in search engines.
But according to a Nov. 26, 2010, article by David Segal in the New York Times, one online entrepreneur has turned conventional wisdom on its head. His solution: Generate good SEO by creating enemies instead of fans. Enraged customers that you have ripped off and abused will fill Internet consumer web sites with negative reviews that will actually increase your ranking in Google searches. (See “A Bully Finds a Pulpit on the Web” for the full astonishing story.)
I would hate to contribute to the success of the retailer profiled in Segal’s article, so I’m not going to name him or his site. This SEO contrarian runs an e-commerce business selling designer eyeglasses. Segal interviewed one of his customers who says that when she complained and tried to get her money back after paying for fake designer frames, she received threats of sexual violence, phony legal documents, harassing phone calls, and a threatening email with a photo of the building where she lives and an “I am watching you” message.
Evidently, though, the marketer in question uses this kind of customer abuse as an SEO strategy. When he received many complaints on one consumer site, he posted this message in response:
Hello, My name is ********* with *********.com I just wanted to let you know that the more replies you people post the more business and the more hits and sales I get. My goal is NEGATIVE advertisement Its a new proven to work strategy when you post all kinds of negative it always turns positive. I never had the amount of traffic I have now since my 1st complaint. I am in heaven.. Thanks so very much for your continued effort. I really appreciate it.
This retailers’s create-enemies strategy is carefully crafted. It has to be, or he would lose his credit card merchant accounts. Segal, who interviewed the retailer, relates:
The only real limit on his antics is imposed by Visa and MasterCard. If too many customers successfully dispute charges in a given month, he can be tossed out of their networks, he says. Precisely how many of these charge-backs is too many is one of the few business subjects that Mr. ********* deems off the record, but suffice it to say he tracks that figure carefully and dials down the animus if he’s nearing his limit. Until the next month arrives, when he dials it back up again.
Has this retailer’s recent notoriety reduced his Google rankings? Evidently not. A search today on “lafont designer eyeglasses” reveals the following rankings:
The listing for the master of dysfunctional customer relations is third in organic search results.
Building a business by enraging your customers is exhausting work, Segal learned from his interview with the retailer:
Mr. ********* typically works from about 10 a.m. until 5 the next morning, spending much of that time feuding with unhappy customers. He describes this grueling regimen of confrontation with a heaviness that is enough to make you want to give him a hug.
“I’m sure this is taking a toll on my health,” he complains. “I probably won’t live as long as you.”
One can only hope.
— AB, 27 Nov. 2010
A Thinking Person, a.k.a. Cogit8R 