Several photos of the Beijing Olympic’s XP Crash being projected onto roof of Nation Stadium, also know as the Bird’s nest, have surfaced on the various blogs and websites. Ironically, Lenova chairman Yang Yuanqing stated that Windows XP was choosen over Microsoft’s newest operating system, Windows Vista, because the complexity of the the IT function required a stable operating system.
The most notable photo was taken during the exhilirating climax of the Torch Lighting Ceromony. As Li Ning flew threw the air, rounding the lip of the Bird’s nest, someone snapped this photo of the BSOD being projected.
Two of my favorite restaurant chains have fallen victim to the economy and possibly disconnected marketing. Bennigan’s and Steak & Ale have filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection and stores owned by its parent company will shut their doors.
The news appeared to be a shock to most of the company’s employees, but some may have had an inkling that the company was not doing well. Steve, a Bennigan’s waiter in Plano Texas, said he recently went from making $30 on a good lunch shift to only $10. “Business has been slow,” said Steve, who said he relies on tips. “I went from making a lot of money on a shift to making very little.
I’ve shared many a laugh and a meal within the walls of these two restaurants and I’m sad to see them go. I fear this is just the beginning for the restaurant industry unless a major marketing mind shift takes place.
At first glance the closing of these two casual dining mainstays seems to be indicative of the economy. Sure the economy has something to do with it but I’m not 100% convinced all the blame lies on the economic downturn.
Considering a corporate blog? Of course, what forward-thinking, progressive company looking to thrive in “Recession Obsession” isn’t. (That’s a statement, not a question.)
A corporate blog can be a phenomenal piece of marketing for your company. It allows you to give your company a voice “outside” of your marketing - one that is more casual and real. It allows you to gain insight from feedback posted by fans and naysayers alike - and respond to that feedback by answering the charges head on and using the information to evolve your company.
I hear you saying there’s a downside: it’s more work on your plate. And then the blog wil likely not get the priority it deserves, and will not get regular posts.
It doesn’t have to be that way.
You will find that most successful corporate blogs are written by more than one author in an organization. Take the Dell Blog - Direct2Dell - for example. Not one author but several from different departments in Dell. Each one an expert on their own topics. Or WalMart’s Check Out Blog. Same scenario. Even the Single Throw Blog has everyone involved.
The days of when all comments must come from the President of the company are over. Allowing a “Corporate Blog Team” the opportunity to come together with the same goals, presenting highly relevant content from the “experts” in your company will provide an environment where everyone contributes to the growth ofthe company and fosters your marketing message.
BUT - there’s always a BUT - you need to create this “team” and encourage their participation. And you must create guidelines. Here’s a few tips on how to get started.
1. Build the Team Who can write, who likes to write, who has a lot of knowledge and can be ecouraged to write…these are the people you want on your Blog Team!
2. Who’s in Charge Here? Someone (or maybe even 2 people) should assume the acting ”editor-in-chief” to ensure that content meets marketing guidelines, and just generally oversea the project. All it takes is someone who will read the posts and note and issues or concerns to the author.
3. Set Some Ground Rules Have a meeting, talk about topics, what should not be in the blog…that sort of thing. Keep it simple. With the right people as authors, this should not be a huge issue.
4. Have Some Fun With It The posts need not be long. The can - and typically should - be written in a lighter more business-casual style (unless your audience is for some reason not business-casual). Pick topics that are interesting and even a tad controversial to get readers engaged and commenting.
You’ll find that sharing the content workload will make it a lot easier and provide you with a blog that is relevant, consistent and interesting. You don’t need to be the size of Dell to get more than one person involved. Gather your potential team together with some pizza for a lunch meeting and talk about it. I think you’ll find they are far more interested in corporate blogging than you think!
To my dismay, I received an email today from my one of my bosses at work with the subject that read:
The new “Google” is Cuil.
At that moment, although I couldn’t remember why, a dark cloud began to come over me. Not because I am an avid Google worshipper. Not because I feared that Google might be dethroned. No not for that, but for some other unknown reason. I knew I came acrosse that name before… “Cuil”, but I just couldn’t remember where. So I continued to read the email and followed the link to this article Ex-Googlers Debut Cuil, A(nother) Anti-Google.
I read the article, instinctively skipping over the first paragraph. Yes, I am weird like that. But more often than not the first paragraph just provides references to some other posts. I wanted to get straight to the meat and potatoes. Kind of like skipping the introduction in a book.
Anyway, I must say I was impressed to learn that this new search engine just launched with over 120 billion pages in its index. Cuil claims to the largest and fastest search engine in the world. But being a Webmaster and developer of hundreds of sites and several web servers, I asked myself “How in the world did a massive search engine launch without me knowing about it?”.
Then A new Outlook email notification popped up:
“More on Cuil…Do a search for Internet marketing consultants. If this is going to take off, we will need to understand where they are grabbing the logos from. The BlueClaws logo isn’t going to cut it for us.”
So I searched for Internet Marketing Consultants. Yeah, when I copied it from Outlook it selected the period as well. And what do you know, “We didn’t find any results for ‘Internet marketing Consultants’”. I was immediately apparent that Cuil has a long way to go before they can claim they are bigger, faster and better than Google. And it wasn’t just me, many bloggers and news article reported that Cuil fails to return results for a variety of search terms.
So then I removed the period and what do you know… My company Single Throw Internet Marketing is right there on the first page. Just it is in Google. Just as we should be.
Eventually, I made my way back to the original article I was emailed. I read that first paragraph I initially skipped. When I got to the part that says “Cuil (”cool”),” a light bulb went of in my head. After quick search I found a post I made last year on samaBlog and remembered where I knew their name from. When I made that post, I didn’t know who they where. Their spider, the “Twiceler Bot”, had began crawling a new web site I was working on and mauled my server. It would not go away and every time I tried to block the bot, the chameleon put on a new face to avoid detection.
A warning to webmasters:
Cuil’s Twiceler bot maliciously indexes content. It does not respect well accepted standards like Google’s Webmaster Guidelines or even the Robots.txt protocol. It blatantly ignores http status codes like 404 page not found and 403 Access is denied. Their bot has the potential to crash your server and wipe out your databases. The more you try to fight it off, the harder it tries to index your content.
Cuil’s black background suits them well. Let’s just say the Google is a white hat search engine and Cuil is a black hat. A very black hat. Let me go out on a limb here and say I would bet money that a vast portion 120 Billion page index is html error pages and duplicate content.
What do you think of Cuil? Pass or Fail? Let us know.
Not only does Cuil fail to return relevant search results, Cuil’s Index is way out of date. In many cases they return no results at all. I don’t care if your index has 5 trillion pages or 500,000 pages as long as you return relevant results for what I am seaching for.
In my opinion, Cuil fails to live up to their marketing hype. Furthermore, they are going to have alot of explaining to do. The already have a bad reputation with webmasters who know who they really are. They are going to have issues gaining trust among the community, so if they want to be the next Google, that’s where they need to start. Especially as more developers and webmasters like myself start coming out of the woodwork to reveal how they got their massive index.
I don’t know about you, but I’m getting pretty tired of all the doom and gloom in the news. Recession. Inflation. Stagflation. Is it time to crawl under a rock and hide…just let your business wither away?
Of course not! It’s time to step up your game.
We are all guilty of riding the big bubble and now have to find a way to sail through a “correction” as the industry pundits call it. So how do we not only survive this wave, but grow and prosper? Here’s 4 things you can do to jump start the ride…
Dust off your “UVP” – Your Unique Value Proposition, sometimes called Unique Selling Position, is where all your marketing and messaging starts from. It’s how you differentiate yourself or company from your competition. If you can’t tell the difference, your customer won’t be able to either.
Market Where Your Customers Are – Seems simple enough. But where are your customers? I can pretty much guarantee in this day and age they are ONLINE! If your website is still the one your extremely smart and talented nephew that had a computer and Frontpage built for you, it’s time to make a change. Your website IS MARKETING and likely viewed by more customers and prospects than your Yellow Page ad or that ad you ran in a business journal once or twice last year. It’s time to put together a comprehensive marketing solution that includes Internet Marketing and social media marketing along with traditional marketing and branding.
Clean Out Your Sock Drawer – What? You mean procrastinate? NOOOOoooo. I mean look at what you have, what works and what doesn’t. Those fuzzy argyle socks you bought a few years ago really don’t go with your business suit. And those socks with the holes in the toes, you were going to sew up the holes? If you haven’t done it already, you won’t. They’re taking up space. Get rid of them. Stick with what works and make room for new ideas, or even new staff members.
Learn and Train – Now’s the time to improve your skills. Attend a sales training or marketing seminar. Read a few business, sales, or marketing books. There’s plenty of old concepts you’ve yet to master, and certainly new ones waiting in the wings.
If I were adding a fifth item it would be stop wasting time. The 4 items above are Business 101. If you haven’t considered them, you’re already behind. But the good news is you can always start today and play catch up. So what are you waiting for?
If this is going to take off, we will need to understand where they are grabbing the logos from. The BlueClaws logo isn’t going to cut it for us.” 