Net Strife - providing smashing tips on Internet Marketing

As an internet marketer myself, I firmly believe that the amount of clients/sales we’re generating and our profits highly depend on our reputation. I can say this with confidence because I’ve met reputable people online, and not-so-reputable ones. Comparing the amount of sales that they generate, I can attest that the latter do not produce as much as the former!

I am writing this post because I want to help you — I want you to avoid ruining your reputation, while it is still possible. You see, once you “kill” your reputation, it’s dead. I doubt that you can ever get back what you lost. Well… maybe some can, but it would prove to be very difficult!

Just How Important Is Reputation?

I know, some people don’t see reputation as an important factor in internet marketing success. They take it for granted. Hence, I am going to give a situation which will serve as a concrete example that reputation is a determining factor to achieve success in IM.

Let’s have “Person A” and “Person B”. Both of them run competing web design companies. Person A is highly respected, and a lot of people recommend his service. Person B, on the other hand, has a habit of bad-mouthing his clients. As a result, his ex-clients warn others that Person B’s company is not recommendable.

Supposing that they both have the same skills and pricing structure, who would get more client work, and, in the end, more profit? Surely, it’s Person A!

Now you see how important reputation is. I want to delve deeper into this topic by talking about my experiences on people who (seemingly) are murdering their reputation unconsciously.

Unconscious Murder of Our Own Reputation?

What Things Usually Happen…

There are times when people do things just for fun, not knowing that those things could possibly hurt their “perfect” reputation! Fake bids. Swearing at clients. Not honoring bids/not sending payments promptly. Do those phrases sound familiar? Well, unfortunately, a lot of people do those acts. What’s more unfortunate about this is, they’re killing their reputation by doing so.

A Brief Yet Interesting Experience

Allow me to share an anecdote. Last week, I was on the Digital Point Forums and I recently sold a small website there. The bid was $165 and it was a private bid. I was told that I would be receiving the payment last Tuesday, but then up until now I see no signs of any payments made. I am not whining or whatever. Besides, it’s not the money, it’s the principle of keeping your word. It’s the principle of speaking with honor!

So, what does this experience tell me about the bidder? He’s a liar, he doesn’t honor his bids, and he’s not worth my time. To be honest, I gave him an allowance of four days already. He had been reading my private messages (I know this because I was asking for read receipts through vBulletin’s system.), yet he didn’t even have the courage to tell me ANYTHING at all! At least now I know that I MUST avoid him/not accept his bids, should I sell any more sites on Digital Point.

Well, I pity him because he’s not getting any more business from me, nor from my entire network.

How to Prevent This from Happening

Always think before you act! This is a very important rule that everyone should follow. Don’t be tactless; always use your head before doing anything! Before promising a client something, make sure that it’s possible for you to do it. For example, don’t tell your client that you can come up with a marketing plan in an hour after he pays you if you really can’t.

Speak with honor… all the time. I hate it when people say something with full confidence, and then take it back in the end when they know they’ve said something unfavorable to them. If you say something, then be sure that you can back it up, and defend it until the end!

Act professionally. Shame that there are a lot of bad-mouthed, morally impaired, and ethically challenged people who call themselves professionals. In this world of business, we should all act professionally so as to avoid pointless arguments and loss of heaps of revenue. Don’t resort to using cuss words just to get your point across. Don’t disrespect anyone you’re dealing with. Just be polite and remember that having a great reputation depends on how well you know your values.

Summary

People tend to kill their reputation unconsciously. Whether it’s through scamming, not honoring their words, or even cussing at clients, it’s still a riotous act that could ruin your reputation for your entire life. To prevent this from happening, always see to it that you’re acting professionally, and you hold true to your word. A great rule to remember is, “ALWAYS think before you act.”

Firstly, I would like to apologize for the lack of activity on the blog. My attention these days is divided into a LOT of things and I simply don’t have all the luxury and time in the world to post. Nonetheless, this blog won’t die out. That’s just not my thing, you know.

Curiosity, Confessions, and Such

Okay, so I was just wondering about something. As an internet marketer, do you still surf the web for fun, like watch videos, read funny comics, and stuff like that? I mean, as all of us were exposed to the world of internet marketing, our naivety to the online ads and efforts of businessmen to make money from “innocent” surfers, we veer away from the idea of just surfing the internet for entertainment. Instead, we use the internet to research on market trends, chat with our fellow webmasters, and read blogs that could help us in our endeavors!

Frankly, even I do not surf the web for fun any more. Well at least, not as often as I did before. Nowadays, I just lurk around the SitePoint marketplace and look for great deals. Sometimes I chat with my fellow webmasters, but take note, that I only do it sometimes. Most of the time I’m either researching, or building/buying websites. In all honesty I actually find this new “lifestyle” a bit boring, but I know that in the end there will be great rewards.

Another thing that makes online entrepreneurs stop browsing the web for fun is the fact that they are knowledgeable of the benefits of having ads on a site. They know very well that each click (sometimes, each view) on an ad will make another person some money, and they detest that thing. I guess they are too conceited that they even want to prevent other people from attaining success.

How about you? As an internet marketer, do you still have the luxury of surfing other websites for entertainment, or are you too inclined with your work that you do nothing but transact businesses online?

New Internet Marketing Project

I would like my readers to know that I am conducting a little experiment on proxies. I have set up a dozen or so web proxies, and I have outlined a plan already. I am aiming to be making at least $50 to $100 per day from all of them in a month. I have little experience in proxies, so if you’re a guru or something, let me know if $50-$100 is too ambitious for 10 (more or less) web proxies.

After a month or so, I will be posting the results of my experiment here. Hopefully I would be able to help some people start their very own proxy business.

Question and Answer… Answers

Nope, I am not posting them today. Please wait for them tomorrow! While you are reading this, I am probably constructing my answers already so please, stay subscribed.

It’s a Sunday here so I thought that a less serious post will do for today.

Have you ever wanted to piss off an internet marketer friend (or rival)? Here’s good news for you: I’ve thought of 15 ways to piss off an internet marketer — big time!

1. Send them an e-mail saying their landing pages suck. More evil way: Send a separate e-mail for each landing page!
2. If you have them on instant messenger, offer to review their sales letters and always say “Sorry, write a new one. It’s worse than a report done by a first grader.”
3. Visit their websites and leave comments similar to “When will I ever see something useful?”
4. Search for them using Google and then once you find something interesting (or disturbing even), blog about it and link to their website using an appropriate keyword. Hopefully you’d rank high — if you do, they’d be real pissed.
5. Beg for some internet marketing tips on instant messenger, and then when they give you some, claim that those tips were all rubbish crap.
6. Sign-up for their newsletter using the name “Don’t you dare spam me” or “I only want your free product”. Don’t use your real/main e-mail address!
7. If they own a membership website wherein you can post your own testimonials about the site, write something like “I was very disappointed with the products. I can’t believe I got a dozen boxes of bananas right at my doorstep when I clicked the ‘download e-books’ button!”
8. Fill their forum sales threads with the banana smiley. Just make sure you don’t get banned from the forum!
9. If they do Facebook marketing, tell them they’ve got one less person who’d fall for their lousy marketing tactics — and that’s you!
10. Offer to review their sales letter and say you’ll highlight the things you don’t understand. Send them a copy of their sales letter which has everything highlighted.
11. Ask who’s their favorite internet marketer or entrepreneur. Once they answer, say “You want to know mine? Well, it’s ‘Not-You’.”
12. Disagree with everything that they say about IM.
13. Call them a trying-hard internet marketing newbie.
14. If they sell domains, claim that all the domains they’re selling are yours.
15. Send them a free t-shirt with “I’m an internet marketer and I suck at doing my job.” printed on it.

There you have it. 15 ways to piss of an internet marketer. I hope you enjoyed this post!