Yet another way to piss off your customers…. fail to deliver what you specifically promise to deliver!

Interestingly enough, shortly after my last post, I had a conversation with a friend in which she vented her frustration about a product she purchased online.

After 10 years of marriage, my friend’s husband decided to "trade in" my friend on a "newer" model, leaving her to navigate the ever treacherous waters of the "dating scene".  Newly single, she like many other Gen Y members turned to the internet for advice.  During this search, she came across an information product web site.

The marketing behind this information product was SUBERBLY crafted.  The product developers showed incredible insight on crafting a compelling message.  They understood that no one was going to show up on their web site and fork over $500 for their info product on the first visit, so they offered a tempting free bribe in exchange for signing up for their newsletter.

According to my friend, the ensuing monthly mailers were exquisitely crafted to create a compelling pitch for the product.  Dan Theis does a WONDERFUL job of outlining this strategy in his post :

How Internet Marketers Use "Straw Man" Logic To Sell Products

The way they [internet marketing gurus] convince you to buy the product they’re pushing involves a lot of "straw man" arguments. Let me walk you through the basic template they’re using here:

1. If you have failed at (SEO, marketing, business, life) it’s not your fault.
2. You’re not failing because you didn’t actually put in the time and effort to do things right
3. No, it’s not your fault, it’s all those evil "gurus" who aren’t telling you the whole truth!
4. As an example, watch us construct a straw man and knock it down
5. See, we’re smart, and we’re trying to help you.
6. Open your wallet now.

Well, on one particular day, an email landed in my friend’s inbox from this internet marketing, uh I mean DATING guru.  In this edition, he happened to hit upon a scenario that my friend was currently experiencing.  It was as if he’d been spying upon her or was in some way psychic.  In this email he wrote that after a honeymoon period, the man in the relationship would pull back and stop calling.  According to the email, his information product would not only tell you WHY your man is doing that, but WHAT you MUST do to save the relationship.

As you can guess, my friend had NO TROUBLE finding her credit card and purchasing the product.  After all, she was going to find out EXACTLY what to do to save her faltering relationship!

The DVD’s arrived in short order and my friend consumed the series in short order. 

IMAGINE HER FURY to discover that while the series did indeed explain WHY her gentleman friend had pulled away, it failed to direct her in what she needed to do to salvage the relationship!

Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned!

Not only was my friend venting to me, she was venting to EVERY SINGLE WOMAN SHE KNOWS!

Ouch!  My advertising mentor taught me long ago that a happy customer will tell 3 friends… and a disgruntled one will tell 12.  Recent research puts the second figure at closer to 16.  My friend is on track to beat that estimate.  She is now a woman on a mission.  She’s not only telling every one she knows, but she’s also spending time online warning others. 

She’s also taking advantage of the site’s "30 day money back guarantee"….. and is fully prepared to contact the state’s attorney general if they fail to refund her money as promised.

By promising something he had no intention of delivering, he’s not only going to get to refund her the $497 she paid, he’s also going to have to battle the bad PR my friend is so intent on delivering.  All because he over promised and under delivered. 

That’s one of the perils of tightly targeting a niche market.  If you fail to deliver what you promise, your customers usually spread the word quickly to destroy you.

 

New rising stars… blogging FORUMS

Blogs are a great interactive medium where one person writes and then others comment on the article.  I adore blogs for my clients because it’s a cost effective way for bootstrapping entrpreneurs to get their marketing messages onto the web easily and effectively.

Jack Hughes has pointed out that the rise of blogging forums may be pointing to flaws in blogs….

If there is a "flaw" to blogging it’s this: creating content is TOUGH!  As Jack and other bloggers have found, staying motivated to blog regularly requires a hurculean effort, especially if your talents don’t lend themselves to writing.  A blog without posts is like a day without sunshine and blog irregularity is a common affliction amongst many blogs.

While blogs require consistency in effort… forums on the other hand don’t.  Forums are a "set it and forget it" option for many web site owners.  Start a thread, drive some traffic and soon you’ll find other people are generating content for your forum.  It’s no secret that search engines love forum threads and forums really don’t require a lot of effort on the owner’s part.

One client of mine launched a forum and she set it and forgot about it.  It didn’t take long for the forum to get active and popular.  That is when the problems began.  Once her forum posts began rising in the SERPs…. she began getting the seedier crowd nosing around.  Before long, a security hole was exposed and patched by the developer of the bulletin board software, except my client didn’t upgrade her installation.  It wasn’t long before the bad guys had gained access to her site through a back door.  When she went to check on her site one day, she saw there were 10’s of thousands of spam posts.  The board was dead.  Anyone wanting information on the original topic would find post after post advertising seedier sites on the internet.

If you want to launch a forum, it is truly the "easier softer way"…. but it’s definitely not a "set it and forget it" option. 

I would say the "set it and forget it" appeal is the reason blogging forums are on the rise.

How to piss off your visitors….

The title of the article was simply, "How to piss off your customers".  It was an evocative title that did it’s job… it got me tp click and begin reading the article.

Unfortunately, the article wasn’t about customer service or even order fulfillment but it was about spam and how the definition of spam is growing to include "anything you don’t want in your inbox".  I found the article mildly interesting with one important take away: 8 out of 10 users report using the "designate as spam" button for incoming emails. 

It was a great headline headlining a dull article that had absolutely NOTHING to do with the title.

Because of the business I’m in, I went digging further.  Was this a one time thing for this author?  Was he in the habit of writing great headlines that grabbed attention and then disappointing his readers with the article?

At the end of the article was the author’s bio which wisely included a link to his website.  I click and go there.  Located in PRIME real estate territory is a link called "One Page Marketing Piece"…. yet another compelling title and again, I’m a sucker.  I click. 

Without warning, I find my browser is opening a PDF document.

OH THE HUMANITY!  NOOOOO!!!  I have other apps running!  I’m installing an update!!!! 

ABANDON SHIP! 

Scotty’s voice, "Captain, I’m giving it all we’ve got but we just don’t have enough RAM to open that print quality PDF!"

BROWSER CRASH!!!!

I hit ctrll/alt/del… all of my other browser windows have closed except for one… the one opening that monstrous print quality PDF. 

What blows me away is this guy is a self proclaimed marketing expert AND customer service consultant.  He claims to have worked with really big companies on his web site (from what I saw before I made that fatal click).

Want to piss off your visitors?  Include a link to a print quality PDF (aka:HUGE FILE) and be sure not to warn visitors that the link leads to this massive document. 

When I include a link to a PDF document, I ALWAYS warn my visitors to download the PDF to their computer first. (I know… PDF documents are no longer the safe download they once were…. sometimes I HATE the progress hackers force upon us!)  I also provide instructions on how they can download the document and how, if they only click on the link, they will open the document in their browser which very well MAY crash their browser.

Want to piss off your visitors?  Include a link to a print quality PDF (aka:HUGE FILE) and be sure not to warn visitors that the link leads to a massive document.

Video Testimonials go Mainstream

For about 6 months now, I’ve been encouraging my clients to include video testimonials on their blogs/web sites, not only because it’s a powerful marketing tool, but also because of the "wow" factor.  After all, while streaming video is nothing new, the You Tube revolution has made adding video to any blog or web site as easy as adding a link!

Now, marketing genius Ken McCarty is advising his readers to look into Video Testimonials:

About 80% of consumers put more faith in advertisers who present customer reviews than those that don’t.  Over thee out of four customers say it is extremely or very important to read customer reviews before making a purchase.

And not just any old reviews. They want customer reviews and prefer them 6 to 1 over "expert" reviews. 44% of online shoppers say that consumer ratings and reviews are the most useful e-commerce  feature.  No other eCommerce shopping feature came even close.

I’ve talked often with my clients about the power of testimonials.  I’ve even included a lot of testimonial gathering tactics in my book Beyond the Niche.  However, when it comes to a selling tool that carries the POWER of a testimonial, well… it shouldn’t surprise ANYONE that some people will actually create FRAUDULENT testimonials and place them on a web site. As a matter of fact, testimonials are so powerful, (and their power is definitely "decreased" by fraudulen tuse) that  there’s even a company that offers the service of AUTHENTICATING your written testimonials on your web site.

Which is why I encourage MY clients to feature VIDEO testimonials on their blog/web site.  Video testimonials are much tougher to "fake" than written testimonials.  Simeon Pollock’s Wholistic Blog features a collection of video testimonials.  Take a look at them and ask yourself, isn’t this more powerful than words appearing on a page?

What do women really want?

A young King was ambushed and imprisoned by the monarch of a  neighboring kingdom. The monarch could have killed him but was moved by the youthful king’s morals and ideals. So, the monarch offered him his freedom, as long  as he could answer a very difficult question. The young King would have a year to  figure out the answer and, if after a year, he still had no answer, he would  be put to death.

The question?….What do women really want?

Such a question would perplex  even the most knowledgeable man, and to the young King , it seemed an impossible query. But, since it was better than death, he accepted the
monarch’s proposition to have an answer by year’s end.

The young King returned to his kingdom and began to poll everyone: the princess, the priests, the wise men and even the court jester. He spoke with everyone, but  no one could give him a satisfactory answer.

Many people advised him to consult the old witch, for only she would have the answer.  But the price would be high; as the witch was famous throughout the kingdom for the exorbitant prices she charged.

The last day of the year arrived and Arthur had no choice but to talk to the  witch. She agreed to answer the question, but he would have to agree to her
price first.  The old witch wanted to marry the young King’s most noble knight and the young King’s closest friend!

The young King was horrified. She was hunchbacked and hideous, had only one  tooth, smelled like sewage, made obscene noises, etc. He had never  encountered such a repugnant creature in all his life and he refused to force his friend to marry her and endure such a terrible burden.   But the knight learning of the proposal, spoke with the young King.  He told his friend that nothing was too big of a sacrifice compared to his friend’s life and the preservation of the monarchy.

Hence, a wedding was proclaimed and the witch answered the young King question thus:

What a woman really wants, she answered….is to be in charge of her own  life.

Everyone in the kingdom instantly knew that the witch had uttered a great  truth and that the young King life would be spared.

And so it was, the neighboring monarch granted the young King his freedom.  The young King’s best knight and the witch had a wonderful wedding.

The honeymoon hour approached and the young King’s best knight began steeling himself for a horrific experience.  He hestitantly entered the bedroom, but, was amazed at the sight awaited him. The most  beautiful woman he had ever seen, lay before him on the bed. The astounded knight asked what had happened.

The beauty replied that since he had been so kind to her when she appeared as a witch, she would henceforth, be her horrible deformed self only half
the time and the beautiful maiden the other half.

Which would he prefer? Beautiful during the day….or night?

The young King’s best knight pondered the predicament. During the day, a beautiful woman to show  off to his friends, but at night, in the privacy of his castle, an old
witch? Or, would he prefer having a hideous witch during the day, but by  night, a beautiful woman for him to enjoy wondrous, intimate moments?

The young King’s best knight,  knowing the answer the witch gave the young king to his question, said that he would allow HER to make the choice herself. Upon hearing this, she announced that she would be beautiful all the time because he had respected her enough to let her be in charge of her own life.

Now….what is the moral to this story?

The moral is….. If you don’t let a woman have her own way….  Things are going to get ugly

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