Prosperity TVRG (and followers, friends, fans...) This: Charlie Rose interviews Marc Andreessen (Netscape, Ning, more...) Aweosome perspective on social media and the future of... http://ping.fm/wyJPc. I say it's a Must Watch!
As I walked into Mel’s Diner, the jukebox was blaring with the Big Bopper crooning “Chantilly Lace.” Perfect. So naturally I ordered a turkey dinner, with stuffing, lumpy mashed potatoes with gravy and cranberries. I washed it down with a root beer and finished with some banana crème pie. And just to make the experience totally authentic, the table wobbled and the chairs were those uncomfortable ones like your mom had in the kitchen when you were little.
Funny for the nostalgia, because I’m in San Francisco, attending the Web 2.0 Expo, masterminding about where the future of the Internet is headed. The best minds in the space from all over the world are here and it’s been a thought-provoking week.
There were some intriguing keynotes, interesting interview sessions, and a few great breakouts. Of course some of the best learning at these things comes from walking the hallways, networking with the other attendees. There is also a huge Expo hall filled with vendors offering web technology and services.
More than a couple things were totally fascinating to me…
At lunchtime you got to select your can of soda from a barrel of ice. I looked around my table and six of us were drinking Dr. Pepper, and two were having Mountain Dew. A corporate consultant joined us later because there was nowhere else to sit and she was the only Diet Pepsi. At any other type of conference in the world the diet colas would have won nine to one. So is that memes, good niche marketing, or are techno geeks really different animals?
It continues to amaze me how many start-up ventures there are with no business model, and no conceivable way to make any money, even if they had 50 million users. I thought we got over this when the tech bubble crashed, but evidently these venture capitalists still have a few hundred million (or billion) to piss away.
There was a company there touting a free service to update your Facebook, Twitter and My Space accounts. I asked the guy what was the benefit of his service versus Ping fm, which allows me to update like 40 different social media sites at once. And he kept murmuring over and over that I could do those three on his site, like that was some kind of a benefit.
You can’t complain about the marketing skills of these techno geeks, because they don’t have any.
Like a lot of trade shows, there were scads of expensive booths that companies had spent tens of thousands of dollars on, yet walking by them you couldn’t find a hint as to what they actually do. Probably about 40 percent had huge logos of their company name, and you couldn’t find a benefit or even what they offer with a search party. And of course another 40 percent had massive displays of feature blather and undecipherable jargon guaranteed to cure insomnia.
The booths were packed with headlines about “digital media supply chain management,” “value added services delivery,” “custom rich internet solutions,” and “enterprise scale” whateverthefuck.
One company selling mobile apps spent a fortune setting up a big, pretty booth, and staffed it with two people that couldn’t speak anything but Japanese. Even with the help of a translator, neither could give me an example of how I could use or profit from their service. I realize I can figure that out, but what’s the point of sending them here if they can’t buy a clue?
Even the company branding themselves as “a digital agency” couldn’t come up with a single benefit to a potential customer. And they’re going to charge money to market you? I guess they figured those free bottles of water they were giving away would clinch the deals. The only booth that knew anything about marketing was selling “the best chair for people with bad backs.” Not exactly techno, but they were smart enough to realize all the techno people are sitting in bad desk chairs all day.
Silicon Valley has heard of the recession and claims that money is tight. But the VC guys can’t help themselves. If you use the words “cloud,” “metrics” or “analytics” in your business plan, they simply have to fund you.
Just because these tech guys can’t sell anything doesn’t mean there isn’t some amazing stuff here however…
I sat in on a demo of the new product collaboration between Cynergy Labs and Microsoft called Surface. Now I’m a Mac guy, so it’s not easy for me to be impressed by the Ballmer Boys, but this is totally off the chain.
If you saw that last Bond flick, Surface is what the agent was using when he was touching the screen on the table to generate the video display to show M the currency they traced and where the guy ended up in Haiti. It looks like it is touch controlled, but it’s actually driven by six cameras underneath. It’s designed for collaborative computing, and can process 50 inputs at a time. Check it out here:
As you know, I’m not a programmer and couldn’t write code if my life depended on it, but I was intrigued by the description of a session in the programmer track presented by Aza Raskin, who is head of user interfaces for Mozilla Labs. So I chose that session, and was glad I did. Aza is mad genius, and he gave a sneak peek of their new “Ubiquity” software that is the nuclear bomb of cool.
What’s interesting is Modzilla’s Firefox just became the top browser in Europe. (The last time the #1 browser anywhere wasn’t Microsoft was never.) What’s REALLY interesting about that is Modzilla has about two designers, another seven or eight people in the lab, and less than 200 employees total. Yet they have about 1,000 contributors, about 10,000 testers, and about 300 million users. Forty percent of their code comes from the outside, from people like a 17-year-old student in Singapore that loves the opportunity to churn out code during most of his free time. Basically they have become the world’s largest open source engineering department with a payroll you could run a couple Burger Kings with.
So where is the future of the Internet going?
Well if I knew that, I’d have someone removing all the seeds from my watermelon and popping grapes in my mouth. But there are some pretty captivating scenarios.
The last two years all you heard was social media marketing. That drumbeat seems to be replaced now with mobile, mobile, mobile. It’s the new black.
One of the things Aza talked about was how people are missing in the browsers. In China, Chat is bigger than surfing the Net. Now we can attribute some of that to the fact that China bans so many shall we say “interesting” sites. But you also have to recognize the compelling nature of chat, texting and of course micro-blogging like Twitter. So might we see a dramatic shift from social media sites to social media browsers?
And where will the happy campers end up next? When the web started, it was the wild, wild, west, and everyone explored everywhere. Then we had the benevolent dictators like CompuServe and AOL that offered us the sanctity of their idyllic little walled gardens, promising to protect us from the evil, bad people.
We soon grew tired of the totalitarian dictatorships, and wanted to be free to explore the frontier again. So these walled off enclaves lost their allure and we set off to explore the great, vast Web.
Now there is so many cool sites, hysterical YouTube videos, interesting Diggs, can’t miss RSS feeds, engaging podcasts, scintillating Blogs (and of course, totally mesmerizing e-zines like this one) – we simply can’t cope with the information overload any longer.
So we’re reaching out to the social media sites, asking them to be the gatekeepers again, to protect us from overindulging at the all-you-can-eat Internet buffet. We use the Twitter feed, Digg river, and Facebook stream (which looks suspiciously like a Twitter feed) to segregate and provide the content topic areas and people we select. How long will that last?
As Aza demonstrated the Ubiquity software, you started to realize that the Internet is moving away from destination sites and will be driven more and more by user interfaces that have little relation to home URL or boundaries. And that will change EVERYTHING. Again.
Our sites, Blogs and even online communities that we’ve worked so hard to build, brand and grow, will actually become less relevant. The Internet experience will be more about outcomes driven by community. But not necessarily our community, but the communities each user has created on their own. And their interfaces will drive where they land, in a lot of cases bypassing the community.
When someone uses software like Ubiquity, it works from wherever they are standing at the moment. So when they decide they want pizza in Detroit, to translate something to Russian, or take another action, the software will process and handle that without a search engine, translation site or whatever site.
Sharepoint is the fastest growing product in Microsoft history, and it’s a basically a tool to bring 2.0 into the business environment. As Tim O’Reilly suggested, you start to see that Web 2.0 is not a version. It was meant to harness collective intelligence. Which it does. Just as it harnesses collective fear, stupidity, and prejudice. When you take Web 2.0 and add the world, you get the Web to a much higher power.
As usual, some people will get quite rich. And lots more will become road kill on the information super highway. It’s going to be a fab, funky and freaky ride.
The one thing I feel safe to say, is quality and value will still win out. At least a lot of the time. So it’s important that you be developing your tribe now, providing great products and services and creating long-term fans of your work. People that will remain loyal to you, because of the tangible benefits of what they receive.
Along those lines, I should mention Derek Gehl’s "Insider Secrets, Version 2009" resource. As most of you know, I think it is the best tool that comes out each year for helping you build your site the best way for search engine traffic, protect the deliverability of your list, build your community, and market from e-zines and direct from your site. Every business with a website should get this resource every year, the minute it becomes available. And that is right now.
Derek is actually retiring, so I’m not sure if this will be the last version ever put out. So don’t mess around with this. Get it here:
This was sent out as a “Randy's Rants,” but I’m posting it here on the blog, so you guys can participate in the discussion of where the Net is going next. I’ll be eager to see your comments and insights. So please check in below with your thoughts.
Peace out,
-RG
Subscribe to Randy’s Blog via Email
RG (and followers, friends, fans...) This: Charlie Rose interviews Marc Andreessen (Netscape, Ning, more...) Aweosome perspective on social media and the future of... http://ping.fm/wyJPc. I say it's a Must Watch!
Randy,
Having worked in Tech for a number of years (VoIP space), I'm always intrigued by your amazing insights into the latest trends.
What I wonder, however, is what it is about these Internet Marketing Gurus that has you forward links to everyone. Having seen countless web pages much like the one you forwarded which ALL have "If you are one of the first 500 you'll receive X bonuses worth $1000 FREE, etc." yada yada, I wonder just how real any of these are, or if in fact, it's the Sure Thing Internet Marketing lessons that actually made these guys millions. I suspect it is.
And yes, I'm a skeptic, because as you well know there are countless numbers of these Web Marketing gurus selling their programs, which likely are all identical with the same money back guarantees. And then try getting your money back if you're not satisifed, LOL.
While I'd LOVE to come from a place of Belief, Prosperity and Abundance when reading these, the simple fact is that they all read the same, the one you sent today, included. So is this the 'magic' to making millions? Putting up the web pages like this one? Just curious.
Ditto your questions. When you get an answer, please let me know.
"where the Net is going next"
OK, Randy, my predictions:
1) I know people are going to disagree, but I think Twitter is going to be a victim of its own hype. Too many people are getting caught up in the Twitter hoopla, and there soon will be a "who cares?" backlash. Twitter won't go away, but I predict a year from now that no one will be talking about it much.
2) I think your question "So might we see a dramatic shift from social media sites to social media browsers?" is close to the mark. Actually, I predict we will see a new social media site launched in the next year -- less boring than LinkedIn, and not as cutesy-pie as Facebook. And the company behind the new social site? Google! (A side effect is that the meaning of the verb "to Google" will change from "search the Internet for" to "keep in touch over the Internet".)
I'll admit I could be totally off-base on these, so we'll just have to wait and see what weird and exciting things the next 12 months bring......
- jim
Perhaps they're running out of ideas on how to keep people busy, busy, busy back at the farm with the other animals? Kind of like participating in Earth Hour together with the Coca-Cola Company.
There will always be a new fad to distract your time, energy, focus, attention, and $$$. From this one to the next one and then on to the next one, each one promising answers to health, wealth and happiness.
YOU are your own best teacher!
God question guys. I never recommend someone I don't believe in. Derek has the best stuff in terms of Internet marketing for the layperson. I enthusiastically recommend his course every year, and have for at least 7 or 8, when the late Cory Rudl started it.
-RG
Hey Randy, I'm the blind guy at your first Prosperity Series seminar in Sydney 2002. Going by my research, interactive handsets. The I-phone which will have electronic magazines. Flipping Page, The ability to flip through a magazine on your pc or internet connected mobile. Generation Y and X's are already grasping it with both hands. Ex;www.bmags.com Great reading, keep it up
Always personal, almost always entertaining, and usually insightful, I enjoyed your discussion. As a former long-term member of the human-computer interface community, I notice public technologies that were in the research communities 10+ years earlier. One point-of-information: Microsoft was not the #1 browser until 1998-1999 to the dismay of us Netscape users. http://is.gd/qJzl
Randy,
I congratulate you - You've accomplished what very few ever do - You've used balance in the conversation. You've acted as an advocate and as an inquirer, which is quite rare in today's me, me, me blog-a-thon mentality. I appreciate the fact that we all have opinions. Let me just say Thank you for being unique.
I am not writing this sentence last - since the comment itself turned into a sub-post that I hope others will appreciate and not falme the ever-loving crap out of me for it. It wasn't my intent to or any attempt to dominate a conversation, but to raise awareness of the urgency of technology and how as humans we change. For the lengthy post - I apologize now and let it be done.
I have long since decided that I have personally learned from so many, including you, that not all the ideas I now embody are ever all my own - they are from bits and pieces of many, many great people whom I have had the pleasure to learn from over the last 17+ years on the Internet.
It amazed me when the largest credit card processor in the world did not have a web site in 1996. I got one built for them and then their mind's started working and so did their business. For what it cost then, you could have hundreds or even thousands of sites today. The most sophisticated technology is only at a cost of 10% what it was even 5-7 years ago.
What amazed me even more thereafter, was the number of people that never "got it", but played as mimes - doing what everyone else did, without injecting their own personalities, to make it theirs and unique and a valued services to those they served. It seems like very few have the guts to not use the "Marketing 101" mentality.
The final amazement is how many people do not have the least idea how to formulate a cogent plan to take their business from idea to merchant worthy - regardless the amount of money they attract or burn. In some respects, its the same today as it was 10+ years ago and I am still stumped.
The newset technology in my opinion will be...
What was once old will be new again - Everything that hits the "fringe edge" must come back to the existence of solid reality. What I'm saying is this:
As consumers we have more power than ever and we aren't going backwards anytime soon. Treating people like they don't matter doesn't work. The technology must also "feel human". We are a global society and people do matter.
We techno-geeks have a responsibility - there has never been a worse time for business as usual. That mentality will forever fail.
The MBA Marketers don't get it, as another round of ambiguous S%$# was handed out as "research" somewhere yesterday. Here's an idea -- Let's do something extraordinary, like ask the customer...test, try and adapt the technologies to suit the needs of the users.
For instance, let's take the US auto Industry for example and compare it to the poor bloke whose company only updated the 3-three social networks in your experience - 2 years ago was good for him; 30 years ago was good for [them]. Ping.fm took 2, then 5, then 30+ more to make their system better than the others. That's called progress and I pity the poor souls that never look forward.
With the auto industry, what worked for Lee Iaccoca and Chrysler 30 years ago didn't work out so well for the clunk-heads of today. The real competitors ARE NOT AFRAID to spend money to create something new. Somehow Chrysler, Ford and GM don't get it - Vehix get's it. Honda and Toyota have already moved there - they spent the money. And while we are at it, I LOVE the old muscle cars. They just aren't practical for transportation of us as people any longer; And I lamnet that maybe they never were.
"Big" companies come from yesterday - because what they did worked yesterday, meaning quite specifically that they WILL NOT work tomorrow - We are smarter than they think.
Whoever's technology wins - Its not a win, lose or tie game. Its about getting the eyes and ears of [your] audience - the real people, who are only too happy to do business with other real people. If your product or service actually does something remarkable, your business will grow. Maybe not as fast as you'd always like, but keeping the customer in mind and their needs forefront, will mean it will grow more than you might have ever imagined.
It seems that I am supposed to insert some kind of head-jerking insight to the what, why and if of this game. Actually, maybe I don't have to, we may have finally reached the threshold of true "skepticism".
So, summarizing my opinion, we need transformation - A Transformation Age for our be all places at once society. Everything [we] do needs to make a difference in the lives of the people that we interact with. It seems that our goal should be to make this place (world) a little better tomorrow than it was today and to NOT prop up what was.
The technology that wins is the one that engages the people, fires or fuels the passions to exist beyond themselves and make a difference in a noisy world.
Am I wrong...Am I right? What do you think? Why do you think that (insert your opinion here)?
Kindest Regards to all and may your successes out-perform your dreams
Thanks.
Chris
I love Charlie and Marc is always worth listening to, definitely a critical thinker.
-RG
Randy, I can't help connecting the implications of your comments regarding the state of the internet and it's future to that of the network marketing industry, which is becoming more and more internet dependent. from this perspective, this post could be called : The End of HYPE.
You correctly focus on VALUE to the end-user/consumer. I would add, that respecting the consumers intelligence is also of VALUE to them. Happily, this same thinking is being applied by some marketing strategies, and as a subset, by some network marketing systems.
Mainstream marketing has become increasingly "sophisticated" by addressing subliminal needs and aversions - disregarding the fact that target audiences have also become more sophisticated - getting savvy about the manipulations they are constantly exposed to. The reaction has increased suspicion making it more and more difficult to get a message across - despite the innate value. Any time there is even the slightest inkling of a fragrance of a "pitch", alarm bells go off and, literally, defense systems go onto nuclear alert. Especially when it costs money,
This, in turn, has made it even more challenging to gain the trust that is necessary for a relationship. These two elements' in turn - trust and relationships - have been recognized as the pillars of social networking, and network marketing, however it is done.
Nevertheless, most internet advertising campaigns are still hallmarked by lengthy, impossible-to-read, aggressive squeeze pages splattered with aggressive bold-print subliminals that bring to mind the old vaudeville adage: "If you can't dazzle them with your brilliance...baffle them with your baloney!"
Coming back to the "nuclear alert" analogy, internet surfers relate to marketers as if they (the marketers) are literally still "at war" with their prospective customers and partners and intend to conquer them.
So, regardless of the software, the principles of respectfully striving to provide value to people, must be clearly evident in the communications that we put out.
Thanks,
Jack
Interesting perspective and wisdom about the internet and technology .Im info tech graduate. U make my day.
RG (and followers, friends, fans...) This: Charlie Rose interviews Marc Andreessen (Netscape, Ning, more...) Aweosome perspective on social media and the future of... http://ping.fm/wyJPc. I say it's a Must Watch!
Randy,
Having worked in Tech for a number of years (VoIP space), I'm always intrigued by your amazing insights into the latest trends.
What I wonder, however, is what it is about these Internet Marketing Gurus that has you forward links to everyone. Having seen countless web pages much like the one you forwarded which ALL have "If you are one of the first 500 you'll receive X bonuses worth $1000 FREE, etc." yada yada, I wonder just how real any of these are, or if in fact, it's the Sure Thing Internet Marketing lessons that actually made these guys millions. I suspect it is.
And yes, I'm a skeptic, because as you well know there are countless numbers of these Web Marketing gurus selling their programs, which likely are all identical with the same money back guarantees. And then try getting your money back if you're not satisifed, LOL.
While I'd LOVE to come from a place of Belief, Prosperity and Abundance when reading these, the simple fact is that they all read the same, the one you sent today, included. So is this the 'magic' to making millions? Putting up the web pages like this one? Just curious.
Ditto your questions. When you get an answer, please let me know.
"where the Net is going next"
OK, Randy, my predictions:
1) I know people are going to disagree, but I think Twitter is going to be a victim of its own hype. Too many people are getting caught up in the Twitter hoopla, and there soon will be a "who cares?" backlash. Twitter won't go away, but I predict a year from now that no one will be talking about it much.
2) I think your question "So might we see a dramatic shift from social media sites to social media browsers?" is close to the mark. Actually, I predict we will see a new social media site launched in the next year -- less boring than LinkedIn, and not as cutesy-pie as Facebook. And the company behind the new social site? Google! (A side effect is that the meaning of the verb "to Google" will change from "search the Internet for" to "keep in touch over the Internet".)
I'll admit I could be totally off-base on these, so we'll just have to wait and see what weird and exciting things the next 12 months bring......
- jim
Perhaps they're running out of ideas on how to keep people busy, busy, busy back at the farm with the other animals? Kind of like participating in Earth Hour together with the Coca-Cola Company.
There will always be a new fad to distract your time, energy, focus, attention, and $$$. From this one to the next one and then on to the next one, each one promising answers to health, wealth and happiness.
YOU are your own best teacher!
God question guys. I never recommend someone I don't believe in. Derek has the best stuff in terms of Internet marketing for the layperson. I enthusiastically recommend his course every year, and have for at least 7 or 8, when the late Cory Rudl started it.
-RG
Hey Randy, I'm the blind guy at your first Prosperity Series seminar in Sydney 2002. Going by my research, interactive handsets. The I-phone which will have electronic magazines. Flipping Page, The ability to flip through a magazine on your pc or internet connected mobile. Generation Y and X's are already grasping it with both hands. Ex;www.bmags.com Great reading, keep it up
Always personal, almost always entertaining, and usually insightful, I enjoyed your discussion. As a former long-term member of the human-computer interface community, I notice public technologies that were in the research communities 10+ years earlier. One point-of-information: Microsoft was not the #1 browser until 1998-1999 to the dismay of us Netscape users. http://is.gd/qJzl
Randy,
I congratulate you - You've accomplished what very few ever do - You've used balance in the conversation. You've acted as an advocate and as an inquirer, which is quite rare in today's me, me, me blog-a-thon mentality. I appreciate the fact that we all have opinions. Let me just say Thank you for being unique.
I am not writing this sentence last - since the comment itself turned into a sub-post that I hope others will appreciate and not falme the ever-loving crap out of me for it. It wasn't my intent to or any attempt to dominate a conversation, but to raise awareness of the urgency of technology and how as humans we change. For the lengthy post - I apologize now and let it be done.
I have long since decided that I have personally learned from so many, including you, that not all the ideas I now embody are ever all my own - they are from bits and pieces of many, many great people whom I have had the pleasure to learn from over the last 17+ years on the Internet.
It amazed me when the largest credit card processor in the world did not have a web site in 1996. I got one built for them and then their mind's started working and so did their business. For what it cost then, you could have hundreds or even thousands of sites today. The most sophisticated technology is only at a cost of 10% what it was even 5-7 years ago.
What amazed me even more thereafter, was the number of people that never "got it", but played as mimes - doing what everyone else did, without injecting their own personalities, to make it theirs and unique and a valued services to those they served. It seems like very few have the guts to not use the "Marketing 101" mentality.
The final amazement is how many people do not have the least idea how to formulate a cogent plan to take their business from idea to merchant worthy - regardless the amount of money they attract or burn. In some respects, its the same today as it was 10+ years ago and I am still stumped.
The newset technology in my opinion will be...
What was once old will be new again - Everything that hits the "fringe edge" must come back to the existence of solid reality. What I'm saying is this:
As consumers we have more power than ever and we aren't going backwards anytime soon. Treating people like they don't matter doesn't work. The technology must also "feel human". We are a global society and people do matter.
We techno-geeks have a responsibility - there has never been a worse time for business as usual. That mentality will forever fail.
The MBA Marketers don't get it, as another round of ambiguous S%$# was handed out as "research" somewhere yesterday. Here's an idea -- Let's do something extraordinary, like ask the customer...test, try and adapt the technologies to suit the needs of the users.
For instance, let's take the US auto Industry for example and compare it to the poor bloke whose company only updated the 3-three social networks in your experience - 2 years ago was good for him; 30 years ago was good for [them]. Ping.fm took 2, then 5, then 30+ more to make their system better than the others. That's called progress and I pity the poor souls that never look forward.
With the auto industry, what worked for Lee Iaccoca and Chrysler 30 years ago didn't work out so well for the clunk-heads of today. The real competitors ARE NOT AFRAID to spend money to create something new. Somehow Chrysler, Ford and GM don't get it - Vehix get's it. Honda and Toyota have already moved there - they spent the money. And while we are at it, I LOVE the old muscle cars. They just aren't practical for transportation of us as people any longer; And I lamnet that maybe they never were.
"Big" companies come from yesterday - because what they did worked yesterday, meaning quite specifically that they WILL NOT work tomorrow - We are smarter than they think.
Whoever's technology wins - Its not a win, lose or tie game. Its about getting the eyes and ears of [your] audience - the real people, who are only too happy to do business with other real people. If your product or service actually does something remarkable, your business will grow. Maybe not as fast as you'd always like, but keeping the customer in mind and their needs forefront, will mean it will grow more than you might have ever imagined.
It seems that I am supposed to insert some kind of head-jerking insight to the what, why and if of this game. Actually, maybe I don't have to, we may have finally reached the threshold of true "skepticism".
So, summarizing my opinion, we need transformation - A Transformation Age for our be all places at once society. Everything [we] do needs to make a difference in the lives of the people that we interact with. It seems that our goal should be to make this place (world) a little better tomorrow than it was today and to NOT prop up what was.
The technology that wins is the one that engages the people, fires or fuels the passions to exist beyond themselves and make a difference in a noisy world.
Am I wrong...Am I right? What do you think? Why do you think that (insert your opinion here)?
Kindest Regards to all and may your successes out-perform your dreams
Thanks.
Chris
I love Charlie and Marc is always worth listening to, definitely a critical thinker.
-RG
Randy, I can't help connecting the implications of your comments regarding the state of the internet and it's future to that of the network marketing industry, which is becoming more and more internet dependent. from this perspective, this post could be called : The End of HYPE.
You correctly focus on VALUE to the end-user/consumer. I would add, that respecting the consumers intelligence is also of VALUE to them. Happily, this same thinking is being applied by some marketing strategies, and as a subset, by some network marketing systems.
Mainstream marketing has become increasingly "sophisticated" by addressing subliminal needs and aversions - disregarding the fact that target audiences have also become more sophisticated - getting savvy about the manipulations they are constantly exposed to. The reaction has increased suspicion making it more and more difficult to get a message across - despite the innate value. Any time there is even the slightest inkling of a fragrance of a "pitch", alarm bells go off and, literally, defense systems go onto nuclear alert. Especially when it costs money,
This, in turn, has made it even more challenging to gain the trust that is necessary for a relationship. These two elements' in turn - trust and relationships - have been recognized as the pillars of social networking, and network marketing, however it is done.
Nevertheless, most internet advertising campaigns are still hallmarked by lengthy, impossible-to-read, aggressive squeeze pages splattered with aggressive bold-print subliminals that bring to mind the old vaudeville adage: "If you can't dazzle them with your brilliance...baffle them with your baloney!"
Coming back to the "nuclear alert" analogy, internet surfers relate to marketers as if they (the marketers) are literally still "at war" with their prospective customers and partners and intend to conquer them.
So, regardless of the software, the principles of respectfully striving to provide value to people, must be clearly evident in the communications that we put out.
Thanks,
Jack
Interesting perspective and wisdom about the internet and technology .Im info tech graduate. U make my day.