Internet Archives - Page 9 of 13 by Mark Murnahan

Online Contest Contest: Win Prizes and Gain Exposure

Online contests have become extremely popular, and with good reason. People love getting things for free! So I decided to offer you the “Online Contest Contest”. Yes, you read it right … a contest contest. So what do I mean by that? Allow me to explain.

I am going to give you a chance to win cash and prizes and also gain free exposure to a lot of people. Since my blog is about Internet marketing, this is both an online contest and also an article to help people think about how to better market their business. This way, you can still gain a lot of value from it, even if you do not win the contest. Yes, you still win, even if you do not “win”. While I give you the rules I will provide tips to run your own contest. Each “Online Contest Tip” below will outline this particular contest.

I hope you will enjoy this. I look forward to rewarding some very excited winners.

Online Contest Tip: Defined Timeframe

A contest should have a defined timeframe so that participants know when to expect their winnings. This contest will run from April 5th to April 20th 2010 and winners will be announced by the last day of April.

Online Contest Tip: Easy to Participate

This is a contest for the best online contest ideas but you do not need to submit a contest idea to win! I am going to give you multiple easy ways to participate and win. You do not even have to fill out a registration form or sign up for anything!

Online Contest Tip: Make it Relevant

Since prizes are a huge piece of any contest, they should be relevant to the contest promoters’ business model. For example, if you have a fishing store, you may want to give away fishing poles, but you probably do not want to give away knitting needles. It should be relevant to your industry.

As an Internet marketing guy, I help people to make their business more successful online. So, when I decided to hold a contest, I determined that it should be relevant to people seeking more success in their business. This is why I am providing ways for you to achieve more exposure.

Online Contest Tip: The Prizes

The best contests will provide value for the contest promoter as well as the participants. Nobody loses, and somebody gets a great feeling of winning along with some cool free stuff, like money! Here are the prizes of this particular contest:

Cash Prize – The first place winner will receive ten percent of any new marketing contract that I accept during the contest period, referred as a result of the Online Contest Contest, plus ten percent residuals for the first 12 months from any contingency contract. Note that I do not sell $.95 knitting needles, and this could be big.
Win a Blog – The first and second place winners will each receive a custom WordPress blog setup including ten hours of customization and SEO services, or equivalent redesign services.
Business Exposure – Gain more exposure to your business! Each winner will receive spotlighted exposure in a blog post here at aWebGuy.com in a winner’s announcement, plus all participants will receive recognition in the comments and reactions on this blog post. This can add up.
Brain Food – Top ten participants will win a copy of “Twitter for Business: Twitter for Friends“.

Online Contest Tip: Let People Win

If you run a contest, try not to exclude people. You should make it easy to join in and win. In this case, I am making it really simple to participate. Since my blog will add social media reactions in the comments, it will be really easy for you to show your participation and gain exposure, too.

Everything that appears in the “Comments and Reactions” for this blog post will have a chance to win. For example, my blog is set to include social media “reactions” from FriendFeed, Twitter, Digg, Reddit, Hacker News, Blogger, WordPress, YouTube, Vimeo, Picasa, Flickr, TypePad, Movable Type, BackType, UberVU, and other services. These are just the services that are set up to automatically appear in the comments and reactions. You can also add comments directly. Remember, everything that shows up has a chance to win!

Online Contest Tip: Make the Rules Easy to Understand

If it is easy to understand, it becomes easier to win. In this case, I am using a point system. Winners will be determined based on a simple points system, and can choose how to get more points. Some of these are really easy! Here is how to get points:

250+ Points (New Contract): I will award two hundred fifty points to the referrer for each new client who contracts my SEO and social media marketing services during the contest period from April 5th to April 20th 2010. That is 250 points per new contract, and it adds to the cash prize, so don’t be shy! They simply must express that they heard about it from you.
100+ Points (Contest Ideas): If you submit the Contest Idea that receives the most “likes” (note the “like” button beside each comment) you will receive one hundred points plus five points for each “like”. You surely have friends to help you, right?
100+ Points (Blog Points): If you blog about this contest with a link back to it, you will receive one hundred points for the blog post (or other website) plus one point for every 10 unique visitors linked directly to this page coming from your blog / website during the contest period as verified through a Clicky Web Analytics referrer report. I suggest adding a comment here on this blog to claim your article. I will also provide a “dofollow” link back to your post.
50+ Points (Comment Points): If your individual comment here on the contest page other than a Contest Idea receives the most “likes” (note the “like” button beside each comment) you will receive fifty points plus five points for each “like”.
50-550 Points (Digg Points): If you Digg this article and include a Digg comment, you will receive 50 points. If the article reaches the front page of Digg.com, each person who diggs the article will be awarded an additional 500 points.
25-45 Points Daily (Twitter Points): If you send a tweet, you will receive 25 points, and if it is retweeted, you will receive an additional 2 points for each verifiable retweet up to a total of ten (for a possible 45 points per day). Twitter points will be calculated based on tweets which appear at TweetMeme.com.
25+ Points Daily (FriendFeed, Reddit, Blogger, WordPress, YouTube, Vimeo, Picasa, Flickr, TypePad, Movable Type) Reactions aggregated and appearing on this blog post as reported by BackType and UberVU across these listed social media sites will be awarded 25 points each, with a limit of 25 points per network per day.

Online Contest Rules: The Fine Print

Every contest needs some rules, but the fine print should be easy to understand. In the case of this contest, I have tried to make it as easy as possible to understand, and to win. See the Contest Contest Official Rules.

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Google Returns 404 Errors After Data Center Fire

Google is apologizing following what started as a minor incident at one of their data centers when a CO2 handler caught fire.

Google returned 404 errors (page not found) for over an hour in many locations around the world after a fire in one of their data centers, but not because of the fire. According Google, the fire started as only a small blaze caused by systems designed to reduce CO2 emissions. Ironically, the worst damage was caused by the fire suppression sprinklers and not the fire.

Although the sprinkler systems put out the fire and saved Google from significant losses of data and equipment, one of their routing systems was affected by the water and was unable to properly re-route the center’s web traffic to other appropriate alternative data centers. The way Google tells the story, as the replacement router was installed and powered up, the backup of traffic caused four other Google data centers to crash.

Google Fire Bad News for Advertisers

While data loss was minimized by Google’s swift reaction with a replacement router, there were reportedly many advertisers who were falsely charged for AdWords. Google expects it to take some time to determine the advertisers and the amount of lost ads.

For more information, see Google’s full statement.

UPDATE: Read additional coverage on Mobile Local Social “Google Data Center Fire Returns Worldwide 404 Errors” which reports “A fire at a Seattle data center, nicknamed The Googtopia has affected over 42,000 servers, bringing down search engine results pages across the globe.”

Do Potential Customers Know They Need You?

Will Your Customers Wait for a Flat Tire?

Do your potential customers know that they need your product or service offering? You may be surprised to find that many marketing shortcoming are not only in lack of exposure, but also because potential customers failed to see a need … or enough need to do business with you. Maybe you have addressed this question before, but perhaps I can help you with a different spin.

Imagine First Generation Drivers

Back when cars first gained popularity as a mode of transportation, most people did not know much about them. The first generation drivers were pretty clueless about the new “horseless carriages”, but they sure were eager to learn. They had a lot of crashes back in those days. I can imagine why they crashed. Just picture the kids back then having to actually hand write their text messages on paper!

Try to imagine the days before anybody had a father to nag them about checking their tires. Cars need maintenance, but in the beginning, most people didn’t know anything at all about tire care. Drivers overlooked maintenance and had a lot of breakdowns. My father told of his first car, which was a Ford Model T Roadster. Stop right there, I am not all that old. My dad was about a hundred and twenty something when I was born. Anyway, he said it seemed like he blew a tire every time he turned a corner. This created a need for better tires. Not just a need for better tires, but also used tires, tire repair, tire changing, and of course some good tools for changing the tires. All of the sudden, there was an emerging market. It became a pretty huge market that made many people such as the Firestone family abundantly wealthy. Tires were expensive, and people tried to use them as long as they could. They would drive them until they blew out. It is why the term “tire kicking” is still used today. Back then, people would kick the tires because if the tires had been repaired, kicking them would help them to know if there was a “boot” in the tire. No, not the kind of boot on your foot, but a piece of rubber that was used inside the tire to repair it.

Now, back to the Firestone family, the Firestone’s did not get wealthy only because there was a market need. They helped people to understand their need, and they did this better than the rest of the tire companies who competed with them.

How Would You Market Tires?

When you imagine your market, try to think like the earliest tire companies. Pretend that you are the first company to try and explain to people about tires. What would you do, and what would you say? Would you wait until their tired blew out and they knew they had a need, or would you try to help them to be safer by knowing when their tires were getting too old? Would you teach them about tire pressures and how to make their tires last longer, or would you hope they wore them out sooner so you could sell more? TIP: Even tire companies selling the same tire but who help customers prolong their tire life have “better tires” because they last longer.

Think about how you would reach those early drivers. How would you let them know, not only that you exist, but how you would impress upon them that they need your tire store and not just the closest tire store to where their next tire blows out. How far would you reach to grow that market if the big obstacle was to help people understand that they are safer when you are their tire guy?

Exposure is a huge component of marketing, but never forget that there are already a lot of people who know about you, but do not realize how much they need you, or why you sell “better tires” than the others.

People Don’t Repair Good Tires

People do not repair good tires that hold air. This occurred to me as I consider the Internet marketplace. A lot of people who really need the marketing services which I provide just don’t know how much it can help or how bald their tires are. Do you need a better tire seller?

Are You Too Good at Your Job?

Being too good at your job can damage your vision. What I mean is that when you are too closely involved, it can become easy to miss something that is right under your nose. It seems that a lot of people are their own worst enemy when it comes to their business, and especially as it relates to their marketing. I hear it all the time that a client will hold onto delusions that they know their market inside and out. They blame the industry, their customers, or the economy for problems instead of realizing they have made some mistakes. The truth is that they are often just too closely involved. I am sure you have seen something that you can relate this to, right?

I even feel this way in my job a lot of times. Since I know a lot about Internet marketing and search engine optimization (SEO), I forget that a lot of people are just not so familiar. If you are good at something, it is easy to forget that the world is made up of all types and that the more you specialize, the more you become blinded. Addressing this with clients is an interesting challenge to me, because I frequently provide concrete evidence to show them just how wrong they are and how much business they have been missing. Then I have to present it in a way that does not make them feel stupid for not seeing it and addressing it sooner. People hate feeling stupid, and I don’t always have such a soft hand at pointing things like this out. I am that guy who will tell people what they need to hear rather than candy-coating a turd and telling them what they want to hear. I am a great marketer but because of that, I lack the wasteful schmoozing that some people expect to get when they spend a lot of money. This is my example of being so focused that I don’t see so well. I hope that you can realize it if there are instances like this in your work, too. Recognizing it is a good step in the right direction … I think … or rather, I hope.

It is common to use bad judgment or to be complacent when addressing matters within your own industry. It is why people use the analogies of a cobbler with barefoot children or a plumber with leaky pipes. It is easy to just think we are so good at something that we know how long we can put a task off before things break. It can also be easy to think we are doing all the right things, while we are actually just making things worse. Allow me to share an extreme real life example.

Jeff is Too Good at His Job to be Sick

I am reminded of many years ago when I had a roommate who was a physician. He woke up one morning and he was very sick. He could barely stand up, but of course he didn’t need a doctor. He figured that since his abdomen hurt that he just needed some antacid. He swigged a big dose of about three different over-the-counter antacids and headed to work.

Later that day as he was doing rounds at the hospital, it got worse … a lot worse. I got a call from an old school friend’s mother that evening. It kind of surprised me because I had not spoken to this woman in the prior 15 or more years. She was calling for professional reasons, as she is a nurse who worked with Jeff (the roommate). She called to let me know that while Jeff was at work, he had become so sick that he needed an emergency surgery. His appendix had perforated and he was in really bad shape. He made the mistake of diagnosing himself and it finally took a doctor friend to force him to go to the emergency room where a formal diagnosis was made. His condition was worsening fast, and if not for the intervention, it would have been life-threatening in very short order.

Jeff is a sub-specialist with over 15 years of post-secondary medical training from some of the most prestigious medical schools in the world. He is extremely talented in his field of medicine, but he was just too close to see the problem. I am not a doctor, and even I knew enough to tell him to stop by the emergency department to drink a GI cocktail just to see if the pain went away. If not, it would be a sign of something worse. He didn’t take my tip, nor several coworkers advice throughout the day, and he suffered a lot for it.

Jeff’s instance makes a good example of just being so good at a job or too closely involved to have good judgment. I see business instances similar to this often enough to believe that most people can find a similar oversight in their work.

My work involves a lot of different markets, and I am always thinking about how to best reach my clients’ prospective customers. Not so unlike Jeff, I am my own worst patient. I think a lot of us are this way but we become too blind to recognize it. We get so wrapped up in our respective jobs that we put things off or make costly mistakes.

It is very likely that you are overlooking a lot of potential in your business, too. Recognizing the ailment is an important step to recovery. Don’t be a “Jeff”! Putting things off will often make for a much longer recovery.

What Do People Want and Where Do You Fit In?

Knowing what people want is an important part of effective marketing. Knowing where you fit into the customer’s plan is critical to success. It is not a simple one-answer question and it requires a close look at what people want, why they want it, and how you can help them get more of those things they want. Knowing where you are in this big picture is often difficult, because you are on the inside and trying to find a view from the outside. I want to offer you some help.

Note that this is not a matter of fitting your product or service into what you think people want, but what they actually want.

Humans Are Highly Evolved and Sophisticated Creatures

We humans are highly evolved. We think differently than most animals. We think differently enough that we have sometimes even become arrogant about it. We think we can fight what is in our nature, and that we are totally in control. We even came up with a word to make instinct seem more evolved, and we called it “emotion”. Emotion is what drives us to many of the choices we make, whether we like it or not. Emotions bring us closer to our friends, emotions cause us to argue with our friends, and emotions help us to find the right mate. Wait, but couldn’t the same things be said of instinct? Instincts drive us to be with others like us, instincts cause us to compete and fight within our packs, instincts are what make this mate or that mate right for us, and instincts are what drive us to buy things. Seriously, emotions are synonymous with instincts, and I make this point because we cannot fight our instincts. If I tell you that you cannot fight your emotions, I may reach some of you, but when I put it in terms of the lion with the biggest mane, it is because I want you guys to hear me, too.

Let us just consider, for a moment, that we are each hunters and gatherers. Like it or not, that’s where I am going with this. If I am a better hunter and gatherer, I will be rewarded. OK lions, that means I will have the best den, the best mate, and the best and most delicious gazelle. If you do not believe me on this, take a look at statistics on divorce. When a lion has a broken ankle, (not providing well) the mate (male or female … because ladies, you really are the ones who rock my blog) is far more likely to kick you out of the den or at very least to the other side of the den until you can show them the gazelle. I hope we are clear on this, because I want to tell you a little more about instincts and why some things sell so much better than others.

We have all heard that “sex sells”, but have you really looked deeper into why sex sells?

Why Does Sex Sell? Because People Instinctively Want Sex!

There are very basic non-sexy reasons that sex sells, and the sooner you realize it, the better. Aside from finding something to eat, there is not a single more instinct-driven action in our world than to pass along our genetics and keep our species alive. Without sex, nobody would be here and reading my blog. Yes, like it or not, your mother and father had sex … probably a lot.

People beat around the bush about the topic, and it is taboo for some people which makes it even more desirable. We avoid talking to grandmother about it, but let’s face it: sex sells. It sells news, it sells products, and it sells hope … in numbers that nothing else can compete with … not even close! There is no need for you to be shy when I tell you that sex sells, because grandmother is not watching. Even if grandmother was watching, she could probably tell you a good thing or two about sex. I know, it seems impossible, right?

In case you have any doubts on this topic, let us consider how you feel about the words mastectomy, castration, hormone disorder, or erectile dysfunction. I don’t mean just clinically, but how they affect people. These are some of the most frightening things that can happen to a human being. Castration is often considered one of the most cruel and unusual punishments possible, and in case you have not noticed, plastic surgery (namely fake boobs) is a pretty profitable field. On top of that, “erectile dysfunction” could easily be the overriding view of our life and time if we were dug up by anthropologists in a couple thousand years.

When a company embraces a market directive of not only the fact that sex sells, but how they can position themselves such that others are instinctively driven to their product, they win! They have the biggest profit margins and they have the biggest market, and all because they give us what we want. Just look at Calvin Klein as an example of this. Have you ever purchased one of their products or had sex with somebody who did? They offer jeans to make butts look better, scents to make people smell sexier, but really, above all, they market to instincts. They are not conning you, but rather simply understand what people want and they know how to deliver it.

So you may ask “what of other markets”. Instinct holds answers there, too. If you are a successful plumber, instincts tell us that backed up sewage is not healthy and that we should call you. If you are a successful restaurant, instincts tell us that your food will make us more satisfied than the others. If you are a successful car dealer, instincts tell us that you have a better way for us to go out to hunt and gather. As crazy as it may seem to you, even the seemingly least desirable or ridiculous things you may ever purchase are there because somebody had a better way to appeal to your instincts (emotions).

How Can I Harness Instincts?

Since you read this far, you are probably wondering just how you can harness instincts to explain how very valuable and useful your products or services are. The good news is that it is not as ugly or difficult as you have probably imagined. It takes a careful look at what you do and how it really fits into things that people want and need. Knowing where you are in this big picture is usually pretty hard, because you are on the inside and seeking a view from the outside.

My tip is to realize where and what you are. Be aware of yourself and why you do the things you do. It is a huge step to understanding where you fit in the pack and how you can help the rest of the pack survive stronger than without you. When the pack is stronger because of what you do, you become a success.

From my standpoint, I realized a long time ago that I do things because I am a lion with huge claws and teeth, and I know why I do things. There are instinctual reasons that I ride a motorcycle that is ten feet long and why I purchase amazing items. In my case, I want sex … just like nearly everybody else.

How this works into the pack and makes my pack stronger is that I help them to do the same. I help people to earn more money, which helps them to have more of the things that they want. I help people to find where they fit into the pack. I hope that I have helped you. If you need more help and want to grow your pack, just ask me.