Ricky’s Online Business Blog

I received an enquiry on email hosting. The company asked me whether my server could support mass email broadcasting. They just want to send out emails to promote their training courses to their tens of thousands of email addresses in the mailing list. Upon further probing, they just want to find an email server that allows them to spam.

Receiving spams is a reality nowadays. How many spams do you receive each day? We know most spams are about “sexual health”. But I found more and more spams related to training and education these days.

These are subject titles of some spams on training courses received in my spam folder recently. I have never subscribed to any of their mailing lists before:

• How To Sell Successfully To Corporate Customers
• Train The Trainer
• Enhancing Interpersonal Skills
• Corporate Social Responsibility For Competitive Advantage
• Public Speaking & Presentation Skills
• Planning For Strategic Marketing (do they teach us to spam for marketing?)

One of these spammers is even more “sophisticated”. They know how to use a different email address to spam each time to bypass spam filter and to hide their real identity!

But do you really need to spam in order get the words out about your products and services? Nowadays there are many ways to do Internet marketing, such as search engine marketing and blog marketing. Unless you are in fly-by-night business, sending spams will not only not work, but backfire on your reputation as well!

So I advised that company not to spam but consider other ways of promotion that could be more long-term and beneficial. Unfortunately, they said they want “fast results” and will go on shopping for another hoster who allows them to spam. But as I understand, no legitimate hosting provider allows customers to spam. So good luck!

One day when I was driving, I saw an advertisement at the back of a taxi that reads “Business, Finance and More”.  It’s BFM, a new radio station on business news and programmes!

I turned on the radio and tuned to FM 89.9 immediately.  I was so delighted to have found such a channel that I have long yearned for

I’ve been the type of person who don’t listen to music while driving.   No, I was not like this when I was younger.  I spoilt my car audio speaker before for playing rock music too loudly in early years of driving.  It is also not that I don’t like music.  If you go karaoke singing with me, most likely I’ll sing more than you.  But as I grew older, I just became the kind of person who would not turn on car radio for music any more.

But apart from its normal programmes, BFM is music most of the time!  In order not to miss any good business programmes, now I keep the radio on while driving and listen to music after so many years!

The moral of this story is that, BFM turned me from a non-customer into a customer.  Just as Nintendo successfully turned non-customers such as adults to its Nintendo Wii video game console, BFM just successfully turned me into listening to music!

Instead of taking away existing customers from competitors in the market, this is defining a new market boundary by appealing to non-customers and turning them into customers.  A blue ocean strategy!

I got an enquiry from a member of a reputable direct selling company in Singapore.  As member, she was given a special web page with her name and photo on it.  She asked how to promote her web site.  I’m not really an expert but ventured to answer her question.  Please add to my answer if you have any good ideas.

Question

Hi Ricky,

I need a favour from you, can you please advise me - How can I promote my website (http://name.company.com) as you are an expert in this.

Answer

I’m still long way to become an expert.  Anyway, here’s my brief feedback.

I have checked your web page.  However, as the web site does not belong to you, and so you have not much control over the web site content, there is not much thing you can do on the web page itself.  Otherwise, you could do some search engine optimization (SEO) to attract Internet traffic.

But I guess there are at least two other ways to promote your business online:

First, use social media like Facebook, Friendster, LinkedIn and even Twitter.  Not only mention what you do, but treat these media like your “mini PR agencies” to constantly update and tell the world how you are doing in your business.

Second, set up a blog and tell the world what you do.  Although you don’t have control over the web page your company gives you, you have control over your own web site.  Use blogging not only to attract Internet traffic from search engines by SEO, but also to show your products and services, with photos and funny stories.  Those people having similar mindset as yours can get attracted to you, and maybe your business.