July 23, 2007
fresh meat!
From the “When It’s Time To Bitchslap The Newbie” Department. Just got the following e-mail:
My name is [*Name Witheld*], one of staff members at [*Name Witheld*], an independent production company in New York. Our digital media division has just launched a new blog, and would like to link our readers to yours. In exchange, we ask that to be added to your blog roll.
Here is our link. If you have any other questions, please let me know.
www.[*Witheld*].tv/
Thank you,
[*Name Witheld*]
Man, it makes me all nostalgic for 2002.
[UPDATE:] The CEO of the company in question leaves a comment below:
Hugh — First of all, sorry for starting off on the wrong foot and creating a bad first impression with you and your readers. After more than 10 years in traditional media, we are learning this new way of talking and we’re just taking our first steps. So thanks for not biting our heads off.
Secondly, a big thank you to the folks who commented — especially Rachel and Joaquin — for pointing out what we did wrong and how we can go about doing it right.
Like everyone else, we’re learning as we do and your post is a lesson for us. And this time we’ve learned our lesson.
Cheers
Johnny Boston
CEO Raw Digital
No worries, Johnny, I assumed it was a fairly innocent case of “Newbie-itus”, which is why I didn’t mention names or URL.
Yeah, I know, this blogosphere culture has all these strange rules and rituals that are hard to navigate. Tell me about it.
But what’s interesting to me is, by leaving the comment below, you actually made your company look good in the longer term. Turned a negative into a positive. This is what they mean when they say “Join the conversation”. Cool. Thanks. Like I said, interesting…
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Wow dude, how lucky are you! Perhaps you could recommend me? Please, I’ll recommend Stormhoek to my grandmother (who’s dead).
Are people STILL doing this??!!
It’s sooooo sad to see the recurring pattern of confusing GOALS with OUTCOMES…
Do you mind writing a post about this comment of mine, link to my blog, post my resume on your site and send me a free bottle of Stormhoek Rosé? In exchange I promise to mention you in my next meeting with friends who don’t blog…
Of course they are still doing this — and they’ll be doing it for a while longer. As building ‘relationships’ online increases, as more and more companies and their agencies see see it as a powerful tool to spread the word of their brand, you are going to be see more of this. The number of people who have learnt the lessons is dwarfed by the number of people who are going to have to learn the lessons.
Now, the sensible ones, the ones who are going to be good at this, will research, investigate, talk to people, learn, all of this before launching in. The rest will just do — send out emails with little clue. Go to conferences and ask the same questions that were asked the last time and have been blogged and written about (in books no less) about infinitum — how can we keep control, what do we do if someone says something bad about us? Those are the ones that will annoy many over the next few years, until digital awareness becomes more of a requirement for recruitment and the new generation gets into position to do things, the good ones are doing it really well and Darwinian selection gets rid of the ones that will never get it.
“..we ask that to be added to your blog roll.“
Never trust someone with appalling grammar…
Were they possibly … Nigerian
Aww, you should have given the url so readers can troll the crap out of it.
Hugh — First of all, sorry for starting off on the wrong foot and creating a bad first impression with you and your readers. After more than 10 years in traditional media, we are learning this new way of talking and we’re just taking our first steps. So thanks for not biting our heads off.
Secondly, a big thank you to the folks who commented — especially Rachel and Joaquin — for pointing out what we did wrong and how we can go about doing it right.
Like everyone else, we’re learning as we do and your post is a lesson for us. And this time we’ve learned our lesson.
Cheers
Johnny Boston
CEO Raw Digital
I had two of these last month which shows how desparate they can be!
Nice reaction Johnny. Congratulations. THAT does make people want to check Raw Digital out…I’ll do that just now.
Fair play to Johnny for stepping up. Looks like they are going to be one of the companies that learn quickly and won’t make the same mistake again. As Joaquin says, time to check them out.
Fair play to Johnny for taking it on the chin.
I’ll check out your website for sure.
Congratulations, Johnny; you’ve effectively turned a messy situation into an opportunity to connect.
As someone who’s new to the blogosphere, I also want to applaud you, Hugh, for treading gently. Some of you guys who have been living and breathing this stuff for years may have forgotten how scary it is when you first start out.
Imagine you walk into a room filled with people engaged in an active, lively discussion. You don’t know anyone, so you stand there for a few minutes, listening and working up your courage to participate. Finally you overcome the butterflies in your stomach enough to make a comment that completely misinterprets the thread of the conversation and exposes you for the ignorant git that you are, right at one of those moments when the rest of the room falls silent.
Painful… and worth a bit of compassion from the veterans.
Yep, I agree, fair play to Johnny. And I pretty much agree with everything Kalia said. A very apt allegory…
I got the same email and just deleted it. Well done for the gentle approach Hugh-seeemd to pay dividends here.
…and next moment rawdigital.tv goes offline, probably buried under the avalanche of visitors from gapingvoid. another lesson for a blog-newbie: be prepared for a day you’re (finally) linked to