Friday, September 22, 2006

Stila founder doesn't appreciate customer feedback

Dave Winer and Robert Scoble, to name just two notables, have been blogging recently about how there is a lot of money to be made for companies who are willing to listen to what their blogging customers have to say. The way companies tend to work now with bloggers is that, if you’ve got a highly-trafficked blog related to their product (for me, it’s the beauty blog, for which I receive many shipments of freebies to review each week), they send you their product(s) in the hope that you’ll give them a rave review and a link. Dare to give some less-than-thrilled feedback, and they get can get rather huffy.

To give an example away from the technology ground of Winer and Scoble, check out what happened when I blogged a note of constructive criticism - and a commenter on my post added their own disappointment as a customer - to the creator of major make-up brand Stila.

The person I was addressing, Jeanine Lobell, found my note through Google (we rank on the first page of searches for her name) and left a snarky comment. Oh, but guess what? The point the commenter made - about the flimsiness of the company’s packaging - was valid enough that Stila introduced a new product which addresses the problem. Still, Lobell couldn’t resist getting sarcastic with good, evangelistic customers (my post praised the colour in question as the best I’d ever found, and no, it wasn’t a freebie; I bought it, and many other Stila products, with my own money). Now things are getting really interesting in the comments to my post, and other Stila constituents are not happy.

Tuesday, September 19, 2006

$2.3 million in revenue via blog

Dave Winer saw $2.3 million in revenue from his blog last year.

People think blogs are about advertising, and I would agree, but they’re thinking in terms of clicks and eyeballs, and I’m thinking of technology that’s created using the intelligence of community participation.

Hell, you don’t even have to be in the technology business to reap those kinds of monetary rewards from clever use of your (or your company’s) blog. Unless you’ve got something to hide, I don’t know what would stop you from blogging properly (link away from your own site; I never trust a man without a blogroll).

As for ads on his blog, Winer says:

I don’t share this space with hitch-hikers. I use my blog for my own ideas. They make good money. No point diluting what I have to say.

Sunday, September 17, 2006

Yes, we're still here

Apologies for the lack of blog posts over the last few months. Things have been quite hectic, with EA business taking me to Silicon Valley (twice) and with much to do in London as well. I will be back to regular posting starting now, though. Thanks for reading. 

Tuesday, July 18, 2006

Rent an Expert

When I was in San Francisco last month, one of the best things that happened to me was meeting BrainJams‘ Kristie Wells and Chris Heuer. These are fiercely intelligent, open, unpretentious, generous people who are doing incredible things through the power of their own personal networks.

One such example of this is the Rent an Expert event which BrainJams is staging at CNET HQ tomorrow in San Francisco.

The format will follow the laws of open space as the ‘how to classes*’ offered will be determined by the participants. We ask that a small fee (average is $5) be given for each ‘how to class’ you sign up for, and all the money collected during the evening will be donated to a charity that will be decided by those in the room (majority rules folks).

Check out the Rent an Expert wiki if you can attend and want to share your expertise and/or learn from the expertise of others in attendance. If you go, tell them that I sent you - and thank me sooner or later, because you won’t regret the experience or getting to know Kristie and Chris.

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

Commission Junction University

I spent more than 12 hours at ValueClick‘s Commission Junction University event today, watching loads of presentations and talking about blogs, RSS, and social media for around 15 minutes. I need to process my notes and write properly about the event (not to mention sleep off the champagne I had during the last couple of hours of CJU...), but I want immediately to thank Alison Guise and Tina Judic for bringing me in to take part in CJU. Big thanks also to Susan Kingston for introducing me to Alison, Tina, Gary Goodman, Carl White, Steve Winterhalter, Ben Kopetti, and other enthusiastic, clever people from the ValueClick group of companies.

Pictures from CJU - which I will finish tagging and organising after some kip - are already on Flickr. More tomorrow…