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Oi, The Online Circle! Don’t spam! Don’t lie!

07 June 2010 in Internet, Marketing by Stilgherrian | 6 comments

[Update 8 June 2010: The Online Circle's CEO Jeff Richardson emailed an apology and explanation today. I think it's a superb response, dignified yet accepting the very harsh criticism I served out. I'm impressed. And of course I accept the apology. So do bear that in mind as you read this rant. — Stilgherrian]

Speaking personally, I wouldn’t trust a “full-service interactive agency” that can’t even get the basics of the Spam Act 2003 right. So here’s my Big Fat Monday Night Hello to The Online Circle, the arsehats who just spammed me.

Guys, here’s how your email starts:

Hi Stilgherrian,

Firstly, thank you very much for your effort and involvement in our [redacted] campaign (We hope you enjoyed the chocolate). We saw some great blog articles and Twitter updates written that have really helped people understand more about [redacted] and why we all should get involved.

Erm, I wasn’t involved in this campaign, with or without any effort. So there’s arsehattery #1. And I never got any chocolate. There’s arsehattery #2.

Oh, and that sentence in parentheses? The full stop should be inside the closing parenthesis. That’s #3.

I’ll skip over the plug for your “we’re excited to announce” thing because — and OMFG how original is this? — you’re inviting people to upload videos to promote your client’s product! A video competition! How unique is that?

“Not at all,” is my answer there. Video competitions have to be the most overworked cliché in social media marketing.

But here are the bits which really shit me.

You are receiving this email because The Online Circle has found you to be an online influencer in Australia. This is our first contact with you and we promise not to share your name or any details with anyone.

An “online influencer”, eh? So it’s not that I’m an “interesting writer” or “respected commentator” or “glutton for chocolate” or even just “nice guy” or perhaps even “dangerous psychotic” — but an “online influencer”. Great. I fit some smegging buzzword du jour category for your marketing effort. T’riffic. How depersonalising.

“This is our first contact with you,” you say?

Bullshit.

You previously emailed me on 24 February, subject line “Social Media Influencer — How about free samples?”, to say that you “understand generating content for your blogs and social media channels can sometimes be challenging”. No, I don’t “generate content”. I write. I take photos sometimes.

And you emailed me again on 1 March, subject line “We are ready to send you some free chocolate”, with the same content.

All three emails claim “This is our first contact with you”. Liars.

And if you’d bothered to even look at my website…

… as opposed to, I presume, just finding me on some list of Australian bloggers somewhere, you might even have discovered that I don’t fill my website with random plugs for multinational corporations. Especially corporations that pull more than USD 7 billion a year in revenue but still want the punters to do their creative work for them in exchange for a few chocolates.

Arsehats. Exploitative spammy bloody arsehats.

Patch Monday: Is cloud right for your business?

05 March 2010 in Internet, Language, Marketing by Stilgherrian | 1 comment

[Oops. Not only was the Patch Monday podcast filed late, so it kinda became Patch Tuesday, I forgot to post it here. Well, that's fixed now.]

The key IT buzzwords for 2010 seem to be “cloud computing” and “virtualisation”, but is cloud really right for your business?

Will it provide a cheaper, more flexible option? Or can companies not afford to store data and run applications outside their business?

In a program recorded at the annual Kickstart Forum on IT trends, I spoke with Rosemary Stark, Microsoft Australia product manager for Windows Server and infrastructure solutions and Craig Deveson, CEO of Devnet, one of Google’s enterprise and web development partners.

Meanwhile, Michael Rich, managing director of Attaché Software, explains why he thinks IT vendors have got it wrong by attempting to sell products instead of providing business value.

You can listen below. But it’s probably better for my stats if you listen at ZDNet Australia or subscribe to the RSS feed or subscribe in iTunes.

Please let me know what you think. We accept audio comments too. Either Skype to stilgherrian or phone Sydney +61 2 8011 3733.

Gold Coast? Kickstart? Pirates? Oh dear!

27 February 2010 in Internet, Marketing by Stilgherrian | 11 comments

Tomorrow morning I’m flying to the Gold Coast for the Kickstart Forum 2010, a 3-day event that will “bring together more than 50 of Australia’s leading IT journalists and vendors”.

Apparently I’m one of them. “Leading IT journalist”, that is. Gosh.

Now some of the attending journalists tell me it’s a valuable opportunity to network and generate story leads. But with less than 24 hours until I fly north, I’m hesitant.

I’m starting to see the silly themed promotions some vendors are planning. Norton are doing some “top secret we fight cyber crime” Men in Black thing. Then…

“On the Sunday night, MyNetFone is sponsoring a Masterchef style interactive cooking dinner. Please note, you must wear covered shoes. On Monday night CSC will be sponsoring a pirate themed event, it’s always more fun to get into the spirit if [sic] things and dress up a little. ”

Erm, no it’s not. I loathe dress-ups and themed events. What a wank.

OK, it’s at the Hyatt Regency Sanctuary Cove. Which is all well and good. It certainly looks comfortable enough.

But Sanctuary Cove isn’t a cove at all. Look at the map and you’ll see that it’s one of those awful fake resort gated communities built in the middle of a swamp.

There is no escape!

Have a look yourself. Take the online tour. It’s diabolical!

But still… One way or another I have to deliver a Patch Monday podcast on Monday and an episode of The 9pm Edict Monday night. And Crikey commissioned a story about something else for Monday too. Erk.

Wish me luck.

I’ll keep up a regular flow of commentary via my Twitter stream using the hashtag #ks10.

Stopping the junk mail flood 4

23 January 2010 in Marketing, Personal by Stilgherrian | 4 comments

Since my last post on this subject two months ago I’ve seen a substantial drop in advertising material in my letterbox. While I haven’t complained to the perpetrators who continued to ignore the “no advertising material” sign, let’s list them for posterity.

The new guilty parties are: 3 Mangoes Thai; Arthur, a builder; Australia Wide Tax Solutions; Bus Stop Espresso; Caldo Pizza; Domino’s Pizza (yet again, twice); Chadwick Plumbing; Civic Video; Essence of India restaurant; Green Ecovations: Hot’n'Spicy Thai; James Wilson Pest Management; Just Screw It (carpenters!); L J Hooker (the real estate agent, again); Lat-Dior African Eatery; Moon Koon Chinese Restaurant; Notes Live Music Restaurant and Bar; Patrick Coughlan, electrician; Pavarotti Gourmet Pizza; Ray White Real Estate; S & W Building Services; San Remo Pizza; Smiles (a dental clinic); Stanmore Natural Health; Steve’s Budget Gutter Cleaning; Thingk Baby [sic]; Urbane Inner West (another real estate agent); Yoga To Go.

I still want to know why real estate agents figure so prominently. And I still want to know why Domino’s customer service people never reply to their emails.

Stopping the junk mail flood 3

22 November 2009 in Marketing, Personal by Stilgherrian | 7 comments

There’s been far less junk mail lately. Complaining to the major distributors, as described in my previous update and its comments, works. However there are still some serial offenders.

First, though, a pat on the head to Broadway Shopping Centre, Franklin’s and Mountain Designs who, as reported in the comments, responded quickly.

A slap on the wrist to De Sousa Real Estate; Domino’s Pizza (again! three times now!); Marrickville First National Real Estate; Prestige Cleaning Specialists; Raine & Horne Marrickville (a real estate agent again! twice!); and Ray White Newtown (yes, another real estate agent!), none of whom even acknowledged my email. Pathetic.

Since my last update, the new batch of rude pricks includes Banana Joe’s FoodWorks Marrickville; Camperdown Fitness; Domino’s Pizza (again); L J Hooker (a real estate agent); Lat-Dior African Eatery; Magic Tree Service; McGrath (a real estate agent, of course); Pinpoint Plumbing Services; Ray White Surry Hills & Alexandria (yes, another real estate agent); St Brendan’s Church, Annandale (OK, I suppose religious organisations are exempt); Sydney Antenna Specialists; and a builder-repairer called Michael.

I won’t contact these businesses his time, as some of the problems date back more than two months, and, quite frankly, I couldn’t be bothered. But I will get back into a routine of a roughly monthly post — for my own reference if nothing else.

Does 50 Cent have a heroin problem?

18 November 2009 in Human Nature, Marketing, Music by Stilgherrian | 3 comments

Photograph of posters advertising 50 Cent's new album and a heroin treatment clinic with remarkably similar imagery

These two posters are currently on view on Liberty Street, Stanmore, near the railway bridge. I can’t help but think there’s some sort of connection… but what?

Virgin Blue’s mistake reveals countless selfish whingers

15 November 2009 in Human Nature, Internet, Marketing by Stilgherrian | 55 comments

Thank you, Virgin Blue, for sending your “erroneous” email Friday night. You’ve done us a great public service. You’ve exposed a pack of greedy, selfish, shallow tools who deserve to be ridiculed publicly. Thank you.

On Friday evening, Australian airline Virgin Blue sent an email telling some Velocity Rewards members they’d been upgraded to Gold status. But as documented at mUmBRELLA, the email went not just to those entitled to the upgrade but their entire database — including people who’d opted out of email marketing.

Including me because, yes, I’m a Velocity Rewards member.

“That can’t be right,” I thought. “I haven’t flown with Virgin Blue this year.” Then I saw others saying similar things online and I figured the mistake was more widespread. I chuckled, knowing that someone had a bit of a mess to clear up.

Sure enough, three hours later a second email arrived.

Oops! Due to an error you’ve received our previous email by mistake. Please disregard the free upgrade communication as unfortunately you do not qualify for that upgrade.

We apologise for any inconvenience caused.

Mistake. Correction. Apology. That’s the end of the story, yes? Alas no.

Suddenly a whole bunch of people are demanding their Gold status should stay even though, like, they’re not actually entitled to it. People are “upset”. They’re demanding compensation, some even saying they should be compensated with a free flight voucher.

Compensated? Compensated for fucking what, exactly?

Compensated for being too stupid to realise the email was obviously a mistake? Compensated for having a vastly over-inflated sense of entitlement? Compensated for being so much of a consumer-puppet that you validate yourself by bragging about some confected faux-status symbolised by which colour plastic card sits in your wallet and then being embarrassed because, oh sorry, you’re actually still just another cheap-arsed prole after all?

I don’t think that’s Virgin Blue’s fault.

Losers.

Now of course there’s a metric bazillion blog posts and comments banging on about how this is “epic fail” on Virgin Blue’s part and how they’d have handled it so much better and faster. I won’t link to them because it’s too depressing to realise how many instant fucking experts appear after every little glitch is made public.

However I will link to Darryl King’s excellent piece about what he calls Crowd Spanking.

Why is it that the tools of Social Media make tools out of people?

Yes, companies, people and organisations of any sort can and should be open to criticism and correction of poor behaviour. I agree totally. However I don’t agree that Crowd Spanking of everyone that does something wrong is effective nor necessary …

Add some perspective. This is not a corporation that has exposed their staff and customer to asbestos and are denying compensation. It is an upgrade people! …

Before all the Social Media Gurus come up with the 10 things that Virgin Blue could have done better blog posts think through how businesses and people at work live.

Ex-fucking-zactly.

“Epic fail” on Virgin Blue’s part? Bah! Step back a little and think about the full gamut of things which an airline can get wrong and the potential consequences. Up one end, you’ve got mistakes where hundreds of people die in a ball of flame, traumatising their loved ones. Down the other end you’ve got… gosh! A marketing email that was sent to people by mistake.

To the folks who reckon they’d have handled it better and quicker, well, are you really set up to handle such an unusual situation on a Friday night when people have gone to the pub or gone home for the weekend? Personally, I reckon identifying the problem and getting the second email out in three hours isn’t a bad effort — especially when in the meantime there’s, you know, a fucking airline to run!

Well done, Virgin Blue. Well done.

I reckon — and this is just my opinion here — but I reckon we save the Really Big Stick for mistakes which actually matter. Also, stop being such selfish, judgemental little pricks.

[Update 16 October 2009: To illustrate some points I'll be making in the comments, here's a screenshot of the erroneous Velocity Rewards email.]

McDonald’s pranked with second fake memo

20 October 2009 in Internet, Marketing by Stilgherrian | 2 comments

The supposed leaked memo from McDonald’s that I wrote about on Saturday is itself a fake.

The memo, which like the original fake by serial prankster David Thorne was posted on Reddit, purported to be an email from McDonald’s Australia’s Corporate Communications Manager Bronwyn Stubbs outlining their response.

Someone also attempted to post the text of the memo as a comment to my original post.

However Stubbs emailed me yesterday to say it’s a forgery.

The Purported McDonald’s Memo that you include as part of the article is based on a piece of internal communication that I sent out to my colleagues, however, it has been doctored and changed in various places. Most particularly the final paragraph regarding David Thorne has been completely made up.

That made-up paragraph read:

According to recent news articles and other information we have been provided, the fabricated letter was created by an Adelaide man named David Thorne. At no time should any member of McDonald’s mention the name David Thorne to any media representative. We have spoken to police and are in the process of filing charges against Thorne. We are also speaking with legal regarding a possible law suit. At no time should any member of McDonald’s contact Mr Thorne or engage in any correspondence with him. Should Mr Thorne contact you in any way please let me know immediately or forward any emails.

This certainly kills our speculation as to why someone at McDonald’s would have leaked this memo — they didn’t.

The question now becomes who posted this fake memo, and why? If we’re talking opportunity and motive, well, anyone on the entire Internet has opportunity. Motive? How about a certain prankster seeking attention for his book?

Bugger. I just linked to it myself.

Another question is how businesses can respond to fakery like this, particularly when it’s a brand which people already love to hate.

Is McDonald’s doing comment spam now?

17 October 2009 in Internet, Marketing by Stilgherrian | 10 comments

[Update 20 October 2009: It turns out this new purported McDonald's memo is itself a fake. The comment spam attempt was not from McDonald's.]

Well-known burger-tossers McDonald’s would be pissed off about that fake email tarnishing their reputation, and understandably so. But are they now responding with unethical tactics?

I don’t know. But here’s my little bit of evidence, and maybe The Power of Crowdsourcing [read: "expecting everyone else to do your work for you"] can fill in the gaps.

A document purporting to be a leaked internal memo outlining McDonald’s response policy, and claiming they’re taking legal action against prankster David Thorne, was posted on Reddit — which happens to be where Thorne promoted the original fake memo. The account used to post this new memo, the oh-so-revealing 9911882882288, was created at that time and this is their only post. I’ve included the full text of the purported memo below.
This morning someone tried to post a comment here which was merely a copy and paste of that same memo. They used a clearly false email address, which is presumably what caused their comment to be tagged as potential spam, and an Apple Mac running Safari sitting on an IP address on the Hutchison 3 mobile network.

This strikes me as rather curious.

Since McDonald’s is the big fast food chain that haters of big fast food chains love to hate, I don’t see that many anonymous bystanders rushing to its defence. Something in my waters says this is more likely to be someone acting on McDonald’s behalf — but that’s just a gut feeling.

And since McDonald’s is a big company, presumably they have a big respectable PR firm too.

So why, therefore, the anonymity?

The Public Relations Institute of Australia’s Code of Ethics talks about “dealing honestly”, which in my books means identifying yourself — although I’ll admit I’m hazy on how the PRIA itself would interpret that.

Has anyone else had someone attempt to post this memo as a comment? Is anyone seeing McDonald’s posting official comments in their own name?

And what do you make of the fact that prankster David Thorne works for a design agency which lists McDonald’s as a client?

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