I received a few responses to my entry regarding my blog a few weeks ago. I’m going to address them separately here to bring attention to the matter. If you recall, I addressed the fact that my competitor was going into my blog and putting entries in there. Those entries not only gave her a backlink to her site, but was clearly an underhanded way of moving people out of my blog, and into hers.
I received a few critical responses because I deleted the questionable entries. Fair enough, you have your right to your opinion. But I’d like to explore that a little…. which is my polite way of saying… REALLY? What, if any, is a justifiable entry to moderate? Where are the official blogging rules that say I can’t or shouldn’t delete a message? Where are they posted? I’ve never been enlightened by any such list.

In my opinion, it all comes down to this:

1. I am not posting the blog for the fun of it, or because it’s a great place to go chat… although it is. Let’s be honest here.. A blog to an ecomm biz, among other things, is a great tool to meat up a site for search engine optimization. I post that blog to provide a place rich in keywords and content to benefit my site, thus improving my organic placement in the engines.

2. I monitor the content for spam. Why not for a competitor trying to directly steal business from me? If anything, my competitor going in and deviously placing a post, is a much more qualified offense, correct? To elaborate, a casino posting in my blog is looking to take my traffic, just as my competitor does. I have the power to intercept both, and rightly so.
3. Now, I am, and always have been, open to opinions in the blog that differ from mine. For instance, in an old blog, we had a few customers that didn’t like a rhinestone pin we were carrying at the time. The pin said “Bitch” on it. And it evoked quite a response. Each of those negative entries stayed. And to my critics regarding this most recent issue, the competitor who posted wasn’t really posting an honest opinion, although she made it look like she was, she was lying and stealing. What I did was the equivalent of locking my door.

I feel I’ve been unjustly accused of censorship. If my competitor had come in and entered the same entry, without the backlink, I don’t think I could find the objection. I am a business! A business who values her customers, and works hard to get them in to shop. I am doing this to make money. I expect she’d do the same. And finally, if I had the audacity to go into her site and try to pull off what she did, I’d be doing it with a very guilty conscience. There’s a very big difference between editing content for ill-intent and truly censoring an opinion. So, c’mon, and give me a break!

I’ve been in a pickle.. trying to get my new server set up correctly. I have blogged previously about the fact that we have a dedicated server just for our direct mail campaign. Recently, we were urged by our host to upgrade this server, and we took their advice, as they cut us such a nice deal to do so. Sounds good so far, right?

Well, in the last three weeks, our customers just faded away. Lee Ann and I were in a panic. How could this be? Did they really not like our stuff THAT MUCH! We’d have days with only one or two sales, and that just isn’t normal for us.

Back to the server…. I had asked that the old mail server be pointed to the new server quite a while ago. I got a confirmation that it was done within a week.  I was satisfied. But then business started dropping off.

My host also offered what they called a “migration”. This was to automatically take all data on my old server and migrate it to my new server. Well, that was a nightmare! Because when that happened, and when they re-initiated my mailing lists on the new server, they dropped half of the names along with all preferences set in the lists (ie emergency moderation so my lists can’t be hit with SPAM), and then each member got an email welcoming them to the list, and asking them to manage their membership. I was really angry because this was very confusing to my over 50, suspicious of the internet, members. But we survived it. I send out a damage control email apologizing for the confusion.. They forgave me. I did, however, lose some members…

Here’s my confusion, and where I believe I didn’t get an honest answer from the dedicated server support staff…. Until the new email was initiated, and even after, I was able to access the mailing lists on the old server. I was forced to since their migrations weren’t working out. This went on for 3 weeks that I know of. I never suspected that the mailing lists weren’t working, because the test email, my own, that is on each list was getting the direct mail campaign. I truly figured that my customers were upset, and didn’t like what they were seeing. When I asked my host if something was going wrong, they insisted no. They insisted that the lists on my old server were working, and it was just a breakdown on our end (no surprises there!)
The final chapter.

I rebuilt all lists with new list names on my new server. I now know for sure the mail has been moved. I am sending mail out to the new lists, and, hmmm, I’m pleasantly busy again. Interesting huh? I’m making the assumption my host is just covering up their error. They must be trained to do so. I’m curious if anyone has dealt with this before? And what do you think about it?

Thanks!

You tell me…

Over the last week one of our competitors has come into our blog, and added some entries. It’s really one thing to go ahead and add entries under her own name, but she added her business name in, which of course linked back to her blog, which in turn, links to her site! She actually put a link to her red hat website in my red hat website.
Did she think we were born yesterday? I deleted it immediately. She reposted in a different section, with a different little something to say in support of the topic at hand. Is she kidding? Did she not get the message the first time I deleted her entry. Did she think I wasn’t going to notice the second attempt. UNREAL!

Now typically I love these opportunities. I love to craft the finely tuned letter to my opponent… it gets my blood flowing, to be honest. I love a good written duel. But I haven’t yet. I’m waiting for her next move. I think it’s going to get more interesting.
I’ve also blogged about another competitor who stole our imagery off of the site, and didn’t think we’d notice. I was able to handle that swiftly with an email to her, cc’d to our lawyer, and it hasn’t happened since.

We watch what our competitors are doing. We should be! Sometimes I get calls from Lee Ann saying “Do you know what they are doing now!! They stole our idea….“, to which I reply “They always do!” Somehow it’s like a war and not a business. Lee Ann almost takes it personally, especially when one of them finds the one thing she’s been looking for. I’ve even known her to buy three times what we would normally buy, wiping out our manufacturers inventory, just so our competition couldn’t have it. She also almost always asks for exclusivity with our suppliers. Some say yes, and it’s a great move for us! I have to give her credit for thinking like that. It would never occur to me to even ask.

So, back to the friend or foe issue. Competitor A goes into our blog and makes an entry like she’s our best girlfriend. Her entry appears to be genuine and real. What does she have to gain? What’s her angle? Reciprocal linking? Pushing shoppers into her blog? Getting my blood to boil? What am I missing? Let me know, thanks!

I have spent the day moving my mailing lists to my new server. It’s not how I wanted to spend my entire day of New Year freedom (kids went back to school today.) I had intended to send some targeted emails to my list… meaning offers to different areas of the world since I’ve downloaded my new coupon code extention from miva’s website. I’ll update you on how that goes, when I indeed do it.
We are trying to boost interest right now in subscriptions. Our list isn’t as profitable as it used to be. It’s a constant struggle to get people to sign up, and share us with their chapter. I think it’s the single most important thing we can do. And right now, I believe it’s the reason our sales are in a slump… that and who wants to spend money after Christmas anyway? I tried to generate some interest with our Breast Cancer
“Name the Team” thing.. calling it “Give Us Your Breast Shot”, but we haven’t had a lot of success with it yet. Maybe it was a bad time of year to do it? Not sure.

Now earlier in the month, I was bragging about how well we were doing. Karma stinks, huh? Right now I’m actually trying to figure out where our customers are! Analytics says we dropped dramatically the week before Christmas, which I coulda toldya from my sales. So where does that leave me tonight?

Panicked? Stressed? NO! Enthusiastic and challenged! Just kidding. Somewhere in between. I’m sort of out of ideas, and hoping it’s just that what I’ve been showing them for product lately isn’t really exciting. I mean.. who doesn’t love flashing blinking sunglasses? We all should have a pair, right?

That’s it for now. I need to chill out for a bit and have a glass of wine away from the laptop! And… play with our new Wii… but not for long.. my sore Boxing shoulder would prefer that I work on the site…