Blogling Experiment
Welcome, another blogling!
Power to e-marketing, I guess. She has successfully used Orkut to get the word out about her blog, plus she writes well, I think! She has already driven more traffic to my blog than I have, in the last 30 days!
Disclaimer: We’re related, by marriage 
- Harsha Raghavan
Email Fraud – Follow up
I had recently written about phishing and email fraud and the only way I think I can be protected, is to look at the link.
To prove how easy it is, I created the following 4 screen shots.
1st is the email from "ANZ Bank" (a real Aussie bank). Cleverly, the link in the email reads "www.anz.com.au/signon?LOB=CONS&screenid=", while pointing to http://www.cystalagency.com/anz.com/netbank.bankmain.asp
2nd is the "ANZ Bank" website shown to me when I clicked the above link.
3rd is when I visited http://www.cystalagency.com/anz.com/, which proved that this server space had been hijacked.
4th is the real Crystal Links (fancy hairdo mate!)
- Harsha Raghavan
Email fraud
Oprah Winfrey did a show recently on email scams and it got me thinking…..
LOOK AT THE LINK!
See where the link leads you to and it should go to the domain name of the 
company that is supposedly contacting you. So if this was an email from eBay, you must be redirected to the site (click on the screen-shot to see a red box at the bottom of the screen) and not to some anonymous website.
The link may lead to a website that looks EXACTLY the same as eBay, but the only way to differentiate is to look at the link itself. I think this is probably the #1 way to protect yourself from phishing. Any other ideas?
- Harsha Raghavan
Neerja Raman
Based on Rajesh’s recommendation, I’ve bought Neerja Raman’s book and have just started reading it. In the meantime, I wanted to share a quote:
On Happiness: The Story of Two Cats
A big cat saw a little cat chasing its tail and asked, "Why are you chasing your tail?" Said the kitten, "I have learned that the best thing for a cat is happiness and that happiness is in my tail. Therefore I am chasing it and when I catch it, I shall have happiness."
Said the old cat, "My child, I too have paid attention to the problems of the universe. I too have judged that happiness is in my tail. But I have noticed that whenever I chase it, it runs away from me and when I go about my business, it just seems to come after me wherever I go."
This is Rajesh Setty and this is Neerja Raman and her book.
- Harsha Raghavan
Don Imus
I promised myself that I won’t write about this controversy but one can’t resist after reading a brilliant and classy article by Cynthia Tucker. Her post entitled "Who are the Hos here?", was part of Time’s coverage on the Don Imus controversy.
She writes "The obverse, of course, is the black woman who presumes to move into the American mainstream. That woman is not successful. She is uppity". She is referring to the fact that black women are thought as, in her words, "lazy and drug-addled welfare queens, thoughtless breeders of criminals, and unwed heathens who are sacking the sacred institution of marriage".
When Don Imus abused those women, I think it struck a similar chord with people. Cynthia writes what many people think but don’t say aloud and that is what it is so pointed. Her "uppity" remark is apt.
She beautifully ends the article by stating "I am surprised that Imus continues to enjoy the support of so many political and entertainment celebrities. They were not offended enough by his racial stereotypes to turn down a little airtime. I think I know hos when I see them."
While you feel her boiling anger, the article neither spills over with grotesque depictions of the discrimination nor the sense of helplessness or apathy.
On the other hand, for a long time, Ana Marie Cox says she knows she became popular thanks to Don Imus and his show but wants none of it now. I thought, "Not so fast, miss!" But maybe two GOP hopefuls could learn from her.
Cynthia Tucker is the Editorial Page Editor of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and this is her article in the Time magazine. Ana’s article is here and here is the news article on McCain and Giuliani.
- Harsha Raghavan
Email Marketing
I recently reached out to a catering service in the bay area to see if they can 
deliver goodies to a client. When asked, this is how they responded:
"We ask at least 10 people"
Thats it. Nothing else in the email. Now, I know if you have an email address out there, you will get tons of stuff, relevant or crap. But to respond to what could be a genuine inquiry, as though it isn’t, is just plain stupid.
Their response to my question is technically correct. I had asked "What is the minimum amount I need to order to have you deliver to xxxx, CA?"
Does that make the one-liner response (and the lack of follow-up) acceptable? If you are already running a business that’s too successful and have no bandwidth to accept online orders or inquiries, then don’t.
Look at the elements of this transaction:
1. Local order made by someone sitting 3000 miles away
2. Delivery to a large client, so potential future business
3. Lost opportunity to distribute business cards
4. Eroded brand equity online (I’m tempted to tell you who it is)
5. Lost current sales
Ram Charan places a premium on execution. And you ought to have a laser sharp focus. Catering is about two things: food and delivery. Your food quality depends on the ingredients and the cooking process. Delivery depends on how easy you make it for me to order and how well you bring the finished goods to my door. I can get to the food part of the equation only if you make delivery enticing enough.
Marketing cost = 0
In catering, the food markets itself. So when someone orders it, they’re marketing and distributing your business. All you need to do is make it easy for them to order and show up on time to deliver it well. This business is highly dependant on word-of-mouth marketing like Chipotle does and they do a bang up job. It becomes especially important if you’re a small business trying to make it big. You WANT your consumers to love your food and tell others about it. Every inquiry becomes valuable, if not now maybe for later? Had their response been any better, I would have recommended them to my client for their delivery quality (if their food sucks, then no one can help them, can they?).
Cartoon picture taken from here; Ram Charan’s website and my previous post on Chipotle.
- Harsha Raghavan
Marketing
Rajesh writes:
"However, the bigger problem is that whoever sent me is now thinking that he did some work. Out of every thousand emails that he has sent, he will get one or two responses. Rather than questioning the overall strategy, the person will now start thinking about "conversion rates" and "writing better copy". And, the fantasy trip will continue."
He is referring to an email he received from a company attempting to explore a strategic alliance with him for off-shoring IT development work. You can read that email here.
Rather than rethink mass-mailing as a business development strategy, especially for a strategic alliance type of partnership, this person probably found it easier to blast stuff out and "market" his "brand". Whatta-bunch of crap!
If your target audience is a B2B buyer, how better will he like you or your company by merely looking at such an email? Is this how you’d build a relationship with people? What, you’d yell in a crowded noisy room "Hello, my name is …." to try and introduce yourself?
Brand building is like a workout – consistency and focus are paramount. So what if one or two leads respond to such an email? Yeah, you’d probably strike up a deal or two but that sort of spray-and-pray model works for moving merchandise, not relationships.
It is *really* hard to build any relationship. So instead of spamming a person like Rajesh, who is always ready to listen to a meaningful pitch and turning him/her into a non-listener, if you had approached him directly or indirectly in another way, you’d have gained a genuine business contact.
- Harsha Raghavan
Past
Hello – Here are some links about things I’ve done in the past. I just found it interesting that once something is out there, it is part of the public domain for very long (of course, the content must still remain hosted to be available). A couple of other articles are missing; looks like they found better use for that hard disk space!
- Harsha Raghavan
Chipotle
I did not realize there is so much mania surrounding Chipotle!
During TG 2006, I was down in Virginia and had lunch out there and was blown away by the store concept, quantity, cleanliness and speed of service. At the end of the day, they’re yet another mexican joint, but with a difference. They’re so unlike a Taco Bell or any other chain you can think up.
Meet Greg of Chipotle Log. Here is a rabid fan of the restaurant and he writes extensively on his blog about this joint. How much does he love these guys? And oh, he is not endorsed by the restaurant nor do they own his idea. I read about them on John’s blog and he linked to an article that appeared in BusinessWeek about Chipotle on 3/12/2007. Apparently, people who love their food actively promote them and the restaurant supports this form of viral marketing. They stay away from ads since we’re all already inundated by them. My experience with them in VA left an impression.
I just found out that there is one near Boston, so you know what I did the following weekend, right? (picture taken from here)
I think ‘bucks had this going for them back in the day. They had a good clean store, great coffee and quick service. Chipotle has stuck to it (with a line of Margaritas, baby!) and in Subway style, they dish up the perfect burrito that you want made by them. NEAT CONCEPT! Now if only they added a burrito maker, margarita glasses and mix, do you think they’d still be popular??
Check out www.chipotle.com (brilliantly funky website! I’m so hungry now!)
- Harsha Raghavan
Forrester Web 2.0 Briefing Day
This looks interesting for those of you who are in the bay area.
Forrester Web 2.0 Briefing Day:
Forrester will be holding its first Web 2.0 Briefing Day on Thursday, April 19 in Foster City, California. This complimentary event is an opportunity for companies to brief several analysts who focus on Web 2.0 trends and technologies – all at the same time and place.
Here is the link to their blog.
- Harsha Raghavan
