Re: Is it spam?

From: John Walker <jcfwalker_at_home.com>
Date: Sat 2 Sep 2000 10:03:08 -0600

ILONA JERABEK <ilona_at_queendom.com> WROTE:
> I must say that this approach

(Ilona refers to an attempt at a polite but indirect
"cold call," with the sales person first inquiring
about the other person's product or business)

> irritates me much more than when someone offers
> me their service in an e-mail. First of all,
> I see it as a deception or manipulation.

First, I would bet that Ilona is European, and not just
from her name. Europeans dislike the indirect approach
Americans often take in business conversations, while
we Americans often find our European cousins to be
blunt. I attribute this to ~ 30 easy years here while
Europe struggled to rebuild from WW II. Polite
indirect conversations are a luxury more consistent
with 1950s-60s USA than postwar Europe. It's part of
our culture to want to be nice despite our talent for
being obnoxious, and this surfaces in marketing.

We (Yanks) often forget in doing online business that
that the Internet is international; I regret the
popularity of bland .com and .net top-level domains
which have made country-code TLDs almost anachronistic.
Be patient with us Ilona but continue with your
honesty!

Specialized and accessible business education is also
more a US phenomenon -- American business people are
often weak in science and engineering, while many
European business people have transitioned to business
from a scientific background. The scientific method
encourages direct exploration, while business success
sometimes awards subtler methods -- the dreaded "office
politics" and other banalities.

Does anyone else feel like there is too much talking
and not enough listening, now that it is so easy for
everyone to talk? Especially in "B-to-B" e-marketing
which sometimes seems to be code for trying to sell to
each other simultaneously. I've progressed from a
200-mile up overview to developing street-level online
advertising tactics this summer, and much of that time
was spent on listening. I've learned a lot.

Regards,
John Walker
Boulder, Colorado USA





Received on Sat Sep 02 2000 - 11:03:08 CDT