Re: Is it spam? (international peacekeeping)

From: Ilona Jerabek <ilona_at_queendom.com>
Date: Fri 08 Sep 2000 08:40:25 -0500

JOHN WALKER <jcfwalker_at_home.com> WROTE:
> 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.

Hi John,

Ok - you are right on target with me being European
(although I have been living in Canada for 11 years,
and was born 20 years after the war ended) as well as
the transition from science to business (I am trained
in neuropsychology).

Nevertheless, my attitude to "polite cold calls" was
shaped more by experience in online business than by
my birthplace. When we started Queendom.com in the
spring of 1996, I was excited to talk to any potential
business partner, cold call or not. But as our site
gained popularity and traffic and got into the top
1500, we started getting a lot of unsolicited offers
for partnerships, and the vast majority a) duplicates
services that we already have; b) is rather irrelevant
to what we have to offer (such as selling diamonds on
our site, which perhaps makes sense given our mostly
female readership, but who buys diamonds online?); c)
would cost us much more to implement than any income
it could potentially generate fades in comparison.
Queendom is a content site and we have to be extremely
careful with what we offer our visitors. With our
psycho-targeting potential (through psychological
tests), we have to think long and hard before we
present our visitors with any offers of products or
services, regardless of whether the targeting is used
or not.

All this to say -- perhaps out of 50 companies that
approach us, one has something interesting to offer.
So we need to screen (and we do so politely) and
cut to the chase. I see it as being efficient, rather
than blunt (for the record, one of our sunny employees
screens the calls before transferring any calls to
me).

Besides, the cold callers often inquire about things
that, with all due respect, are none of their business
(i.e. confidential or semi-confidential info about our
visitors, plans, budget, goals, traffic, competition
etc.). And if you look at other large sites, you will
often find very limited contact information, and
it's virtually impossible (unless you have
connections) to get to someone with any decision power
(i.e., try to find contact for bus. development for
AOL). Many Internet giants simply don't deal with
unsolicited offers (or so it seems). Yes, they may
miss a great opportunity, but perhaps there are too
few gems in the rough.

Just my two cents.

Ilona

Be seriously entertained @ QueenDom.Com
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Received on Fri Sep 08 2000 - 08:40:25 CDT