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NONE: On-line marketing and sales
On-line marketing and sales
HankHeath_at_aol.com
Sun, 25 Aug 1996 14:53:36 -0400
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I read a lot about the rocketing demographics of gays, Hispanics, and Asians
everywhere but in the online community of marketing and sales. These folks
seem to be more interested in clicks, hits, click-throughs, links, and
whatever, than on who has their hand on the mouse.
So, my question is: is everyone on the 'Net 28 years-old, attractive,
grey-skinned, and devoid of ethnicity? [I stole the image from Ursula LeGuin]
If not, how do *you* decide your affinity groups on the 'Net? Do search
engines give you connections to people of your own liking, or do they further
de-humanize you with their categories? Do chat groups and MUDs do it for you,
or are you leery of the anonymous avatars in their place? If you wanted to
talk to a focus group of gays, Hispanics, Asians, where would you start? If
you wanted to focus even more closely - married lesbians, black Hispanics who
use Puerto Rican phrases in the U.S., Overseas Chinese in Canada - where
would you look?
Answers to questions like these may be more important to your business than
which is a real hit, and which is a false hit.
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Does anyone know where to contact a company that retails only rocking chairs?
I've heard that Matt Bearson in Los Angeles does, but I haven't found him on
the 'Net, yet.
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Another thing that irks me is that people on the 'Net have no families.
Selling to them, then, lacks an entire dimension. They are two-dimensional
people in a three-dimensional world.
What do I mean? Well, when doing face-to-face selling, I usually don't do a
very good job of "pitching." I look too much like Calvin of "Calvin and
Hobbes" to be believable. You can see people thinking, "What is this little
devil up to?"
So, I have learned to sell by keeping my mouth shut except to ask questions.
The questions I ask are devised to learn how to prove - over time - that they
can trust me with their business. So I ask questions about them, about their
ideas and hopes and futures, and about their family. These are all areas
that we can form into a common ground of experience. Family, in particular.
However, the 'Net people have no family. I think this may be a major
impediment to selling on the 'Net. If I can make contact with your feelings
about family [and by this I may include "significant others", pets, extended
families, and so on], I can probably sell you our services.
So, how do I get to know someone's family through the 'Net?
[Note from moderator: hey, if you are _really_ interested, you can meet my
family at http://www.tenagra.com/~kurtzman/ --Cliff]
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