Post by Rich Fisher on Sept 21, 2018 8:48:21 GMT -4
Here's something that I find to be just bad business: A local weekly by me has an annual awards ceremony where they give out awards to local businesses for things like "best burger", "best service", etc. Here's the problem - Everyone gets an award of some kind if the weekly thinks that they can squeeze ad dollars out of a business. Here's an example: There are three area businesses selling 'widgets' and there's a good chance that they all have an advertising budget. Business 1 would 'win' "Best Service", Business 2 would 'win' "Best Variety", and Business 3 would win "Best Employer". They all 'win'. The weekly then tells the businesses that they "won" and presents them with a plaque and stickers saying what they won. Of course the weekly's logo is prominently displayed on all 'prizes'. The businesses then hang these for their customers to see and post them all over Facebook. A short time later the weekly sends their sales person into each business and sells them an ad saying that they are a big winner, as well as anything else that they can up-sell. On the surface this seems like a good business plan, but slowly people are figuring out that it's nothing but a way for the weekly to get their name out on social media and sell ads, not have any awards that are genuine. One of my ventures "Kent Island Online" competes with this particular weekly and I am 'that guy' who explains to our readers and advertisers that their "awards" are not what they seem to be. Point is, there will always be a person, or people, like myself who exposes a fraud. The best practice - Be genuine. If you want to give awards, post a real-time poll on your page for all to see. You can still mine the winners for ad dollars and there's nothing for anyone to point a finger at. Oh yeah, I won an 'award' from them a few years ago for a music festival that I was involved with. The other two area competing music festivals won too...
[HASH]fakeawards [HASH]badbusiness
[HASH]fakeawards [HASH]badbusiness