blending the mix

So as you well know, my job search continues! With a broad mix of experience from direct mail right through to online and web 2.0 bits and pieces, part of me wonders what do other people see about my experience?

If you too want to consider where others see your skills, try this:

1. Open Gmail and comose email

2. Copy and past your cv into the message box

3. Save as draft.

4. Click again on the red draft text

5. See the Adwords ads that pop up on the right hands side!

OK, not exactly rocket science but it does make for interesting reading!

More updates soon (hopefully!) as I am working on the mother of all texts with a Cluetrain Manifesto piece…are you sitting comfoprtably…!

Talking to a colleague earlier this week, it suddenly dawned on me I could actually be damaging my business through my own treatment of unwanted email.

Do you unsubscribe to emails you don’t want to receive or do you mark them as spam?

Just as I thought! Isn’t it so much easier to let hotmail, yahoo and google control what comes in your inbox by marking unwanted emails as spam than actually creating an unsubscribe email, replying with unsubscribe or following a de-registration process?

But in doing so, all you are doing is telling ISP’s that you consider a legitimate (albeit unwanted) business approach to be as relevant to you as Viagra or those, y’know thingy extensions (which actually begs the questions where WOULD you buy Viagra from online?!!).

Anyway…my personal issues aside (!)… most marketeers would rather shy away or hide the unsubscribe button/link for fear of losing subscribers and therefore business, but what would you do if you lost business because your emails never even made it past the ISP?

It takes less than a second to click "report spam". It takes less than a second to click "unsubscribe". It takes weeks if not months though to get yourself de-listed from the spam archives of the ISP.

Make it as easy to unsubscribe as it is to subscribe and you will end up with a receptive, fresh and eager subscriber base.

Tags: spam, email, subscribe, unsubscribe, ISP

My Sony laptop is on the verge of packing in, after years and years of (ab)use it is at death’s door.

The CD drive does not allow me to burn back-up discs anymore and it is pot luck as to whether or not it will work from one day to the next.

So, I am offering a unique opportunity to sponsor ME.

Apple, Microsoft, Dell, or indeed any company willing to provide me with a half-decent laptop will have their name mentioned as part of my email signature.

In ALL communications in which I participate and which requires me to use the laptop (pretty much all the time!), I will apply the following signature text for a full 12 months (and I WILL provide weekly evidence of this):

Paul Fabretti

Director

Written on an Apple Macbook Pro by Company X.

Or

"Written using the latest Dell Precision M90"

or whatever suits the company providing it! You get the picture!

I may even think about something that sounds good too!

I am a minimum 3-times a day, 3-blog blogger with a (growing) average 800 unique visitors per month (ok, not a lot but growing all the time!). I am an active member of linked-in, openbc, ecademy as well as the pinkomarketing wiki and google group.

I am also an eBay (UK) Gold Power seller. A link to the company providing my laptop will also be included in ALL my eBay auctions.

Some will no doubt snigger at the visitor numbers (and advertisers may balk at the numbers!) but I am an extremely active member of the communities in which I mix, and present you with an opportunity to touch business professionals deeper than any banner ad would.

If this is of interest to you and you would be able to provide me with a laptop, I look forward to hearing from you soon!

Tags: ebay, Dell, Apple, Macbook Pro, laptop, pinko marketing

So, hot on the heels of Yahoo Mail Beta, comes Windows Live Mail Beta Invitation:

Promising the following features (might as well copy and paste from the Yahoo email!!):

• Previews
• Drag & Drop organisation
• One-click junk/spam control (i.e. an icon!)
• Right-clicking (reply, delete and forward)
• 2Gb of storage

Fair play, they are up with everyone else in trying to keep people using their interface rather than using 3rd party mail software, but I honestly think that with windows Live, they have got a significant advantage over Yahoo in that it will easily become part of the Windows Live interactive desktop.

Technorati Tags: Yahoo, Windows Live Mail

BBC News runs a great story on how MSN WAS intending to charge for hotmail, but actually ISN’T!

The article (linked above) was written in 2001 when MSN WERE thinking about it after the dotcom bubble burst!

What has brought the news to the fore again is a rogue email linking back to the story!!
So, don’t fall for the email - they are NOT planning on charging!

In fact, see above for my Windows Live Mail Beta invitation!

Yipee, it sounds just like Yahoo Mail Beta which sound like Google Gmail…..

Technorati Tags: MSN, Windows Live

Yahoo have launched sign-up for their next generation Yahoo Mail service with a tantalising sign-up page with small embedded animations teasing us with the new features.

From other reports I’ve seen and heard, and looking at the tiny shots, the mail interface looks to be very much less bog-standard webmail and more Outlook (Express).

With added MS Outlook functionality (previews, right-clicking and RSS enabled), it makes me wonder whether their next move will be to enable to interface to handle the current notpad, address and other such feautres as ONE package Yahoo Mail Beta package.

In this way, they will almost be ahead of Google with their Gmail.

There is no coincidence between the fact that Gmail now has GChat integrated because 9 out of 10 users read their webmail through something like Outlook Express or Thunderbird so who is reading the ads?! “Bundle items and they shall come” seems to be the way at Google.
Yahoo have taken the different step of trying to make their interface so attractive and great to use (don’t quote me on that until i have seen an invite to join the beta test!!!) that people will want to use it - although I find it hard to believe that habits will change so significantly.

Technorati Tags: Yahoo, Yahoo Mail, Google, Gmail