Recently, a comment was caught by this blog’s moderation queue, meaning it was automatically marked as spam, with good reason. This comment, which seeked to promote a future senate candidate, was totally unrelated to my last Malu Fernandez post. Luis, who blogs over at drivebyshooter.net, also reported receiving the same comment from 122.53.136.228. We both shared our irritation through email.
I wouldn’t consider myself a veteran expert in online marketing, but I do know one thing: if you want to attract attention, traditional arm-twisting techniques such as bombarding everyone with the same message is no longer that effective. Net savvy customers will only pay attention to what they consider important, since there’s just too much information to sift through online. Part of a successful online marketing campaign is a focus on relevancy. Even if both topics involve the Philippines, it takes a special kind of imagination to see the connection between the next senate elections (which is in 2010!) and Malu Fernandez.
The comment would have held more stock if it was tailored to suit the conversation it would appear in. And if this certain candidate actually had a website for people to visit, to check out his agenda and platform. To a certain degree, it would’ve made more sense to offer this comment up on the many local political blogs. But it would’ve been best for this so-called “pian” to actually engage in conversations with his target market. People would rather communicate with real people than deal with automated messages.
Consider this an open letter to whoever’s posting this comment indiscriminately. You may apologize for being “terribly out of place” and ask to “Please bear with me. I just want to create awareness by choosing the busy forum or the latest” all you want. But we refuse to bear with you. Our increasingly limited time is precious, and we don’t need people taking advantage of the Internet’s instant reach to waste the time of others. Apology not accepted. Thanks to you, your candidate now needs to do more to win my vote.
2 Responses to “How Not to Market Online”
[...] I shared my irritation with Rico over email, and he pretty much articulated all my thoughts on the matter over at the BBN. [...]
[...] Almost a month ago, I ranted about some SPAM comments. I was only mildly irritated then, but irritated enough to know that I would probably use some bad language if I wrote about it. I opted to limit my words and let Rico do the talking on the BBN. [...]
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