It is a good exercise, we should all do it.
I would like to think that I am not stupid.
I have been around the internet for a very long time, and got to learn a few things. First of all, there is a lot of hype around it, so, if you are much of a sucker, you invariably fall for it.
You might not be that old to remember the web domain buying frenzy of the late 90’s. I was around, and bought a few hundred myself. Managed to sell one for 200 bucks, so, that little “business” cost me quite a few grand, for domains were very expensive back then!
I went through affiliates, adsense, creating multiple sites with different themes, using SEO techniques, portals, bla blah blah. All hype. Sure, for some people it worked, especially those working fulltime in it, just like things work for some people in MLMs. But most people just lose money. By the way, those that lose make somebody rich in the process. You guessed, the one generating the hype gets the dough
The other day I read someplace that twitter and facebook professionals commanded a salary of about 20 grand in a South American country. A MONTH. And it is dollars, not pesos! That is a lot of money, for something that, I believe, is worthless.
I go into FB a few times a day, and guess what? Never did business with a single FB advertiser. In fact, don’t even add people who are simply there for business, and do not “Like” businesses anymore. And I found that most people, the vast majority don’t. Truthfully, by the looks of it most FB ads seem silly.
So, these poor suckers, the advertisers, are being dragged into thinking this is the thing of the future, that FB is a marketing platform, the metrics is excellent and all that crap. To me, it is little by little becoming a sex thing, lolitas all over. But that is besides the point.
Then there is twitter. I “followed” this guy who was on the same business as I, for a while (when I still entertained the idea that twitter was of some use). He almost gave away the name of his clients and contacts, the silly dude, for face it, my business is not sexy at all, and he had nothing exciting to say, besides saying he was busy (he really wasn’t, for he was posting every 5 minutes). My business is highly technical, most people will not understand a thing we say. In my estimation, he was spending at least an hour a day posting!
He definitely paid a few bucks to go to a twitter marketing seminar, attended a webinar of some sort, or paid some self styled “pro” to give him pointers.
The reality is, the driving force behind the internet, like it or not, is still google. Sure, most searches are probably still sex related, however, it is the only thing that works! The rest is just a way of taking people’s money on hype. Like those “Rich man, Poor man” seminars. Argh!
And in order for you to build up your google ranking, you need tons of references or links on the “open” internet. Publishing articles on Facebook, or twitting, will not boost your ranking at all. It will consume loads of time, and no result. Both FB and Facebook are basically closed systems, and google has no access to what is inside.
Sure, it makes people feel sexy, up on things, modern, state of the art, they get goosebumps when they say their business has a Facebook page or a twitter account, but the reality is, what really generates $$$ is your google ranking. The rest is hogwash and the more time you waste on your FB business page or twitter account, the farther your business will be going down google’s ranking.
I for one, would be very happy if twitter disappeared tomorrow. I see no usefulness in a microblog, especially in this day and age when teenagers are losing mounds of their grey matter for being addicted to connectivity, and no can no longer form good phrases or think critically. Duh, um and like are the most widely spoken words of this generation of texting-addicted folks.
I am not just saying it. I tested this. At one point I had two thousand followers on twitter, and I posted tons of interesting items, with links. Out of two thousand, two or three bothered to check it out every time! Facebook, same thing. I had over 5000 friends, and tops, 5 people would bother to read what I had to write. Leads me to think, in order for these things to work, you need to be Ashton Kuchter. Which, by the way, I am not.
As for linkedin…
So, although it hurts, I will continue to give my money to google. Or even the good old United States Post office.
Joseph Sala Gor 