Marketing

One of the most irritating topics that people seem to want to talk about ad nauseum is how to make money online. Frankly, I’m sick and tired of reading horrible advice on this topic, and I’m even more sick and tired of responding to people’s questions about Google AdSense, which is quite literally the worst monetization service of all time for people who don’t have millions of pageviews per month. In other words, Google AdSense ain’t gonna work for you, cowboy.

To rectify this abominable confluence of bad info and terrible services, I’m going to clue you in on two sure-fire ways you can actually make real, spendable, negotiable cash from your Website. Not surprisingly, both methods of earning money involve actual products, and while not necessarily falling under the “easy” category, they both find their roots in the “no bullshit” category, which I happen to love.

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In a world where the tools of communication have become more ubiquitous than the automobile, change happens faster than ever before. Businesses are forced to focus on their agility, and marketers face a challenge that will likely turn that industry on its collective head.

Whether you’re aware of it or not, we’re in the midst of the biggest cultural paradigm shift not only of our time, but probably ever. When people refer to America’s youth as the MySpace generation, you know something’s up. So what’s really going on here? How can businesses embrace the sweeping changes that are riding the coattails of the information generation?

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Every so often, stories that garner a lot of press attention tend to spin off excellent marketing opportunities. Remember God Warrior from Trading Spouses?

I’m the kind of guy who gets a kick out of spotting these opportunities in real time. In fact, I don’t even care to profit from most of them; I just view it as staying on my “marketing toes.” The point of this post, however, was not to tell you about my armchair marketing habit.

The point was that I totally missed the most recent (and probably strongest) piece of spin off marketing to hit the streets since - well, I guess I haven’t really been around that long. I’m embarrassed to admit it, but I didn’t even see this one coming!

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In a recent advertising campaign, Cingular claims that they have the fewest dropped calls of any wireless network. What they don’t tell you is that dropped calls are not just a function of the network itself - other factors like the make and model of your phone play a huge role (which I’ll explain). Essentially, they’re masking other associated shortcomings by selling you a very compartmentalized view of their services. How does that sit with you?

From a marketing perspective, this could be considered savvy advertising, but I believe the nature of the beast is changing as blogs (and communications in general) grow and expand. In the land of Web 2.0, the mantra for Marketing 2.0 ought to go something like this: above all else, your claims and your words must be genuine.

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Fear. Marketers use it all the time to get your attention, toy with your emotions, and loosen up your wallet. It’s considered one of the most effective marketing tools because it typically evokes such strong natural reactions in humans. Therefore, it’s no surprise that tons and tons of companies attempt to take advantage of this by utilizing motivation by fear in their advertising.

For the most part, ads of this nature come off okay (albeit sheissty), but occasionally, someone will flat out miss the mark. And I’m talking by a freakin mile here, people.

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Blogs are the new media, but you already knew that. Unfortunately, you’re a huge minority in the big scheme of things, as most of the population (in the US, at least) still doesn’t even know what a “blog” is, exactly. Old media is hesitant to view us as credible, and only a handful of bloggers actually make headlines in news outlets that don’t make a habit of covering internet-related issues. To me, it’s clear that bloggers simply haven’t had that breakthrough moment that takes them from local club phenom to international superstar.

Why are we so underrepresented in traditional media?

The blogosphere has a crappy PR department, that’s why.

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It’s easy to get stuck in a comfortable, reasonably profitable business model. In fact, this is precisely why otherwise gifted, creative individuals choose to take salaried jobs at boring companies - security and comfort outweigh the potential risk. For me, this scenario represents a fate worse than death. At the same time, however, I often find myself resisting work on newer and riskier ventures simply because I feel this strange obligation towards my sustainable niche, which in my case is web design.

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