Bernard Hickey and Barry Colman talk about making money from news online

A very interesting interview that Bernard Hickey (Interest.co.nz) shared with me. The interview highlights the difficulty that the papers have in dealing with the Internet and all the free news and content. No doubt papers are looking at the delicate balance of attracting enough repeat visitors to earn advertising revenue but also applying some kind of pricing model for their content.

Its a very interesting subject.

Bernard Hickey and National Business Review (NBR) Publisher Barry Colman talk on TVNZ’s Media7 about how to make money from financial news online in the wake of the Colman’s decision to charge for some news. It’s fair to say Barry and Bernard disagree in a respectful way.

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Journalists should research more if they are going to attack something

Jamie Hanton’s article on Twitter provides a good overall view of how not to write an opinion piece.

The article oozes his lack of understanding of the power Twitter has as a communications and networking tool. His research seems to have been confined to Christchurch, New Zealand when in fact he should have covered other major New Zealand cities. What I find almost ironic is that Jamie’s last Twitter post was over a month ago.

To help Jamie out I will provide my opinion on how Twitter has benefited my businesses in bullet points.

  1. I have meet some amazing people on Twitter. Some I have meet in person and established business opportunities.
  2. Twitter has increase traffic to our websites including pre-qualified prospects that have resulted in signed contracts. Yes – that’s right – we have earned extra revenue from Twitter that is worth the effort we put in.
  3. I have learned many new topics on Twitter and enhanced my own knowledge in my own skills.
  4. I have helped people connect for business benefit and help many with information that they needed.

Overall Twitter is one of the most effective business marketing tools we use and we will continue to use it.

I suppose what annoys me more than Jamies opinion piece is Stuff.co.nz inability to recognize the importance of adding a comment section to all of the opinion pieces. Maybe someone should educate the team at Stuff.co.nz on inbound marketing?

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Cadbury Should be Congratulated and Supported

choc

Cadbury issued a press release on 17 August 2009 stating that they are removing the palm oil from Cadbury Dairy Milk products.

“Cadbury today announced it is responding to consumers by returning Cadbury Dairy Milk to a recipe containing only cocoa butter.”

Now I am not going to voice my opinion on whether they should have added palm oil into their products or not. What I want to talk about is how Cadbury listened to consumers and responded to the overwhelming opinion to change back.

The fact that this site, which appears to be an official Cadbury web site, mentions that they added palm oil into the product to keep down production costs and keep the price down for consumers shows that they are they an open and honest business.

The fact is cocoa prices have doubled in the last two years. For most of this time, we’ve taken this on the chin. We’ve soaked up the price hikes whilst trying to minimize the cost impact to consumers.

So we had a choice – increase the price of our Cadbury Dairy Milk milk chocolate and potentially put it out of reach for many of our customers or reduce the product size and costs. We didn’t want anybody to miss out just because of price and so we decided to reduce the size and reduce the price we charge our retailers.

Cadbury listened and responded to their customers in a timely fashion. I doubt many businesses of that size would respond with such speed and gusto.

But it doesn’t stop there. Cadbury via their http://www.choclovers.com web site encourages people to voice their opinion in public. Cadbury staff monitor the chatter and respond.

We should all be proud of a company that actually listens and admits when they get it wrong.

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Want to be Happy? Maxwell Maltz of Pyscho Cybernetics can help

psychocyb-book-covergifA few years ago I read Pyscho Cybernetics by Maxwell Maltz. This book removed a lot of demons from my mind that I had accommodated for over a decade.

To keep it short Maxwell was a plastic surgeon in the 1950’s who found out that you can change the physical look of a person but unless the person’s self image was healthy no amount of plastic surgery would make a person happy. In his book he teaches the way to improve your mindset.

Pyscho Cybernetics is one of those books that you read when you feel down or lost in this world. I always feel I can take on the world after reading a few pages of this “bible” in self-help.

Watch this video below of an interview with Maxwell Maltz for an introduction into this wonderful person. He changed my life for the better and the many millions which have also read his book.

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Home-made video. 7 million views already. The power of social media.

Below is a home-made(?) video of a wedding entrance for a young couple. The video on YouTube at the time of this writing had 7 million views.

This video is ultimate proof for me that you should always fight against the norms that society imposes on your life. “Life is what you make it”

Plus – food for thought here.

Will the music company which owns rights to the music played in the video demand that the video be removed or understand that this video could dramatically increase sales of this song.

I for one will buy the album that this song is on. I never heard of the musician until this video. That is the power of social media.

What do you think?

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Business ‘ruined’ by TV show Target

I have to admit this is my third revision of this post.

Each previous revision was quite frankly too abusive towards the TV3 show Target that I ran the risk of legal action.

You may not have read the articles published on both NZ Herald and Stuff web sites this weekend about Cafe Cezanne and the poor café owners terror experience of nearly losing their business to what appears to be gross incompetency and lack of internal processes on the part of “Target”.

I have never watch the show “Target” and now, after reading about the massive lack any internal processes to double check their facts I will recommend no one watch them.

Everyone in the real world knows how incredibly hard it is to not only start a business but keep it in the black. It takes years and years of hard work and dedication to make it work. Only a business owner knows of sleepiness nights, long hours and zero cash flow.

Then along comes some show called “Target” and it a matter of minutes puts all that hard work at risk.

How can a production with a budget that most small businesses only dream about cause such destruction and get away with it by issuing a silly apology? I would assume that the editors or whoever approved the release of that episode have never owned a business before. They nestle in the lap of employee status where everything is okay and their wages are in their bank accounts on time.

I have talked to few people today about Cafe Cezanne and all state what a wonderful café it is.

In order to help Cafe Cezanne I have done the following and I hope you can help somehow as well:

  1. Wrote this blog post and published it on a business focused web site.
  2. Posted it on our Twitter profile with over 4000 followers mostly of which are NZ based.
  3. Posted a link to the NZ Herald article on another NZ based discussion forum that is frequented by many NZ journalists.
  4. Posted a question to the TV3 Twitter profile asking them why “Target” is still on air.
  5. Rung the owners up to provide my support. (If I lived in Auckland I would also be having lunch there today).

We are currently in the worst recession for the last 6 decades. We cannot let some TV show that shows a lack of incompetency that brings me to my needs still be on air!

Do what you can – ring the Cafe Cezanne owners to voice your support, go to the café for lunch, ring Tv3 and demand they take the show off the air. Anything to help these business owners out!

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Top 5 Business Articles for Week Ending May 29 2009

Hello all,

Here are the top 5 Articles for this week:

1) “Social Media in Plain English” video.
Not bad in explaining social media. Better than me!
Click here to watch

2) Social Media for Business Who is Doing It
Article from Oct 08 but still very current.
Read here…

3) The Real Power of Twitter
A brilliant article on the real benefit of Twitter.
Read here…

4) In Defense of Distraction
Another though provoking article on how we are getting more and more distracted by “noise”. Which is resulting in our ability to focus our attention.
Read here…

5) Tragedy of the commons
A very interesting dilemma that humans suffer time and time again.
Read here…

Funny!
No video this week but a picture that all to well highlights our current world.
user3080_pic238_1243554216Last Weeks Top 5
Read here…

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Social Media Explained in Plain English

No one really knows what “Social Media” is as many people use the term for different things. This video however explains in plain English what I consider social media to represent.

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Top 5 Business Articles for Week Ending May 1 2009

Hello all,

Here are the top 5 Articles for this week:

1) 7 Lessons Entrepreneurs Can Learn From Twitter’s Success
By any measure, the growth and popularity of Twitter has been phenomenal. To say that Twitter has hit mainstream isn’t really the right metric to use. It’s more powerful to note that for a large group of Twitter enthusiasts, to spend even a day without using it would be as bad (or perhaps even worse)…
Read here…

2) Having the right people in your team – how a profiling system helped my business
I want to share with you what I learned from an event I attended and how it greatly helped the success of my business. A couple of years ago I attended a Roger Hamilton’s Wealth Dynamics weekend event. I don’t usually attend “wealth creation” seminars however I found this event to be very helpful with my business.
Read here…

3) My Top Twitter Articles for Business
Where I now keep all the great articles I find about Twitter!
Read here…

4) Closing the Sale
Good thought-provoking article that takes a look at the art of closing a sale.
Read here…

5) Nielsen reports online video and social media reshaping web
Very good free report from Nielsen on their findings for how the internet is impacting business.
Read here…

And Friday Funny!

Previous Top 5 Articles
Also read “Top 5 Business Articles for Week Ending April 24 2009″ click here…

Cheers

Marc

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Top 5 Business Articles for Week Ending May 22 2009

Hello all,

Here are the top 5 Articles for this week:

1) Jeff Jarvis on Tapping Social Media
Good interview with great advice for business owners unsure of what social media is and how to deal with it.
Watch here…

2) An Executive Guide To Social Media
A set of articles for business owners covering different social media subjects.
Read here…

3) Beware the Social Media Charlatans
Very good article for business people who are not technical and thus can be mislead by dubious contractors.
Read here…

4) Web Design Industry Jargon: Glossary and Resources
Excellent resource for business peopel confused by the jargon used within the IT web design/developer space.
Read here…

5) What is happening to our attention span?
My opinion on the decline of quality article content on the web these days.
Read here…

Funny
Trekkies Bash New Star Trek Film As ‘Fun, Watchable’

Last Weeks Top 5 Articles
Check out last weeks Top 5 Articles here..

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