About This Blog…

Here you will find all sorts of Raymond's random "Deep Thoughts".

Some may be business related, some personal. Some may be agreeable, others controversial. And quite frankly, some may be even inappropriate :)

But all of them will be genuine and authentic, so enjoy!

Random Snapshots

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Random Quotes

Borrow money from a pessimist – they don’t expect it back — Anon

SEO seems like some lofty term that’s tossed around by snooty internet marketers sipping Cristal thumbing their noses on those who don’t know what it means…

Well, for the record, SEO stands for search engine optimization and anybody in any industry can do it (that means MLM, network marketing, real estate… ANYTHING) as long as they have a website of course…

So what I’ve done is put together an elevator pitch of what SEO is (in layman terms – never mind the technical mumbo jumbo).  So next time you see a circle of snobby online marketers, you can look smart and pretend to fit in ^^

And if you want to appear even smater… check me out over at SEO Networker :)

Raymond

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Okay… so reading this awesome article sharing some awesome Twitter news sparked a thought. I know...»

Basically, the article, in a nutshell talks about how Twitter is going to start going after “Twitter abusers”.  And what exactly is a Twitter abuser?  As far as Twitter is concerned, at the time being, it’s those who use a software that randomly follows tons of people everyday.  and after a set amount of time, if that person doesn’t follow back, the software UNfollows that person.

So in a nutshell, people gain followers by following them first and triggering the law of receprication…  They are NOT gaining followers through adding value and carrying on meaningful conversations, which is the point of Twitter.

And now, you have Twitter abusers who claim to be social media mavens because they have a grotesque number of people following them (never mind that they have an equally grotesque number of people they are following).

Now, don’t me wrong, just because someone has the same number of people they are following as they do followers doesn’t mean that person is automatically a “Twitter Abuser” but it doesn’t raise some questions.

So here’s my proposal of a new Twitter number (let’s call it Twitter Ratio): the ratio of your followers to the number of folks you are following.

So let’s say someone is super popular… say, Oprah.  Her Twitter Ratio would be ~ 115,982.  Now let’s take a Twitter abuser, his/hers would be <1.

That’s a drastic difference and that’s my point.  It by no means DEFINE a Twitter user, but it does help to pain that more complete picture.

… just a thought :)

Let me know your thoughts!

Raymond Fong

dangerous right?  ;)
Categories : Social Media, Twitter
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Jun
18

Hilarious Parody Song

By Raymond Fong · Comments (1)

This is one hilarious song (a parody of Lisa Loeb’s “Stay”) by the UPenn’s a capella group called “Off the Beat“.

In case you don’t know what a capella means, this is taken from Wikipedia:

is vocal music or singing without instrumental accompaniment

Anyway, this song is sexual in nature but hilarious as heck.  Suffice to say, if you are easily offended and/or have virgin ears, do NOT listen to it.  And of course, if you are an immature kid you shouldn’t either…

Without futher ado, here it is (don’t forget to crank up your speakers):

Go get Adobe Flash Player!

Raymond

Categories : Entertainment
Comments (1)

Here’s the summary of a neat presentation by Nielsen Economic Advisor Todd Hale, as he provides some insights into consumer behavior in lieu of our crappy economy (marketers and business owners, take note):

Behavior Shifts:

  1. spamCoupon redemption which in past years has declined, was up 17% in Q4’08
  2. Consumers are increasing their turn to internet – must have messaging on your website about value
  3. Increased ownership of home electronics, particularly big screen tv’s
  4. Spam, Macaroni and Cheese, Ramen, and dollar stores had a great year
  5. Organics are doing poorly, canning and freezing supplies are doing well
  6. More people are spending time at home to save money.
  7. TV viewing time has increased 5 hours/month to an average of 151 hours/month
  8. Newspaper advertising is dying
  9. Of all the spending channels, Online Spending had the highest increase in Q1’09 of 15%

Marketing:

  1. Kellogs SEO’d for the terms “Cereal + Deals” and “Cereals + Value”
  2. In the last recessions, companies that increased their marketing and sales efforts during the recession, experienced on average, a 275% growth in the 5 years post the recession.
  3. You need to have the right promos on the right products

So let me break that down for you point by point…

Behavior Shifts:

  1. tvPeople were cheap once… now they are even cheaper.  Yaye coupons!
  2. I reckon it’s due to a) high gas prices b) online prices tend to be cheaper and c) fear of rioting in Los Angeles…  Ultimately, be grateful you have an online business.
  3. That $600 stimulus tax rebate we got back from the IRS obviously went towards something useful, like a healthy investment in a large TV.
  4. Re-read #1.
  5. This makes sense… bad economy = the need to cut corners and save.  Forget about saving on big screen TVs and other frivolous materialistic items, we should cut corners on our health YO!  After all, we got health care to take care of us when we get sick and old right?  RIGHT???
  6. Yes, spending time at home watching TV and sucking on frozen foods.  That’ll save money – boo ya!
  7. After a long day of hard work, Jerome deserves to sit in front of the tube (which he bought with the $600 tax return) rotting for five hours while eating his canned foods all in an effort to *gasp* save money!  Good for YOU Jerome!  Never mind more productive things like investing, self-improvement, or picking your nose with your toe (all of which is more productive).
  8. What’s a newspaper?
  9. Do they sell TVs and frozen and canned foods online?  If so, that makes sense.

Marketing:

  1. They should’ve SEOed for “cheap frozen cereal” and “cheap canned cereal”.
  2. Get your marketing on NOW :)   Think about it, with everyone else cutting their marketing department, that’s only thinning the competition in the marketplace which also means cheaper advertisement/marketing and more eyeballs.  Umm, duh?
  3. Right, buy a teddy bear and get a razor blade for free no longer works.

For more Todd Hale fun, visit him at Nielsen Wire.

Raymond

Categories : Entertainment
Comments (1)

So here’s an intro to the latest addition to my army of pets which I am training to take over the world with me some day (I am at 2 cats and a puppy now… as soon as I get a llama, a goat, an unicorn, and a midget piglet, I’ll be ready). His name is Bubba and he’s one crazy (in a good way, most of the time) dog.

Here’s him showing who’s the boss:

YouTube Preview Image

He’s going nutso on a toy (that’s obviously too big for him and is indeed… it’s designed for dogs weighing in at 20~40 pounds, Bubba is 5 pounds).

Like they say though, it’s not the size of the dog in the fight, but the size of the fight in the dog.

Note: I’ve since removed the toy after reading Cesar Millan’s (aka, the “Dog Whisperer”) book and watching his shows. This is to help Bubba become the “calm-submissive” dog I want him to be :)

Categories : Pets
Comments (1)

ianlurie

I just came across this awesome article by Ian Lurie on how to tell if a SEO firm is a fraud. In this day and age, search engine optimization (SEO) is increasing in popularity because of the promises of “free traffic” (Come on, who wouldn’t want free traffic right?)

Unfortunately, that gives way to scammers looking to take advantage of client’s:

  • The powerful lure of free traffic when they are paying $$$ for other marketing streams like AdWords
  • Lack of knowledge when it comes to SEO

As such, ridiculous claims are stated and false promises are made.

One perfect example was when we consulted with Robert Kiyosaki, author of Rich Dad, Poor Dad.  His marketing director at the time told us that they spoke with another SEO firm who promised them top rankings for terms like, “401k”, “credit cards”, “financial freedom”, etc…   All within a couple of weeks.

This is laughable because these markets are already dominated by what I like to call “800-lb gorillas” who not only have deep pockets but also are very SEO-savvy.  To try and knock them off of their perch would take a ridiculous amount of time, energy, and money.

Doable maybe in a year or two (maybe with Robert’s resources and our expertise), but certainly not a few weeks.

Anyway, Ian shares the same sentiments and he touched on four “run-the-other-way” signs that a SEO firm is full of horse-sh*t and you shouldn’t waste your money hiring them for your SEO needs.  Take a look at his enlightening article on SEO Fraud.

And next time, rather than getting ripped off by SEO quacks… hire our SEO services instead :)

Raymond Fong

Categories : Search Engines
Comments (1)

Okay… so here’s the deal.  MLM Traffic Formula 2.0 just launched and for the next few days (until Tuesday the 9th until 10:00 PM PST), it will be discounted by literally 70%.  That’s right, it will be sold for $297 until next Tuesday.  Then it will be raised back to its regular price of $997.  You are talking about a savings of $700 on one kick-ass product.

How kickass?  Here’s my candid feelings on what you can expect:

The first Traffic Formula help Fernando and I quit our jobs and now we are invited to be instructors on MLM Traffic Formula 2.0 teaching SEO 2.0 (so you KNOW it’s going to be awesome ^^ )

And to follow that theme of “SEO”, Fernando and I will give away our yet-to-be-publicly-released DVD, SEO Rush, which teaches you how to generate quick cash, leads and new distributors for your business, within 1 week, for absolutely free.  This is a $97 value.  So essentially you will be getting MLM Traffic Formula 2.0 for only $200.

So what are you waiting for?

http://www.seonetworker.com/traffic/

Raymond Fong

Comments (0)

Here’s a keynote on the latest and hottest project Google’s working on, the Google Wave – “a personal communication and collaboration tool”.

Commentaries to come soon, for now, onto the video:

YouTube Preview Image

Categories : Social Media
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While PayPal has served us well (and it still serves us well), a few months ago Fernando and I decided that we needed a full functional shopping cart.  Our sales funnel was just becoming too deep and too convoluted for something as simplistic as PayPal.

We needed full control over our sales process – up-sells, down-sells, cross-sells, continuity product, the works.

So I went on the hunt.  I remembered Perry Belcher and Ryan Deiss discussing the whole concept of “risk free upsell” and how 1ShoppingCart has a lil’ script that allows that to happen; so I poked around and got some feedback.  It was Justin Christianson who then said, “Dude, why don’t you check out UltraCart, it’s awesome.  It has the whole up-sell process taken care of along with a ton of other features/benefits.

I did.  And I have to admit, at first I was bewildered at all the options I had… all the menus, the configuration settings, not to mention the close to 500 page manual!  I was like, “Justin, how did you bother going through all this stuff?!

His reply?  “Forget the manual… just use their customer support!

And boy did I!

Their customer support was superb and was on top of everything.  With their guidance I got my sales funnel figured out and was all ready to rock until…

The Event That Caused Me to Flex My Twitter Muscles

You see, everything was coming along nicely.  I’ve spoken with their super friendly customer service representatives countless number of times on topics like, “How do I get an one-time offer salespage up?”  “How do I add an image?”  “How do I setup shipping?”  And things were rolling, but then I hit a snag.

I went to upload a few videos and they just refuse to show up.  So I called and asked and got they told me it takes time for the videos to process.

Next day, same thing happened and this time they told me to submit a formal help ticket so their tech guys can get on it.

A few days went by and I heard nothing.  I emailed a few more times, called a few more times, and felt like I was given the run around.  Each time I was promised that someone would get back to me but nobody ever did.

Finally, after 2 weeks of this horse-s**t (this was holding up our launch), I said enough was enough.  I grew sick and tired of being mistreated, neglected, and ignored.

So I looked to social media for help.

My first one was innocent enough and looked something like this:

twitter1

But after becoming more frustrated with the situation and still not getting the response I was expecting (neither on the phone with them nor in email), I poured on the fire:

twitter2

This Got UltraCart’s Attention – GOOOOO Twitter!

This is where the sexiness happened (thanks to Twitter and kudos to UltraCart for patrolling the webspace for their names).  UltraCart got a whiff of my dissatisfaction and rather than sitting idly by while I stir up a sh*t-storm at their expense, they took action:

twitter3

At around the same time, I finally got a straight answer from their customer service department (after I probed deeper and practically threatened to cancel service)… so I finally got some closure.

Here’s the Point…

Twitter Can Cause Harm IF You Let It, AND It Can Cause Good… IF You Allow It

Don’t sit idly by when some folks start talking about you/your brand/your company/an issue you care about.  Because sooner or later, it’s going to gather enough momentum, enough folks are going to get whiff of it (and gawd knows how many people will eventually blog about it)… that by then it’ll be too late for you to “take care of it”.  This is assuming...»

What you have just witnessed is how I was able to leverage the power of social media properly to “call out” UltraCart because I genuinely feel like I was being mistreated.  By the same token, you have also witnessed the ability for a company like UltraCart to quickly, efficiently, and tactfully diffuse a situation before it got out of hand.

All thanks to social media.

Use Tweets to Your Advantage

So how did Ultracart find me so quickly?  Well, I am willing to bet money that they are using a service called TweetBeep, where you basically setup an account and get alerted whenever someone Tweets any of your selected keywords.  In their own words, it’s “like Google Alerts for Twitter!”

So as soon as someone mentions your keyword, you get an email that tells you the Tweet and who Tweeted.  Or...»

On another note, you can use TweetBeep for more than just protecting your business.  You can use it to create business and draw more potential clients.  For example, my buddy Fernando Ceballos got his current health insurance plan because he tweeted one day how he’s looking for one.

And guess what?

Someone had setup their TweetBeep to get alerted whenever someone Tweeted about “health insurance” and he got in touch with Fernando and voila!  He got himself a client in Ferny.  Pretty neat huh?

So get creative, what can you use Twitter for?  What can you set your TweetBeep up for?

And lastly…

Don’t ever under-estimate the power of social media.

Raymond Fong

P.S. As a quick plug for Ultracart, they are awesome.  What transpired was a miscommunication and they were quick to own up to it and did what they can to correct the misunderstanding.  By the same token, they have gladly spent hours on the phone with me walking me through each minute steps.  So as far as a “review” of Ultracart goes?  I give them two-thumbs up :)

that 1. you are not just some crazy person and 2. you actually have a compelling case
you can do it manually by using Twitter’s own search function.
Categories : Social Media, Twitter
Comments (2)
May
23

Too Cool for Shcool!

By Raymond Fong · Comments (0)

How cool is this…

YouTube Preview Image

And one kickass song as well!

Categories : Entertainment
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