Nintendo Of America With A BIG, Fat Fail

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If you’re on Twitter, and you check out hashtag #nintendofail you’ll begin to see a series of posts developing over a recent move (some people would call it a “dick” move) by Nintendo of America.

I can’t believe I’m typing this, but Nintendo can’t stand the fact that kids and adults alike are creating their own “play through” videos of Nintendo games, posting them to YouTube… and because some (perhaps most) of these accounts are “monetized”… these folks are making a SMALL amount of money off of the ad clicks generated by these videos.

Nintendo couldn’t stand it, and are standing firm on their “these games are ours” copyright-oriented ground… and pulled the most “old media” type of action.

They took the revenue being made by the play through creators for themselves in a partnership with YouTube. Sad.

The story is here along with Nintendo’s rather stern and not very fun statement.

Bad move by a gaming company… do they not see the value of the FREE marketing these play throughs were providing for them?

That, and I think their bottom line wasn’t hurt a bit from these play throughs.

I will edit this post as I get new information.

 

For Copywriters: 5 Important Lessons I’ve Learned

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This will be a quick post…

5 important lessons I’ve learned from over a decade of copywriting experience, that hopefully will help you if you’re a copywriter yourself (these are in NO particular order)…

1.  Get paid upfront, at least 50% of the project fee.  Make it a “kill fee” if for some reason the client decides to cancel the project and move on.

2.  Take care of your health.  Without it, none of this really matters.

3.  Take good care of your clients (especially the ones who take care of you), and always look for ways to provide extra value (at YOUR discretion) like consulting, an extra email for an email series, etc…

4.  Set clear project expectations with your clients upfront… don’t wait.

5.  Life is too short to deal with clients who don’t respect you as a professional copywriter (e.g. those who want you to charge by the word, those who don’t understand the value you bring etc…).

BONUS:  Have fun, it takes time to build a copywriting practice… so enjoy the journey.

The Myth Of “What’s Next”

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Many business owners, in our initial discussions, ask me…

“Hey Joe, what’s next in the world of business?”

Or this…

“Hey Joe, what big innovation can take my business to the next level?”

My answer usually sets them back a few notches…

“There isn’t one.”

I’m famous for telling my clients EVERYTHING they don’t want to hear.  But let me explain why…

This notion that there is a “What’s next?” for any business, small or large… is a complete myth.  It’s a waste of your time to pursue this idea, until you have the “What’s now?” mastered and delivered 100%.

The more surprising fact of the matter is… almost NO business has done that yet. Not even the biggest, most profitable companies have mastered all of the basics yet.  If a company provides great customer service, for example, and over-focus on it… they typically lose in the administrative or analytics part of the business.

This isn’t to say there aren’t a handful of businesses who seem to have all of the bases covered.  I’m leaving that as a general statement though, because I have yet to come across any business that does everything well (different from trying to please everyone).

Let’s dig in a bit further here…

When you keep hunting for “What’s next?”… you lose sight of the basics, and your business begins to enter an endless cycle of hunting for magic bullets from which to profit.  You can only do that for so long, that is NOT sustainable.

Here are the basics…

  • Listen to your customers.  You don’t have to do “everything” they say, but if a good portion of your customer base is saying the same thing… examine it deeper.  NOTE:  By the way, listening to your customers will lead you to “What’s next?” automatically.
  • Business is about people.  That includes your customers, but also your employees, vendors, and other people connected to your business.  If you don’t treat all of them exceptionally well, your business will be doomed with small margins as you compete on price.
  • Know your numbers.  You might be good at whatever you do or offer in your business (e.g. you’re a good mechanic), but you MUST understand your business.  You have to know what is selling and what isn’t, and above all, use this information to optimize your business to take care of the people who support it (  <— BIG point).
  • Don’t be lazy.  Most business owners are lazy.  There are NO shortcuts, no magic pills, a Facebook page WILL NOT skyrocket your business profits overnight, you can’t just use direct mail once, fail, and assume it doesn’t work anymore etc…
  • Nobody cares about your business… at first.  I don’t care if you have the greatest mousetrap in the world, you will NOT be able to sell it unless you get over the fact that nobody cares about your business.  That being said, if you have a remarkable product or service, a certain group of people in your customer base WILL care, so long as you take care of them like royalty ( <— ANOTHER big point).

One big final point…

Don’t EVER sacrifice the people that support your business in the name of profits.  Don’t hire until you need to, don’t sacrifice customer service EVER, and holy shit don’t cut the marketing or training budget.

Here’s where the die-hard, “we’re in business for the money” entrepreneurs will challenge me I’m sure, but I have one point that even you cannot challenge:

If you truly, wholeheartedly have EVERYTHING in place and optimized, you’ll also have a culture people care about (customers and employees alike).  Your profits are a measuring stick of how well you’re doing that.  Google started out very optimized, and now, it’s VERY profitable and has an employee culture worth talking about.

Don’t get me wrong, there isn’t a perfect example of any business… because almost none have mastered the basics.  Almost no business has “What’s now?” down, 100% of the time.  Google is a good example of that too.

Big businesses seem to get so big, they rely heavily on automation, at the expense of their customers.

But heed my warning… automated systems will only get any business so far.

Once the shiny, glossy nature of the digital world has lost its luster in about 5 – 20 years, entrepreneurs will begin again to come up with the next age of culture-oriented companies focused on solving real-world problems.  Actually some already are (note: these are NOT investing recommendations).

A few of the next age of real, problem-solving innovations will challenge Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Target, Wal-Mart, etc… etc… for BIG pieces of their market share.

That is, unless they focus more on “What’s now?” ;)

Notice too, that I did NOT focus on “growth” in this article.  Sometimes, smaller, more focused companies are in better position to stay with the basics.  They don’t grow too big for their shorts (usually at the expense of customers and employees).  They are also more profitable when they do it right.  You won’t see them on the NASDAQ though.

We have to change the way we’re thinking about business people.  The “profits before people” mentality needs to change.  But you don’t have to sacrifice profits (in the long-term) to accomplish that.

CTRL ALT DEL by Mitch Joel: A Review

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Mitch Joel (@mitchjoel on Twitter) shared a review copy of his newest book, CTRL ALT DEL with me.  I’ve now read it cover to cover twice.

It’s even better the second time around… and I’ve only said that about 3 other business books:

  • The New Rules Of Marketing And PR by David Meerman Scott.
  • The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell.
  • Thinking Fast, And Slow by Daniel Kahneman.

This book joins the ones listed above.

Why?

The main reason is it makes a bold promise on the cover (Your Future Depends On It)… and then backs that promise up with carefully selected evidence and thinking.

Plus, Mitch Joel is one of those guys who thinks on a much deeper level than most “marketers.”  He doesn’t think “on the surface” or in a reactive way… he takes a step back and can see the bigger picture, and in most of his thinking, all of its parts.

For example, in CTRL ALT DEL there is a part where he writes a question “Do you need a mobile version of your business website?”.

Most people’s answer to that question would be a resounding “YES”.  My answer is no, as is Mitch’s… but for very different reasons.  You’ll have to pick up a copy of the book to see the rest of Mitch’s answer.  It will surprise you as it did me.

In fact, the way he explained just that one point reinforced why I listen to every word Mitch says.  I don’t agree with everything he stands for in business, but a good portion of it I do agree with.  Thinkers like Daniel Kahneman, Seth Godin, Steven Pinker, and David Meerman Scott round out a short list of people I pay regular attention to, that list includes Mitch Joel.

I’m going to conclude this NOT by recommending you to pick up a copy of his book.  Instead, I recommend you stop by Mitch’s blog at Twist Image first, and his Twitter account second.  Those should give you a solid perspective for considering whether or not picking up a copy of CTRL ALT DEL is a good idea for you.

My Privacy Is Mine, Your Privacy Is Yours… Own It

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The above Tweet links to a talk Danah Boyd gave in 2010 about privacy.

As much as some techies and geeks want to dismiss it (calling it “dead”), privacy is an important topic… one that needs to be debated out to the n’th degree.

Folks, we need to own our privacy… and quit dealing it out to Facebook, Google, Twitter, and other companies without knowing what the “deal” is.  If you like the deal any of these companies offer in exchange for use of their particular media tool, then by all means take it.

If you wonder about the deal being offered, DON’T use the tool until you can be comfortable using it.  If you have problems with the “deal” either stop using the tool, or don’t use it in the first place.  And keep in mind, any of these companies will continually change the “deal” being offered.

Your privacy is for sale people… to the most – targeted bidder.  Any company that says otherwise had better be able to provide proof beyond “PR” type responses.  Show us you’re not selling our information to the advertisers, and the more the better, and you’ve got one point down.

Quit assuming we want to “opt-in” and instead present it as a well-explained option.

Not all of us understand your pages and pages of geek-speak.

(I understand a great deal of it, but sometimes…)

And folks reading this, you need to examine the “deal” media companies are offering you online… in depth.  Yep, that requires more work than just “clicking to agree” and hoping for the best… but it’s your life out there, online.  Don’t expect these media companies to respect it, they give you everything you need to know… it’s just that some of it isn’t in the limelight, easy for you to see.

There are a TON of related topics here, I will expand on this, and I am touching on this in my upcoming book… Slow.

But for now, let’s take a harder look at what we’re offering of ourselves online, and establish our privacy boundaries… it’s ok for you to do this, no matter what the geeks might say ;)

 

You Need To Update Your RSS Feeds

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Because Google Reader is shutting down soon, and Feedburner also, you need to update your RSS Reader with my new blog feeds if you have the old Feedburner feed in them.

For The Ratliff Report - My blog on business, marketing, and success… please use http://josephratliff.com/blog/feed in your reader.

For The Ratliff Rants – My various rants and more “edgy” writing about various topics like life, people, politics, health, and more… please use http://josephratliff.com/rants/feed.

For The Ratliff Writings – My various other, lighter, writings and shares from around the web… please use http://josephratliff.com/writing/feed.

Each of these blogs will be accessible from my Home page, but please update your reader now, because if you are still using the Feedburner feeds, you’ll miss out on random stuff that I give away like this… and this.

If you are looking for an alternative RSS feed reader… Feedly and Feedreader are good places to start, but you can always do a Google Search as well.

 

Google Glass: What’s The Point?

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As I write this post, I have NOT received or reviewed an actual Google Glass yet.  Honestly, I don’t want to.

Eric Schmidt and Google have got it wrong BIG TIME with this one.

There are implications… potentially big privacy lines being crossed when issuing a technology like this.  That, and has business and advertising really stooped so low, that it HAS to rely on bringing the advertising right to the consumer’s eye?  (edited out for now, Google won’t allow advertising on Google Glass I’m told)

And by the way, Eric Schmidt, who is quoted saying the following about the “critics” of Google Glass:

“Our goal is to make the world better. We’ll take the criticism along the way, but criticisms are inevitably from people who are afraid of change or who have not figured out that there will be an adaptation of society to it,”

How exactly is Google Glass going to make the world a better place?

By the way Eric, society only adapts to those technologies IT deems fit for society. YOU don’t get to make that decision.  It has almost nothing to do with people being “afraid of change”.

That, and another, perhaps more interesting question… exactly what problem does Google Glass solve for the consumer?

If I want to take a picture of my kids playing basketball… I’ll pull out my phone or, GASP, a camera… and actually pay enough attention to the whole scenario that I don’t need a device on my eyes that can do that.

I truly hope that you won’t take the condescending attitude you have here, Eric, and take this criticism, and others, to heart.

And, even though Scoble didn’t get assaulted while he was wearing them in urinals… that doesn’t prove a thing. Most people don’t know about Google Glass yet, nor will they care yet… so they aren’t familiar with what it can do… and therefor won’t react under those conditions.

That’s basic common sense, Robert.

That, and why on EARTH would you wear anything like this in the shower?

Overall, personally… I am NOT afraid of technology at all… and my initial take on Google Glass is “it doesn’t solve any real problems… so what’s the point?”

One last point, back to Eric Schmidt, who has been quoted as saying some version of “we should have nothing to hide when it comes to our privacy.”

You say that like it’s a good thing.  It isn’t… and I don’t want Google, Facebook, or anyone else in charge of my privacy, because it’s mine… thank you very much, and I’ll handle it.

Besides, I’m truly worried what Google, Facebook, etc… will do with it. ;)

JUST IN 05/02/2013:  After looking at Engadget’s review of Google Glass… my original question remains (what’s the point?).  A smartphone can do everything this can, for about 1/3rd of the price… I just can’t wear a smartphone, but so the hell what?

Post updated from original version to reflect new information received.