Jersey Shore of Business: Is Your Brand Overexposed

Yes, another blog post about business and t.v.  I’m not an academic, poet or deep thinker.  I work on the biz and I watch my stories.  Over the last year, one of my favorites has been Jersey Shore.  I know I’m not alone.  I think the magic behind the JS is that all the participants in the show are relatable.  In the first Season, they drove crappy cars to a C-class vacation resort.  And they worked in a t-shirt shop to cover their living expenses.  Never would this be confused as a high-class lifestyle.  But growing up in Middle America, driving a Pontiac Grand Prix (or as my wife called it, the “Big Prix”) to the family lake cabin, I related.  I was Jersey Shore. 

Now, Season 3 is here and the Situation is driving a Bentley and not really taking the job at the t-shirt shop seriously.  Snooki is playing up her characterizati0n — acting more and more outrageous and calling attention of the cameras.  Worst of all, Vinny is getting girls.  This is not the same group of people that I related to last year. 

It got me thinking about companies.  Every hugely successful company has a known brand.  And in getting that brand exposed, they eventually overexpose it.  Overexposure, in my opinion, is not easily calculable.  Everyone loves the Fonz, until he water skis over a shark, and then they don’t.  So when do you realize that your brand (or take on your brand is overexposed)?  Here are my thoughts:

1.  People hate your commercials:  A great example is the GEICO ads with the “weeee” pig screaming in the back of a car.  I honestly will never consider GEICO as an insurance provider as long as this commercial is in rotation.

2.  You are known more for your Brand than your product:  Microsoft would be a good example.  You know the logo, the founder, and the word processor, but what about their mobile phones, Xbox product line, Halo or database technology?

3.  People that don’t use your service have an opinion about it:  Howard Stern, if his radio show could be considered a product or service, would be a good example of this.  I’m a huge fan of his.  Listen to him in the car and at work.  Most of the time, it’s about in-fighting with his staff or a great celebrity interview.  But everyone that doesn’t listen to him thinks its about scantily clad women discussing personal matters.

Any other thoughts on whether your brand is overexposed?

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Your Wifi Network Isn’t Secure Anymore

Years ago the industry standard of WEP encryption on Wifi networks was forced to evolve when programs that could easily be found with a google search allowed any mischievous individual to compromise a wireless network and steal the credit card information of everyone on it. Everything sent over a WEP network is encrypted with the same password. This single layer of security leaves networks vulnerable to hackers, as the password can be obtained in a matter of minutes through any number of algorithms that guess every possibility for the password. This method of hacking, dubbed the “dictionary attack”, is thwarted on websites that block users after too many wrong password attempts and utilize Captchas.

None of us like squinting at the warped letters and having to repeat forms because we mistook a twisted “t” for an “f”, but it protects our personal and financial information. Since WEP could be hacked so easily, businesses quickly switched to WPA encryption, which uses a constantly changing key for every transmission. The new encryption method almost universally adapted by business owners and lauded by security professionals as being unhackable.  Many old devices only support WEP encryption, leaving their users left behind in the dust. Thomas Roth, a security consultant in Germany, made waves last week when he claimed to hack a WPA network in minutes for less than six dollars, using rented supercomputer power from Amazon’s new cloud computing service.

“People tell me there is no possible way to break WPA,” said Security Consultant Thomas Roth in an interview with Reuters, “Or, if it were possible, it would cost you a ton of money to do so,” he said. “But it is easy to brute force them.”

Amazon Cloud provides supercomputer power not only to small businesses aiming for efficiency, but also to hackers who don’t need expensive equipment or computer expertise to compromise your privacy. After obtaining your password, the hacker may use a Firefox extension called Firesheep to intercept your company’s financial records and intellectual property. Customers logging in at your storefront location are also left vulnerable to having their credit card information stolen while logging in at your brick-and-mortar location. Pages secured with an https:// prefix are protected from the latter.

Roth plans to release his algorithm to the public later this month at the Black Hat hacking conference in DC. In the meantime, security professionals are scrambling to release a new, impenetrable encryption protocol for wireless networks. By releasing the malicious code, Roth could make innocent people vulnerable, but the goal of computer security professionals like himself is usually to find the vulnerabilities before the bad guys do. The Black Hat conference is full of insiders like Roth (last year one wirelessly hacked an ATM to spew cash). The media attention provoked by Roth will hasten the industry to use something more secure than WPA and hopefully minimize the damage to victims.

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So Maybe I was Wrong…Over 7 Million iPads Sold in the 4th Quarter of 2010

Just over 9 months ago on this very blog, I proclaimed that the “iPad is iCrap” and wondered aloud why anyone would be so dumb as to purchase one of these new fangled tablet computers.  Well, while I still think that, for me, the iPad is a non-essential gadget…I guess 7,330,000 other people in the 4th quarter of 2010 disagreed with me because all of them bought one! 

Yes, the iPad IS officially another success story for Apple, and yes it DID probably revolutionize the PC market once again for Apple, and oh yea it IS probably the hottest new gadget in the tech industry since the iPhone and iPad.  All of these things may be true but I am happy to say that not a day goes by that I wish I had one!

Another interesting tidbit that I wanted to pass along today that made me realize how massive the Interweb (my fancy name for the Internet) really is: Did you know that 70% of Facebook’s user base reside outside of the United States!?!?  Maybe this is just me being naive or maybe it is because I am one of the last Americans to NOT have a Facebook account, but this really shocked me…I mean to the point where I actually read this sentence again to make sure I didn’t read it wrong.  For some reason I always assumed that Facebook was a mostly America-centric social application but obviously I was wrong again there too!

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Thanks New York Times for Covering the KikScore Blog!

I can not tell you how valuable Google Alerts are for your business or startup.  I was getting ready to go back to work after New Years and I received my regular email for my Google Alerts for “KikScore.” Now I get a lot of emails for the various mentions of “KikScore” across the internet, but I had to do a double take when I saw that we were referenced wholly unsolicited in the New York Times’ You’re the Boss, The Art of Running a Small Business blog.  If you have not read this small business focused blog, its a must read.  The blog offers a very unique insiders view of being a small business owner and includes excellent guidance. One of its contributors is Gene Marks who writes Dashboard and is a nationally recognized small business expert, speaker and small business owner (check out his Quicker, Better, Wiser service).  We owe Gene a special thanks for covering us in his This Week in Business post.  Now if only my hometown once a week delivered newspaper, the Stow Sentry would just cover KikScore!

The lesson learned for us from this coverage are at least three-fold:

1) Focus on Good Content – Keep trying to push out good, valuable content on a topic (for us its small business, startups, entrepreneurship all mixed with pop culture and humor) through various channels including your blog, Twitter, Facebook and sites like BizSugar and you will get noticed by being helpful to the community;

2) Value of Google Alerts – If you have not already done so, every small business and startup should set up Google Alerts for at least your company name, your management team members, your product names and industry relevant terms.  You may even want to set up alerts for your competitors too just so you can keep a watch on them.

3) Say Thanks – It is a small gesture, but once you get covered take a moment to say thank you and acknowledge the writer that covered your business.  This is our thank you to the New York Times and Gene Marks!

Let us know your thoughts on what you have done, when your business was covered by a major media outlet.

Photo Attribution: Scott Beale / Laughing Squid at laughingsquid.com.

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Advertising Evolves to Become More Effective and Relevant Amidst Privacy Concerns

If you own a house in the Baltimore-Washington metropolitan area or any state where door-to-door soliciting is legal, there’s a good chance you’ve had your fair share of canvassers come knock on your door. If the canvasser introduced himself as Mike and tried to say something about a free estimate for windows before you told him to get lost, we’ve probably already met. Like myself years ago, most canvassers are teenagers in high-school, attracted by the commission-based pay and opportunity to work outside. A backlash against door-to-door marketing has grown as disenchanted workers and homeowners accused companies of exploiting unskilled youth labor and invading personal privacy. Minors are barred from canvassing and telemarketing in many states, according to the US Department of Labor

Since beginning college at American University, I’ve left the unfortunate trade of canvassing in favor of unpaid internships that do not induce ego rot caused by constant rejection by cold-call leads. The state of advertising has evolved since, becoming more personalized by utilizing the personal information that most Americans make available online. Cold call marketing, such as through telemarketing and canvassing, is being replaced by personalized ads on the internet. Business owners are no longer left to shoot in the dark. Facebook has pioneered this front by allowing businesses to create ads (using this simple form) that appear to users based on personal information posted in their profiles. Although I’ve discovered a few good bands through these ads, aimed specifically toward me because I like 50+ artists, most are no more relevant than anything I’d expect to hear from a telemarketer. Despite Facebook’s efforts to deliver relevant ads, promotions for Methadone treatment and Doom Metal bands still make their way to bewildered consumers.

Those who have seen Steven Speilberg’s film adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s Minority Report remember a scene where Tom Cruise is immediately identified by ubiquitous retina scanners when walking into a mall, and bombarded with personal advertisements. “Hey, Tom, you really look like you could use a Guinness.”

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YouTube Video

With the consistently growing presence of advertisements in our culture, this dystopia may be an accurate prediction of the future for consumers. Is Facebook already crossing the line by utilizing users’ personal information to direct advertisements? Or is this a better alternative to being harassed by telemarketers and canvassers?

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The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills: The Reason I'm not Working on My Small Business Tonight

As a nights and weekend entrepreneur, every night I have a list of things I need to do to work on KikScore.  Usually I find the time.  But not on Thursdays.  Thursdays belong to Camille, Kyl, Lisa and Taylor — the ladies of RHOBH.  And I can’t be the only guy who thinks the same way.  In fact, there has been more than one drive home where I’ve talked about the show with Raj. 

Now besides being a fascinating study of human (mis)behavior, there are some decent business lessons to be found (at least that’s what I tell my partners so they don’t get made at me).  Here’s a start at what they are:

1.  Own Up to Your Mistakes:  We all know that Taylor talked trash about Kyl to Camille early on in the series.  Ever since, Taylor has been denying it and losing face every day.  Your customers know when you screw up, so instead of making excuses, just own up to it (you’ll be better off in the long run).

2.  Publicity May Not Always Be the Best Thing:  So you’re married to Kelsey Grammer and you want to establish you’re own identity.  Signing up for the RHOBH make sense.  But then it blows up.  Soon the whole world finds out that you’re a dim, manipulative harpy, whose only friends are on her payroll.  Maybe you don’t seek out publicity for your business, and only hope for attention for positive reasons (not because you’re desperate for it).

3.  Don’t listen to Mediums (or Larges).  During a memorable dinner party, Camille brought along her novelty friend, who was the inspiration for the show “Medium” (now cancelled).  In not a surprise twist, Camille’s friend started predicting all sorts of bad things for Camille’s frenemies.  She clearly saw that Kyl’s husband was going to cheat on her.  What the medium missed was the fact that Kelsey was, at that exact time, in NYC cheating on Camille.  Kind of a big miss.  So don’t believe mediums or proformas.

That’s the best I can do…i’ve no got to watch the show.

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Apparently Facebook and Android do not go well together and other Social Media Risks

It’s Facebook. Again. This time it’s a vector for smartphone malware.  According to an article on PC world,  since the Android is more open source than either the iPhone or the Blackberry, it’s more prone to getting malware.  Apparently BitDefender called Facebook the largest mobile malware….Facebook has a lot of problems doesn’t it? The malware gets on the devices through bad links on Facebook, since the malware is platform independent.

So here’s a refresher on Social Media risks.

• Turns out scams are more common then we think. Twitter accounts get hacked, malicious links get posted and so does Facebook. However, both sites are trying to improve their security.
• Many people often use the same password for numerous sites. We get it, it’s hard to remember so many passwords. So, write them down on a piece of paper or in a journal(do people keep those anymore?) and stick it somewhere safe.
• Don’t give too much information out either. Those vacation plans of yours, they might be better written down in an word/excel document and stored on your computer.
• Don’t post comments when angry! (They get around) And if it’s something really bad, there will be consequences. It’s fine to say something about how your toast was burnt this morning and how you hate burnt toast, but it’s another thing to say something about your company, your significant other, etc..
• Don’t click on any funny links! See a status  update about how a friend needs money because her car got stolen in Chicago? Call them and check to see if it’s true. Most of the time, it isn’t. (This happened to me once. Turns out she really did need the money.)
• Make sure your company has a flexible Social Media security policy. Technology keeps on changing, so a flexible policy is a good policy!
• Keep up to date on the latest Social Media scams and threats. People keep coming up with new ones all the time!

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DC Area Friends, SmallBiz & Startups – Come to the 28Corridor Tweetup This Thurs #28ctweetup

I talk to the Swami on my way home nearly every night from Herndon.  No I do not talk to myself or my imaginary friend in the passenger seat (though if I had one, I would imagine I was sitting with Mike Holmgren and ask him when will the Browns return to relevance in the NFL?).  The person that I talk to is the Social Media Swami, Shashi B.  That call often begins on Route 28, right off the Dulles Toll Road and next to beautiful Dulles Airport.  We typically chat about our day, what is going on with KikScore, how Shashi’s daughter (and Kikscore intern) Mitali is enjoying college as well as a host of other things.  It allows us to catch up with each other during the nearly 40 minute drive home to our respective homes in the District and in Maryland.

So it is only fitting that Thursday, Shashi is organizing the first ever 28 Corridor Tweetup.  That would be the same 28 that we drive on every day.  For those not familiar with Route 28 in Northern Virginia, here are some “beautiful” aerial pics!  The “excuse” (as if we need one!) for the tweetup is to get together to welcome the wonderful Lisa Byrne, @dceventjunkie, to Network Solutions  (our co-sponsor from last year’s fantastic Social Commerce Camp). Lisa just started working on Shashi’s fantastic team last week.

As more folks started to tweet about the tweetup, it dawned on us that lets try to get area small businesses, startups, bloggers, nearby airport baggage handlers (bet they have some great stories!) and anyone else together to join us at Ned Devine’s in Herndon, VA for the tweetup.  So please come on out on Thursday.  We would love to see you there.  Spread the word and tell your friends.

By the way here is some extra incentive, if we get more than 30 attendees, the Swami will sing the Lady Gaga song of the crowd’s choice (I hear there are a lot of people voting for Poker Face!”).

Click here for the details on the 28 Corridor Tweetup. The hashtag by the way for Thursday’s event is #28ctweetup.

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Want faster broadband? Go mobile!

Well in the US anyway. According to this study, the US is third for m0bile broadband quality.  However, that’s only in mobile broadband. Confused by all the figures? This article gives you a good summary. The US is ranked 15th in the world in terms of better broadband access, along with France, Latvia, and Canada. The best place for broadband access….No, not Japan or Sweden….it’s South Korea!

I believe that the study measured it in download and upload speeds because that’s what the article said, plus one of the graphs was showing downloading and uploading speeds in the requirements. I do wish the second graph-like thing on pg 16 of the PowerPoint came with a key because it was a little confusing.  I believe what it means by “household penetration” is how many houses have broadband access. Looking at the graph, it seems like most of the countries who are leading in household penetration are not broadband leaders.  However there are still quite a few countries that don’t really seem to have proper broadband.

The PowerPoint also stated the countries that were ready for future applications. The US was not one of them. It was, however, in the list of numerous countries that enjoy current applications without (many) problems. There are quite a few countries that are barely or unable to support many of today’s applications.

On the other hand, the US has a negative difference between the broadband in its main cities and outside them. The study didn’t say how far outside the broadband quality remained the same, but it’s still good news. The country that has narrowed this gap the most is Poland. What I found interesting was that Japan was below the US.

The graph on page 8 of the PowerPoint shows that many of the developing countries are focusing more on developing broadband in their cities because they acknowledge that it is an important part of their economic development. On the next page is a list of cities that have the quality required to be “smart and connected.”  The PowerPoint does not explain what this is. It doesn’t look good for the US here, because the only city that fits that requirement is …..(take a few minutes and guess, I want to know what guesses you came up with)…….New York. (I’m pretty sure all of you guessed this. Just once I would like to see a place like Tulsa get into some technology list.) Ok! The next page……I’m not sure h0w to read this or what the bubbles are talking about. (I don’t know that much about broadband….yet) So, moving on!

I don’t really understand the chart and graphs on pages 13 and 14, but I do know that the Social Media slider should be all the way to the right. The second to last page talks about the relationship between broadband leadership and innovation economy.  I believe it means that there is a positive relationship. The thing that I took away from this is that the US, if it wants to be on the very edge, should probably improve broadband quality. Maybe that should be it’s resolution for this year?

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Returning an Unwanted Gift? It Might be a Little Easier This Year!

Now that we are 10 shopping days past Christmas I hope you have already returned all of the gifts that you didn’t want.  I was just reading this article in the Wall Street Journal about how most larger retailers are now starting to ease their return policies this holiday season. 

The article makes special note about how Best Buy has stopped charging their 15% restocking fee for certain items.  I think this is an interesting point because it shows how ridiculous some retailers return policies have been for the past few years.  The fact that Best Buy has actually been charging people so that they are happy with their shopping experience shows how far the pendulum has swung in the favor of the merchant in recent years when it comes to returns. Hopefully in a few years there will be no such thing as restocking fees and other return policies that retailers have in place will be eased considerably.

I actually have a recent first hand experience of trying to return a large ticket item that was purchased as a gift from Amazon which is one of the largest online retailers in the world.  Since the gift I was trying to return or even exchange (I was willing to do either) was purchased longer than 30 days previous to the day I was returning it within days after Christmas I was told that my only option was to return it, pay for return shipping, and only get reimbursed for 85% of the value of the item.  30 minutes on the phone with customer service later and Amazon was paying for the return shipping and I was getting a gift card for 100% of the value of the item but I had to put up a considerable fight and jump through a few hoops to make this happen!   Ridiculous!

Anyway, I think there are a lot of really non-consumer friendly return policies out there that are hopefully about to reversed over the course of the next few years.  Does anyone out there have another unbelievable return policy that they experienced first hand to share?

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