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August 5, 2011Limited JV sale at WP List Mailer
August 13, 2011
Are you easily offended?
Have you offended anyone in an online business relation ?
Simple questions, right? Well, if you read this you probably answered Yes or No to the above or maybe you’re just curious :)
With all the perks on internet it is easily to get over some of the most obvious downsides like the one in discussion here – business relationship communication. I for one always try to talk wt least once with all the Xtreme Freelance clients, either by Skype or other means but surely that’s not always possible. Even so, there is no deny it’s much harder to know and have a business relation without actually meeting the person. That’s because we rely on many more factors when judging a person or relation than merely talk or writing.
But this is what we have when we try to make a living using the online world. I am happy with all what I’ve accomplished in my business and relations in this way but sometime there’s a harsh reminder of the limits. So here is what happened to me recently …
First of all, you need to know English is only my second language.That said, I love it and I use it everyday sometimes more than my primary language. I have tons of American and other English speaking online and offline friends so the following was new to me…
Recently I launched a new site – WP Safelist . During the launch a former client and friend referred me to a few business owners that were supposedly interested to help me promote WP Safelist and my upcoming big hit :) WP List Mailer. As a sign of appreciation I promised all of them that I will keep them informed and also upgraded their accounts at WP Safelist to the maximum level – a 1 year premium membership with all access. Now here comes the funny part…
Business relation mayhem
One of the business owners, let’s name him X started to send me emails complaining about all sort of things – all of them were wrong or false or just plain weird. Like when he asked about his referral link AFTER he obviously had been using it since he had a few signups under his account. I didn’t complained and politely replied to each of his questions and remarks, even if some were downright offensive like “Perhaps because English is not your 1st Language and you are not Western raised, you do not understand.” – this sounds pretty much like “You’re stupid because you were born somewhere outside US” to me…That’s from the same guy telling me “I find your layout and instruction difficl“. Now, some of you would know that launching a completely new business model it’s not something easy to do. Sometimes things are just not falling into place easily and OTOH it takes time to optimize each and every bit on a new membership site. I do however provided easy access for all members and not only to a manual that explains in plain English – with images – every little bit they need to know. That one could be improved too but I’m not aiming for instant perfection nor I demand it …
So, to get to the final chapter – I sent to X the one and only semi-promotional email. This was an announcement for some former clients and a few other interested parties regarding the launch they were interested in the first place – nothing to sell directly, just a link to a post containing affiliate info and a limited JV promotion. I admit I did 2 mistakes I don’t do usually – I just added all interested email contacts to one bulk email and some that were not in my contact list to CC field though I intended to use the BCC. I admit that’s not a good practice and I don’t do this usually. I send individual emails to everyone normally but this time I simply didn’t had enough time…and also clicked the CC instead of BCC…
In about 5 minutes I receive an email from X stating that practically I’m “a SPAMMER and that is what you just became“. I immediately replied and apologized and tried to explain the situation but it was a dead end. I am a big boy and I can support a honest critique and I always try to make amends when I do make mistakes. This was however more than I could accept so I replied politely again that we should terminate our business relation which is over in my book.
The moral of this story – I do believe we need more tolerance in this cases. What it can be a simple “sorry” situation can be a huge deal online unless we really try to understand the other party. If you’re not willing to do this the probably the internet is not the best way for you to make a living, as unfortunately for you, we are in it regardless where we were born.
Unless we ALL do our little part we can expect the online world to be a very dark and shady place.This is something I would not like…Please share your thoughts and experiences in the comments
Until then, if you’re one that is too easily offended, 
2 Comments
I could say that it very relevant that as an online marketer we should have a better communication skills among our client we are serving. We have to see to it that we communicate well and understand each others part.