Stalked

My personal theory is that there is a conspiracy in Google land to drive up traffic. In one of my Google AdWords campaign, the usual impression rate is about 10-20 per day. That is until two days ago, started on the 22nd, the impression rate spike up to thousands. Now, as much as I like to take credit for increased exposure, I know this is not due to any intentional effort in our part and, as far as I can tell from the daily Google alerts, there is no reason from the external world that would cause this.

What I do see is a corresponding spike in junk e-mail hits from China. Lots of @165.com and @qq.com. I won't belabor the point of the stupidity in entering the info when you cannot expect to get anything in return, but this is really getting on my nerves.

So, I first fired up a complaint to Google saying that there is an unusual spike in impressions and I suspect there is a good (bad) reason for it. Then, I took all the non-core markets off the Google campaign geography - China is off. Finally, I split up the campaign that experienced the spike into Search and Content to ensure that any crowding effect from Content hits does not impact negatively the Search hits.

Can somebody explain to me the attraction of virtual vandalism? Shouldn't the person be surfing some adult oriented sites instead?

Harte Hanks is going on its second week. So far, we are getting an average of nearly two requests for appointment per day. And, non-appointments discussion where they agree to receive additional information runs about 11 per day. The initial logistic issue have been sorted out for the most part. We now get a daily update around lunch time for all the leads generated the day prior. I have also created a number of algorithms to prep the raw data into something a bit more intelligible for the salesperson. (I am just a nice guy.)

How to measure HH? That is really the question. I think the verdict is still out. But, so far so good.

I have been inundated by PR and marketing outfits in the past few weeks. It seems that as soon as our press release for the marketing product launch came out, everybody, or it seems that way, smells blood. And, in fairness, I have not discouraged this interpretation and been inviting these firms to send me their information.

The issue with my current PR team is that there does not seem to be a good energy level and everything seems to have to be driven from my end. Given the fact that we are not getting a lot of exposure anyway, this is quite tiresome. The plan to have a nice chat with the PR team tomorrow with Mr Whup-Ass in attendance. Given a choice, I prefer not to switch PR team due to the time needed to get up to speed. But, at some point, it may be needed. The question is, what and where is that point.

In terms of the PR firm calling, there is this firm that is kind of passive aggressive. The sales rep says that he can do better than our current team and keeps sending me cryptic messages on why he can do a better job in upping the exposure. Stalking comes to mind. We will see how this one works out.

Oh, remember the discussion about making a consultant/analyst an industry expert in an area that he has no idea on. I have been laboring everyday for the whole week to come up with a series of four white-papers focusing on different aspects of the product functionalities that are considered important by customers. While each white-paper has a specific focus, there are side notes that tries to give anecdotal information on the history and usage. I kind of like the format and it also allows me to intersperse bits and pieces from other whitepaper to create a complete picture for the reader. so, on one hand, each whitepaper has a specific focus, but in its entirety, it still gives a complete picture of what our product does and why it is a good thing.

Finally, there is additional discussion on pricing. Somehow I think we have a dysfunctional pricing process. This seems to be a topic that is regularly discussed and I have never heard any consensus. I think partly it is because pricing has been fairly academic until recently when we begin to get enough sales traction. But, as a consequence, there is a constant tug of war between sales and finance/operation. In a way, this is healthy because as a company grows, it is important to keep adjusting. On the other hand, I do feel that we still do not have a common language on pricing so that we spend a lot of time talking over each other's heads. That part bugs me.

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