Why Fight?
The internet is a place where people compete. You’ll compete fair and square. But, sometimes, there’s “toe stepping”. Unfortunately, while you can do toe stepping, you will end up being ‘emotional’ in nature if you don’t know how to handle yourself.
One good point in this whole internet marketer deathmatch is that the more mature individual will stand out from the rest. Obviously, if someone sends a message to their list to destroy your credibility, and if it really can be done that easily, then you’d better pull up your socks! Take it as feedback.
I received a note from a subscriber that said this:
From: qwe qwe
Sent: Sunday, February 25, 2007 3:28 AM
To: Stuart Tan :Your techniques are all unworkable , you are just marketing to a herd’s mind that’s all . I see through that , sad to say you are not creative enuff to be a internet maktg speaker , perhaps only amateur will benefit by only 30 % , other than that you are just ripping money from people which is not good on the long run , thanks anyway , just my 2 cents worth .
First of all, my reply was cordial.
WOW! This is a first. And you’re right, my target IS amateurs. Lol, if not I wouldn’t spend so much effort developing content for this list.
I’m interested to know what kind of ideas you have that I can improve.
It’s not easy to find people like you, so I’m definitely willing to accept feedback.
Second, this person doesn’t write back. So I’m curious to know why people actually write these things in the first plance. I re-analyzed what I had taught, and I didn’t feel that my techniques were unworkable. I took it upon myself to decide check with some other experts, and they say that what I mentioned is sound.
Anyhow, a dose of criticism is good for competition, and it is difficult to not take personally. For instance, because this person has made a claim that could be damaging to my reputation, I could take this person to court and make this person prove his claims. But is it really all about being legalistic? And surely my position is not that weak that I have to spend money to prove this person wrong. What’s going to happen to the freedom of speech?
Anyhow, I’ve decided not to sue this person and my mind isn’t on him being libellous.
First cut – think win-win. Shut up before you blurt out something you’re not supposed to say, in the context that is wrong. See what you can do to grow the market rather than destroy it.
Second cut – sort things out with a phone call. My business and joint venture partners all agree sometimes people do the wrong things and until there is a final clarification, there is no need to make curt and damaging comments. When someone thinks “lose-win”, everyone loses.
This is the main reason why I dislike the internet marketing industry, and love it at the same time. I’ve got great friends and buddies but at the same time, I’ve got people who are sore losers and critics. I suppose we can’t win them all. If not for my desire to build JV partners, I wouldn’t bother being in the internet marketing arena. I wish there were more competence (not to be read as people are incompetent), more knowledge in budding entrepreneurs. So the only way to do this is to educate.
What matters is that this community is fair and forgiving. The community should also be supportive and direction focused. All in all, different people have different ideas about marketing, so why destroy the creativity. Challenge people once in a while, but don’t make it destructive such that you run the risk of being legally implicated.
And that’s for you bloggers out there too…
5. March 2007 at 2:24 am :
I like your objective and positive reply and response – good on you. Thanks for being so open and bold in sharing such strong critics here.
7. March 2007 at 12:51 pm :
Hi Stuart,
I guess the more successful and famous you become, you are bound to invite more criticism. Perhaps people are just jealous of your success. Or maybe this guy did put in a little bit of effort and expect miracles to happen. And when they don’t, they blame their external circumstances. Sounds familiar doesn’t it? This is the mindset I feel most ppl adopt.
I think in every industry there’s always a minority who succeeds and another grp who complain and lag behind. Chances are, these are the ones who did not bother to try hard enough.
Nonetheless, for one every criticism you get, I believe you get 9 other praises. And I’m one of them.
That should be enough to make your day I’m sure!
Keep The Good Info Coming In!
Calvin