Photo by Walsh

A couple of years ago I first ran across Crossloop, a free and easy-to-use PC screen sharing tool. I liked it so much I wrote up a review, and ended up spending a lot of time talking with and eventually meeting Mrinal Desai, the man with the vision behind the product.

Technically there’s a lot that attracted me to the application. They’ve done a great job of simplifying the user experience to the bare minimum, rather than overwhelming them with the space shuttle control panel like most previous sharing tools. They also run their business with a heavy focus on user statistics, so they can tell you exactly how many minutes have been spent on Crossloop, 31 million at the last count with 600,000 users!

Another thing I liked was that they always had a business model in mind that wasn’t advertising. Today they’ve finally gone live with their help marketplace. This allows people in search of technical help to connect with someone who can give them a hand. It’s initially free, but the plan is to charge a fee to thos who need help, and pass that on to the helpers. This makes a lot of sense to me, there’s a big pool of people out there with time and technical know-how who can answer questions, and a lot of people with simple computer problems who’d be willing to pay a small amount for help. If the system takes off, the world will end up with a lot of poor but tech-savvy folks (eg students) having a new income, and a lot of users with problems solved. There’s already a lot of companies using Crossloop for technical support, this seems a good way to make it easy for individuals to get involved, rather like eBay for services.

"There’s really nothing to it. There’s no story, so it’s really hard to say anything."

This video of a friend-of-a-friend desperately trying to find something good to say about the latest release of his software brought back memories of trade shows past. When the powers-that-be want to bump up the version number, but don’t synchronize that with any actual development schedules, you end up trying to find something, anything, to demonstrate.

I love the random email conversations my blogging spawns, which have involved everything from why hedgehogs hibernate to arcane technical details of COM dll registration. I recently received an email from a young entrepreneur asking me to check out their site. Then, a few days later I had a another email saying basically "I noticed you read the last email we sent you, why didn’t you reply?". Checking the source of the original mail, he’d embedded an image bug to work like a read receipt.

I had to admire his enthusiasm and drive, but was definitely creeped out by the way he was tracking me. I wish I understood why my marketing sometimes fails, so to try and turn this into something positive, I thought I’d discuss what didn’t work for me with his original message:

——

Subject: Blog Question

I came across your blog and thought you might be interested in trying out my product X.  We help you solve common problems with creating your blog from placing in text links, placing pictures and videos, and more.

Check us out at http://X.com , use the invite code: X

If you have problems understanding what we do on the site please let me know, we are a young company with a great product.  We have a new site coming out in the next few days that will make everything more clear.
Thanks for your time, I look forward to hearing what you have to say.
Thanks,

Robert X

X@X.com
Forward email
This email was sent to searchbrowser@gmail.com, by X@X.com
Update Profile/Email Address | Instant removal with SafeUnsubscribe™ | Privacy Policy.

Email Marketing by
X | 142 South X | San Francisco | CA | 94103

——-

I came across your blog and thought you might be interested in
trying out my product X.

For a start, there’s no "Hi Pete", or any other personalization that demonstrates he’s an actual reader of my blog. Mentioning a recent article is a quick way to show you’ve spent a little time learning about your recipient.

We help you solve common problems with
creating your blog from placing in text links, placing pictures and
videos, and more.

This sentence is pretty vague and unclear. You have a few seconds of someone’s attention, you need to make a clear and concrete promise about the benefit to them of investing more time on your proposal.

If you have problems understanding what we do on the site please let me know, we are a young company with a great product.

I actually quite like this part, it’s projecting a good attitude and wanting to start a conversation.

We have a new site coming out in the next few days that will make everything more clear.

This, not so much. That made me think, "well, maybe I’ll just wait a few days and look then, rather than spending time now on something unclear".

Thanks for your time, I look forward to hearing what you have to say.
Thanks,

The double thanks adds to the assembled-by-robots feel.

This is a screenshot of the actual footer to the message. The mentions of email marketing and unsubscribe options made it seem even more like this was a mass-mailing. The tracking bug is hidden in there too, though I didn’t know it until I checked.

I will now be replying to Robert, and I hope he takes this in the spirit it’s intended. I spend plenty of time trying to get people interested in my projects, so I know it’s not easy. One thing I have learnt is that there’s no short-cut to getting someone’s attention. You have to put in the time to understand what your recipient wants, and highlight what you’re offering that fits in with that. A form letter like this is unlikely to get the response you want.

Mike Gunderloy over at WebWorker Daily included GoogleHotKeys in their weekend roundup, and I got a real kick out of his "Take that, Google!" title! Thanks too to Anne Zelenka for passing that on to Mike. Her blog has some really thoughtful articles on a wide range of subjects, including whether to focus on a niche for your blog or just post about everything that interests you. That’s definitely a struggle I can sympathize with!

The photo’s one I discovered through Stock Exchange, by Linden Laserna. Check out his Deviant Art page for more eye-catching photography.