Eagle-eyed Econsultancy readers will notice that we’ve published a number of end-of-year roundups recently.
For each of these posts we asked a panel of experts for their views, and while I had their attention I slipped in a few extra questions.
Everybody loves a successful startup, but even the most successful startups generally overcome plenty of mistakes before they become successful. Unfortunately, for many young companies that don’t win in the marketplace, failure is the product of fatal mistakes.
Like most things in life, mistakes aren’t created equal, and when it comes to the mistakes that can really hurt a young startup, technology mistakes can be particularly pernicious.
Here are several of the biggest technology mistakes startups make and how they can be avoided.
With a market cap of over $15bn and a share price of $290, Netflix is one of the internet’s highest flying stars. But changes the company is making to its pricing could have it crashing back down to earth.
Yesterday, the company announced that it is offering two separate plans going forward: one for unlimited DVDs by mail, which costs $7.99/month, and one for streaming, which also costs $7.99/month. Currently, Netflix customers can receive both unlimited DVDs and streaming for only $9.99/month.
Not surprisingly, a 60% price increase has sparked an online fury, with angry Netflix customers threatening to drop their Netflix subscriptions.
You’ve worked hard building a strong relationship between your business and its customers. They trust that your products and services meet their needs, and more importantly, they trust the people who work for your business.
But what happens when you make a mistake, and that relationship based on trust is put in jeopardy?
Unfortunately, it happens, and it happens quite frequently. Many companies, some with previously stellar reputations, have lost the trust of their customers in the blink of an eye.
It’s official: after more than a year of rumors, AOL has finally managed to find a buyer for Bebo, the social networking website it purchased in 2008 for a whopping $850m.
The buyer: financial firm Criterion Capital Partners. The price: word on the street is that it didn’t exceed
$10m, and may have been as low as $2.5m.
Perhaps no online retailer has acquired a reputation for customer
service quite like Zappos, which was acquired last
year by Amazon for more than $900m.
Reputations, of course, are difficult to acquire and maintain, but very
easy to lose. And for good reason: when something goes wrong, many
companies respond in ways that end up tarnishing their reputations. Last
week, a costly mistake put Zappos to the test.
In today’s internet-enabled world, your ‘reputation‘ is arguably more important than it has ever been in the past. Increasingly, information about you and your business will find its way online, and what people say about you online has the potential to become a significant asset or liability.
So it’s no surprise that ‘online reputation management‘ is a hot area. But as with SEO and social media, many mistakes are made.
Here are 10 of the most common…
Many businesses are increasingly comfortable with social media, and many more have decided that social media is far too important not to experiment with.
But the growing level of maturity in the world of social media doesn’t mean that mistakes are uncommon. To the contrary: many businesses make the same mistakes over and over again. Here are 10 of the most common.
Running an ongoing SEO campaign is a lot like spinning plates. With so many factors in play in search engine algorithms, you really need to be aware of all of them at once to ensure a successful campaign – it’s all about keeping a balance between all of them.
This post is a compilation of various pitfalls, gripes and bugbears I’ve come across where something is lacking in the balance required for success in organic search.
In this post, we’ll be looking at the top mistakes we’ve seen email marketers make in 2009, packed full of useful tips and unusual analogies.
As I was going through my RSS reader earlier today, I came across an post on paidContent detailing the launch of Sharecare, a new online health and wellness website that is set to launch in 2010.
I was intrigued because of the number, and identity, of the co-founders: celebrity doctor Dr. Mehmet Oz, WebMD founder Jeff Arnold, Discovery Communications, Harpo Productions (Oprah!), Sony Pictures Television and HSW International. Wow, I thought, this must be good.
If you’re an entrepreneur or run a small business, chances are you’ve hired a freelancer or considered hiring a freelancer. And for good reason: when you don’t need or can’t afford an employee, freelance labor gives you access to talented workers who can take care of a specific set of tasks.
But getting the most out of freelance labor is not always easy because freelancers work differently than employees and many entrepreneurs and small businesses don’t understand that. To ensure a successful relationship with a freelancer, here are five common mistakes to avoid.