Just a few days ago I was visiting one of my local jeweler clients when one of their customers came in to sell scrap gold. I was surprised how easily one of their associates was able to pick through the pile of chains and rings to separate out the real gold from the fake. He then tested it all and explained it to the customer. Surprisingly the customer claimed that the new pawn shop down the street had evaluated the entire pile of scrap as real gold. The associate performed the gold test right in front of her and tried to explain the science behind the chemical test.In that situation the young sales associate was the trained jewelry professional with scientific proof, but yet the customer didn't believe because their vision was clouded by dollar signs offered by a less reputable "professional." Being able to tell the difference between fine jewelry and fashion jewelry was "common sense" for the sales associate, and in this case the customer decided to go back to the pawn shop and take their offer.
I sometimes forget that what I know and take for granted as "common sense" about the internet is much different than what the everyday average jeweler knows. Since I work as a professional internet consultant I always need to be the go-to guy for everything internet related. On the other hand, even though I know enough about jewelry develop marketing plans, I know far less than, what I believe, your sales associates know. I have a few "gold" chains at home that I still like to believe are real gold even though they've been tested and proven to be junk.
On Friday May 31, 2013 as the crowd of jewelers gathered before my presentation at JCK I overheard several of them debating a few misleading internet myths. Even though most of those myths were outside the e-commerce topic of my seminar a few of them were asked during the Q&A...
One jeweler wanted to know if they should trust people calling and claiming to work for Google. Usually these phone calls guarantee some type of higher organic ranking for a fee. This type of phone call is always 100% bogus and I know that as soon as I hear the caller say the words "guarantee" and "organic." But the average jeweler might get enticed by the incredibly low price that the caller is offering, especially since it's "guaranteed."
I don't want you to be the uneducated pawn shop owner that pays for fool's gold so let me give you some basic facts so you don't fall into the trap of paying money and losing out.
Phone call tips to protect against bogus cold calls:
1. It's impossible to guarantee any type of marketing placement online.
2. Google does not call to help you increase your "organic" ranking.
3. Typically, Google will never call you so be ready to hang up on someone claiming to work "with" Google.
4. Google might call you if you have an AdWords account and are spending money on advertising monthly.
5. If Google calls they will already have identifying information about your AdWords account to prove who they are.
6. Google reps will never "guarantee" anything about your AdWords account. They will say they want to help you "improve" your ads but that's their euphemism for getting you to spend more advertising money.
7. If Google calls, the representative will give you their name and their contact email, which will always have the @google.com address rather than @gmail.com. Anyone can have a gmail.com email address.
Google makes most of their month through AdWords advertising and I've never heard of, or experienced a legitimate case when a Google rep called for any reason other than AdWords related services. Never organic.
Ironically enough, I had already outlined the details of this Nugget before receiving a phone call at 9:34pm last night from Google. Yep, Google. Another thing about Google is that they call at all hours of the day and night from as early as 8:00am and apparently as late as 10:00pm. The Google rep left his name, his @google.com email, phone number, and he wanted to talk to me about one of the AdWords accounts I manage. When I talk to him later today I will thank his for reinforcing what I just outlined above for you today.
I would love to hold a Town Hall type meeting with an open Q&A to address all the myths about the internet, but I suppose that's what these Daily Golden Nuggets are for. So send along your questions if you have them.
