Tiger Woods Spits on Golf, Google Secrets, How JC Penney Got Their Site To The Top: What your business can learn from the Tiger and JC Penney
Posted by Salem Global on Feb 15, 2011
Befor
e I begin this week, I want to point out one of the funniest clips I have ever seen on the Internet. My friend Simon Feil (http://www.simonfeil.com/index.htm) stars in this clip from the Onion News Network: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9NDPX4RYH-g&feature=player_embedded. So the opposite of the various Sunday morning yell at each other what’s your opinion democrat vs. republican BS that is spewed. “Your logic is flawless!” “I couldn’t agree with you more!” Straight out of Leslie Neilsen writing and comedy.
And here is something NOT funny. Tiger Woods spitting on the putting green. Golf has reached an all time low. Ewwwwwwwww. Tiger Woods hocked a lougie and left it near the 12 hole. Come on man. That’s just gross. And irresponsible. I really hope that Tiger can get his act together. Why did OJ kill his wife and then continue to do bad things when cleared of the charge. Burglary in Las Vegas of Sports memorabilia? Michael Vic and dog fighting? Come on guys. You have talent. Raw talent. Talent and skills that you have honed throughout your young lifetimes. To make history, fame and fortune. What the heck is wrong with you? Can’t you just accept your success and live gracefully. Tiger. Get it together and keep your saliva in your mouth or in a tissue. Then throw it in your caddy’s bag and play to win. You are better than that http://sports.yahoo.com/golf/blog/devil_ball_golf/post/Tiger-Woods-spits-on-green-golf-world-splits-in?urn=golf-321079
As for companies who are better than that, a number of people had asked me if I had seen the NY Times article on “The Dirty Little Secrets Of Search” (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/13/business/13search.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&hp) When you are an individual and famous like Tiger Woods, Brittany Spears or Lindsay Lohan, your face and your name are your brand. Now seriously. Who is going to want to buy a Lindsay Lohan necklace after her latest fiasco in California? One of the most famous books out there is by Mark McCormack, “What They Don’t Teach You at Harvard Business School.” As head of one of the largest sports and celebrity representation companies, he was all about what you do today to make money and glorify your brand so that in the future you can ride those coattails. (See Jerry Maguire – SHOW ME THE MONEY!) Do good on the field and then you can do well after the game is over. Give to charity today and watch them honor you later on in life.
JC Penney is one such company. A good company that makes VERY good money. According to the NY Times article, they made $17.8 Billion dollars in 2010. Not bad! They also spent $2.46 million in paid search ads. Definitely worth it. But they also used a digital marketing and SEO firm to broker some bad black hat practices for them. As a result, they were at the top for many Google searches when they shouldn’t have been. Apparently Google didn’t catch it and only busted them after they probably raked in millions as a result of being at the top of the organic listings. So this stinks for JC Penney, but it also stinks for Google, the world of search and all of the small guys who should have been at the top for various keywords when they were not.
The good news that I glean from all of this is that I am right! I said that Google was going to downplay links coming from 3rd party outside sources and websites and that content was going to reign supreme. They had paid for thousands of non-relevant links and it paid off in the short term. But now they are being punished so that’s too bad. I am guessing a few possibilities.
1) JC Penney might not have known what their search engine firm was doing for them.
2) Some people might not have known. Others who didn’t know didn’t care or weren’t paying attention. After all, online doesn’t compare to offline for them so it probably slipped under the radar.
3) JC Penney did know but didn’t care.
4) JCPenney knew and so did Google. But because they spend so much they were willing to overlook it.
This can be a nasty business sometimes considering click fraud and the amount of money Google and other search engines charge. But supply and demand drives the market.
In conclusion, I believe in testing, reporting and monitoring. Not everything is going to work at first. But if you can find an honest way to market yourself, you are going to benefit in the long run.
Want to know more about the tiger woods or how search engines work? SalemGlobal can help you get more leads than you ever thought possible through the Internet. Call Raphi Salem today at 888-578-6732 or email info@salemglobal.com and we can talk about it.
