Tom Martino Damages Oregon Business

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In November 2004, talk radio host Tom Martino picked up the phone on his consumer-advice show. Unhappy Washington state resident Melissa Feroglia was calling to complain about a jet ski she had purchased in Boring, Oregon at John and Susan Gardner’s Mount Hood Polaris. Unfortunately for the Gardners, Martino’s show was nationally syndicated.

Feroglia told Martino that her jet ski had broken down again and again. According to Feroglia, John Gardner had first promised to refund her money, but had then said that her ski jet was fixed and there would be no refund. Feroglia concluded her woes by telling Martino that at that point the weather was too cold. She would have to wait until spring to try out her jet ski.

Martino, in the flip and annoying way of many talk show hosts who could not be bothered with the facts, then told Feroglia that Gardner was lying to her. Martino and Martino’s producer continued the saga by telling us of a cycle we are all far too familiar with: Calling the shop, being told to contact the manufacturer, contacting the manufacturer, and being told to call the shop again. We don’t know if their tale was true or not.

We do know that Martino said, “Polaris sucks.” The situation further spiraled out of control as Martino encouraged his listeners to contact Mount Hood Polaris and the manufacturer and tell them that they would never again buy any Polaris products.

John and Susan Gardner sued after their phone lines were flooded and they were threatened. The Gardner’s lawsuit stated that people driving by the store for several weeks shouted insults and the store lost approximately $600,000 in business. A judge dismissed their suit and in April a federal appeals court upheld the dismissal. According to the federal appeals court, this was basically not slander because reasonable talk show listeners do not expect facts on talk shows like Martino’s, just opinions. Without facts, there cannot be slander.

In the eyes of the law, any damage to the Gardners’ business and reputation was due to Martino’s opinion, not to any false fact or facts. Given that this damage could not have been caused by reasonable talk show listeners, the Gardners have no recourse. No law protects businesses from talk show hosts who urge unreasonable talk show listeners to damage the business.

Tom Martino has more critics than just the Gardners. His critics are concerned by the “Troubleshooter Referral List,” a list of businesses that Martino endorses. A business can join Martino’s list by paying a $3,000 fee and agreeing to a code of ethics. This code includes agreeing to let Martino decide disputes with consumers and follow his decisions. Martino also personally endorses business products and services on the air for payment. Critics question Tom Martino’s being a creditable consumer advocate due to the very substantial fees he earns from his endorsements.

Martino apparently enjoys both sides of the street. He appears to profit as an entertainer masquerading as a consumer advocate. He also appears to profit as a businessperson selling endorsements that appear to make him a pseudo consumer advocate. Unfortunately, his audience does not appear to notice that he is a pseudo consumer advocate. He is not the real thing.

Perhaps some day we will have a law that holds talk radio hosts liable for inflaming audiences that can reasonably be expected to cause damage. Until then, businesses savaged by Tom Martino will continue to occur damages, both justified and unjustified. In the final analysis, we have no idea if the Gardners were fine upstanding business people or not. We don’t know anything about their business practices. We can definitely state that it would have required some very bad business practices for $600,000.00 in damages to have been a fair penalty. We can conclude two things from this: We need laws to handle situations like this and we need to watch out for Tom Martino and other talk show hosts like him.

Forum Marketing-how To Build A Good Forum Relationship

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Forum marketing is a very popular way affiliates promote their websites or blogs. Promoting on forums can be a great way to drive free traffic to your site, so you can introduce your product to interested people. Before you start promoting on a forum, you need to know how to go about it. Building a good relationship with a forum community is essential. So, if you are thinking of using forums as a source to promote your website, make sure you know how to go about it and get started.

Forums are a community of sorts. Think of them as your neighborhood and the people on them are your neighbors. A forum is a gathering place where people come together to discuss certain topics of interest. There is most likely a forum out there for every niche possible. You can use these forums to get information, ask questions, make new friends, and of course promote yourself. You don’t want to sign up at a forum site and just start promoting. There are certain unwritten rules that you should follow when you join a forum.

Like I said earlier, a forum is a community. The people who belong to them are a network. They know one another and are trusting of each other. So, it would not be a good idea to just join the forum and start bombarding it with your links for promotion.

3 Steps for Establishing Yourself in a Forum Community

1. Register and Look Around

Once you have found a forum geared toward your specific niche. Go ahead and register an account for yourself. Then, you should set up your personal profile. You should take a few days to look around the forum before you start posting. Get a feel for the forum. Browse the posts, learn about some of the other members, and get yourself familiar with the written rules.

2. Start Posting (Slow and Easy)

You can go ahead and start posting after you have seen how your particular forum operates. But, don’t over do it with posts. You don’t want to be seen as a spammer. Spammers bombard forums with irrelevant posts, so that they will get link exposure. You want people to take you seriously, so again, don’t over do it!

3. Build a Respectful Reputation

Since you have started posting on your chosen forum. You want to continue to post good and relevant posts. Don’t expect people to automatically think you are an expert, show them. Help people with their questions and answer them as thoroughly and as best you can. You will get more clicks on your link, as you gain respect in your forum community.

Creating relevant and valuable posts to your forum is nessesary. You should not post a bunch of “I Agrees!” Don’t expect to establish a good reputation doing that. You need to provide valuable information to your forum.

There are several different ways to post on your forum. First, and foremost. You should post an introduction. Introducing yourself to your forum community. Also, when there are other new people who have joined the forum, you can post to their introduction and welcome them.

When posting questions, don’t ask questions that you can easily find answers to on a search engine. You should post thoughtful questions. When answering questions on your forum, give as much information as you can. Don’t post uninformative answers, as they are not going to be very helpful. When someone else has already posted a good informative answer to someones question, you can always comment on their answer and add valuable insight. Once again, you should not just post “I Agree!”

Once you have spent a few days or even weeks establishing yourself in your forum community, as a valuable, trusting member. You should be able to start dropping your signature link at the end of your posts. All forums are different when it comes to posting a signature link. Some, let you include a link immediately. Some, will require you to post a certain number of messages first. Then there are ones that require you to be an active member for a specific period of time. Make sure you read all the forum rules, so you know when to start adding your signature link.

Building good relationships and establishing a good reputation in your forum community first is KEY! Getting clicks on your link will follow. So go get started.

Advantages Of Using Promos In Your Business

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Promos are considered one of the most effective and cheapest means for marketing. Corporate gifts or promos are not very expensive and can be less than a dollar as well. According to the reports of an Advertising Specialty Industry, around 56% of people keep the promos, while 58% of the people remember name of the company printed on the promos. Promos are cost-effective means of advertising brand image of your business. This article discusses about some useful tips on how you can make the most of promos for a campaign.

You should be aware of the wants and desires of your prospective clients:

Promos that you use must be market driven. It is very important customers appreciate the promos that you give out; as this will help you increase your customer base. Therefore, what you can do is, make the promotional products the way your clients expect them to be. You will have to spend time conducting research, when it comes to determining the right promos.

You must be very cautious all through the process, because business organizations have the tendency of losing their core message in their attempt to target niche audiences. Your brand identity must be clearly expressed in advertising merchandise so that people wont have any problem getting the message you want to promote.

Remember less is more:

You should keep in mind the concept of less is more while designing promos for marketing. You should keep the text and color to the minimum to attract attention of prospective clients. Too many colors and words tend to make the promos look messy and chaotic. There is amazing elegance in simplicity and this helps you effectively project your business message to your clients. Untidy presentation shows lack of professionalism and leaves behind a negative image in minds of the clients.

Many consider bargaining or haggling a desperate act in business. It is actually a business negotiation process that a wise entrepreneur does to cut down the overall cost. Once you are aware of the basic negotiation skills, you will be able to save substantial amount of money.

Some of the commonly used promos include T-shirts, pens, gym bags, mugs, and other useful pieces of merchandise. Targeted promos for your customers generate more sales and help attract attention of clients to your site. Make sure to give out good quality freebies, as your company image will crumble down when you offer cheap promos.

Using promos for marketing is one of the most affordable means to increase your profit margins and improve your business. So, keep in mind the three useful abovementioned pointers and create a brand image of your business with promos or promotional gifts. You will be amazed to take your business products and services to an altogether new height with such promotional items.

Risks And Challenges Involved In International Business

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International businesses have to face risks and challenges at many fronts. Some are similar to the risks and challenges a domestic business confronts and some are unique. Even the challenges that are similar by definition differ in nature. For example both types of businesses have to face financial challenges, but an international business will be facing many factors related to global financial markets that don’t affect domestic businesses as much. They are more of a challenge in nature than risks and most of them can be handled through proper planning. Keep reading to understand these challenges better.

The challenge of international planning & strategy:
The first challenge for an international enterprise is to make a global strategy and then implement it. The managers and those at decision-making positions often find it difficult to change their thought pattern, which is not used to work in global paradigm. There are many international businesses but just some of them have truly adopted a proper global strategy. Though the situation is improving with more and more trained graduates and professionals taking on the management roles. Nevertheless, international business management requires extra ordinary management, foreseeing and leadership skills.

Financial and economic challenges:
It starts from arranging the funds to start international business and includes everything such as fluctuation in exchange rate, global economic crisis (or some economic crises in the host country), shift in oil prices, global inflation or tariff barriers imposed by the host government, also the export related policies of your own government.

International Politics:
Political know-how is a must for everybody but it becomes all so important when operating at international level. If some policies were suitable for your business, a change in ruling party can bring drastic changes in those policies. Political chaos will bring down the economy and with that your business. To prevent your business from such negative impacts, you need to make sound political judgments.

Environment, natural disasters and warfare:
Many multinational businesses have to face serious opposition by some environment friendly organizations. Citizens are more concerned about air and water pollution these days as it is becoming a serious threat to their health. Some natural disaster like floods and earthquake, or some kind of civil war breaking out in the host country is also in the list of possible challenges. A new challenge that an international business has to bear now days in some specific countries is the threat of terrorism.

A Simple Guide In Developing A Crisis Management Plan

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Crisis management is said to be the procedure in which an organization takes on the different events or situations that may threaten or harm the stakeholders, the general public and/or the company itself. Before you can make the crisis management plan, there is a need to first define the threats or crises that might affect your business. In order for you to identify them, there are three things that you have to look for. These are the events that threaten the success of the business, the element of surprise and short time that is needed to make the right decisions. According to experts though, there is a fourth element required to determine whether a certain event is a crisis and that is the need for change. In this case, if that particular situation does not call for change, it can be considered as just a failure or an incident and not a crisis.

Another thing that you have to know before you make the crisis management plan is the very little contrast between risk and crisis management. For many years, there have been comparisons between the two even including debates about risk management vs. crisis management. The main dissimilarity between them is that risk management involves the assessment of potential threats and searching for methodologies that will help the business in avoiding the threats. Crisis management on the other hand deals with threats themselves after they have broken out of company control.

The crisis management plan is created in order for the supervisors or the business owners to obtain guidelines for any crisis situation. Thus, it should be an effective document, which includes the fact that it should be continually updated since the industry, the company and the world changes rapidly. Crisis management planning is and will always be a part of the overall protection and emergency awareness and strategic planning process of the business. To get started, five Ps and one E should be remembered: predict, position, prevent, plan, persevere and evaluate.

The first step is to always identify the issues but this does not mean that once you have detected the concerns, you will stop there. This is an ongoing process which includes creating a list of every imaginable company issue starting with the things that will most likely happen. Then you will need to categorize and prioritize the items on the list. You can assign a crisis team that will help you in completing the task. The next step is for policy preparation which involves the policy statements with general principles such as honest, direct and timely responses, ethical standards integration and considering media when implementing the business practices in dealing with emergencies.

The crisis management plan is not complete without the specific responses toward the threats. When drafting them, consider the scope of the crisis, the established unified response and the knowledge of the staff members. The crisis management planning process should be clear, concise, simple and consistent so that the crisis management plan can help in identifying the things that happened, why they occurred and what the company should do to ensure it will never take place again.