Disqus - Latest Comments for tashian

Re: "What's an Internet, Again?" | Thomas B. Conner

tashian — Tue, 05 Mar 2013 01:01:21 -0000

Thos, I love this! I have a vague memory of that pipie being installed. In my memory, I see Splotchy wielding a drill with a 5" circular bit--and a grin. I love that it's still there. And yes on the reunion!

Re: I have ZERO Facebook friends!!! - Blog - baratunde.com

tashian — Wed, 19 May 2010 14:04:39 -0000

I went through something similar when I changed the Flag of Equal Marriage from a group to a fan page. I learned the hard way that groups with over 5k people are useless. Anyway, I'm still around 4,200 on the fan page after a few months, so it does take a while to recover. Whatever. It is definitely not the measure of a man.

Re: Dial M for Hamburger: a design tragedy

tashian — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 12:51:09 -0000

Wow, this sounds like an amazing microwave. Let me know if you ever find the model, I might order one myself...

Carl

Re: online technology and the white house - together at last!

tashian — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 00:31:58 -0000

It'd be great to do the same thing with lottery money, tolls, parking tickets, etc... :-)
You get a parking ticket and think, "Yes! Another opportunity to vote with my wallet!"

Re: after almost 3 years, reddit gets a redesign

tashian — Mon, 26 May 2008 22:05:41 -0000

Congrats on the redesign! It's hot.

Re: mediocre marketing: how not to cold email someone

tashian — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 13:40:20 -0000

The way to fix cold e-mail, just like a cold call, is to warm it up. I would begin with an audience and write directly to them. Appeal to their sensibilities. If you don't know with enough specificity who the audience is, you're a spammer. But as you target a more narrow group, you'll probably notice that all those ellipses and exclamation points start to dissolve (unless they're ironic exclamation points).

Maybe I am more jaded than most, but the only cold e-mails I've ever responded to--and this happens maybe once per year--were clearly targeted, had an element of exclusivity, and had a name behind them that I knew of (a brand, a founder, etc). Even if you have all these things, you might still end up in my Junk. I almost junked an e-mail from Sprint that led to a free phone for two years. It's so easy to confuse even the most legitimate cold e-mails for spam.

But there is a hack. As you refine your audience, you can start e-mailing people via venues that they already get e-mails through. If you are writing your pitch to those venues, I think you can get through to people much more often. For an online gaming mailing list, I'd push the gaming aspect more (and those ironic exclamation points might come in handy). For a Facebook group, maybe I'd push the social side more. In all cases I'd try to partner with people in charge of whatever venue I'm trying to reach, so they may lend some legitimacy to the message...

Carl