Surprise, Surprise, Surprise for Kasauti Zindagi kay lovers, here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QVC40ihHloc

I also found the title song on Cooltoad and other music download websites.

E- Business

Imagine two eye balls on your computer watching everything you do. As we all know e-businesses thrive on the time they lock with the users. The more the time you are ona particular site or the more you use it, the more the money that goes into the pockets of these businesses.
Now it's eerie sometimes. Yahoo or Google knows where I stay, what I do, what are my needs, what do I look for when I am on the internet and what is my objective, my likes and dislikes.
The adaptive technology brings on palette links suited to my unique personalized choices. It's like even before I google and find out stuff on internet, the links are there appearing on the top of my gmail page. Isnt that a breach of privacy. I know it s an automatic system, that looks for some repeated words in my mails and gives me back the search results, and it feels great to find exactly what you want, but it doesnt feel too great that someone knows every single thing about you, probably more than you know yourself. Probably this is what they called Agressive marketing.

Initailly it kept me wondering that in Facebook or other forum like sites, these ads are never clicked. I mean our eyes are tuned to just rip off the necessary content in the site.
But as I write this post, I realize that they have refined over a period of time. Now I find myself clicking on those gmail links more often. Now I understand that it's because they knows me better than before to give me exactly what I want, 90% of the time.

E-bay or other advertisement sites work on the same foundation. They read the customer, rip you off. But now e-bay has come with a feature, which allows you to offset the profile settings, which means you ll be a fresh customer each time you visit the site...

More on this here : Who's afraid of Google

The side of Marketing I hate

In a recent conversation with a friend, we discussed how marketing is seen by some people as salesman kind of work. That's myopic...


There are numerous theories and statistics and a great depth in what we call marketing. In the crudest sense it appears to me as 'the art of attraction'. What would be the percentage of cases when we buy what we don't need ? How many people get confused between need and desire ? How smart are those marketing professionals in convincing that you really really need it to be complete or satiated !

Coming back to the topic,'marketing' at a small scale for small business which is not so organized, makes me distrust the intentions of people. It's like' Is this why he/she being so close and concerned'. The best examples would be Quickstar and Amway products. I feel they make false promises pulling people into business and makes others move away from these people. Sometimes 'marketing' becomes a mantra for them. In the process of promoting they change themselves, lie through their teeth and sometimes believe in 'what they sell' like they would belive their religion.

They try to seduce every family member, some turn into bakras and buy and obviously realize it was never worth the money.
I am definitely for these small business and their efforts to grow. As long as you don't propagate false philosophy/ideology it's fine. If you truly believe in the product or service you offer and see potential for it ( in terms of need or atleast desire) , still respect the space people have. Don't go persuading to the extent, that people avoid you. You haven't gained much, but have lost a lot.

Yet another thing practiced here in US is build public relationships. And I get extra cynical when this friendship building is way too fast against natural speed. People greet each other her and start talking especially if they belong to the same country or clan, so one often gets confused, so fast relationship building happens even in absence of marketing, which is what makes me distrust even genuine people. Some background check helps, if that s possible.

So next time someone says ' Our wavelengths match, don't they', be doubly sure, especially when you have know this person for less than an year.

I would really love to see myself promoting my business, for I still need to master the art, but I would call it ' answering people why would they need it and what are the shortcomings as well'. The objective would be "to genuinely make life easier and better" and 'money' shall be a by product. As they always say 'it ll be a special communion of necessity and my imagination', certainly not a false necessity. Time shall stand testimony...