Counter-Rant: “Firefox add on kills sales and destroys list building… find out how to stop it”
I got a stupid letter today from Robert Puddy, and it just pissed me off. I’m learning things just like everyone else online, but his letter just burned me to the core on two fronts. I’ll share…
He wrote to warn his letter receiver about the evils of FireFox, and how it was taking away sales from Internet marketers. He reasoned that because of certain Firefox plugins, people weren’t getting our heavily-labored marketing materials.
He rants “It’s the add ons… and one in particular thats costs IM”ers thousands of dollars and thousands of subscribers every day.
Because people have no idea of the detrimental effect this add on has to their bottom line and this insidious little add on continues to deprive you of sales and subscribers every day.”
Sorry, Robert, but the only “detrimental effect” that Firefox plugins have on marketers, is that the plugins Firefox offers knocks out all those weak, annoying marketing techniques in the first place. If they didn’t suck, if they weren’t annoying to a bunch of present users, people wouldn’t download the plugins to stop them in the first place.
The only things that FireFox plugins knockout are the marketing techniques that are either A. horribly antiquated, or B. those that resort to spam techniques.
Yep, my pop-up killer is on, and it’s staying on. I don’t need them. If you want to advertise to me, or to any other web savvy person, it’s going to have to be on my terms.
And my e-mail filter is still knocking out everything with the word “FREE” (or “FR*EE). You wanna hard-sell with those terms? Sorry, that’s on you. If you don’t have a brain in your head that can come up with copy that doesn’t use the word, or it’s spammy counterparts, sorry ’bout ya.
Sorry that I’m killing your traffic exchanges and your flash pop-ups, and you aWeber signup pages. But, I came to get information, not a lifetime subscription to your crappy newsletter.
Here’s an idea: if you value repeat business and lifelong customers, simply pay to get them.
PPC, targeted postings, and good information will keep the people that you pay to get coming back. And you’ll probably end up treating them better too, because you’ll have a more substantial investment in each of them.
The problem isn’t Firefox, Robert, is the internet marketers that still think it’s 2002. Grow up, already. And I’ll still use Firefox, and load that up with every pop-up blocker and anti-advertising plugin I can find. Because I want to surf when I want to surf, and shop when I want to shop. ‘Nuff said.