Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?
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@scottalanmiller said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@Dashrender said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@BRRABill said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
This is different from this thread, but I still think that I can trust someone who gets financially rewarded.
For example, I would trust clicking the ads here on ML. Assuming ML is not out to get me.
Why? Why do you trust the ads here more than the stuff on the shelf at BB?
I would say I would only trust the ads at ML slightly more because I know the community. But only barely. What I do trust is the interaction between the vendors who participate in the threads themselves, that has nothing to do with the ads.
I totally trust the ads... to be ads. They are exactly what they come across as. I can vouch for them, as I physically place them there. None are malware, if that is what you are concerned about. ML ensures this my hosting plain images, not applications that look like images, and linking to sensible URLs.
I find the idea of trust very odd here. Best Buy, I mostly trust to have the real products on the shelves and not Chinese knock offs and stuff like that. Is that what people mean by trust?
Sure - I suppose, but I don't trust that guy working at Best Buy to know anything about the products they sell, or that that can help me make the best decision on what to buy for my use. Sadly - 99% do think they can trust that BB employee to tell them the best, the real best, thing for the person to buy.
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I would trust ML to not run ads for "Curtis IT Services" just because he paid a lot.
There are only two options then.
Option 1) ML knows something about technology and to some degree would not run ads that promote known-bad products.
Option 2) ML knows something about technology and shows ads for crap stuff on purpose for the money.
Either way, option 1 I can reasonably trust the ads here show decent tech products. Option 2 hurts ML's very reputation as a knowledgeable tech community.
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ML only runs ads for Vendors we KNOW. Which means tech people have tested out and trust. And not just my team but other IT people as well.
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@Minion-Queen said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
ML only runs ads for Vendors we KNOW. Which means tech people have tested out and trust. And not just my team but other IT people as well.
That's what I would think.
But that is not what is coming across in @scottalanmiller's argument.
They are just ads, nothing more. No recommendations. Buyer beware.
I would think they are ads from tech people you know and have been tested and you trust.
Which is EXACTLY what I have been saying, and is exactly what this thread is saying not to trust.
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POST 600!
(Sorry, couldn't resist!)
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@guyinpv said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
I would trust ML to not run ads for "Curtis IT Services" just because he paid a lot.
Okay, that's a point. But if McDonald's paid to run an add, I guarantee you'll see Egg McMuffins and Big Macs over on the side bar and no one is vetting to see if they are tasty, healthy or whatever.
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@BRRABill said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
POST 600!
(Sorry, couldn't resist!)
This thread is taking over!
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@BRRABill said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
They are just ads, nothing more. No recommendations. Buyer beware.
But truthfully, they are NOT recommendations from a consulting firm. They are recommendations from a marketing firm. I think you are reading into an add far too much.
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@BRRABill said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
I would think they are ads from tech people you know and have been tested and you trust.
Which tech people do you think that they are from?
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@BRRABill said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
Which is EXACTLY what I have been saying, and is exactly what this thread is saying not to trust.
No, you SHOULD trust them... to be marketing ads!
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@scottalanmiller said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@guyinpv said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
I would trust ML to not run ads for "Curtis IT Services" just because he paid a lot.
Okay, that's a point. But if McDonald's paid to run an add, I guarantee you'll see Egg McMuffins and Big Macs over on the side bar and no one is vetting to see if they are tasty, healthy or whatever.
If you were running a gourmet food advice forum, would you feel the same way?
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@scottalanmiller said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@BRRABill said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
I would think they are ads from tech people you know and have been tested and you trust.
Which tech people do you think that they are from?
"ML only runs ads for Vendors we KNOW. Which means tech people have tested out and trust. And not just my team but other IT people as well."
Would make me think ... ML!
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@BRRABill said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@scottalanmiller said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@guyinpv said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
I would trust ML to not run ads for "Curtis IT Services" just because he paid a lot.
Okay, that's a point. But if McDonald's paid to run an add, I guarantee you'll see Egg McMuffins and Big Macs over on the side bar and no one is vetting to see if they are tasty, healthy or whatever.
If you were running a gourmet food advice forum, would you feel the same way?
Would make you look pretty ridiculous if so.
Would be like a church running ads for prostitutes.
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@BRRABill said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@BRRABill said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@scottalanmiller said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@guyinpv said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
I would trust ML to not run ads for "Curtis IT Services" just because he paid a lot.
Okay, that's a point. But if McDonald's paid to run an add, I guarantee you'll see Egg McMuffins and Big Macs over on the side bar and no one is vetting to see if they are tasty, healthy or whatever.
If you were running a gourmet food advice forum, would you feel the same way?
Would make you look pretty ridiculous if so.
Would be like a church running ads for prostitutes.
But churches running ads at all would be ridiculous. A church isn't an advertising platform or marketing company (well okay, that might be an argument to make, but you know what I mean.) A gourmet food advice forum running McDonald's ads would not be weird in the slightest, not even remotely. It's a "magazine" and they run ads. If you think that the running of ads implies something similar to advice, that's a major point of confusion. There are two huge mistakes there: one is assuming a social contract that does not exist, at all. The second is assuming that the platform of discussion is the same as being an expert. That's not at all the case. GS/ML is not a tech company, it's a social media marketing company. Assuming that they are giving you IT advice is a very bad idea, that is not why they are here. They are a platform for us to give each other advice.
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@BRRABill said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@scottalanmiller said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@guyinpv said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
I would trust ML to not run ads for "Curtis IT Services" just because he paid a lot.
Okay, that's a point. But if McDonald's paid to run an add, I guarantee you'll see Egg McMuffins and Big Macs over on the side bar and no one is vetting to see if they are tasty, healthy or whatever.
If you were running a gourmet food advice forum, would you feel the same way?
Of course, anything else would be crazy.
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@scottalanmiller said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@BRRABill said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@scottalanmiller said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@guyinpv said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
I would trust ML to not run ads for "Curtis IT Services" just because he paid a lot.
Okay, that's a point. But if McDonald's paid to run an add, I guarantee you'll see Egg McMuffins and Big Macs over on the side bar and no one is vetting to see if they are tasty, healthy or whatever.
If you were running a gourmet food advice forum, would you feel the same way?
Of course, anything else would be crazy.
Remember, GS is a social media marketing company, so them running a gourmet food forum is very much possible. They DO run a travel forum.
I see this same kind of confusion on Spiceworks. Spiceworks is not an IT company, neither is GS. They are marketing companies. Assuming anything about them being IT experts because they host discussion platforms that IT people use is totally, and absolutely wrong. There is no connection there. That's like assuming that the people who grind up the gravel for roads are all race car drivers just because they make the rocks used in road material.
Does ML vet ads and vendors to make sure that they are actual, legit companies? Yes. Not everyone goes that far, I've seen places put up ads for con artists and scam services that were so obviously illegal that it was ridiculous. ML does offer a much higher level of advertising trust. But you are talking about trusting a marketer. So let me ask you to define this...
What does trusting a marketer mean to you?
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@BRRABill said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@guyinpv said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@scottalanmiller said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
Just don't do the reselling portion Like you said, it's trivial money, no skin off your back. So just skip it, problem solved.
Well yes, trivial. Like maybe the tune of $400 in the last few years? Thus I've only thought of it as bonus money, pocket money, lunch money, coffee money. Not something that changes my entire business model, focus, and how I go about working for people.
Honestly, for that, I wouldn't bother to be thrown into this pit.
Not that $400 is nothing, but to open this kind of can of worms...
That's what we keep saying.... if the money is big enough to be worth it it causes one problem. If it is not, why bother?
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@guyinpv said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@scottalanmiller said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
The facts are that adding in a payment for being a seller's agent makes an inappropriate conflict of interest that must be disclosed.
I think of it more like a tip or bonus.
A barista who puts out a tip jar doesn't become a slave of the coffee shop just because sometimes during their work, some change is dropped in.That's a tip, it is aligned to the goals. The tip comes from the customer, not the coffee shop. Where did slave come from? No one said slave, we said influenced.
And if you think that tips don't influence behaviour, you are disagreeing with the entire system because they exist for one purpose - to influence behaviour going totally against everything you just suggested. I mean, that's an absolutely perfect example of how the tips are all-influencing. So much so, that the tips can outweight the employer! The only recourse that an employer has against good tips making a service person do something unwanted by the employer (customer) is to fire them to break off the source of the tips! That's how dramatic that problem becomes.
So tips are a great example of exactly our concern.
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@guyinpv said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
It's obvious people already in IT have all these strong thoughts on the subject,
This has absolutely nothing to do with IT, though. It's about basic business understanding. If a business owner doesn't know this already - that's a business heading for failure. This is super, ultra basic common business sense. You HAVE to know how your partners are aligned and who works for you and who works against you.
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@scottalanmiller said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
@guyinpv said in Home business ideas for transition out of 9-5?:
It's obvious people already in IT have all these strong thoughts on the subject,
This has absolutely nothing to do with IT, though. It's about basic business understanding. If a business owner doesn't know this already - that's a business heading for failure. This is super, ultra basic common business sense. You HAVE to know how your partners are aligned and who works for you and who works against you.
Well it comes back to trust I suppose.
If I hire a "consultant" to come figure out my home security, part of me already understands they will likely have only a few common vendors, and maybe they get commissions and maybe not. It isn't so much the commission I care about, it's whether they are actually doing what's right for me at the end of the day.I also "trust" that if they have some favorite vendors, it's because THEY are the experts, and thus THOSE vendors are particularly good ones, and the company is particular trained on using them.
Any decent company would do right by the customer. If they are this utterly persuaded to jack up their customers for some commissions, I agree the business won't last long. Or they will develop a bad reputation, or whatever else.
So it comes back to "trust" regarding the ML ads angle as well. You say the ads are not "advice" but that's not what I was saying anyway. I was saying I trust that the vendors within the ads are vetted enough to where I can believe they are at least good companies and have quality products. Not that ML is "recommending" or "advising" on their use. But simply that they are good, or approved of, if you will.
