| LED Digest 2021: Thieves, Religion and Business |
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================================================== The LED Digest Moderated Discussion List "Effective Online Advertising, Since 1997" pair Networks: The LED's Web Host Hosting and Domain Reg. from a Trusted Leader pair.com for Hosting | pairNIC.com for Domains ================================================== List Moderator: Published by: Adam Audette LED Digest post, led-digest.com http://www.led-digest.com .............................................. September 7, 2005 Issue #2021 .............................................. .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ==== CONTINUING ================= --== Religion and Business ==-- ~ Martha Retallick "[a] company's website is no place to express [their] religious beliefs." ~ Kathy Wilson Anderson "Actually, this is an excellent method of target marketing." ~ Rich Dudley "It's their site, and should be a reflection of them." --== Dealing with Image Theft ==-- ~ Maty Matyszak "Image thieves can be an opportunity." ~ Sarah Hayes "We had a company steal a complete page design..." ~ Tom Aman "...change the image names or move them to a new subdirectory." ==== BILLBOARD =================== --== URL Redirects and Google ==-- ~ Ian Smith ===== CONTINUING ================================= From: Martha Retallick Subject: Religious biz > Have any of you dealt with clients who've insisted > on promoting their religious beliefs on their company > web site? How did you handle it? - Beth Earle, LED 2017 I would tell the client, in no uncertain terms, that his company's website is no place to express his religious beliefs. Reason: Because it will turn off as many people as it will attract. In addition, public expression of religious beliefs creates an expectation that can backfire. For example, I can recall having a conversation with a former next door neighbor about a nearby auto repair shop. Apparently, my former neighbor had taken a vehicle there for servicing, and, to make a long story short, this shop charged a lot of money for a lousy job. That angered my former neighbor. What frosted him even more was that the shop owner took great pains to tell one and all that he was a Christian. To my neighbor, the shop owner did not live up to what he thought a Christian should be Being a pretty vocal guy, my neighbor didn't hesitate to tell one and all about the experience he'd had at this auto repair shop. Martha Retallick Western Sky Communications Web & Graphic Design http://www.westernskycommunications.com -------- new post - same topic --------- From: Kathy Wilson Subject: Religious biz Isn't this still a country of free speech? If a client wants to promote their religious beliefs on their website that's their option. After all, it's their website. What difference does it make if they're promoting their religious beliefs by talking about it to everyone, having those little fish symbols on all their promotional and advertising materials, or putting it on their website? Actually, this is an excellent method of target marketing. I also do life coaching, and there is quite a segment of coaches who specialize as Christian life coaches. I specialize in Spiritual coaching and promote my beliefs on my website and also in my ezine. This has garnered me several clients who were looking for a coach with beliefs that are similar to theirs. Love, Kathy Wilson Anderson http://www.under-one-roof.net -------- new post - same topic --------- From: Richard Dudley Subject: Religious biz Yes, and I just went with it. It's their site, and should be a reflection of them. If the client considers their beliefs to be that important to them, then that's their choice. I drive by several thriving brick and mortar businesses on my way to work each day, with small signs proclaiming the glory of God, and one that uses its changeable letter sign for short missives (quite a few of which are funny or make you think, so mission accomplished there I guess). I did express my concerns about customers being turned off (I would shy away myself). Their experience has been different -- people who share the faith (and many, many do) prefer to do business with others who also share their faith. Some people also consider a small businessperson of faith to be less likely to rip them off. In the end, it's a free market, and there will always be competition. Expressions of faith are only one way to differentiate yourself from the competitions. Personally, I fret more about a decent design and technical operation than Jesus. Rich Dudley www.rjdudley.com -------- new post - new topic --------- From: Maty Matyszak Subject: Image Stealing > ... some images are being used (ie referenced direct so > they are using our image on our hosting - not copied to > their own server) by other sites... Is there an easy way > to stop this? - Emma Mackintosh, LED 2018 Image thieves can be an opportunity. When we find an example, we change the stolen image for a (large) advertisement for our site which we have prepared for just this eventuality. An image thief is actually offering you free advertising space on his website and giving you control of the content to be displayed. All for the cost of a bit of bandwidth. Now if someone could come up with a way to make those images clickable so that the visitor can be passed back to our web pages ...! For a current example, look at http://www.freewebs.com/socialhunny/puzzlesandgames.htm which is still running our 'advertisement' as I write... Maty Matyszak Biscuit Software Services Ltd. -------- new post - same topic --------- From: Sarah Hayes Subject: Image stealing We had a company steal a complete page design for an online shop selling the same products, they were using the images and stylesheet from our. Their contact info was non existent although we did manage to find out where they were but they didn't look like the kind of company that would take any notice of letters or emails. So, we renamed the images on our site and replaced the images that their site was using with some great, not to be missed, low special offer prices. It took them a week or so but they soon got the message and changed their site! Best regards, Sarah Hayes ------- new post - same topic ------- From: Tom Aman Subject: Image stealing The very FIRST thing I would be inclined to do (assuming we are talking about a relatively small number of your links to the images) would be to immediately change the image names or move them to a new subdirectory. I realize this would involve a bit of work since you would have to correct your own Web pages, but that would at least instantly remove them from use by anyone else. If there are not a lot of Web page links involved on your site, I would recommend the subdirectory approach since you could then easily move the images to new subdirectories on a routine basis until you resolve the issue with the pirates (for that is what they are). This would cause them a lot of broken links with relatively little effort on your part and it may be all that is needed to discourage them from continuing. Depending on your server situation, it might also be possible to configure the Web server to only allow access to the image files when the refering URL requesting the image is a page on your own site - this would effectively lock out any foreign sites. Then I would do a bit of investigation, locate the pirates, and tell them to cease and desist or you will expect them to start paying you for server bandwidth. In the case of the eBay auction site, I would also notify eBay as eBay may take action for you. If the images belong to you (the images are not public domain stuff and you hold copyright priveleges in some form) you can also talk about copyright infringement and possible legal action. Tom Aman Aman Software http://www.cyberspyder.com ==== BILLBOARD =================================== From: Ian Smith Subject: How Do URL Redirects Impact Google Page Rank? Hi, I was wondering if any of you knew any research that had been done on this: How do URL redirects, such as those from http://xents.com, impact Google page ranks? Can I use them for tracking purposes and still receive a good page rank? There are other service too (such as http://tinyurl.com) but I was more interested in the tracking aspect of redirects. Any ideas? Thanks! Ian Smith ------------------------------------------------------- The LED Digest is sponsored by pair Networks: pair.com for Hosting | pairNIC.com for Domains Copyright 1995-2005 Orange Wheel, LLC. All Rights Reserved. ----------------------------------------------------------------- "Anyone can become angry - that is easy. But to be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way; this is not easy." - Aristotle |
